I CAN BARELY SAY
Chapter Eleven: Past to Present
Sora stared out through the windshield and into space, thinking out loud, "I can't believe they didn't find her…"
"Hopefully she just gave up." Goofy suggested in a positive tone, Sora turning his head slightly to look at him as he spoke.
"Yeah. They said she was a lot weaker than Ursula, right? Maybe she realized she was no match against all of us." Donald chimed in as well.
The brunette focused on everything in front of him again, "I hope so. But I know Ariel, Eric, and King Triton aren't going to stop worrying until they find her. So I hope something turns up soon."
"Me too." Goofy nodded his head.
"We can always go back if we need to." Donald answered automatically before hesitating, "Uh… I mean. It's not the best option, but me and Goofy could always go with King Mickey…"
Sora let out a breath, trying not to let himself get too sad about the situation. It'd only been a day and he was already back in the mindset of traveling with Donald and Goofy. But on the other hand, seeing Kairi was the first thing on his mind when he woke up that morning.
Getting used to this was going to be hard.
Eventually, he replied, "It's nice to have stuff planned ahead most of the time… but if it's an emergency, I'll make it work."
"Okay." Donald sounded a little sad too, but Sora could tell he was trying his best to stay positive.
The rest of the way to Disney Castle was a little awkward, none of them really knowing what could be said to really make the situation better. And the mood didn't really improve after making it to the castle and reporting to King Mickey and Queen Minnie that Morgana had yet to be found and that the mission essentially was hanging in the air.
Donald and Goofy followed him back out to the gummi ship hangar, lingering a few feet away from the door and both looking pretty glum. "Don't worry, I'll see you guys again soon." Sora smiled widely, trying to cheer them up.
"Aw, we know. We'll just miss ya, that's all." Goofy rubbed the back of his head sheepishly.
Sora reached out to hug Goofy first, then moved on to Donald, "I'll miss you too."
"Good luck with surprising Kairi when you get home." Donald said as Sora pulled back.
"Thanks." He smiled, standing back up, "Speaking of, I guess I need to get going if I want to beat her back from school." He gave a small wave, "Bye."
They both waved back, "Bye, Sora."
After a gummi ship ride that seemed to take forever, he literally sprinted to Kairi's apartment. Selphie was waiting outside, looking very unhappy as he came into view. "I was starting to think you were gonna be late." She looked down on him as he bent over, supporting himself on his knees as he tried to catch his breath.
"Sorry," He let out a loud breath, continuing in fragments, "Tried… my best."
Her face softened a little bit, but she still looked skeptical as she asked, "So you're going to surprise her looking like that?"
"I'll be okay in a minute." He stood up a little straighter, still giving a few heavy breaths before reaching to the backpack over his shoulders, "I have clean clothes in here."
Selphie gave a nod of approval, "Alright." She motioned toward the door, "I left it unlocked. I'm gonna go out for a bit so you two can be alone."
"Thank you so much for doing this, Selphie." He smiled excitedly, "I owe you so much."
"That you do." She nodded again before waving him away, "Go clean yourself up! She'll be here pretty soon."
He headed for the door, saying "Thank you!" one more time. Once inside, he twisted the lock on the door before heading into the bathroom and setting his backpack on the floor. After changing into new clothes, reapplying deodorant, and a few splashes of water on his face, he felt good as new.
Zipping his backpack, he walked back out to the living room and took a seat on the couch. He wondered for a moment if he should just stand, but he would have plenty of time to stand up before Kairi managed to get the door open. But his nerves also made it nearly impossible to stay still, either. Any time he so much as heard a bird, he almost jumped out of his seat. And the one time he was sure it was Kairi, it was actually her next door neighbor.
Finally he heard the key turning in the door and then there was no doubt. Shooting upward, his heart started to race as he waited for her, staying just out of sight.
As the door creaked open, she called out, "Selphie, you home?"
Sora smiled to himself, biting his lip as he tried to stay quiet.
Hearing no response, she closed the door and took a few more steps into the apartment, her backpack draped loosely over one arm. After she had passed through the small hallway and caught sight of him, her mouth immediately fell open, "Sora!" She dropped her backpack to the floor with a loud thud, her arms wrapped around him tightly before he even had the chance to respond.
"Hey," He spoke against her hair, hugging her back just as tightly.
She tilted backwards, asking breathlessly, "I thought you wouldn't be back until late tonight or tomorrow morning at the earliest?"
Sora looked away, a small smirk on his lips as he admitted, "I may have exaggerated a little…"
"That was sneaky." He heard her answer in a loud and teasing voice before he felt her lips on his cheek, "But thank you."
His eyes moved back to her and he dipped his head, kissing her eagerly. Kairi smiled against his lips, kissing him back with just as much energy as she moved her hands up his back to pull him even closer. He deepened the kiss in response, his hands wandering downward until they stopped at her hips. Pulling away and shifting his hands a little to loosen his grasp, he asked, "Did you want to go see the sunset? If we head out now, we could still make it."
Kairi nodded, pulling her arms a little more towards herself. With a breath of air, she answered, "Sure."
Sora slipped out of her grasp before intertwining their fingers together and pulling her out the door, leaving her backpack right where she dropped it. "So what did you do while you were gone?" She pressed her arm against his as she looked up at him.
"Surprisingly, not much…" He used his freehand to rub the back of his neck, "We went to Atlantica and there was a bit of trouble going on but, there wasn't much we could do about it because we were on land."
She squinted her eyes, "On land?"
"Yeah," Sora nodded, "Ariel decided to become a human permanently and got married to Prince Eric."
Kairi looked away, humming in thought before responding, "That must have been a hard decision to make."
He shrugged, "She seems really happy, though. Well, aside from the stuff going on with Ursula's sister."
"You still need to explain that part." She reminded him with a small laugh.
"Right." Sora smiled sheepishly before continuing, "Well, uh. Ariel and Eric actually have a daughter now, named Melody. And they were going out to sea so King Triton could meet her for the first time and I guess Morgana crashed the party. Because of what happened to Ursula, she was threatening to hurt Melody."
Kairi's face fell, "That's terrible! She's just a baby and had absolutely nothing to do with it!"
"Yeah, it's terrible. Needless to say Ariel, Eric, and King Triton are all terrified for her. King Triton's got almost all of his soldiers searching the ocean for her but they haven't been able to find her yet so they called us in to help protect everyone on land. But they still haven't found anything, unfortunately."
She sighed and lowered her shoulders, "Wow, I can't imagine how worried they are."
"I know. I hated leaving there this morning, but there wasn't a whole lot more we could do." He sighed as well, "It really sucks. Melody was like, literally the happiest baby I've ever seen. Ariel and Eric should be able to enjoy their time with her, you know? I'm sure it's already hard enough just being a parent without having to worry about sea witches."
Kairi smiled, swinging their arms a little and agreeing, "Yeah." She gave a little pause before continuing, "So… was it kind of weird to find out Ariel was married and had a daughter?"
He gave a little nod, "I always want to believe that not that much time has passed. Especially because it started to seem like I was at least somewhat catching up here. It's just…" He lowered his head, "I know I lost three years. I know it, but I still can't really believe it. Because for me, everything just sort of stayed the same while everyone else was moving on."
She blinked, carefully considering what to say to him as she gripped his hand tighter. "You didn't lose those three years, you just weren't here on the islands. And yeah, maybe you missed out on some school." She paused again, lowering her voice for a moment, "Maybe a few other things… but you were changing people's lives. Directly or indirectly. I know you probably didn't really think about while you were out there actually doing it, because I didn't either. But it'll hit you how much you really changed their lives when you really sit down and think about it. I don't think you've really got the chance yet because you've been so busy trying to get everything back in order."
They stopped walking just shy of the dock, Kairi letting go of his hand so she could stand in front of him and lock her eyes with his, "But I think you'll even start to see it when you revisit worlds you haven't been to for a while. Even Atlantica. Think about it, if you hadn't helped Ariel then she might not be where she is today, with Eric. With Melody."
Sora lifted his head slowly, taking in her words and letting them wash over him. But he didn't have a response. Not yet.
So Kairi continued, "I know there's not really a way to make you feel better about the things you missed here and I'm sorry for that. But you've already got your high school degree and soon enough, you can go take classes at the university if you want to. As for missing out on things with me and with Riku, those three years will be so insignificant soon. You're home now and you're going to be here for so much more than what you missed."
He kept staring at her for a moment, his mind clearly still spinning. When he finally managed to get his thoughts at least somewhat organized, he immediately collected her into his arms and kissed her before resting his chin atop her shoulder. "Thank you." He said softly before giving a bit of a laugh, "I'm sure you and Riku are both getting tired of me bringing this stuff up all the time, though. I'm sorry."
"You don't have to apologize." She reached up to rub his shoulders soothingly before leaning towards his ear and teasing in a low voice, "You might make us late for watching the sunset, though."
Sora pulled away, walking over to his newly repaired boat and waved over it with a smile, "Wanna try it out?"
"I dunno, are we gonna get stranded on the island?" She grinned as she walked over.
"It's a possibility." He untied it from the dock, readying it for her.
She sat down in the boat, shrugging, "Oh well. Guess I'll just have to miss class tomorrow morning if we do."
He laughed, sitting down in the other end of the boat before pushing off shore with his hand. Shaking the water off and reaching for the paddle, he commented, "The ocean's starting to get pretty cold."
"It's definitely fall, now." She answered, "Halloween's coming up pretty soon. You know what that means."
"Ah, yeah. Riku's party." Sora started to row, "Do you have a costume?"
She shook her head, "No, me and Selphie are going to go shopping soon. She propped her elbows on her knees and held her face in her hands, amused as she asked, "Do you have any idea of what you're going to do?"
He shrugged, "Uh… I don't know. I guess I'll probably use the magic I would use for Halloween Town. I don't really have the time to go shopping. Plus it's free."
"Cheater." Kairi stuck her tongue out at him.
"I could do the same thing for you, you know." He looked up with a raised eyebrow.
She rolled her eyes, "Unlike you, I don't want to take the easy way out."
"Alright, your loss." He answered in a bit of a sing-song voice and Kairi shook her head. "So if we don't get stranded, are there any papers or other things I should know about so I can get you home at a reasonable hour?"
She grinned into her hands, "There's a few things that I could probably work on but… nothing's urgent. So I'm yours for as long as you want me."
"As much I'd love to have you to myself all night, I think I should probably let my mom know I'm back home before she goes to sleep." Sora looked over to her with a small smile.
"I understand." She gave a smile in return.
After a few more minutes of comfortable silence, they finally reached the play island. "Looks like we just made it." Sora commented as he docked the boat.
"Mhm." Kairi nodded before climbing up onto the dock, looking down to watch him as he finished up and scooting backwards once he reached up to grab the side of the dock. Moving to the front of the dock, she carefully dangled her legs over the edge as she waited for him.
He slid in beside her, his shoulder and leg pressing lightly against hers, though he kept his arms behind himself as he leaned back. "Feels good to be home." He closed his eyes, listening to the same sound of the waves that he searched for out on other worlds. But what really made it feel like home was the weight and warmth he could feel from Kairi at his side.
She titled her head, resting it against his shoulder, "It feels good to have you home."
He smiled, opening his eyes and looking over to her. Kairi, however kept staring out into the sunset; her lips curled upward into a smile as well. Looking back over the ocean, he wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her closer. "Hey, Kairi?" He called in a soft voice.
"Yeah?" She tilted her head upwards to look at him, though he was still focused on the sunset.
"How'd you hold up after I left?" He looked over to her with a small laugh, "You and mom both were practically guilting me out of leaving."
She elbowed him teasingly, answering, "I was okay after a while. It was sort of hard to fall asleep but Selphie entertained me for a while. It's nice to have things with her back to normal." She smiled again, "Thanks for talking with her. I know things are still kind of awkward but… at least it's better."
"Yeah, I mean she helped me out with surprising you. Definitely a big step from where we were." He nodded.
Kairi blinked in surprise, "Really? I figured you just used your keyblade…"
"Unlike you and Riku, my first thought isn't to break into people's houses." Sora answered seriously and she gave a pout. He lightly tickled her side with his fingers causing her to smile again before batting away his hand. "But anyway, I asked Selphie before I went out to get dinner the other night. After I told you about the letter." He rested his hand against her side again.
"Selphie just can't say no to romantic gestures." She giggled to herself.
Sora raised an eyebrow, searching for verification, "So it was romantic, then?"
"I thought so." She nodded, looking up at him to ask, "Why?"
"I guess it's just nice to know that I'm not completely clueless." He answered with a grin.
She reached up and cupped the side of his face, staring at him in admiration, "Whatever you are, stay that way." She leaned in to kiss him.
