This is just a funny crack fic I've been wanting to write. (At least, I find parts of it funny...) There are characters all over the place and in random places, but at least they're there! haha i.e., Rufus is running Shinra, and yet some of the Turks are still teenagers. Things like that. Oh, and OCs abound. There's, like...two, I think. *sweatdrop* Anyway, hope it's not too confusing, and you get a good laugh out of it ^.^

I first got the idea for this story when I saw some amazing artwork on deviantART by *chibiasta. (Go to my profile to see the picture links.) They depicted Zack, Cloud, Tifa, and Aerith as students at a place called Shinra Academy. The thought of a fanfic was just too good to pass up.

Some parts of the story are based on the movie Sixteen Candles (LOVE), like the main OC's siblings' names, and things like that. Other parts are slightly based on the movie Better Off Dead (also LOVE). The title is taken from a song I used to listen to a lot... *sweatdrop* It just seemed fitting. The title may change, though, so watch out for that.

Lastly, I do not own Final Fantasy VII, Sixteen Candles, Better Off Dead, the song the title's taken from, or any of the characters and dialogue involved. But a girl can dream, can't she?

But enough of all that. Let's get to the story, shall we? Enjoy! ^.^

-Chapter 1-
or, I Thought It Would Be Just Another Day

I pulled my grey sweater vest over my head, then raised my hands to smooth down my hair. I walked over to the mirror in my room, tying the red ribbon around the collar of my white button-up shirt. I smoothed down my red pleated skirt, and looked at my reflection. I bit my lower lip, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear, my silver wing earrings swinging around and gently touching my cheeks. I sighed, twisting the silver ring on my left ring finger and shaking the silver watch on my right wrist down my arm. I sighed again as I adjusted the necklace around my neck -a silver cassette tape, bedazzled with white crystals.

I ran a hand through my brown hair, looking at the highlights that had become even more blonde over vacation. I leaned close to the mirror and smoothed my black eyeliner, checking to make sure the whites of my eyes didn't look bloodshot from my late night on the computer. It really didn't matter whether they were or not, anyway. No one looked long enough to notice. If they did look, all the usually noticed was that I had blue eyes, if they saw that at all.

But they didn't see that my eyes were blue-green, and sometimes changed color in different light. They didn't see the faint scar below my mouth on the left side from where a dog had bit me when I was little, or the scar on my knee and the ones on my legs from falling on asphalt when I was a kid. They noticed that my fingernails were alternated two different colors all the time, but just long enough to call it "weird" that I didn't just paint them all one color.

They also noticed when I tripped and ran into walls and things, but just long enough to laugh, not to see if I was actually hurt or not.

I pinned a red hair ribbon in my hair, and sighed a third time. "As always," I said quietly, "this is as good as it's gonna get."

I pulled my red sneakers on my feet, then grabbed my phone, iPod, notebook, pens, and pencils and put them in my black bookbag. The bookbag emblazoned with the Shinra logo, and filled with red books with the same symbol printed on them, felt much heavier than usual that morning.

"Breakfast," my mom said in the same tone she used every morning as I walked by the kitchen.

I grabbed an apple from the bowl on the table and held it up for her to see.

She sighed. "Honey, why don't you ever sit and eat breakfast anymore? I know how hungry you are in the morning..."

"She's not eating 'cause she thinks she's fat," my brother snorted.

I glared at him, then shuffled over to smack him in the back of the head.

"Ow!" he cried dramatically.

"Get over it, wimp," I snapped. "I do not think I'm fat."

"I should hope not," my sister said, coming down the stairs from her room. "You're skinny as a rail as it is now."

"Ginny..." Mom breathed in annoyance.

"And flat as a board." My brother laughed hysterically at his "joke", almost knocking over his bowl of cereal in the process.

I swear, if looks could kill, my brother would've turned into a pile of dust right then and there.

"Michael!" Mom snapped.

It was so hard to get a word in edgewise with my siblings around.

I sighed. "I'm just not hungry this morning, Mom," I assured her. "You know how much of an appetite I usually have. I'm fine." I turned and headed toward the door.

"Kelsey?"

I stopped and turned back around.

Mom walked over, something in her hand. "Here," she said. "Lunch money."

"Oh, right," I said, taking it and putting it in a zipper pocket in my bag. "Thanks, Mom."

She smiled tiredly at me, running a hand through her messy dirty-blonde hair. "Don't listen to your brother and sister, alright?"

I smiled a little. "Mom, do I ever?"

She laughed softly. "Have a good first day at school, alright?"

I nodded. "I'll sure do my best. Bye, Mom." I kissed her on the cheek. "I love you."

She smiled. "I love you, too. Now go, or you'll miss the train."

I nodded and left the house, my sneakers tapping on the stone steps as I went down them. I turned right down the street, and headed for the train station.

And that was how a typical morning went in the life of me, Kelsey James.

My idiotic little brother was Michael (or "Mike" when we weren't angry with him -which was hardly ever, in case you're wondering). My sanctimonious big sister was Ginny (yes, that was her real name). And I was caught in the middle, convinced I was the only one with any brains between the three of us. Of course, I wasn't saying I was a genius. But compared to them, I might as well have been one.

Mike was the most annoying little brat (I don't want to use the real word I often thought of him as) I'd ever met in my life. He was always making "jokes" about how he thought I saw myself, or how my body looked. I swear, if it wasn't against the law to committ murder, he would've been dead before he'd turned five. Now he was twelve, and I was about ready to carry out my plan for the perfect murder. Unfortunately, he was the only son, so I had to leave someone for Dad to relate to. How Mike and Dad related, I'll never know. It was almost impossible to think that Mike was actually -biologically- part of our family.

Ginny was -I won't sugar-coat this- a ditz. A pompous twit. She was twenty-two, blonde, and thought she was better than everyone in our family, not to mention her large circle of "friends", for lack of a better word. Oh, did I forget to mention that she was dating Rufus Shinra? Yeah, that just put her even higher on the humble meter. Note the sarcasm.

I don't know what Rufus saw in Ginny anyway. Yeah, she was pretty and all that, but she got all the blonde in the family. I wouldn't be surprised if someone X-rayed her head and found that it was empty. But, for whatever reason, Rufus did like her, and came over for dinner with us at least once a week. My parents seemed okay with their relationship. And why wouldn't they be? He was practically the most powerful man in the city. Obviously, Ginny was in this thing for more than his looks. (Hint, hint, his money. Yes, my sister was that shallow. She'd date any guy that told her he was a millionaire, no matter how he looked. And she'd believe him.)

Needless to say, a lot of fighting went on between the three of us siblings. Mom and Dad did their best to keep the peace, but it was hard when I was forced to remain silent most of the time, forced to listen to all their comments about me, the freaky middle child. Until I had so much pent up rage inside of me that I started screaming at them to shut up. Either that, or I would glare at them a lot and then trudge off to my room to cry and beat up my pillows. It was usually the latter those days.

I hated that what they said got to me the way it did. But it seemed I couldn't stop the effects of their words. To make matters worse, they didn't care how it affected me. Ginny would just sit there like, "Oh, you're such a child. I hate telling you these things, but why can't you see that they're true?" And Mike's reasons were anyone's guess. He just liked that he got to me, he didn't care why.

Skinny as a rail, I thought angrily, mocking Ginny's voice in my head. Flat as a board, I continued, mocking Mike's voice as well. I wish I could tie her to a train rail, and him to a board going through a buzzsaw. Then I could laugh maniacally like the bad guys in those old cartoons. You know, the ones who tie girls to railroad tracks and to logs in mills. They've usually got green skin or something and black handlebar mustaches. Things like that.

I stood on the platform, standing out among all the men and women who were wearing mute-colored suits. I saw people look me up and down, vaguely recognizing my uniform. Then they saw the logo on my bag, and it all made sense.

It was all clear on their faces. "Oh. She's a student of Shinra Academy." Some looks were pleased, others indifferent, and still others were annoyed and angry. It was the same every morning. I didn't care much anymore.

A gust of wind rushed past as the train pulled into the station. The quickly moving air scattered scraps of paper, candy wrappers, and old newspapers away from the tracks, swirling and swerving in and around the people on the platform.

The doors to the train opened, and people started filing out the other side onto another platform. Meanwhile, those of us who had been waiting for the train started boarding. The motion detectors inside the doors continually asked for tickets in their robot voices as people passed. The people emotionlessly raised their tickets or passes and put them under the scanner, some not even waiting for the robot's request to be finished. Then the scanner thanked them and kindly asked them to take a seat or hold onto a handrail.

The same every morning. Over and over again.

I took my customary seat near the back of the car, setting my bag at my feet. I took out my iPod and put my earbuds in my ears, canceling out most of the sounds around me. I leaned my head against the cool metal of the train wall, looking out the window at the bustling people.

Sleepy children being tugged along or carried by cajoling parents. Men and women in suits on their cell phones. Homeless men and women panhandling from their places along the walls of the platform. A few kids my age running towards the train's open doors, all of them wearing uniforms like mine. (Exept for the guys, of course, who wore black pants instead of skirts.)

I watched these things as if I were watching a montage in a movie. The music set the background and tone, and it was up to me -the viewer- to take in all the details I could.

"Stand clear of the doors," the robot instructed. "Doors are closing. Train is leaving station."

I watched the people in the station until we pulled away. Then I looked at the partly cloudy sky, still not the vibrant blue I knew it was going to become. The morning sky of Midgar was a sight indeed. It was tinged with the colors of sunrise, the colors reflecting off the ever-present clouds (that came from Shinra's headquarters) and cloaking the stars in light, turning them invisible.

As the train chugged along the tracks, leaving Sector 2 behind and heading for Sector 0, the sky grew a little lighter, showing signs of actually letting the sun appear and officially make it day.

When the robot announced that we had arrived in Sector 0, I took my headphones off and tucked my iPod back away. The brakes screeched as the train stopped, and I stood from my seat. The other Academy students stood as well.

Some of them were dreading another year of high school school. Others were nervous about friends, or the possibility of a pop quiz on the first day, or both. Some were excited to go to school that day, to start anew (or so they thought).

As for yours truly...I wasn't quite sure. It was...just another day of school. I didn't expect it to be any different than the (seemingly) hundreds that had come before it. Another day sitting silently in class, doodling maybe. Another day eating lunch alone, listening to the popular kids laugh and talk about how great they were. Another day of ignoring the comments about me, "the weird loner girl", and the wondering looks they gave me. Which was sure to be followed by a whole year of days that mirrored it down to the most minute detail.

I don't know why none of the other kids approached me, or ever tried to make friends with me. Was I intimidating? Scary? Or was it simply that I was too different for their taste? So I liked sitting alone and writing and drawing and reading. Did that make me a freak?

I lagged along behind the other students, envying their excited talk of vacation and fun times they'd had. I tried not to listen, but it was difficult not to. I wished I had stories to tell beyond how I helped at my parents' bookstore all vacation long. Not that I minded that, but it just didn't make for a very interesting story, you know?

So it's the first day of my last year of high school, I thought as I sat down in my desk in homeroom. I set my bag next to my desk, making sure it was leaning up against my chair and not falling over. Why should I expect anything to be different?

But, with one simple sentence...everything changed.

"Students, I would like to introduce you to our new student..."

Yes, rather short...but I just can't resist a good cliffhanger :) If you liked it so far, let me know! I'll keep posting, though, even if I don't get reviews. 'Cause I've been working and rewriting on this story now for a while, and it's high-time I posted it. *nods* So there. Heh. But I really would love to hear your thoughts on the chapter! Thanks for reading! ^.^