*Yuffie*

"So, you're sad about Hayner dying?" Sora asked me. He sounded angry. We were at school, eating lunch together.

"Well, duh! Someone I went to school with committed suicide. It just makes the fact that it could happen to any one of us even more real. Which is scary," I admitted, staring at the table.

Sora sighed and rolled his eyes.

"What about you? How do you feel about it?" I asked, knowing he wanted to talk about it. I began to unwrap whatever the heck was for lunch today. Sora always brought a lunch from home, and was today picking at his ham and cheese sandwich.

"I think it's stupid. His life was fine. He obviously wanted attention. I mean, why's everyone getting so worked up? They all hated him anyways!" Sora said, annoyed.

"Sora! People don't just end their lives for attention!" I scolded. "Once you're dead, that attention doesn't matter anymore, anyways. He obviously had problems. Everyone's getting worked up because someone we never expected to do this did. That means anyone around here could suddenly be gone."

"Here one day, gone the next…" Sora mumbled, staring out the cafeteria windows.

"What?" I asked, not sure if he had some deep meaning behind what he had just said.

"N-nothing. I didn't say anything," Sora said quickly, refusing to look at me. "So, what's your mystery food today?"

"Oh!" I hadn't yet unwrapped my lunch. "Some type of poisonous cheeseburger, or so it seems."

Good luck, Yuffie. I don't know why you're still alive, eating those."

Hayner ate these, and he's dead now, I thought, suddenly upset about eating school lunches.

"I – I didn't mean it like that! Yuffie, I'm sorry!" Sora exclaimed. I could tell he was being sincere, so I silently forgave him. However, I knew he still wasn't taking this as seriously as the rest of us were.

"Olette!" I called, running after her. School was over, and I was dragging Sora along with me to comfort Hayner's close friends: Olette and Pence. I figured Olette should be first, since, according to rumor, she was present during Hayner's death.

"Yuffie?" Olette asked, surprised. We didn't really know each other, and we definitely didn't hang out together. We belonged in two different social groups. We didn't even wear our uniforms similarly. I wore knee-high black socks with mine, while Olette wore white, shin-high socks. She wore the blazer over her white blouse, while I just rolled up the blouse's sleeves and wore it that way. To sum it up, we walked two very different paths that never crossed.

"Hi!" I said, and then stopped to catch my breath. "I just wanted to see how you're doing," I said, flashing her a smile. I kept a tight hold on the collar of Sora's shirt, in case he decided to run off.

"Thank you!" Olette replied, all smiles and sunshine. "You're actually the first person to ask me about it. Most people are avoiding Pence and me, like suicidal thoughts are contagious or something." Olette added a short laugh after this creepy joke.

She's awfully cheery about this. This is suspicious…

"Oh, okay. If you ever wanna, er, talk or something, you can come to Sora and me!" I said, plastering a fake smile on my face, knowing she'd never take me up on that offer. Olette nodded and smiled in reply, and then we parted ways.

"What was that?" Sora asked, obviously as confused as I was. I let go of his collar.

"Acting. On both of our parts," I said."There's no way she's that happy. Unless she's secretly some sick, twisted person, she was lying to us."

"So… does this mean she killed Hayner?" Sora asked.

"No! You idiot! Oh, my gosh, why would you even think that?!" I said, instinctively slapping Sora on his shoulder.

"Okay, calm down, please," Sora begged, rubbing his shoulder. "You're strong…"

"But, either way, his death was serious, Sora! And that's my point here. Not Olette's fake happiness. Now, come on, let's go."

I grabbed his wrist and pulled him away from the school. I needed some new scenery. All this thinking was really hurting my brain.

"Sora, wanna go to the beach?" I asked, deciding the fresh sea-salt air would calm me down.

"Sure," Sora replied, not even asking why. I liked that about him: he never really questioned you, he just went with it. Well, most of the time, anyways.

"Come on!" I said, grabbing his wrist, and running off, dragging him behind me.

"Yuffie, slow down!" he whined, even though he knew I wouldn't. "Yuffie, you're squeezing my wrist; stop it!" His voice was serious; he wasn't playing around.

"Oh, sorry, Sora!" I gasped. I stopped running and let go. His wrist was red and Sora was staring at it. "I'm sorry, Sora!"

"Mmm, it's okay," Sora said. "You're stressed over Hayner's death, right? So it's understandable." He looked up at me and flashed a huge smile. "Man, you're strong!" he muttered.

"Can we get some ice cream? I want ice cream now," I said, changing the subject from both Hayner and the pain I had inflicted on Sora.

"Sure. I know this great new place in town!" Sora said, jogging away. Suddenly feeling sad again, I followed.

"Yuffie!" a voice called my name. Tired, I turned around and saw Kairi, of all people, coming up to greet me.

"H-hi, Kairi," I stuttered, waving. I was so confused and so tired. I had only gotten a few hours of sleep last night due to worrying and homework and now I wondered if I was actually hallucinating.

"Yuffie, how are you?" Kairi asked, giving me a quick hug, like we were old friends.

"I'm good," I lied. "What about you?"

"I'm good, thanks!" She chirped. "What about Sora; how is he doing?"

And her real motive comes out. Everyone knew Sora and Kairi hadn't been on good terms since September, when they had had a big fight. "Why?" I blurted, acting without thought.

"Well, Riku's been hanging out with his girlfriend, and I got lonely," Kairi admitted, pouting. A sudden wave of jealousy overtook me.

That's low. Abandon him, and then go crawling back to him when you are abandoned.

"Riku has a girlfriend?" I was genuinely surprised. Riku was always quiet and Kairi had always been the only girl he hung out with.

"Yup. That new girl, Nami, is going out with him now. It's strange that he'd date, let alone a tenth grader who just transferred to the school."

"Oh, okay. I have to go now. It was nice to talk to you," I said, waving as I walked away. Suddenly thinking of something, I turned around and called out, "If you want to know how Sora is, why don't you ask him?"

"Yuffie? Yuf-fie!"

"W-what?" I asked, instinctively jumping away from the source of the voice.

"Calm down, Yuffie! You're so jumpy today," Sora scolded, unlike himself.

"S-sorry," I muttered, staring at my navy blue skirt, blushing at my stupidity today.

"Anyways, is it true that you and Kairi were talking this morning?" he asked, cocking his head, reminding me of a puppy.

"Yeah. . . Why?" I asked as the jealousy came back to me.

"She came up and talked to me, mentioning that you two had talked and you told her to talk to me," Sora stated.

"What was it like talking to her again after so long?" I asked calmly, even though I wanted to scream. What had I done? Sora would go back to Kairi and leave me behind.

"It… it was really nice," he admitted, smiling that stupid, familiar smile of his. "Makes me regret not talking to her sooner. I think that we're going to become friends again." He suddenly looked nostalgic. I wondered if he regretted hanging out with me.

"Well, I'm happy for you, Sora!" I said, smiling. I gave him a quick hug and turned away. "Well, I need to get to class. Bye now!"

"Bye, Yuffie!" Sora called as I speed-walked away, feeling the hot tears begin to sting my eyes.

I just gave away the one thing important to me to someone who doesn't deserve it. What have I done?!