Pretending for a Lifetime
Riku moved to Destiny Islands when Sora was seven. Sora always avoided him, pretending that he wasn't running away from the boy who made him feel like a panicked seagull was trying to escape from his chest. On the weekends, he told his friends that he heard his mom calling him home for dinner, even when they had had lunch only an hour ago.
When Sora was a freshman at Destiny High, Riku defended him against some guys who were bullying him, even though Riku was only a Sophomore and they were Seniors. When Sora thanked him and found out that Riku knew his name, he pretended not to swoon.
When Riku came out to him three months into his first year of college, Sora came out too, but he pretended not to be perturbed when Riku laughed and said that he already knew, and that they would always be best friends.
The night after Sora turned eighteen, Riku confessed to liking him and asked him out. Sora flung his arms around Riku and shouted YES! before Riku could get the final word out. He pretended not to fall in love when Riku smiled at him, a look in his eyes that confirmed what he had just said.
When Riku said I love you the first time, Sora said it back, not pretending at all.
Riku broke up with Sora after three years together, and not long after that, he asked Axel out. Sora pretended not to be haunted by Riku's mantra since their breakup: We'll always be friends.
Axel got further than Sora, proposing to Riku after only six months of going out, eight of knowing each other. Sora pretended to grow a beard for No Shave November after he threw out his razor.
When he got the wedding invite in the mail, Sora went to the pharmacy, pretending to be picky about pain killers while trying to rip himself away from that shelf full of pills. He got a bottle of Seagram's instead.
Three miraculous years later, Sora had found some peace in his friendship with Riku. He pretended that that wasn't because he had finally sobered up and needed all the support he could get to stay that way.
Riku came to his apartment one night a year later with a large duffel bag, asking if he could sleep over. The weary look on his friend's face forced Sora let him in. He pretended not to have thousands of questions because he knew Riku would explain when he was ready.
Riku did explain after a few more nights at Sora's apartment: he and Axel had separated. Sora didn't have to pretend to be pained about the couple's separation because he knew that pain all too well, but he did pretend that there was nothing else to pretend about.
Two months passed before Sora couldn't pretend anymore that Riku was drunk more than he was sober. He had warned him, of course, but Riku didn't listen. Sora pretended to be patient while pestering his sponsor, alternately complaining to him and asking for his advice.
Riku finally hit rock bottom. Sora dragged Riku first out of the gutter and his own vomit, then into the shower, then to an AA meeting. He pretended to be annoyed when all he felt was relief. He also pretended that he didn't want to hold Riku for any reason other than comforting him every time he woke up, shaking and sweating from a nightmare.
Riku and Axel's divorce was finalized. As Riku sobbed into his shoulder, Sora fought the urge to kiss away his tears and pretended again that holding Riku to comfort him was the only kind of holding he wanted to do.
Three years and a day after that, Riku found himself collecting a chip at an AA meeting that said, Congratulations! Three years of sobriety. While cooking dinner that night, Sora pretended that his eyes were watery because of the onions he was cutting.
When Sora picked up the mail a year after that, he noticed the address of Riku's new apartment on one of the envelopes. When he responded to the note by phone, again screaming YES! even though he couldn't fling his arms around Riku, he pretended that he hadn't just taken a long shower so that he could sing his heart out while having an excuse to not hear his neighbors banging on his door.
On their second first date, Sora was almost knocked to the ground by the force of his feelings raging up as they hadn't done for just under a decade. He pretended that he couldn't see Riku experiencing the same thing.
Sora asked Riku to marry him nine months in. He laughed at the irony when Riku flung his arms around Sora and bellowed YES! directly into his ear. Sora pretended that his ears weren't ringing for the rest of the night.
Their wedding was on the beach, in the same spot where Riku had confessed the first time around. After all the pain and the pretending, they had finally found the love that they both deserved. They murmured together, It's always been you. Sora found himself forgetting the thirty-four years of waiting that lead up to this moment. Between them, there was no room left to pretend.
When Riku died at 86, Sora thanked God for literally everything, right down his first bottle of Seagram's, the onions he had been cutting on Riku's third sobriety birthday, his high school bullies and even the times when his mom really was calling him home for dinner. Sora didn't need to pretend that he and Riku had had a good life together.
Just before Sora died, almost two months after Riku, he wondered if reincarnation was real: would he see Riku in heaven or have to find him in the next life? He pretended not to be anxious, for their daughter's sake.
As Sora took his last breath, he decided that every moment of the thirty-four years he had waited to be with Riku was absolutely worth it. That was something which he knew he never could have pretended about.
The last four lines about Sora and Riku's wedding are adapted from the final lines of Dark Ki's fic, I Would Know You. It's my favorite fic of all time by a landslide, and those last lines are my favorite ones in the entire story. Cheers and many thanks to you, Dark Ki – you're simply amazing.