Author's Note: It feels spiffy to be writing video game fiction again. :D Just beat KH2 (depending on when you read this… but it was early April 06 WOOT!), had a sudden burst of inspiration, and I figured I should probably write this before I lost my idea… so here goes. :D This story is loosely very loosely based on old Shakespearean plays and… Panic! At The Disco songs. Hence the weird titles and such… so. :D Review if you like… t'will make me feel fantabulous. :D
Disclaimer: I can't even afford chocolate, so… I don't see how I could own anything from Disney or Squenix. ;o;
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Midsummer Panic
Chapter 4
If the door won't
open, then maybe you should stop running into it
Things were going pretty good.
He wasn't sure how they got this way, but he admired himself for his willingness to accomplish such a seemingly unbelievable task. Even though it had been three weeks since her birthday, a week and a half since the beach visit and the drive home and countless weeks since his insta-bonding with Sora began, one thing still remained solid like a rock; a solid, irreplaceable truth.
HE COULDN'T TALK TO HER.
"Talk about unbearably sad." He mumbled to himself, drowning his head in his hands. He gave a sigh bleeding with stress, and shut his eyes for a moment. He lifted his head for a second and was startled as he spotted Sora, standing directly in front of him, staring at him. They each stared at each other oddly for a while before Sora finally wandered over to the sofa beside his, and then decided to give him weird looks from there.
"What are you talking about?" he asked, bluntly. "The fact that you talk to yourself?"
"… not really." Roxas replied. "But I figure I should… if it's, um… that… weird."
"Maybe." He shrugged and reached for the remote lying on the floor.
Roxas would randomly pop over every now and then, which didn't necessarily bother Sora because at first he didn't care. He figured it was because he wanted someone to talk to, and since Sora was used to talking to almost everyone, he didn't think anything of it. It slowly got to the point where it was like 'Roxas is here again'. If not for sleeping, Roxas almost never left. When Sora thought about it, it was a bit weird in a way. He laughed about it, and he figured that since he was such a cool guy, people naturally flock to him like that. But he couldn't help but wonder if there was some form of ulterior motive behind Roxas' frequent visits.
…
"Hey Namine," he called her up one day. As soon as she heard his voice, she choked. It took her a while to regain her composure. "You okay?" he asked.
"Yes… I'm okay." She replied, uneasily. "What happened?"
"Just wondering… out of plain curiosity and stuff," he said, casually. "But is your friend gay?"
Silence.
"… Namine?"
"Which friend?"
"Roxas."
"…not that I… know of." A pause. "Why do you say that?" there was an odd hint of curiosity in her voice.
"Um. No reason." Sora replied, and then quickly hung up. Namine quickly documented that in her list of phone conversations with Sora.
His mom loved Roxas. She thought he was absolutely 'the cutest thing on two legs'—which scared Sora a lot, because she always referred to him that way. No matter what time he happened to have called or came over, she would always, always let him in. She would feed him fruits until Sora came downstairs, and then life would ensue as usual. She happened to have overheard Sora's phone call with Namine, and she was even more intrigued by Roxas as a person and more inclined to speak on his behalf.
"You better not be telling people… you know," she would tell Sora, while popping peanuts in her mouth. She gave him her most serious and motherly look. "Well, you know," she continued. "That he's gay, if he isn't, okay? That kind of rumor can hurt a person's self-esteem."
He looked at her with nothing but pure confusion. She kept looking back at him and attempting to look intimidating and evil, but Sora was just confused. He blinked at her. "… mom, what?"
She didn't say anything. Instead, she grabbed a handful of peanuts and headed back into the kitchen. Sora didn't say anything either. The doorbell rang, and as he poked his head around the wall, he could see a glimpse of dirty blond hair in the window. "Not now," he groaned, and dropped his head painfully on the breakfast table. Likewise, his mom rushed around the corner to answer the door. She probably invited him over.
"Roxas, dear, hi!" she cried with joy. By now, she was probably giving him a hug, ushering him inside and feeding him peanuts by the door. Sora could assume that much, even with his head on the table recovering from the brutal crash seconds ago.
Sora could hear footsteps from down the hall and he slowly looked up, massaging his head, as Roxas came rushing towards him with a mildly distraught expression. "I have something really important t-to… ask you." He said.
Sora was afraid.
They went upstairs to his room where Roxas instantly took a seat on the bed and began to twiddle his thumbs. Sora sat at his desk chair, facing Roxas, somewhat afraid of what it was exactly that he wanted to "ask" him. He waited for a while, mentally preparing himself for the most obvious questions and what types of reactions he should have. Deep breath… okay.
"C-can you… tell me… everything you know… about Kairi?"
What? "What?" he asked, blankly. He wasn't expecting that at all. Roxas nodded firmly and Sora raised his eyebrow at him. "What do you mean by everything?"
"… everything, as in everything." He answered with a short nod.
Sora stared at him.
Roxas really wished he wouldn't; he was nervous enough as it is. It took him forever to realize that unless he got information of out Sora now, his whole 'plan' would never be successful. He silently hoped that Sora would actually decide to speak and put away that weird feeling he had that just screamed 'CLEARLY, THIS GUY IS UP TO SOMETHING'. He stared at him, apprehensively.
Sora cleared his throat. "Very… vague… but, um," he looked at him oddly. "If… for whatever reason… you just have to know, and stuff… then, w-whatever." He thought for a moment. Roxas wished he brought a book to take notes. There was no way he was gonna be able to remember everything Sora said.
From what he could gather; her birthday was August 28 and she loved astrology. Her father is 'this research scientist' and her mother is 'a lawyer or something'. She can be really talkative and 'annoying' at times, but she's generally a happy person. She cries a lot during sad movies, she loves to sing babies to sleep, her favourite colour is green, she only likes reading romance novels, she has an unhealthy obsession with swords and the samurai, she loves cherry soda and 'will eventually love daiquiri', she used to want to be a ballerina, if you poke her in her side, she'll cringe and 'go all emo', she's really attached to her phone, she's always broke, and the list goes on…
Somewhere in between his long ramble, which only turned out longer because Roxas wouldn't stop asking extra questions about this, that and the other thing, Sora got a strange, strange idea. For what other reason would Roxas be asking about all this stuff? He thought to himself, what could one do with all this seemingly unnecessary information? Unless he was planning on compiling a database of Kairi-ism, then Sora really had no idea… why… he would need all this.
Unless.
"Oh—" Sora added, just as Roxas was thinking up his next question. He grinned, "And also, she loves outgoing guys."
Roxas' eyes blew open.
Sora nodded. Roxas probably would've fell over if not for the fact that he was trying to pretend that it didn't matter—but hell, of course it did! OUTGOING? Just how outgoing is outgoing for her? He knew for a fact that outgoing was not something he could put on his list of personality traits. All of a sudden, it felt like an anchor was sinking in the pit of his stomach, slowly dragging him down with it. He was devastated.
Sora noticed. He does like her. I knew it.
"Just how… outgoing… is outgoing?" Roxas asked, trying to act as if he really didn't care.
Sora's insides were smiling. "Well, her last boyfriend… Axel Xenisillas used to rock-climb." Roxas' heart valves were exploding, one by one. "But I'm not sure if he counts because he's older than her, so… well, you know how superficial girls are these days, they always go for older guys and stuff, right?"
"…r-right." Roxas nodded, slowly. "So… he doesn't count."
Sora smiled and shook his head. "No. Lucky you."
"Huh?"
"Um." He stopped smiling instantly. "I mean nothing."
Roxas tried to comfort himself, and tried to convince himself that Sora was still oblivious as to why he asked him that question. He left his house in a hurry, apologizing to his mom, and then quickly sped away in his car. "Of course he doesn't know, " he told himself, casually, even though his voice was shaky. "It was a completely objective question, with no emotional attachment whatsoever."
A pause.
"Well whatever," he mumbled. "So what if he knows… it doesn't matter." He continued. "It doesn't matter, it doesn't matter…" …
"That's rich." Sora sighed, sprawled comfortably on his bed. Nothing amused him more than Roxas' sudden visit and faster-than-usual disappearance. He figured with such a blatantly obvious question, that of course his five-second analysis had to be right. And this, above all, made him laugh. The fact that—okay, this was killing him beyond belief, he couldn't even think.
"Sora—" he shook a little and instantly sat up when his mom burst into his room. She found him with the most amused smile he'd ever had, and she was instantly worried. "What happened to Roxas? What did you tell him? Why is he gone?"
He couldn't believe she was asking that. What does she mean 'why is he gone'? He doesn't even live here. However, that simple fact refused to ruin the salsa music playing in his head and the fairies flitting about in utter bliss. He shrugged, "No idea." He told her, innocently.
"You liar." She sneered at him. "I hope you didn't tell him anything that you should be regretting for the rest of your life, because he's such a nice boy—"
"Of course not."
"What happened?"
"Why do you… always ask me things that have nothing to do with you at all—?"
"Hey. Kid. Talk or I'm taking my car back."
Sora sighed and quickly tried to form some kind of sentence in his head that wouldn't make him laugh or choke, but still made sense in some kind of weird way. "Um." He began. "Roxas is… a Kairi fan-boy." He said it as calm as he knew how, but the fairies in his head were dropping down, one by one, laughing their lungs out. Oh, the amusement.
His mom beamed, clasping her hands together, as she rushed over to sit with him on the bed. Sora rolled his eyes; she was such a drama queen. He often wondered why he couldn't have a normal mom; one that was old, loved to knit, knew nothing about young kids and assumed their kid was a male prostitute. She came over and began to pet his head affectionately, which only scared him. "My God, that is too cute!" she gushed inwardly. She glanced over at Sora, whose eyes were blown up much bigger than usual and possessed such a shocked expression. She smiled, "So does she know? Does she? She doesn't know, does she? Huh?"
"… um…" Sora began slowly. "I don't think so…?"
His mom squealed and fell back on his bed. He slowly inched away from her. Before he decided he could get up, run, and still be able to keep his sanity, she sprung back up and stared at him, with a warm smile. "So where does this leave you?"
He blinked at her.
She smiled at him.
"What?"
"I know, you don't wanna answer it because I'm your mom and this is weird."
"… what?"
"But really, you should think about it."
"Think about what?" he asked. She stared at him, her eyes trying to burn holes into his head. It really just looked like she was attempting, very badly, to wink at him. He laughed, and shook his head slightly. "Okay, I get it. You think that all of a sudden, Roxas is gonna turn into frigging Superman and everyone's gonna love him because he's just so cool and whatever—okay, that's funny, really."
"What? I'm being honest." She gave a fake pout.
He grinned. "You seem to think this is like Armageddon or something. And it's not. And I'll tell you why, since you're so… interested in this," he cleared his throat. "He's a nice guy, sure. But he's no Axel… by no means whatsoever."
His mom raised an eyebrow at him. She pursed her lips disapprovingly and glared at him. "That sounds like something a jealous person would say."
"… but I always sound like that." He answered, with a casual shrug. "…you know what I think, you're over-analyzing this, and now everything just seems weird. You'll get over it. I have." And with that, he fell back on his bed.
She peered over at him for a moment, before creeping off his bed and slowly out of his room.
Happy happy joy joy. :D Once again, reviews would be oh so spiffy… and next chapter soon XDD