Yeah yeah I don't own KH :( oh well wahooo at least I can write about it...
I just felt like writing today, so, yay. Enjoy...and I do the random question thing too (you'll get what I mean when you get there).
..Sunny
Rain dripped down the edge of the roof of the watch tower and splattered on Riku's face. He let it trail its way slowly through his silky hair and down his cheek before it landed with a simple plop! on the wooden floorboards of the tower. He watched the other three carefully. They had only been in the tower about five minutes, but the silence seemed to weigh a bit heavily. Riku forced himself to look at his best friend, who was kitty-corner from him.
The brown, spiky haired boy was watching the auburn haired girl across from him. Riku watched as Sora pretended not to be looking, and instead, to be glancing out past Kairi to the wet island. But Riku knew, oh, he knew what Sora was really staring at. He shook his head so slightly, that it was almost non existent. He closed his eyes and tilted his head backwards again, up to the roof. The raindrops fell on his eyes. It was nice.
He was all too aware of the tight competition between the two of them for Kairi. She never seemed to notice. All the races and the "just for fun" battles. He tilted his head slightly, his eyes parting slightly. The rain drops that had been resting on his eye lids slid down his cheeks, resembling a sort of crying look. He felt their cold tracks, but didn't do anything about them.
She was shivering, he could tell. He wanted to hold her, make her warm again. He bit the inside of his lip a little too harshly. But Sora had…given her his jacket. Her hair stuck to her cheeks…he wanted to reach out, to brush it away, so he could see her better. He wondered if she had been scared, about him…when he fell…
His gaze drifted back to Sora. He couldn't tell…what his thoughts were of Sora, exactly. Sora was his greatest ally, his closest friend. It had always been that way. But they had always been…well…competitive. But it never really seemed a problem. It really was never a problem.
'Til now…Riku thought bitterly, but quickly cast away the thought. He had spent so much time, had even given himself to the darkness to save her…but what had come of it? Nothing at all…he had even made it worse. He grimaced slightly and close his eyes for a few moments. The guilt and shame and regret that washed through him brought him down, that he could not save her. He could tell, though, that even though Kairi had hugged him…had kissed him even (the corners of his lips ever-so-slightly tilted up), that she would always pick Sora over him. Riku looked away, wondering if the jealousy would turn into something more…hatred, perhaps? He shook his head the way he had before, ever so slightly. He wouldn't let it get to that. He found himself looking at Lireal, across from him.
He smiled slightly to himself. Her bright, scarlet hair collided brilliantly with the aquamarine eyes that were watching him. When Lireal realized that Riku was looking back at him, she winked and then glanced outside of the tower, where it was raining. Her hand was fishing around for something in her pocket. Riku let out a small sigh. It floated out into the air in a pale cloud. He wondered why he had.
All eyes in the tower turned to Axel…Lae's sister as she pulled out a small, shiny object from her pocket. They watched her as she flipped the top of it, back and forth, back and forth. Until suddenly, the top a lit and fire sparked from the top. Instinctively, the other three moved closer in.
"What's that?" Sora asked. He was the closest, and most of his body was leaning on the girl's. In turn, Lireal was leaning on the keyblade master, so their combined forces allowed them to sit up straighter. Kairi noticed this and glanced towards Riku to see his reaction, but he seemed to be completely uninterested in her.
"A lighter," Lireal said simply.
"A what?" Riku questioned, reaching out. He let his hand hover above the lighter. Kairi made a noise as if to stop him from burning himself, but Riku simply grinned and moved his hand closer to the fire.
"Be careful," Lireal warned in her same, sarcastic tone. "You will in fact burn yourself." Riku raised his eyebrows.
"So this is a lighter…and this is real fire?"
"Got it memorized?"
Predictably, something inside of Sora snapped. The voice in his head that was always there. Sora didn't mind, so much. It was like having a friend that you could talk to, but already knew what was going on, so there was never that awkward silence. "What'd you say?" Sora asked. Kairi glanced at him. She knew too.
Lireal glanced at the two of them, and then her eyes rested on Riku for a moment, but only a moment longer. She snapped the lighter shut and stuffed it back in her pocket. She tossed her hair over her shoulder and leaned back against the tower wall, causing Sora to fall on his face.
"Sora!" Kairi exclaimed, but it was in vain, for Sora was already sitting up and rubbing his nose. He looked at Kairi for a moment. And then, he turned away to look at Lireal.
The other girl winced. "Sorry 'bout that."
Sora, good natured as always, grinned and nodded his head. "I'm fine," he said, leaning back against the wall. Although, for minutes afterwards, he continue to gently rub his nose. Kairi and Riku leaned back as well, the warm phenomenon gone. They sat there in silence once again, Sora tapping his fingers along his hands. Kairi was, in turn, looking at him. Sora, unfortunately for him, didn't see this.
"So!" he said, his usual cheerfulness returning. "What should we do?"
Riku shook his head, hiding a smile. "What can we do? We're stuck in this tower."
"Well…" Sora faltered and scratched his head, water droplets flying. Lireal was hit by the flying water first, and she brushed them off carelessly. Kairi was hit next. And as she was already soaking wet, she simply laughed. Riku was barely hit at all, and he just grinned. When Sora noticed his mistake, he smiled and offered a sheepish "sorry".
"What about if we walk out in the rain?" Kairi suggested. The theme of being out drenched in the rain had appealed to Selphie and she immensely over last school year, when they amused themselves by reading romance novels. This idea seemed to stick, but only for a moment.
"I can't be out in the rain," Lireal said, but she didn't sound angry or annoyed, like it would seem. The others glanced at her.
Riku gestured with one of his hands. "You can't, or you don't like it?"
Lireal shot Riku a swift glare. "Technically I don't like it," Lireal replied.
"Ah," Riku said nodding his head, the silver strands of hair moving back and forth about his face.
They sat in silence as they tried to brainstorm more ideas. After almost ten minutes of the rain continuing to come down, they realized that there was only one thing to do. As Riku opened his mouth to speak, a torrent of rain thundered down on the small island, making the noise even louder and the drops falling even larger.
"Kairi!" Sora shouted over the rain. The brunette turned to look at him. She nodded for him to go on. "Did it rain this much while we were gone?"
She shook her head wildly. Her face and hair were dry, but her clothes were still damp. At least the hoodie was still warm. "I don't know why it's raining like this! It hasn't done this before!"
There was silence for a few moments while each of the four pondered something to say. Lireal was first. "Riku!"
"Yeah!"
"What's your favorite color!"
"What?"
"Your favorite color! What is it!"
"Uh…I don't know! Green maybe! Why do you ask!"
"Random question!"
"But why!"
"Somethin' to do!"
Questions like these proceeded around the tower. An hour passed. The converstion lulled here and there but would pick up and again when someone thought of a new wacky question or something to say. Another hour passed. The rain still drove down hard.
"This is impossible!" Sora shouted. "There wasn't this much water in Atlantis!"
"Where!" Lireal shouted back at him.
"Atlantis! Mermaids!"
She smiled. "Cool! Although, I don't think I could ever go underwater!"
"Why not!" Riku asked. "Do you even know how to swim!"
"'Course I know how to swim! What kind of idiot lives on an island and doesn't learn how to swim! I just don't like it!" Lireal shouted back.
"You scared or something!" Riku responded, his voice rising as the rain came, miraculously, even harder down.
Lireal shook her head. "My family has just always had an issue with being cold! And wet!"
"Is that why you carry that lighter around!" Kairi shouted.
"Yeah!"
The grey skies above simply got even darker when twilight and soon after, night began to fall. They had passed the hours when Lireal had, mysteriously, pulled out a deck of cards from her black jacket. By now, the three best friends were regarding the jacket her brother (or his Nobody) had given her as some sort of relic. This, along with singing odd songs and laughing at each other's awful musical talent, gave them a sort of bonding with their new…friend.
"Do you think Wakka and the gang are still on the island!" Sora shouted.
"I don't think they were on it to begin with!" Kairi shouted back. Riku nodded an affirmative.
"Who!" Lireal shouted.
"Some friends of ours! You'll meet em soon enough!" Riku filled in.
"Are you guys hungry!" Sora shouted.
"Do you always think about food!" Riku answered.
Sora pouted. "I do not! You think about it as much as I do!" Riku shrugged in consent.
The three watched as Lireal shifted slightly, her hands reaching in towards her to pull something out of hidden pockets. She produced candy bars. "Sorry!" she shouted as she unwrapped hers. "It's all I had!"
Sora grinned, taking a large bite of his, chocolate smearing around his mouth. "Don't worry! This is great!"
(By now, you must've realized, their voices were getting quite sore.)
Kairi laughed and licked her thumb. She reached out and rubbed the chocolate away. He watched her carefully, and when she pulled back, a rosy tint colored her cheeks and she smiled a small smile at him. Sora, still a bit mesmerized, could only watch her as she began to delicately open up the wrapping paper. Riku and Lireal saw nothing of this, as Riku had challenged Lireal to a game of rock, paper, scissors in exchange for trading candy bars.
Lireal won.
Riku sighed in defeat, shook the redhead's hand, and leaned back to eat his candy. "So Lireal!" Riku shouted, starting up a new conversation.
"Yeah!"
"What's with your jacket!"
Kairi elbowed Riku harshly in the ribs. Letting out a very audible "ow!", Riku turned to look at her. She pouted and he quickly got the message, looking away for fear that Kairi's expression would turn into a glare.
"It's okay!" Lireal shouted, saving Riku from almost certain lecturing. "Just another magical gift of Organization XIII and their cloaks!" This brought slightly halted laughter as they were once again reminded of their troubled pasts.
As it got darker, Lireal pulled the lighter from her pocket again. Sora thought of his fire magic. He knew he shouldn't used it, and became quiet as he refrained from mentioning it. Out of exhaustion and boredom, the four began yawning and stretching out their arms. This proved of some difficulty, as for when any one of them would stretch, their arms would unavoidably whack into another's head.
Sora was the first one to have his eyelids droop unexpectedly and for his head to nod up and down slightly before he would reawaken himself. This led the others to realize that all of them would soon be dropping off as well. Rather than wait for them all to pile up on each other when they fell asleep, the four tried to make some sort of arrangements of how they would go to sleep. Horizontal or vertical? Lireal next to Kairi or Lireal next to Riku? Sleep closer to make more room?
It was decided in the end to go something like this: Sora and Riku would sleep on the outside, where the open spaces were. Hopefully, they wouldn't move and roll out, but if they did, they figured they'd be less hurt than the girls (Lireal protested to this, but Riku could not be moved from his choice). Lirael would sleep next to Riku (this led to less moving about) and Kairi would, of course, end up sleeping next to Sora. This would leave them four across. They had thought of going vertical, so their heads were faced towards one opening and their feet towards the other, but this had proved too squashed.
There was some rustling about and bad coordinating as the four tried to get into their positions so this wouldn't cause trouble later on. The tower was smaller than they had estimated (there did seem to be a lot more room when they were sitting) and this caused a few things to happen. One, the four were all pushed closer together. Two, since Riku and Sora were now bordering on the very edge of the tower, they had to face inwards.
Now, they couldn't very well talk amongst themselves, so it pretty much led to Lireal and Riku along with Sora and Kairi. Because, Kairi felt the duty to explain, if she and Lireal were to talk, then that would leave the boys bored and awake for some hours to come. Lireal and Riku's conversation was very quiet, but they didn't talk about anything in particular.
As it would turn out, it was only about fifteen minutes before the younger two fell asleep, so their conversation was short.
"Sora," Kairi said softly. Since they were close now, they no longer had to shout, just to be listening carefully. And, guaranteed, the two were listening very closely to each other.
"Yes Kairi?" Sora answered, he shifted his feet nervously, and his shoes clunked against the wall. He winced, and Kairi tried to hold in giggles. He grinned. He liked it when she had that smile, trying to suppress laughter. It rarely worked. But for some reason, she was able to calm herself down.
"Are you…" she started, then looked down towards her own shoes. Her hands were resting, tucked underneath her cheek. Sora had one arm under his head, serving as an awful makeshift pillow, and his other arm was resting on his side.
"What is it, Kairi? You can talk to me about anything, you know," Sora offered quietly. She nodded but stayed quiet. He watched her. He smiled to himself. Yes, he definitely like watching her. Her blue eyes glanced back up at him. He grinned. As it normally was, she couldn't resist grinning back.
"Are you okay? From when you fell?"
Sora hid his surprise and strangely felt joy by making a shrugging gesture, not wanting to move about too much in case he fell. "Yeah, yeah, I'm fine."
"You sure?"
He looked at her again. She looked…worried. He gave her a reassuring smile. "I'm fine, Kairi. Just got salt water up my nose, that's all." She giggled softly. They were quiet for a few minutes, and they moved a little closer, happy to be feeling each other's warmth.
"Sweet dreams, Kairi."
"Hehe, you too Sora. Good night."
"'Night."