“I did some reading at the library,” Sarina said, puffing up in pride as she handed Noa his Valentine. “In Japan, girls give Valentine chocolates to boys today, but in March they have another Valentine’s Day where boys have to give girls chocolates!”

Noa took the card she was offering – one from The Lost World with a velociraptor that said, ‘Valentine You Rule!’ – and the small baggie of Valentine’s Day chocolates that she was also offering him. He looked them over, reading the card.

From Noa’s side, Rion looked at her weird. “We’re not in Japan, Sarina.”

“But Noa’s half-Japanese,” Sarina said. “So, he should get me chocolates in March.”

“I’m Canadian,” Noa said, as though that concluded things. “Thanks, Sarina. But I already got you a Valentine.”

He held out a Valentine for her. It was a Star Wars one.

Sarina pouted as she accepted the card. She barely glanced at it. She didn’t like Star Wars.

“But I got you chocolate,” Sarina said. “So you should get me something too.”

“I don’t like chocolate,” Noa said, blinking at her. “Do you want it back?”

“What?” she sputtered, blushing in embarrassment. “No!”

“Then today can be Valentine’s Day for both of us,” Noa said. “We don’t need to do it again in March. That’s dumb.”

Noa’s words were a painful stab. Why would he call the idea dumb? She’s been thinking of him!

Instead of saying anything, she turned sharply to Rion so that she could begrudgingly hand him his Valentine and some cinnamon hearts. It was her least favourite card of the pack she’d gotten, one with a T-Rex that read ‘Have A Wild Valentine’s Day!’.

Rion gave her a card back, the same one. He’d gotten the exact same pack of Valentine cards. Because Rion was annoying like that. He made her so mad sometimes.

“I like chocolate,” Rion said, setting aside the Valentine card and turning to Noa. He held up the cinnamon hearts Sarina had given him. “I’ll trade you my cinnamon hearts if you like them better.”

“Okay,” Noa said.

Sarina watched them trade, her face burning in shame and frustration. The chocolates were meant for Noa! It was really mean of him to give them away! Why would he do that?

She had dressed up all cute today and everything. She was wearing a T-shirt covered in big red hearts and she’d even done her hair up in pigtails all by herself. Noa didn’t even notice. He hadn’t said anything, he’d barely looked at her and now he was trading away the chocolate she gave him to stupid Rion.

“Um…”

Sarina jumped at the soft voice next to her shoulder. Standing beside her was Monique. Sarina hadn’t even noticed when she’d joined them.

Monique was always quiet and she had a permanent gloomy look to her, dark bangs constantly in her face. She wasn’t dressed in cheery Valentine’s Day reds or whites like Sarina. Monique was wearing a baggy Sailor Moon shirt and some dark plaid pants.

She was kind of weird, but Sarina had been best friends with her since kindergarten.

“Um…” Monique said again, looking up at Rion and Noa shyly. She had some Valentines in her hands.

“Are those for us?” Rion asked.

Monique nodded and held one out to him.

“Thanks,” Rion said, smiling as he took his.

“Thank you, Monique,” Noa added as he took his.

“Sarina…” Monique said, offering her a Valentine too, along with some chocolates.

“Thanks,” Sarina said, taking it. She quickly went through her bag of Valentines to take out her card and chocolates for Monique. “Here’s yours.”

“Thank you,” Monique said in a tiny voice. Then she leaned in towards Sarina to whisper, “Have you seen Danny?”

“Danny?” Sarina repeated. “No. He’s probably in his classroom.”

Monique deflated. “I guess so…”

“We could go see him,” Rion said. “I have a Valentine for him.”

“Me too,” Noa added.

Monique squirmed in place at having the attention on her. “O-oh…um… It’s…um… I…”

“She’s my best friend. I’ll go with her,” Sarina said, puffing up. “And Danny’s my best friend too.”

“But we’re friends with Danny,” Rion pointed out. “And we have Valentines for him.”

“Why don’t we all go together?” Noa added. “Since we’re all friends.”

“It should be okay as long as we don’t take too long,” Rion said, glancing around. “We just need to get back before class starts.”

Of course they were going to be annoying like that. Sarina was okay with Noa coming, but she really wished Rion would go away. Why was Noa even friends with him? He was weird and annoying.

“Fine. Then let’s– Ow!” Sarina squealed as someone grabbed her by one of her pigtails and gave it a tug.

It didn’t really hurt that much since it wasn’t a hard pull, but Sarina was startled. She tried to turn and found Eric standing behind her with a big grin on his face.

“Why’s your hair done up all funny?” he asked, giving her pigtail another tug.

“Ow! Stop it!” Sarina protested.

“Let go, Eric,” Rion said.

“It’s not like I’m hurting her,” Eric said, wiggling her pigtail, still keeping a tight grip on the end.

Sarina’s annoyance and surprise were giving way to more shame and embarrassment. She was already having a bad day because of Rion and Noa… Now Eric was humiliating her too. Her eyes were starting to sting. She wanted to run and hide and cry.

“What are you doing? Don’t pull on Sarina’s hair like that!”

At the sound of Danny’s voice, Eric immediately let go. Sarina hurriedly stepped away, Monique jumping to her side as she bumped into…Noa?

Yes, Sarina had bumped into Noa. He didn’t look at her, though. He was tense and stiff, staring Eric down with his jaw and fists clenched tight.

And then Danny was there in front of them, frowning at Eric.

“That’s really mean!” Danny said. “Don’t pull people’s hair!”

“I was just kidding,” Eric said, shrinking down and looking embarrassed, rubbing the back of his neck. “It was a joke.”

“It wasn’t funny,” Danny said. “Sarina’s a girl and she’s littler than you. You shouldn’t hurt her. That’s wrong.”

“I wasn’t hurting her. I just grabbed her hair…” Eric said. He perked up a little bit. “I have some Valentines for everyone.”

He pulled out a bunch of generic cards for all of them.

“Well, okay… But you should say you’re sorry,” Danny said and turned to Sarina. He had brought some Valentines with him too. “Sarina, are you okay?”

“Yeah…” Sarina said, already feeling better now that someone was finally defending her. “Yeah, I’m okay. Thanks, Danny.”

“We were gonna come looking for you,” Rion said. “We have Valentines.”

“Same here,” Danny said but he turned back to Eric. “But first, you say sorry to Sarina, Eric.”

Eric shuffled his feet. “Sorry, Sarina… I was just kidding around.”

“It’s okay,” she said. “Um…here.”

She looked through her Valentines and found Eric’s, passing it to him. He swapped it for hers.

“Sorry I didn’t come sooner,” Danny said, all smiles now that things were resolved. “Science ran late because we were watching a video.”

“Lucky!” Eric said at once. “We never get videos.”

“D-Danny…”

It was Monique. She was looking up at Danny with big eyes, holding out her Valentine for him. She’d put some glittery, Halloween bat stickers all over it and she had a bunch of Hershey Kisses for him.

“Oh! That’s for me?” he asked. Monique nodded. “Thanks, Monique! Wow, that’s…that’s a lot of bats!”

“Monique wishes every holiday was Halloween,” Sarina said.

“Well, Halloween is pretty great,” Danny said.

Monique’s whole face was red. She nodded.

“I like Halloween,” Noa said, “because it’s Rion’s birthday.”

Rion laughed. “I like that I can dress up on my birthday. But sometimes I’d rather stay home than go trick-or-treating.”

Sarina made a face. She hated hearing about Rion’s birthday.

She had a holiday birthday just like Rion did. But her birthday was on Christmas. It was the worst thing ever! Mom and Dad got her the same amount of presents they did for Travis and then said her presents were Christmas and birthday gifts. But then Travis got way more stuff on his birthday in March. It wasn’t fair!

But…but Amber and Celeste had made things a lot better. They started giving her some little presents in June to celebrate the halfway mark to her birthday. Travis had even started joining in.

Rion had no idea what that was like. He got candy, cake, and presents on his birthday. It wasn’t a problem for him. And his dad always got him really cool things like Game Boys and stuff. Her parents would never get her anything like that.

“Hey, why don’t we go find the others and give them their Valentines too,” Danny said. “There’s still time.”

“Good idea,” Rion said.

“I’ll stay here,” Eric said but he grinned and waved at Sarina. “Bye, Sarina. Your hair looks kind of cool done up all weird like that.”

“Thanks?” she said and watched him run off to some of his other friends.

“I hate him,” Noa said once Eric was gone.

“Whoa! Isn’t that a bit much?” Danny said, spinning to him in surprise.

Noa made a face and shook his head. “No. He’s mean. I hate him.”

“Hate is a pretty strong word, though…” Danny said.

Noa huffed.

“I think he means that he doesn’t like him,” Rion said. “I don’t like Eric either. He pushed me off the jungle gym last week.”

“He always does mean stuff and then says it’s a joke,” Noa added.

“Well… I don’t know. I’m not saying anyone should like him…” Danny sighed and turned for the door. “Come on. Let’s go. We’re going to run out of time.”

Instead of sticking with Sarina, Monique was hot on Danny’s heels, following him like a shadow. Sarina hung back with Noa and Rion as they slipped out of the classroom.

The halls were busy since it was Valentine’s Day. There were a lot of kids exchanging cards and candy with friends. They managed to find Peter with his friends and then Celeste. She was all smiles, giggling funny when they found her.

“Have you seen Amber or Jesse?” Danny asked her.

“Yeees,” Celeste said with another giggle, pointing. “They’re in the corner by the lockers over there.”

“Is something funny?” Danny asked her, confused.

Celeste grinned, biting her bottom lip. She shrugged but didn’t give them an answer.

They followed her directions and they found Amber and Jesse off by themselves. They slowed down a bit since it seemed like the two of them were having a quiet conversation. They were both clutching at their Valentines, looking intense. And they were blushing…

“…If…if you ask your parents and I ask my parents…it should be okay. Right?” Jesse was saying.

“Yeah! Sure!” Amber said, her voice going much higher than normal. “I’d love that, Jesse! Really!”

“You… Yeah?” he said, immediately grinning. “Me too! I mean… As long as our parents don’t mind. But I think… My mom really likes you so I’m sure it’ll be okay.”

“I’d love to be your girlfriend!” Amber said. “I’ll talk to my parents tonight, I promise. You get permission tonight too, okay?”

“Oh, whoa, tonight?” Jesse said, blinking fast. “I… Yeah! Yeah, sure! I really…I really want to be your boyfriend too…”

Sarina’s face was getting hot at overhearing their conversation. Jesse and Amber wanted to be boyfriend and girlfriend?! But before they could listen in more, Danny quickly began steering them away.

“You know what?” he squeaked, voice cracking. “We’ll talk to Jesse and Amber later. I think they’re busy! We can trade Valentines with them after school!”

Monique had buried her face in her hands in embarrassment and Rion looked stunned. Noa was the only one making a weird face.

“Gross…” he said. “Ew! They’re going to date?”

“It’s not gross!” Sarina said to him. “I think it’s really cool!”

“Bleh!” Noa replied, sticking out his tongue in distaste.

Rion blinked at them and let out a laugh. “You think they’ll get in trouble? For dating? Are they allowed to do that?”

“I’m sure it’s fine. They said they were going to talk to their parents,” Danny said. “Hey, come on, since we’re here let’s go look for Travis or something.”