Title: pet semetary
Author: Digimon Empress Yaten (de yaten)
Notes: Written for kh_request. Pet Semetary!AU. Dark. Lots of language. Violence, some sex. Gross imagery.
Disclaimer: I don't own Kingdom Hearts or its characters. I don't claim to own them.
Riku sat in his wheelchair with his back straight and perfect like a good soldier; cracked a smile for his (dead-beat) mom and all the visitors from their little town like a good little son, good little neighbor boy; and sat there, being called a hero by some reporter (for getting hit in the head and being stubborn enough to stay alive?) and being interviewed by the newspapers (war wasn't nearly over, and he was the only boy back without a casket so far) and he was stuck.
He was stuck relaying bare-boned, red-white-and-blue tinted tales of the "war." Except the war he told was all green and glory, no guts to be found. No land mines or grenades blowing everyone to smithereens. No guns blasting off half a guy's face and o, he's still alive and screaming but you've got to move-move-move or it's your ass next. No having to shit in the field with ten guys watching because if you try to leave your trench you'll get a bullet through your skull. No coming back from a mission with less than half the guys who were sent out - no, no, no. He was American and when you were American the war was a great thing, a great effort to help save the world from bad, bad men, and, damn it, if he didn't lie and say things were peachy-keen then all them women and nurses and little girls from down the street with ribbons in their hair were going to think of their sons and husbands and brothers in all that stink and blood and mounds dead dead boys.
In truth - which he rarely told these days, except to himself - Riku almost wished he was dead and buried - wished he hadn't tripped at the exact right moment and ended up with a head injury instead of whatever death was waiting for him. But almost was key, almost was important. He only almost wished he was dead because - well, he had someone to live for. Not his mom (she was a bitch, and he suspected she was only being nice because he brought the only positive attention their family'd ever gotten in this town) or his dad (he was a sick fuck, a dirty dead sick fuck and even after he was worm-bait Riku never forgave him for what he did to the family) or his brother (he was dead, too - see dad) or even his once-upon-a-time girlfriend, Kairi, who turned out to be a few screws lose and drowned herself at the beach after Riku went away. Silly girl.
But, no. His Someone was none of those people, who - aside from maybe his brother - were all meaningless, worthless, in Riku's eyes. His mom could die tomorrow and the only difference would be he'd have to hobble with his cane down the driveway to get the mail himself. But no, unlike his mom - his Someone was special. His Someone was someone he couldn't live without. His Someone was Roxas.
They had been best friends since... well, not the beginning. In the beginning, Riku and Sora were buddies, pals, best friends and blood brothers (Riku still had his scar) and nothing was evereverEVER going to tear them apart. (Especially girls, because girls had cooties. And Roxas, because Roxas was weird and didn't have brown hair like Sora and Sora's mommy and daddy did - he had blonde hair like Mr. Johnson at the hardware store.)
Except when little boys made pacts and promises that they're nevereverEVER going to be torn apart, they don't think of certain things, they don't watch out for what could happen. They don't know what the world wants to really give them - no it's not a solid future and freedom and a three bedroom house with a white picket fence and 2 1/2 kids (a boy, girl, and a dog which only counts as a half). It wants to give them bad things. Awful things. Like sickness. And Death.
Death took Sora like the school time spring before the summer - too slow and too cold for baseball or swimming anything but the shiver-shiver-shakes with nasty-tasting syrups and mountains of blankets. By the end of it Sora was sickly grey and all skeleton bones (reminded Riku of pictures he saw in the military hospital, somethingsomething about Germany and the bad men, o nurse, can I have a sick tray?) and little Riku thought it was odd Sora fell asleep during his story about something God said in church, but then he lifted the covers and screamed when he saw there were bumps and bruises and three big earwigs crawling across Sora's chest that, Sora'smomdadRoxasgod wasn't moving at all.
That was the day Roxas and Riku became friends. The day Sora died. The day Riku went into Roxas' room to tell him Sora was gonegonegone and nevercomingback and Roxas only shrugged. "Shit happens," he said (but they were only ten and swearing was bad, ohh boy if Roxas' mommy heard what he just said...) and Riku wiped away the snot from his nose and nodded. Shit, indeed, did happen (even if Riku didn't want to swear). More shit, indeed, did happen that day. The day Sora died, the day Riku went into Roxas' room - the day Riku went home to tell his parents that Sora wasn't coming over to play that weekend, and he creaked open the front door to find Xehanort on the floor and Daddy in the air and Mommy sipping gin on the couch and sighing, "I suppose we should contact the sheriff..."
The day Sora died. The day Riku went into Roxas' room. The day Riku's daddy fucked Xehanort 'till he was bleeding (nothing new) and stabbed him overandover like a good slab of meat (something new) and then got all sad and sick about it and hung himself until his tongue was blue and he shit his pants. The day the sheriff clucked his tongue and shook his head at the mess (Riku had to clean it up, mommy was too drunk) and all the neighbors peeked through their curtains to watch them carry out the bodies.
The day Roxas and Riku started writing their letters. Back and forth, one (sometimes two) a day. Fake stamps and secret code names (more for Roxas than Riku) and a friendship blossoming over ink on paper.
Because, really, what good parents (like Roxas') would let their boy associate with someone like Riku, after all that had happened? After his father turned out to be a pervert and his brother was murdered and oh that mother of his was a rotten lady to let it happen. No parent in their right mind would let their child be friends with such filth, such trash.
But what they didn't know couldn't hurt them, and when Riku's mom was gone (which was often) Roxas would come over and they'd sneak whiskey from her cabinet and talk about putting their money together to get a house together when the country turned around. When the dust settled and bankers finally stopped throwing themselves out of windows. (Which was less and less nowadays, they'd say. Less and less. S'gonna turn around any day now, look at Germany, it's growing stronger isn't it?)
It was like that - smoke and drink and plan to get out - until the war. Until Uncle Sam wanted them and - what were they to say? Roxas' parents practically shoved him into the recruitment officer's arms (weird child, blonde child, outoutout) and Riku's mother wasn't even home when he signed the form (would she notice when he was gone?) and off they went, in crisp uniforms and sharp hats and neither of them had ever played with guns, before. Only swords, like pirates. They were separated - they never made a nevereverEVER pact, so it didn't kill them inside - and occasionally Roxas would hear news about 'some odd kid with white hair' and Riku would hear about a pretty blonde boy that broke the record in so-and-so company for most Germans killed in a single battle, and they would know they were both still alive. But no letters between them, like before - no long notes in shitty cursive on homemade stationary from Riku or strange one-liners in red ink about spiders in the corner from Roxas. No knowing exactly what the other one was up to. No knowing of anything but that both their hearts were still beating.
--
Now that Riku was home, he got letters plenty. Or as plenty as they could get, because fighting was tough and sometimes you didn't want to write home after being forced to kick-in a stranger's skull because you just didn't want to die, damn it. And sometimes there were no mailboxes or paper or pens, and you were lucky to get a block of tasteless food, much less be able to send a stamped envelope to your buddy back home.
And every letter was precious - a treasure. He kept them stacked on his nightstand, next to two framed pictures (one of Roxas, the other of his brother when he was less dead) and a single unlit cigarette he was saving for when Roxas returned. Which was going to be... who knew? The newspapers kept changing their mind. The war was close to being over on Sunday, and on Tuesday they were calling for more troops, more manpower, more guns and boys willing to shoot them.
Ironically - or was it only oddly? - today's newspaper said nothing on the word. It wasn't so much ironic or odd as it was eerie to Riku -- the town was small, boring; Riku returning from war had been the biggest news since the boys left. The small-town reporters usually latched on to any big story they could find (or at least make up) and the war was good for those sorts of stories. Dying and Germans and the latest from the front... but today, there was nothing.
A front-page story about some guy named Jud (Riku had seen him around) winning a pumpkin-growing contest. 'Biggest pumpkin we've ever seen!' It said, next to the giant black and white photo of Jud and his prize-winning pumpkin. Riku shrugged and tossed the paper to the table - his life was boring without Roxas, but it wasn't that boring. Wasn't dull enough to spend his time contemplating strange Jud and his strange pumpkin. He was going to make his way to the mailbox to check for a letter (his mother had been gone for a week, maybe another boyfriend?) - another should've come by now, maybe Roxas had time to send one. He hadn't gotten one for a while and it hurt his chest, sometimes, when he thought about it. On second thought, Riku tossed the newspaper in the trash. Newspapers were boring and Roxas letters made for a better read.
(If he had read the article, the nice little ditty about pumpkins and inches and widths around, Riku would've had to flip to PAGE 3A for the continuation on Jud's big secret of how he did it; Page 3A, reading; 'Local soldier killed in battle one week ago;')
But Riku didn't read it, and so Riku didn't know, and limped around the house the rest of the day wondering where in the hell his letter was. It had been weeks now and - yes, battles were busy and war was time-consuming, but Roxas knew that Riku was home (sent him a letter at the hospital, 'hope they
don't amputate your legs, I'd have to carry you around like a doll') and so he should've known how horrible it was alone. There wasn't even the preoccupation of fighting to keep Riku's mind astray - it always went back to Roxas, Roxas, Roxas and his letters. The way Roxas wrote his Riku with a perfect R and scribbled the rest of his name; how Roxas always managed to put everything, everything into one single sentence instead of prattling on like Riku did.
Riku would wax on about what they were going to do once they got out, where they would live, what jobs they would have -- Roxas would respond with, "You better have good taste in kitchen curtains" and nothing more. (... Riku thought his taste in kitchen curtains was fine, thank you very much.)
Riku sighed, kicked his leg against his nightstand - damn thing was always cramping up - and clutched at his pile of letters from Roxas like an woman holds her purse on the street. (Nothing's gonna take this from me, not even rough people in alleyways with knives and guns and ill intent. You'll pry this from my cold dead fingers.) They were his only lifeline between (literal) life and death.
"I might as well be in hell with Xehanort and Daddy if I didn't have you," he said - to the letters. It wasn't like his mom (if she heard) would think it odd. Or bother to check on him if she did, being gone and all. She hadn't even come back to buy groceries - Riku was eating leftover meatloaf from last week that was beginning to taste like shit. Or maybe the smell of the uncleaned bathrooms (house smelled something awful, like when she drank too much and flooded the toilet with vomit) had seeped into the fridge somehow.
"Maybe she won't come back and you can just live with me until we find our own place. We could go to New York, even. I'll write a Broadway show and you'll star in it..."
The letters said nothing in return, but Riku didn't think they would - he wasn't crazy. Just lonely. And too absorbed in re-reading the letters to hear the rumble of an engine that needed very badly to be replaced slowly making it's way through the town, alerting all the neighbors who followed the curious car shamelessly. Something big was going on in Derry, they knew, for such an official looking vehicle to be used.
The car rumbled down Lafayette; "when I get home you're making me dinner every night for two weeks straight"
More bored-ass housewives tugged their children along to see what was happening; "I wish you wouldn't kill spiders"
It turned at Cornelle, narrowly avoiding little Susanna on her bike; "I hate Europe. The women here don't bathe enough and their chocolate tastes like shit bricks. The men are too nice to me."
Little Susanna (she was bored, too) followed it as it stopped - no, wrong house - and finally turned down Neibolt street; "hEy ThERe PRETTY SOLDIER cOmE oN oVeR TO THE TRENCH FIELDS"
Passed one house (an old man looked out his window as it went by); "i'll go to hell with you if you want me to. blink twice for yes. don't worry, i'll know."
Passed the second house (Roxas' was second on the right, straight on till morning, like Neverland); "LOVE YOU LOVE YOU LOVE YOU LOVE YOU LOVE YOU LOVEYOULOVEYOULOVEYOULOVEYOUYOUYOUYOU"
And - ooh, hell, missed it - turned back around, and the small crowd gathered gasped; "SHIT HAPPENS"
--
At the moment Roxas' mother dropped her bowl of casserole (another son lost o dear) Riku creaked the door open to his mother's room. The noodles kissed the concrete just as as Riku threw up next to his mother's rotting body. A maggot waved from her glass of arsenic.
As the neighbors rubbed the poor woman's back and "Our deepest apologies ma'm, he was a fine soldier," rung in their ears, Riku thought, Riku smiled and thought: At least Roxas and I can live alone together now.
He was waiting outside for the police to come (mother is dead, you know the drill) when Jud - (ol' Jud, the one who grew a big pumpkin and tahhlked funny) - walked to the bottom of the stairs and asked him if he knew about "thaht pohhr boy down the rahd thar who dyyed. Fahhmile jus' found thahht owt." Riku nodded (but he wanted to scream and pound his fists into Jud's ugly face and drown himself in the river) and shrugged a bit. "Shit happens," he said, and he didn't even apologize for such language with his elders. He doubted Roxas' mommy would care at this point, anyway.
"Sowh, uh, whaht's goin' on here than?"
Oh. His mother.
"My mother killed herself. Body's inside. Waiting for the police." And - though he tried to think SHIT HAPPENS SHIT HAPPENS SHIT HAPPENS, his voice cracked anyway. For Roxas. Only for Roxas. He didn't want to cry (shit happens shit happens SHIT HAPPENS) but he did - disgusting slick tears painting his cheek and snot bubbling out that he wiped on his sleeve. Jud only watched, silent. Might've thought Riku was upset about his only family in the world being gone and didn't know what he was going to do now, no family, no friends, no money. Poor little Riku from that family and - oh, dear, it was just a shame but the entire town (Jud included) expected it to happen sooner or later.
"Yahh knowwww..."
"What?" It slipped out, a reflex - Riku doubted Jud had anything useful to say. "I'm sorry" would have been... normal (not nice, because no one's every really sorry - they just say it, another reflex.)
He spoke in a hushed voice, although for Jud hushed was more the normal volume everyone else talked. "You cawld, uh... brang her bahk. Frahm the dahd, y'see. It cahn be... arrrrranged."
And Riku - sweet Riku, silly Riku, little Riku that watched Roxas shrug off Sora's death - perked up, and listened. Ol' Jud knew what to do to fix this mess. Jud took him by the arm (his legs were still weak, limping from war and shaking from Roxas) and walked and talked as he led Riku farther, much farther, than he had ever been before. Past the pet Semetary (Riku buried his fish Georgie there) and somewhere... somewhere different. Somewhere dark even though the sun was blazing down on them and the heat was almost too much to bear. But Jud didn't mention it and Riku only talked to question and clarify - animals, people... came back if they were buried there? (True, Jud said something about Indians and la-la-la cannibalism and cover-your-ears what comes back might not be exactly the same - but that didn't matter. All that matter was Roxas, Roxas, Roxas.)
"And if-if-IF I bury RRRrr... my mother here, h-she will come back to me?"
'Yes,' Jud said - though it was more of a "Yahhhsss..." that Riku's brain filtered into understandable English. Understandable American, red white and blue.
Jud walked - helped - Riku home and by the time they were finished, Riku's mommy was gone (tacked note on the door, 'Contact sheriff's office for burial information') and the little crowds of people discussing Roxas - oh, Roxas - had long since go back to their homes. His parent's lovely second-to-the-right house was closed, curtains slammed together and the flag at half-mast. Sad people here, don't bother us, we don't want what you're selling. The funeral was (Riku asked a straggling old lady passing his house, trying not to look like she was reading the note on his door) in a week. Body should be home in three days - fast shipping, they used. They had to use fast shipping so the body didn't have time to curdle.
--
Every night before the funeral, Riku had a nightmare about the maggot from his mother's drinking glass squirming into Roxas' ear, telling him lies (Riku doesn't love you anymore, Riku forgot about you, Riku thinks you're a blonde freak) and tainting his brain. Tainting his love.
Six days of maggot-dreams and six days of watching the town get ready for the funeral from his curtainless kitchen window. Big news, when someone died. They talked about his father (bastard) and Xehanort for weeks afterwards. Made fun of Riku for it, too. Sometimes he'd find crude 10-year old stick figure drawings of his brother on the floor (naked, dead, little stick-penis up the air) and daddy in the air (naked, dying, kicking his fat stubby legs) but the teacher's only clucked their tongue and told Riku to sit down like a good little boy. (Back straight, pay attention, dive from the plane...)
But no one cared about Riku's mommy dying because of Roxas. A drunk slut who let her children be abused and (one) killed by their father? Or a hero (like Riku, but more dead) who died for his country? A tough choice.
Oh well. It was better for everyone to forget his mother because he was forgetting her quickly enough - soon, it would just be him and Roxas. One day till the funeral, and however long for him to return. Jud didn't say how long it took to take effect - a day, maybe two, Riku guessed.
He kissed the letters goodnight and fell asleep clutching them to his chest.
He woke up with the sun in his eyes and the itchy taste of an earwig crawling into his open mouth.
--
The funeral was official, clean, somber. A military funeral for a military soldier that died doing his military duty. Everyone who was anyone was there because, really, what else did they have to do?
Riku was even able to sit on the bone-white lawn chairs with the rest of the neighborhood without too much fuss. 'He was in the army too,' someone clucked, 'maybe they fought together?' 'Oh, you poor dear, this must remind you of your fighting days, come sit next to me.'
Roxas' parents scanned over Riku once and glanced away, quick as they could. Maybe they knew that Riku loved Roxas more than they ever could - they only loved Sora (Riku was the same once) and losing Roxas was just a shock because they maybe planned on living off his military wages for a while. He wasn't Someone to them, just something.
The casket was closed - little henpeck whispers said something about legs, missing legs? shredded beyond repair? maybe his face was blown off - and the priest was a bore, but the audience seemed to love the gunshots at the end. Bullets in the air for the bullets in his (most likely) brain.
Most everyone shuffled away, with Roxas' mom rubbing at her eyes with a black handkerchief and the little kids tugging at their mother's dresses and asking if they could go get some ice cream now because the funeral was over?
Riku sat still in his chair, back straight, hands folded neatly in his lap. The priest gave him a soft little smile - the "I'm sorry," smile they train them to give when someone is (apparently) not prepared to let go, to leave, to move on with the grieiving process. Except... the priest could not have been more wrong. In fact, Riku was very (very) close to smiling - and how could he not? Roxas (blonde hair, blue eyes) was coming back home! And all he had to do was sneak (like a cat, like a fox) back here at night and re-bury him in the dark place Jud showed him.
Then...
Then everything would be okay.
It had to be. Or he'd drown himself underneath the bridge and burn in hell with the rest of his family.
--
Riku clawed through the final layer of dirt with his bare hands and ignored the feeling of dead earth bunching under his fingernails.
There. There it was - he had finally made it to Roxas. Or Roxas' box, Roxas' temporary sleeping space before Riku moved him somewhere better, somewhere that would bring them together again. The only things between them now were the top of his coffin and a beating heart. But both could be fixed.
He lifted the top of the coffin - heavy, unnaturally smooth and black but it was new afterall, and took the deepest breath he ever took.
Roxas.
Beautiful, beautiful Roxas. The same blonde hair - though it was clipped short (post-mortem?) and parted neatly - and (he assumed) the same blue eyes, under the thin blue-veined eyelids. Same lips (don't kiss him not until tomorrow kissing the dead is a sin) and cheeks and everything was just... oh.
'Oh,' Riku thought, when he realized what the perfumed-drenched old women had been chattering about at the funeral. His legs - his leg was gone. Some of it, anyway - and just the right one, but it made his clean and pressed army pants look so silly, with the way they dropped off after his knee. Riku wanted to giggle but swore himself to a vow of silence until Roxas was safely buried. If he got caught, they would take Roxas away and Riku would die alone and angry, like his family always wanted. (Like the town wanted, maybe. 'Ex-soldier digs up grave of recently deceased, drowns self in river' would make for a sensational story at the knitting circles.)
After a few more breaths (maybe he was dreaming, maybe this wouldn't work, maybe Jud was a liar-liar and was tricking him--) he carried his friend on his back and, ignoring the mess (it wouldn't matter once Roxas was back) hauled them both out of the dead ground. He eyed the woods, the space beyond, and managed a little smile. It wouldn't be long now - it wouldn't be long, and everything was going to be just fine. Just perfect.
He followed the path he'd walked along with Jud (dowwwn thiiis trayll iz whar ya whanna go naw, Reeeku) with his breath harsh and ragged in his throat. Even missing a leg, Roxas was heavy... but it was (worth it worth it, no pain no gain) nothing, in the end. A little pain versus the opportunity to bring his only friend (lover, companion) in the world back.
He'd come by the burial ground earlier in the day and dug a hole - it would save time and strength - and so all it took was a tender laying-down (brush his hair out of his eyes, smooth down his jacket) and a bit of dirt to keep him warm.
There.
It was done - it was finished and (like he'd said a million times in his head) everything was going to be okay.
Riku went home and smoked a puff of his only-ever cigarette before falling asleep.
He had, for the first time in his life, sweet dreams.
--
Th-thump
Riku half-awoke, head lolling to the side from his dream still buzzing in his brain.
Th-thump
He sighed lazily, stretched - was it Xehanort's turn for daddy to love him again already? He knew the noise --
Th-thump
-- but wasn't it his turn...? Daddy didn't like the way Xehanort's headboard always went
Th-thump
when daddy got too (rough) excited, because it woke mommy up and sometimes the neighbors complained about the noise.
Th-thump
and if it kept getting louder like that - Riku yawned, blinked away more of his dream - then Xehanort was going to get the belt again and maybe-
crrrreak
Riku sat up, breathing in (he thought) the morning air and stretching his arms, nonchalant. Time for lovin'.
"Daddy?"
Th-thump
"Rrrrr..."
Riku blinked, once. That could not be daddy. Daddy was a bastard that was rotting in hell and Xehanort was dead and his mother was freshly buried and Riku was alone --
Th-thump
Riku's breath suddenly felt thick and tasted of the smell of the nasty syrup Sora used to have to take - he smacked his lips, peered into the (definitely not morning) darkness.
"... Hello?"
Th-th-THUMP
"Oh."
"Rrrriku..."
(roxas on the floor with his elbows th-thumping)
(roxas on the floor with his mother's ring – ring finger, to be precise—dangling from his mouth)
Th-th-th-thump
"Hh…hhh…aaate….hhhhaaaate you…"
(ol Jud was right thahhht ain't rahhxas a'tawll)
Riku tried to throw his only-ever burning cigarette on the letters before—
thump