Characters: Kairi Sanjo, Rikka Hiiragi, Hikaru Ichinomiya & Yaya Yuiki

Café Buono!: Last Forever

It was one of the last guardian meetings of the year. Kairi, Rikka, and Hikaru were in the royal garden, doing paperwork. Yaya had ballet practice, and couldn't make it to the meeting.

On the other side of the royal garden, Musashi and Hotaru were having a quiet conversation among the plants. With them was a guardian character that belonged to Hikaru. He was silently playing around in the plants with a smile on his face, occasionally adding his own comment into Musashi and Hotaru's conversation. This guardian character had yellow eyes, and a ring of tiny white stars in his grey hair. He wore a white button-up long-sleeved shirt paired with a light yellow tie with little white stars on it and a pair of grey dress pants.

The royal garden was absolutely silent, both Kairi and Hikaru were calmly doing their work. Rikka, however, was sweating, her eye was twitching, and her left leg was bopping up and down beneath the table, agitated with the silence. Finally, she threw up the pencil and her papers and shouted, "I can't take this anymore! It's too quiet! C'mon Hikaru-kun, Kairi-senpai, say something, please!" When Kairi and Hikaru both ignored her and continued working, Rikka groaned and slammed her head down on the table, muttering, "It's going to be even quieter when Yaya-senpai actually leaves."

"Now there's a negative thought," Hikaru commented sarcastically, not looking up from doing his work, his expression blank.

"It's probably best if we don't think about things like that," Kairi said, pushing his glasses further up the bridge of his nose, also not looking up from diligently doing his work, though his eyes briefly flickered over to Yaya's empty chair.

Rikka stood up and pointed at Kairi in success and said, "Ha! So, you were thinking of Yaya-senpai leaving!" She then nearly jumped up onto the table as she got up in the Jack chair's face and asked eagerly, "What's going on? Are you going to miss her? Do you two have a mood going on?"

Kairi was unfazed, though Rikka prevented him from doing his work with her interrgoation, and replied matter-of-factly, "I think we'll all miss her."

Before Rikka could question him about his feelings, Hikaru added, still doing his work, "Yeah, I'm sure you're sad that she'll be leaving, too."

Rikka sat back down in her chair, and Kairi immediately began doing his work once more. The new queen's chair sighed and replied in a glum tone, "Well, yeah, because it's going to be even quieter without her here! If everyday's going to be this quiet when she's not here, it's going to drive me insane!"

"There's always Ami-chan," Hikaru stated, placing his finished paperwork into the pile, and grabbing Rikka's unfinished paperwork without another word as he did so.

Rikka glared at Hikaru, and exclaimed, "Just because she's Amu's sister doesn't mean that she'll be automatically getting a guardian character!"

"Seems that you don't have any other reason for missing her other than the fact that she's the only source of noise during meetings other than yourself," Kairi remarked, placing the last of his paperwork into the pile of finished paperwork. He then took the rather tall pile in its entirety and began organizing it.

If Hikaru were used to having emotions more often, the kid would have rolled his eyes as he said to Kairi, "Well, seems to me that you'll miss her most. Don't you wish that moments with her would never end?"

Kairi, working to keep his serious front up, hid a growing blush behind the stack of papers as he replied, "Yes, I do."

Rikka thought for a moment before saying, "Hey, isn't graduation on Friday? Oh no, I only have two days before things become as quiet as the ice age!"

Kairi sighed, and looked over his stack of papers as he said to Rikka, "Graduation is more than that. Yes, it's the last time you'll see upperclassmen like Ace. But it's also a ceremony celebrating people who have finished their course in schooling, and welcoming them to a new chapter of their lives."

Rikka sighed and waved Kairi off as she said, "Whatever." She then slouched back in her chair as she said in a melancholy tone, "I wonder how Yaya-senpai felt when all of her friends were leaving..."

Almost a year prior, Yaya was walking down the hallways of Seiyo Academy, a box of decorations in her arms. It was the day of Amu, Tadase, Rima, and Nagihiko's graduation, and the pig-tailed girl was in charge of setting up, being the next most senior member. She'd left Rikka and Hikaru in the auditorium with the guardian characters and the four graduating guardians.

As the ace chair passed by a window, she saw a blue bike leaning against the brick wall outside, "Hi bike-tan! Here again like always!" Yaya passed another window and spotted a familiar hill, "Hi hill-tan! It's nice to see hill-tan again, like always!"

Her mood was dulled however, as she remembered just why she was walking down the halls, "But, Nagi, Amu-chii, Rima-tan, and Tadase won't be here again like always…" She sighed and then wailed, "Why does there have to be a graduation? Just one day passes, and then 'BAM!' it's goodbye to everyone and everything's different..." She bit her lip as tears came to her eyes, "Why can't things just last forever?"

Bringing up one of her arms from the box to wipe her eyes off on her sleeve, Yaya rounded the corner only to shout in surprise when someone bumped into her. Yaya was sent sprawling onto the floor, the box falling down to the side, but thankfully not breaking open. "Ah! That hurt!" Yaya exclaimed as tears began to leak out of her eyes.

She vaguely heard a soft voice frantically say, "Oh, sorry, sorry, sorry! I'm so sorry for crashing into you, Yuiki-san!" But, the ace chair paid it no mind as she asked in a loud tone, no longer crying, "Oi! What's the big idea!" Angrily pouting she opened her eyes and spotted familiar blue hair and glasses, "Oh, it's Amu-chi's friend, Wakana-tan!"

Wakana chuckled sheepishly as she said, "It's nice to see you, but I'm so sorry for crashing into you! I was just trying to find Manami-chan..."

Yaya then stood up as she asked, her sad mood forgotten in the conversation, "Oh! Are Manami-tan and Wakana-tan going to help everyone set up? You guys don't have to, you know, you're the ones graduating!"

Wakana replied gently, "Ah, well, we have to be here early for a rehearsal anyway, so we'd thought we'd just help set up. But, Manami-chan went to the restroom and I can't find her anymore..."

Yaya scratched her head, thinking of where Manami could possibly be, before suggesting, "Ah, well maybe she's already back at the auditorium!" She walked over to her large box of decorations before saying, "Let's go, check, okay? Yaya has to get this box over there, quick!"

Wakana shook her head and said, "Ah, I was just there..." Upon seeing Yaya uncharacteristically frown, however, she asked in worry, "Ah, Yuiki-san are you alright?"

Yaya then sighed before exclaiming in frustration, "Yaya hates spring, especially how it just makes you cry!"

Wakana tilted her head in confusion before asking, "Why's that?" Understanding dawned on her, however, as she added, "Oh, is it because of the graduation?"

Yaya nodded, calmed down as she said sadly, "Yaya won't see her friends around school anymore!"

Wakana awkwardly pulled at the cuffs of her sleeves, thinking of what to say, before spotting the doors of the auditorium at the end of the hall, and turning back to Yaya to say, "Ah, but that's not true!" Yaya raised an eyebrow in confusion, about to refute that before Wakana added, "See those doors? I may be leaving onto new things as soon as I pass through, and though everyone will be pushing me forward, that doesn't mean I can't ever return to visit."

Yaya shook her head, exclaiming, "Eh? But things will still be different!"

"Well, that may be true," Wakana replied, "But, that doesn't mean that the memories you have of the good times won't remain sparkling in your heart." Yaya was listening intently to Wakana as the blue-haired girl added, "Besides, aren't the seasons always changing? Life's always changing, and the next season will always come in with new things, but that just means that there's more to look forward to!"

"Hmm..." Yaya mulled that over before asking, "Is Wakana sure?"

Wakana nodded, confident, "Of course! Besides, I'm sure that your friends are just as nervous, they'll definitely come back to visit you!"

Yaya's expression lifted, a smile growing on her face before she said excitedly, "Yeah! Wakana-tan's right!" She took a quiet, deep breath, before saying, with a resolve, "Things will change tomorrow, but that just means that Yaya has to cherish the moment!" She pumped up a fist, the large box falling out of her hands onto the ground as she said, "That means Yaya has to get back to the auditorium ASAP! It's the last chance for Yaya to talk to her friends while they're still sixth-graders!"

Yaya reached down to pick up the large box as Wakana said, "I'm glad you're cheered up, let's head on over to the auditorium!"

Yaya nodded, "Alright!" She made her way down the hallway, she wanted the moment to be memory that would last forever, so that she'll have them when things turn bad.

She didn't ever want to forget these feelings.