The Delinquent

I only own the words written, not the character's or places.

Rinoa stood in stunned silence, the only sound managing to get past her barricade of shock was the roaring sound of it. She had never noticed quiet to be quite so loud; it seemed somewhat contradictory to what was normal.

She stared at Squall for what felt like the longest time. He was now staring at the ground with no intention of raising his head for anything. His eyes had widened and his mouth was slightly ajar and he did not want Rinoa seeing him like this.

The words had just slipped out of his mouth before he had time to catch them. The whole time he was worried about the more acidic side of his tongue coming out. The side that came out more often than anything else, instead out came a side of him that he hadn't really been too worried about.

How often when you're in a heated argument do your true feelings come out? Usually it's riddled with harsh words and spiteful insults that you regret afterwards. Not that Squall did regret saying the words as soon as they had come out.

Rinoa opened her mouth to say something but quickly closed it again, deciding that it probably wasn't smart to say anything.

Squall glanced to his side, praying to Hyne that nobody had heard that, praying that he could turn back time and just erase this entire thing.

"Squall…" Rinoa whispered, finally gaining the courage to say something.

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"I wonder whats going on?" Selphie said as she continued pacing fretfully.

"I bet Squall's getting' it on!" Irvine piped up.

Quistis shook her head and rolled her eyes, not surprised that a statement like that would come from Irvine, in fact she would've been surprised if he hadn't said anything of the sort.

"I highly doubt it, Irvine. I bet Squalls' so mortified that he hasn't even looked Rin in the eye since." Quistis replied.

"Ah ha, but what if Rinoa pounced on him once he'd said it." Seifer countered.

"Nah, I reckon he's already run all the way back to Balamb." Zell interrupted.

Everyone thought that could actually be quite possible, apart from the occasional opinion that Rinoa had become some sort of wild cat and just jumped him; everyone was in agreement of Squall's position, or disposition, after his little outburst.

"So, like, what the hell are we supposed to do now?" Selphie burst out.

Zell shrugged his shoulders and took a couple of steps forwards, shielding his eyes from the sun with his hand.

"Wait I spose, there's not really much to do."

"Don't worry about those two Selph; they'll sort there shit out. I say we just enjoy the rest of the time here as planned and wait for them to fuck or whatever's going on." Irvine added.

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"I-I uhhh…."

"Stop," Squall interjected, "you don't have to say anything."

He raised his head slowly, finally plucking up enough nerve to look at her again. He couldn't believe it, he'd just poured his heart out to her, he hadn't said that he loved her or anything dramatic like that but he couldn't honestly say that he did. He didn't know what love felt like so how was he supposed to know if he was in it.

Saying that he cared about her was enough, saying that he thought about her every day was enough. He couldn't take any of it back either, how could he lie to her face now?

'Fuck I couldn't before, now it'll be worse…'

"I better go." Squall settled.

Rinoa shook her head, not wanting him to go at all. She wanted him to stay, in fact she wanted to pour her heart out as passionately as she would for anything that she felt strongly about, but she couldn't. The words seemed easy enough but to someone like Squall it was hard to be so emotional.

Squall had such a cool exterior, this façade of a person he put up to the world that made him seem invincible but Rinoa had just witnessed a part of him that seemed more fragile.

"You're not running away from this Squall." Rinoa said firmly.

"I'm not running, Rin." Squall said quietly.

"I won't act as if that this didn't happen." Rinoa stated resolutely.

Squall closed his eyes and rubbed them with his hand; a habit that he had taken up when he felt slightly stressed or was in deep thought. They weren't arguing anymore but oh Hyne how he was yearning to go back to that.

"Rinoa," Squall sighed, "don't pretend that this is the first you knew about the way I feel. You knew I cared about you. Ever since the first night you ever came out with us, you knew… You may be able to imagine that it was all phoney and this is news but its not. I won't act as if this is a big deal."

Rinoa didn't say anything; instead she just stood there in an astounded haze. She didn't really know how to reply to that. Of course she'd known he cared about her, she cared about him too but there was more than that. It was the way he had said it more than what he had said.

Before Rinoa could stop him again he turned and left, leaving Rinoa standing alone, still taken aback.

She expected to hear the sound of Squall's car pulling away, that's what she'd do in the same position but nothing came. She resigned herself to the fact that he wasn't going to leave any time soon and slowly made her way back to the beach.

When she got there she was relieved to see that mostly everyone else had gone somewhere else. The only people still floating around was Squall and Irvine.

She could see Zell and Selphie splashing around playfully in the water while Quistis and Seifer seemed to have disappeared from sight. Rinoa sighed and rolled her eyes, knowing exactly what they were up to; those two had endurance that could shame anyone.

Unfortunately as soon as Irvine spotted Rinoa he darted off somewhere else, not making it half obvious at all.

"Squall, I know there was more to it than that." Rinoa stated.

She wasn't going to talk to him at first, in fact she was going to straight out ignore him and go play with Selphie and Zell but this had to be dealt with and no time like the present.

"What do you know?" Squall scoffed as he idly turned the page in the book that he had retrieved once again.

"I know your going to talk to me and I know that your ganna have to answer to Quistis and Selphie so you might as well just answer to me."

Although outwardly he didn't show it, he did admit that she was right. Not that he planned on answering to anyone but either way it went he was going to be explaining to whichever one was more persistent.

He couldn't stand Selphie whining and Quistis's explanations on why it was futile to try and hold it back usually got to him after awhile. He also knew that Rinoa had a bad habit of just going into great detail about how the world will end if he doesn't do what she wants.

"And then all that shit your going to get from the boys meanwhile I have to put up with the girls' girlish giggles and taunts. You have to talk to me Squall, please; I don't think I'll be able to manage it all without something to explain to them. What am I supposed to say? This is awful…"

"Just shut up will ya!" Squall interrupted.

Rinoa suppressed her grin and put on her best depressing look, which she had down packed, with her big panda bear eyes it was hard to resist just giving in.

"I don't know why I said it." Squall sighed.

He picked up a tiny stone from the sand and threw it aimlessly out into the ocean, doing anything to take hims mind off all this emotion business.

"Just forget about it."

"Ok fine. But don't say I didn't try." Rinoa concluded.

"I won't." Squall replied mockingly.

Two hours later

Only Rinoa, Selphie and Quistis now inhabited the beach, the boys having gone off to 'rally drive'. They'd been gone for about fifteen minutes and Rinoa was just waiting for questions to come out. So far they had been pretty reserved about the whole thing, dismissing it and acting as if it didn't happen. But as Rinoa knew would happen soon the questions came out.

"So what happened?" Selphie enquired excitedly.

"What?" Rinoa replied, knowing full well what Selphie was talking about.

"We heard your little spat with Squall." Quistis stated.

Rinoa rolled over onto her stomach, trying to waste a little bit of time before answering.

"You did…"

"C'mon Rin, don't be so nonchalant about it." Quistis burst out.

Rinoa sighed and tried to make herself seem as small as possible, it was all very exciting for Squall to be admitting his true feelings and everything but she had hoped that this would've happened in a little more privacy.

"Well you heard everything, there's not really much to tell." Rinoa said.

"I can't believe that he said that. I can't believe that he bared his soul like that." Selphie sighed.

"C'mon guys he didn't exactly confess his love or anything." Rinoa exclaimed.

"He might've well have, you don't know him like we do, Squall saying that means more than any love confession. He's usually pretty aloof about these sorts of matters." Quistis explained in all her wisdom.

"You guys are fully taking this too far…" Rinoa trailed off as her thoughts were turned to more exciting matters.

Around the corning, skidding to a tyre burning halt was Seifer and Irvine. Seifer was driving of course; he didn't really trust anyone else's driving. Closely following them from behind was Squall and Zell, Zell driving this vehicle.

Zell ripped on the hand break as he spun the steering wheel around ninety degrees. The desired effect was for the car to spin while breaking making a sort of half donut and it was successfully achieved.

"C'mon girls, you gotta check this shit out!" Irvine yelled from the vehicle he was residing in.

Selphie jumped up excitedly and headed straight for Irvine and Seifer, Rinoa following suit, not wanting to be too near Squall in this uncomfortable time. Quistis dusted herself off and went towards Zell and Squall, Seifer was a bit too loose for her.

As soon as the car doors had slammed Seifer took off, leaving Squall, Zell and Quistis in a cloud of dust.

Rinoa clutched onto Selphie's arm, suddenly wishing she'd chosen the other car. Seifer was indeed a mental driver. She hadn't bothered to put her seatbelt on, the only reason one would wear ones seatbelt was if the police were about and would fine you for it.

Seifer was following a narrow dirt road with ditches on both sides, he was sliding side to side like a maniac and it was starting to make Rinoa more than a little nervous.

They passed a row of trees and behind it was a large grass field that they would need to go down the ditch to get to. Rinoa widened her eyes as she clicked onto what was going to happen.

"Oh shit!" Irvine exclaimed, tightly griping his dashboard.

Without slowing down at all Seifer swerved off the track and straight down the ditch. They bounced a little at the bottom and it slid for a bit but Rinoa thanked Hyne for keeping them safe on that one.

"Booyaka!" Selphie squealed excitedly while they were doing a backwards donut.

Rinoa turned in her seat to see where Squall and the others were. They were already down the ditch, swerving side to side in the wet grass.

She was jolted to the side as Seifer ripped the handbrake on for a side skid and then took off on a burnout.

'I should have my seatbelt on…' Rinoa thought to herself.

She grasped at it, pulling it down violently only for it to lock into place. She yanked at it again and again, slowly and gently then she got annoyed and it got more aggressive.

She looked up just in time to see the car slam into a bank. Rinoa smacked her forehead into the seat in front of her. She yelled out in pain but didn't have time to nurse her injury as the car started to roll.

She tried to crawl along with the spin but couldn't do anything. The rest was a bit of a haze but she seemed to come to and find herself lying flat on the roof of the car with muddy water soaking her.

She immediately took flight out of the car, moving as fast as she could. She'd seen way too many action movies to stay in that vehicle.

She then remembered the others were still inside and crawled back inside. Selphie was just coming out of her daze and was looking down at the blood on her hand. She had a cut lip but nothing too serious, they'd been lucky that it wasn't a serious crash.

It appeared Irvine had his seatbelt on as he was hanging upside down, frantically trying to tear the seatbelt off. Seifer pulled out a pocket knife and cut through the material. Irvine fell to the ground on his neck.

"Selphie!" Irvine called out worriedly.

"I'm alright." Selphie panted.

She inched out of the wreck, grabbing Irvine in a bone shattering hug once she was out.

Rinoa was just edging out when Squall and the others pulled up.

Squall raced out of the car, going straight to her side. He hauled her gently up, inspecting her body for any damage.

"Are you ok?" Squall asked anxiously.

Rinoa nodded, not wanting to talk at all. It was the first time she'd really been in a car accident of any kind and shock had over taken her.

Her bottom lip started to quiver and her eyes began to well up. Squall pulled her tenderly into himself, wrapping his arms around her trembling body.

"It's alright." Squall said softly.

She felt the soothing affect that his kind words always had on her, whenever he said it was alright she believed his words. She couldn't stop herself from trusting him.

"So much for your special day." Squall said absent mindedly.

Rinoa let out a faint chuckle, no it hadn't quite gone the way she would've like it. First Squall and Lucas have a run in, then her and Squall had a fight and now she was in a rolling car.

Rinoa felt her legs turn to jelly and she gradually began to lower herself to the ground.

"Are you sure you're ok?" Squall persisted.

Rinoa nodded again, this time managing to crack a smile. He smiled at her, the reassuring smile that Rinoa had hoped he'd flash at her, if only for a second it would but her heart at rest.

He gave her one last lingering look before he briskly walked over to make sure everyone else was alright.

Rinoa sighed, pulling her knees up to her chin as she did so. She tilted her head to the side and closed her eyes, searching her mind for memory of the actual crash but found her mind empty.

She couldn't remember any of it. It was like a dream; bits and pieces would come along but then drift away as quickly as she recalled them.

Zell came and sat down beside her, wrapping one arm around her shoulders in a brotherly type fashion.

"Crazy." He sighed.

"I can't remember what happened." Rinoa stated.

Zell nodded, not surprised in the least. He'd had his fair share of accidents before.

"I dunno why but sometimes when you go through something really freaky you just block it out." Zell replied.

"I wish you could block out what you wanted." Rinoa said, meaning more than what she said.

"Some things you're supposed to remember. If you didn't have bad times then you couldn't consider any of your times good."

Rinoa was more shocked by Zell's sudden wisdom than the crash. He just seemed to get this otherworldly intelligence that Rinoa hadn't seen on him before.

Rinoa caught Squall glance at her, he quickly turned his head back towards Selphie trying to act as if he wasn't staring at all.

She smiled, finally noticing the little signs that all inevitably led up to only one thing. She couldn't understand how sightless she'd been before; of course she'd been attracted to Squall from day one. She'd be considered crazy not to be but she jus blinded herself to what was really there.

"You get your good with your bad." Rinoa whispered quietly to herself.

I thought this one got up quite quickly.

The car crash was one that me and my two friends were in down at the river last year so credit for this chapter not only goes to my readers and reviewers but to them as well.

Notice how there are beginning to be more and more Squall x Rinoa moments now? Oh and the whole Garden bit that was in the middle of this story somewhere isn't over yet, it's leading up to it.

How'd ya like it?