'I find it kind of funny, I find it kind of sad.
the dreams in which I'm dyin' are the best I've ever had.
I find it hard to tell you 'cause I find it hard to take
When people run in circles it's a very, very
Mad world'
-Mad World, Tears for fears.
Out of the corner of his eye, Davis watched Takeru and Hikari, famously dubbed Takari by the other students due to them being inseparable, cuddle on the bleachers. They were there to watch his soccer practice and support him. But much to his dismay, he truthfully wished that they weren't. In reality, he wished that he had never met the duo in the first place. Because up until now, all they had done was bring him pain. He could pretend to be okay with their relationship all he wanted, but everytime they kissed, everytime they hugged, everytime they showed up together, it hurt Davis's heart in a way that he wished he never had to feel. He was never okay with the fact that the one girl he had ever loved rejected him, no matter how lovingly and sweetly she did it. But for the sake of his friendship with the two, he was forced to accept the fact that he might not ever be with her.
Hikari waved at the brunette and Takeru gave him a thumbs up, mouthing 'good luck' to his friend. Davis gave them a cheeky smile and held two thumbs up as he ran over to the field. As much as he despised their relationship, he valued their friendship even more. Takeru was like a shining beacon of hope, he never failed to make his friends feel better if they were having a bad day. He supported them no matter what they chose to do and would be their shoulder to cry on if they needed one. Davis might have had his bad days with the blonde, but he never doubted how much of a great friend he could be when he let him be one. To Davis, Hikari was an entire different story and situation. She was just a delight to be around. She brought light to the room, she made you happy. She made Davis happy, no matter what she did. She was special. In his eyes she was perfect. He could find nothing wrong with her, not one flaw no matter what she did. But sadly, she didn't seem to feel the same way about him. Sure, she loved him. But Hikari loved everyone. She just couldn't hate, she wasn't capable of having resentment in her heart. He was grateful that she loved him the way she did, but she didn't love him the way he loved her. She didn't love him the way she loved Takeru. And that would keep him awake hours through the night at times..
The coach blew on his whistle, signaling the start of practice. Davis sighed, pushing away his thoughts for now.
Mimi pursed her lips, gently taping the tip of her pencil against the table surface. Shifting her eyes, she concentrated on the paper before her, trying to recall how to answer the equation on the sheet - Izzy had just explained it to her a few minutes ago. With a sigh, the strawberry blonde dropped her pencil and rolled her eyes. None of it made sense to her, algebra would always be her weakest subject and she never seemed to be able to get any better at it no matter what she tried. But she had to try her hardest. She closed her eyes and leaned her head back, her dad's voice echoing through her mind. If you fail again, I'm going to send you to live with your aunt back in New York. I'm tired of your inability to do well at school, maybe being far away and being cut of will teach you a thing or two. She hadn't told anyone about her father's threats, she nerve talked about her family or home life. It wasn't something she was comfortable speaking about, no matter how close she was to anyone.
"Mimi?" Izzy called, bringing her back to reality. "Come on, it's not that hard. I'll help you out." He offered, grabbing a hold of her sheet. For over an hour, the pair sat in the library and studied - or attempted to. Mimi's concentration was very short, one minute she'd be focused, the next she'll be staring at the chair infront of her, completely zoned out. But Izzy never gave up, trying again and again to help her out. She just never listened.
Mimi sighed even louder, scooting over to the red headed genius beside her. Placing a gentle hand on his arm, she smiled. "Thanks Izzy, you're the best. I don't know what I would do without you."
Izzy blushed. He lowered his gaze and concentrated on answering the problems in front of him. "Y-Yeah, no problem, Meems. You know I'm here for you."
"You're a great friend, you really are."
Friend. The word was like a knife stabbing him over and over right into his heart. As grateful as he was that he was able to mean so much as a friend to Mimi, he wanted to be more. Why couldn't she see how hard he fell for her? He must have gotten too good at hiding it. "Thanks, Meems." He mumbled, almost too low for her to hear him. He tried to ignore the hand placed on his arm, but it was physically and mentally impossible. He pulled his sleeve up and wiped the sweat off of his forehead with his free hand. That's what happened when he got too close to her, he would start sweating even if it was the coldest day of the year. He'd lose focus and his words would start to not make sense anymore. Nothing made sense when he was with her. He was a geek - a nerd. He spent his free time studying and finishing the rest of the semester's homework before it was even assigned. He was skinny, almost boney. His red hair stuck up in all the wrong places, making it as shaggy as possible. He never knew how to dress, his mother still helped him pick out what to wear every morning. It blew his mind at times how easy it was for him to fall in love with her more and more each day. One day, he'd have the courage to tell her. But he knew that it was impossible - completely impossible for her to ever feel exactly the same way he felt about her. Because even if she did feel a certain way towards him, it would never compare to the feeling he got and the happiness she brought to him.
"So, how's it going?" He asked, with a nervous smile. "What's up?" He asked again, mentally giving himself a wedgie. There was no need to ask twice, boy-genius.
"Oh, nothing really. Everyone is so busy these days, no one really has time to hang out anymore." She replied, biting her lip. "I haven't seen anyone in the past few days, really." She always bit her lip when she lied.
Izzy raised a ginger eyebrow, Mimi was biting her lip. He knew her inside and out, he could tell she was lying. But why would she lie about something like that?
"Oh? Neither have I, really. Except for the younger kids. I usually watch Takeru practice after school."
Mimi pouted "I feel guilty about that, I haven't talked to any of them in a while." She leaned closer, hovering over Izzy as he worked. "I miss them, actually."
Izzy tried his best to avoid looking up, trying to concentrate as much as he could on algebra. But unfortunately, it wasn't easy to ignore someone like Mimi. "Yeah, I was thinking that maybe we could all spend spring break together - you know, bond?"
Mimi's eyes grew wide and her lips curled into a sly smile. "Izzy, you're a genius." She exclaimed, pulling out her phone immediately.
Davis stuffed the last piece of meatloaf into his already full mouth. He looked down at his now empty plate and sighed, wishing that it could magically fill up with all of his favorite foods. Licking the flavour off of his fingers, he reminded himself that life wasn't that easy.
"Are you done inhaling your food?" Yolei asked from across the table with a hand over her eyes. "Can I look now?"
Davis gave the purple haired girl a sarcastic smile - one that she couldn't see - and managed to blurt out a yes from his full mouth. giggling, Hikari reached over and lended the soccer player a napkin. "Don't talk with your mouth full, silly." She said, receiving a cheeky smile in return.
"So did you guys hear?" Yolei asked, picking at the meatloaf infront of her. When she was younger, she always thought that the story about how the school's cafeteria's food always tasted terrible was just a cliché. When she actually got to high school, she realised how wrong she was. She winced, remembering some of the absurd affects the food had had on her before.
"Hear what?"
Yolei swallowed a hard, cold piece of meatloaf and instantly regretted it. She pushed the plate aside, over to Davis, who gratefully accepted her offer with a hungry look on his face. "There's an exchange student coming to school." She replied, focusing on Hikari in attempt to avoid watching Davis devour the food again. Then again, she had no one to blame but herself. She's the one who supplied the monster with more.
"Oh, that's cool." Hikari said, turning her focus to her boyfriend seated beside her. "Did you hear that, Takeru?" She asked. But Takeru's mind was somewhere else.
Hikari followed his gaze until her eyes rested on what he had been looking at. There he stood, a few tables away. She watched her older brother Tai flirt with a blonde, ditzy girl. The way they were flirting was a bit too close for comfort. Hikari looked away and wrinkled her nose in disgust. She knew that her brother had been around, but she didn't want to watch it. "It's disgusting, ever since him and Mimi broke up that's all we've seen." She groaned.
"Yeah, I feel kind of bad for him." Takeru added, peeling his eyes off of the sight of Taichi and the blonde ditz. He remembered back when his girlfriend's older brother and Mimi were a couple. They were in love alright, but it was a bitter-sweet romance. Despite their love for each other, something never failed to tear between them. The fights, the jealousy, the grudges and the broken trust. Eventually, they figured that if they didn't stop when they did, their feelings for each other would cause a strain in their friendship, one that was not easily repaired. Preferring not to lose one another, they both ended it on good terms, promising to forget the past and not let how each of them acted while in the relationship define them later on. But ever since the two of them broke up, Tai has jumped from one girl to another. He'd made it through the cheer squad, the girl's volleyball team and every female on the school council. He was worried about him, and he knew that both Hikari and Matt were as well. "Have you talked to him about it?"
Hikari shook her head as she stared at her frozen meatloaf. "No, I've opted to stay out of it." she muttered. "Change of subject, please?"
Takeru nodded, smiling and wrapping an arm around his girlfriend. He watched her, taking in how beautiful she looked to him. Leaning his head against hers, he played with the strands of her hair. "So what about this new exchange student?" He wondered.
"Supposedly, she's from France. I wonder if you know her, 'Keru." Yolei offered.
Takeru chuckled, "Just because I spent a summer in France with my grandfather doesn't mean that I know everyone from there, Yolei." He noted, breaking away from Hikari and settling in his seat.
"True."
Across the cafeteria, Sora and Matt walked in hand in hand. They had both just finished classes for the day and had agreed to meet there with Mimi. Supposedly, she had some big idea she wanted to share with everyone. Everyone. Matt wrapped an arm around Sora's shoulders and the red head leaned her head on the blonde's shoulder. She licked her lips, suddenly aware of all the people watching them. Girls across the cafeteria eyed her, she even spotted some pointing. She knew that ever since she started dating Matt, she'd become more and more unpopular among the school's female population. If high school were a sea, Matt would be the rarest fish in it. "Hey, there's my brother." Matt said, noticing Takeru and his friends seated at their usual lunch table. Sora smiled, just the chance she'd been looking for. She'd been trying to find a way to spend some time with the younger teens, hoping to run into them at any chance. Eagerly, Sora yanked her boyfriend's hand and marched towards the table in the middle of the cafeteria. Sora and Matt took a seat next to the others, startling them. "Hey guys, it's been a while." She said, looking around.
Yolei beamed, happy to see one of her role models. "Hey Sora, Matt! Long time no see. I've missed you guys."
Sora nodded, reaching over to pat Yolei on the back. "You too, Yolei."
"Did you guys get Mimi's message? She said that she wanted to meet us here." Taichi said, walking over to the table. Hikari eyed the blonde he had been flirting with. She was now by the doors, flirting with yet another soccer player. It seemed that she had been making her way through the soccer team.
"Yeah. She's not here yet." Hikari noted, avoiding her brother's gaze. Taichi arched an eyebrow, dumbfounded by his sister's cold behaviour. He wondered if she was upset with him. Almost on cue, Mimi and Izzy raced through the cafeteria doors (Something that would play on Taichi's mind later.) Holding a tight grip on the redheaded genius' hand, she almost sped towards the table everyone else had been seated at with an excited, enthusiastic look on her face. Her short, silky skirt flew as she ran, catching the attention of many of the males seated in the cafeteria. She even earned herself a few whistles.
Takeru's lips curled into a smile, seeing how sweaty and nervous Izzy seemed having Mimi's grip on his hand. Being one of the only two people who knew of Izzy's love for the girl, he couldn't help but feel ambiguously sorry for the guy. "So what is it that you wanted to talk to us about, Meems?" Hikari asked once the duo had been seated.
"I have a great idea." She exclaimed, tightening her grip even more on Izzy's hand. She had not let it go yet, even after being seated.
"Oh, dear god no." Tai joked, rolling his eyes. Mimi punched him in the arm, as hard as a one-hundred-and-ten pound girl could. "Didn't feel it."
Ignoring the jock seated by her, Mimi continued. "Okay, guess what?" She asked.
"What?"
"We're all going to spend spring break together at my Dad's cabin."
A/N: mahwish1, blueberrykisses, koumi-locc, thanks for the reviews. I'd like to clear something up, I'm using the original japaneese names, with the english dub names serving as merely nicknames. R&R!
