Hello again! Yes, I've started another story without finishing my others, orz. But this one... this one I'm very proud of, and I haven't been able to say that about a story for a long time.

So deal with no updates on the others for now, mkay?

Mkay.

Anyway, this is an AU story, as you'll see. It's AkuRoku and I plan on yaoi later in the story, so... you've been warned.

Welp, enjoy! I love this story very much, and hope you do too.

So what can I say… My name is Roxas, and I'm a nineteen year old college student currently attending Twilight Town Community College. I'm studying art there, much to my father's disappointment, and soon I will be transferring to Radiant Garden University. The only reason I'm not there already is because my grades in high school weren't good enough. So I spent a year in the local Community College, working on my GPA and building up some credits, and after this term I'll be able to transfer.

My twin brother, Sora, is also in college, at Destiny Islands University. He was lucky enough to score a scholarship so he could get out of this town. Not that money is much of an issue, but he was very adamant on working hard to get that scholarship. Our father could easily afford to send us both off to the college of our dreams, being the owner of some multimillion-dollar company. I'm vague on purpose, because I don't know what company. When I was little I didn't understand, and as I got older I stopped caring. Our mother on the other hand… well, who knows what she's doing these days. She left us when we were six . Our father did his best to hide his feelings, burying himself in his job, but I can tell he's still suffering over it. I guess you could say I've moved on.

Sora would disagree, and I suppose he's got a good reason. The only person I've ever been close to is my brother. And our dad I guess, but he's distanced himself from us the same way I've distanced myself from everybody. My theory: you can't get hurt if no one can get close. Classic abandonment anxiety. So I put up walls; ten feet high, two feet thick, and made of an impenetrable metal, with razor-sharp barbed wire along the top. That way if anyone manages to scale my wall, which would be an achievement in itself, they get cut up.

That should teach them to keep the fuck out.

Sora, being practically the opposite of me, has almost developed Dependent Personality Disorder. He relies so heavily on others that it depresses me. I say "almost" though, because I don't see anything unhealthy about his relationships. Sure he grows attached pretty quickly, and once he's attached it's like peeling off super glue, but he can be independent. Sometimes. When he has to be. I mean, the whole reason he even went to DIU was because his best friends were going there too. That, and the scholarship. But he had gotten a scholarship to RGU as well, albeit for a slightly lower amount.

But that's not the point.

My point is: Sora needs relationships to keep him going.

I don't.

I'm happy by myself. Don't misunderstand me, though, I do have friends… of a sort. There are people I can talk to if I start missing Sora too much. People I can go to on weekends to get drunk and party with. My dad disapproves, of course, but he doesn't do anything to stop me. I think he's hoping that someday I'll learn my lesson, whatever lesson that is, but part of me just thinks he doesn't want to bother lecturing me, because he knows he doesn't have much authority. Sora also is unhappy with my situation, telling me I just use these people. I know he's right, but I can't help thinking they know they're being used, and just hang out with me because they pity me. And, being the rich kid, I supply the booze. So it's really a two-way street.

But I told myself, as I drove to the lively campus for the second time that month: just two weeks of school, then two weeks break, and I can finally leave. After this last term, my GPA should be good enough that I can get into RGU. I'd been coming here at least once a month for the past year just to get a feel of the campus. Already I knew it as if I attended it, and I'd even managed to crash a few parties because they thought I was just another student. In fact, this weekend I had been invited to a pre-finals house party, and I had every intention of showing up.

Which is where I was currently headed. Who was I to pass up free booze, when I'm almost always the one to supply it? I parked my car down the road from the house that's the location of the party. I could already hear the music before the house was even in sight. Smiling, I closed the door of my car, taking care to lock it first, and walked down the street towards the music. Getting closer I could also hear people shouting at each other over the music. This should promise to be a fun night. I walked up the few steps that led to the house and stepped inside, being greeted by a few people near the door.

"Roxas!"

I turned my head as I heard my name called out – screamed out, really, in an effort to be heard over the music and everyone else. A guy with dirty blond, mullet-styled hair raced towards me.

"You made it!" He threw himself on me in a hug and I patted his back awkwardly.

"I told you I would, Demyx."

Demyx was the one who invited me to the party. I'd met him the last time I'd came to the university, for an official visit actually, and not just a personal one. After I had filled out some papers and talked to a couple advisors, I hung around campus and started sketching. Sketching is how I usually passed my time, and I sketched everything I could. On that particular day, I'd been sitting in the grass, looking around for a muse. On the other side of the lawn had been a boy playing guitar, and the way the light reflected off said instrument would provide a good challenge for me. After a few hours of sketching, the boy had come over to me and introduced himself, saying he noticed me watching him and was just curious what I was doing. I showed him my sketch and he had nearly exploded in glee, something I had not been expecting. We talked for a while and when I was getting ready to leave Demyx had mentioned his party, and told me to drop by if I was in the neighborhood.

"You said 'maybe'," Demyx pouted. "I didn't know whether to expect you or not, especially since we'd just met."

I scanned the crowded living room and kitchen. "You wouldn't have even noticed if I didn't show up."

"That's not true! I noticed you as soon as you walked in!"

I smirked. "Yeah that's true… were you watching for me or something?"

Demyx shifted awkwardly on his feet. "No… well ok, I heard some people say hi to you when you came in. I've actually been downstairs this whole time, and I just came up for more beer when you happened to show up."

I rolled my eyes. "Whatever you say, Dem. So… you mentioned beer?"

"Yeah we're about to play a game!" He shouted excitedly, linking his arm through mine and leading me to the kitchen. "Wanna join?"

"Sounds great." Drinking games were perfect excuses to get myself smashed.

"Awesome! Come on, you can help me carry down more beer." He pointed out two cases of beer for me to grab, while he grabbed another two. I followed him down the stairs to his basement, which had been turned into a gaming room. At the moment there was a table set up in the middle of the room, with ten red, plastic cups set up in bowling-pin formation on either end. I smiled to myself; I was fantastic at beer pong. My friends thought it was probably the artist in me, somehow that correlated to me being good at judging distances and angles.

I set the cases of beer down where Demyx instructed me to, next to a table where three people were sitting and watching a guy roll a few quick joints. He saw me looking and cast a curious glance at me. "Want one?" He asked. He had an eyepatch over his right eye and a scar down his left cheek. He looked pretty intimidating, but his smiled was friendly.

I smiled and shook my head. "No thanks." I had tried marijuana once, and didn't enjoy it at all. Ever since then I'd just stuck to my alcohol.

Eyepatch-guy shrugged. "Suit yourself, kid." He lifted the joint to his mouth and lit it, taking in a long drag.

"Xig! We've told you to do that outside! There's no ventilation in here."

"Xig" rolled his eyes and stood up. "Sheesh, calm down, Ax-man, I'm leaving."

I grabbed a few cans of beer from one of the cases and took them over to the table. "I'm guessing you want beer in these?" I asked in general, pointing to the cups.

The same annoyed voice that had yelled at "Xig" was now directed at me. "That's generally what you put in them, yes."

I looked around for the source of the voice. A tall, lean guy with fiery red, spiked hair was scowling at me. I raised an eyebrow at him and shrugged. "Not if you're playing with shots…"

His scowl immediately disappeared and he studied me carefully. "Shots?"

I opened a can and took a drink before starting to pour some into the cups. "Sure, you pour a shot of Jack into each cup, mix in some coke until there's enough liquid in the cup, and play like normal. Rules are still the same, you just get messed up faster."

The redhead smirked and cracked open a can to help pour into the cups. "I'm sure. I've never played like that before."

"I don't get to too often, because I'm the best of all my friends at this game. So I get them fucked up pretty quickly then I'm left with a slight buzz."

His smirk intensified. "You don't say…"

"It's not much fun when you're the only one not drunk."

"I'll make sure you get nice and drunk then, how's that sound?"

I stifled a disbelieving scoff before looking up at him. Is this guy for real? "I think I can manage to get drunk on my own, actually."

His smirk faded into a normal smile, and we continued filling up the cups in silence. Once we had gotten beer in all the cups, Demyx came over to figure out teams, a short and skinny boy with blue-gray hair following him.

"Alright, so this game's gonna be me, Axel, Roxas, and Zexion." He looked around at everyone, obviously hoping they would choose teams so he didn't have to do it.

"Well," the redhead answered, "Roxas here thinks he's pretty damn good at this game -"

"Because I am," I interrupted, ignoring how he emphasized my name.

"See? And we all know how I'm the reigning champ -"

"Don't let your ego get ahead of you, Axel," the slate-haired boy interrupted.

"Can't I finish a sentence around here?" The three of us snickered and Axel rolled his eyes. "Right, anyway, my point is Roxy and I -"

"Roxas," I corrected immediately, ignoring Axel's scowl at being interrupted again.

"We should be on separate teams, so we don't have an unfair advantage."

Demyx shrugged. "Sounds good to me. I'll be on Roxas's team, that way height difference doesn't give any advantages either."

Axel smiled, obviously happy about this. "Perfect! Alright, let's get started."

I started to walk over to my end of the table with Demyx, when someone grabbed my arm and stopped me. I turned around to see Axel smirking at me, and just as I was about to pull my arm away in annoyance he bent down to whisper in my ear.

"Good luck," he said softly, his breath tickling my ear.

My stomach suddenly clenched painfully, but not altogether unpleasantly. It kinda felt like it was being tied in a knot. I glared at Axel, at a loss for a response, and joined Demyx on our side of the table. It was clear after a few minutes why Axel had wished me luck, though. Despite being a pretty awesome shot myself, Demyx was dreadful. A few times he'd almost knocked the entire table over as he and Axel both dove to retrieve the ping pong ball, and he hadn't made a single shot yet whereas I'd managed to get rid of four cups already.

Axel seemed as good as he boasted, though. He'd also made four cups, and Zexion had made two. Demyx was a lightweight, as I found out, when it came to beer, so he'd only drank the cups that Zexion had scored and was already buzzed, while I was left with the others and had yet to get anywhere near that state. I tossed my ping pong ball over, ignoring Axel's waving arms that were trying to distract me, and sank it another cup. Pleased with myself, and the disappointed look on Axel's face, I smiled at Demyx.

"You're up."

Demyx smiled back and aimed his shot, wobbling a little due to his intoxicated state, and threw the ball. It bounced on the table, then off, and predictably he and Axel both dove for the ball again. This time, though, as Demyx made his dive he didn't quite clear the table and his hip knocked into the side. I ran forward to steady it, as did Zexion, but we were too late and the table fell to the side, the remaining cups of beer spilling all over the floor. Demyx and Axel were both frozen, looking at the table, their attempts to claim ownership of the ball forgotten.

Then Demyx started giggling wildly. "Ohhh, that's gonna be such a pain to clean up!"

I walked over to help Demyx up off the floor. "Don't worry, I'll help you later."

His answering smile was radiant enough to power the city during a blackout. "Really?"

I shrugged. "Yeah sure. But later. Right now, I wanna forget my name."

Axel clapped me on the back. "Sounds like a plan." He offered me an unopened beer and I shotgunned it, wanting to feel the effects as soon as possible. When I finished I sighed and crumpled the can in my fist while Demyx cheered. I smiled patronizingly at him.

"That was nothing. Once I shotgunned a 40 oz. just because my friend said I couldn't. Good thing I didn't need to come up for air."

Demyx "wow"ed softly while Axel smirked, his eyes glinting for some reason. Zexion had vanished mysteriously after their game had ended, and now the only other people in the basement were the two girls who had been sitting at the table with "Xig."

"Alright, guys," the girl with the short black hair called. "Now that your game's over, how about you entertain us?"

Axel quirked an eyebrow, that seemingly ever-present smirk still on his face. "How would you like me, Xion?"

"Out of my face, for one," she said, not missing a beat and barely acknowledging Axel. I smiled at the girl. I liked her already. She noticed my smile and smiled back at me. "Let's play another game, and get to know each other a little better."

"What'd you have in mind?" The other girl asked. She was blond and looked as if she was prepared to kick anyone's ass at any time.

"Hmm… I've never?"

"Yes! Let's play!" Demyx shouted, taking a seat at the table.

I shrugged and joined him at the table. "I'm in as long as I get to drink."

Axel sat down in the empty seat across from me. "I'll play if Roxy here is playing."

"Roxas," I hissed at him.

He pouted a bit but I didn't relent, so he just muttered, "Fine," and took another drink of his beer.

"I'll start!" Xion called happily, opening her own beer. "I've never… gotten caught sneaking out of the house."

Everyone at the table drank except her. The game proceeded to Demyx, on her left. "I've never… gotten kicked out of a bar."

Axel and the blond girl both drank. It was my turn now. "I've never… gone skinny dipping."

Again Axel and the blond girl were the only ones to drink, then it was the blond's turn. "I've never put someone in the hospital."

"Yet, Larxene," Axel added. She snickered at his comment. No one at the table moved toward their beer, then Axel picked his up and sipped at it. Larxene smirked while I eyed him curiously. "You know who," he said to Larxene, "and it was just for a couple hours." He sat down his beer and thought about his statement. "I've never… questioned my sexuality."

Xion picked up her beer and took a drink. I reached for mine hesitantly. I wasn't quite sure what he meant by "question," but I suppose there had been a brief time when I wasn't too sure. I took small drink of beer and set it back down. Axel watched me the whole time.

The game continued for some time, all of us refreshing our drinks at some point. Axel was now on his sixth, and I was close behind on my fifth. After we'd all been drinking for a while, our shyness had evaporated and we'd started asking more personal questions. One of which resulted in Xion stripping down to her bra and panties because she'd made the statement "I've never played a drinking game where I had to take off my clothes." After that everyone had cheered and encouraged her until she finally gave in and took them off.

Now it was back around to Demyx. "I've never… kissed a boy."

Everyone at the table took a drink, myself included, but I was shocked at his statement. "Never?" I repeated. Ever since I'd first met Demyx I'd thought he was gay. And he was very attractive, so I couldn't imagine no one had ever kissed him.

He shook his head sadly. "Nope."

I could only stare in disbelief. Was he not gay? Or even bi? Or even curious, for that matter? "Would you like to change that?" I asked with a smirk. The beer had lowered my inhibitions, sure, but I was still aware of what I was doing.

Demyx smiled, both nervous and excited. "Maybe if I found the right guy to kiss."

"What's your type?"

"I think right now I could go for a cute blond with spiky hair."

That's all I needed and I leaned forward, pulling Demyx closer to me, and kissed his lips. He shivered when I ran my tongue along his bottom lip, asking for entrance, and he gave it to me. My tongue swirled around his mouth and danced with his tongue, eliciting a quiet moan from him. I felt that same clenching feeling in my stomach that I'd felt earlier, though this time it was quieter, less painful. Of course, that could have just been the beer masking it.

Finally Demyx pulled away, panting, and then gave me a warm smile. "You're a really good kisser, Roxas."

I smiled back, thrilled at his compliment. "Thanks, Dem."

Axel looked like he was torn between fascination and wanting to punch something. Larxene seemed to notice his look too, because she was standing up and announcing that she was going to bed. Xion quickly followed behind her, after gathering up her clothes. An awkward silence was left behind them, while Axel stared at the table, apparently lost in thought. I looked over at Demyx, a question on my face, and he just shrugged.

"I guess it's that time. I'm gonna head off to bed as well," he said. "Roxas, were you still wanting to stay in my room?"

I nodded. "Yeah, I'll be up in a bit." Demyx left for his room. I stood up and walked over to the still flipped over table that no one had bothered picking up and set it upright. I picked up the cups that littered the floor, to make it easier to clean in the morning. When I had decided to come to the party, my only objective was to get smashed and hopefully wake up and not need to throw up. Now, though, after kissing Demyx, I had all sorts of other ideas in my mind. That had been a pretty sobering moment, although I still felt dizzy if I stayed still for too long.

"He wasn't lying."

I looked over at the table where Axel was sitting, now watching me rather than staring at the table. To be honest, I'd completely forgotten he was still there. "What?" I asked.

"Dem wasn't lying when he said he'd never kissed a boy."

"I never said he was."

"It was his choice, you know. He's had plenty of guys falling at his feet. But none of them were good enough for him."

I just shrugged, wondering why Axel was telling me this. It made no difference to me why Demyx had chosen not to kiss a guy until tonight.

Axel stood up and headed towards the stairs. He hesitated on the first one, then glanced back at me. "You must be special." He smiled, then headed up the stairs, not expecting a response from me.

I didn't have a response anyway. I was too caught off guard to say anything. Why would he think I was special? No one had ever thought that, and I wasn't too sure I was ready for someone to think that now. I left the basement and made my way to Demyx's room. The living room had emptied out now, and most people had either gone home or were currently crashing on the couches and floor. I walked up the stairs and quickly found a room marked "Demyx."

Pushing the door open, I stepped inside and closed it quietly behind me. Demyx was curled up on the edge of his bed, looking as if he was in danger of falling off. More than half of the bed had been left empty, but I wasn't sure if that meant I was supposed to sleep there or not. I walked over to Demyx and shook him awake softly. He looked at me blearily for a minute, then when he recognized who I was I saw him blush faintly.

"Where did you want me to sleep?" I whispered.

"You can share my bed, I don't mind," he whispered back, shyly.

Remembering Axel's words, I heard warning bells in my head. I ignored them, though, and took off my shirt and crawled into bed next to Demyx. He was only offering me a place to sleep, not his virginity. I did, however, put my arm around him and pull him closer.

He made no attempt to stop me, and actually moved closer on his own, but after a few minutes he spoke up. "R-Roxas?"

"Yeah?" I asked sleepily.

"I um… I don't want you to get the wrong idea or anything but uh… I actually like someone else, so I'm not looking for anything from you."

Honestly, I felt relieved. I had no objections to this, but Demyx felt like he needed to explain further. "I only kissed you because… well because I wanted experience before I kissed him. I mean, I've had experience with girls, but not guys. I just didn't know whether it'd be different or not. I guess it's not that different after all."

So this person Demyx liked was a guy, was it? I could only smile, not really knowing how to answer.

"You're not mad, are you?"

Was I mad? Of course not. A little disappointed, maybe, that I wasn't going to get any further with such an attractive guy, but not mad in the slightest. I understood perfectly what it meant to be used. I did it to my friends all the time. "No Dem, I'm not mad." To prove to him I wasn't I pulled him closer and snuggled into him, wanting nothing more than comfort from him.

I heard him sigh in relief. "That's good, I really like you and I was worried I'd ruined our friendship."

I chuckled lightly. "Go to sleep, Dem. You have nothing to worry about."

I stayed awake for a bit longer, though, thinking over what Axel had said, and wondering why Demyx had chosen me, of all people, to practice on. As I felt myself drifting off, I heard his words again, and pictured acid green eyes framed by fiery hair, his trademark smirk on his face.

"You must be special."

Okay, so that wasn't so bad, right? You know the best way you can tell me? A review! Whey!

Yeah anyway, hope you liked it. Update coming asap, though no promises on when.