A/N: Hey! Another update in the same season! It's amazing, isn't it? Thank Sabam for pushing my ass to write it.

Chapter 14: Black Cross Rinoa's POV

After the formalities had been taken care of, I briskly strode out of the hall, famished, in dire need of lunch. Sure, there was a buffet laid out there but I didn't really like the idea of all the drivers standing there, watching me stuff my face. I knew for a fact that I could shove a large quantity of food in my mouth all at once. So, I decided to power-walk to the limo and have Louis drive me to my favorite restaurant: Black Cross.

I found Louis to the left of the main entrance, goofing around with some of the other limo drivers. They were laughing over one of Louis' stories… From the looks of it, it was about the store in the mall where you could make your own teddy bear that he aptly described as "the world's most humiliating store disguised as a toy store."

He told the story all the time. He figured that a mall full of people had already seen him make a fool of himself in the store so what did it matter to add a few drivers to the list of people?

"Hey Louis! I need to go get something to eat. Sorry, guys." I called to the group of laughing men. Their faces looked downtrodden when they realized that I was taking away the source of their amusement.

Louis walked over, disappointment written all over his face. He opened the door for me and I climbed in. He closed it after me and walked around back to the driver's seat. He started the engine of the black beast and set the wheels in motion.

"Where to, Miss Rinoa?" He asked me courteously.

"Louis, how many times must I remind you to simply call me Rinoa?"

"As many times as I'd have to remind you to call me Lou."

"Fair enough. Black Cross, Lou."

"Yes, Rinoa."

"Hey, Lou? Tell me that story you were telling the guys before?"

"Alright. Well, my sister had recently had a baby and I was in the Deling Mall and I saw a shop where you could make and dress your own stuffed bears. I thought it'd be a cute idea to walk in and make the kid a bear. But I saw a monkey and figured he'd like it better. So, I picked out the monkey, brought it to the sales clerk for her to stuff but she brought me to the front of the store in stead, and made me jump on a mat so that the stuffing would come out of what looked like a giant cotton candy machine. And the mat, when you jumped on it in the right places, it belted out a stereotypical rock song riff… The kind you'd hear in a wannabe punk song.

"After I was finished stuffing the bear, she gave me a star to put in the monkey but before I put it in, I had to do 'Head and Shoulders, Knees and Toes' first. She was all, 'Do you remember that from kindergarten?' and I thought, 'Hell yeah! That was the first time I saw a girl's underwear.' But that day, I was wearing a pair of slacks that had shrunk in the wash. Anyway, we got to the 'Knees and toes' part and when I bent over to touch my toes, I heard a very loud 'Rrrrip' come from my rear. I had torn my pants in the process. And I didn't even realize that there was a crowd watching me in front of the store until I heard a loud roar of laughter.

"Anyway, I finished making the damned monkey, wished to hell that the kid wouldn't have to do this ever and walked the hell out of the store. That place is the world's most humiliating shop disguised as a toys store."

Louis finished his story as we pulled into the parking lot. He had managed to cheer me up so I told him to park the car and eat with me.

We walked into the restaurant, and had the waiter seat us at a table for two. Normally Louis doesn't eat with me because he "can feel all the men looking at us, as if to say, 'What the hell is that chick doing with that loser?'" but today I insisted. I didn't like to eat alone at the bar with the weirdoes.

John, the waiter that I had come on a first name basis with, came to talk to us, to see what's new, before a bitchy woman snapped for his attention. He rolled his eyes and excused himself. Deep down, I pitied the poor man and yet I admired him for not lashing out at the poodle-like woman.

"So, why did you request for me to dine with you today? Not that I don't enjoy your company but the curiosity is eating at my insides." Louis asked me nicely but still managed to temporarily ensnare my hunger.

"Well, on a much cleaner and less grotesque note, I insisted that you eat with me today is simply because I enjoy your company. And-" At that moment, something had caught my attention.

Two tables across from us I saw a certain Mr. Squall Leonheart seated with Ms. Selphie Tilmitt in what looked to be a very enrapturing conversation. I felt a slight pang of jealousy towards Selphie but I knew that they were only friends. At the same time, I was mentally kicking myself for pushing Squall away.

In front of me, I heard Louis call my name. I blushed. It was very impolite of me to divert my attention from my lunch guest.

"Sorry Louis. It's just that-"

"You have feelings for the guy and can't help but stare at him when he's not looking and thinking very dirty thoughts in various positions?" He cut me off.

I turned another shade of red and couldn't help but reach across the table and smack him upside the head for that very rude and, although I'd never admit it, accurate remark.

"That is for me to know and you to hope to cheese you never find out. Furthermore, that was a very rude assumption." I scolded him. He was very lucky that I don't have the heart to fire people that I've grown to be very good friends with over the course of three and a half years.

"Terribly sorry but my sense of humor had been tweaked that way ever since my last days of innocence in high school. I'm the poor victim of education."

"Of course you are." I replied skeptically.

At that moment, John had returned to take our orders. He asked if we were terribly hungry and when we replied not entirely, he sat down with us once more. He told us about how his wife was constantly nagging him about some mysterious clutter that he could never see and how one day, she was fed up with him so she sent him to the eye-doctor who diagnosed him with clutter-blindness and told him that ninety-nine percent of the male populations suffered from it.

He told us about how his little girl constantly cried in the night and how his wife always sent him to go check on her. He explained that she was the exact reason why he's loosing his hair so soon.

Once more, the poodle-like lady snapped her fingers at him and he immediately went to attend to her. Honestly, I still admire him for not lashing out at her. I knew that by the second time that she snapped her claw-like fingers at me, I would have pulled her afro of white hair out of her head. It's a good thing that John doesn't think like I do, else he would've been fired long ago.

Louis began to tell me about some crazy girl has been stalking him for months now. I couldn't help but pity him. I tormented him with the idea of her showing up right then and there with the assumption that they were a couple. At the moment, Louis' "Spider sense" began to tingle. He said that there was a "gentleman staring" at us.

I turned my head around to see whom it was only to find a certain Mr. Leonheart staring at us. It was very rude too… His mouth was hanging open. I saw John walk past his table but Squall called for his attention but Selphie cut him off. My only guess was that a certain male driver was about to get boozed up before another race that afternoon. I smirked as I watch the scene unfold. John managed to escape but Squall was the fallen comrade, left to be tortured by enemy scolding, performed by Selphie.

John came over after that incident with our food. He sat down with us and began to tell us more tales from the crypt keeper he avidly calls home. He told us how his wife Lucy isn't entirely horrible when the baby was off at her mothers and there wasn't anything around for her to clean.

Half way through our lunch, Squall and Selphie had finished and left. I found myself wondering why it was that they had gone to Black Cross to dine.

John left our table once more to attend to the poodle woman. During his time away, Louis and I finished our lunch and were talking about music and pop culture in general. John came over, took our plates away, took our dessert orders, returned with the pastries and joined in our conversation.

"Some guy once said that music was the most expensive form of noise. I forget who it was though…" John managed to say before the clicking of fingers whisked him away.

"Hey! Junior! If you want a tip, be sure to learn from this lesson. I don't want to have to snap my fingers at you every time I need for water for my dentures, sonny." The old broad snapped at him. Once again, I was very surprised to see that he was still very polite towards the nuisance of an old lady.

We finished our pastries, I paid for the meal and we left John with the words, "Good luck." I felt bad leaving the guy there with a hag who was disrespectful in every sense of the word. Okay, fine, there's only one sense of the word 'disrespectful' but hush no one likes a know-it-all.

We walked into the parking lot, got back into the limo once more and drove back to the track. It was now one thirty and the race was two o'clock. I knew that my father would have a fit seeing as I wasn't back at the office yet but that was his problem.

"Hey Lou, take the longest path possible."

A/N: Oooh… Looky, looky! It's a finished chapter! And um, yeah. Review and tell me what you think. And while you're at it, go ahead, tell me what a lazy author I am! The shot's for free!

By the way (singsI tried to say I'd be there, waiting for, Dani the girl is singing song to me beneath the marquee, overload! Whooo! I needed to get that out of my system… Not that it'd ever leave), the guy who said that music is the most expensive form of noise was Oscar Wilde and he was tone-deaf. Poor bugger, doesn't know what he'd missed out on.