Y/n began playing her accordion around the same time Riley began stuffing her face with cereal, Joi on her back while she danced around, the emotions glaring at her from their bedroom. "Mornin', y'all! How'd ya sleep!"

"Do you have to play that?!" Anger grumbled.

"Yep!" But she managed to stop, Joi jumping off her shoulders and running around in excitement.

"Okay. First day of school. Very, very exciting! I was up late last night figuring out a new plan. Here it is. Fear!"

"Wuah!" Be dropped his clipboard, startled.

"I need a list of all the possible negative outcomes on the first day at a new school."

"Way ahead of you, Joi. Does anyone know how to spell 'meteor'?"

"Disgust." She glanced at Joi apathetically, lowering her makeup mirror. "Make sure Riley stands out today. But, also blends in."

She snapped her mirror shut. "When I'm through, Riley will look so good, the other kids will look at their own outfits and barf."

"Y/n."

"Hmm?" She had finished putting her accordion away, looking over at him from her case.

"You and Joi - that's me - will be in charge of the console, keeping Riley happy all day long."

"Is that it? Dang, sounds like Riley has more work than us!"

"Right?!" He took her hands and twirled them both around until the sound of a train stopped them. "Train of Thought! Right on schedule!" To Anger, he instructed, "Anger, unload the daydreams. I ordered extra, in case things get slow in class."

"Might come in handy if this new school is full of boring, useless classes. Which it probably will be!"

Joi stopped Sadness, who was moping by. "Oh, Sadness! I have a super impatient job just for you!"

"Really?" she asked with the slightest tint of a smile.

"Mhm, follow me!"

-

"What are you doing?" Sadness asked, watching Joi draw a circle around her.

"And...there. perfect." He stood up, the circle complete. "This is the Circle of Sadness. Your job is to make sure all the sadness stays in the circle!"

"So...you want me to just stand here?"

"Hey. It's not my place to tell you how to do your job. Just make sure all the sadness..." He pushed her toe over the line. "...stays in the circle. See? You're a pro at this! Isn't this fun?"

"No."

"Atta girl." He hopped over to the controls. "Alright, everyone! Fresh start! We are gonna have a great day which'll turn into a good week which'll turn into a good year which'll turn into a good life!"

-

"So. The big day," Jill said as she helped Riley get her backpack on. "New school, new friends, huh?"

"I know! I'm kind of nervous, but I'm mostly excited. How do I look? Do you like my shirt?"

"Very cute."

-

Family Island began working.

-

"You gonna be okay? Do you want us to walk with you?"

-

"Mom and Dad? With us in public. No thank you." Disgust reached for the controls, Joi stepping ahead of her.

"I'm on it!"

-

"Nope. I'm fine. Bye, Mom. Bye, Dad."

Bill covered his cellphone to whisper, "Have a good day at school, monkey."

She began making monkey noises, her parents joining her, the guy on the phone probably confused as all hell.

-

Goofball Island took over, making springing noises when the hammer hit the monkey.

-

"Have a great day, sweetheart."

-

Riley walked up to the school gate, watching all the kids enter, hesitating.

-

"Are you sure we want to do this?" Fear asked, a hand on the controls.

"In we go!" Joi declared, taking over again.

"Okay! Going in! Yes!"

-

Riley smiled, walking into the school.

-

Riley sat in the middle of the classroom, looking around nervously.

-

"Okay. We got a group of cool girls at three o'clock," Disgust stated, referring to the girls on Riley's right in the front of the room. One had a skull shirt and the other a pink scarf. The third was turned away, but the emotions could see blue streaks in her hair.

"How can you tell?" Y/n asked.

"Double ears pierced, infinity scarf..."

The leader turned, the emotions catching a look at her apathetic expression.

"Eyeshadow?" Y/n gaped. "No way! They look more like highschoolers!"

"Yeah. We want to be friends with them."

Joi grabbed onto the controls. "Let's go talk to them!"

"Are you kidding?!" Disgust shrieked, pulling him back. "We're not talking to them! We want them to like us."

"Ohhhh wait what?"

"I don't know if they're good for Riley," Y/n spoke up, pushing a button. In her other hand, she was holding a memory that Joi recognized as the skating one from the night before. "You know...being cool seems exhausting."

At that moment, Fear came over, dropping a stack of papers. "Almost finished with the potential disasters. Worst case scenario is either quicksand, spontaneous combustion, or getting called on by the teacher," he said, fingering through the papers, then leaned against them. "So long as none of those happen -"

-

The teacher walked in as the bell rang, students scattering to their seats. "Okay, everybody. We have a new student in class today."

-

In his panic, Fear scattered papers all over the floor. "Are you kidding me?! Out of the gate this is not happening!"

-

"Riley? Would you like to tell us something about yourself?"

-

"NO! Pretend we can't speak English!"

"Don't worry. Y/n's got this."

Y/n looked around, for once, unsure of what to do, feeling exposed. So she pressed a single button, hoping that would help Riley.

-

"Uh...okay..." She stood, everyone's eyes on her. "My name is Riley Andersen, I'm from...Minnesota, and now, I live here." She glanced at the cool girls, who looked bored.

"And how about Minnesota? Can you tell us something about it? Well you certainly get a lot more snow than we do," the teacher chuckled.

-

"She's hilarious!" Joi laughed, falling all over the controls as he took over.

-

"Yeah, it gets pretty cold. The lake freezes over and that's when we all play hockey. I'm on a great team. We're called the Prairie Dogs. My friend Meg plays forward. My dad's the coach. Pretty much everyone in my family skates."

-

Joi recalled a memory of the family skating, projecting it.

-

"It's kind of a family tradition. We go out on the lake almost every weekend."

-

The projection went from yellow to blue. Y/n's smile may have faded the quickest. She shook her head, trying so hard not to look at the memory.

-

"Or we did...'till I moved away."

-

"Huh?"

"Hey, what gives?"

"What?"

Sadness had touched the memory, still standing by it when Joi looked back. "Sadness! You touched a memory?! We talked about this!"

"Oh, yeah, I know. I'm sorry."

"Get back in your circle." He tried to eject the memory. "What's going on?! Why won't it eject?!"

"Get it out of there, Joi!" Fear cried.

"Uh Y/n! Take over, please!"

"Huh? Oh...okay." Nervously, she hit a button, the console turning pink.

-

"We used to play tag and stuff..." Riley sniffled.

-

"Welp! I tried!"

"Try harder!" Joi pleaded.

"Cool kids whispering at three o'clock!" Disguise pointed.

-

The girls whispered, then turned back to Riley, looking concerned.

-

"Did you see that look?! They're judging us!" Fear panicked.

"Oh no...try something else!"

"Like WHAT?"

Instead of answering, he ran over to the memory holder, trying to forcefully pull it out. "Somebody help me! Grab that...everybody..." The others ran over, except for Sadness, who walked over to the empty console. Sadness began to work the controls with Y/n.

-

"But everything's different now...since we moved..." Tears began to run, Riley sniffling.

-

"Oh no...WE'RE CRYING AT SCHOOL!" Fear screamed, running around headquarters. [Bestie that was my hormonal ass every other day in highschool even something as simple as forgetting my homework could set me off. You'll be fine, go get some water.]

"What?! No! Sadness!" Joi pulled her away. "What are you doing?!"

"Oh! No, I'm sorry...I..."

A loud noise came from the memory holder, blue light illuminating the room.

"It's a core memory..."

"But it's blue."

A special slot opened up for the memory to roll into the holder.

"No, wait!" Joi cried, trying to grab it. But it slipped in, Joi banging on the floor and running after it. "Stop it! No! Ah!" He opened the holder and grabbed it. Looking around, he sent all the memories down to long-term, going to shove the blue core memory with it.

"Joi, no. That's a core memory, Joi!" Sadness tried to grab it from him, Joi pulling it away.

"Hey! Stop it! Let go!"

"Joi!" Y/n tried to take it. "You don't get to choose who Riley is!"

"Stop, it isn't right!" He bumped into the holder, knocking the rest of the memories loose.

"The core memories!"

The islands went dark.

-

Riley looked ahead, her tears stopping.

-

Joi pulled away the memory and threw it, reaching for the yellow and pink ones. Sadness took the blue core memory and went to put it in, but Joi, gasping, lunged forward to knock it out of her hand, letting it get sucked in the tube.

Y/n tried to stop him, dropping the memory she was holding by the vacuum. "No!" she screamed and grabbed it, rolling on her side and getting sucked up. Joi grabbed her leg, the core memories slipping from his hand. He tried to grab them with his foot, which caused him to lose his grip and get sucked up, Sadness following and pushing them up.

The tube got retracted the emotions gaping at it.

-

Riley wiped her tears and sat down.

"Thank you, Riley. I know it can be tough to move to a new place, but we're happy to have you here. Alright, everyone. Get your history books out and turn to chapter seven."

Riley took her book out, hiding behind it.

-

After a moment of silence, Anger asked, "Can I say that curse word now?"