I know this took REALLY LONG. I'm sorry. I think the next chapters are a little easier.

Author's Note: I have no idea what the time difference is from Japan to California, so let's just say she left in the morning and arrived in the morning. There. Haha.

Chapter 12: Feeling Special

Sakura had just stepped out of the long tunnel linking their plane to the airport when a man and a boy separated from the rest of the waiting crowd and ran toward her, visitor's passes flapping up and down on their chests. For a minute she stared curiously at them, wondering why they were smiling and waving at her, and then she realized it.

Oh, it's Dad and Touya!

And I almost didn't recognize them.

The rush of shame that followed was quickly cut short when Fujitaka gave her a big hug and started talking excitedly, too fast to understand, tears in his eyes. All she could see of Touya was a big smile. Sakura stood in the middle of it all with a dazed smile on her face, wondering what the heck she was supposed to do now.

"Oh, Sakura—"

"It's been so long!"

"Now we can…"

"…riding stables here, did you know?"

"And then we can…"

I don't really… feel anything.

Wait—

She thought of Syaoran and then grinned slightly, looking up at her family for the second time. Her dad stood back with tears in her eyes. Her brother was smiling from ear to ear, one of his hands clapped heavily onto her shoulder.

"Well, kiddo," he said suddenly in perfect American-accented English. "You ready?"

Sakura stared at him, and Touya laughed. "Don't mind him," he said, Japanese still as fluent as ever. "He's just showing off his new language."

"I think it sounds great, Dad. Like a real American."

She felt her excitement slowly start to come back as he laughed back and then took her bags. They led her out of the airport, taking care of all the document checks and even buying her a drink. It felt good to have someone else do all the dirty work for her, like opening doors and paying for soda and reminding her to go to the bathroom.

Outside a minivan was waiting for them. It was their minivan, Sakura reminded herself, a minivan so that they could use it to go anywhere… she could ask Fujitaka to drive her anywhere she wanted… if he allowed her, of course.

It wasn't as if she'd been living alone all her life. It wasn't as if she'd never experienced these little things before. But maybe it would have been better if she hadn't, because then she wouldn't miss them. Everyday she thought of how it should be when her family was there, and everyday she reminded herself to wait for the next vacation or birthday or whatever.

But today… today we have a whole month! (And yes that doesn't make sense but who'll stop me from thinking that way?)

Sakura got into the front seat and stopped when she saw the iPod and iTrip plugged in, ready for use. She looked up at her dad and raised an eyebrow. "Dad, you use technology now?"

Touya laughed. "It was a rivalry thing. His friend was bragging about how many songs and videos he had, so dad just had to get one with an iTrip so he could brag about how he can play it in the car."

"I see," Sakura said, and then laughed. She buckled up her seatbelt, the car started, and they started to talk.

"So, Sakura, how's school back there?" Touya asked.

"Oh, it's great, I made some new friends and I…" she blushed. "Remember I called and said I was going to be in the school musical? Well, it's over, and I was the lead part."

"Really? That's great! Any guys falling at your feet now?"

She ignored that. "So how are things here?"

"The weather's hotter in the daytime, but I think I like the scenery better," her Dad said. "I mean, San Francisco is a city too, but the suburbs are nice…"

"He can talk all day about that stuff," her brother said. "Oh yeah, did I tell you? I got a spot at University of San Francisco, so I'll be living here and you'll be sick of me."

"That's great!" Sakura grinned. What she remembered from spending time with her older brother wasn't exactly a loving relationship, but a partner-in-crime thing. "So, um, how about the school?"

The two looked at each other. "What school?"

"The school. You know, the one I might study at if we move here?"

It was funny how they thought so differently. Her brother said, "Well, it's a co-ed public school just a walk away from our house," and her dad said, "Maya, I'm glad you're already considering it," and they both said, "But you don't have to think about that just yet."

Sakura frowned. "But I want to think about it." She'd come because there was a chance at them all being together. Now were they telling her it had all been for nothing? "I want to know if this place is worth leaving Tokyo."

"I know it's a hard decision and—"

"Dad. I said, I don't need that help. I just want to decide after I… look around." She nodded. "Is there a problem? I mean, do you guys think we shouldn't live here after all, or what?"

"Well…" her father looked at Touya. "It's because…"

"We should tell her," Touya said. Sakura stiffened. Those four words were always a bad sign.

"Tell me what?"

"Sweetie," her dad said, "I've been offered a promotion if I stay here. That's why now, we're telling you, we are almost certain that we're going to move. But it all depends on you, and we didn't want to say it because you'd be pressured."

"Oh." Sakura's head swam. So everything had been decided for her? "Oh. Well, I won't say no if that's what you guys want! I mean, you make the big choices, and stuff…"

"No, no," he said. "You're our daughter, and we're tired of doing what we want and leaving you with no one to tell things to. You make this decision based on what you want, all right?"

Sakura was quiet. "All right."

They shouldn't have told me.

---------------------

They stopped in front of a pretty, two-floor, normally normal suburb home with a front yard and a garage door and everything. When she was younger Sakura had had to travel around with her family and she'd been in many houses; they'd agreed long ago that her bedroom would always be the room on the second-floor looking out onto the street.

She got out of the car and then stopped and turned back to her family, but her dad only smiled. "Go on," he said, unlocking the trunk. "We'll follow you with all the bags."

Sakura nodded and then walked up the steps, already so used to staying in temporary homes that she didn't feel any excitement at seeing her new room. It was the same as usual—cream-colored walls, a bookcase, a bed, a bureau for her glass animals, and a closet. The only different thing was a small but beautiful wooden desk in a corner, with intricate designs carved on its sides and a small cushioned chair to match.

"Did you get this for me?" she asked, turning as her Dad caught up to her outside the room.

"Well…" he smiled. "The house's old owner was actually supposed to bring it with him, but he sold it to us. He said this was the only place it would fit perfectly, under this roof, in that corner by the window." And Sakura looked and saw she was right.

"It's new, but it fits," she said softly, and Fujitaka came up to put his arm around her shoulders and she wondered if she could say the same for herself.

After a few hours of unpacking, they heard a wild knock on the door and then a bang as it was flung open. Sakura had been looking at Syaoran's gift and she stuffed it under a pillow before the whirlwind that was her brother crashed in to see her again.

"So what's up?" He knew she could talk to him more freely than their father, not because she trusted him more but because she never wanted to hurt Fujitaka.

"Touya-kun!" She grinned and stood up to hug him. "My God, I didn't notice at the airport, you're twice as tall as me!" Here under the slanting ceiling, he was a full 2 feet taller, maybe more.

"It's your fault for shrinking," he said, running a hand through his hair and putting his fists in his pockets. That reminded her of Syaoran, so she turned to her window and looked out on the street.

"Do you live here, or at a dorm?"

"Here," he said, pointing to the bike he'd propped up against their mailbox. "And dad's have been nagging me all week about you coming here, saying you would want a friend and all."

"And a college student with absolutely no morals is supposed to be a friend?"

"Hey," he said. "That's soon-to-be-college-graduate to you, kid." She laughed and he bent down to tie a shoelace. "You wanna go out biking?"

"I don't know, maybe later," she said, sitting down on her bed.

"Okay, I'll go downstairs and make a sandwich then." He did just that, clattering around the house so that everyone would know he was there. Touya had always been like that. And he'd always been persuasive like this too, never taking no for an answer. "Later" to him meant "in five minutes".

Sakura sighed and put Syaoran's gift away. She'd have to write in it later, then. It took only a moment to pull on shorts and a comfortable t-shirt that said RUNS END, RUNNING DOESN'T, and then she went downstairs trying to make as much noise as Touya did so she would feel at home in this ordinarily new place.

Sakura's bike was at home in Japan but Touya had an extra one for his girlfriend's little sister and he lent it to her. It had pink and purple streamers on the handlebars, but Sakura climbed on anyway and followed her brother up and down hills, panting and laughing in equal amounts.

"Maybe we should stop somewhere," she said after an hour or so of this free neighborhood tour. "I don't think I can feel my legs."

"Ahaha, broke a nail or something?" Touya checked the street signs and then jerked a thumb left. "There's a park nearby with benches and a basketball court. We can rest there."

She was about to object, not wanting to see any other basketball-playing teenagers who lived here, but Touya was off and Sakura forced herself to keep up, cursing under her breath.

They put down their bikes in one of the car park slots and walked up to the basketball court, where Touya saw a few friends and went to say hi. Sakura headed for the water fountain, noting how there was even an ice cream umbrella-cart here. Everything was so happy-ish and she felt out of place, being the heartbroken emo kid in the middle of all this suburban stuff.

"Sakura! You okay over there?"

She wished he hadn't drawn the attention to her. His friends muttered something and then one of them went to his cellphone, probably texting his sister about the weird Japanese girl who was going to attend school here.

"Yeah!" she said back, adding a few random Japanese words just to bewilder them. Touya shook his head with a snort and went back to fooling around with the rest of the guys, so Sakura walked over to a bench, sat down, and tightened her shoelaces. Her hair was slipping out of its ponytail and she took it off and retied it again, staring furiously down at the ground.

That was when she saw it.

Flickering into existence under the other end of her bench, a whisper of power made her hair stand on end. Sakura tensed and cast a wild glance around. She couldn't possibly show all these people what she was hiding, but at that moment a shimmer of rainbow-pearl made her head spin, and she knew that something was there, whether it was a Card or not.

I need my staff, she thought, glad that her old baton was in her backpack. She hoped no one would look to see her holding a stick with strange wings and gems on it. People around here would probably make some crack about Halloween and tease her for it.

She stood and stepped toward the card, aware that it didn't seem to be defending itself. Maybe this was more of something she'd have to figure out, not battle.

She'd gotten less than a foot away from the card and bent down, confused that it wasn't doing anything, when suddenly a gust of something sweet-smelling tugged at her, and she remembered Syaoran, how he was always smiling a little, how he had to hold his stomach from laughing, how he looked at her, how he'd put a hand on her shoulder and kissed her that night of the musical, telling her somehow that things would be fine, tears welled in her eyes and she wondered what the hell she was doing here—

She stumbled back and the images faded. Sakura gasped for breath, and then shook her head, lips in a tight line.

So that's how it is?

That was when the pair of black shoes entered her view.

Sakura looked up with a slight frown, expecting to see some American kid, maybe even expecting him to start bullying her or something, but instead she saw another Japanese boy, looking down at her with surprise on his face mirroring hers.

"Nihon-jin desu ka?" they both asked at the same time, and then he smiled. Sakura smiled back. He wasn't the eye-catching attractive that girls usually went for, like Syaoran, but he had dark hair that curled and, behind a pair of glasses, brown eyes that were deep and dark and mysterious.

She liked that. A little.

And the card, or whatever it was, was gone.

"I can't believe you're Japanese too," she said, relieved now that she wouldn't have to jump right into the whole fit-in thing. "Do you live here?"

The boy nodded. "I moved here a few months ago. My Dad's a professor and a researcher at Stanford."

Sakura stared. "The Stanford University?" Even she knew about that prestigious college, and that only the best of the best were accepted, students and professors alike.

He saw how surprised she was, and he blushed. "Um, minority status, and he went to school around here…"

She didn't stop staring, but it wasn't the Stanford thing anymore. This guy was blushing. Blushing. And from the way he looked down quickly to hide his face, she guessed he knew he was doing it.

He's like me, she thought. Trying to hide his feelings, even if they're out in the open.

It's cute.

(Syaoran!)

I guess.

The thoughts whirling around in her head made Sakura look away this time, and she turned to call out to her brother. One untied shoelace was trapped under her other foot, and all at once her ankles knocked against each other and she was on the ground. Cursing under her breath, she put her hands down on the dirt and got ready to push herself up—

--and stopped, staring as the boy's hand came down a few inches from her face, offering her help.

Syaoran had never done that.

He'd laugh and she'd laugh and then she'd trip him and they'd roll over in the soccer field with Tomoyo and Meiling, shaking uncontrollably, but he'd never actually offered to help her up.

And it made her…

…it made her feel special.

"Are you okay?" he said.

Sakura blinked and said, "I'm Kinomoto Sakura."

He blinked back, and then smiled a shy schoolboy smile. "Mashima Yukio."

"Nice to meet you." She reached up, and took his hand.

"Same." He opened his mouth and hesitated, and then she saw determination flicker behind those lenses. "Are you… free tomorrow afternoon, then?"

I like feeling special.

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Behind those carefully calculating eyes and his shy smile, Yukio's mind was ticking away, trying to make sense of what his senses had just sent it.

Unless he was blind, or going crazy, this Kinomoto Sakura's baton had just…

changed, somehow?

What the hell is going on here?

He'd heard that the stories were getting more and more detailed, more and more frequent, but he'd never realized that they could actually be true, those little-kid tales of kids capturing entities encased in normal-looking cards, defying the laws of physics to boggle all the scientists.

Yukio had never been so determined to know something in all his life.

Yes, his father was a professor and researcher at Stanford, but he'd forgotten to tell Sakura that he himself was a transfer sophomore there, having advanced a total of three K-12 grades at various intervals.

It was near impossible, and Yukio prided himself on being at least an almost-genius, his mind somehow trained to think flawlessly. His dad called him a savant, but he didn't care what it was, only that it made him smarter than everyone else.

He had also been diagnosed with mild autism and had been proclaimed 'likely to overreact passionately', but that was almost a good thing, when he was geared to a goal. He was happy with being a savant. And up till now, it had made him able to think logically through every minute of his life.

Except for today, that almost-imperceptible wave of power, that unbearably cold feeling he'd experienced just looking at something he'd never be able to figure out.

I have to find out how her mind does it, he told himself. I think I can deal with some skinny girl.

Yukio smiled calmly and asked the girl for her cellphone number.

Just make her feel all right, make her feel… special.