Disclaimer: I own neither Reno nor Axel...*cry* Or anyone else for that matter.

There is no way you just told me that... There's no way it's true, either... You simply have to be joking about it...

Right?

There was some expected trepidation upon my first meeting with the soon-to-be object of my every thought. I mean, people as gorgeous as he just don't appear in your life every day. My only option that first day was to just lie low and not be seen. Good luck with that, said fate. We, Rude and I, that is, had been running around town getting stuff for the beginning of school that week. I, being somewhat new to the area, was being all but led on a leash through the rather large and accomodating mall, buying clothes, pencils, pens, paper, pocket protectors, everything that I could possibly want or need for a couple full years of schooling. The problem was, I would only be here for a couple months at best. Rude didn't seem to care, if he even noticed at all. He just kept on trucking, and I knew my cousin well enough by then to know that he wouldn't leave the matter alone until he had had his fill of shopping and stores (and staring longingly at the many girls who thought him homosexual for doing such a feminine thing).

You see, the thing is, I didn't really mind overmuch, because he wasn't the only one who was staring longingly --I had long been accustomed to being stared at by all progeny of people hoping to find that special someone. Those few who do catch my eye are usually only in my presence for a minute or two before they scamper off to squeal to their friends about having caught my attention. This time, however, I was the one who scampered off to do my own squealing.

There was really only one reason he even made me pause. There I was, standing with Rude, looking at backpacks, and in my peripheral I saw this red blur. I thought it was a mirror, but why would there be a mirror in this part of a store?

Of course, there are some places where they have them everywhere just to be weird, but this wasn't one of those places. I turned away from Rude's excited droning about these really popular new backpacks, and did a double take. It wasn't a mirror, because there was no way my hair was that spiky. I stood there like a moron trying to make sense of this kid standing a couple aisles away, looking like me. Reality slapped me in the face when the blonde beside him noticed my idiotic slackjaw and pointed me out to him.

He turned and my world seemed to turn with him. God, those eyes... I wanted to leave right then and there, but then he waved and smiled like a freakin' cat and it was so cute I turned the color of my hair. His eyebrow rose as I grinned like a maniac; ducking behind the shelf, I grabbed my still-jabbering cousin and darted out of the store, mumbling that we had done enough shopping for the day.

All my efforts to avoid him after that were for naught. The next few days we had before school started were spent at the library. Yes, I do go there every once in a while. Books have been my only real friends all my life, yo, other than Rude. Anyway, I was picking up a book called The Blood Confession to read for like the billionth time. It's a historical fiction about Elizabeth Bathory; the chick was a countess in the seventeenth century who thought that bathing in the blood of virgins would keep her young and beautiful. Again, anyway I had picked up this book and was checking it out when I looked over and saw the kid from the mall in the line next to me. Startled, I failed to notice the line moving forward and the lady must have called me up a few times because she sounded a little miffed when I finally answered. I handed her the book and my card and she scanned it in, but frowned after a few moments.

"I'm afraid you have a fine of over twenty-five dollars. I can't let you check anything out on this card until you pay at least half that off."

"What? Really, yo?!" The lady nodded and asked if I wanted her to put the book on hold. "No, I'll just go put it back." Oi, I thought. As I climbed the stairs, I noticed my look-alike was following me.

"You know, I could get that for you," he said as we entered the microfilm veiwing room.

"I don't even know your name, yo, and besides, I have a better way to deal with this." I kept my eyes averted from his as I sat down at a table and began to flip through the book.

He laughed. "The name's Axel. And what plan is this?"

"You'll see." I said quietly, still flipping pages slowly. The room was silent for a few minutes. Then, "Aha! You're mine now, yo!" I pulled the magnetic strip out of the book and crumpled it up. "Ow! Fuck," I drew the bleeding finger to my mouth and sucked on it. The sharp metal edge of the strip had cut into my finger, leaving a deep crevice about a quarter innh into the flesh. Beside me Axel gulped and covered his mouth, looking away. "Heh, blood shy are we?" I laughed, my unease forgotten for the moment.

"You could say that." His face moving back into calm bit by bit, he scooted away some and asked, "Won't they know you took it?"

"Nah. Since you can check out books on both floors, the downstairs people think you got it upstairs, and the upstairs people will assume you're checking it out downstairs. And then there are the U-Scan thingies on the basement level." I got up and wrapped the bloodthirtsy magnetic strip in a kleenex and threw it in the trash on my way out. On the stairs, I stuffed the book in my bag. We started to walk out the door and I was scared shitless when the beeper went off. I was in the process of working out a believable story and halfway back through the doorway when I noticed the book in Axel's hand.

He laughed; I got red. "Forgot I hadn't checked this out yet," he held the book up, smirking. "I'll be right back."

The alarm stayed silent when I went outside this time. I didn't bother to wait for the other redhead as I made my way home.

"Alright, alright, I'm good to go, yo!" I was shouting this at my nearly-deaf-and-overly-careful aunt as she fettered over my and Rude's clothing and school packs. "I'm gonna be late if you bother me any more, you madwoman!" Having escaped her grasp, we headed for the school at breakneck speed. I ended up walking into the first class ten minutes late anyway.

Apparently, it didn't matter all that much, seeing as the teacher wasn't there either.

"Dude," I turned to the silver-haired kid beside me. "Is the teach always this late for his own class?"

The kid, Kadaj by his school ID, just glared daggers, then went back to his book. Apparently it wasn't right for the new kid to talk to someone like him.

"Oh, it's okay," came a voice behind me. I turned around and saw a girl with long black hair. She was wearing a lot of leather, the top half of which barely contained huge jugs. Seriously, those things had to be frickin' size triple D. Anyway, she continued, "He and his brothers are the wrong crowd anyway. They-"

"-went missing for like three months last year," The girl on my other side picked up where she had cut the other off midsentence. She leaned in conspiratorially, "Their oldest brother got arrested and everyone thinks they broke him out."

I just sat staring at her for a moment, taking in the short dark hair and delicate features. I looked back at the one behind me, then asked, "You're related, aren't you?"

"Cousins," they chorused, smiling.

"Yuffie."

"Tifa."

"And I'm Leon." My head whipped around at the sound of an attractive male voice. The guy came up to me and extended a hand. I took it and told them my name.

"Reno, yo." I barely had time to smile before the teacher walked in.

"Mm..." I could sense that he was close by. A room and a half over, in fact. And very yummy-smelling. I looked in the general direction and got a glare from a certain blonde. I turned to the water elemental, a smirk upon my lips. "Jealous, are we? Oh don't worry, I won't let him spoil what we have." I leaned over to Demxy's side o our shared desk, running a finger along his jawline, lifting his chin. His bright blue eyes glared defiance while my own teal ones exuded a genteel attitude.

"I sure as hell hope not." he pouted, leaning up to peck me on the lips.

Glad that we had independent study first period, I went back to my ponderings. The redhead was simply endearing. He looked as if he were hiding a hell of a story...

"Here, think about this instead of him," Demyx mumbled angrily, jabbing a note in my face. It was the handwriting that stopped me cold. His parents wanted to see him.

"That's never good," I quipped. "What, do they want to-"

"They want me to sit and act like I don't exist, that's what they want me to do. Assholes." he turned back to his papers abruptly, scorn plain on his face. "I think they know about you. And me. Us. They want to keep me at home from now on."

"What? Why? I mean, how? They don't even know I exist, they..." I looked around the room, ran through lists in my head. There was no one who could have alerted them. No one. Unless... "Did-"

"I did nothing! SO glad you have so much confidence in me. Jesus, why the hell would I tell them? Honestly, I'm betrothed to some chick I've never seen, and if I fuck that up my whole family name goes down the drain, Axel. Down. The. Fucking. Drain." He looked away; I looked down. The music sheet was screaming in agony under his hand. I gently pulled it out and smoothed it down, frowning.

"That's not what I was going to say." I said slowly, my eyebrows coming together. "Never mind. Here," I handed back the paper and stood to go. "They'll be glad to have you back. Someone else to hate the world alongside them. I'll see you later."

"But class isn't over... "

I raised a brow as the clock suddenly flew forward. "It is now."

"Ah, food!" I grinned widely, staring almost maniacally at the tower of pizza slices on my tray. I had only bought three, but it turned out that no one else liked it, so they gave theirs to me.

"Yes, food." Tifa and Yuffie agreed. They gave me an incredulous look, then sat across the table from me. "Uh, Reno, have you by any chance noticed that senior kid who's been staring at you like all lunch peroid?" Yuffie leaned in conspiratorially. "He's kinda cute, too..." Leon, who had come up just in time to hear the last, frowned slightly.

I didn't pay any attention, however; my focus was on my food. I love pizza. It smells good, looks great, and tastes better. I even learned how to make pizza so I could have it whenever I want (assuming I had the money for the ingredients). I sighed a tiny bit at the thought of cooking. I love to cook. Food is my world, and without it, I would just die. And not just because one needs food to survive, either. I reached for my fourth slice of pizza. My hand met empty air.

"What the hell, yo?! Gimme my food back! Who dunnit!! RAWR!" I ranted, half trying for laughs and half pissed. Leon grinned like a maniac until Tifa gave me my tray back, giggling.

"You weren't listening, were you? Yuffie said-"

"I heard what she said! Don't steal people's food, yo. It's just wrong on so many levels." I took a huge bite. "A yeah, I saw him. I'm just choosing to ignore him right now in favor of edible things." They looked at me as if I were speaking french. I shrugged, finishing the pizza, "I don't chase. If he wants to talk to me, he'll have to find the balls to come to me. And neither 'kinda' nor 'cute'. 'Very' and 'gorgeous'."

They looked at each other, giggled, and told me they'd see me later, that they were going to class. Leon sat beside me for a moment, watching them go.

"You don't talk much, do you?"

He shook his head in reply, then waved as he headed to his own class. That left me and the grapes on my tray, which I piled into my mouth as I headed out the door.

A/N: I realize, re-reading this, that I wrote Reno very ADD... Hmm. I think it suits him. And I figure that Demyx, as much as he jokes around, he just has to be covering up some major issues. So he's a bit darker than most people write him to be. Let me know what you think, people. ^-^