Stitched Patches

A/N: Loosely based on the song "Tokyo Teddy Bear".

Disclaimer: I don't own Vocaloid.

The day the newborn Rin Kagamine was admitted out of the hospital, she received a teddy bear. As a baby, she had giggled and clutched at it, softly drooling on it while petting its fluffy head. As she grew older, she still carried the teddy bear around with her. Its brown fur was not as bright as it was when it was new; after all, going through the wash so many times must have dulled the color slightly. But there was no need to worry, her parents assured her. If the color dulled too much, they would buy her a new one. Even so, her parents noted, the color had faded only a shade or two; it would be a long time before the color was too dull.

When Rin finally entered first grade, the other kids teased her, for she still carried her teddy bear to school. Regretfully, she left the teddy bear at home, slowly accustoming herself to it. But when she arrived home, the first thing she would do was run to her teddy bear in her room and hug it; at home, she still carted the stuffed animal everywhere.

It seemed like a normal life was unwinding for Rin Kagamine.

It started in fifth grade.

In their P.E. class, they had started a game of dodgeball. Rin had tried her best, but failed to throw the ball very hard. As a result, she was hit many times, while her targets didn't need to move to escape her throws.

For the rest of the day, she endured taunts about her weak arms and throws.

By the time she got home, she was crying.

"Rin, honey, what's wrong?" asked her mother, trying to gather her daughter into her arms. Rin, however, pushed her mother aside and ran to her room, sobbing into her teddy bear and soaking its fur. She sniffled down at her arms and the teddy bear's arms; they were both soft and plushy, with hardly any muscle. She hated it.

She got up with a few more sniffles and ran to find some things.

When she returned to her room, she locked the door. With dull scissors, she sliced the skin of the teddy bear's arms right off; the stuffing inside barely managed to stay in place when its casing was removed. Quickly but sloppily, Rin wrapped a different fabric around the stuffing; taking her last item, a threaded needle, she stitched the new fabric into the teddy bear, connecting it with the still-original shoulders of the stuffed animal.

Finally, she finished her task and lifted the bear up; the new skin contrasted greatly with the rest of the bear, but it didn't matter, because it wasn't the same. As long as it was different, everything would be fine.

She had stopped crying by now.

The next day, their dodgeball unit in class continued; the other kids laughed at her before the game even began, telling her to just try and dodge everything coming her way. She giggled along with them and joked that she would try her best.

The game started. Rin grabbed the closest ball and threw it with all her might at one of the boys in her class; it hit him and he froze with a stupefied expression on his face. Rin grinned and yelled, "You're out!" before grabbing another ball, blocking one that came her way, and throwing her ball to knock another person out of the game.

By the end of the day, everyone was amazed by her throwing skills.

Seventh grade brought about another incident.

Again, it was in P.E. class; they were running laps. Rin was the slowest person out of the entire class, simply because she wasn't used to doing so much exercise at once.

"What a weakling."

"Can't even run a mile without stopping to walk."

"She was running?"

"For a minute, I think."

"More like thirty seconds."

The cruel laughter stung more than the pain in her legs from exercising. Their teacher had scolded the kids for being mean, and they all apologized; Rin could tell, though, that none of them were sincere.

When she was back home, she kept her tears to a minimum to avoid her mother. Even so, the woman sensed that something was wrong.

"Rin, did something happen at school?"

"No, mom."

Her mother eyed her doubtfully before going back to writing some letter. Rin continued up to her room and hugged her teddy bear; when she put it back on her bed, she suddenly noticed the patched arms. She looked at its legs. Short and stubby, not built to run. She looked at her own legs. Not built to run. Filled with a sudden hatred, Rin pulled out the supplies that she had kept in her drawer from two years ago.

The dull scissors pierced the legs this time, tearing the skin off. Carefully, Rin grabbed a different fabric, a sturdier one than last time, and surgically attached it to the rest of the teddy bear's body. Taking a deep breath, she replaced the bear on her bed.

The next day, she ran a full mile without stopping and was the fastest runner in the class.

In ninth grade, something happened again.

She still wore a large bow in her hair; she had since she was young. But everyone seemed to think she was a child with it on, and constantly made fun of her and took the bow, leading to around-the-school chases to get her bow back.

But she dealt with it.

Until someone took it, ripped it in half, and threw it in the trash can.

Rin went home to her teddy bear. She stood up and looked at herself in the mirror; without her bow, she felt... just off. She still had her hair clips in to keep her hair out of the way, though.

She stared down at her bear. And then, she was suddenly filled with an intense hatred for her bow; taking scissors, she sliced the top of the teddy bear's head right off, before sewing another patch in place over it.

Rin looked back into the mirror and stared at her hair clips. They suddenly felt wrong. Rin shuddered slightly and removed them, tossing them into some drawer to be forgotten. Without them, her blond hair fell down.

The next day at school, people complimented her new look. Rin smiled vaguely at them and thanked them.

When she brought home a B- in English class, sophomore year, her parents were furious.

"What do you think you're doing, Rin?" her father had yelled. "This is awful! You need to keep all A's on your record! How could you fail something as simple as English?"

Rin shrugged helplessly. There was nothing she could do about it now. She was simply worse at English than her other subjects.

"Don't you just shrug this off, Rin," said her mother sternly. "This is no laughing matter. One bad grade comes along, you might get more. No more, Rin!"

Rin shrugged meekly. Her mother let out an exasperated sigh, but her father swelled like a balloon. Before Rin knew what had happened, he had slapped her.

She blinked at the stinging pain in her cheeks. Her father seemed stunned at his action; her mother's mouth was open and a hand was at her mouth.

"Rin, wait!" called her father as Rin burst past them and ran to her room. "Rin, I'm sorry! Come back!"

"How could you do that?" Rin heard her mother say angrily. "She's our daughter!"

"I don't know, it just came over me!" was her father's response.

Rin slowly took the scissors in her hand, wishing to cut off her own face. Instead, she sheared the cheeks off of the teddy bear, before replacing them. She could sew the new patches on relatively quickly now.

The stinging in her cheek faded as she stared at the bear's new face.

It was junior year when people began to poke fun at her outfit.

"Who wears something like that? It looks like something a baby would wear."

"Kagamine, how old are you exactly? Because your clothes make you look like you're two."

Rin shrugged it off and said, "I've been planning to get some new clothes lately." A complete lie, of course.

But she did go to the mall over the weekend and bought new clothes. She tiredly put them on, and nothing seemed right; her mother, however, told her that the clothes were fabulous so she bought them.

When she returned home, she tried the clothes on again in her room. They felt wrong. But then she carefully cut most of the torso of her teddy bear off, leaving only a patch of original fabric over its heart. It was almost habitual now. She didn't cry at all as she stitched a new coat onto it.

When school resumed on Monday, plenty of people whistled at her new outfit.

She developed a crush in her junior year as well.

A boy in her grade that had the same last name as her was almost always assigned to sit next to her in their shared classes due to the alphabetical arrangement of seats. She chatted with him happily, giggling and getting along with him very well. His name was Len Kagamine.

But then, one of her friends scoffed at her.

"You like Len Kagamine? Do you know how unpopular he is? Like, no one knows who he is!"

Rin supposed it was logical that her friend was so upset, considering that she was pretty much the most popular girl in the school.

"I can't help it," murmured Rin. "He's cute and nice. What's wrong with him being unpopular? I'm not exactly popular."

"You hang around with me, girl. Anyone who's my friend is popular."

"So why don't you become friends with Len?"

"Rin," sighed her friend, "we've been friends since what, seventh grade? There's a difference between friends before high school and friends during high school. I'm not going to befriend some weirdo that no one likes. And if you like him so much, then go ahead. You'll be forgotten too."

"Why?"

The girl scoffed. "I'm not going to be seen with that guy. And if you're with him, you're definitely not with me. Have fun being a complete no one, Kagamine."

Rin's eyes grew very wide as her friend stalked off. She sadly returned home and picked up her teddy bear. The one original patch left, over its heart, was torn out. A substitute patch was sewn into the chaotic medley of fabrics that remained.

The next day, she ignored Len completely; he seemed slightly hurt by her actions, but her friend congratulated her on ignoring her brief infatuation with the unpopular boy. Rin grinned in response and agreed.

It changed in senior year.

Everything up to this point had affected Rin in some way. More patches had been added to her teddy bear. It was completely different.

But then, Miku Hatsune became her friend. Also relatively unpopular, like Len, she still managed to sneak by Rin's friends' suspicions. She was a bubbly girl, filled with happiness while being an extreme diva as well. Rin got along well enough with her, although was skeptical of her real motives for becoming her friend.

But as the year wore on, she felt more alive than she ever did. Miku's friends, Luka and Kaito, had become Rin's friends eventually; through Kaito, she had met Meiko. And, to her extreme surprise, Len eventually became friends with her again through Miku.

Their little group became more closely knit; Rin's other friends discovered her "unpopular ring" and quickly abandoned her, but Rin didn't care. She had other friends.

Still, though, she hid herself. She couldn't tell why the others had become such good friends with her; she didn't know what they were doing. Why would they?

Yet, as she grew with them, she felt more and more that they were simply sincere people. Hope filled her heart, completely unfamiliar, and she stumbled home one day to her teddy bear.

She stared at it. Its patched coat. So many different fabrics all sewn together to hide what was truly there. Filled with a sudden hate for it, she viciously tore at the strings, pulling the patched coat off piece by piece until nothing was left but a vaguely shaped lump of stuffing. But she didn't care.

Because the stuffing was the only thing that mattered.

She hugged the fluff tightly and set it on her bedside drawer, thanking it for enduring through the past years, thanking it for being there. But she didn't need it anymore.

The next day, when she returned to school, a new bow was in her hair, and her hair clips firmly kept her hair out of her eyes. Her outfit was back to the one she used to wear as well.

"Hey," Len said suddenly when he saw her, blushing. "I... remember that outfit. And the bow."

Rin blinked. "I wore this bow in freshman year. We didn't know each other then, did we?"

He looked down at the floor in embarrassment. "I... uh... sort of noticed you then. And your outfit from last year; I like it. More than that new stuff you wore."

Rin opened her mouth blankly, not knowing what she was about to say. But then she smiled and said, "Thank you. I've got to get to class now, I'll see you at lunch!"

As she turned away, Len suddenly called, "Wait!"

Rin turned back.

Len was turning a fierce, red shade. "It's not just the... outfit... that I like."

A familiar feeling stumbled in Rin's heart.

"You... too... I like you."

In response, Rin was only capable of stuttering, "Uh... Uh..."

And then Miku burst into the scene, screaming in utter joy for the two of them and how they would look so adorable together and how she knew that they belonged together and how —

"Shut up, Miku," said Meiko, coming over with Kaito in tow. Luka arrived soon after, panting.

"Miku, why did you run so fast? Something about Len? We were on the third floor," she explained between breaths at the questioning glances from the others.

Len glared at Miku. "You heard me from the THIRD FLOOR? What kind of maniac are you? That's two floors up from here!"

Miku nodded at him wisely. "When it comes to matters of the heart, there is nothing I do not hear."

Len blushed again and swatted at the girl.

Rin stepped back silently and watched the group. Len and Miku were arguing, Luka trying to break up their argument, while Meiko suddenly began to beat Kaito for no apparent reason other than the fact that he wanted ice cream. Rin smiled. This was what life was like. There was no need to hide.

When the first bell rang, signaling that they only had five minutes left to get to class, all of them immediately scattered, shouting good-byes to each other.

Rin ran as fast as she could, which, to be honest, was not very fast; even so, she giggled with Len as the collapsed in their seats with ten seconds left before the final bell rang.

Rin pulled out several items from her bag, including a strange ball of white fluff.

"What's that?" asked Len curiously, poking it. "Cotton?"

"I have no idea," Rin replied promptly, smiling. "It is what it is."

And Rin pulled the ball of stuffing into a big hug.