A/N: Whoo, finally the third chapter. Thank you Sexy-Tacos-Emo-Waffles and Nitrea for reviewing! I would have replied, but I don't know how I have to do that. -_-

Disclaimer: I think it's obvious I don't own KH. The song is the same as in the last chapter: Fools in love by Joe Jackson

Edit: I changed the time Roxas knows Axel because it'll be important later on.

Chapter III

Fools in love (2)
Fools in love they think they're heroes
'Cause they get to feel more pain
I say fools in love are zeros
I should know, I should know
Because this fool's in love again
-Joe Jackson

I was early, there were almost no cars in the parking lot and I could immediately spot Axel's red hair. He was alone and clearly waiting for someone. Probably me.

I picked up some speed in an attempt to surprise him. I rode straight to him and stopped only when it was clear he wouldn't jump out of the way. A wheel hit his knee, but it didn't have enough speed to really hurt him. He hadn't moved an inch. The only thing that had changed were his lips, now smiling brightly. The 'if I were a car, you would be dead' comment I initially planned on saying suddenly sounded very childish and stupid.

It was the first time I stood face to face with him and I only noticed just now how incredibly tall he was.

He bowed down a bit, resting his arms on the steering-wheel. His face was way too close, but with the saddle pressing in my back, I couldn't get away. I could only hope he would move his face away and, above all, that I wasn't blushing like a high-school girl right now.

"Nice to see you."

The words lingered in my ears for a few seconds, ringing like bells before I understood what he had said. By the time I blinked with my eyes his face was gone.

"The others are in the cafeteria, didn't want to wait outside. Drunkards."

I would have laughed, but I was way too stunned by what had just happened. And by his clothes.

"Axel, isn't that way too cold?"

He was wearing black, broad pants, which were not the problem, but both his leather jacket and his shocking red shirt missed sleeves and his gloves didn't have fingers. (They were studded however, but I was positive the metal wouldn't help him fight the cold). He looked at himself like he didn't understood what I meant.

"I'm naturally hot, nothing to break your little head over."

He got a flat look in return.

"I have other gloves. With fingers."

"That's not the problem."

Smile.

"You worried about me?"

Pause.

"No."

When we got to the cafeteria, the two 'drunkards' had finished whatever drink they had ordered – if they had had anything at all – because their table was empty. They came over as soon as they saw Axel, which, of course, did not take them long.

"Hya there, I'm Demyx and this weirdo here's Marluxia."

Directly after the sentence left his mouth, Demyx got slapped by the other boy.

"I know," I answered, earning a strange look from Marluxia.

I shrugged. "Well, it's difficult not to know a group of people whose hair can be spotted from 500 meters away. Especially if they have a girl amongst their ranks that picks on every first year she sees." 'Or she thinks is a first year.' That last sentence however, I didn't dare to say aloud.

"I like you,' Demyx said. "Though I wouldn't take Larx too lightly. She has a whole army of girls at her side."

"Hey guys, I actually got to go to the toilet. You go ahead."

Coward. This was only stay of execution. But at least now there was this little chance Axel's friends wouldn't be in the vicinity while I'd do the embarrassing job of explaining why I had lied to him and that I did actually do – and even like – figure skating.

I had no idea what kind of difference that would make, but that was of secondary importance.

I decided to go and put on my skates before I turned into a pussy and ran away. Luckily Marluxia, Demyx and Axel had already entered the rink.

When I came into the rink, I just stood there for a moment to take in my surroundings. Axel was warming up on the outside circle of the rink that was used for short track and from what I could see; he wasn't half bad at skating. Marluxia and Demyx were on the inner circle – the real rink, which was used for figure skating and ice hockey. Marluxia seemed to be doing okay, but Demyx fell more in five minutes than I did in an hour while practicing for my jumps. He looked like he would have the same level of skating skills as Marluxia though if only he would be a bit less reckless.

I couldn't spend the whole evening staring though and I skated over to Axel reluctantly. When he saw me, his eyes darted towards my feet immediately and his mouth turned into a smile.

"Nice skates."

"So, um..." I looked away.

"You didn't tell me you did figure skating"

"Um, well, yeah…"

"So what can you do?"

I looked at him in surprise.

"What?"

His smile had turned into a grin.

"Well, this is way more interesting than short track. So tell me what you can do. You've awoken my curiosity."

I eyed him suspiciously. This was not the reaction I had expected. Didn't he think I was way too girly to be normal?

"Well, I can do all kinds of spins. As for jumps, I can do anything really, salchows, loops, flips, lutzes, Rittbergers, toeloops, axels... That's about it."

I was counting them out on my fingers, but when I looked up again, the grin on Axel's face had become huge. Not good.

"I'd like to see you jump an Axel. Preferably this one." His eyes were twinkling, both index fingers pointing at himself.

I could feel my jaw drop, while the rest of my body froze. I knew when I first heard Axel as a name, I had been quite surprised. I'd been figure skating for years by then and when I heard 'Axel', I was bound to think of the jump, and every time someone spoke of it as a name, it would sound like an inside joke and I was bound to laugh a bit in myself. But I had known the redhead for almost two years by now, and over time, 'Axel' and 'axel' had become two entirely different things and when speaking of one of them, I never thought of the other anymore.

So there I stood, looking like a deer caught in headlights, while Axel's grin never vanished.

I remembered once comparing Axel's grin to Sora's. But now I couldn't understand anymore how I could ever have thought they were alike. Sora's smiles were always bright, while his eyes were shining with happiness, but this, this was almost frightening. Axel looked almost like a predator that was playing with his prey, his eyes full of mischief. And that was not a good sign.

"I'm going to get a coke."

Monday came around and I was bored. The whole class was, actually and everyone was just waiting around for the bell to finally rescue us. Ethics was always boring. We weren't a good class; it was hard to be one with a teacher like ours. We didn't say anything useful because he would just shout at us anyway and it just wasn't worthwhile. Ethics class was often use to finish homework or to socialize with your friends, but when you didn't have any of the two, you had to fill your time with other things. Like thinking how you just wanted last Friday had never happened.

Last Friday…

After stomping of to the vending machine to buy a coke, I'd joined Marluxia and Demyx, completely ignoring Axel. To my relief, none of them had found my figure skating girly, gay, or, even worse, both. (I quote Demyx: "Why would we? I mean, have you seen Marley's hair?") The two of them actually made quite nice company.

Saturday, my game of 'ignore the idiot' continued. I didn't even allow myself to look at him. (I'd failed miserably though, but I don't know if Axel had noticed that I had been cheating.)

I usually didn't see Axel at school. The sixth years had a special classroom for themselves where they could stay during free periods and breaks, so the only way for me to see him here was when changing classrooms. This was exactly where I had to prepare myself for once the bell rang. I knew my heart would jump when I'd see red spikes in the corridors and I had to make sure my inner turmoil wouldn't show on my face. Luckily Axel was nowhere to be seen and I could walk into the classroom that was used for Latin safely.

During Latin we had to do a little group assignment with the person sitting next to you. It wasn't all too hard – especially because Olette always got the best points for Latin – and we were done relatively early, giving us another 20 minutes to do nothing at all.

That's when I got an idea.

"Olette, can I ask you something?"

The girl stared at me as if I'd grown horns.

"Are you actually speaking to me?"

I had the sudden urge to reply with: 'No, like every sane person, I like speaking to the statues of great Roman writers. And I especially like to call them Olette, just to confuse other people.' But just speaking to her made me nervous, especially because of the questions I was going to ask, so I just nodded.

She returned the nod, indicating I was free to ask whatever I wanted.

"You don't have to answer if you don't want to, but why did you fall in love with Axel? I don't mean to insult you or something, but he's clearly a player."

She looked at me rather skeptically.

"Why do you ask?"

"Well, I have this friend at the drawing school who likes him. I have a hard time understanding that."

"Hmm… Well, this is kind of embarrassing, really." She blushed a bit, but she wasn't done speaking yet. "Actually, when he asked me out, I was sort of honored. He could take every girl he wanted, and he picked me. The fact that he'd had dozens of girlfriends before and the fact that our relationship probably wouldn't last long didn't matter to me back then. I liked him, but it was just physical attraction."

She paused, thinking about what she was going to say next. "But while hanging out with him, things started to change. There usually was this… though aura surrounding him, but sometimes, he could be very kind and respectful of me. It's hard to describe. There were moments when gentleness would shine through. Gradually, I started to hold those tender moments dear. Those feelings were amazing, but with them, the jealousness arose. I tried to hide it, because I'd heard from other girls that Axel had dumped them when they got too jealous too easily. But he noticed. And he dumped me. Two days later he had a new girlfriend."

There was another pause, and when she began to speak again, her voice was softer. She was lost in thought. "I don't understand why really. I never said anything about him talking or flirting with other girls. I never complained. I never scoffed at girls that I thought were too close to him, hell, I didn't even glare at them. When we were alone together, my jealousy was always forgotten instantly. Yet he ended our relationship right after the jealousness arose. I don't get it."

She trailed off, drowning in nostalgia.

I didn't want to interrupt her daydreaming, but I was really, really wondering about one other thing. After a small inner debate, my curious side won, and I gathered the courage to voice my question. I knew I was going to sound stupid, but oh well. I guess it was a good way to lift the atmosphere.

"Can I ask a stupid question?"

Olette looked distracted, but she was curious about my new question, so she nodded.

"Is it really true that Larxene has an army of girls?"

She burst out in laughter, earning a glare from the teacher, and some students who were still busy with their assignment, but she ignored them.

"You really don't speak to anyone do you?"

I nodded, a bit embarrassed.

"Well, it's true," she said after her giggle fit was over. "Most of the girls join in their first two years. When someone joins, she can count on protection form the whole group. It's really organized and they even have a forum and all. It's also used as a social website. It's also a social network. When some girls get bored, they will plan an event through the forum. Anyone who likes that event can come, though they all have to inform that they'll be there and those who host the event make a list of the attendants. This way, people who dislike someone can easily avoid them. Most of the people are really open though, because Larxene just doesn't like close-minded girls and she can be a real bitch at times."

"Wow, that sounds really cool."

Olette laughed again, this time she kept her voice low though. She didn't want to be thrown out of the class.

"Sorry, no boys allowed."

I laughed with her, Axel momentarily forgotten.

A/N: I don't know when chapter 4 will be up, I'm currently still writing it and I hope to bost it befor the end of the month.

Also, for those who wonder what the songs are: They're just lyrics that helped to inspire me to write everything and lyrics that go well with the music. You should search up the whole song, sometimes the lyrics give hints to what is going to happen next. Don't take it for granted though xD.

Pleaso don't make me beg for reviews, it makes me feel pathetic.

Random fact of the day:
Butterflies taste with their feet.