Though We May Fall {An Aphmau AU}

We Met

**Aaron's POV**

    I lay in bed that night, thinking over all that had happened in this one day. I fought with Dad, learned I was rooming with Jeffory again for senior year and was reunited with the one person who was able to make my sides hurt hours later and my face ache in an unfamiliar way.

    Irene, Melissa was right. Ugh, I am never telling her I thought that. But she was. She said that I had been off ever since Aphmau had left, ever since Mom and Dad had forced me to go to that stupid military academy freshman through junior year. I hadn't grinned, I hadn't laughed until my sides ached for a decade until tonight.

    Now that she was back, I could remember almost every memory we had together. But before that, she had slowly vanished from my mind. Whenever I glanced at that picture, I had wondered who that girl had been. I knew I felt sadness, but couldn't remember why.

    Yet now I can think of exactly how the two of us met. I was in third grade and she had just started kindergarten...

    "Aaron!" I turned around and saw Jeffory running towards me, threading his way through the crowd of students leaving the building. I waved, grinning and waiting for him to catch up. The two of us always walked home together as far as we could until he turned left and I turned right. But we were still in the same neighborhood, so most of the time we went home with each other.

    He caught up to me, brown hair tousled and green eyes blazing. "Were you about to leave me?" He teased, and I laughed.

    "Maybe, maybe not. That's for me to know and you to never know!" He laughed with me and started chasing after me. I laughed and started running. I wasn't paying attention to where I was going and ran straight into someone. I stumbled backward, shaking my head and glancing down at the person who had fallen down to the ground.

    They were a little girl with shoulder-length black hair and tan skin. She wore a red dress and brown boots and she looked really young, almost like she was in kindergarten.

    "I'm sorry," I said, reaching down to help her up. She took my hand and I pulled her to her feet. I gave her a grin, and she smiled back. "You okay?"

    She nodded, picking up her oversized backpack from the ground. "It was my fault." She mumbled, managing to get the words out. Then she grinned at me, and her brown eyes glowed. "I'm Aphmau. You can call me Aph!" I smiled, turning behind me to see where Jeffory was.

    "I'm Aaron. It's nice to meet you Aph. I'll see you around, okay?" She nodded, waving goodbye and skipping away. I was going to watch her to make sure she got home safely, but then I spotted Jeffory almost right behind me. I bolted, laughing and running as fast as I could down the sidewalk towards our neighborhood.

    I grinned into the night, turning over to face the wall. Sitting on my nightside table was the picture that we all treasure so much. And there was Aphmau, making us laugh and grin like fools. After that day, that first day we met, I would see her around and wave. She would wave right back and we would smile. But it didn't really go any farther than that.

    Then one day, right before winter break, I was walking home from school. My eyes were on my feet, and my mind was weeks away, thinking about Christmas. It was so close, yet so far away. I was so preoccupied with my thoughts I almost didn't see what was happening a few feet to my left, right in the center of the snow-covered green.

    "Give it back!" A high pitched voice shrieked. I looked up from my shoes and searched for the source. There, in the green. A little girl bound up in a heavy winter coat and boots was jumping up and down, trying to grab a stuffed animal swinging from a boy's hands. He held it just above her reach, laughing his head off at her futile efforts.

    I recognized him easily. He was Gene Boborus, the bully of third grade. I hated him fiercely, but his little brother Dante was one of my friends. Dante didn't know how terrible his brother was, but all the rest of us did- Katelyn Fyre, Garroth, Vylad, and Zane Ro'Meave, Laurance and Cadenza Zvahl, Travis Valkrum, Kawaii~Chan, Nicole von Rosenberg, Lucinda Sacro, Jeffory Gold, and myself. We all hated him so, so much.

    I marched across the snow-covered green, hands balled up against my sides. I hated seeing him bully people, and he seemed to know it. But at least he was too afraid to actually try and bully me. He knew that I wouldn't take any of his crap.

    As I got closer, I recognized the girl. It was Aphmau, the little kindergarten girl I had run into a few months ago. It made me angry seeing such a young girl, probably someone who had done nothing to him, get taunted this way. She wasn't very tall to begin with, and he was four years older than her.

    "Gene!" I called, trying to contain my anger by digging my nails into my palms. He looked over, and a look of contempt flashed over his face. He sighed, letting the stuffed animal fall to his side. Aphmau tried to grab it, but he shifted away right before she could.

    "What Aaron? Come to tattle on me?" He taunted, pouting his bottom lip in the most unrealistic look. Then he laughed, crossing his arms and pulling the toy higher from her reach. "Go on. Do it then." I growled under my breath and stalked closer, flashing a smile at Aphmau.

    "Hey. I'll get it back for you, alright?" She nodded, recognizing me and smiling back. Before Gene could say anything, I glared at him. "I will 'tattle' on you," I made air quotes with my fingers, "but not to your parents. No. I was thinking how terrible it would be if your little brother, the only person in school who still thinks you are a nice and good person, learned the truth about you. I wonder how he would react when I tell him that his role model is bullying kindergarteners..." I trailed off, shaking my head and starting to turn away.

    He groaned, throwing up his arms in defeat. "Fine! But next time, I will get the better of you." He threw the stuffed animal to the ground and stalked away. Aphmau cried out as soon as it hit the ground, rushing over and gently picking it up from the ground. It was a little wolf plush probably a third her size. It was a dusky purple and was definitely loved. I walked to her side, giving her a smile.

    "Hey, are you okay?" She nodded before running up to me and hugging me tightly. I blinked before hugging her back. "Hey, let me walk you home."

    After that, we became the best of friends. She turned out to be friends with Travis and Kawaii~Chan, so she fit right in. And our lives would have never been the same without her.