Chapter Eleven: People Who Say That They Knew Me…..
There are people who will say that they knew me so well
I may never go to heaven
I hope you go to hell…
Counting Crows. .Mr Robinson and His Cadillac Dream
Throughout this chapter most of Seifer's thoughts are in italics.
Not very pleased with this one.
Seifer woke up some hours later. He snagged Quistis' small and expensive phone
from the bedside table and checked the time. It was early, but already light, six am,
and a beautiful morning. The sun shone, the noise of seagulls drifted through the open
window and there was a naked woman in his bed.
Technically, of course, they were both in Quistis' bed, a fact he was sure she'd remind
him of as soon as she woke up. Seifer didn't mind. Sometimes it was the outcome that
mattered, not how you got there.
Quistis was still asleep, looking about five million times more innocent that she ever
managed when awake. Seifer didn't want to wake her for two reasons.
Firstly, because they hadn't got much sleep the night before.
Secondly, because he really needed a cigarette.
He was pretty much aware of Quistis' caustic opinion of smoking, which was that it
was an antisocial habit practised by people too old to know better and everyone else
who didn't give a damn about their state of health in ten years' time.
Seifer's opinion was that there were plenty of things that would kill you faster.
He shrugged out quietly from under the sheets and walked over to the balcony, pausing
on the way to retrieve his boxer shorts from the floor near the window. There was still
half a packet of Carcinoma Angels and a lighter in his jeans pocket.
Worse ways to start the day…
He lit up, stepped out onto the balcony and threw the packet and lighter quietly back
inside, aiming for a pile of clothes. Most of the room was covered in discarded
clothing, so it wasn't exactly a challenge. It muffled the impact of the box bouncing
to the ground, anyway, and that was all he'd wanted.
It was cold outside, early enough that the sun hadn't yet cleared the roof. Seifer
shivered and wished he had more clothes on, cupping his hands round his cigarette
like it could warm him up.
He looked down at the floor, stretched till his joints popped and then cursed as his
stitches reminded him forcibly of their presence. Quistis' blue pyjama top
decorated the boards underneath his bare feet, damp with dew and more
creased than it had probably ever been in its short and neatly folded life. Seifer
rolled it up with one heel and kicked it inside.
The cigarette smoke and the early morning breeze blew away the phantoms of
the night before, fading into a not-quite memory deep in the back of his skull.
Newly exorcised, Seifer's brain turned to other matters.
A quick glance over his shoulder confirmed that Quistis was still sleeping peacefully,
sprawled out over most of the double bed. Seifer allowed himself a brief smile.
He held the cigarette loosely between two fingers and thought about the bomb.
Technically, of course, it wasn't a bomb, but if all the electricity had been knocked
out it sounded like an explosion to him. Take out the generators and the whole
Garden went down. It didn't even have to fall with any force. Just settle and tip.
Seifer winced.
That was how he'd have done it, anyway. Back when he'd still wanted to.
There would be backups, of course. He seemed to remember checking the schematics
during the wars. Backup everything, and he was still trying to work out just how the
fuck Cid hadn't known the thing flew. Not that boarding schools were particularly
aerodynamic, but the guy had designed Garden. You'd have thought he'd remembered
telling the builders to add wings. Whoever had planned the attack, they'd been good.
Whoever 'they' were. The protestors, Seifer guessed. Some stupid acronym had been
printed on their posters. CLA or something.
Not quite the bunny-hugging nice guys the newspapers had figured them for. The
protest photographs had showed old ladies and kids with sandwich boards, those
too young or too stupid or too senile to have figured out that nobody gave a rat's
ass about what they thought. And the little old women surely weren't masterminding
the attacks, not unless someone had been mixing the meds at the old folk's home again.
It's a good job I'm dead, otherwise they'd probably blame me……...
He scratched irritably at an insect bite on his leg. The flies round Hana might not be up
to Bite Bug standard, but they didn't half itch.
CLA, huh?
Children's Liberation Front, his ass. Motherfuckers.
His cigarette was almost burned down to the filter. Seifer stubbed it out on the
peeling wood of the balcony, ignoring the red-and-black striped No Smoking
logo of a sign tacked to the wall. He was fast coming to the conclusion that he
didn't have any socially acceptable hobbies, not if you erased smoking, drinking,
fighting and his new number one, sleeping with Quistis.
He smiled through the smoke.
There was movement from back in the room, which Seifer ignored, registering it as
Quistis getting up. He knew her well enough now to accept that she had the temper
of a T-Rexaur in the morning before she'd had her first two cups of coffee. Seifer
was still too sore from the fight to risk pissing her off more.
Maybe later.
He sighed, and the movement sparked off a hacking early morning cough he tried
to muffle in his hands. His lungs felt raw.
It had all been so simple back in Garden. All the resources you could want, magic
and money for the asking, light entertainment provided in the form of hapless newbies
to haze. In the real world, it was different.
Especially when you were supposed to be dead.
When you go right down to it, he supposed, he was angry.
He was angry that they'd dared to harm something he'd always regarded as his.
If anyone was going to take Garden out, it was going to be him.
Angry, too, that the damage was hurting someone he was doing his best not to
regard as his.
He reached inside the door for more cigarettes and almost bumped into Quistis,
coming the other way. She was slightly pale, wrapped in her dressing gown and clasping a sheaf of paper.
"What's up?"
Seifer could guess. He snagged the Carcinoma Angels anyway, behind her back.
Quistis was too distracted to notice.
"Trouble." Quistis' face was grim. She spread the newspapers out into a fan,
letting him see the titles. There were seven in all, four fairly reputable major dailies,
the rest tabloids. All of them featured archive pictures of the Gardens prominently
on their front covers. Seifer noticed Balamb's airy blue buildings, Galbadia's larger
squat silhouette and Trabia's mountains.
"You went out already?"
Quistis shrugged, her body language unhappy. "I get them delivered to the lobby."
She held a paper out to him.
Seifer shrugged and took it. He hadn't expected good news, but the headline was still a surprise.
'Self Defence Claim By Garden Strike Team.'
Interesting.
He leant the paper on the balcony and selected a cigarette, holding it loosely between
his teeth while he tried to get the lighter to strike. "Sure. They bombed the biggest
private military force on the planet in self-defence?"
"Oh, it gets better." Quistis smiled humourlessly. She held up a few more headlines.
'CLA Claim SeeD Strike'
'Rebels say Chaos Justified.'
Quistis pulled her hair back with one hand and tucked it neatly inside her bathrobe
collar. "They're saying that we attacked them first, so they were perfectly within
their rights in sabotaging the Gardens."
"Attacked them how?" Seifer asked. He threw the cigarette packet back inside,
cupping his hands around his second smoke of the morning.
Quistis shrugged and joined him at the balcony. She leant her elbows on the creaking
sill and lowered her head between them. "We sent a strike force, apparently. Only
minor damage." Her voice drifted up from between her arms.
Seifer ran his hand up the back of her neck and absently tucked the tag into the back
of her towelling robe. "Because of some pizzas? No, hold on, Leonhart ran an op for
free? They've got to be kidding. Everyone knows you've got to pay Garden a bloody
fortune just to get out of bed in the morning. "
"But they've told the papers we've attacked them, and people believe what they read."
Quistis' voice was patient. "Despite the matter of a little thing called 'provable evidence.'"
Despite her crisp turns of phrase, she sounded almost defeated. She'd slipped back into
teacher mode, voice loaded with so much irony Seifer blinked. "And they didn't want
you back?"
"SeeD's bigger than just one person. "
"Sure. Squall and all the people on his speed dial." Seifer said, nastily. "People can't be
believing this? Damn, you lot were flavour of the month not so long ago." He turned to
face her. "Where's the story?"
"The tabloids love it. 'Plucky resistance faction going up against the largest military
organisation on the planet.' They're eating it up. Everyone adores the underdogs."
She held up another paper. "Remember?"
Seifer scowled and squinted at the title through the haze of cigarette smoke and early
morning sun. It read, in ornate faux antique print 'The Planet. The News That They
Don't Want You To See.'
Quistis tore the front page in two. "And it's all the more interesting because it's
completely fictional."
Seifer absently stubbed his cigarette into the centre of the page. Quistis dropped
the paper as it burned and then stamped on the embers with her furry slippers, which sizzled.
"You should cut down."
Her request met with silence. She put her hands on her hips and tried again.
"Do you know what your lungs look like?"
Seifer squinted at her in the bright morning light and then turned back to the view "No.
Neither do you, despite everyone's best efforts. Just give it a rest, okay?"
Quistis aimed a swipe at his head with the papers that knocked the cigarette from his mouth,
a minor bonus. He made a grab for the tiny paper cylinder and missed. The cigarette rolled
down the balcony's slightly sloping wooden floor, slipped through the cracks and disappeared.
Turning away through the patio doors, Quistis casually flipped the nearest pile of clothing
over his cigarette packet and lighter, hoping to toss the whole lot when Seifer wasn't
looking. "You're really a pain in the neck sometimes."
"You love it." Seifer stared regretfully after his lost cigarette, which was happily
smouldering among the rhododendrons.
"There's a time and a place, and this is not it. I want to check the ratings."
"Ratings?"
"On the TV."
Quistis settled herself in the bed and flicked the TV on. It was an expensive flatscreen
model, out of place in the general ye-olde-lodging-house ambience. It took up half the
wall and had a quite impressive range of pay-per-view pornography channels.
Seifer trailed in out of the balcony and settled beside her, leaning back onto the pillows
and looking entirely too comfortable. He stirred the clothes round with one bare foot
and asked "Seen my smokes?"
Quistis thumbed a button. "I haven't any idea. Filthy habit anyway. I repeat, you should
quit."
"Yeah, yeah."
She turned away and watched as the screen displayed bar charts and graphs. "Look. The
blue stack's the pro-Garden faction, and that tall red pile is voting for the rebels."
Seifer shrugged. "The blue's still higher."
"It's all relative, Trust me, Xu's going to be tearing her hair out over this."
"No great loss, then."
Xu had never had a good opinion of Seifer. The feeling had been mutual throughout their
time at Garden.
Quistis sighed. Her friend would probably have seven kinds of fit if she learned that
Quistis was actually dating Seifer Almasy. The most favourable opinion of Seifer she'd
ever heard from Xu's lips was 'He's an arrogant asshole who's going to get someone
killed one day, and if Hyne has any justice it'll be him."
Seifer's reply had been unprintable.
She hid a smirk and picked up the handset again, searching the news channels randomly
for more information. In quick succession she found bad comedy, advertisements,
reality TV shows, sitcoms, and yet more bad comedy, surfing channels like a Waikiki
Beach pro searching for a wave.
"Hyne, give me some news."
Seifer, behind her, folded his arms behind his head and leant back on the bed. He
stroked his foot absentmindedly up Quistis's spine in a way that was quite distracting.
"I though you weren't watching smut….oh, never mind, it's just Leonhart…"
"Where?" Quistis hit the back button.
"That interview. It's got to be him with that hair." He gestured impatiently. "Back."
Quistis stabbed with one finger at the remote control and then paused as Squall's
distinctive profile came into view.
He was standing outside the gates of Balamb, wearing full uniform and looking vaguely
uncomfortable in a neutral kind of way. A female reporter faced him, chattering on
camera into a microphone.
"This should be fun." Seifer muttered from behind her. He'd stopped stroking one foot
up and down her spine and had moved forwards to sit on the edge of the bed with her.
Quistis irrationally missed the gesture. She held one finger up to her lips anyway. The
sound wasn't that loud and she wanted to hear what was going on.
On screen, Squall turned towards the camera and the woman immediately quieted.
It didn't surprise Quistis. Squall commanded respect because of who and what he was
(respectively the commander of Balamb, the hero of the sorceress's wars, and the son
of Esthar's current president.)
"So it isn't in fact true that you launched an attack on the CLF?" the woman was asking
"Negative."
"Can you repeat that?"
It was almost amusing watching Squall try his honest best to be social. He paused.
Seifer mimed 'Whatever' at the screen.
"We believe that they have some kind of personal vendetta."
"But surely they aren't really a threat to such a large organisation?"
"We are attempting to liase with the group as soon as possible. My PR officer will
keep you updated."
A small insert of Rinoa flashed up on the screen. The presenter pasted a large smile
on her face and began a quick aside. "For all those listeners who aren't familiar with
current events, Miss Rinoa Heartilly, the daughter of General Caraway of Galbadia,
is currently acting as Balamb's press officer. Miss Heartilly is the fiancée of Commander
Leonhart and was recently voted ' Best Dressed Of Balamb' in our prestigious TV
awards! The.."
"I don't see what that's got to do with-" On-Screen Squall said. He sounded slightly
angry. The presenter, who wore a large white badge reading 'Hello My Name is Truda'
and little else, looked alarmed. She tried another tack, gesturing at Balamb's impressive
Frisbee-shaped energy field. "Is the Garden ready to fly, Commander?"
Squall didn't look any more pleased. Seifer grinned.
"Don't think his anger therapy's helping much."
Quistis gritted her teeth. " He isn't having anger therapy."
"Maybe he should."
"You're hardly qualified to criticise."
"Quiet, Instructor." Seifer put the accent on the last word. "You're missing the interview."
Not so much missing as completely lost, Quistis thought as she looked back at the
screen. The presenter was winding up her spiel and Squall had disappeared. She spoke
into an outsize microphone and shielded her hair from the whirl of Garden's energy fields.
"We hope to have interviews with the commanders of the other two Gardens later in the
day. I'm Truda Mostu, and I've just been interviewing Squall Leonhart of Balamb! "
The screen faded out with a montage of Garden's logo, portraits of Squall and Rinoa and
a blocky red glyph that could only have been the signature of the Children's Liberation
Front. "This was brought to you by Breakfast After Noon, the news programme that
everyone knows is the best! Our news is your news! We'll be right back after the
weather report! "
The set blanked out, playing a little jingle accompanied by cartoon dancing hamsters.
"No use, no work, no information -for mindless chatter, we're your station! Back
in one second for more early morning fun!!"
Quistis reached for the control ad flicked the TV off, checking the time before the screen
snow crashed. It was eight thirty, too early for the free breakfast and too late to go
back to sleep.
Seifer considered the news and fast came to the conclusion that the papers had been more
helpful. He was sprawled across the bed, still wearing his boxers and wondering with the
other half of his mind - the half that wasn't worrying about Quistis- just where his cigarettes
had disappeared to.
He reviewed the facts, and would have been surprised to learn that Quistis was doing the
exact same thing.
One. Someone's attacking Garden. All of the Gardens, which meant they've got
some problem with mercenaries as a whole. Can't think why…
Two; they're attempting to justify their actions by saying that we attacked first.
Three. They're almost certainly lying.
Quistis reached for a pen. Seifer gazed with interest over her back as she picked up a
highlighter from the floor beside the bed, wrote four words in lemon yellow ink and then
underlined the sentence.
What do they want?
She stared at the paper for a few seconds. Her eyes were so intense Seifer half-thought
that the writing would burst into flames, but she just crumpled the note in one smooth
movement and then threw it blindly into a corner of the room. She drew her knees up
tightly to her chest, arms wrapped round her feet, effectively blocking him out with her
body language. Her chin was rested on her knees, mouth set into an angry line with the
little frown between her eyes that meant she was trying to work something out.
Seifer had never liked being ignored. He wrapped one arm round her shoulders and pulled
Quistis closer. She was warm against him, almost too warm in the rising morning heat, but
he refused to let go. He moved imperceptibly closer and ran his tongue down the back of
her neck.
Surprisingly, Quistis didn't brush him away. She reached one hand up to her shoulder and
started absently stroking his hand in a way that made Seifer wonder how much she was
thinking about anything. Her other arm reached round his back to reciprocate the hug.
It brushed over his stitches on the way to his shoulder. Seifer couldn't stifle a wince.
He tensed unconsciously and regretfully watched as Quistis flowed out of his arms like a cat.
The regret intensified as he realised that she really wasn't wearing any clothes underneath her bathrobe.
"Sorry. I'll get some antiseptic."
"It's all right." He felt suddenly awkward. "I.."
He wasn't sure exactly what he meant to say, but suddenly it didn't matter.
There was a long knock on the door, followed by a hushed whisper of conversation. They
both froze, almost guiltily.
"Who's that?" Seifer said.
Quistis shrugged. She got up off the bed and angled her head to peer through the tiny fish-eye
lens set into the hotel door. The doorknob rattled sharply. Quistis's hand moved to the lock
and then just as quickly moved away again. She swung back to Seifer.
"You have to leave."
"Now?" Seifer asked. He reached for clothes. Quistis was already on her knees, frantically
trying to tidy up the floor. She pushed the lighter and cigarettes into Seifer's arms and then
followed it with a pile of assorted clothes, a miniature peace offering.
"Now."
"Uh, how? Who is it anyway?"
"Old friends." Quistis didn't need to elaborate further.
The doorknob rattled harder, this time accompanied by a muffled shout from outside the door.
Seifer dumped the clothes on the bed and sorted through them, hoping to find his jeans.
Instead he came up with several items belonging to Quistis that would have merited a closer
inspection under different circumstances.
"Seifer, last night was great……but could you please dress faster?" Quistis whispered.
She considered. "Actually, don't bother leaving. Just hide."
Seifer glanced round the room. His eyes slid over the bathroom and the open window and
then went back to the door. The banging had stopped, to be replaced by frantic whispering
and repeated taps.
"Where?"
She pointed to the dresser. "Wardrobe."
Thankfully the wardrobe was over six feet tall, fake antique peasant style like all the other
furniture in Quistis' room. She thrust a bundle of clothes into Seifer's arms and slammed
the door.
Seconds later there was the sound of a key turning in the look
It was dark inside the wardrobe. Quistis didn't have many clothes, but because she was
Quistis what she did have she'd hung up neatly. Apart from that, it looked as if someone
had being using it as a storage space, there seemed to be half a dozen moth-eaten fur coats
hung up right at the back.
As wardrobes went, it was okay, but then he hadn't been in many.
Seifer tried to straighten himself out and nearly garrotted himself with a coathanger, trying
frantically to stop their wire frames from banging together. Holding his breath in the
close hot blackness, he tried very hard not to make a sound, and listened as best he could.
There was the sound of another key and the creak of the heavy door opening.
"Quistis!"
Didn't he recognise that voice? It had been a long time, but there was just something,
a faint hint of too many E numbers, that reminded him..
Reminded him……
Selphie.
Oh, great.
"Selphie! Rinoa!. Hi. I was just sleeping in!"
Was it his imagination that made Seifer think there was a slight edge of embarrassment to
Quistis' voice? Was she embarrassed because of him, or was it the whole situation that
she found awkward?
Seifer suspected the latter. Rinoa's happy optimism and aura of nauseating cheerfulness was
sure to put Quistis on edge, and Selphie was the human equivalent of candy floss. Four
thoughts raced through his head in quick succession, maybe because it wasn't a nice place
to spend any amount of time.
She has her boyfriend(sort of) locked in a wardrobe while talking to two friends who
think he's dead and , who, not too recently, were trying to make him as deceased as
possible, and vice versa.
Of COURSE it's awkward! What do you think?
Plus, this is Quistis. For her being Garden's resident Untouchable Ice-Queen isn't a
act, it's a vocation.
If this ever gets out, I'm going to be gutted by the Trepies…
"You brought Angelo! How ..nice!"
Rinoa.
Oh, shit.
I don't think she'd mind about Quistis..well, maybe she would have if this was before
the wars, and before she found True Love with Leonbrat,..and before I tried to feed
her to the embodiment of evil…
It would never have worked out, anyway.
From the darkness of the wardrobe, he wondered what Rinoa looked like now. There was
a very faint line of light coming from a crack between the doors, where they didn't quite fit.
He inched over to it and squinted through the gap, smelling old mothballs, sweat and
washing powder, furniture polish and carpet cleaner.
Rinoa had her back to the wardrobe. Her black hair was even longer, if possible, hanging loose
to her waist in a gloriously impractical sweep. Selphie was wearing her favourite yellow mini-dress,
standing hip-tilted nearer the door. She'd cut her hair shorter, a style that didn't suit her.
Quistis was facing them both, seated neatly on the bed. She looked only vaguely flustered, with
no trace of the hint of embarrassment Seifer thought he'd heard a few seconds earlier. But then
that was Quistis, the consummate actress.
To his disappointment she was fully dressed, wearing some kind of long green skirt which stuck
to her legs in interesting ways and made Seifer wonder why he hadn't seen her in it before. Her
legs were crossed, one on top of another and she locked her hands round one knee
unconsciously as she talked.
"Didn't expect to see you here."
Selphie giggled. "Surprise!" She clasped her hands behind her back and rocked back and forth.
"Squall said we could come and see you! We've got some kind of letter but he said not to give
it you until we were leaving." She tapped the side of her nose with one yellow-varnished fingernail.
"It's a secret!"
"Is it?" Quistis' voice could have cut paper.
Rinoa moved in front of the doors, stroking Angelo absently with one hand. As usual, the
dog was curled up against her legs, staring adoringly up at her mistress.
Seifer mentally swore as his view of the room was reduced to a stripe of black hair, blue
dress and dog fur. He hoped to Hyne Angelo didn't pick up any kind of scent. Last time
he'd seen Rinoa, or rather, the last time he'd been on speaking terms with her, the dog
and him had reached a kind of multilateral disarmament.
"We knew you'd be getting bored."
The voice was Rinoa's,
"So what exactly have you been up to anyway?" That was Selphie.
Quistis said "Nothing much."
Rinoa moved away from the doors and the room swam back into Seifer's vision. He held
his clothes up with one hand and absently scratched the back of his neck with the other.
The fur coats were getting on his nerves.
Selphie had wandered over to Quistis' computer. She gave Quistis a look of imploring
invitation, typing the password and login number into the machine with a blithe unconcern.
"Oooh! Snake! I love Snake!"
Quistis rolled her eyes. "Selphie, you installed it. Remember? When you were telling me to
have fun?"
"Did I? Well, you must have had it. Fun, I mean." Selphie settled down onto the chair,
crossed her ankles and placed the computer neatly on her lap, pressing keys with hyperactive
amusement. Quistis sighed.
Rinoa shrugged.
Selphie ignored them both and tilted the computer on her lap madly, talking to the machine
and shouting epithets at it furiously when the game failed to go as she'd planned.
"How was the mission?" Quistis said politely.
Rinoa frowned." Okay. He wouldn't let me take Angelo, though. You know what he's like.
He can be so strict sometimes. …" She smiled slightly and flicked her long hair back.
Strict? And you like it…
Anally retentive fighting-by-numbers asshole….
"He's so hard on himself. I think he's worried about his job…"
He's the fucking headmaster! What's he going to do, fire himself?
The wardrobe was stiflingly stuffy. Seifer shifted, trying to manoeuvre himself into a
position that didn't feel as if someone was trying to remove his head with a spoon. He
eventually settled for a cramp-inducing half-crouch, which fixed his eyes firmly on the
crack in the door and his body in a position any contortionist would have envied.
Quistis was still sitting on the bed.
What the hell are you doing? Get them out of there. And let me out of here. You mad?
Is that it? Shit, did I keep you awake that long last night? It always used to freak
Rinoa out….
I'm going to suffocate.
Quistis gaze fell on the newspaper of last night, left sprawled at the foot of her bed. Seifer
could almost see the gears in her head start to move.
No! Put it down! Make them leave!
He had a horrible thought.
Worse, don't fuck off and leave me here! The coats smell like little old ladies. And
that's just creepy.
"How's Garden?" Quistis asked.
Seifer swore into the hot, dusty darkness of the closet.
"It's fine." Rinoa said. "There's the CLA, but Squall and Cid are trying to liase with them,
find out what they want. They were just lucky, sounds like. "
"Really?"
Rinoa closed her eyes." Really. They got in contact with us and made an appointment to
discuss their situation." She spoke with absolute confidence. "It'll work out."
Seifer felt the hackles stand up on the back of his neck, a shiver that had absolutely nothing
to do with the furs. He knew only too well what that kind of connection was like.
"Rinoa! !That's freaky!" Selphie shook a finger at Rinoa, glancing up from her game. She
held out a hand, wiggling her fingers at Angelo, who sat regally next to Rinoa and ignored
her. "Damn! I lost my save."
Rinoa didn't seem to be offended. "Who else would mess with the Gardens? We're
stronger now then ever. And I'm doing such a great job with the PR.."
Yeah? So good people try to crash your base for no reason at all…..
"Just a bunch of crackheads with bees in their bonnet again." Selphie said reassuringly.
"We should let them have a tour round the school." Rinoa said. "We could give out freebies."
What? One assassination with every five hostile takeovers? Get real. You always
were a dreamer.
Maybe that's why we got along…..
Quistis smiled. She picked the paper up from the floor and riffled through it, tearing out
every page that didn't mention Garden and rolling them into small balls for Angelo to
catch. "Good point."
"And then we should lock them in the training centre…" Selphie said.
I knew there was something I liked about Selphie.
"That would be ..wrong" Rinoa said carefully.
Selphie swung a leg and smiled innocently "We could let them out afterwards…".
"There wouldn't be anything left."
"And your point was?"
"Selphie!"
If I wasn't sleeping with Quistis, and if Selphie didn't have such crappy taste in men
and you know, the hair and the dress, and the personality, I think I'd be in love.
Always knew she was evil, deep down.
Or at the very least, insane.
"Anyway, I'm sure we have lots more interesting things to discuss." Selphie didn't look
up from her computer game. "Like why Quistis has a man's sock on the floor……."
She slammed the lid shut, smiling brilliantly round at both of the other girls.
"What?" Rinoa sounded faintly surprised. "I thought you were looking a bit more..relaxed.."
Seifer groaned mentally as he watched Quistis attempt to kick the sock under the bed with
one bare foot. Angelo darted forwards, gripped the offending article of clothing firmly
between her jaws and marched proudly back to Rinoa, tail waving with the pleasure of a
job well done. Quistis almost forgot herself enough to make a grab for the sock and then
folded her arms in her lap, blushing furiously.
Weird. They finally made Quistis go red.
She spoke carefully, each word measured. "I think we should go and get some breakfast."
" Tell us!" Rinoa took the sock from Angelo's jaws. Dog saliva had done nothing to make it
any more appealing.
"Quistis's got a boooyfriend." Selphie gloated.
"It's about time." Rinoa dropped the sock again. Angelo happily snatched it up and settled
down into a corner, jaws working furiously as she ripped long trails of yarn from what had,
until recently, been a piece of clothing.
Hey! Stupid dog! That's my fucking sock! I only have three!
"What's that supposed to mean?" Quistis looked cornered.
"It means," Selphie said "that you've needed to get laid for a very long time…"
Seifer grinned in the dark, forgetting about the sock.
Ohh, you have noo idea….
"Selphie, that was a rhetorical question. It's just a sock. The cleaner must have left it there. "
Quistis sounded slightly guilty.
Seifer could have told her that it just wasn't going to work, but by the tone of her voice, she
knew it already.
Selphie could scent romance faster than Angelo.
"You can tell us! You don't have to be ashamed……."
"I'm NOT ashamed."
I would be, if I were going out with me. Compared to Rinoa, who's going out with a
guy who's on lunchboxes, for Hyne's sake. Bloody hero. There's probably women
all over the place who'd gut their own mothers for the chance to fondle his
discarded underwear…
"Boyfriends are good." Rinoa looked round. "Angelo! Stop that! You'll choke yourself!
I don't want to have to take you to the vet again."
"Boyfriends are great!" Selphie spun round on Quistis's desk chair, her expression changing
to a pout. " I miss my Irvy."
Quistis crossed her arms. "Selphie.."
Seifer smirked to himself in the darkness and then squashed it as he remembered that any
one of the women in front of him could probably kick his ass, what with him unarmed and
only wearing pants. He recalled Selphie and her nunchucks all too well: she could be a
vicious little bitch when she wanted to be. Even Rinoa, with those stupid blast edge things
he'd laughed at, back in Timber…
The conversation moved on, around him.
Rinoa sat down on the bed next to Quistis. "No. Squall's great. Squall's good. I wish he
wouldn't wear so many belts though. He doesn't need them."
"Did you ask him why?" Quistis asked curiously.
"Yeah. He changed the subject. It's not like he needs them to keep his trousers up or
anything…….."
He needs then to hold up his suspenders.
Rinoa waved her dog's lead. "Come on, Angelo. Leave that horrid sock alone.."
"Talking about changing the subject…..." Selphie rolled over onto the bed. Folding her
hands demurely in front of her she placed her chin on her wrists and asked innocently,
"So- what's he like?"
There was a sudden silence.
It was broken by Quistis taking a deep breath. "I don't ask you what Irvine's like."
Selphie smiled widely. "He's my sunshine."
Well, that's a bit more PG-rated than I expected from her……
Quistis tapped a finger on her chin. "It must be the chaps."
"Oh no. I like him much better with them off." Selphie coaxed Angelo onto the bed,
pried the remains of the sock delicately from her jaws and threw the remains into the
wastebasket. "Silly dog. You'll poison yourself. You don't know.." She gave a sideways
glance at Quistis "where it's been. Rinoa, what do you think?"
Rinoa looked thoughtful, a small frown creasing her perfect face. "Well, the only two
boyfriends I had were Squall…and Seifer, I guess…….."
Quistis's face went resolutely blank.
In the wardrobe, Seifer swore under his breath.
Selphie smiled elfishly "Oh! I forgot! I forgot you used to know Seifer…….."
Please kill her.
"How did they, you know, compare?"
Screw Hyne. I'll kill her myself. If I wasn't wearing only boxers, supposed
to be dead and wanted in four different countries…
Quistis covered her mouth and glanced towards the wardrobe. Seifer saw a
fleeting flicker of amusement in her blue eyes. She started to laugh and then
turned the snicker deftly into a cough.
"What's the matter?"
"Just..choking……."
"So come on, tell!" Selphie encouraged. "I'm deadly serious!"
Quistis groaned. Seifer echoed it, quietly, wishing he had magic junctioned so that
he could cast Silence. Maybe a miracle would happen, and Rinoa would be
spontaneously struck dumb.
Maybe not.
Rinoa giggled. "Squall likes to be on the bottom. Seifer liked to be on top."
Shit!
I don't want to know how Leonhart fucks.
I don't want to know if he fucks better than me.
Quistis had gone a pale shade of pink. "That's…..interesting.."
Seifer groaned again.
No matter how much he tried he wasn't going to black out on purpose. He really
didn't want to know this.
He wasn't going to be offered a chance in the matter.
Seifer rested his head against the doorframe and thought very hard about stuffing his
one remaining sock in his ear. The rest of his clothes were bundled beneath Quistis' bed,
all except for the sock and his T shirt. Maybe he could stuff the sock in his mouth.
Poisoning had never looked like such an attractive prospect.
The conversation continued, rolling inexorably on like a juggernaut and crushing Seifer's
never fragile self-esteem under its armoured wheels.
"So why did you guys break up?" Selphie rested both fists on her chin. "I mean, like,
when we met, you weren't going out with anyone, and then there was the Squall thing…"
The Squall thing, I like that description
"In the summer before,… before It." Rinoa had turned a faint and appealing shade of pink
Just tell her she's being nosy. Little cow.
"There's nothing much to tell." Rinoa said.
"Ohhhhh, you mean HE broke up with YOU."
"No. Nothing like that. It just kind of happened. Seifer was always Seifer, I guess. He
always used to make me feel so dumb. Naïve." she corrected. "Kind of innocent. It
was nice for a bit, but it got a bit old when he wouldn't take us seriously. "
"Sounds like Seifer." Quistis said thoughtfully.
"Yeah,….what was it. Oh yes. Something about 'bleeding heart idealist assholes' who
couldn't rescue a cow from a slaughterhouse.'"
Seifer almost slammed one hand into the door and then caught himself at the last minute.
Self -analysis? You could keep it.
Actually, that does sound kind of dumb…..
Of course I can't say that I'd do it any differently now
"Harsh, But fair." Selphie said.
"What? We did it!" Rinoa looked indignant.
"With our help." Selphie replied then, by the sound of, it realised what she'd said. "But that
was, um, a good thing. Right? 'Cause without that, you'd never have met us and you
wouldn't have met Squall….. "
"You're much better off with Squall. And he's much better off with you." Quistis said
encouragingly.
Yeah, thanks, Quistis. Who needs enemies when you've got friends?
"Yeah. You've really been good for him." Selphie was backpedalling fast, digging herself
a hole with such speed Seifer half-expected her to pop out of sight at any moment. "I
remember there was that one time when he, when Squall, painted his room black when we
were fifteen. Isn't it great, all these memory things……"
Quistis winced. "I really don't want to remember what it was like when I was fifteen."
Seifer tried out the image of Quistis as a troubled and insecure adolescent and then
discarded it. Quistis had been born with the poise of a ballerina and the killer instincts of
an angry great white shark.
You weren't that bad. Just bossy, so what else is new?
Rinoa looked interested. "What do you mean, Squall painted his room black?"
I remember that. He was chipping gloss off the wall for weeks.
Selphie smiled. "His two-month Goth phase. We don't talk about it much. I think we
were fifteen. He used to sit in his room all day listening to Nine Inch Nails and the Cure
and writing angsty self-loathing poetry."
And he dyed his hair black…
"He dyed his hair black." Quistis added. "But the clothes? Same as ever."
Rinoa said "I'll have to ask him about it."
"Do. Just don't tell him that we told you." Selphie, as usual, was busy lowering the
tone. "So what's Squall like in bed? "
Seifer shuddered as he tried unsuccessfully to wipe the image of Leonhart's underwear
from his mind. Hyne, the man wore a bolero jacket in public. The fur…and the belts….
and the leather.
At the very least-it's got to be black vinyl. Black vinyl, or panties. Or black vinyl
panties…..eurgh.…
He moved his head back to the crack in the door, reaching up automatically to muffle
the coathangers.
Rinoa flicked her hair back and shrugged. She seemed remarkably
self-possessed. "Selphie, if I try hard I can tell what he's thinking. Doesn't that tell
you something?"
"So he must be really great in…"
"Selphie!"
Ugh.. Leonhart's going to turn out to be some kind of sex god……Kill me
now….I'm sure there's more than enough volunteers…..
I'd feel much better if she'd just sit down and confess that he couldn't turn on
a lamp…
There was a short pause. Selphie went back to her game. Rinoa smiled smugly.
Quistis pointedly avoided looking at the wardrobe. Seifer tried his best to jam his
fingers in his ears all the way up to the knuckle.
Come on, Quistis, it's nine…get them out of here!
As if in response, Quistis automatically yawned and then put a hand to her mouth
"Have you two eaten?"
"Well, we had something before we came out."
"Not much." Selphie said, digging Rinoa in the ribs. "We left early. Really early."
"We thought you might be up, and we didn't want to miss you." Rinoa smiled politely.
"But you were obviously doing better things…hey, why'd you tread on my foot?"
Quistis ignored them both and said "There's an all-you-can-eat breakfast buffet
downstairs. We better go if you want some."
"Super!" Selphie punched the air, bouncing from foot to foot. She looked suddenly
crestfallen. "How much? 'Cause, we don't want to impose or anything."
"On the house. It's all-included." Quistis folded back the bedsheets. "Ready?"
"Oh, yeah.."
"Rinoa?"
Rinoa bit her nails. "Sure, I mean, if it's free. But is it all right if I leave Angelo up
here? I'm sure she wouldn't get in the way…?"
"No!"
Quistis' denial and Seifer's mental shout came at the same moment. Quistis hastened
to back it up. "They said no pets allowed…they're really strict, and the landlady's a
bit strange. Anyway, I'm sure Angelo'd love a run in the back garden. The breakfast's
on the patio, so you can watch her while we eat."
Wow. She can lie like a rug…..…
Seifer watched through the crack as Quistis casually brushed past the wardrobe key
as she left the room, slipping it casually into her pocket and unlocking in one swift motion.
The door, to their no doubt mutual relief, failed to swing open. This fault might have been
due to the catch or to the fact that Seifer was holding onto it like grim death from the inside.
Quistis slid the balcony doors closed. When you were a known neat freak, there were
some things that were expected of you, after all. She walked over to join Selphie and
Rinoa without locking them, listening carefully for any telltale sounds. There was silence
from inside the wardrobe.
Whether tactful or enraged, Quistis couldn't tell, but she suspected the latter.
That'll serve you right for getting pissed and then expecting me to clean you up…
.And for smoking everywhere. And generally making the place look untidy…..
She hesitated. Smoking….
"Rinoa?"
"Mmmm?"
"When you went out with Seifer? Didn't the smoking thing bother you?" She closed the
room door, left it unlocked and, after a minute's thought, turned the handle sign round
to "Do Not Disturb."
"What smoking thing? Seifer doesn't ..didn't," Rinoa added, after a visible effort, "..smoke."
Quistis tried hard not to blush. "Uh, sorry. Must have got messed up. With those GFs
it's hard to remember what you did yesterday."
"I thought you'd stopped using them as much." Selphie asked innocently.
"Yeah, but that was before all that stuff happened."
There was a gleam in her eye Quistis wasn't sure she liked. It could have been due to
the cigarette butts scattered over the balcony, but then again, maybe not.
Surely even Selphie, who had a treacherously good eye for small details, wouldn't be
able to notice stuff like that?
"No need to be so defensive, Quisty, " Rinoa chimed in " we know you're still the
brains of the bunch…."
Quistis tried hard not to preen, smoothing her skirt down. "We'll be late."
"Don't want that." Selphie chirped. "See you down there."
She ran off down the corridors.
"Is she going the right way?" Rinoa asked curiously.
Quistis shrugged. "I hope not. Otherwise we'll get there and there won't be anything
left. You remember who always used to beat Zell to the hotdogs? And he never
figured why they started disappearing just after Selphie joined." She started to shepherd
Rinoa in the opposite direction, towards the stairs, wondering exactly what Seifer
was doing and praying that Selphie didn't somehow run into him.
Rinoa plucked a petal from the nearest corridor flower arrangement and held it to her
nose. "She just never stops."
"Only when she sleeps. And even that's rare, now she's got Irvine to keep her
company."
"They were made for each other." Rinoa sighed. "Just like me and Squall."
Quistis tried not to vomit. "Sure. We really should be getting down to breakfast."
She took Rinoa's arm. "Selphie'll be along in a minute. We should probably
get her a plate. Or two"
Selphie caught them up in the lobby with a cry of "Bummer." and a flash of yellow
dress.
They had a pleasant and almost entirely ordinary breakfast. Selphie entertaining
them all with a number of interesting and morally dubious tales about the love life
of various Balamb cadets, most of which Quistis hadn't heard of, no matter how
hard she tried to keep up with the news. By some kind of unconscious act, they
all three avoided mentioning Garden after the first hopeful reassurances, saving
business for later. Selphie and Rinoa either didn't notice or failed to mention
how Quistis seemed so unusually nervous, shredding her serviette into tiny crumbs
of paper over the table before starting on her styrofoam cup.
It was when they were on their way back upstairs that she first noticed something
wrong. Later, she would vaguely recall that the corridor looked kind of empty
on her way up the stairs, forgetting instantly as Selphie began complaining about
the quality of the breakfast muffins.
Ten seconds later, she really wished she'd paid more attention. They'd reached
her room without incident, and Quistis, who was jumping at every little noise,
half-expecting Seifer to pop out of a door somewhere in a state of angry indignant
undress, began to relax.
She whispered a short prayer to Hyne under her breath as she opened the door.
The second of stunned silence was broken by Rinoa's scream.
"Quistis! They're beautiful!"
"Lovely." she managed between clenched teeth.
The bastard. The unprincipled, arrogant, selfish..jerk.
Seifer was so going to get it when she found him. The empty corridor suddenly made
sense. No flower vases. Or no full ones, at any rate.
The whole of Quistis' bed was covered with white roses, filling the room with scent
and leaving little damp circles of water on the crumpled sheets. It would have been
amazingly romantic, if she hadn't known exactly why Seifer had done it. Operation
Humiliate-Quistis-In-Front-Of–Her-Friends had gone off without a hitch, and the
whole thing tasted of revenge.
Oh. Hyne.
I am never, ever, going to hear the end of this.
And neither is he, if I have anything to do with it.
She gritted her teeth. Next to her, Selphie had clasped both hands and was bouncing
up and down with a huge grin on her face. "I knew it! I knew I was right!"
"No one's ever done anything that romantic for me!" Rinoa's voice was one note short
of a whine.
Selphie looked thoughtful "Well, there was this one time, you know, when I took Irvine
to see a show, and you had to dress up, in , like, underwear and things."
Rinoa and Quistis exchanged worried glances.
"and he wore my underwear. Red suspenders.."
Quistis began to hum quietly under her breath, and Rinoa moved almost imperceptibly
away from Selphie, who was, judging from her expression, on a quick cruise down
Memory Motorway.
.."gold panties. He looked lovely" She smiled brilliantly
"You didn't get….photos.. did you?" Rinoa asked cautiously
Selphie beamed. "Lots! You want to see them? I've got them at Garden."
"NO!" They spoke in unison.
Quistis' eyes roved round the room searching desperately for something to fix on.
They landed, by default, on the flowers. A corner of paper stuck out from between
two stems. She shot a surreptitious glance at Rinoa, who was wincing and blushing
simultaneously, and began to move carefully towards the bed. Rinoa's gaze followed
her in desperation and her eyes lit up like Christmas tree lights as she saw the paper.
"Quisty's got a note!"
"Love letter!" Selphie gurgled.
Quistis snatched the paper from between the wilting flowers and twisted away from
the bed, holding it at arms' length above her head as Selphie woke from her reverie
of Irvine in kinky underwear and made a grab for the note. Sometimes being tall had
its advantages. She angled it towards the light, trying to read the writing, which
turned out to be a mistake. Selphie jumped on the bed, the mattress creaking beneath
her weight and showering petals and drops of water onto the floor, snatched the note
out of Quistis' hand and disappeared into the bathroom.
The door slammed with a very final thud as Quistis's hand closed on air one inch behind
the Trabian SeeD's collar. This noise was followed by the snick of the latch shutting and
a gleeful giggle that drifted out under the door.
"Selphie! That's personal!"
The noise of unfolding paper. Quistis searched her memory desperately. Surely Seifer
wouldn't have been so stupid as to sign it? "I'll tell Irvine about what happened
at the last Graduation ball! With the champagne and the grapes on the cocktail sticks
and that first year cadet with the ginger hair!"
"He knows." Selphie's voice was a sepulchural giggle. "You shouldn't keep secrets.
It's naughty."
"Read it!" Rinoa had seated herself on the bed behind Quistis, who was on her
knees in front of the bathroom door and desperately trying to jimmy the latch.
"Don't defend me or anything. I'll remember this" Quistis snapped, uncomfortably
aware that her ice-queen façade was melting fast. "Dammit, Selphie!"
Remember, calm, unavailable ice princess..calm unavailable..
"Dear Quistis" A giggle.
Screw it. Quistis gave the door an unrepentant boot, cheeks flaming in a blush that
seemed to work its way up to her face in a great red tide. She was going to cut his
heart out with a spoon.
Selphie's voice was replete with satisfaction. "The night of passion we spent was
amazing, my darling lady. Where did you learn all those things? We must have
kept the whole hotel up way past midnight so I'll leave you to get some rest with
a token of my pure and undying love. I'm thinking of you, sweetheart.
xxx.
PS- I didn't know you were double-jointed."
Rinoa collapsed behind her onto the bed in a cloud of giggles and white rose petals
as hysterical laughter drifted from the bathroom. Quistis clenched her fists, face bright red.
Sometimes murder was just too good.
BAM.
A knock at the door. Sighing, Quistis went to open it and stared straight into the
uniformed pigeon chest of the hotel porter.
"Miss Trepe? There have been several unaccountable thefts from the public areas
on this floor. Did you hear anything suspi…."
The porter's voice tailed off as he looked over Quistis' shoulder into the room.
Rinoa was sprawled out over the bed, face bright red with laughter, like a particularly
modern fairytale princess. As they watched, Quistis with an expression of horrified shock
and the porter in amazed and incredulous titillation, she screamed and jumped up,
showering petals like confetti and with rose stalks hooked to her skirt.
" Quistis, do you know these things have thorns?!….Oh. Hi." Rinoa gave a little wave,
smiling winningly. Quistis sighed, eying the trail of flowers, petals and water spread over
the bedsheets and floor.
"I think you better come to reception, madam"
Hey everyone(all four people who are going to read this anyway). Not much time
tonight( damn the coursework) so here goes:
Amber Tinted( Quistis says he was a screwed up kid 'beyond troubled' or something,
in the game.), breaker-one (thanks: ) ), DBZ Fanfiction Queen( the infamous Seifer/Edea
fic is coming on (hehe); currently am skating round bad slash. It will be posted when I've
finished it, which is going to be a while yet.), ghost182( what was the question again?)
mana angel (yeah, the dreams were just me having fun writing ficbits and then wondering
where I could shove them in. ), nynameve77( fp.com? Give me the addy and I'll go
read it.) Quistis88 (Yeah, I know. Poor Fanon Seifer. But the dreams are just so much
damn fun!) seventhe (I only drink with my father. He's a bad influence, plus, he buys.)
sulou (The dreams seemed like a good idea at the time. Before I read David Mack's
Kabuki, which had some awesome flashback prison points I just wish I'd though of
first. Ah well. That's why he writes amazingly beautiful successful comics. And I don't.)
Peace out
kate