For Day 8 of the Kingdom Hearts 3 Countdown Challenge - New Year's Day. Contains SoKai shiptease.
"Happy New Year!" Donald crowed. There was a loud popping sound, and then confetti and glitter filled the air.
"It's New Year's Day already?" Sora asked, brushing confetti out of his hair before returning his hands to the Gummi Ship controls.
"Yup." Goofy balanced a cookie on Sora's armrest. "At least on our world it is, don't know about yours, Sora."
"Well, Happy New Year, then." He grabbed the cookie and bit into it, chocolate chip with colorful sprinkles.
"What do you do to celebrate New Year's back on Destiny Islands?" Goofy asked.
"Oh, well… for us, it's a time to get together with family. Kids get these special envelopes with munny, and we all eat stuff like osechi and mochi together. Instead of tangerines, we put paopu fruit on top of the mochi. Destiny Islands specialty."
He'd missed last year's New Year's celebrations back home, and he was missing this year's, too. He and Kairi and Riku all used to go to the shrine together to get their fortunes, buy new charms for each other, and drink amazake with gold flakes to toast the new year.
Guess this is the second year Riku and I are gonna miss it, and the first year Kairi is.
Funny how he took those celebrations for granted until he couldn't take part in them anymore.
"What about you guys? What do you do?" he asked, to get his mind off the hollow ache in his chest.
"Well, for us it's our time to spend with our special sweethearts," Goofy said. "Christmas is our time for family."
"So it's like the opposite of Destiny Islands, then."
"Yup."
Interesting. "So what else do you do?"
"Well," Donald said, "I usually take Daisy on a date, and at the stroke of midnight…" He made a loud noise quacking noise.
Sora raised his eyebrow. "You kiss?"
"Yup," Donald said. "New Year's tradition. What better way to ring in the new year than with your special someone?"
Sora's thoughts flickered to Kairi. What would it be like to take her to that hill above town, just the two of them, a little before midnight?
He could picture her now, her red hair standing out against the night sky, wearing a cute dress with a light jacket and a matching hat. Maybe they could get some of those noisemakers Donald had and set them off right at midnight.
Or right before midnight. The confetti would get in Kairi's hair, then she'd turn to him and giggle as she brushed it out of his hair, too. He'd put his hand on her cheek and lean in close, and then, right as the new year began—
"Sora, you're blushing again," Donald teased, poking his cheek and jolting him back to reality.
"Am not!" he said, jerking the ship to the side. Donald, unbuckled as he was, went flying and crashed against the wall. A string of incomprehensible quacks came out of his beak before he recovered and made his way back to his chair so he could buckle in.
"Watch what you're doing, or I'll have to do the driving while you daydream," Donald muttered after that.
"Hey now!"
Donald and Goofy just laughed at him at that, and he couldn't help but grin.
If he couldn't celebrate New Year's like normal, at least he could celebrate it in his head. That would have to be good enough for now until he could make his dreams a reality.