Old In Here
Don't ever think that our relationship is all sunshine and flowers. Roxas and I have had some pretty rough patches. It took a long while to convince Roxas to let me tell you this story, so get ready for a ride.
This particular incident happened around Roxas' birthday. Or...Ventus' birthday? I don't know, the whole leap year thing still confuses me. They were born on separate days, but they still celebrate together, although sometimes they celebrate twice? I have no clue how they do it. All I know is that for the whole month leading up to their birthday, Roxas was a lot less enthusiastic than I expected him to be. Example...
"So, what do you wanna do for your birthday?"
"Die."
I wondered for weeks what had brought on the awful mood. He didn't want to talk about it, so I stopped asking about it after a while.
Two days before his birthday, we went out to dinner. He looked really out of it and distracted. One thing I noticed about Roxas is that whenever something serious was on his mind, it took complete control of him. He wouldn't bring it up until he was on the verge of snapping.
"You're doing it again," I frowned, sipping the very expensive wine he'd ordered for us.
He looked confused when he looked up, like he didn't even know he had been spacing out. "Doing what?"
I put my glass down and sat back in my chair. "You have a really bad habit of keeping things in and letting them destroy you. Something is obviously wrong with you. Talk."
He offered a smile and shook his head. "It's not that important."
"Roxas—"
This idiot looked at me with that stupid crooked smirk and said, "Gorgeous."
"I—Why do you—?!" I covered my cheeks with my hands when he started to grin. I hate when he tries to distract me from having a serious conversation. The more he wanted to avoid it, the better the compliments would get so I'd forget what I was saying completely. It wouldn't work this time. "Stop it, Roxas. What's up? Why do you get all down and quiet when I mention your birthday?"
"Why do you seem to get more and more beautiful every time I look at you?" he smiled, reaching for my hand. I snatched it away and folded my arms over my chest. He rolled his eyes and massaged his forehead with his hand. I waited patiently for an answer as he let the hand slide down to his cheek, elbow propped on the table. "It's not something I'd like to talk about."
"Because you don't trust me or because you think I won't understand?" I asked, narrowing my eyes.
"I'll be in trouble no matter how I answer that question, so let's just finish this dinner. We can talk about literally anything else you want, just not my birthday."
I knew that was partially a lie because there were a couple of things that I knew he would never ever talk about. Then it hit me: if I brought up a subject that made him extremely uncomfortable, then he'd be more willing to talk about why he apparently doesn't like his birthday.
"Okay then. Did you ever blow Riku?"
"...I have mixed emotions about my birthday."
I'm a fucking genius.
"What do you mean?" I asked, scooping up some of my pasta with my fork. It was really good. I think it was made by some really famous chef that's known around the world or something. Who knew those little fat wannabe-noodles could taste so delicious?
Of course I was worried about Roxas, but this pasta!
He grabbed his glass of wine and slowly swirled the liquid around. "I've never felt like my birthday was about me. Everyone in my life always has something more important going on, so I'd spend the day making sure everyone else was okay. I don't know if it's because my birthday isn't really the same as Ven's or if people really just don't give a shit about me, but my birthday just isn't special. I want it to be, but that's just wishful thinking."
I nodded, letting him know I understood. "So why don't you and I have our own little celebration tomorrow? Just because it won't be your birthday doesn't mean we can't still celebrate."
He scoffs, smiling bitterly. "Thanks...but no thanks. You don't have to worry about doing anything for me."
"Really? You tell me that after you made my birthday so amazing?" I asked. He just shrugged and started eating again. I knew there was something else he wasn't saying. "Is there another reason why you don't want to celebrate it?"
Roxas chewed on the tip of his fork thoughtfully, staring at his glass of wine with a blank expression as he swirled it some more. "Can I speak freely for a second?"
I nodded. He knew he could tell me anything.
"It's not that I don't want to celebrate my birthday...I just don't want to celebrate it with you."
I did my damnedest to swallow the fear, confusion, anger, and hurt that decided to band together and bum rush my heart all at once. I stared at the table top with wide eyes. For some reason, I couldn't stand to look him in the eye without feeling awful. In that moment…it felt like I had done something wrong and that I was supposed to know what it was, but I couldn't come up with a single thing. Guilt didn't quite make it to my heart. Oh no, that was stuck in the pit of my stomach. The self-directed disgust decided to make itself comfortable in my throat while shame settled in right behind my eyes. It wrinkled my nose while shock hung from my slack jaw like an anchor.
I think that was the most poetic thing to ever come out of my brain. I would have been more excited about that if happy hadn't been gunned down in the middle of the street and dragged into a dark alleyway.
"Okay," I managed to speak in a shaky voice, rapidly blinking away my tears. "And why don't you want to celebrate it with me?"
He hesitated. "Look, I'm sorry. You're an amazing woman and I've enjoyed the time we spent together, but I..." Roxas slowly put his glass back down onto the table, sighing deeply. "I think we should…"
In the brutal brawl that decided which emotion would get full control over my body, anger clawed its way to victory from the depths of a burning fire and fucking exploded before he could finish. "You think we should what?" I hissed. "Take a break? Is that what you want, you want a break?! How 'bout I break you fucking skull you piece of shit!"
As much as I had thought about it, dreaded it, and dreamed about this eventually being my reality, I never thought that the next sentences out of his mouth could have been real.
"I just don't feel the same way about you anymore. It'd be best if we stopped seeing each other."
I should probably tell you now that I don't take rejection well. Like, at all.
All the heat in my body left within milliseconds, then rushed back into me with the force of a wrecking ball.
"Naminé...?"
Everything between my shoulders and my fingertips stared to shake uncontrollably. I hadn't been that angry since my senior year of high school. That story doesn't matter, though. I wanted to hurt him so damn bad.
I remember him opening his mouth to speak, but I stood up and smashed my wine glass over his head before I could stop myself, letting the contents of the glass stain his hair and shirt a deep maroon. I was so fucking livid that my entire body had begun to shake, but I was also so hurt that tears had already found their way to my chin. I didn't care that I had the whole restaurant's attention, or that Roxas could have felt humiliated. I wanted him to be. I wanted him to feel as stupid and worthless as I felt.
He didn't bother to move, even as a bit of blood trickled down his forehead. He couldn't even look at me. "I'm sorry."
I found myself laughing in spite of everything I was feeling that night. "I promise you, you are the last man who will ever make a fool out of me. I hope you choke on all your pretty lies about wanting to be with me forever."
"I didn't lie to you, I—"
The rest of his sentence drowned out when I snatched my purse and quickly made my way towards the exit. Once outside, I got an Uber and went straight home. After that incident, I felt the strong urge to just shower and scrub away the last few months of my life. Everything that involved Roxas and that stupid gorgeous smile of his. I wanted to scrub away all remnants of him and burn all of the shit he gave me. I wanted to accept the engagement ring back so I could throw it in his dumb, pretty face.
More than anything, I wanted to cry.
x.o.o.x
The next morning, I woke up, but didn't open my eyes immediately. My entire world felt wrong, but for a completely different reason than being dumped. After some deep thinking, I realized that Roxas' little break up speech was rehearsed and insincere. It was set up to make me angry and hurt me on purpose. He wanted me to hate him...so that I would react horribly and leave.
Roxas had obviously been thinking about that for a while, but why? What was so bad that he would break up with me to keep me from questioning him? My eyes opened with a new determination to figure out what the hell was going on inside of my idiot boyfriend's head. He was not going to get off this easy.
And, as crazy as this sounds, he was not going to leave me without a legitimate explanation.
I went into work feeling fine. I was pissed at the bonehead for sure, but I was more concerned than anything. Something was seriously wrong, and it affected him to the point where he felt like he couldn't talk about it with me. That just wouldn't do. I let it slip from my mind as I lost myself in my work, patiently waiting for the work day to end.
The eyes of my fellow coworkers followed me as I made a beeline for Roxas' office after hours, along with some whispered rumors about us having another fight. Most of them were on their way out anyway, so I didn't care. I made sure to open the door quickly and slam it hard behind me. There was...no real point of me doing that. Like I said I was still pissed. Let me live my life, okay?!
Roxas was already sitting at his desk, looking like the walking dead with that bandage on his head. I couldn't even see him breathe at first, which honestly scared the shit out of me. "Roxas."
"Carter," he replied. He sounded just as bad as he looked.
"So we're back to last names? You're really taking this fake breakup thing far, aren't you?" I asked, leaning against the door.
He exhaled through his nose. "It wasn't fake. I really broke up with you last night."
"Because you don't feel the same way about me anymore. Correct?"
"Correct."
I had a gut feeling that Roxas was full of shit. A cruel smirk made its way to my face as I walked over and straddled his lap. His body reacted to me immediately; he sat up from his slouched position and his hands attached themselves to my waist like magnets. They always did. His eyes lit up like they always did. His breathing changed from deep inhales to shallow exhales like it always did. This dumbass still felt the same way about me, and there was literally nothing he could do to hide it.
"Tell me again that you don't feel the same way anymore. Try to convince me that you're not so turned on right now that you can't fucking think straight," I glared.
He only further proved my point by hesitating to respond. "There's a difference between love and lust."
"But you love me anyway. Don't you?"
"Carter—"
"You shut the fuck up, Roxas," I spat. "Whatever it is that you've got rolling around in your head, you get it out right now. Because one of the most annoying things about you is that you like to play tough and keep shit in that's hurting you when you don't have to. I'm not here to be your trophy, Roxas. I'm your girlfriend. I'm here for you to confide in. I'm here for you to trust. What's the point of being in a relationship if you don't talk to me? Communication actually works, you know."
"Actually, you're not my girlfriend anymore."
I shut my eyes and rubbed my hands down the sides of my face. "Swear to God, I'm about to turn into your worst nightmare if you don't stop this."
"Stop what, Naminé?" he glared back. There was a hint of real anger in it, but not enough to convince me that this was real. "I'm not playing around. This isn't a game or some sort of trick! We're not together anymore! Now will you please get the hell out?!"
I leaned away from him, nodding ever so slightly. "Okay. Ooookay. I warned you," I chuckled as I removed myself from his lap and walked over to the file cabinet. "Now here comes the crazy bitch." It didn't take much effort for me to push the file cabinet on its side, causing it to crash in front of the door and block the exit. Roxas quickly jumped out of his chair to stop me, but I had already flipped the table that was to my immediate left and knocked over another file cabinet before he could reach me.
"Cut it out! The hell is wrong with you?!" he spat.
I whipped around to face him after ripping some of his dumb motivational posters down. "This fake ass break up is obviously some sort of twisted cry for help! Well this is my cry for help! Help me understand why you're such a goddamn idiot that you can't just open your mouth and talk to me!" I roared as I punched him in his stupid broad chest as hard as I could.
"Carter, you're fucking insane...!" He coughed and wheezed as I punched him again and again.
I did not know I was that strong. I wasn't trying to hurt him.
"Oh, you haven't even begun to see insane. You want to act like this break up is real, so I'll show you what it's like to have me as an ex-girlfriend. Until you can get it through your thick skull that I'm trying to help you, I'm your crazy ex. I'll stop when you stop."
Roxas quickly dodged what would have been a serious blow to the throat. "If you keep hitting me, I'm going to call security and have you escorted out because I don't want to hit you."
That one sentence alone made me angry enough to tackle him to the ground. The second his back hit the floor, I started hitting him with about half of my strength. I didn't want to actually wound him or anything, though I sure as hell could have with that advantage. I just wanted to smack some sense into that stupid head of his.
But...I may have miscalculated one tiny little detail. Roxas is, without a shadow of a doubt, stronger than I could ever hope to be. Once he'd had enough of my crap, he grabbed both of my wrists in his left hand and pinned me to the floor, his right fist cocked and ready to hit me if need be. Actually, he was already in mid swing before he seemed to realize who he was about to hit. He redirected his punch to the floor next to my head at the very last second.
I'm telling you now, if that would have connected with my face...I wouldn't have been alive to tell this story. That would have imploded my skull. I'm surprised the floor didn't break.
Roxas glared down at me like he could have killed me, arm cocked back once again in threat. "I don't. Want. To hit you. Are you going to stop?" he spoke through his teeth.
"Fuck you," I laughed. I was scared out of my mind that I might have pushed him far enough to actually hit me this time, but I had to prove my point. "You're a selfish bastard who doesn't even see that the solution to his problem is right in front of his face. This is why you had so many problems with Riku!"
I easily dodged that second swing. Something told me that he wasn't really trying to hit me, but I felt the wind from his swing on my cheek. That was even more terrifying than actually being punch in the face.
"Riku has nothing to do with this. This is a problem that you and I are about to solve right now. You get out of my office, and I'll never have to see you again. Problem solved."
I relaxed a bit. "So that's it? You're not even going to kiss me goodbye?"
This seemed to calm Roxas down as well. "If I do, will you please just forget about me and go find someone who will actually care about you?"
I nodded, not wanting to show him how much that hurt me. I knew he didn't mean it, but it was still awful to hear someone you're crazy about say that to you.
So I headbutted him the second he got close enough. He clutched his nose in pain as I shoved him off of me and rushed towards the door. Just as I was about to grab the edge of the handle my hand was met with empty air. Panic raced through me as I heard Roxas stagger to his feet...and saw that the door handle was on the ground.
The file cabinet I pushed over must have knocked it clean off.
I ducked as Roxas swung at me with his palm open. I then took that opportunity to grab his midsection and squeeze him tightly. "I don't want to fight anymore! I quit!"
"No, you started this shit! You wanna act crazy?! Let me show you what crazy really is!"
Roxas…body slammed me.
I mean it was on the very lovely cushions of his brand new couch, but still...he body slammed me. I think that was the very first time I feared for my life around him. That's when I remembered he had a tendency to black out when angry.
Probably shouldn't have smacked him in the face that many times.
He drew back to hit me, I think, and I panicked. "The door handle fell off and we're stuck in here!" I screamed, holding my arms over my head to protect myself.
Thankfully, that managed to shock Roxas enough to get him to back off. He looked back at the door and sighed loudly. "You've gotta be kidding me. How is it that I'm always getting stuck in places with you?!" he yelled, punching the back of the couch before he walked back to his desk. I watched cautiously as he picked up the phone and dialed someone.
"Maybe this is a good thing? Maybe this is a sign that you should stop being an idiot."
He ignored me. I expected nothing less.
"Hey, I'm kinda stuck in my office with Naminé. Well, she flipped her shit and knocked over a file cabinet and it knocked the handle off. Yeah...no. Because there's no point. Can you just come open the door?! Hello?!" He rolled his eyes and hung up the phone.
I sat up as he sat down in his chair, shielding me from his view with his hands. The air was deathly silent and super tense.
In other words, it was the elevator all over again.
x.o.o.x
An hour in, I vowed that I would do something to get this bastard's attention and make him talk to me. He did a great job at ignoring me, but I was sure I could do a better job of being annoying.
"So did you break up with me for Riku?" I asked innocently. At that point, I was sitting on the edge of his desk with my legs crossed in a very Fran Fine-like way. I love her, so I decided to channel my inner Fran to bug the hell out of him.
Roxas didn't answer.
"Whatever. I'll just call him and ask him my—"
He snatched the phone out of my hands and threw it across the room. It kinda hurt my feelings, but I managed not to cry like a wimp.
"Self...okay!" I forced myself to laugh. It got no reaction out of him whatsoever. "Will you at least tell me why you don't want to talk this out?"
"There's nothing to talk about," he mumbled.
Was I getting fed up with his attitude? Of fucking course I was. But was I about to leave him alone and give up? Hell no. Honestly, the whole situation was draining. I was trying to help my idiot boyfriend with whatever the hell was wrong with him, but he just continued to push me away. Acting crazy wasn't going to solve anything, and neither was treating this like a game.
I loved Roxas more than I loved myself. And I think that's where I went wrong.
Slowly, I removed myself from the desk to get my phone. There was one last trick up my sleeve. If it didn't work, I was more than willing to let things stay the way they were. The only person who could help me get dumbo back to normal was one of his closest frenemies.
I called Vanitas.
"I knew you'd be crawling back for more," he answered in a voice as smooth as a velvet cake.
Damn, I'm craving velvet cake now...
"More what?" I snorted.
"Come on, don't act like you don't want me."
I shrugged. "Okay, I won't."
"You know you...'scuse me?"
It was so hard not to laugh. I had to boost his ego if I wanted to get us out of here and make Roxas jealous at the same time. "I said I won't. Because I do. I called to ask you for a favor because you're the only one who can help me."
The line was silent for a while. I almost feared that he hung up because he thought I was playing a joke on him.
"Wait, what about Roxas?"
"He broke up with me last night," I said, feigning indifference. "Won't even tell me why either. So...I give."
"...Where is he?"
Now that I honestly didn't expect. I thought he was going to say something that was slightly charming in a very Vanitas way, but no. He sounded mad.
"Locked in his office with me. I kinda got mad and broke the handle off...so we're stuck in here."
"I'm 'bout to whoop this motherfucker's ass! Wait 'til I fucking get down there! He's gonna fucking wish he was never born! Shit, all that crying he did when you two split was hell, and now he does this!"
My eyes widened as I held the phone away from my ear. I expected him to get all flirty in order to make Roxas jealous, not get mad and try to fight him. Maybe I fucked up? "Van, calm down. I don't need you to do anything drastic, so stop it. I just need you to come open the door for us. In exchange for this itty bitty favor—"
"Fuck your favor. I'm gonna kill that bastard."
The call ended just like that, and I could almost literally feel jealousy in the air. I glanced over to see what Roxas was doing. Glaring holes through me. Great.
He sat up in his chair a bit. "Why were you talking to Vanitas?"
I realized right then that I had the upper hand. He wanted to know something, I wanted to know something. I could see that little angry vein in his neck bulge out. That's what I like to call his jealousy vein. It's only visible when he gets jealous. Explosively so.
A smile easily hid my panic as I tried to pose as casually as I could. I don't think it worked. "No reason."
"Talk," he frowned.
"Nope."
"Dumb whore."
"Unoriginal hypocrite."
I knew he was just acting out so I didn't pay much attention to the name calling in that moment.
He would pay for that later, though.
"Why are you doing this?" Roxas asked, dropping his hands on the desk. "Why can't you just leave it alone?"
I snickered. "I did. I left it alone and now I'm leaving you alone. That's what you wanted, right? To break up with me? This is what happens in breakups: people talk to other people. I don't understand why you're upset right now."
"Because you're not telling me what I wanna kno—" He immediately stopped and grit his teeth. I smirked and tapped my temple with my index finger. I may be turning into Axel...and that's totally okay with me.
"Hear it now?" I asked casually.
Roxas ran a hand through his hair and growled. "I broke up with you...because this is something I know you won't let go until I talk about it. I don't want to talk about it because you won't understand."
"You don't know what I'll understand. And even if I don't, maybe it's just something you need to get off of your chest. I can listen. Everyone needs to vent, you idiot. I don't want to have to fight you and try to make you jealous just to get you to act right, Roxas."
He shook his head, propping his chin up in the palm of his hand. His eyes still looked kind of dead. "I told you on our first date that I'm a little crazy."
"So am I! So is everyone in the fucking world! Shit, we're all different types of crazy. We live to find other people with similar types of crazy so that we can feel normal and loved and accepted. You've got me, and I'm a damn handful. If you ever had any real feelings for me at all, you'd stop being so stubborn and let me in."
Roxas stared at the floor, looking like he'd rather die than to open his mouth. At first, I took his silence as his answer and just turned away. It fucking hurt to even think that all we had been through wasn't real and I was on the verge of tears because of it. I had fallen in love with that reject and I just knew that he'd fallen for me. So him not saying anything was like a huge slap in the face.
"I broke up with you," he began slowly and softly, catching half of my attention, "Because I...I feel...old."
I turned back around to look at him. This was the saddest, most serious I had ever seen him. I really didn't understand what he was talking about. He's only a year older than me. "Huh?"
"I feel old," he repeated. "With every passing birthday, I start to feel worse and worse about my age. Then I met you and you made me feel young again. You make me want to marry you and have kids and start a family...and I...I feel like I should have done all of this in my twenties. By the time we get married, I'll probably be in my fifties and you won't even be able to have any kids. Then we'll just spend the rest of our days wishing and wondering and regretting the time we wasted on all those other people. Makes me want to give up now and die alone, but you just won't let that happen," he chuckled, blinking away tears.
"Of course I won't. Because I love you, Roxas. And none of what you're saying makes sense because you're not old, and we still have a chance to do everything you want to do. Pulling stunts like this is what really wastes our time. Instead of trying for babies, you're making me fight you when all I really wanna do is kiss the hell out of you."
"You don't get it. I know I'm not old, but—"
"You're scared of getting old."
I knew I was right when he looked away.
"Roxas, you don't have to worry about that. You said I make you feel young, right? Then focus on that. Nothing else."
Roxas sighed heavily, shaking his head. "I'm so sorry for my behavior. I threw an ugly tantrum like a child and it was so stupid. You were right. I should have just talked about it."
"You're damn right," I laughed, walking over to sit on his desk again. He buried his face into my lap, trembling like a cold Chihuahua and sniffling softly. That right there let me know that he had never talked about this with anyone else. I was the first to hear about this, and it made me feel really special. "I'll kill you if you ever do this again."
He laughed at that. I frowned to myself as I rubbed his back. Bitch thought I was playing. Funny.
"You know," Roxas started, looking up at me with a half smile, "I never would have really hit you. I was just trying to scare you into leaving me alone."
I smiled. "I figured as much. But Vanitas is going to really hit you."
"What?"
There was a loud bang against the office door, followed by a loud scraping sound as the file cabinet was slowly pushed out of the way and the door was forced open. Vanitas stood in the doorway in some of his best business casual clothing.
I'm not gonna lie, business casual looked real fucking good on him.
"You motherfucker," he spat, glaring daggers at Roxas.
I quickly hopped off of the desk. "You're going to pay off that whore comment like a fucking debt with three years worth of intrest."
"Wait, no! Don't leave me alone with him!"
I think that's the first time Roxas ever lost a fight.
x.o.o.x
On Ventus' birthday, I woke up in a pair of strong arms. They felt like home, so I immediately knew that it was Roxas. I knew how every inch of his skin felt without even having to guess. I was still mad at him for being so ridiculous...but the sex is absolutely amazing when he's out-of-his-mind jealous.
"Baby," he sang with his adorable sleepy voice as he kissed the back of my neck.
I swatted his arms away. "I'm not your girlfriend anymore, remember? I'm dating Vanitas now."
"Like fuck you are," he hissed into my ear. It gave me chills. "No matter what you do, where you go, or who you see, you will always be mine. I'm never letting you go again."
It didn't fix the hurt that I had been feeling because of what happened, nor did it relieve me of the new insecurities I felt and the doubts I had about our relationship, but...it was a step in the right direction.
"I love you," he whispered when he received no response.
I smiled, placing my hand over my aching heart. "Fuck you, Roxas."
Roxas pulled me back against his chest and wrapped his arms around me tight. I could hear the smile in his voice when he spoke. "Close enough."
x.o.o.x
I wanna address two things here: 1, this is not an abusive relationship. When Naminé "hit" him, it was more like playful smacks. That fight scene is meant to be seen as a cheap stage fight because neither of them are actually trying to hurt the other. 2, when Roxas says she'll always be his, he's joking around with her. They have the type of relationship where they can talk to each other that way and know that it's not serious. Do NOT fucking come at me talking about I'm glorifying abusive relationships because I'm not. This isn't even meant to be taken seriously.
On a more positive note, thank you guys for reading, and for laughing at the craziness of this relationship. There will be more coming soon.
