Swing it

YU-GI-OH GX © KAZUKI TAKAHASI

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The soft song of playful sparrows drifted into Jaden's ears. He stirred from his sleep, sighing slightly as he rolled onto his side. He blinked against the ribbons of sunlight wafting through the window, shading his eyes with his hand until they adjusted to the morning light. As he sat up, the incessant beeping of an alarm clock laced itself with the birds' morning tune, quickly forming one of the most irritating sounds the youth's ears had ever had the displeasure of being subjected to. He let his hand drift around the top of his clock until his fingers founded the button that would silence the thing. Jaden then swung his legs over the side of the bed, letting them hang there as he rubbed the sleep from his eyes.

Once his vision was clear of last night's dreams Jaden turned his brown eyes to the clock, seeing that the red blur he had seen when he first woke up was actually reading the time 11:15. A jolt ran through the duelist's body- his first class was at 8:30, with Dr. Crowler, who was already keeping a long list of reasons to hate the teen, and his books were scattered all over his desk from his attempt at studying, and he didn't have a notebook, and he didn't know where he left his backpack. He jumped off the bed in a panic, glancing from side to side as thoughts continue to chase each other in his head. Dressing at a speed he'd only attributed to cheetahs in the past, he scooped up a handful of looseleaf paper which he folded haphazardly and shoved his pocket. He was still tugging his shoes on when he hopped outside. He sprinted down the steps with his laces untied.

"Wha…?" Jaden had stopped to catch his breath, his measly scraps of paper falling out of his pockets as he straightened up, looking at the Duel Academy campus. There were two Ra boys tossing a Frisbee to one another, and a group of Obelisk girls gathered in the shade of a willow. A pack of mixed students ran past him, seemingly on their way down to the beach. No one was wearing their uniforms. Instead, each student sported their own individual style- torn up jeans and black tank tops, band t-shirts, sundresses and skirts.

"Jaden!" At the sound of his name, Jaden turned. He grinned when he saw Alexis Rhodes making her way towards him, her tell-tale smile wide across her face as she waved at him.

"Hey!" Jaden called back, waving as well.

"You're actually alive," she laughed, slipping her hands into the pockets of her jeans as she came to stand beside him. Jaden laughed nervously, rubbing the back of his neck.

"Uh, yeah…Kind of, um, overslept," he explained. She shook her head.

"There is no such thing as oversleeping on a Saturday."

"S-Saturday?"

"Yes," Alexis replied. "Saturday. A day of freedom, in which no teachers can chase us down for overdue papers or test re-takes? When we don't even have to set foot inside a classroom? I thought you were fond of it."

"Yeah," Jaden said slowly, drawing out that single syllable as he looked at the giggling girl before him. "I sort of forgot."

Alexis waved him off and, after another laugh, the topic seemed to have been dropped. She started walking down the path, Jaden faithfully beside her. Her smile had not moved from her lips since she appeared, and now and then Jaden saw her eyes slip towards him. She seemed to be watching the pink he was sure was only just started to fade from his cheeks.

"So," she said after a few quiet moments. "Did you have any plans for today?"

"Well," Jaden began, "considering I didn't know today was…well, today…Not really."

"Good," Alexis said. He turned to face her, seeing a sly smirk playing over her lips. "I want to show you something."

Jaden opened his mouth to speak but was cut off when Alexis grabbed his wrist, her skin soft and warm against his own. She took off at a run, her sneakers slapping against the concrete path, Jaden flailing behind her, tripping over his own feet in his desperate attempt to keep up. Suddenly, she veered off the path and the sound of hers and Jaden's heavy footsteps were hushed by the lush grass. Lingering dew dotted their shoes and splashed onto their ankles, but Jaden had no time to think about that as he was pulled along by his friend.

Together they zig-zagged through the campus, past the main school building and passing, on their way, a cluster of Slifer freshman seated in a circle and seeming to play a game with each other, a young couple strolling leisurely towards the Obelisk dorms, and two boys with surf boards walking towards the water. As they kept running the amount of other students became sparser and sparser, until Jaden didn't see anyone else around them at all.

"Alexis," he said, his voice breathy as he ran behind her, "where are we going?"

"You'll see," she said with a giggle. She pulled further down the island, far away from any of the usual student hang-outs. After a few more moments she slowed back to a walk, Jaden sighing as she let go of his hand. "We're almost there," she promised.

"Almost where?" Jaden whined. The girl did not answer him. She only continued on her way, forcing herself past a particular thick bush and climbing over a fallen tree limb. Jaden, bewildered, hurried behind her, almost tripping over the branch in the process.

"Here," Alexis announced, pride in her voice as she placed her hands on her hips. Jaden glanced around. They were in a tiny alcove surrounded by trees. At the far end there was a line of four red teeter-totters with black handle bars, waiting for a child to come play. To the right there was a tall ladder , weeds twisted around its bottom rungs, leading to a long yellow slide. To the left there was a jungle gym with a miniature garden of dandelions sprouting up beneath it and a wooden sandbox that was only half-full. At the very center of the clearing was a swing set, home to four swings that were swaying with a gentle breeze that passed over the island.

"A…playground?" Jaden asked. He looked to Alexis. Her smile had grown so that it was reminiscent of the sun that was beating over them. She nodded her head and brushed her golden bangs out of her eyes as if to keep them from spoiling the perfect picture before her.

"Yep," she said cheerfully. "Come on!"

She grabbed his hand again and pulled him towards the swing set. She settled herself in one of the center swings and, slowly, Jaden lowered himself into the other. She kicked off her shoes as she started to pump her legs back and forth, holding tight to the rubber-guarded chains as she set the thing in motion.

"I didn't know this was here," Jaden commented after a while. He was watching her swing, her hair billowing behind her and her smile brightening the sky.

"A lot of people don't," she said, turning her gaze towards him. "Atticus found it when I was a freshman."

"He did?" Alexis nodded. She flew backwards with a determined gleam her eyes, and as the swing start to propel her forward again she flung herself from it, landing hard just a few feet away. She glanced over her shoulder, meeting Jaden's eyes again.

"I have no idea how," she said. She made her way back to the swings, settling back in the one she'd jumped from and spinning around so that the chains started to twist. "When we were growing up, there was a playground down the block from our house. Our mom used to take us there all the time. When I got older, some friends and I would go there to hang out. I know it sounds kind of silly, but there was just something nice about pretending to be five again."

"Oh, I know the feeling," Jaden said with a smile. Alexis laughed and shook her head, waving him off.

"Well, anyway, when I came to Duel Academy for freshman year I started to miss that playground. So this one weekend Atticus came running up to me, all excited, and he told me he wanted to show me something. I thought it was going to be something stupid, like a new surf board or something like that, but I went with him. He brought me here." She stopped turning and lifted her feet off the ground, sending the swing into a spiral as the chains raced to untangle themselves. "I've been coming here ever since."

"It's a nice place," Jaden commented, taking another look around. A grin played across his lips. "When I was little, I always loved sandboxes! I could spend hours in them."

He hopped off his swing and ran towards the sandbox, jumping into it. His landing resulted in a large puff of dust rising around him, messing his clothes and producing a fit of giggles from Alexis. That goofy grin stayed on his face as he started to run his fingers through the sand. He then patted it down flat and started to draw a swirling pattern in it with his index finger.

"I never got the point of a sandbox," Alexis confessed. "I guess it's because I went to the beach a lot when I was a kid. You know, Atticus and my dad loved it and I liked to tag along. I always thought a beach full of a sand was better than a box."

"I'm sure it is," Jaden said. "But I didn't really get to go to the beach a lot. Nearest one was more than an hour away from my house. Sandboxes were a pretty decent substitute."

"Hmm," Alexis hummed. "I guess you're right. But my favorite was always the swings."

"I can sort of tell," Jaden said. He shifted where he said, resting his back against the lip of the sandbox and holding up one hand to shade his eyes from the sun. Alexis was swinging again, going higher and higher and higher each time she swung forward.

"Hey, you can't blame me! What kid won't rush for a swing?" She started to slow down now, bringing herself lower to the ground so that it would be easier to chat with her friend.

"Ok, you got me there," Jaden admitted. He started packing the sand in front of him into a small mound, patting it down on the sides so that it would stay put as he continued to make it grow even bigger. "Hey, Alexis?"

"Yeah, Jaden?"

"Do you think we should go get the others? They'd like this, wouldn't they?"

Alexis skidded to a stop, the chains of the swing rattling with the sudden cease of motion. "Don't you dare."

He was shocked for a moment, but then he saw how the corners of her mouth were turned up. She jumped off the swing and ran towards him, jumping into the sandbox the same way he had. She collided with his carefully built hill, causing it to disappear.

"Alexis!" he whined, once again earning girlish giggles from her. She folded her legs and started to rebuilt the mound for him, her delicate hands working around the sand at her whim.

"Promise me something," she said once she had gotten the hill to a considerable height.

"Sure," Jaden replied.

"Promise that you won't bring anyone else here," Alexis said. "This is our place, okay?"

"Our place?"

"Yeah." She leveled her eyes with him. "Our place."

Jaden was quiet for a moment, considering. Then he found his smile again, and this time it matched hers in radiant intensity.

"Okay," he promised. "It's our place."

She nodded, satisfied, and if possible her smile grew and lit her eyes even more.

"Race you to the swings?" she asked.

"You're on!"