Our next past chapter is here! There is lots of Riku and Xion fluff in this chapter, so be warned - but the chapter is important for the rest of the fic, so keep reading! Enjoy!


~Tuesday, November 1st, 11 months before Xion's death— Kagayami residence, Riku's room, 2:24 a.m.~

Riiiiiiing! Riiiiiiiiing!

Riku groaned when the sound of the phone woke him up from his sleep. Who in their right mind would even think, let alone try, to call him at two o'clock in the morning? He could only think of one person that would: Xion, his two-months girlfriend. About something stupid. But, being the good person that he was, he felt obliged to answer it. Lazily, before his parents woke up, Riku stuck his hand out from under the covers and grabbed the phone off its cradle, putting it up to his ear while still relishing in the comfort of the dark tunnel of his sheets.

"'Ello?"

"Oh, Riku, thank you for answering!" Xion cried on the other end, her voice squeaky and cracking from what Riku thought was crying. "I didn't know… who else to call…"

"Baby, what's goin' on?" Riku asked, turning onto his back and letting the phone dangle by his ear.

"You know," she sniffed, "you know our performance of The Nutcracker is coming up, right?"

"Yeah." Of course he knew, because that was all she talked about. Xion loved ballet, and so did Aqua, but Xion wanted the role of the main dancer in their Christmas production more than anything. Suddenly he realized what she was calling about.

"And, you know how the lead dancers get their parts announced first?"

"Uh-huh."

"Aqua announced last night she got the role of Clara!" Xion shouted into the phone, her cries loud and clear. Riku pushed the phone away from his ear to save his hearing. "And I worked really really hard to try and get the part! Just because Madame said I'm not strong on pointe…"

"Xion, it's alright," Riku cooed into the phone. He hated hearing her like this, so sad and melancholy. "Surely you got another role just as good—"

"Argh! I just hate her so much!" Xion interjected, her cries slowly turning into angry shouts.

"You mean your teacher?" Riku was starting to come awake; he sat up and flipped on his bedside lamp.

"No, Aqua! She's always so much better than me, in everything," Xion replied harshly. "Sometimes I wish I could just wipe her off the face of planet and claim the rightful spot that I deserve as the best and only—"

Riku cut her off. "Don't say things like that, Xion. Aqua would do anything for you. She loves you with all her heart; I've seen it in how she acts toward you. She even helped you with your dancing so that you could try to get the role. I don't think Aqua would want to hear you talk so bad about her when she's only trying to do the best for you. It's not Aqua's fault that she got the role. If you are to be mad at anyone, be mad at your teacher. Not your sister."

Xion sniffed again and Riku could hear a bit of happiness in her voice. "Yeah… I guess you're right…"

"So you're gonna go out there and do your best, no matter which role you get?"

"Yes. I will!" She giggled. "Thank you, Riku."

"No problem. Now get some sleep." Riku started to hang the phone up but he heard Xion's voice again.

"Hey, Riku?"

"Hmm?" He mumbled, fingering with a loose strand of thread on his bedsheet.

"You're still picking me up today for ballet practice?"

"Of course." Riku turned off the light and lay back down in his bed; now he was gonna have to function today with less sleep.

"Okay. Bye."

"Bye." Setting the phone on the cradle, Riku turned back over onto his stomach, letting his long silver hair fan out over the pillow like a peacock's feathers. Xion was becoming increasingly more emotional as the date of the ballet production grew closer. He figured it was just nerves, and it would all blow over after the performance at the end of the month. But Riku had also noticed how his girlfriend had started to place a lot of her problems on Aqua, no matter what it was. But maybe girls were just like that. He'd never had a girlfriend before, so he didn't know…

Letting his thoughts turn back into dreams, Riku slowly succumbed to sleep again.


~Tuesday, November 1st, 11 months before Xion's death – Shirakawa School of Ballet, 6:55 p.m.~

Putting the car in park, Riku sighed and leaned back in his seat, gazing up at the ballet studio, with its weathered wood and single large window in the front. He looked at all the girls, their grace and poise as they stood en pointe, not moving a muscle, almost frozen in time at the ballet barre. He knew Xion was that beautiful when she danced, not matter how much she didn't believe it. Then he heard Xion trying to yank open the car door roughly; with another sigh, he unlocked the door and she practically flew out of her seat, bouncing up and down with excitement on the asphalt parking spot next to her.

"C'mon, Riku, let's go! It's cold, class starts in twenty minutes, and I wanna see what part I got!"

Riku motioned for her to meet him on the sidewalk in front of the building, and she did as told as Riku got out on the driver's side and walked up to meet her. He pulled up his jacket on his shoulders and shivered. It was cold, and Xion was probably a Popsicle by now, only wearing a light jacket over her black leotard and pink tights. She grabbed him by his arm and dragged him up the sidewalk, up the steps, and into the wood-warmed lobby of the ballet studio.

The first thing Riku registered was noise. Save for the classical music playing from the dance room by the door and the other room to the left he had been looking in earlier, all Riku heard was the excited chatter of little girls, from very young to high school, crowded around a list posted on a bulletin board by the dressing room. The crowd was so thick that Riku thought he might drown if he got in too deep. He looked down to ask Xion if she wanted to wait out the crowd, but she had already starting elbowing her way in.

Riku chuckled and shook his head. Girls.

"Hey, Riku, welcome to the club!"

The silverette looked left, seeing none other than Ventus sprawled out in one of the lobby chairs. Accompanying him was his dark-haired twin, Vanitas, that sat across from him with a smirk on his face, and Terra Chikyuu, who sat next to Ventus, studying his fingernails like they were the most interesting thing in the world.

Riku took the plush chair next to Vanitas, smiling. "What club?"

Brown-haired Terra sighed. "The my-girlfriend-just-dumped-me-to-go-do-other-girly-things club…"

Ventus kept the chain going, "Or the this-place-totally-ruins-my-masculinity club…"

"Or the I-just-wanted-to-check-out-all-the-hot-girls club." Vanitas finished with a smirk and he blew a kiss at some unsuspecting ladies going into the dressing room; they squealed and Riku rolled his eyes.

"Seriously, guys?"

The Riku's other friends collectively stared at Riku and replied, "Yep."

"I can't believe it!" Came Xion's angry shout. Her pointe shoes were untied on her feet and when she sat down next to Riku she started lacing them around her ankles. "I always get the worst parts!"

"What'd you get, cutie?" Vanitas taunted, leaning forward.

Xion threw a glare at him before saying to Riku, "I'm a Party Child, a Soldier Captain, a Candy Cane, and a Flower. Again!" She finished lacing her shoes and threw her hands up in the air in frustration. "They could at least give me some variety, like, oh, I don't know, being in the Russian dance or being a Snowflake, at least! But noooo… these were the same parts I had doing The Nutcracker in the Land of Departure…" She sighed. "I don't get it."

"At least you won't have to practice as much since you know the steps so well," Ventus offered.

Xion took this moment to glare at him as well. "So what? If I had only gotten Clara…"

"And here come the waterworks," Terra interjected with a smile at Xion.

Riku leered at Terra. He wished he hadn't said that. Knowing Xion…

The raven-haired girl got up and, with the hard toe of her ballet shoe, kicked Terra in the shin. "I really didn't need that right now."

"Can't you take a joke, Shi?" Terra said, rubbing his bruised shin. Xion kicked him again – this time in the stomach – for good measure and then stalked off to the dressing room with her hands in fists. Terra doubled over and slowly raised his gaze to meet Riku's.

"Sorry about that, Riku. I was just kidding…"

"Why are you apologizing to me?" Riku replied; just because Xion was his girlfriend didn't mean he was going to go in a rampage about how mean Terra was, how he shouldn't have done that, how Xion was his girlfriend and he had no right to treat her that way… Riku wasn't like that. He probably never would be. "Go apologize to Xion. She's the one you hurt."

Terra straightened and nodded, leaving to go catch up with Xion before she went into the dressing room, and for a good while there was silence between the remaining three boys. The crowd at the bulletin board slowly dispersed as the girls began to trickle in to the dressing room in preparation for the seven-fifteen Beginning Pointe class – Xion and Aqua's class. Riku sighed as the lobby's quiet became deafening, only being broken when Terra came back and flopped into his chair. Terra was just making a joke… but he knew that Xion was already having a bad day and he could have at least tried to see that. And considering that Terra was Aqua's boyfriend, Xion must have felt like the duo was out to get her. Riku hoped she could be strong and move past the little incident.

The girls came out of the dressing room and went into the studio across the hallway, and that was when Riku stood up and went to the built-in window that overlooked the expanse of the bright studio. Among the girls at the barre, the twins were in their normal places: Xion was on the side of the room nearest the window facing outside and Aqua on the barre by the wall. Riku rested his chin on his hands and watched as they warmed up with stretches, his eyes on Xion the entire time. She was graceful, more graceful than he would ever be if he danced ballet. He closed his eyes as time passed but they snapped open again when the teacher announced, loudly, that it was time to start practice for The Nutcracker and she would go over the steps only once for the lesser parts; he winced. Even though the studio door was open and the teacher was all the way across the room, he could hear her as clear as if she were standing right next to him.

The music started, that familiar tune that everybody who had ever seen anything Christmas related knew. They were dancing the party scene, when the Party Children and Clara would dance with their new dolls – though it was only Clara who had the Nutcracker. His eyes darted back and forth between the Xion and Aqua as they graced the stage, with Aqua front and center and Xion taking baby steps in the crowd of other girls. Riku sighed, closing his eyes again. The girls were both equally talented—

Then he heard screams. Riku opened his eyes as the music stopped and he saw Xion and another girl tangled together on the floor.

"XION SATSUJIN!" The teacher shouted, infuriated. She stomped over to Xion, and waited until she stood up before yelling in her face. "For the last time, the steps are balancè, balancè, frappè, glissade, chassè, arabesque, exit! THERE IS NOT ANOTHER BALANCÉ!"

Xion trembled and mumbled something under her breath. The teacher replied, "Apology accepted. Now if only I could train you to be as good as your sister… From the top, girls!"

Riku saw Aqua go over to her sister and hug her, whispering something in her ear. Xion nodded and retook her spot on the dance floor, and when Riku looked closely, he could see that she was crying.


~Tuesday, November 1st, 11 months before Xion's death –Riku's car, 8: 25 p.m.~

"C'mon, Xion. It's okay…"

"No, it's not okay!" Xion said, sitting in the passenger seat with her arms crossed over her chest. "Stupid, stupid me…"

"You're not stupid. You just messed up," Riku reassured. "Everybody makes mistakes."

"Well, Madame says there's no room for mistakes. And then Aqua, little Miss High and Mighty, came over and told me I did my best. Yeah right. She just said that to make me feel good. But I know she doesn't believe it, she thinks I'm horrible, and so do I!" Then she burst into a fit of tears. Riku tried to reach over the seat and hug her, but she only pushed him away; Riku respected her decision.

After a while the crying subsided and Riku heard Xion shift her position to face him. He looked at her and could barely get her name out his mouth before she had climbed across the seat and forced her lips on his, pressing him against the car door window and entwining her fingers in his long hair. Riku at first tensed but then he relaxed into the kiss. It was his first, and he didn't know exactly what to do. He wrapped his arms around her waist, pulling her closer despite how sweaty she was from practice. For his first kiss, it felt right to share it with Xion. He would never have it any other way. She snaked her tongue into his mouth and he moaned, breathing in all the smells of her, drinking in how she felt against him, taking in everything than made her Xion. In an instant, he realized he had powerful emotions for this girl – and he was ninety-nine percent sure it was love. After being together for the rest of the previous summer and throughout the school year, always going over to each other's houses and sharing ice-cream together, what else could it be? More than simple attraction, he was sure.

They kissed for a long time, the two only stopping to breathe before pressing up against each other again, lips upon lips and two becoming one. Finally Xion was the one who relented, bringing her mouth away from Riku's and resting her head on his chest. Riku looked down at her. She was so fragile and tender, with her short black hair falling in her eyes. Yes, this was the face he would never get tired of seeing.

"Riku…?" Xion asked quietly.

"Yes?"

"I need you… to promise me something."

Riku swallowed, hoping he wasn't making a huge commitment. "What would that be?"

"Promise to never leave me. Promise to always stay by my side. Okay? Because…" Her gaze turned sad. "I really need you."

She held her pinky up to him. Riku didn't want to stop and think, he wanted to say yes, he would, and get it over with. Everything has a consequence. Riku had a feeling this promise he made was going to come back and bite him… and if it did, he wasn't going to let it hang on. I won't break this promise.

As Riku locked pinkies with Xion, she smiled the prettiest smile he had ever seen her give to him.

"Thank you… Riku."


Reviews are appreciated!

~Anais