"Have you ever had that feeling? That itch just below the skin that only a razor blade can scratch . . ."

The next day Selphie spent most of her time at her assigned study station on the computer. Quistis had excused her from all of her lessons, due to yesterday's incident, insisting that she get some rest, much to Selphies annoyance. If she couldn't sleep at night, then she most definitely couldn't sleep during the day.

Instead, she had logged onto the Balamb Garden network and checked up on the festival. The term dance was coming up soon. Normally, Selphie would've been ecstatic, running around and bothering everyone about remembering to turn up, but right now, you would've gotten more excitement out of a stone. She clicked out of that page, deciding that her own typed words of 'remember to bring a parrrdner!' at the bottom of the page, were depressing her even more.

Selphie sighed. She had typed that sitting on Irvine's lap when they first got the page up and running. He kept bashing on the keyboard and typing rude obscenities about what he'd like to do to her. Neither of them noticed Instructor Aki standing behind them. They had gotten into trouble for that and had been put in the disciplinary committee's room for an hour each.

She couldn't help but smile ever so slightly at this memory, yet it wasn't for long when she realized he was no longer by her side. Selphie clicked into her email inbox, trying to find anything to read to take her mind off Irvine. All she could find was a cheesy forward from Zell about how boys are better than girls and a message from Quistis.

She clicked open the latter one, expecting it to be a message asking how she was, is she up to date with work, etc. But what she found was very different. In fact, it wasn't Quistis at all that had emailed her. Somebody had hacked her account, that somebody being none other than Irvine . . .

From: Q. Trepe

To: Selphie T

Subject: (none) Time sent: 13:08

Heyy Sefie,

First off, I should probably say this isn't Quistis. It's Irvine (don't hit the delete button!) She let me use her account to email you, seeing as I heard from Zell that you blocked me. Urh, gee don't really know why I'm messaging you. Whenever I try to talk to you face to face, I always end up making you cry. I didn't realize that my sunshine girl could cry. And I never thought I'd be the one to provoke it. I've heard from Zell how upset you are. Don't go getting mad at him, because I guess we were having a man to man talk at the time.

Sooo, I suppose the whole point of this message is to say . . . do you want to meet up and go somewhere out of town? Just to talk, I mean. Maybe that place with all the cherry blossom trees. I know you love that place. Meet me outside classroom 1F at 2:00. Please?

Irvine xxx

Heart pounding, Selphie sat staring at the screen for a few minutes, wondering if it was some sort of joke, but then came to the quick conclusion that it wasn't. Turning off her work station, she picked up her notebook and glanced at the clock on the wall behind her.

01: 37.

Just enough time to go back to her room and freshen up a bit.

Walking along the corridor, Selphie repeated bits of the message over and over in her head, while staring absent-mindedly into space, paying absolutely no attention to the "danger, wet floor" sign placed a few steps away.

She walked straight into it and being caught off guard, she couldn't help one of her boots from getting wedged in the signs tripod like legs. After she tripped and fell, it slowly followed her path and clattered to the floor beside her, creating a noise that echoed down the length of the dormitory corridor.

Well, at least no-one was around to see that, she thought, looking around from her place on the damp, white tiled floor. She had fallen a few feet away from someone's dorm room, although she didn't know whose, and only prayed they wouldn't come out and cause her more humiliation.

As Selphie placed her hands on the floor and slowly pushed herself up, she heard murmuring coming from behind the closed door. She didn't pay much attention to the noise, until it started getting louder and she found that she could decipher words.

". . . Ohh, oh, yes! Harder! . . ."

Selphie frowned and wondered again whose dorm room this was. As she walked past the door to carry on her route, she heard something that made her stop dead in her tracks.

". . . OH! Yes, yes, yes! Irvy, you're so big!"

That was Celia's voice. She'd know it anywhere. Selphie clamped her hands over her ears and forced herself to run all the way back to her room, fighting back tears for the first time that day.

---------------------------------------------

Behind the door, the three girls collapsed with laughter.

"Did you see her face?!"

Celia, Amber and Nichi had been watching Selphie through the spy hole in their door. They had heard the clatter of the sign fall down outside and decided to see who had caused it. Upon realizing it was Selphie, they had decided to play a cruel trick.

Irvine wasn't even with them at the time.

---------------------------------------------

Despite how much Selphie told herself not to cry, she had started now and found she couldn't stop. Like a reflex action, she had dug up a not-very old habit and gotten out her razor blade. She didn't feel, just heard all the taunts that had ever been made.

She thought Irvine had actually wanted to make up with her after reading his message. Having this blow up in her face was too much to take. Like a child with high hopes, sitting on up Christmas Eve, spying for Santa, only then to find out he was a fraud.

Selphie wrapped her arms around herself, trying to picture someone who loved her. She couldn't . . . no one came to mind. Having no parents only made it worse. She had no one that would love her no matter what. No-one around with a love that was unconditional and no-one that looked at her with eyes that said she could do no wrong.

Despite feeling as if she could sit crying and watching the blood trickle down her arm for the rest of the day, she knew she had to decide whether to ignore what she heard or not and go see Irvine.

You have to face him sooner or later, y'know.

She settled on sooner. Pushing herself up from the floor, she walked into the bathroom and turned the cold water tap on. Putting her arm underneath it, she watched the clear, cool liquid turn to red as it swirled away down the drain. Bringing her head up from its hung position, she faced herself in the mirror above the sink.

A girl with messy chesnut hair, panda eyes (thanks to mascara that wasn't waterproof) and a forlorn expression on her face stared straight back. She stood looking at herself for around 3 minutes, hardly blinking. She couldn't believe that one person, let alone herself, could hold so much within the eyes. You could see the emotion churning behind them, clashing together in her mind. The hurt, the anger, the jealousy and sadness of losing a friend and gaining several enemies. It's true what they say; eyes really are a window to the soul.

A clicking sound in her room outside the bathroom brought her attention back to the present.

"Yo, Selph, you really shouldn't leave your door unlocked, anyone could walk in uninvited."

Selphie wiped her eyes quickly with a hand towel and stepped outside.

"What, like you, you mean?"

Zell brought his hand up to his neck and kicked his foot at the floor, looking rather sheepish.

"Ah, sorry. S'up?"

"Not much . . ." apart from I heard Celia and Irvine graphically fucking.

Zells eyes bugged out a big.

"What?!"

Selphie looked puzzled and stunned, thinking Zell was psychic until he spoke up again.

"You didn't mean to say that out loud, did'ya?"

"Er, no, but . . . oh well."

Zell shuffled around some more, looking a little embarrassed for some reason.

"Wanna talk about it, Sef?"

Selphie walked over to her cabinet, picked up her mascara and re-applied it carefully to her lashes. Her blonde friend watched her intently, always bemused when girl friends did typically female things.

"Not much to talk about really. I was walking down the hallway to my dorm, well I say walking, I tripped up . . ."

Zell interrupted, "Oh, are you okay?"

"Yeah," Selphie replied casually, whilst sitting down on her bed and patting next to her. Zell duly followed, plopping down next to his friend and bringing his legs up on her sunshine yellow duvet to cross his legs.

"So, anyway," She continued, "I happened to fall over outside the slut faces dorm-,"

"Which one? There's so many now . . ."

"Celia . . . As I was getting up I started hearing moans, y'know, general sex noises. Then it kinda got louder and the bitch screamed out his name."

Selphie sat staring into her friends cerulean blue eyes, which looked oddly striking when compared to the black tribal tattoo on his face.

"Yeesh. I was sittin' with Irvine in class, but then afterwards, he said he had to go somewhere for a bit, but he wouldn't tell me."

"Yeah, well that's him all over. Bastard."

Selphie sat fidgeting and glancing at Zells wristwatch every 5 seconds.

It was 2 'o' clock already and she couldn't help but wonder if Irvine was standing waiting for her, wondering where she was.

"What's up? You're all twitchy."

Selphie banged her head down on Zells shoulder, and then did it repeatedly, out of frustration of whether to meet up with the sharpshooter or leave him hanging.

"Hey, don't do that Sef!"

"Why? I'm not doing it hard."

"Yeah, but you've got a soft head, might damage the few brains cells you have left."

Selphie pouted and smacked Zell round the head lightly, while he snickered.

"Okay, I admit it. There is something else bothering me."

"Knew it. Tell?"

"Well . . . He emailed me . . . Irvine that is . . . asking to meet me at 2 'o' clock. I don't know what to. I was going to go before I heard him . . . doing stuff."

"Well, if he asked you to meet up with him . . . isn't that, like, a good sign?"

"I don't know. It would've been, if I hadn't heard him rocking someone's world. Not just anyone's, Celia's! . . . Gross. Why would he wanna fuck a blonde slut faced bitch?"

"Why does everyone wanna fuck Irvine? How comes he's the sexpert of Balamb Garden?"

Selphie and Zell sat there fuming for a while, then looked to each other and cracked a smile.

"Why? Do you wish you were the one the girls chased?" Selphie teased Zell, bumping him lightly with her shoulder.

"Nah . . . well . . . would be nice, for a change. Maybe girls would actually notice me."

"I notice you."

"Yeah, but you're not a girl."

Selphie frowned at him and went to hit again, when Zell corrected himself.

"Nah, I know you're a girl. I just mean . . . you're like one of the guys . . . but with boobs . . . and curves . . . an' stuff."

"Riiiight."

"Yeah."

"I'm going."

Zell looked puzzled, seeing as this was Selphies room, not his.

"Huh?"

Selphie got up and straightened her dress out.

"I'm going to go see him. If he's still waiting there. What time is it?"

Glancing at Selphie and looking down to his watch, he responded, "2.10. Want me to wait around?"

"No, it's okay, I'll be okay. I can handle this . . . I think. Um, do I look alright?"

Zell gave his friend the once over and held his thumbs up in the air.

Selphie gave a single nod, smoothed down her hair and sucked in a deep breath.

"Okay, I'm going . . . you gonna stay in here?" The brunette girl eyed the blonde suspiciously.

"Not if you don't want me to. Afraid I'll find somethin' naughty?" Zell gave a cheeky smile and hoisted up one of his eyebrows.

"No, I don't hide porno mags under my mattress. I'm not you."

"Hey! I don't have any!"

"Just teasing. Well, do what you want, I'm off."

"Good luck."

"Thanks."

With that, Selphie walked out of her door, leaving Zell to sit on her bed, and discover the bloodied razor blade that she had forgotten to hide . . .