A/N: I wrote this for a friend, and I'm not really sure if it's any good. Sorry about any minor (or major) OOCness. I did my best… That said, read, enjoy, review!
In the World That Never Was, there was a little white room. It was full of little white sheets of paper, and little colored pencils, and a big white table, and a little blonde girl. She slept in a little white bed with a little white side-table with a little clock with neon gothic hands that proclaimed "Here there is no Time. But if there was, this is what it would be." She liked to draw, and think, and remember, and pretend.
In the beginning, all the little blonde girl liked to draw and think and remember and pretend was a mysterious boy with spiky brown hair and goofy yellow shoes and something that was either a really big key, or a really weird sword. She wasn't sure which. He had two friends- a smiling girl with red hair and pale skin. Naminé felt like she should know her, but she didn't. Not the way she knew the brunette. There was also a boy with turquoise eyes and silver hair. He kind of scared her. But he was part of the smiling blue-eyed, goofy-shoed boy, so she drew him anyways. She wasn't quite sure why she drew them, her, him, him, other than she ought to know them, but didn't. She was pretty sure they weren't like her, though, or anyone else she knew, her only real contact being with the Organization. Marluxia never laughed like that, head thrown back, eyes closed, completely at ease. Larxene never ruffled Zexion's hair after helping him up. No one ever held the little blonde Nobody when she was tired and hurt and upset. No one. Nobody. Never.
That was when she started drawing other things. Sometimes, it was just blonde instead of red, a simple fantasy, or maybe even just a mistake. The wrong color at the wrong time. Then, an unnatural contortion of a cruel face full of honest joy. Or a sadist in a black robe mentoring Naminé- they could have passed for sisters.
She was in the middle of one of her more fanciful sketches, red and blonde dancing in purple and white ball gowns, when something unprecedented happened. A series of timid knocks sounded through the wood of her white door. "Y-yes?" she called out uncertainly, too softly to be heard. The knocking repeated itself. "Come in," she said, louder this time. The door creaked open with the same quiet confusion that Naminé had invited her mysterious guest in with.
"Hey Naminé. Do you mind if I come in?" Demyx smiled at her sheepishly from the doorway. "It's just that, well, uhh… Larxene, Marluxia, Axel, and Lexaeus went with the Superior to check out some more of Oblivion, and Luxord has Xaldin, Saix, Zexion, and Vexen at each other's throats over some stupid card game, and I was wondering, it's so noisy, doyoumindifIpracticemysitarinhere?" The last part came out in a nervous rush that left Demyx mentally cursing himself. Way to look like an idiot in front of her. Calm down, man.
Naminé nodded, startled. "Sure…"
"Thanks kid." Demyx cleared off a space on the corner of the little white bed and sat down with his sitar in his lap. There was a moment of silence, in which each of them tried to adjust to company, an unusual sensation. A few feeble notes floated through the room as Demyx plucked at his strings, tuning them haphazardly, and Naminé's pencils began their rhythmic scratching before stopping yet again. She stared down at the paper in mild satisfaction. It was finally finished. Her chair scraped against the floor as she stood up, taking the paper with her to carefully file it away in her little white dresser. Only the real pictures went up on the walls. The ones of the brunette and his crazy key-blade-thing. She turned around sharply on her heel to avoid having to make any sort of eye contact with the Melodious Nocturne who had, for whatever reason, decided to invade her room. Not that I mind, of course. The company was nice. She enjoyed having someone else around, especially since she was alone so often.
Before the witch could make it back to her seat and begin drawing anew, Demyx broke the silence. "Who is he?" The sitar lay across his legs, voiceless now that his attention had been diverted. Naminé didn't have to ask, but she did anyways.
"Who? There's no one else in here but the two of us." She winced internally. That didn't come out quite right.
"No. Him. The boy in all the pictures. An old friend? A special someone?" He gave her a cheesy wink.
"Well, yes, but not like that." Naminé sighed. No one would ever be 'like that' with her, anyways. What had possessed Demyx to ask a question he already knew the answer to? Nobodies didn't have anyone. Not even themselves. "He's just…" She paused. How could she explain it? "He's a fairytale character." Yes, that seemed right. "A prince." She shifted her weight uncomfortably. It was hard to talk about him. Especially with an Organization member staring at her like that. Even if it was only Demyx. He nodded.
"Maybe you'll tell me the story someday?" He smiled widely. Naminé struggled to find something to say in reply. Someday? What is that supposed to mean?!
"Uhh… Yeah. If you want. Someday." Demyx loved it when she smiled, like the laughing face of the moon, amid all the darkness that was their world. Note to self, he thought as he watched her. Make that a song…He strummed a few chords experimentally. Naminé took this opportunity to seat herself at the white table again. Pencil and paper found their way to her hands, and her magic started its work.
Some time later, hours in fact, Demyx began to notice his legs cramping. He had been carrying on a mostly one-sided conversation about anything that came to mind, mostly music, with only an occasional response from Naminé. He had paid no attention to the time flying past, which was how he ended up heading back to his own room at what Naminé's not-a-clock called 2 in the morning. Standing in her doorway once again, Demyx flashed the Nobody a grin. "Come by and see me sometime, kay?" And with a flourish of his cloak and a twirl of his sitar, he was gone.
Demyx was nothing if not startled to hear tapping on his door several days later. Propping his sitar up on its stand, he opened the door to find, not another Organization member looking for a temporary alliance, but the little witch, Naminé, drawing materials in hand. He wasn't entirely sure why they called her that, a witch that is. There was nothing scary or warty or pentagram-y about her. Just sweet pastels.
"Hi." She broke the silence cautiously. "Did I come at a bad time? If you're busy I can leave. I'm so sorry." She blushed bright pink and turned around to leave. Demyx didn't mean to touch her, but his hand shot out to grab her gently by the arm before he could think about it.
"No. It's fine, I promise," he reassured her, letting go quickly. She looked up at him with wide blue eyes and he nodded. "Come on it." The Organization's ninth member held the door open farther and gestured for Naminé to join him. The artist followed him through the doorway with a sense of wonderment. His room was starry and black, so very different from the harsh light of her own.
It smells like rain, she thought, confused.
"Make yourself at home," Demyx told her with a good-natured laugh. "Sorry if it's a little messy. Musicians, we don't pay much attention to cleaning, you know?" Naminé smiled in response, feeling a little more at ease already. The decision to show up at his room had been a difficult one for the little-understood girl. He was part of the Organization, black cloak and all. But he joked and teased her and was nice in a way no one ever had been, almost like the brunette and the redhead, and Naminé wasn't quite sure what to do about that. If it felt so good, to have a friend, even the possibility of one, it had to be right, right? Right. Until he betrayed her or used her or left her to go fight the boy with the key-sword. Plus, didn't he hang out with Luxord? Luxord was scary, with his cards and dice and carefully enunciated words. But… a friend. A smiling laughing friend, who could talk about silly things like fairytales for hours. In the end, that was what decided her. That, and, if nothing else, she could always leave. Nobody or not, Naminé was fairly certain Demyx wouldn't sink to holding her against her will. Why would he want to?
So far her reasoning was turning out fairly well, with him chivalrously surrendering the room's only clean chair to her and sweeping a pile of miscellaneous junk off his desk to give her a place to draw before retreating to an electric blue beanbag chair with his sitar. Unlike last time, there was no awkward quietness on Demyx's part. He set to playing away on his odd instrument right away, a soothing melody with a hummed harmony. Naminé let the sound wash over her as she closed her eyes, emptying her mind to look for something to draw. Slowly, an image came to her, neither imaginary nor real. Every shade of grey, blue, and green made their way across the page in swirling strokes. She didn't notice the silence descend after the last note, nor the quiet footsteps approaching her. An increase in the scent of fresh rain was her only warning before Demyx was leaning over her shoulder, peeking at this newest picture.
"A waterfall?" he asked. She jumped and twisted around to look at him in alarm. "It's beautiful." This came out as a whisper. Beauty wasn't a very large part of life in The World That Never Was, and was to be cherished when found. Naminé held the thick sketch paper out to the Melodious Nocturne shyly.
"It's for you." Demyx blushed furiously at this statement.
"Umm… Thank you?" No! That wasn't supposed to be a question! He tried again. "Thank you, Naminé. It's wonderful." Much better.
Demyx wasn't sure what had possessed Naminé to come out in just her thin white dress with such heavy rain, but he couldn't think of anything cuter than seeing her running after him, dripping wet in said white garment through the city streets. He laughed loudly, enjoying himself too much to even notice the eerie echo any significant noise always produced in the empty city. "You're all wet! Here." He offered the girl his thicker black coat, leaving himself in only a pair of black pants. She accepted with a smile and a slight flush at the sight of his well muscled chest. "Much better," number nine declared, holding his arm out to escort her. "I thought we could go for a walk. I didn't expect it to be raining, though. Sorry. Guess I kinda messed that one up, huh?" His chest rippled as he reached up to scratch the back of his head, grinning in embarrassment.
"No, it's fine. I like the way rain smells anyways." Even after their long months of sitar-playing and picture-drawing and laughing and teasing, Naminé still couldn't bring herself to say the rest of that sentence- because it reminds me of you. She looked up at her companion with a gentle smile playing across her lips. "Let's walk, by all means."
The gaudy neon lighting coming from the mysterious buildings lit their skin in odd colors, leaving the little witch wondering what she would have to do to recreate it. Demyx's bubbly voice rose easily above the rain, telling her about all sorts of things, how Castle Oblivion was almost ready, how the Superior would be back soon, and he was sure to give him a mission for real this time, about his latest song, and her latest picture, and how he really needed to find some frames or something, because her stuff really was that good. Really. Naminé just smiled and nodded, content to let the moment soak in along with the cool rainwater.
After considerable time walking, the duo at last came to a halt next to a large staircase. The rain has stopped several minutes prior, leaving the surfaces glittering with water-reflected neon. Demyx looked around futilely for somewhere the two of them could sit, but when nothing presented itself he shrugged helplessly. "Sorry," he began again. "There's a really gorgeous view of the moon here, and I thought you might like to draw it, but then it was raining, and now it's all cloudy, and I messed again…" He trailed off into an uncomfortable silence.
Naminé stared off into the distance for a long moment before replying, and when she did it certainly wasn't what he expected. "Demyx, are we friends?" His confused frown made her feel the need to explain further. "I mean… We aren't just pretending, are we? I know Nobodies don't really have feelings, but if we did… Would we be friends?" Demyx continued to stare at her as though she had spouted wings. She squirmed under his gaze. "You know what? Nevermind. Forget I said any-"
Her companion's finger on her lips stopped the flow of words. "I don't know if I can really answer that, Naminé," he told her. Raindrops rolled down the girl's face. Nobodies can't cry. "Except like this."
Sora looked around the stark white room curiously. There sure were a lot of pictures on the wall, most of them of himself, which he found rather unnerving. One, however, caught his attention. It was of two figures he didn't recognize against a black backdrop with a yellow heart-shaped moon. The taller one, a shirtless boy, was leaning down to brush lips with a blonde girl in heavy dark robes.
Only true pictures went on the walls.