Nothing's like before
How I missed Kairi.
I wondered if she still looked the same. Red hair, violet eyes, beautiful smile.
And Riku. The longer I looked for him the harder his image had become etched in my brain. His white hair and icy blue eyes growing sharp around the edges.
I would have dreams about them, lying on my back in the middle of nowhere in particular. I would wake, hoping to open my eyes and see them before me and yet, it couldn't be.
Kairi was back on our island, safe, for now. Riku was lost behind the door to the dark, the door to the light. I didn't know if he could have survived an entire year in the darkness.
Sometimes the only thing that kept me going were the warm and soft memories of the beach sand sticking to the bottoms of my wet feet. We would run across the beach, racing for nothing, racing for her. She was so far away.
Nothing seemed right anymore, fighting my way to a door and who knows what else. No one could tell me what would happen when we opened that door. Would all the worlds become one again? Would the light within finally vanquish the darkness? Would I ever be reunited with Riku and Kairi?
Donald's quaking snore interrupted my thoughts.
Of all the strange things I had seen and done since this adventure began, pairing up with the talking duck and dog were possibly the strangest.
Goofy seemed nonplused by Donald's noisy slumber. He was quiet and watchful, looking out for Heartless. We had spent many such nights, sitting quietly together. We had no words to describe the horrors we had seen and the wonders. There were still wonders.
The architecture of Hollow Bastion had held a special power over me. That was Kairi's home world. I recognized it from the memory she showed me of the library. That place was beautiful even in disrepair.
Yet the horrors were beginning to outweigh the wonders once again. The scale was tipped clearly in favor of the darkness.
Ansem had been destroyed and that had been a victory, but it was a very small victory compared to what was lost.
The door closed and Riku looked out at me his eyes shining and his heart on his sleeve for the first time in his short life. I wanted to reach my arm in and pull him out. I wanted to tell him that he could come out, that he didn't have to repent for his errors in judgment. He wouldn't have listened, but I wanted to tell him.
In that one stupid moment before the door closed, sealing my best friend away from me forever I had frozen. I could not tell him that I loved him and that I forgave him.