Chapter One: A Barely Orange Sunset
Sora leaned on the back of his office-like chair. He adjusted his hand on the back of his head and glanced to the left, out of the window, where he could see the sunset. 'Tsk, what sunset. The sun's barely even orange yet...' he thought, and turned his eyes back to the computer screen. He was supposed to be working on his summer homework, but – for a reason or another – he couldn't concentrate and had watched his favorite Disney movies for the four hours now. He didn't think watching K-rated movies was dumb. No, not at all. He looked up to the heroes of them, yearning to be like on of them. His best friends Riku and Kairi had been watching them with him since they were four years old, but about three years ago Riku claimed that they were for little children, and Kairi hadn't been watching them with Sora in ages. At least, it felt like it.
Sora sighed. "The last day of my vacation, huh? ..."
"Ye~s, it is!" a cheery girl behind him confirmed, being so close to his neck he could feel her breath. The spiky-haired boy blushed. "You startled me, Kairi", he said and turned around to see her face properly. "That's the idea, y'know?" Kairi winked, pointing at the roof. Sora's room was filled with star-shaped objects, and the roof was sky-colored and filled with those magical decorations that shiny in the dark. And yes, they were star-shaped, of course. Cheesy lines popped into his head, and his mouth even opened, but he decided to not say any of them. Even though he acknowledged his feelings towards Kairi, he had decided to keep silent about them, protecting their friendship. And so, he just replied:"Sure sure", and turned around and continued watching The Lion King.
"He~h, The Lion King... This one was really good", Kairi murmured as she saw what Sora was watching. "But you know, I haven't seen you touch any of your books, and we had a to~n of homework from the teachers... Now now, was it from from Mr. Xemnas, Mr. Saix–, even Demyx gave us homework, and gee~, he's the music teacher..." Kairi exhaled heavily. "'Play an instrument everyday for at least half an hour' is an impossible task! Unless you actually play an instrument."
Sora made a small voice of agreement, even though he didn't pay any attention to what Kairi was saying. "So~ra, are you listening?" she asked, and blew gently in his ear. The brunet jumped mentally at least five meters in the ear, through the roof and came back. "W-w-what did y-you say?" he replied in confusion. "Oh, so now you're back", Kairi snickered. "I was just asking if you'd want to do the homework together... But I guess not", she said and acted dissapointed, since she knew this would wake Sora up and agree to her request. And it worked.
"Oh yeah, homework!" Sora remembered. "If it's not too much of a bother to you..."
Kairi giggled "Of course it's not!" and took a few steps back. "I'll be waiting in the living room. Oh, and I asked if, uhm... Roxas – you know – would like to come with us... If that's fine with you", the red-head said, now blushing slightly. She was looking down at her small cute toes which were decorated with nail polish and her ankle that had her good luck charm on it. "W-well, is it?"
As much as Sora would have wanted to say no, or say something related to concentrating better alone and deciding to do his homework alone, he tried to grin – which probably looked forced, but he couldn't tell – and said it was fine. Roxas had been Sora's number one rival since the seventh grade. But at the same he couldn't help but admire him. Roxas excelled in everything he did, and he wasn't even trying. Riku was basically the same, but at least Riku was a year older, meaning Sora looked at him more like a student respects his teacher. Or better yet, as an older brother. Yes, that would be it. But really, comparing Roxas and Sora was like comparing a level fifty Legendary Pokémon to non-Legendary Pokémon of the same level. Just looking at their stats and abilities one would notice the difference. Or at least, that's what Sora thought. 'I shouldn't be worrying about stuff like this!' he thought and stood up, took the huge pile of books, and started walking towards the living room, prepared for the worst.
When Sora arrived in the living room in 8.124236538 seconds, he saw Kairi and Roxas there, already solving the problems. 'Didn't Kairi say that she'd wait for me?' He felt sort of dissapointed, and was wondering whether he should join in and finally start his homework, or if he should just go back to his room and continue watching The Lion King, leave his homework undone and get scolded the next day at school... Really bad. He would've honestly turned around and go watch his movie, if Kairi wouldn't have noticed him at the last second and shout:"Hey, Sora~! Where do you think you're going?"
'Gre~at. Now I have absolutely no choice.' Sora turned around and faked a smile. "Gee, I thought you would've been better off without me!" and as he said that, he felt like stabbing himself. That wasn't what he planned to say, but apparently his mouth reacted too quickly to his thoughts. Kairi looked up from his maths book and gave him a worried look. He glanced at Roxas, who looked as puzzled as she did, and then she got up from her comfortable pose and went to Sora. She slightly touched his right arm, which was enough to make Sora's heart pound ten times faster, tilted her head and said:"Are you okay, Sora? Something wrong?" with a worried look on her face. Sora avoided her gaze, afraid of being captivated by her eyes and saying his feelings out loud. Something he was bad at. "Nah, I just meant that you probably could concentrate better if I wasn't there, you know..." he mumbled, looking down at his feet. "Hmm... You really sure?" Kairi replied. "Yeah. Really", Sora confirmed, once again, faked a smile and punched the air. "Oh kay~! Let's start with the homework!"
The three of them settled down, ready to do their homework. "So, uhm... Sora, was it", Roxas said in the awkward silence that they had tried to cover with pretending to be busy with the problems. "Yeah?" he replied, but didn't bother to look at him. He had already ruined his day, for Paopu's sake. Sora was secretly puffing his cheeks, although nobody noticed it, since his nose was pretty much literally stuck on his book. "W-what's your favorite subject?" Roxas asked. Sora sighed, accidently too loud. 'Aww, he's trying way too hard to make up some converstation...' "Ah, sorry, it's okay if you don't want to tell!" Roxas retreated, shaking his hands in panic after hearing Sora's sigh. Then he dived back into his English book – he had already finished maths earlier in the summer. Since Sora hadn't given a reply after a while, Kairi glanced at him, then at Roxas, then back at Sora. She was just about to say something to Sora, but he was quicker.
"Don't have any", the brunet said quietly. "Oh..." Roxas looked at him, then blushed. "M-me neither... Then, what about you, Kai?"
"Eh, me? Well, I li–" "Kairi likes to read. She's really good at every subject that contains reading", Sora stated real quick. "Sora? Why didn't you let me answer?" Kairi asked, surprised about Sora's behaviour. She had certainly noticed that Sora was acting weird since she came, and she had let it slip, but now it was kind of bugging her. As she figured he wasn't going to answer back to her, she got up, grabbed Sora's thin hand and led him outside, leaving Roxas shouting behind them.
The sun was finally properly setting, and the whole sky was from yellow to red, depending on how far the sun was. Since Sora lived on an Island, near the beach, the sun looked like it was melting on the sea. The same kind of reaction what happens slowly when you take a scoop of ice cream on your hand. Kairi kept leading him on, and when they finally reached a certain palm-tree that had the kind of curve you could sit on, she turned around and let go of Sora's hand. She inhaled three seconds, paused, opened her mouth... and shouted.