Chapter 17: Daylight
"Are you ready for this?" Squall asked as he and Seifer walked toward the elevator.
"Absolutely. I know exactly what I'm going to say," Seifer replied, his hands forming fists at his sides.
Squall eyed him warily. "That's what concerns me."
"I'm not going to hold back just because the truth might make them uncomfortable."
"Well, there's truth and then there's your opinion. It's not going to help anybody, especially Quistis, if you get confrontational. Try to stick to the simple facts."
Seifer scowled, aware that he ought to heed Squall's advice but not sure that he could. The moment one to those Garden Council fucks so much as implied that the mission had failed and that it was Quistis's fault…
Anger flared so hot in his blood he had to pause to take a breath to slow himself down.
"I can't believe we're even having this debrief when Quistis is still in the infirmary and unable to speak for herself," Seifer grumbled.
Squall shrugged. "That's policy. Debrief's happen within twenty four hours or less. It's supposed to help keep the details sharp."
Well, Seifer's details were certainly going to be sharp. No worries there.
They arrived at the elevator, pressed the button, and the doors slid open. Seifer stepped inside and was busy contemplating all the ways he would like to rip the council a new one for needlessly risking Quistis's life for a couple of fancy new spells when the someone slipped between the quickly closing doors, nearly colliding with him.
"What the…?"
The doors closed and for a brief second of confusion he thought maybe Quistis had been released to join them. But it wasn't Quistis who turned her face to look belligerently up at him. It was Alexandra Heller.
Ah, shit.
The elevator started upwards, trapping him with her.
"Cadet Heller? What the hell are you doing here?"
She was out of breath, apparently having had to run to catch him. "I heard your mission went sideways. I wanted to see if you were okay."
Seifer groaned in frustration. "I'm fine."
"I saw Fujin and Raijin helping you to the infirmary when you got back."
"Yeah, well…all's good now. As you can see I'm back and in one piece. Though even if I wasn't, it shouldn't concern you."
Heller crossed her arms. "I know you seem to think that nobody should give a damn what happens to you, but I do. Sorry."
"That's not what I'm saying."
"Then what are you saying?"
The elevator arrived on the third floor and the doors slid open.
"I'm saying that you're a cadet and I'm your instructor. It isn't your place to think about me outside of class. Ever. For any reason."
He stepped around her, hoping that would put an end to the conversation, but she followed him out into the hallway, Squall trailing uncomfortably behind.
"So it's not okay for me to like you," she started, "but it's perfectly okay for The Trepies to have an entire forum on the intranet where they talk about how much they want to fuck their teacher?"
He rounded on her. "No! It's not okay. Someone should have put a stop to it a long time ago. And you need to watch your damn language. I'm not going to warn you again."
She sighed and flipped her hair over her shoulder. "Look, I just wanted to make sure you were okay. I was worried."
"Fine. Mission accomplished. No get out of here before someone sees you."
"I'm afraid it's too late for that, Mr. Almasy," came an imperious voice from behind him. Seifer recognized it at once and closed his eyes for a second to marvel at his own bad luck before turning to face Instructor Aki.
The man stared over his spectacles at them.
"Cadet, you're not authorized to be on this floor. I suggest you head back to the elevator and tend to whatever classwork you have today."
Seifer heard Cadet Heller quickly scamper away.
Aki's attention then turned fully upon him. "Your debriefing starts in two minutes. Hurry along or you'll be late."
Feeling uncomfortably like there was a weight hanging above him that hadn't dropped yet, Seifer followed the instructor down the hall to the conference room where the Garden Council awaited — a group of instructors, faculty, and administrative officers. Normally Squall sat on the Council but since he was being debriefed, Xu had taken his place. Everyone aside from Aki was already there, and as Aki took his seat he gestured for Seifer and Squall to take theirs as well.
Seifer rubbed his palms against his thighs, very aware that everyone in the room wore a uniform except for him. He didn't own one and so was dressed as usual, minus his coat which hadn't come back yet from the laundry.
"Let's get right into it, shall we?" said Aki.
Squall immediately took the lead in describing the events of the mission. When he got to point at which Quistis had been dragged into the lake, Seifer briefly took over to tell them how he was able to retrieve her from the monster's grip, and then Squall wrapped up the rest of the tale with brisk efficiency.
"Why do you think your team leader did not call a retreat at any point?" one of the faculty members asked.
"You'd have to ask her," Squall replied frostily.
"We're asking you."
Squall sighed. "You tasked us with determining the nature of the monster and we hadn't done that yet. There was some question as to whether it might be a guardian force."
"And…was it?"
"Yes. We believe so."
A murmur went up around the table. The gazes that met them now were sharper, more judgmental. "Your team leader was aware of this fact when she destroyed it? Do you have any idea how valuable a GF of that nature could have been to Garden?"
Seifer gripped the arms of his chair so tight it squeaked in protest. "Of course we know how valuable it could have been. Why the fuck do you think we agreed to go down there to begin with? For fun?"
"Mr. Almasy..." Aki began, warning thick in his tone. "Watch yourself."
"I'm perfectly at ease with how I'm conducting myself, sir. Are you? You're the one who was willing to throw away two of your precious heroes so long as it meant Garden might make a little more money."
"That creature could have saved this institution!"
"If the only way Garden can exist is by sacrificing its best, then it doesn't deserve to exist!"
"That's an interesting sentiment coming from someone who once actively tried to destroy it."
"If you've got a problem with me, that's a whole other meeting," Seifer pointed out, his teeth gritted.
"We're off track. And there's no need to get defensive," one of the other faculty members said. "We're merely here to determine why the mission failed."
"It didn't fail. We took on an incredibly dangerous task and came back to you without any loss of life and Quistis even managed to learn two new blue magic spells before the thing nearly wiped us out. One of them includes a status effect no one has ever seen before. That's not a goddamned failure."
"For what it's worth," Squall said, "I agree with Seifer on this. For a mission with such poorly defined parameters and almost no intel to prepare with, the fact that we made it back alive is itself a win. Plus, that guardian force had been isolated for so long, it was never going to submit to being junctioned."
"You don't know that."
Squall lifted an eyebrow. "If you don't trust my judgement then you're welcome to replace me as Commander."
Xu flashed him a smile while the rest of the council shifted uneasily. Even Seifer, who didn't have much of a mind for politics, recognized that Squall had just masterfully put an end to their entire line of questioning. No figure in Garden was more widely and deeply trusted than Squall. He was the one who had pulled Garden out of the fire during the war, who had taken over and brought everyone safely out of the sorceress's grip. Seifer gathered that the job of Commander had been essentially bestowed upon him when no one else seemed able to step up to the plate.
If he decided to make a stand on this, there was not much the council could do about it. Holding Quistis accountable would have already been an unpopular decision thanks to the Trepies. With Squall actively speaking against it, they knew they would lose the support of the rest of Garden as well.
Aki drew in a long breath. "I suppose we're done here then."
Squall pushed out his chair to go and Seifer followed suit, hardly able to believe that this could really be that easy. Quistis had been so hard on herself — in actual tears over her "failed" mission — and he couldn't help but wonder if it was because the same people she would have to report it to were the ones who had cut her down during her first year as an instructor.
Much as he hated her being in the infirmary, he was glad at least that she hadn't needed to come here and face these assholes again.
As he went to walk out the door, Aki called him back.
"Hold on a second, Mr. Almasy. There's another matter we'd like to discuss with you."
Seifer halted mid-step, a sinking feeling in his stomach. With all of his concern over defending Quistis, he had totally forgotten that he had his own reckoning to contend with.
At the door, Squall paused, an actual hint of concern playing out across his face. "Should I stay for this as well?" he asked.
"No. It doesn't concern you," Aki replied.
"It might. I am the one overseeing his position here in Garden."
Aki sighed. "You can stand in if you want." Then, to Seifer, he said pointedly, "Mr. Almasy, please have a seat again."
Squall remained by the door as Seifer returned to his seat, well aware of what was coming.
Looking over the top of his glasses, Aki began, "There have been some rumors circulating about your conduct concerning a certain cadet."
Seifer bit the inside of his cheek to keep his temper in check. "I'm aware," he replied as evenly and calmly as he could.
"I was willing to dismiss them simply as rumors until I saw you with the cadet in question in the hallway earlier."
Bullshit. Seifer knew that Aki had always loathed him. The man had probably been waiting for him to screw up ever since he came back to Garden — anything to have an excuse to kick him out. And sleeping with an underaged girl was just the sort of slime-ball evil Aki would undoubtedly expect of him.
"Care to explain exactly what your relationship is with this girl?" he asked.
"I have no relationship with her. She's a student in my class. That's all."
"I'm sorry, but that is patently not the case. Not all of your students make public scenes before you head off on missions where they shout about how much they love you, or accompany you into restricted areas, or post on the Garden forums about having shared certain intimacies with you." Aki's lips twisted, as if even having to say such a despicable thing had left a bad taste in his mouth.
"She's lying," Seifer said flatly.
"She's not lying about the incidents I witnessed," Aki shot back.
"For whatever reason, she has become fixated on me, but I have never done anything to encourage it. I have actively discouraged it in every way I know how. I even met with Xu about it." He gestured to her and she nodded.
"We did discuss it," she told the others. "I agreed to sit in on his class every day to act as a trusted witness."
"And? What have you seen?"
Xu met Seifer's eyes, her gaze apologetic. "Nothing. I haven't had the opportunity to sit in on a class yet."
"So we're back at square one," Aki said, turning back to Seifer. "It's your word against hers."
Seeing as Seifer's word was worth exactly nothing to these people, he knew that was a damning position to be in. Still…
"That's not exactly true. From what I've seen on the forums, Cadet Heller has never suggested that I'm sleeping with her, only that she suspects I am involved with someone. It's all other people's speculation that she was talking about herself. But she wasn't."
"So you're claiming that she was talking about some other person?"
"Yes."
"And who is this person?"
"That's none of your business," Seifer replied, gritting his teeth.
"If whoever it is can corroborate your side of the story, it might be."
Seifer fixed his jaw in place — he couldn't tell them. Not only was it way the fuck out of line for them even to ask who he was sleeping with, but he knew Quistis would not want him to say. Would she "corroborate his story" in front of these people? The very same group of powerful administrators she'd been working most of her life to impress? He could believe that she might someday tell her friends about him. People close to her. But the Garden Council? No way. She was far too wrapped up still in needing their approval to admit to slumming around in his bed. He was on his own.
Sitting a little straighter in his chair, Seifer said, "I won't tell you who she is."
"Why not?" Aki asked.
"Because, like I said, it's none of your fucking business."
He knew being confrontational wouldn't help his case, but damn it — this wouldn't be happening to anyone else. If they truly loathed him so much that they were willing to believe he was a child predator, then no amount of polite denial was going to change their mind. He might as well let out his frustration.
"All I'm going to say is that Cadet Heller is nothing more to me than a goddamned nuisance. I was dealing with it and haven't done anything wrong. You guys act like you own us. Hell, you were willing to purchase a new guardian force with mine and Squall's and Quistis's lives. But I'm not your property. I don't owe you explanations into my personal life to dispel a fucking rumor."
Aki tapped his fingers against the table. "That's all you're going to say?" he reiterated.
"Yes."
"Then you can go."
The dismissal caught Seifer by surprise. He'd expected more pushback. "We're done?"
"It appears there's nothing more to discuss. So there's no point in continuing. You may leave."
Seifer hesitated. No one else on the council had said anything, and he couldn't make out the facial expressions of the faculty members underneath their hats, but the stormy expression on Xu let him know that he was probably fucked.
Oh well. He knew this Garden thing wouldn't last. The fact that he'd been invited back at all had surprised him. But with the way everyone here felt about him, it had only been a matter of time before it fell apart. At least he could rest confident in the knowledge that he'd done a damn good job as combat instructor, and he'd stayed loyal to Quistis even when outing her might have saved him. This would be a good death, as it were. An honorable one.
Pushing out his chair, Seifer got up and left with his head held high.
Squall followed but said nothing.
"Not going to try to convince me to fight harder on this?" Seifer asked as they got into the elevator.
"It's not my place," Squall replied.
Seifer had always thought of Squall as withdrawn and awkward. But he saw now that maybe the man was just discreet and no-nonsense. He didn't want to be drawn into other people's shit, respected their boundaries, and avoided inserting himself into drama. Seeing as Rinoa was the exact opposite, he wondered how it worked between them. Perhaps they balanced each other out. Kind of like me and Quistis…
As the elevator slowed and came to a stop on the first floor, Seifer's thoughts circled around what would happen between them when he got kicked out. Whether she would visit him wherever he ended up. And whether he would even be able to find a place to live where he wouldn't be in one legal trouble or another thanks to his service under Ultimecia.
Damn it. Raijin and Fujin would probably try to come with him.
He'd have to find some way of convincing them to stay in Garden…
"Hey," Squall said, snapping him back to the present. "Rin and I will do what we can for you. Okay?"
A lump formed in Seifer's throat.
"Thanks."
Squall nodded and walked off, probably off to marshal Rinoa to his defense.
The couple seemed unlikely allies for him considering all that had happened between them in the past. But that also made their support more impactful. Seifer found himself genuinely touched, his eyes burning as he rushed away, blinking fast.
Damn. He never thought he'd have anyone on his side besides his posse.
If things could be different. If he hadn't done what he had during the war, maybe his life could have looked a lot different.
Happier.
With friends and family and love.
Bringing himself back together, he set about tracking down Fujin and Raijin. His life was what it was, and they deserved a heads up that it was all about to come crashing down.
Quistis didn't finally convince Dr. Kadowaki to let her leave the infirmary until evening. She wasn't sure exactly why the doctor had been so reluctant to let her go but suspected that it had something to do with the fact that Squall and Seifer had their debriefings that afternoon and so long as she was still in the infirmary she was exempted from having to attend. In any case, after a long day of puttering about, helping with paperwork and getting her vitals taken, she was finally released into her own care.
Her borrowed flipflops slapped annoyingly as she walked, the hood on her sweatshirt drawn up to avoid unwanted attention. The bulky sweatshirt was at least two sizes too big and yet somehow the shorts Kadowaki had given her along with it seemed a full size too small. She felt awkward and unkempt, her hair left down and un-styled. Hyne, she hoped no one saw her before she had the chance to put herself back together.
Thankfully, most everyone seemed to be at dinner. The halls were mostly empty.
She arrived at her room and breathed a sigh of relief as the door slid open. It felt good to be back in her own space again. As she tossed down the plastic bag holding her dirty battle dress on the floor, she wondered whether Seifer would visit her tonight. He probably didn't even know she was out of the infirmary yet.
Quistis kicked off her sandals and was in the middle of changing into her own clothes when someone knocked at her door.
"Hey! You in there? Open up! It's Xu!"
"Just a minute!" Quistis called as she pulled a pink tank top on over a pair of form-fitting black pants.
A second later, she swiped her hand over the sensor to open the door and let her friend in.
"Hi," Quistis said with a smile, but Xu rushed in right past her without returning the greeting. Quistis had to spin on her heel to follow her friend's brisk progress over to the desk where she paused to cross her arms. She looked upset.
They'd just talked this morning. What could have happened to rattle her this much?
"We need to talk," Xu replied heavily.
"Okay…" Quistis walked over to her closet and pulled out a sweater to wear over her tank top. "Can it wait for me to finish getting dressed? Kadowaki only let me out of the infirmary a few minutes ago."
Xu turned to face her. "I know. She called me. I didn't want to bother you there, but Aki called a late meeting and—" A pained expression crossed her face. "It can't wait anymore."
"Alright." Quistis sat down on the edge of the bed to put her boots on. "What are we talking about?"
"Seifer."
Oh crap. Whatever direction this conversation was about to go, Quistis knew it couldn't be good.
"Quis — he's going to be fired."
Quistis's heart lurched. "What?! Why?"
"Because the Garden Council thinks he's sleeping with a cadet."
"You mean Cadet Heller? How did they even find out about her? And how in the world can they believe anything's actually going on. I mean…Hyne! It's ridiculous!"
"They don't believe there's anything to it. Not all of them, anyway. But there's been rumors going around on the forums and it's given some of them the grounds they needed to get rid of him. We had a meeting with him about it today, right after his debrief. He denied any involvement with her—"
"He hasn't had any involvement with her!"
"I know. I told everyone else that I was sure he hadn't done anything wrong. But he didn't do a great job of defending himself. He got pretty combative. And when they pressed him on if he was carrying on a relationship with someone in Garden, he said yes but wouldn't tell them who with, only that it's not a cadet."
"Why would they need to know who he's sleeping with?"
Xu threw her hands up. "They said to 'corroborate his story,' but in truth I think Aki was just trying to bully him. He already had his mind made up. It didn't help that Heller actually followed him to the meeting. There was a whole scene in the hallway right before the debrief."
"Oh God." Quistis gripped the edge of the bed, horrified. How could they do this? Her own firing had been devastating. For Seifer, it would completely alter his life — probably force him out of Garden completely, out into a world that still hadn't forgiven him. She couldn't let this happen. "They've already made the decision to fire him?" she asked.
Xu nodded. "We just had the meeting. Squall voted against it. So did a couple of other people. Rinoa even came in to advocate for him. But it's already been decided on the basis that he supposedly 'violated Garden regulations' by having an inappropriate relationship with a subordinate."
"Damn it." Quistis raked a hand through her hair. "Does he know yet?"
Xu shook her head. "They're going make it official in the morning."
Quistis shoved her feet into her boots. "I've got to go find him. Maybe there's something we can do…"
Mind whirring, she stood up and started for the door, not even pausing to put her hair up. Xu followed as she whipped out into the hallway and to the other side of the dormitory wing where his room was located. She arrived breathless, her heart pounding, and knocked on the door hard enough to make her knuckles sting.
No one answered, so she swore and knocked again.
Xu came up behind her. "He might be at dinner. Everyone else is."
"Right. Of course!" Quistis pivoted and started down the hallway again, her fast clip determined and purposeful. Xu had to jog to keep up.
"What are you going to do?" she asked.
"I don't know."
Formulating a plan was beyond her at the moment. She only needed to find him. Then they'd figure it out together.
It didn't take long to get to the cafeteria. When Quistis and Xu walked in, they found it utterly thronged with people. Pausing just inside the door, Quistis raked her eyes over the crowd. He tended to sit near the back where he and his posse could avoid attention as much as possible. She didn't see him but started in that direction anyway, hoping he would be there.
Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted her friends sitting at a table all together.
Near them, she saw Instructor Aki sitting with some other older faculty members, several of them members of the Garden Council. A hot spike of anger at the sight of them made Quistis's blood boil as she remembered him presiding over her own dismissal, the uncaring look on his face as he destroyed her life. Imagining him doing the same to Seifer in the morning made her quiver with rage.
Suddenly, she knew exactly what she wanted to do.
"Seifer!" she called out, making everyone in the cafeteria turn to look at her. The heat of their gazes only fueled her fire. "Seifer! Where are you?"
At the back of the room, beyond the sea of curious faces, he stood up. A slightly alarmed expression crinkled his brow and from the breathless way the whole room froze as she strode toward him, she wondered if everyone — him included — thought she was about to toss him into another dimension.
In a way, she supposed she was. Nothing would ever be the same after today. Not for either of them.
"Instructor Trepe?" he said once she was close enough to hear. "Is something—"
She grabbed hold of his shoulders and pulled him into a hard kiss.
He grunted in surprise against her mouth, his whole body gone rigid with surprise.
Lest anyone mistake his stiffness for unfamiliarity, Quistis slid one hand around to the back of his head and arched her body into his. After a moment, he relaxed enough to settle his hands on her hips and kiss her back.
All the air had left the room.
Quistis didn't care.
Let them be shocked.
Hell…let them be envious.
She loved this man and she wasn't going to hide it any more. She'd spent too many years of her life trying to be what everyone else wanted, stretching herself to the brink to please. Not anymore.
Seifer broke their kiss to murmur softly against her lips, "Everyone's watching."
Quistis curled her fingers into his hair and smiled. "I know."
"You don't mind?"
She responded by kissing him again, deeper this time. By the time she finished, they were both out of breath and the cafeteria had gone from shocked silence to an uproar of excited chatter.
Seifer blinked hard, his green eyes awash. "Why are you doing this?"
"Because I should have done it when this first started. I'm so sorry for what I put you through…the way I tried to hide what you are to me."
His mouth quirked. "And what is that, exactly? What am I to you?"
She bit her lip. "Everything."
He looked so astonished — just absolutely shell shocked that she would claim him publicly like this, and it made her intensely disappointed in herself that she hadn't done it sooner. He acted so comfortable with everyone's distain that it was easy to assume he genuinely didn't mind. But clearly, he did. And clearly he'd thought she would never risk her reputation by attaching herself to him, no matter how much she might profess to want him in private.
And he'd done everything he could to protect her from public scrutiny anyway, even though he thought she cared so little.
Grabbing Seifer's hand, she twined their fingers together. "Come with me. There's something I need to do."
He laughed nervously. "You mean like an aura thing? Did Kadowaki give you some kind of amazing cocktail of drugs before she let you out or something?"
"No. This is all me."
Through the sea of stunned face, she brought him straight over to Instructor Aki's table. The man glanced sourly up at them over the top of his glasses, his fork poised limply over his dinner. Beside him, two other members of the Garden Council wore similar expressions. Seifer hadn't figured out her plan yet; but they clearly had.
"Xu tells me you had a late meeting tonight," she said to them, not bothering with any pleasantries.
Aki's mouth hardened into a firm line.
"It seems there was some question as to what's been going on in Seifer's personal life. Well, I can answer it for you. He has been with me. Every night. And during the day whenever he has had free time as well."
Seifer sucked in a breath and held it.
"I can assure you," Quistis continued, "that I am the only person he has been sleeping with. And if you mean to fire him over the fact that a cadet has a crush on him, then I'm going to be leaving right along with him. I'm sure we won't have any trouble finding somewhere to go considering Seifer is one of the most competent fighters in this entire building and that I just learned two new blue magic spells no one has ever seen before."
Truthfully, she wasn't sure if she had mastered either spell yet. But Aki didn't need to know that.
She barreled on, powered by years worth of untapped anger. "The fact that I have had to come here and tell you any of this is, frankly, shameful. It shouldn't matter what's going on in his personal life, because if you'd ever bothered to look at the job he's doing with his class, you would know that he's a damn fine instructor. You should be doing everything you can to keep him, not looking for made up excuses to fire him. If Balamb Garden is failing and in need of saving, it certainly isn't because of him. Or me. It's because of people like you."
The cafeteria had gone completely silent.
Aki opened his mouth, but no words came out.
"Instructor Trepe…" he finally managed, his voice barely above a harsh whisper. "Your biggest failing has always been your inability to maintain emotional distance. I would suggest that you think this through very carefully before you tie your fate to his. He will crash and burn, and when he does he will take you right along with him."
"I'll gladly go wherever he goes," Quistis shot back. "And you can fuck off with your advice."
An audible gasp went up from the crowd. At any other time, standing beside any other person, Aki's threat might have shamed her into obedience. Her whole life, she had feared nothing more than failure. But Seifer made her brave. He made her feel like if she fell, someone would be there to catch her. She didn't have to hold back. Didn't have to curate herself to please those around her.
Especially people like Instructor Aki.
His opinion didn't matter anymore.
And the weight of it — of everyone's expectations — lifting off her shoulders left her feeling light as a feather. She squeezed Seifer's hand, needing to anchor herself lest she float away.
As Aki ducked his flaming face and the cafeteria began to rumble with voices again, she turned to Seifer. He looked dazed. "Are you all right?" she asked softly.
"Yeah. I'm just…processing, I guess." He swallowed hard. "Are you sure this is what you want to do? Be with me?"
Quistis slipped an arm around his waist. "I'm sure."
He still looked as if he might faint.
"How about we sit and have dinner together?" she suggested.
Arm in arm, they walked back to Seifer's table where his dinner still sat uneaten beside Fujin and Raijin's. Quistis's heart fluttered nervously when they looked up at her. She'd gotten used to the idea of spending time with Seifer. But his posse? Not so much. She wondered how they might feel about her as Seifer pulled out a chair for her at their table. He took the seat beside her and pushed over his dinner tray so they could share.
Was this what being brought home to meet a boyfriend's family for the first time felt like?
"Does this mean Seifer's job is safe?" Raijin asked without preamble.
Quistis let out the breath she'd been holding. "I don't know. It depends how badly they want to keep me."
Fujin crossed her arms and nodded. "SAFE."
"Yeah. They'd never fire you, ya know?"
"I wouldn't count on that. They've already fired me once. But there's more out there than just Garden and I have a lot of connections. No matter what, Seifer will be fine. You all will. I'll make sure of it. Not that you all need me to save you," she added hastily, lest they think she was overstepping or casting herself as some sort of hero. "But I'll help however you want me to."
Seifer put one hand on her thigh under the table and squeezed. "We'd appreciate that. But I don't think it will come to it. You saw Aki. He'll be looking for a new job of his own by morning."
Quistis smiled encouragingly, but she didn't have the same faith in Garden's unwillingness to let her go. She was just one person, after all. She could be replaced.
To distract herself from the nervous flip-flopping that thought created in her stomach, Quistis grabbed a vegetable samosa off Seifer's plate and took a bite.
"GUYS!" Zell's shout nearly made her choke. He appeared from out of nowhere to slide into the seat next to Fujin with his dinner tray. "Oh my God! Why didn't you tell me?"
"Raijin and Fujin probably didn't know, just like the rest of us," said Selphie, taking the place next to him. She shot Quistis a look but Quistis hardly registered it, her heart having stopped as her friends crowded in around the table, even having to pull up extra chairs for all of them to fit.
"I don't think anybody knew!" Rinoa added. "I mean, looking back on it, I realize now how Seifer asking to trade places with me to be on her team was kinda suspect. But I'm pretty sure all of us were totally in the dark on this."
Xu squeezed in next to Quistis and flashed everyone a huge grin. "Not me. I knew."
"You did?" Seifer asked in astonishment, leaning around Quistis.
"Oh relax." Xu waved dismissively at him. "She didn't tell me. I figured it out myself."
"I knew, too," Squall added.
"YOU WHAT?" Rinoa rounded on him. "You knew and you didn't you tell me?!"
Squall shrugged and chewed a bit of chicken. "Figured it wasn't any of my business."
"Squall! Sweet Hyne!" She slugged him in the shoulder."You can't just keep things like this from me! How did you even find out?"
"During the mission."
"When she was hurt?" Rinoa turned huge, shining eyes on Seifer and clutched both hands to her chest. "Oh my God. Did you lose it? Did you hold her tight and refuse to let go?"
Seifer merely rolled his eyes, but Squall said, "Pretty much."
"Dude. What happened to it not being any of your business?" Seifer snapped.
"Well, it's not like it's a secret anymore."
Rinoa shook her head at them, then turned to Zell again. "Anyway, my point is that apparently other than Xu and Squall, your friends weren't keeping secrets from you."
"Actually, we knew, too," Raijin said.
Seifer sent his friend a startled look. "What? No you didn't! I never told you."
"OVERHEARD," Fujin replied.
"Overheard what?"
They both blushed. "We just heard you…uh…use her name a couple of times, ya know…"
It took a moment for Quistis to figure out what that meant, and once she did she thought she might die of embarrassment. Oh God. They'd heard them in his room at night, and they'd known it was her! She couldn't remember Seifer using her name at any point but she hadn't exactly been paying close attention.
That everyone else at the table knew exactly what Raijin meant became clear when a deafening, uncomfortable silence fell.
Quistis was considering climbing underneath the table when Zell finally announced, "Well, now that it's not a secret anymore, you guys are both going to come to game night. Right?"
"Us?" Seifer asked, surprised. "Why would this change whether or not I come to game night?"
"Because that's why you weren't coming before! So that you could spend time with Quistis. Right? Well, now you don't have to keep it secret and you both can come! Which is great, because we're about to start a big new campaign and having two more people would really flesh out the storyline. Quisty — I'm gonna bring you a booklet. You'll need to get up to speed on the character types… Hang on. I'm gonna write a note to myself." Zell leaned back in his seat to rummage through his pockets and fetched out a small spiral bound notebook and a golf-pencil.
Quistis leaned in to whisper to Seifer, "What the hell is he talking about?"
"I'll tell you later," he murmured.
Though "game night" sounded ominous in a "Garden Festival" kind of way, Quistis decided to let it go for now, her heart warmed by having all of her friends around her, smiling and laughing and not thrown at all by the fact that she had just made out with Seifer in front of the whole school. She'd been so afraid they might not stand behind her if she did anything questionable. That they would judge and abandon her. Instead, they'd done the opposite.
For a second, her eyes burned and she thought she might cry.
Xu nudged her.
"Told you," she said softly. "You had nothing to worry about."
Indeed, even the ambient chatter around them had died down, everyone in the cafeteria having gone back to their own meals aside from Aki who Quistis saw storm out of the room, leaving his dinner behind.
This was really it then. She and Seifer were out in the open — a couple. No more hiding.
She couldn't believe how light she felt. How unburdened. She hadn't thought that keeping secrets from her friends had weighed that much on her. Now, without it pressing down on her emotions, they bloomed impossibly large. Love overwhelmed her — both for Seifer and for her friends.
Once dinner wrapped up, she and Seifer walked out side by side, his hand holding hers. They fell back from the rest of the group who were all discussing their evening plans, and Seifer pulled Quistis into a quick embrace, planting a firm kiss on her lips.
"Hyne. You have no idea how much of a rush it is to do that in public."
She had a pretty good idea.
Heart thundering, she laid her hand flat on his chest. "Want to come with me back to my room?"
"Hell yes."
Their friends all pretended not to notice, glancing politely in the other direction, as the two of them split off from the rest of the group, rushing hand-in-hand down the dormitory hallway. Quistis was giddy with excitement by the time they arrived at her door. She'd never done anything like this before. Never had a…oh god, a boyfriend.
It sounded strange in her head.
Seifer. Her boyfriend.
The word somehow seemed too juvenile and not nearly broad enough for what he'd become to her. Though she couldn't think of a better one and stopped trying when he pushed her bodily up against the door and kissed her hard — his hands roaming, his tongue seeking, and a bit back groan rumbling in his throat.
"I don't think I'll ever get used to this." His hands trailed down her sides to her hips. "You're really sure you want me like this? With everybody knowing?"
"It would be a little late for me to change my mind now," she pointed out.
"I know. But—" He pulled back, his eyebrows crinkled so that the scar on the bridge of his nose pinched. "You can still walk away. You know that. Right? You probably saved my job tonight and I appreciate it. But that doesn't mean you have to stay with me."
She gripped his shoulders and looked straight into his green eyes. "Seifer…I want to eat my meals with you. I want to watch movies with you. I want to go to the next Garden Festival with you. And I want to spend all the nights in between with you. I've never been in a relationship before and I probably don't know what I'm doing. I won't be very good at it. But—"
He kissed her again. "We'll figure it out."
"Yeah." She smiled.
He nuzzled at the side of her neck with his face, his lips seeking out her pulse. "I know you just got out the infirmary, but if you're up for it, I'm absolutely dying for you."
She slid her fingers deep into his hair. "God, yes. I'm up for it."
Opening her door, she pulled him inside and they quickly made their way to the bed, shedding their clothes in the process.
Being with him now, without the veil of secrecy, had a different timbre to it. His hands moving over her body played the same tune, but fuller. Louder. She knew her own heart now and was confident of his. For the first time in her life, she felt like someone truly and genuinely cared about her with no reservations and no conditions.
"Seifer," she breathed, wrapping her arms around him.
"Mmm." He pushed her down on the bed and slid on top of her, every inch of his skin on hers electric. "When you say my name like that, I feel it all the way down to my toes. I still can't believe it's you. And me. Here. Doing this."
He hooked a hand under her knee and pulled up to pivot her hips to the right angle before sinking down deep inside of her.
"Seifer," she repeated with a moan.
He made a noise, half-ecstasy and half-pain.
With long, emphatic strokes he brought them both to a shattering climax, then rolled onto his side, dragging her along in his arms.
For a long time, they stayed still, breathing in unison, floating in a contentment so complete that Quistis forgot all about everything outside of her room. The steady thud of his heartbeat in her ear and the liquid pleasure still humming in her muscles was all that mattered until Seifer shifted and said, "You know, I thought they all hated me."
Quistis lifted her head. "Who?"
"Your friends. The old orphanage gang. I mean…I couldn't exactly blame them if they did, after everything I've done. But Squall went to bat for me with the Garden Council. And back there in the cafeteria—" His words broke off and he swallowed hard.
Quistis brushed a stubborn bit of hair back out of his eyes. "Rinoa was controlled by Ultimecia once, too. They understand. You're still one of us. They don't hate you."
"They should."
She kissed him softly. "Don't say that."
He shook his head. "The Garden Council was going to fire me. I didn't know for sure, but I figured… I always knew it would happen eventually. That I shouldn't get too comfortable here. I adore you, but I don't want to take you down with me. If they still decide to kick me out—"
"They won't," she said firmly. "But if they do, then I'm going with you."
"Garden is your home."
She shook her head. "It's just a place. Anywhere can be home with the right people in it. Anyway, I don't think there would be room for me in Garden anymore if they kicked you out."
He held her tight and was silent for a long time. Finally, he cleared his throat. "So…you really learned two new blue magic spells?"
"I haven't tried them yet. But I think I've got them figured out."
"The status one and the weird light one?"
"Yeah."
He trailed a finger down her spine. "Maybe we'll have to test them out in the Training Center sometime."
She grinned. "You sure that's a good idea? You know what happens when I use aura around you."
He chuckled. "Maybe if we put in enough time satisfying all your primal urges before we go, it won't be a problem."
"Maybe." She rested her chin on his chest. "It's worth a try."
He gave a little growl and pulled her up into a kiss. "I'll do my best."
Though it was still early in the evening, they didn't get back out of bed, choosing instead to languish in one another's arms, talking and touching and learning what it meant to be a couple until at long last they fell asleep. Which suited Quistis just fine. Quite honestly, she couldn't think of anywhere else she would rather be.