A/N: Lights, camera, action! Wait, this is a book. Not a movie. A book based off of an animated movie, with action drawn, not exactly . . . acted out. :P Anyways, thank you so much for checking out this story! I literally saw "Inside Out" yesterday, thought "Hey, maybe I could write a fanfiction on this!" and wrote this first chapter last night. Now, as I just have a general idea on where this story is going, I'm not quite sure how often the updates will be, or how long it will be before I finish this story. But you can be sure on one thing: I will NOT give up this story. I'm actually sort of basing it off of a problem I've found in my own life that I've sort of overcome. . . but still wish it wasn't there. By the way, if you can, please make sure to review and tell me what you think! :) Should I change anything? Does the story not make sense? Do I have any grammatical errors? Thanks, guys! :) (And a favorites and follows are much appreciated, too.)

Disclaimer: I do not own anything from "Inside Out," only any OCs and the actual plot of this story.

~MagicFireTiger

Chapter One

Meg's Surprise

Riley Anderson sighed with relief as she stared out of the car window. The scenery flashed past her in a confusing blur—the farther away the trees, lampposts, and buildings were, the slower she seemed to pass them—but when they came right next to her, it was a split second before a bush replaced a passing tree. She was going home, at last—away from San Francisco, and back to Minnesota—back to her best friend, Megan (Meg, for short) Harper—back to her old neighborhood, her old home, her old room—since her parents had had their old house for rent, and the family previously renting from them in it had left already—and her old hockey team. Sometimes, she thought, old wasn't the best thing, but right now, when old was the only thing familiar to her, she was happy with it. Because she was going to a place that was old to her—home.

And Riley was so close to it. She could remember entering the airplanes that would take her eastward, stepping off them into the breeze and sunlight, an overcast morning, or once, the pouring rain, like it had been mere seconds ago. She closed her eyes and seemed to take one last look at her house back in San Francisco once more with a sense of giddy anticipation. She hadn't exactly had the time of her life back there—the feelings of humiliation, longing, and recklessness that had led her to nearly running away back to Minnesota had been hard to deal with. It had seemed like, during that small stretch of time, she hadn't felt any joy at all.

But that didn't matter now, because Riley was going back home.

She was itching to play some hockey again—she hadn't done it for ages, not since that horrific evening at the tryouts in San Francisco. It felt like it had been years and years. And she wouldn't be able to get back onto the rink for another few days. . . . First of all, there was all that unpacking to do (the moving truck had been sent back home from Texas the day the Andersons had decided they were moving back to Minnesota). Then, of course, was the fact that practice wasn't even scheduled until Monday, and today was Friday.

But that would not let Riley down. She would be patient . . . at least, she would try.

Riley sighed again and opened her bright blue eyes. She almost jumped in shock at the sight in front of her—because right now, her family was turning down the street back to their house.

Leaves sprinkled the sidewalk along the row of houses her family lived on. Across the street from her home was a park, with a lake nearby it—the lake, the one Riley had skated on with her parents every winter since she was old enough to walk. And then she saw it. Her house, with its one floor, yellow walls, roses seeming to flow out of the flowerbeds by the windows like lava—just like she had left it just weeks ago. It was small (though of course, her family wasn't exactly that big), but it was perfect.

"Aaaand . . . here we are!" said Mr. Anderson. Riley could tell that he was smiling from the way he said it, even if she could not see it, because though there was a mirror that reflected her father's face back at her from the front seat, she was too busy staring at the door slamming open from the house on the exact right of her own.

Riley's best friend in the entire world, Meg Harper, had run out of it, wild, curly red hair, glasses and all. Without even waiting for the car to come to a complete stop, she unbuckled herself and leapt out of it, running right towards her friend.

"MEG! MEG! MEG!" she shouted out to her.

"RILEY! RILEY! RILEY!" Meg sprinted with equal speed and enthusiasm right towards Riley, waving her arms about like crazy, and they met right on the grass separating their houses from each other.

They gripped each other in a hug that took the breath out of both of them, and then pulled apart, beaming broadly. The two best friends were back together at last—Riley, short blond hair shining in the sunlight, light blue eyes twinkling, and Meg, curly red hair up in a ponytail at the top of her head, light blue eyes wide with excitement.

"I feel like I haven't seen you in forever!" Meg giggled.

"I know!" Riley breathed.

They stared at each other for a couple of seconds, and then Meg grabbed Riley's hand and started pulling her into her house.

"Come on, come on, come on, Riley!" she exclaimed. "I wanna show you something!"

"Okay!" Riley let herself be pulled along inside the house, into the small hallway, filled with shoes, toys, and the occasional pair of underpants. Meg had a lot of younger siblings—four, in all, except, maybe—

"And . . . here!" Meg exclaimed finally in an excited whisper, and she waved her hand in a dramatic effect, showing Riley the room she had led her to. It was a familiar one—Meg's parents' room, as a matter of fact—and inside it was a sight that made Riley's eyes go wide in astonishment.

Unknown to Riley, inside her head, her emotions were very busy making sure that she was happy, sad, un-poisoned, safe, and being treated fairly all at the same time.

There was Joy, the life of the party—blue hair pulled into a bun at the top of her head, bright, glowing yellow skin, small green dress, and enormous blue eyes. Then there was Sadness, who was to say, in every which way, blue—her turtle-neck shirt, pants, square body, skin, hair, eyes—you name it. There was also Disgust, who was, similarly to Sadness, one single color—but green. She had very long eyelashes, short green hair, green skin, and a very thin body. There was Fear, who had a very oddly shaped body—he wore a suit, was very purple, had one single strand of hair, and somewhat resembled a noodle with limbs. And then there was Anger—and short, stout emotion, colored red, who had the ability to make flames on the top of his head.

For the past several minutes, they had all been feeling very excited (with Riley) at the prospect of her going back home—at least, in their own ways. And now, upon seeing the thing that made Riley stop in her tracks so abruptly, they all had their own reactions.

"He's so adorable!" gasped Joy.

"Awe. . . ." Sadness's face softened and she gave a small smile.

"It's . . . cute," said Disgust, looking up from examining her hands.

"It's—what is it—can it hurt us?—Oh, wait, no, I don't think it can—" stammered Fear, "never mind."

"Another one?" said Anger, brows furrowing suspiciously. "Doesn't this girl's family have enough?"

. . . .Through Riley's eyes, they were all staring at a little baby held in Meg's mother's arms. Bundled in a small blanket, the baby boy was sucking on the bottle held by his mother.

"See? See? See?" Meg said in excited whispers, bouncing up and down on the balls of her feet.

"I . . . wow, Meg. Your mom had the baby!" was all Riley could say.

"I know, right? It was just last week, I wanted to tell you, but, you know. . . ." Meg's voice trailed off. Riley was certain she was remembering, as well as she was, the night when she had shoved her away while video chatting. They had made up since, talking on the phone and video chatting again, but that moment was still a bit awkward to remember.

Fear had jumped back after Riley made that last comment, because he had forgotten that Meg's mother had been expecting a baby for a while now, and then spun around in agitation, accidentally grabbed a green memory, before placing it in the memory ball beam.

The others turned around.

"Fear!" exclaimed Joy.

"Sorry, you know how that stuff happens!" Fear apologized fretfully.

"Well, now we've gotta get a better memory," said Joy. "Let's see. . . ."

"How about this?" Sadness walked over to the shelf of memories behind them and picked out a blue one.

Too preoccupied deciding what memory to use, Joy hadn't noticed what Sadness was doing until the screen before them had become blue.

"Wha—wait, Sadness!"

It was right at that moment that Meg's mother noticed that the two girls were at the doorway to the room.

She smiled. "Hello, girls. It's good to see you again, Riley! Come and meet our new addition to the family, little baby Ethan."

As she and Meg walked into the room, a fresh wave of memories swept over Riley. She felt a pang in the pit of her stomach as she thought back to nearly five years before, when something she wished had never happened, did.

Her mother and father had sat her down at the dining table to tell her something. She had felt both scared and excited at that time. Were they going to go on a vacation? No, her parents' faces were too serious for that. But they had looked excited and nervous, too. Had they won the lottery? Wait, no, her parents didn't do the lottery. What had happened, then, seven-year-old Riley had wondered, to make them look like they did?

They had then both exchanged looks before giving her the news that in several months, she would be a big sister to a new baby sister or brother. They had also told her that it would be best not to tell anyone until several months later, not because it would be dangerous or anything, but because if anything happened, like a miscarriage, then they would have to tell too many people that they weren't having the baby. Riley had asked what a miscarriage was, and they explained to her.

So the next weeks had gone by as usual, Riley taking care not to tell anyone (though she wished so hard she could tell Meg, because she had always told Riley whenever she was having a new baby brother or sister). And then one day, her mother said she needed to go to the doctor, and Riley had started to worry. Then her mother came home and said that the baby wasn't going to make it.

And then, Riley had cuddled up with her mother on the sofa and they had cried together. She hadn't even seen the baby, and yet she was feeling very sad. Maybe that was part of the reason why she was feeling so sad. She hoped she (because even though it had been too early to tell, in her heart of hearts had known that it was a girl) was happy in heaven now.

"Okay . . . gotta replace it with something happy . . . something happy . . ." Joy muttered to herself, and then turned around and deftly grabbed a yellow ball of memory, took out the blue one from the beam, and replaced it with the yellow before running up to the keyboard and pressing several buttons.

Instantly, on the screen in yellow light showed the time when Riley had first held Meg's first baby brother, many, many years ago, and Joy felt satisfied with her work.

Riley hadn't realized that she had started tearing up a bit until she stopped. Thinking back to that time when she had first held baby Ethan's oldest brother in her arms comforted her, and she smiled down at the now watchful baby.

"Do you wanna hold him?" Meg asked excitedly.

Riley nodded. "Yeah!" She was glad her voice didn't have that edge to it she tended to get whenever she was on the verge of tears.

Meg's mother held out the baby, who had the same brown eyes as his mother, and Riley took him gently into her arms. She smiled again and rocked him gently, knowing that all she needed for a baby sibling of her own was right here. . . . Though in her heart of hearts, she knew that she would never, ever give up her longing for a baby brother or sister of her own.

A/N: Thanks for reading, guys! :) By the way, if you're interested in "Frozen" and/or "Tangled" fanfiction, feel free to check out my first fanfiction series (still in progress, on the second book), called "The Cousins." The first book is called Ice Meets Fire, and the second one, which I am in the middle of writing right now, is called The Wolf. Thanks, guys! :)