Ode to a Beach Ball

"Alright, let's party!"

Roxas joined in the whooping and cheering, tugged the string of his party popper and shouted alongside the bang. Several bodies tackled his, Sora and Ventus and Riku all hanging off him and singing something—he had no idea what.

"Welcome to the Islands,
Yes you're welcome here my friend
To our Destiny Islands
From day's start to day's end!
Welcome to the Islands
You're welcome here to stay
At your new home in the Islands
We'd have it no other way!
For there's no place like the Islands
None as boring or as bright
Find your destiny in the Islands
And we're sure it'll be right!
Wel—"

"Shut up!" Roxas shouted finally, ignoring the hollers as his three friends hung off him like a pack of monkeys and tried to drag him to the ground. It was ridiculous—even more so because Riku was joining in on their antics while everyone else yipped and laughed. "What is that song? It's not your anthem is it? Please tell me it isn't."

"Nope!" Sora stuck his nose in the air. "I made it up!"

"Sora it's awful! Don't look so proud of yourself!"

But Sora only swiped a finger under his nose, unapologetic in his delight at his own (nonexistent) lyrical prowess. He was so delighted (and so unapologetic) that he took Roxas by the hand and dragged him off to dance down the beach, making him listen to three more verses. Roxas scowled and complained—and tried not to laugh—as Sora skipped him around Riku and Ventus where they'd flopped down.

Of course they whistled when Sora dipped him—and dropped him. "Ow, Sora!"

"Sorry!"

Roxas groaned, but it took everything he had to bite back his smile. He failed, forced to accept the truth that he was glad to be with everyone. Glad to be here. Still, he'd be happier still to unleash Sora's exuberance on someone else, and so turned to Ventus and winked before shouting,

"Hey Sora! Riku wants a dance!"

"Roxas you motherf—"

His words were lost to the wind, Sora spinning past and snatching both his hands to swing him around and around again. "What'd Mickey say to that sort of language, huh?" He asked, silencing Riku's complaints immediately and effectively. The rest of their friends laughed, everyone gathered to celebrate Riku's embarrassment—well that, and the actual occasion

The occasion that was Roxas and Axel moving into their new summer home in Destiny Islands.

Axel.

The thought drew his eyes up the beach to where he lay, sprawled on the towels beneath a bright beach umbrella. He looked perfectly content in his red shorts and flip-flops, massive sunglasses slipping down his nose. He pushed them back up with one hand, a bottle of lemonade in the other—a lifeline in the heat. Disregarding his association with fire completely, Axel seemed happy to spend the day lounging in the shade. But we can't have that now, can we?

Roxas clambered up the sand, wet grains clinging and clutching at his bare feet. A light breeze caught in his unbuttoned shirt, sending bright summery motifs fluttering, cool wind like soothing kisses against his skin.

He staggered to a stop at the top of the rise, glanced back. At the bottom of sandy hill Riku and Sora had started wrestling, Kairi and Ventus cackling at their display. The others shouted out bets, cheered when the wrestlers stumbled into the waves. Further in the distance he could see Terra and Namine trailing behind Tidus—their local guide to the fancy seaside bar Roxas could see amidst the palm trees.

Almost, he thought he heard Xion shouting something about a beach ball—the one Roxas and Axel had brought from Twilight Town most likely. No one replied though, apparently too distracted to think about ball games.

"Gonna join me for a nap?"

Roxas snorted, turned back to his boyfriend. Axel's lazy smile had an answering one quirking at the corner of his lips. "No. I was kinda thinking about dragging you down the beach so we could celebrate our moving in party together, actually."

"Pass. Too hot."

"Says the Flurry of Dancing Flames?" Roxas raised an eyebrow.

Axel rolled onto his side, elbow propped on the inflatable floatie he'd been using as a pillow. Ridiculous. Again the sunglasses slipt down his nose, propped back up by a sharp jab with his finger.

"Roxas, I grew up in Radiant Garden. It's like, mild year round there? Even when it was Hollow Bastion that was the one thing to stay the same, the weather. But this here," he waved his bottle around, made a ridiculous hissing noise when he poured soft drink on himself, "Destiny Islands is just—you know—it's hot!"

"Really? I didn't notice."

Axel groaned, slumped his head on his floatie. "Roxas," he whined.

"You didn't seem to mind the heat when we were looking at homes here two months ago, and it was hotter then. Like 'Roxas and Axel could recreate the battle in the basement of the Old Mansion' hotter."

A snort. "Right. What a memory."

Roxas flopped down beside him, looked down at his boyfriend's face. He was sweaty, but no more so than anyone else. Fingers reached out to brush aside a few strands of red hair, then poked his nose. "C'mon, what's up?"

Nothing, for a moment. Then Axel huffed, reached out to drag Roxas down onto his sticky, sweaty chest. "Oi!" But Roxas didn't resist, settled against him while the sounds of their friends kicking sand and splashing around drifted up into the blazing blue sky.

"Gonna answer me now, or am I stuck smelling your sweat and all the lemonade you've managed to dribble on yourself?"

"So rude," Axel laughed. "You sure you don't want a nap? You seem kinda grouchy."

"I just want to know if you're alright."

That got him. Axel's mouth clamped shut, jaw tense. Roxas contented himself with waiting. He knew his bait would get a bite after all.

"Alright," Axel said. "It's dumb though. So, first things first, I am happy. Like really happy, got it memorized? I'm a bit tired, what with the whole moving in requiring a bizarre amount of box hefting and all that. And I am hot, but it's a nice hot. Isa's going to melt though—what's he doing by the way? Is he coping?"

"I think he was standing knee deep in the water last I saw," Roxas said, snickered, "reminded me of one of those big hairy dogs playing in the waves we saw last time we were here."

"Yeah, sounds like Isa, though I'd guess he wasn't playing."

"Nope, just moping."

"Too hot then. We'll have to take time to visit him instead, when he goes home."

A hum of agreement, then silence. Axel sighed.

"Right, right. So did you get the 'I'm happy' part memorized?"

"Yes."

"Alright good," Axel hugged him closer, fingers cool from his drink splayed out against Roxas's back, skirting beneath his shirt. It made Roxas's skin prickle when the wind blew by—just a breeze, just enough to make him shiver.

"Axel?"

"Sorry, putting my thoughts in order. Anyway," Axel went back to gesturing with his drink, no spills this time, "I'm just...homesick."

"Homesick? You know the way things are now we can go visit Twilight Town almost anytime we want, right?"

"I know, but living somewhere and visiting somewhere aren't the same—and yes I know we're only here for the summer but it's like...I know when we go back, it'll be different. It just rattles me a bit, I guess."

Roxas was about to say something, then stopped. He tried to put himself in Axel's shoes, think of similar situations they'd been through recently. "Is it kind of like when we visited Radiant Garden while it still looked like Hollow Bastion?"

Axel sighed. "A bit. But maybe it's just that Twilight Town was kind of our place, y'know? You, me, Xion—even Isa and Namine I suppose. Your little gang hangs out there too. All these people we know. Sora and the others are our friends but it's just strange maybe, moving away from where the two of us met. Moving away from where we've been for so long..."

They let the words trail off, conversation drowned by a sudden shriek down by the water, followed by vicious splashing. Neither of them got up to take a look—it wasn't a bad sort of sound after all. Even if it were they were too comfortable, Axel's fingers still dancing across his back, Roxas's splayed on Axel's chest.

"I think," Roxas began, "you're scared of losing something."

Axel's hand stopped. "You think?"

"That, or you're scared of leaving something behind." Roxas sat up, ignored Axel's complaints as he hefted him so his head laid in his lap. "Shut up a second." Axel did. "Do you wanna hear what I've got to say?"

"Yeah," Axel relented, placated when Roxas began running his fingers through his hair.

"Good. Anyway, I think I get what you're feeling. Back when everything went wrong...when it was the three of us in the Organization, and it was falling apart, I remember I went back to the places that meant most to me. I wanted to hold on to it, I guess, the feeling of us together, the memories we made there. I didn't want to stick around in The World That Never Was, but I did want to be in Twilight Town—even if I had to be alone."

Axel hummed. Roxas let his fingers sink deep into his hair, like his toes in the sand, and scratched. It took all his willpower not to laugh at the face Axel made. Cute.

"So I guess I get it?" He continued. "You don't want to lose the place that was special to you. You don't want it to change when you're not looking. But it's like...life's already been bouncing us around like a—a..."

"Like a beach ball?" Axel offered.

"Yeah, like that. Very appropriate," Roxas gave him an extra good scratch, and Axel pulled a face—not displeased, just playing off the vulnerability of the moment. Roxas let him, but not before reaching down to plant a kiss on his forehead. "Life's already bouncing us around like a beach ball, and we kind of just have to learn to deal with it, but it's hard?" He frowned. "Am I sort of getting it? What's going on inside your head?"

"Yeah," Axel breathed, and Roxas could see his eyes close behind his sunglasses. "It's just...weird."

"That's fine. You're weird."

"Hey!"

"You know I'm right, but hey, half your friends are like, running around in replica bodies, and that's weird, and the ones that aren't are weird anyway. You're in good company."

"Well thanks," Axel laughed, poking him in the side. "Guess I'm lucky."

"Yeah, and you know that's what matters, right? It...it is hard, knowing that things might change. Even I get scared—of course I do, considering everything that's happened. But we're all bound to each other's hearts, just like Sora says. More than that it's the company you keep, y'know? The memories you make—and we just gotta make 'em, together. And no matter if we're here or back in Twilight Town or somewhere else entirely, I'm gonna be with you. I'm not leaving you behind. I'm not forgetting you, or where we've been, or who we are."

Axel didn't have an answer to that apparently, because he just reached up and pulled him down for a kiss. No fire and flame, just lazy summer afternoons in the press of lips and tongue, thumb brushing over his cheekbone.

"Just gotta make some memories huh?" He murmured when he pulled away.

"Yeah," Roxas breathed. "Kinda like that."

Axel's laughter was apparently enough to draw the others back up the beach. Their private moment was over, but it was a good time to pause for lunch.

They all gathered under their line of obnoxious beach umbrellas, passing Destiny Islands' local snacks back and forth alongside Twilight Town's pretzels and watermelon, icy poles and ice creams prodded and poked into each other's mouths. There were little conversations now and then—Sora missing Donald and Goofy, commentary on the weather and such—but with food in hand, silence reigned.

Roxas and Axel remained quiet throughout, even when the noise started up again. When Aqua let half her ice cream melt over Ventus and he yelped, when Namine tripped and got coconut all over Vanitas and Isa both, when Riku and Sora started rolling around again—this time a little less violently, a little more intimately—and Kairi squirted them with her water bottle. Soon they were all shouting and Roxas could only laugh. The chaos grew until Xion shouted over it all.

"C'mon guys!" she exclaimed, loud enough to drown out Selphie and Wakka's wolf whistling—intended for Riku and Sora. "Let's do something together!"

"Didn't you want to collect some sea shells?" Aqua asked. "I'd like to do that too. We could go together?"

"Sure, but later, when the sun's setting. I was thinking maybe we could all play a game now, maybe get these two lazy bums to join in," she said, and Roxas yelped when her foot connected with his back, "since it's their moving in party and all."

"Oh, let's play a ball game!" Sora shouted, leaping to his feet.

"Yes!" Xion agreed. "I'm glad someone gets me." She was apparently so overjoyed in fact, that when Sora ran over to her and held out his hands, she accepted them. Soon they were jumping up and down like a couples of kids. it should've been silly, but Roxas was just glad to see them both so happy. So glad it kind of made him want to get up and join in, excitement making him jostle Axel in his lap.

"So I guess we're getting the beach ball out huh?" Axel asked.

"Yeah I guess," Roxas grinned. "You have to play too, okay?"

"You sure you want someone as tall as me playing beach ball against someone as short as you?"

"You think they're gonna split us up?"

"Oh definitely. We'd be too dangerous together."

"Well in that case," Roxas nabbed Axel's sunglasses and stuck them on, "I'll be fine. We all know I'm the more dangerous one."

Axel choked on his laughter, though Roxas seriously doubted it was because he questioned his skill. He rose, let Axel slide off and roll across the towels to laugh some more while he went and looked for their beach ball.

He looked in their backpacks. Empty. The picnic baskets. Empty. Inn a last desperate attempt he checked the cooler. Empty. Under the towels, the floatie—nope. Nothing.

"Uh guys," he said, "I can't find the beach ball."

"Wait, seriously?" Riku asked, coming over.

"Yeah. I swore we put it in except...oh damn!" The memory hit Roxas like a ball in the face—a touch ironic given the circumstances. "We took it out when we ran out of room for the snacks. We were supposed to deflate it and stick it back in but we...didn't."

From his place on the towels, Axel cackled. He sounded mad.

"We left it behind!" He exclaimed. "Roxas we left the beach ball behind!"

And as the rest of their friends descended into beach ball-less chaos, debating who would go back to pick one up from the mainland, or if one of the closer islands might have one, the realization hit Roxas and he laughed.

"We left it behind!" He cried.

"We left it behind!" And Axel was behind him, dragging him out from beneath the umbrellas and swinging him round. "Poor beach ball!"

Roxas didn't have the words, was too busy hacking up a lung with his laughter. His cheeks were flushed, a bit embarrassed as Axel picked him up properly and twirled, but the whole situation was too ridiculous for him to care that much. We've already left something behind. After everything we said we're already forgetting.

"Roxas," Axel said, setting him down "I've gotta make memories right? That's what you said?"

"Yeah?" It was as much a question as a statement.

"Well I'm starting now," and then Axel turned back to their friends, all rushing down the hill after them, kicking up sand, confused. "Folks, it's official. We left our beach ball behind."

Variations on we know and yeah we figured that one out were said, but Axel pressed on.

"We can't forget it's sacrifice, lost to the struggles of moving out. So," he grinned, "without further ado, here it is. The one and only, made up on the spot. Axel's Ode to a Beach Ball."

"Really?" Roxas exclaimed.

"Yes really!" Axel whooped, and he sang:

"Twilight Town beach ball left there alone,
Valiant sacrifice biding its time;
We're so very sorry that we can't atone
For leaving you behind's a very bad crime!
You were our beauty—at least I think,
What did you look actually y'know?
Were you round or—well actually you certainly were
What other shape is a ball y'think?
It's not like a square can roll around so...
Well this whole song's becoming rather a blur."

"Axel stop! This is worse than Sora's Destiny Islands song!" Roxas scowled, even as the others danced around the beach, laughing and humming the tune.

"C'mon Roxas, it's not that bad. Besides, you need three whole stanzas to make an ode and we've only done one so far!"

"No, no more!"

"Yes, yes more!" And Axel lurched back into song.

"Twilight Town beach ball shiny and new,
We bought you down at some Tram Common's shop;
I do hope that one day we might play with you
We'll pick you up when we make our next stop!
You were a bargain—three ice creams plus you
Oh yeah you were orange, and shiny and blue!
I, oh wow, what was I trying to rhyme?
No matter dear beach ball, it's all still for you!
So shiny and orange and Roxas eyes blue!
Alright I think I got it this time!"

"No you don't!" Roxas exclaimed.

"Yes he does!" The group called back.

"Got that memorized?" Axel laughed, and Roxas rolled his eyes. "C'mon just one more!" But even as he said it Axel slowed down, his spinning and dancing strangely sober.

"Twilight Town beach ball that we forgot,
I admit that it scares me a little sometimes,
To think of the things that'll never be thought
The memories I've lost for all my lifetimes...
What am I leaving, what have I lost?
What am I gaining, and what have I got?
Feels like the world is just passing me by
And if I stand still then what is the cost?
Well I'm sure it's that maybe I'll be forgot,
And I want a future—with him by my side—so sorry sweet beach ball but this is goodbye!"

It was completely and utterly ridiculous, but by the end of it the others were still dancing, echoing the words round and around.

Yet everything about it made Roxas hurt; the parts that were funny, and the parts that weren't. All the little fears wrapped up in a beach ball, all the things you lost when you took a step forward. I don't want to forget. I don't want to be forgotten.

It was all too much. He succumbed to hysterics and let Axel spin and twirl him around, lift him up in his arms and bring him down for a kiss.

"There you go," Axel murmured against his lips, "made a memory."

"Is it a good one?" Roxas laughed, arms clasping round his shoulders, legs clinging to his waist.

"Yeah," Axel breathed, and his green eyes shone in the sunlight. "A little sad maybe, but still really good."

And though their friends were still singing, still asking when and who was going to go get a beach ball, Axel and Roxas slipt into their own little world, kissing each other in the sand and surf.

A new memory, a good memory.

Or it was, right up until Kairi squirted them with her water bottle. But Roxas just laughed some more, caught Axel as they tripped into the sea and, together, scrambled out, onto the sand of their new home.

We'll pick you up later beach ball, Roxas thought, you're not forgotten yet.

But for today he was just going to celebrate moving in—and moving on, partying beneath the summer sun with Axel by his side.