Disclaimer: Jade owner of nothing Kingdom Hearts or Final Fantasy related.

Glitter

Hayner was nine when his older brother Zell was fifteen. The eldest Dincht boy found it was his job to inform his younger brother just enough to make him think he knew everything. Simultaneously leaving out just enough to make him sound incredibly stupid.

One day after school, Zell was working on a poster while Hayner was trying not to snap his new recorder in half out of frustration with the stupid thing. Zell made a noise of protest when he siphoned off the excess glitter he was using and came away with the stuff stuck all over his hands.

"Frickin' craft store herpes," he mumbled under his breath. He tried to brush the silver sparkles off his hands, but was still left with a considerable amount stuck to his skin.

"What's that?" Zell turned to find Hayner looking at him questioningly. The smaller blonde boy had apparently given up on the instrument he was supposed to be practicing on.

Zell raised an eyebrow at his little brother. "Glitter," he answered flatly. "Duh."

Hayner frowned. "No, I mean herkes. What is it?"

Zell looked confused for a moment, then rolled his eyes, realizing what his brother had meant. "You mean herpes," he corrected. "Glitter is the herpes of craft store products."

"Yeah," Hayner said slowly. "But what does that mean?"

Zell sighed, sounding put-upon. "It's a disease, and you get it from other people, like when someone gives you a cold. Get it?"

Hayner thought, then shook his head. "Why is glitter a sick?"

Zell rolled his eyes again. "Look, glitter gets everywhere, right? So if somebody's got glitter on them, and they get it on you, it's like they gave you herpes or something. That's why it's craft store herpes." The older blonde then turned away from his brother. "Now shut up and do your homework."

Two days later, Hayner's class had just finished a big test. Their teacher decided to use class time to grade papers, having her students do an art project while she worked. Part of the test had been on national monuments, so the assignment was to make a picture of one using as many materials as possible. Each table was given a tray of supplies with markers, crayons, glue, tissue paper, glitter, feathers, and stickers. Ms. Tilmitt may have over estimated her students' ability to keep clean, but she was young, so we'll forgive her that.

Hayner boldly chose to do the Lincoln Memorial, mostly because it was on a penny. Across from him, Seifer, his best friend and rival, was making a picture of the Washington Monument. Though he'd never admit it, Seifer was actually a pretty decent artist, and while Hayner was tearing up strips of tissue paper to make columns, Seifer was adding details to the water in front of the tall white monument. He grabbed the glitter to add sparkles to the water, like he'd seen in a picture once.

When Seifer looked up for a moment, he noticed feather fluff stuck to the bridge of Hayner's nose. He instinctively reached out to brush the offending feather off Hayner's face. The smaller blonde looked up in surprise and scrunched his nose. The movement made Seifer notice that some of the glitter that had been on his hand was now residing on Hayner's face.

"What'd you do that for?" Hayner asked.

"There was something on your nose," Seifer answered. "And…I kinda got glitter on your face by accident." He laughed a little. "You're gonna be all sparkly, lamer."

Hayner glared harshly at him. "I can't believe you!" It would have been a shout if they'd been outside, but this was in class, so Hayner used a borderline inside voice. Regardless, Seifer was taken aback by how angry his friend sounded.

"What's your issue?" Seifer asked, confused. He went back to working on his picture, ignoring Hayner.

The other boy continued to scowl at the slightly older blonde. Without warning, he took the jar of beads from the set of supplies and dumped it unceremoniously over Seifer's paper. Seifer quickly scooted his chair back when a rain of colored beads fell across his lap.

"What's was that for, Chicken-wuss?!" Seifer stood from his chair as Hayner did the same. Both looked ready to fight. Around them, the students hushed to watch, and Ms. Tilmitt looked up in surprise at the quiet.

"You got me sick, butthead!" Ms. Tilmitt rolled her eyes and stood as Hayner shouted at Seifer. Not again.

"What?!" Without any warning, Seifer launched himself at the smaller blonde, and in no time, the were rolling around on the floor, fighting tooth and nail. Ms. Tilmitt sped up until she practically sprinted across the classroom, shouting at the boys to stop and act like normal people instead of wild animals.

She managed to pull them away from each other, the rest of her students were cheering the two boys on until the end of the fight. By the time Ms. Tilmitt had them separated into two boys rather than a mass of tangled limbs, both were sporting a few injuries. Seifer had a rapidly growing bruise on his jaw and was favoring his left side a bit. Hayner was holding his arm gingerly and had a split lip with a bit of sparkle showing through the trickle of blood that was now stopping.

Ms. Tilmitt narrowed her eyes at the boys, crossing her arms. "Now, would you like to explain why you two were fighting again?" she asked in a stern tone. They both knew from her voice that there would be calls home. "Well? What happened?!"

Hayner pointed an accusing finger at Seifer with his good arm. "He gave me herpes!" he shouted.

Ms. Tilmitt's eyes widened, and her hand came up to cover her mouth, hiding a smile and a laugh.

Zell was rocking out to his iPod as he walked in the front door, slamming it behind him. He was shocked into silence and stillness when his earbuds were ripped unceremoniously away. Before he could register that it had been his mom doing such an ungodly act, he was whacked soundly upside the back of his head.

"What was that for?!" he shrieked, outraged. He rubbed at the back of his skull in pain. Zell glared until he saw it was his mother who had done the whacking. The middle-aged blonde woman scowled disapprovingly at her son.

"Apparently, your brother has an STD." Zell looked shocked. "What exactly did you tell him was the meaning of herpes?" Zell flinched. Oh, this was not going to be pretty.

A/N: Okay, this sprouted from PB's statement that glitter is the herpes of craft supplies. I blame her exclusively. Hopefully I didn't offend anyone. If I did, let me know, and I'll take it down.