All night study sessions had become key to keeping his grades from slipping. Grade slippage was a very bad thing considering not only did his far future rely on his grades being high but so did his very near future. Without A’s and B’s, Valentine’s scholarship would be ruthlessly yanked from beneath his feet. His family was by no means poor, they sat somewhere right in the middle of middle class, but his family certainly wouldn’t be able to afford to send him to school, pay for his medical and dental insurance, plus the families insurance and bills. At least not for a very long time. Valentine’s job covered his insurances and bought him his food, his scholarship bore his schooling, his books, and most of his dorm. His parents put one hundred dollars towards his dorm room every month, as a contribution. His job could have covered that one hundred dollars but his parents had felt the need to pitch in. After all, as they said, he had earned his scholarship and they didn’t have to pay for his school. The least they could do was pitch in.

So, having spent all night sitting at his desk destroying his liver with caffeine only to get two hours of sleep before taking that test, Valentine had crawled back under his blankets at ten thirty this morning and had remained there most of the day. It was now two thirty in the afternoon and Valentine had been awake for only half an hour. He had moved only enough to pile his pillows up higher and to pick up his book, the one he reads for leisure and not for study.

Reaching for his water bottle, Valentine glanced at the three frames sitting on his night table. One was a picture of his family, all four of them, on their family vacation to the Grand Canyon, another was Valentine and his childhood friend Brandon after a mud fight when he was only eight, and the other was one of him and his sister on her sixth birthday. That was the year that he had bought her the two hamsters, Nala and Simba. They had died two years later and he had put them in small shoe boxes and buried them in the backyard. He’d even made tiny little stone headstones. Forever may the rodents rest in their family’s backyard. He smiled.

He wasn’t expecting his sister today; it would be a pleasant surprise when she came.

Today was a warm, windy day. A perfect day for flying a kite or visiting a quaint little stone bridge, or perhaps, for visiting one's brother. Adelie decided on the latter of her windy-day possibilities and began at once preparing for her surprise visit to Valentine. She had no idea that today was an important test for him, so it was pure luck that time would eventually allow her to show up at the appropriate moment. After cleaning up a bit and choosing a cute lolita-hinting outfit (which consisted of black capri-length leggings hemmed with lace and ribbons, a pink and white lacey trapeze top, and tiny ballerina flats) she picked out a tin lunchbox decorated with shining beads and pink ribbon and went to her kitchen. After packing a little meal of toast, honey, sugar cookies, and two cartons of cold milk (and a juice box), she put some money in her pocket and headed out the door. Adelie called to her parents before the door closed, "I'm visiting Valentine! Bebacklaterbye!"

Soon she was on the bus to her brother's, and again was proud of herself for knowing the entire way there off by heart -- no pun intended. Adelie very much enjoyed Valentine's company, he was so much more interesting than her parents and it was rare that the two didn't get along. Adelie had always been surprised whenever one of her friends commented on Adelie and Val's bond, saying how it was nothing like their siblings' bonds. But it was no matter, she treasured Valentine dearly and nothing would change that. Before she knew it the bus came to a stop at the school and she got off along with a few others. There was no need to pause, Adelie knew exactly where to go now. It wasn't long before she reached her brother's room, lifted a thin hand and daintily tapped on the door. Already she was smiling widely, wondering how he would react to her surprise visit.

Valentine sighed and marked his page in the book with a receipt. "Just a second," he called out, his voice was lilting and sweet to the ears. They'd gotten that voice from their mother. Their father couldn't carry a tune in a bucket, despite his sweet bass tone voice. Valentine's vocals created a humming baritone sound.

Valentine rolled out from under his blankets and pulled on a pair of loose black trousers before opening the door and dragging his fingers through his dark curls. His eyes had aimed higher in the doorway, expecting one of his dorm mates or class mates or even a friend or two, but they lowered when they met no one, finding his sweet little sister standing in the hall way.

Valentine blinked twice, two long sweeps of long black lashes, and then his lips parted into a broad smile, one corner of his lips rising higher then the other in the tale tell signature of a Heart smile.

"Addie!" he exclaimed. "Get in here," He reached out and swept her into his room and against his bared torso in easy hug that can only be reproduced by fellow members of brother's much older then their sisters-hood. He smiled and reached over her head, pushing his door closed.

Adelie was nearly buzzing with excitement when she heard her brother call from inside his room. She beamed up at him like a small child at Halloween, clutching her tin lunchbox like a goodybag when he opened the door. Of course she fell in sync with the brotherly embrace as soon as it began, girlish laughter spilling from her while Val closed the door behind her. Once the hug was finished she pulled back appropriately and looked up at her brother's angular face. He looked tired.

"You were still sleeping, weren't you?" Her pretty lips slanted in a somewhat smirky smile. Adelie's dark eyes left Valentine's face and went to his bed -- which clearly had just had an occupant. "Mhmmm!" Her equally sweet voice sounded once more in a lyrical 'I told you so', and she walked toward the bed and sat on it, her lacey shirt mimicking a dress and poofing a bit as she did so.

He released her in suitable manner and put his hands on his narrow hips when she commented that he had still been sleeping and then made herself at home on his bed.

"No, Miss Assumption," he told her, walking to his closet and pulling a shirt from it's depths. He pulled the shirt on and buttoned it up half way up his alabaster chest. "I was reading," he informed, nodding to the book on the night stand before the three pictures.

Valentine's dorm room contained a twin bed, a tall dresser, a computer desk, and a closet, plus two corner shelves above his bed lined with school books and notebooks. His bed had six pillows, too many for the small bed, and a thick layer of blankets. His room was clean and only just tidy, with a few pieces of clothing lying on the floor which he busied himself picking up and draping over the back of the chair.

"Did you get here alone?" he asked. He knew the answer. If his parents had brought her they would have insisted on coming up to his room with her and he would have spent the next two hours listening to a lecture about still being in bed, pulling all nighters, and not studying far enough in advanced.

He much more enjoyed his visits with just Adeline.

She smiled the classic tilted smile when he responded with a tease and an alibi. She couldn't help but imagine Valentine as a secret vampire of some kind -- simply because of his beauty and (what she thought were his) sleeping patterns. Adelie almost asked him what he was reading, but instead her attention was caught by the photos on his bed stand. Her small hands reached for the frames, but passed the Grand Canyon and went straight for her birthday. Her dolly-eyes looked fondly over the glossy photo and a soft sound came from the back of her throat upon remembering her late pets.

"Huh -- Oh, yeah," she looked up at Valentine. "I wanted to come surprise you."

The young girl looked this way and that -- there it was. She lifted the cute lunchbox and grinned. "I brought this, too. We can go have a picnic, and take ... Oh no!" Suddenly her expression became worried and frustrated. She'd forgotten her camera and wanted to take photos.

"Oh well," she sighed. "I forgot my camera but that's okay." Adelie looked thoughtfully at her lunchbox for a moment, then back to her brother.

A lot of people thought of Valentine as though he were a vampire, if only because of his pale skin and his beauty, coupled with the fact that he dyed those long curls black. His sleeping pattern was a bit off but so was thirty percent of his fellow dorm mates. Many of them had night classes or early classes, leaving the middle of the day to sleep off the studying.

"Well you surprised me," he told her, grinning. The red of the shirt was bloody beside the black of his pants, his hair, his white skin. They contrasted so much in their clothing, yet she could have been his twin, were he only a few years younger or her older. He watched her lift the picture from it's place and knew that she missed those silly little rodents.

"Don't worry about it," he told her when she said she had left her camera at home. "I'll buy you a disposable. It's not as good but it'll do" Valentine, though their parents gave them things and money, supported her photo-taking habits. He also tended to spoil her. He peeked out from the blinds and smiled. "That was a good idea," he told her, "It's a good day for a picnic. I'll put some blankets in the trunk and we can go to the river or the park?" he made it a question. This was, after all, her picnic plan and he would let her choose the place.

Adelie's clothing style was highly volitile, her parents' wallets would sadly agree, and she was changing it as often as every day or week. But never did she take her clothes for granted, because every article she owned could be shaped and suited for a new stylish outfit with a few simple changes. But even as stationary as Val's fashion sense was, Addie enjoyed it nonetheless. But she would love to see him in a fantastic black leather and chain J-ROCK costume one day!

She perked up when her brother announced he had been surprised, and she set the frame down on the side table once again before moving to the edge of the bed. Adelie should have expected Valentine to offer buying her a disposable camera, she was spoiled more by him than her actual parents. When he suggested the river or park, she wondered for a moment. "Whichever one has a shop on the way where I can buy a kite!" Adelie was behaving more youthfully than she was capable of, but that was probably only because she had yielded to the brotherly seniority of Valentine and had outwardly shed the mature young lady that she'd been on the way there. But inwardly her maturity remained hidden beneath her girlish beaming and hopes of kite-flying.

Adelie stood and held the tin box in her hands moving toward the door and waiting patiently for her brother to gather the blankets and whatever else he required for their outing. Today was going to be fun!

Valentine smiled.

"Lets go to the park then," he decided, finding a pair of black denim jeans to change into. The dress slacks he had pulled on were both dirty and too nice to wear to the park. "The river is surrounded by trees and I'm not going to spend the day picking your kite out of the branches," he smiled. At least the park had nice open skies.

Valentine pulled the top blanket off of his bed. The blanket beneath it was a quilt that their grandmother had made him. He's had it since his freshman year in high school. What can I say, Val's a sentimental fool. He folded the blanket up and lay it on the computer chair, taking a moment to tidy his bed by yanking the blankets up to remove most of the wrinkles.

"Why don't you go start the car while I change my clothes and I will be right out," he suggested. His bright red '86 convertible camero was very hard to miss. He'd bought the piece of junk the day after he'd gotten his license for five hundred dollars. Now that piece of junk was the envy of many dorm mates. "And don't talk to anyone you don't know," he told her, ushering her out and handing her his keys. It worried him when his fourteen year old baby sister walked through the halls of a men's dormitory alone. He'd drilled her before, the typical: Scream bloody murder, scratch, bite, kick him where it counts. Remember, there is no such thing as dirty fighting.

He changed his clothes quickly to the black jeans and a short sleeved button up shirt with a silk feeling. It was light weight, breezy, set off his hair in an amazing contrast, plus he'd gotten it at Ross for seventeen bucks. He jogged down the hall, locking his door from the inside since she had his keys, and caught up with her at the bottom of the stairs.

"So what kind of kite are we after? Dragons? Butterflies?" He always managed to join the girl games: barbies, butterflies, without cringing. In fact, with Addie, he'd had no qualm at all playing the girl games. Just as long as they fit in an occasion game of basket ball...one which she usually won. There were plenty of things they could do together: swimming, the beach, the amusement park. That was what made them such close siblings, despite the difference in age: they compromised with each other well.

Adelie nodded her head, her thick chestnut hair bobbing in sync with her movement. The park sounded just fine! And it was true about the river being surrounded by trees just ready to snatch an a paper kite right out of the sky. She watched him gather this and that, straighten his bed out, and then tell her to start the car! Without trying to show her excitement too, too much, Adelie eagerly took the keys and nodded her head some more.

"Okay!" She quickly threw open then door and ran into the hallway -- but she stopped herself by gripping the doorframe and swinging back into the threshold when Valentine issued parental 'stranger' rules. "I knoooow, Val."

Damn right he'd drilled her before! But she ran down the hall like a happy puppy to a treat with caution thrown somewhere into the mix. Addie hadn't had a problem with any of the boys in the dorm before, but whenever she saw them she'd grin and giggle before running off. Just like the giddy schoolgirl she was, of course!

She slowed down at the stairs and took each step carefully, the last time she'd come down them she'd nearly fallen. Luckily she caught hold of the railing before she'd tumbled down and gotten hurt. Valentine's honey voice met her ears and she turned to see her brother at the bottom of the stairs with her.

"I like butterflies. I'll get a butterfly and you can have a dragon, okay?" She kept pace with him easily and smiled to two boys that passed them. They smiled back, of course.

"I know you know but do it anyways," he'd muttered the words after she'd left already, mostly just to himself. He knew the answer he would have gotten for that comment would have been along the lines of a huffy sigh and a long 'alllrrrriiiight.'

He smiled at her when she declared that she would indeed have a butterfly. "How about a dragonfly?" he asked her. He put his hand on her shoulder and did not take the keys away from her, despite the fact that he had caught up already before they'd even left the building. For some reason that he couldn't grasp it thrilled her to start that car. Although he could admit to a sense of pride every time the engine roared to life. He did take the blanket from her.

Two classmates passed and smiled at Addie. He looked down at her face and she was smiling at them. He passed them without a word but his lips twitched to a friendly smile as well. He didn't know the boys personally, though one was named Andrew and happened to be in his The Art of Being Human class.

They crossed the parking lot, his big hand and long fingers resting on her shoulder, to the red beast of a car. "Go start her up," he told her. "And pop the trunk," he added, brandishing the blanket.

"Dragonflies are very cute, too," she smiled at his butterfly-dragon compromise. She was thinking of how a butterfly and a dragon could ever fall in love when Valentine rest his large hand on her small shoulder. Adelie half expected him to ask for the keys, but also half expected him to let her start his precious car. Even if he asked for the keys back it was very possible the girl would have kept them if she wanted to.

The entire way to the parking lot his hand remained on her shoulder and she waited patiently for him to either take the keys or tell her to start the car. Lucky for her it was the latter!

"Okay!" Addie agreed cheerily and went to the driver's side. Carefully she unlocked the door, and carefully she slipped into the comfortable seat, setting her tin lunchbox on the passenger's. After closing the door and popping the trunk, she fervently (but tentatively) slid the key into the ignition and started the car. When it came to life she felt powerful and couldn't help the enormous ear-to-ear grin that surfaced on her glossy lips. However, a couple of passing girls came by and she wiped the smile from her face only to replace it with a cool look that suggested she'd started the car a million times and could drive it to Manitoba and back without batting an eye.

At least half of that sentence was true!

Once Adelie saw in the rearview mirror that her brother had finished at the trunk, she reluctantly got out of the car and excitedly hopped over to the passenger's side and got in. By the time she'd buckled up and gotten comfortable, her huge grin had returned.

Valentine tucked the folded blanket over the space where he stored the extra wheel, since the car wasn't set up to carry a spare he just stored it in the trunk, and he pulled the trunk back down and wiped his hands. He looked over the hood of the car and smiled when three women passed by, all looking into the cab of his car at his sister. When lied out and examined, Valentine's pride was stronger in his sister then his project car. He'd spent four years working on this car, spending time under it's hood, making it take shape. He'd spent ten more years caring for his sister, watching her take shape into a sweet, hearty young lady.

When Adelie got out of the car and moved to her own seat, he slid inside the car. The interior was an insensible white but he'd been unable to resist the white leather. The original interior had been gray, the hood of the convertible black. He'd changed the hood to white as well.

"Want the top down?" he asked her before getting all the way into the car. He pointed at the clip inside on the passengers side, the clip that hooked the cover to the frame. The make of the car was far too old to have an automatic top.

Adelie loved that her brother took pride in her. It quite honestly made her feel important and special, however corny that may be. Though she knew her mother and father loved her as well, there was a different quality to her and her brother's relationship that made it that more treasured. When he had moved to the dorms it was true they had both felt a bit uneasy, but that was precisely why Addie was visiting him today. They never went too long without seeing each other, and that was just the way it should be according to Adelie.

She wiggled comfortably in her white seat and watched her brother get in. As soon as he asked about the top she smiled a yes (and actually said "Yeah!" too) and her dainty hands went to work preparing the top to come down. It was always much more fun driving with the wind blowing through your hair.

"Thanks for letting me start her up," she said, fondly patting the dashboard. "I love doing that!"

He grinned at her excitement. He hadn't needed to ask to know that she would want the top put down, what teenager got into a convertible and didn't want the top put down? He had asked because he knew she would be excited and she would exclaim it. He set to work on the clip on the driver's side and started to fold the canvas top back. A young man called out to him, almost inaudiable across the parking lot and over the humming rumble of his car.

Valentine shook his head, clipping the canvas beneath the piece that was made to hold it down. The white interior was made brilliant by the sunlight.

He came back around the car, after snapping the canvas down around all sides, and he slid into the driver's seat. "I know you do," he replied, shaking his head but still grinning. He backed out of the parking space and pulled to the stop sign at the exit. He turned the knob on the radio to bring up the volume and pressed the CD button. Stray Cats didn't belong on todays radio but it matched is car to a tee. The 70's music was fun, Valentine always believed that if he was driving he did not want to be put to sleep by his music.

"I figure Elm will have a place with kites and with your cameras. "He reached over and tapped her tin lunch box with his knuckle. "What'd you bring us, Addie?" he asked, pulling into the traffic.

Continued Here