Disclaimer: KH isn't mine, hasn't been, and nevah shall be.

Author's Notes: This is for xtorchlightx's prompt of "Seifer and Hayner meeting in Pre-school. Kindergarten is looming just around the corner for Seifer, but for the time being they love playing in the sand building castles and sand-dragons that don't actually look like dragons." Hope you like it!

Sand Dragons, Sand Castles, Sand in Your Eyes

There was a boy in his sandbox.

Seifer didn't recognize him, which was weird, because Seifer knew every kid in preschool. He knew all of them, and their parents too. But not this one. And this one didn't know that it was Seifer's sandbox. The little blonde boy grinned widely, tongue pushing reflexively into his cheek.

Time for some fun.

He stomped over to his sandbox, knocked his shoes against the sides loudly right before he jumped and landed-

-right in the middle of whatever the other boy had been making.

"Hey! Tha's not nice!" the other boy protested, and he glared up at Seifer, pouting.

"I'm not very nice. Now get out of my sandbox." Seifer said, and proceeded to completely wreck the rest of the mound of sand.

The time out was completely worth it for the look on the other kid's face.

"My name's Hayner."

Seifer patted down the sand on the top of his wall, forming the raised sides so his soldiers could walk between them and be safe. He looked up at the boy, same one from yesterday, and frowned. "I don't care. My sandbox. Leave."

"Miz Aeris says we have to share," the blonde said smugly, and he sat down across from Seifer and started patting at the sand. "So there."

"I dun care what Miss Aeris says!" Seifer snapped, and he closed his hand, knocking down part of his wall. Pouting, he started reforming it, pudgy hands clumping sand into the crack. "Go away!"

Hayner grinned widely and just kept making a lump in the sand. Seifer ignored him and made a better castle. Little twerp couldn't even build properly. Hayner's castle didn't get much higher before they were called back inside, and Seifer made sure to step on it on his way out.

Seifer figured out, about a week later, that Hayner wasn't even trying to build a castle.

"That's not a dragon!" he argued, gesturing at the lump of sand. "Where's its teeth? And its wings? That doesn't look like a dragon!"

Hayner flushed and kept patting at the sand. "'s a work in pro-pro…" He frowned, tilting his head. "It's not done yet."

Seifer sighed and sat down next to him, digging up more sand. "Legs go here, right?"

Hayner looked at him curiously, brown eyes dark in the midday light. "Why're you helping?"

"Castle's gotta have SOMETHING to defend against, right?" Seifer snorted and kept working. "Imaginary armies can't knock it down."

"Oh." Hayner thought about it for a second before nodding. "Yeah. Dragons are better."

Two weeks later, and they were running around the entire playground, flying and breathing fire at each other.

"I hit you! I hit you!"

"No you didn't," Seifer yelled back at Hayner, arms outstretched as he ran even faster. "I'm dodging it, see?"

"No fair! I'm breathin' fire, Seifer! I totally hit you!" Hayner shouted, and he stopped running, stomping his foot on the ground. "You're cheating!"

Seifer stopped too and walked back towards him. "Oh don't be a crybaby, chickenwuss! 'S just a game!"

Ignoring him, Hayner stomped all the way over to the sandbox and sat down on the wooden rim, kicking idly at the sand, pouting. "I don't care. Not fair. You can't dodge fire."

"Come on, just build a dragon or somethin' an' leave it alone," Seifer just snorted and sat down too, starting to build his castle again with careful hands.

Hayner growled and knocked over the beginnings of the castle and stomped off.

Seifer sat back and watched him leave, and rubbed at his tearing eyes, because Hayner was stupid and boys didn't cry about things like this.

The next day, Seifer saw Hayner's shadow on the ground before he heard his voice, sullen and slightly upset and saying, "Hey, Seifer. 'M sorry. For kicking your castle over."

He rolled his eyes and turned around. "Don't be so upset. I made a new one."

"Okay." Hayner scuffed his foot on the ground and smiled up at Seifer, brown eyes wide and happy. "Wanna play Dragons, then?"

Seifer tried to hide his smile, but it was useless because his mouth just stretched across his face and the small knot of unease that had burrowed into his chest was finally gone. "Sure."

And they were off, arms wide and short legs pounding against the ground.

"You're leaving?"

Seifer looked up from tying his own shoes (like a big boy, because he was good like that), meeting Hayner's eyes. "…Yeah, I'm movin' up to Kindergarten."

"Oh," Hayner said sadly as he sat down next to Seifer. He scuffed the toe of his shoe on the ground and looked up at Seifer through his eyelashes. "…who's gonna play Dragons with me now?"

"I dunno." Seifer twisted the fingers of his hands, refusing to look up at Hayner. "Pence? Olette?"

"Olette?" Seifer saw Hayner wrinkle his nose out of the corner of his eyes. "But Olette's a girl." And Seifer had to laugh, coughing into his hand as he did. "No really, who can I play with now? Everyone else just plays tag or sits on the swings."

With a shrug, Seifer crossed his legs, looked for his mom and dad in the afternoon light. Hayner scooted a little closer to him.

A second later, warmth was pressed against Seifer's side as Hayner lay against him, cheek resting on Seifer's shoulder. "Gonna miss you," he said in a small voice.

Seifer swallowed hard, leaned his cheek against Hayner's hair for a moment before he sat up again. "Yeah, me too." You were fun, he didn't say. You made this place fun. I'm not used to having friends.

"But we can be dragons later, right?"

Seifer looked down at the top of Hayner's head and patted a stubby hand through his friend's blond hair. "Duh, chickenwuss."

Hayner pouted up at him and stood, and Seifer hadn't realized how much he had grown because Hayner used to have been the same height as he was. And now, he was at least half a head shorter. "Don't call me that," the shorter blond muttered, but he was smiling anyway.

"Seifer!"

Looking outside, Seifer could see his mom smiling at him and waving him forward. He nodded to himself and grabbed his backpack, hoisting it up onto his shoulders as he took the first step towards her. Warm arms wrapped around him from the side, and Seifer couldn't move, Hayner's body tucked close against him for a few seconds before Hayner stepped back, sniffling.

"Bye, Seifer…"

Seifer snorted at him and hugged him back with one arm. He let go after only a few moments and rushed outside to his mom.

(As she drove back home, Seifer pressed his face to the window, seeing Hayner watching him from the doorway, and he didn't look away until he couldn't see Hayner at all. He kept looking after that and wondered why he felt sad.)

(Years later, they met again on the Struggle field, because Seifer and Hayner had gone to different schools, and Seifer only had a brief moment of wondering why Hayner's eyes looked familiar before Hayner opened his mouth and Seifer was overcome with urge to beat the idiocy out of him, because this guy had to be the stupidest guy he had ever met.)

(It took a while longer and his mom showing up to practice one day for him to connect the dots between this brat and the little boy who used to play Dragons with him in the sandbox.)

(Seifer still wasn't very nice.)

(Hayner still didn't know how to get out of Seifer's sandbox.)

.end.

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