A/N: My first KH fic! I am so productive in history lecture.

"Kairi!" my grandmother yelled up the stairs. "Dinner!"

I closed my history textbook and sighed. I still had 20 pages left to read, plus an essay due Tuesday that I really needed to start. It would be a long night tonight.

Standing up, I glanced over at my reflection in the mirror. My hair was falling into my eyes – I really needed to get it trimmed. I just didn't have the motivation to keep up with it these days. My gaze fell to a splash of bright color to the right of the mirror – my Keyblade. My heart jumped into my throat, and I struggled to swallow. Sora...

"Kaaaaiiiirriiii!" came my grandmother's bellow.

"Coming, Grandma!" I hollered back, and launched myself down the stairs. The tantalizing smell of spaghetti wafted toward me, and I cheered slightly.

Dinner was quiet. Grandma asked me about school; I told her about my essay, and she grimaced along with me. She asked about my friends, too, which was a much more touchy subject. I was silent for a moment, trying not to remember; and then I let her know that I was doing homework with Selphie tomorrow after school.

That wasn't enough for Grandma, though. Since she's been taking care of me since I was really little, she knows me a little too well. "You miss him, don't you?" she said softly.

A goofy smile. Laughing easily. Hands behind his head. Impossibly messy hair.

A pang shuddered through me. The mental images shifted: Silver, spiky hair. Determined blue eyes. Satisfied smile. Teasing laughter.

"I do. I miss both of them," I responded carefully. Still, there was a voice in my head that whispered, Liar. You miss Sora more.

But that wasn't true! Of course I missed Sora; but I missed Riku, too. They were both my best friends. I couldn't live without one any more than I could live without the other.

I managed to keep it together until I got upstairs to my room and shut the door. Then I sat down heavily on my bed and allowed myself to cry quietly. Once again my eyes wandered to the brightly colored flowers of my Keyblade.

"Why am I just sitting here waiting?" I asked softly. Who I was addressing, I wasn't sure – Sora? Riku? Myself? Maybe some combination of the three? "Why can't I be out there, fighting alongside you? I'm strong enough to wield a Keyblade. If you can take it, then so can I!"

And then, to Sora specifically, my heart breaking: "Why did you leave me behind?"

I wrapped my hand around the Keyblade's handle – my Keyblade, I thought with pride. I am strong enough. And while you boys are off exploring the worlds, you expect me to stay put? I'm not going to just sit around and wait. I've had enough of being the helpless princess waiting for someone else to save her!

With that in mind, I leaped up and dashed out the front door, hoping Grandma wouldn't notice I was gone until it was too late to stop me. A little while later, Selphie found me down by the water, staring forlornly at the waves. Because in my haste, there was one thing I hadn't considered: How exactly was I supposed to find my boys?

Selphie's voice drifted to me from behind. "You're thinking of him again, aren't you?" As much as I wanted to, I couldn't ignore her.

"I'm starting to forget what they look like when they smile," I said hollowly.

Selphie came to stand beside me. She didn't know where Sora and Riku were, of course, but she knew they were gone and she knew how much that affected me. Selphie and I might not be as close as the trio, but she was my best girl friend and she cared enough to notice that I wasn't as okay as I pretended.

"You can pretend with everyone else, but I know and you know that I was talking about Sora," she admonished. "Face it, Kairi – you've got it for him bad."

"That's crazy," I protested weakly. "Sora is—"

"Your friend, yeah, blah blah blah," she interrupted. "I know, I know. But it's not Riku you're pining after, is it? It's Sora you love."

"I don't know about love," I replied slowly. "I mean, yeah, I love them. I love Sora, and I love Riku, as friends. But—" I cut off Selphie's interjection. "But I see what you're saying. It's true. I do like Sora. In an entirely different way from how I like Riku, or anyone else. Sora is special to me. He's..." Made of pure light. The most loyal person I've ever met. Quite possibly my soul mate. I shrugged. "He's Sora."

Selphie grinned at me. "Did you two ever eat the Paopu fruit?"

The flashback was staggering in its intensity. "Have you two ever heard the legend of the Paopu fruit?" Biting into the star-shaped fruit, the overwhelming sweetness of it. Laughing with my two best friends at the absurdity of it all, but each of us secretly believing in it all the same.

"Yeah," I said. That one word ached with the weight all the things left unsaid.

"Then stop worrying, silly!" Selphie giggled. "He'll come back to you eventually."

"What if eventually isn't soon enough?" I asked a little desperately.

She grew serious. "Then you wait," she stated simply. "You wait, and you listen for him with your heart, and you hope every day that this will be the day he comes home."

Eventually Selphie left to go finish that paper I probably should have been working on, too. Instead, I stayed rooted to the spot, staring at the horizon, with the ocean lapping around my feet. "Hurry home, Sora," I whispered, knowing that somehow, wherever he was, my words would reach him. "I'm waiting... and I've got something to tell you."