Author's Notes #1: Here's Chapter Seven! Hope I didn't keep you waiting too long. Thanks to everyone who reviewed! This is the longest chapter I've written yet, so I hope you like it!

Disclaimer: Kingdom Hearts and all related characters are the property of Square Enix and Disney. Elsewhere was written by Gabrielle Zevin.

Claimer: Lyrics for Dormant are the property of RamaLlama.

Chapter Seven: Smoke and Mirrors

Roxas heard a voice from above him call out enthusiastically, "Rise and shine, Sleepy!"

He groaned. "Ugh... Mom?" He blinked away the blinding sunshine from his eyes. "Just give me five more minutes, Mom!"

'...Wait a minute. Didn't this happen with Sora and me?'

His eyes snapped open.

'Oh God. Oh God. I've somehow managed to end up in some sort of never-ending time loop. I'm never going to be able to finish my Reversal. I'll be stuck outside the Gates forever. Oh...Oh shit. Oh fu-'

"Honey! Honey, time to get up. You're going to be late for school."

'School?'

He looked up. Never before had he been so relieved to see his mother's face.

"Oh, thank God!" he exclaimed. A time loop was the last thing he needed with everything else that was going on with him.

Aerith laughed. "Wow. I've never seen you so excited to go to school before! Is anything special going to happen today?"

"Special?"

October 13th. He remembered what would happen later today.

'If you call completely losing the trust of you and Dad, and regaining it only after a year of humiliation 'special,' then, yeah, today is going to be just fine.'

"You... could call it that."

His mother smiled. "Well, hurry up and get dressed. I'll have breakfast waiting for you downstairs." She gave him a kiss on the cheek and left to go downstairs.

Roxas didn't immediately rush to get his clothes for school, as he usually would. Instead, he just sat on his bed and thought about things for a while.

'What should I do?'

What was he going to do about the situation with Axel?

Completely avoiding it would be impossible. He learned that the hard way with the meteor. Sooner or later, he's going to have to confront him. But what should he do then? If he had to be around Axel, either the kiss or the cigarette was going to be stuck in his mind. He didn't dare to mention either to him.

He couldn't get even with Axel for either of them, either. He had learned from his previous day that Axel doesn't react well whenever Roxas tries to get some sort of revenge. Roxas couldn't risk Axel doing anything drastic. He had a lot against Axel on his mind already, and one mistake could completely sever his relationship with him. He was pretty sure that wasn't the lesson he was supposed to be learning from all this.

Should he just... let today happen the way it was supposed to?

'I guess I'll just have to learn to deal with it.'

He had lasted an entire semester filled with rumors and ruined reputations. He could live through one bad day.

Getting up off his bed, he started to pick out clothes from the closet. With all the time he wasted thinking, he really was going to be late for school. Not that it would've mattered, given the circumstances, but Roxas was never one to be tardy. As he started to change, he looked into his bedroom mirror and noticed that something was slightly off. His reflection looked different. His face had gotten slightly rounder, his eyes slightly bigger, and he wasn't as tall anymore. He looked different enough to throw him off guard but not enough to be unfamiliar. He realized that the Roxas he saw in the mirror wasn't the same Roxas who fell asleep on December 1st almost a year later. He had changed.

He was 14. Axel was 16.

Sure, the changes were subtle, and the person he saw in the mirror was still him. There was no good reason for him to think of his reflection as a completely different person. But it was a different him. A younger him. It felt like an entire year of his life had just been erased, wiped from existence, and he would just keep losing more until he ran out. He knew that wasn't the case, however. He knew all those years would still be there, along with all the events and smiles and feelings that came with them, even after Reversal ended. He just wouldn't be alive to experience them anymore. Not the 15-year-old version of him, anyway. He kept changing, and the rest of his world changed to match him.

It was funny. Fourteen didn't feel this young a year ago.


School was never a friend of Roxas's. It wasn't that he wasbad at it or anything. He was actually quite a good student before the whole cigarette thing. However, he did have one subject that he did poorly in.

Enter History. The instructor of this fine subject? Mr. Saix.

"...and so, in order to repair the massive damages made after the war, the Hollow Bastion Restoration Committee was formed. It consisted of..."

Roxas yawned. Honestly, this lecture was boring enough the first time. It didn't get any more interesting a second time. Looking to the side of his desk, he saw Axel slumped in his chair, struggling to keep his eyes open. Obviously, he was just as bored as he was.

He had always hated History. Besides the fact that the class was boring and Saix creeped him out, it was because he found it very difficult to associate himself with the past. He simply couldn't get himself interested in the events that surrounded the lives of people who lived in a different generation. Those people had died long ago. You couldn't ask them any questions about who they really were, and no one alive would be able to answer them. Everything you could ever know about them was written in a textbook, and half the stuff there was memorizing dates. Those people always seemed to be boring people with perfect lives.

In a strange, sort of ironic way, wasn't that really what Reversal was? The point was to learn more about your own life, or at least that's how Roxas understood it. It was the life of a person who had lived in the past.

The life of a person who had died.

Hunh. Maybe that was why he hated it so much.

Buzzzzz...Buzzzzz...

'The hell?'

Perfect. Not only did he have to sit through the torture that was History, but he had to do it with a goddamn bee buzzing around his face.

'Hold your temper. The bee will eventually go away. Just be patient.'

Buzzzzz...Buzzzzz...

'Stay calm. If you make any sudden movements, it will sting you. Just... stay... calm...'

Buzzzzz...Buzzzzz...

'Goddammit! Why isn't this bee going away?'

Buzzzzz...Buzzzzz...

Roxas then did something incredibly stupid and immature, which, looking back at it, he will wonder what began to possess him.

In irritation, he picked up his eraser and threw it in the direction of the bee, hoping to knock it out. The bee, however, too smart even for Roxas, skillfully dodged the oncoming projectile and fled out the open classroom window.

The eraser, while not striking its intended target, did manage to hit Mr. Saix square in the head.

You have never seen fury until you've met Mr. Saix.

"Who threw that?" he asked coolly, in a manner that reminded Roxas very much of the calm before the storm.

'Yep, I'm going to die again. I'm going to die for a third time at the hands of a heartless teacher. I think I'd prefer the meteor.'

Bracing himself for the inevitable pain, he heard someone call out, "I did."

He turned to Axel in shock.

Saix seemed surprised as well, raising an eyebrow in disbelief. "Really, now?"

Axel nodded his head.

"Well then," said Mr. Saix, returning to his usual, composed manner, "Mr. Parr, I don't know why I should've been surprised. You're always stirring up some sort of trouble. There isn't a day that goes by that I don't hear at least one complaint from the other teachers about your disruptive behavior." Mr. Saix eyed him suspiciously. "Which is why, even with all that, it's a wonder you always manage pass my class."

"Mr. Saix, I certainly hope you're not implying that I would ever cheat," Axel stated, pretending to be insulted, "What can I say? I'm good with numbers. It helps me memorize dates better. Maybe I'm not so good with words, which is why I'm failing all those other classes, but when it comes to History, all those years get stuck in my head like I'm some sort of numerical genius."

"Then would you care to explain why you're failing Algebra?"

"Formulas make my head hurt."

Mr. Saix rolled his eyes in irritation.

Axel noticed. "What, you don't believe me? It's true! You know those 'Guess how many gumballs are in the jar' things or some other crap? I won at that before. I could prove it, too." He held up his hand. "Here, watch me count to three," he said, smirking.

Mr. Saix watched patiently to see what he would do next. He had already thrown an eraser, disrupted class, mocked the teacher, and spoke out of turn. How much more trouble could he get himself into?

"One," Axel counted, sticking out his thumb as he did so.

"Two." He stuck out his index finger.

"Three."

The middle finger.

The entire class started to snicker. Mr. Saix, however, was not amused. He silently made his way over to his desk and started to write something down. Ripping it out, he handed it over to Axel.

Axel just stared at the pink detention paper.

So did Roxas. Even though he was glad it wasn't him instead, he couldn't help but feel a little guilty for getting Axel into trouble. Axel was never on Saix's good terms, even though he was one of his best students, and now, he probably made it even worse.

"All right, class is dismissed," said Mr. Saix loudly. "Now get out of here."

He started to pick up his books when he heard Mr. Saix say, "Except for you, Mr. Strife. I need to have a word with you."

'Crap.'

Roxas nervously made his way to the front of the room. "Yes, Mr. Saix? What did you want to see me for?"

"Don't even think you can fool me for a second."

"Huh?"

"I knew you were the one who threw the eraser," Mr. Saix accused, "That's why I was surprised to see Mr. Parr taking the blame instead. I never took him as the hero type."

"B-but if you knew, then how come..."

"I didn't give you a detention because it would defeat the purpose of his sticking up for you. You need to encourage these types of things, unfortunately. I gave him one because I don't take very well to being made a fool of." Mr. Saix eyed Roxas disapprovingly, "Don't think he's always going to be there to save your ass. In the future, try not to let something as small as a bee get the better of you."

Wow. Mr. Saix must've had some peripheral vision. "Is that all, sir?" Roxas asked.

"Yes. You may leave now."

As Roxas was halfway out the classroom door, he heard Mr. Saix call out, "I hope you realize what a good friend you have there, Mr. Strife." There was a smile in his voice.

Maybe he had a heart after all.


"Hey, Namine, do you want to walk with me to lunch?"

Roxas and Namine were the only ones left in the halls. Everyone else was already downstairs for lunch. Roxas usually liked to wait until the hallways cleared out so that it wouldn't be so crowded on the way to the lunchroom. He didn't have to worry about being first in line because he always brought his own food from home.

'Why am I asking? I already know what she's going to say.'

"Sorry Roxas, but I'm not eating lunch downstairs today," Namine said apologetically, "I'm helping Ms. Tifa clean up the Biology lab. It's been a complete mess ever since the frog dissection."

Roxas sighed dejectedly. Even if he expected the answer, it felt bad to be turned down. Especially if the person who turned you down preferred to spend lunch period with dead frogs rather than you. "That's okay. I'll just walk there by myself."

"JUST GET OUT THE HELL OUT OF HERE YOU DAMN ASS PUNK!"

Roxas stared at Namine in sheer horror. "Excuse me?"

She looked equally as frightened. "That wasn't me."

"GODDAMN IT!" They realized that the yelling was coming from the Biology lab. "WHY DIDN'T I TAKE THAT OFFER TO BECOME A WAITRESS AT THAT GODFORSAKEN DINER?"

"Is that Ms. Tifa?" Namine asked in disbelief. Roxas slowly nodded his head.

Axel came running out of the lab snickering hysterically and with a bleeding lip. Of course. Of course this had something to do with Axel.

"What did you do this time?" Roxas asked him accusingly.

Axel looked surprised to see him and Namine still in the halls. Then he started to laugh wildly. "I don't even know!" Axel choked out, hardly able to breathe. "But that was hilarious! Jesus! You drop a few F-bombs in class, and she acts like you've brought on the Black Plague!" Suddenly, he let out a sharp hiss of pain. "Damn, that woman punches hard," he said, rubbing his cheek. "I swear, she's a real bitch when she's PMS-ing."

"Why don't you get that checked by the school nurse?" Namine asked.

'Namine, why did you have to open your mouth?' Roxas thought. He knew what was coming next.

"Oh, hell, no!" Axel exclaimed. "That bastard Xaldin creeps the shit out of me. It's like he has man PMS." He let out another hiss of pain. "Isn't it against the teacher code or something to physically harm a student? I'm gonna sue this place for all it's worth."

"Yeah. All fifteen munny worth," Roxas joked. Namine stepped on his foot.

"I'm serious, guys! That could get dangerously infected! You should walk yourself over to the nurse right now, Axel!"

"I'm not going there alone!"

Namine turned to Roxas, her eyes silently pleading, 'Please walk this poor idiot downstairs for me.'

Why not? He had nothing better to do.

"Come on, Axel," Roxas said, tugging on his arm. "I'll walk you downstairs."

"Yeah, and I'd better start helping out at the lab," Namine spoke up, gesturing over to the room where Ms. Tifa was punching the walls angrily.

Roxas leaned over to her and whispered, "Good luck with that."

"Good luck with that," she whispered back, pointing to the still complaining Axel.

The two of them sighed in defeat. Namine reluctantly dragged her feet towards the direction of the lab.

"Hey Roxas, what's taking so long? Are we going or what?" Axel called out once she was out of earshot. He ran towards the other end of the hall. Roxas looked at him strangely.

'That's weird. He seems pretty eager to go to the nurse.' Then it dawned on him.

"You're not really hurt, are you?"

Axel smirked. So he figured it out, huh? "Nope."

"And were not really walking to the nurse's office, are we?"

"Nope."

"Then where, pray tell, are we going?"

"We are going to..." Axel stopped in his tracks and turned to face him. "...talk."

"Fine. But you can walk and talk at the same time, can't you?"

Axel scowled. "What's with you lately? You've been acting bitchy all day."

Roxas sighed. "I'm just...I just have a headache today, that's all. I stayed up all night trying to finish my homework."

Axel seemed to accept this answer and continued to walk down the hall.

"That was pretty funny earlier. Y'know, when you hit Saix in the head with that eraser. Did you mean to do that, or was it an accident?"

"Accident."

Axel chuckled. "Hah. Figured as much. Lucky I was there to take the blame. You owe me lunch for the next six months."

"Yeah, right. Helping a friend should be its own reward. Besides, you know I can't afford to get on Saix's bad side. At least you're passing his class with flying colors."

"That doesn't mean I have to like it. I hate History. Do you want to know why?"

"Not really." He had expected Axel to explain it to him anyway, but for the next few minutes, he didn't say anything.

He figured Axel grew tired of talking, and Roxas was prepared to walk the rest of the way in silence. Then Axel started, "The thing is..."

For a person who said they weren't very good with words, he sure had a lot of them to say.

"The thing is...you can't really tell what a person was like just by looking at a bunch of their stuff," Axel continued, "Or by listening to a bunch of people who knew them. Sometimes people say wrongs things about a person, you know?"

Roxas winced. He, more than anybody else in school, should know what that was like.

"The only way you could really know a person, like, their personality or whatever, is by actually meeting them, face to face." Roxas could see Axel struggling to think of a way to explain what he meant. "Like, let's say that in the future, humanity is completely wiped out or something. And a bunch of scientist alien people come to Earth and examine all of our bones and everything. They may know what we looked like, but they'll never know the real difference between one set of bones and another." Axel pauses for a moment, and Roxas almost swore he saw him blush, but he knows he must've imagined it because Axel is too manly for that.

"They'll never know exactly how much one set of bones meant to another set."

Roxas didn't know what to think of that. He knew what Axel was talking about, of course, but what struck Roxas as odd was how similar Axel's feelings about History were to his own. Granted, he may have worded it a bit differently, but underneath, it was the same idea:

You'll never get to know a person until you really get to know them.

That was one thing he and Axel had in common.

"Axel..." Roxas said after a long moment of silence, "You make the shittiest analogies."

Axel smirked.

The bell rang. School was dismissed.

Some kids were already running fast as hell, eager to get as far away from the school as possible. However, others, despite the clearly displayed NO LOITERING sign, decided to hang around for a while. Roxas was among the latter.

"Hey, Roxas! My car broke down! Can I walk home with you?"

Scratch that. He was just heading home.

"Bye, Namine," Roxas said to his girlfriend. "I'll see you tomorrow, okay?" He kissed her on the cheek and ran towards the sidewalk.

"Hey, wait!" Axel called out.

Roxas ran even faster. "Sorry, headache!" he yelled, pointing to his forehead. "Gotta go take care of it!"

"Roxas! Stop running!"

"Wh-"

Suddenly, his face came into contact with a hard, brick wall. He could feel one of the scratches on his face start to bleed.

Axel tried hard to stifle a laugh. "Told you to stop."

Roxas groaned irritably. "Bastard."

That, of course, only made Axel laugh more. "C'mon, let's walk over to your house. I could treat that with some bandages." He noticed Roxas eyeing him wearily. "Well, at least I could try."

Roxas froze. Him. Axel. His house. A pack of cigarettes hidden in Axel's back pocket.

He wasn't ready for a repeat.

"N-no. No." He shook his head. "No."

He picked himself up off the ground. "I-I can fix it by myself. I don't need your help. Just...stay here, okay?"

Axel watched him run away, concerned.

Something was wrong with Roxas.


Roxas soon found himself at his front door. 'What am I doing?'

Damn it, Axel would know that something was up. He should've tried to act less conspicuous.

He took out his set of keys and opened the door. His mother, who was sitting on the couch folding the laundry, greeted him. "Roxas! You're home early." She was home rather early, as well. Maybe the flower shop closed early?

She then went on to ask him the same old questions of "How was school?" or "You're staying out of trouble, right?" Roxas answered them without really listening. His mind was on other things.

"Um, Mom? Can I ask you a hypothetical question?"

"Sure!" she replied, folding the last of the large pile of clothing.

"If, hypothetically, everyone thought I did something really bad, and I swore to you I didn't, would you believe me? I know it seems really weird to ask, but..."

'Please say no. I would rather hear you say that than have you lie to me.'

His mother smiled sweetly. "Of course we would, honey. We know we can always trust you."

'Liar,' Roxas thought, and he felt terrible for thinking so.

"Why are you asking?" his mother asked, concerned, "Is someone spreading rumors about you in school?"

"No, don't worry. I was just curious. Thanks, Mom. You guys are such great parents." He forced a smile onto his face. "I'm gonna go upstairs."

He struggled carrying his heavy backpack to his room. Couldn't he just burn the damn thing? He wasn't planning on doing any of his homework, anyway. Though he had to make it look like he was, lest his mother suspect anything was wrong. He had a strategy to tackling the rest of this day: Act as normal as possible. He was reminded of those comic book superheroes that had to act as regular citizens to protect their secret identities. Roxas felt far from a superhero, however.

His cell phone started to ring, snapping him out of his thoughts and back to reality. His ringtone, Dormant by Demyx Loreone, started to play. Roxas soon found himself listening to the melancholy tunes of a dead man.

It's a whisper-thin wall

That is threatnin' to break

You long to feel

You whine and yearn

Growing extremely uncomfortable at the thought of listening to a song sung by a person who died at the same time he did, Roxas quickly answered his phone. "Hello?"

"Hey Roxas, it's me."

Axel.

It would have been much more comfortable if he had just listened to the entire song.

"Oh, hi, Axel. What is it?" he asked, trying to make his voice sound casual. It would be better if he just pretended this was a normal conversation on the phone.

"You seemed a little off today after school," Axel said, "I just wanted to make sure you were okay."

"Y-You were worried about me?" Roxas was pleasantly surprised, and, though he would never admit it, a little flattered. Neither Namine nor his mother was able to tell that anything was wrong with him. Axel even cared enough to call.

"Yeah. I mean, if I don't watch out for you, who will?"

Axel chuckled and so did Roxas. And for a while, any hard feelings Roxas had against Axel melted away.

Then he remembered the detention paper.

"Listen, Axel, I'm fine. You don't have to worry," Roxas said, "But about what happened this morning... with Saix? I'm really sorry. Really, I didn't mean to get you into trouble."

"Ah, it doesn't matter," Axel said passively, "I'm used to it anyway. Glad to hear you're fine, though! I guess I'll see you tomorrow in school, then. Okay, bye!" He could picture Axel's finger ready to press the End Call button.

'That's it?'

"That's it? I've been treating you like absolute crap the entire day, and you don't mind?" Roxas asked, incredulously. If it were any other person, normally, Axel would've gotten pissed and given them hell for it. Earlier, Axel had even told him he was acting bitchy. And yet he just forgives him in a matter of seconds?

'This isn't like you.'

"Of course I mind," Though Roxas could only hear Axel's voice through the phone, he knew he was smirking. "I was serious about you treating me to lunch."

"That's not what I meant! You... you should hate me right now. You shouldn't have called to ask me if I was okay. You should be trying to make me feel worse. You should be trying to make me feel terrible for-"

'-not going to your birthday party.'

"-not admitting that I was the one who really threw that eraser at Saix-"

'-like I hated you for not admitting that you were the one who was smoking.'

"-like the twisted, cocky bastard you always are."

Axel was confused. "You want me to hate you?"

"Yes! It-"

'-gives me a reason to hate you back.'

"-makes things fair!"

"Fair?" Axel started to grow concerned. "Roxas, what are you talking about? You don't hate me... do you?"

'Yes.'

"..."

Roxas didn't want to say anything. He didn't want to talk to this person. This... this stranger. Whoever they were, he knew for sure it wasn't Axel. Axel was never this forgiving or friendly or kind. He had liked the other Axel better, the troublemaker. That was the person he had wanted to make friends with all those years ago. He already had a girlfriend, Namine, who had more kindness and mercy in her than the rest of the student population combined.

"Axel?" Roxas finally said, "Just... just stay away from me for the rest of the day, okay? I don't feel like talking to you right now."

"Why?" Axel asked, sounding angry. But he wasn't asking it as a question. It was a challenge. Axel wasn't going to let Roxas weasel his way out of this one so easily.

'Fine,' Roxas thought, 'You want a battle? I'll give you a war.'

Too late did Roxas realize how far the conversation had drifted from a normal conversation on the phone.

"Axel," he said, making his voice as cold as he could make it. "You're better off just hanging up and leaving me the hell alone. Trust me. Just get on with your own life."

"Why?"

"You don't get it, do you? I hate you! I don't want to see you! I don't ever want to see you." Roxas bit his lip. The words... weren't coming out right. There were real, true emotions behind them, but not quite the anger and fury that he wanted. Instead his words were filled with utter desperation.

'Please.'

"I wish we had never met in the first place."

There was a moment of silence. Roxas thought that maybe Axel had actually fallen for that little performance. Then he heard laughter.

"You're lying," Axel said, "You don't really mean any of that."

"Y-Yes I do!"

Did he really? When he was alive, Roxas would have never said any of those words. He couldn't bring himself to truly mean them. He would never want to stop being friends with Axel. Whether he liked to admit it or not, deep down, he still thought of him as his childhood hero.

"Yes you are, I can tell," Axel said, "Face it, Roxas, you were never meant to be an actor. Something's bothering you, and you're being too stubborn to talk about it. C'mon, just tell me what's wrong. Maybe I can help."

"No! I told you, just stay away from me!"

"Is it about me?"

"No!"

"It is, isn't it? What did I do this time?"

"EVERYTHING!" Roxas blurted out, and he instantly wished he didn't. Too late, though. He started this. He had to finish it.

"Wh-Why are you being so nice to me?" he managed to ask. "Even though...Even though I..." He felt like an absolute ass. Axel was being so compassionate and concerned, and Roxas still hated him. It would have been so much easier if Axel had hated him back.

"Because we're best friends. That's why."

'This isn't like you.'

He understood what Axel was saying. He was saying that since he and Roxas were friends, he gets special treatment. But he didn't want to be special. He wanted Axel to treat him the same way he treated everybody else. That would make him feel a little more justified in his hatred and a little less guilty.

'You're making it very hard for me to hate you.'

If he didn't hate Axel, then how did he feel about him?

How was he supposed to feel about everything that had happened? Because if he didn't know, if he didn't have a concrete emotion to hang on to, before he knew it, all of the emotions inside of him would just collide with one another, until it became difficult to tell them apart. He wouldn't be able to handle it if everything was so jumbled. He needed something tangible, something easy to identify.

In a strange, sort of ironic way, only in that exact moment was he able to identify the emotion that has been there since the very beginning. The emotion that has stayed with him and weighed down his soul ever since he died.

It wasn't hatred.

He was just confused.

"I'm coming over Roxas. I'm coming over to see what's the hell is wrong with you."

'No.'

"NO!"

"You can't stop me. I'm already putting my shoes on."

'No. If you keep insisting that everything's okay...'

"Axel, I swear you'd better not leave that house, or I swear I'll-"

"You'll what? You can't do shit to me and you know it. You're so eager to have me to hate you? Fine. Try to mess with me, and I'll beat the crap out of you. But I'm not going to sit down while you obviously need help." Then a voice, softer and quieter. "'Cause that's what best friends are for." Roxas heard a door opening on the other line. "Bye."

"No, Axel, no!"

The line went dead.

Roxas just stood there, frozen in place. He couldn't do anything about it anymore. All he could do was wait for Axel to show up. Everything was going to play out exactly like the last time, and he was powerless to change it.

'Both of us are gonna get hurt.'

He slumped back, defeated, onto his bedroom floor.

He had lost the battle.

(...END OF CHAPTER...)

Author's Notes #2: I have to confess. The finger-counting scene with Axel and Saix and the middle finger was taken from an old movie called Stand and Deliver. I thought it was appropriate.

The next chapter is ANGSTY. So you can look forward to that. Unfortunately, the next chapter may end up taking longer than a week to get here, too. (It's a very emotional chapter!)

Review, please! Reviews make me happy.