Disclaimer: I don't own Kingdom Hearts, or any of the characters. I don't even own this idea; it came from Kayla, and she gets full credit (and some cookies for letting me borrow her plot and rewrite it because I was bored.)
The water came down in a steady pulse, hot enough to almost burn, steam rising from the walls and her skin and smothering the room in its hazy embrace.
Naminé closed her eyes and let the water scald her skin. She was trying not to think; she tried to concentrate only on the heat of the shower, the paths the water took, the sound of it bouncing off the tiles, the taste of the steam as she breathed it in.
It didn't work for long.
Roxas would be coming to pick her up in a little more than an hour. He was, technically, her boyfriend of a year, though they'd been on a grand total of four dates, this being their fifth. Roxas wasn't exactly the 'date' type of person, and she would take any excuse to be with him, even if it meant ordering pizza and watching TV over at his flat. She didn't mind, really.
She'd never told him that she loved it when they went out like this. She knew that he didn't, and she wasn't really sure how to bring it up, how to ask. So she'd stayed silent and content with going out every once in a blue moon.
It was kind of funny. They'd been together for a year - friends for much longer than that - and yet she still didn't know how to talk to him. Oh, she knew how to do small talk; they could talk for hours about everything and nothing at all, it was one of the things she loved about him. But she didn't know how to have a real, heavy conversation. They'd never argued, and she didn't want to change that. Even if it meant staying silent when she really didn't want to.
Which was why he was coming to get her in an hour, even though she knew that he had spent last night at Axel's house, just like he'd spent every night this past week at Axel's house. He was still going to take her out to dinner, even though she knew Axel only had one bed and the couch was completely unusable (he'd mentioned it once, in passing, not even thinking about it. But she'd noticed. She always did.)
Roxas was still coming to get her, even though the last time they'd made love, it hadn't been her name that had come from his lips in a breathy whisper (the most noise he ever made when they were together, and she wondered, when it was late and he was asleep next to her, if it was different for him.)
She realized with a start that she was crying, and the water had gone cold. She turned it off in a single shaky motion and stepped out of the shower, grabbing a towel and wrapping it around herself. She was shivering fiercely, from the cold or from the tears, she wasn't sure.
She took a deep breath and started to get ready. Roxas would be here soon, a few minutes late, as he always was, his hair messy as always and his lips still a little red from the kiss of someone else.
She felt her heart break a little more and shoved it away, beginning to dry her hair.
It didn't matter, after all. She loved him. And if he didn't love her back - at least, not in the way she wanted him to - well, what did it matter? What could it matter?
Naminé checked her reflection in the bathroom mirror one last time. Roxas was supposed to be here five minutes ago, which meant she probably had another five minutes to wait. He hadn't been on time once since their first date. Roxas wasn't an 'on-time' sort of person, either.
She examined her appearance with a dispassionate eye. She knew, in a detached sort of sense, that she was beautiful; long, blonde hair that she had combed out and left down, smooth and perfectly straight, as it always was; blue eyes that matched Roxas's own, just barely accentuated with mascara and light eyeliner; a pearl necklace that Sora had given to her, not that Roxas knew that (or would care if he did, but Naminé liked the delusion); and a white dress with a sparkling golden design of vines stretching around it. In another setting, she might have been almost ethereal in appearance, but in the harsh light of her bathroom she just looked pale and washed out. She wondered if she should have worn some color other than white, but then, she didn't own many clothes that weren't white. It was just one of her quirks.
The doorbell rang, two minutes before she expected it to. She smiled a little, and called 'coming!' as she ran down the hall as quickly as she could in heels. She opened the door, and her smile faltered a little.
Roxas was dressed far more formally than she had expected; a black suit and a blue tie, complete with a dress jacket. He obviously hadn't put much effort into his hair, as it was as messy as ever, and his eyes were still blue, blue as the sky and shining like diamonds. She was wrong, their eyes weren't the same; his eyes made hers look dull in comparison. But none of this was why she was forcing a smile now.
First, she was right; his lips were red and swollen, as though he had just been kissed. She'd been expecting that; she'd braced herself for it. But there was another mark; taunting her from his neck, a bruise that peeked out from just under his collar, clearly meant to be hidden by the jacket.
It was stupid - it was nothing she hadn't known - but he'd never let her do that. He said it made him feel like a girl, to have a hickey on his neck; he'd pushed her away, and she'd never done it again. And now it taunted her, marking him as someone else's, and it made no sense, she was being irrational, but she thought she was going to be sick.
"You look beautiful," Roxas said in a soft voice. He smiled, but Naminé's smile fell, and she felt the wall that she's built crack and break beneath the strain of... everything. Her eyes burned and she wiped at them, angry that she was crying so easily.
"Naminé... what's wrong?" Roxas said, his soft, alluring voice taking on a tone of concern. She loved his voice. She loved him.
And that was why she had to speak up.
"I..." Naminé tried, her voice shaky and choked. Her eyes were on his neck, that mark, still barely visible, taunting her. Roxas suddenly seemed to realize what she was looking at.
"Oh." Shock, panic, and nervousness all managed to infuse themselves into that word. Roxas swallowed. "I. Naminé, I can explain. That's not what you think it is, really."
Naminé shook her head. "It's okay, Roxas." She looked down, and she could feel her heart breaking with every word she said. But it was better this way. He'd be happier with Axel, and that was all she wanted, in the end. His happiness. "It's okay. I know already." She blinked heavily, and noted that Roxas stayed silent. "About Axel. And." Her voice choked off. "Maybe... maybe... it's better if we just end it now?" she said softly. "I don't think I can pretend anymore, do you?"
"Naminé," Roxas said. He was hurt, and she felt bad about that, but beneath that... beneath that was the unmistakable tone of relief, the tone she had almost been hoping not to hear.
"Just tell me something," she pleaded. She saw Roxas nod out of the corner of her eye. "Will you be happy with him?"
"I," he started, looking up at her. He reached out a hand and tilted her chin up. "Naminé," he said softly. "I'm so, so sorry."
She shook her head. "Just tell me if this will make you happy." She met his eyes, blue on blue, and she wondered if he wished hers were green. The thought made her heart hurt. She broke away from his gaze. "That's all I want," she said in a whisper.
The silence dragged on, Roxas's hand still on her face, her eyes still gazing over his shoulder, avoiding his neck. Her throat was clenched with suppressed tears and her heart was in a million pieces.
"He makes me happy," Roxas whispered finally, his voice just a breath on the wind. "He makes me so happy."
Naminé nodded, and somehow her tears dried a little, and her throat relaxed. "Alright," she said. She looked up, and met his eyes again. "Goodbye, Roxas," she murmured. She wanted to kiss him, so she did. One last time. She could feel that he was cold and unresponsive beneath her lips, and she knew, as she pulled away and opened her eyes to find that his had never closed, that he was no longer hers. She pulled away, back into the warmth of her apartment, and placed a hand on the handle of the door.
They watched each other for an eternal second, and Naminé saw something that just might have been regret flicker through Roxas's eyes. But then it was gone, and she closed the door.
She stood there, not sure she could move, or even wanted to. Some part of her wanted to just stand here forever, never moving on, never loving someone else, never taking another step from this point.
"I still love you," she said, but on the other side of the door, Roxas had already gone.
She kept standing there, staring at the closed door, the dress brushing her knees in the breeze from the ceiling fan in the next room. Someone next door turned on the TV and an obnoxiously loud laugh track burst through the walls. A car drove by outside the window. Life went on.
And, finally, she turned around and stepped into the kitchen, because, after all, Roxas wasn't coming to get her anymore, and she'd have to fend for herself.
And maybe, eventually, everything would be okay. In fact, she was sure of it.
She smiled.
A/N: I was debating for quite a while about what to put this under (Axel/Roxas, Roxas/Namine?). I decided on AkuRoku because that's what it ended up being, but please, voice your opinion.
If you have anything to say besides 'That was so incredibly cheesy', please, leave a review! (I know it was cheesy. I know. Almost everything I write is cheesy.)
If you're a regular reader of my stories (do I have any regular readers?) you'll be interested to know that Ruth and I now have seperate accounts, though this is still our main, shared one. I'm Demonic Seraphim, she's Angelic Seraphim. Yes, it's a nod to my status as the evil twin, but mostly it just sounds cool.