Gem: The ninja roll moment actually happened once. It was either leap the table or get hit right in the lower region. The guy completely cleared the table and then did a ninja roll out of it. There is also a scene from my own memory in here; the guy actually did what is described. Some of the content may be slightly disturbing. None of the screen names are real. Also, here are the IM names used and who is using them.

Gemmy889-Gem

Marcus84433-Marcus

MonkeyMan-Zidane

Poker3223-Blank

GoodCooking-Cinna

Princess4475-Garnet

DarkRuby-Ruby

StormyWeather-Squall

77462377Rinoa-Rinoa

Blond4475-Quistis

Food47Good-Zell

LadiesMan-Irvine

SugarGirl-Selphie

AlBhedPrincess-Rikku

SummonerChild-Yuna

TooMuchBleach-Tidus

BlackMage-Lulu

TooMuchGel-Wakka

Window2Soul-Paine (thank you yoo-hoo)

Kleptomaniac-Yuffie

Gunslinger-Vincent

MartialArtsGirl-Tifa

FlowerChild-Aries

CalmBeforeTheStorm-Cloud

Disclaimer: I own no part of any FF. I only own the plot and myself.

It was pretty amazing what we went through the year before. That summer though was one that I would never forget. Our little group wasn't so little anymore. Marcus and Zidane had their graduation parties on the same day and dear Lord, I had no clue that either of them had that many relatives. Oh well. We lived.

"Zidane! Where'd ya go! I got somethin' for ya."

"Food?"

I giggled as did Yuna, Rikku, Garnet, Lulu, and Paine. Yuna, Rikku, Garnet, and I wound up laughing even more because Lulu and Paine were giggling.

"Boys and their food," said Garnet as she shook her head.

"Hey!"

Geez oh man. And that was only part of the day. We wound up playing touch football in a field-type area near the place that had been rented out. It was Zidane, Garnet, Tidus, Yuna, Rikku, Aries, Cinna, Tifa, Vincent, Quistis, and Irvine against me, Marcus, Wakka, Lulu, Paine, Cloud, Blank, Squall, Yuffie, Zell, Rinoa, and Selphie. This was the most open that Squall had been so we were determined to keep him that way. Squall had the ball at one point, and Irvine was chasing him. There, however, was a picnic table in the way. Irvine ran around it while Squall took a literal flying leap over length of the table and ninja rolled out of it.

"Ra syta ed!" yelled Rikku's brother Brother. (a/n He made it)

We had learned enough Al Bhed to know what exactly he was talking about. Rinoa had made sure that Squall was fine after his ninja roll and near…accident. Our summer passed in much the same way. We went up to the field to play touch football or stayed inside on rainy days and played PS2 games. Granted our little group had expanded within the entire month of May, but hey, you did what worked. Too soon it was time to say goodbye to Zidane and Marcus. They had decided on a school that was a couple of hours away.

"You send IM's and call, okay?" I told Zidane and Marcus.

"Yup. And you tell us if you change your sn," replied Zidane.

Hugs went around and Baku, Marcus, and Zidane got into the van. We would see them again around Thanksgiving. Or maybe if they had a break in there somewhere. It didn't even take until the next day for us to have a complete IM conversation. It was rather entertaining actually.

Gemmy889: Ziddy, ya on?

MonkeyMan: What?

Marcus84433: Damn. There's a lot of people here.

Marcus84433: Who all's here?

Gemmy889: Well, besides me, u ziddy, marcus, and garnet, you got the rest of the gang.

MonkeyMan: Damn.

MonkeyMan: I'm guessing that klepto is yuffie?

Kleptomaniac: Yup!

Marcus84433:I want to guess the rest!

Marcus84433: And you have to tell us if we're right

Princess4475: Okay. Gem and I know who all's here so we can give you a hot or cold.

MonkeyMan: Whatever works.

MonkeyMan: my next guess is TooMuchBleach

MonkeyMan: it is tidus, cloud, quistis, or rikku since they're the only other blonds

TooMuchBleach: Which one do you think?

MonkeyMan: I'm going with Tidus since I know for sure he bleaches his hair

TooMuchBleach: okay. Who's next?

Marcus84433: I think TooMuchGel is Wakka

TooMuchGel: ya got me man

Marcus84433: next is FlowerChild

Marcus84433: I'm between Yuna and Aries. Aries likes flowers more though.

Marcus84433: FlowerChild's Aries

FlowerChild: Nice guess

SummonerChild: currently giggling

MonkeyMan: I think that SummonerChild is yuna!

SummonerChild: how'd ya know?

TooMuchBleach: you do have an obsession with summoners

MonkeyMan: DarkRuby and Poker3223 are the next two in this little game

Marcus84433: Poker3223 is my bro

MonkeyMan: DarkRuby's Ruby

MonkeyMan: ruby, your name's obvious

DarkRuby: so what if it is darlin'?

Poker3223: what gave it away?

AlBhedPrincess: because you whoop all our asses in poker

Marcus84433: GoodCooking has to be Cinna

Marcus84433: he's the only one of us who really cooks

GoodCooking: yup

Gemmy889: okay, you've got quite a few already. I'm amazed that you managed so many

Gemmy889: the thing I want to know is if people had fun using a phone keypad

Marcus84433: I did

Blond4475: same here

Marcus84433: Blond4475 is next

Marcus84433: well, we've gotten rid of Tidus and I don't think that cloud's a girl

Marcus84433: and Rikku wouldn't be so obvious so it's gotta be Quistis

Blond4475: yup. Who's next?

MonkeyMan: StormyWeather and CalmBeforeTheStorm

MonkeyMan: once again I have two guesses, squall and cloud

MonkeyMan: I just haven't figured out who's who yet

MonkeyMan: StormyWeather's squall and CalmBeforeTheStorm is cloud

StormyWeather: what makes you say that I'm squall?

MonkeyMan: what your rl name means

Princess4475: lol. Ya got it ziddy

Gemmy889: nickname stealer!

Princess4475: I'm running away from you!

Gemmy889: I know where you live! And I'm chasing you!

Marcus84433: since the girls have lost their minds…..

Marcus84433: let's continue

MonkeyMan: okay, who's next? I'm guessing that 77462377Rinoa is Rinoa since the name gives it away and Food47Good has to be Zell. Damn, you eat a lot

Food47Good: you got both of us

LadiesMan: you have quite a few there

SugarGirl: is it my turn yet?

MonkeyMan: LadiesMan and SugarGirl are next

MonkeyMan: LadiesMan is Irvine

Marcus84433: SugarGirl's Selphie

FlowerChild: I didn't think that they'd get this many

TooMuchBleach: same here

AlBhedPrincess: you two have no faith in them

Marcus84433: AlBhedPrincess has to be Rikku

Marcus84433: who else is referred to as a princess besides garnet and rinoa?

AlBhedPrincess: yup. Ya got it right

MonkeyMan: BlackMage is Lulu

MonkeyMan: she's the only black mage I know of

Marcus84433: same here

Marcus84433: three left

MonkeyMan: Gunslinger and MartialArtsGirl next

MonkeyMan: MartialArtsGirl's Tifa. It has to be

MartialArtsGirl: darn you all

Marcus84433: Gunslinger's Vincent

Marcus84433: he's the one who likes guns

MonkeyMan: last but definitely not least

Gemmy889: and b/c you had no clue

MonkeyMan: is Window2Soul

MonkeyMan: it's Paine. We've exhausted all other options

Window2Soul: you really had no clue

MonkeyMan: hey, I go with what works

SummonerChild: you could try something new every while

Marcus84433: and what if I don't want to?

FlowerChild: then we'll drive up there

MartialArtsGirl: and smack you around until that gets through your head

Marcus84433: HEY!

Gemmy889: hehe

AlBhedPrincess: Pops wants me and Yunie to get off. It's dinner time

AlBhedPrincess: will ya be on after dinner?

MonkeyMan: yup and I'll make sure that marcus gets on

SummonerChild: ttyl

AlBhedPrincess: ttyl

Gemmy889: mumma's callin me fer dinner too

Gemmy889: how bout we all get on again in an hour and a half?

TooMuchBleach: works for me

It was the first of many such conversations. Zidane and Marcus were enjoying their time spent at college and we entered our senior year of high school. I had communications with Lulu, Paine, Yuna, and Rikku since we all royally stunk at writing speeches. All in all, we had fun in that class.

Our Java class would have been tiny if we hadn't all taken it. And the computers broke half the time despite being brand new. Granted one of the biggest flirts of my class was it. Dear Lord, I can't remember how many times I smacked him. He flirted with all the girls despite having a girlfriend. At least his girlfriend was easy going.

I was lonely in band. Marcus had graduated which meant that he wouldn't be sitting next to me anymore. I wanted to cry when I realized this. None of the rest of the group was as much of a band dork as me though I learned that a few of the guys were thinking about starting up a garage band.

AP English rocked especially when we got to Homecoming Week. I was wearing a Japanese style top and a straw Oriental-style hat with black pants. All I needed was a sword and I could be a samurai. I had a thing for cross-dressing during Halloween. Other people had too much fun stealing ideas from video games but Rikku amazed us the most. She dressed up as a geisha. Se was adorable and whoever had a camera took a picture of her. I'm sure that she's gonna wind up in the yearbook. But getting back to English class. My work group consisted of me, Jen, and Mark. I had taken off my hat and Jen had taken off her boxing gloves so we could work. Mark had finished his part so we were okay with him wandering to the back of the classroom and grabbing the Darth Vader mask our English teacher had. Over top the mask, he put my hat and then put on Jen's boxing gloves. It was entertaining to say the least. To top it off, he walked to the government teacher's classroom to show her. Wow is the only word to describe it.

Lunch was an interesting time. I still stole the seat where my left hand hung free and I faced the doors. It was just a weird habit for me. We took up about a table and a half. We had fun though well until the girls found out what had been on my mind all year.

"Gem, please let me in. I don't think that you are still going."

"No."

"Gem, please?"

Tifa's voice. "I'll kick down the door."

"Fine."

"Gem, what's wrong? Normally you don't spend this much time in the bathroom when you're here. We care about you."

"Gem, tell us what's wrong. You'll have to tell eventually," added Lulu.

Working up my courage, I told them about the suicidal thoughts that had been occurring a lot recently especially this semester. I wound up in the middle of a hug and I noticed that two not very huggable people were also hugging me. It seemed like all the girls in my group had invaded the tiny bathroom. They told me that they were going to watch me to help me solve my problem. I wound up crying on Garnet's shoulder while the other girls shooed people out of the bathroom.

"Gem? Ya here?"

"Sorry, sorry. I've been playing phone tag a lot lately. I'm hoping to catch the one person I need to catch today."

"How's stuff been recently?" Yuna asked me.

"Nuts. And as for the other half of what you're gonna ask, I'm fine."

At this, the boys looked slightly confused. The girls had promised me that they wouldn't tell the guys anything about that day in the bathroom. But five seconds later, the guys were back in a conversation about Monster Band or the little kiddy band our school district had every spring. The high schoolers helped out whenever they could and it seemed like my group was getting in on it despite none of them having helped before.

Stats was probably my hardest course. I had Yuna, Lulu, Garnet, Rikku, Aries, and Tifa in there for the girls and Cloud, Squall, Wakka, and Tidus for the guys. They tried to get out of us what we were talking about at lunch, but we refused to tell them. As Lulu put it "it is Gem's business and it's her choice if she tells you it." The guys groaned but gave up on it because having a black mage against you was a bad idea. And Lulu was known to hold a grudge before.

The group of us moved to our government class after Stats. Other people from our group joined up with us for the last two periods of the day. Rikku had AP Gov as did Paine, Irvine, Selphie, and Rinoa. Yay for having a set of books at home. It made life so much nicer.

Our first semester, we had writing for the college bound and honestly it was an easy course. Plus, our entire group was in there. We'd pass notes so we wouldn't get in trouble for talking in class and eavesdrop at the same time. It is amazing what people will say. Our second semester though we had psychology. I generally stunk at it though I did try. I just can't take tests, and Rikku whined right along with me about tests. This caused the rest of the group to laugh at us for our whining. I asked them if they had any cheese and then had to explain the whole wine and cheese thing to them. Honestly, I'm normally one of the innocent ones of the group and I knew that! Oh well, what can you do?

Gem: I promise that I will go into more detail next time. I just needed to set up the background for this. I'll cry if I don't get reviews!