Author's Notes: Yo ho! Welcome to the eleventh part of my ever so slowly growing story. To exit the chapter, I strongly encourage you to leave me a review. And I am terribly sorry for the delay but with Christmas come exams. And since you are probably familiar with the dilemmas of projects, tests and papers, please don't exercise your anger on a simple student such as myself. Note that I said simple and not innocent.

Enjoy!

Chapter 11: Explanations, Memories And The Start Of A Promising Weekend

Rinoa's POV

Call me what you will but it won't mean anything if you don't know the story behind it all. Fact is there are only three people who truly know of what happened to me all those years ago.

As a child, my mother died in an accident. I was depressed. I felt that I had lost my one source of happiness and comfort.

My father tried to make it better by buying me ponies and dolls and what would've made me happier before she died. But it never worked. I wouldn't touch my dinner; I'd locked myself in my room and cry myself to sleep instead. Yeah. I was only five. I wasn't allowed to see how it happen then and it made my grief ten times larger. Ten times that would consume whole.

One day, my dad forced me out of my room and said that we would spend bonding time together. I started by crying. He was suggesting that we do something without my mom and it was to take place outside of my base of refuge.

When I had cried so much that my throat was sore and I hadn't any more tears to cry, he strapped me into the car and drove us downtown to catch a matinee of Alice In Wonderland. The play was really well done but it didn't feel right without mommy there to whisper faults and humorous comments in my ear. Dad just sat there, staring at the set, probably waiting for it to be over with.

After the play, we went to McDonald's for lunch. Ronald McDonald tried to hug me but I screamed in stead. Dad had to apologize to the guy inside by saying that I had a great fear of clowns.

We had to find a seat that was as far away from Ronald as possible- yes, I am on a first name basis with him now. We sat beside the window closets to the door. It would take more than a clown to scare me off from my favorite restaurant. I was five remember?

He sat me down as he went to order our food. He was expecting that I'd eat. Eat, I did. When he returned with the food, two weeks of not eating anything soon caught up with me. The chicken nuggets were open prey and I had to eat.

Within three seconds, they were gone and I'm willing to bet my life that my dad noticed. I'm also very sure that he was inwardly scolding himself for not trying McD's earlier. I could tell by the constipated look on his face.

After lunch, we went to the local theme park and it cheered me up a lot. However much fun the merry-go-round was, deep down in the pit of my stomach, something didn't feel right without my mom. A tiny voice in my head told me that my mother was never coming back. Another told me to eat; it would make me feel better.

We left the park before suppertime and dad bought me an ice cream. It was wonderful, so chocolaty and cold. It was to be my downfall.

Day after day after day after day all I would eat was McDonald's and ice cream. I didn't go outside to play; I stayed inside with my dolls. One by one, I drove my friends away. I was inflating to the size of a blimp and it was more than their naïve little minds could handle. By my eighth birthday, I was alone.

One dad, my dad told me that we were going to move to Esthar. He was transferred there and he thought that it would me some good to get a change of scenery. We were to move to a nice little cheery neighborhood, right across the Leonheart's.

I remember the first time that I ever met them. I remember everything, right down to the very last strand of hair.

It was a beautiful summer's day in July. The sun was beating down on the town and almost everyone was in their pool, lounging around, drinking drinks from coconut cups with little umbrellas to stop the sun from evaporating the liquid. Or at least that's how I pictured them.

My father and I spent the day unpacking the boxes that littered the house. The cardboard cubes were stacked one on top of the other, hiding the empty alls. I was ten years old and I didn't know why, of all places, we had to move to the desert.

We were unpacking the kitchen apparel when the doorbell rang. My father left to answer the door but neither of us were dressed in anything that would make a good first impression.

Dad wore his Guns 'n Roses tee shirt with "Here today, Gone to Hell tomorrow. GNFR" (Guns 'n Fucking Roses) with cut-off jean shorts. As for myself, my hair was tied in a ponytail, a vain effort to keep my hair out of my face. I wore a tee shirt that proclaimed that "Shit happens; what can you do about it?" and shorts. We were two peas in a profane pod.

When my dad answered the door, I saw a poster family: a mother, a father, and two boys. All were nicely dressed. They unleashed ethereal white smiles upon my father without warning.

I stood behind my father, looking at them curiously when Mrs. Loire spoke up.

"Hi. My name is Raine and this is my husband Laguna. These are our two sons, Squall and Jordan. We live right across the street and we'd like to sat 'Welcome to the neighborhood.'" She smiled again.

I saw my father smile out of the corner of my eye. Then he stuttered.

"Well, uh… That's very kind of you. Um… my name's James Caraway- I don't usually stutter this much… you just caught me off guard- and this is my daughter Rinoa."

On cue, his hand reached behind him, latched on to my arm and wrenched me out to face the poster.

The moment I came into view, I saw the two boy's smiles falter. They were two normal boys with both parents and still had their best friends.  I understood that I didn't look like anything that would grace their vision everyday.

Nobody noticed the expressions on the boys' faces, as they were all preoccupied with talking to each other. What they spoke of continues to baffle me because it what parents spoke of amongst themselves.

I didn't show it but deep down inside, it stung. It hurt. It was pain beyond belief. I felt unloved. I felt alone. I felt uncared for. It was rejection at its unkind hour.

Sure, my father loved me at the time but it wasn't the same. I wanted to be accepted by people my age but at the mere sight of me, people's eyes shifted, smiles faltered and they tried to look away. Occasionally, some yelled mean things at me like, "Cut down on the cream puffs!" or whispered things like "Look out for the blob!" These people cost me years of psychiatric help. By the age of fifteen, I had seen more psychiatrists than the amount of CD's I owned (FYI: I had an entire room dedicated to my collection).

But that day marked me. I never forgot it. It foreshadowed what was to come at school. It left me no hope. I knew it. I was 5'0" and 300 pounds.

After a year of torment at school, I had decided that I ought to try shedding a few pounds. I wrote myself a schedule: a morning jog before school and one after, twenty push-ups, sit-ups, side-bends, curls and relaxation.

The first day I decided to cut the jogging as to save the neighbors from the sight of jiggling fat. I also decided that twenty was too much, so I cut it to ten.

After three days, I concluded that I simply didn't have the time for it. So, for another year, I endured the torment. By next summer, Caraway was transferred back to Deling, so I left Esthar with unpleasant memories with no one to say goodbye to who'd actually give a shit about me.

In Deling, I signed up for an aerobics class, got a personal trainer and a treadmill. My father and I said goodbye to all the fatty-foods and the results slowly began to show.

At first, dear ol' dad was glad. After the first twenty pounds, he ceased to care. The more weight I lost, the less he cared. He did try to salvage our relationship but it didn't work His work had swamped him and I was only second on his list of priorities. As an attempt, he gave me a job at the company saying that we'd see more of each other that way. He gave me a job as his personal assistant. More like personal slave. As time passed on, the more I became irritated at the mere sight of him.

With the job came Squall. I never admitted to anyone about the crush I had on him… Mainly because there was no one to tell. A few days ago, those feelings that I thought were long gone resurfaced and my attempt to them away was to push him away.

But it's not working. He's always on my mind. Even now as I get ready to go supervise the time trials. I picked out a black skirt and a light blue tee shirt. I know that it will attract attention but that is not my main concern.

My heels clicked the wooden stairs of the staircase, announcing that I was coming down. I saw Caraway still down stairs, reading his paper, sipping coffee. His eyebrows were furrowed, an indication of anger, disgust, thought and/or displeasure.

"I received a very interesting call this morning." He said, never once taking his eyes off the paper in front of him.

"Yeah? What was it about? Or am I not allowed to know?" I asked bitterly. Inside, I knew it was probably about me.

"Actually, it does concern you. It's about your little dinner with a certain driver competing in my race. You know how bad that can look, right?" He had finally folded his paper and looked me in the eye. His eyes were full of self-concern. Great.

"Yeah. I do. I was catching up with an 'old friend'." I said, air quotes and all.

"Really?" He asked, skeptical to believe me when it came to such a lousy defense.

"Yeah. His name is Squall Leonheart. You remember the Leonhearts from Esthar, right?" I asked, jogging his memory.

"Wait. That was sometime ago. When you were still fun and didn't hate my very existence." He said, reminiscing of the times where I actually called him 'Dad' on a regular basis.

"Yeah. Right. Whatever you'd like to think."

"So, what was it that you were doing there? My contact said that you had left a very drunk driver on a very harsh note."

"What's that supposed to mean? You gonna drug test him for Advil?" I was pushing his buttons, trying to steer away from the topic of last night, "Don't you think that that's just a tad bit… Oooh… What's that word I'm looking for? …  Oh yeah! Redundant."

"Oh come now. It's not that redundant. And besides, no, that wasn't my intension. My intension is to find out what you were thinking by going out to dinner with him in the first place."

"That, my dear father, is none of your business." I said bitterly, the cold in my voice icy enough to penetrate those muscles of his and shatter his bones.

"Fine. I'll drop it." He said, and then added rather hastily, "For now. Mark my words. I will find out."

"Yeah, yeah. Come on. We're gonna be late for your race."

***

The drive to our corporal edifice wasn't very exciting. We bickered here and there but that was it. The silence ate away at us, but not enough to make us speak to each other.

When we got there, Jerry, our valet, parked the car and we went to the company box that gave us a hawk's eye-view of our muddy and gravel kingdom. The crowds were close to full but you could still see the people walk up and down the aisles finding seats and kicking out those who were in the wrong ones.

"Ah. Glad to see that our organizers finally made it." An obnoxious voice came from behind us as we took our respective seats at opposite ends of the room. I would know exactly to whom that voice would belong to if I were half dead, bleeding in a ditch. Gregory Summerville: the company ass and full-time flirt.

"And to what do we owe the 'pleasure' of your presence, Mr. Summerville?" I asked, not bothering to turn my head.

"The pleasure came from you gracing us with your entity, Ms. Heartilly." He attempted to charm me as he took the seat next to me.

"You do know that Ms. Trepe will kick you out of her seat as soon as she arrives." I stated. As if on cue, a certain Quistis Trepe strolled though the door, her clicking high-heels announcing her presence. "And that, my friend, would be Ms. Trepe."

"My friend? Wow! I graduated from spineless ninny without even knowing it!" He exclaimed. Just then, two long fingers with French manicured fingernails clamped themselves around Summerville's ear and yanked him out of the seat.

"Ow! Jesus, Mary and Joseph! You couldn't just tell me to get out of your seat?!" He yelled at her.

"No. I already warned you that I would do that Last week when supervising the construction of the track." She said as she gracefully sat down.

"Oh, right." He said, rubbing the sore lobe.

Maybe I've never noticed it before but his hair was brown and his eyes the same color. His nose was long and sharp: a human swordfish. He wasn't the hottest person I'd ever laid eyes on but he had charm. Now, if only he wasn't such an ass.

"So. What are we to discuss today as we await the beginning of this magnificent race?" Quistis asked lazily.

"I dunno… Summerville's latest adventure in the sack with the receptionist?" Jack Davenport suggested. He was our office clown, ready to insult on behalf of the entertainment of the company.

To Jack's immense pleasure, the box roared with laughter as Summerville just stood there, mock laughing and yelling for everyone to shut up. Jack's highlights are getting on Greg's nerves. It's funny.

Shirley, my father's new assistant, was the first to recover and pointed out the window as she yelled for us, "It's about to start!"

Author's Note: Well, then, I was right. Pay up. Oh, right. We never made and official bet on that. Right.  Anyways, kindly direct your attention to that lovely little box in the bottom left-hand corner and click. I'm sure you'll notice a window that pops up with a box that gives you the space to write me a review. Please give me feedback. And feel free to tell me if I'm massacring the already hopeless story.

And, I think I will try something I've never tried before: replying to my reviews… As minimal as they are…

Karla3: Thanks for the encouragement. I really need because every time I end a chapter, I put myself into a hole and am trying to find a plausible way to get out of it. As for the realism… I don't know how realistic that was… but… Um… Tells moi what you think.

Seifer's Incarnate: Yeah, I am alive and still kicking although not quite sure if it's a miracle. I wouldn't go that far… *new tangent* I'm glad to see that someone loves the Italian Job as much as I do.

darkcloud: Thankies for the motivation and I am trying but it's just not simple balancing time… As much as I waste it, it's not easy. I will try to 'mush' onto the next chappie… It's partially written…

huh: You wanna know the first thing that I said after I read your review? "Huh…" Yeah. I'm just as clueless as you are. Hee. I'm still trying to improve it… maybe what was missing was actual plot development…

Sabam: Tee hee… I believe that there is prolly no point in replying but… um… *nods her head in a "sad but true" way* you are forgiven for forgetting to review.  And um… How many times do I have to tell you not to stress? At least once more. Thought so. *Loves Pirates of the Caribbean* and um… I have an insane thought to tell you! Go MSN now!

Kool Kaizer: Right. I been meaning to check your story out… Just slipped my mind too many times. Um… Thankies for the b-day salute and, um, dude, get some sleep. I shall go check out your story… *counts down*… NOW!!