Fan Number 61

by a quirky little tune

(BEFORE HOMEROOM)

It was finally the day of Riku's birthday and Sora felt the usual mix of excitement and anxiety floating around in his stomach. He loved Riku's birthday, simply because it was one of the only days of the year that Sora could get away with acting like the lovesick dog he really was while Riku remained clueless – his older friend just chalked it up to the usual birthday hype. Kairi happened to find it all very amusing and adorable.

And this year – this year was going to be the absolute best. Riku would never know what hit him! Sora had never failed to disappoint in the art of Riku-gift-finding, but his ideas this year were the best he'd ever had.

Sora checked the clock above the school entrance for the nth time in five minutes. He couldn't wait until Kairi got there with their presents and hoped he didn't look as dorky in his impatience as he felt he did. Almost everyone knew that all the care and love in the world would not be able to compensate for Sora's poor skills in gift-wrapping, so it usually fell to Kairi to make his purchases look pretty and suitable the night before the event. Riku was the same way, Sora thought fondly, but the older boy was too proud to have anyone else do his own work – the proof being the numerous poorly wrapped gifts that Riku sheepishly bestowed upon him year after year.

That sort of pride was something they both shared, though they were prideful about different kinds of things. Riku wanted to do everything himself to prove that he was capable of anything. Sora also believed in accomplishing things through one's own means, though he understood, unlike the older boy, that asking for help was sometimes the best option. That sometimes, asking for help showed a different yet equal amount of capability and strength in a person.

Especially when it came to gift-wrapping a present for one's crush. Or so Sora liked to tell himself, anyway. He checked the clock again and bit his lip.

Double doors swung open and caught Sora's attention in the next instant. Kairi spotted him with a bright smile and swung a huge bag of colorfully wrapped gifts in front of her as she moved to his side. She handed him two square boxes, one covered in shiny red paper and the other covered in shiny blue. "The red one," she pointed out, "is the DaiRiZu gift. Blue is the gift you're giving him as Sora."

Sora made a face, but tucked both into his school bag. The DaiRiZu had mandated that everyone should purchase some sort of gift or card to celebrate Riku's birthday, so Sora had taken one of his lesser brilliant ideas and used it as his gift from 'Fan Number 61.' He had given both items to Kairi to wrap and, after she had pestered him for days as to why he was giving more than one present this year, eventually spilled the entire DaiRiZu story.

Kairi had laughed for a good five minutes straight when he told her the short version of the tale, and cracked up for another ten minutes after that when he told her the long version (she couldn't breathe when he detailed the whole initiation process). Then the merciless teasing started, though Sora was too relieved over her good-natured acceptance to be insulted at her ribbing; he was pretty sure that Riku would not take any part of that story half as well as Kairi did.

When she had finally calmed down, the redhead had demanded that Sora keep her updated on all things DaiRiZu-related – however, there really wasn't much to tell. Surprisingly enough, the following few weeks after his initiation were relatively simple and painless. He had to go to two of the DaiRiZu meetings every week, but they usually only lasted twenty or minutes or so, unless there was another initiation being held. Mostly the club had been preparing for Riku's birthday. And not a peep had been heard from the nastier side of the fan club in days. Maybe they too were distracted by the upcoming festivities?

As for Riku, Kairi and Sora had both agreed that, for the time being, it was best that he was left in the dark about Sora's 'undercover work' – especially considering how angry he still was at the fanclub as a whole. He had gotten suspicious a few days ago, wondering why Sora was suddenly skipping out on some of their hang out sessions after school, but Sora had somehow made it seem as if all his absences were due to Riku's birthday preparations and the older boy had thankfully left him alone.

All in all, it was going very smoothly, every last bit of it. And in retrospect, Sora should have seen that as the sign that it truly was – the sign that everything was about to go topsy-turvy, Bizarre Room-style.

"Now, Sora," Kairi said sweetly as she patted him on the cheek, "make sure you give Riku your gift after lunch, you hear me?"

Puzzled, Sora asked, "Huh? Why?"

The redhead linked arms with him as they began to walk down the hallway. "Because I'm going to give my gift to him before lunch, so he can spend at least one period admiring my gift and thoughtfulness before you blow him away with your own and he forgets about everything else. Capiche?"

He pouted. "Kairi! My gift isn't going to blow him away! I'm certain he'll love our gifts equally –"

"So-ra, you sil-ly goose," she giggled, interrupting his train of thought. "I'm not saying it out of spite or jealousy, you know – my gift is wonderful too. But I caught a peek of your special gift to him last night – don't give me that look, I get privileges since I'm the one doing you a wrapping favor – and it really is something else. He'll love it."

Mentioning Riku and the word 'love' in any capacity was enough to get Sora a little hot under his collar, but he ignored it in favor of grinning. Kairi's sincere words had struck something very warm and pleased in the pit of his stomach. "You think?"

Kairi nodded sagely. "I know." Their respective classrooms were coming up, so she disentangled their arms. "So remember: no gift giving until after lunch, okay?"

Sora was in too good of a mood to do anything else but agree. "Okay, I promise!" He ran off to deliver his DaiRiZu gift to the higher-ups before he went to bombard his best friend with birthday wishes.

(BEFORE LUNCH)

"Sora!"

The brunet turned around at the sound of his name, already grinning in recognition of that voice. "Riku!" he called back, waiting for his friend to catch up with him. "Happy Birthday!"

"That's the third time you've told me that, goof. You don't need to say that every single time we talk today," Riku laughed, obviously not really minding. He ruffled the shorter boy's hair and draped a pale arm across his shoulders. He was in a good mood, Sora observed happily, basking in the contact and offering up nothing but a grin in response.

"How has your day been treating you so far, birthday-boy?" he asked, noticing the traditional flower wreath around Riku's neck that Selphie always made for her friends on their special days.

"Good, good! That idiotic club hasn't bothered me all day, though I'm sure it's only a matter of time," he said with a face. Sora tried to not to react too noticeably. "Oh, but Wakka and Tidus chipped in to get me this awesome yellow and blue hoodie and Selphie gave me, well, she gave me an interesting… weird… novel… thing – you know how odd she can get sometimes." Riku seemed to be slightly flustered at the mention of Selphie's gift, but his tone of voice remained affectionate as he spoke of his friends. "And Kairi just gave me her gift, but I haven't opened it yet –"

Sora punched his shoulder lightly. "Open it, open it!" He already knew what it was, of course, having helped think of it, but he loved watching peoples' reactions to presents. And he especially loved watching Riku's reactions; he loved watching that normally serious, quiet disposition turn into something childish and unguarded, if only for a few minutes.

Without any further needling, Riku retrieved the small purple gift bag from his backpack and dug into the white tissue paper. He pulled out a dark wood frame that held a simple color pencil sketch inside. Three figures stood on a beach, a crude attempt at a raft drifting in the water behind them. One had red hair, a seashell necklace, and a yellow star fruit in hand. The other two, a brown-haired figure and a silver-haired figure, faced each other, each holding wooden swords.

"This is cute. I'm guessing some part of Namine has really rubbed off on her, huh?" he said gently, running a hand over the two boy figures. "These days feel so far away, but Kairi really did a great job of capturing them."

"Yeah, definitely." This was the first time Sora was seeing the finished product after he had suggested the idea and he was suitably impressed with Kairi's art skills.

"She even perfectly portrayed how I kicked your ass all the time."

Wait, what?

"Wait, what?" Sora squawked, leaning in closer.

Smirking, Riku pointed to the bandage on picture-Sora's leg. "Obviously, young Riku got the better of young Sora here. As per usual."

Sora gaped. That was not part of his suggestion, damn it, Kairi! But it was hard to stay annoyed – indignation reluctantly washed away when he heard Riku laughing yet again (the third time in minutes, one of Sora's most impressive Riku-related records to date).

Riku very carefully situated the frame back in the purple bag. "This is definitely getting a spot on my wall."

"She'll be really happy that you liked her gift so much," Sora remarked, both glad for Kairi and extremely anxious to see how Riku would react to his gift later. As if he were reading Sora's mind, Riku turned to the brunet with an intent look.

"Isn't there something you'd like to give me, Sora?" Riku held out his hand expectantly, jokingly.

Sora gave that hand a low five. "Kairi wanted to space out your gifts today, so you won't be getting anything from me until after next period." He stuck out his tongue for good measure.

The lunch bell rang at that moment and the two needed only to glance at each other with giant smiles before they both broke into a run and raced to the cafeteria.

(AFTER LUNCH)

They had gotten out of lunch relatively early for once and Sora could wait no longer. Kairi gave him an approving smile, signaling that she was fine with how long he had restrained himself. Sora grappled with the contents of his bag, finally pulling out the red present. He tried to hide his excitement – his gift was so going to kick ass! – and fixed all his focus on the smirking silver-haired boy in front of him.

Consequently, he missed the expression of contentment on Kairi's face slowly transforming into one of confusion and then panic, and barely even registered her attempts to gain his attention.

"Thanks," Riku said warmly, accepting the red box.

Red box. Red?

Something began to twinge urgently in the back of Sora's head.

Kairi moved to his side as Riku began to unwrap the gift. "Sora," she hissed. "Red paper meant your DaiRiZu present!"

Which meant that Riku was now opening the nice, generic idea for a present that Sora had come up with for his Fan Number 61 persona. And his truly meaningful gift, the one that personified their hardships and battles and friendship, the gift that was so damn personal that Riku would be able to tell who it was from, was currently sitting in a pile of gifts meant to be given from Riku's hated admirers.

Oh.

Oh shit.

Oblivious to his best friend's slow mental demise, Riku removed a pair of yellow and blue gloves from the box's depths and exclaimed energetically, "Oh, sweet! I've been meaning to get new gloves ever since we got back!" He put them on and clenched his fists, admiring the way the fabric stretched and covered his long fingers. "These match perfectly with that hoodie that the boys got me, too. They'll be perfect for sparring, I bet…" He looked up with a genuine grin on his face, so very sincere, that even in the midst of panic and fear, Sora still felt something in his chest twinge happily at the sight. "Thank you, Sora."

Sora tried to return the smile. "Of course! I'm – I'm glad you like them."

"These are absolutely perfect," Riku said earnestly. His eyes seemed to be trying to impress something upon Sora, but at the moment, all Sora could feel was complete and utter failure. "I've been searching for a good pair of gloves all over, but could never find them. You must have gone through a lot of trouble."

"It really was no problem at all, Riku," he replied weakly.

Except it was a problem. A really big monster of a problem. And he had no idea how the hell he could fix it.

After much thought over how I wanted Riku to act on his birthday, I finally decided to make him happy and a little bit boyish. I know it may seem out of character, but I think that before their adventures, he would act smug and too-cool on his birthdays (you know, early-teen-Riku-style). During their adventures, he wouldn't even give any thought to his birthday at all. But this birthday, Riku has grown up a lot and it's the first real birthday he is celebrating after two years. He's surrounded by his precious people, doesn't have to worry about life threatening situations, and I'm sure he still feels great relief that his loved ones haven't turned him away after all that he's done. That makes for a slightly giddy, adorable Riku – or, at least, it does in my mind.

I'm so sorry for the delay, once again. I feel like I'm always apologizing (mostly, because I am), so I'm sorry for that too… Life just likes to come in waves and currently, I'm in a monsoon of bad tidings that make it difficult for me to concentrate on anything else. I still love this couple and this fandom and all my stories, though, so be sure that I will finish everything I've started in due time. Love you all for your kind words, support, and saintly patience!

Forever yours,

A quirky little tune