Kairi sighed as she bit down on the lower right corner of her lip. A bit of a smile wanted to play at the edge of her mouth otherwise but a certain sense of sadness was keeping it at bay. Just as well she figured, before raising her eyebrows and giving a dry sort of hollow laugh; Might as well get on to reading entry number two . . .
b e a c h e d . 2
It had been a few days since the initiation of Kairi's idea of her and Riku and Sora being a kind of three-sided, polygonal "couple". They had survived their first collective day back to school as such and no one had noticed anything different about them. Since when had it been abnormal for them to help each other carry their books to different classes, anyway? And so what if they sat together for lunch – that was above and beyond par for the course with them. Besides, no one else knew or noticed when Kairi's leg bumped into Riku's or when Sora's foot bumped into Kairi's – so what did it matter?
Now though, after the sun had set and no one was to be seen on the sands of the beach other than these three, things were a different story. Lying on their backs and gazing upward, they watched as the stars began to alight in the deep bluish-black sky, one by one by one, like little lanterns being lit. Riku lying in the middle, he had one arm beneath Kairi's waist, his hand at the end thereof curled 'round a bit to hold her at her side. His other hand was being held by Sora, their fingers intertwined tightly as Kairi absentmindedly ran her fingers through Riku's hair.
"The sky is strangely pretty tonight," she said with a kind of sigh in her voice. "I can't even remember it ever being this beautiful."
Giving a low sort of chuckle, Riku gave her side a playful squeeze and said, "Are you sure it's not just because of us, Kairi?"
"Are you trying to get her to call you beautiful, Riku?" Sora asked in a teasing voice.
Cutting his eyes toward him, Riku sighed apathetically and said, "She knows what I meant. Everything seems more 'right' now, since we decided to stop fighting and just let things be the way they should be."
"Ah. Yeah, they do. You're right," Sora said.
"Makes sense," Kairi added, her fingers still running themselves through locks of silvery-white as she smiled faintly. "I know I'm just . . . happy now, all the time."
Hearing this made Sora break out into a smile of his own, and he let go of Riku's hand to instead prop up on his elbow and glance over at Kairi, and then back to Riku. "I'm happy if you're happy," he said to them.
"Oh, I'm sure we're all plenty happy," Riku said as he felt Kairi roll toward him, her head coming to rest against his chest; he began to smile, but then gave a small yawn as well. "Well, happy and tired, apparently."
"Our last math class together was brutal, remember?" Sora said to him, easing down from his elbow to also rest his head on the other side of Riku's chest, before reaching over and placing his hand against Kairi's available arm. "We have every right to be tired."
"And with a science class like mine?" Kairi added. "I'm exhausted."
"Maybe we should just rest for a while then," Riku suggested, one arm looped around Sora's waist, the other hand tangling itself up in Kairi's hair. "Then we can go back home and get a good night's sleep. Besides, the dance is tomorrow night."
Hearing this, Kairi smiled and nuzzled her face into Riku's chest. Her world, for the moment, was completely content; entirely complacent to the idea of anything causing a bump in the road.
. . . . . . . .
Shivering a bit as she came to the end of the second journal entry, Kairi glanced back over her shoulder to catch a glimpse of the sun as it disappeared beyond the horizon, seeming to melt right into the endless ocean waters right before her eyes. She decided that she should really retreat to the little cave home she'd made for herself over the past howeverlong it'd been since she'd been what, swept away to wherever she was?
And so she gently marked her spot in the journal and got to her feet, before moving a hand down to dust the sand from both her kneecaps. The sand had probably crept all over her body, really, but no matter – the floor of her humble as could be abode was made of sand anyway its own self, right?
Shivering once again against the ever coming presence of coming nightfall, Kairi slipped behind the nature-made curtain of moss that separated the cliff-side indent from the rest of the beachfront. Once within, she crept over to a small pile of sticks that she used nightly to make a fire with, just to a keep herself a little extra sunlight until she was really ready to put her head down to go to sleep for the night at least.
Making sure to keep the journal plenty far away from these sticks, the bony-kneed girl soon knelt down and went to work on rubbing the sticks together for friction; in no time at all she had a decent sized blaze a' going. Smiling at her work, she crept over to the other side of the cave wall and sat down upon a bed made of gatherings of fallen fig leaves. Reaching outward once more for the journal thereafter, she opened it up across her lap to find that she'd opened it right to the space where she'd just left off moments earlier.
"Very well then, on to the third part," she said aloud to herself, before snuggling in a bit with the book and reading onward.
t h e r e 's a w i l l – t h e r e 's a w a y . 3
Kairi, by all rights, felt almost completely dejected and depressed as she sat on her bed with her back flat against the wall, knees draw up to her chest as she hugged them, her head resting atop them. Tonight was the night of the dance at school. She'd been looking forward to it for ages now; she'd even already gone out and gotten a nice new dress to wear. It was a shame she wasn't going to get to go now, after all that.
You failed to return home all night long! You were – you were off with those two boys of yours; I know you've been their friend for most of your life, Kairi, but, my dear, we were oh so worried sick! We had no idea where you'd even gone. And the shock of not finding you safe and sound in your own bed this morning? . . . let's just say that I love you, my daughter, but that you need to be punished for what you've done – acting so irresponsibly, and at your age, too, why you're almost grown!
. . . I'm sorry, but I'm afraid you're grounded for the rest of this week, Kairi. And yes, that means missing tonight's dance.
Her step-father's words still rang out in her ears with anger, hurt and concern in them. She felt deep down as if she couldn't really blame him. It had been very unwise on her part to just let herself drift off to sleep on the sand, regardless of the circumstance. And now she had been grounded and she had no idea if Riku or Sora had been punished, also.
From where she sat she could see her dress hanging in the closet, as its doors were open. Glimmering in the glow from the moon-shaped nightlight plugged into her wall, the black sequins that trimmed the edges of its brown fabric shimmered off and on again, seeming to somewhat dance about amongst the other hanging clothes. Sighing sadly, she drew her knees in even more tightly against her chest before resting her head back against the wall, right beside a window.
"Kairi!"
Giving a jump and grasping at her bosom, the red-haired girl moved away from the window when she heard the sound of a pebble strike its glass, followed by the sound of a rather close in proximity voice also calling her name from beyond it.
"Oh, it's you," she said seconds later, as she moved to unfasten locks on hinges and raise the window itself. "You just gave me a complete heart attack, you know!"
"Sorry, sorry – had to get your attention to let us in though, didn't I?" Riku answered her in a calm voice, before reaching forward from the tree branch he was perched upon to find a way to climb on into Kairi's bedroom via the window.
"Yeah, well, you're lucky it didn't get anyone else's attention," Kairi said darkly, offering Riku a hand as he stepped on through the window and onto the bed, followed by Sora too. "I'm grounded until the end of the week."
"We figured," Sora said. "We are, too."
"And yet here we are," Riku added. "Until they figure it out and nail our windows shut so we can't get out anymore."
"Don't even joke about that," Sora replied. "It's bad enough we got in trouble this time. I'm never chancing staying on the beach so long again. I still can't believe we didn't wake up sooner."
"What I don't understand is why we couldn't have at least put off our groundings until after tonight's dance," Kairi piped in, kneeling on her bed as she closed the window.
"Well the school dance would have been okay," Riku mused aloud as he got off the bed. "But I don't think all is lost." Walking across the floor to reach a laptop placed upon a writer's desk, he turned it on and opened up its media player application. "Sora thought of an idea on the way over."
Looking from Riku to Sora, Kairi asked with much curiosity in her voice, "What is it you thought of?"
"Well," he said, scratching at the back of his head with a sheepish grin on his face. "What do we need for a dance, really? We need music and we need fun and we need each other. We have all we need right here already don't we?"
Returning Sora's smile, Kairi clasped her hands together excitedly, her eyes dancing. "Hold on then – just a minute."
"Uhm, okay," Sora said, the music now playing none too loudly as Riku walked over to stand beside him; exchanging shrugs, they waited there as Kairi disappeared into her walk-in closet, closing its doors behind her.
Much murmured talking to herself and many random sorts of noises followed, but finally, after a few minutes, Kairi re-emerged from the closet wearing not her nightgown but instead a knee-length dress. Smiling, she approached Riku and Sora and gave an awkward sort of giggle. "I bought this for the dance but, uh, I need some help zipping it up in back."
"Turn around then," Sora said to her, and when she did he reached for the zipper located just above her waist and then paused, slowly moving it along its lined teeth to the top, doing it slowly as to let his eyes trail a surreptitious glance at her bare skin.
"Thanks," Kairi said quietly, before turning around and taking a step back, and then curtseying. "So – what do you think?"
"You look great, Kairi," Sora said.
"Yeah, you really do," Riku agreed.
"'Kay," was all she said in return, but the creeping blush on her face spoke volumes for her alone. "So do you – er – well, you both always look great, but, yeah. Heh. So, care to . . . dance?"
"Sure," Sora eagerly agreed, before giving a chuckle and adding, "I'm not sure if I can do it right, though."
"It's not too hard, but, I'm no expert myself so it doesn't matter much," Kairi assured him, reaching forward to take his hand.
"Okay," Sora said nervously, approaching her more closely.
"Place your hand on my side," Kairi instructed him, and he soon did so. "And now I'll put my arm around your neck . . . then we just sort of move around and sometimes turn or just, whatever; it depends on the song too."
"This seems complicated," Sora said, his nerves failing to be calmed.
"How hard can it be?" Riku said, stepping over behind Sora and reaching a hand around to place it over both his and Kairi's, which were still clasped together.
Giggling, Kairi rested her chin on Sora's shoulder and cut her eyes upward, meeting Riku's gaze. "Poor Sora," she said. "How will he ever learn to dance this way, Riku?"
"It's not that different," the silvery-haired teen insisted, before moving his other hand around and placing it against Kairi's side, just above the place on her hip where Sora was still keeping his hand. "Just move along with the music, Sora."
"Hmm," he murmured, closing his eyes as he slowly moved around in time with the song playing, Kairi's chin still resting gently on his shoulder as Riku rested his own chin atop Sora's head. Eventually he opened his eyes and smiled. "Hey, this isn't so hard to do after all."
"Told ya," Riku said, before moving away from the pair.
Looking over to him, Sora gave him a smile and mouthed the word "thanks". Riku nodded his head, a small smile on his own face. Falling back into rhythm, Sora and Kairi continued to dance through the rest of the current song and then the one that came after as well, before Riku cut in to dance with her his own self. Ultimately, Kairi got Sora to dance with Riku as well and, once that ended, they had begun to consider dancing together – the all three of them - once again.
And then there came a knock at the door.
"Get in the closet!" Kairi hissed to Sora and Riku at once. "Dad had my lock disabled for the rest of my grounding! Go! Hurry and hide! I'm supposed to be in bed!"
"Kairi?" a voice called out through the door.
Scrambling for the closet, Riku and Sora soon found themselves standing together within the confined space of darkness, doors closed tightly before them. From without the closet Kairi jumped onto her bed and then panicked, realizing that it would look all too suspicious if she was happened to be seen in her dance dress.
"Oh jeez . . ." she murmured to herself, slipping the sequined straps down from her shoulders and then painfully and awkwardly managing to slide it all the way off before burying herself beneath two layers of quilts.
"Are you asleep in here?" asked the voice of Kairi's stepfather, followed by the sound of the doorknob turning, and then, footsteps as he stepped a few paces on into the room. "Ah, you are asleep. Well I guess there's nothing wrong with a little music playing while you do . . . sweet dreams, Kairi. Sleep well, young one."
And then, just as quickly as he'd come, the man was gone, door closed tightly behind him. Sighing heavily in relief, Kairi sat up in her bed before giving a start and pulling the quilts up around her bosom, which would have otherwise only been obscured from view by a lilac-colored camisole. "Guys – the coast is clear, just – can you give me a minute?"
"Okay," Sora's voice answered her through the closet doors.
"Thanks," Kairi said, before slipping out from the bed covers and grabbing her dress, stepping into it. "Okay, you can come out now."
The doors opened and Sora stepped out, only to trip over his own shoes and crash land to the floor.
"You okay?" Riku asked him, quickly reaching down to grab his hand and help him up again.
"Yeah, I'm fine," he said, before laughing sheepishly. "But that was a close call, huh?"
"You're telling me," Kairi replied, stepping up to them. "Uhm . . . I kinda sorta slipped out of my dress just in case he tried to wake me up – didn't wanna look suspicious in my party dress; he might've thought I was going to try to sneak out and go to the dance. So needless to say, I need help zipping it up again."
"Makes sense enough," Riku said with a shrug, glancing downward as Kairi turned to place her back to him. "Uh-oh," he then said. "Uh . . . your zipper looks kinda weird."
"Weird how?"
"Well maybe I'm wrong but . . ." Riku reached out to the zipper but found that while it was partially zipped upwards halfway, it was also stuck at this position, unwilling to budge up any further. "Yeah, no, it's stuck, Kairi. I'm sorry – I can't get it to move."
"Oh no, it must've happened when I shimmied out of the thing all so rushed and unable to unzip it before I tried to take it off," Kairi lamented, covering her face with her hands. "I'm sorry our whole little dance-thing here got messed up on my account."
"Aw, come on, Kairi – nothing's been messed up. Don't think like that," Sora said to her in a reassuring voice, his hand reaching forward to reach the back of her bare shoulder, gently rubbing her there.
"Sora's right," Riku said, stepping around to be in front of Kairi.
"You sure?" she replied quietly, leaning her forehead to rest against Riku's chest as he placed a kissed atop her hair; from behind her, she could feel Sora's hands loop around her waist. These actions made her feel more reassured; more certain things really were okay after all.
. . . . . . . .
Marking her spot and closing the journal, Kairi hugged it to her chest and cast her eyes toward the ground. She'd give anything for a hug or kiss from them now . . . her boys.