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It wasn’t unusual. In fact, many of their friends had assumed the situation they were in was a common occurrence.
It made as much sense as night and day. Close enough even to be compared to living in someone’s heart (which, for Roxas, was literal).
But being in the same bed together was one thing. Falling asleep together was not.
Well, the connotations swimming through Roxas’ head didn’t necessarily have to come true. He had fallen asleep many times in Sora’s arms, lap, against shoulders, thighs…
This wasn’t that different. So Roxas didn’t say anything, even as their fingers stayed stuck in an interwoven web, one that was impossible for him to untangle with Sora still asleep.
Sora, none the wiser to the whispers of Roxas’ heart, continued his journey through dreams, muttering incoherent nonsense that still managed to send Roxas’ into a fluttering mess.
They were close enough that Roxas could feel the other’s body heat. He swallowed and tried to stretch without pulling his hand away from the vice grip. The blankets rustled with his movements, scattering the moonlight while the shadows in contrast took their place.
It couldn’t have been long after midnight. Roxas recalled counting down for something, but he wasn’t sure what. All he knew was that fire was involved… somehow.
Fires in multiple colors. Explosions that lit up the sky. Right, they had been celebrating something, and afterwards Sora had dragged him over and they had played video games well into slumber.
Thus, their current predicament. Roxas sighed and sucked in a breath and pushed away his own heart’s protests, slowly unlocking his fingers with Sora’s hand. Once he had enough of them free he reached over and held Sora’s wrist as if it were glass.
A grasp at freedom. Hopefully then he could breathe. That was his thought process as he inched his hand out and away, huffing as Sora’s fingers twitched into a tighter hold.
“Come on.” Roxas shook his head. “Don’t do this to me.”
One year of secrets. One year pretending every smile didn’t catapult his stomach, didn’t coat his mind with thoughts that he could barely understand. One year of being scared that if he was open and honest their friendship would change for the worst.
But he wanted more. He wanted so much more.
“Sora, please,” he hissed, whispering a curse as his hand finally broke past a locked embrace. He closed his eyes and took in a deep breath.
It’s all going to be okay . He told himself this repeatedly, squared his shoulders, and opened his eyes.
Three seconds of silence followed and just as Roxas’ heart finished pouting it’s way to a normal beat, everything in him froze as Sora let out a long exhale.
For as long as Roxas had existed outside of Sora’s heart, there were a few things about his Sora that hadn’t changed. Sora was incredibly clingy, particularly when he first woke up.
No matter where Roxas was, Sora would find him and zone in like a missile, grappling him into a hug so tight Roxas swore his spine would crack from the strain someday.
Escape was never an option. It didn’t really matter who it was, whenever Sora came to the closest person to him was going to get a massive bear hug no matter their opinions on hugs.
Yen Sid once shared that it was a side effect of Sora’s time in purgatory, of being frozen in Quadratum. Isolation had made it hard for Sora to naturally sustain his own light, and his body would unconsciously seek it out in others.
Of course, there was also Sora’s knack for invading everyone’s personal space. Though Roxas’ mind and heart suffered for a variety of reasons, he couldn’t help but be sympathetic. He too had come back from death in his own right, so what reason did he have to judge?
Nevertheless, his face would be telling. Roxas shifted and turned, trying to move into a more comfortable position as he waited for the inevitable and fished through his mind from a pile of lies he could use to explain the red hue spreading along his cheeks.
Sora gripped his arm first then ensnared him from behind, humming his way towards consciousness as he blinked repeatedly. “Hmmm… Morning, Roxas.”
Roxas swam through the excuses and swallowed down his whine as his spine joined the wailing alongside his heart. “….hi.”
“Oh, shoot, I’m doing it again.” Sora glanced around, eyes widening briefly as he realized where they were. “Oh!”
“Yeah… Sora…?”
“Right, Right! Your back! Uhhh…” Sora lifted his hands up above his head. Then he sheepishly laughed and released Roxas’ waist from his legs. “Sorry.”
Roxas coughed once, shaking his head. “Used to it,” he mumbled as he caught his breath.
“Hmmm.” Sora sat up, looking from the ceiling then back to Roxas’ hunched form before scratching his head. “So…. Today’s the first.”
“First?” Roxas mirrored Sora’s position but kept his gaze locked up. “First of what?”
“The first. You know, it’s a new year.” Sora grinned and playfully shoved Roxas to the side. “Which means we get to start over and do whatever we want.”
“Feels the same to me.” Roxas sighed. “Not like I’m any closer to where I want to be.”
“Maybe.” Sora shrugged. “Where do you want to be?”
The question was so genuine. Curious and open. Roxas looked directly into Sora’s eyes, knowing he couldn’t be silent but also couldn’t just blurt out wherever you are, always where you are .
So he settled with, “wherever my heart takes me I guess.”
Something kind and knowing deepened Sora’s grin into a smile so rich in warmth Roxas nearly had to shield himself from perceived rays of sunshine burning through his chest. What Sora said next was just as sweet and targeted. “Mind if I follow?”
Roxas looked away. He couldn’t let his heart be swayed. It wasn’t anything different than what Sora would say to their other friends. So he tempered his voice and kept his tone neutral. “Not like I could stop you. Think you’ve proven that you’ll go wherever you feel is right… regardless of what anyone says.”
Despite the consequences.
For a brief moment a chill gripped Roxas’ lower back. Right in the center of where Sora’s hugs would press and press . If Roxas hadn’t kept his eyes open he would have missed the flicker of darkness that flashed across the air.
Right in front of his face. Roxas sighed. “Am I wrong?”
“…No. You’re not.”
“Then why bother asking?”
Sora placed a hand on Roxas’ shoulder. The same one that wouldn’t let go. “Because I paid the price for giving myself up like that… without even… without thinking about what it would do to everyone. Or me.” His grip grew desperate. “I just didn’t care. I wanted to save everyone.”
“You could have waited.” Roxas shivered. “I spent a lot of time in my memories searching for clues. Searching for ways to find you. Now you… it’s been years. It’s been years and I still can’t believe you’re here.”
Sora chuckled sadly. “Yeah… and you always have to remind me every year too.”
“Well… I mean it every time. And I’ll do it again.” Roxas wanted to shove Sora’s hand off. He wanted to grab it and pull , hug Sora closely and never let go. Wanted Sora to feel his heartbeat and just know what he really wanted to say, like how Roxas felt he had known Sora all those years ago.
But he wasn’t living inside Sora. Now he felt like he barely knew who Sora was. There was so much that had changed, so much that was different.
It excited him. It also scared him. It didn’t change his feelings. It made everything stronger. Roxas felt stuck with mountains of words trying to break past his lips. He bit them instead briefly, hard enough to pierce through to anything that would actually be worth sharing.
Be worth risking their friendship.
Sora in turn glanced at Roxas’ mouth before keeping his gaze pointed, as if he were trying really hard to focus on a single point in Roxas’ hair. “I thought this year we could do something new. Something to prove I won’t just go off and leave…” he closed his eyes, “leave everyone to fight by myself.”
Roxas shrugged. “You don’t need to prove anything. Not if you get the message.”
Sora tilted his head, pouting at the ceiling. “I got it the first time. Five times really.”
“Good. Then you’ll get it at number 6.”
“Okay, but when will you get mine?” Sora crossed his arms. “I’ve been trying to tell you this thing for so long. If you got it you would have known for sure that I don’t need to be reminded.”
Roxas could barely attempt to stifle his laughter. “Right. Sure. I don’t think anything you say is going to change this, Sora. You’re stuck with me rubbing it in.”
Sora’s expression was taxed. There was something almost mischievous leaking under the surface, to the point where Roxas knew he was either inviting himself to be shoved off the bed or dragged into one of their famous pillow fights.
And his heart was soaring. He was having a great time. He smirked, raising both eyebrows. “Sorry. Payback for all the memory diving. Maybe in ten years I’ll be satisfied? I’ve seen so much of you over and over, to help search you know? So, I think this makes us even.”
It would never be enough. Not now that his dreams were constantly plagued by impromptu visits with versions of Sora even more mischievous, cunning, and unbearable in the best of ways.
It was a glimpse at the possibility, but it couldn’t hold a candle to just being stared down as he was now. Even if it was a glare.
“So this is all revenge? Going to keep punching down after all I did to help save you?” Sora touched his own chest. The glint in his eyes teetered on the edge of sarcasm and a genuine threat. “This is the thanks I’m given for being a hero?”
“Yeah? Stop trying to be one. Problem solved.”
Sora beamed. “Well, I can’t do that. Not the way you want. So! I have a different solution!”
“Of course you do.” Roxas sniffed the air. “Bet it’s a stinky one.”
Sora lifted his hands to shove but paused them near his own chest. He closed his eyes and smiled wider, clasping his hands together. “No. I’m done being everyone’s hero.” Sora opened his eyes and a mixture of emotions slapped Roxas in the face as the next few words collided straight at his core. “I’ll just become yours.”
Roxas wheezed . He lifted a finger, opened his mouth, then closed it. He repeated this motion seven times, cheeks heating up right as Sora’s smile resurfaced with enough confidence to grind whatever front Roxas had been maintaining into dirt paste.
He squeaked. “What?”
“Your hero. Me.” Sora brought up Roxas’ hand, kissed it gingerly, then gave it a few pats. “There. Problem solved.”
“That doesn’t solve anything ! You’ve unsolved it!” And I’m going to die. “You can’t just say that.”
“Why?” Sora blinked. “Don’t believe me?”
Roxas pulled his hand away. It was already warm and that was freaking him out. “No. I… I don’t know! You’re not making any sense!”
Sora huffed, looking almost miffed. “Roxas… I’m…” He rubbed his eyes. A similar blush sprinkled its way on his cheeks, mixing in with his freckles. “You’re just going to make me say it, huh?”
Roxas’ chest did over a thousand flips. He stiffened. “You like me,” he spat out incredulously, as if he had just swallowed a rock.
“Yes? Stronger than that?” Sora peaked through his fingers. “Yes. That’s what I meant. Yes. Like… more than like. Yes.” He shielded himself.
Roxas didn’t know whether to scream or shove Sora off the bed. He couldn’t believe he had held onto his feelings for this long only for Sora to get the jump on him first in the most surreal way possible. “Yes.”
Sora lowered his hands. “What?”
“I like you. Too.” Roxas scratched at his head, looked everywhere but Sora’s eyes, then settled on his lips before internally screaming. “More than like. I think.”
“Oh!”
“Yeah.”
“Huh.” Sora looked away, then down, then back up. His gaze was slightly lower than Roxas’ eyes. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Why didn’t you tell me?!”
“I…” Sora raised his hands. “I thought you would just know! I dropped the hints!”
“You dropped nothing.” Roxas was very adamant to not check his memory for any supposed hints because he couldn’t stop mentally kicking himself. So he continued pushing out nonsense. “I don’t know what to tell you.”
Sora grumbled, then quickly brought himself closer. He snapped Roxas’ forward by the shirt and somehow crushed the other in a hug stronger than anything he had given prior. Roxas felt dazed by the time Sora pushed him away from the embrace while keeping them connected firmly with hands attached to Roxas’ shoulders.
Sora breathed out roughly, shrugging his own shoulders out, shaking his head in disbelief. “Hints,” he repeated, as if this would somehow clear up every confusion that ever existed between them.
“So breaking my spine is the key to winning my heart?”
Sora struggled to contain his laughter. “Yes.”
“Alright. Sure.” Roxas fought the urge to laugh mirrored in his own chest. “Perfectly normal way to do this.”
“Yeah.”
Sora slowly ran his hands up from the shoulders to glide along Roxas’ neck before resting over the red, cupping Roxas’ cheeks. Before any of them could prepare for it Sora took the leap and connected their lips.
All of Roxas’ thoughts shuttered to a halt. It was as if the sounds in his brain were overridden by static. In their place pleasure danced along the mental walls and filled Roxas up with images he routinely shoved into any crack he could find. A fairy tale for the void.
He couldn’t reject them now. Everything gushed towards the surface, spreading a sense of peace and warmth so strong he nearly collapsed into Sora’s chest. But somehow he stayed still, stayed upright as Sora kissed him again and again.
Three. No, four times. Roxas quickly lost track. Thankfully, Sora was merciful and Roxas took the time to breathe as they parted.
Sora was even redder than him now, but also pleased. “Guess that’s not a bad way either.”
Roxas shook his head, unable to hide his own smile. “Should have led with that.”
“I think you would have ran.” Sora interlocked their hands once again, lifting them up. “You tried to leave me earlier.”
“You have to understand that since your hints barely worked I had to protect myself. My heart wasn’t going to survive.”
“Oh.” Sora somehow combined looking both cocky and bashful all at once. “I got you good.”
“Say that again and I’m kicking you off.” Roxas leaned forward, shielding his eyes in Sora’s shoulders as he embraced him. “Only today. You’re allowed to be my hero for one day.”
“Just today?”
“Yeah. Once a year. Gives you something to look forward to.”
Sora laughed. The sound vibrated between them as Roxas felt the other’s heartbeat speed up. “Guess I’ll take what I can get.”
They stayed that way long past dawn into the late morning. Roxas kept his word and allowed Sora to take care of his every need. Much further down the line after many conversations he relented to giving Sora one day a month, but as sweet as each of these days were they didn’t stick out as sharply in his mind as the first.
But he knew that was okay. It was how memories were made and cemented after all.