Author's Notes: Yes! Yes, yes, yes, another update! I'm so happy that my muse has finally decided to stop rebelling against me and that this story is actually (almost) complete right now. With only the epilogue left to be written, this should be finished before I know it.
For the people who were requesting more Seifer x Roxas interaction, I hope you are pleased! This chapter is pretty much nothing but SxR, after all. ;) Honestly, I don't understand why this pairing is so unpopular, I thought it made perfect sense (but, that may just be because I'm a rabid Final Fantasy VIII fan girl combined with me being one of those irrational people who keep believing that Seifer bullying someone really means that he is attracted to them). When I played through the epilogue and watched Seifer attacking Roxas in what was almost involuntary viciousness, I immediately believed that Roxas was triggering something inside Seifer that he himself was uncomfortable with. Well, then again... maybe it's just me.
In any case, thank you for reading and if you are interested, I am going to post the first chapter of a new story (this time AkuRoku) hopefully within the next few days. If you liked The End Of Every Story until to this point, I hope you will check out my new story as well once it's up.
Nothing left to babble on about except please review. :-)
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The End of Every Story
Chapter 7: The End of Every Story
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Chapter 7: The End of Every Story
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When Seifer's staff collided with Roxas's stomach, Roxas realized that no amount of mental preparation could ever have so much as hoped to ready him for the pain the impact caused. It started in his stomach, then, like a blizzard left loose, shot through the entirety of his slight teenage body. It buzzed along his nerve endings as well as blackened his vision.
It was with an "umph" sound that the blonde's behind crashed into the sandy ground; the pain up his butt from the heavy fall immediate, mingling with the pain throbbing in his stomach. However, there was no time for Roxas to nurse his aching body parts, as he, with one heart-wrenching gaze up the statuesque figure of his opponent, realized that said rival was about to land another hit - and that he was aiming for his face.
Seifer's staff made a hissing sound as it whirled through the air, then a soft one as it missed Roxas's lithe form and instead hit the ground a second after Roxas had rolled out of the way and erected himself onto shaky legs. Roxas was standing there, panting, one hand clutching his stomach while the other was busy making sure he wasn't going to drop his weapon and staring at Seifer out of eyes that made no secret of the almost laming fear he was experiencing.
Seifer laughed and the sound rattled through every niche of Roxas's body. He saw the smirk on Seifer's face splitting his handsome face, then, with one motion that Roxas's eyes had trouble following, Seifer launched another attack. Fortunately for Roxas, while his eyes hadn't been quick enough, his reflexes had; he found himself raising his own staff - Hayner's staff, he reminded himself - and with the dull sound of wood clashing each other, their staffs collided. The force behind the hit had been no less powerful than the one behind the first - a laming pain shot up his arms at the impact - but, for reasons that Roxas himself was in the dark about, he managed to hold off the attack. While he was clumsily tumbling backwards, dodging another one of Seifer's blows, he distantly heard the crowd screaming, cheering; among the cheers he could hear his own name, heard fear and triumph binding into what reached Roxas as a plethora of tumult.
A sparkle in Seifer's eyes. Sharp pain shot up Roxas's arms and raced into his shoulders as he parried the next hit, jumped two steps back, then dodged the horizontal slash that Seifer drilled the air with. Sharp panic was writhing inside Roxas, sneaking its way up into his throat and nesting there. Fear demons were nibbling at his intestines, taking off chunks larger than they could swallow with every bite.
Another hit, racing toward his face like an arrow. He dodged it by stepping back yet again seconds before he parried another slash, his face contorting into a mask of pain as the now familiar sting dashed up the length of his arm and tackled his aching shoulders. Another upward hit just barely missed him, passing by so close to his face Roxas could smell the wood, could feel the air whipping his face.
Hit for hit, Seifer closed in on him, ever refusing to let him get even one hit in edgewise, forcing him ever closer to the edge of the battle-ground. Sweat had started to build on Roxas's body and was pearling on his temples, wetting his hands; his heartbeat was beating so furiously his whole body was vibrating in cruel harmony with the pounds; the dread and fear had turned into a corporeal entity that was clogging his throat.
"Getting tired already?" Seifer taunted. "Oh, little R, but we're just getting started."
There it was. The truest form of cruelty flashing across Seifer's face; then the realization Seifer was going to hit him pressed against the back of Roxas's eyes like a burning light bulb. It was in slow-motion that the following transpired - Seifer's body twisting as he gathered the strength he would bless this hit with, then the wooden staff coming toward Roxas slowly, every so slowly, frame-by-frame as though a slide show of impending doom. Adrenaline twisted through Roxas veins and his arms raised to meet the blow and his strength centralized in his legs as he spread them to prepare for the blow and -
- he met Seifer's blow in mid-swing and a long tremble shook his entire body as the world seemed to come to a complete halt.
And then, their bodies working so hard at keeping their balance, to not fall over from the sudden impact - their feet firmly rooted to their spots, toes digging into the soft ground underneath, the muscles in their legs slices of tension - neither moved, neither even blinked as for one perfect, still moment only, they stood there staring at each other.
To Roxas, the surroundings melted away in that moment; cheers from the crowds nothing but insignificant clamor fading out slowly, like the siren of a passing police car being sucked away once it passed. In reality, the moment could not have lasted for more than a second, but to Roxas it seemed like a minute, an hour even.
Green. The green of the wave-tossed seas and just as deep.
He noticed with disgust that his glare had been rubbing itself against Seifer's like a willing body and another wave of hot shame coursed through him. Gritting his teeth in disgust with himself, he shook his head, then forced his eyes to flex upon the staff in his hands and to remember.
He remembered the day Hayner had bought that staff, the very staff that he was now holding on to as though he was a drowning man and it a safety rope. In Roxas's memory, it had been a good day, a beautiful day, but in retrospect he could not have told you whether the weather had been nice or even how his health had been at that time. Memory tended to omit information not deemed of sufficient importance, and so all Roxas could remember of that day was Hayner presenting the new staff at the usual spot, proudly announcing that he had spent all the money he had earned during the summer and the summer before and the summer before to be able to buy this staff. Olette, Pence and himself had stared at Hayner out of plate-sized eyes that had drooled admiration and surprise, asking shyly if they could touch it, and then they had stood there, running their fingers over the fine wood and the well-drawn red and blue ornaments and it had been lovingly passed around like a newborn infant.
However, to be perfectly honest, there hadn't been anything special about the staff itself. It had looked like countless other staffs and it had felt just the same as Pence's staff when Roxas had taken a couple of experimental swings with the weapon in his hand. But yet, he and his friends alike had known that it was special, that it deserved all the awe and loving care of a remarkable gemstone - because, rather than any inherent quality, it had been the staff's attributes blended with Hayner's own abilities, it had been Hayner's dreams and hard work and passion for the staff that made the staff so unique. And just like during that day all those years ago when his best friend had presented them the staff he had worked hard to buy and would always cherish, it wasn't the inherent strength of the staff itself that lent grace and determination to Roxas's movements but what the staff had been made to be through a network of belief.
So Roxas's eyes danced back up to meet Seifer's and this time, the expression in Roxas's eyes no longer revealed fear nor anger; had, in place of those petty and troublesome emotions, given way to determination. He gripped his staff - Hayner's staff, his staff, their staff - tighter as he released the next words.
"Hayner gave this staff to me, Seifer. I will not be afraid any more. I have his support and that of my friends within me right now; they love me, Seifer. Who loves you?"
Seifer's eyes narrowed; a scarlet fire deep inside them igniting, ravishing, feeding. "What?" Seifer hissed and for just one sweet moment that Roxas wished he could have hold onto, he felt like he really could defeat Seifer, that he could exploit all that weakness he suddenly saw presented to him like a buffet plate at a wedding, free for him to pluck apart however he pleased.
And then the moment was broken. Or, perhaps, rather than broken, it would have been more accurate to say it was sliced in halves with the precision of a scalpel when he felt Seifer pushing him away with one single, powerful thrust - power he in that moment knew he could never hope to match - and he went scooting over the ground, trembling, tripping, catching his weight just before he was about to crash head-first into the sand. He snapped around to look at Seifer who was already close to him - how had he closed the distance so fast? - his staff now raised high. The expression he had been wearing like a mask since the start of the fight had sneaked its way back onto his face, only this time it had come accompanied by a tremble of anger.
"Where are your friends now, huh? How are they helping you now?"
The distance between their bodies was breached so fast that if it hadn't been for the fact that Roxas's body was running on pure adrenaline, would have run him right over like a truck a wooden hut. The next blow Roxas parried sent a tremor throughout the entirety of his body, but what was it? There was no strength behind that hit? And then Roxas caught a fragment of Seifer grinning and Roxas's mind called uselessly, "oh. Fuck" and it was quick, so cruelly quick. Seifer dropped his arm and then brought it up and the staff came racing toward Roxas in a crushing upper-cut. Roxas's head was snapped back to nearly breaking point as the weapon connected with his cheek and for the first time in his life, Roxas knew what it meant to see stars.
His body reeled off balance and he was flying through the air. His staff slipped out from in between his grasping fingers, thudding into the sand where Roxas would soon join it. Roxas had always loved this feeling of perfect weightlessness during a free fall, that one perfect moment in which nothing mattered - but just as it had the times before, it only lasted a fraction of a second. Roxas screamed as his head crashed against the ground but the scream was muffled and killed by the sand that hurried in a second after the fall. His chest convulsing horribly, he gagged and rolled onto his stomach - his head still spinning from the impact, his eyes watering, his stomach about to heave - spitting sand as he did so. Ocean blue eyes widened as the feeling of suffocation collected him into one crushing embrace and when he tore his eyes open all he could see standing amidst the darkness that was pressing closer was Seifer standing over him.
And Seifer looked so beautiful and horrible in his tallness and blondeness and the mere power that encircled him that Roxas's mind was swept completely blank as he looked up at him.
Seifer crouched a little - his legs spread, arms resting on his knees, looking as cool and composed as he always had - and stared at the boy to his feet. "Look at your precious friends, now." Seifer indicated the lost staff to Roxas's right. "Over there, buried in the sand. Boo-hoo."
Roxas caressed the staff with his eyes; it lay there, abandoned, forgotten, the ghosts of his friends vaporing around it like hot steam out of a pot.
Noises from the crowd around him engulfed the blonde in an inferno of wailing cheers. His body felt completely still, drained; there didn't appear to be a muscle left in Roxas's body that didn't hurt and every thought that stumbled into his head did so enshrouded in the thick miasma of apathy. Heaviness lodged in every cell of his being.
Why... why did I come to fight Seifer again? What was the use of fighting if I couldn't win? were the first thoughts that trickled back into his mind and while he was laying there, and it would be impossible to tell how long he would have stayed on the ground if Seifer's hadn't snapped at him,
"Get up already, Roxas! I don't hit opponents writhing on the ground like little worms. Get to your feet like a man."
Roxas's body flinched as though it had been struck - he had never seen Seifer sound like that before. Eyes drawn into a suspicious frown, he searched Seifer's face for hints of mockery, but no matter how much he searched, they always managed to dodge his eyes.
"Isn't this exactly what you want?" Roxas whispered, fighting hard against the tears that were pricking the back of his eyes like the cruel little needles they were, "me, down? Me, defeated? Wasn't the purpose of this fight for you to see me like this?"
Anger on Seifer's face; the most pristine, most honest version of it. His eyebrows were drawn together, his jaws clenched so tightly it looked like it hurt and his eyes... yeah, his eyes...
Only moments earlier, Roxas had thought he would drown in those sea-shore depths; he knew he no longer could. The very depths of those eyes had been set on fire, and the flames of anger entrapped in those glowing orbs were smoldering hotter than any hatred he could have seen there.
"Just pick up the goddamn staff get the fuck up, chicken-wuss!" Seifer commanded.
So he did. Roxas's legs were weak underneath him, threatening to let him go and send him crashing down into ground once more, but he managed to erect himself to his full yet still petite height. He raised his eyes to see himself being towered over by the other boy and his skin jumped into goosebumps as... he felt himself completely consumed by the other boy. Seifer's aura was singing on his skin just in tune with his cologne mixed with the scent of masculine sweat dancing over his brain cells and Roxas, for a couple of heart-wrenching moments, was rendered unable to do anything other than stare into that face, to try to find the secrets hidden beneath that expression.
He bent down to pick up the staff and, for some reason Roxas would never quite grasp, he hesitated; instead of his fingers, it was eyes that travelled along the sides of the smooth wooden staff, took in every curve, every flaw, ever splinter and tried looking for its real power that must have been floating all around the weapon like mystical flames.
And then, it happened.
Roxas didn't quite know how, or why and never would be able to. Hundreds of times he had asked himself this question and been denied answer from the depths of his working mind just as many; but this time, the secret unraveled itself in front of him like a birthday present being torn apart by a child, like what he imagined enlightement must feel like to people who used meditation as means to communicate with what they called God.
For some reason, he knew and the knowledge, ignited somewhere deep inside his body surged up toward his throat where it finally split into the open.
"You see me as your equal," Roxas breathed, so quietly that if Seifer hadn't stood so close to him, would never have heard.
Dawns of the first hints of fear spilled all over Seifer's face - fear! On Seifer's face! - followed by the first rays of rage. Roxas went on, his voice gaining strength with each word spoken, "that's why you approached me that day, all those years ago, and that's why you did it again just yesterday. You hand-picked me, Seifer. Why do you think you did that?" Roxas's eyes narrowed. "I know why you did it now, Seifer. You thought I had -"
Seifer attacked him again and Roxas yelped as he dodged the blow, searching Seifer's face for a confirmation, a denial, but only finding bottomless anger there. It was the first time Roxas had ever seen the taller boy that angry and if he hadn't been pre-occupied with defending himself, it would have been cause for marvel; as it was, though, the sandy-haired boy found the mere act of ensuring his survival a delicate enough predicament as blow after blow cracked against his staff. Seifer's anger and heat was an almost palpable thing, tingling on Roxas's skin; beautiful and terrifying all at the same exquisite time and then, yes then... then the truth of what he had just said finally truly sank in.
Seifer had chosen him. Perhaps he had seen potential in him, perhaps he had always felt an inexplicable attraction; the real reason why he had approached him, though, had obviously been out of Seifer's conviction that, like a jigsaw puzzle, like two halves of soul, what they could join to make would far surpass the inherent power of either. Seifer believed that they were similar if only he could realized Roxas's potential.
Another hit, a low groan from Seifer.
He knew it now.
Roxas jumped as Seifer slashed at his legs.
There was no question that the reason why Seifer had hand-picked him that day, there was no question that he sought him out and only him. Sometimes, your rival could help you reach greater heights than your allies ever could.
Seifer's tries to hit him kept getting messier and messier, his face documenting his loss of control.
And what that meant was that Roxas was stronger than he had ever thought he was, that he, himself, bore the answer. And suddenly, his muscles which just moments earlier had been begging for relief soothed as his entire body was fed by the strength that flooded him, that made his muscles sing with ability and his mind shudder in ecstasy as it built brick walls around himself. And then, Roxas, in one perfect moment that rolled every humiliation he'd ever felt at the hands of Seifer into one, he struck Seifer.
It had been the first time Roxas had ever struck Seifer with his - with Hayner's - staff and words couldn't even scrape the surface of how good it felt to smack it right into the tall boy's stomach, to marvel at his face morphing into pain and to watch his broad shoulders heaving with his shaky breaths. Though inferior in terms of raw physical ability Roxas clearly was, it was with his new-found realization and the belief that it brought along with him that Roxas found it as easy as dancing to a well-remembered children's songs to dodge Seifer's increasingly desperate hits, to even land hits of his own, to shove his staff into Seifer's stomach, to slam it against the other boy's side.
If Roxas had been able to see his own face, he would have seen that of a boy he would have trouble recognizing. Joy was amusing itself on his face like light on still water. A tranquil smile was curling his lips. If Roxas had been able to see himself, he would have recognized much earlier than he did that he was enjoying this far more than had known he was capable of. Something in him was gnawing away even as he was carried away in his actions, something that was horrible and fascinating all at the same time. Was he...
(just like Seifer)
really this cruel? Was it really him who enjoyed hitting the taller blonde?
Did he want to be?
He knew the answer - somewhere inside him, at least - yet found himself unable to stop. Seifer gave a long, drawn-out groan as Roxas hit him into the stomach. His hands clutched at his abdomen just as Roxas, clasped by the fists of frenzy, struck again, against one of Seifer's long thighs, and the taller blonde gave a mumbled cry, the knee of the leg being whipped around, bending. Energy pulsed behind the smaller blonde's eyeballs as he kept striking the taller blonde until he had gone down, until he was on his knees; head down, panting, holding his stomach, one fine trail of blood flowing down from underneath his beanie and down his cheek, pearling on his jaw and -
Wait, what? Blood?
The noise from the crowd around him was pressing down onto him from all sides in a dizzying crescendo, but the clarity that wafted through his head after taking sight of the blood was absolute. Roxas hadn't even remembered striking Seifer's head - he wouldn't actually do such a thing, would he? Would he? - but seeing the blood pearl on his opponent's jaw was enough for a sobering realization to pass along Roxas's nerve endings, like a pot of ice water had just been emptied over his head.
"Seifer? Are you okay?" he heard someone calling and it was only when he was already on his knees in front of the opponent he hated and loved and feared and wanted and shaking his shoulders that he realized it had been him who had spoken. Seifer's eyes were flexed upon the ground as Roxas touched him, let his fingers trail over the crimson stream along the side of his face. It was sticky and slippery; yet, in a way that Roxas wasn't completely comfortable with, entirely intriguing.
Roxas hadn't forgotten about the battle, was still aware of the fact that they were in the middle of the most serious battle Roxas had ever had to face in his young teenage life, but right then and there he was overwhelmed by the gnawing sensations of worry and... guilt? Was it guilt?
"Seifer," the boy called again and he curled his fingers underneath the taller boy's chin and lifted it only to be presented by a grin so large and evil Roxas immediately knew that surrendering himself like this had been a grave mistake, and just at the same time as that realization pulsed into his mind, several things happened all at once.
Seifer jumped him, literally jumped him, and at the sudden crush of their collision, Roxas lost balance, falling onto his back with enough force to knock the wind out of his chest, but before he could nurse his pains, before he could even so much as form a plan of action, Seifer was already upon him.
Breath was sweeping over his face; wet and fast and bringing the scent of cinnamon chewing gum right along with it. His lungs wheezed in protest as Seifer's chest pressed against his own and pain inhabited his legs as they entangled messily with Seifer's much longer ones. When Roxas opened his eyes, he found the other boy's green ones hovering only an inch or two above his own.
"Don't you know the first thing about fighting, Roxas? Never let your guard down. Don't feel pity for your opponents. He who pities, loses," Seifer whispered. Roxas could feel every word Seifer spoke on his skin, their lips only inches away, their breaths fusing together. In a way they were kissing already.
Blue eyes wide and raw. "I couldn't have won against you anyway."
A small, intimate smile. "No, you couldn't have."
"I thought I had figured it out. I thought you and I were the same."
Seifer grinned and the next words he spoke, Roxas would never forget. The next words provided him with the last piece of the puzzle, made everything fall into place, set everything into a perfect order. "That's not what you thought. You thought I saw you as my equal. Roxas, the meaning of an equal is not that he is the exact same as you; it merely means that you compliment each other. You haven't fully realized your potential yet, but you're not me and you never will be."
A beat.
"And I'm glad you aren't. I didn't choose you because you were like me or because I thought you could ever become like me. It was because I knew what you could become some day."
"What? What is it you see me becoming?" Roxas croaked, but he would not get an answer and it wasn't until much, much later that he would find it.
While the last words of what Seifer had said were reverberating inside Roxas's skull, Seifer pressed his lips firmly against Roxas's. Screams reached them as the audience gaped at the two kissing boys; the force of the crescendo engulfing them, but the shock that it carried with itself merely scattered to the ground around the two boys, unnoticed and unimportant. Doubtlessly, Roxas would come to regret this deeply - how could he allow the school bully to kiss him in front of everyone? - but right then, the idea that this could be wrong never so much as even scraped the surface of his consciousness. Nothing mattered to him but Seifer's taste, Seifer's aura, Seifer's tongue in his mouth, Seifer's hands buried in his shaggy hair.
Nothing mattered. Nothing but them.
The kiss was different from the very first they had shared; gentler, deeper, but every bit as passionate. They were moaning and writhing against each other and Seifer was pressing himself against the smaller boy's body like he had earlier that day during their - and Roxas's - first kiss. It didn't take long for Roxas to reciprocate, for him to wrap his arms around the taller boy's neck and welcome the showers racing along his skin and down his spine. Roxas felt like he was drunk again, like he had been in the woods when Seifer had made him drink, only he knew this time it wasn't alcohol he was drunk on.
Afterwards, Roxas could not have said how long the kiss had lasted - a minute, two, perhaps five? - but in any case, it hadn't be very long before Seifer, with one long, wet gasp, broke the kiss. Seifer got to his feet in one jump and Roxas - cheeks flushed, lips wet and kiss-bruised, eyes watery and dim with lust and imagined drunkenness - gave an unhappy, impatient groan before he felt himself being pulled to his feet by Seifer's hand. A big question mark was drawn all over Roxas's face as he stood erected, but Seifer only turned to Vivi.
"The fight's over," he called. Then to the crowd, "nothing more to see, people. Thanks for watching." Then, he finally turned to Roxas, a glint in his eye that made Roxas shiver and send all the wrong messages to his groin. "And you, you're going home with me."
Roxas flushed. "What? But... didn't Vivi say something about giving up or death and -"
Seifer laughed. "I made the rules. I can break them."
And then Roxas felt Seifer's hand on his wrist and an insistent tug and he let Seifer drag him past Vivi (who, if he was in any way surprised, didn't show it), into the crowd (people yelled and screamed in what all blurred inside Roxas's mind to meaningless clamor) and along streets (the air was harsh and cold, but the heat inside Roxas was enough to smother it all) and up stairs (Roxas's joints hurt from the battle, but it was a distant pain, as though already a memory) and up toward Seifer's house (grand and imposing, white walls bloated with the wealth inside) and into the house (Seifer held his mouth against his lips to keep Roxas quiet) and up stairs again (by now his joints didn't hurt so much) and into Seifer's room (oh my God).
Back before Seifer had approached Roxas for the second time, the smaller boy had sometimes wondered what the bully's room would look like. Would it be messy, like his explosive nature seemed to suggest? Or, would it stand in stark contrast to his nature, just like his fine, elegant handwriting did? But now that he was actually inside Seifer's room, he wasn't given any chance to pass more than one brief gaze over the room's contents (bed, one large desk, rows upon rows of books) before he felt arms closing around him, crushing him against that chest once more. Seifer's impossibly green eyes stared down at Roxas as he lifted him off the ground. Seifer scooted over the floor and threw Roxas onto the bed and then lunged right at him.
Roxas was too stunned to do much of anything as he lay there on Seifer's soft, soft bed, feeling the taller boy placing soft trickles of kisses on his chest and running his hands up and down the length of his upper body, caressing and feeling. Seifer was already writhing against him, moaning quietly and very obviously aroused before he raised his head and captured Roxas's lips into yet another kiss.
What had once been a fully functionable human brain had turned into little more than a puddle of mud and what had once been a body capable of self-control was writhing underneath Seifer's body like a cat in heat. Roxas tugged up Seifer's shirt to his underarms. When he ran his hands over Seifer's bare chest, he could feel soft skin, marred every now and then by skin tissue, and a heartbeat strong and feverish enough to shake the torso above him with its every pump. Roxas loved the sound and feel of Seifer's heartbeat, but he couldn't decide whether he loved that or the feeling of Seifer's tongue inside his mouth more.
Roxas moaned from out of deep of his throat and Seifer's kiss broke, the promises of their saliva still wet and heavy on their lips as he breathed, "shhh, Roxas, my parents are next door."
Roxas only laughed, running his fingers over the golden blonde strands of Seifer's hair, pushed the taller boy's mouth down toward him and welcomed his tongue into his mouth like that was already where it belonged. Seifer smirked against the kiss, amused at the smaller boy's eagerness and maybe, just maybe, also amused at his own growing tenderness.
Seifer's tongue pushed as deep inside as it would go and Roxas moaned, arching his back, wrapping his arms more and more tightly around the other boy's neck and pushing it down toward his mouth with growing passion. In time, Seifer's eagerness grew and Roxas's eyes blew open in shock as the blonde above him started rocking his lower body against the smaller boy's in long, drawn-out circles. Roxas could feel it. Oh by God, he could - hot bolts of lust shivered through his body at the sensation of Seifer's erection pressing against his own through the fabric of their pants and at the exquisite sensation of having his cock grounded between the hardness of Seifer's body and the equal hardness of his pubic bone. Roxas's eyes rolled around in his head - what was he to do? Seifer's parents... don't moan, don't moan - and when the need to make noise became too strong, he decided to moan right into the other boy's warm, wet mouth, for them both to swallow and muffle Roxas's sound.
While the sudden, violent kiss at school had been anything but, this make-out session on Seifer's bed was far closer to how Roxas had imagined sexuality to be. Seifer's body on top of him, while eager and excited, was everything pleasant and right. If Roxas had been in any position to - or indeed, been able to - have any rational thought, he may have wondered just when exactly the evil he had detected coming off of Seifer in rolls of doom had morphed into something that could feel so good.
Roxas's legs wrapped themselves around Seifer's body almost automatically as the longer boy shifted his position and the feeling Roxas was engrossed in was so mind-numbing - strong hands on his chest and both his cock and his tongue stimulated - that, at first, he didn't even feel the soft hand travelling down his body, over the sunken plane of his smooth stomach and down to his zipper and -
And then several things happened in quick succession. Seifer's fingered attempted to sneak into Roxas's white khakis and as soon as the realization of what was about to transpire hit the smaller boy, something quite peculiar happened. Doubt and fear stormed into Roxas's body and triggered the alarm in Roxas's head that caused the smaller boy to shoot up and grasp Seifer's hands and firmly say, "stop."
It took a while, during which Seifer kept clawing at Roxas's zipper while the smaller body tried to push his hands away, for the words to sink in. Seifer's eyes were that of a man whose mind was shrouded with lust and it was for the first time that Roxas noticed that the eyes of a person at the mercy of their arousal was little different from the eyes of those haunted by insanity. "Why stop?" Seifer moaned, disappointment evident in his voice. "You seemed to enjoy yourself quite a bit there." He sat up, looking down at Roxas almost accusingly and if Roxas had been in another mood, he may have burst into laughter at the sight of Seifer lingering one step away from curling his mouth into a pout.
Getting Seifer to stop undressing him had been the smaller boy's top priority, so once he had succeeded, he felt himself at a strange loss as to what to say to Seifer's question. Yes, why had he stopped Seifer? He looked at Seifer, at his now messy hair of which strands of golden blonde hung down his smooth forehead and dipping into green pools. Roxas also allowed himself to briefly sweep his eyes over the other boy's naked upper body (some time during their make-out session Roxas must have undressed the taller boy) and was presented with the ridiculously sexy view of Seifer's chiselled, sun-kissed pectorals and dimly asking himself if he was fucking mad for having stopped such a gorgeous boy.
When he finally found his voice, he just muttered, "it just felt weird right now... I was..." he looked up, the lost look of a child on his pretty-boy features, "scared, I guess?"
Seifer ran his hand through his hair and made an annoyed face. "You didn't seem all that scared before when you were writhing underneath me, as hard and horny as a sailor on his first day back on land after a four-month service."
Roxas rolled his eyes. What had he been thinking? Of course Seifer was an ass. "Way to ruin the moment, Almasy. You have a special gift for it, I must say."
Seifer snorted then, abruptly enough for Roxas to have to bite back a surprised little scream that would likely have come out embarrassingly girly. Then Seifer was upon him again, leering at Roxas. The smaller blonde's body went rigid at the sudden invasion and he was in the middle of mustering the strength to tell Seifer to back the fuck off when Seifer's voice interrupted him. "I see. You want to ask me for some time, don't you? How cute."
"Cute?" Roxas echoed, nose wrinkling. "Lay off it, Almasy. I'm not some girl."
"Then why won't you allow me to carry this to where it was naturally going to lead?" Seifer challenged and Roxas opened his mouth to give an answer, realized he had none, and snapped his mouth shut again.
Silent moments passed between the two boys, moments that were spent gazing into each other's eyes and curling their fingers around each other's - the gesture was so sweet and girlfriend-boyfrindy that Roxas would have never in a million years expected them to ever do it. Just a week ago he had regarded Seifer as being so rotten he would not have been surprised if the tall blonde had never once looked at a butterfly with any intention other than to rip off its wings. And now... now...
"I was scared just now," Roxas admitted. "I thought that.. if we were going to go there we would go, you know, all the way... and that, I'm really not ready for. I mean, just yesterday I hated you and now you expect me to... you know." Roxas smiled. "I may be a slut, but I still have some morals. Which is probably more than I can say for you."
Seifer smiled at him. "You liar."
Roxas raised both blonde eyebrows. "Huh?"
"I said you were lying. You never hated me. And, neither did I hate you. So what's so immoral about this again?"
Roxas snorted. "Who knew you were such a horny little bitch."
"Says the body who just a second ago was sounding like he was cumming in his pants," and at that Seifer contorted his mask into a mockery of lust and aped, "oh yes, Seifer, oh yeah, right there, ohhhhh -"
Roxas slapped Seifer's shoulder, eyes wide and voice shrill, "I did not!"
The taller blonde boy smirked, revealing a row of straight white teeth. "Like hell you didn't. "Ohhhh, yeah, oh my God, yeah, more -""
"Will you stop it?" Roxas shrieked, pounding Seifer's naked shoulders. The clear sound of Seifer's laughter filled the bedroom as the taller boy threw his head back and ruffled Roxas's hair as though he was a puppy - a gesture at which Roxas grit his teeth and raised his first, ready to punch Seifer.
But he never got to punch Seifer that night. The taller blonde caught Roxas's fist, a smirk plastered all over his handsome looks. "Baby's got a temper."
Before Roxas could reply to that - "I'm gonna show you baby, you jerk!" had seemed like such a good response in Roxas's head - Seifer had already pushed him down onto his back once more and was beside him, his chin propped on his palm as he regarded the smaller boy out of contemplative eyes, then sighed, rolled onto his back and folded his hands under his neck.
"All right, then. Then let's take rest, or something. You may be sore from the fight - no, of course you'd be. Who were you up against?" Seifer chuckled to himself at his own words, then he closed his eyes and tension and lust and disappointment and everything that had been there seeped out of him, cleansing his face of their presence, leaving only tranquility behind.
The moments ticked past. Guilt demons were starting to gnaw away at Roxas's intestines (was Seifer mad? Had he broken an unwritten promise he had been unaware of? Was it simply bad etiquette?) as he regarded the other boy. For the first time in his life, Roxas saw Seifer in a state of utter peace - not a muscle was moving on the other boy's usually so expressive, animated face and with his long lashes stark against his skin and a manly smirk absent from his lips, Seifer looked a lot prettier, a lot more vulnerable than he ever had before. Seifer, the evil ruler of town who ignited fear in the hearts of people with his battle cries howling over school yards, the very nightmare of Twilight Town's school kids who was feared by everybody and everything was gone, had vanished, had been swallowed up by the human being that had surfaced from out of the core of who Seifer was. And what a beautiful human being he was, at least on the surface.
Roxas let his own pair of eyes travel from Seifer's thin, pointed nose down along the lines of his jaw. It was proudly protruding against tanned skin blessed with a rich, golden undertone and Roxas lowered his gaze again, down to Seifer's narrow, pointed chin. The bully that had been twisting those features was gone, and the pretty boy in front of him had stepped forward to fill the void.
Wasn't it ironic then that exactly the moment that Seifer looked like the very image of peace and quiet, Roxas's own body was anything but? His heart wouldn't stop beating, his limbs wouldn't stop jerking from all the bent-up energy urging for release that had gathered inside them and - yes, and... his... intimate little brother down there didn't seem to have any intention to stop bothering him any time soon.
His cock kept demanding attention, would react to dismissal on Roxas's part with only louder and louder wails and more demanding tugs like a child craving for attention, like a real little sibling slapping with clumsy, pudgy hands. Roxas bit the inside of his mouth, trying to stifle his groans of frustration, but to his great dismay, one managed to sneak itself out of his mouth. Shocked, Roxas's head snapped over to Seifer - oh my God, had he heard? - only to confirm his worst suspicions as he stared squarely into Seifer's eyes.
"Let me guess," Seifer sneered, "you're fucking horny and you don't know what to do about it."
Roxas's eyes widened. "No!"
Seifer rolled his eyes, then smirked again. "Yeah, right. Listen, if you're not a horny little virgin, I'm a chastity-belt wielding monastery owner."
While that did shut Roxas up, it did nothing to extinguish the shame blasting through his body and rouging his cheeks that dreaded shade of girly pink.
The color of his cheeks was destined to become even redder as Seifer sat up, one suggestive smirk on his lips. "Well, you said you didn't want to go all the way, but if you want me to, I can... take care of your problem. And you of mine. And stop whenever you want me to, okay?" Then he thought for a moment, green eyes drawn to the ceiling and one finger poking his cheek. "Although, you better not fucking do it just as I'm about to shoot my load."
Roxas didn't even get the chance to reply before the taller boy was upon him again, laughing and nuzzling his hair. Those hands where hovering over his body once more, every bit as eager and demanding as before, but also just as good.
Feeling the busy hands on his body and an equally as busy tongue in his mouth, Roxas closed his eyes and let out one long, drawn-out sigh. The sigh of a man who had crossed the Sahara on foot and was finally greeted by a circle of belly-dancing beauties holding out water in beautiful cups at the end of it.
Whether they would end up doing this only once or whether their future would be dotted with it, whether they would end up as sworn enemies and rivals or as devoted lovers or both, Roxas didn't know and didn't care. He didn't know what him and Seifer would mean to each other next week, tomorrow, or even what they really meant to each other right then and there, yet didn't care. This moment would change his life forever, for better or for worse, and there was nothing left to do than sit back and watch where life would take him. This moment was the end of his story, the end of every story and yet also, Roxas knew, the birth of another.
Author's Notes: Whew, this chapter was both extremely hard and incredibly rewarding to write. Also, pretty damn long for my standards; in fact, this is the single longest chapters I've ever written, just shy of 8,000 words in length. I'm a little proud of that, I have to admit.
If you liked this, even just a little bit, please review. :-)