Author's Note: This is my first fanfiction like this, so go easy on me. xD If you want to read more by me, check out my other Kingdom Hearts fanfiction, The Forgotten Heart. That one actually follows the storyline of the game. xD And it's seriously lacking in reviews, as I'm sure this one will be.

Warning, this chapter is pretty light, but future chapters will most definitely be boyxboy fluff. I'll rate it teen for now, but I might change it to mature later for suggestive scenes. Anyway, please read and review!

Disclaimer: I don't own Kingdom Hearts. I never do. D: I own my plot, though!

Prologue:

The Man in the Grocery Store

Spelled out your name and list the reasons.

Faint of heart, don't call me back.

I imagined you when I was distant, not insistent.

I followed suit and laid out on my back, imagine that.

A million hours left to think of you and think of that.

'The Con' by Tegan and Sara

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"Rox, just drink your coffee, it's probably getting cold." Hayner commanded his friend, his own hands wrapped around his hot cup of coffee as well. As they walked down the street, freezing cold on their first day of winter break, it mostly served as a reassuring warmth for his fingers. He hadn't even taken a sip yet.

"What's taking Olette and Pence so long?" Roxas asked. "We've been pacing this damn sidewalk for the past half an hour." They all had plans to stock up on groceries for Olette's winter party in a few days, and there was no sign of them. Still, seeing Hayner's wary look, he brought the cup to his lips and sipped in the black coffee. It was bitter and seared the roof of his mouth and his tongue, but at least something was happening.

"We're here!" Olette called from the street out of the window of her old, rusty Honda Hiccup. She waved out of the window and parked by the Starbucks that they said they were meeting them by, and both her and Pence stepped out of the car. Pence immediately frowned upon seeing Hayner and Roxas's coffees- before they had met Olette, that had been a pasttime of all three of theirs- getting coffees in the afternoon.

But that had long since disappeared.

"Chill," Hayner smiled at his friend, "we just needed something to do while we waited for you." His cup must have been empty, because he threw it behind him without even checking to see if there was a cat he would have hit, which he did. "Where were you?"

Roxas could see the moving of lips, but could only hear a distant mutter. He sighed and rolled his eyes, pausing only to pull his headphones out of his ears. Either he would have to start keeping those things off when his friends were around or they would have to speak up, and guess which one involved less people?

"...and something huge was stuck up in the engine, we don't even know how it got there." Olette finished, but in a meaningful pause, she added, "Or what was stuck up there at all, I guess." Much to their surprise, Hayner let out a sharp, but peeved laugh. He always disliked things that people couldn't control, especially if it meant he was going to be penalized for it in any way, shape or form.

"Let's just get the shopping done?" Roxas suggested, feeling the tension between Hayner and Olette. It was inevitable, however- at the party that they were at just the night before, Hayner had thrown up all over Olette's shirt. It wasn't a pretty sight, but no matter how much Hayner apologized (or how half-assed those apologies were), Olette hadn't quite forgiven him.

Without any further arguments, they walked the half block it took to make it to the grocery store. Hayner was slightly hyper from all of the coffee he drank, and Roxas was mellow from the coffee that he didn't. The moment they stepped in, Pence took off towards the ice cream aisle- of course they would need sea salt ice cream for the party. It was mostly because Pence wouldn't drink, so he had to get his hype somewhere.

"What do we need?" Roxas asked, breaking the awkward silence left between Olette and Hayner. Olette looked back at him through half-closed eyes, apparently trying to appear smug to Hayner, who didn't seem to give a crap. She smoothed her curly brown hair back behind her head and responded to Roxas, but Roxas only.

"We need chips, and a lot of them. Just go and grab some that you think the guests'll like. I'll go get the dip." Olette walked off, leaving Hayner at the entrance of the grocery store, who apparently decided to acknowledge his lonesomeness for the first time.

"Hey, what about me?" Hayner blasted angrily. It was a good thing that he wasn't the angry type when he was drunk, or else he could have really scared the crap out of everyone else at the party the other night- no, he was just the sick type.

"Get me a new shirt," Olette snapped, twisting her head only to glare at Hayner for a few moments. Hayner recoiled slightly with a look on his face like he'd just been slapped, but then his face twisted into fury again, and instead moved towards the magazines. He figured Olette could get it all on her own if she was going to be a bitch about it.

Roxas, in the meantime, was rummaging through the chips in the grocery store. Everything either looked like it tasted like shit mixed with piss or was overpriced. A figure to the left of him must have noticed him grimacing at the chips, because he reached past him and grabbed a bag of them, handing them to Roxas.

Roxas took a moment to observe the character; he was tall, at least a foot taller than Roxas. He had to have been older than him as well, he had that look in his face that just screamed, 'I don't have to sneak behind my parents' backs to buy alcohol.' His hair was a fiery red, spiking up at the oddest places, and he had odd tattoos on his cheeks, just barely noticeable. His eyes proved to Roxas that his hair was a natural color, as green eyes were most commonly paired up with red hair. "Try those," the man suggested, "everything else here is crap."

Roxas raised an eyebrow. "Then why are you down this aisle?" He bit his lip- Roxas was never too good at meeting new friends. He was lucky enough to meet Hayner and Pence when he was in gradeschool. During middle school when they met the first- and only- female member of their gang, Olette, it was really Hayner and Pence that had introduced themselves to her. They both had a crush on Olette and were trying to impress her, but once they found out that she could beat their asses in skateboarding, that idea faded, and she became one of the guys.

Bottom line, Roxas wasn't good with new people. Never was, probably never would be. He sucked at socializing, even if it was just for a moment. He always seemed to make things awkward. Still, the redhead smirked and answered him calmly, "I'm getting some chips for the bar I work at. We're always out."

Roxas looked down at the bag that the man had handed him. "But this is the last one." Roxas argued- why did he just do him a favor? This guy was not only grown up and with a job, but he was helping out a seventeen year-old with his best friend's party snacks, which would be devoured in moments, anyway.

The man shrugged, stuffing his gloved hands into his leather jacket. "I know." He just smiled then, and walked past Roxas without a second glance. "See ya 'round, kid." As he turned the corner of the aisle, Roxas realized he had been staring.

"Nice first impression, retard," Roxas scolded himself, walking the opposite direction to go meet Pence in the ice cream aisle, "But this is the last one," he mocked himself in a pissed off voice. Good job, Roxas, your socializing skills just flew through the roof.

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"What's got you so pissed?" Pence asked, pulling out a sea-salt ice cream from the box as they began to load up the old Honda. Roxas grimaced- Pence really shouldn't have used pissed in a sentence while he was eating a salty ice cream bar.

"Pence, save those for the party!" Olette scolded him.

"What, so some other guy can throw up on your shirt?" Hayner jumped in now, a scowl still apparent on his usually calm and collected face.

"Oh, shut up, you still owe me a new shirt!" Olette countered, and Hayner crossed his arms over his chest, leaving Roxas, the only one who wouldn't destroy the car with his emotions, to close the trunk.

"I'm not pissed," Roxas replied, "I just realized how bad I am at talking to people."

"What, did you find a cute boy at the grocery store?" Olette asked. Roxas turned away, slightly embarrassed. He wasn't even too sure about his sexuality, he never had been, but if anybody could pick up on these things, it was Olette. Of course, he was around Hayner and Pence so much, that they were bound to pick up on it as well. Olette just had that female's-sixth-sense, and she was the only one in the group that actually got the grades that a college would accept.

"You're the same way at parties," Hayner started, ignoring Olette's comment. "Don't worry, tomorrow night, we'll get you talking to some people. Maybe the beer'll give you a jump start, but," he waved that off and continued, "I invited some college students I met when I was visiting University of Twilight Town, and-"

"U of TT?" Olette mocked, "You'll be lucky if they'll accept you at a community college with your grades." She jingled the keys, signaling the two of them to get into the car. They were staying the night at Olette's so they could help set up for the party, but beforehand they were probably going to hang out on top of their building.

"Like I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted," Hayner began, walking into the car and slamming the door behind him. The engine roared to life and they began on their way to Olette's house to drop off the groceries, "I'm inviting some college kids, so you're gonna kind of be forced to be social."

"Yay," Roxas said without much joy in his voice. At that moment, he wished that he had his coffee- pure caffeine would do him some good at that point, if anything to numb out the embarrassment that he had just endured. If he was blowing it all out of proportion, he didn't seem to notice.

He also wished that Olette's car had a heating system. He could see his own breath in that damn machine.

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The Clock Tower was ticking beneath the four of them as they all sat on top of it, eating four more Sea Salt ice creams that Pence had pulled out of the new box that he bought, which left about four left for the party. That didn't make any sense at all, but Olette had such a stressful day that she didn't really mind.

"Will you guys just make up?" Pence asked with an odd flare in his voice, unusually angry. Although, a few more moments and Roxas would have probably blown up in the exact same fashion. The silence between Olette and Hayner wasn't just awkward, it was annoying and putting a cramp in their afternoon.

"I'll forgive him once he apologizes for barfing all over my shirt," Olette huffed, hugging her knees to her chest.

"Well, I'll apologize to her once she apologizes for spiking my drink with brandy. You know I hate that stuff." Hayner glared at Olette, which was a start, but Olette looked back at Hayner with a shocked look on her face.

"I didn't spike anything. I don't even like brandy myself. You know me better than that you big retard." She shook her head and looked forth into the sunset, her eyes looking down at the busy roads beneath them. Roxas had an instance where he almost fell off of the clock tower before, so he never looked down, just forward. In many ways, Olette was much stronger than Roxas was. She was social, attracted boys, and very good at everything she did, including school. Roxas always envied her in a freakish way.

"You're lying," Hayner said after an obvious hesitation.

This went on for a little while longer, but it only led to Roxas spacing out, looking forward at the bloody sun, thinking about that man that he had met at the grocery store. He was such an anomaly, and made Roxas feel like milk- bland and unexciting. He shrugged and stuck his headphones back in his ears, Mindless Self Indulgence drowning out Olette and Hayner's petty argument. He probably wouldn't ever see the man again, anyway. Thinking a little harder, he licked the salty ice cream he had been presented with.

Hopefully the man liked milk.

Hopefully, for his sake, those chips were good.

Author's Note: A little short, but I think it was a pretty good prologue. Please review!