You Can Have Manhattan—A SoNami {Sora/Naminé} Fanfiction
Chapter Summary; Naminé and her parents have dinner. Afterwards, a boy from school shows up outside her window.
Story Rating; T for now, but that may change later on.
Author's Note; I apologize for the wait for this chapter! I have no idea why but I had a hard time with this one. The writer's block kicked in a bit too early in this story for my liking. So, to break the writer's block spell I went to my local art museum and just sat in front of this huge display of my favorite paintings. Thankfully, it worked and I got back the inspiration I needed! So now I present chapter two! Please R&R, I would really appreciate it.
You Can Have Manhattan—Chapter Two
Visitor
"So dear, how was school?"
"I don't really want to talk about it," I said, wincing.
"You have to tell us about your big day. You can't just sit there in silence."
At this point, my lack of appetite didn't need any assistance. Yet, my mother knew how to completely destroy any chance of my hunger appearing without even trying. Her request was innocent enough and in reality, she had no idea what had happened at school earlier—mainly because I begged the nurse not to call her. Thinking back on my disastrous first day and all the demons I had to face without any preparation whatsoever, I did what I knew would get her off my back—speak up and lie a bit. "Okay, okay. It was fine."
My mother twitched her nose in displeasure, as if my answer wasn't good enough for her. "Well, what did you do?"
Swirling my spaghetti around my fork, I sighed. "I learned things."
"Did you make any friends?"
By now I was starting to feel aggravated. "No."
"Honey," she said, looking to my father, "will you please tell your daughter to act her age and actually talk to her concerned mother."
"Naminé," my father said sternly, "be an adult."
"Look, I'm telling you the truth. I went to all my classes, I kept to myself, then I came home. That's it. My first day was as uneventful as your meals, mom." Shoving my plate towards her, I shot her a glare. I was not in the mood to talk about my day and she pushed me as if she couldn't read me like a book. My mother claimed to understand me better than myself whenever I went to the doctor's, though she couldn't tell that I was uninterested in talking about my not-so-brilliant day? I definitely didn't feel sorry for her as she gathered my plate and stomped into the kitchen without a single word. My mother was a talker and the moment she silenced herself, you knew something was eating away at her. Oops.
As usual, my father felt the need to rush to her rescue instead of mine. "I suggest you go to your room for the rest of the night."
"But dad, come on. I didn't do anything wro—"
"Now, Naminé."
Forcing myself up from my chair, I left the dining room in a furious state. I didn't expect my parents to act any differently the moment I was diagnosed, yet I had assumed they would at least treat me with a little more respect. I was still the suspicious one in the family—the moment anything went wrong, I was to blame, I was the bad guy. Mother would go to bed crying, Naminé, what did you say? Father's office door was left open, Naminé, what did you take? Now my mother was upset over my words and I expected my father to come to my room later and tell me to watch my mouth next time around. Though furious, I also felt abandoned by the people who were supposed to love me. What did I ever do to them?
As I made my way to my bedroom, I tried to keep myself composed. I said I didn't want to talk about it, my mother chose to ignore my wishes and now it was my fault. My insides were screaming at me to react. My heart was telling me to run back downstairs and stand up for myself. Instead, I followed my reasonable, anti-confrontational mind and kept silent as I shut my bedroom door on the world of my parents.
"Hi Bubbles," I said, greeting my goldfish. Slumping into my desk chair, I stared into his tank as he happily swam in circles. While my parents were unreasonable, Bubbles was understanding. Whether he truly knew what I was saying or not, I always spoke to him when things were semi falling apart. "You look extra thrilled today," I smiled, placing my finger on his tank wall. He swam to it, pacing back and forth as soon as he reached it. For the first time that day since I ran into Yuffie, I genuinely laughed.
If my house felt tense, I escaped to my room. It was comfortable and it was mine. There I could laugh, I could smile, and I could act however I pleased. The walls were a bright, welcoming yellow while everything else was a flawless, eggshell white. My floor, my furniture and even my bedding held this color and I had planned that all along. The white reflected my innocence, my childhood that was stolen but not forgotten. When you have to grow up faster than expected, white sort of represents everything you wish you still had. The moment we moved back into my childhood home, I got to work on designing a room that I could call my safe haven. I had definitely succeeded.
Grabbing my book bag off my floor, I dumped out the contents and snatched up my chemistry notebook. Mr. Merlin didn't assign any homework but I thought it would be nice to get my mind off of things. Opening the notebook, I started to read over the notes I had taken in class earlier. By the time I reached the bottom of the first page I was yawning.
A loud tap on my window startled me awake. What time was it? A few minutes after ten, according to my alarm clock several feet away. After peeling my notebook off of my face, I noted the drool and immediately tried to forget about it. Another tap on my window made me jump. Cautiously, I made my way over to it. It was dark, but I could vaguely see an outline of someone standing in my backyard. Opening my window and screen, I popped my head outside to get a closer look. All I noticed in the faint light of the moon was a head of bright red hair.
"Axel?" I questioned, squinting my eyes a bit. It was definitely him, flaming hair and all.
"Hey there blondie," he said, waving, "are you going to come down and see me?"
Placing my finger to my mouth, I shushed him. All I needed was my parents to wake up and see a boy relaxing in our yard. "What in the world are you doing here?"
"I just want to talk," he whined, "if you remember, you sort of gave us the cold shoulder at lunch today."
"I did not," I defended. I saw the outline of his figure shift as he shrugged his shoulders. "Look, it's late and honestly, I don't even know you. You're basically a stranger to me."
"Oh come on," he shouted, throwing his arms in the air. I watched as his figure dashed towards my house and disappeared. I thought for a moment that he was gone, until he spoke once more. "If you're not going to come down, I'm going to come up."
"Wait wh—" I said before being interrupted by Axel climbing through my open window. Jumping backwards, I nearly tripped over the foot of my bed. He had somehow maneuvered his way up the side of my house and now he was in my bedroom. There was a boy in my bedroom. The realization hit my like a ton of bricks. "Oh no, no, no, no." I rushed towards him as he fell from the window onto my floor. "You need to go, you need to go right now."
As he started to get up, I began to push him back towards the window. With the little bit of upper body strength I had, I managed to force him off balance. "Easy there hotshot," he groaned, finding his center of gravity once more, "why don't you relax a bit."
"Relax? My parents will kill me if they see you!" I tried to push him once more but he didn't budge. "You need to climb right back out that window."
"Not going to happen. I came here for a reason and I'm not leaving until we talk."
Now I could understand why all the nurses would complain about men being difficult. Axel was being more than difficult—he was being unreasonable. "What 'reason' possessed you to come to my house at ten o'clock at night? And who told you where I lived?"
I watched as Axel made his way around my room. I watched as he observed the area, as if he was going to figure me out by examining every inch of the place. He had yet to answer my question by the time he was finished snooping around. Sitting in my desk chair, he smiled, "Nice space you got here. I especially like the white."
I raised my voice a bit, "Will you just tell me why you're here?"
"Just as I said, I want to talk. Sora said that you used to live next door to him, so I thought I'd see if you guys came back to the same place," he said, laughing, "as usual, I was right."
Apparently, I had no choice but to listen to whatever Axel had to say. He obviously wasn't leaving anytime soon. Making my way over to my bed, I sat on the edge of it. "What do you want to talk about?"
He shrugged his shoulders. "I don't know. After you left us at lunch, Sora came running in with this weird smile on his face. He was going on and on about how he saw you and I eventually had to shut him up because he literally would not stop. After we told him that we had just sat with you he couldn't believe it. If I recall correctly, he said it was like a dream of his was coming true."
"Really?" My cheeks were burning up.
"Really," he chuckled, shaking his head, "we haven't seen Sora that upbeat in years. It was like, a lightbulb finally lit up in that kids brain. It was incredible."
We haven't seen Sora that upbeat in years. I was puzzled. Sora was always so bubbly. Did things change that much in my absence? "Has he been sad?" I asked, squeezing my own hand.
"Well you see—" Axel said, trailing off. It was as if he wasn't sure how to put the situation. After a moment of silence, he continued, "I moved to the islands a few years after you left. I met Sora and the others after my parents made me go to this stupid school carnival. Riku and Kairi were cool but you could tell that Sora wasn't all there," he paused, sighing heavily, "and that's when they told me about you."
I was interested now. "What did they say?"
Running his fingers through his red hair, he shot me a quick smile. "They said you were the island sweetheart. You were loved by a lot of people, especially Sora." I noticed his smile begin to fade. "But then, they said you just disappeared. Sora was optimistic for a while, until a few months passed by with no word. They told me that that was the moment he started acting strange. He still smiled, laughed and told obnoxious jokes but he was missing something. Kairi specifically said he was missing his artistic side." His smile returned as he pointed to the drawings pinned to my walls.
"Very funny," I said, frowning a bit. "So, you're here to make me feel bad? Is that it?"
"No, that isn't it at all." He shook his head. "I guess you could say that I'm here to ask why, for the sake of Sora."
"I'm not going to tell you why, you wasted a trip." Folding my arms across my chest, I nodded towards the window. "So you can leave now."
"Fine," he said, throwing his hands up in defense, "I'll go." I followed Axel with my eyes from the moment he left from desk chair to the moment he reached the window. I was glad he told me about Sora but I was still in the dark as to why he told me in the first place.
"Thank you."
Before climbing out the window and out of my sight, he paused. "Can you just give me some sort of clue? I mean, I came all the way over here because I was curious. No one put me up to it. Sora has always been this big mystery to Roxas and I, so I just wanted to see if you had some answers."
The genuine tone behind Axel's voice sent chills down my spine. If he was searching for answers, I couldn't let him leave empty-handed. Yet, I wasn't going to spill my entire life story to a stranger. Quickly, I decided to give him a small taste of what transpired and the general reason behind why I left Destiny Islands in such a hurry; "I left because I got sick."
