Thanks to my reviewers for the last chapter!: silentmusic16, LivingHerOwnFairyTale, Kit-Kat-Wafer, Caxz, NinjaSheik, and Procrastination Fairy.
You're all amazing =)
Day 1
He had only meant to find his cousin.
It was how Roxas found himself in the hallway of the apartment block at 8 o'clock, on his first evening off work in weeks. Head down and hands buried deep in his pockets, Roxas couldn't help feeling he blended right into his drab surroundings. The ugly yellow light of wall lamps lit the narrow corridor in an unnatural glow, making him feel somehow exposed; As if he were standing beneath a spotlight. He kept to a fast pace as he turned into another longer, windowless hall. He wanted to be out of the harshly lit hall. Although his cousin's, Sora's, apartment wasn't exactly a hoarding ground for shadows. He liked the light.
Roxas turned the corner, his arm skimming the wall, and looked up from his feet. He saw her almost immediately. Almost, because the urge to yawn had narrowed his eyes into slits. Through the oval-shaped slits in his eyelids, Roxas saw a girl leant against one of the doors. Any boredom induced yawn forgotten, Roxas paused and widened his eyes. One corner of his lips twitched upward, although simple courtesy forced him to compose himself as he approached her, his footsteps light on the rough carpet.
She appeared to be asleep, although he couldn't be sure. Her blonde hair had fallen in light curtains around her face, angled down towards the knees that were drawn to her chest. But what had caused Roxas to smile was her choice of attire: A pair of lovely blue footie pyjamas.
Roxas hadn't thought he was making any sound, but he must have made some noise because the next step he made caused the girl's head to snap up, like a puppet on a very roughly pulled string. The movement revealed a face that was both contorted in horror and flushed red with embarrassment. She jolted to her feet in a single moment, her arms and legs rigid at her sides as she edged towards the door, as though she might melt into the wood if she tried hard enough.
"T-This isn't mine," she stammered, her blue eyes wide enough to steal away half of her face. She looked, to Roxas, like a child who'd be caught stealing; And in their pyjamas, at that.
Roxas fought to tug down the edges of his mouth. He regarded her with badly disguised amusement, wondering how many times she'd had to repeat that excuse. "Are you OK?" he asked, just about showing concern over enjoyment.
The girl's eyes grew impossibly wider for a moment - with surprise? - and she nodded sharply, froze, then lowered her head and sighed. "I'm locked out," she muttered sadly.
Roxas felt his expression soften, his smile soothing away from amused to gentle, as though he were showing sympathy to a miserable child. "Have you got a roommate?" he asked.
Without raising her eyes, she nodded. She pushed a strand of fair hair behind a round ear, the other hand tugging self-consciously at the leg of her unfortunate choice of clothing. Roxas couldn't help but feel sorry for her.
He frowned, awkwardly chewing on the inside of his lip. "Is your roommate out?"
With a barely noticeable moment of hesitation, she nodded again. "She is."
Roxas nodded slowly, raising a hand to scratch the hairs at the back of his neck. "Well…you can wait in my apartment if you want…" he offered awkwardly, "until she gets back."
The moment the words left his mouth, the girl's head shot up, her eyes narrowed into a suspicious glare as she studied him for the first time. Roxas realised, with slight shame, that he probably looked a mess. With his clothes askew and his hair impossibly more dishevelled than usual, giving a strange girl an invitation into his apartment most likely gave an air of suspicion.
"You're not going to kill me, are you?" she asked, completely serious.
Roxas laughed softly. "I assure you, my intentions are not in any way related to homicide."
She squinted. "You're not a psycho?"
"Nope."
"Sadist?"
"No."
"Rapist?"
"Nope."
"Anything else I haven't mentioned?"
Roxas shrugged. "Unless you consider serial parking ticket obtaining to be fearful," he muttered, just barely managing not to smile, "no."
"Promise?"
"On my life."
She let out a breath, and Roxas wondered whether she had genuinely suspected he was one of her selected psychos. "Well, that's good," she said. "Being killed would suck."
Roxas arched both eyebrows, and the crimson blush instantly crept back across her cheeks. "I'm sorry for…This isn't…I'm not normally so…" She sighed at her sudden speech impediment, and instead chose to smile. "Sorry."
Roxas shook his head. "Don't worry about it. This is usually how I spend my night off work."
She smiled slightly. "Scouring the halls for girls locked out of their apartments?"
Roxas shrugged. "Not just girls."
Day 217
"…you told me your name was Naminé, and you promised I would never have to see you in those pyjamas again." Roxas laughs slightly at the memory, his eyes glazed and darkened with exhaustion. He sees the memory as though through a thick haze, both of their faces nothing but blurs on the wall of his mind, worn away with time. Kind of like a scene from a film. But the disc is scratched.
"I kind of liked them, though," he admits, his thumb tracing slow circles over the back of her hand. "You look nice in blue." Somewhat distantly, he smiles. "But you lied, when you said Kairi wasn't home. She had locked you out on a dare, but you still came back with me. And you said it was because you didn't want to be shut outside for another ten minutes." Roxas chuckles. His fingers tighten around her hand for a moment and his eyes flicker up to her face, briefly focusing on her closed eyes, then drift back to her hand. He can't help checking. "I suppose I should have thanked Kairi."
Seriously short chapter, i know. But this isn't going to be a huge story. Hopefully i'll update faster than this from now on though. I think this is going to be about 8 or 9 chapters..ish. Some fluffy, some meaningful, some funny, some really stupidly depressing.
Please Review, it'd make me happy.
Listening to Holiday Parade made this chapter happen. They inspire me =)