A/N: This will be the part two in my "Presents:" trilogy, and it will focus on Xion instead of Zexion. No kidding, I used to hate her as a character and now she's one of this trilogy's main leads.
And just right the first part this story isn't beta'd so enjoy my grammatical errors, again~.
Rating is currently T but it will change to M in later chapters.
Warnings: OOCness, AU, some own characters, YAOI, and in later chapters also drugs, sex, bad language, pregnancy, etc. Xion's POV. Don't say I didn't warn you!
Disclaimer: Kingdom Hearts and Disney characters belong to Square Enix and Disney Interactive Studios/Disney respectively. Final Fantasy belongs to Square Enix. I own nothing but this story and my OCs. And I won't repeat that 'I don't own' sentence in every chapter. You know I don't own the KH, FF, or Disney characters. And it probably doesn't change during this life-time.
Presents: Once Upon a Daydream
Chapter I
A loud beeping noise filled my room. I yawned a bit and I turned off my alarm. I smiled. 6 o'clock, perfect. I was a morning person just like my mum, Aerith. The sun shone brightly to my room and made me smile even wider. I smiled at the Dahvie Vanity poster on my wall. This was going to a perfect day. And by perfect I meant it was going to be my first day of high school, and I was very excited about it. Actually I had waited for it the whole summer.
I knew my brothers were sleeping, and they wouldn't probably wake up at least in half an hour, so I tiptoed quietly to the bathroom in my pajamas. I barricaded myself there with my rarely used make-up supplies. I usually didn't wear make-up but this day was going to be an exception. As well as the every single day of my time in high school. My hair looked like a mess like always in the morning. Sometimes I wished I would have naturally messy hair like Sora and Roxas. And in addition to that I was blessed with black hair. No blond, or brown, but black. Sora had chocolate brown hair, just like mum. Roxas' hair instead was platinum blonde, like dad's hair was. Fair enough. I plugged my straightener to the wall and waited for it to get warm.
After few minutes I had straightened my hair. "Uh huh", I groaned and shook my head. Something was missing. An edge or something. I looked around my supplies and I caught a glimpse of a small, plastic container. It was very expensive hair wax, a birthday gift from Amber. With a sound clack it opened and I stuck my fingers into the wax. I had gotten an idea and I wanted to try it. It was going to be cute, but with something special.
There was loud clack as someone suddenly tried to open the bathroom door. "Wha-! It's locked!" It was Sora. I couldn't mistake him to anyone else. He kicked the door. "Hey! I need to use the bathroom!"
"Dammit, Sora! Use the one in downstairs!" I shouted. For once, he woke up before seven. I just wished it would have been some other day. I heard him growling on the other side of the door as he kicked it one more time just to realize I wasn't going to open it.
"Fuck you, Xion!" he cried out, running the stairs down. I rolled my eyes and continued fixing my hair. I realized that I looked rather intriguing when most of my raven wisps were sticking out in random order. Actually it was making me look like a complete mess, again.
"I look fine", I hissed, nodding to my reflection. "Stop making me look stupid. All I need is a make-up." I grabbed the mascara from the bathroom table, opened it, and sighed. "Now let's let the hell break loose..."
It took few moments until the mascara, the powder, and the lip gloss made me satisfied to the result. The person in the mirror was actually kinda pretty. I grinned widely. "I've made a decision! I'm going to get a boyfriend!" I told myself aloud and slapped my hands to my cheeks. I'd always been one of the boys, and this year it was going to change, I reassured myself while I returned back to my room. Yesterday I had chosen the comfy blue hoodie that matched with Sora's and Roxas' hoodies but now I realized there was now way I was going to wear it. I would have looked like a boy in it! I needed a back-up plan.
I looked through my wardrobe but everything I tried on was either too boyish, borrowed from Rox or Sora, or then just simply made me look like I was ten. Neither there was a way I would wear a skirt on the first day. After quite a long while I ended up choosing a pair of gray jeans, a light blue tank top with the black vest I had got from Aunt Sophie and I had never used it before because I didn't have much curves show. Yes, that was going to be my outfit.
I took my school bag from my desk and leave my room to have some breakfast. I had just enough time before the beginning of the school.
"Morning, mum! Morning, dad!" I whooped as I entered the kitchen. I leaned to give my dad 'good morning' kisses to his cheek. He raised his eyes to the morning paper and smiled.
"Morning, Xion", my dad, Cloud, replied and took a sip of his coffee. "Feeling nervous?"
I took my usual place at the table and grinned. "Not even close", I hummed and took one of sandwiches mum had made for us. She made the breakfast for us everyday, and this day wasn't an exception. I took a bite. "I'm just excited."
Sora yawned on the other side of the table, ruffling his messy, chocolate colored hair. "I'm not", he muttered. "Kairi went to a private girls' school and now I'm going to see her less."
Kairi was our childhood friend, and she had started dating with Sora last year. I had waited for it to happen quite some time. But our little Sora was so damn shy it took months until they went to their first date. Mum giggled, and placed a hot cup of cocoa in front of me.
"You can always ask Kairi to come here", she said gently to Sora. "You know we all like her. She's always been like a part of our family."
That was correct. For me at least she was like sister I never got. She was perfect for Sora. Cheeky, but not too bitchy. Pretty, but not too snobby. She misses him, but is not too clingy. An archetype of an ideal girlfriend. I ate the last bit of my sandwich.
"Where's Rox?" I asked, finishing my cocoa as well. I hadn't seen him in this morning. I didn't want to be late just because Roxas was a dreamer, or because he just went forward on the slow-motion. He was probably either sleeping or fixing his already perfect golden hair.
Mum gave a smile. "He left already, saying he needs to meet the student counselor."
"What?! Why?!" I barked after I had almost choked.
"He didn't tell", Cloud snorted. "He was acting quite suspicious."
I frowned. My father was a police but since he got shot few months back he'd been stuck in his office in local police station. All he does is filling papers all day long because the higher ups hadn't let him back to real work. And the lack of field work makes him cranky.
"Maybe he's got a girlfriend and just lied to you, mum", Sora noted, wiping the bread crumbs off from the corners of his mouth. We all just stared at him. "What?" he croaked. "It could happen!"
Nope. Roxas was one of the most honest persons I knew. He just didn't like to lie, especially not to mum. And lying to dad would cause several weeks of being grounded. Both I and Sora have been grounded because of lying, but never Roxas. He had always been a good boy.
I glanced at the clock and quickly stood up. "Thanks for the breakfast, mum", I said and received a smile from her. "Come on, Sora. We're gonna be late", I continued, glaring Sora.
"We won't be late", Sora mumbled, chewing his sandwich. "It won't take even fifteen minutes to get to school by car. And dad's gonna drive us there, right?"
"That's what you say, you lazy bum!" I shrieked. "We're going to walk!"
Dad turned the page. "I have a day-off today", he said. "I'm not going anywhere."
"Shit!" Sora immediately stood up and left the kitchen, running upstairs to get his school bag. I rolled my eyes and walked to the entrance hall with my bag. I was putting on my shoes when Sora ran back downstairs.
"Hurry up, Xion!" he yelled, quickly pulled on his loosely tied sneakers and slammed the door open. "My form master is said to be strict as hell!"
"I don't care!" I shouted back. "And Sora, it's your fault if we're late!"
We arrived to school barely on time and without further arguing we split up to find our classes. I knew mine was in the first floor. Home economics class it was called. I sat down in one of the table where two girls and a boy where already sitting. The girls were both so pretty I felt stupid in my outfit. The other girl had blonde, soft-looking hair, her eyes were blue. After all she looked like a model, or a princess! Her color was pink, definitely. Her shirt, bag, fingernails, everything was in some shade of pink. Another girl instead had long, reddish hair which curled up a little bit. Her eyes were brown, very curious look filled them as she looked around the class. Her clothes looked very comfy, unlike mine. Shades of red, green and brown everywhere, she had tought about the time of year. The last one in the table, the boy, wasn't bad looking either. His hair was silver with a very slight tint of blonde because of the lighting of the class, and his eyes were blue-green. Reminded me a little bit of Rox by his facial features. He had light bluish scarf and an orange t-shirt with blue jeans. He really was cute but… I don't know. There wasn't anything really special in him. I glanced around the rest of the class as well and I knew some of them already.
"Hello, girls and boys!" the female teacher sung, interrupting my thoughts. She looked very bright and she wore brownish blouse and dark brown skirt, black tights and black shoes. Her strawberry blonde hair was tied with a black ribbon. She looked like a mother more than a teacher. She smiled. "I'm Cindy Clapton. I'll be your form mistress, and home economics teacher for these three years", she told. "I hope I'll start remembering your names soon. But as a start there's a task for you." She pointed at the side tables. "There're ingredients, and I want each of the table groups to think together what kind of dessert you could make of them. And then make that dessert." She looked at the clock on the wall. "You may start now."
"Before we start cooking", the girl with red hair said with a smile. "It would be better we know each other's names at least. I'm Shiki Misaki."
"I'm Charlotte La Bouff", the blonde girl told. "You can call me Lottie."
"Xion Strife." I smiled.
The boy smiled faintly. "Hope Estheim", he said.
We went to take a look of what was given to us to work with. I was quite surprised because seriously, you could have made a cake of them! I really would have made a cake except that there was one little thing. I didn't know how to cook. I had made cookies with mum but I had either burned them, used salt instead or sugar, or failed in some another way. Once dad's bird-brained dog, Chocobo, ate half of the cookie dough while I was in the bathroom!
"We could make cookies", Hope suggested right after I had stopped mentally praying we wont make them. "Chocolate chip", he continued, taking a bar of dark chocolate from the side table where the ingredients were. Shiki was all for the idea.
"I love chocolate cookies!" she exclaimed, smiling widely and giggled. "I could-!"
"Misaki?" the teacher called, interrupting Shiki's sentence. "Could I borrow you for a while?"
"Sure", Shiki replied, blinking few times before she turned to us. "You can start without me. I'll be back in a moment", she continued with a smile. The teacher shook her head.
"Actually this may take a little longer", she told. "Come on, dear."
After Shiki left with the teacher there were only three of us left but it didn't seem to bother Hope and Charlotte. "We should start now?" Hope said, picking up the right ingredients for us and carrying them to our table. "Do you want to make the dough?"
I looked at Charlotte, hoping she would help Hope more than I ever could. "I'll just ruin them if I try", she snorted. "Can I make some cocoa instead, honey?" she asked from Hope in a flirty manner and flashed her cheerleader smile. I was so sure she would've been a cheerleader.
"Yeah, sure, Lottie", Hope replied in a tone I wasn't sure was he flirting back or not. But they could have looked together like a cute couple from a poster of a skiing center in Norway.
"Sweet!" Charlotte giggled. "I'll use the secret recipe my friend Tia told me!" She was probably thinking Hope had flirted back. "Rawr! You're gonna love it!"
Charlotte danced away, leaving me and Hope alone. Hope was already leafing through a cook-book to get us a recipe of cookies. He gave it to me when it showed the right page.
"Here you go", he said. I tried to stutter something as a response but he just turned the oven on and smiled. "It's easy. Just mix everything together." He took a knife from one of the like bazillion drawers and opened the slab of chocolate. I snorted. Easy, eh?
Well, after a while I had managed to at least make it almost look like cookie dough. Almost. Hope barely could hold back his laughter when watched my struggle against the dough. That's why I never bake! I just can't make it work. I'm a kitchen failure!
"Let me help", Hope said finally and took the bowl from me. He had probably got tired of watching, I thought. He smiled. "You have to be more gentle", he told me but not in a teasing manner. It surprised me.
"You seem like you can bake", I said when he began mixing the dough with slow, circling motions. "Can you cook as well?" He gave an ashamed smile.
"I have to", he said. "Because my roommates can't."
"You're living on your own?" I asked, wide-eyed. Hope's lips quirked up into a half-smile.
"Yes?" he said. "And you aren't?"
"I'm living with my parents", I told, watching him scooping the dough to the baking paper. "And with my two brothers", I added. Yeah, Rox and Sora. Gotta love them.
He had finished with the cookies and was already putting the damper in. "That doesn't sound too bad", he said. "Do you have problems with privacy, then?" He laughed.
"No!" I barked, immediately regretting it. "I mean… No. We don't have problems with privacy."
"Touchy subject?" Hope hummed, sounding quite intrigued. I just rolled my eyes and he got the hint. I had shared my room with my brothers till we got to the seventh grade. Go figure. We changed the subject and talked about other things. It took a while until we took a look on the cookies.
"Take them out", Hope encouraged me. "They look ready."
"Quite good actually", I had to admit to myself while taking the damper from the oven. They weren't burned, and it was a won already. Charlotte had danced and jumped around us for a moment already. She had finished the cocoa ages ago. Or at least that's what she said.
So I, Hope, and Charlotte sat on our table eating not-so-bad chocolate chip cookies and drinking cocoa. And since Shiki hadn't come back we asked about it from the teacher. The teacher told us she wasn't going to join us for today but she refused to tell where Shiki was. Charlotte went all crazy about it! She was sure that something had gone wrong and Shiki were in problems or something. Hope calmed tried to do his best calming her down but he didn't succeed. Charlotte didn't shut up until the bell rang when she quickly left the class, leaving me and Hope to clean the table.
"What do you have next?" Hope asked me suddenly.
"Art", I replied, cleaning the table rag under the running water.
Hope looked a bit disappointed. "Too bad", he said. "I've music."
"I didn't even know that was a choice", I told him. I would have chosen music instead of art.
"Yeah, well… It kinda wasn't", Hope murmured. "I'll explain later. We'll see at the cafeteria for the lunch break, right?"
"I think I'll go with my friends won't let me", I said. And by friends I meant my brothers and few others who I probably wouldn't call my friends. "Maybe some another time?" I asked.
He flashed a smile. "Sure."
At last I left the home economics class just to hurry towards to the art class on the other side of the school, hoping I would saw Shiki or Charlotte. Well, my hopes crumbled when I saw Charlotte with a volleyball. She clearly hadn't art. And I didn't see even a glimpse of Shiki anywhere so in the art class I just sat down to the table, minding my own business. Since I saw none of the girls in my class I just ended up being here alone. I looked around and my eyes widened when I saw a familiar blonde walking towards me. It was another of my brothers, Roxas. But still, what the heck? He didn't have art! I had seen his schedule! And for all I knew he hated all forms of art, except movies and comics.
I smiled. It was meant to be a smirk but it turned to an awkward smile as I noticed he wasn't alone. I went all red whilst there was a guy with him. A good looking guy to be exact. And I knew all Roxas' friends at his age, and that one definitely hadn't caught my eye before. I couldn't have forgotten a face like that. He… He was gorgeus.
"Morning, Roxas", I said to Roxas, maybe a rather too quickly. I glanced at the boy with him and I noticed he was looking at me as well. I quickly turned my eyes back to Roxas and hoped from the bottom of my heart he wouldn't notice how red my face was. Roxas grinned at me.
"Morning, Xion", he said with a tone that meant that he had seen my blush. "Where's Sora?"
"He has P.E.", I told blandly, trying to collect the remains of my pride. "Just like you should have."
Roxas almost laughed at my comment when he sat down next to me. I knew he will always think about me as his "little" sister but I wasn't that young. I realized he had gone to see the councellor only to choose art instead of P.E. as his optional course. He had changed it probably thinking I couldn't handle few classes without him. He could use a bit more appreciation towards me. I mean, seriously. He was way too over-protective. Almost all my classes were either with Sora or him!
I looked at the boy next him. "Is he your friend?" I managed to ask. The boy smiled at me. Oh, even his smile was so cute.
Roxas shrugged and concentrated on finding something from his school bag. "No, he's just a stranger I'm going to do a presentation with", he replied, making me frown. He glanced at me before snickering. "Just kidding. That's Zexion Spears. We're in same class."
So his name was Zexion. It was so similar to mine our meeting had started to feel like a destiny. He was my dream boyfriend who had become reality. He was good-looking, not too athletic type, though, and seemed intelligent and mysterious. And there was something in his aqua eyes that made my knees start buckling.
"Nice to meet you, Zexion", I luckily managed to say without stuttering and smiled. "I'm Xion Strife."
He just nodded and sat next to Roxas. I hoped he didn't drool when I looked at him. What will his voice sound like? I wondered dreamily. I was sure he was going to say something but an awkward looking half-bald man who probably had seen his thirties a long while ago, also known as an art teacher, interrupted the moment. He seemed very arrogant and somehow mean compared to my class teacher. He just stood there, glaring at us.
"Listen up, class. I'm your art teacher, Gunther Thug", he said in a very weird accent. I barely could hold back my laughter as he continued talking and forced us to introduce ourselves.
After that he ordered us to draw something what represents ourselves as persons. Yes, he used exactly those words and shared white A4 papers for us. That was going to be an easy one. I dug up my pencil case and smiled. The theme was girlyness. Pink, more pink, rainbows, kittens, flowers, anything that could be related to a word 'girl'. Perfect.
Everything went fine until I saw from the corner of my eye that Mr. Thug was coming to our table. He kinda like skipped Zexion and just stared at Roxas' drawing, looking disappointed. I would have kicked him for making that kind of face!
"What does your drawing represent about you?" he asked, raising his eyebrows.
Roxas looked up at the teacher. "Flaming queer", he murmured back with a slight smirk. The teacher snorted and marched away. He didn't even stop to look at my drawing! Not that I really cared. Mine was good enough for me. Instead Rox's comment made me laugh. He had totally pushed that man off from his throne.
"That was a good one", I snickered and took a better look of Roxas' drawing. "But what does it really represent? Your inner fire or something?"
Roxas gave a smile. "Yeah", he told. "Something like that." I frowned. He didn't sound very convincing. I'd have to ask about this later. But not now. I looked at my drawing. I'd have to finish this first.
The bell rang and I was quickly going to leave the class. Roxas and Zexion followed me. It was a lunch break so it was only a matter of time when Sora would come to get me. He was broke so who was going to pay his lunch? That's right. Me. His debt was going to be never ending.
He was waiting for me and Rox with Hayner, who was another childhood friend of ours, and two girls, Selphie and Su. I knew them, too, but it didn't mean I liked them. They weren't bad but kinda follow too much trends and liked gossiping a lot. It wasn't my style. Sora instead was very comfily standing between them. Too comfily to be taken.
"Hi, Sora", I snarled, looking straight at my brother. "Hi, all", I continued.
Sora grinned widely. "How was art, sis?" he asked glancing noticeably at Roxas when he talked. Alright, this meant war. Sora had known Rox was going to chance himself to the art group!
"I drew a nyan cat", I told, and I was so going to play that song until Sora was begging for mercy. I looked at the others as my stomach growled silently. "So, we're going to Radiant?"
Hayner grinned. "Who would eat at school's cafeteria, anyway", he snorted.
Radiant Garden was one of my favorite places. Dad's friend owned it so I, Rox and Sora had practically eaten there since we were three. We picked up a table, and I sat down right next to Zexion. I was glad Selphie and Su were sitting on the other table because I didn't want to share Zexion with them. Selphie was way too flirty. He had flirted with Sora, too, and he was already with Kairi when that happened! Hayner and my brothers were okay since none of them was gay. I ordered a cinnamon roll and a cup of latte and bought sandwich and a coke to Sora as well. And now I had just enough time to get better known to Zexion. All I needed was to know how to start a conversation with him. He didn't seem he was very interested in sports since he didn't take part in the conversation about the inter-school championships. I knew both Hayner and Roxas were going to take part in Struggle and they were placing bets about who of them were going to win. Sora was instead on his own planet again. He was probably texting to Kairi. I rolled my eyes and looked again at Zexion. Think, Xion, think! There has to be some hot topic to talk about! Why I was this shy? I wondered, hiding my blush when I saw a faint smile on his lips. How can I eat when my stomach is already full of butterflies?!
"Do any of you know any good Chinese restaurant nearby?" Zexion asked all suddenly.
Hayner interrupted his conversation with Rox. "I don't", he answered and shook his head. Well, I didn't expect him to know anything. I blinked, quite surprised, when he actually grinned, yelling to everybody: "But I know someone who might know!" He just grabbed his old Nokia, the only phone his parents got him since he was the walking disaster when it came to breaking electronics, and started making a text. I heard Selphie and Su giggling. They were thinking exactly same thing as I.
"Aww", Selphie said to Zexion with a playful pout. "You just gave Hayner a reason to text to Fuu Almasy."
Hayner turned bright pink, like always when somebody mentioned Fuu. "Shut up, Tilmitt!" he barked and stood up from the table. He sat back down when Zexion asked who Fuu was. Sephie and Su giggled even louder.
"She's in the same class with Sora. In 1-A, to be exact", Selphie told Zexion and I wanted to strangle her for doing it. I wanted to tell him. "She's Hayner's crush", she continued.
Su nodded, giggling. "But Fuu's big brother is kinda over protective", she hummed. "And he has hated Hayner since they were in middle school. That's why Hayner can't approach Fuu carelessly."
"Yeah, Seifer Almasy", Selphie sighed a wide smile curling her lips. "He's quite a catch. Handsome, stylish, intelligent, sweet…" I snorted quietly. As if they had been the only ones' who've had a crush on Seifer.
"And rich", Su said and stopped counting things what made Seifer so awesome with her fingers. "No wonder Hayner is such an underdog compared to him. Fuu would never date him because Seifer is so perfect. She doesn't even talk him." I had to agree with them.
There was a loud beep a little later. At least Hayner's message tone wasn't 'Nokia Tune' anymore. Hayner grinned widely. He almost looked like he was on his own private patch of heaven.
"Ooh! Fuu texted back", Sephie hummed, mimicking Hayner who had just raised his phone like it would've been a religious object or something. Hayner didn't care about Selphie. He was way too happy right now.
"The Lucky Cricket!" he exclaimed. I sighed. Thanks a lot, Fuu. For the last class I now had to handle already too overactive guy who was now also floating half a meter from the ground. I already knew we both had French which meant that Hayner had already decided he'll be glued to me and Roxas because he didn't know even how to write 's'il vous plaît' correctly. So thanks again Fuu and your rich family's summer cottage in France's countryside.
As a habit Rox, Sora, and Hayner went buying ice creams for dessert. I smiled. There was my chance. "Umm, Zexion?" I tried, pointing at the ice creams through the freezer's plastic lid. "Want one, too?"
"No, thank you", he said and smiled. The whole bunch of butterflies decided to began flying inside me. I went all red and nodded.
"Oh, okay", I murmured. "I'll just buy one for myself, then."