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It had been weeks since they’d been able to spend a night wrapped up in each other like this. Roxas was important, he was powerful, strong, and that strength was invaluable when it came to the light's fight against the encroaching darkness. There were missions to be carried out, guardian work to he done, interstellar exploration to be, well, explored. Roxas had been focused on all of these important things out amongst the stars- worlds, Hayner now, secretly knew- important things like important world mapping, important heartless, important rescues. Important dangers, important perils. Adventures.
It was all so very important. Roxas himself was so important that he was needed by countless other people for things more important than how bad Hayner missed him.
Roxas had texted him about what was going on with him in the rarities when his thoughts of home had coincided with a moment of calm. They would talk back and forth a few messages, laugh about each others antics reports whether it be Pence falling asleep on a parade float or Ven defeating a heartless by riding on its back and directing it straight into a solid wall of rock, but that was it.
They talked, but kept it light. They talked, but even then all Hayner really knew was that something big was happening way out there in those other worlds. Something big that needed Roxas more, no matter how much selfish longing seeped up through Hayner’s edges.
He had swallowed it. What choice had he had? The alternative was to stand his pitiful emotions on the other side of the scales and ask Roxas to choose; Hayner or the rest of the known universe. He couldn’t stand himself if he did something like that, so he did what he could.
He kept their minimal correspondence lighthearted, made his piece of their shared twilit home as easy to return to as possible. He welcomed him back into conversation as though it hadn't been 3 days of missing him between. It was what Roxas deserved.
All the same, Hayner knew they both felt it. The ache stretched long between them. It was part of why tonight had been such a relief.
The sun went down over Twilight Town’s long dusk, an ever polite knock sounded at the window, and finally- finally! - one pushed up pane of glass and Roxas returned to Hayner’s arms. Finally, Hayner got to see him, to touch him, to hold his focus like he had unknowingly grown so used to. He hadn’t known how intrinsically centered Roxas had become in his life until suddenly, jarringly, their communications had dwindled to maybe a few texts a day.
There were only a few hours of dark in Twilight Town, and neither of them had wanted to waste a moment of it. Hayner’s back met the wall in an instant, glee swelling thick in Hayner’s guts as Roxas followed him into it. As they crashed together mouths first, hands and bodies second, there was nothing like it, really.
Hayner had been so happy to see him again, to kiss him again, and after they fell into bed together, to see him peel himself out of his clothing, to feel him pulse and shiver in and around him. He had drowned himself in Roxas’ heady attentions, let himself luxuriate and sigh and beg, but now all that was gone. The hours of giddy relief, excitement, and passion were over. Even the sweat between them had long since cooled.
Dawn, barely bluer than ink, threatened the horizon with their next moment of separation. As their single night together’s end loomed ever so slowly brighter in the darkness, things felt muted. Subdued.
Hayner laid beneath the window, lips kissing the side of his own loose fist and cheek pressed to Roxas’ bare chest. His height made it a little awkward to lay half strewn over Roxas, but Hayner was unwilling to move, as if so much as shifting a centimeter would speed up the turn of the earth beneath them and bring morning sooner.
Roxas laid on his back staring towards the ceiling, one hand behind his head and the other tracing the blooming marks and bruises up and down Hayner’s neck without looking. He seemed to know where they were by feel alone and trailed his fingertips over them as if gently stirring ripples in water. The sky lightened bit by incremental bit and both of them held still but for their breath and lingering, tender touches. Neither of them wasted a moment on sleep.
“What are you thinking about?” Roxas broke the silence in the low, smooth voice Hayner had missed so much. A quiet moment passed as Hayner licked his lips and decided on honesty.
“This… Old story my mom used to tell me.” The edges of the room grew lighter and more distinct.
“Was it good?”
Hayner’s hair brushed against Roxas’ chest as he nodded. “I think so, it’s kinda. Hard to remember. It’s been a really long time since I heard it, and I think she made it up anyway, so it’s really foggy. It rhymed. Maybe it was a song? And was all about this couple of birds, two sparrows, waiting in a meadow.”
Roxas hummed in polite interest. “Why were they waiting?”
That part of the story was as clear as the encroaching dawn, even if Hayner couldn’t remember the exact verse. “They were asked to. One of them was in love with a spirit, and it said it needed them to wait.”
“Oh. Did it ever come?”
The details of the dresser Hayner was staring at were becoming more and more clear, as if this were the fake Twilight Town and the textures were ever so slowly loading in. It would be impossible to notice if it wasn't all he could focus on.
Hayner closed his eyes as the light seeped brighter, instead focusing on the feeling of Roxas’ gentle strokes. They raised little thrills and goosebumps when they strayed just slightly past their worn path. It felt like if Hayner just really tried, he could sink his being into the sensation until all he was was the sensation alone.
“Hayner?” Roxas’ fingers paused.
“Sorry.” They continued, and Hayner filed the memory safely away, knowing he would need to make it stretch long enough till Roxas could come back again. “The spirit?”
“Yeah,” Roxas clarified, sounding more than just politely interested in the story’s outcome. It warmed Hayner’s heart, he knew how Roxas loved a happy ending. He wished he could have given him one this time.
“Don’t know, the story ends before that. The sparrows are just always waiting.”
“Oh.” Hayner felt the disappointment in the stop of his strokes over Hayner’s skin. “They just stay there? Forever?”
“Well yeah,” Hayner lifted his head and looked at him apologetically. He laced his fingers together over Roxas’ new, still soft heart and settled his chin onto them. “That’s how it ends, and besides, wouldn’t you? If some magical and beautiful thing had asked you to? I know I would.”
Roxas’ mouth quirked up on one side in disbelief. “You get impatient waiting for the train.”
“The train isn’t beautiful or magical dude, it’s just a train-” Roxas shrugged and nodded, conceding his point, “-and besides, that’s not the point.”
“That you aren’t a train person?”
“No, that the spirit comes back, that’s not what the story is about. It’s more about believing it will even if you don’t have any way to make sure of it. It’s about not listening to the doubts and fears, even when you don’t have a way to check, you know? It’s about trusting that your promises will be kept and that-”
Hayner realized he could make out every detail of Roxas’ face and his gut clenched. His words hung dry in his throat all of a sudden. He grunted and licked his lips, trying and failing to chase the moisture back. Why was this so hard to say? He had heard the story so many times and he knew what it was about, but just talking about it.. Hayner pitched his voice low in an attempt to hide the lump in his throat.
“It’s about hoping you aren’t being forgotten. That you won’t be abandoned.”
Hayner shouldn’t have been looking Roxas in the eye as he said that. He felt too bare.
Something weighty passed between them, the edges of Roxas’ eyes and mouth tightening slightly. Hayner stared back, feeling just as brittle as he waited for the response he saw Roxas testing on his tongue. Would he understand? Would he apologize? Hayner hoped he wouldn’t, he couldn’t stand if he had made Roxas sad with his own fears.
Roxas spoke quietly, carefully, as if treading on uneven ground. “Your mom sure told you some fucked up stories.”
Hayner’s eyes went wide. He. He sidestepped it completely. And then Hayner was dipping his face downward to hide a grin as his shoulders shook with the kind of surprised, snickering laughter that was felt more than heard. He had a point!
“That’s what you’re focusing on? Really??”
“Hey, I’m just saying!” Hayner heard the smile in his voice. He had missed the sound so much. “That doesn’t sound like any fairytail I know.”
“That’s because it’s not!” The tension bled out of him as Hayner rolled his head sideways, resting his temple on Roxas’ far pectoral. It wasn’t funny. It wasn’t, so why was Hayner laughing so hard? “It’s really not, it rhymed! But that’s about it!”
“How old were you??”
“Like six!”
Hayner’s eyes squeezed shut as he began to shake with Roxas’ laughter along with his own. His head lolled with each jump of Roxas' chest below him, and somehow that made it even funnier. “What was she thinking??”
Hayner spread his hands helplessly in a shrug, not even bothering to lift his head and disrupt his senseless snickering. He didn’t even care if Roxas saw the gesture through his own laughter, it just felt like the right thing to do. “I don’t know! It’s not like I can go and check!”
“Are you sure? Have you tried?”
Hayner shot him a narrow eyed smile, pretending to think about it around the laughter. He peeled his arms off Roxas and began to push himself up to get out of bed. “Sure, yeah, lemme just go cup my hands to the ground outside, maybe she’ll hear me.”
“Noooooo!” Roxas’ voice jumped with each hiccupping laugh as he flung his arms around Hayner’s shoulders and neck to keep him from getting up. “Do it later, she can wait I swear!”
Hayner let himself be pulled back down into Roxas’ arms, more on his level than below it this time. Roxas sank back into the mattress under Hayner’s weight, comfortably bracketed in on either side by his forearms. “Okay, okay! It probably wouldn’t even work, we didn’t even bury her.”
Hayner grinned down at Roxas, positively delighted when he snorted and started back up again.
"She's not even in the ground??"
Hayner shook his head. "No, she's in a vase downstairs!"
Roxas’ body seized with another, deeper bout of laughter, head thrown back and the whole top half of his face screwed up with it. His nose, eyes, eyebrows were all wrinkled with an absolutely infectious mirth. It was irresistible. Barely able to talk through his own laughter, Hayner chased Roxas’ laugh. “The ashes are in the living room!”
That did it. Roxas convulsed so hard he startled a matching fit of giggles out of Hayner. He collapsed overtop of Roxas, who slapped twice at Hayner’s shoulders until he fell sideways off of him. The two of them lay half tangled together, hands grasping helplessly at each other as they lost themselves together in an inconsolable bout of laughter. Roxas got a hold of himself only for Hayner’s laughter to set him off again, and then the reverse, and then again, one more time before they were peterring out at last.
It was only funny because it wasn’t.
Roxas broke their comfortable silence, still smiling. “Do you think she’d forgive me for laughing like that?”
That got an amused eyebrow raise from Hayner. “Again, I’d have to ask her and she’s not exactly taking appointments.”
Roxas patted him on the shoulder as Hayner extricated himself to lay more comfortably on his side. Roxas followed his lead and shifted onto his side to face Hayner, giving him an empathetic head tilt. “Maybe you can whisper if you get close enough. Porcelain is pretty thin."
Hayner bent his arm beneath his head and smirked back at him. "So the plan is to cup my hands around my mouth and do my best after all, huh?"
"There's worse ideas," Roxas shrugged, "How else do you get motherly approval than by asking for it? Seriously, I'm asking, I don't know. I've never had a mom, you see."
"That's pretty cool of you, I had one for like 8 years."
"Extremely punk rock," Roxas nodded, impressed.
"Thank you," Hayner graciously acquiesced with a nod of his own, but it was more of a mock bow than anything else. "How will I know what she says, you think? Will she like, send me a sign? Should I be on the lookout for suspicious beams of light, or maybe a particularly strong gust of wind?"
"Yeah, I'm pretty sure that's how it works. Something will happen and you'll just feel it. "
"Aww, no knocked over potted plants or anything? She can't just write it on the walls? That'd be the easiest to understand."
"No, too easy," Roxas waved it away and spoke through a yawn. "It's gotta be something magic, right? Some sort of glowing bird maybe."
Hayner's mouth fell slightly open as some light deep in his memories lit and gently faded. It was a space so long ago and so rarely visited that the spark of remembrance hit him soft and all at the same time hard. It felt like home, but from before he even remembered what home felt like. His expression softened.
"What?" Roxas asked, laughter still pulling at the edges of his lips.
"Nothing," Hayner shook his head, letting his impossibly gentle eyes meet Roxas' again. "You just helped me remember a little bit of that story is all. There was a glowing dove in it, that was the spirit they were waiting for."
Roxas' eyebrows lifted in surprise. "Whoa, really? That's part of the story?"
Hayner looked down, around Roxas' exposed collarbones, and his eyebrows creased in nostalgic thought. "Yeah, I think so. I forgot about that until right now."
Another thought blipped through his mind and then Hayner was grinning his usual wide, mischievous grin. He rapped the side of his fist once against Roxas' arm
"Hey, think that's the sign we're looking for?"
Roxas grinned back. "Yeah, you're stupid enough for that to be divine intervention."
Fuck, Hayner loved him. He pushed him with both hands "Fuck you!"
Roxas pushed back. "Fuck you!"
"We don't have time for that!" Hayner half hissed half laughed in disbelief, and just like that, the fun evaporated between them.
While Hayner hadn't been paying attention, the room was positively bright. The sky was a lavender that was quickly edging into powder blue. He could see it reflected in Roxas' pupils.
It made sense that Hayner hadn't noticed. Roxas was the one facing the sky that Hayner wished more than anything he could ignore until it went away. Sometimes enemies were like that in old video games, the second his character looked away from them and they weren't on screen anymore, they wouldn't be able to attack.
Real life isn't much like old video games though. Things keep coming whether he's ready for them or not. The imminence of their end was making itself known and judging by the look on Roxas' face, he hadn't forgotten for a second.
"Don't stop talking again, man. Please." He reached for Hayner, the metal of his black and white rings clinking together, and Hayner pulled him in close. He welcomed him onto the pillow he'd made of his folded arm, nose and mouth pressing of their own accord into springy blonde hair.
The feeling of Roxas' palm wound around and pulling at his back made his heart ache in a way he knew Roxas' nobody senses could feel. He folded him into his arms that much tighter.
"I don't know what to say."
"Anything, man. I have to get ready to leave soon, and I don't want to just stare at the room getting lighter."
"Yeah, that's… probably not gonna help either of us," Hayner agreed, having been doing just that since the earliest notes of dawn.
"You could tell me that story. It sounds sad."
"My mom's bird story?" Roxas nodded, tucked into Hayner's chest. He shifted slightly, so he could talk without getting hair in his mouth. "I don't know it all."
"That's okay, just the parts you remember."
"Uh, okay, let me just… I think it went like," Hayner's voice took on a reverent, musical quality as he recited the first passage.
"One day out in the meadow,
I cast my eyes upon,
A lonely little sparrow,
And it's lonely son."
He paused for a moment, eyebrows crinkling in thought as he chased down the words and only found some success. His voice lost and gained that musical quality over and over again as he wrestled with the parts he remembered and filled in the spaces between with what he knew belonged there but couldn't quite place.
"They had been asked to…
Wait there … something something god?
They loved it, and, uh.
yeah, something 'glowing dove, ' that's the spirit.
"Anyway, uh, so I asked the spirit,
'what could be so wrong?'
And, the sparrow was crying, because
In the meadow, it had been left so long."
The next part came easy and clear, at least at first, and Hayner's voice gained a little more confidence.
"The days had bled from weeks to months,
and something something stayed.
Waiting, dreaming, wishing, hoping,
The sprite had been delayed.
"Why wish for that?, I asked, uh…. hold on, let me," Hayner pursed his lips and thought hard, trailing off as he ran through the first sentence he remembered over and over again. He felt the words in there, somewhere through the fog, but even though he knew their shape he just couldn't make them clear enough to know.
He felt Roxas pull back just slightly and rearrange the angle of his head so he could press his mouth to Hayner's throat and breathe in through his nose. Not kissing, not biting, just pressing close and intimate, as if he was savoring Hayner as much as Hayner was savoring him.
Hayner gave up. He chuckled humorlessly, incredulous that he recalled so little of something that he used to know so well. "I don't think I know the rest. Sorry, Rox."
"S'okay. Gimme the gist?"
It made Hayner a little uncomfortable somehow, not that Roxas was asking but because he didn't know how much of it he even knew. It was unnerving to try to nail down the edges of a foggy idea in his head that he knew had once been crystal clear. It was like trying to draw a picture of an image in his head, no matter how much he stared, the wrongness of the lines wouldn't right themselves
"The birds were afraid, but they stayed anyway. Something about blizzards."
"Storms?"
No, that wasn't right. "Something else. Maybe it was like blizzards but wasn't one. Buzzards? Something scary. But they waited for the spirit anyway, because they loved it and it was better to wait than give up."
"So they just stayed," Roxas said by way of conclusion. "They didn't want to miss it if it came back, so they just stayed. Forever."
Hayner nodded and felt Roxas' arms tighten just that much more around him as the first rays of sunlight broke free of the horizon. He watched the line of it creep steadily down and coat a rectangular patch of Hayner's far wall golden.
"I don't know if I like this story after all. I want things to work out."
Hayner tipped his head back down and smiled into Roxas' hair as he the sunlight broke over his shoulders. "It was prettier when my mom told it."