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Since his life has begun once more, this time with an actual heart beating in his chest, Roxas does his best to understand the sudden influx of feelings that he’s yet to identify. His friends, save for Xion who endures the same struggle, do their very best to describe commonplace feelings, and Xion tells him of the feelings she finds and reads about in books. He thinks he has a grasp on some of the simple ones—anger and sadness were the easiest, and he’s still getting a feel for what happiness is—but there are some that he doesn’t quite get.
Namely, the way his heart squeezes deep in his chest when Riku smiles at him.
As Roxas cards through his shared memories with Sora, he still can’t put his finger on it. Each one of Sora’s friendships were unique and came with its own sets of feelings, and that did not change for memories. In a lot of ways, he feels what Sora feels when he recounts some of the moments in Sora’s life—he feels the deep sorrow when he witnesses the darkness overtaking his closest friend, the fear when the blade in his hand releases his and kairi’s hearts, the relief when he sees them both at the end of the road. It’s all a mess of so many emotions, some Roxas has grown familiar with, and some he can’t place. All he knows is that both he and Sora share that same twinge when Riku is near. He offhandedly wonders if this is what best friends are like, though Roxas hasn’t experienced anything of the sort around Xion or Axel. Maybe it’s just something about Riku that makes others feel this way.
Both Roxas and Riku had patched things up months ago, hashing out their anger (well really, it was only Roxas who was angry, while Riku was apologetic and took Roxas’s anger in stride) and eventually working towards a better relationship. Sometimes he visited twilight town, and he and Roxas would share time together. They’d spar in the woods, and Riku would pack food from the bistro for them to share. While his visits weren’t often, Roxas soon began to look forward to them. He likes spending time with Riku—it would come with a warmth running beneath his skin and his heart picking up a quicker speed. Nothing he knows is like what he feels around Riku, but something about it all feels fragile. Some part of him almost fears that these moments aren’t destined to last forever.
“I think I’m in love with Sora.”
The statement comes over another picnic, the crisp of autumn present in the air. The leaves among the trees have begun their descent, shades of red and yellow blanketing the green grass they sit on. Roxas’s brow quirks at Riku’s bold statement, his head tilting softly. “Yeah? What’s that like?”
“Well...” Riku looks up towards the sky, gathering his thoughts. He is always well-spoken when it comes to describing emotions to the once-nobody. “well, there’s... something called longing—it’s when you miss someone and want to be close to them. Even if you see them all the time, it never seems to be enough. And, well, with Sora... I miss him all the time, sometimes even if he’s right next to me.” Roxas doesn’t miss the way Riku’s cheeks dust pink, though Riku turns his head away. “There’s this tightness in my chest, too. The only way that it goes away is when I’m with him.”
Roxas takes in his explanation. “Isn’t that how friends feel too?”
“It’s a little different.” Riku reaches for Roxas’s hand, entwining them. The blond grips his hand tight, trying to ignore the way heat blooms in his chest. “You’re my friend. Doing this doesn’t make my skin all hot or kick my heartrate up. With him, my palms get all sweaty, and my heart feels like it’s going to burst out of my chest.”
Roxas stiffens then—his skin feels on fire, and his heart is going much faster than he’s used to. The realization hits him like an ice bath. This is what Sora feels. This is what Roxas has grown to feel too. What he had understood as just a different variation of friendship meant something drastically different. He pulls his hand away from Riku almost immediately, the tips of his ears reddening as he hopes with all he has that his heart would just calm down. He feels too vulnerable, as though he’s been found out by the silver-haired boy who has somehow made Roxas feel some kind of way he hadn’t ever thought he could feel. Fuck.
Roxas clears his throat. “What you’re describing sounds a lot like what Sora felt for you when I was still in his heart. It’s very possible he feels the same way.”
The way that Riku smiles, a beautiful mixture of hope and fondness in his eyes, has Roxas’s heart twinging in his chest all over again. The hurt comes from the realization that Riku’s smile isn’t for him. It never has been. “Yeah? That’d... be nice.”
Their shared meal comes to an end shortly after, and Roxas finds himself back in his room staring at the ceiling, carding through memory after memory. He thinks long and hard, desperate to understand these feelings through the way that Sora felt them. He looks as far as he can into his own heart until he finds Sora’s voice floating somewhere. It’s a thought that passes so quickly, he almost misses it: “As long as Riku’s my friend, that’s enough.”
Roxas’s nose wrinkles. Of course Sora would think that—friendship has and will always be the most important thing to someone with a heart as big as his. He watches more of Sora’s memories, reliving them all as Sora and feeling the all-familiar twist of his heart. He watches Riku fall to the darkness, he watches Sora fight for him with every ounce of his being, and he feels Sora’s facade crumbling when he reunites with Riku, his appearance so different from the familiar emerald eyes he’d missed so much. He feels the longing, he feels the love Sora has for Riku. Roxas knows that pain, and if one of them must bear it, it will be Roxas. Tears gather in the corner of Roxas’s eyes, but he squeezes them shut, rolling onto his side. It hurts, but in some twisted way, he knows that this is a burden that he must bear.
Friendship, as Roxas gathered, is about shouldering the other’s pain, and considering how much Sora has done for him, this is the least he can do for his other, as well as his new friend. The pain is worth their smiles.