Well I had planned to write a New Years one, but then I got a cold. By the time I felt like writing again it was getting a little late to make it actually worth it. So instead I chose to write something that I have been thinking about doing for a while now.
This is a sequel to Sunsets. I felt it needed something more to finish it and I hope this properly ends the little story. I might do a prequel, but I feel like I covered their past pretty well in the original, so I don't know about that. Anyways, I don't really have a song for this one. Please enjoy.
It's hard to see in the dark. Our bodies are not made for it. We need light to let us see. But what do you do when your light is gone?
Axel wasn't sure, but he found out it involved a lot of stumbling around, groping for safety until the light returns.
Because the light will always return.
He promised.
Luckily, when the sun goes down at the end of the day, it doesn't leave us completely alone. Along with the promise to return, he promised, it also leaves the moon. It doesn't shine very bright, and it's hard to see where you are going with only the moon, but at least it keeps you from falling.
Axel's moon was a woman named Aerith. She was his therapist, recommended to him by Roxas's brother, Sora. She was a soft spoken woman, with kind green eyes, but Axel quickly learned that she didn't take nonsense. She may have been kind, but she was stern when she needed to be.
She wasn't the bright light that Roxas had been for Axel, but she was enough to get him through, enough to keep him from tripping as he stumbled through every day, groping and hanging on to every solid thing he could find.
Sora was something solid. He took Axel grocery shopping every Saturday and made sure he cleaned and did his laundry. He knew how much Roxas meant to Axel, and how much Axel meant to Roxas, and so he would do anything to make sure Axel survived without his bright blond brother.
Riku was something solid. He was a good friend of Axel's since he and Roxas meet. He made sure Axel got to work and therapy every day.
Zexion was something solid. He was an accountant at the design office Axel worked for, and he made sure Axel got lunch every day and made it to all of his meeting and wasn't stuck alone all day in his office.
Demyx was something solid. He made sure Axel didn't go overboard when he went out. He kept Axel from drowning in alcohol, or smoking away his lungs, or simply falling into a coma of loneliness.
Marluxia was something solid. He made sure Axel got breakfast and dinner everyday, and that Axel's cat, Dusk, did not, in fact, turn into a totsie roll or a skeleton.
Larxene was something solid. She slapped some sense into Axel when he almost did something stupid and got him to face his fear of the empty space in his bed.
Axel knew he was walking in the dim moonlight, but at least he had solid things to hold on to.
Axel's life fell into routine. He didn't feel like doing much of anything anymore, so he just found something that worked, and stuck to it.
Every morning he woke up at the same time and took a short shower, dressing in whatever Marluxia set out for him at dinner the night before. By the time he was clean and dressed, Marluxia was knocking on his door with breakfast, setting everything out as Axel filled Dusk's food bowl, running his fingers through the velvety softness of her fur.
As Marluxia left, Riku arrived to drive him to work. They would chat a little on the way, but Axel was usually rather quiet these days. Riku would drop him off in front of the building and drive off as he got through the door, where Zexion would greet him. Zexion was temporarily moved into his office so that he wasn't alone all day. They didn't talk much throughout the day, and Axel was just fine with that, he just liked having the other body in the room with him.
His boss understood what he was going though and why he was at a sudden lack of inspiration for new designs, and so had, also temporarily, moved him to edits instead of original designs. He could handle that.
After work he would bid farewell to Zexion and meet up again with Riku to head to his therapist's office. There he would sit for an hour and tell Aerith how everything had gone since they last meet the day before. He would go home with Riku after that and sit in his usual chair, watching Dusk lounge in Roxas's favorite chair like she always did these days. Marluxia would come by some time later to cook dinner and ask Axel how the day went.
Finally the time of day that Axel waited for would come and he would sit in the window, or on the rooftop, or on rare occasions he would go out to the clock tower and climb to the top so he could watch the sunset. Everyday as the sunset approached, Roxas's words would ring in his ears.
I will be there in every sunset you live to see.
And he was. Axel could see him. He could see the golden hairs on top of his head. He could see the peachy tanned skin. He could see the redish brown freckles that would dust his nose and shoulders when he got too much sun in the summer. He could see the perfect curve of his lips in a smile. And most important of all, he could see those blue eyes looking back at him. Every day.
But as Axel sat in the window that day, Dusk purring away in his lap as she watched with him, he couldn't find Roxas.
Where were the golden hairs?
Where was the tan skin with red freckles?
Where was the perfect smile?
Where were the blue eyes?
He couldn't find them. Roxas was wrong. He wasn't there anymore.
Axel felt something rough against his face and he soon realized it was Dusk, licking away his tears before they could roll down his face.
"He's gone, Dusk. He's really gone." He chocked out, looking down into green-blue eyes surrounded by soft gray fur. She mewed softly and nuzzled his face. He held the little cat close to him, allowing his tears to soak into the soft fur.
It was the first morning in a while that Marluxia had to pull Axel out of bed. The first time in a while that Axel didn't get a shower before quickly dressing and scarfing down breakfast. The first time in a while that Axel didn't see the sun rise outside him bedroom window, despite Dusk sitting under the curtains, eyes locked on the rising sun.
He barely made it through work and only picked at his lunch. None of his friends said anything. They figured it was just a bad day or Aerith would figure it out. They would only step in and say something if the mood persisted.
Axel flopped down in the fluffy seat in his therapist's office, but the woman was, for once, not there waiting for him. He sat uncomfortably alone for several minutes before the door finally opened and she stepped through the door. She sat across from him, gently folding her hands in her lap and looking at him.
"I want you to meet someone."
Uh... what?
"I know what you're thinking. It's barely been two months, and you don't think you're ready to move on yet, but I think I have someone that can help you move forward." She explained, never looking away from him.
Heheld himself back from refusing outright. How could he be with someone else when he only ever loved Roxas? But... Roxas was gone. He wasn't there the night before. He wasn't there looking back at Axel. Was this his way of telling Axel to find someone else to spend the sunsets with? He knew Roxas didn't want him to crumble and fall in the dark without him, and he was trying. He was trying so very hard. But seeing someone else?
How could he ever love someone after Roxas?
"I guess... It couldn't hurt... to meet them..." Axel forced out. He hated this. He didn't want someone else. But maybe this was why Roxas left. He had to believe Roxas wanted him to move on.
"Good. Let's go." Without another word, Aerith was on her feet, fully expecting Axel to follow her out. He scrambled out of his seat and out the door behind her. She led him downstairs and out of the building, down the street and into... the hospital? Oh god, she didn't want him to meet someone else who was dying, did she? He didn't think he could handle that. But he followed her nonetheless, into the elevator and down a hallway. He didn't really know where he was, but he knew it wasn't the wing that Roxas had been in. He knew that area like the back of his hand.
Finally she went though a door into what seemed to be a small waiting room. She had him wait there, of course, while she went to get this mysterious person she wanting him to meet. He waited impatiently, not really wanting to be there where his light had gone out, meeting someone that his therapist was trying to replace that light with.
A few minutes later the door opened again, Aerith coming in first, a young woman behind her. Oh, a nurse. She looked nice, he supposed. Dark hair pulled back and big brown eyes. She didn't stand up to Roxas though. It was then that he noticed she had something in her arms. A little blue bundle.
"This is who I wanted you to meet." Aerith said, turning to the nurse to take the blue bundle from her before stepping over to Axel. As she stepped closer Axel realized the blue bundle was, in fact, a baby. The vaguely noticed the nurse slip out the door and back into the hallway.
"You wanted me to meet a baby?" Axel asked, confused.
"Yes. I know you have a cat, but I think you need something new to love. Something that will take up more of your free time than a cat will." She explained, carefully handing the bundle to Axel. "You need a new life in your life. You need someone you can love as much as you loved Roxas, but not in the same way. You're not ready for that, and maybe you will never be or never need to. But you need someone that can light up your life like he once did."
Axel carefully held the little child. He was so light. Did he even weight anything? Soft blind hairs peaked out from under the soft blue blanket. "You... want me to adopt?"
"Yes. I know you wanted to have kids someday anyways, and I think now is the time. This is Ventus. His father wants nothing to do with him, and his mother can't take care of him. He's been put straight into the system. She never even held him." The woman whispered the end.
Axel simply watched the little child, considering. He had soft, perfect skin, a round face, and blond hair, but it was when the little child opened his eyes that Axel knew.
That was not the blue of a newborn.
That was Roxas blue.
Axel looked on, amazed for a moment, before he looked up. "How old is he?"
"Not even a day. He was born just this morning." She laughed slightly, "Just as the sun rose."
Axel nearly burst into tears at the words.
It was Roxas. He was holding Roxas again.
He knew it was true because Roxas had promised. He had promised that the good things in life came back. Of course. That was why Roxas wasn't in the sunset. He was getting ready to come back. He was here again. It wasn't how Axel had thought it would be, and he wouldn't be able to love this Roxas the same, but it was Roxas. His light was back and that was all that mattered.
Axel looked down at the tiny light in his arms, the bright blue eyes scrunched up from the big smile on the infants face as he giggled and reached out to Axel with tiny hands and tinier fingers. Carefully holding Ventus with one arm, Axel allowed the tiny fingers to wrap around one of his own.
"I will always love you, Ventus. I promise."