Chapter Thirty Six: Normal?

As he paces around the small kitchen of the hotel room, Riku slams the tiny fridge closed with his hip. He adjusts the phone on his ear as he quickly makes a mess of the egg he had been trying to fry. Trying to cook breakfast was seriously a bad idea.

Why did he think he could cook? He had been a rich boy all of his life, he had never cooked in his damn life. The only time he had ever made something edible was a single time when he was a teenager and Sora had been making sugar cookies for Valentine's Day…

"No, I'm still here, Uncle," the man grumbles into the phone as he prods the mass of blackened egg with his spatula. It jiggles slightly, making him frown. He knows that eggs shouldn't do that. "Look, I really don't appreciate you sending my cousins over to look after me. Haru and I have a lot to do –"

The voice on the other end sighs, the deep voice already sounding disappointed. "You know that I am concerned with you taking care of a child, Riku, in your delicate state… You could easily hurt the boy, you should come and live with your cousins as soon as possible."

His grip on the phone tightens and Riku has to pause to count to ten, just like his therapist had told him. One, twothreefourfive-! "Xemnas, look, I don't need help taking drugs! And I don't need them running after my kid and trying to make him a zombie like you three are!" He snaps, making the three year old jump and drop his sippy cup. Riku turns around to look at Haru, who states back at him in a horrified way, obviously expecting to be punished.

"Excuse me?" His uncle demands coldly, obviously not finding the half-joke funny.

Haru bursts into tears, pressing his little hands hard against his face as Riku grabs the frying pan and shoves it into the sink. "Will you wait a damn minute, I have to take care of my son." The father growls before slamming the cell phone hard onto the counter. He knows that it wouldn't have turned off from that, but it was satisfying nevertheless.

If only he could do that to Xemnas in person…

The three year old hiccups in fear, even as his daddy scoops up the little red cup he had dropped and puts it back onto the table. Haru shakes harder as Riku picks him up and puts a kiss on his forehead. The motion makes the boy freeze. "I'm not mad at you," his daddy tells him immediately, soothing the boy with a cuddle. "Xemnas is making me mad and I can't make your breakfast like I said I could, okay? I'm just mad but not at you." Riku explains.

Haru bites his lip and looks up at him. "Can I have peanut butter?" he sniffles as he rubs his eyes hard. Riku softens at the gesture and sighs. His son is adorable, even and especially when he was being helpful. "Yes, Haru, you can have peanut butter. Just give me a minute to talk to Uncle Xemnas and –"

"I do hope you have not hung up on me, Riku," the voice interrupts from the counter, somehow managing to sound just as loud as he would have if Xemnas had been there in person. "Because I have not finished speaking to you."

Riku slams his hands into his head, groaning as he flops down to the floor. His head starts to ache, making him know that it was time for another dose of medication. Man, he really wants his medicine… No, he wants to get away from this crummy room and back to the house that he had found vandalized and destroyed when he came home. Maybe a new house, maybe he could find a new house… He sprawls out and looks up at his son in his high chair, wishing desperately that he could run as far away from both the phone and the burning pan and-

Burning pan.

"Shit!" Riku jolts up just in time to see the abandoned pan on the stove flare up with blue flames because he had put the heat up too high when he was trying to defrost the bacon. The man rushes for the cabinet, ripping it open and hauling the only too well used fire extinguisher from inside. He flicks the pin off and sprays the entire stove full of white foam before shoving the second pan into the sink with the first.

He could feel Haru watching his dad as he twists the dial to turn the stove off. "Daddy?" The little boy asks as Riku flops back to the floor and starts to cry. He didn't know why he was crying, only that it hurt and he really wants the pain to stop. Choking on mucus, Riku just flashes his son a thumbs up sign and rubs his eyes hard, trying to force himself to calm down.

One of the side effects of his medicine was severe mood swings.

Gulping in a few mouthfuls of air, the former criminal looks up at his son and sighs softly. "Peanut butter?" Riku asks quietly as Haru looks away from him, the quivering of his bottom lip showing that the little boy was about to cry too. "I'll make us some sandwiches, okay, Haru? Even I shouldn't be able to mess that up."

"Okay… not hungry no more." The little boy answers with a shaky voice, obviously trying not to burst into tears again. Riku shakes his head and hoists himself up off of the floor, pulling a hand towel from a handle and rubbing it against his palms.

"Out of jail for a damn week and everyone and their mother is bothering us," he mutters darkly to himself as he walks over to his son and pulls him into a tight hug. Haru shifts to look up at him, startled amazement appearing in his eyes as his father cuddles with him again. Riku smiles; it didn't take very much to make the little boy happy, he was starved for attention that his father was only too happy to give to him. He runs his hand on his son's face and whispers softly. "I love you. It'll be okay, buddy."

Haru nods and relaxes into his father's embrace, clinging to him close and inhaling the scent of his father's cologne, the charred bacon, and the sickly sweet scent of the medicine in his veins.

"Riku!" The phone snaps one more time.

Riku and Haru sigh in unison, both father and son staring up at the ceiling in annoyed anxiety. "That's it, we're moving. I'm going to get us as far away from this place as humanly possible," The man mutters as he reluctantly lets go of his son and walks to the counter to snatch up his phone again. "Yes, Xemnas, I'm here," He says into it before pausing to look over at the table again.

His son stares as Riku grabs a jar and a bag of bread from one of the cabinets and takes them with him to the table. Even though he was paying attention to the ramblings of his family member, Riku's mismatched eyes are solely on his son. His hands work to fashion a haphazard sandwich and the smile is slowly growing on his face as Haru giggles under his breath.

He makes a funny face at him, making the toddler burst out laughing in surprise. Riku adjusts the phone one more time on his ear before asking: "So, Xemnas, if you're so worried about me, how about you let your son take care of Haru and I for a few weeks while we move? I'm thinking of moving in with you for a bit."

The startled splutter from the phone, loud enough so that even the giggling Haru could hear, is enough to make Riku start laughing too.

"Alright, so that's a no. I'll need my cousins to make room for me though, where'd you say they went again?"

Riku freezes when Xemnas answers, his mouth dropping as the name of the town emerges from the other side of the phone. He could not have heard right. "… They live in Twilight Town?"

"Yes, and I expect you to get there in no less more than three days, boy," Xemnas informs him coldly, obviously having had enough with his nephew. Riku feels himself collapse into one of the chairs, the words echoing in his muddled, unmedicated mind. He feels his son pull the finished sandwich out of his hand and start to eat it, but the man could only stare at a spot on the wall in horror.

Twilight Town… he was going to have to go to Twilight Town…

He might see Sora and Kairi.

Haru takes another bite of his sandwich and pokes at his father's hand. "It's good," the little boy says calmly, unaware of the fear that was coursing through Riku's veins. All the child did is take a few more bites of the sandwich and then put his sticky hand onto his fingers.

Riku says nothing, only listens to Xemnas as the older man went on a tirade on how he should be grateful for the sacrifices his family is making for him, how Riku should be ashamed to have been in jail, and how Xemnas hoped that he would stay on his medication. The threat of having Haru taken away from him is only briefly registered, forcing the father's hand to find his son's and hold it tight.

All the while, the same six words keep repeating in his head like a terrifying echo. He couldn't let it happen, he couldn't let himself see her again, he couldn't let her die because of him… he couldn't let his son see the evidence of his crime, he couldn't lose Haru! He would die before he would ever lose his son.

'You're going to see Xion again…'