Disclaimer: I do not own Kingdom Hearts (II), Riku, Sora, Kairi, etc.

Author's Note: Okay! So! New story! Whoot! Alright, so...this is my first Rikiné/Namiku ever, so I don't know exactly how this is going to turn out. However, I shall try my hardest to make this succeed, or, at least, get one review per chapter. (Thinking of Born To Be Wild.)

Warning: Rikie gets emotional.

Quick Author Babble: Ah!! I just love Riku's mom! Of course, if she was real, I would've probably shot her by now...

Breakfast At Tifa's

Chapter 1: An Introduction to Life

What is life? What is most important in life? What does everyone experience at least once in their life?

Well, Riku had always thought there were no answers to these questions. Life was unsolved and forever would be. Nothing is most important in life—everything is important. Riku had always thought like this, and thought he always would.

Is that why he had such people in his life? Such happy people, always smiling and making him roll his eyes, always laughing at jokes he could not understand, always playing games that he couldn't comprehend until he was actually playing. Was this what life was?

Certainly not, said a little voice in his head. There was something else.

Something he was missing.

xXx

"Come on, you three, another picture!" Mrs. Allen whined, pointing her camera right in Riku's face.

"Mom!" Riku hissed through his teeth, slamming the camera down with such force that it nearly fell.

"Gentle, Rikie!" Mrs. Allen cooed. "You wouldn't want to break Mommy's new digital camera, now would you, sweetie ookums?"

"Ah!" Riku looked away from his mother as his face turned a dark shade of crimson. What an annoying woman!

"Oh, come on, Riku, just let her take the picture." A chirpy voice from behind the silver-haired boy piped up, clearly trying to hold back laughter.

Riku turned and glared. A spiky-haired, brunet boy with tanned skin and the biggest, bluest eyes you could imagine stood their grinning, showing his two sets of pearly white teeth.

"Not helping, Sora," Riku snapped, gritting his teeth and setting his chin in a formidable manner.

Sora was his best friend. He had always been his best friend, and Riku had the feeling he always would be. Perhaps it was because Sora was such a bright, happy, loyal person, or maybe it was because Riku wanted to think happy thoughts considering it might be the last day they'd ever see each other again.

"Sora's right, Riku! It could be the last day we'd be together like this again! We've got to get as many memories as possible!"

A firmer scowl printed on Riku's face. He turned, glaring at the red-haired girl behind him. Kairi. She always had to be so sweet. It was sickening.

Who was Kairi? Oh, well, Kairi was also a good friend of Riku's. Not a best friend, but the two boys kept her as close as they could—although, Riku had to admit, he was probably the reason for why Kairi wasn't buddy-buddy with them yet. Sora and Kairi were such friendly, social people that they stuck together like magnets. Riku had no choice but to be the wall. They'd be all over each other if he wasn't. He made a good wall. Nice and sturdy.

"You two are officially mentally retarded," he snapped, poking Kairi and Sora's foreheads. "You always have to be so nice to my mother. We all know she's an insane woman who probably should go to a mental asylum..."

"Smile, guys!" A blinding flash caught Riku right in his aquamarine eye. Letting out a howl, he covered his eyes with both hands. Behind his eyelids, there was an eruption of colorful dots.

"Totally deserved it," Sora murmured quietly to Kairi.

"I HEARD THAT!" Riku yelled, punching blindly at the air, hoping he'd hit Sora. "YOU MORON! YOU CALL YOURSELF A FRIEND! YOU IDIOTIC, RAVENOUS, HORRIBLE...!"

His fist made contact with something. Letting out a yell of triumph, he opened his eyes.

"Ha! Take that, Sor..." The rainbow of colors cleared to see a red-haired girl doubled over in pain.

His face paled completely.

"A..."

"RIKU, YOU IDIOT!" Sora's voice was so loud that everyone cringed. He quickly knelt down and used his arm to support the redhead. "Are you okay, Kairi?" His voice obtained such a soft tone that it was like he was talking to a baby.

"I'm...fine..." The red-haired girl winced a little as she stood up, then smiled cheerfully at the two boys. "It's okay."

"I think I'd better take you to the nurse anyway," Sora said decisively. "You were hit pretty hard."

Kairi rolled her eyes as Riku stood there feeling terrible. How could he be so stupid, punching wildly around with his eyes closed? As soon as Kairi leaves, Sora was going to kill him, no doubt about it.

Not that Sora could kill him with his clearly inferior abilities. But still. It's the thought that counts.

"Sorry, Kairi," Riku apologized shamefully. "I didn't meant to hit you."

"I know you didn't." Kairi's smile was so wide that it was almost scary. How could someone be so optimistic? "It's okay."

Riku gave her the shortest half-smile he could muster, then gave a side glance to Sora who was looking at him in a way that said "It's definitely not okay." Then, without another word, the brunet boy dragged Kairi away to the nurse's office.

"Oy," Mrs. Allen sighed, pressing her fingers to her forehead. "What a stupid son I have. Doing such a thing on his graduation day!"

Indeed, it was Riku's graduation day. Or, as it turned out, his, Sora's, and Kairi's graduation day—the ceremony that seemed so small to onlookers but so big to participants. After this one summer, Riku's whole life was going to change.

Riku was going to have the biggest change of all of his friends because Sora and Kairi happened to be attending the same university, while he was going to a separate one. Ahh!! The horror already started so early for him.

What would Sora and Kairi do without their wall? The whole point of their relationship was so that they could have a nice, sturdy, dependable separation from each other so they don't turn into one of those paperback novels.

"Hey!" Riku snapped, anger sparking. "This is all your fault in the first place! You and your stupid camera!"

This wasn't completely true, but it felt good to put the blame on someone else.

"At least I'm not the person who had to resort to violence, as always," Mrs. Allen replied coolly.

Riku grit his teeth. He had to get away from this conversation.

"I'm going to go check if Kairi's okay," he said.

Excuses, excuses. Oh well. He might as well go check on Kairi anyway, considering he was running in the school's direction.

xXx

It was dark in the school. All the lights were off, coating Riku in an uncomfortable darkness, and nobody seemed to be present, causing an unbearable silence.

Everyone was at the graduation ceremony, Riku figured. Ah, well. It might be a good time to just look at the school for one last time...

He stared at the posterboard at the left side of the hallway. Had he really ever looked at it before? It was weird how things seemed to make such an impact on you when you realize it wasn't going to be there anymore.

A happy, yellow poster was pinned up onto the board. Riku squinted to make out the words.

"Good...luck to...our...graduates," Riku deciphered through the shadows.

A black graduation hat sat in the middle of the poster, glowing with an enthusiastic green. Instead of making Riku smile though, it made him frown. What a dumb poster. Good luck for what? "Good luck for life"? "Good luck trying to succeed, suckers"?

It just made Riku's situation all the more real. He was graduating, and in two in a half months, he'd be leaving Destiny Islands for maybe forever. How could this be? Sure, Riku had always wondered about what it would be like to live on his own, but leaving his home, his friends, and even his school behind? It wasn't experience and it definitely wasn't good luck. It was torture.

Riku ripped down the poster and crumpled it up before it could deceive him any longer. Then, quickly disposing of it by tossing it into the nearest classroom, he decided he'd look for Sora and Kairi.

Going through the maze of hallways to locate the nurse's office, Riku passed his ex-locker. He stopped abruptly and sent it a glare. He remembered all the moldy things he had to pull out of there a week ago and cringed. He also remembered the pictures he'd constantly put up then quickly pull down because he didn't want his locker to look like a girl's. Who was going to get his locker next year? He imagined some greasy kid with zits all over his face picking his nose and wiping it on the blue metal.

"Gah!" Riku covered his mouth with his hand in disgust and quickly turned away from the locker. Okay, moving on...

He passed the principal's office. Now here was something he wasn't going to miss. The principal, some old guy by the name "Xemnas", had caught Riku and Sora doing numerous idiotic things, and each time his head nearly blew off. Kairi had always been so worried about their permanent records, but personally, the two boys had never cared all that much.

Thinking about Sora and Kairi, Riku's mind wandered to other places. He wondered what would happen when he went off to Twilight University. Who would he goof around with now? Who would actually manage to make him smile like an idiot? Who would sit him down and force him to do his homework?

Not Sora and Kairi, that's for sure.

He wondered if they would miss him as much as he would miss them. It was almost embarrassing to think about. Of course they wouldn't miss him! They had each other. Riku would find someone else to hang around with.

Of course, just thinking so was probably not going to help. Riku had began high school secluding himself, until one term Sora was in his class, and, as usual, brought Riku into a bad mood by trying to include him in class activities. He also introduced him to Kairi, who Riku didn't like at all in the beginning. Of course, she grew on him eventually, but not as much as she did on Sora. Kairi was the magnet and Sora was the helpless, metallic object. So pathetic.

And that was how Riku became the wall. The big, thick wall that held their friendship together, but also kept them apart just enough so that no one was sucked up by hormones. Unfortunate, but true. The job suited Riku perfectly though—he always was built strongly and icily.

So, maybe they would miss him, if not a ton. He was their wall. Their foundation. They needed him.

Brimming with a bizarre confidence, Riku stopped outside the nurse office. Unlike the rest of the school, it was lit up and the door was open.

"Hi..." he began, but was stopped by the voices inside.

"Kairi, to be honest..." Sora was saying, but his voice sounded odd and a bit unnatural, "I've always...really liked you..."

Eh? Riku peeked through the crack in the door in alarm. How had this conversation started? Why had he taken his time coming here? Was he that crappy a wall?

Sora was blushing and looking down. If he wasn't in such a situation, Riku would've laughed himself sick. Unfortunately, he was in no place to do that.

"Sora..." Kairi's voice sounded weird too. They didn't sound happy-go-lucky as they always did, but with a level of seriousness that Riku couldn't comprehend.

Their faces inched a little closer. Riku felt an urge to slap them—or at least one of them—and yell at them to snap out of it. What the heck were they thinking? But the more he urged himself to do so, the more he couldn't, because it gave him more time to look at their faces—their bright red faces that showed more than Riku thought was possible for a face to show—and he knew it wasn't his place to do anything.

"I really like you too," Kairi concluded with a mischievous smile.

Riku couldn't decide if he wanted to throw up or launch a projectile. Could he do both?

Kairi made the first move. She gave him a light but long kiss. Sora's blue eyes were wide open all the way through. He looked like such an idiot. Riku felt his hand instinctively reaching for his cell phone to take a picture, but stopped himself.

"Sora?" Kairi looked confused. "You okay?"

"Do that again," Sora commanded. "This time I'll be ready for it, I swear."

Riku imagined himself rolling his eyes. Classic Sora. He couldn't bring himself to actually do it though. He felt this strange sensation of emptiness in the pit of his stomach, and they were leaning forward again...

Riku turned his head quickly and ran. He couldn't have run more fast if he tried. His long, silver hair was blowing in his eyes and it was irritating, but his fingers were too numb to reach over and brush it from his face. It was like his brain had switched off. All that were working were his legs, running and running for all eternity, pushing themselves just that much farther.

Soon, he was outside. His mother spotted him almost instantly. She waved ecstatically.

"Riku!" she called. "Perfect timing! You're father just got here!"

He ignored her. He turned away from the graduation platform and ran down the road.

"Rikie!" his mom called after him. "Where are you going?!"

Don't call me Rikie, you stupid woman! Riku wanted to yell at her.

"Home!" he shouted instead, and indeed, turned in the direction of his house.

What was he going to do when he got there? Reminisce again? Collapse on his bed and fall asleep? Watch TV until the ultra-violet rays damaged his eyes permanently?

Who knew? He just wanted to be at home and dosed in familiarity. At least, he knew, not much could've changed there.

So, how did you like it? Believe it or not, I seriously do want to hear your opinion! No, there is no fluff yet, or even the slightest sign of Naminé's existence, but I swear there will be! Pinky promise!

Read and review! (...Please?)

Nighty-night!