Fake Roses
The flower fell.
A few red petals skirted off and danced through the air in serene grace.
Normally, he would have caught it, he would have held it in his thin, spider-like fingers, and enjoy its lone grace and beauty.
Not now though. The Boy was watching. Intently.
What The Boy had said, had caused a great uproar in the void of The Tall Man.
So much uproar that The Tall Man had cut a rose that was still in the processes of blooming.
A newborn hatchling pushed out of its nest. A rose cut down in its prime.
The Boy had called the rose a fake.
The rose fell and fell and fell and fell and fell and fell and fell and...
xOx
A lone man sat in a white room, trying to think.
Nothing was in the room, save for a white chair and the man himself.
On one of the walls of the room, was a glossy white door, leading to a white hallway full of other doors with black roman numerals nailed neatly to the each of them.
The specific numeral nailed so neatly to the mans door was VIII.
The man sat there thinking, and thinking and thinking and thinking and thinking and thinking and thinking and thinking of nothing. The door opened, and without thinking, he already knew who it was.
Footsteps (Fake) broke the hollow silence of The Mans room.
His bored eyes slowly trailed to the figure of The (Fake) Boy silently closing the door. The Mans eyes locked onto the clam lake that were The (Fake) Boys crystal blue eyes.
Instantly, the calm lakes had transitioned into hectic oceans.
The boys normally (Fake) sulky mouth dropped opened.
"Axel, Axel"
It was at this point that Axel noted the gash on The Boys forehead.
"He hurt me Axel, he hurt me"
xOx
The Tall Man was busy deadheading the remaining bud of a wilted rose.
He cringed his nose in disgust.
This technique had utterly perplexed him; that fact that gardeners knowingly hurt a living organisms, just to promote more rose growth.
He smirked.
Beauty is Pain, Pain is Beauty.
He moved onto another rose bush with an abundance of red roses; and an equal amount of wilted buds.
His pliers instantly went to work, clipping several buds off.
A sound caused him to momentarily stop.
He listened, the stem of a wilted bud stuck in between the incisors of the pliers.
Footsteps.
He felt violated.
This garden was his sanctuary, the place where he could get away from the constant looks of the organization, and from life as a nobody in general.
The footsteps gained momentum now, black rubber soles scrunching against green grass.
The Tall Man clasped the handles of the pliers together, and the bud fell to the floor with a resounding plop.
The footsteps were on him now, echoing in his ears.
He turned his attention to another bud. The bud landed on the floor with a plop.
The footsteps stopped now.
The Tall Man straightened out his back.
"Marluxia"
The Tall Man turned at the sound of his name. It was him, The Boy.
Him, The Boy.
Marluxia smiled.
The Boy instantly felt rage seethe through him. He hated that fake smile plastered on Marluxia's face.
"Roxas, hello"
Roxas had to return the fake smile.
xOx
Ablaze, Everything is set on fire.
The Man feels guilty. The Boy laughs. The Tall Man tries to cry.
Ablaze, everything is set on fire.
xOx
The Boy is in (Fake) hysterics now. The Man remarks how great an actor he is.
A little part of him is angered and annoyed at his (Fake) ploys. Another bigger part is believing his farce of a story.
"Are you sure thats how it went?"
The Boy nods, (Fake) tears rolling innocently out of his tear ducts.
"Yes, Axel, yes. He hurt me. Real bad"
The Man, Axel, rose from his white chair. He thought and thought and thought and thought and thought and thought and thought and thought until he believed.
He shut up the voice that kept telling him The Boy was lying; that he was just using Axel in his great scheme of things.
He listened to the stronger voice, the angrier voice. That voice told him that someone had fucked with his friend, and that someone was going to pay.
"What are you going to do? What are you going to do? What are you going to do?"
A snap. Followed by a showy spell of fire.
Two chakrams appeared on both sides of The Man. The Boy fell silent.
"Lets go"
xOx
They stood there, The Tall Man with the pliers off to his sides, and The Boy, staring out The Tall man intently.
Marluxia was the first to crack.
"So Roxas, can I help you?"
The Boy cringed at Marluxias voice. It sounded sweet. Masculine, yet feminine. Natural.
To The Boy, it sounded Fake.
The Boy turned his attention to the ground, forcing his eyes to drink up each individual detail of each shimmering blade of grass.
"I just wondered if you needed and help, is all"
Another fake smile, another surge of anger.
"Well, Ive already finished watering the plants. Im mostly finished here"
"Then do you mind if I watch?"
The question had not surprised Marluxia. Most of the organization members came into the garden, either to watch the fake wind blow through each individual plant or to watch him work.
Marluxia smiled again.
He failed to see the anger swell up in The Boys crystal blue eyes. Maybe he did see it, but simply refused to acknowledge it.
"Sure, Roxas, sure. Sit over there on that stump. You can watch from there"
The Boy obeyed.
The Tall Man returned to his rose bush, while The Boy sat on the nearby stump and watched.
Marluxia counted the wilted roses. 13.
He clipped one. 12.
He clipped another. 11.
The Boy watched.
Rage was under control.
He hated how fake The Tall Man was. Hated how fake he moved. Hated how fake his voice sounded.
The Boy hated how his (Fake) heart pumped with (Fake) feelings for The Tall Man. (Fake) Feelings of...
Clip. 7.
xOx
The Man barged into the garden. The (Fake) Boy was slowly trailing behind him.
The Man had turned several times during their excursions through the hallway, and thought he had seen The (Fake) Boy smiling.
However, The (Fake) Boys face would always change back into a sad puppy dog frown at the right minute.
Axel still refused to listen to the voice that kept trying to warn him that The (Fake) Boy was lying; that by the end of this day, The Man would be in over his hand.
The Garden was quiet; The Tall Man must be either gardening and not noticing their presence, or out somewhere.
The Man smirked.
He threw both chackrams at one of the rose bushes.
The rose bush instantly caught on fire; an orange-red spectrum of light quickly devouring the once rosy hues of the plant and turning them into an ugly unnatural black.
They watched as the plants, not just roses now, fell to the slaughter of the graceful orange-red light.
The (Fake) Boy smiled. It reminded him of dominos.
The Man could not feel anything. He just watched as the as the smoke raised to the fake crystal blue sky.
Both heard the shriek. The shriek the shriek the shriek the shriek the shriek the shriek the shriek that sounded sweet. Masculine, yet feminine.
To The Man, it sounded natural.
To The Boy, it evoked (Fake) feelings of... (Fake) feelings of... (Fake) feelings of...
They both saw the figure of The Tall Man.
Rubber heels scrunching against green grass.
He shrieked again.
xOx
The Boy watched The Tall Man intently.
He hated how fake the man was.
Yet it was this hatred that had attracted The Boy to Marluxia.
To The Boy, the hatred almost felt like love.
Love. What a Fake-ass word.
The Boy watched.
Clip. Another bud fell.
As the bud fell, the boy opened his mouth.
"Marluxia"
The bud landed on the floor.
The Tall Man stopped. He straightened out his back, and turned around.
"Yes?"
The sweet voice. The goddamned Fake-ass sweet voice.
The Boy hated that voice, yet at the same time...
"Has anyone ever told you that your so beautiful?"
Marluxia did not falter.
The Boys remark was nothing new. Most of the Organization members have been telling him that.
He was used to it.
It was the way that they said it that would surprise him.
When Larxene said it, he swore that he could detect some disdainful jealousy. Zexion had said it in spite. Plain, flat-out spite. Demyx had said it in mock appreciation.
Now he can add a new one to the list. Roxas said it... in lust?
Marluxia smiled, and again did not notice the anger in The Boy, or chose not to.
Thank you for your comment
He turned around and pulled the handles of the pliers.
He was about to clip another wilted rose bud, when he felt a pair of arms grasp him somewhere around his waist.
Someone touched him.
In his sanctuary. In his paradise.
Someone touched him.
He had to ignore this invasion of privacy for something more horrific, though.
In his surprise, he accidentally closed the pliers on the wrong stem.
The wrong stem.
Marluxia watched helplessly as a single red rose fell.
(and fell and fell and fell and fell and fell)
A few petals peeled off the rose, and hung in the air seemingly refusing to go down with its mother.
It landed on the rough soil with a soft plop.
A hatchling pushed out of the nest. A rose cut before its prime.
The Tall Man froze, ignoring the sounds emanating from the Garden, ignoring the groping arms of The Boy.
"I... I think..."
Marluxia wasnt paying attention.
He didnt want to hear.
Didnt want to listen to the cause of his roses premature wilting, premature death.
"I think... I... I think I lov-"
The Tall Man elbowed him.
Gently.
The Boy fell backwards.
He landed on his back in the soft, soft grass.
A look of disappointment, hatred, was on his face.
The boy watched as the tall man bended over and seemed to pick something up.
(Pain is Beauty, Beauty is Pain)
(Beauty is Fake, Pain is Real)
The Tall Man slowly turned around.
Marluxias normally smirking rose pink lips were twisted in a disgusted O.
His hazel eyes were open in anger, in disbelief.
To The Boy, Marluxia had never seemed so (REAL!! FuCk jUSt aDmiT iT! REAL!!) fake.
The edges of his fingers were pinching
(Beauty is fake)
The stem of the rose.
"What do you want!?!"
"I... I lov-"
"You love me? Ha. Dont make me laugh"
He held up the rose to The Boy.
"You killed my rose"
"Stupid rose is fake"
He threw the stem of the rose at The Boy.
It hit his forehead, and landed on his lap; a forlorn flower.
A single thorn
(Pain is Real)
had pierced the skin of his forehead.
The Boy craned his neck to get a good look at the rose.
A drop of blood trickled from the gash on his forehead, and landed on the rose.
The colors of the two different items had blended together nicely. You could not tell the Rose apart from the blood.
Marluxia saw the trickle of blood, and did not care.
The Boy had pushed the new hatchling out of the nest. He helped cut the rose in its prime.
The Tall Man felt no remorse for The Boy, and would have probably thrown more roses at him, but he was courteous.
Courtesy always stopped him from getting out of hand.
He held out a hand to The Boy.
They locked eyes, and Marluxia finally saw the hatred in the boys eyes. Or maybe he had always seen it, and finally acknowledged it.
The Boy instantly knocked The Tall Man's hand out of his way.
He scrambled to his feet; the rose falling from his lap and landing on the soft, soft grass with a plop.
He ran away; Marluxia watched him disappear into the grooves of other plants.
The Tall Man looked at the forlorn flower.
The blood
(Beauty is fake, pain is real)
dripped like morning dew off the edges of the petal, and trickled over a blade of grass.
Blood red, green life.
Marluxia sighed.
He turned around, and continued cutting the rose bush.
xOx
Gone, gone, everything is gone now.
The Man Fakes feeling guilty. The Boy Fakes his laughter. The Tall Man Fakes his tears.
Gone, gone everything is gone now.
xOx
(theycannotfeel, theycannotfeel, theyhavenohearts, theycannotfeel)
The paradise is gone.
xOx
His paradise is gone.
The flowers, the plants, the trees.
All gone.
Everything is darkened by the soot of the fire.
The walls, the only thing the fire had refused to touch, had shown a disgusting brilliance of intense white.
The fake blue sky overhead had reverted back into a plain white ceiling; the fake breeze had stopped blowing.
The once beautiful Garden was now a desolate wasteland of black and white.
The only three things alive in the room were The Man, The Boy, and The Tall Man.
xOx
The Man saw the destruction he had wrought.
He thought he felt guilty.
Axel saw The Tall Man kneeling.
Was he trying to cry?
Was he trying to feel?
He wanted to leave as soon as possible.
He turned around.
The Boy stood there, laughing; the gash on his forehead laughing with him.
Just when he thought he could not tolerate any more (Fake) laughter, the tiny voice in his head swelled up ten fold.
It laughed along with them.
He turned to the glossy white door, with a black roman numeral XI nailed neatly in the middle.
He wanted to leave, he wanted to leave, he wanted to leave, he wanted to...
xOx
The Tall Man was kneeling on a lone patch of grass.
Marluxia was staring at the destruction The Man had wrought.
He saw the charred remains of his Garden, but did not have any remorse for it.
Did not feel any remorse for something he thought he loved.
Still, he tried.
He tried to feel something.
He forced himself to cry.
Crocodile tears streamed from his tear ducts.
He heard (Fake) footsteps, rubber soles crunching charred grass.
Marluxia did not let the (Fake) footsteps, nor the (Fake) laughter of malevolence stop his crocodile tears.
He knew the tears were (REAL!! FuCk jUSt aDmiT iT! REAL!!) fake, but in the void that was once his heart, they felt (FAKE) real.
The footsteps stopped. The laughter continued. The tears rolled on.
Marluxia finally realized were the tears were falling.
The tears were trickling off the edges of a red petal.
The petals of a clipped
(Beauty is Pain, Pain is Beauty)
red rose.
A gloved hand had reached out to the stem of the rose.
Marluxia watched as the stem of the rose was pinched carefully between Roxas's thumb and index finger.
The tears dripping off the edges of the red petals had washed
(Beauty is Fake, Pain is Real)
away any of Roxas's remaining blood.
Marluxia looked into Roxas's crystal blue eyes and saw (Fake) hatred.
Roxas brought his (Fake) face closer to Marluxia's.
They locked lips, Roxas tasting Fakeness, Marluxia tasting lust.
They broke apart, Roxas smiling, Marluxia still shedding a few bitter tears.
"You are so Fake" The Man said. The Boy said. The Tall Man said.
"Hypocrite"