Author's Note: I don't even know… Theme = dark; that is all. I just kept writing, and this is what came out. I don't even know. NaNoWriMo prep has me writing to random prompts everyday if I can fit it in. I'm just not sleeping tonight to get this one in, which might explain this junk.

I don't even know…

I feel that I should also mention that the site on which I have been writing these has evaluated this piece, and claims that the overall feeling is mostly 'Affectionate,' but that the post is concerned mostly with 'death.' I don't know how that works, exactly, but there you have it. It also rated my piece R for swearing, sexual content, and violence. I hate to get your hopes up, but can someone explain to me what on earth that site is talking about? :P

Reviews are always appreciated, whether you love it, hate it, and whatever you feel in between. I'll shut up now so you can read it. ;)

Word Count: 2271

Dark

"Who's afraid of the dark," Roxas shouted at his friends who were jeering at him from the other side of the wrought iron fence. "I'm not!"

With that he turned his back on them and continued into the graveyard, strutting as confidently as he knew how. In all honesty, he was trembling uncontrollably, uncomfortable with what he'd gotten himself into. Why couldn't he turn down a dare? It wasn't like he'd had anything to prove when Hayner had claimed no one could last an hour in this creepy old graveyard. It wasn't like Roxas had to speak up, in the first place. That didn't change the fact that he had, though.

"That's not true," he'd stupidly countered. "I could."

"Oh, really," Hayner had smirked, and Roxas had known what was coming next. "Then prove it. I dare you."

That was pretty much all that was needed, when it all came down to it. Roxas had never been able to turn down a dare in his life, and Hayner knew it. The blond had even seen how many gummy worms he could fit into his nose on a dare once, and on another one he'd tried to get milk to come out of his eyes. In retrospect, pretty much the most idiotic things he'd ever attempted were done on dares, and they didn't usually end too pleasantly. So why couldn't he turn them down? Seriously, you'd think he would have learned his lesson by now, and yet here he was... dared to stay inside of this graveyard for a whole hour.

He pulled his phone out of his pocket, running his fingers over the keypad to check the time: two minutes in. Fantastic. Sighing, he slipped the thing back into his pocket, and continued moving forward.

The shaking in his limbs had died down a bit, but his stomach still quivered as he kept walking further and further away from the lights in the street. It wasn't long before he could no longer hear his friends, and not long after that before he couldn't see the street lights anymore. Darkness seemed to close in around him, and he walked on a few more paces trying not to panic as he kept going.

He couldn't hear anything moving around him, so he was alright, right?

As Roxas thought this, his foot came into contact with something hard on the ground, and the next thing he knew he was sprawling on the ground, a shout falling from his lips as he fell. Part of him hoped that his friends hadn't heard that, but mostly he was wondering what he'd tripped over, his mind conjuring up the worst as he tried to see what had been on the ground.

Had it been a dead body? Maybe it was a skeletal hand trying to pull him into one of the graves? What if there was some kind of creature in here who fed on bodies at night, and it didn't care if you were alive or dead?

Roxas had always had a pretty good imagination for things like that, though he'd been too old to be afraid of the dark for several years now. That did not, however, prevent him from sprinting to turn on a light when he had to get up in the middle of the night, or cowering in his covers at night trying to make himself feel safe when his eyes were playing tricks on him in the middle of the night. No, he could always think of some dark thing coming to get him, and reaching high school age hadn't stopped those visions.

His eyes finally adjusted, though, revealing a sinister... tree root in the middle of the path. "Great Roxas," he grumbled, "just great. Maybe the zombie tree root reached out, and grabbed onto your ankle. Ha!"

"Do you mind," a voice to his right growled, causing Roxas to jump completely out of his skin, scrambling to his feet.

"Wha-" he all but shouted. "Wh-who's there?"

A deep, exasperated sigh came from somewhere to his right, and the moon lit up two sparkling emeralds set much higher up than he would've imagined before the very tall boy stepped into the moonlight.

"Wa-wait, a minute," Roxas said, voice still shaky from surprise. "Don't I know you?"

The other boy sighed, again, and rolled his eyes, nodding. "I'm sure you do," he answered, voice dripping with sarcasm.

Who didn't know him. That was Axel, the tallest, skinniest, gothiest boy in his high school. The junior that sophomore girls (and boys, but Roxas was pretty sure he was the only one who qualified here) swooned over whenever he walked by, but also the junior who got picked on so severely by the other upper classmen that it was hard to tell if he was loved or hated at school.

"Oh," Roxas didn't know what to say. Feeling his face and neck growing hot, he dropped his gaze down to his feet. He'd never mustered up the courage to talk to Axel before, and no one knew about his little secret yet so... Hayner hadn't managed to dare him to do it. "Sorry," he mumbled, drawing on the unseen ground with his toe. "I didn't know anyone was here."

There was a long pause, and for a moment Roxas thought that the other boy had turned and left him standing there. It felt like an eternity before he finally looked up expecting to find himself alone again, only to jump again when he saw Axel still standing there looking at him.

"What are you doing here," the tall good-looking junior finally asked.

"Well, uh..." Roxas fumbled. He really didn't want to say that he'd been dared, did he? How embarrassing, but... what else could he say. Sighing, he lowered his head to examine his unseen toes before admitting the truth. "I was dared to spend an hour in here by my friends."

"Ha," Axel's laugh almost sent Roxas running for the gate behind him, dare be damned, but he stilled his limbs. "Some friends," the junior went on. "Well, I was enjoying the quiet, but you're welcome to join me for an hour, if you want."

The short blond just stared at Axel for a moment, his mouth agape at the offer. Join him? Just like that? Surely he didn't mean...

Shrugging at Roxas's lack of response, the red haired boy turned away from him. "Suit yourself," he said.

"Wait," The blond interjected before Axel had even finished. "Y-yeah, I would."

"Come on, then."

As Axel said this, he began moving towards a small patch of trees that Roxas hadn't noticed before. They seemed to sit in a circle, a weeping willow at their center. If he hadn't tripped, the smaller blond might just have stumbled across the red head's little hideout all on his own. It was lit from the inside, and as Axel lifted the hanging branches, firelight caught hold of the blue eyes.

"Wha-" Roxas started, but his throat swallowed the rest of his words. Under the tree were tons of candles, a couple of books, and... was that an altar? "What is this?"

"It's my circle," Axel answered, waving around to the area like an entertainer. "Almost no one ever comes here at night, so I come here to relax and cast in peace. You gonna tell on me?"

The glint in his eyes as he said that last sentence made Roxas's breath catch. The way those green eyes had narrowed, it was almost flirty. He felt his face heating again as he shook his head a little too eagerly. If he told anyone anything about this encounter, he'd give away his secret for sure.

The red head grinned though, as though the whole thing was one big joke, and moved to sit at the center of the clearing before patting the ground beside him invitingly. Roxas obediently made his way over to where Axel had indicated, trying to ignore the shaking in his middle as he sat down next to his biggest crush. "Uh, so... you're like here every night?"

Axel nodded, not even seeming to care whether or not his answer made him sound weird or not before turning to Roxas. "And you, do you participate in these dares often?"

The blond didn't miss the teasing in the older boy's voice, and he looked down at his hands, irritated. "No," he snapped.

"Touchy," Axel sang, two hands lifting into the air, palms forward. "Forget I asked."

Roxas sighed, watching the red head from the corner of his eye. "Sorry. We just watched some stupid horror movie at the theatre, and..." He trailed off. The story about how he had ended up here was stupid, anyways. "Nevermind."

"So what were you gonna do in here for a whole hour if I hadn't found you," Axel asked him, sounding curious.

"I... uh," Roxas began. "I don't know. Freak out and run around screaming, probly."

This made Axel laugh, and, though Roxas wanted to elbow him hard for it, the sound made his stomach skip around even more than it already was. He had made the sexiest boy in school laugh, and it was a realization that made him puff out his chest a bit in satisfaction.

"I'm sorry I missed that then," the red head finally put in once he'd stopped clutching at his sides.

Roxas found himself smiling up at the other boy, wracking his brain for something else to say now. "What about you? Did I interrupt anything in particular?"

"Not really," he shrugged. "I was just sitting against that tree over there," he indicated one somewhere behind him, "with my eyes closed, enjoying the quiet, when I heard you shout."

"Ah," Roxas said, turning his head to study his fingers. "I didn't mean to, er, interrupt."

"Nah," Axel replied. "You're fine."

Unable to think of anything to say to that, Roxas just nodded. A comfortable silence fell between them for a long moment, during which the wind picked up where they'd left off. It stirred the trees around them, whispering in the leaves, and creaking in the branches. And just as the conversation around them started to really pick up, Roxas felt a prickling on the back of his neck.

Looking up from studying his fingers, he found that Axel was staring at him. "What," he asked, automatically.

"Nothing," Axel answered, turning to face one of the books that sat beside him on the ground. Roxas furrowed his eyebrows at this. That was weird, he thought, but apparently the red head wasn't done. "It's just," he began, not looking up from his book. "It's weird that you're the one here tonight."

"Uh, I'm sorry," Roxas replied sarcastically. "Why exactly?"

"Well," Axel played with the corner of one of the book's pages. "I was sorta... thinking about you when you shouted earlier."

The blond snorted at that. He couldn't help it! That was a complete load of crap if he'd ever heard it. "You were not," he retorted, irritated that the older boy was teasing him. How did Axel know? No one knew about his crush, but here were those green eyes, looking at him like, like... like what?

"Okay," Axel finally relented, glancing once at Roxas before returning his gaze to the page in his fingers.

Blue eyes just stared spiky red hair, the older boy refusing to look at him now. "But... why?" The question was so quiet that Roxas almost didn't hear his own words, as he said it half to himself and half expecting to be made fun of any second now. Somehow, someone had discovered his secret.

Silence greeted him at first, but then Axel inhaled, turning to face him. Instead of answering him, however, the older boy focused on Roxas's face an intent look on his face. Then, slowly he leaned towards the blond, who was so shocked that he just sat there frozen. The next thing either boy knew, Axel had pressed his lips against Roxas's unmoving mouth, kissing them timidly, as though he expected to be pushed off at any second.

The blue eyed sophomore just sat there, his body refusing to respond as his mind screamed at him to do something, anything!

After a short while, too short if you asked Roxas, Axel pulled away, his cheeks stained a slight orange, though maybe that was just the candlelight. "That's why," he finally said, turning away with a sigh. "Feel free to punch me now, or shout at me about being a freak, if you want."

Roxas's mouth was slightly open. He couldn't think of anything to say to that, or... hit him? He felt a pang in his chest at the idea of anyone hitting Axel, and he found himself suppressing a growl.

"I would never, I mean... I don't want to... uh..." He didn't know what to say, but as Axel turned back around to look at him, green eyes locking onto blue Roxas gave up. He knew now why he had accepted this and every other dare that had ever been thrown his way; he'd been building up his courage the only way he knew how, all for this moment.

He also knew that he would spend far longer than an hour in this graveyard, and that he would probably return tomorrow night and the night after that. As often as Axel wanted him to, because those green eyes told him the truth. And as Roxas leaned forward, pressing his lips against Axel's once again, he soared with the realization of it.

The crush was mutual.