Back at your door Chapter 2

The mix of voices hit her hard as she appeared outside the door. It seemed that her absence was quite the cause of concern, for another wasn’t there yet either. Leave it to the minds of the Rose of the Castle, the Shadow-master, a little sparkplug, and the leader of them all to jump to conclusions. Of course, 5 people were there, but one rarely said much of anything, at least not around a large group of people. He spoke quite freely other times.

“Yeah, leave it to that little whore…”

“Now, now. Larxene, we don’t know if that is, in fact, where she and he are.”

“You seem so sure, Zexion. Is it just because it’s not registering in your little book there? That why you wouldn’t think that your supposed best friend, my lover, wouldn’t be out with that girl?”

Daryx sighed. Larxene always thought the worst of her. So what if she was younger than she was? So what if she was fairly attractive and able to capture the attention of guys, even if she didn’t want it? It sort of hurt her, though she didn’t really have a heart to hurt, that Lexaeus would say nothing to this. She waited a moment longer, ear pressed against the door, listening intently.

Marluxia could just barely sense that she was there and stood quietly, walking towards the other side of the door. He raised a pale, delicate hand and tapped right about where her ear was. She squeaked and fell back. With her gift of sound-element, things like that really hurt her sensitive hearing. He opened the door and offered a hand. As she took it, he pulled her up, dropped her hand, and went back to his chair.

Daryx gave a shy glance to them all. Each gave her their form of recognition. Larxene glared, and Zexion waved. Lexaeus gave her a warm glance, looking to the vacant chair next to him. Marluxia smiled faintly, and Xemnas shared Larxene’s reaction. She took the seat seemingly saved for her and instantly became fascinated with the edge of the table, not daring to meet anyone’s glances.

“Well now, I guess I can’t scold you too much, XIII, for you aren’t the last one here. But please, try to be more punctual.”

Hesitantly, she glanced to Xemnas as he spoke. She really did look quite innocent and naïve then. Lexaeus, in his secretive way, reached over under the table and rested a hand on her leg. She jerked, shocked by this, and looked to him. A grateful, loving glance went to him as her hand slid down her leg to rest over his.

Vexen popped in a moment later. He hid no affection for Larxene, kissing her deeply in front of everyone else. Daryx had to look away, still a bit touchy on the whole subject of her past relationships. Marluxia also made it a note to shy away. This only confirmed what Daryx had thought, as well as most of the others present. The Rose had a crush, for lack of better thought, on Larxene.

Xemnas cleared his throat, making it a point to glare at Vexen as he sat.

“I would like to remind you all that these meetings aren’t a chance to flaunt your personal lives, for I doubt anyone save for the people involved care much about them. And this meeting is only for trying to figure out what we’re going to do with whom as a matter of work and tasks.”

Larxene scoffed, frankly not caring much about this. She was only here out of necessity. Daryx found herself blushing faintly, though she wasn’t the one showing off much of anything.

Zexion sensed the growing uneasiness around them and sighed.

“Can we just get this meeting over with?”