Chapter 3
Where did you find all your answers?
The same place I found all my questions.
I'm being serious.
And you think I'm not?
It's just that…you always seem to know.
And that may be the one thing I regret most of all.
Early morning sunshine peeked through the window at Sora, who grumbled incoherently and turned as much as he could away from the piercing rays that entered the room. Gulls made their cries somewhere out over the sea, their noises mixing with the sounds of soft zephyrs flowing through the window to make a strange harmony unattainable by any other orchestra than nature. Somewhere downstairs, someone was cooking breakfast, and the smells from the eggs, toast, butter and coffee pervaded throughout the house, finally rousing Sora from the dearly beloved worlds of his dreams.
After the bout from the day before, he and Riku had been invited for dinner and had been given two rooms in the mayor's house- the latter being offered after they had shown their munny pouches. The house was large but not too conspicuous, as the mayor was still a man of the people, and it reminded Sora of his own home.
Home. He had passed by his house they were in the mayor's car. It had passed too quickly for him to take a good look, but those same old lights had been lit, and the front yard was still very well-kept. It didn't hurt that much, though.
…Yet, anyways, said a voice in his head.
He sat up on his bed and ran a hand through his hair, feeling it move back into a comfortable chaos over his head. Standing up, he stretched and yawned languidly, feeling the life return to his limbs. Still half asleep, though, he didn't realize he was heading towards the bathroom until he was right in front of it and had noted another person walking in his direction.
Kairi's hair stood up in an auburn halo around her head, and she was rubbing the sleep out of her eyes. Her pajamas were white and purple, which reminded Sora of her old tank top and skort. Not that, he noted to himself, he minded her newer outfit. She still hadn't noticed him, so he watched her until she was nearly face to face with him, when he said, "Good morning, Kairi."
She opened her eyes slightly, stared at him a good ten seconds before she turned around, still evidently half asleep and not making an effort to wake up, and murmured something about using the upstairs bathroom. He watched her pad softly away, her slippers making slight scuffling noises as she headed towards the stairwell. Chuckling softly to himself, he opened the bathroom door and stepped inside to get ready for the day.
The bathroom was nearly all white, with its standard toilet and mirrors. He picked up one of the soaps and sniffed it. It had taken him quite a long time to realize how much he had missed that particular scent. Actually, it had taken him a long time to realize he missed any of this at all, so caught up was he in his grand adventure. And when it had finally dawned upon him…
Picking up one of the disposable toothbrushes that had apparently been laid out for him, he brushed his teeth, rubbing a hand through his eyes to ward off the drowsiness. He winced as he splashed icy water on his face and hair, waking him up instantly. Bowing his dripping head over the sink he groped around for a towel until he felt one being handed to him. He took the towel and began to dry his face and his hair before he turned around to face Riku, who was leaning against the doorway.
"Morning," said Sora, finishing with the towel and placing it around his shoulders.
"Afternoon," corrected Riku. "It's almost eleven-fifty."
Sora frowned. "Wait, that doesn't make sense. I just saw Kairi wake up, too."
"What a coincidence, huh?" said Riku rather caustically.
"Yeah…" Sora continued to dry his hair when Riku's thoughts occurred to him. "Wait, hold on, you're not suggesting…" Sora trailed off as his face turned red. "H-hold on!"
"I'm not suggesting anything," said Riku, and straightened up to leave when he found Kairi glaring at him from the hall, still dressed in her pajamas and with wet hair.
"Just so you know, I was sick all day yesterday," she said, leaning over and poking Riku in the chest. "And I'd appreciate it if you don't go off fantasizing and handing out tickets for gossip!"
Riku opened his mouth to make a retort, thought better of it, and looked away, embarrassed, while muttering an incoherent reply. Kairi, satisfied, then turned on Sora, who quickly turned around to pretend to be washing his face again.
"And you're the same as ever! You have no reason to sleep half as much as I did! How can someone not change that much in two years?"
Sora, his face wet again, pretended to use that as an excuse not to say anything. Kairi didn't wait for him and turned on her heel to go back to her room.
The two remaining people waited until Sora had finished drying his face before breaking out in chuckles. Sora headed back to his room, and Riku told him to get down as quickly as possible because they had a number of things they needed to do during the day. Sora nodded vaguely, obviously going to take his time.
"Oh," Riku added, halfway down the stairs. "And your breakfast's about to be thrown away."
The thundering of feet told Riku that Sora had rushed to his room.
Kairi came down shortly after, wearing mahogany short-shorts and a matching hooded tank-top. Both boys glanced at her, but Sora returned to his food and Riku turned his head to stare outside. Choking down her annoyance, she went over to the refrigerator just as the mayor's wife hurried over to the door.
"Have a nice time with your friends, honey," she called over her shoulder as she went.
"Bye, mom," said Kairi quickly and shortly as the front door slammed shut. After taking a carton of milk out, she poured herself a bowl of cereal and quietly began to eat. Sora, on the flip side, was eating through his brunch with a gusto, saying, as he did so, that nothing was quite like Destiny Islands' food.
Kairi noticed something, then. "Hey…do either of you have any other clothing besides those things you're wearing now?"
Sora and Riku traded glances and both shook their heads. Actually, Riku did have his Order robes, but they were out of the question, so…
"Then we should go buy some! It can be our first stop for the day!"
Sora looked down at his clothes and frowned. He was fond of the outfit, quite so, actually, and couldn't imagine wearing clothes in any other style. But…Then again, these clothes represented a life that was no longer his. A life that could no longer be his. They were the clothes of a Keyblade master, imbued with the same magic - if it was magic at all- innate within his old weapon; a weapon that was only dwindling in his heart. What was this reluctance at throwing away his clothes, then?
"Sora, you coming?" Kairi's voice brought him out of his thoughts as she and Riku were leaving through the doorway. Now was not the time to be lost in his thoughts. He'd have plenty of time to think things over.
They took the trolley-Sora wondered if his memories of Twilight Town's were his own or Roxas'- to a street lined with stores. The first thing they did- Sora hadn't shopped for anything but items for his journey and food since he could remember and Riku hadn't shopped since they'd left Destiny Islands- was to go and get Sora and Riku some new clothes. The two boys stood back and let Kairi choose, mostly. Neither of them quite knew where to start and, to be honest, neither were really interested, either.
"So, Sora," said Riku after they had been watching Kairi move around the racks for a while. "Have you thought about it?"
"Thought about what?" said Sora, following Kairi's decisions with a slight grimace every few seconds. Destiny Islands fashion had changed, as far as his fashion sense was concerned. It now mattered more on matching colors rather than the myriad colors that had been in fashion when he had started his journey.
"School," said Riku.
Sora turned to him. "You've decided on something?
Riku nodded. "I went on a jog in the morning and ran past it. I think you'd find a few things there... interesting. I'm all for going now. We should stop by later so you can see."
"Like what?" said Sora, but before Riku had a chance to answer, Kairi walked up to them and handed out their bags.
"I kinda estimated your sizes, and I'm not too great on fashion, but they'll look normal. You guys look like you're from another world," she said, grinning and sticking her tongue out at them.
Oh, the irony, said a voice in Sora's head.
They left the store to go yet another and another after that. It didn't take long for Sora and Riku to be holding at least three bags per arm. Neither were breathing very hard, though the day really hadn't turned out as either one of them had planned. They walked along the street like this, Kairi saying hi to people along the way while promising to get back to them. Sora noticed that these people would cast furtive glances towards Kairi as they passed. He glanced at Riku, but Riku was looking at the stores, watching for...
"Hey, hold on, Kairi, Sora," he said suddenly, stopping in front of a store. Sora looked over Riku at the window of the small shop, expecting to find...weapons, of course.
"Boys," muttered Kairi. "I'll be at the ice-cream parlor over there." She pointed across the street. Riku and Sora nodded and watched her leave as they entered the shop.
The shop itself was quite large- larger than either of them remembered it had been when they had entered as kids gawking at the weapons from the window. A vast array of weapons lay on the walls, from the training wooden swords both Sora and Riku had used when they were younger, to lethal-looking weapons bursting with magical power.
"Can I help you two kids?" a burly man from behind the counter said, eyeing them warily. "If you don't have a mind to buy anything, then please leave. Mind you, I'm not going to sell you a thing unless you can prove you can use it."
Riku ignored the manager and began looking from wall to wall, but concentrated mainly on the broadswords lying behind the counter. They were normal broadswords, too, unlike the ones right behind the owner, some of which glowed from time to time. It didn't take a fool to know which ones had been magically imbued.
Sora, on the other hand, felt uncomfortable under the scrutiny of the shopkeeper and was slowly making his way to the door when a particular longsword caught his eye.
"Hey, Riku," he said, pointing to a blue longsword that looked as if it had been made by glowing water. "Isn't that the weapon Tidus was using?"
The shopkeeper whirled on him and demanded, "What? Tidus was using his Brotherhood?" This time, it was Riku who turned around and asked, "Brotherhood?"
"Yes, the name of that model. One of the better blades, aesthetically pleasing, too, but not near the level of Tidus' Swordplay...Hmm… I wonder why he isn't practicing with Caladbolg... Perhaps it's still a little much for him?..." The shopkeeper trailed off, then, realizing his customers were still there, glared at them as if to say they had made him say something wrong.
"So," said Riku casually. "What do you think about Tidus?"
The shopkeeper stared at him incredulously for a moment and then broke out in laughter. "What do I think about Tidus? What else would anyone think about our blitzball ace and four time champion of the Destiny Islands Coliseum? He's the pride of our island!"
Sora was wondering what the shopkeeper was talking about when he heard the door open and close. Riku had walked out of the door. The shopkeeper was going on about Tidus's pretty girlfriend, too, but Sora paid him no heed and followed Riku out.
"What was that all about?" he asked Riku as he caught up to the silver haired boy. Riku didn't say anything, but headed towards the ice cream shop, his mouth in a grim line. Sora followed Riku's line of sight and saw Kairi, but she was not alone. Blonde hair and tanned skin greeted Sora's eyes as the two boys entered the small shop. Kairi waved when she saw them and began to move towards them.
"Oh, sorry Tidus, I've gotta go," said Kairi as she brushed by him. "Thanks a lot for the ice cream, though."
Tidus didn't say anything but watched as they left, though not without meeting the eyes of the two other boys before the two walked out behind Kairi.
"I think that should be about it for now," said Kairi, taking a last look around the street. "Maybe we should go home-"
"No, wait," said Riku. "Sora wanted to go see the school and I have some business to attend to. Why don't you two go and see the school and I'll meet you two back home."
Kairi and Sora nodded and left. Riku watched them get on a bus, Sora struggling a bit because of his bags, before his green eyes turned back to the weapon shop.
"You again?" asked the shopkeeper as Riku entered the doors for a second time, though the burly man was looking a little angry they'd left the shop during his rant.
"I'm here to buy this time," said Riku, setting down his bags.
"As I said, kid, I don't sell to just anyone unless I know they won't cut their damn toes off," said the Shopkeeper.
"So what do I have to do?" said Riku.
The shopkeeper sighed. There were too many kids like this these days. After the two boys had disappeared, though, it was only Tidus who could…He stopped, and frowned. Two boys? What two boys?
"Hey," said Riku, starting to get cross. He got the shopkeeper out of his reverie.
"What? Oh. Right. Well, it depends. What do you want to use?"
Riku pointed. The shopkeeper sighed.
"That's a pretty good choice, but no deal. As I said, kid, I don't want you to go and kill yourself, and with that sword, at least hurting yourself is guarantee-Hey!"
Riku had taken the sword- a simple looking falchion- from its place on the wall right behind the counter. He swung it around a couple times before nodding.
"Just do the test already," he said.
Destiny Island High School- known to some of its more disgruntled students as "Dihs" or "diss"- was bigger than Sora had imagined. Though possibly only three or four stories high, one could tell that it was very well supported- he could see the bowl-shaped swimming pool that was used for blitzball practice, the standard fields, and what looked like a stadium nearby. He could see the flags that represented each island counted in the Destiny Islands region fluttering around the top of the stadium. Perhaps it was just the setting sun that made the buildings look more magnificent than they really were, but it looked great anyways.
"You like it?" asked Kairi. Sora nodded. He really wouldn't mind coming to school, he realized. No, he was actually looking forward to it. The notion was a little startling, and he found himself wondering if it would really work. Going to school.
"Hey, don't just stand there, let's go closer," said Kairi, and grabbed his wrist- his hands were still full- and dragged him around the school, explaining as she went.
"This is Ms. Truman's Spanish class- she thinks she's really smart and stuff, but everyone knows she's a bitch. And this is Ms. Joslyn- the language teacher- very cool, I hope you can get into her class with me. And this side's the math department, Mr. Elliot's really hard but you can learn a lot…" and so it went. Sora found himself enjoying himself more than he had in a long while, just walking with Kairi and listening to her talk.
After they had toured most of the school, they wound up near the swimming pool, where the blitzball team was hard at practice. A tall, sun-browned man sporting a tattoo on his exposed chest stood at the edge of the bowl, shouting orders.
"Wakka! What in the hell was that!" he shouted. "I coulda blocked that with a strand of hair!"
"Ahh, sorry, Coach. 'Gotta bruise from da scuffle yesterday."
"And I'll add one to that if you don't pick up your pace!"
Sora blinked. "Kinda harsh, isn't he?" he said, watching the ball move back and forth across the bowl.
Kairi laughed and said, "That's Jecht, the P.E. teacher. Even though he's like that, he's actually a very warm-hearted person."
Sora watched as Jecht took a blitzball and threw it at one of the players. "I'm sure he is," he muttered. He turned to go, but one of his bags fell from his grasp and hit the concrete floor rather loudly. General activity ceased and someone said, "Hey, look, there's Kairi." People began to mutter and some began to laugh, saying,
"Hey, dream-face, is that your world-travelling hero who saved all our butts?"
"Is it just me, or did the witch find some way to make him solid?"
Laughter.
Sora turned around, frowning. When he saw Kairi's slightly bowed head and felt a sudden pain in his heart, he began to put down the bags…
"Kairi, they're not…"
"Let's go, Sora," said Kairi, taking his arm and dragging him away. Sora followed, and glanced back to see the team had gotten rowdy- Jecht was shouting for everyone to shut up while Wakka had picked a fight with one of the ridiculers.
Kairi let go of Sora once they had gotten a fair distance from the bowl, but didn't talk and shook her head whenever Sora asked anything. Sora eventually gave up and they walked home in silence, though not the comfortable one that they usually shared.
The image of Kairi's bowed head wouldn't go away from Sora's mind.
Riku greeted them at the door to Kairi's house, but trailed off as he felt the slight tenseness between Sora and Kairi. He sent a quizzical look to Sora, who shook his head. The two watched as Kairi made her way up to her room. The two ate dinner alone that night, as Sora explained what happened, and retired up to bed rather early. Sora rummaged through his own bags and found some blue pajamas Kairi had bought. He found them a little large, but put them on anyways, carefully folding and stowing away his old clothes as he did so.
He crawled into bed and tossed and turned for a couple minutes. The images wouldn't leave. He sighed and knew he was in for a long night.
A knock. Sora started.
"Sora? Are you sleeping?" Kairi's whispers wafted through the closed door.
Sora turned his eyes from the window, where he had been staring at dark sky, thinking. It was a clear night, full of stars with a full moon. It wasn't really the brightly lit light; it was the bed and the prospect of lying down and resting until morning that unnerved him. Ever since the Keyblade had come into his hands, he hadn't ever had a "good night's rest", as his mother would have called it. That meant eight hours or more. He'd never had that much time to waste on himself, whether he noticed it or not. The night before, he had fallen asleep as soon as they had entered the house and hadn't been really conscious of anything until morning.
"Sora?" Kairi softly knocked. Sora softly got out of bed and walked over to the door, watching his shadow echo his movements on the floor. He opened the door to let Kairi in before he closed it again, not wanting to wake any of the other residents of the house. He turned around, though, to find an image of Kairi that had only been appearing in his dreams. The moonlight danced off her fair skin and the simple white gown- reminiscent of Namine, Sora realized with a start- and her hair seemed to be longer than it had seemed from out under the sun. She was beautiful.
He watched her as she sat down on the side of the bed. A soft, warm breeze blew through the window, brushing at her pale cheeks and flowing hair. Sora felt his heart beating and blood rushing to his head. Kairi stared outside and motioned for Sora to come sit next to her. Both sat and watched the stars glimmer in their places in the heavens, the moon a centerfold for all of them. They stayed like that for a long time, and soon enough, Sora's heart slowed down to normal. When his mind began to wander again, Kairi's soft voice brought him back.
"What?" he said. "I couldn't hear you." He heard Kairi breathe in and say…
"Can I sleep with you tonight?"
A/N: SoraXKairi for now. Don't worry, things'll get messy soon enough.
Review please!