IHTP Ch2

Oopsies! Sorry, I’ve been busy

. I’ll update more often now, I swear! It’s summer~!

One more chapter to go before it starts to get interesting! Yay! =D

Chapter 2: The Past

The two children laughed, Ann pushing Chris down the large sand dune, but not before he grabbed her hand and dragged her down the sand hill with him. They rolled down uncontrollably, wrestling each other.

When they stopped at the bottom of the dune, Chris was on top of Ann, laughing. Ann was grinning broadly.

Chris stopped laughing when he felt lips on his cheeks for a short second. He looked down at his friend, getting off her. He blinked, staring at her as she got up also. Just then he could’ve sworn he thought Ann was…cute.

Ann was still smiling, her hands behind her back.

“Here, Chris. I want you to have this.” She held out her hands. In her tiny palms was a golden locket.

“Wow…Thank you. What is it?” He took the locket, looking down at it in his hands.

“My parents gave it to me.” She answered, standing up next to him as he held the locket up in the moonlight and watching it glint, “It’s very precious.”

Chris knew something was wrong at that moment. He didn’t know what it was, but he knew something was wrong in some way.

Ann didn’t notice his serious expression, but ran out towards the sea. She stopped at the shoreline. “Chris…”

“Yeah?” Chris walked over, plopping down in the sand next to her. The tides came in, surrounding their feet.

“We’ll be friends forever, right?”

Chris smiled, looking up at her. She was pointing one of her little fingers up at the starry night sky. She was pointing to the brightest star.

He nodded, standing up. “Yeah, friends forever.”

Ann look at him out of the corner of her eye, her other hand reaching for his. She held it, making him blush. She lifted his hand into the air.

He got her message, pointing at the same star.

“Vow that no matter what, we’ll be friends?”

“I vow that we’ll be friends forever.” Chris smiled, lowing his arm, holding out his hand towards Ann. His pinky was shaped like a hook. “Pinky swear, too?”

“Pinky swear!”

Chris laughed as they hooked fingers, then he looked back up to the brightest star. “Heh, no matter what, we’ll be friends, Ann, so don’t you worry! Even if we’re apart, all we have to do is look up to the stars! Every place shares the same sky, and we share the same heart!”

Ann smiled. He didn’t know it, but that was exactly what she wanted to hear.

***

“Uhg…” Ann moaned, bringing Chris back to reality.

“What’s wrong now?”

“Just a headache. No need to worry.” Ann smiled nervously.

“Again?” Chris shook his head. “You’ve been having headaches ever since you got amnesia.”

“I never got amnesia. I’ve been getting headaches ever since I got here.” Ann insisted. Chris shook his head again; she always said that. Why couldn’t she believe that she had lived here before?

“Let’s go.” Chris said, handing Ann her weapons.

“You’re not cold?” She asked, taking off her over-coat and squeezing the water out of it.

“After all those times I swam here? No.” Chris shrugged.

“…When did you swim…?” Ann asked, “I live with you. I’ve never seen you swim.”

“You don’t like swimming, so I end up swimming alone. At night.”

“Really? It must be freezing at night!”

“Yeah. We used to do it all the time together. Remember?” Chris didn’t hear his own words.

“What? You’re still at that whole ‘we’ve known each other forever’ thing?”

Chris stopped. “Sorry.”

“Hmph. Still, I don’t like water. Where I come from, there’s only a little bit of water. At least from what I’ve seen.” Ann said stubbornly.

Why won’t she understand…? Chris thought, his hands digging through his pockets absently.

“You go home. I’m going… swimming.” Chris said.

“What? Now?”

“Sure, why not? It’s evening, and I’m wet anyways.”

“What about dinner?”

“I’ll go fishing.”

“Honestly, where did you learn to fish?”

You. “An old friend…”

“Sora? Riku? Kairi? Um… Tidus? Selphie? Wakka?” Ann began naming off the island kids.

“No. Anyway, see you tonight.”

“Okay! Be careful!” Ann said as she walked off. Chris watched her go away, sighing.

He wished he could take her to the place he always went when he wanted to think. He never did take her there, and she was the one who discovered it. It was an old cave, like the one Sora, Riku, and Kairi had and didn’t let anyone in. Chris remembered accidentally stumbling upon it with Ann in his younger days. There were childish drawings all over the place.

That’s where he got the idea to draw in his own cave, with Ann, of course. He walked to the edge of the water, wading through. He began to swim to the other side of the island. He stopped by one of the docks. He saw Sora and Kairi. They were talking, and their conversation seemed pretty deep. He caught a bit of their conversation.

“Sora, let’s take the raft and go—just the two of us!”

“Huh?”

“Just kidding.”

“What’s gotten into you? You’re the one that’s changed, Kairi.”

“Maybe... You know, I was a little afraid at first, but now I’m ready. No matter where I go or what I see, I know I can always come back here. Right?”

Chris stopped listening at that point, he had swum on. He wondered what they were going to do.

Soon he reached the side of the island where a big wooden wall stood separating the two sides. He took a deep breath, diving under. Underwater, he swam through a tunnel in the rocks below, emerging in a cave with stale air. On the cave walls were drawings. He stepped onto the ground there, walking deeper into the cave, his hand dragging along the cave walls.

He came upon the last one. It was one Ann drew. It was of the night they made the promise. He was saddened as he looked around to all the great memories. The last time he was here he laughed at himself, for the way he used to draw. There were no drawings after that one. It was empty. Chris had no longer desired to draw in the cave; it just wasn’t the same without Ann.

He sat there, in his sanctuary. No, if it were a sanctuary, he would be at peace. He wasn’t at peace. But that didn’t matter. He just thought. He thought back to the days with Ann where he was the happiest, he thought so he wouldn’t forget.

But honestly, he wanted to forget, so he could start over, just like Ann. But he just couldn’t let go. He didn’t want to let go of the Ann he once knew.

He thought back. This time to the days after she became a new person.

***

“What are you doing?” Ann asked Chris, who was now at the age of eleven.

“Cleaning my dagger.” Chris responded without looking up. His voice was deepening; it made him seem a bit scary in Ann’s eyes.

“Cool, where’d you get it?”

“Someone who makes daggers on the island made it for me.”

“Why’s it green?” Ann wrinkled her nose.

“Because it’s made of jade.”

“Jade? Is that what it’s called? ‘Jade Dagger.’ Hehe, sounds awesome.” Ann grinned.

“No, Jade Blade.”

“That sounds even more awesome!” Ann poked Chris’ ribs, causing him to twitch. “Let’s play together! Show me how to fight! Maybe I can use the dagger, too!”

Chris jumped up from his spot by his desk. “No! It’s too dangerous! You’ll get hurt.” Chris protested, “Besides, you’re a girl. Girls can’t fight well. Um, that well.” Chris didn’t want a bunch of angry girls at his door wanting to beat him up, so he added that last bit as if it’d help a little.

“And? Like I care! I can become better then those other girls then!”

“You don’t care if you get hurt?”

“Uh… well, I…”

“Tell you what, you can beat me up, and I won’t have to hurt you, okay?”

“…That’s a strange proposition… but okay, deal!”

“Wrong.”

“Huh?” Before she could register what was going on, Chris flung her onto her bed that was halfway across the room. “Hey! No fair! How’d you do that? And what was that for!?”

“The right answer was ‘What if you get hurt?’ not ‘Okay.’”

“How was I supposed to know!?”

“We’re friends, and friends don’t hurt each other… badly.”

“But you’re the one who made the offer!”

“I wanted to see what you were going to say.”

“You’re mean.” Ann pouted.

“Come on, I really will fight you. Just don’t take it too far?” Chris gave a rare smile.

***

“Heh, the good times…” he mumbled, half sarcastically.

He thought once more. He remembered a time when Ann’s mom gave him a paopu fruit.

***
Gods, I love the flashback at the beginning of this chapter =3. Revealing more about the characters! And look, dialogue from the game! And wow, I have my own cliché cave with drawings. How unoriginal. But hey, this was written way back then. I just edited it slightly because I got better at writing.

I’m not sure how Chris managed to fling Ann across the room when he was eleven when that strength doesn’t really show up later on. Either that or Ann used to be REALLY light (but twice or so is she called heavy… the second time has yet to appear!). I still love those flashbacks. Kid Chris and Ann are cute =3.

R&R!