[Play Kingdom Hearts 3 OST - Lazy Afternoons]

Sean sat there at the table in the busy cafeteria by himself. On the table in front of him is the food that he has purchased from the kitchen itself, the smell of fresh french fries and a steaming hamburger with cheese, pickles and lettuce featured as additions for the meal as he sat there eating slowly and letting his thoughts be his main priority while making sure he had the things he needed to eat.

Even after this morning, he couldn't stop thinking about Xion. He remembered from such a long few hours ago when his alarm clock had awakened him to go change and check up on Xion before heading downstairs for the usual Tuesday waffle breakfast.

What made him think of Xion though? Was it the mystery behind her and why she didn't speak? Not a single bit of emotion was seen on her face when he talked to her. Just only the sight of her blue ocean-like eyes looking right back at him.

From the moment he had arrived at the school, the first thing he had done was find another route into the school building and waited until Greg and his friends had finished in the hallway where his locker was. No one had commented on why he was hiding from them, but they pretty much had an understanding on why Greg was one of the mean boys around the secondary school.

So far, most of the school day had been going well, it was the usual run of starting first period in Geography followed by a second period in the usual Math class. Thank goodness that it was lunch on the third period as he knew that Greg had lunch on the fourth period with the rest of his friends that were usually with him. He wouldn't end up seeing him until fifth period but knew himself not to speak with him unless he wanted to be attacked or taunted again.

He continued to eat the rest of his fries after having finished his burger, listening to the numerous crowds of teenagers whose age was either the same as his or more older by a year or more.

It was the usual conversations that any other teenager would talk about. Their girlfriends, video games especially for the nerds on the other side of the cafeteria on their laptops, and the typical girls talking about how cute certain boys were. Not a single girl here at the school spoke to him except for the teenagers. The only other time that a female classmate would talk to him was if it was a class project that he was assigned with. Other than that, he and his classmates didn't really share anything common.

But since discovering Xion... this was someone he could talk to, regardless if she was a girl. He felt something inside. A sense of relief over talking to someone, even if she didn't speak.

Inside, a question was on his mind the more he looked at all of the students walking alongside one another and talking to each other as they walked. Even though talking to her with her only listening, he felt like that could be something that he could do with her outside of the house instead of just keeping her all cooped up in the closet to hide from his parents and siblings.

Something like what these students were sharing... friendship.

It all came to his mind. Maybe take her somewhere to get ice cream? Yes... that could work out well. But what flavour to get for both him and her?

The many flavours of ice cream begin to picture into his mind. Vanilla? Chocolate? Too basic... Rocky road? Not really sure. Caramel? Strawberry? Cookies & Cream? Pistachio? Probably not pistachio, so scratch that off of the list... maybe sea salt... that could work perhaps as it is his second favorite flavor.

He will have to wait until school is finished to get her out of the house to share ice cream. Even if she didn't talk, Sean felt a bit of happiness inside to be able to talk to someone he had just started to know - whom came from nowhere.

For now, classes first, avoiding Greg during and after school second and then friendship time with Xion last.

Xion's POV

I sat there in the closet in the same position that I had been in since the moment I first woke up yesterday. I can only stare ahead at the closet door which light shone in from Sean's bedroom.

The day surprisingly has started to feel very long from the moment I woke up this morning. I would just sit there and wait, seeing if Sean was going to come back from a place that he calls 'school'. He ended up telling me before he left that he was going there and will be back to see me again.

I felt the need to move, so I begin to move my legs and prop myself forward as I am getting up slowly, being careful not to hit my head on the iron, silver-like pole that had my own reflection on it in a strange kind of layer. A mirror layer, perhaps?

My hands slowly begin to lift, reaching and grabbing onto the door itself. Though very unsure how strong it could be, I give it a bit of what strength I believe is inside of me, allowing the door to slide to the left, revealing more of the room.

In a much brighter light and nothing to partially block my view, I slowly poke out and observe every one of the surroundings for what is Sean's room itself. In the corner on the top of what looks like a cabinet of some sort... is a rectangular shaped box that is rather thin... I can take that is where the light came from when Sean was playing a video game last night.

Slowly bringing my hand up towards the strange box, I reach towards it to touch it, finding that has a rather hard seemingly hard surface. I held my glove covered hand onto the surface of the box for a few more moments, letting my eyes study the box. I can see funny small shapes on the box itself, with text above them.

Off? Volume with plus and minus signs?

I'm not sure what the shapes will do, but I wasn't sure how Sean would feel about me touching anything in his room. There is a rectangular shaped wall with a handle to my right that is not like the windows or anything else in the rest of the room. It reminds me a lot of the closet and how you open and close it...

I can hear a noise downstairs. It sounded like the noise that this strange wall had made when Sean had entered the room. Is this also a door, but designed differently? It sounds like it was closing twice. And then there is thumping that sounds soft at first, but begins to get louder with each half second that came and went as I stood there, my eyes watching the door as the sound grew closer.

The handle on the strange door shape... it is turning. The door of what I can decipher as wood designed. Then there is a bit of light coming into the room as I can see a familiar figure that I recognized come into the room...

Sean.

His expression had changed as soon as he had seen me standing there. A look that was showing eagerness had dropped to being rather hurried as he quickly walked over towards me with great worry. The look from his brown eyes could also tell me that as well.

"Xion, what are doing outside from the closet?" He questioned, with worry as if I was in trouble that I had no idea of. I'm not sure how to react.

He looks around quietly for a bit, seeming to listen to hear if there was anyone else in the house. After listening, he turns and looks at me still holding onto that face of concern. "You've got to really be careful when stepping outside from the closet. It could have been either one or both of my parents that could have stepped into the room unexpectedly."

As he was telling me this, my face still remains blank - unable to form an emotion on how to feel about this. I didn't know if I did something wrong or not...

"But they still haven't come home yet, so I think we should be safe. On top of that, I thought up an easier to get you inside instead of sneaking you in through the front door. Because my mom and dad will probably start asking me questions eventually," He takes my glove covered hand, my feet moving as he guides me towards the open door. "Come on, I'll show you."

I follow him as he brings me to a set of stairs. I carefully begin walking down the steps, but my right foot loses its footing and I slip forward, with Sean's back used as a pillow to catch me in my fall.

"Are you alright?" He asked me.

Again, no response from me, but the blank expression on my face studying his emotions, his movements as well as everything around me.

"I've got you, don't worry." He says to me, guiding me down the steps, slowly one step at a time.

Once we both were at the bottom of the steps, he lets go of my hand for a moment. I watch as he is putting his shoes on and tying them up before getting back up and turning to look at me.

He takes my hand again, opening up the front door and leaving the building with me alongside him. He closes the door behind him, taking out a key of some sort which I believe locks the house to keep it safe. A tug forward and I move along, watching as he guides me to the other side of the house with looks completely different from the front side.

There is a strange tall object leaning on the side of the building. Sean turns to look at me as he begins to explain what it is and what part of the house this is.

"That's a ladder. My parents and sisters don't really go into the backyard, so you shouldn't really have any trouble sneaking out from the room. Though if you are when they are here, you'll have to do it really quietly."

This... is a backyard here?

"Also, mind the neighbors as well. This part is known to be a quiet neighborhood, so they don't particularly enjoy any kind of loud noise unless it is public service doing their job to clean the streets or fix the roads."

Neighborhood... So I have to be quiet here?

"I know, my neighborhood isn't as exciting as the other ones around me that like to party. But at least where I am taking you, it'll be a lot more exciting there. As long as it doesn't overwhelm you, of course. We'll find a spot at the harbor and just watch ships coming in from out at sea and have ice cream."

Ice... cream?

Still holding onto my hand, I walk along with him as he guides me back to the front of the house, onto the sidewalk where I begin to move away from the house he brought me to. From what I know now, he is taking me to go get this ice cream.

I turn my head with the still blank expression on my face, glancing for a moment as he looks quite happy to bring me along with him outside of the house. Despite the brightness from above in the sky, the air around me smells a lot more fresh. I turn my head back forward, looking directly at where we were going.

[Play Final Fantasy VIII OST - Fisherman's Horizon]

We were at the harbor, as my boots stepped onto the wooden platform, my eyes set out on the glimmering waters that the ball of light, which Sean calls the sun, reflected light from. Sean is still holding onto my glove covered hand, as me and him continue towards the end of the platform.

The platform above the water at the end, has a few benches that overlook the ocean itself, with only a few people observing the beachs below with everyone tanning, surfing on the gentle waves or just taking a walk on the sands or sitting on the rocks to listen to the waves.

I continue alongside Sean until we have reached a bench that provided a good view of the sea and the boats coming in. He looks at me, a small smile lit up on his face. "Sit down Xion," He tells me, letting go of my hand. "Wait there. I'm going to go and get ice cream for the both of us."

I look at him as he tells me this. I turn to the bench, taking a seat in the middle as my eyes watch him go over towards a booth, in line with a few other customers looking to get ice cream as well. As he waits to get to the booth, I turn around with my eyes set directly towards the ocean ahead of me.

It looks rather beautiful itself. I have never seen anything like this before...

Though the sight of it feels rather familiar, I couldn't quite remember nor put my finger on it of where I have seen this before... the earliest memory that I have is that of floating in darkness and waking up inside of Sean's closet where he was hiding me. If that is the case, why does this feel familiar?

I waited for some time, letting the gentle breeze with the sound of occasional ship horns in the distance fill into my ears as well as the waves below the dock and the birds above in the sky cawing to one another.

A form of communication with those animals...

The sound of footsteps grabs my attention as I turn my head to the right and see that Sean has come back from the booth with two ice cream in the both of his hands. "Sorry about that," He says to me with a bit of a chuckle. "You know the customers, plus I had to find out what flavors there were right there, but I got the right ones for us."

His left hand offers me on the stick, a blue colored ice cream. I brought my right hand forward, taking the stick of ice cream in my hand and looking at it as he takes a lick of his ice cream.

He looks at me. I look back at him as he is giving me a smile, holding the same colored ice cream in his right hand.

"This one is called sea salt ice cream," He explains to me. "I'm not really sure how to describe the taste, but all I can say is that it has a salty taste with sweetness within. It's my second favorite flavor of ice cream, with rocky road being my number one favorite."

I look from him at the ice cream in my hand. Sea salt ice cream...

"Go on," He says to me with a calm voice. "Give it a try."

I take a bite into the ice cream, taking in all of the flavor with each bite that I took. After I swallowed from the first bite, I figured that Sean was telling the truth when he was describing the ice cream's taste to me.

Salty, but sweet...

"The icing on the cake..."

That voice... it didn't sound like Sean's voice, but it sounded rather different, as if I had heard it before. I can see everything go to white around me, with color returns from that flash, as I find that the environment was shifting around me.

Instead of wooden floors of the harbor, my feet were there, hanging down from what had changed from a bench into the edge of a tower. I make no quick reaction to any of these changes I am seeing as I take in the sight of the light setting down towards the horizon ahead of me.

Down below, stretching far towards the sea side ocean ahead, it's a town I am seeing. I turn my head around to the left and look up.

It's a giant clock. Is this... a tower that supports the clock itself?

I turn my head to my right after having looked in that direction. To my right, there is someone else sitting next to me. It's not Sean. He looks completely different from what he looks like.

The boy turns and looks at me. His blue eyes... kind of like mine. And that blonde hair of his. He is wearing the exactly same clothing as I am. His eyes are studying me. In his right hand, he is holding two sea salt ice creams, like the one that Sean had given to me.

"This is such a great spot..." I find myself speaking to the boy. "How'd you find it?"

The boy turns for a moment, taking his left hand and gripping it onto one of the two ice cream sticks. Moving his left hand over to me, he offers me the ice cream.

"Here you go." He says to me in a calm voice as I take it with my right hand, looking and studying the ice cream in my hand. As I am looking at it, he is giving me quite a confident, gentle smile. "Sea salt ice cream. C'mon, try it."

I nod in understanding, bringing the ice cream to my mouth and taking a bite from it. Letting the flavor set in, I finally spoke of what I had tasted. "It's sweet... and salty."

"It's good, right?" The boy spoke to me as I turn and look at him with a smile on my face."... and I, we meet up here for ice cream after work." He turns and takes a bite from his stick for that sensation of sea salt ice cream. "This flavor is ...'s favorite."

"Sounds like it's yours, too." I responded to him.

"Yeah." He responds back as he stares at the image in the distance. "... brought me here to eat ice cream on my first day with the Organization."

Organization? What does he mean by Organization, and when he mentions his friend's name, why is it silent and muted as if a name never existed?

"And then after my first mission," He continued as he turns to look at me again. "He got me ice cream again. Said it was 'icing on the cake'."

"Like you just did for me?" I asked him.

He nods, keeping the warm smile on his face. "Yeah." He responds, with relaxed happiness in his voice.

"You guys must be really close." I spoke to him, turning to look at the image ahead of us.

"Well, ... and I are friends."

"Friends..." I pondered on the meaning of what friends was before turning to look at the boy. "Do you think I could be a friend?" I asked him.

He turns and looks at me again. "When ... gets back, we'll all have ice cream together!"

"Okay!" I responded to his statement before joining him in continuing to eat sea salt ice cream and watching the view from above.

This... is this... a memory I am experiencing...?

"Xion..."

"...Xion?"

My attention was brought back into reality. It was Sean's voice calling my name. I am still seated there on the bench where he and I were together. I turn my head to look at him, he is giving me this expression on his face. A face of possible concern.

"Are you okay, Xion?"

I just stared at him, taking another bite of sea salt ice cream from my hand as my own blue eyes are staring at his brown colored eyes. He looks like as if he doesn't know how to respond to me, but just exhales a bit of quiet breath. I'm not sure how he feels, but from what I can only guess, he just feels happy to have me there. Someone to talk to.

I am surprised that even myself hasn't said anything to him just yet. Why? I'm not sure... was I still getting to know Sean a little more? I mean, it is nice that he had given me sea salt ice cream.

But even from his eyes as he turns and looks down at his ice cream, I can sense that something is wrong. He feels... down. A frown is there on his mouth. Is it sadness? Why is he sad?

He takes a bite from his ice cream, trying not to let it melt. I continue to stare at him and watch him as his expression remains the same on his face. I wanted to ask him if something was wrong.

I wanted to ask him, to give him some sort of assurance... I just... I just didn't know how.

The only spark inside me is the hope that I will speak to him. Hopefully soon... or far in the future. I can only wish that it will be a lot sooner...

Like that boy in my memory that I don't remember... he spoke of his friend being a friend to me as well as him... a friend...

Does Sean need a friend...?

Am I his only friend...?

I continue to sit with him next to me as the both of us stare at the boats going closer to the harbor of boats and afar ahead into the distance of the sea. I think he'll let us be here for some time until it is time to go back to his house, quietly of course. It's quite a beautiful view from where he has taken me.

If Sean really is in need of a friend...

...Then even in my silence... I would be happy to be his friend.