A/N: Ahahahaha. Yay for a new chapter! oh & just a warning... little bit of Yuffie angst. I'll leave it up for you guys to find out what it's about, of course I don't want to spoil it for you!

Also, I have a sidestory to this fic coming soon- either today or tommorow. It'll be posted as it's own story, so keep watch for that.

I have yet another new fic called For Good- a collection of one-shots & drabbles focusing on friendship. Please go check that out, I want some feedback on whether I should continue to add to it.

Disclaimer: I don't own Kingdom Hearts.

Chapter 11: Falling

The November wind gave Kairi the chills as she walked outside. She really wasn't ready for it to be this cold, so she ran back inside to grab a scarf and a thicker jacket. Why must it be so cold? She asked herself. She wondered how Yuffie and Selphie's instruments were supposed to survive in the freezing weather of the Northern Islands.

She remembered how Selphie would go to extreme percautions to protect her instrument, Pixi, in 7th grade. She wrapped in this thick gauze, and it looked bulkier than a cello. Yuffie had laughed at her, and said that the case should have been fine protecting it. After the embarassment, Selphie realized it would be okay, and the next day, returned the big roll of gauze back to wherever she bought it.

She giggled at the thought of Selphie trying it again this year, since the temperatures were colder than usual for the Islands.

"What are you laughing at?" It was Selphie herself, she had met Kairi where they usually did. "Is it my huge bulky coat? Because I'm freezing!"

"Nothing... I was just thinking."

"Oh." Selphie smiled. "I can't wait for it to snow. Even though our strolling gig will probably we canceled if it does."

"I'm sorry... I know how much you look foreward to those. Where's Yuffie, anyway?"

"I stopped by her house... she seems sick..."

"Oh? What did she have?"

"I don't know. I didn't see her, her mom came and told me she wasn't feeling good and probably wouldn't come to school today."

Silence arosed between the two girls as they walked toward the school, shivering from the cold.

"Hey, guys!" Namine waved to them, with a huge smiled on her face. She stopped when she saw the girls. "What's wrong?"

"Yuffie isn't feeling too well."

A look of concern spread onto Namine's face. Maybe she knew something that the other two didn't? "Oh... well... Yuffie hasn't exactly looked the best since that Thursday that we went to the Junior High concert."

"But that was two weeks ago! Sickness doesn't stay that long, does it?" Selphie burst out.

"I'm sure she's fine, Selphie." Kairi patted her friend on the shoulder. "She kind of overdid herself this year. Even with viola and strolling, she still did cross country and fencing, remember? Maybe she just needs a day of rest."

"I hope that's all that she needs..." Selphie genuinely missed Yuffie, and it had only been less than half an hour into their day.

Namine didn't know what to say. She knew the real reason why Yuffie was missing school today- because of Mr. Leonhart. They had talked on the phone the night before, while Selphie was raving to Kairi about something during their phone call.

Namine continued to keep to herself. After all, Yuffie didn't exactly want everyone to know- and that was what you got if you didn't tell Selphie when she was in her "serious" mode.

Her debate on whether to tell her best friends the truth was cut short when she heard a loud thud her left. They had reached school, and were in the courtyard by then. Namine hadn't absorbed a single word of Selphie and Kairi's conversation until then, although they had been speaking to her, also.

Kairi had fallen to the ground, tripping on the sidewalk. Her face had, luckily, landed in the grass, but one of her knees were scraped pretty badly.

She was lucky that they usually came to school fairly early- before most people came, so she really didn't have much to be embarassed about. Except for the fact that a certain brunette had watched her fall.

He rushed to her side, crouching down to see if she was okay. He held out his hand for her to get up. "You okay?" He put the kindest expression that he could muster on his face.

Kairi recognized the voice. It was Sora, and it was so weird to see him outside of the orchestra room. It was like the thought of little kids when they first started school- that their teachers lived, ate, breathed, and slept in their classroom all day and night. Except it was with Sora, and the orchestra room, and Kairi was a freshman in high school.

She looked up at him, and blushed. He was really the last person that she wanted to see her fall, but hey, she had to deal. She took his hand and said, "Thanks," trying to hide her red face.

He took a look at her knee, and winced. It must've been a pretty bad fall, seeing all the blood on there. It took Kairi a while to realize what he'd been staring at, and then, all of a sudden, the pain of the scrape hit her.

"OW!"

"A little slow there, eh?" He teased. He continued to hold her hand. "You want me to take you to the nurse?"

"NO WAY!" Selphie answered for her. "Me and Namine are going for her!" She grabbed Kairi's hand out of Sora's, and dragged Kairi and Namine with her towards the nurse's office.

Since when did Selphie get so protective? Kairi wondered. Selphine continued to drag the confused two girls until they had reached the nurse's office, well out of earshot of Sora.

"Did you see that? Did you see that?" The girl seemed to be recovered from the saddness she was fazed with about five minutes earlier.

"Did I see what?" Kairi was more confused now than ever by Selphie's exclamation.

"He loves you! He loves you!"

All the other two girls could do was raise an eyebrow.

"See, he like, fought me to get to you first! Didn't you see that, Namine?" She winked at the blonde girl. Now she was no longer confused.

"Uh, yeah." Namine was holding back giggles. Selphie's matchmaking idea was NOT going to work.

"Sure, Selphie." The wound was now throbbing in her leg. "Could you please let me go to the nurse now?"

Selphie, giggling, opened the door for Kairi as she limped into the small white room. Namine now let her giggles run free, but in the back of her mind, she was still wondering about Yuffie's situation.

-

Yuffie sat up in bed and looked through her window. She couldn't run away forever... but if there was one time where she could, now would be when she would want to. She'd take her cross country shoes and run as far as she could without stopping... and at the moment, that stopping place would only be three miles away from home...

But that would work. It didn't matter how far she ran, just as long as she got away from where she was.

Why did this happen to her? Why was she the only one who had ever fallen for a teacher? Everyone had fallen for someone at least around their own age... Selphie with Tidus, Namine with Riku, and Kairi with whoever. But she was sure that Kairi would never fall for Mr. Leonhart, or any other teacher for that matter, the way she did.

She tried to ignore the feeling, but it was just too much to ignore now. It was sort of like letting dough rise in a closed container- one day, it was just going to burst the container. And yesterday was when her container of love for the teacher had finally bursted.

It wasn't something that had just taken place a few months ago- ever since honor orchestra in sixth grade, when she first saw the way he conducted and treated his students.

On the outside, he seemed a bit emotionless and "no fun," as Selphie would say, but Yuffie knew, even as a naive sixth grader, that there was more to him than that.

And that was three years ago. She was surprised that she was even able to contain it for so long.

But it wouldn't work out- just as any student-teacher relationship wouldn't have. She had prayed that he at least felt the same way she did, because he always seemed to open up to her more than he did to his other students. Maybe she was just comparing herself to the other violists, whom he'd never paid much to attention to anyway.

Her hopes stayed high. She supported everything he did- even occasionally went to the high school concerts and wherever the strolling gigs were by herself the years before. She had begged Miss Heartilly to let her join strolling in eighth grade, asking if she could take her last hour class out and take it at the high school.

But the teacher had said no, You had to be in a Destiny HIGH orchestra... and Destiny Junior just wasn't good enough, apparently, to be in the Strolling strings.

It wasn't just because of physical attraction that Yuffie liked Mr. Leonhart. It was the way he taught; how he would teach not only about technique and your music, but about teamwork and musicallity. He was... purely amazing, from Yuffie's eyes. The man could do no wrong. He never openly criticised someone's playing, although he wouldn't make a smart comment every so often. And it wasn't just admiration. It was a feeling...

That the music... rang together. It never clashed, and it was only possible for it to come together beautifully, like a weaving. A weaving of the notes.

She hated Miss Heartilly. Okay, she didn't hate her. Her conducting and teaching skills were almost the same as Mr. Leonhart's... but she was the one obnoxious piece of string that found its way into the weaving and would not allow the weaving to continue. If it did, then nothing would be right.

She broke her heart. In eighth grade, the same year she denied Yuffie strolling, Selphie had used her "uber ways to find out gossip" and found out that Miss Heartilly had been dating Mr. Leonhart. It killed her inside, and a hatred for Miss Heartilly grew out of that.

Yuffie wandered over to her bathroom. She looked in the mirror, and saw a blotched face with red eyes. She had been crying... crying since she had gotten home last night. Since she could just let loose.

She had told Namine everything- and hadn't realized how close she was to the blonde girl until last night. And she hadn't realized how good of a listener she was, and how good she was at giving advice.

And she had listened to it. It was okay to cry. And she needed to wait for her heart to tell her the answer.

But Yuffie was never patient. She couldn't wait.

And the chain of events- everything that seemed to happen one after the other- hit her like a rock.

She was first in the music hallway congratualating the Junior High kids on their first concert, telling them how wonderful they were, blah blah blah. She decided to go see what Mr. Leonhart was up to, just because she was curious...

And then she walked into a makeout session between her ex-teacher and her current teacher. Blushing, she ran out of the room, pinching herself just to make sure that she wasn't living in some nightmare.

As Yuffie thought of the memory, tears streamed down her face. For a year, she had lied to herself. She had told her that Squall never really like Rinoa, and just went out with her because of the position they carried. But maybe... maybe they really did have feelings for each other.

And then... yesterday, she just couldn't contain it anymore. She had to tell him her feelings... the ones that had been there for almost three years.

All he could say was, "I'm sorry, but I don't feel the same. And even if I did..." He looked down at her in disappointment, "nothing would work out right."

She felt her heart stop. How could he? How could he just throw away her feelings like that? She care about what society thought of student-teacher relationships anymore. All she could think of... was to be with him...

She looked through her window, and gazed at her own reflection on the shiny glass. How did this happen in one day? Before, she was the queen of the violas... the lead runner on the girl's cross country team... an amazing fencer, despite the fact that she had just started this year...

And then it shattered. Furious, she slammed her fist into the window. It broke, and shattered into a million pieces- half a million landing outside on the patio, the other half million on the floor of her room. Just like her life.

She would have to pay for that later. But she felt better. At least for now she did.

-

The lunch table was as loud and noisy as ever. Selphie told some joke, and Namine and Kairi giggled- not because of the joke, but of the expression on Selphie's face. No one really understood Selphie's jokes, anyway, but there was something completely contagious about her laugh.

Namine laughed the loudest, almost as if she was in a contest with someone.

"Hey, Namine... you seem awfully happy today."

"Yeah."

"Might I ask why?" Kairi sounded like she was at some business meeting.

"Because I finally told Roxas to fuck off." She grinned.

Selphie was shocked. Namine had never used that word before... never outloud, and never inentionally toward a person. And now, all hopes of her and Roxas getting together had vanished.

"What?" She gaped.

"He won't be bothering me anymore."

"But... what about..."

"Selphie... it's okay." Namine spoke with sudden boldness. "I have my eyes on someone else, anyway."

"Wow... is it really happening? She's crawling out of her shell! I'm so proud of her!" Kairi slapped an arm around Namine's shoulders.

"Me too!" Selphie squealed, seeming to be ignoring the fact that there was, in no way, that Namine and Roxas would ever be together.

"Hey, I've got to go to the orchestra room." Kairi suddenly seemed very aware of how fast time was going by. Today was her day to meet with Sora, after all.

"'Kay! Bye!" The other two girls waved.

Kairi walked along her usual path toward the orchestra room, feeling a bit nauceous. Now, that was funny... she was feeling fine just a moment ago, joking with Namine and Selphie, but now the thought of having to spend time alone with Sora...

She just felt queasy in her stomach. Like she was going to throw up her lunch. Why did she feel this way? She wasn't going to run... so she sucked in her gut, and entered the room. They sat together at their usual spot, at Kairi's stand.

"Hi..." her voice sounded a bit soft around him.

She turned away, and tried to ignore the fact that she was going to be alone with him. She didn't want to be alone with him... she prayed that someone else would come in... her stand partner, Selphie, even some older kid that she barely even knew!

There was no avoiding him once she started walking toward her seat. Her heart was thumping, and it felt like it had crawled up to her throat. Why did she feel this way?

And then she looked into his eyes... they were deep blue, and she had always thought they were pretty... but now she felt like she would be falling forever into them.

And his messy hair... she wanted to ruffle it... to make it messier than it already was... and play with it.

What was this feeling? And why had it come up all of a sudden?

And it hit her...

He was the only guy that had ever thought of helping her up... or maybe that was only part of this new feeling.

Struggling to contain her emotions, she shakily got out her music. She didn't have much of a problem with the pieces now; it was just a mistake here, and out of tune now there... and occasionally a note worth grimicing at...

"Okay, let's start with this piece." He took it out, and shook it so the other page would flop out. "Want me to play with you? You don't look very confident today."

"No... I'm fine... it was just something I ate."

She started off fine with her piece, and with each measure a sense of nervousness grew. No, she told herself... You know this passage, don't worry. And every other note, she would slip.

"Okay, okay." Sora stopped her. "Let's do this a little bit slower. You were rushing, anyway."

Was her nervousness really that visible? "Okay," she said, while looking at him.

She could feel herself falling into those eyes again... and he didn't seem to move. Was time stopping for them?

The ring of the bell made Kairi realize that time, most definately, was not stopping for either. She nervously looked away, and muttered a "thanks."

"You're welcome." Sora grinned, and ruffled her hair.

Normally, she would have gotten angry with him for teasing her like that... but today, she welcomed it. His hand felt... comforting?

Kairi shook her hair and went back to the music. Now that Sora was gone, she didn't feel nervous, and played much better.

-

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keep watching for the sidestory. tEEhEE.