Disclaimer: If I owned SQUARESOFT and FF8 I would be one rich person. I'd have a mansion, and a super fast computer and a fancy sports car. I currently own a bungalow, and a shitbox computer and a ricky-tic-tic jeep … do the math.
Chapter ThreeRinoa closed the door of her son's bedroom noiselessly and crept back down to the living room. After much hysterics and her daughter waking up as well, she managed to take care of the situation and get them both sleeping again… however, not without struggle.
Turning on the television, she lowered the volume instinctively. What was on at this hour? Some political shows, the weather, soap operas, sports… your typical porno. In a summary, there was absolutely nothing worth watching.
Flipping through the channels, trying to find something decent to watch, she paused on a news briefing. Her mind nearly instantly reminded her that she had once said 'If I ever happen to watch the news, this would either mean that I'm bored out of my mind … or that I've gone crazy…' To this her mother had replied, 'Why? The news can be educational…' And she had rolled her eyes and replied, 'As if I don't have enough problems in my life, must I preoccupy myself with other people's?'
She sighed slightly. A realization striking, 'Maybe people watch the news to make sure that they aren't the only ones with problems.' She never needed that comfort because she never cared about others.
'That's partly true…' She thought, 'I care about my kids, my parents… I care about Squall… sort of.' And she forcefully smiled, 'Sort of… in a type of way where I am insanely in love and in deep need of him.' Then she frowned, 'Except when he pisses me off to the point where I see red dots and all I'm thinking about is giving him a good kick in the…'
Guilt slightly begins its course from the brain, directly to the heart. She just hung up on him… maybe she could have at least added a simple 'Bye, I love you.' But that isn't her style, it never has been.
"I love you, more than you'll even know, Jack!" The blonde supermodel was clinging onto a handsome dark haired man… on the television that is; the news briefing was obviously over.
"Woah, what the hell am I watching?" She said this out loud, but watched the volume of her voice. She had no intention of having an awakened son screaming about the random monster that lives in his closet again.
"I love you as well, Stephanie… please, marry me." The young man was now bent on one knee, in proposal mode.
'Oh bullshit, that's not the way things happen… who watches this crap anyways?' Bitter thoughts form in her mind, 'If Squall had proposed to me that way and not under the circumstances that he was under… I'd be ready to bet that the marriage would have been a healthier one…'
She sighed as she put the television on mute and changed the channel altogether. 'The marriage isn't that bad… just several flaws here and there. We can't spend two days without arguing, I can never say that I love him to his face and my parents have a knack for calling while we're busy in the bedroom… yeah… not that bad.'
'Oh why can't I come off it? I didn't live off my teenage-hood and he didn't either. We're both two malfunctioning adults that can barely take care of themselves and to add on the extra weight, we've got two kids. Ok that's his fault. Damnit, what's my problem? It's our fault.'
~*~
"Mom, please, don't tell daddy right away… please!" Stupid, stupid, stupid girl. Either way, her father would find out, and either way… he would have a blind rage and would refuse to talk to her until the child was born.
"I can't believe you brought this upon yourself, you're just as stupid as me!" Julia had sighed angrily, "You know, sometimes, I think this is a curse."
"Squall doesn't even know yet… please, mom… just don't tell anyone. Not now, I'm not ready." More pleads, more begging… would they ever stop?
"You're never going to tell Squall. You plan on running your little ass out to Timber and staying there… out of contact!" Her mother had snapped back and her mother had been right. That was part of the plan.
Rinoa sighed, "Ok, I'll tell him. Then daddy after."
"No more children, Rinoa. No more." Julia had said firmly, "One is enough, no more."
She hadn't replied, so her mother had repeated herself to make sure that this advice would be engraved into her cerebrum, "Are you listening, Rinoa? No more children."
And her present self finds irony in the fact that the daughter was stupider than the mother… and exactly a year after the first born, there would be another child.
She still had to survive this one. She had showed up at his apartment and he had been fairly glad and surprised to see her.
"Hey, come in." He let her through the door and shut it back behind her, "I was getting worried about you… you… hadn't called in a while."
"Squall, we need to talk." Straight to the point, undeviating, no beating around the bush, no square dancing around the topic… it was better this way.
"No, not now." He interjected, "I really don't want to talk about anything, I don't care how important it is, just shut up."
There was an excruciatingly long silence during which she simply stared at him blankly, unsure of what to say, and even if she had known what to say she couldn't have said it. She had been told to shut up and she was partly grateful, things would be easier without words. The only obstacle was how to relay the message.
He broke the silence, "You're here to tell me that you're going away. Aren't you?"
No reply… she had been told to shut up. She would obey. He seemed a little frustrated at this, "I tell you to do one thing and you do the opposite, but now, at the worst moment possible you decide to listen to me?"
No reply, the less she would say, the less she would hurt him, the less she would hurt herself. He grabbed her by the shoulders, not roughly but enough to stimulate a certain feeling of shock in her, "Rinoa, why are you doing this to me?"
"Do you think I'm having fun?" A rhetorical question, undoubtedly. Her eyes narrowed into his pale blue ones, frightened ones. "Damnit, Squall! You think I like running away from this? From everything? From the agency, from my father… from you? I'm sorry if I hurt your feelings, Mr. Leonheart, but I was considering my own life!"
"Your life? Your life?" Suddenly becoming very angry with her, as if something inside him had clicked. Something painful: a very stinging realization striking. He calmed and a hurt expression replaced his angry one, "I guess I don't occupy the same amount of space in your life than you do in mine."
Nothing was going according to plan. Her breaths had become shallow and quick, "Squall please… you don't want to be a part of this… just leave it be…"
"I don't understand." His voice was softer and his grip on her shoulders was less firm, "I don't get it, Rinoa, explain to me… why are you doing this?"
She took a deep breath, "Could we please sit down?" She eyed the couches and then had thought of how cliché this was going to seem. At this point she didn't care, she just wanted to get it over with.
"Ok…" He plopped down on the loveseat and she did right after.
"Ok… I'm leaving the agency because I really can't do this anymore. We've both killed people but I can't anymore… because I just can't. It's called morals, Hyne, I don't even know how I was able to do it for so long…"
He raised an inquisitive eyebrow, "Morals? You mean ethics? Shit, Rinoa… for fuck's sake! You've done this for how long? And all of a sudden you think 'Hey, I've got ethics'? Holy hell, you know what? This is why I stay away from women: too fucking confusing!"
"Will you stop getting pissed at me and let me finish?" She snapped, "Yeah, it's called ethics, morals, whatever! You don't have any at all, but that's not my point." Her voice was icy as if she was reprimanding him, "I am just so sick of killing people! I only know why I'm killing them! I don't know if they have kids, a wife… maybe they even have good reasons for committing the crimes they did! Who's to judge… Mr. Ackroyde?" She said the name with a venomous tone.
"What the fuck have you been doing lately? Watching social justice channels?" He exploded, "I'm not saying Ackroyde is to judge, I'm not saying anyone is! It's a job, Rinoa; people do it to make money and to bring something to the society. In this case, we're protecting the political figures so that someone's there to run the country!"
"Political figures? What have the 'political figures' been doing recently? Oh, there's the whole 'Galbadian President and Whores Have Party' headline from last week's papers… what else, huh?" She breathed deeply and continued, "You know, this isn't what I came here to talk about! It's my reasons for leaving the agency… why can't you just accept them?"
"Your reasons are for shit!" He snapped and then stopped abruptly, "Reasons? As in… reasons with an 's'?" He was trained to notice small insignificant details, "You only gave me one … what's the other reason?"
There was no escape; she had come here to tell him one thing in particular that concerned him in a large amount… "The other reason is the most important one… so please, don't go crazy… ok?"
"Ok…" He looked quite worried now. "Go on…"
"Well… you remember the last mission…?" She mentally scolded herself for beating around the bush.
"Yeah." A quizzical stare following.
"Well… remember that night?" Square dancing around it, she reminded herself. "You know… after the mission?"
"Y… yeah." He looked slightly flushed at the memory of 'that night'.
"Well, you know…" And she then started talking very rapidly as if she wanted to get it over with very quickly and painlessly, "There are certain biology rules you can't bend, like you have to breath once in a while to get rid of carbon dioxide and of course there are others like you have to eat and also there's this 'cause and effect' one that goes kind of like this…"
"Rinoa, Rinoa, STOP!" He stared at her silently until he finally decided to speak up, "Are you…?"
"Yeah… I am." There was a silence that ballooned up between them; it was so loud that neither could hear anything else. Suddenly she got up from the couch, "I really have to go. Bye."
His reflexes were quicker than she was as he jumped up from the couch and grabbed her by the waist before she could break into a run, "No, don't go! Wait… please?"
She didn't put up a struggle, knowing it was pretty much futile against Squall. She stayed silent, waiting for him to speak, as she had nothing left to say. He did, "Is this why you're running away?"
"Yeah, that's it. I'm just going to go to Timber, like you said, and be a journalist… maybe I'll complete my studies in sciences or something… once the baby is born. But I'm not staying here." Her body relaxed.
"Stay with me. We'll take care of this together. I could keep working for the agency and we'd get a house… or an apartment somewhere. We could… get married, even."
"Please just let me go." She begged, "You know you don't want to do this, just let me go!"
"Rinoa, I'm not losing you! I won't let you go… not unless you promise me that you aren't going to run." She didn't reply and he couldn't look directly into her eyes, "Listen, I'm willing to do this, I want to! I promise, I'll be a good husband, a good father… just whatever! Don't go…"
So she had stayed.
Sammy: And that's the end of the third chapter. I got a review that kind of struck me last time. It was from 'Id'… hey, I just wanted to say how much you made me realize that my stories really have no part before, after or during the storyline of FF8. I'm not sure why I like to place my stories in alternate universes but… I just do. Heh heh… ah well, I'm really sorry if it bugs you, but I rather keep my writing style the way it is. Anyways, yes, this is an alternate universe fanfic… like all my other ones… and so that's that. Thank you to all those who reviewed last time, and please review again!
Paperback Rider: Never thought I'd be doing this… I'm the new beta reader n_n yay. And I like it. Okay just wanted to let the world know that I'm here… Bye bye!
Ekika: Well, you (Sam) seem to have a very first hand experience with "square dancing" around questions… Meh… All the better to write a story… huh? And… um… Cool. Congrats to PbR for beta-ing… less excruciating… if you get my drift…