"Where the shit are they!" Riku growled. He would have folded his arms if they weren't laden with drink cups and buckets of popcorn. Sora tucked the tickets into his wallet as he shrugged.

"Probably making out in the bushes somewhere." He suggested lazily as he glanced at the clock on the wall. Five minutes until curtain up, but the first fifteen minutes of every movie was just trailers and other boring things, so there was still plenty of time for the girls to make an appearance. Besides, Sora kind of liked the idea of two hot girls making out.

Even though it had been Sora to suggest the double date, it was actually Riku who had suggested the cinema. The words were barely out of his mouth when Kairi had whipped out her mobile phone and called Naminé. Before either of the boys could blink, Naminé was on loudspeaker and she and Kairi had giggly arranged a date, time, picked the movie, informed each other on what they were going to wear and Kairi had given Naminé a detailed recount of exactly what she had walked in on, barely five minutes before the call.

Much of what was said was spoken so quickly that Riku and Sora were unable to catch on.

So it came to be that, two days later, while reinforcing the wooden bridge on the island, Kairi had informed them that they would be watching Twilight together.

"Twilight?" Riku gaped at her. "Why the hell are we watching that?"

Kairi frowned as she handed Sora a plank of wood. "Because it's supposed to be a good movie. Naminé has read the books and says it's pretty cool, and she has good taste in books." She waved a hammer threateningly. Riku snatched the hammer from her and drove a nail into place, a little more forcefully than he should have, grumbling under his breath about vampires.

Sora's ears perked as he fitted the next board into place, several feet away. "It's about vampires?" He asked, earning a nod from Kairi "How bad could it be, then? Vampires are awesome. They eat people." He nodded knowingly, his head full of gruesome bloodsuckers and violent screams. After a second, he paused. Something didn't quite add up. "Wait, why are we watching a horror flick for a first date?"

Kairi laughed. "Because Twilight isn't a horror movie." Ignoring Riku's subtle "Yes, it is" she approached Sora, ready to relay the information on the story that Naminé had fed her, and do it proudly. "Twilight is about the forbidden love of a girl and a vampire."

Sora thought for a moment. Even though he was secretly dating his very best, very male friend, he still valued what was left of his masculinity, and the tragic tale of a vampire wanting to eat his girlfriend sounded a little too gay for his tastes. "Well, so long as people get eaten and stuff it'd be okay." He reasoned, gently marking a spot to hammer a nail in with a lead pencil.

Kairi shook her head "No, it's very gentle. The vampire only eats animals, but as much as he wants to eat her, he can't let himself do it, because he loves her too much." She was putting such a good spin on the story that she seemed to convince herself.

Sora made a face "So there's no blood and guts?"

Kairi shook her head, and Riku piped up "Sora, remember what a Mary Sue is?"

Sora thought for a second. "Isn't a Mary Sue an original character in fanfiction that is too perfect in every way imaginable and some ways that aren't, and who causes every male character to forget his previous personality, values and beliefs and falls head-over-heels for her?"

Kairi nodded "And she's usually just a fanaticized version of the author who has a crush on one of the fictional characters of the original story?"

Riku nodded slowly as he rustled around in the bag of nails "Well, it seems that not all Mary Sues are females, and they aren't restricted to fanfiction."

"You don't mean –"

"How would you know, anyway?"

"Oh, God, the world is going to end!"

"Calm down, Sora. The Cullens don't eat people."

"Mary Sues are going to take over the world, one fanfic at a time!"

Sora's mind was dragged to the present by an annoyed voice.

"If they don't get a move on we'll get locked out. And would you mind giving me a hand, here? I'm about to drop some of the junk food." Riku scowled, roughly pushing a bucket of popcorn at Sora. Sora scrambled to ease Riku's burden – food was one of his favorite things, and it just wasn't a movie without a giant bucket of popcorn. Each. And some ice cream. Yeah.

At that second, Kairi and Naminé decided to make their appearance. However, they were looking neat and perfectly calm, as if they hadn't just spent the last ten minutes making out in the bushes somewhere. After a quick exchanging of words, Kairi and Naminé went off to buy food and tickets and Riku and Sora went to find decent seats.

Sora liked to sit in the front row, right in the middle, but Riku eyed some seats in the back corner. Eventually, as more people trickled in, they compromised and settled in the middle of the theatre. Eventually, the lights dimmed and the trailers started. However, there was no sign of the girls anywhere.

Riku glanced over his seat at the rows behind him. "You know what? I think we've been ditched." He smirked. How… convenient of them.

Sora shook his head. "Did you check the back corner?" He mumbled through a mouthful of popcorn. Riku did as suggested and his smirk doubled when he spotted a blonde head and an auburn head in the very back corner.

"Yep, we've been abandoned." He confirmed as he grabbed a handful of Sora's popcorn.

"Hey! You've got your own bucket!" Sora exclaimed as he swatted Riku's hand away.

"Aww, but yours tastes better." Riku teased as he stole Sora's drink and took a swig. He hated Coka Cola, it was much too sweet for him, but it was worth it, just to see Sora glare at him like that. Was it legal to be so adorable?

Sora retaliated in the only way he could. He roughly shoved his hand at Riku's side and began tickling mercilessly. Riku froze, doubled over and began to writhe violently, laughing uproariously, attempting to push Sora away in vain. Sora reached around him with his other hand and began to tickle Riku's other side, causing him to almost shriek with laugher. The sound echoed loudly and many people had begun to search for the source of the noise, but Sora didn't care. He rarely got to bully Riku like this, so there was no way he was going to stop.

Both buckets of popcorn had spilled their contents all over the chairs and floor, and the drinks were about to follow suit, but the only thing that stopped Sora was the sudden harsh light as someone shined a torch directly into his face.

"Right, you two. Out!" An angry voice exclaimed.

Riku, still slumped over and trying to regain his breath, didn't notice the angry usher until he'd straightened up, wiped the tears of mirth out of his eyes and exclaimed in a very loud voice "Fuck you, Sora!"

Within five minutes, they had both received two-month bans from the cinema and had been kicked out onto the street.

"I'm sorry about that, Riku." Sora muttered to his feet as the two of them walked to Riku's car, feeling furiously ashamed of himself for ruining his first date. He hoped Riku wasn't as disappointed as he was.

Riku shrugged "You actually did me a favor – I really didn't want to watch that movie."

Sora looked up at him; eyebrows raised teasingly to hide his relief "Yeah, how did you know so much about Twilight, anyway? You seemed to know all about it, you big fairy."

Riku's hands rammed into his pockets, ignoring the jab. "I read the books to my little sister." He said bluntly.

Sora's mind drifted to the frail little girl that sat in her wheelchair all day. The girl that looked so small and so fragile that a stiff breeze might tear her apart. The ten-year-old who had a hole in her heart, and who had surpassed her life expectancy two years ago.

"How is she doing, by the way?" Sora asked, avoiding Riku's gaze.

"She's one up on the list of heart transplants." He grimaced "The man in line before her died a couple of weeks ago."

Sora bit his lip, not knowing what to say. It was good that she was one step closer to a normal life, but it sucked that someone had died from the same problem she had. He never knew how to handle the issue; it caused Riku a lot of agony, and he didn't want to upset him.

Nervously, hesitantly, he reached across and wrapped an arm around Riku's middle, hoping to put into the gesture what he couldn't put into words. The other boy smiled down at him, allowing his arm to drape across Sora's shoulders, pulling him close. They walked in peace for a while, until Sora began to gently tickle Riku's side. Riku shouted with laughter, pushed Sora away roughly and ran to his car, attempting to lock Sora out of it. Sora, however, was too fast, and was buckled in before Riku could even open his door.

"Let's go watch a decent movie." He suggested once the keys were in the ignition.

"The Terminator?" Sora suggested, fiddling with the radio. Riku chuckled and nodded.

"Agreed."

"Oh geez, the movie hasn't even started yet and they've been kicked out." Kairi slapped her forehead as she watched Riku drag a cringing Sora from the theatre.

"What on Earth were they doing down there, anyway?" Naminé wondered, sitting up straight to get a better look. They heard Riku laughing, yes, but die to the circumstances it seemed very questionable to them. Kairi suppressed the urge to suggest that perhaps Sora had been performing oral sex on Riku. Not even those two were dumb enough to try something in the cinema, before the movie had even started.

"I've never given much thought to how I would die."

"Oh, it's starting." Kairi muttered as she sipped her water. Neither of the girls had bought very much food – just a bottle of water each and a packet of crispy MnMs to share. As she watched the brunette she knew as Bella pot a small cactus on screen, she felt a small hand slip into her own. Swallowing slightly, she glanced over at Naminé, who had her eyes trained innocently on the screen, the ghost of a smile dancing across her face.

"Dying in place of someone I love seems like a pretty good way to go."

Smiling also, Kairi laced her fingers through Naminé's and settled down to watch the movie.

"Wasn't Edward supposed to be hot?" Kairi frowned as the credits rolled on.

Somehow, as the movie drew on, they had gotten closer and closer to each other. The armrest of the seat was in its upright position, but Kairi didn't remember it going up. It came as a pleasant surprise to find their arms wrapped around each other when the lights came on. As tempted as Kairi was to just stay like that, they would have attracted some attention, so she'd reluctantly pulled away from Naminé.

"I know. His face looked like he's been hit by a bus or two." Naminé yawned, stretching luxuriously in her chair. Kairi hauled herself out of her seat with some difficulty and began to shake the sleep out of her legs.

"That Alice girl was pretty sexy, though." She smiled, offering Naminé a hand up.

"Do I have some competition, now?" Naminé feigned anger as she took Kairi's hand, but Kairi just giggled.

"You're better looking than all of the Cullen girls rolled into one, don't worry."

Naminé's cheeks went slightly pink as she stood up. "Really?"

Kairi gave Naminé's hand a gentle squeeze and nodded. "Really really. Now, I'm kind of hungry; do you want some food?"

Naminé shrugged casually as they filed from the cinema "Sure, I guess. We could go to that sandwich bar down the street, remember, where we ate lunch the other day. They have really nice egg and lettuce sandwiches."

Kairi poked her tongue out. Egg and lettuce. Ew. Poking Naminé's cheek playfully, she shook her head "Nah, that's a lunch spot and it's just past eight. I wanted to take you to this small Italian restaurant I discovered a month or two back – they serve the best tortellini I have ever tasted." She said casually, playfully. Naminé shrugged.

"Lead the way, Kai."

The 'small Italian restaurant' Kairi had promised was a lie – it was actually a pizza takeout shop with a few tables and chairs scattered in front of the shop on the street, and a small pasta menu tacked to the wall in a very subtle, dusty corner. Still, it was clean, pleasant and very quiet; they were seated almost immediately and had regular visits from the waiter.

Their dingy plastic table stood in a little fenced-off area on the wide sidewalk; from it they could see up and down the entire street, into the shops opposite and all of the passers-by. A cool evening breeze blew in the gentle rhythm of the island, the steady beat from the heart of the Island itself. It was a warm night, however, and neither of the girls felt particularly hot or cold.

After a short while of people-spotting and talking aimlessly, Naminé settled on the tortellini and Kairi went for the spaghetti bolognese. They also got a plate of garlic bread to share and a jug of water.

After several minutes of eating in silence, Kairi piped up "How's your pasta?"

Naminé swallowed a mouthful and smiled. "Best I've ever tasted." Before Kairi could respond, Naminé jokingly stuffed a big pile of pasta into her mouth, making a silly face that made Kairi giggle as she slurped up a long piece of spaghetti. It was warm, saucy and mouth-watering, but something was off. She could faintly taste something else, something that should not be on her plate. Some trace of chemicals? Or was it simply a bad bit of cheese? She shrugged it off, because the taste of the meatballs hid the other taste quite well. Even as thin as she was, Kairi always ate everything on her plate, even if it would make her sick. It was a rule.

Glancing over at Naminé as she raised the fork to her mouth, Kairi noticed that something was odd. Something was… missing? It took her a couple of minutes of thoughtful chewing to figure it out, and when she did she felt like an idiot for not noticing it before.

"Naminé… did you paint your nails today?" Kairi asked curiously, her own fork forgotten in her hand. In the place of the usual metallic glint was… nothing? Just an ordinary, if not extremely long, unpainted fingernail. She thought back to the time in the elevator several months ago she'd been told that if Naminé didn't paint her nails according to her daily moods, 'bad things' would happen, by the very paint-less girl who sat before her, in fact.

"I did have them painted this morning, now that you mention it. A rather bright shade of yellow that I discovered at the shop a week or so ago, if I recall correctly." She mused with a lopsided smile as she examined her nails. "Anticipation, I decided. I also noticed that you seem to like yellow, so it sort of doubled as thinking about you."

The casual way she watered her speech down with was lost of Kairi, and her cheeks went slightly pink. The thought of Naminé using a colour, just for her? Her stomach seemed to house a butterfly aviary for a split second at the thought. After a second, the churning didn't stop and her head began to swim. Feeling like she was going to be sick, her jaw clamped shut tightly and she rubbed her cheek, as if trying to rub off paint.

"But then I changed my mind." Naminé's hand sunk to her lap and she shot Kairi a very sober stare. Kairi stared, feeling like an idiot "You're not a colour, Kairi, you're not paint. You're a person. You're the only person I feel I can truly be myself around." Her eyes lowered to the salt shaker and she smiled, almost wistfully "If anything, you're nail polish remover – you dissolved the thin coat of paint I hide behind.

"The paints are really just colourful masks that I use to help me decide how to tackle the world, because I can't just go out and be myself – I have no idea who I really am. But," Naminé's icy blue eyes flickered back up to meet Kairi's gaze, burning with an intensity she had previously believed impossible "When I'm with you, Kairi, while I may be no closer to knowing who I am, I am that much more comfortable in my own skin." She paused, calmly sliding her gaze across each item of the table, trying to place what was going through her head neatly into human words.

"When I'm with you… I am… Naminé." She smiled a simple, childlike smile. "And that's enough for me."

For a long moment, time stood still. It was as if a big bubble had encased their table and stopped everything, the mad rush on the outside continuing on as if nothing was amiss. Neither of the girls could feel themselves breathing; the only thing they could feel was their gazes digging into each other's skulls.

But something was wrong. Kairi's heart fluttered irregularly as her stomach churned like an enraged ocean. A sweat broke out on her brow and her limbs felt like they were made of lead. Her chest burned and her head swam, and the world around her began to spin into a mad whirl of colours and sounds. Naminé's face swam towards her, concerned.

"Kairi?"

But the girl was paralyzed, clutching onto the table for fear of falling from the earth and into the sky. Madly, she began to shake her head to try and rid herself of this fog that clouded her eyes. Quite suddenly her stomach leapt at her mouth, pushing her dinner up and all over the table. Her body bent rigidly as she retched loudly all over herself and what was left of her dinner. When there was nothing left in her stomach, she clambered to her feet, face hot enough to fry an egg. Panting, swaying, she gripped the back of her chair for support.

"Kairi!"

Kairi screamed – and turned tail and ran for her life, forgetting her bag, her dinner and her date. She ran and ran as if being chased by some horrific monster, almost blindly, until she couldn't run anymore and collapsed into a dead faint.

Author's Message in a Bottle: So, all of you lovely people have convinced me to continue. I sat down and read through all of my chapters, drafts and notes and got myself back into the story, just in time for Valentine's Day. ^_^

There's one thing I noticed about Naminé in the games – she always has a very good idea of what's going on, but she never has any control in what happens to her. All she can ever do is hide away in her little hidey hole, draw her pictures and hope for some strong adolescent boy to come save her. And she seems to be pretty well collected on the surface but she's actually an uncertain shamble, and she always has to hide it and put on a brave face to help lead the good guys to victory.

I always felt sorry for the girl. :/

And Kairi? Eh. Let's not worry about her; her character is very under developed due to her lack of screen time. This chapter's Kairi was more of the Kairi from the actual event than the Kairi from the game. Leave it at that.

-x-

Well, that update never came. Chapter seven 'died in the arse', as it were, and it's been almost three years since I've touched this story. Yeah, I'm sorry that it died on a cliffhanger. XD It surprises me to see people actually still read this story.

I never felt that Warpaint was my best story, but I suppose it was like the training wheels I needed to get off my butt and actually finish a longer fanfiction. I was only sixteen when I began this fanfiction, but since then I've grown a little, matured even less, but write with a slightly higher level of eloquence. I've been toying with the idea of rewriting this for a while now. Currently I'm a little too busy, but in the near future, who knows? Stranger things have happened.