I sat at the piano today for the first time in months. Aside from it being out of tune and misbehaving in certain weather lately, I think I’ve been a little afraid of it, because there have been occasions in the past few years where I’ve sat there and felt overwhelmed, as though I were facing eighty-eight silent strangers. When I was a little person I had some reasonably notable talent at it, or more than the average child at least. And then somehow I was never able to take the next step to the point where I was too old to impress ‘for my age’ but could impress on the merits of my performance. I didn’t feel right about the way I was learning. I couldn’t bring myself to just sit there and work on my talent, which could either have been a sign of the anxiety I think I’ve had for a while or just laziness.

I remember about a decade ago wanting to be more than ‘the girl who plays the piano’. Recently I’ve realised that the people I interact with socially don’t see me that way at all, and it scared me more than the alternative. I’ve caught myself playing all sorts of tricks to clue them in, from staring pointedly at pianos to tapping out pieces on tabletops. Yeah, I’m subtle.

Today was different. There are a few things that I remember and play very well automatically and other things I muck around at that I don’t have perfect. I wasn’t getting anything perfect today, but it wasn’t as much of a cause for distress as it usually is. There seemed to be something else in my efforts to make up for the lack of accuracy. I was playing things that I knew well, but didn’t like so much, in different ways, meddling with the melody and hearing all sorts of things I never had before. Sometimes my hands were just flying through things that definitely were not meant to be played that way. It was showing off, perhaps, although there was nobody there to listen but the bird, and she was doing all she could to distract me entirely. It just felt like natural play.

Trying to think about the experience aside from the layer of sparkly that has settled over it in my mind, I don’t think I was physically performing significantly better than I usually do. The connection between the physical act and my emotions and intelligence was much stronger than usual, and that was causing me to take more chances, playing with the technical aspects of the pieces and struggling further than usual with a nine-page epic I’ve been wanting to play for years without being able to get my fingers around some of the diabolical parts in the opening bars.

I think that playing piano has felt for a long time like something I should responsibly pull away from. It reminds me of innocence, happy ignorance, heedlessness, the family unit I once had that was for the most part perfect, united, impenetrable. I doubted whatever had made people admire me in the past.

I think I’ve decided that what happened today happened partly because I can’t bring myself to be terribly afraid any more. I’m not holding down a successful, normal job, or a relationship of the romantic kind or an overwhelming social life, but I’ve worked hard particularly this year to do things that I’ve wanted to and am proud of, and also things that I never realised I would be so pleased to do. Now I’m proud of my progress as a human I’m not inclined to think less of myself for doing things my own way – those two things came to me hand in hand, I think. I’m sitting here with qualifications I haven’t figured out how to use profitably yet, no money coming in but hey, maybe I’m sitting on a gold mine with these stories I keep hammering at… and I think I’m finally getting calm about life. And I guess that’s just the key to me being able to access the most abstract part of my life again.

Chapter Two – Smells Like Dahlias

We stopped by the university gym. I didn’t have a membership and I imagined if Edward did he would have creeped the regular patrons out long ago with the whole not-sweating thing what was he doing at my university?, but the receptionist took one look at us and pointed us in the direction of the showers.

“Sleeping with vampires is really not good for your health, you know,” some smart bitch remarked, pushing past me on the way through the door.

“Oh, trust me, I know.”

I amused myself watching the sparkles stream down the drain by imagining it was Edward melting his way down there, Wicked Witch-style. Him and every other freaking vampire in the freaking world who had the audacity to turn out real.

Then I dressed, wrung my hair out as best I could, smacked the smart bitch in the face with it as accidentally as I could, and went out to join Edward in the foyer. We walked to McDonalds. Edward bought me a large fries and a burger bigger than my head. I thought about protesting, but it was his infinite amount of money he was wasting.

“Eat up,” he urged, picking at his own chicken burger. I tried not to drool.

“I am not going to be able to eat all of this,” I warned. “Just so you know.”

“You have to eat,” said Edward.

“I have to eat a steak now and then. I don’t have to eat the whole freaking cow!” I squinted at him. “What are you trying to do, fatten me up so you can eat me?”

Edward gulped. Knowing as I did now that vampires only produce saliva-like substances when doing so will improve the quality of their sex lives, I was no longer looking forward to the inevitable question: so, where is Bella?

“Anyway.” I tried to distract myself. “What are you… uh, doing around these parts?” How much was I supposed to say? Surely he’d noticed the whole series-about-his-life thing. Unless Meyer was way off base – haha, baseballpires you make the dumbest puns when you’re having dinner with a vampire – with some of her account, which was believable since she’d totally fudged Edward’s appearance. For all I knew Edward Cullen was a nice centenarian teenager with a penchant for rescuing the pathetic and clumsy but without a bride or sparklechild, and Meyer was his stalker…

“It’s complicated,” said Edward. He lurched forward, driving the table into my gut and his face almost into my skull. “It’s irrelevant. Has anyone ever told you, the scent of your… uh, hair, it’s outrageous? Like… dahlias.”

I choked on a morsel of bun and jerked my head back. My body kept going with it. I only realised what was happening when the back of my chair smacked against the floor, and in the next blink Edward was bending over me. Either I’d blacked out or he wasn’t being too subtle about his special vampire powers.

I couldn’t believe it and I couldn’t not believe it. When trying to extract the truth from a situation, it was safe enough to guess that if the most ridiculous element of the story was true, the rest couldn’t be far behind.

“Elly?” said Edward.

“I am not clumsy,” I said, coughing out a spray of bun. I wiped my mouth and sat up before Edward could get any ideas. “I just…”

“Honestly, how does someone with your talent for falling into accidents survive?”

I groaned. “This is getting far beyond ridiculous. Just say it.”

“Say what?” Edward turned pale. Well, he couldn’t really improve on death’s makeup so that might have been inaccurate.

I waved off several people who had rushed to my aid once they figured out the show was over. “You know.” I waited until anything that looked like it might decide to become a fanperson to vacate earshot. “Vampire.”

“How did you know?”

“Super-speed that wasn’t the result of a really cool Pokémon move? Your lack of healthy male eating habits? The freaking franchise?”

“Nobody else suspected a thing,” said Edward. We resumed our previous seats. Nobody seemed quite so interested in gaping at us once we were talking calmly. “I know my publicised physical description isn’t entirely accurate, but nonetheless…”

“I’m a writer,” I said. Edward dealt me a smouldering stare of not-getting-it. “And as it happens, situations of WTF are my specialty. …You’ll understand a little better once you’ve known me longer.”

Except I was so not going to stick around for that to happen. I shouldn’t have even let it get as far as it had.

“In that case, I was travelling,” said Edward. “When I heard of this… production, my curiosity took the lead of me. I am… unpartnered again, so I have the time to indulge.”

“So you… Maybe you’d better explain to me exactly what’s true, and what isn’t.”

“Everything is, basically,” said Edward. “Wife, daughter, goddamn werewolves. It’s only the spirit it’s been presented in that isn’t quite right. Whoever thinks that citing biology as the reason for hitting on one’s admittedly over-precocious brat of a preteen daughter is going to result in happy families has been watching too many bad soap operas. By which I mean any of them.”

“You know you love them,” I smirked.

Edward revealed a smile that would have brought colour to the cheeks of the living. “Maybe a little.”

We’d just had a moment. A soap opera moment. This could not get any more screwed-up if Edward decided I’d look prettier in the shape of a pretzel.

“I don’t speak with my daughter any more,” Edward continued. “What she’s doing… None of the family has been in contact with her since she decided she was a furry. She thinks it’s romantic. I think there’ll be more than enough of her immortal life left to get to know her once she ditches that beast.”

“And…” I couldn’t hold out any longer.

Edward chomped into his burger, which would have comforted me if it had been anyone else. “I wasn’t talking to Bella either, for a year before it ended. Becoming a vampire, having her damn baby… I expected her to lose the crazy attention-seeking bitch. I thought she’d stop lusting after warm flesh. I mean, you decide that you either like living bodies or dead ones, right?”

I decided I wouldn’t be trying to eat any more of the beef burger.

Edward sighed. “You’re going to find out sooner or later, if you and me… uh, never mind. We separated after we realised that we couldn’t ever fit in enough sex to distract ourselves from how much we hated one another at that point, but she kept showing up. She hated being a vampire after all. She blamed me for the situation with the werewolf, as if I couldn’t smell the stinking dog on her.” The burger was a crushed lump in his fist. He was making snuffling-in, grunting-out noises. This vampire was going to blow before anyone had a chance to clear the area.

Then he shifted into a state of visible calm before my eyes. “In any case, that’s done for now. There was an… altercation, a while ago, where it all quite naturally came to a head. Because there were vampires involved, we couldn’t just throw a few chairs around the room or something of that variety. We… she… Her head was no longer attached by the end of it. And… well, the details don’t matter, she’s dead.”

I let out a squeak that did not live up to how impressed I was. It would be just my luck that the amount of effort that went into killing a vampire was one of those things not exaggerated in the books.

“I did have about a hundred years of experience on her,” Edward added, as if he were reading my thoughts. If he were he would probably have asked me if I needed to be escorted to the bathroom instead. “Of course my dear adoptive sister was not pleased. She’d been exploring the latent homosexuality she foresaw having with Bella’s help, it seemed. So I took to the road to give her a chance to get over that… which led me here.”

From shredding his wife to eating McDonalds with me. I so needed to get out of there.

Then I remembered the one thing that should have freaked me out all along. If he were reading my thoughts. “Wait, so your sister really does have the… uh, power of prediction. Does that mean…”

“I see into minds.” Edward reached across the table, covering my hand with his mashed-chicken-encrusted one. I suppose that made us even after the glitter. “But not her mind. And not yours, either. It’s very interesting, don’t you think?”

“I would say…” So long as I could stop him from following me home and watching me sleep I’d stay safe. I could move to another country, another planet – if this scene was real then all that other stuff could damn well follow suit. My mother wouldn’t protest if I told her it was vampires. She wanted to see me live to achieve more than living death almost as much as I did in that moment.

“…scintillating,” I finished.

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I generally don’t stick to keeping a blog for any length of time. There are some great ones out there, but in general I think people say too much in public webspace.

But over the past couple of weeks in particular, I’ve felt really strongly that there were certain things I needed to say, and they weren’t the usual things that I could put in my private journal and be rid of. I would willingly have said them to anyone who was listening. I guess that means, at least for the moment, I’m going to give this a try again. Just for myself, even. It will give me somewhere to squee about books and music and games that I’m enjoying, too.

Chapter Two – Heavy Hearted

Not that it was a bad thing, she reminded herself in the opening minutes of that morning, as she lay for the last time with a snoring Leafy warming her back. She would be of the human world soon enough, and she had best grow accustomed to seeing the wisdom of their ways again. It would be a nice change to be ordinary for once, and not feel as though she were continually on call for the whole world. To let machines worry about electricity. To again need to sleep in a bed, to groan and complain and thrash against another day’s hard labour when morning came, in a world where sleeping alongside one’s best friend each night was considered a little suspect.

Those things she knew about the human world, without knowing how she came by them. Alakazam had theorised all the confusing parts would make more sense to her on the other side. Like a jungle-choked maze that seemed unsurpassable until you recruited a flying Pokémon into your team, who could rise over the tangle and report back on the single best way through. A matter of perspective, of needing a human body…

“So today’s the day,” murmured Leafy.

It felt to Elly like forever passed before she was able to respond. A weak, worthless, “Yeah…”

She began to roll over, but was stopped by a firm paw on her shoulder. “Another moment,” said Leafy. “Stay, please…”

So they lay there for a while longer, not touching, not speaking – in words, at least.

Leafy wriggled. “So… do you really think you’ll like being a human better than…”

“I don’t think anything. You know…”

“You feel it’s your duty. Yes, I know that.” Leafy sounded as though she had some very clear unvoiced opinions on the matter, too.

“You know it’s the right thing for me to do, Leafy. It may not be easy, but it’s just a part of my mission, really.”

“Just wish it didn’t have to be the last part,” Leafy sighed.

A short while later they got up and left the base, side by side. Walking down the path that joined with the lane into the village, Elly felt her head drawn backwards to look to the base exterior. It was designed in the mould of her face – for the moment, at least. A rescue team base would look awfully fishy with a great big human head for a mascot.

She looked away to catch Leafy’s eye. “It stays like that forever,” she said. “In your honour.”

“Leaf.” Elly shook her head. “Things change. They move however it feels natural to. Look how all our team members were when I told them I was going back.” Only Little Cat had shown any inclination to see her off properly, and that had been put down by her very first polite dismissal. “I think your face should be on the base from now on,” said Elly. “You’re sole team leader now. It makes sense.”

“I was thinking, I might ask Moonburn to be co-leader with me.”

“That makes sense,” said Elly. “Moonburn is our most loyal member. He would be a worthy…”

The sleepy little Pokémon town seemed to be in a stupor that day. The streets clear as if they’d been Whirlwinded that way, but the little shopfronts and even the dew-bright bushes bristling with eyes, and somehow none of them wanting to venture out and speak to her. It was similar to when the other Pokémon had first found out about Elly being a human in a Pikachu suit, only that was easier to cope with because Elly had still been confused about that herself. Now she knew everything, and she’d been completely honest about it to them as well. All she needed to be complete was to understand exactly who she was out of the yellow skin – was that too much for them to comprehend, perhaps?

And then she felt bad for thinking so little of the creatures that had taken her to heart. But what was she supposed to think?

In only moments they had passed through town and were walking the increasingly craggy path to the Hill of the Ancients. The only sound was Leafy’s feet patting down the fine gravel of the worn trail – Elly’s thoughts were overwhelming. There was something else stirring inside of her as well, a wispy feeling that turned the scenery around her until it loomed miles high, and shrunk her small as a speck of gravel. This she could identify, because Alakazam had taken her aside a short time after everything had happened with Rayquaza, and explained. Instinct. Pokémon were as smart or as stupid as any human could be, but so long as they stayed true to their internals they had the advantage of being connected to something bigger than their own brains, a thread that stretched ever upward and outwards until it joined them to everything and every other Pokémon. Humans had inklings of such senses too, but as a species they couldn’t consistently cultivate them.

Elly knew from Gardevoir’s explanation that she had been considered special, but it would be too much to imagine that this meant she was one of the lucky few Alakazam spoke of who could harness the power of a Pokémon. What would it be like to lose this sense she had been carrying inside her for long enough that she accepted its gifts unthinkingly?

Leafy’s gait skipped a beat, announcing they were about to reach the flat stone plate where Xatu spent his days watching where the skies joined the seas. Elly reminded herself of the truth: that it would be exactly like becoming herself again. When it seemed fixed in her mind, she dared to look up, towards the means of her return.

“Welcome,” said Alakazam. Xatu turned but said nothing, which was actually a relief.

“Uh. Hi.”

“We should waste no time.” Elly stepped foward when Alakazam beckoned her, but immediately wished she could undo it. Close up she could see the thoughts crossing his face. She was also aware that Leafy had not followed her forward, which made her think she hadn’t understood until then the significance of leaving Leafy behind.

“I called you here in case we needed Xatu as backup,” said Alakazam, after shaking himself free of whatever reverie had gripped him. “But I should be able to do this alone. It was always planned, after all.”

“You don’t really know,” said Elly.

Alakazam looked at her, without meeting her eyes. “Does this change your desire to continue?”

Elly glanced back at Leafy, who stood stiff, foregoing breath as if awaiting a revelation on her favourite television show. Why were these flashes of human life coming to her before she could properly return to it?

“No, I have to do this no matter what,” she said. She turned back, away from Leafy’s face, but instead of Alakazam she saw Gardevoir.

“You did not think I would leave you to chance, saviour of our world?” She laughed, as always delighted beyond circumstances, though Elly was not sure how she identified the laughter as it was like nothing in her world.

She did not speak, guessing she was the only one experiencing this alternate vision. Betrayed by a weak human partner, Gardevoir was now only spirit, though she performed her duties as intermediary between worlds without resentment.

“Just close your eyes, and when next you open them you shall be human again,” said Gardevoir.

“Wait,” said Elly, realising that there would be no proper goodbye to Leafy as things were transpiring.

“Have you changed your mind then?” asked Alakazam’s voice from behind Gardevoir’s face.

“Elly…” said Leafy, but if there was more it was lost, because Elly felt her eyes close not of her own accord, and when she opened them again she was on her back, staring at the ceiling of a human dwelling. She had been lying right there on her bed the moment she agreed to let Gardevoir take possession of her destiny, she now recalled.

And there was her mother, hovering over her bed at a peculiar angle and grinning in a manner that sometimes meant she understood perfectly what was going on and sometimes meant she didn’t.

“Elly,” she said. “You’re home now.”

“Yes,” said Elly, and grinned back. How could she have ever felt other than this about her return? “I’m finally home.”

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Dancing Cheek To Cheek

Original Work: Final Fantasy VIII

Summary: Squall is just beginning to appreciate his general appeal to the laaaaaadies. Will Seifer’s meddling cause a setback?

Spoilers: Very light end-of-game spoilers. Although they’re kind of counterbalanced by things that definitely don’t happen.

Warnings: Implied sex.

Preference Warnings: Non-canon joke ‘pairing’ that is more popular than the canon pairing, lets be realistic about this. Blatant silliness.

Notes: I wrote this years ago as a kind of spiritual sequel to Imitation Leather (though their only real connection is that neither of them is plausible) and a commemoration of my friendship group discovering the… uh, of the boys love phenomenon. My friends did not end up reading it until some years later, at which point it killed them with lolwtfs. I think, “Seifer, are you high?” should totally be a line in the game.

Squall Leonhart had certainly changed in the past few months. For one thing, he’d become a much better dancer. All the other SeeD smiled inwardly to see the usually uptight youth whirling about the dance floor with Selphie.

Selphie was all dressed up in a frilly pink number and looked quite well herself with her hair grown just long enough to sweep her bare shoulders. Giggling, she leaned over to whisper in Squall’s ear. “Hey, do you realise that all the other SeeD are looking at us and commenting to our partners about how sexy we both look?”

“Sexy,” Squall repeated slowly. He turned the concept over in his mind a couple of times, compared it with a mental image of himself. “I don’t think so.”

“Aww, come on Mister Leonhart,” Selphie scolded him gently. “You’re not embarrassed about it, are you?” She poked him in the chest. Already nervous, he stumbled back.

“And I thought you’d gotten over your typical male clumsiness,” Selphie teased. “Now, Squall, you don’t fool me one little bit. We’ve been friends for ages and I know for a fact that nobody wears tight leather trousers like that if they don’t intend to look hot. Now, this little show wouldn’t be for anyone in particular, would it?”

Squall was about to explain to Selphie that he and Rinoa were playing it cool, not dating each other but staying off the other potentials too, when Irvine suddenly appeared, grinning goofily all over his face.

“Evening, ladies.” He tipped his had.

“Excuse me?” Squall’s eyes flashed. Irvine stepped back a pace and chuckled nervously.

“Irvy!” Selphie squealed, and flung herself into his arms. “You’ve come to ask me to dance! Oh, I would love to!” She began to plant huge, smeary kisses all over his face.

“Actually,” Irvine tried to explain, “I just came over to say…” His gaze traveled downwards. He realised that Selphie was occupied somewhere under his chin and not listening at all. “Yeah, let’s dance,” he gulped. “C’mon.” Waving apologetically to Squall, he hauled Selphie off onto the dance floor.

Not for the first time in his life, Squall was rejected for a slightly more charismatic guy.

He shrugged inwardly. Life would go on. He was about to move off the dance floor and find some food preferably bearing as little resemblance to a hot dog as possible, when the glinting of the bright lights off his trousers caught the corner of his eye.

First looking guiltily around to see if anyone was watching (they weren’t), Squall looked down, shifting his weight from leg to leg to further enhance the effect. And saw instantly that the lower half of him at least did look rather well in those tight trousers, even without his characteristic belts.

He wasn’t game enough to turn around and check what was going on behind, but he was pretty sure after Selphie’s comments earlier he would find it to be as acceptable as the front.

Man, I’m not all that bad to look at, he thought, and if there had been a mirror anywhere nearby Squall Leonhart would probably have been doing some serious strutting. Sex bomb, I’m a sex bomb…

Almost lost in such pleasant thoughts, Squall suddenly spotted Rinoa alone across the room. She was watching the dancers with considerable interest and probably thinking of the time she and Squall had first danced together.

Ordinarily it wasn’t his style to be the aggressive party, but Squall’s newfound sex appeal had given him courage. He squared his shoulders, held his chin at an angle of approximately ninety-six degrees to his throat and shoved his hands in his pockets. So he and Rinoa were playing it cool for a little while, so what? He would saunter up to his almost-woman casually and ask her to dance.

“Not so fast,” said a male voice behind him, as though his mind had been read. A chillingly familiar male voice. “You’re not going anywhere, Squall. Not until you dance with me.”

“Seifer,” Squall hissed, and whirled around.

“In person.” A dancing couple shifted, allowing him his first proper view of Seifer Almasy in months. And, just like usual, the meeting occurred in the very last place Squall would expect Seifer to be. Still… a major SeeD function was pushing it, even for someone like Seifer.

He forced his expression to remain neutral. The first rule of Leonhart psychology was to never appear surprised to the enemy. And anyone who messed a Leonhart face up as seriously as Seifer had (albeit receiving his own dues back) was definitely an enemy.

“You know,” he said, “if you’re caught here, you’ll probably be facing some trouble.” Why hadn’t Seifer been caught yet? Ht wasn’t as if nobody had seen him. Squall distinctly saw a group of girls staring at Seifer that very moment. One pointed, and then whispered something in a breathless voice to her friends.

Seifer followed his gaze and interpreted their actions more effectively than suspicious-minded Squall ever could. “Silly girls. They only ever think about one thing. Speaking of which, Squall old buddy, have you and Rinoa managed to make it yet?”

“That’s beside the point. What the hell are you doing here and why are you getting away with it?”

“Conditional pardon, with a few added privileges.” Seifer grinned at the expression on Squall’s face. “Yeah, it helps if you happen to have seen certain prominent members of society with their pants down – literally. Especially if they happen to have their pants down in the company of certain other prominent members of society.”

“Huh?” Squall was already confused. Proximity to Seifer always had that effect on him.

“Don’t worry about it. It’s not something I’m supposed to discuss, anyway. That’s the conditions of the pardon, you see. Now, Leonhart.” Just when Squall was starting to understand where his dreaded nemesis was coming from, Seifer switched to another tack. “I believe I asked you for a dance. And I’m not used to getting refusals, so I’m going to take the liberty of making your response for you.”

“Now you just wait a second.” Squall was about to get a few points straight with Seifer when he found himself grabbed and thrown physically onto the dance floor, Seifer grinning and following close behind. Having never thought that Seifer would go so far as to rough him, Squall stumbled and nearly fell.

“Talk’s cheap.” Seifer grabbed Squall’s shoulders and spun him around to face him. “I thought you of all people would have known that. Now shut up and dance with me, Squall. I think I’ve earned at least that much from you.”

The last thing Squall wanted to do was to be seen dancing with Seifer, but it occurred to him that it was already too late. The group of girls who had been pointing at Seifer earlier were now pointing and giggling at both of them. Several SeeD he knew well had stopped dancing or eating to stare – one of them, Squall realised with a sinking feeling, was Rinoa. And the expression on her face was situated somewhere between shock-horror, complete disbelief and – perhaps worst – unabashed curiosity.

Seifer was tugging on his arms. “Come on, Leonhart,” Seifer grunted. “Don’t be such a killjoy. I just want one dance. It’s not like I’m asking you to make passionate love to me or something.”

“With you, Almasy, I wouldn’t be surprised if the one almost always followed the other,” was Squall’s gloomy comment. Seifer grinned, but to Squall’s disgust did not refute him.

By that time, Squall was so completely exhausted he couldn’t think of a single way to get rid of Seifer without appearing to be a jerk. Judging from the excited reactions of all the people who had seen and recognised Seifer, the rumours about a Seifer fan club seemed more likely than not to be true. And as much as Squall was confident of the regard they held him in, he wasn’t dumb enough to think he could get away with spurning a SeeD idol.

What the hell. It’s just one dance. It’s not as if he’s asking me to make passionate love to him or something. And who knows? Maybe this little stunt will actually improve my status around the place.

“Almasy, I don’t know why the hell I’m doing this and I’ll kindly ask you not to explain it to me.” Tentatively, as though either his partner or himself were made of glass, Squall gripped Seifer in the waltz position and began going through the motions.

Seifer just stood there. Squall broke away, embarrassed. It was staring to look as though he was the enthusiastic party.

“What the hell’s wrong now?”

“Squall, do you realise you were taking the female part in that little… experience?” A sly smirk played across Seifer’s lips. “I can just see you in a little skirt. And, of course, no underwear.”

Squall’s eyes widened, but he was so shocked by this comment he could do little more than gape, like a fish.

“Bubble, bubble,” Seifer mocked him. “That wasn’t dancing, Squall. What were you thinking?”

“Well, in case you haven’t noticed, that’s what everyone else is doing!” Squall exploded in an uncharacteristic fit of temper. He stamped his foot so loudly several couples nearby paused to listen to their confrontation. “And why do you people think you’re looking at?” he demanded.

Seifer laid a conciliatory hand on his arm. “Squall, no offence intended, honestly.” Squall slapped it petulantly away.

Seifer tried another tack. “Look, I’m sorry, Squall, I’m really sorry. I should have been more tactful. I mean, when I asked you for a dance, I had something… different… in mind.”

Dear God, what can he be thinking? Squall controlled the urge to run away screaming into the crowd. “Seifer, what kind of ‘different’ were you thinking?”

The two of them were standing several inches apart by then. Seifer adopted a somewhat more… flirtatious pose than usual. “Heaven… ah’m in heaven…” he crooned.

Squall stared. “Seifer, are you high?”

In that moment when Squall made the mistake of letting his guard down completely, Seifer moved. Darting around Squall so quickly his image of the baffling blond blurred, he… grabbed his backside.

Squall’s squeal of horror and disgust could be heard several light years out in space – quite an incredible feat, really, considering there is no sound in space.

“Shut up,” Seifer grunted. “Damn it, when I say dance I wanna grind, and we’re gonna grind if I have to staple you to the ground in order to do it!” With that, and still squeezing Squall’s nether regions uncomfortably tightly, Seifer proceeded to do unspeakable things around that area.

“Seifer!” Squall pleaded. “Even for you, this is too much!” He wondered why he didn’t simply pull away, as any normal sexually threatened male would have done. Maybe it was simply the fact that attention to his ass was confirming what he had already suspected – that back there was a fine ole piece of meat.

He didn’t even pull away at first when Seifer shifted his position and began rubbing his own ass against Squall’s. By the time it occurred to him to pedal forward out of there as fast as he could, Seifer had him by the elbows and things were looking seriously uncomfortable for Squall Leonhart, all around.

The most embarrassing part was yet to come, when suddenly, out of nowhere, the hall was alive with the sound of Fujin. Apparently, Seifer hadn’t had the courtesy to come alone.

“YEAH! YEAH, BABY!”

Which, unsurprisingly enough, caused everyone who wasn’t already pointing and sniggering to turn around and stare directly at Squall and his, ahem, partner. Who was at that moment making certain unusual animal grunts and tenderly massaging Squall with a part of his body not usually reserved for that purpose. Thus, Squall was left to fend off the puzzled and, frankly, repulsed stares.

“Seifer,” he hissed, struggling while trying not to appear as though he needed to struggle. “Everyone is staring at us. What the fuck kind of game are you playing?”

“Squall, you are one hell of a sexy guy,” Seifer purred, of course pretending not to have heard a thing.

“Seifer!”

By that time, a small crowd had gathered around the couple – including, Squall noticed with a sinking feeling, Irvine and Selphie. They all had expectant expressions on their faces, and he noticed the girls who had been pointing at Seifer earlier. Fears beyond even his worst came true when several of them began calling instructions to Seifer.

“Come on, harder! You give him something to remember!”

“Go for the groin! Go for the groin!” That was Irvine.

“Hot dog! Hot dog!” Zell, obviously.

“Take a bite!”

“Hey, don’t have him all to yourself! Let someone else get a turn, too!”

“I wanna join in!”

Remarkably quickly, Squall was learning the sexual preferences of the SeeD under him. Not to mention which of them would never be up for promotion in his lifetime.

Then, Seifer took things a little too far by actually following some of their instructions. Squall’s first indication that this was happening was when Seifer, still rubbing his, ahem, cheeks against Squall’s, allowed his hands to slide nonchalantly around Squall’s waist.

The two slaps resounded around the hall. Seifer staggered away clutching both cheeks… the ones on his face, that is.

“Squall!” he complained. “I just wanted to see how you’d react, that’s all! You didn’t have to go off your nut like that!”

“React? REACT?” Squall turned a strange shade of purple. It was one of those times when a certain overly amorous scarred blond was lucky Seifer Remover wasn’t on the market yet. “And how the hell did you think I was going to react? Rubbing your ass against me is one thing, but putting your grubby hands all over my…” Squall spluttered, trying to find an appropriate word, “… my manhood is taking it a little beyond the joke!”

“Shame, Squall!” Selphie yelled. “You can’t just go and slap the guy like that! Even A-Grade Dickhead deserves respect!”

“Yeah!” Seifer agreed. “Even I deserve…” Suddenly, he realised exactly what Selphie had called him.

Irvine raised his eyebrows and laughed. “You’ll have to have another dance with him now, Squall, to show him you’re sorry.”

“I most certainly will not,” Squall snapped.

Immediately, the entire group formed around the two began chanting. “Shame! Shame! Shame! Shame!”

So Squall, who in spite of his superior standing wasn’t actually respected that much, found himself dancing once again with Seifer Almasy, while a group of giggling SeeD rushed off to the DJ and organised the rudest, lewdest songs for the next hour. They pressed drinks into Squall’s hand, still giggling.

The smile on Seifer’s face grew wider and wider as Squall found the two of them dancing again and again without him either agreeing or disagreeing. Squall blankly watched Seifer go through this transformation as he became ever more inebriated, obediently moving whichever way Seifer ordered him to.

Then, to the highly appropriate accompaniment of ‘You Spin Me Round,’ the room and everyone in it began to spin like a record, slowly at first, then gradually faster until he couldn’t remember for the life of him who he had begun dancing with, why he was so drunk or what the hell everyone was clapping and cheering for.

*

“Wha…?” Squall awoke with a jolt, thinking he heard a voice close to his ear. And was immediately rewarded with his first experience of a hangover. He groaned and pressed his face harder into the pillow.

“And why the hell did I get drunk, anyway? In my life, I have never gotten myself totally smashed before and there’s a reason. I don’t party, I just dance, and I’m always careful about who I partner. Unlike those stupid young SeeD these days, who would probably partner anybody they thought would be easiest to get into bed. Unlike…” Squall struggled to think of someone he knew fairly well.

Seifer.

The name popped into his head unbidden, and shocking memories of the previous night’s main entertainment soon followed. Sleep and alcohol had dulled the memories somewhat, leaving Squall with only a vague idea of what he had actually done and what he had only dreamed or hallucinated. Still, Squall was pretty sure he’d made a complete fool of himself. He could only imagine how he had actually removed his clothes and made it to his own bed.

After the initial shock, he decided the best thing to do was remain optimistic about the situation. Chances were, he’d shown everyone a side of him they hadn’t imagined was there, a side that could cause many SeeD to respect and relate better with their Commander than ever before. Chances were, everyone else (except, maybe, Rinoa) had seen the whole thing as a bit of fun, and nobody would be too harsh on him for his demonstration on exactly how excessive drinking could affect one’s willpower, self-control and memory.

Another way to look at the experience was as confirmation of what Selphie had mentioned before she was whisked away by her dashing lover. He, Squall Leonhart, had developed to a point in his life and physical appearance where he could be officially deemed sexy. And Seifer, moronic as he was, had obviously picked up on this fact and was inspired to thus give Squall the rumpus treatment.

“Yeah, Leonhart, you sure have got a sexy little butt.” To emphasise this point, he wrested a hand free of the confining blankets and reached back to slap his own ass.

“Why, Squall. I didn’t think you’d still feel that way about me.”

All at once Squall realised three things.

He hadn’t felt the slap.

There was something a whole lot warmer than blankets covering him.

A naked, grinning Seifer had just wormed his way out of the blankets and was now speaking directly into his ear.

He’d just slapped Seifer’s ass.

*

Ten million miles away from Garden, on a planet known as Zafrin, a little Zafrin-ling and her pet goté stared up at the sky to determine the origins of an anguished scream, the likes of which neither had heard before.

*

“Seifer,” Squall snarled, “if you tell anybody about this, rest assured your life will be over.”

Seifer rubbed the side of his head affectionately into Squall’s bare back. His hair prickled. “No prob, baby, I can recognise a one-night stand when I have one.”

“Seifer!”

“Hey, okay. I’ll keep it under my hat, I promise.”

“Seifer Almasy, you little shit, you don’t even wear a hat. So don’t even think about asking Irvine to keep it under his for you.”

“Squall,” Seifer chuckled, you know me so well. It really is a pity nothing will come of this.”

Squall was about to reply when, without warning, the door creaked open. “Squall? I know you had a lot to drink last night, and I was wondering if you were feeling all right…” Rinoa’s bubbly tones trailed off as she stepped into the room and realised that Squall had company.

Her next words were spoken in an entirely different voice. “Dear God, Squall, I had no idea you drank that much.”

Seifer propped himself up on one elbow and leered at her. “Don’t worry Rin,” he cracked. “I’ve tested him out myself and he’s in perfect working order.”

This comment was lost on Rinoa, who was already falling backwards as he spoke. She hit the floor with a decisive thud.

“Now look what you’ve done,” Squall groaned.

“Wanna kiss?”

In response, Squall slapped Seifer’s other cheeks again, hard enough to make the blond boy wince, then scrambled out of bed to storm out of the room, slamming the door behind him.

Seifer got up and locked the door. He stared at Rinoa’s prone form and wondered if she would be out for long enough to provide entertainment. He wondered when Squall would realise he was stomping about the corridors naked, and how long he would have to refuse to open the door before Squall started offering sexual favours.

*

“I heard a god speak!” the little girl insisted. “He said, ‘I’m naked! Let me in!’”

“The God has allowed his words to be spoken through the innocence of a child!” the Head Priest declared.

The shrine to the God Naked was duly built, and Zafrinians from across the globe came to worship.

*

Squall looked from left to right. There was no escape route. Every SeeD who could stand up after the night’s partying had locked the doors and rushed out to see him – or, rather, to see parts of him they had never seen before.

He shrugged, struck a pose. “Hell, why not? My reputation’s shot anyway.”

He turned around and began wriggling his ass. “Sex bomb, I’m a sex bomb…”

Imitation Leather

Original Work: Final Fantasy VIII

Summary: When things with Rinoa turn a little pear-shaped due to an unexpected revelation, Squall hits upon a really novel way of resolving the situation.

Spoilers: Character introductions and some really obvious relationships.

Warnings: Sexual references.

Preference Warnings: Silliness, some characters dragged mildly OOC and absolutely no attempt made to make this fit with canon.

Notes: I wrote this almost ten years ago now before ever playing FFVIII, as a joke for some friends. It ended up being the gift that kept on giving, as my first ever finished fan fiction (and only, for some time) and a piece of writing from my teen years that isn’t overly cringeworthy now, though that’s mostly because of its silly nature.

Her arms feverishly clutching at his lower back, her chin buried somewhere in his chest, Rinoa thought she had never been happier in her entire life. Just breathing in the smell of him was almost more than she could take; her pulse rate ran ragged, the room spun and she would have fallen if he wasn’t gripping her just as tightly.

Squall? Squall was perfectly content. Strange feelings stirred wherever Rinoa touched him. He was starting to doubt everything he’d ever been told about shy, klutzy boys always coming last in the game of love. He was also going through the mechanics of the sexual experience in his mind – subtly of course – just in case. It was hard without knowing what she would look like naked…

Rinoa pulled away from him suddenly. He tried to follow her. “Beautiful, what…?”

“It’s okay,” she assured him quickly, smiling. “It’s okay… it’s okay…” She might have said it three times, or a hundred. Squall felt himself actually grinning, his arms held open wide for her, overcome by the sense that his heart was about to burst from his chest and break into joyous song, that every fibre of his body was stretched and clogged with love and longing. It was okay.

She held back just a little while, studying him compassionately. He’d changed so much since she’d first met him. It was hard to picture in this Squall the under confident but serious young man she’d danced with under the moon. This Squall smiled, teased her about her clothes or the way she wore her hair. He sometimes overcame her with his eagerness to give or receive affection. It was as though all those needs had lain under the surface of his skin for many years, waiting for that ‘special someone’ to unlock his rightful heritage.

Of course, Squall always behaved the perfect gentleman when around her. He’d been clever in first inviting her to his quarters in the company of various friends, and intuitive enough to allow her to make the all-important first moves on him while on his home territory. Even now he held back, either understanding or fearing that she could be hurt as quickly as she was pleased. He waited for her to move towards what he must want. Was there a man who didn’t want that?

Rinoa smiled too. He was more than deserving. She slipped a hand to the zipper on the back of her dress as subtly as possible. Better he didn’t know right away. More fun if he was surprised.

“Squall? Beloved?”

First I… then I… and, if I’ve been really good at that point, then she will probably… “Rinoa?”

She’d forgotten how difficult it was to unzip a dress quietly – in fact, she’d never had a need to do that before. She wished she had the courage to ask for Squall’s help, but that kind of courage only came after you slept with the person. To startle him into agreeing, she needed to get out of her dress… “You know I love you more than anything in the world, right?”

Squall stared at her suspiciously. She held her hands behind her back like someone preparing a particularly nice gift.

Rinoa wasn’t put of at all by his non-answer. “And would I be right in concluding that you love me, too?”

“More than anything!” he responded with a loud gasp. To think she would need to ask that! He broke their eye-to-eye stance by rushing to throw more wood on the fire, and Rinoa used the opportunity to unzip her dress properly and pull its clammy length from her front. She hadn’t realised it before, but she was sweating just thinking about it all. Or it might be the fire.

“Rinoa, I love everything about you,” Squall spoke staring into the fire. “Especially…” He turned, and his mouth dropped open to see Rinoa, clad in silky underpants and a bra that took the bare essentials to whole new levels. “Especially…” Words conveniently failed him. “Shit, Rin.”

She chuckled softly, half to herself, and moved slowly towards Squall. More than aware of the effect her uncovered body had on him, she exaggerated her swaying gait.

“Man, man, man, Rinoa.” Man, these trousers ain’t big enough for this man no more, man. Still, he felt his suspicious nature coming back to haunt him, even in those final moments of realisation. “You sure this isn’t some trick?”

Almost settled back in her beloved’s arms, Rinoa paused a moment to appreciate the feel of his leather against her skin, the feel of becoming turned on. And how will you be when he actually takes his clothes off, then?

“No. No trick, Squall. What you see is pretty much what you get – with added bonuses along the way, of course.”

“Oh. Of course.”

She slid her arms around his unresisting neck; rubbing her hands in his furry collar, she eased the jacket over his shoulders. “The only trick, sweetheart,” she murmured in his ear, very low, “is that you have to take your clothes off too. It just doesn’t work the other way.”

This only seemed to worry him more. “M – maybe we should turn the lights off now,” Squall suggested, pulling her towards the bedroom lamp – and, as it so happened, the bed. “It’s late, and…”

Rinoa pretended to pout. “Oh, Squall. You’re not embarrassed about the idea of being naked around me?”

“No, but…”

“No buts,” Rinoa decided. She pulled his jacket off before he could think of a response to that, one limp arm at a time. There she paused another moment to inhale more of his manly sweetness. The next morning she would wear his beautiful jacket, but right now she had other things to do.

She was about to toss it on the floor along with her dress, but common sense made her reconsider. She would fold Squall’s jacket up. She couldn’t resist touching the collar again as she did so, and she paused to read the tag on the collar.

“Funny, baby,” she giggled. “I always thought you’d be the kind of man who cut the tags off your clothes. You know, that’s almost the first thing I thought of you. Squall Leonhart looks like the kind of guy who removes the tags from all his clothes.”

“Yeah, whatever,” Squall muttered. His face was flushed; whether from the heat of the fire or his own personal energy source originating from Rinoa’s semi-nakedness, it was not apparent.

“Anyhow, that’s not important. What’s this say?” Eager to be on with the truly important details of the evening, Rinoa ran uninterested eyes over the tag, which bore on its silky surface only two words, printed small and in bold ink.

IMITATION LEATHER

*

“Rinoa,” Squall tried. He was sitting on the bed, as close as he dared to a shaking Rinoa who tried to force her dress back on every way but the right one. When the silent tension between them grew too great he held out his gloved hands to help her. She jerked away as though she’d been burned.

“Rinoa,” Squall snapped, angry himself. “It’s just a jacket.”

Her eyes flashed. “Just a jacket!” The sound of those words against her ears awakened her to just how foolishly she was behaving, and she hung her head. “I know, Squall. I know it’s just a jacket. I know I’m being silly. But…”

“You thought I would actually waste my money on a genuine leather jacket?”

“Of course!” A cross spasm racked her body; she tossed the dress aside and sat still, hands clasped, staring at the floor. “I mean… well, I did, but… It’s no big deal, I guess.”

“Why do you keep saying it is no big deal when it obviously is?”

“I don’t know!” Rinoa snarled at Squall, snapping her head about so fiercely he stood and backed off a few steps. She saw the expression in his eyes and clapped both hands to her mouth. “Oh, I can’t believe I just did that. I know, I’m being a bitch and I should be more mature about this.”

“Well, I won’t argue with that.”

“I suppose the collar isn’t real fur, either?” Rinoa asked plaintively.

“News flash! Proud dog owner Rinoa Heartilly can’t tell the difference between a real and a synthetic canine!”

“Squall!” Rinoa shrieked, standing up to deliver her words right in his face. “Don’t you dare joke about this!” She began to glow slightly in the fading light of a fire neither of them had bothered to feed.

Squall put his hands on her (still bare) shoulders. “Easy, Rinoa, you’re starting to turn pink.”

At first she glared with him as though he might be joking with her again (since when was pale-skinned Rinoa pink?) but a quick glance into the (dust-coated) mirror proved it to be true. She giggled a little and fell back onto the bed.

“Really… this is too much for one night.” She stood, moved to the window and peered outside, then headed to refuel the fire. Squall stood with his hands stiffly by his sides, sidestepping Rinoa as she moved all about his room muttering to herself. He wasn’t sure whether he should say something to try and patch things up, or wait for her to move. He stole a longing glance towards his imitation leather jacket, now discarded in a corner.

He could hear some of what Rinoa was saying. “So… no real leather, and no real fur, either.”

“It seemed a little extravagant, considering the prices of real leather these days,” Squall volunteered. “Besides, real leather tends to make me itch in all the wrong places.” Rinoa shot him a disgusted look and tossed her head, silken dark hair obscuring her beautiful face for an instant.

“Rinoa, is something as petty as this going to spoil our night?”

“Um…” Rinoa ran her hands through her hair. Squall noticed dark spots under her eyes that hadn’t been there earlier. “Um, yes, Squall, it is. Look, I don’t think I want to handle this right now. Not so late at night, and not the way I’m feeling. We both might say things we regret.”

“But Rinoa, it’s only a jacket!”

“It might be only a jacket to you, and you might very well be right about it, but I have my feelings and expectations too!” Rinoa followed this heavy statement with a tearful sniff, straightening her dress and attempting to pull it on again.

“Here, Rinny, I’ll help you with that.”

“You will not,” she retorted, and did it very capably herself.

“Squall, I’m going back to my room now,” she told him, grabbing her own jacket, lying neatly folded on a chair. “I’ve put up with a lot lately – this is hardly the worst of it, mind you, but I’ve put up with a lot, and this is about the last thing I can handle.”

“It’s only a jacket!”

“It might be only a jacket to you…”

“Look, you selfish little bitch,” Squall exploded. “You say you’ve ‘put up with a lot’ lately. I assume you mean a lot from me. Well, there’s two ways that can go. You don’t think I know about this, but I just happened to be in the next room mentoring some kid when you were there flirting with Zell Dincht…”

“I thought we locked the door!” Rinoa exclaimed, then realised with shock that was exactly the sort of comment she didn’t want to make.

“Walls are extremely thin around here, Rinoa,” Squall reminded her humorously. “I heard every word – how you’d had your eye on him for quite some time but couldn’t act because of me, how you wanted to spend just one night with him if it were at all possible… and, finally, how you were so magnanimous as to pass over the opportunity presented, because you didn’t want to betray me!”

“Squall,” Rinoa pleaded against hope, “it wasn’t like that…”

“Wasn’t like that! How was it, then? Didn’t I express it poetically enough? It was so much more, is that it?”

“Squall, how could you!” Rinoa wailed.

“How could I?”

Rinoa felt her own temper flare up, hot and angry. She stamped her foot. “All right, you listen here then. Do you realise that’s the longest conversation we’ve had in weeks? How do you think I feel, being with someone who doesn’t open his mouth until there’s a real crisis? Someone who insists on doing everything by himself, his own way, all the time? Don’t you think I sometimes feel as though I’d like to be with someone who talks to me properly?”

“We were talking tonight! We were having a great time until you…”

“Only because you thought you might get me in bed if you were nice. And it was working, wasn’t it!” Close to tears, Rinoa spat out a final stinging retort. “Now, of course, I know that’s all you wanted. A cheap tumble in the hay.”

“Rinoa, you’re going to regret you ever said that.”

“In what way?” Rinoa sniffed.

“If you’re going to act this way over a jacket, maybe I don’t want to see you for a while,” Squall warned. Hell, if she acts that way over a jacket, I’m lucky I didn’t let her take off the trousers…

“And maybe I don’t want to go out with you after tonight anyway!” Rinoa countered, the pride rising in her throat. “Maybe you can just stop being my boyfriend.”

Enraged more than he had ever been in his life (I had to come out of my shell to this!), Squall bellowed the first thing that came to mind. “You can’t fire me, Rinoa Heartilly, because I quit being your boyfriend! You couldn’t pay me to go out with someone who carries on the way you do!”

Rinoa’s response was to flee from the room, her hands pressed into her face. He heard her squeak with surprise as she collided with someone heading the other way, and rushed to her aid. Only force of habit, force of habit…

“Honestly, Squall, I could hear you two nearly across the other side of town,” Quistis complained, hands on her hips. “Are you quite finished now?”

“Yeah, we’re finished all right. All because of my stupid imitation leather jacket.”

“You mean you don’t wear real leather?” Quistis exclaimed.

“Is there nobody around here who doesn’t care that I don’t wear real leather?” Squall demanded.

“Well, to tell you the truth, most of us kind of see you as a real leather man,” Quistis admitted. “We don’t tell Rinoa that, of course, in case she takes it the wrong way. But I guess that doesn’t matter quite as much any more.”

“Yeah, you’re right.” Squall stared after the retreated form of Rinoa gloomily, then proceeded to relate the events of the evening to Quistis, leaving out certain details about the situation he felt particularly sensitive about. You see, Quistis, Rinoa and I were about to screw, when she got kinda turned on by my clothing and decided to read the labels. She got more than she bargained for at that point, and quite promptly became premenstrual in nature.

She watched him thoughtfully from a distance during the entire sorry tale, sometimes shaking her head and making little noises of sympathy. She didn’t speak or interrupt him to ask questions about parts she obviously didn’t understand, allowing him to blunder through the sorry tale as he desired.

“And, well, that’s the end of that, I guess,” he finished lamely. “Would you like to, um, come in? Everything’s in a bit of a mess…” Rinoa had to wipe all that dust off my mirror and onto the floor, didn’t she? The least she could have done was kept the place clean if she was going to break up with me over a jacket… “…but I don’t mind.”

Quistis was silent for a minute. Then she deliberately drew back a hand and slapped him across the face.

“The lengths men will go to just to hide their guilt! Squall Leonhart, I thought you were the one man in the world who was incorruptible, above that sort of thing!”

“What thing?” Squall demanded, rubbing his cheek.

“I thought she looked a bit ruffled. I think she was about to cry. What did you do, try to rip her clothes off or something? And now you’re trying to pretend that she got in a little huff over your jacket not being real leather? Grow up Squall; Rinoa’s just not like that! There’s no way she would dump you over a silly little thing like a jacket!”

Compounded with me dropping my little bombshell about her and Zell, and her completely freaking out over the way I’m just coming out socially, she might just dump me over an imitation leather jacket. “It’s way more complicated than you think, Quistis.”

“Complicated!” Quistis sniffed at him in disgust. “Look, asshole, I’d love to say and chat, but I think I’ll go comfort Rinoa.”

“You don’t even like Rinoa that much!”

“So?” Quistis turned about face and stalked off down the corridor, leaving a slack-jawed Squall to gape after her. When Quistis became concerned over Rinoa, he knew he’d seriously screwed things up.

*

“Rinoa, I’m sure you’ll get another boyfriend really soon,” Selphie assured her, squeezing her friend a little tighter around the shoulders. This just made Rinoa cry all the harder.

“That’s the thing, though. I don’t want to get another boyfriend. I just want Squall.” Tears streamed down her cheeks in emotional rivers. Not knowing what else to do, Selphie kindly handed her two boxes of tissues. “I really do love him, Selphie, I’ve never stopped.”

“I hear ya.”

“If only I hadn’t started talking about how little he communicated, he might not have even brought up what he heard about Zell and I! If he was calm about everything, we might have been able to work through that! It’s not fair!” she wailed. “Tonight was supposed to be perfect, and it had to be spoiled by my stupidity!”

Selphie grinned knowingly. “Come on, old pal, you can’t fool me that way.”

Rinoa looked up for a minute, surprised that Selphie’s tone had turned so flippant. I’ve always suspected that some of the others were jealous of what Squall and I had together. But Selphie? It just doesn’t seem her style. “What do you mean?”

“This wasn’t about what you and Zell almost did or what Squall never does, was it?” Selphie smiled like someone who had just figured out the answer to a million dollar question. “You finally found out that he wears fake leather, didn’t you?”

“Selphie, how come you knew it, and I didn’t?” Rinoa was so shocked she actually stopped crying.

Sensing that she might actually be doing something right, Selphie went on to explain. “Oh, Irvy and I had the same problem a while back. Only it wasn’t fake leather clothing, well, not the sort of clothing you wear on a day-to-day basis…” Realising she was probably saying a little more than she needed to, Selphie coloured and hurried on. “Anyway, after those days I made sure I knew leather. And that is not leather Squall wears.”

“Oh.”

Rinoa was quiet for a few seconds as the information sank in, then she began crying even louder. “Everyone has a boyfriend except me! I’m going to be the only person left in the world who is still a virgin at age twenty!”

“Okay,” Selphie sighed to her reflection in the mirror, “maybe that wasn’t a good way to resolve things.”

*

News of Squall and Rinoa’s split traveled fast. It wasn’t long before both halves of the formerly happy couple were inundated with visitors, some offering condolences, others congratulations. Some of them believed Squall’s (true) version of events, others Rinoa’s. The ones who believed Squall (of which there were, thankfully, very few) usually came with advice for the hapless Romeo, and well-meaning suggestions of how he could win his beloved back.

Squall received all his personal calls politely. Secretly, he cursed Rinoa and, with her, all things female. Why hadn’t the silly bitch been able to keep her personal problems private? Why couldn’t Quistis shut up when he’d taken her into his confidence during a moment of temporary insanity? Selphie abused him publicly every time their paths crossed during the day, and now girls he didn’t even know the names of stared, nudging their friends and whispering.

Normally, Squall didn’t care what other people thought or said about him, but on this occasion he wasn’t sure just how much more torture he could take.

He had to get Rinoa back.

It was a task easier said and done. Rinoa was cut badly over the events leading to their break up, and refused to even look at him. She (or Selphie, who appeared to spend most of her free time with Rinoa now) hung up the phone every time he called. He wasn’t even sure if Rinoa would talk to him, should he find some way to obtain an audience. He lacked the courage to approach her in her quarters without a good plan.

Seifer was the one who eventually came to the rescue – ironically, with a plan straight from the mouth of Zell, who was very much to blame for the whole thing.

“Squall, my friend, you are really up a river of shit, aren’t you?” he remarked, surveying the sparse room he had been invited into with the air of a visiting king.

“Yeah,” Squall agreed, and then scowled.

“Nev’r mind my boy, that’s what I’m here for, and have I got a surprise for you! You’ll never guess what Zell said in passing just the other day!”

“Ha, ha, Squall sucks, Rinoa’s going to be mine?” Squall guessed. Seifer paled.

“Among other things… yeah. But the really interesting part – and you know how little Chickenwuss says that is interesting – is that he actually thought up the makings of a brilliant plan that could result in you getting your Rinny back for good!”

Squall moved quickly, grabbing Seifer by the collar and shaking him. “Tell me it’s so,” he pleaded. “Look, this might sound crazy, but since Rinoa left I haven’t been able to eat or sleep. Everyone loves that girl, Seifer, and now they all hate me! The trouble is, I love her too, and now I hate me!”

“Easy, easy.” Seifer disentangled himself from Squall’s frenzied grip. “Like I say, it’s no problem, okay? All you have to do is listen to what I heard and draw your own conclusions as to what you should do.”

“I’m listening.”

“I’m going to ask you a simple question. If Rinoa likes dead skin so much, how do you think she’s going to react to live skin?”

Seifer sat back, grinning, and watched the huge sweatdrop form on one side of Squall’s face. Obviously, he’d been expecting something a little more valiant.

“Are you thinking what I’m thinking, Squallie boy?” Seifer prompted, when there was no response from Squall after ten seconds.

“Shit,” Squall responded faintly.

*

In the end, he simply had to make up his mind which was more important: Rinoa or his intact dignity. He was about to let go of his former sweetheart in his mind when Seifer sealed the deal by saying with a grin, “I knew you’d never go through with it. Zell knows it too, and he said as much. You just don’t have the balls, mate.”

Which was how Squall ended up stumbling over to Rinoa’s room at midnight in only his underwear, praying he wouldn’t encounter anyone else on a midnight errand to prove to Seifer – and Rinoa, in fact – that he actually did have the balls.

He took a deep breath when he reached her door. All right, this is the moment of truth. If this doesn’t get her back for me, nothing ever will. So you’ve got to play this cool. There’s no way I can back out now – not with Seifer threatening to call me the modern Chickenwuss for the rest of my life. Squall took an even deeper breath and then knocked.

He heard shuffling inside. Apparently, Rinoa wasn’t asleep after all. “Come in,” a sweet voice called. It was exactly the reception he’d been hoping for, and Squall obeyed immediately, slipping through the door and slamming it so quickly Rinoa wouldn’t have time to realise it was him, much less throw him out.

His carefully prepared speech went right out the window at the crucial moment. “Um, Rinoa, it’s me,” he spoke into the darkness. “I know I’m probably the last person you want to see, but you can’t make me leave now because I won’t take no for an answer this time. You see, Rinoa, breaking up with you was the worst mistake of my life. I’ve realised it these past days, and now I’ve decided that no silly argument is worth losing you.”

She hadn’t said anything, but the sound of her breathing assured him she was still alive. He went on.

“I know you’re probably still upset over the leather thing and, well, maybe you’re right about it. But I love you Rinoa, and I think there’s a way around it. I mean, what is leather really but dead skin? And I can prove that I have far better live skin – and it’s on me.”

At that strategic moment, Squall flicked the light switch on and dropped his pants.

And then realised there were not one, but about fifteen pairs of eyes staring back at him – most of them female SeeD, all of them possessing very good vision. He amused himself briefly watching Selphie’s eyes bug out before he remembered what they were bugging out over, by which time Rinoa had hurried over to stand in front of him.

“Squall, you idiot,” she hissed. “Why couldn’t you be a nice, normal guy for once and just apologise? What on earth possessed you to do something like this?”

“It was Zell’s idea,” was the only thing Squall could think of.

Rinoa digested this fact. “Oh. That explains the stupidity.”

“And I only did it because I love you,” he added. And because I don’t like Zell’s nickname any more than Zell himself does. And because I don’t like the idea of Zell getting his grubby hands on my girl one little bit. And because I’m still getting horny thinking about the way you looked that night, and if I don’t get laid really soon I’ll probably pick one of those other girls at random…

“Thinking, Squall?” Rinoa asked with a winning smile.

Squall answered her with another question. “Why did you have to pick this night of all nights to have a sleepover?”

“I think they’re kind of glad I did now.” Rinoa glanced back at her friends, who were talking excitedly in a little huddle and gesturing with their hands. It looked as though they were measuring something.

“Anyway.” Rinoa returned her attention to Squall, and her expression became deadly serious. “You know what?”

“What?”

“I’ve been doing a lot of thinking, and I realise now that this is all my fault. What I said to Zell started things, and all the stupid stuff I said about your… imitation leather… well, I blew things way out of proportion and I’m sorry.” Rinoa bowed her head. “You don’t have to apologise at all. I’m glad to get back together with you, if you still want me.”

And I just chucked my clothes off in front of a bunch of strangers for this? I wouldn’t be surprised if Zell knew what was going to happen all along… “Of course I want you back,” Squall declared. “Do you think I would go through all this humiliation in one day and not get some kind of compensation for it?”

The two stared at one another. He was oblivious to the fact that he was completely naked, while she didn’t care about the other girls in her room. The thought of being back together after a truly horrible experience warmed them and brought with it memories of the good things that had happened during their fiery night of romance in Squall’s bedroom.

“I was so silly,” Rinoa whispered. “Here I was, complaining about that silly fake skin, when the best skin was real all along.”

Quistis let out a huge wolf whistle. Rinoa turned around (careful to shield Squall’s best bits at all times) and pointed towards the door.

“Enough fun for tonight, girls. Squall and I have some catching up to do.”

“Bet you do,” Selphie giggled, a knowing look printed all over her face.

Fujin’s one eye was still as wide as it had been when Squall first dropped his… erm, bombshell. “shit!” she squeaked in a very un-Fujin-like voice.

“Out!” Rinoa stressed, and the left not a moment too soon for Squall, who was revising the sexual experience in his mind – just in case he and Rinoa could get through the rest of the night without an argument and he finally got lucky.

A good SeeD is a prepared SeeD.

Epilogue: The Unnecessary Stuff That Happened After

Squall had some good times and some bad times on his quest to become a normal, functioning human being, but he was never again hated as much as he had been during those few weeks when he and Rinoa were on bad terms over his leather jacket. Whenever he met a female in Garden, their gaze invariably dropped to his crotch within a remarkably short amount of time. He wasn’t sure what stories Selphie and her friends had told, but he wasn’t complaining – Rinoa had so much competition she was too scared to dump him ever again. She knew his reputation preceded him.

Rinoa, on top of ending up with the best boyfriend and the coolest hair, soon got over her disappointment about Squall’s fake leather clothing in the bigger scheme of things. She comforted herself on that point slightly by buying Squall enough real leather underpants to last him the rest of his life.

Seifer soon learned that dropping your pants during a girls’ slumber party was actually good for your public image. He tried it once, and then subsequently learned that it was only good if you were as phenomenally well endowed as Squall Leonhart.

Zell gave up on Rinoa – after all, he’d only been flirting with her to gain Squall as a personal enemy rather than Seifer. Squall rarely had the time or energy to make up cutting, constant insults the way Seifer did.

Selphie stayed happy and knowledgeable about leather, even when Rinoa’s sleepovers ceased to be for her.

Irvine did not appear in this story except as Selphie’s personal sex toy, but evidence suggests that he (and his leather ‘not-clothes’) stayed happy, too.

Quistis stayed away from Squall permanently, to avoid any temptation she might have to grab.

Fujin came close to losing her one remaining eye as a result of extreme shock. It was three weeks before her voice recovered its natural volume.

Just You Wait

Original Work: Gravitation

Summary: Shuichi finds a way of getting Yuki’s attention that is guaranteed to succeed.

Spoilers: I don’t even know why I have this here.  If you’re already going WTF at Gravitation, there’s not much left to be spoiled.

Warnings: Candid discussion of sex.

Preference Warnings: The level of candid discussion of sex kind of squicks me out sometimes, and I wrote it. But that’s just because I’m so demure.

Notes: I seem to have a terrible tendency towards showing Yuki making casual fun of his novelling career in my fics. I can see him doing it and still taking his work kind of seriously. It’s more or less how I work, after all. Also, on a side note, HE’S TOTALLY SCREAMING MY NAME.

Eiri grunted in amusement. He was right; when spoken aloud, the bulk of his new manuscript sounded trite and trashy. (In other words it was standard.) Moreover, it was fortunate he wasn’t in the habit of working himself into his plotlines, or he’d need to do some serious editing. Tamami Seyoko would not be making statements to that effect if she’d ever met him.

That thought amused him enough that he was able to continue working on the dull filler sections of his new sex story that, as usual, he’d left until a week before his deadline to compose.

At least, he was able to do so until he heard the moan.

It was the sort of moan that stopped work dead, because it signaled someone in the vicinity was enjoying an experience more fulfilling than any work. Also, it was Shuichi’s voice he’d heard.

Eiri’s hands dropped to his sides as he struggled to comprehend what his senses were telling him.

Shuichi didn’t masturbate. The last time he’d tried at Eiri’s suggestion it might help him with his clinginess, he’d come running out of the bathroom in moments crying about how embarrassing it was to look at his ‘wee willie winkie’ in that condition, and how he wasn’t attracted sexually to his hand anyway.

Shuichi was having sex, then. In his room. In his bed, without him. He hadn’t even asked permission!

Another moan echoed through the quiet house, this time markedly louder. Eiri jerked to his feet, the trivialities of Seyoko’s life forgotten for the moment.

He could have sworn the two of them were alone in their shared accommodation. Whoever his lover was banging must have crawled in while he was distracted. When he was focused on a deadline, Shuichi could have sneaked the whole of Nittle Grasper in and it wouldn’t register.

Still, he’d never thought Shuichi capable of such… deception. Not that he could be certain exactly what Shuichi was capable of. He realised with a stab of something decidedly uncomfortable that he hadn’t networked properly with the little shit who was his lover for weeks. He’d just taken off to his room without bothering to explain about his deadline, where he typed endlessly and grunted in response to Shuichi’s voluble comings and goings, stumped out to eat the occasionally palatable meals Shuichi cooked without protest…

Eiri drove those thoughts from his mind. He was the one being betrayed! They’d been exclusive for months now, at Shuichi’s insistence. He had a right to expect the boy wouldn’t be brazenly doing it with the door open, on his bed, which just anyone!

There was an exultant shout of “Kami-SAMA!”, some panting, and another long, drawn-out moan.

He was out the door before he knew it, striding to the bedroom and flinging open the door that wasn’t quite closed, thinking as he did so that if the guy were that Hiro Shuichi doted on, he’d throttle him with his own hair…

Eiri raked the room with a glare fully intended to be calculating and unforgiving, only to have the expression drop as he took in the scene before him.

There lay Shuichi belly-down on top of the covers, fully clothed. He was propping his head up on one hand; the other held a pencil set to his sketchbook. He looked up and grinned at Eiri, and let out a small, needy-sounding moan.

“You little fucker,” growled Eiri.

“Well, I’ve found something that gets your attention,” Shuichi observed.

“You… you better not have been faking it all these months,” was the only thing Eiri could think of to say that wouldn’t dig him deeper into this hole. He’d been had, played like a kid’s board game with the instructions printed right on the playing board, and it was a bad feeling.

Shuichi’s eyes went swimmy. “You do care about my feelings,” he pronounced, apparently not even noticing his victory of mind.

Eiri was so pissed, not to mention put off writing dull filler, he didn’t take the opportunity to point out if he didn’t, he’d throw the brat out, thus declaring his feelings without needing to declare anything, which would keep Shuichi happy for weeks.

Instead, he yanked him up by the scruff of the neck. “When I’m done with you, you won’t have enough energy to play stupid games.”

Shuichi just grinned.

Fatherhood – A Modern Fairytale

Original Work: Gravitation

Summary: Eiri faces the natural consequences of his wild ways.

Spoilers: None.

Warnings: A whole lot of ranting about sex. And vomit.

Preference Warnings: My screwed-up sense of wit really comes into play here.

Notes: I have no idea what I was thinking when I wrote this. I found it recently in my unfinished stories folder, and if there was really meant to be some further punch line I don’t know what it could have been.

His libido deserved to go to hell.

Eiri caught himself attempting to modulate the volume of his thoughts for the sake of the sleeper in the next room. He wanted to scream. He wanted to bash his head into the wall. He probably would have done one or the other, if it weren’t that excessive noise would only wake the kid and set him screaming, and Eiri would be as good as locked into another six hours of feeding and rocking and coddling until he slept, by which time he would be a few bars of Sleepless Beauty away from collapse.

Mopping his forehead that was beading at the mere thought of the inevitable ordeal, too afraid to mark the time pacing the floor, Eiri wished he could just pack the kid up and send him home to his mother. She was over every other day anyway. She took audits on the contents of his cupboards and lectured him about nutrition. If he so much as glanced towards the brat while she was there she would intercept the gesture and begin to frown, as if she were the only person in the world capable of caring for her baby. If it weren’t that he were too sick to be moved, he could have sworn the woman would have gathered him up in her arms and rushed him home away from Eiri’s corrupting influence.

And good riddance if she did, he thought unrepentantly. That boy’s virus had killed his love life. He hadn’t had sex in eleven days. He hadn’t glanced at a computer in ten. His meticulously constructed career was slipping. He’d lost weight, and not in any of the right places. He was partly shaven, all-over greasy and his face was developing its own shadows. When he hurried down the street for emergency supplies he was sure the people who glanced aside at him as he passed saw a handsome, harried dad rather than the brooding bachelor he’d been not so long ago.

Damn emotional ties.

Eiri thought about a nap on the couch. When had he slept last, exactly? No doubt the memory and any good effects of that sleep had been dashed by an ear-splitting yell from the kid minutes after he retired. He needed his sleep. He couldn’t count on both his hands the things he needed to do before he would start feeling normal again, but twenty hours’ sleep, a shower, a nicotine IV drip turned on high and a meal taken at leisure would be a good beginning.

He wobbled towards the couch, which was incidentally missing one of its cushions, but when he was about two feet away his head turned in response to a restless noise issuing from the bedroom.

“That stupid brat!” Eiri cursed. “Can’t he turn his brain off for six hours at a time?” In frustration he grabbed a fistful of his own hair and yanked hard.

The muffled whimper was very quickly escalating to a wail. He wanted food, or comforting, or something. How was he expected to know exactly which with an individual whose main form of communication involved opening his mouth wide and forcing out as much sound as he could manage?

Eiri crossed the room much faster than he had moments earlier and flung open his bedroom door. There was kindness to the sick and to children, but he’d had about as much of that as he could be reasonably expected to take.

“I’ve had it up to fucking here with being your daddy!” he bellowed, describing a savage line across his throat with his flattened hand.

“What? Yu-uuu…” The invalid’s feverish eyes wavered. His lips twitched.

“Don’t you ‘Yu-u-u-u-u-ki’ me,” Eiri warned, drawing out each vowel like the bite of a machine gun. He clearly looked more serious than usual, because Shuichi shut his mouth.

Automatically Eiri assessed the situation before him. Shuichi had tossed off his blankets in his sleep again. He moved to replace them and noticed, in passing, that the kid had brought up some fresh sweat.

Well, that was it. He would have to wait to achieve his own nirvana of cleanliness, because Shuichi needed a thorough sponging that very moment. That was the first lesson and cardinal law of parenting, right there: the brat came first, always.

“What did you mean about being my daddy?” Shuichi whined.

“Well, that’s what I virtually am now, isn’t it?” Eiri decided to disregard everything he’d been told about not upsetting the sick. Shuichi was looking a lot better today than he had on previous days when his responses were limited to thrashing and dribbling. He tucked his charge in carefully, but chose his words less so. “Unless you’d like to think of me as your honorary mother. Because all I’ve been doing for the past week is taking care of you.”

“I’m sorry,” mumbled Shuichi. “I didn’t mean to get sick like this. It was the tour… all those different people with different lifestyles, and my job does mean I’m standing around with my mouth open a whole lot.”

“Not just your job, either.”

The boy stared up at him trustingly. It was getting to the point where not much shook his confidence. “I love you. Thank you.”

“You need a bath,” said Eiri.

There was another serious issue he had with the whole business. Early on, he’d at least gathered some paltry amusement from undressing the boy without being subjected to his protests and constant questions as to what he was thinking of doing, mostly when it was quite obvious.

Now Shuichi’s exposed body didn’t ignite the tiniest spark in him. The next time he tried to initiate sex, the only things running through his mind would be Shuichi’s colour, and whether he’d lost weight.

“Damn you,” he added.

Shuichi shifted slightly so that he could better watch the object of his affections. Well, reasoned Eiri, if he could roll over, he might be back to his normal, mostly self-reliant self in a day or so. “Thank you, again,” he said. “I know you didn’t want to look after me but you did it anyway. If you’d decided you were too busy I would have had to stay with my parents.” He giggled. “Can you imagine that? I’m kind of trying to avoid a situation where I have to explain to my mum how I ended up with all those bruises on my back.”

Eiri couldn’t understand how Shuichi managed to be perky when his eyes and nose were dripping and he clearly felt like shit. “I hate you,” he mumbled.

“I know,” said Shuichi, calmly.

Shuichi’s bawling had the unfortunate effect of enraging Eiri. And now, he found that the singer’s rare sedate spells also sent him around the bend.

He began to yell and gesticulate simultaneously. “You’ve fucking practically taken over my house with your noise and your Playcubes…”

“What do you mean,” Shuichi interrupted, “Gamecube or Playstation?” He was smiling, a few breaths away from sitting up. Eiri contemplated kicking him out of bed to do his own washing.

“All of them shitty pieces of plastic that make noise. They’re almost as bad as your fucking music that you insist on playing, as if you don’t hear enough of your own voice…”

“Poor Yuki,” said Shuichi softly. “You need sleep. You’ve been so good about taking care of me that you’ve forgotten to take care of yourself.”

Somehow, Eiri wound up in bed with Shuichi, the snivelling musician attempting to gather him up on his lap and rock him like a baby. Eiri didn’t care at that point. He let the boy think he was comforting him. He could pass the whole experience off as one of Shuichi’s convalescing hallucinations anyway.

Shuichi was squeezing him into a ball a little too enthusiastically. Eiri found himself with his head in a serious kink, looking down at his lower body. It was funny, he didn’t remember dressing in his best silk shirt that morning. He would have to change that, before it got more wrinkled and dirty…

“Yuki?” Shuichi sounded frantic. “Um, you’re pressing on my…”

Which was as far as he got before his mouth was occupied in bringing up the paltry constituents of his breakfast: on Eiri’s head and his recently-observed best silk shirt.

The room fell into post-tragedy silence.

Shuichi spoke first, excitedly. “Look, Yuki! It’s exactly the same colour as your hair…”

Eiri cut him off by standing abruptly. “That does it.”

“Sorry?”

“You just got better. Get out of bed.” Eiri pointed. “Have a shower. After that I want you to do my washing and go buy me fifty packs of cigarettes. In exactly fourteen hours we are having sex. And if your interfering bitch of a mother drops by to tell me I don’t know how to take care of you, she can watch.”

Shuichi nodded vigorously. He looked frightened. “Uh, Yuki…”

The image of Shuichi was tilting. Eiri tried to grab him to put him upright, but before he completed the task, the bed rose up and walloped him in the face.

“Yuki! Are you all right?”

His last thought was that he could see Shuichi’s vomit on his hair. And the boy was right; it was exactly the same colour…

…A few hours later, Shuichi got around to making a phone call.

“What, me? I’m fine. Seriously, Hiro, you can be walking around puking your lungs out and be getting better. I’ve got to be better, now, for Yuki.”

A pause, listening. “Yeah, I guess it was inevitable. He looked after me all that time, and you know how he never takes care of himself. He’s so good to me. Hey, how do you think I’d be as a father? No, obviously I haven’t gotten anyone pregnant, but Yuki was saying all sorts of weird stuff and I think maybe he’s considering it…”

Cell Fish

Original Work: Gravitation

Summary: Shuichi brings up the baby topic. Eiri has his own reasons for acting as expected.

Spoilers: Nothing specific.

Warnings: I don’t think I could ever come up with anything more disturbing than what’s already in the series.

Preference Warnings: Baby talk. If you’re, uh, squicked out by babies, I guess. Also I did like zero research for this so it in few ways represents something that could actually happen.

Notes: I think my main motivation for writing this was to do something with that oh-so-punny title that ACTUALLY MAKES SENSE. But aside from that, I’ve read lots of Gravitation fics that bring up babies, and it’s fun to explore my own take on it. I have a few, of which this is the only even remotely happy one.

“Hey, Yuki,” Shuichi called from the doorway. “Can we have a baby?”

“What?” Eiri had met Shuichi’s parents, and they’d seemed pleasant enough, but from the way Shuichi carried on sometimes he wondered if they’d just treated their first child like a big science or social experiment. Tell a kid absolutely none of what he needs to know to exist in the real world, and watch havoc unfold! “No, we can’t,” he said.

“Yukiiii!” Shuichi burst in with that whine. The crybaby express. “You mean you’re not even going to think about it?”

“What’s to think about? You asked a question with a definite answer, not that I know how you were uncertain about the answer in the first place. You need a uterus to grow a child in, and the technology just doesn’t exist to put that in a man. Besides which a vagina is generally involved to start the process, not that you would know much about those…”

He stopped when he realised that Shuichi had come in dressed in the suit he’d worn in his latest shitty winter ballad clip, and looked like he was on his way to a funeral. The second’s pause gave him an opportunity to realise what Shuichi really meant.

“…You can not be serious.”

“Why wouldn’t I be serious?” Shuichi protested.

Of all the… He’d thought he would be spared this discussion with Shuichi. Hadn’t thought about it, actually.

“Of all the people in the world, Shuichi, I would think of having a baby with you last.”

“Why?”

This was going to blow up in his face. He could feel it. Being in a relationship put being in a roller coaster to shame. If the roller coaster ever got it into its head to change the nature of the ride it offered, there had to be signs put up, notices in the paper. And there was always somebody to sue.

“You’re just too selfish,” he said. “How could somebody as self-absorbed as yourself ever be trusted with the life of another human being?”

“I am not selfish!” Shuichi slammed his hands down so hard on the table Eiri’s laptop gave a little hop, and not of joy either. “Why do you think I came in here all dressed up like this? I wanted to show that I could set a good example for a child, that I could look good when I needed to.”

“Oh, geez.” Eiri retrieved his laptop and put it safe on the shelf behind him. He was starting to get pissed, and he didn’t think insurance or his publisher would pay up if he ended up being the one who threw the damn thing at Shuichi’s head. “You think that being responsible is all about you looking good for a nonexistent camera at a given time, and you insist you’re not selfish?”

“Of course I know that’s not all there is to having a kid!” Shuichi shouted. “But I also know that if we did have one, I couldn’t just go on presenting myself the way I do now. I mean, I’m a musician, and that’s not going to change. I really love what I do. But I know I’d have to stop taking it home so much. I’d have to start dressing more normal around the home so that I wouldn’t embarrass the kid to his friends. And sex, you wouldn’t want him looking at some of my stage costumes and asking questions. You don’t want a kid learning about that stuff too early. And…”

“Me,” said Eiri.

“What?”

“Me, me, me, me, me.” He folded his arms. “My point exactly. You make out like you care so much about this hypothetical kid – who is apparently a boy in your delusional fantasies – but what you’re really thinking about is what a shining impact you can make on some captive little human’s life. Because apparently you don’t get enough attention as it is.”

“Well, maybe if you actually bothered taking the things I said seriously once in a while, and listened to me…” Shuichi shut his mouth so hard his teeth sounded like castanets. Eiri shook his head and lifted his laptop over his shoulder. He figured Shuichi had already proved his point dramatically enough that he didn’t need to rub it in.

But he took a breath, like he wasn’t finished yet. “Well…” Eiri wasn’t expecting anything particularly cutting, but he braced himself anyway. “Maybe I would want to have a kid with you least of all the people in the world because you’re such an asshole you could screw up the lives of people you just pass by on the street.”

“I know I’m an asshole,” said Eiri. “And I know you’ve known I’m an asshole all along, too. So the fact that you brought the suggestion to me in the first place doesn’t do a whole lot for your case.”

“Good thing I don’t need you to have a kid anyway,” Shuichi snarled.

“Maybe you don’t, but you need my permission if you want to bring some other human into my house, especially one that screams and shits everywhere. And you need someone to give you a kid, first. You can’t just stuff a few coins in a vending machine and get one on a keychain.”

The Shuichi Express had already left the room. Eiri listened to his feet punching down the hallway, and thought about doing something. But what? He wasn’t going to encourage the brat.

He still felt like shit about it, thinking maybe there was a way he could have handled the situation without having it blow up all over him. That was the other shitty thing about relationships. Even when the other person was dead wrong and deserved to be told, you ended up feeling bad because they were feeling bad, and wanting to lie about how much of an idiot they were just to make them happy again. Which meant you weren’t doing the service to the human race that only you were in the perfect position to. He could understand why people got married. You had to convince yourself somehow that the law was on your side for sticking up with the idiot, or you would eventually go mad.

Was Tohma or Mika the idiot in that relationship, he wondered?

*

Probably because he was mad enough that he wasn’t really trying not to be noticed, he made it to the orphanage with just a hat and sunglasses as cover and didn’t attract any photographers. He kicked aside half a dozen trash cans to make his way up the steps of the building, then trotted back down to toss a few coins to an old guy whose mosaic of bits of different outfits made him look more like he was in disguise than Shuichi. Maybe he really was in disguise, a reporter doing a story or some rich singer or businessman who’d gotten sick of the hamster wheel of high living – but Yuki would have told him he was approaching a perfectly obvious situation like an idiot. In any case, he could have been his parents if Shuichi hadn’t had the look and presence and talent to make it big.

He took the hat and glasses off once he was in the foyer of the orphanage, a room decked out in carpet from another time. There was a desk to approach, but a middle-aged woman with a face sour as a shrunken apple approached him from another direction.

She looked him up and down and smiled, which was not how women of that age in black and white usually reacted to a young man with pink-dyed hair entering their place of business. So, she knew who he was, or at least what he was.

“I know who you are,” she said. “I know I don’t seem the type, maybe, but my granddaughters are tremendous fans. They won’t believe me when I tell them you came around here today. Perhaps, although I understand if it is too much to ask, an autograph…?”

“Of course,” said Shuichi. “After, maybe.”

“Of course, you have some business here.” She wrung her hands back and forth and then stilled, smiling. “Excuse my rudeness, Shindou-san. I am the curator of this place, Hashimoto Sayaka. It’s not often that a person in your… position… chooses to visit a place like this. Not without some warning, although of course it is still fine; we have nothing to hide here. I rather prefer that there is less fanfare so that the children are least disrupted. You wanted to see the children, I take it?”

“Yes,” said Shuichi.

“Well, I shall show you around their quarters. Most of them are having their afternoon nap at the moment, but I can introduce you to the older children who are mostly in the playground, and I think we can make an exception to our rule of no excitement for the little ones this late just this once. Of course you shouldn’t be offended if they do not know who you are, as there are few opportunities for us to keep them acquainted with the latest culture given our rules and funding. But they understand what a big music star is, without question. Sayuri!” She shouted the name twice, and a grubby young girl in an apron burst from the same entrance Hashimoto-san had come through. “Do we have a camera in the building? It would really be something to show to the sponsors… if Shindou-san is amenable to the idea of photographs, of course.”

“I don’t mind,” said Shuichi, though it was a little annoying that Hashimoto-san had immediately taken his appearance as a charity visit, rather than that of a prospective parent. Perhaps because she knew (through the granddaughters) he was with Yuki, and most prospective parents arrived with their partners. Perhaps he really did look like too much of a flake to be seriously trusted with children, even with the suit helping him along? But how could this possibly be selfish? He was denying the ultimate selfish desire – to have a child of one’s own. Well, any child he adopted would be his own, of course, but most people were unable to see things that way. Didn’t it count for something that he did? Of course Yuki would never think to ask the questions that would help him find out about that…

“I will look – right away, Hashimoto-san!” Sayuri squeaked, and fled so fast Shuichi looked for skid marks.

“Actually,” he said, as Hashimoto-san opened her mouth again. “I did want to see the children, of course. But there was something more… I was actually thinking that I might like to adopt one of them.”

“Oh,” said Hashimoto-san. “Is that so?”

Sayuri reappeared with a disposable camera that looked like it had spent the rest of the year being sat on. “We won’t be needing that after all,” said Hashimoto-san. “Shindou-san, I… I think it would be better if you instead viewed the children from the window. Come.” She led the way past the desk and parted the inch-thick curtains grudgingly. Through a sliver of windowpane and over Hashimoto-san’s shoulder Shuichi saw a slide kicked permanently into an artistic slant and a sandbox about big enough for two kids who didn’t mind each other. Both these props were planted into bare old soil. The three kids standing out there looked as if they might have been planted, too.

Shuichi hardly knew how to ask what he wanted to. “Hashimoto-san… why am I not good enough to be a parent?” Small and quavery was not it, for sure. But those little kids out there might have been him, if his parents had been killed in a horror smash and he’d had no relatives to take him in. It was heartbreaking. And Hashimoto-san, who had never met him before in his life and who was fine with her granddaughters being fans, also thought he was not parent material!

When she turned back to him, she looked as though she’d just spent a very long time trying to get a bit of prawn out of her teeth, and had only succeeded in bruising her mouth. “It has nothing to do with whether you are ‘good enough’, Shindou-san. I don’t profess to know you well enough to speculate on your capabilities. But it is your lifestyle…”

“My rock star life?” Hashimoto-san continued to stare at him. “…Yuki?”

Hashimoto-san sighed. “Shindou-san, while it is true that families come in all shapes and forms, you must understand that it would be highly irresponsible of those of us in charge of the welfare of these children to entrust the future of one of them to such an unconventional family as yours.”

Under her gaze that didn’t quite match her words, Shuichi first felt filthy, and then like a boxer who’d gone half a dozen rounds and was more pumped than ever to go a dozen more. He was good enough to pose for photos so that the sponsors would pay up, but not good enough to give anything more than money to one of those kids. Just because he was with a man. The older kids were dying of boredom where they stood, who only knew what the younger ones were going through (because they wouldn’t show him) and all they could think about was how it offended some people for a man and a man to have babies to call their own. They didn’t even care that Yuki was so horrible sometimes Shuichi felt like he was going to hurt forever and you didn’t want that for a child, or that Shuichi couldn’t even remember to feed a goldfish at the right times…

“Of course,” Hashimoto-san added, “it isn’t me that makes all of the decisions about who gets to adopt a child. And in fact it is extremely difficult to finalise an adoption in this country…”

But, of course, she hadn’t talked about that first.

“I understand,” said Shuichi, “I really do. And now, if you’ll excuse me running off like this… I have somewhere else to be.”

He remembered the autographs she’d mentioned, but he wasn’t going to bring it up if she didn’t. Maybe that really did make him selfish. He was denying some probably very deserving girls a scribble of his on a bit of paper just because their grandmother had made him feel bad about loving a man. But he really couldn’t do anything about the way he felt just to soothe his sense of right.

*

Shuichi was back faster than he expected, quieter, and dressed more typically in a bizarre combination of little-girl tights and the sort of leather no child would be allowed to even stare at.

“You were right,” he said.

“I was what?” Eiri had no idea what those words could herald, so he put put his laptop back up on the shelf.

“I am too selfish to have a kid.” Shuichi collapsed in a pile of limbs on the floor at his feet. “I mean, it’s all about giving some kid the best home and the best life you can, right? It’s not personal.”

“Where have you been, anyway?” Eiri asked, and saw Shuichi seize up as if he expected to be hit. “I’m just asking because you don’t usually come from the supermarket with common sense.”

“The orphanage downtown,” Shuichi mumbled. Eiri exchanged glances with the ceiling. “But they wouldn’t even let me see the kids properly. It was all fine when they thought I was just offering help – you know, money-help, but when I said about adoption, they… you know.”

“You know they can’t really refuse you so quickly if you go through the proper channels,” said Eiri. “Bursting in like that isn’t the way to do it.”

“But that’s how I wanted to do it,” Shuichi said. “And you’re right. If I’m going to be like that I shouldn’t be responsible for some kid. All I was really thinking about was how good it would feel to me, how nice it would be to be able to make someone love me, really love me…”

He ought to kick himself. Make a day of it, invite everyone he knew, and put Shuichi in the box seat so he could see every minute of it. But he couldn’t go that far, even for Shuichi. And that was why he owed Shuichi at least the truth.

“You weren’t completely selfish,” he said. “You were right to think about the effect your job would have on a kid. You thought about that a bit too much, but even I know that parents get obsessed with one thing to the detriment of all the others. My father was so preoccupied with me being a good dutiful boy that he never bothered asking whether I was happy, and then he got neither. You didn’t pick so badly on what to be obsessed with.”

Shuichi just stared up at him. Any longer and he would start to get hopeful, and Eiri had a responsibility to avoid being stupidly cruel, at least.

“I need to tell you the truth about why I said the things I did,” he said.

Shuichi wriggled up onto his knees. “Which is?”

“I just don’t want kids. Not with you, or anyone else.”

“What?”

“And that foghorn-screech is why I didn’t want to tell you in the first place.”

“Well I don’t get it!” Shuichi was up and pacing. “Everybody wants to have children to… to carry on their legacy.”

“What legacy? Genes?” Eiri snorted. “If you want to have children with me, then that obviously isn’t your motivation. As for career, I hardly think raising brats is going to get my novels or your lyrics written.”

“You are always, always going to tease me about my lyrics,” Shuichi grumbled.

“It’s only teasing if you think it is,” said Eiri.

Shuichi stared at the floor. Eiri wondered if he was telling it in his mind what a frustrating git Yuki was, and how he didn’t know how either of them put up with him. Well, he supposed Shuichi was deserving of a surface in the house to confide in. Walls could never be trusted.

“It was just an idea for something we could do together,” he said. “Everything else important in our lives seems to pull us apart. I just thought… when things are over, it would be nice to be able to say there was something we worked on as a team.”

“Idiot,” said Eiri. “You don’t need kids to have a family. Only stupid people think that, and then they throw everything they’ve got into raising the kids and break up when they’re grown, because they never had any other reason to stay together in the first place.”

Shuichi was only looking to him, now. “So we’re a family?”

“The bringing together of crazy relatives without murdering one another in the process, yeah, I think we are.”

“I’d still like kids, somehow,” said Shuichi.

“I’ll let you know if I ever change my mind. But so you don’t get the wrong idea, I wouldn’t count on it.”

Shuichi sighed, and laid his head down on Eiri’s knee.

“I’ll buy you a plant,” said Eiri. “A cactus, maybe. And we’ll talk about the kids later.”

Old And Unappealing

Original Work: Gravitation

Summary: If you live your life acting to alienate everybody, who can you count on when you most need it?

Spoilers: Nothing specific.

Warnings: None.

Preference Warnings: Yuki being only 50% of a bitch may not gel with some people’s interpretations of him.

Notes: I was going through a sleepless night myself a while back and scripted this story in my head as comfort. I’m not nearly as nasty to people who care for me as Yuki is (as far as I realise) and I freak out all the time over whether I’m going to maintain any lasting relationships, so I can see this happening.

He bit. He liked to live on the edge. “You must secretly love it, because I don’t see you making a fuss until I step on your toes really hard.”

Mika sighed, like a mother might, and at that point Eiri felt a little like the child pushing his parents just to see that he could do it, and it didn’t seem so smart any more.

The sound of her departing heels swelled louder in his ears, until he heard the dirgelike clop of a stallion drawing a hearse away into the fog.

Eiri jerked awake with his heartbeat a death’s rattle in his ears. The scene he’d just experienced was past, the interaction of a different Mika and a dramatically different Eiri. But even with his sleep-blinders lifted his sister’s past words clung to him like prophecy.

His mind tuned in to the snores of Shuichi, half out of the blankets on his back alongside him.

“Shuichi.” He flicked the side of Shuichi’s head, in the hair, and Shuichi wriggled and came awake all at once.

“What? Is something…”

“Will you still want to be with me when I’m old and unappealing?” he whispered.

“What,” said Shuichi, turning to him in slow motion.

“Tell me the truth, damn it!”

“Of course,” Shuichi said, yawning. “I mean, you’ll never really be unappealing to me. Old I guess I can’t do anything about, but… I mean, you can be… strange, I guess, sometimes. But I’m strange too at times, so it doesn’t… and I’m really tired. Um, I love you?”

Eiri put his head down over Shuichi’s heart, and curled his arm around his waist. “I love you,” he said. “You saved me. I don’t want to be alone when I’m old.”

Shuichi put his arms around Eiri, fingers spreading out across his back. “Me either,” he said, and the slight curving inward of his fists was the only sign that he’d gone back to sleep.

Eiri listened as his heartbeat aligned to Shuichi’s, and started to feel as if he might be able to brave sleep again.