It was Sunday, and the same thoughts passed through Axel's mind over and over again, as they had for the past few hours. First, he wished he were anywhere but his current location; second, he was thankful that the place had air conditioning, as Destiny Island was ridiculously warm under the afternoon June sun; third, it was horribly depressing that he lacked a social life enough that he didn't have to cancel plans with anyone to be here for a weekend open house at the current Strife-Fair residence. After their initial meeting at the hospital function, Cloud and Axel had met later in the week to discuss terms and sign paperwork. The house had spent a couple weeks on the market, during which Axel had spent time at the office, e-mailing Cloud periodically with new pictures and reasons why the old mansion – officially called the Neverwas property, but no one actually called it that – would be perfect for the Strife-Fairs. This brought Axel to his current situation, stuck in his second afternoon in a row of open houses, bored out of his skull.

He'd already toured the house multiple times, the first of which had been with Cloud when he'd called on the blond man at home to sign papers and to get the specifications for the listing.

"Pluto! Red! Down, boys." The dogs that had been jumping at Axel as soon as the door was open stopped immediately, sitting on the rug and staring at the visitor innocently. "Sorry about them. They're friendly, just excitable. They spend too much time with Sora and not enough time in obedience school."

"It's fine, don't worry. I had a dog named Moomba when I was a kid."

Cloud nodded as he hung Axel's jacket in the foyer closet and motioned for the redhead to follow him into the house. They walked down the white hallway, passing by a large, open living room, a dining room with French doors, and a closed door that Axel assumed was a bathroom before reaching the end of the hall. It opened up into a kitchen with a breakfast nook on one end, and a sitting room with a patio door at the other. After offering Axel something to drink, which he politely declined, Cloud took a seat with him at the kitchen table.

"Okay, so," Axel began as he slid one of the packages across the top of the small, round table, "here's everything you'll need to buy and sell a house with Organization Realtors. All of this is to declare that you agree to use the Organization as a selling and buying agent, myself in particular. Since you had the property appraised recently, we don't need to bring in Lexaeus and we can list the value discussed during that appraisal."

The sound of the front door opening and closing drew the two men away from their business momentarily as both heads turned toward the entranceway. A teenage boy with spiky brown hair sauntered into the kitchen area; Axel knew immediately that this was one of Cloud's sons, since he didn't look much different than he had in the old, battered picture in Cloud's wallet, but he couldn't remember for the life of him either of the twins' names. He received an acknowledging nod as he locked eyes with the kid, getting a friendly "hey" as a greeting.

"Sora, this is Axel; he's the real estate agent I told you about. Axel, the older of my twins, Sora."

Axel waved his hand slightly in greeting as Sora turned to open the chrome fridge next to the opening in the wall, addressing his father. "What'd you make for dinner, Dad?"

"There's chicken and potatoes in a container on the second shelf. Take the one with the green lid; the blue one is for your brother's lunch, since he's working late tonight." The blond man turned back to Axel. "Sorry about that. You were saying...?"

The redhead brushed the apology aside. "Right. So if everything looks in order on those papers, you can take them to your lawyer to have them look it all over. If everything seems fine to them, sign all the lines marked with an 'x' and fax them to the number on my card."

"It seems fine from what I can tell. At least, it all looks relatively the same as last time I moved."

"Good," Axel grinned. "Now the only thing left with regards to paperwork is to negotiate my percentage of the sell. I'm thinking eight sounds like a good number."

"I'm thinking not."

If possible, Axel grinned even wider. "Smart man. Never take the initial offer, it's always too high. Okay, so here's what I'm realistically thinking: six percent, and I'll bring it down to four if you buy one of the places I recommend to you. I've got a house or two in mind that we're representing; I'll send you the listings when I get back to the office."

Cloud considered this offer, his visible thought process underscored by the beeping of the black microwave on a shelf as the brunet pulled his dinner from the inside of it before slamming the door shut. "That sounds fair."

"Good. I'll just write that in here, then," a few pen scratches could be heard over Sora's retreating footsteps, "and now we can move on to the listing."

Axel was given a thorough tour, beginning with the finished basement. Descending the stairs, Axel was shown Cloud's home office with wood-paneled walls, the large, open exercise room with the mirrored wall, and the laundry room. Back up on the ground floor, he was given a longer look at the rooms he'd passed by earlier. First was the living room, with its large bay window and protruding gas fireplace; there was easily enough room in this space for two complete furniture sets, rather than just the singular black leather one that occupied the room. The dining room had, in fact, two sets of French doors, one at either end. Painted a warmer colour than most of the house, the room also had a multi-bulb light fixture at each end, controlled by a dimmer at the further end of the room. Axel had been right about the bathroom, though it was technically a half-bath, since it contained only a toilet and sink with a small vanity.

"And you've already seen the kitchen nook and the sitting room. Ready to see the upstairs?" They moved up the large staircase in the foyer, sparsely decorated with pictures of the two boys at various ages along with a few pictures of a smiling man with black hair and a pretty young woman with brown hair; Axel assumed that these were the boys' biological parents. "I apologize in advance for any mess you may witness. I told them to make sure everything was in order, but…" he shrugged.

The redhead laughed. "I've been out of the teenage stage for almost three years now, and my place is still a disaster. Don't worry about it."

Cloud looked like it still bothered him, but continued with the tour nonetheless. Reaching the top of the stairs, the first room was immediately to the right; this was Sora's room, as indicated by the brunet on the bed, fork dangling from his mouth as he stared blankly at the notebook open in his lap. The room was spacious, with plenty of room for the standard bedroom furniture as well as a small television hooked up to some gaming platform or another. The teen raised his head as he heard Cloud sigh, and rolled his eyes.

"Dad, it's clean." Cloud raised his eyebrows, and Axel fought the urge to laugh at the exchange. "Well, it's cleaner than it was before. Yesterday you wouldn't have been able to see the floor."

Shaking his head, the blond man closed the door behind the two of them, leaving Sora to his homework. They continued down the hallway, which seemed to almost be laid out in a square, Cloud pointing out the extra closet spaces as they passed them, until they arrived at the door directly across from Sora's. There were no doubts as to whose room this was, with the name 'Roxas' intricately carved on a plaque hung in the centre of the door. Cloud opened the door and led Axel into a room roughly the same size as Sora's, though exponentially neater. Instead of a television, Roxas' room was personalized by way of a completely full floor-to-ceiling corner bookcase, and he had two windows rather than one.

"This room has the largest closet space, after mine. And it gets sun practically all day, with the extra window. Or at least it would, if not for that gigantic tree at the side of the house." Axel noted the large vegetation to which Cloud referred, some of its leaves brushing against the glass above the absent teen's desk.

Back out in the hall, Axel was shown the full bathroom the boys and guests used before proceeding into the master bedroom. Cloud's room really lacked anything that hinted at the man's personality, but he'd been right about the closet space. The master bedroom not only had a spacious ensuite bathroom, but also a walk-in closet that was not even half-filled with the blond man's clothing.

Moving back out of the room, the pair hooked around the last stretch of hallway and into the guest bedroom at the end. With bland walls, minimal furniture, and a small closet area, the square room was nothing fascinating to look at. Axel did a final check with Cloud to make sure he had all of the specifications correct after they had returned to the ground floor for a look at the yard, and then shook hands with the older man before turning to the rental car he'd picked up earlier in the week. As he drove away, he saw a kid on a skateboard with his nose in a book; Axel only felt a little bad for hoping that the kid rolled into a tree or something, because it really would have been funny.

At least Saturday had brought a few curious people out to see the house; Sunday was absolutely dead. They'd planned the event to run from one in the afternoon until four, that way any service-goers might see the signs and stop by on their way home from worshipping Jenova. So, either no one worshipped Jenova on this island anymore, or no one was interested enough to be bothered to view a house on a Sunday; though Axel himself had no particular religious affiliations, he seriously doubted it was the former option.

A thud from the second floor drew Axel away from the riveting task of twiddling his thumbs, having finished his work he'd brought with him ages ago. He rose from the black leather chair he'd been occupying, curious as to what had made the sound. He knew it couldn't have been Pluto or Red, because he'd seen the two mutts in the minivan when he'd arrived, before Sora and Cloud had pulled away for the afternoon. Cautiously, he made his way around the first hook of the hallway, hearing a light male voice in that direction mutter a string of curses that would've made Axel's father proud. Reaching for the doorknob to the room marked 'Roxas,' he opened the door to find a blond young man hobbling slowly toward the bookcase, the window behind him flung open. The stranger turned when the hinges gave a squeak, and gave Axel a half-smile. "Sorry. You weren't actually supposed to hear me."

Axel could only stare for a moment. The short, blond teen had gravity-defying hair that almost put Cloud's to shame and bright blue eyes that the redhead had seen in pictures multiple times over in this very house. His thin frame was covered with a black and white t-shirt, and beige pants that somehow looked familiar though Axel couldn't think why. He shook his head slightly, getting over the fact that he was actually seeing the elusive and mysterious younger twin. He smirked. "You're not actually supposed to be here at all."

"That's why I came through the window. I figured I could be in and gone, and you'd never know the difference."

"And if someone had been going through the house at the time?"

"They weren't." He reached up, wincing, and placed the book in his hands in a loose space on one of the higher shelves. "There were no cars in the driveway, and the lights weren't continually flicking on and off." He paused and turned to fully face Axel. "Why the hell do they do that anyway?"

"I have no idea, but you're changing the subject." The redhead walked toward the desk, picking up the scattered papers on the floor and placing them on the surface as he peered out the window. "You climbed all the way up here?"

"Yeah."

"Um… why?"

Roxas shrugged, frowning at the shelves he'd turned back to. "I finished that book, so now I need another one."

Axel raised an eyebrow, never dropping his smirk. "So, you climb up here often?"

"No. Actually, today was my first try, so I suppose I'm lucky that I just slid off the desk and didn't break my neck falling out of the tree. It doesn't bother me, though. I like heights." Again Axel was shocked with intense blue. "Why am I even telling you this? I don't even know who you are!"

Now the older man was confused. "I'm the guy who's been trying to sell your house for almost a month."

"So? We've never met before, and you haven't bothered to actually introduce yourself yet."

"Fine. I'm Axel Highwind," he replied, sticking out his hand toward the blond. "I'm sure you've memorized it from the sign out front."

"Highwind? Like, the gummi ship people?"

Bright green eyes rolled. "Yes, like the gummi ship people. Now are you gonna reciprocate or am I gonna stand here like a slot machine a while longer?"

The blond smiled almost against his will. "Roxas Fair," he responded, briefly shaking the offered hand before bolting towards the dresser on the opposite side of the room, picking up a slim paperback from a stack on the top. "Aha! I knew it was in here somewhere."

"Okay, so now I can go back to twiddling my thumbs in the living room without hearing any more strange noises, right?"

Roxas hesitated for a moment, looking Axel up and down. Axel had been checked out before, in bars and such, but this was different. He felt like the blond was judging his entire being. Slowly, the teen opened his mouth to speak. "You can borrow a book, if you want. I think I can trust you enough to not destroy it."

Red spikes moved across the collar of his light blue shirt as he shook his head. "Thanks, but no. It wouldn't look very professional of me if someone walked in and I had my nose in a book."

"So you'd rather sit there, looking like you don't have any working brain cells left?"

A snort. "Fair point. Whatcha got?"

Roxas shrugged. "A bit of everything, really." Once again, he seemed to consider the man in front of him before speaking. "How about Jurassic Park?"

"Never heard of it. What's it about?"

"Dinosaurs."

"Do the dinosaurs eat people?"

"Yes."

"Sweet." He grinned, taking the proffered book from the blond. "Might as well give it a try."

The teen tucked his own book into a pocket along the leg of his pants and looked around awkwardly. "So, I guess I'll be going, then." He moved in the direction of the desk, but was stopped by Axel's voice.

"Roxas?"

"Yeah?"

"Just use the damn door."

Cloud returned home just after four, Sora, Roxas, and the dogs all in tow, as Axel was preparing to leave. The redhead reported on his fascinating day of severe loneliness, conveniently leaving out the part where he had been startled by Roxas climbing through his own bedroom window to exchange books. Cloud didn't really need to know, and he was sure the blond had already told his father something to explain the slight wince when he turned a certain way. However, he made the mistake of thanking the younger blond for the loan of the book, asking if he could return it at the open house next weekend.

"Roxas lent you a book?" piped Sora. Cloud also looked mildly curious. "When?" Damn.

"Um…"

"He left me a note on his desk, saying I could pick out a book if I was bored. The note made a very convenient bookmark, too."

Roxas merely nodded, agreeing with the redhead's story, before marching up the stairs to disappear down the hallway. Sora watched his brother's exit before turning to Axel, who was still trying to leave, in disbelief. "Whoa. Exams must have totally fried Rox's brain."

"What makes you say that?" Axel asked, curious.

"Because Roxas is very particular about his books. He's never ever lent a book to a stranger before, and he's never met you."

End notes: Holy flashback, Batman! But trust me, it was important. Not that the house itself was important in any way, but the rooms really give you more of an idea of how the family lives.

Also, yay Roxas! He wasn't actually going to appear in this chapter (actually, the flashback wasn't going to happen quite the way it did, either, but whatever), but then I was talking to my Dad about real estate stuff, because I know jack-all about it and he actually remembers our last move, and he mentioned the family going out during open houses, and my mind went, "Waitasec! That's it!" So now we just have to wonder what's going on in Roxas' mind with regards to Axel…

And that bit about the flicking lights is totally true. People will stand there and watch the same light go on and off like forty billion times. I don't get it.

Finally, I included Jurassic Park in here because, since I live in a box or something, I just found out the other day that Michael Crichton (author of the book, along with Twister, Timeline and the book on which The Thirteenth Warrior was based) died. So that was a tiny tribute to him.

Thanks to all the people who've kept up with this story thus far, especially the ones who've reviewed. I know it can be a pain, but if you do have something to say about my work, even an 'It's good, I like it," please let me know!