Chapter 005
Roxas took the steps up from his building's lobby two by two, the day's mail clutched in a vice-like grip in one hand. He made it to the third floor landing in a matter of seconds, chest heaving, and forced himself to slow his pace down the final hallway that would take him back home. A shoelace had come untied in the haste of his ascent. It trailed unnoticed, jerked erratically under the influence of gravity, a spontaneous movement following each successive step.
Stopping only long enough to fish a chain of keys out of the front pocket of his backpack, Roxas entered the apartment with an air of giddy anticipation, slipping out of his thick winter coat and hanging it up in the hall closet in one smooth, routine motion.
The living room was empty, west-facing window blinds open to the what remained of the day's quickly fading red-orange hues. A few months from now, it'd remain light out much later. High school would be officially over. And Roxas and his friends would have twelve glorious, summery weeks to hang out at their usual spot, to talk college and dorm rooms, and just screw around not doing anything really in particular.
College.
The effervescent feeling returned, a fluttering of excitement forming then moving outward from the depths of his chest.
College. He was going to go to college.
At least, that's what he hoped.
Looking down at the envelope in his hand, Roxas took a moment to breathe in deeply, to settle his nerves.
His mother was in the kitchen, stove on, water simmering its way toward a languid boil. She turned at Roxas' entrance, offered her son a bright, welcoming smile. It was received with a sense of newfound anxiety as, quite suddenly, Roxas' thoughts inexplicably began to take a turn toward troubling.
He'd just received a letter from the top college of his choice, yeah. But the admissions process there was highly competitive, the ratio of applicants to acceptances incredibly low. He'd even applied as a binding early decision applicant, hoping to prove his unwavering commitment to matriculate — if only they were willing to let him in in the first place.
But…didn't offers of acceptance usually come in larger packages? Hayner's certainly had, even if it was just to a local city school.
Now acutely aware of just how slim the letter happened to be within the envelope he was still gripping in the tense fingers of one hand, Roxas found it next to impossible to return his mother's smile.
His mother's expression wavered, brows furrowing at her son's troubled look in a show of clear concern. "Älskling," she said, depositing a large wooden spoon onto a nearby countertop. "Is something wrong?"
Wordlessly, Roxas extended his arm, held out the envelope in front of him so his mother could read the distinctive font in the upper left corner, indicating the letter's original sender.
"Oh." Quiet understanding flickered in her eyes. A moment later, she approached. Placing a supporting hand on his back, Svea Sorenson gently guided her son out of the kitchen, into the adjacent space, and over to a dining room chair. She took a seat nearby, crossing one slender ankle over another, then placing folded hands in her lap before offering Roxas an encouraging smile. Even those simple actions had an air of graceful delicateness. A dancer once, a dancer always, Roxas supposed, even if his mother had officially retired from performing years ago.
"Open it, honey. You know I'll be proud of you no matter what."
Swallowing tightly, Roxas looked down at his thighs where the envelope had come to rest. With considerable hesitation, he turned it over, wedging his index finger under a small opening at one of its corners, then began to tear it open carefully from left to right.
A single sheet of paper greeted his anxious gaze. He pulled it out, unfolded it twice, before sitting up a little straighter and allowing his eyes to travel over the letterhead, the salutation, then down to the first line of the actual message.
Roxax read the first sentence twice, a third time, just to be safe, making sure he hadn't missed any subtle, crucial words. When he looked up, his mother was watching him closely, expression expectant but otherwise neutral. Something unidentifiable, a rising sensation of some intangible unknown, was making its way from his chest up into his throat.
"Mamma," he said, voice emotional, for some reason compelled to call his mother a term he hadn't used since he was in the third grade. "I got in."
"You did." The words were a soft acknowledgement, confirmation that what he'd said had been both heard and understood.
And though it hadn't sounded like his mother had asked a question, Roxas nodded, let out a shuddering breath of relief followed by a veritable rush of supplementary words. "It says the welcome packet comes later. And something about loans and scholarships."
His mother rose quickly, made an indistinct sound of delight as she reached over to pull him into a hug. Normally so careful about displays of affection in this past year since he'd started to come to terms with growing awareness of his own orientation, Roxas nevertheless stood and let himself be embraced. After a moment's pause, he even lifted his own arms and returned the fervent, celebratory gesture.
After a prolonged moment of affectionate contact, his mother stepped back, elbows straightening, hands sliding up to Roxas's shoulders. Roxas looked up at her, for once not bothered by how much shorter he was than even his own mother. For the first time since he'd gotten home, a smile began to form at the corners of his lips. Once it started, he was helpless to control the expression, found it rising up toward his cheeks until his lips parted into an exultant grin of his own.
He'd done it. All those late nights studying, every time he'd had to turn down outings with friends. Each little sacrifice, the hours upon hours of hard work, had ultimately been worth it in the end.
"Congratulations, sweetie."
Roxas inclined his head slightly, still smiling, then noticed the letter still clutched in his hands, and looked up once again. "Do you want to read it?"
Dropping her hands back down to her sides, his mother nodded enthusiastically. "Yes. Yes, of course."
He passed the cream-colored sheet of paper over to her, watching as blue eyes so similar to his own traveled across the page. By now, it already felt like he'd managed to commit the entire first paragraph to memory and he found himself silently reciting the words along with her as she continued to read. They still had to figure out tuition and living expenses, his thoughts cautioned, and make sure it would otherwise be financially feasible for him to attend. Right now, Roxas opted to overlook those concerns in favor of giving himself a well-deserved moment to just simply celebrate this initial accomplishment.
Mid-way down the page, his mother's expression changed. Her eyes closed, brows knitting together as if in pain.
Roxas took half a step forward, arm not quite fully outstretched, then stopped as he saw her raise her hand to her face, pressing two fingers to the side of her head, against a temple. When she opened her eyes a moment later, they were unfocused, her expression subtly perturbed.
"Mom," he ventured. "Are you okay?"
"Yes, of course," she said, tone strangely opaque, seemingly unaware that she'd repeated words she'd only just moments ago said in an entirely different context. As Roxas watched, mildly unsettled, Svea Sorenson turned, lowered herself carefully back into her chair, her son's acceptance letter trembling minutely in one hand. She looked up at Roxas, then smiled again. To Roxas, it was a shadow of her first expression, a vaguely worrying, haggard-looking gesture.
His mother took a deep breath in, drawing the letter to her chest, before exhaling a string of slow, laborious words.
"I'm fine, älskling, maybe a little tired," she murmured, voice becoming increasingly quiet as she continued to speak. An unconscious sigh, another half-smile, and then, spoken so softly Roxas almost couldn't hear at all, "It's probably just the start of another one of my headaches."
September 10, 2012
Political science text, chapter two, third page.
Once again, for the second time in as many days, Roxas found his mind drifting. This time, in the white-washed hospital setting with a head too stuffily clouded to even manage to bring up a semi-accurate image of Axel, Roxas figured he had even less of an excuse not to be catching up with his readings.
The saying that history repeated itself was by now so obnoxiously, ironically accurate to his life it practically hurt.
He hadn't felt much like studying after he'd gotten back to the city yesterday, an apathy internally justified because he'd had to make a handful of frustrating phone calls to find a coworker willing to agree to a last-minute switch of shifts. It was the only way his schedule would otherwise have been able to accommodate this morning hospital visit.
It'd been difficult to find someone, with most simply refusing due to such late notice and others not even bothering to answer their phones in the first place. Eventually he'd gotten through to a former high school classmate, a fellow cafe worker by the name of Fuu. She was Roxas' age, but that was about the only commonality they shared. On the days they were scheduled to work together, Roxas usually found himself keeping his head down, trying to avoid the abusive, snarky comments from her meat-head of a boyfriend who more often than not seemed to have nothing better to do than hang around the coffee kiosk.
While Fuu trended toward minimal word usage, generally just shooting Roxas sullen looks to express her disdain at his presence, her boyfriend, Seifer, preferred to take a more direct approach. It wasn't unusual for him to make pointed comments, mocking Roxas about everything from his family's immigrant status to his modest height and presumed sexual orientation.
Essentially, the guy was a dick of the highest order, and used every opportunity to prove it, and indiscriminately, if Hayner's similar complaints when working shifts with Fuu were any indication.
The call hadn't been the most pleasant to get through, Roxas remembered, still staring dolefully at his political science text as hospital staff and visitors milled about all around him. Fuu hadn't been thrilled with the request, even after he'd said it was a family emergency. To make matters worse, Fuu's general aversion to full sentences had meant he'd also gotten an earful of Seifer's commentary on the other end of the line.
"Who're you talking to?" Roxas had heard, only a few seconds into the call.
Fuu had remained quiet a pregnant moment before answering with her typical curtness. "Nobody. Just Roxas."
"Who? Wait, that twinkie fob from the coffee shop? What the hell does he want?"
Over the line, Roxas had grimaced, allowed himself to roll his eyes without the worry of having to deal with a direct reaction from Seifer. Fob? Twinkie? Seriously? He was fucking second generation, no different than Fuu, whose parents had immigrated from Vietnam. Christsakes. If the insult was relevant to Roxas, it applied just as equally to her. Knowing Seifer, he probably made some kind of arbitrary exception for Asians he thought were hot. Shaking his head, Roxas had pretended not to hear and just continued on with his reason for calling in the first place, determined to get through the conversation before Seifer managed to induce a night-long headache. It didn't stop him from thinking about just how much of a tone deaf toolbag Seifer really was though. Even with high school long over, some things just never seemed to change.
The rest of the conversation, though grating with Seifer's continued commentary, had ultimately culminated in Fuu's reluctant agreement to swap Roxas' Monday shift in exchange for him taking her morning Tuesday hours. Not great, but at least he'd managed to find a sub on short notice, even if it just meant he now had another duty in its place to worry about. It also meant another morning working with Hayner, who was usually scheduled as a Tuesday regular. Not bad either, except it left even less time to catch up with his homework.
Then he'd had to call Axel…
Nearby, Roxas noticed a boy slouching in his chair, bare arms crossed over what looked like a turtleneck-tanktop hybrid of a t-shirt. His oversized headphones seemed to be the only thing pinning down the unruly, myriad spikes that framed a shock of sienna-toned hair. Catching Roxas staring, the boy's expression contorted, morphed from one of bored neutrality into an implication of subversion, lips thinning into the beginnings of a darkly adolescent scowl.
Roxas averted his gaze, returned his attention to his textbook. Under normal circumstances, he might've been offended by the angry look the kid had shot at him without any conceivable justification. The boy's presence in this wing of the hospital alone was enough rationale for the sour expression though, he supposed. If the kid was looking at him with such hostility, Roxas figured he was probably dealing with something just as awful as the reason for his own visit today. As much as he hated the topic of psychology, Roxas was reminded of the way he himself had initially lashed out in the safe space of his mental health counselor's office last year, how the counselor had encouraged him to express his feelings using herself as a surrogate target for his anger. At the time, she'd explained it in terms of being a necessary aspect of the grieving process, a simple example of emotional transference.
Because 'simple' was such an apt word to use for the agony of emotional turmoil, the complexities of wave after wave of raw grief. Sure.
Unconsciously, Roxas bit the inside of his cheek, implored himself to regain at least a modicum of focus. It was bad enough that he had class in a few hours' time without already finding himself falling behind the course syllabus' relatively intensive reading schedule. It was only the second week of school, so he could probably catch up with a little diligence.
Or he could get so far behind he'd end up spending most of the semester hopelessly lost, winging pop quizzes left and right, and royally fucking himself over in terms of maintaining the grades necessary to keep his partial scholarship.
An insistent vibration began in earnest at his hip. Roxas slid out his phone, feeling an involuntary, nervy fluttering at the possibility that it might be Axel returning the message he'd left the night before.
A moment later, his anticipation turned tepid, dissolved almost completely, as Roxas noted the name lighting up the caller ID.
It was Pence.
Normally, he wouldn't have hesitated to accept the call. On this particular date, however, he couldn't possibly be bothered to act in a way perceived as normal. Nothing about this damn day was normal, and he sure as hell didn't want to hear more about Pence's offer of support; he didn't need anyone's sympathy. Without a further thought, Roxas declined the call. Phone still in hand, he did pull up his messages app though, shooting Hayner a quick text to let him know they'd be sharing a shift Tuesday morning.
"Roxas Sorenson?"
An unfamiliar voice drew Roxas' eyes up away from the screen of his phone. Before him stood a tall brunette sporting a white medical coat, long hair pulled back in a thick fabric band, her ponytail swaying gently as she came to a stop in front of him. A standard-issue clipboard rested loosely against her chest, held in place by a thin, willowy arm.
Roxas nodded but didn't stand, eyeing the woman with mild curiosity as his gaze fell on the nametag attached to her coat.
Lucrecia Crescent. The name didn't ring a bell.
"I'm Dr. Crescent," she said by way of introduction, extending her free hand. Still seated, Roxas shook it, but the confusion as to her identity and purpose for talking to him remained.
"Let's head over to a conference room where we can talk more privately," she said, turning, indicating with a slight jerk of her head that he should follow.
Roxas stood, slinging his backpack over one shoulder, nestling his political science textbook securely under his other arm. He cleared the distance between them in a few sprinting steps, falling in line immediately behind her as his sluggish, sinus infection-ravaged thoughts tried to make sense of the obvious discrepancy.
"I was supposed to meet with Dr. Havartin this morning," he finally said, following the woman with growing unease. They both continued walking despite his comment, taking a route by now familiar to Roxas, out of the waiting area and toward individual patient rooms.
Dr. Crescent glanced at him, her expression not unkind, but didn't slow her pace. "Yes, I know," she said. "Dr. Havartin is unavailable at the moment. I'll be handling his rounds for the day."
Swallowing hard, not comfortable with any form of change on a date that already promised to emotionally drain, Roxas steeled himself, said nothing, just continued trailing along behind the doctor. His expression remained set and determined, but noticeably grim.
It's not like it matters, he told himself, trying his best to sincerely believe the silent assertion. After all, it was hardly important who ended up explaining the process to him. Death was death, the ultimate form of finality. In the end, like a recurring, unavoidable nightmare, it would always lead everyone involved to the same, wretched outcome.
o - o
Roxas sat in a small hospital room on his own, elbows resting on his knees, chin cupped between both palms. To an outside observer, it may have seemed as though he was considering something carefully, eyes scanning the veritable mountain of paperwork Dr. Crescent had left in her wake on a nearby table in front of him.
He'd stopped actively reading any of it hours ago. Much like with his assigned readings, Roxas' eyes simply traveled over the same lines repeatedly, processing nothing. Completely unseeing. At some point, a nurse had stopped by, making an attempt at polite conversation and offering to let in some fresh air by opening the room's only window.
Roxas must have agreed, his hair now occasionally falling into his eyes a direct result of being ruffled by the day's warm breeze. He had no recollection of giving any form of affirmation though, would even have had difficulty describing the nurse's appearance at this point if pressed.
The life support machine was the only thing that seemed even remotely real to him. That, and the constant beeping of half a dozen machines tasked with routinely medicating, of regulating air flow that dictated the steady, measured rise and fall of his mother's chest.
He'd long ago stopped talking to her aloud on these increasingly infrequent visits, not able to stomach the cruel silence that came standard with a completely one-sided conversation of this nature. Over the course of the past six months, verbal smalltalk had yielded to internal, often incomplete, conversational thought. As the months had dragged on, as the realization set in that the woman wasn't going to miraculously recover, it'd started to become an increasingly half-hearted effort for Roxas to keep up appearances even in that regard.
Now he couldn't even muster that. Today, on the only anniversary he wished he could purposefully forget, on the day that they'd first set foot in this sterile, suffocating box of a room expecting a few tests, short stay, and quick results, Roxas felt like he had nothing left to give. This, unequivocally, was the end.
At least her headaches could no longer bother her wherever she was now, he thought. There was a time, before she'd lapsed into this state of permanent unconscious, that his mother would try to sit up, blue eyes glassy and wide. Anxious, almost manic, she'd try to get out of bed. It seemed to Roxas like an attempt to flee from the pain continuously plaguing her, a clawing, relentless torment that no quantity of high-strength meds had ever seemed able to stem. These were also the times he was convinced she was losing her mind from it, unable to recognize the familiar faces of nurses, her attending physician…not even the messy blond hair, the increasingly hopeless expression in the eyes of her only son.
Her condition had deteriorated so rapidly. Despite diligent efforts, they hadn't been able to do anything for her.
Eyes purposefully aimed away from his mother's bed, they played across the top sheet of paper that Dr. Crescent had left for him. They passed over legal words like healthcare directive, power of attorney, final will and testament. These were all things Roxas might have found interesting in a more academic setting. Coupled with medical terminology, other paperwork explaining the ventilator, a host of IVs, her feeding tube, and the unequivocally spelled-out futility of recovery from a condition called 'brain death', the lines of text coalesced into something entirely uninterpretable to him. Wholly foreign. Considerably hostile.
He just needed to sign a handful of the pages, needed to handle decisions for a parent no child should ever end up asked to make. True, he had his grandfather's support, Roxas tried to rationalize, but in the end it was his decision, ultimately, as Svea Sorenson's direct next of kin.
Unable to help himself, he ventured a glance over at the bed. Apart from the sounds of the ventilator, undeviating in its steady, life-giving rhythm, plus the tube down her throat and a few beeping monitors that were easy enough to tune out, he could almost imagine his mother being just simply asleep. Her face was slack, seemed relatively peaceful. He could almost believe it. If he turned off his thoughts, suppressed the twisting ache deep in his heart, he almost nearly could…
Then, quite suddenly, the horrifying weight of the power he wielded hit him. It was authority he'd never asked for, had not once even remotely ever wanted. It occurred to him that, despite possessing what he'd always considered to be a sizable vocabulary, there were no words in the world, no matter what languages he spoke, to describe the feeling now washing over him at the realization that the person who'd brought him into this world, who'd never wavered in her unconditional love and support, might not be here anymore by this time tomorrow.
And although he wasn't suicidal, couldn't truly even pass for depressed, he was unable to help feeling at this moment, in this prison of paralyzing circumstance, that, if his mamma had to leave the world in this awful way, a part of Roxas wanted to die with her, couldn't imagine any other desirable alternative.
The room began to blur out of focus, the finer details of the paperwork before him becoming abruptly too overwhelming to consider for even a second longer. Despite the fresh air still breezing in from the window, the atmosphere around him felt stale and thick. Able to inhale only with considerable effort, the air soured, oppressive, embedded itself deep in his nose and throat.
Homework. Hospital. Rent, food, job. Obligations to still-living family and friends. This was too much. All of these responsibilities. Every single one.
On quivering legs, vision still swimming, heart beating feverishly, Roxas stood. He offered a silent, anguished apology to his mother, his farfar as well. Then, throat constricted in response to this stifling, inexorable horror of a situation, and only just vaguely remembering to retrieve his belongings…
Roxas fled.
o - o
He couldn't tell how long he'd been walking. Maybe an hour. He hadn't consciously been paying attention to the direction he was going. Possibly just west. Whatever the finer details happened to be, they hardly mattered. He'd just had to get away, just needed to keep himself moving.
His phone had gone off several times since taking off. A text from Pence, then Olette, a call from Hayner next, then Pence again. Each time, the vibrating notification had jolted him out of the unfeeling stupor he kept lapsing into, mind mercifully blank until he was forced to acknowledge anything beyond his own acute misery.
The messages were supportive and sweet. They reminded him that, no matter how alone he felt, he still really did have people in his life that he could call true friends.
But, just as soon as he'd skimmed the messages, right about the time he told himself he needed to reply, Roxas found himself stuck, incapable of expending the emotional energy to even offer one or two sentence responses of thanks. Eventually, he switched his phone to do not disturb mode, hoping his friends wouldn't worry too much about his current radio silence, and decided it'd be in his best interests to skip his afternoon class in favor of getting his emotions more effectively in check.
After reading those messages, however, after absorbing the sentiment behind each one, Roxas couldn't deliberately return to the desired state of blankness he'd so recently enjoyed. Instead, it was a matter of aligning his thoughts with safer topics, neutral musings that didn't burrow their way straight into the vulnerable parts of his soul. Still padding around the city without apparent direction, he thought about school readings, cafe work, the possibility of a history research assistantship. Even in his mind's current state of keen, silent distress, Roxas quickly got bored with the limitations of these few topics. His thoughts wandered back to Axel, hoping that thinking of the hot foreigner might perk him up.
It only served to remind him that even their first meet-up no longer promised to lead to another.
He allowed himself a moment of guilt for having to cancel their get-together tomorrow. The self-reproach was intrinsically associated with the reason he'd had to cancel in the first place. Long, winding halls, stark white walls — all telltale signs of that deathtrap of a hospital. Before long, the emotional floodgates opened, as visuals of his morning came rushing, roaring back into the confines of his unwilling but susceptible mind.
His mother's bed. An open window. The sweltering breeze.
The beeping monitors. Her rhythmic ventilator. Page after page of paperwork needing his signature.
Paperwork… that he hadn't bothered to take with him in his frenzied flight off hospital grounds.
Roxas stopped dead in his tracks, causing a few angry comments from people on the sidewalk behind him, inducing a full hand's worth of middle finger flip-offs when he didn't show any outward reaction or give indication that he was going to resume walking.
Well, shit. He'd screwed up again.
Suddenly caring, emotions finally leveling, his mind returned to its default state of calculating, rational thought. He even took a quick foray into empathy to wonder just how annoyed Dr. Crescent would be upon realizing that nearly an hour of time spent going over end-of-life options with him appeared to have been wasted, all documents left unsigned and scattered on the table in his mother's room for someone else to clean up.
Moving out of the steady flow of early rush-hour pedestrian traffic, Roxas leaned himself up against the side of a nearby building, pulled out his phone, and began dialing the number to the hospital. At least this was something he could easily sort out, he figured. A nice departure from the fucked up mess that constituted the current state of every other aspect of his life.
After clicking through a couple automated options to get to the right department, Roxas finally heard the recording disconnect, followed by a few shrill rings.
A receptionist answered, her voice a pleasant cadence of words, repeating the name of the specific hospital department Roxas had been seeking.
"Yeah, hi," he said, arm rising to smooth some wayward tufts of spiky hair at the back of his head. "I'm trying to get a message to Dr. Crescent."
There was a pause, a prolonged silence over the line. For a moment, Roxas thought the call might've dropped.
"Dr. Crescent," the receptionist finally repeated. "I'm not sure there's anyone by that name in this department."
Roxas tilted his head slightly, shifting the strap of his backpack into a more comfortable position on his shoulder.
Huh. That was kind of weird. Maybe he'd gotten her name wrong, or the receptionist had just misheard.
"She was filling in for Dr. Havartin today," Roxas supplied, thinking it might make a difference. "The name on her badge said Lucrecia Crescent, and she definitely said she was a doctor, maybe just from a different department?"
"Just a second," the receptionist said, still sounding doubtful. "Can I put you on hold?"
Chewing on his lower lip a little, Roxas nodded to himself, tried to hold back a sigh. He reminded himself he was doing this in order to be polite. "Sure. Yeah, that's fine."
A minute passed by, then two. As Roxas waited, he watched with remote interest as the crush of people, of cars and urban noise, filled his senses. The cacophony of sounds was familiar, almost a patent comfort, despite it being little more than discordant noise. He'd grown up around this bustle, the outright craziness of nearly ten million people, all living on one, modest-sized island and its surrounding boroughs. This was New York, without question one of the most vibrant cities in the world, that people traveled from just about everywhere to have the opportunity to visit.
All those things were true, sure. But, he thought, feeling a measured swell of subtle pride, this city? It was first and foremost his home, a place he knew, unequivocally, he belonged.
"Roxas? Is that you?"
Nervous energy formed instantaneously at the sound of the voice. By now, Roxas felt he'd know that accent anywhere; he just hadn't expected to hear it coming from somewhere beyond his cell phone today. Surprised, he turned toward the voice at the same time that the receptionist returned to the line.
"Hey," he managed to get out in response to Axel's words before the receptionist began speaking over him.
"Sir? Thank you for holding." Roxas shot Axel an apologetic look, eyes flicking in the direction of the phone held up to one ear. Axel nodded, kept quiet. "I'm sorry," the receptionist continued, "but there's no one by that name who works as a doctor at this hospital. Maybe you where thi—"
"It's fine, no worries," Roxas said, cutting her off. "I'll just try back tomorrow …or something." Actually, whatever, as far as he was concerned right now. With Axel present, he was feeling a lot less bothered than he otherwise might have been with the response the receptionist had just given him. Given the choice between Axel or the hospital, his mind seemed more than happy to focus on the person in front of him now. There was plenty of time to deal with the mess he'd left at the hospital sometime in the near future.
Roxas dropped the call and looked up at Axel as he slipped the phone back into his pocket. Without the distraction of the phone at his ear, Roxas suddenly realized he had no idea what to say, was in danger of becoming quickly flustered yet again. He'd been expecting a call from Axel, if anything. Meeting each other in person hadn't really crossed his radar as a possibility for today.
"I got your message," Axel said, breaking the silence before it risked becoming awkward. "I have to say, it's a nice surprise to run into you today in light of tomorrow's cancelation."
The words were spoken casually, in a matter of fact way that didn't seem accusatory. Nevertheless, Roxas felt heat begin to creep into his cheeks. Why did he always get this way around a man he'd only just met? It was embarrassing as hell. Instead of voicing his thoughts, he fished around for an adequate response, attempted to make himself sound even remotely normal. "Kind of coincidental too," he offered. "It's not like we're in a small city."
"Perhaps it's destiny." A small smile formed at the edges of Axel's lips, a familiar expression of amusement flickering in his dark eyes. "Although it certainly doesn't hurt that you're only half a block from my hotel."
Roxas blinked, caught off-guard, then took a moment to look around. "Oh. Right." He hadn't been paying attention to where he'd been going, had mostly just been following the flow of the crowd, allowing strangers to determine his general trajectory as he tried to keep his mind as smoothed-over-unemotional as possible. Now, he didn't even have the energy to silently berate himself for making himself sound even dumber than he figured he typically already would around a crush.
Because, yeah, he was owning up to it, at least privately to himself. The telltale signs of attraction were there. It'd just figure he'd start crushing on a foreigner, someone who likely wouldn't be in Manhattan for long, not to mention might not even be single, come to think.
"Where's your …friend?" he asked, rather than scrambling for a witty response that'd no doubt totally miss the mark given his current mood. In a way, it was nothing short of a miracle he was even forming complete sentences after the day he'd thus far had. A small miracle, he guessed. Maybe he should have the sense to feel thankful.
"He had to return home early, unfortunately," Axel replied, apparently not catching the hesitation in Roxas' tone. The blond was still unsure if Demyx and Axel's relationship extended beyond friendship. Until told otherwise, he guessed 'friend' was just how he'd keep referring to Demyx when it related to his associations with Axel.
"Shame, too," Axel continued. "He was really enjoying this place."
Unsure how to reply, Roxas remained silent, found himself fiddling with the strap on his backpack in an attempt to calm his renegade fluttering nerves.
As another wave of pedestrians began to pass by them, Axel took a step closer toward the brick building that Roxas had been leaning up against just a short while ago. For a moment Roxas thought, maybe even hoped, that Axel was going to lay a hand on his shoulder again, possibly his wrist. Instead, the man merely took up the spot next to Roxas, leaning back against the exposed brick building's exterior with comfortable casualness, before speaking again.
"If you aren't free tomorrow, would you like to grab a bite of food now?"
There were a million reasons why he shouldn't, not the least of which included homework, head-colds, and the persistent desire to just lie down. More than anything at the moment, Roxas really just wanted to curl up and sleep, needed assurances that this day would soon officially be over and done with. Permanently.
There was also the realization that he might just lose it completely if he allowed his mind to wander, alone at home and exposed to every iniquitous memory. He'd eschewed the presence of his friends today, not wanting to deal with their pitying expressions, having zero interest in choreographing a careful, tiptoed dance around the subject that would undoubtedly be on each of their minds.
Axel, though. Axel didn't know.
He didn't know anything about the significance of this day, just seemed interested in Roxas himself, wanted to spend more time together. And, without the requisite knowledge, there also wouldn't be any pretense, any presumed duty, of feeling as though he had to keep Roxas company simply out of a sense of polite sympathy.
Slowly, Roxas nodded, then offered up his response. "Sure," he said, trying to keep his tone light and demeanor as insouciant as Axel's naturally was. "I could definitely go for some food."
Or just about anything right now would work, really, as long as it promised to give him a reprieve from reality... the opportunity to forget for just a little while longer.