...

Two

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"So next door is Radiance Inn. The whole Gainsborough family lives here, but I think only Namine and Grandma Gainsborough will be here now," Hayner continued on our tour of the town, strolling down the path beside me.

I cocked my head to the side, "Wait, why does the town need an inn? Do we get that many visitors?"

"You'd be surprised. A lot of us have family outside of town that visits, but no room for them."

"Hm... All right," I laughed, following him into the inn.

The small blonde behind the counter was wearing a grin so wide I thought she might secretly have been a Cheshire cat, "Hayner! You finally got him out of his house!"

"Well I wasn't going to let him hermit his life away," Hayner chuckled, "Roxas, this is Namine. Namine, Roxas."

She stepped out from behind the counter and wrapped me a in a big hug. Apparently everyone in this town liked to hug; a lot. "So nice to meet you, Roxas!"

"Nice to meet you too," I smiled, trying to pry her off of me.

"Where's Grandma?" Hayner asked her, looking around the inn.

Namine thought for a minute, "I think she might be out gathering wildflowers. We don't exactly have any guests right now for her to fuss over."

"All right, we'll try to find her one our way around town then," he threw her a dashing smile. Hayner seemed to be pretty close with all of the townspeople. I wondered when I would get to meet his wife, Olette.

"You two run along now and go meet my sisters! They're dying to see the new hunk of man that's moved in," she winked at me, grinning mischeviously.

As we left the inn, Hayner glanced over at me, "By the way, do you have a woman in your life? 'Cause I think you left quite the impression on Namine."

"She's... not really my type," I mumbled, following him to the next shop, which had a faded sign above it that read "General Store."

"Hot blondes aren't your type?" he questioned, "I mean, I prefer brunettes myself, but you didn't seem like-"

"She just isn't my type, Hayner. Drop it," I cut him off, smiling at an older looking blond man standing behind the desk, "Hi. I'm Roxas, the new guy."

"Name's Luxord, love. I run the General Store here with my daughter. Larxene, get out here!" he hollered into the back room.

Another super-blonde woman sashayed out from the back, batting her eyelashes at me, "Who's this, Daddy?"

"His name is Roxas, he took over Twilight Farm for his grandfather," Luxord told her in a thick British accent. One that his daughter didn't seem to have.

"Luxord came over from England before she was born," Hayner whispered in my ear, probably seeing the confusion written all over my face.

I held out my hand to her, but she just held out a limp wrist to me. I didn't know what she expected me to do, so I just loosely shook her hand and continued to stare awkwardly between her and her father.

"How old are you, Roxas?" she tilted her head to the side 'cutely,' like she was trying to flirt with me or something. What was it with the blonde's here?

"I'm twenty five," I informed her, glancing to Luxord who was staring at me with intense, freaky blue eyes.

She giggled, "Ooh, an older man. You're kinda cute," she bit her lower lip, twirling a strand of hair with her finger.

"Excuse my lovely daughter, please. She's only eighteen, and she needs to go finish unloading the produce Pence dropped off earlier," he emphasized the last part with a sharp glare to her, forcing her out of the room.

Hayner nodded, "Good, I'm glad Pence remembered to drop it off this time. I don't always trust him by himself."

"Who's Pence?" I asked, watching Larxene skip out of the room. She certainly seemed... interesting.

"My partner in crime at the farm slash best friend," Hayner said, "We'll see you later, Luxord. We've still got a lot of ground to cover."

He threw me a rather handsome smile, "Stop by any time, Roxas."

"Will do," I smiled awkwardly. I hated introductions like this. "Is something up with him...?" I questioned once we were safely out of earshot.

"You've got a good eye," he chuckled, "Luxord is a little ...how should I put it? Fabulous."

I smirked a little, "You mean gay?"

"Yeah... Only one in town, so far as we know. Not everyone is too keen on it. We still haven't told Grandma Gainsborough. She definitely was raised a bit more traditionally."

I shifted on my feet as we stood in front of the next shop, "Oh... But he has a daughter?"

"Yeah, well. Let's just say there's a reason the two of them moved out here."

I nodded, "All right then..."

"Well this one you should certainly recognize. The Wayfinder Cafe," he smiled, opening the door for me.

I stepped inside and immediately came face to face with a mirror image of myself, "Ventus! Thanks so much for helping me move in earlier," I told him, pulling him into a bro-hug.

"No problem, cuz! You still coming by for dinner later?"

"Wouldn't miss it for the world!" I grinned, my eyes following a blue-haired woman as she cleared a table, "Who's this?"

She turned to look at me, giving me a pretty wonderful smile, "I'm Aqua, the mayor's daughter."

"Right! He said you worked here. Waitress?"

"Yeah, pretty much. I leave the cooking to Ven here," she gave him a pat on the back, "You have to try his grilled cheese. To die for."

I nodded, "I'll try to remember that."

"Is this the new kid?" a rather gruff voice sounded behind me. I jumped a little and turned to face a man with a rather large scar running down his left cheek to his jaw and a black eye patch over his right eye.

"I'm Roxas," I offered a hand to him, which he promptly crushed between his calloused fingers.

"Xigbar. I run Darkstar Blacksmithing just on the other side of town. This is my apprentice, Terra."

I glanced behind him to find another rough looking man poking at a bowl of soup. He just barely glanced up at me, "Hey."

"He's not too much of a people person, but damn if he doesn't drag me here every day for lunch," Xigbar leaned closer to me, "I think he's got a bit of a thing for Aqua, myself."

"Xig! Shut up!" Terra exclaimed, throwing a dinner roll at him.

Aqua just raised an eyebrow and took the empty plates she was holding into the kitchen.

"Now you come to us to get your tools made. Don't you go buying any of that cheap pre made bullshit. Our tools? They'll never break, never fail. You'll have them for life."

"I'll keep that in mind, thanks," I told him, turning to Hayner, "We should get going... I still have a lot of unpacking to do." Honestly, all of these introductions were making me uncomfortable.

He seemed to understand, thankfully, "All right, let's head over to the bar."

"Bar...?" I liked the sound of that.

"Yeah, Oblivion Bar and Grill. They've got all the greasy bar food you're probably used to from the city."

I nodded, "Sounds pretty awesome. I do love greasy bar food."

"Riku is a genius in the kitchen just like Ventus. You should see it when we have cooking competitions. The judges never know who to pick."

Cooking competitions? That could be fun. Not that I was a good enough cook to ever enter, but I could totally do some food judging. Maybe things here wouldn't be as boring as I first suspected.

...

A/N: So like I said before, the first chapter I wrote got broken down into three. After these weird introductory chapters the flow will be much, much better. Ooh, just wait until he meets the mysterious farmer across the path!

Don't forget to review and follow please!

Simply Rexene