so i don't get arrested: i'm telling you now, every living character belonging to an already existing story does not belong to me no matter how hard i try to write up documents to say that they do. i know...i've tried. -shifty eyes-

Author's Note: yes, i've done it! i'm crazy and loving it...are you loving it? i've posted another story for the kingdom hearts section. and, as much as i wanted this to be a one shot, i couldn't...so it became what you will hopefully enjoy reading below. believe me, after desperate trying to write more and more for my other stories i had a brain fart and my hands just wouldn't go near the keyboard. then it hit me after watching a soap opera earlier...why not this?? and i thought, "i'm insane...let's do it." X3

and, once again, akuroku ahoy. and, for the first time, more yaoi OTPs will join like...zemyx, slight soriku, maybe even a little triangle.

sheild your eyes because: there will be yaoi, cussing and certain situations that will make you go "...whoa" why? -points to title- thumbs up? all clear? enjoy, me harties. -still in POTC mode- XP

My Love is like: Whoa

Chapter One: This ain’t no Happy Ending

It was a perfect Saturday afternoon, the kind of Saturday afternoon that made all the pretty ladies and grown ups swoon over while all the kids just ran around, letting it pass them by in a snap. Actually, it was supposed to be a perfect afternoon, hadn’t he been shoved into the “naughty corner” for the third time that day.

Axel always claimed his spot as bad boy amongst all the kids at the orphanage. Yeah, he was an orphan...whatever that meant. Green, green eyes carefully scanned the surface of the brick wall in front of him before momentarily glimpsing over his shoulder where one of the nurses raised a shaped eyebrow at him. He huffed and ogled the Easter-egg-blue sky hovering over his head.

He crossed his arms stubbornly and kicked his worn out tennis shoes against the dirt, making a cloud of dust fog his little face.

“If you keep acting like that I’ll just have to increase the time on the clock, young man.”

Like any little kid, the redhead groaned, muttering something about unfairness and the nurse’s death, and boredly wrapped himself in the puffy cotton balls in the sky. He’d dipped one of Ollette’s brunette curls in the pink paint not to annoy her much, but just because he thought girls happened to like pink almost as much as their hair. So combining the two made perfect sense.

Obviously not.

RING RING RING

“Alright, Axel. That’ll do.” Behind him, the nurse, clad in all white from hat to shoes, got up from her desk, shut the vibrating clock off and walked up to the stiff boy. She put a hand, which he debated on biting or not, on his shoulder and turned him around to face her.

“Next time, remember that paints are meant to be on the paper, ok?”

He opened his mouth to speak.

“And crayons and marker ink and glue. No exceptions.”

He lowered his head, lamely letting her pet his untamed hair, and mumbled, “Yes, ma’am.”

“Good. Now go play. I heard Roxas asking for you in the play yard.” Really, it didn’t take a pat on the back to kick start the little redheaded firecracker to run to where Roxas was. Wherever he was, the fun was and that was all that mattered. Besides, Roxas and him came into this place at the same time and cliqued like they were brothers joined at the hip. Something about Roxas completed Axel and he just called it “being best friends”.

xxXXxx

It was a very complicated situation, really, and there was absolutely no time to fix it. What can anyone do? Not much but stare at the rising flames that licked around the large house. Helpless neighbors and bystanders pretty much figured that there was no life involved anymore. That alone made millions of questions rise on the spot.

An arson?

A lit candle?

The lady left the stove on?

Whatever the reason, chances were that a baby wouldn’t know. That raised questions beyond human count. How did this little tyke survive it? Parents were dead, house was burned to ashes...

So, he was left—all on his lonesome.

xxXXxx

“Woxas? Did he get outta time out yet?”

Roxas, a boy of 7 years old, swung his feet nonchalantly over the patches of brown and green grass that waved lazily under the metal bench. One word said it, no, screamed what Roxas was: BORED. Ever since Axel got plopped into the open court room for dipping paint in Ollete’s hair, he slumped into one place and constantly sighed, thinking that somebody, something would pass him a ball or something.

He cocked his small head to the right where Olette was sitting, one of her top, front teeth missing from her smile. He shook his head.

“Not yet. But he’ll show up. He promised that he’d play Blitzball with me when he gets out of the corner.” Roxas’ whole body shook impatiently and his baby blue eyes were staring at the empty archway ahead of him. He knew that Axel didn’t mean to paint Olette’s hair and it wasn’t like Olette cared. Since the two boys got into the orphanage they were the best of pals. So it was only right to say that they nearly drowned in ultimate depression when their other half was gone.

“Hey, wook! Thew he is! Right thew, right thew!” Olettes tiny finger shot toward the archway, but Roxas had already seen what she was so keen on showing him. Within seconds, Axel ran through the grass to the bench where he wrapped an arm around his BFF’s shoulders.

Roxas laughed. After those 10 minutes of being quiet, he laughed.

xxXXxx

Now, it was a very complicated question, really, and it needed to be answered in a heartbeat. What would someone do in a situation such as this one? After all, when there’s life involved, what’re you gonna do, become a murderer? That leaves two questions, unanswered, mind you. For starters, it’s not the baby’s fault that it was born so it would make no sense in tossing its little life, less than 5 minutes long, away.

Yes, she did consider the situation and went over the questions as best she could. It wasn’t until she did two things that she made up her mind: took one look at the wallet, took one look at the baby. That settled that predicament...

Her husband couldn’t complain. In fact, what husband? He’d gone years ago.

So, all on her lonesome, baby in arms, 100 bucks in wallet, she left the little bundle on the side of the road—in the dark, in the wilderness, alone.

xxXXxx

And so, the perfect Saturday actually lived up to what it was supposed to be in the first place. Birds were singing, the nurses literally phased off the face of the earth and, somewhere in the peace and tranquility, two boys were madly punching the guts out of each other with a Blitzball.

Ah, child’s play.

Roxas quickly jumped up to the left and smacked the ball down to his feet where Axel slid into the dirt and punched it back with a victory yell. Not bothering with the grass stains, he stood back up just in time to kick the ball back to Roxas’ waiting hands. They’re constant screaming and hurting each other had won over the attention of all the little pipsqueaks in the building.

“You’re not gonna beat me, Roxas!” Axel whooped, punching the ball back halfway across the garden.

Roxas chased after it, panting and smiling at the same time, and just barely made it under the shadow of the Blitzball when he reached up and whacked it back with his palm. Even though it burned a little, he shook it off and the game of murder ball resumed.

“I promise I’ll beat you!”

“You promise?” Axel yelled back and all the beady eyes darted between him and Roxas as they exchanged words.

Smirk pulled on his lips, Roxas eagle eyed the ball against the white sun and pushed off from the ground with as much force as his legs would allow him. Sweat was already starting to get in his eyes and it was making him squint in pain. He reached up, fingers stretched out so much his skin tightened, and suddenly felt the ball roll awkwardly against his fingers and through the air.

“Ow!”

“Roxas! You did it now!”

“Shut it, Demyx!” Roxas blurted out just as he hit the ground with a thud. He swayed on the spot, nearly falling over on his butt, but managed to get up and run over to the other side of the playing field where the Blitzball had made friends with Axel’s stomach.

“Axel, Axel, I’m sorry! Sorry, sorry, sorry! I didn’t see it! I-I got something in my eye and-and—“

Axel looked up from the ground and stopped his friend’s sputtering with a raised hand. Roxas just eyed it stupidly until he saw Axel grin, obviously meaning that he was feeling ok or that he accepted Roxas’ apology. Whatever the reason, Roxas didn’t have the slightest bit of time to ask about it since both Axel’s hand and head dropped and he lay there motionless in the grass, a Blitzball calmly sitting like a puppy on his flat stomach.

“I-am-so-dead.”

xxXXxx

“You could’ve ducked, you know.”

“Maybe it would’ve been better if we played something else. I mean, Blitzball’s not supposed to be a kid’s game, right?” With a soft grunt, Axel shifted uncomfortably in his lower bunk across from Roxas who had clicked on a flashlight and dimmed it down with his hand over the bulb. Roxas’ bangs lightly bobbed when he shot his head up at Axel’s sudden movement. Guilt suddenly jammed itself in his chest, harder than any Blitzball could’ve done.

After that painful pause Roxas looked up again, legs crossed under his body, and made his eyes wander around Axel’s shadow. “Hey, did you hear?”

Axel’s mattress creaked when he rested his arms behind his head. “Hm?”

“That Tidus kid got a new family, just yesterday.”

At the sound of that, Axel’s eyes flashed against the darkness around them and eagerly blinked at Roxas. “Seriously?”

Roxas nodded solemnly and bit his lower lip, acting as the exact opposite to Axel’s reaction. “He’s leaving tomorrow morning...Axel?”

“What?”

“Uhm...you think we’ll, you know, leave soon too?”

Axel’s scoff seemed to answer all on its own. With another grin playing on his face he leaned further back into his pillow and stretched his legs further out on the bed that was already too short to fit his unusually tall body. It was so hard to believe that Axel was 8 years old. He grew like a vegetable, chatted away like a teen and even cussed more often than the nurses did when they dropped something on their toe.

“You know, I hope not too soon.”

Roxas’ brows rose in surprise. “Why not? I thought you wanted to get away from the nurses here.”

“Yeah. They can be annoying bitches...”

Roxas cringed at the word and he uneasily glanced around the large room for anyone that did the same. When all he heard was loud snoring and breathing, he went on listening.

“But if one of us leaves then that’ll leave one of us all alone, won’t it?” Axel turned his head calmly on his pillow, hoping for an agreement. When nothing happened, he shot up like he’d been pinched and glared at Roxas’ shadow with jaw dropped. “Come on, Roxas! Don’t you like me?”

“I do like you!” Roxas hastily responded in a loud version of a whisper. Axel’s voice was already breaking past a shouting voice; it usually did when it came to their more personal conversations. Sometimes he wondered if Axel knew half the words stumbling out of his mouth before he said them.

“Good. ‘Cause you know, I like you too, Roxas.” Seemingly ending the convo on that confident note, Axel flopped back contently on his pillow and snuggled deeper until he had his stomach flat on the mattress. “I like you a lot.”

Something about the way Axel would say things like that made Roxas poof up like a girl. He tried covering it up with a smile and stuffed his own face halfway into his pillow too, quickly clicking the flashlight off and storing it under his head.

“You know, it’d be awesome if we got adopted together, now that I think about it. We could be brothers!”

“Brothers...” Roxas considered it, but there was something very odd about putting him and Axel together under the same roof, calling each other ‘bro’ every time they passed by each other in the morning, sharing each other’s headphones and pushing each other around even when their future parents lectured them about it. If they couldn’t be brothers, then what could they be besides just best friends?

xxXXxx

“Well...that’s them.”

Axel nervously twitched his mouth in a half smile and quickly looked over his shoulder at the silver car, left to run at the side of the orphanage entrance. Two people, smiling and chatting happily, were standing in front of the opened trunk, tossing in some small luggage...and a blue and white Blitzball. His Blitzball.

“That’s them,” he croaked, turning back to Roxas who was looking up at him, failing to hide the shininess in his clear blue eyes. As much as it hurt him to, he could hold back crying much better than Roxas could, making him the stronger half. After 8 years, he was leaving...and what was totally unfair:

Roxas was staying.

“I’ll see you around?” Axel asked, his voice raising with the lightest bit of confidence that they, indeed, would. They had to. Otherwise...otherwise he’d be doomed to boredom the rest of his life. He’d be doomed to wake up without seeing that blonde kid on the opposite bunk, laughing and sharing their inside jokes; actually glad to see him and accept him for the unruly kid he was.

“Y-yeah.” Sniffling once, Roxas lifted out his hand in between them but when Axel took it, he pushed that aside and full on hugged him, making all the kids that had been watching them inside gasp and giggle and the nurses make puddles at their feet.

Roxas couldn’t explain it, but feeling Axel’s warm body beside him was...different. Actually, he just now realized that every time they made contact somehow, he felt different. Always. And when he saw the last of that red speck disappear around the corner and drive out of sight down the road, he had a new different feeling attack him:

Emptiness

xxXXxx

Ok, fast forward to present time now. As charming as it is to hear/read a good children’s story, it would seem better to read the happy ending. Where’s the magic that happens when these two meet again? What exactly happened to blondie after redhead left? Sadly, there is none. At this point in time, it hasn’t been written; it hasn’t occurred.

All Roxas hoped, and double, triple prayed for was a happy ending.

“Roxas. Roxas! Roxas get your fat ass off of my couch and finish packing will you? These boxes aren’t gonna scuttle out the door themselves, ay-yai-yai, SHOOT me if they do.”

Groaning and muttering something about murder, Roxas kept his weight on one elbow and fisted a hand into his eyes. The whole room smelled like moldy cardboard and from where he was sitting it looked like moldy cardboard. He almost flopped back down if it hadn’t been for the smack upside his head that woke him back up.

“Ow! Bastard!” he hissed, sitting up abruptly.

Above him, Cloud, roommate and long lost cousin, restlessly rubbed his hands together before slipping them under Roxas’ armpits to pry him up from the black leather couch. He wasn’t usually like this. Normally he was a turtle with the body of an amoeba; mopped around the house like a ghost. Today, however, being Roxas’ moving day, he had every human right to be anal.

“I told you yesterday ‘don’t lounge around when there’s packing to do’ and this is where I find you! Think about the education you’re wasting.” With Roxas successfully on his feet, Cloud sliced through the white living room and heaved up box in his toned arms. He carefully shook his bright blonde hair, styled identically to Roxas’, away from his eyes and trudged across the room, stopping in front of Roxas as he dropped the heavy box in his unsuspecting hands.

“What’s in here? An encyclopedia?”

“Three volumes of one. Geez, and you didn’t even remember what you put in the damn things.” Leaving Roxas to prop the box of death beside the front door, Cloud returned to marking the remaining packages with ‘FRAGILE’ in big, bold sharpie pen. Aside from that, his increasingly maddening death stare and fairly large muscles would intimidate anyone who had it in their right mind to break his cousin’s property.

Roxas had stayed in that stuffy orphanage for another full year after his best friend left him. Cloud pulled up with his mom and dad who mentioned that they were lost relatives of the kid. After that, Roxas joined the party wagon of adopted kids and earned himself a real family, even if he had to move in with Cloud after he turned 15. Cloud was 24 at the time they became the mini Brady Bunch...just less happy-go-lucky.

Now...oh, now he was off to college. And, boy, did it feel fantastic. Just peachy.

“There. Anything else we forgot to pack? The TV? The wallpaper? Maybe the—“

“Don’t say it!”

“The kitchen sink?” Roxas added with a snooty gesture; leaning his body forward and clamping his hands down on his hips.

Cloud, despite his misery, rubbed it off and stood up, piling the last two boxes on each other before stepping outside. Roxas followed behind him with his hands in his khaki pockets. His fingers momentarily brushed against a paper he’d been keeping folding away from the world and it wasn’t until now that he bothered taking it out and reading its creased text.

Dear beloved student,

We are pleased to inform you that you will soon be beginning your semester with us here in Bryman college! To prepare for your freshmen year, please take the time to look over the supply list below and gather the necessary items needed to ensure a safe and successful year...

Roxas looked up from the crumpled yellow paper and re-crumpled it into his pocket where it belonged. He was about to glance over the list of supplies along with the list of students he would be going around with, but decided it would be better to await Surprise to arrive at his door. After all, he was pretty sure that he wouldn’t find ‘1 kitchen sink’ on that list.

‘Beloved student’ his ass.

“Roxas! Come on! Grab those boxes and let’s go! You might miss your chance to snag the good room.”

“Coming, coming,” he sighed and wrapped a single book bag over his shoulder and took two of the lightest boxes possible in his arms. If there wasn’t a happy ending here...then...

xxXXxx

“Now remember, you flunk this up we’ll pull you right out, understand me?”

“Mm-hmm...”

“And if all you’re doing is partying for the whole year we’ll still pull you out.”

“Yuh-huh...”

“And if you backtalk your professors we’ll send you face down to the cement if you refuse to listen to a word I’m saying, young man!”

“Uh-huh--w-wait! Hold up, I was listening, I was listening!” Having had both iPod buds popped out of his ears as well as had the actual iPod snatched away, Axel clicked his tongue and pressed his back against his seat, bouncing his leg irritably on the floor. Beside him on the right was his adopted mother, Aerith Gainsborough who had an annoying habit of braiding her extensive hair every time she walked out of the house. Today was no exception.

“You’ll listen to me this time.” Sighing gently, she reached a hand, the one that wasn’t holding the iPod, over to Axel and touched him on the shoulder. He looked at it once and then out the window as the college was starting to come into clear view down the road.

Shit.

“See, there’s the college and I haven’t even told you everything.”

“Mom, chill. I’ll be fine. I’m 18, legally an adult.” He jabbed a thumb into his chest and smiled out the window at the flood of student dragging bags and even refrigerators on the sidewalk. Refrigerators! He admitted that to being the slightest bit freaky.

“And legally allowed to be placed into jail.”

“Mom!” the redhead snapped quickly just as the car came to a full jerked stop right in front of the large school doors. Aerith patted him on the shoulder and popped the door open, already flying out like she’d sprout wings any second.

Their driver had already gotten half the boxes out when he finally found it in him to step outside in the burning sunlight. There was something totally nostalgic about looking at the grass under his feet. Reminded him too much of a certain someone.

“That should be everything! Now you just leave these here—they all have your room number on them—and take your book bag to your dorm. There’ll be someone to take care of these ones. Oh, I can’t believe you’re going off already!” With that said, Aerith swung her arms up and lightly squeezed them around Axel’s neck, crushing his forehead dangerously near her breast area.

“I’ll-miss-guh! I’ll miss you too...” Axel panted, rubbing the back of his head as he felt a flush coming on. With the 124th flying kiss done, Aerith gathered herself into the back of the car again and the driver wheeled off around the corner, out of sight.

xxXXxx

“He could’ve considered parking on the other side of the school, but no. He had to find shade under a tree. Now look, I’m stuck here, wandering the corridors without a clue where my dorm is and so far, college is just—“

“Hey, you looking for your dorm too?”

Roxas spun around, heart pounding, and his eyes fell upon a teen a half head taller than him with a stylized, dirty blonde fauxhawk. Right there he could tell the guy was into rock, no, all music at that. Probably worked at McDonalds for a living and still lived with his parents. Could’ve been in the same situation as him right about now; being forced to look for something that very much so might not exist.

“Yeah. Yeah I am.”

The teen smiled weakly and fell into step beside Roxas like he’d known him forever. “See, the paper says 306 so that means its on the 3rd floor. We’re on the—“

“First floor. We should head up.” Roxas turned a corner into another long hall with more doors on every side of them. The high, coffee painted ceilings decreased the feeling of claustrophobia despite the fact that there were hundreds of students crammed inside.

“I’m Demyx,” the teen said cheerfully, turned his head in Roxas’ direction.

“Roxas.”

“Wicked. You in the same course I’m taking?”

“Could be. We’ll check the papers once we get to the 3rd floor.”

xxXXxx

“3rd floor, 3rd floor, 3rd fucking floor...” Axel muttered as his eyes squinted at every gold plated sign pinned on the wall. Ever turn he made plopped him in the same exact looking hallway as before and no matter where he went there was absolutely nothing resembling stairs nearby. His checkered polo flew along with him as he sprinted off down the hall, cursing every word known to man.

“You’d think they’d put stairs! A sign at least! Where the hell’s a bloody sign when you—“ Then, the gates of heaven open. He stared out and, sure enough, some feet away from him were the flight of stairs that he knew for sure would lead him to heaven...or at least his dorm. Both sounded the same right about now.

Not hesitating, he jumped up and ran for the corner.

xxXXxx

“Oh, and I heard you gotta look out when you’re in the older rooms ‘cause they’ve got roaches in every niche. And if you—“

Roxas just nodded respectfully at Demyx’s history story. Mm-hm, ok, nice, sure, roaches, yeah. Stairs...yeah, stairs would be nice too. He picked up the pace and Demyx just followed, the huge headphones around his neck bobbing along with his steps. Finally, mister fauxhawk seemed to make use of himself when he jutted a finger out in front and pointed out the first step to stairs just around the corner.

“Great! Let’s go!”

xxXXxx

He counted his steps: 1, 2, 3, 4...almost, almost...7, 8, 9...

Just a few more and home free.

xxXXxx

Ready, and, turn corner!

xxXXxx

Turn. Crash. Disaster.

Screams came from every possible direction, even from underground if that was possible. Some pens went sliding away along the newly polished tiles, getting lost in the tangle of feet and now limbs as they collided into each other upon impact. It felt like a full 30 seconds before Roxas’ body fell back and he met with the floor, butt doomed to be bruised for at least the next week.

Next to him, Demyx had crouched down and, as much as he hated it, started yelling in his ear asking if he was ok. Roxas nodded after each time he asked even though his head was spinning and polka dots were flashing in his line of sight.

“Hey, hey, Roxas, you ok? Oh, hey, man, are you ok? We were runnin’ and-and...” Demyx suddenly trailed off when his smoky blue eyes peered up from behind the strands of hair that fell over his face. Using a finger, he absently pushed them away and began ogling at the person that his new roommate had just met. It was surprising to see a guy with red hair around town nowadays...

Axel, unaware that Demyx had locked onto him, cracked a single eye open and stared down at his feet where a pair of dangerously familiar eyes were just now doing the same. Speechless, breathless and bruised, Axel barely moved when his head sparked a little red flag. He knew this guy...he knew him!

Likewise, Roxas thought the same, shooting an unblinking stare into Axel’s venom shaded eyes. Although the students were still fluttering around them, he was pretty sure that he and Axel were the only ones that were alive at the time.

“You know him?” Demyx’s dazed and almost flustered voice piped up in a whisper behind Roxas’ left ear. Roxas did a double take at the sound of his voice and, after catching the direction of where he’d been looking, noticed that nearly half of Axel’s fine toned stomach was showing after his shirt flew up messily after the collision.

He suddenly had both a hatred for Demyx...

...and a huge, huge lust for his long lost best friend.

i must tell you, i write with no beta. the beta desk is empty. so this means that i could very much have typoz. (that was done on purpose XO) and, since my other lengthy story is in 1st person, forgive please if i happened to switch to it again in this story. i slave myself to type gooder.

that was chapter uno! i tried out different scene switches in this and, yes, i know it might've went like SWOOSH through their lives. but! no worries! it'll slow up to make room for what i've got in store. i've got much more planned out for this fic and, as much as it's begging to spew out!!! ...it'll need to wait. 3 AM again? oh, yes, it is...

review puh-lease. because it makes me and my carpal tunneled hands shoot through the roof. -woot- plus, i personally find it depressing when people click the fav/alert button and leave the poor review button out in the emo corner. the review button DOES like attention, donchaknow?

and before i forget...

happy dexel day (demyx/axel, 8/9) from,
kokoro77 X3