Note: Well, this is it, guys! Thanks for all of your feedback throughout the story, it made this a really wonderful experience. I hope you had as much fun reading it as I had writing it.
She doesn't have an account here, but I want to just take a moment to give a shout out and a thanks to my beta, who fixed all of my timeline weirdness and grammar oopsies.
Hmm… For the first time in years, I have no idea what I'm going to write next. But hopefully, I'll be seeing you guys again soon. Happy reading.

Epilogue: New Perspectives, New Beginnings

Axel's students love it when Roxas drops in. He doesn't blame them. For one thing, it's a sure distraction from lecturing, for everyone involved. Second, it's good practice for the kids, who seem to have taken a strange sort of interest in actually learning sign. Axel admits it's more interesting than analyzing poetry. What's weird for him—really weird—is seeing all the same kids he knew back in high school. It makes him feel old. Hell, Roxas would tell him that he is old.

He sees all the cocky rich kids, the Isas who are going to turn into Saixes, who would step on people and ruin people and never receive an ounce of comeuppance. He sees the outcasts and loners and little oddballs he used to pick on when he was their age. And he sees himself. That's probably the part of the job that he likes the least: it's seeing all the kids who are just so completely lost and latch onto anyone who will give them a sense of power, a sense of belonging, some sort of identity. He thinks some of them will just grow out of it. They're mostly sophomores—fifteen, sixteen. Plenty of time to grow up. But he also thinks some of them never will.

Of course, when he isn't waxing philosophical, Axel's train of thought is usually focused toward grading tests and papers. It's mindless work, but he doesn't mind it too much. He's still used to it from his short stint teaching his first year of grad school.

Roxas tends to sit in and be generally snarky before he has to get his own job. It's a decent set-up; he hangs back for an hour or so, they grab lunch together, Roxas leaves shortly into Axel's last class, which is also the last class of the day.

Today is Friday. Class lets out for lunch in twenty minutes, and Roxas quietly files in and takes a seat on an empty desk, pushed into a corner. The kids are finishing up some group projects, and at this point most of them are so used to the blonde's presence that only a few of them even look up.

Roxas says, "It's chaos in here." Axel grins.

"Gets me off the hook, though."

Roxas smiles at that and lifts the plastic bag in his hand, showing Axel the logo printed on the cover. An unnecessary way of saying, I got the food you asked for. Axel shoots him a quick nod before snapping his fingers once then letting out a loud, "Hey! Time's up."

Roxas watches the rustling of the students, running every which way to arrange their desks back from their circles, some talking, some laughing, some looking deep in thought or just plain stoned. Ten minutes later they file out, some waving to him, others ignoring him. One particularly ambitious girl asks him how he's doing.

Then he and Axel are alone.

Roxas doesn't even remember jumping off the desk and striding to the front of the room, but suddenly he's been swept into Axel's arms and they're sharing a kiss, and he rests his head against his boyfriend's shoulder and breathes deep. Their time spent apart was hard; harder than he thought it would be. Even though they're almost a year together, sometimes the surprise of that initial longing still causes a strange, dull ache somewhere inside of him.

"A year to go, huh?"Roxas asks as they pull apart. He waits for Axel to respond as the redhead pulls the two Styrofoam containers from the bag and opens them. When he sees orange chicken he pushes it over to Roxas, then opens his own, and takes a mouthful.

"Yup. Then I'm outta here."

"I'm happy for you." Roxas says sincerely. He didn't take Axel's departure to grad school lightly; he wanted to see Axel doing something he loved, and that was the long and the short of it. He just guesses he didn't see himself as part of that picture. And that he was nineteen and stupid, wounded from an old relationship. This is a more honest try.

"Hell, I'm happy for US, you know? These stupid college bills might not actually kill us." Then, he shrugs. "This isn't as bad as I thought it'd be, you know? But I'll be happy to finally be working with some fucking cars." Axel breaks into a grin, then laughter. "How's everything going in the world of public relations?" Roxas snorts.

"I feel like we have the same job right now, let's leave it at that." Still laughing, Axel reaches over to ruffle Roxas's hair. Roxas smiles and pushes him away, then pulls him in for a kiss.

"Um, I have a question about—oh." Axel looks up, and it takes Roxas a moment to figure out that they have company in the form of a mousy, dark-haired sophomore boy from his next class. There's a collective "oh shit" reaction among all three of them. "Oh, I, never mind, it can wait." He near-bolts to the door before, in a moment of courage, saying, "It's fine, we all pretty much figured…" his awkward sentence trails off, and he's out the door.

For a single, stunned moment all Axel and Roxas can do is stare at each other. Then they laugh, neither of them really noticing that their hands are joined, pointer fingers and thumbs looped and joined together, connected.