Summary: This is the tale of the life and times of Laurel Phae Souza, rambunctious kindergartner and philosophical extraordinaire. Based off of Byutifull, which you could look at as a prequel. CxD, multi-fic.

A/N: And so, readers, we meet again. People decided they wanted to hear more about Lauri, and who am I to deny the public? You don't need to read Byutifull to read this fic, but it would be cool if you did: http:/www.fanfiction.net/s/7849443/1/bByutifull_b . In case you're wondering, that's the link. Any suggestions for chapters, I'm way open.

WARNING: This fic will have relatively short chapters and will be updated weekly on Wednesdays/ Fridays unless something comes up.

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters you've already heard of. Except Laurel. And Consty. And Xavier. And Timmy.

Alright, business over. Enjoy!

Chapter One:

The First Day

"Nooo! Mommy, I don't want to go!"

"Laurel, you have to go."

"No."

"Laurel, let go of my leg."

"Never!"

This was not how Laurel thought kindergarten was going to be. It wasn't like pre-k. Everybody was screaming. Why in the world would they just run around and scream and knock things over for no reason? She didn't see Consty or Xavier anywhere, but Timmy was calmly sitting in his seat sending her withering looks.

And they wouldn't let her bring Pinky. Where did they get off not letting her bring Pinky?

A lady that was not Ms. Muffy got down on her haunches to speak to Laurel. In hindsight, it actually never occurred to her that she would have a new teacher now that she had moved up a grade. Another reason not to like kindergarten.

"Don't worry, Laurel, you'll be just fine here in our class!" A lady with a pale face, frizzy off-blonde hair and blindingly blue eyes stared her in the face from behind a pair of round, mauve-colored glasses. This woman's voice was loud and her large, harsh nose was creeping Laurel out.

She reached out to grab Pinky's ear tighter but, alas, her hands were empty. She turned around and shoved her face into Mommy's conservative boot-cut dark wash jeans while she pulled her own embroidered denim jacket closer to her body. It wasn't cold in there but Timmy's expression was almost as frightening as Ms. Frazzled.

And just when she was cementing her resolution to get that boy over there that was gluing barbie heads together -shudder- to paste her to the underside of Mommy's calf muscle, Consty arrived.

"CONSTY!" She screamed, flying-tackling the poor girl as she walked through the door with a death grip on her father's hand and a facial expression mirroring Laurel's. Consty was relieved, she was afraid Laurel would be in a different class than her. She knew Xavier wasn't in this one. Not that she cared.

"Laurel!" Laurel's excitement was infectious. They hugged each other tightly and ran across the blue carpet to the right side of the room where the circular tables were. All thoughts of staying with Mommy were gone and they threw hurried goodbyes to their respective parents and then to the other parents as well. By this time class had settled down and the only seats left were at...

... Timmy's table.

"Laurel Souza."

"Here!"

"Grace Sterling?"

"Here!"

"Constance Sutton?"

"Present."

Ms. A. Johnson (that was the lady's name) was calling roll, and Laurel had to smother a laugh at Consty's response. Consty was so funny! When everybody else was really excited Consty was always so laid back. It was interesting that they were such good friends considering the fact that Laurel was one of the most high-energy children you would ever meet.

It turned out it wasn't so hard to sit with Timmy, all the girls had to do was turn their chairs in the complete opposite direction and talk loud enough about everything but him that he'd get the picture.

At the moment they were exiting the brightly colored classroom. The walls were covered in posters and games, toys, and books were strewn all about the floor.

After sitting on the carpet for circle name games and painting pictures of flowers and trees all morning, it was lunchtime.

And lunchtime at Choice Academy Child Care Center meant one thing- gossip.

Laurel and Consty walked into the cafeteria in single file with one hand on their mouths and the other behind their backs. They looked around in wonder at the large space, they hadn't been allowed to eat in the cafeteria when they were younger. Rows of dull, rectangular-shaped tables stood upon the fake marble flooring.

Laurel was looking down now, trying to step on all of the red squares painted on the floor while Consty was trying to figure out where she Laurel were going to sit. Xavier's class came before them and the dark-haired boy was waving frantically at them from his seat where he had purposely saved two seats for them.

Consty chose to ignore him, and almost got away with it until he accidentally fell out of his chair and drew the whole room's attention to himself. Of course everybody burst out in wild laughter and it took all of five minutes to get everybody back under control. When the dust settled Laurel finally had a clear view of the room as she and Consty took their trays to Xavier's seat at the back of the room.

Laurel discovered the cafeteria hierarchy.

The first two tables belonged to the girls who wore the most pink and glitter and whispered to each other about things nobody really cared about. Then there were the boys who yelled nonsense about scores and dirt and other strange boy-things. After that were the boys who dared each other to stuff glue up their noses and eat worms and the girls who snuck dolls into the school. Then there were the boys that colored inside the lines and the girls that colored outside the lines.

Not fitting into any of these strange groups, Laurel and Consty slid into the table with Xavier. They were the only boy and girls that sat together. They shared conversation about teachers and tv shows and other non-important things until Consty and Xavier found something to argue about. And then somebody slid into the empty seat at the end of the table next to Laurel and completely turned the trio upside down.

"Hi guys! My name's Diesel Hendricks! What's y'all's?" A boy with flaming red hair bounced exuberantly. His eyes were a piercing dark green and Laurel blurted out without thinking.

"You have pretty eyes just like my daddy!" It occurred to her that she probably shouldn't have said that, but it was true.

"Thanks! I think you're pretty, too!" He smiled a huge smile showing small pearly-white teeth.

The whole cafeteria froze. Xavier had a look of absolute horror on his face and Consty probably hadn't ever grinned so hard in her life. Laurel felt her cheeks heat up and she touched them, all of the sudden frightened for her health. Laurel didn't exactly know what it meant to 'blush'.

And the dam within Consty bursted.

"AHH HAHAHA! L-LAUREL! Y-YOUR FACE!" Consty was beside herself with laughter, she almost fell on the floor. At which point everybody started laughing. Laurel bit her lip so she wouldn't start crying and Diesel, embarrassed, put his head on the table. Xavier saw Laurel looking like she was about to start crying and elbowed Consty. Consty shoved him back and they ended up getting into an actual fight.

I'm a big girl, I'm a big girl, I'm a big girl, Laurel repeated and shut her eyes tightly. She barely noticed the teachers cart Consty and Xavier away. Lunchtime was finally over and she couldn't have been happier.

Now they were in the bathroom taking a break before naptime. Laurel, due to all the excitement, hadn't actually eaten much. She had cried a lot -quietly- and somehow her carefully pinned down ponytail had gotten loose. She saw herself in the mirror above the sink that was two feet off the ground. She looked a mess.

She was incredibly red-faced and she pulled at the slightly puffy skin under her eyes. She ran her hands over her head to try to push some of the fly-away hairs back from her face. She really wanted Mommy and Daddy right now. Diesel was nice but clearly a dunce.

Somehow Consty and Xavier both managed to get off with light warnings and the girl in question entered the bathroom, backpack in hand.

"Are you going home?" Laurel asked as Consty set the Dora-themed bag on the sink. Consty looked up at her incredulously as she rifled through the thing.

"No, I'm fixing my hair." She answered just as she pulled out a brush that she had gotten from one of her mother's bathroom drawers. She took her long, soft curly light-brown hair out of it's low ponytail and motioned for Laurel to hold the ponytail holder. In the scuffle with Xavier her hair had gotten mussed up and it was pain to deal with later.

She managed a sloppy pony with at least most of the more noticeable pieces of hair smoothed down. She looked at herself in the mirror, smoothing out her long orange jumper and rainbow tights. Righting a butterfly clip in her ponytail and re-velcroing her Mary Janes, she was good to go.

And then Laurel asked her an interesting question.

The idea had nagged at Laurel for a while but she hadn't actually thought that much about it up until now. Shrugging, Laurel decided to take the plunge.

"I'm still mad at you." Ok, so maybe she was beating around the bush just a little bit. Consty faced Laurel, looking into her blue eyes with dark brown ones.

"Laurel, I'm sorry. I meant to laugh, but I didn't mean to be mean." Well, at least she was blunt. Laurel nodded and they went back to looking at themselves. Ok, this time for real, Laurel.

"Why do you and Xavier fight so much?" Laurel asked her caramel-skinned friend. Just the thought of that gap-toothed idiot made Consty want to punch her tiny fists through a wall.

"'Cause he's stupid. I wish we didn't play with him."

"Well I like him! And you do, too." Laurel said, finally voicing her earlier suspicions. She had asked Mommy about the problem about a week ago and she said it was probably because they like-liked each other and didn't want to admit it. Consty made a face at her.

"Gross."

"You do!"

"No I don't!"

"Yes you do!"

"Do not!"

"Do too!"

"I. DON'T. LIKE. HIM."

"YES. YOU. DO." They glared at each other harshly for about five seconds until their collectively short attention spans caused them to lose interest.

"I have to pee."

"I'm going to go get in line."

And they went their separate ways. After relieving herself and washing her hands, Laurel left the bathroom only to have Diesel wave at her and call a, "Hi, El!" from across the hallway before the teacher shushed him. She did, however, sneak a "Hi, Diesel!" from the end of the line. Why she was talking to him she didn't know but this certainly was shaping up to be a pretty strange start.