Long Drive
Washes of hot pink and white light pierced through the veil of darkness. A Jackson Pollock of colour splattering across Axel's sleeping face and ceiling and waking him when pulsating vibrations followed, trembling through his mattress.
One aqua coloured eye opened and the pupil retreated at the sight of his phone background- a blurry gothic pink and black illustration of a young man with a handkerchief tied around his mouth and giving the finger in anger of his oppressed youth. 2:18am. Three missed texts. He rolled onto his back, writhing against sheets itchy from old snack crumbs, and attempted to hold up his phone without dropping it on his face.
He slid his finger gracelessly across the screen and squinted hard through the blinding light. Axel felt his chest be gripped from the inside by anxieties cold hands contracting in his core.
Saïx .
Wake up.
Today 1:55 am
Axel.
Today 2:07am
Come Outside.
Today 2:13
Axel was asking the phone why, aloud to no one in the dark of his bedroom when it began to buzz with electric vigor in his hands.
Saïx
calling...
"What the hell do you want?" Axel answered his sleepy Appalachian accent obvious in his throat.
"Hey, I'm here. Come outside."
Saïx talked like he texted. Only saying what he needed. Simple, structured, and every goddamn sentence, perfectly, annoyingly grammatically goddamn correct.
Irate frustration seethed through Axel's unbrushed teeth and he could almost hear wallpaper curling off his wall in the distance. "No way man, I'm not doing this again." God, he wanted a cigarette. They were in the pocket of his leather jacket on his desk chair and if he was getting up to get those, he might as well go to Saïx . He fought the temptation, gripping the sheets with his right hand.
"This is important." Saïx 's tactless voice resonated in Axel's ear.
"Aw, fuck off. My job is important, and I'm up to my eyeballs in shit from my dad enough as it is."
"Axel." Saïx stated.
Axel squeezed his eyes shut and went to cover his eyes. Saïx did not say please. Ever. It was fact, like evolution or the holocaust, or how fire needs oxygen to burn. Saïx did not say please, but his voice lilted slightly in the way he said Axel's name. A type of pleading, a remorseless beg smothered in so much apathy it could have been its own tangible, slobbering beast.
Axel groaned, just loud enough to hear the tags off his hound's collar rise from the laminate hardwood floor down the hall, but not enough to stir the snoring of a man who had been half cut by four thirty that afternoon.
"Tch, fine." Axel grunted, tossing his phone down, and standing unsteadily, he picked up his acid wash jeans off the floor and zipped them, slowly, closed over his naked hips. That would be just what he needed, to get his dick stuck in a zipper- like in the horrible movie he got dragged to last summer by some flat-chested brunette that had an affinity for over lining her lips in fuchsia, wearing yellow and drenching her skin in perfume that smelled like cotton candy. It had been a 90's movie night at an old school drive in that, what was her name, Sophie?... or Selena? had scored tickets to. Axel remembered more of the movie then the girl eagerly bobbing up and down in his lap, squealing like a rusted gate in his dad's pick-up. She got pissy quick when Axel didn't come and screamed at him that he would just have to fuck himself as she slammed the truck door. He finished the movie alone in the cabin that stunk of sex and candy, and watched the zipper scene in abject horror praying to sweet baby Jesus that that would never, ever, happen to him. Maybe it was because the humid Tennessee air was thick in his senses, or maybe it was because he was eighteen and his hormonal body hated everything, but to this day the smell of cotton candy makes him nauseous.
.
He moved silently through the darkness to his window, leather jacket in hand, and gingerly raised it. Chips of white paint from the frame fell into the room and onto the brown shingles beyond the threshold, and the dog's collar jingled again-back to the floor. Axel tossed his jacket out the window first, onto the lawn and then slipped through, lowering the window just as silently behind him. Axel could see, from where he crouched on the roof, Saïx 's red 1969 Mustang parked in front. The engine was running, no headlights.
Axel, who was barefoot, had the afterthought of grabbing his high tops just then as the asphalt shingles scratched at his calloused heels. The roof led to a white lattice that one of these days would collapse under Axel's weight. It was built into to an overgrown and decaying flower bed and was once his mothers little area of respite, but she wasn't around to care for it anymore or him for that matter. It sounded a little negative, unappreciative even, but when your mother fucks off with some twenty five year old business tycoon obsessed with ocean coloured ice cream, you get a little bitter.
Axel picked his jacket off the grass and slipped it over his white v-neck and lithe shoulders. He retrieved, and lit a cigarette in his mouth as he walked lazily across his lawn to Saïx 's car. He couldn't actually see his bright yellow eyes from across the yard, but he knew Saïx was watching him. Watching the glowing ash from his cigarette lit up the right side of his face, reflecting light like a wax figure painted orange and yellow and judging his shock of red hair was disheveled and unwashed, and knowing his shirt was undoubtedly in the same state. His fucking eyes, Axel exhaled calmly- quelling some lustful animal behind the cage of his ribs. What the hell was he doing? How was it so easy for Saïx to get Axel to do whatever he wanted? His eyes grew brighter with every step, like a shitty tractor beam from some old sci-fi movie they had watched together once, until one of them grew restless and undressed the other. Now Axel couldn't remember how the movie ended.
It must have rained at some point as his the cuffs of his jeans grew damp and stuck to his bony ankles, but this proved to be little hindrance to Axel, who let a large toxic cloud of smoke burn though his nostrils and out into the air. The car had the top down, and Axel bent his angled frame down, resting his arms on the passenger side window. He had agreed to come out and see him, that didn't mean he was going anywhere. Axel would need some serious romancing first if he was going for a ride with his coldblooded, back-stabbing ex. Axel pulled the cigarette out of his mouth as Saïx 's yellow eyes finally locked with sharp, fluorescent green.
"Can you make this quick?" Axel asked quietly, realizing a small rock had imbedded itself in the ball of his left foot as he stood on the warm, wet sidewalk. He dragged the rock off his foot on the other leg. "You know I work early tomorrow."
"Get in."
Axel grunted, his shoulder lowered and brought the cigarette back to his lips. "No fuckin' way."
"I told you, it's important."
"You know, you have a lot of balls just showing up here like this, callin' me." Axel grumbled the phlegm out of his throat instead of just telling him to leave, because he knew exactly where this was going to lead. "I haven't heard from you in months."
Saïx didn't even waiver, not a single expression rippled across his stupid, scratched up face. "I need to show you something..."
Axel didn't reply, but exhaled his smoke in Saïx 's direction, and flicked his thumb, letting the ashes fall onto the passenger seat of his car. Saïx reached across and brushed them off, as Axel opened the door and got into the car. He settled quickly and shut the door, looking to Saïx with an are-you-fuckin'-happy-now expression.
Saïx , might have grinned as put the car into drive and started away, down Iris road to highway forty. Axel looked away from him as quickly as possible, resting his elbow out of the window thinking that this is how it was going to start all over again- riding round and round the same tracks, slowly wearing down each time, like those really old amusement park rides that just passes basic safety regulations and kills a couple people every decade. But hey, fuck it! Everyone loves that classic shit.
.
Neither of them spoke for the first twenty minutes, as they passed the little lights of Maryville. Axel kept himself busy by flicking through Saïx 's music collection on his phone, he always complained the cassette adapter cord was too short and he still hadn't bought a new one.
"Got anythin' to eat in here- I'm starvin'-" Axel asked opening the glove box and shuffling things around.
"Couple of candy bars should be in there- probably melted."
Axel shrugged, melted chocolate was still edible chocolate. He ate a couple bars eagerly and then chased them back with a flask full of Jack Daniels in his breast pocket.
"I hear you've been out and about with Fujin..." Axel uttered after another five minutes or so, after he finally picked a song (they didn't have the same taste in music, clothes, or... anything, really).
"Yeah. We only went out a couple times."
Only. Makes it sound so trivial, although Axel really couldn't expect any less from his ex.
"You guys must have the most rivetin' conversations." Axel actually laughed, "I can just see the look on Seifer's face."
"Conversing in monosyllables seemed like a nice change of pace." Saïx retorted, twisting that little knife he stuck in Axel's ribcage a year ago. Rusted now and rotting in his infected skin.
"So, are you guys like... together then?"
"No."
The city lights had completely disappeared by now as the road turned up into a two lane highway. The edge of Little River Gorge and her rocky hillside were scorched by this time in the later summer and all colour leeched from the earth leaving it dry and coiled like a red cornsnake. Axel rested his head back, lifting his eyes to the open night sky- he never enjoyed sitting on the lawn and watch the world turn. The vastness of the universe and the colour of starlight made him feel very small and insignificant as dry blades of grass poked through his shirt, leaving him itchy for days. He did it for Saïx , and his weird obsession with God's nightlight. Saïx knew, and silently appreciated.
"Can you put the top up? I need a smoke." Axel asked against the wind, and reaching into his pocket, to trade his flask for his straights.
As the top electronically snapped itself together, Saïx rolled the windows up, and adjusted the AC. All sound seemed to get sucked out of the vehicle, and they were as cool and convenient as vacuum sealed microwave dinners. Axel put the cigarette to his lips, and dug a worn out looking bic lighter. He flicked it vehemently about six time before Saïx reached across, pushing in the little lighter receptacle so it could pop back out with warm relief for Axel's craving.
"Thanks," Axel said.
Saïx finally decided to say it. "Roxas doesn't mind your smoking?"
Axel's eyes dropped, and he turned his head towards the window, he didn't take another drag. "How long have you known?"
"I've known since the Christmas party. Roxas was trying so hard not to look at you, and that fight you had with Selphie... wasn't hard to put two and two together." Saïx paused again, watching Axel finally take a long inhale of his fading smoke. "I didn't mean to make you upset-"
"Everythin' you do makes me upset," Axel growled at him. "I don't know who invited you, I don't know why that time- that one time- instead of all the other times when I needed you- you picked that night to actually show up!"
"I wanted to apologize, set things right between us again."
"It ain't never gonna be that easy, Saïx . This. Us."Axel gestured towards himself, with both hands, his smoke still resting between two fingers. "This is not gonna end in some fairy-tale paradise bullshit. This is us. And I think you and I both know- it's gonna end in fire."
Finally! Finally! There he said it! Jesus Christ. If Saïx wanted to have it out so bad, then he was going to get it. Eighteen months, eighteen months it's taken them just to get here to this stupid conversation. They both knew what happened, and they both knew how they felt about it- but they still had to let the air out of this suffocating, little space that both had locked within each other's hearts.
"You were drunk-" Saïx voice began to raise, hot orange like a harvest moon in the dry summer night.
"You didn't fuckin' stop me, Saïx !" Axel snarled back defensively.
Neither at fault, both to proud to admit it, and yet neither of them were right.
"How would you know?! You don't even fucking remember!" Saïx 's sudden livid howl muted Axel's in the car rendering him silent, fearful. His wall of cool composure shattered. Saïx 's eyes like a hysterical animal alight briefly in the light of a passing vehicle.
It was quiet for a long time.
.
See, when Axel and Saïx were still dating, they were "invited" so some rich kid's mansion for a house party. They went to the same high school and Saïx didn't even know his name, but he was the same spoiled rich kid archetype. Mommy and daddy didn't love each other anymore, bla, bla, bla so they would buy his affections in expensive guitars and retro haircuts. Anyways, Axel drank half in body weight in whatever liquor was available, broke some other kids face, scarring him from his forehead to under his left eye, and threw up in the rich mother's prized azaleas.
Saïx had never been one for heavy drugs, and the fine white powder encrusted in the blood on Axel's nose had him engorged in rage while driving Axel to the school parking lot to come down and sober up. They both fell asleep in the vehicle, but not for long. Saïx was awakened by the sound of breaking glass as Axel was throwing rocks into the school's chemistry room and cheering with psychopathic joy in the chaos.
When Saïx had raced to stop him, they erupted in a screaming match of exaggerated profanities and disgusting accusations. Axel continued the onslaught of verbal abuse, while sparking an old metal lighter to life, confessing about life with his father, how he hit him, his mother, how she abandoned them, how he was getting suspended for failing classes, how people are beating him up for dating a guy. He never told Saïx that he took the rap for them both because he didn't want Saïx to get hurt or be angry. He was going to show the world what he really thought of them. He was going to watch it all burn.
Saïx went to him, attempting to take the lighter from him, telling him not to make things any harder on either of them, and Axel shoved him down in the glass, where he landed on tiny little shards that sliced that weird little X shape between his eyes.
Axel didn't even notice, Axel didn't care- he tossed the lighter anyway and with a loud 'pop', the lighter exploded sending torpedoes of fire into the rest of the room. He didn't turn from the burning room until he heard the car start and Saïx pulling away- fast, leaving Axel behind.
Saïx , through blood and tears, could see Axel in his rear view mirror raising his arms in the air, pacing, his fingers tangling in his hair. He looked as though he might have been shouting, but Saïx didn't hear him and he didn't stop.
It was needless to say, that was how their relationship ended, a year a half ago or something like that. The police and fire department had arrived early enough, as the ruckus had awoken a concerned citizen, to contain the fire to the chemistry lab. Axel was suspended for two months, and participated in community service during his time away from school. When he returned, Axel and Saïx 's relationship was not the same. Saïx wanted nothing to do with him, even as Axel had confessed he didn't even remember most of that night. Saïx was angry for a long time. Axel dropped out of high school in January.
"Ya know,"Axel said calmly, tilting his head back on the rest taking another small swig from his flask. "You never did tell me how you got that scar, the one by your eyes there."
"You drink too much, Axel..."
.
The red '69 mustang finally rolled to a stop after another forty minutes. A smaller road went up a wooded mountains side to a look out just passed Meigs Falls. Heavy rubber tires crackling over the gravel roused Axel from the light doze he'd fallen into. As his heavy eyelids opened up and he straightened himself- Saïx had already gotten out of the car, and was standing facing the city- hands bracing the guard rail. His outline against yellow light that burst up into the partly clouded sky from the bright city lights reflected back down- colouring the entire county in a polluted glow. Axel unbuckled his belt and pushed up to stand-posing unintentionally, leaning an arm on the door, with a leg still in the car (the bottoms of his jeans dry now), like an old cologne advert. A gentle wind blowing up the mountainside and through his long hair, it smelled like dry pine, and water from the nearby falls.
"Hey," he called to Saïx , who turned slightly, but didn't respond. "Is this what you wanted to show me, in the middle of the night, this- godforsaken city? Even all dressed up at night- it still don't look any better."
Saïx felt Axel stop beside him, leaning his back into the rail as he lit another cigarette.
"How is...Roxas?"
"Seriously?" Axel inhaled, and dropped his head back- dishevelled spikes of red falling off his shoulders to watch the smoke glide upwards. "He's fine- gonna be joining you at UT in the fall, said something about takin' cultural studies."
"He makes you happy?"
"Well... yeah, I guess." Axel shrugged, "I mean, it's comfortable, we've known each other a long time."
Saïx felt sadness sink in his gut; he had been forcing himself to hope that he was over this feeling- this petty jealousy. Axel had grown up with Saïx too- they had known each other since they were in kindergarten, the year Saïx 's family moved from Sacremento, and Axel didn't meet Roxas until he was a junior high freshman. He had known him longer, was a part of all his secrets, his everything. Roxas didn't know him, but Axel hated being predictable.
Axel flicked his finished smoke into the gravel, and twisted around, leaning an arm into the rail, and scratching the back of his head with the other. "Look, I'm not... mad at you. I mean, I was- for a long time, but I'm not anymore. I was a really shitty person then, and I didn't understand how you were tryin' to help me. I guess, I just wanted you to see things the way I saw them- you were the only person who could. I thought things were so unfair, and your family was so perfect, even after your dad... And you know your grades were perfect, and your mom was so ready to help you get into a good school, and your aunt came to help take care of you. You're the only person who always did things like that for me, after my mom left us, and dad gave up. There's so much bullshit all balled up inside of me, and I put it on you 'cause I didn't know how to deal with it. I'm still figurin' out how to deal with it." Axel looked over his shoulder to Saïx who still looked straight forward, eyeing the horizon. He looked so sad, in the warm city light. The little scars by his eyes, his lips downturned. But he didn't say anything. "Look, what I'm trying to say is that, I understand why you left me, and I don't blame you. Now I know it was good for me. It can't take back the things I said and the way I treated you. You were my best friend..."
There was a long silence, and suddenly the croaking of chorus frogs, and the slithering chirrup of camel crickets that no matter what the hell you do- always find a way into your basement. You could actually create a bio-dome, saran wrap, water-fucking-seal the entirety of the house and they'd still be in there, making themselves at home with open access to the warm spot behind the fridge, complete with crumbs, and free wifi.
Axel's voice wavered, a desperation flooding in, "...aren't you gonna say anything? Why'd you bring me all the way up here if-"
"I'm leaving."
Axel chuckled slightly, his own sentence coming to a crashing halt. "-I was... leaving? What do you mean you're leaving?"
"Mom's moving us back to California, made me put in a transfer in the spring. I've been accepted to Sacramento U. We leave in the morning..."
"And you're telling me now? Jesus Christ, Saïx !" Axel said backing away from him, "what the hell were you thinking?! You were just gonna be up and gone and hoped I wouldn't notice! You must really think I'm stupid! If I hadn't have come up here- you would have just left?"
"Probably," Saïx lifted his head up slightly, to look at the moon, to stop the emotion escaping his eyes.
"Holy shit-" Axel sighed, his brought his hands up, running them through his hair as he walked to the car and back again- pacing in front of the headlights.
"Axel..." Saïx almost whispered, "would you... come with me? If I asked you?"
"...are you askin' me?"
"I want to, but I think already know the answer." Saïx replied.
"I can't believe this,"
Axel stopped and sat down on the hood of the mustang, resting his elbows on his knees, and face in hands. He shared some colourful phrases as Saïx walked to him, placing his hands on the sides of his legs. This was it. Saïx was leaving and their history was going to remain incomplete, unfinished. The idea of what was going to happen left Axel unsettled- a bitterness rising in his throat tasting like his last cigarette
"Look at me," Saïx asked, "please-"
Axel lifted his hands from his face and looked at him- a big blue blur against a big yellow blur. Saïx 's hand on his face replaced his own, and pale fingers combed through his red hair past his ear. He used very little force, to pull the back of Axel's neck forwards. Axel flowed in towards Saïx , as the tide follows the moon, and he was met with a familiar, aggressive kiss.
Saïx 's whole mouth was against his, and Axel let him in. They both exhaled at different times, air hot against wet skin as they parted. Axel got up quickly and put both hands on the sides of Saïx 's face angrily, like a punch he just couldn't put any feeling into and he brought their lips together again.
They had grown up together, best friends since they were five. Best friends forever. Shared lunches, detentions (Axel's fault), shared Halloween candy, clothes, and favourite movies, shared nights of staying up late and early mornings and long easy kisses- so unlike this last one. The last one they were ever going to have. It made Axel remember their first one. A memory Axel visited often. He could still feel the wet granite under his fingers, the same cold squeeze of uncertainty in his stomach.
.
It had been a sweltering hot day in June, a Saturday. Saïx was twelve and Axel eleven, they were working outside on their last assignment for school while Axels mother had fixed little drinks and tea as they played and glued pictures from real books into a handmade one.
By the late afternoon, Saïx and Axel had finished their project and retreated inside- much to his mothers chagrin. She screeched like a harpy at the sight of them- glue and paper and stickers everywhere. She demanded before they touch anything in the house that they go upstairs and wash up. And such obedient little boys they were.
As Axel washed his hands, he talked about how the project was looking good and now they could have fun because their homework was finished. He was pouring out suggestion of what they could do with rest of their afternoon when Saïx placed his hands, half dried up with purple glue, on the sides of Axels cheeks and kissed him really hard on the mouth.
He tasted like raspberry kool-aid, and smelled lightly of sunscreen, a total embodiment of summer. Axel was so startled at first that he didn't do anything, but rest his right hand on the wet counter top to steady himself.
Saïx eventually let go of him and back away- his cheeks flushed with embarrassment and joy.
.
They knew everything about each other, frivolous things, like Axel's love of cinnamon gum, and how he dipped his french fries in chocolate ice cream, that Saïx 's favorite candy was red licorice, had phases of the moon tattooed along his spine, and volunteered at the animal shelter. And the important things, like the time Axel's father made him kneel on salt for accidentally breaking his glasses during a game of cowboys and indians when he was seven, and the time Saïx scared the shit out of Axel when he once had an epileptic seizure during a backyard barbecue.
And the simple things, like driving an hour out of town to watch the stars, share a case of river city beer, and make love in the car. That was only two years ago, during a hot summer not unlike this one and it felt like yesterday.
Axel pulled away from Saïx and rested against him forehead to forehead. "You can't just kiss me and expect this to be all better. What the hell am I going to do without you?"
Saïx was looking at him again, his gaze ever so striking with the way he never blinked. "You'll be fine, I'll come up next summer. And you have Roxas."
"Aw man, you can't do that! You can't just be all jealous, tell me you're moving away and then just expect me to be happy or okay with somebody else. You know that it's you! You've always known that it is you, and that is will always be you!"
Saïx smiled.
"I fucking hate you."
"I hate you too."
.
With that, Saïx slowly left him to get into the car and start it up. Axel took a few minutes to himself in the absence, raising his head slowly to look over the city lights. Five minutes ago he hated this place, the view and all its bad memories. Now all he could see was Saïx . The water tower they would climb up and smoke their dad's cigarettes, the movie theatre where they watched The Fellowship of the Ring five times and quoted it all the way home, and Tifa's bar- the first time they tried out their fake I.D's and got kicked out. Now everything about this place felt special, and nostalgic, like the smell of old Christmas decorations brought out from storage containing the memories of every the year past. Axel stood, and got back in the car.
The Mustang shifted side to side as he dropped himself in the old bucket seats and slammed the door, not noticing at first the stupid grin on Saïx 's face.
"…What?" Axel asked, gesturing lightly.
"I have an idea," Saïx said, "I know you have to work tomorrow, but… mom is making us stay in a hotel our last night so the house could be shown tomorrow. So… no one's there. Want to go in? One last time? I left my old bedroom window unlocked."
Axel didn't reply, but grinned right back.
The drive back down was quiet and the right kind of tense. Axel squeezed Saïx 's sweating hand as they chatted until they could see the lights of town just a few intersections off.
"I remember when I first moved here, you and Hayner used to call me a 'jasper'."Saïx laughed at him, shaking his head a bit. "I thought you were so funny with your honey-sweet southern drawl."
Axel chuckled back at him, "that's what dad and his buddies used to call people from out of town."
"I just never knew what it meant, I always thought you were making fun of me."
"Oh we were," Axel snorted, and looked towards the highway intersection fast approaching, the light turning yellow.
Saïx 's laugh began to fade off, and changed into a sort of gasping, a rattling in his throat. The car wasn't stopping.
"Saïx slow down," Axel said with warning in his voice, before he turned to see Saïx pressed backwards into his chair and his fingers stretched out against the steering wheel. "Saïx !"
The light turned red.
With a sudden shudder, Saïx 's whole body convulsed, his eyes rolled backwards and his mouth opened. Axel had only seen this once before, in the summer when Saïx was eight. The convulsions looked a little different then, but he knew it was a seizure. Saïx 's body flipped again, releasing the steering wheel completely and convulsion violently against the seat belt holding him in place. Axel reached for the wheel as they sailed through the intersection but couldn't reach it before he was face to face with the big bright lights of an oncoming semi.