Author's Note: Decided since it's been so long since I updated, I'd post what I have so far of part 5. I am working on the rest. Actually have most of the dialogue written already (have for several months sigh>) and have alot of dialogue for other scenes too. Been suffering from a crisis of direction for the story, which I hope is solved. As a result, I might possibly have a little side series set when they're children at the orphange. I think it will be cute and give background to some of the events which are occuring/will occur in Homecoming.

*7/15/02: Revisions; cut a scene which was duplicated at the beginning of Part 5b (Chapter 6).

Warnings: Yaoi (Seifer/Squall), angst (always), foul language, possible graphic violence, and most importantly: Rinoa romance. shudder>

Hope you like it, even though it's short. Sorry for the long wait.

*As always, comments and criticism are welcome.


Homecoming
By Lady Tempest

Part 5a: *(7/15/02 Revised)

Seifer leaned against the doorframe of his room, staring into the darkness. The air was thick on his skin, a suffocating shroud; It hung heavy, dank and musty, like it had been sealed from circulation for far longer than the few days he had been gone. Fitting, he breathed the emptiness already within.

He shuffled inside, tossing his tattered trenchcoat onto the chair he knew sat in the corner. He should have been angry, and maybe he was. But, a numbness clung to him, going deeper than the aches in his bones. Anger wouldn't get her back. And his pride wouldn't let him beg, although his heart bled to try.

Collapsing to sit on his bed, he buried his face in his hands. How could she do this to him? How? How could she leave him alone, with no one. No one to love him, no one to understand him, to want him, to... need him. Alone...

...Like always. He should have known it was all too good to be true. A sweet girl like Rinoa actually caring about him? What a joke! His own parents didn't care, so why would anyone else. They left him alone and abandoned in a world too vast and lonely for a child to understand.

Seifer bolted upright and jumped to his feet. Fuck her! Fuck them all! His boots thumped in the darkness as he paced across the carpet, his heart booming in his ears, the heat of his racing blood flushing his skin.

Fuck everything! He didn't need her. He didn't need anyone. What an absolute fucking waste of his time. She was a fool to throw him away like last week's garbage. A total idiot!

He continued pacing from one wall to the other, like a caged tiger. His every step was ordered by instinct, in the blackness knowing the layout of his room nearly as well as he would in the light.

She was an idiot! Seifer Almasy was a far better catch that any she'd get again. Handsome, intelligent, a gorgeous body even another guy would die for -- if he must say so himself, funny, loyal, noble, passionate, strong... the strongest fighter Garden, hell, the world, had... ever...

...seen...

He stopped. Banging his head against the wall a few times, he slid to the floor and his knees.

Fuck. She didn't want him. She wanted Squall. Gloomy, pissy, no-personality Squall. No, she had Squall. She had gotten what she wanted. And it wasn't him. Squall. Anti-social, irritating as hell, cold, passionless, beautiful, intelligent, strong, beautiful, funny, a body he would...

He banged his head on the wall once more. Where the hell were those thoughts coming from? Only weak, sissy-boys noticed other guy's... other uh... guy's... uh...

Shaking his mind of its disturbing thoughts, he pounded his fist on the sweat mark where his head had just been.

... And he was definitely not a weak sissy-boy!

...But he was weak; A fact which angered him more than being rejected for a guy that looked like a girl. He wanted so much to be loved, to be needed, he left himself open for attack, vulnerable. He just never expected the attack would come from the one he trusted most. The one he trusted with his dreams and his feelings and his thoughts. The one who wanted someone else. Someone obviously stronger or why else would he lose?

As he lifted a hand to rub the pounding ache between his temples, the chill wetness on his cheek startled him. Damn, he was weak. However, the bite of it was weak as well. The pain in his heart bled through him, pouring more tears down his face. He couldn't control it if he wanted to and he didn't have the energy to want to.

**********

...tbc...