Disclaimer: None of these characters in these stories belong to me.....
Some Things Are Meant To Be: Love And Cocktails
Thursday morning dawned golden and promising, over Twilight Town. It boded well for the day ahead which was just as well, thought a sleepless Roxas, as he lay with a pregnant but-she-didn't-yet-know-that-he-knew-it girlfriend curled up in his arms, her white blond hair streaming across the pillow and his arm. He drew her closer to him, suddenly feeling incredibly protective of her and their tiny unborn creation, wondering how long she'd known, and now understanding her deep interest in everything that Kairi was going through. He was dying to quiz Sora more thoroughly as well, but knew that he couldn't until he officially 'knew', or Sora was almost bound to drop a clanger in front of Nami. Secrets and Sora just didn't go together that well!
He felt Namine stir, and she turned to face him. "Hey, what's your name, handsome? And what're you doing in my bed?" Roxas decided to play along, "Nothing – yet," he countered. "Well, Mister Nothing, if you're in my bed, you'd better get doing something," she said bringing his mouth down to hers, and her loving boyfriend dutifully obliged. It really was a glorious morning, full of good omens, he thought, and who needed sleep anyway!
Later. A LOT later. Roxas was finishing off the packing, whilst Namine straightened her hair. "You taking your sketch pad or your knitting?" Roxas queried, the relevant items staring up at him from the bed, "I doubt you'll have time to do both, with all the babysitting we're signed up for."
"I'll take both, forgot to tell you last night, you were so late back from Dem's. Riku rang. New plan. We're not running interference anymore, in case it screws up whatever His Mouseness has up his sleeve."
"Yeah but Riku didn't hear Dem last night. He said he's going to tell Axel something!" Roxas said, chewing his top lip, nervously.
"What?"
"Exactly!"
"No, you idiot! What is Dem going to tell him?" exclaimed an exasperated Namine. Guys could be so dense sometimes.
Roxas looked a little embarrassed. "Well, I'm not too sure. I kind of switched off like I usually do when he launches into the whole 'Woe is me' thing and I didn't actually catch anything until the '..I'm going to tell him!' part."
"God, you're useless!"
"Really?" asked Roxas dropping the sketch pad he had just picked up, and making a beeline for her with a very cheeky look on his face.
"No, not really," she said after a quick interlude of kissing, "this morning you were very useful, but it's a good job you're not in charge of intelligence! I'll just have to worm it out of him on the flight over, and then we can reassess if necessary!"
"Well, it's a plan," noted Roxas, as he carefully packed Namine's creative stuff in the case.
"Right, bar your straightener's, we're sorted!" he announced, quite pleased with himself. For once, he didn't actually have to sit on the cases to make them close. Namine had been right. Folding the items before you packed them, instead of just throwing them in, (his usual method), made it much easier.
"Not taking them, using Kairi's!" Namine quipped. "Now, let's go get waterboy, and begin this charade!"
Demyx, actually was sitting on his case, not in order to close it, but because it happened to be the nearest thing to the door to sit on. He was running through a mental to-do list, in preparation for leaving. Lights, check. Timeswitch, check. Cooker, check. Windows, check. Sitar, check. Guitar, check. Fire extinguisher, he allowed himself a small laugh at his little joke, totally check. He realised that, for the first time since he had found out that Axel would be at the luau, he actually felt quite cheerful, and he was smiling as the doorbell rang, and he opened it, to a slightly apprehensive couple.
"Ready!" he sang out. They smiled in response, and when Demyx had finished triple-locking his door, they got in the cab and headed for the hangar, where Roxas new gummi ship, the Blond Bombshell, was parked. As with anything that came from Luxord, it was sleek, luxurious and kitted out with every mod con, the man never did things by halves, and never skimped on gifts to his friends.
"Way to go, Rox. I'd heard she was a beauty, but WOW!" Roxas glowed with pleasure at Demyx's obvious appreciation of his favourite new toy.
"Well, let's get on board and I'll show you how she flies," enthused Roxas, "That will really knock your socks off!"
Namine and Demyx, settled themselves on the sunken couch in the saloon area, whilst Roxas did his flight check, and then blasted them into the warp lane to the Destiny Islands. He could have left it on automatic pilot, but he enjoyed flying manually, and thought Namine might have more success with Demyx alone. So after a quick, "Waddya think of that?" to Demyx over the intercom, and receiving exactly the kind of answer he had hoped for, he settled down to piloting, and left Namine to probe.
"So, you're actually thinking of talking to Axel," Namine broached in a gentle voice, but her usual forthright manner.
"Don't know about talking, that implies a conversation, which implies responses. I plan on telling him something – yes!"
Namine looked at him expectantly.
"What? Roxas didn't tell you already?" Namine thought it was just as well she didn't blush, because if she had, she'd have been an unflattering shade of tomato.
"I've decided to tell Axel that I forgive him. I'm going to be the bigger person. It's my 21st, and I am going to show that oversized child that I am mature. I will get up on stage and before I start the concert , I will publically forgive him for being a lying, cheating, insensitive, uncaring, abusive arsehole," finished Demyx with a smug smile of extreme self-satisfaction on his face.
Namine who had responded to Demyx's first sentence with the smile of the truly blessed, now looked like the forces of darkness had all come back at once, and she chewed her top lip so hard that she broke the skin.
"What's with the glum face?" queried Demyx, completely oblivious to any flaw in his plan. Namine realised Demyx genuinely thought he was making a grand gesture, because he genuinely felt that Axel needed forgiving for all those things, but she knew that if that was ever allowed to happen the dudu would really hit the fan!
Before, she had time to compose herself sufficiently, for an explanation and reply, Roxas came over the intercom. "Coming in to land. I phoned ahead and we have a welcoming committee, looks like. So look lively there, let's show these island hicks all that's slick about the city!" he joked.
So saying, he performed a few fancy manoeuvres and a wing wave before bringing his craft in to land. They'd barely made it down the landing ramp before a very pregnant Kairi barrelled into them, closely followed by Sora.
"Missed you, sooooooo much!" she said hugging them as close as was feasible. "Hope you're hungry 'cos I'm starving, I'm always starving these days, I hope the baby doesn't want feeding as often when it comes out as it does now, and Olette's cooking up a major banquet, so let's go eat!"
By now, Riku, had joined them, and once all the hugging and back-slapping was out of the way, they headed off towards the mayor's home, where his pretty wife had spent the entire morning in the kitchen, once again proving to Riku, how truly brilliant he had been for falling in love with her! She was as phenomenal at cookery as Kairi was completely hopeless, and a five-course lunch for a few friends didn't faze her at all.
As they sat down around the large dining table on the patio, and toasted their reunion, everyone noticed that their personal favourite dish was somewhere on the menu, a handwritten copy of which had been thoughtfully placed on their sideplate, with Olette at his side Riku was really going places.
"To us!" grinned Sora, "Three years older and wiser, and still together!" as he raised a glass of the islands' best.
"To us!" they chorused loudly, in reply.
Loudly enough for it to be heard on the steps across the square, where a red-head, and a dark blond stood, opening the door to a rather expensive looking white villa. "Lux, you awake yet?" Axel called into the cool, airy interior, as the gentleman in question appeared from the direction of his kitchen.
"Sure am. Just fixing us something to drink to go with our rather delicious looking meal. No, I haven't learned to cook in your absence, I got the club kitchen to send it over earlier. Thought you might be in need of some proper sustenance after military rations."
"Military rations," laughed Hayner, "you may have the best chef in the Islands, well, OK, most of the galaxy, but Belle's cousin, Michel, has recently been seconded to the Red Arrow, need I say more!"
Lux was acknowledging Michel's well-known kitchen skills, when Axel broke in with, "What's going on over at Rikulette's place? Could hear them right across the square! We not get an invite?"
Luxord decided evasion was not going to work, "Demyx, is going on. Rox, Nami and he just arrived. Please, Axel, leave it be, there'll be enough fireworks this weekend as it is!" Hayner had actually put a restraining hand his superior's arm, but had to withdraw it at the heat that suddenly coursed through, but, for once, Axel seemed in no mood for an argument.
"Sure, Lux. I'm not so rude as to spoil lunch, not after you've gone to ALL this trouble," Axel joked, and accepted a bright blue and, he hoped, seriously alcoholic, drink from his host.
Across the square lunch was progressing in a leisurely fashion, with the small talk running at twenty to the dozen as everyone tried to catch up with each other's recent activities.
Namine, who happened to be sat next to Riku, and far enough away from Demyx not to be overheard if she spoke quietly, told Riku of the conversation on board the Blond Bombshell, but Riku persisted in his argument, of non-interference. Namine was more than a little exasperated with the entire male sex but reasoned that it would not help the situation if they were all arguing about how to handle it, and, for the moment at least, gave in gracefully.
By the time lunch was over, in both houses, the mix of good food, alcohol, sea air and a warm afternoon, saw everyone more than ready, to go for a nap. Roxas had actually pre-empted this by falling asleep in his dessert, prompting a great deal of amusement and cries of "Get a room!", which were a little out of context.
Sora and Kairi headed for home, with Namine and a slightly disorientated Roxas, in tow, across Riku's back garden which adjoined theirs. Everyone else retired inside to their rooms. By complete accident, both Demyx and Axel had been given rooms overlooking the square, and chose the identical moment to go and close the shutters to their respective balconies.
Axel looked across and saw a vision in deep turquoise, that he recognised instantly. His heart, which now beat in his chest like any normal person's, skipped a few of them, and he suddenly felt a bit unsteady on his feet. "Got to stop with the drinking!" he said to himself, but he couldn't drag his eyes away from the slim blond with the silly haircut and piercing aquamarine eyes, wearing an Island shirt and a faded pair of jeans, who stood still as a statue, opposite.
The statue, was in a not dissimilar frame of mind as he stared across the square, except he was also angry with himself. He hadn't seen so much as a picture of Axel in three years, and seeing him now and feeling his heart leap into his mouth, like it had the first time he set eyes on him, (even though he hadn't had a heart then), was very disconcerting. Nothing had changed but his outfit. The same fire red hair, the same piercing emerald eyes, the same inverted teardrop tattoos, the same half-smile, now only emphasised by a bright green T-shirt, and red combat pants, and, Demyx noted, moving at last, to touch the aquamarine in his own ear, Axel was still wearing the emerald in his. The presents they'd exchanged after they'd been together for six months. Unable to take any more, Demyx retreated into his room, pulling the shutters closed, behind him.
When Demyx had gone, Axel sagged slightly, closed his own shutters and sat on the bed. He'd been waiting for something, he could feel it, but what? He realised he'd been expecting Demyx to shout an apology to him, even if that was so not Demyx's style, and he'd have gone running to accept it, and everything could be back to normal, to how it should have been.
"Holy crap!" thought Axel, as he lay back on the emerald silk sheets, "I'm still in love with the arsehole! Now what the hell am I going to do?"
Lying in the darkened room, across the square, Demyx was coming to a different kind of realisation. He had never doubted that he loved Axel, and always would, but he now realised that he meant every word he planned on saying to Axel, he wouldn't be saying it because he was the bigger person, but because inside he'd truly forgiven Axel for being a jerk! As he drifted off to sleep, he felt at complete peace with himself, and couldn't wait for Saturday.
Across the square, sleep was more elusive, and after an hour of tossing and turning, and slipping off the shiny sheets more than once, Axel gave up. Throwing a green dragon robe over his boxers, he returned to the lounge. He could hear Luxord was up and already mixing cocktails, from the sounds of things. Axel felt like he wanted a bigger boost than something that was strangely coloured and served with umbrellas, "Lux, bring me something strong and straight, will you," he yelled in the direction of the kitchen as he sprawled on the couch.
"This do you?" Luxord chuckled. Axel turned to see his tall whiteblond friend, stark naked, doing an ironman pose in front of him. "Or were you referring to an alcoholic beverage?"
When Axel had quite finished laughing at his British friend's humour, he ordered a dark rum, "Besides, Lux," he quipped, once he could talk again, "since when are you straight?"
"Always, my dear boy, barring my time as a Nobody. I even had a wife and kid once, but it didn't last, I was too much the gambler." His voice sounded a bit wistful, as he stared into space at the distant memory. "Anyway, Ax," he said coming back down to earth, "what's with you hitting the hard stuff when you're barely out of bed. Usually takes you at least a couple of hours."
"I just saw Demyx, and Lux, I'm still in love with the bastard! I realised, all I want is for him to apologise, and everything can go back to how it was!" declared Axel, the sincerety in his voice, unmistakeable.
Luxord, caught off-guard nearly dropped his tall cocktail glass of mint green liquid, but his hand shook enough to dislodge the umbrella. "I know," said Axel, misunderstanding completely, "I was amazed too!" and he knocked back most of his drink.