The Art of Love
Masigla

' '

Author's Notes:
Hey, everyone! I'm here today with a new fic for y'all! I know, I know, on top of Seasons of Love and Awkward Silence, I've decided to put a larger burden of myself by starting on this! XD! YAY! It's an alternate-universe thing, with our favorite characters as sophomores in high school (which, surprise, surprise! -- is named 'Destiny High'.). The story mostly revolves around my favorite character, Naminé (yeah, get over it XP), but don't worry, of course it will contain dangerous levels of fluff (mostly SK ones, myah!)! And I swear, if I stop typing now I'll end up watching the ending of KH2 and spoiling it all. So I'm going of on a tangent. This is my hope, y'all—I can't afford to be bored, or else I'll end up doing that. x----x;

This is the prologue. It's really pointless, but I posted it anyways. XD

Disclaimer:
Kingdom Hearts © Square-Enix & Disney

' '

&& oo. It Starts

-

"Naminé," Kairi stood in the doorway of the Fujiwara household. It was a well-made house, a little bigger than the rest, but not by too much. Kairi could say the same for herself. She was the daughter of the Mayor, after all. "Are you ready?"

"Coming!" the blonde said, rushing into the main hallway of her house, sweeping her book bag from the floor and slinging it over her shoulder. She then hurriedly put on her shoes, made sure they fit snugly, and looked up at her auburn-haired friend. "Let's go."

"So, are you looking forward to sophomore year?" Naminé asked (for a lack of a better topic) as she and her best friend, Kairi, walked to Destiny High.

"Yeah, I guess so," Kairi laughed softly, "I'm personally so glad we don't have the same teachers as last year, and now we get to boss the freshmen around."

Naminé giggled. "It'll be the best when we're seniors, though."

"Not really, because we'd have to all start preparing for college… and stuff."

"I guess you're right." Naminé shrugged. Looking ahead, she spotted two of her other best friends—one was a year older than her, with silver hair that stood out like a sore thumb, and the other was a year older as well, her brown hair swaying lightly in the gentle breeze.

"Orette, Riku!" Kairi called out having seen the two herself, waving her hand up in the air enthusiastically. The two younger ones hastened their steps as the two smiled at them.

"Hey Kairi, hey Naminé!" Orette greeted.

"You're walking to school today, Naminé? I was expecting Heine to drive you to school or something." Riku said, chuckling. He was referring to Naminé's older brother—Heine, who was in the same grade as Orette and Riku.

"He did go to Driver's Ed over the summer," Naminé sighed, "and he did get a student's license, but he refused to take me to school because he thought it would deduct from his 'coolness points'."

Her companions laughed, along with herself.

"That's so Heine," Kairi said in between her long trail of laughter.

"How many did he date over the summer?" Orette asked. Naminé rolled her eyes as she shook her head and answered,

"I don't even want to think about that.". Again, her friends laughed.

The four started moving their feet, walking and talking on the way to school as they each told tales of humor from their summer vacation. Naminé didn't talk as much—after all, she had spent nearly all her summer sitting somewhere, sketching or painting. She had visited a couple of places with her family, but all she did do at those places was sit somewhere, sketching or painting. She sometimes wondered if her undying love for art was getting in the way of the spirit of being a teenager. If not doing the previously mentioned, she was either sleeping, eating, reading, or talking on the phone with someone. It was a quiet summer for her.

Upon arriving at the gates of Destiny High, the four reunited with the rest of their friends—or so they thought—Selphie, Tidus, Wakka, and Pints. Wakka and Pints were in their Junior year along with Riku, Heine and Orette as well.

"Where's Heine?" Naminé asked after the hugs and the greetings, though something inside told her that she already knew the answer.

Selphie jerked her head towards her right, where the parking lot was located, "Over there, showing off his so-called 'previously owned' car."

"Why doesn't he just call it used?" Tidus said sarcastically.

Pints laughed, "Apparently, that's ten points—"

"—deducted from his coolness points." finished the rest of the crew. Everything that made more sense deducted points to Heine's coolness points.

"We officially have twelve minutes until school starts, everyone." Kairi announced. "Where's Sora?"

"I don't know—maybe he lost track of time?" Orette answered. If there was one thing they all knew about their spiky brown-haired friend well, it was that he often overslept, lost track of time, or both.

"We should all get him a rubber chicken for his birthday," Tidus dumbly suggested, receiving stares from everyone else, "that way we can just squeeze it and he'll wake up."

"Sure thing, then. Is anyone weird enough to barge into Sora's room every morning to squeeze a rubber chicken?" Riku said as-a-matter-of-factly as he folded his arms across his well-built chest and smirked at the apparent silence that passed, "I thought so."

"His mom could do it," Tidus debated.

"I doubt Mrs. Erizawa would even approve of that." Kairi added.

"It was a good idea while it lasted…" Tidus sighed in defeat. "What about we just make him pay 5 munny for every time he oversleeps or loses track of time?"

"And where will the money go?" Orette inquired. Tidus, in reply, shrugged.

"Maybe," Naminé spoke out softly, "we could use that money for our outings and…. stuff?"

The others exchanged glances, "That will make us… rich, man." Wakka commented. The others couldn't agree more on how much money that would bring them if that plan was implemented.

"I say we just let him be," Kairi defended. "It's no use changing the ways of a lazy bum, after all."

"Officially seven minutes and a half remaining of summer vacation." Pints said. All groaned.

"Hey, guuuuuys!" a familiar voice yelled from a distance. The entire crew jerked their heads towards the direction of the gate. Sora had finally arrived—but that wasn't all—he was pulling along a blonde, with features subtly similar to Sora's (namely the spiky hair and blue eyes), to which the group of friends was not in any way familiar with.

"Guys," Sora addressed his friend as he and his blonde friend were panting from the apparent rushing, "this is my… cousing… Roxas. They just.. moved here.. and now he's… going to school with us… sophomore year!"

Naminé suddenly found her self staring dumbly at the blonde—there was something striking about his eyes… Sure, they were identical to that of Sora's, but everyone knew Sora was now off-limits, so no one bothered, but Roxas' eyes…

"Rox…what?" Selphie tilted her head in confusion, "Your name is so hard to pronounce—"

"It really isn't, Selph—"

"Ssh! No interrupting!" She glared at Tidus, "From this day on you shall be known as… BHK."

"BHK?" the cousin asked, obvious confusing tainting his eyes.

"Blonde-haired-kid!" Selphie explained. "Okay? OKAY!"

"That's Selphie," Kairi smiled at him, "You'll get used to her hyperness. My name's Kairi,"

"Yeah, I know." Roxas rolled his eyes to the direction of Sora, who merely blushed. The others laughed. Sora and Kairi had been an item since the beginning of summer vacation: when Sora went away for a week, Kairi found herself missing him in a way that no friend would, and called him up spontaneously and said, "I miss you. When are you coming home?", muffled with tears. The two then talked for a long time after that, ending with confessions. And since then, they had been an item.

A long string of introductions followed:

"The soon-to-be six-footer over there is—"

"Riku. Nice to meet you."

"I'm Orette!"

"She's the 'ask Amy' of our grade. We think she should get a column in the school newspaper for all that she does."

"I'm Tidus, and this is Wakka."

"Nice to meet you, muhn."

"Those two are blitzball freaks. I'm Selphie!"

"She's on sugar half the time, so watch out for her."

"Watch it, Tidus!"

"Anyways, I'm Pints."

"…he stalks girls with his camera."

"I do not!"

"Haha, Riku's just playing—Pints is a photographer for the school newspaper and junk."

"That's better."

"There you are, Heine! Where the hell were you?"

"Over there, with my previously owned—"

"—used—"

"No, previously owned, car. I have myself a date this Friday!"

"Moving on to more important matters, meet my cousin, Roxas. He just moved here."

"His new name is BHK."

"Oh, nice to meet'cha. I'm Heine. Stay away from my sis and we're good."

"Heine!"

"Haha, Heine's Naminé's big brother. Don't worry about it—he says that to every new guy who comes to this school. Watch him say that to all the freshmen."

"Geez, I'm not that stupid!"

Naminé looked away in embarrassment. What did she expect? Her big brother was that of hypocritical Heine—one who claims that one as young as Naminé should not have any relationships, and one who had already at least 6 girlfriends (consecutively) by the time he was her age.

"GUYS! Five minutes until class!"

"Oh, shit, we better get inside!"

"Alright, I'll see you guys later," Riku waved as he, Wakka, and Heine headed to the Juniors' hallway—where the lockers were 2 inches bigger and the air-conditioning was 5 percent better and where Orette and Pints had already arrived. The sophomores—Sora, Kairi, Naminé, Selphie, Tidus, and now Roxas, walked together to the Sophomores' hallway, which wasn't as good s the Juniors' or the Seniors', but indeed it was an improvement from the Freshmen's which they occupied last year.

Each student got their schedules in their mail along with a set of textbooks, which they were to keep in their house. There were copies of the same books in each classroom—depending on the teacher. This system made it so that students wouldn't have to carry textbooks everywhere.

Selphie peered over Kairi's shoulder, who was reading her schedule, "Oh man, we don't have the same homeroom—hey Tidus, what about—oh, no! Oh my God, I'm not in any of you guys' homerooms!"

"Aww," Naminé said softly. She was in Ms. Takahashi's—the sophomore and junior art teacher--homeroom. There was another teacher for the freshmen and the seniors, which didn't really make sense, but that's how it went. "Are any one of you guys in Ms. Takahashi's?"

"I am," Roxas blurted out. Naminé smiled at the boy (or at least she tried her hardest to—she was still embarrassed about earlier). "is she nice?"

"I don't know," Naminé replied, "this is the first year we've had her. But I heard from Orette that she is."

"That's cool."

"I'm in Mr. Kanagaki's.. P.E. teacher." Tidus stated. "I guess I'll be heading to homeroom, then. Bye guys!"

"Bye, Tidus!" Selphie waved. "So, what about you, Kairi?"

The auburn-haired girl glanced over to her boyfriend's schedule. "Mr. Inoue."

"Same as me!" Sora added with a cheesy grin.

"Oh jeez," Selphie rolled her eyes, "You guys are gonna like, make out in homeroom."

"Selphie!" Kairi exclaimed, turning bright red.

"Haha, just kidding! Okay, okay! I'm leaving! I'm leaving!" Selphie retreated.

"Okay, so…" Sora turned to his cousin, "Since you and Naminé are in the same homeroom, I guess you guys could like, bond or something."

"Yeah, okay." Roxas replied. Naminé simply nodded. Sora and Kairi then smiled at the two, then took held hands as they departed for Mr. Inoue's classroom.

Naminé glanced over to the clock in the hallway. Despite the near-tardiness situation, there were still many students in the hallway, obviously not back into the school groove as of yet. "We have something like… 50 seconds. We better hurry."

"Okay." Roxas nodded as he and Naminé started for the classroom. "So, Naminé… what kinds of stuff do you like?"

That was when sophomore year started, or, junior year, for some of them—but nevertheless, it was a year very different than their last—in the sense that things were beginning to change.

' '

Author's Endnotes:
Yeah, I know—that was an entirely pointless chapter. XD Well, it's basically a prologue for what's to come… but still really pointless. I'm sorry if that was a totally bland chapter.