Author's Note:Sorry about the slight delay in this chapter. I've been really busy with work, and then a rather big... confusion/problem in my personal life, which will hopefully be resolved soon. Anyway, a massive thank you to all of you amazing people who reviewed. You've really kept me going. Instead of curling up under my bedcovers and listening to the Love Actually soundtrack, I came and wrote this chapter for you. I hope you enjoy it!

Disclaimer: I don't own Kingdom Hearts or Apple.

-o-x-chapter eleven-x-o-

Kairi blinked as her alarm sang next to her, twenty-five minutes earlier than usual. She tapped the button on the top of it to turn the noise off, and slid out of bed. It felt strange that she hadn't need to put the alarm on snooze and pull her duvet over her head until it went off again. But then, she had already been awake for an hour. It was strange, whenever you wanted to make your mind blank - and sleep was usually a good way to do this - you never could. Yet, it often goes blank during an awkward conversation when you can't think what to say.

Dragging her feet slightly, she made her way into the bathroom. She turned the shower on and held her hand under the water until the temperature had adjusted properly. She sighed as she stepped under the stream of the slightly-too-hot water, her taunt muscles relaxing.

Selphie thought she was mad to be going to school today. She said she should stay at home, eat chocolate and try to figure out what she was going to do. But, the truth was, she didn't want to have to think about it. When Selphie had come over yesterday, the brunette had done her best to help Kairi to decide what she wanted. Unfortunately, Kairi was so confused that she didn't even know what she wanted.

The only solution she could see to her problem was facing the people involved. She was sure that as soon as she spoke to Riku she would know what she should do where he was concerned. She also felt that as soon as she saw Sora, she would work out what he had meant in his note.

The redhead frowned, digging her fingers into her scalp as she lathered her shampoo into her wet hair. She knew that Sora had brought her home and stayed with her that night, but she couldn't understand what he meant by 'I hope you discover what you really want.' What did that mean? She had decided that it probably meant what she wanted to do about Riku, but she couldn't help but feel a little suspicious that there was an underlying second meaning to his words.

She struggled to remember what they had talked about when he had brought her home. She could remember her trying to kiss him at some point, but that was about it. Everything was so hazy. Once again, she cursed herself for drinking so much.

She shivered as she stepped out of the shower and quickly grabbed a towel. She heard her mother shouting her from downstairs and quickly ran over to her wardrobe, pulling out a t-shirt and skinny jeans.

Her mum was probably wondering why she was up so early. Kairi hadn't actually seen her since Saturday afternoon, so of course it would seem strange; especially when she usually had to be dragged out of bed in time for school.

She paused on her way out of her bedroom. Her hand was hovering over a navy blue hooded-sweatshirt that was on the back of her desk chair. It was Riku's. The redhead bit her lip, she could feel her throat tightening slightly. She closed her eyes for a second, and then spun on her heel. Ripping open her wardrobe door, she found a white one of her own.

She picked up her bag and swung it over her head so the strap settled on one shoulder and went across her body. Brushing her fringe out of her eyes with her free hand she slumped down the stairs.

Her mother was sitting fresh-faced at the wooden kitchen table, a mug of coffee in one hand and a letter in the other. She looked up as she heard Kairi enter the room. "You're up early," she stated, frowning a little.

Kairi kept her head down; she knew her eyes were still slightly red and swollen, not wanting to bother her mum with her problems and also not wanting to talk about it. However, her mum was incredibly perceptive.

"What's wrong, Kairi?"

The redhead shrugged and headed over to the fridge. "I'm fine." Opening the door, she picked up a small bottle of strawberry and banana smoothie. "I've got to go, I'll be late." She put the bottle on the counter and pulled her hoody on over her t-shirt, keeping the hood up.

"Riku's not going to be here to pick you up for another half hour."

"I know," she replied, still not looking at her. "I'll see you when you get back from work." Without another word, she swept out of the house.

Once she was on the other side of her front door, she let out a long sigh. She hated lying to her mum, but she just wasn't ready to face up to what had happened. She had at least another forty-five minutes until she would, and she was going to treasure them. Shoving a pair of headphones roughly into her ears, she let her mind be absorbed into the dulcet tones emitting from her iPod.

She paused on the corner of the street she had met Sora once. For a moment, she considered waiting for him, then get nerves got the better of her and she walked on.

Ten minutes later, she blinked in surprise when she realised that she had just turned onto the street her school was on. She shook her head, snapping herself out of her revive. Squeezing her eyes tight shut for a second, she considered her options. She could either walk into that building with her head held high and face up to what had happened at the weekend, or she could turn right around and run home, holing herself up in her room and putting everything off for another twenty-four hours. And then go through the same process that next day.

And the next.

And the next.

Maybe she didn't really have that much of an option.

She adjusted the strap of her bag and walked timidly into the school. Having arrived half an hour earlier than she usually did, the school seemed quieter and emptier than she had ever seen it. She was so early that the cleaners hadn't actually finished their jobs. Feeling a little unnerved and the stillness of the place, she made her way to her homeroom. Selphie had promised her that she would come in early too, though Kairi had insisted that she didn't have too.

She opened a red door with a small square window at what was supposed to be eyelevel and sat in her normal seat. She fiddled with her figures while she waited for Selphie to arrive, creating a hang nail on her left thumb.

"Kairi!" The redhead jumped as the door burst open and Selphie ran over to her. The brunette sat in her chair next to her and threw her arms around her. "I can't believe you've come into school, you're so brave!"

Kairi extracted herself from Selphie's grasp. "Thanks," she smiled weakly. "I didn't see the point in putting in off though."

The brunette nodded, pityingly. "I guess so. Naminé is coming by the way - I ran into her on my way, she just had to go drop something off at the art department- oh, here she is."

Naminé poked her head around the door and smiled when she saw the two girls, though her eyes were wide with worry. "Hey, how are you doing?"

The redhead shrugged. "I think it's still kind of sinking in."

The blonde came over and sat on the edge of the table between the two other girls, her leg swinging underneath her. "Listen, Kairi. I've got to get this off my chest, I feel terrible..."

Kairi looked up at her, a slightly crease between her eyebrows. "What is it?"

"Well..." She bit her lip. "I was with Riku for a bit, you know, quite a while before I saw you and you asked me if I'd seen him. But he was with Yuna then and she was obviously flirting with him. I'm so sorry, but I just didn't really think anything of it because she flirts with everyone and I'd never have thought that Riku would go along with it. I should have tried to get her to back off or something. I'm so sorry."

The redhead shook her head. "No, don't even feel bad about that. It's not your fault. He shouldn't need someone there to help him resist someone's advances, drunk or not." She squeezed Naminé's hand to reassure her.

"So... have you decided what you're going to do?" Selphie asked, cautiously.

"I know it sounds crazy, but I don't have a clue," she admitted a little sheepishly.

"Well, at least one thing is certain. You're breaking up with Riku," the brunette muttered, scowling. When Kairi didn't say anything, she added, "Right?"

Kairi sighed, and put her head in her hands. "I really don't know what to do. I'm hoping that once I talk to Riku I'll know what to do."

Selphie stared at her shocked. "But, Kairi, you can't want to stay with him after what he did to you! And it's not just that, he doesn't even treat-"

"Selphie, please." Naminé held her hand up to silence the brunette. "This is Kairi's decision; she's got to do what she wants to do. Not what we think she should do."

The redhead looked helplessly at them. "I don't even know what I want to do."

Kairi's eyes widened as she spotted a familiar face half way down the corridor she had just turned onto. She dashed back around the corner quickly, hoping her hadn't spotted her. As much as she had been trying to reassure herself, she wasn't ready to talk to him yet. She leant against the wall and tried to catch her breath, ignoring the strange looks she was getting from passersby and nodding in response to a few people how asked if she was okay.

She pushed herself away from the wall, pulling the bottom of her hoody down and brushing her hair out of her face to help her regain her composure. Just as she was about to walk away, deciding a longer, alternative route to maths class would be necessary, a hand caught her arm, jolting her to a halt.

"You've been avoiding me."

Kairi squeezed her eyes tight shut for a second before turning around and looking at Riku awkwardly. She raised an eyebrow in a manner that clearly implied, 'can you blame me?'

He sighed, and hung his head a little as though he was ashamed. Kairi noticed that he looked a little more dishevelled than usual, there were faint, dark rings underneath his eyes. "I can't even begin to say how sorry I am," he started, taking her hand in his. It should have been a pleading gesture, but Kairi couldn't help but feel as though it was just a way of keeping her there. "Yuna, she meant nothing to me. Nothing. I was- I was just so drunk and I didn't know what I was doing. I love you, Kairi, you know I do. Please, just..." He trailed off, looking pleadingly into her eyes.

"Forgive you?" she finished for him, trying to keep her voice as expressionless as possible, though it wobbled a little.

"It was just one mistake, and we can work things out, right? We can make this go back to how it used to be. Can't we?"

The redhead sighed, taking her hand out of Riku's grasp. "I don't know. It's not just what you did on Saturday. Things haven't been right for a while. I know you've noticed it too." She looked around her, noticing that the corridor was clearing. "Look, can we talk about this later? I've got to get to class." Without waiting for an answer, he stepped passed him and turned around the corner, her arms wrapped tightly around herself.

She felt drained and a little shaken, despite the fact that she and Riku had barely touched upon all that would need to be said. So, what she had hoped would happen certainly hadn't. She still didn't know what she was going to do about Riku, but all her options had suddenly become much clearer, now that she had decided to let them flood into her mind. She shook her head in an attempted to clear her it; she couldn't let herself go into a lesson with so many thoughts about Riku jostling around in there.

Taking a deep breath, she opened the door of her maths classroom, mumbling an apology for being late to Dr. Ansem and rushing over to her seat. She now regretting taking the one second furthest away from the entrance of the room as thirty pairs of eyes watched her as she walked. Dr. Ansem resumed the lesson when she had sat down, though only after he had made a sarcastic comment about her speed.

She twiddled her thumbs nervously while Dr. Ansem finished explaining the work they would be doing this lesson. She knew there was no point in her listening anyway, she still hadn't build up the ability to resist his sleep-inducing tones.

When he had finished and the rest of the class began leafing through their textbooks, Kairi leant forward towards the brunet in front of her. "Hey, Sora," she whispered.

He turned his head to the side so he could see her through the corner of his eye, without drawing the attention of Dr. Ansem, who appeared to be in a worse mood than usual this morning. "Yeah?"

"Thanks you looking after me the other night."

He shrugged. "It was no problem."

The redhead worried into her lip. "Listen, can I talk to you after? I need- we need to talk." She mentally smacked herself over the head for using that line. It wasn't that sort of talk.

Sora looked momentarily surprised, but then he smiled. "Sure."

Kairi grinned at the brunet as she took a seat on the marginally nicer green, wooden benches on the school field.

"I swear, best sandwich ever," he insisted, waving the package at her before sitting down next to her.

She giggled. "So you say, but I still don't trust the school food. Not since Selphie found a hair in her bolognaise, anyway."

He shook his head at her in a mock disappointed fashion. "You have no idea what you're missing," he told her, pointedly taking a large bite out of his sandwich and giving an exaggerated groan. "Beautiful. Anyway, you wanted to talk?"

"Um, yeah." Kairi pulled the sleeves of her hoody over her hands a little nervously. "I just thought I should probably say sorry, you know, about what happened on Saturday night? I shouldn't have kissed you. I was just so upset and you were being so nice... but, still, it's no excuse at all."

He grinned at her. "It's fine." His grin flickered for a second and then his eyebrows contracted slightly. "Is that why you kissed me, just because you were upset about Riku?"

The redhead bit her lip and looked away for a second, then looked back at him. "Well, I don't know. I mean, I think-"

Sora cut her off. "You know, just for a second I thought you might like me."

"But- I do like you, Sora!" she insisted. "We're best friends. You're probably the person I get along with best, if I'm honest," she admitted, sighing and blowing a stand of hair out of her eyes.

The brunet shifted uncomfortably next to her. "Just friends, huh?" He hesitated for a moment. "But friend's don't do things like that."

Kairi's eyes widened, she suddenly felt terrible. "I- I know, I said I shouldn't have done it. It was horrible of me."

"That's not what I meant," he told her, shaking his head.

"Then… what did you mean?"

"Have you spoken to Riku yet?"

"Sort of, but only in passing. But, don't change the subject. Sora, please, I'm confused," she begged. If only he would tell her what he meant, then she would know what to do.

He shook his head again. "No, I can't explain it to you. You have to figure things out for yourself. I don't want- I don't want to affect your actions."

"Figure things out?" The redhead sighed miserably, propping her elbow on her thigh and resting her head on her palm. "I don't even know where to start."

Sora raised his eyebrows at her doubtfully. "Really?"

"Okay, maybe I do. But… I just don't want to have to think about it," she admitted. She knew it must sound crazy to everyone else, but she really didn't want to think about it. She just wanted everything to go back to normal. If only she could wind back the tape a couple months a do some editing.

"Well, surely there's not much to think about," he said, incredulously. "Your boyfriend cheated on you. He-" Sora appeared to struggle for words at this point, then he sighed and looked away from her. "He doesn't deserve you."

She shook her head, smiling awkwardly. "It's not as simple as that. I wish it was, but it's not. We've been together for two years, and that means something."

Sora didn't reply. He didn't even look at her.

"I know what he did was wrong, but this kind of thing happens to couple all the time, and they forgive each other and go back to the way they were and it works out. Should I just throw away our whole relationship?" It must have sounded like a rhetorical question, but she was disappointed when Sora didn't answer even so. "I don't know what to do."

They were both silent for a while, Kairi looking at Sora inquiringly, begging with her eyes for him to answer her, to give her some advice, but he just stared across the field. After what seemed like several minutes, though it couldn't have been longer than a few seconds, the brunet stood up. "Well, let me know when you've worked everything out. I'll be there, just like I always have been." And without saying another word to her, he walked away.

Kairi sat, stunned for a moment. She wanted to run after Sora, shake him and ask him what the hell he meant, but something about his stance as he walked kept her grounded to her seat. He obviously didn't want her to follow him.

She groaned in annoyance, and wrapped her arms around her head. She was sick of the riddles; she wished everything could just be simple and straightforward. There was something Sora wasn't telling her and she was certain that when she found it out, everything would make sense again.

She knew that the only way she could find out that piece of information would be to do as he said. And that meant talking to Riku.

Sighing, she pushed herself up from the bench. She knew she couldn't delay it forever.

Author's Note: I hope people aren't getting too annoyed about the slow pace at which this story is moving along. I have to admit, it is bothering me a little too. However, I do try to write as realistically as possible, and I know - from personal experience - that things like what Kairi is going through do take time.

Anyway, I really hope you enjoyed the update. I feel as though I should warn you, though I am sure you have sensed it, this story is fast approaching it's end! However, if anyone has any ideas for a sequel/accompanying oneshots etc. or just plot ideas they fancy seeing me write, please do let me know, either PM me or email me, and I will consider them all.

Please review. It'd be amazing if I got to 100 reviews before I post the next chapter.

Read, review, party, enjoy life,

Nirii. x