Rainy Day

"I'm gonna die..."

"Stop being so dramatic, Hayner," Olette reprimanded. "And stick your head back in here."

It was actually raining in Twilight Town, and it was raining hard. The usually bright orange sky was now covered by a mass of gray clouds that allowed nothing but the flashes of lightning and downpour of rain to come through. Even though it was still the middle of the afternoon, it was actually dark enough to be night.

And because of said rain, the gang was now stranded in Hayner's room with absolutely nothing to do other than to die of boredom. Though it looked like Hayner, ever defiant, would rather die of pneumonia judging from the way he was sticking his head out in the rain.

"Seriously, I can feel it," Hayner insisted, his head already quite soaked. "I can feel the boredom about to shut off the power to my brain."

"Wait, you're telling me it was on this whole time?" Roxas mocked from his sprawled position on Hayner's messy bed.

"That's a bit much Roxas," Pence disagreed. "I would think Hayner's brain works at least an hour each day."

"Easy. Play nice, boys." Olette was smiling though. Thunder roared from outside and all of them gave a slight jump. "That's some storm though. We're not going anywhere for a while."

"Ugh, to be stuck in Hayner's room of all places," Roxas groaned.

"Better than the Usual Spot I guess," Pence reasoned. "If it isn't flooded by now, it's definitely leaking all over the place."

"I'd take wet over bored any day." Roxas sat up and glanced out the window. "I wonder if we can run to my place. At least there's something to do there."

"We can't go there," Pence reminded him. "Your mom's still experimenting with food, and she always makes us her test subjects."

"The same reason we can't go to Olette's place," Hayner added.

"Hey! I'm getting better! Right, Roxas?"

"Erm, uh... what about your place?" Roxas asked looking over at Pence, changing the subject not too subtly.

"Are you kidding?" He looked at him as if he had suggested the craziest thing ever. "I'm not gonna let you and Hayner anywhere near my room! One minute inside and you'd break every sensitive piece of camera and computer equipment I have."

"It would be more fun than dying of boredom," Hayner reasoned.

"Not for me it wouldn't. Besides, it's on the other side of town, so we can't go even if you wanted to."

A moment of silence passed between them, disrupted only by the sound of the falling rain.

"Why don't we--"

"We're not going to do homework, Olette," Hayner said, leaning further out the window. "I'm praying for lightning to blow our school to pieces before tomorrow."

"Hayner."

"Fine, just Seifer then." Roxas nodded in assent. He could see the headlines now: Disciplinary Committee leader's big head attracted lightning bolt.

"Okay, fine, were not doing homework," Olette said, giving up. She looked around Hayner's room. Or did it even qualify as room, considering the mess scattered about? "But can we at least do something about this mess?"

"What mess?" Hayner asked.

"The mess that prevents me from seeing the floor," Olette answered. "I've been stepping on dirty clothes this whole time and I'm not gonna put up with it anymore."

"You call it mess, I call it decoration."

"And you have such wonderful taste," Roxas said, holding up a pair of striped boxers.

"Hey, that's my lucky underwear!" Hayner yelled. "I was wearing that when I beat Seifer in the Struggle last month."

Roxas suddenly dropped the piece of clothing. "Please tell me you've washed them since then."

Hayner gave him a sarcastic look. "What do you think?"

Roxas put a hand to his chin, thinking a moment. "That pretty much convinced me. I'll help, Olette."

"Better than nothing I suppose," Pence agreed, getting up.

"Do what you want," Hayner yawned.

Olette went over to a particularly messy pile next to Hayner's bed and started to sort through it, neatly setting apart the dirty clothes, music cds, school books and other stuff. She had finally managed to clear some space up, enough to notice something sticking out from between the bed and the wall it was against.

"Hm, what's this?" She tugged at it, freeing it from the crack. Her face immediately turned red from what she saw.

"Hayner! W-w-what's the meaning of this?!" Said boy pulled his head out of the window and turned around to find Olette holding a magazine which cover featured something only boys of a mature age are allowed to see.

A look of panic flashed across his face. Then, as quick as the expression appeared on his face, it disappeared as he regained composure. He turned to Roxas. "Oh yeah, you left that here the last time you came over."

"W-Wha--!" Roxas was about to say more when Hayner threw a look at him. He faltered, all the words jamming in his throat. An epic and legendary internal war was waged inside him, lasting an entire five seconds. It was Hayner's image or his.

Roxas stopped himself from saying anything more, gritted his teeth, and took the magazine from Olette. "...yeah... forgot..."

Hayner owes me bigtime for this, he thought. Still, he supposed it was quite something that Hayner tried his best to keep a somewhat clean image in front of Olette.

"O-oh... so that was Roxas'..." Olette suddenly perked up, regaining momentum. "Roxas! I never expected that of you! Maybe if it were Hayner--"

"Hey!"

"--but not you! That thing is just... just..." Olette fumbled for a word obscene enough to describe what she was feeling but had to settle for awkward hand guestures.

"This goes for the two of you as well!"she said, rounding on Pence and Hayner. Everyone was now staring at Olette. When she got fired up, she really got fired up, dragging all of them into the mess. Like that time she had dragged them to the forest to pick up trash for the whole day. "I mean, I know you're guys and that you're at that age but you should know better!"

Hayner groaned. This wasn't good. She was about to start ranting again. He had to find something to distract her, or they would spend the whole rainy day listening to her go on and on and on. Or maybe... he could turn this against her.

"Is that really fair Olette?"

The girl gave Hayner a look. "What do you mean by that?"

"Is it really fair to simply pass judgement like that? That you just decide a certain thing is wrong? I mean, you haven't even looked through it, have you?"

"W-Why should I have to look at it?! It's common opinion that--"

"So you're saying we should blindly follow common ideas and conventions?" Hayner asked, trying his best to hide his smirk. It was a good thing he listened every now and then to Olette's rants. He could even mimick them now. "Don't you think it's up to a person to decide what's good or bad, using his experience as a guide? Then after that, deliberate with others to reach a consensus?"

"Never thought Hayner knew such big words," Roxas whispered to Pence.

"He doesn't. Pretty sure he's just using them randomly. It's amazing he's lucky enough to use them correctly though."

"FINE!" Olette thundered. She snatched the magazine back from Roxas and opened it to the first page. "I'll show you. Even after I read this, I'll still think it's something you boys shouldn't go near!"

From the way her face was beet red, you wouldn't think she was reading the table of contents. Though it probably had something to do with the abundant pictures scattered about the page.

Roxas and Pence both had worried expressions on their faces. Things never turned out that well whenever Hayner and Olette clashed. She was only starting on the second page and it looked like she was growing faint with all the blood rushing to her face.

It was during times like these that some intervention was needed. Pence glanced at Roxas, and he nodded.

"Say cheese!"

Light flashed from the camera in Pence's hands, perfectly capturing the scene of Olette reading the explicit magazine.

"W-w-what are doing?! Pence!"

"Roxas!"

"I'm open!"

From Pence's hands, the camera was tossed to Roxas, who then ran out of the room. Olette was only seconds behind him.

"Roxas! Get back here! Delete that picture now or I'm breaking that camera!"

"Hey, wait up! Olette, you're gonna mess up that magazine if you bring out in the rain!"

"Don't let the camera get too wet, Roxas! And don't let Olette break it!"

Hayner's front door swung open and four teenagers bolted out into the wet outdoors, one chasing the other. Roxas in the lead, holding the incriminating camera. Followed by Olette, brandishing the rolled up magazine as a weapon. Hayner and Pence bringing up the rear, telling them to be careful with their stuff. They ran across town as if the rain didn't exist, their yells as loud as the thunder that kept the people indoors.

Soon enough, they were out of breath, soaked to the bone, and laughing their hearts out. Somewhere along the line, it had changed from a chase, to a race, to simply splashing around in the rain.

After running around almost the whole of Twilight Town, they finally stopped at the station clocktower. They all collapsed in a heap of tangled limbs as soon as they got to the top. After running a marathon like that in the rain, all of them were exhausted.

"Ugh, Pence, get off," Roxas groaned. "I can't feel my legs."

"Can't. Olette's sitting on me..."

"I'm not that heavy!"

"Hey guys, look." Hayner had managed to disentangle himself from the others and was now gazing out into the scenery before him. "The rain's stopping."

From the top of the station clocktower, they had the perfect view of Twilight Town. The rain was now reduced to a light drizzle as a few rays of sunlight managed to break through the grey overcast sky. It shone down like numerous spotlights, lighting the areas of Twilight Town with its familiar orange glow, as if the heavens were opening its gates to the earth.

Pence grabbed his camera from Roxas and after a quick check to see that everything was still working, he took a quick picture. He turned and smiled at the others.

"Pretty good ending for a boring rainy day, huh?"

"Definitely."

"Thats for sure."

"Yeah." Olette held a hand out to Pence. "It will be as soon as I delete that picture of me."

The boys couldn't help but laugh and sigh at the same time. Just when they thought they could get away with it...


A/N: Took awhile to get this down right. I actually had to write a number of versions because the story wouldn't flow for me like it usually does. Still, I liked how it turned out.

Just to announce it again, I've decided to dump all my Twilight Town gang friendship stories here. Makes it easier to keep a track of (not to mention it'll be easier to get reviews). No story in mind really, just a bunch of slices from their everyday lives, though I might write a few arcs sometime. And since there's no real story in mind, please note that it probably won't be updated consistently.

Review plz!