They shinned. Not literally, but to me they did. There were five of them, and they kept mostly to themselves. But I watched them, like I watched everything else. It was what I was best at, at least in that moment of my life. They were two years older than me; I was a sophomore, and they were seniors. If one looked closely enough, you could tell that they had traveled to all nine levels of hell and lived to joke about it. Yet they still shinned as pure and bright as a newborn babe. I don't think that they even realized how much they shinned. But I did. I saw through that face that they put up at school, and in public; the same one that I out up. I saw the light they gave off. I don't know if anyone else saw it, cause if they did they didn't say anything, like I didn't. I was too scared at the time, to scared of everything. And angry. Scared and angry. Wasn't sure what I was angry about though, not then. It wasn't until near the end of the school year that I realized why I was so angry. But that's for later, you probably want to know who these people are that I hold in such high regard.

The first one, I guess that you could call him the 'leader', though they were all completely independent, was named Heero Yuy. He was tall, with dark skin, dark brown hair, and dark brown eyes. I dubbed him 'the dark one' when I first met him, and not because of what I just described. He had a darkness about him, you saw it in the way he moved, the look in his eyes. He had seen and done horrors that I couldn't even dream about, and I hadn't had all that sheltered of a life myself. But even with all that darkness about him, there was a feeling of trust. If he was there you knew that everything was going to be all right, and it came naturally to him.

The second one was Duo Maxwell. He was the complete opposite of Heero. His skin was lighter, his hair was what my mother used to call 'playful brown', never mind the fact that it was several feet long and held in a braid. One of my friends, who is a brilliant artist, once tried to draw him with short hair, and it just didn't look right. And we could never tell what color his eyes were. Sometimes I would look at them and they would be a dark blue. Someone else would look at them at the same time and they would be violet. I thought it was awesome, not like my normal blue eyes. I nicknamed him 'laughter' because no matter what situation he or anyone else was in, he always had a smile on his face, and he could make anyone laugh no matter what kind of mood they were in.

The next two I have to talk about together, because, well, they always were. And they fit so well with each other. No one ever questioned their friendship, but there was much heated debate around the school as to how far that friendship extended. They were Trowa Barton and Quatre Winner. Trowa was very tall, with blonde/brown hair that naturally fell over one of his amazing emerald green eyes. He was very silent most of the time, but it was a comfortable silence. He had this quiet, patient way of helping you without making it seem like it was a burden to him. Quatre was almost, but not quite the complete opposite of him. He had very light blonde hair, the kind that most girls would kill for, and beautiful crystal blue-green eyes. His personality was more like Duo's, but a little quieter. He was gentle, with kind smiles and sympathetic looks that told you he knew exactly what you were going through. They were Silence and Light respectively.

The last one of their group was Wufei Chang. When I first met him, I had absolutely no idea what to make of him. He was more like Heero in that he had darkness, but at the same time similar to Quatre with how gentle he could be. He was full blooded Chinese, and had those beautiful Asian features that everyone falls in love with. He was very smart, but not stuck up about it. And he knew how to teach or explain things to you in such a way that not only did you understand it, but you didn't mind having a tutor. He was 'Scholar'.

So now you know who it is that I'm talking about. Still wondering why? Well, it's finally my senior year, and I was chosen as the student speaker for my class. I wasn't in government, or valedictorian or anything, but the Principle had decided that they wanted a regular student, someone who hadn't necessarily excelled in academics, to say a few words and my classmates chose me. Right now I'm sitting on the stage and waiting for my turn to speak, holding tightly to my speech and thinking about those boys who shinned in my eyes when I was a sophomore.

888

Early September

888

I had always been a little short for my age; not so short that I got nicknamed 'shrimp', but short enough to get passed over by most people. It hadn't really bothered me before, but being in high school changed all that. Everyone was so damn tall here, and the jocks were all built like tanks, even some of the girl jocks. It was disconcerting, and made me more than a little self-conscious. Not only that, but I wasn't particularly good looking. My friends told me that I was pretty enough, and that I was no where near hideous looking, but there was nothing about my looks that stood out. I had light brown hair, blue eyes, and light skin that burned really easy.

The first day that I met them was the first day of school. There was minor chaos around the campus as we all tried to make our way to the classrooms that had our schedules, the new freshmen having the most difficult time with this, and trying to find friends that we hadn't seen much of over the summer. I myself had gotten stuck behind a group of football players, who were walking slower than I thought possible of any human, and trying to find a way around them without bringing attention to myself. I had done enough of that last year, and they had done everything that they could think of to make my life a living hell. All they could think of though was shoving me in the halls and spreading rumors about me. As if I cared about the rumors, it actually gave me a chance to see early on as to who would make a good friend and who was going to follow the popular people. And the shoving didn't bother me; I lived in a pretty rough part of town so I was used to getting pushed around. Of course I made sure that none of them heard about that, cause then they might have put some effort into torturing me, and I did not really care for that.

Finally I saw an opening, and I began to squeeze through. Unfortunately, one of them chose that moment to push one of his friends, which in turn caused me to be squished up against a locker. Dammit, there goes my anonymity. As one they seemed to turn a predatory gaze on me, and I steeled myself, praying that I could keep them from seeing that they got to me.

"Well, lookee here, it's our little squishing bag, all ready for a new year of being squished." His friends laughed, and I mentally rolled my eyes.

"Looks like the studies are true." I said as I stood before them.

"What studies pipsqueak?"

"That some people, especially jocks(1), get dumber over the summer." They all looked at me with murder in their eyes, and I started to mentally kick myself for saying something like that, as I was now sure I had signed my death warrant. One of them pulled back his fist, and I scrunched my eyes tight while I waited for the first of what was to be many blows.

It never came. Long seconds passed, and I dared to peak open one eyelid, only to open the other one wider than I thought possible and stare in shock at one of the most gorgeous guys that I had ever seen holding back the fist of Daniel Jacobson, Captain of the football team and the one who had been about to hit me.

"It is not honorable to pick on someone who is weaker unless they have a fair chance of defending themselves." Wufei Chang said, though at this moment I didn't know who he was.

"And what would you know about it Chink?(2)" Daniel sneered as he wrenched his hand out of Wufei's grasp. Wufei stood his ground in front of me, and I had taken enough self-defense classes to recognize a master when I saw them, and I almost prayed for Daniel. Almost.

"I know that she is more likely to become famous by using her brains then you are to become famous through sports." He said easily. Each of the football players bristled, and it was taking all of my control not to start giggling. Daniel looked like he was ready to throw a punch at Wufei, but one of his buddies held him back.

"You can get him later Daniel, one of the Narks are coming." The Narks were the slang term that us students used for the schools security monitors. Most of them were pretty nice, but we all knew better than to be caught breaking the rules while they were there. Daniel clenched his fist but only glared at Wufei.

"Watch your step Chink, you won't always be so lucky. You too squishing bag." Him and his buddies stalked off, pushing their way through the crowd, and I breathed a sigh of relief. Wufei then turned to me.

"Are you all right?" He asked. I nodded and gave a small smile.

"Yeah, thanks."

"You shouldn't let them push you around like that, it isn't very healthy."

"Normally no, but they don't ever actually hurt me. And I learned last year plenty of ways to stay out of their way."

"Still, you shouldn't just back down."

"What would I gain by fighting them? Besides, I go through worse walking home from school." It was at this point that I met Duo, as he was pushing his way through the crowd towards us.

"Hey Wufei, there you are. Where'd you disappear to?" He asked as he literally bounced where he stood.

"Just helping someone. As if it's any of your concern."

"Yeah, well, Heero wanted me to find you; we've still got some paperwork to fill out." It was then he spotted me, and his eyes lit up the way my friend Jens did every time she was about to tease someone for something. "Ohhhh, I see what you were doing. Already working over the ladies, aren't ya? You sure picked a pretty one." I blushed profusely, and Wufei spluttered while Duo ran off laughing.

"Maxwell!" Wufei yelled and followed after him. I leaned back against the locker and heaved a long sigh. I could already tell that this year was going to be interesting where they were concerned, and I hadn't even met the other three yet.

8

I met Trowa and Quatre in band class, and boy, I have never heard anyone play like the two of them. They played a duet for the teacher as their audition piece and so that he would know what chair to place them in, and there was complete and astonished silence while everyone listened, and then a huge round of applause when they finished. Quatre blushed most adorably at the praise, and Trowa…well, we never could tell what he was feeling. I play the clarinet myself, 2nd chair, First Clarinet (3), and have done so since 5th grade. Not the chair that I sit in, but playing Clarinet. It's probably the only thing that keeps me sane at times, though you might think otherwise if you've never been in band and have only looked from the outside. We can get pretty weird. Fun, but weird.

Ms. Jacobs put them at the head of their sections, with a look on her face that said there had better be no protests. She didn't need to worry, the students who had previously held those positions gladly relinquished them after that performance, and I was close enough to the Flutes that I could hear Rachel, First chair for the flute section from last year, start pestering Trowa about the techniques that he used for practice. I had a feeling that Jesse, last years First Violin, was doing the same to Quatre.

Ms. Jacobs called for quiet and started our rehearsal and I swear, everyone sat up just a little straighter and tried just a little harder. I even caught myself doing it. There was just this feeling with Trowa and Quatre there that we were in the presence of greatness, and something about that made us want to do better.

8

Heero turned out to be in my ceramics class. He was seated at the same table as me, along with two girls from the junior class that I recognized from somewhere but couldn't place, who couldn't stop giggling, whispering, and sneaking glances at him. I started to admire him right there, cause even though there is no way he couldn't have noticed them he acted like they didn't exist at all; where as I was ready to throttle the both of them and the comments weren't even directed at me.

That first day of class we didn't use any clay, the teacher just handed us some art worksheets and class papers, and showed us different pieces of art on the overhead projector. I only briefly paid attention, as I had seen the pictures last year when there was a mix up with my schedule, and began to rifle through the class papers, finally coming upon the list of our assignments for the semester and when each was due. I skimmed over them quickly, and hoped that I wouldn't have too much trouble with them. I love crafts, and am pretty decent at them, but the closest that I had come to using clay was Playdough.

Mr. Clark finished the slide show and handed out pieces of paper, telling us to sketch out our first assignment, which was to be a sort of self-portrait plaque. Sort of in the way that we were to use words, pictures, symbols, or drawings of some kind to describe us instead of a picture. I tapped my pencil to my bottom lip out of habit as I thought of things to describe myself with. I put down my name, Kristen, in fancy lettering, a shooting star, and I wanted to put in a clarinet, but I can't sketch worth a damn so I knew that I would never be able to make one out of clay. The next choice would be to put Music notes, and then I decided to put a few bars from one of my favorite TV show theme songs. I'd have to search for that one though, so I just put a note on my paper to remind myself about it.

I looked up in surprise when my paper was snatched from me, and then wished that I could die right there when I saw that it was one of the two Juniors who had snatched it, and was now giggling with her friend over what I had put down. My ears burned hot with embarrassment.

"Maybe you should just squish your clay tomorrow, you know, cause you're the squishing bag." She said. Ohhh, now I remember them. They're on the cheerleading team, and help out the Jocks in torturing me. Her friend giggled with her.

"Yeah, like, she could like, squish it like she gets squished!" Her friend said, and then the two of them burst into fresh giggles. I had to fight to keep the tears from spilling over. I know that those words don't seem all that hateful, but that attitude was getting hard to ignore after a year of dealing with it. Heero then reached over, snatched my paper from their hands, and quickly looked over it. I thought that I was done for and began to plan my suicide. Instead of agreeing with them and picking up the torture, he glared at the girls.

"At least she put some thought into hers." He said. I stared at him wide-eyed while the Juniors huffed.

"What are you talking about? I put plenty of thought into mine." The first girl said.

"Then why have six other girls put the same symbols on their papers?" This stopped the cheerleaders cold, and I abandoned my thoughts of suicide. They then turned up their noses and asked Mr. Clark for different seats. Heero handed my paper back to me and returned to working on his own. I just sort of blinked for a few seconds before smoothing out my paper and returning to my own work.

8

5th period found me in Journalism class, which I was taking instead of English. It was a mixture of all the grades, and I found that Duo was in the class. He plopped himself down at my table, which I was sharing with my best friend Kari.

"So I have this class with the cutie from this morning; I don't think that we had a chance to properly meet. I'm Duo Maxwell, I may run and hide, but I never tell a lie." I stared at him blankly (I did that a lot with these guys) a little taken aback by his comment. Kari kicked me under the table to bring me back to reality.

"I'm Kari Stripend." She said. "This space case here is Kristen Dasher."

"Well, it's nice to meetcha. Did you two take this class last year?" He asked. Kari and I shared a proud smile.

"We started the class actually. It used to be a club, this is the first year that it's a class." I said. Duo smiled even wider.

"Well, then I have you to thank for giving me an option other than a regular English class, I was getting sick of them." Kari and I giggled at the face that he made. "You two must like writing a lot if you made this a class."

"We're going to be famous writers someday and need all the practice we can get." Kari said.

"Then I must be lucky to know you before all that. Can I have your autographs now so I don't have to wait in line at your book signing?" Kari and I giggled at the absurdity of the request, but we signed our names on a piece of paper and handed it to him. He folded it neatly and tucked it into his pocket, giving us a wink that made us giggle even more.

When we looked around the classroom to see who else was there we both stared at the girl, a senior, who was arguing quietly with the teacher. I nudged Kari.

"Didn't we kick her out of the club last year?" I asked. Kari nodded.

"We did. I wonder how she got in the class."

"Why did you kick her out?" Duo asked.

"The number one rule here is that all articles, even editorials, must be based on fact." I said. "Hers were anything but, so we took a vote and kicked her out." That was a very short version of what had actually happened, but it didn't seem appropriate to go into it at the moment. Justin, one of our members from last year, plopped down in the last empty chair at our table.

"Her father called the school and got her in the class, and she's trying to say that she got the class started." He said, then held out his hand to Duo. "Justin Kissinger."

"Duo Maxwell." Kari and I snorted.

"If she started the class then how come it's our names on all the paperwork that it took to get this class started?" Kari asked as we watched her take a seat in the front. Those already at the table (members from last year) got up and moved elsewhere, and the four of us laughed quietly as she tried to pretend that she hadn't noticed.

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1. There are studies that show that students do tend to forget what they learned over the summer, though I doubt that the jock part about the study is true, and I have nothing against jocks personally, but in this story they're not the best of people and I needed something that would make them mad that sounded semi-smart.

2. Derogatory term for Asian born people. I have nothing against them, but my Daniel character is racist so he would say things like that. I hate writing them though.

3. If you don't know about stuff like this, ask me and I'll explain, or find someone you know who is in band and ask them to explain.

So, how did you like? Please let me know!