Warning: Health Hazard

Chapter Three

"Kai-riiiiiiiii!" hollered Olette, her voice cutting across the background babble of a party in full-swing. The girl may have seemed sweet and innocent in her simple orange top and beige cargo pants, but she had a mouth on her the size of Pluto and never hesitated to use it if need be. She was so loud it was probably possible to hear her from Pluto, as well. Several of the teens stood by her were already massaging their ears and schlepping off into the crowds, trying desperately to get away from the crazy girl with the brown eyes who was talking in a pitch that could shatter glass. Painful was the only way to describe it.

"What?!" the popular red-head called out from the other side of the room, standing on the tips of her Converse in a desperate attempt to peer over the heads that obscured her vision. When God was handing out the tallness genes, the petite (polite was of saying 'short') girl had obviously been the last in line. So, to make up for her lack of height, God decided to give her gargantuan feet.

Luck was a bitch and life wasn't fair.

"There's somebody at the dooorrrrr!" Olette screeched, gesturing wildly towards said door, which was open, complete with crazy, Marilyn Manson goth-type kid leant against it, proving Olette's point. There was indeed 'somebody at the door'. A somebody with a lot of piercings, studded up both ears and on the top lip, black clothing covering almost every inch of his skin, eyes framed with sooty-black kohl, lashes emphasised with mascara. He was also carrying a bouquet of blood-red roses, which was highly suspect – in Olette's opinion, anyway.

Who did this kid think he was, some emo/goth type version of Romeo? And what did he want with Kairi? Did he think Kairi was his preppy/popular Juliet? (Now that would make a great movie). Did the girl have some secret lover from that all-boy's school opposite Oblivion High?

It was called Hollow Bastion High; if Olette remembered rightly, home of the male goths and punks and emos. She remembered that mainly because her brother, Roxas, had seriously considered going there, and Olette had protested because she didn't want her lickle brother swanning off to some all-boy's school run by a former male model. Mainly because she wouldn't be able to protect (or, to be more accurate, annoy) him.

"Who is it?!" Kairi shouted back, marvelling at the fact that they were actually managing to have a semi-sensical conversation over a (loud) Linkin Park track and a roomful of dancing/shrieking/shouting kids.

"Riku," the weird goth kid said in a monotone mumble, after a little prompting from Olette (she gave him a funny look that clearly read 'so, um, who the hell are you, exactly?).

"Riku!" Olette repeated (nay, shouted), sniggering at the name. It sounded a lot like Miss. Blonde-&-Preppy-&-High-On-Sugar-&-On-The-Blitz-Team Rikku in her year.

Kairi, on the other hand, seemed to find nothing funny about this. The boy or the name. On the contrary, she mumbled something that sounded a lot like 'shit' and stormed away from the punch table in the general direction of the door, a face like thunder with fists clenched at her sides.

Many-a teenager jumped out of her way as she rampaged across the room in a mission for blood, eventually coming face-to-face with the Marilyn-Manson goth-type kid with the silver hair and the piercings and the roses.

"Kairi, would you ta-" the boy started, thrusting the very pinky-redy-rosey bundle at her. He never got to finish his sentence, however, and had to pull the roses back to his chest pretty sharpish for fear Kairi would take them and ram them up his backside.

Oh, woe is a pissed off Kairi.

"You stupid little boy," hissed the girl, glaring daggers, knives, and multiple other pointy objects at the piercing-ridden specimen before her. Her hands were thrust on her hips, her eyes narrowed, hair flipped behind her shoulders – the ultimate image of a 'pissed off woman'. "How dare you come here…"

She was shaking with rage – literally shaking, and now her face was as red as the bundle of posies Riku held protectively to his chest. Olette and Riku took a few steps back in alarm, obviously worried that Kairi had turned into a ticking time bomb and any bad move would make her explode.

"You… You've caused enough damage! I never want to see your ugly face again!" cried Kairi, obviously pondering the pros and cons of shoving a fist in Riku's 'ugly face'. Or maybe that lovely array of roses…? Wouldn't he look nice with a face full of thorns…?

"But Kairi, I thought you'd understand! Please, take the flowers…"

"I don't want your fucking flowers or you're fucking excuses. This conversation is over."

"But Kai-"

"OVER."

Olette guessed that the 'OVER' signified a definite end to the conversation, and by the look on her friend's face it was about time to slam the door into Riku's face. Which she did, with little hesitation – she had a feeling if she didn't comply to the girl's silent wishes she'd end up minus her head.

She felt a bit shocked at Kairi's outburst – the poor boy hadn't done anything wrong, but it wasn't like Kairi to get mad over stupid things. No, scratch that, it wasn't like Kairi to get mad at all.

So why…?

"Kai, I'm sorry about bothering you. If I'd've known you didn't want to talk to him I wouldn't've opened the door, but he said he really had to talk to y-"

"I know," sighed the girl, waving one hand in the air lightly in the hopes that Olette would get the message and stop pestering her. "I know I was a bit of a bitch, but if you knew what'd happened earlier you'd see why I acted like that."

"So, um… Will you tell me? What happened between you and him before, I mean?"

"No," Kairi replied tartly, looking around the room desperately for somebody she could scoot off with. She wasn't in the mood to answer questions, especially not ones concerning Riku. Riku was a touchy subject, and what Olette didn't know wouldn't hurt her…

It seemed the best way to inject any normality into the current situation would be to swan off with some guy she barely knew, because people you don't know very well are less likely to ask questions, thus she keep their conversation away from rocky subjects like Riku and onto more neutral things, like the weather.

The weird kid who sat next to her in Chemistry and mixed acids and bases whilst she chatted with Rikku and Olette seemed like a perfect nobody to spend some time with.

Selphie and Yuffie were fast workers, Sora'd give them that.

He'd only be away for all of ten minutes, and when he'd finally returned he couldn't find them anywhere. They'd got their guys and ran off into the dark of the night, leaving him stranded and alone, like a pathetic puppy at a homeless shelter nobody wanted.

He felt like Yuffie and Selphie had kicked him in the stomach – it was a horrible feeling, this 'betrayal'. He knew the girls had the attention spans of particularly thick moogles, and should've known it was ludicrous to expect either of them to stick around whilst he went and snooped about Kairi's house like the obsessive stalker he was.

But still…

It would've been nice if they'd told him they planned to leave with boys by their sides five minutes after they'd even arrived.

The boy was tired from the ten-minute long look around Kairi's house, and then the ten minutes tacked onto to that searching (in vain) for Selphie and Yuffie. All he wanted to do was sit on the stair step and ferment in his sorrows, because lamenting was so old-fashioned and angsty. And Sora wasn't an angster, Sora was merely a very dejected little boy who'd been stranded in enemy territory, surrounded by strangers on all sides without his two favourites girlfriends to cling onto like rafts in a storm.

In fact, there was probably no point being at the party at all. He could be at home, wearing a Sora-shaped rut into the cushions of his lubberly sofa with a packet of kettle chips in one hand and a remote in the other.

He didn't need to solve the mystery of the blonde-haired girl he'd seen upstairs – she was most likely a party guest who'd gotten lost. So, that was one thing sorted. Now the only other thing that needed rectifying was his presence at the party…

It wasn't like he'd actually see Kairi, anyway – not amongst all the people.

He got up; all set to gallivant off to the door and out into the night, when a heavily manicured hand stopped him by landing on his shoulder. The boy was forced back down onto the steps in a half-sitting, half-standing position, craning his head up to sneak a peek at what had ever-so-rudely interrupted his departure.

And then he blinked, legs going slack, collapsing in a puddle of hormones and hairgel.

"Wanna dance?" asked Kairi sweetly.

a.n: Riku has a part in this, as does the unidentified blonde girl. And there is a twist in this story – oh yes, there is a twist. All twistiness coming up in the next coupl'a chaptoids xP.

Xx skitts xX