Yes, yes, I know, I'm horrible. That cliffhanger wasn't cool, but it was sure cool as hell to write. Not so much the content, but leaving it off like that, was pretty cool. I hope you all don't hate me too terribly much. And I hope this chapter won't infuriate you anymore than the past one did. Enjoy!
Side note: I should probably give you guys a fair trigger warning. If you're like me and ignore trigger warnings no matter what, so be it, but if you don't want to be bothered, there is some graphic mention of self-harm in here.
'Who will love you?
Who will fight?
And who will fall far behind?'
~Skinny Love, Bon Iver
Roxas
"Axel…Axel, wake up buddy. We've got to get up. It's grocery day." Roxas muttered to his unconscious friend. For a friend who had a separate place to live, Axel sure wound up on Roxas' couch more nights a week than the red head was at his own house. Not that Roxas would complain; Axel had saved him from sleeping on the streets multiple times. The red head stirred from his sleep and peaked up at his blond friend with a scowling green eye. "Why the hell do I have to go grocery shopping with you, I'm not your bitch." He mumbled, and rolled back over. Roxas huffed and picked up the shoe he was trying to slip on and hit his friend over the head with it. "Because, you eat more of my food than I do!" Roxas answered as Axel sat up and attempted to throw the shoe back at Roxas.
"Fine, fine, ya little shit, give me a minute." The red head growled, and slowly sat up on the couch. Roxas waited while his friend washed up in his bathroom and tried to remember how much money he still had in his account. He worried that he might be close that month. He hadn't exactly become an alcoholic, but over the past few months his buying habits had steadily increased, which had taken a toll on his already limited money supply. Roxas sighed and checked his refrigerator. He didn't have much left: beer or actually food. "Hey, Axel?" He called down the hallway. "What?" he heard his friend ask. "Do you have any extra beer at your house?" he questioned. He was not met with an answer right away. Instead he heard his friend step into the kitchen behind him and clear his throat.
"Listen, Roxas…I know I'm not the wisest guy when it comes to this stuff. My moral compass isn't stuck on North. But maybe you should give it a break for a little bit. How about you take some time off work, and just sleep? Or write or whatever the hell you want to do. I just…" Axel sighed and paused for a moment, shaking his head, "Look, I'm not some emotional, touchy-feely type guy. But I worry about you a lot more than I should. I just don't want you to keep sitting here all depressed and drinking your life away. Yeah, doing it was fun the first time, but I want to go out with my best friend without the fear that one of us is going to carry the other one home. I want to go get a drink with you and not watch you totally trash yourself and end up picking a fight or walking into my cousin's apartment! Got it memorized?"
Roxas had shut the door to his refrigerator and waited for his friend to finish. In truth he knew that his friend was right-Axel was usually right about most things-but there were too many things he didn't want to give up. He didn't want to have to slave away and grind out 40 plus hours of work every week and have nothing to look forward to. He didn't want to be constantly reminded that he was alone. He didn't want to be stuck by himself with nothing to numb that intolerable, crippling pain that came with loneliness. His eyes scanned over his best friend who sighed, "But let's face it. You don't care. You won't give it up even if keeping it were to kill you." His friend muttered, and headed towards the front door.
Roxas was content for now to let his friend go. The red head would be back, he knew it. He always was. But something about this particular speech unsettled him. Be it the recent talk of Naminé, or how lonely Roxas felt in that moment, Roxas took a deep breath and called out to his friend, "And what if I don't take some time off?" Axel stopped at the door, and paused for a moment. When he finally did speak, he looked back, his voice was soft, "I don't know what to do with ya, kid. I don't know what to do to make you see how pointless it all is. I can't make you do jack-shit…I'll still be there, I guess, to carry you home when you can't stand on your own, or talk you out of a fight, or track you down to somebody's house. I'll just be here for you."
"Thank you, Axel." The blond man said after a moment of silence. "Anytime. I am your best friend after all, I'd like to think so, anyways. It's what I'm here for. To have your back when you fuck up." Roxas smirked and replied, "Wow, I can just feel the love oozing off of you, man." Axel grinned and told his friend, "I'll see you around, okay?" Roxas nodded, but before Axel could leave, there was a knock at the door. Axel turned back to the blond and raised an eyebrow at Roxas, who shook his head and shrugged- he didn't know who it was. He hadn't told anyone to come by today. Axel opened the door, and to Roxas' absolute disbelief, a tall man with a fohawk and his old friend were standing in his doorway, a nervous smile splayed across the short brunette's face and a hand scratching the back of his head.
"Hello, I'm Sora Hikari, is this the residence of Roxas Strife?" Roxas nearly choked from trying not to laugh out loud.
Riku
"But you must tell us if you find her, understand?" Marluxia said from the other end. Riku rolled his eyes, and replied, "Yeah, yeah, I'll tell ya everything. Now I have to go, I haven't eaten since the plane ride here." He heard Vexen call from the other end, "See if you can find Xigbar for me!" "Will do!" Riku responded, and hung up not long afterwards. Sometimes he rather appreciated his posy of friends and coworkers. Yes they followed him around, but they also checked up on him and made sure he wasn't about to do something crazy that would kill him. Riku shoved his cell phone back into the pocket of his jeans, and jammed his feet into a pair of shoes. He called a taxi out front and decided to treat himself to something special. He ended up at a high-end sea-food restaurant eating shrimp alone at a table for two.
"Will you be needing anything else this evening?" The dark-haired waitress asked him with a flashy smile. He glanced up at the woman and gave her a grin, "No, thank you." He replied, and the waitress left the table, a faint pink running across her nose and cheeks. He chuckled to himself. Would these women ever learn? He never minded the attention, he quite enjoyed it. He just wished that he had a woman with him that he wanted to give equal attention to. It was nights like these that made Riku truly miss Xion. His conversation with Aqua on the plane had brought up a barrage of memories that washed over him with a nostalgic and emptying rush that left him breathless. He missed Xion, and not just for her spectacular body or her breath-taking face, but for her presence and the way she would roll her eyes and tell him something completely sarcastic and rude but hilarious. He missed that she would scare off girls who wanted to talk to him, and how protective of a friend she was. He'd yet to find any woman like her, and he doubted he ever would.
The sudden flood of memories convinced him to go back to the hotel and lay down, and he did just that. He laid down, and allowed himself to remember her. Something he had not done once in the past five years. He had known the darkest things about her and in turn she'd discovered all of his well kept secrets as well. That was the part that hurt the most-all of the things he knew she had been dealing with and what she probably was currently handling. The worst memory was when he found out what she'd been doing with herself.
Riku and Xion had hated each other since the eighth grade when his oh-so brilliant friend, Sora had tried to set them up on a blind date. They did hate each other for a year and a half after that. In the last month of their freshman school year, that all changed. The two had seen a lot more of each other than they'd liked to have seen due to their best friends all being friends with one another. Sora, Kairi, Roxas, Naminé, even their more distant friends, Olette, Hayner, Pence, and Selphie. They were stuck together whether they liked it or not. But there came a night where that all changed.
Riku, Sora, Kairi, Roxas, and Naminé had all been gathered at Sora's house to have a movie marathon in his basement, and they had texted Xion last minute and not heard a reply from her. It had been an hour and Kairi in particular had grown increasingly worried about her. Sora had to stay at his house due to the fact that his parents were entrusting the whole house to him that night, and Kairi wanted to stay with him. Naminé had politely asked not to be sent to retrieve Xion, and nobody could argue with sweet little Naminé. Roxas had appeared slightly worried, but just as it seemed he was going to volunteer to go get her, Kairi asked Riku. Riku knew Kairi still wanted to pair he and Xion up, and as annoying as it was, his lingering middle school crush on Kairi caused him to grumble and complain, but agree to go find Xion.
Being a fifteen year old, he couldn't drive yet, and he had to trek all the way to Xion's house on foot. Fortunately, 'all the way' to Xion's house only took around ten minutes on foot, and he arrived at her house quicker than he had expected. Xion had lived in a small house, nothing flashy or fancy but one he grew to love in the following years. Riku knocked on the door and waited for someone to answer the door. Nobody did, however, and he rang the doorbell this time. Still no answer. He began to tap his foot impatiently, and knocked on the door a second time. "Xion!" He shouted at the house. "Hey, Xion, we're all waiting for you at Sora's, get out here!"
No answer. He sighed and turned around to leave. Great. He'd had to walk all the way here just to be met with no one home. Just great. He was gonna give Sora hell when he got back. And he was gonna give Xion a piece of his mind, too, the next time he saw her. He began to step down the front porch steps, when he heard the sound of something crashing from inside the house. He stopped and turned to eye the front door. Sure he really disliked Xion but what if someone was trying to kill her in there? What if something was happening, he couldn't just leave her, could he? He groaned and ran a hand through his hair. Could he go to jail if he ran away and she was being murdered in there?
He finally placed his hand on the front door handle, and pushed the door inwards. The hinges creaked slightly, and he glanced around the entrance from the house, checking for any sign of a struggle. So far, so good. He checked in the kitchen-nothing wrong in there. The living room was clear, too. Eventually Riku glanced up the staircase leading to the second floor. Could he really bring himself to go snooping through the second story of Xion's house? Could he really do this? Maybe something had simply tipped over-maybe Xion wasn't even home. But he concluded that he was already in the house, he might as well see if everything was alright. So he crept up the stair as silently as he could. When he reached the top of the stairs was when he noticed one door open. One room with the lights on. Riku felt his heart skip-what if someone was in the house that wasn't supposed to be? There was no turning back now; he had to make sure things were okay.
Riku slowly stepped up the hall and into the doorway of the room with the lights on. "Oh my god…" "Holy shit, get out!" Xion screeched from the interior of her room. "Xion…what are you doing?!" Riku questioned in bewilderment. To Riku's utter horror he found Xion standing in front of a huge, full length mirror, clad in only a sports bra and underwear. But that was not the horrifying factor. The horrifying factor was the darkly stained knife in her hand and the array of scars lined neatly along her upper thighs and stomach. But the worst was the bright, crimson blood dripping from her upper abdomen and her hips. There was so much blood, the only time he'd seen so much was when Roxas had split his head open on the curb when they were bike riding the previous summer.
"You pervert, get out!" She shouted at him, pointing the knife in the direction out of the room. "What, seriously? Out of this entire situation, you're focusing on the part about me seeing you without clothes one?!" he exclaimed, taking a step into the room. She took a step back; a drop of blood dripped down her leg and dropped into the carpet. He watched it and grimaced, "Good god, Xion, what are you doing?" he sputtered. She shrugged, "What's it look like?" He had to work to keep himself from gasping out loud. He watched her grip onto the knife tighten and he help his hands up, "Look, Xion, I'm just here to get you to come to Sora's. Everyone's waiting for you. We texted you but you never replied." She blinked and replied hastily, "I heard you outside my house." He nodded. He wasn't getting anywhere from her. "That's alright, I see you're…busy, I'll just go now."
"No, wait!" She called as he turned around. "Wait, please…please don't tell everybody." He was struck by the utter desperation in his voice and he turned back to look into her glassy, terrified blue eyes. He watched her loosened her grip on the knife. "Don't worry…I won't." he assured, stepping back into the room. Another drop of blood dripped off of the knife tip, "Could you, ya know, put that down, please?" he asked, gesturing to the blade. She absentmindedly dropped the knife onto her nearby desk. He nodded, "Good…now should I leave or should I stay?" she shrugged. There was a beat of silence and then she asked, "Are you, you know…grossed out?" He raised his eyebrows. There were blood stains on her stomach and more of it dripping down her thighs. There were scars lining her thighs and tears accumulating in her eyes. Was he a little scared? Yeah. Was he confused? Of course. And was he upset? A little bit, yeah. But was he grossed out? No, actually.
"No, not really. I'm a little confused, and I guess kinda worried, but no, I'm not grossed out." He said truthfully. She cocked her head to the side, "Really?" she inquired. He nodded, "Really…now listen, I don't know why you're doing what you're doing. There's time for you to tell me why later. But if you ever feel like doing…this." He gestured to her body then, "Then just text me or call me or bike to my house but for god's sake don't create waterfalls of blood from your body." And even he surprised himself with how earnest he sounded. Xion, who was equally taken aback crossed her arms over her chest and let a single tear escape from behind her lids. "Hey, stop that!" He exclaimed, and crossed the distance between the two teenagers and wrapped an arm around her. He had to admit, it was a bit awkward. After all: the two had hated each other for a year and a half now. But nevertheless he hugged her and she let him hug her until she sniffed and backed up, "I'm sorry, I got blood on your clothes. He looked down to see that she had indeed gotten smudges of blood on the bottom of his shirt.
He shrugged and took his shirt off in one solid motion. "Riku!" She exclaimed, and he fixed her with a hard stare and shoved his shirt back on inside-out, "Hey, hold your horse, missy. I might now hate you anymore, but that doesn't mean I'm willing to strip for you or anything." He retorted, and she giggled. "You don't hate me?" he shrugged, "I don't think I could if I tried anymore." She looked down and muttered, "Oh." He shook her shoulder and said, "Stop that right now, go get dressed, we have movies waiting for you." She looked up at him with those big eyes of hers and smiled, "Alright…thank you, Riku." He smiled and muttered, "Yeah, yeah, go change. Hurry up. Sora and Roxas probably ate all of the chips already."
Riku sighed. He wanted that back. He wanted her back. He wanted to put his arm around her and assure her that she'd be alright. Be even he didn't know if she was alright anymore.
Man, I'm on a role, a one-shot AND another chapter in one day. Well…not gonna lie, that was pretty hard to write. I hope you all enjoyed it enough to want to favorite, follow, review (even though I didn't put anything about Kairi in this chapter, I know, I'm terrible). This is not going to be the last super dark thing that's going to be written, so just know that and keep it tucked in the back of your minds. As always, have a great day/night, and I hope to hear from you all next time.
Special thanks to: Namine031898, Lucenthia, 89niners-best-team-ever, Guest, thelonesomeartist, and Princess-Xion (I almost died when I saw you review). Thanks for reviewing! Have a fantastic day!