Written for the exhaustion square of the H/C bingo challenge. This is not an OT3 'verse; the fic is Sora/Kairi and Sora/Riku. I don't particularly know where I was going with it, but I'm planning on more in this universe. We'll see how it goes. Title taken from the song The Ocean by Dar Williams. You can say it's the theme song.

Sora's days all pretty much started and ended the same way. He climbed out of bed, he made sure his chest still felt full and happy and Roxas wasn't sulking, and then he walked through his morning on autopilot until Riku showed up at his door with a bag slung over his shoulder.

Then he would perk up and think, 'Oh, oh, oh, it wasn't a dream, this is real,' and it would be like the sun rising while he was lying on the beach, this warm feeling that started in his toes and worked its way upwards.

Sora would smile so hard his cheeks ached.

"Your face is going to get stuck that way," Riku said.

Sora reached up every morning to put his fingers in the dimples at the corners of Riku's mouth and this time was no exception. "I'm just happy," he said.

Riku always swiped his fingers away, but still smiled and that was all Sora ever needed. Everything was simple and the sunlight bounced off Riku's hair and when Kairi joined them three houses later, everything was right.

"Sora," she said, hands on her hips, "You're smiling like a loon. It's going to scare people."

Sora shrugged. "It's a good day," he said.

And that was when his day suddenly changed, because instead of saying, "How do you know, it's just started!" Kairi said, "My dad wants to talk to you after school."

Out of the corner of his eye, Sora saw Riku stop before he turned his head to the side, away from them, and said, "You're in trouble now."

It sounded normal. Sora's heart ached fiercely in his chest for a minute and he rubbed at it to make it stop. Something wasn't right. He tugged Riku's hair to make him turn back around and face them; he shouldn't ever look away like that.

Riku had looked like that a lot just before the darkness came and swallowed up the worlds.

"Sora," Riku said, patiently, "We've had this conversation. My hair is attached to my head. It hurts when you pull it."

Sora stopped pulling and let the strands of hair slip through his fingers. "Don't do that and I won't pull your hair," he retorted. "This island runs on smiles, not brooding."

Riku shook his hair back into order with a head toss and said, "Islands don't run on anything, Sora. I'm a little worried about what your friends taught you while you were out fighting."

A lot of things, Sora thought, like how to listen to your heart and how to fight with it too, but that's too serious for a day like this. He just got Riku to stop brooding, Sora doesn't want him to start up again.

"I don't think you're in trouble," Kairi said quietly. She was staring at the sky when Sora looked over, bathed in sunlight and sparkling from the inside. "My dad just wants to talk to you."

"That's girl code for you're in trouble," Riku said, dryly.

Sora pulled on his hair again.

Sora walked out of his meeting with Kairi's dad reeling. His hands were sweating and his head ached and it wasn't true, it couldn't be true.

One of his precious people was out on the beach, but one of them was also right around the corner and that's the one Sora heads to first. Riku was hurting, Riku was hurting, his heart chanted, but Kairi was too. Kairi was too and Riku would always understand that Kairi came first.

He didn't know what to say to her when he found her, though. He leaned against the fence and groped for words that weren't, 'but it's not fair,' or, 'you want me to leave Riku behind,' or, 'why didn't you tell me, Kairi, I can't fix it if you don't tell me things.'

Kairi kicked her legs so her heels banged against the fence slat. "So, you talked to my dad," she said.

"You didn't tell me," Sora said. He can't helping feeling betrayed because he thought everything was good and it was like suddenly being blindsided by an enemy where he was expecting a respite.

"I didn't want to have to tell you, Sora," she said.

"That's stupid!"

Kairi's head jerked back like Sora had just slapped her. "My feelings are stupid?" she asked archly.

"No," Sora said, "But keeping them to yourself is. I can't fix it if I don't know it's broken, Kairi!"

"I don't want you to fix it!" Kairi slammed her foot against the fence hard enough to splinter it. "I don't want you to have to pick between me and Riku. It's not fair and I'm not going to make you do it."

"Kairi," Sora said helplessly, "Kairi, you know I love you more." It tasted like ashes on his tongue, like realizing that Riku might be gone forever and not being able to do a thing, like finding Kairi only to realize that there was nothing Kairi about the body.

He wasn't trying to make her cry, but that's what she started doing. Sora fluttered his hands uselessly in front of her face for a second and then dropped them down to his sides. "Kairi..."

"You should know by now," Kairi started, then had to pause and wipe her face with both palms, laughing a little through her tears. "There's no 'I love you more.' There's just 'I love you.'"

Sora wanted so badly to reach out and hold her, to apologize, but she twitched a shoulder when he made to hug her. "No," she said. "No, you're going to let me finish before you try to fix everything like a hero, okay, Sora? Because I think you need to hear this."

"I know," Sora said miserably.

"No, you don't." Kairi crossed her arms over her chest before she wiped her face on one shoulder and smiled. "You don't get it. I love you. I know you love me. I know you love Riku, too, and that's okay. You love us both."

"I do," Sora said, "I really, really do, Kairi. I looked everywhere for you guys and I worried so much."

"I know you did," she said indulgently. "I didn't ever doubt it."

Sora looked down at his hands, at the lumpy knuckles that never healed right and the scars on his fingertips. He'd tried so hard. He'd found his precious people. He felt stupid now because he thought it would all go back to normal when they came home; he'd laugh with Kairi and poke Riku and they'd be happy.

But things weren't normal. Sora would find himself clutching at Riku's hair and pulling until Riku sprawled on the ground for him to lean against while Kairi splashed in the water, or twining his fingers with Kairi's thoughtlessly, and all that time people stared like he was doing something wrong. Like they were wrong.

Sometimes Riku would look at him like he was drowning and then smile and lie and leave him and Kairi alone together like that was what they wanted. It wasn't, it wasn't, at least, it wasn't what Sora wanted.

The Mayor had told him Kairi wanted something different, though, and Sora might have known all the ways the light in her heart felt on his skin, but he didn't know her feelings.

"I don't want to hurt you," he said and had to force his throat to loosen so he could say, "But I-"

"You can't hurt Riku either." Kairi put her hands behind her back and whirled to take a few steps away from him, then turned, smiling again. Her face was damp and splotchy, so, so pretty, and the only thing missing was half of Sora's heart, beating quietly alongside a boy who was hurting regardless of what he wanted. "It's okay, Sora. I don't want to hurt Riku. I love him too."

Sora rubbed his nose, tired. "No you don't," he finally said, because he knew it was true, even if everything would be so much easier if she did. Kairi didn't reach out for Riku like he did.

"You're a doof," Kairi said. "I know you love Donald and Goofy and your Mom, Sora. That's how I love Riku. I don't love him more than you or less than you. I just love him differently."

"You could be happy with just me."

Kairi glared fiercely at him. "Don't you dare make that sound like it's something better than how you feel," she said. "You're not wrong for loving Riku. Your heart can't be wrong when it loves someone."

"How do you know?" Sora asked softly.

"I'm a Princess of Heart," Kairi said. She draped her arms around his shoulders and laid her head against his throat with a sigh. "It has to be good for something, right? And right now, it's telling me that you need Riku too, and that's okay. Because I love you and I love him and I know you love me and he does too. Okay?"

Sora tentatively put his hands on her back and squeezed as gently as he could. "Alright," he said, and burst into tears.

Riku was on his back in the sunlight when Sora found him. He did that a lot now, even though it burned his skin and made his eyes water. It's one of the things that made Sora's heart ache, usually, but Sora's heart had a lot more to ache over today, so he just flopped down next to Riku and tried to remember how to breathe.

"You've been crying," Riku said, voice so gentle.

Sora rubbed his cheek against his own shoulder and said, "You're imagining things."

In response, Riku grabbed a handful of sand and pressed it to his cheek without opening his eyes. The sand stuck after Riku's hand fell back down again. "Why's your face wet, then?" Riku asked.

Sora leaned his chest forward onto his knees and peered down at Riku's face. "How do you know that without opening your eyes?" he asked, genuinely curious.

"I spent a year wearing a blindfold," Riku said; his eyes flicked open for a second, sardonic and so pretty. "It's not hard to figure out that you've been crying like a little girl."

"Why do you have to be so mean?" Sora said plaintively, and wiped all the sand off his cheek.

Riku just grunted at him.

It was hot on the island. Sora leaned back onto his hands and knocked his toes together, just soaking in all of that heat. His heart felt sore and bruised but it was still happy to be here, in this place, right now, because Riku was here.

Riku was here.

"I talked to Kairi's dad," Sora blurted out.

Riku hummed and rolled onto his side. "He gave you a clue, huh," he said.

"A little bit," Sora said, and reached out to push Riku's hair off his face.

Riku's eyes flew open to regard Sora with a confused look. "That's... not exactly what I expected you to take out of that conversation, Sora."

I know, I know, I know. Sora threaded his fingers in Riku's stupid long hair. I know, but I can feel how much this is hurting you and I don't want to hurt you more. I can't, Riku, I can't. I'd pick Kairi if I thought it would help, but it won't and she won't let me anyway.

"I don't know what I'm supposed to do," Sora said absently. He stared down at his fingers instead of looking into Riku's eyes. It seemed... safer. He could already feel Riku's heart brushing up against his, all 'hello,' and 'I'm hurting,' and 'why are you?'

"You're supposed to do what you're doing," Riku said.

It was easier to talk to Riku than it was to talk to Kairi. He always wanted to protect both of them, but he knew Riku could protect himself. He didn't have to be a hero for Riku. "I'm hurting both of you," Sora pointed out.

It didn't ache as badly saying it to Riku as it did saying it to Kairi.

Riku got an elbow underneath him and pushed himself up before he said, "So?"

"I don't want to hurt you, you jerk," Sora said.

Riku looked at him steadily. In the silence, Sora could hear everything they've ever screamed at each other, all the stupid things Riku did and everything that ever made Sora feel two feet tall.

It pissed him off. "It's not a competition," Sora hissed, "You shouldn't just let me do it because you think you deserve it."

"I don't think I deserve you," Riku murmured and flopped back down into the sand. He draped an arm across his face, trapping his hair against his skin, and said, "Sora, there's nothing you can do to me that's going to make me leave. Not unless you ask me to. So it doesn't matter."

"That's not what I want," Sora said. "I don't want you to feel like you owe me, Riku. You don't. We're. I just..." he trailed off, struck stupid.

There are things about his own heart that he didn't understand anymore. He didn't know why brown haired girls made him sad or why white dresses made him want to cry. But he didn't need to know all his secrets to know Riku.

Sora pulled his glove off with his teeth and reached for Riku's free hand. Riku let him have it without even shifting the arm that covered his face, so Sora went ahead and pulled Riku's glove off with his teeth too; his palm underneath the glove was salty and kind of gritty against Sora's teeth.

He flicked the taste off with his teeth with his tongue and clasped their hands together.

"You don't owe me anything," Sora said.

Riku just laid there, letting him do what he wanted. "You don't owe me anything either," he pointed out. "If you and Kairi-"

"Kairi doesn't want me to choose," Sora interrupted. "I already tried."

"You tried, huh?" Riku smiled a little, but Sora was pretty sure he wasn't meant to see it. It was mostly hidden under the fall of Riku's hair.

He hated that smile, Sora thought. It wasn't the kind of smile that made anyone want to smile back, it was the kind that hurt. "Don't smile like that," Sora said, "It wasn't how you're thinking. You're being stupid."

Riku squeezed his hand. "I've been told that before."

"You wouldn't want me to pick you any more than Kairi wants me to pick her," Sora said.

"That's true."

"So stop being stupid and thinking that I don't love you enough."

Sometimes, he wanted to Drive again, even if he didn't need to. He wanted to pull Riku's heart into his chest and let it sit there right next to his, safe and warm. Riku didn't take care of himself well enough and Ansem had shattered him so bad that Sora didn't ever think he was going to be okay again.

But he was still Riku.

So Sora was expecting it when Riku finally squeezed his hand and said, "Okay."