Coffee or a Book?
I had always wondered if I was meant for more; meant to do something that would make the world a better place. Maybe I felt that way because my life had been so safe. I lived in a quiet middle class neighbourhood with cookie cutter houses and impeccably groomed lawns. Our house stood out from the others just because of the interesting additions my parents had made to the house at the beginning of the start of our little family. When I say little, I mean not so much. My extremely loving and nurturing parents started off our little family normally enough. They had one little boy, and they named him Cloud. The name was a little odd, but in this day and age that name was getting pretty common. Three years after the birth of their little blond, blue-eyed stoic, they had another boy. They named him Demyx. Again with the odd names but my family is very... well... unique. My mom, not being satisfied without a little girl to dress up like a doll, decided that she and my father should try again. They ended up getting a little more than they bargained for; they had quadruplets. We have no idea where the genes came from, but it happened anyways. The quadruplets consisted of two girls, Kairi and Namine, and two boys, Sora and Roxas. So all of a sudden our little three roomed bungalow in the middle of Radiant Garden just wasn't big enough so my parents decided to expand, and my mother being my mother, she decided to add a little something unique to our house in the mean time. An extra floor was added to the house, containing two bedrooms for the girls (linked by a common bathroom) and two bedrooms for the quad boys (also linked by a bathroom). The house already deviated from the cookie cutter mould, and then my mother decided to add a tower to our strange little mishmash of a house. The builders just slapped it onto the side and made it a three story structure with a winding staircase accessible through the living room, and so we became known as the House with the Tower. At least no ounce of normalcy was expected from us. And so no ounce of normalcy was exactly what they got. That year, my first year of High school, is when my life turned from quirky to absolutely bonkers. And I loved it.
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"Hey, I'm home." I deposited my bag on the floor near the coat racks and dumped my shoes in the pile of approximately 10 pairs of shoes near the door.
"Hey hunny. How was work?" My mom called from the recesses of her clutter friendly art studio.
"People either wanted a caffeinated beverage or a book, and I gave it to them, so they were pretty happy." I smirked at the sight of her plaster covered face.
"Thanks Sarcastabrat, that was very descriptive." She stuck her tongue out at me and then started contemplating how to change the big blob of plaster into a masterpiece. I snorted when she smeared even more plaster onto her chin and just walked away shaking my head.
A chorus of stomping footsteps alerted me to the avalanche of people coming down the stairs. I walked over to the kitchen and grabbed the box of Count Chocula out of the cupboard and grabbed a bowl, sitting down at the breakfast bar and munching down on my bowl of cereal enthusiastically. Then the group came racing round the wall at the bottom of the stairs and the semi-peace I was experiencing shattered into a million tiny pieces.
"Roxas let Demyx know that saying he's Bi is just because it's the new fad is anything but cool." Sora skipped into the kitchen with his Cheshire cat grin. This was a clear sign that he was in the mood to be a complete and utter brat; I rolled my eyes and smirked.
"Sora, just because Demyx doesn't want to be so absolute and say he's flat out Gay, doesn't give you right to tease him. Lay off. He'll catapult out of the closet eventually; once he tells Zexion how much he Lurves him" I grinned back at Sora.
"Zexion is just a friend, and I'm not Gay; I still find women attractive, like the lead singer of that favourite band of yours Roxas." I almost choked on my cereal at this point.
"You mean Tokio Hotel?" He nodded. I laughed before looking over at Sora and seeing his similar expression of triumph. "Demyx, the lead singer of Tokio Hotel is a boy; his name is Bill." I snorted and tried very hard to stop myself from falling to the floor laughing.
"God Damn It!!! Why does he have to look so girly then?" He scowled before crossing his arms.
"It's his style. Mock it, and die. Besides, why do you have to have a Faux Hawk?" I stuck my tongue out at him and he gave me a look of utter despair before leaving the kitchen and starting to make his way up the stairs.
"So Demyx, when is your boytoy coming over again?!" Sora yelled to Demyx's retreating back and I raised an eyebrow at him. "Boytoy?" I mouthed at him and he nodded emphatically.
"Zexion is not my boytoy... he's just a friend." I could hear the panic in Demyx's voice. Busted.
"Nobody said anything about Zexion, Demyx. I wonder why his name popped into your head?" I grinned and Sora and I burst into giggles as we listened to Demyx's footsteps as he stomped up to his bedroom before shutting us out with a thwack of his door and blasting of music. Namine entered and ignored us as she grabbed a seat at the table and opened up her sketchbook, followed by Kairi who grabbed the Rolo ice cream from the freezer and a spoon from the drawer and hopped up onto the breakfast bar before digging into the ice cream. I gave her a look.
"That is so healthy Kai; you're awesome at the good choices thing eh?" I snickered at her, but she just stuck out her tongue at me.
"Shut it, Count Chocula." I laughed and shook my head at her before tipping the last of the chocolatey milk into my mouth from the bowl.
"Oh FYI Nami and Kai, we've pretty much got Demyx confessing that he's gay." Sora smiled at Kairi triumphantly when she gave him a look of surprise and Namine frowned at him.
"What did you do to the poor guy?" Namine, ever the peace keeper. I wandered over to peek at what her new project had become while Sora told Kairi of his evil scheme to finally get Demyx to come out of the closet. I tuned out most of it, but I did hear mention of a closet being locked with people in it, and something to do with woman's underwear. Kairi could be heard chuckling along to this evil and mastermind of a scheme, as Sora described it.
"Sora, just because you've realised that you're gay, doesn't mean everyone in the house has to jump on the "Gay" bandwagon." Sora just stared at me before with shock before breaking out in a smile and starting to open his mouth to respond. "And besides, the day that you tell Riku that you're in love with him is the day that you'll be allowed to comment on other people's secret crushes." Namine nodded and looked up at me with a thankful smile. Namine was pretty much the mother-hen of the kids. I mean my parents made sure nothing crazy happened, like the time Cloud hung Sora from his belt outside one of the third story windows for going into his room without permission and left him out there for 4 hours before anybody realised he was missing, then my parents intervened. But with the small little spats that are normal for most siblings, Namine was always the one to make sure nobody crossed any lines. She also seemed to have a special place for Demyx, since he was the easiest of the siblings for anyone to pick on. So in this case I realised Sora might be being a little hypocritical.
"That's different. Riku is straight, as far as I know, and it's completely obvious to anyone with eyes that Zexion is gay. Not only is he gay, but he's also completely in love with Demyx, so why shouldn't I push him to confess, when I know it'll only possibly lead to the happiness of a most beloved brother?" He batted his eyelashes, trying to increase his 'I'm on so innocent' speech.
"Uh huh, and the fact that you get to witness a very frustrated and embarrassed Demyx has nothing at all to do with it right?" He just looked at me, knowing it was pointless before lifting up his chin and flouncing out of the room. This was Sora's 'You win for now' act and I rolled my eyes before pouring myself another bowl of cereal.
"He is kind of right though, isn't he? I mean they are SO obviously in love with each other. Maybe forcing them together is the only way to actually make them confess their feelings." The sound of Kairi's voice was slightly muffled by the spoon she had sticking out of her mouth.
"That may be true, but what right do we have to force them into doing anything?" Namine didn't even glance up from her sketchbook. "I mean what if they confess to each other without being completely being sure of their feelings? What if they do it just because of being forced into it, and then they realise they don't like each other as much as they thought they did? Then a perfectly good friendship would be ruined just because they couldn't stand the pressure of the people around them. Especially Demy. I mean he loves you guys so much that he would probably confess to being in love with Zexion just because it's what you guys wanted him to do. Then he wouldn't be able to feel anything for himself because he'd be so focused on the fact that he's only with Zexion just because you guys thought he should be." Kairi frowned down at her ice cream in thought before nodding her head.
"You're right. I'm going to go tell Sora that we should back off a bit. Thanks for being the voice of reason again Nami." Kairi hopped off the counter and ran down the hall.
"So, do actually think Demyx likes Zexion? I mean I know that he's nervous around him, but isn't he like that all the time? I can barely get him to pay for his own stuff when we go shopping together, let alone confess his love to one of his friends who he's nervous around in the first place." Namine finally looked up from her sketch.
"Yes, but Zexion is the only friend Demyx is nervous with. The other ones he's completely fine with. And as to whether or not he'll let Demyx know how he feels, that we'll only find out with time. But trying to push him into it isn't the right way to go about it. That'll just scare him out of confessing, because if he does confess and get rejected, everybody will notice. Sora and Kairi just want everybody to be happy, but they don't realise that you can't force it on people. They need to let people find happiness for themselves, or they'll never appreciate it as much." My eyes had widened about half way through that speech.
"Wow Nami, you're deep." She chuckled before returning to her sketch of what looked to be a huge library with a table in the center. I shook my head before depositing my dishes in the sink and running up to my room, turning on my stereo and sitting down at my desk to work on homework.
