A/N: Even though I'm like 99% sure everyone that used to follow this story is like gone now, I had to finish it for myself. So, anyway, if you're out there, I'm sorry I'm such a dud and took forever on this. And I'm not sure its good enough to make up for it taking like two months or whatever
El Epilogue
Hoagie and Abby sat uncomfortably straddling that line between friends and something more. It had been weeks since that day in the hall. The day everything in Abby's life had suddenly turned around. Now she had two best friends…and whatever Hoagie was to her.
The goggled boy lay splayed across Abby's bed, while Abby took her post at the foot. He picked up her braid and ran it through his fingers. "So, who's coming here?" he asked her. A sheepish look spread across his face.
"Abby's told you this at least four times, baby. Kuki and Wally, Nigel and Rachel," Abby repeated.
He flipped onto his back, arms straight out, and nudged her head with his socked foot. "And, I'm supposed to remember them?"
Slightly annoyed, the dark-skinned girl moved her head out of Hoagie's range. She had learned, after being the boy's friend for about five minutes that he never stopped moving. And his brain never stopped whirring either. "Well, you remember Abby and I remember you. Kuki remembers Abby. Nigel and Rachel remember each other. And Kuki was talking about some tree house thing that she and Wally remember. So, yeah, Abby would say you will probably remember someone."
Hoagie nodded his head slightly at the notion before sitting up. "Can we go get some food?"
Nigel Uno dragged his sneakered feet along the sidewalk as he made the trek from his house to this 'Abigail's' house with Rachel. "You're completely sure we have to do this?" he asked her for the umpteenth time that day.
In response, she smiled a pained smile. Like she was gritting her teeth to keep from yelling at him until she was blue in the face. Abruptly she stopped and grabbed the boy's hand in both of hers. "You promised me, Nigel. And all those years, I never broke the promise I made to you."
He stared at her. And everything replayed in his mind. All those years of him brooding and painting, only caring about himself, she was standing right next to him in every memory. Her large brown eyes filled with worry. Nigel didn't want to be that person any more. He wanted to be worthy of her. So, he found his bald head nodding slowly. Nigel picked up his feet, and followed Rachel.
Kuki Sanban sat on her bedroom floor with a box in front of her. She couldn't help but feel that the box held something special. And so, she was hesitant to open it, afraid that her suspicions would be false. It had been under her bed. Shoved to the very back by years of junk and she couldn't seem to remember it at all.
She had learned, especially in the last few weeks, that the things she could not remember were all often related. And that was why she sat, with shaking hands, the box unopened in front of her. Kuki picked up her small pink phone and flipped it open, pressing a number she pressed more than any other.
Moments later, he appeared at her doorstep. Wally Beatles. The person who had taught her that it was OK to be unsure, to not know. Kuki grabbed his elbow and dragged him upstairs to her bedroom.
"You brought me here to see a cruddy box?" the boy groaned, used to his girlfriend's antics, but annoyed all the same.
Kuki shook her head and grinned. Wally never failed to amuse her. "Wally, I have a feeling about this box." He raised an eyebrow and sighed. "I need you to open it for me."
Wally grumbled to himself as he sat on her pink shag rug and opened the small box. Kuki watched as his eyebrows scrunched together in slight confusion. "What the-"
Immediately, Kuki dropped to her knees next to him. She lightly pushed the blonde boy out of the way as she too leaned over the box. Her thin, lithe fingers sifted through its contents. Kuki could not remember ever smiling with such happiness.
The six sat in a circle. Letting an almost reverent silence fill the room as they took each other in. The feeling of familiarity was so…present. They could taste the memories, sweet, on the tips of their tongues. Sunglasses dark as night, yellow-tinted goggles, toys upon toys, too much violent television, a vivid red cap, a tiger-striped sweater.
The petite Asian giggled and plopped herself down in the blonde's lap. "I feel so full right now," she smiled. "Like I could live in this moment forever."
Wally rolled his eyes and handed Kuki the box.
"What's in the box, girl?" Abby asked.
Kuki paused, meeting the eyes of each person in the circle. Letting them each see pure joy swim in her light orbs. "This," she began, patting the box as if it were a pet, "this holds the answers to everything." Sacredly, Kuki lifted the lid off the old box and, then, she unceremoniously dumped everything out of it onto the floor.
Photos, notes, odd little receipt-like strips of paper, pieces of candy, blueprints, a pair of dark shades, and so, so much more scattered in the middle of the circle. And they each found themselves reaching for a different object.
The blonde haired girl held a photo delicately in her hands. It was old, the children in it probably around nine. And she could tell they were happy, arms slung casually around each other's shoulders and smiles overwhelming their faces. Slowly, she took in the circle of people around her and easily matched them to the happy children in this picture.
She was not in the picture.
Rachel glanced to her right and found Nigel turning the pair of sunglasses over in his hands. They were his, according to the picture she held, he must've given them to Kuki. She watched as a small smile crept over the boy's face. Rachel couldn't help but smile too.
Abby was looking at the receipt-like strip of paper. Something called a mission spec. Something that she couldn't make anything out of. She slipped the paper between her fingers as she read through the codes and such. And there, at the bottom of the rather long sheet, was something she did recognize. Numbuh 362 (aka Rachel T McKenzie, Supreme Leader of the Kids Next Door).
The dark-skinned girl had no idea what this kids next door business was. But, Rachel McKenzie happened to be sitting right next to her, studying an old photo with a sad look in her eyes. Abby nudged her friend and handed over the sheet of paper without a word.
There was a question, in the back of each of their heads. Quiet at first, but as they looked through the treasures that Kuki had shoved under bed, gaining volume. What had they been?
"A leader," Rachel whispered, repeating her title over and over again in her head until she could almost remember somebody calling her it.
"A freaking genius!" Hoagie crowed, pouring over the blueprints written in handwriting he recognized as his own, while wondering how any of it was even remotely possible.
"A candy hunter?" Abby questioned, reading through a letter written by her and addressed to Kuki, postmarked from Guatemala of all places.
"Kind of a jerk," Wally murmured, thumbing through a very extensive list of all the things of Kuki's he had broken when they were children.
"Happy," Kuki smiled, glancing around at what she had done, what she had given to all of her friends.
"Whole," Nigel nodded, placing the too-small sunglasses atop his head.
They had been something called the Kids Next Door. And that seemed to ring a bell somewhere deep in each of their minds. As if it had been shoved back there, much like a box under a bed.
They couldn't really remember these things and nobody would ever be able to tell them whether they were right or wrong or somewhere in between. But they could almost seem to remember being this way, feeling this way. They felt familiar. They felt right. They felt like them.
A/N: I'm tearing up the smallest bit as I write this. I'll miss this fic :-( Let me know what your favorite part was of the whole thing. and maybe a favorite line/paragraph if you have one :D Thanks for sticking it out with me!