For my Seifer/Squall claim on fated(underscore)children at LiveJournal. Themes used were "heart" and "I should have told you before".
Frozen water has just stopped. That doesn't mean it won't run again, the same or faster than before. That's the hope I cling to. I fucked up, and I know it, and his heart is a frozen lake. But ice can always be melted, and so I hope for Squall's heart.
I have always had feelings for him. Yeah, I know, I didn't have the best way of showing them. I was young and stupid then, okay? I'm still young, but hopefully less stupid.
I don't belong at the side of any mind-fucking Sorceress, and if there's anyone I belong to, it's the man whose frozen heart I have to melt first.
We were doing well before I messed up. We were… friends, of a sort. We'd get up early to meet, spar, and then talk a little. Just a little, but by Squall's standards, it was a lot. And then we'd duel again. We fought like we meant it, but all we wanted to do was help each other. In some way.
I guess, before Squall took the SeeD exam, I failed on purpose – I'd never have admitted it, it was simply the assessors being assholes, but I didn't really try. It wasn't that I didn't want to become a SeeD. I didn't want to become a SeeD without him. But he was always a better student than me anyway.
Anyway. I blew our friendship to smithereens when I scarred him. Even though, after the battle, I tried to cure him, he was having none of it. When he fainted, I took him to Kadowaki. I wanted to wait for him to wake, but she sent me away – I guess she assumed that I would cause trouble.
I hate the way I behaved back then. I lost the one thing that I really wanted, didn't even realise, and he lost from it, too. He turned into ice then, betrayed by the last thing he trusted. I don't think I've ever regretted anything so much.
I loved Squall, back then, I think. I didn't realise it, didn't say it, didn't even believe I'd ever fall in love. I was Seifer Almasy, and I wasn't going to fall in love like some stupid idiot.
Yeah, right.
Squall sits at his desk, looking up at me with his icy eyes. Any feelings are carefully detached from him, bundled up somewhere for later.
"What?" he asks me, crisply, as if he doesn't have time for this.
Sorry, Squally-boy, but you can make time for me.
"I wanted to tell you something…"
He stares at me, willing me to just get it over with. Sorry, Squall, no can do. I'm taking my time over this one. I've already taken five years or more to say it, you can wait a few more minutes.
"I should have told you before… I lo -"
He cut me off, standing up, his chair scraping back as he reaches forward to put a hand over my mouth. "Seifer, don't say things you don't mean."
I prise his hand away. "I mean it. I love you."
He shakes his head.
"I mean it," I repeat softly, and I lean across to kiss him.
He doesn't feel cold against me. Maybe there's hope yet.