Chapter Text
If ever she was asked how she met Jaden, Chris would give them a brief "in the playground", and if she was asked how old, she would say "six" and that would be that. The inquirer would then imagine a mini-Jaden and a mini-Chris in the sandbox of a playground in a random school, and they would walk away thinking that's how the two met. That's how they're friends now.
This is because Chris would never bother telling them that at six years old, Jaden was being bullied by kids who thought he was crazy, talking to thin air all the time. That at six, she was stalking a boy her age successfully unnoticed, and at six she was already sneaking out of the house to avoid her very drunk & very dangerous father. That at six all Jaden knew was an empty house.
The two went to the same school, had the same lessons, and walked the same hallways. At first little Jaden thought it normal to see duel monsters everywhere; his parents were never around to tell him otherwise, and the people he passed by on the streets just assumed he was a boy with a big imagination. He went to school with the biggest smile his face could hold and quickly became the class clown. Little Chris thought it normal to go home late so that her father would be sleeping and to lock her door securely. School was someplace she would stay in while her father was at wherever he went every day, and she didn't bother talking to anyone. The two opposites often passed each other but never interacted.
Then little Jaden's favorite card Yubel started coming with him to school, and his genuinely confused face when told his friends couldn't see her worried the teacher. He played it off as a joke but after catching him talking to nothing several more times the kids started to make fun of him, teasing him during recess and calling him "weird" and other things hurtful to a six-year-old. However, instead of crying or even getting angry at them, Jaden silently watched his former friends until the bell rang and they had to go back inside. He then proceeded to spend the rest of the day smiling ear to ear.
Now, this wouldn't have had anything to do with Chris had everything stayed the same on her end. Yet, be it fate or chance, her father became nocturnal and would bring people to his home for parties; after having several close calls with them almost succeeding to open her bedroom door, Chris started staying out late and sleeping even later. School was now a safe haven where sleeping was the only activity for her. She began to change, from being the unnoticed-kid to the kid-who-always-slept. This made the teacher move the kid-who-everyone-hated next to the kid-who-ignored-everyone so it would benefit the whole class.
(In another dimension, the teacher was oblivious to Jaden's bullying and said child would learn to ignore the duel monsters until they gradually disappeared.)
And so Jaden and Chris sat next to each other in class, and soon Jaden would learn to sit next to her sleeping form during lunch and recess because everyone ignored her. Chris would wonder how he kept smiling after the people surrounding him were constantly putting him down. Jaden would continue talking to thin air and Chris, who had nothing better to do, would follow him around trying to figure out why he was so happy so she, too, could feel happiness.