Affection

Chapter Two

A. N. Dedicated to my dear friend Lina, who is both a muse and a beta reader :3

Riku was roused from his sleep by the many scents of breakfast wafting from the kitchen. He took a moment to gather himself, stretching himself out slowly as the last vestiges of sleep left him. It took a long minute before Riku realized that he was not in his bedroom, again.

There was no doubt about who this room could belong to. What with the glow-in-the-dark star constellations staring back at him and the dreamy blue paint on the walls. Definitely Sora's room.

Riku had never bothered to paint his room when they both moved into the two bedroom apartment. His was decorated with posters and snap shots while Sora's took on a life all its own.

The silver-haired teen (barely so) laid back on the bed, taking another long minute to ready himself for the day ahead. The ocean whooshed loudly from his right, sure enough, the window was open and a gentle breeze played pass the curtains.

Something small landed on Riku's stomach (where had it come from?) and Yuffie stared at him with eerie cat eyes. "Mrew!" she proclaimed loudly Morning! is how he translated it.

Riku scratched the black cat behind the ear affectionately. She reared up, pushing against his hand before jumping off the bed. Yuffie paused at the doorway, her tail flicking contently as she stared expectantly at Riku.

Time to get up, is what her gaze clearly said, or else. Riku chuckled to himself as he flipped the blanket off (and closed the window, the cat was notorious for escaping sending Sora into childish crying spells for days until she chose to grace them with her presence again). He wandered down the hall to the kitchen, not bothering to visit his room for a more appropriate change of clothes. Not like Sora had never seen him in his boxers anyhow.

"Good morning sexy!" Came the first howls of laughter from Kairi. Selphie wasn't far behind with her "Guess this answers the question of boxers or briefs!" both girls were leaning against each other, so enrapt in their giggles they completely missed Riku's death scowl.

What an impressive scowl it had been too.

Riku moved quickly to his room, comforted slightly by the light chiding the girls were receiving in the other room. He threw on the first articles of clothing he could find, they smelled clean at least…

Returning to the kitchen (and trying to get the blush to stop for the love of Holy!!), Riku did his best to ignore the girls; choosing instead to focus on the figure standing in front of the stove.

It was a daily occurrence to find Sora in the kitchen, he was going to a culinary institute after all, but to see such a breakfast spread was a little more rare. There were three types of muffins, pancakes, waffles, scrambled eggs, bacon, and a few unidentifiable (but sure to be delicious) items.

It all earned a raised eyebrow from Riku. "What's the occasion?" he asked to no one in particular.

Selphie chose that moment to begin sobbing. Again. Even Kairi began tearing up as she attempted to calm her friend down. All the dramatics were enough to make Riku jump in his chair.

A spatula wacked him sharply against the back of the head. "Riku!" Sora was frowning down at him, already disposing of the offending weapon and pulling a clean one from the dishwasher. "You know what today is." Insisted the brunet, returning his attention to the skillet sizzling happily.

Riku's frown deepened, with the large breakfast it had to be something tramatic. Sora only ever cooked that much when something depressing was going on… aqua eyes drifted to the calander, the date circled with a fat red pen. Time to say goodbye was scrawled across the square.

Realization dawned on Riku's face slowly. "Oh," he breathed, it wasn't as if he had forgotten per-say… It was just too early to function that clearly.

Today was the day Tidus and Wakka were leaving, both boys had been drafted for the New Zanarkand Blitzball team. It would be months before their girlfriends (fiancé, in Kairi's case) got to see them again. Hence the waterworks, and the breakfast.

And the hissing ball of ginger fur that was currently batting Yuffie across the floor… Selphie never traveled anywhere without her overweight pet. "S-sora be nice to Yuffie!" Selphie managed to choke out, startling her cat for a moment (long enough for Yuffie to zip under the couch).

The real Sora visible winced at the stove. He never could fully appreciate the honor of having a cat named after him. Less so because the offensive animal was a female. It definitely made visits from Selphie an interesting occasion.

It was a long awkward moment that followed, Riku thinking of something to say that wouldn't cause the girls to breakdown again.

"Are you alright?" Kairi asked, dabbing at her puffy eyes with a tissue, "you look kind of tired."

Riku straightened in his chair, his eye twitching slightly (when had that started?), as he wondered if his sleepless nights showed that much. "I'm phone!" He smiled broadly.

It was the sudden and incessant giggling that tipped him off to something wrong in his manner of speech. He blinked slowly, replaying the two words he had said. "Uh! Fine! I'm fine!" He shook his head, trying to clear his mind. What was going on?

Selphie's hand shot into the air suddenly and all went quiet. "Y-yes Selphie?" Kairi called on her friend warily. Normally when the brunette raised her hand like that, it meant she had something that she deemed important to say, while the others would find it weird and a bit nutty.

"If you were a phone, would people have to talk into your crotch?" She asked with such an innocence that no-one in the room could doubt this was a legitimate question coming from her.

Riku shoved half a muffin in her mouth. "Just… just eat your breakfast." He insisted, attempting to laugh at the girl.

There was a clatter of silverware followed with idle chatter amongst old friends as Sora joined the table (with another stack of pancakes, strawberry?). A few hands were stabbed in the process of grabbing for the freshest batch of pancakes ("damn it Selphie, you got the blue berry ones let me have a strawberry one!" Riku cried). All in all it was a considerably cheerful morning.

Kairi was the first to lean back in her chair, pushing her plate away with a declared "I'm stuffed!" Selphie agreed with a loud slurp of the syrup on her fingers.

Sora chuckled lightly to himself. "Everyone got enough to eat?" he asked lightly, blue eyes dancing across the table. All his friends seemed on the severe bloated side, with content lazy smiles adorning their faces. "I take that as a yes." He began gathering plates on top of each other, preparing to clean them.

Riku reached out, holding firm to the pile his younger friend had made. "You cooked, let me clean." He insisted, keeping his aqua gaze steady.

Sora blinked, surprised. It wasn't unusual for Riku to insist on cleaning up their mess, but it was rare for him to be so forward about it. "A-alright," Sora relented with a cautious smile, fighting the blush that threatened to over take him.

Two breathy sighs from across the table diminished what little will-power Sora had stored. Suddenly his face was bright red as he glared at the girls. "What a sweet married couple they are," Kairi was stage whispering to Selphie. The brunette giggled in reply, "they must have had a very good night." The two girls sent Sora a sly look.

His face glowing, Sora mouthed back three words, "I hate you." With a small smile playing on his lips. They meant it in good fun, he just couldn't help getting so worked up over it.

More giggling, "you're just saying that to make us feel better." Kairi insisted, joining Riku at the sink to wash the soiled dishes.

Selphie was preoccupied chasing her cat around the house ("Sora-kitty come back! You can't do that to Yuffie-kitty!"), Riku and Kairi were splashing each other with bubbly water (they seemed to be getting far cleaner than the dishes) and it left Sora, sitting back down at the table, alone with his thoughts for a long moment.

They had come back; Kairi after an extended break from school, to upset parents. Her adoptive Mom and Dad had been beside themselves, crying as she raced into their arms again. Riku returned to his elderly grandparents who welcomed him back with a quiet sincerity that had ruled his life.

Sora, had come back to a dark and empty house. Dust covered every surface in a thin layer. The lights had been cut off months ago, yet everything else remained exactly the same. His room was still in the same exact disarray it had been when he left it at fourteen. His mother, was gone. Her health had been poor before Sora left, and once he was gone, she gave up. The romantics on the island claimed she died "of a broken heart" abandoned by her husband years ago (who had been claimed by the sea) and now by her own son. Sora finally realized, far too late, how ridiculous his dreams had been when they potentially cost his mother her life (although it wasn't really his fault, the doctors would insist, she had come down sick and her immune system was far too weak to fight).

Riku tried to have Sora move in with him, but his grandmother would have none of that. She blamed Sora, saying it was his fault that her grandson had been lost for so long. So Sora hid, for days, in his dark lonesome house alone.

It was a hard time for all of them, he realized guiltily, they all worried so much about him.

Finally, after what ultimately was only a few days, Riku came. He scaled the tree outside of Sora's second story opened window when the brunet refused to open the door. He launched himself in, landing with a bounce onto the bed.

They stared at each other for a long minute, Sora's crystal blue eyes wide with shock, Riku's aquatic ones fighting some inner storm. "Come on," the older boy finally said, his voice sounding over used. He began gathering Sora's things, packing them away in bags he had brought with him.

Finding his voice, Sora managed to ask "where are we going?"

Riku didn't answer him. Even as Sora begged, tugging on his arm the entire way down the many streets, he received no reply. Not until they entered an apartment complex, row after row of cheerful mini-houses staring back at them.

"Selphie's mom is the manager," Riku explained quietly, fumbling with a set of keys, "she pulled a few strings, signed off on it and everything, and now it's home." It was a spacious place, two bedroom with their own baths, facing the ocean.

Sora was overwhelmed, "but what about your grandparents."

Riku fixed him with a very strange look that day, his eyes shone back with some unfathomable emotion. "Sora, they're my family I'll never stop loving them. But they don't need me, you do."

A warm hand was suddenly on Sora's forehead, he blinked, momentarily shocked. "He does feel a little warm," came Riku's voice, a look of concern gracing his face.

"No!" Sora declared, pushing away from the table, only to fall hard on his back. "Ow," he moaned, grabbing the back of his head with both hands. "I'm fine, I was just thinking."

Selphie was the only one who looked convinced, she skipped off calling for her cat again.

The other two fixed Sora with two very different, very hard looks. While Kairi's feelings for the two boys stemmed to brotherly love, some days she could be down right obsessive with their health.

"You're over-doing it again aren't you?" She chided sternly as Riku helped him to his feet. "Probably been staying up into all hours of the night working on recipes and then waking up at the crack of dawn to start cooking!" She was ranting now, her lithe body pacing back and forth as she lost herself to her concern.

She stopped suddenly (no-one really knew what she had been babbling about seconds before, they had all tuned her out sometime ago, and were thusly fearing the wrath she would undoubtedly bring upon them for ignoring her), placed her hands firmly on her hips and said; "that's it back to bed with you! I won't have you catching a fever or something by going out today," with her long arm pointing its way towards Sora's room there was no doubt in anyone's mind that she had switched to the unpredictable mom mode.

"No!" Sora balked at the very idea of it. "I'm not going to let Wakka and Tidus leave without saying good-bye to them!"

Nobody bothered to point out that Sora's hand was still firmly clasping onto Riku's.

So the four of them left the sunny apartment and the two cats behind. They walked side by side down the long streets in the warmth of the day (it was dangerously close to noon, the departure time for the ship), trying desperately to keep their conversations light to stave away the sadness that would soon wash over them.

Chapter Note: This was…longer than I anticipated…but I actually became wrapped in the descriptions a few times so… I hope you'll all bare with me...

P.S. for some reason when I first posted this chapter deleted a few key sentences... oO so it just seemed like Sora was spazzing out at the end...