Deep End
Chapter 4
Notes: Pov starts with Squall then switches to Zell. Bit a Zelly chapter this one, don’t know what to do with the Squall/Seifer thing so I cheated and switched to the Zell/Irvine/Nida thing for this chapter. And shock horror, Seifer’s not in it at all!
Decided to make their world the FF8 world with them living in Galbadia because if I used the real world I wouldn’t know where to put them.
Deep End
Chapter 4
"So you going to see him again?" Zell whispered to me as we sat at the back in the middle of a medieval class. I don’t think Zell ever thinks to what he supposed to, how the hell he pasted exams and tests I don’t know. The teacher glanced at us briefly in warning before continuing with what he was talking about. We sat at the very back each at a single person desk with Zell leaning over the gap.
"Yeah probably I gave him my number."
"You liked him though, right?"
I shrugged. "Yeah I guess, but I don’t know him very well you know?" I smiled "Oh and guess who his roommate is."
"You meet his roommate? You want back to his house?" He laughed till the teacher glared at him "Zell!"
"Sorry." He said, sitting straighter in his chair and being silent and good for five seconds until the attention was off himself then he turned back to me, leaning over the gap again.
"It wasn’t like that, we kissed and then his roommate interrupted us but we didn’t do anything."
"So who was he?"
I smirked. "Nida’s back in town."
The smile slid of the blonde’s lips and he looked a little guilty. "I know."
"You saw him?"
He nodded. "We went out for a drink."
I stared at him. "What?! Why?" I sighed. "Do you do out of your way to make life as complicated as possible?"
"No, it wasn’t like that it was only a drink."
"Yeah right."
"It was!" He swallowed. "But-err- he might have told me he missed me- and -err- kissed me."
I shook my head. "God Zell."
"But only once."
"That’s more than enough! What thee hell were you thinking? What did Irvine say?"
He looked sheepish.
"You didn’t tell him? What is he going to think when he finds out?"
"Nothing happened."
"That doesn’t matter, he’ll think something did happen because you didn’t tell him."
He bit his lip. "I didn’t think of that."
I sighed. "How is anyway over the whole- Seifer thing?"
"Okay, he went through the whole cycle of blame. First and it was Seifer’s fault then it was your fault and it was my fault until the final stage…" He grinned. "Make up sex!"
I rolled my eyes. "Do you love Irvine? Or do you just love fucking him?"
He frowned. "Of course I love him, or I would have told him long ago to get lost."
"And Nida?"
"Do we have to get into this now?"
"Yes we do."
"I don’t know, I used too but now I don’t know." He gave me a confused look.
"Your life is forever complicated!"
"Well it’s not as easy for me, I can’t just pout and have guys fall all over themselves to touch me like you do."
"I do not!"
"Squall!" The teacher said with a look.
"Sorry."
"You do." Zell whispered.
I waited outside the college for Squall to come out so we could walk home together. I used to have this great motor bike type thing but then there was no room for Squall and my friends begged me to get rid of it when I had one little crash. I don’t see why, I wasn’t that bad at riding it. Irvine called it a death trap and that was before we were a couple. Now that it’s been almost two years since I got rid of it, everyone has suddenly forgotten what it looked like and tease me for having a moped. It was not a moped, it was far more manly than that!
So now Squall and I walked home together everyday, almost all the way but we veered off in different directions these days. A year ago I lived with Squall. I moved here to Galbadia from Balamb where I had lived with my mother, but school wasn’t so good there, they weren’t so happy about gay people there. I moved here to go to school and applied to the advert that Squall had in the paper for a roommate. I chuckled as I thought back to the advert he had written. Mr. Picky or what.
Roommate wanted to share small two bedroom bungalow. No pets, no babies, no children, no one over 60, no house plants.
What the hell was up with the ban on house plants? I brought him one as a gift when I moved in with the advert glued to a lolly stick and stuck in the soil with the house plants bit highlighted. I told him next year I’d get him a puppy. I think my being gay helped me get the room that meant annoying girls coming round, no babies and no women the house full stop… except Rinoa. She really surprised me. We all went to the same school, Squall didn’t have as many friends as I expected him to have, I was so shocked to meet his GIRLFRIEND, I was so sure he was gay, he hadn’t said anything but he never looked at girls, he didn’t bat an eyelid when I said I was gay and have you seen those leather pants? They’re painted on like bondage or something. At 14 all the guys were all about naked girls with hormones on overload.
Selphie was sort of friend, she would run past in a blur, yelling a greeting and sit with us for lunch sometimes. She became more and more one of the group as time went on, she was hard to lose sometimes. She attracted Mr. Cowboy Slut to the group a year later. She introduced us, I had seen him around of course but I stayed far away from the school flirt back then at 15 he was all talk because he told me himself that he didn’t lose his virginity till he was 16. We meet and I remember all through English class I could feel his eyes on me and it was hard to ignore him. Irvine joined the group back then when we were 15 all touchy feely but we all thought that was just his way and put up with it. Like when we would walk down a street, the three of us Irvine would stand in the middle with an arm around both of us and sometimes a hand would find it’s way onto my knee under the cafeteria or in the cinema in the dark. He was careful not to get spotted and I don’t think anyone ever noticed.
Funny really how soon after he got a girlfriend that lasted more than a few days, couple months he was with her and then at 17 I meet Nida on the street, I sort of tipped my lunch all over him including a hot cup of coffee, I was in a hurry and not looking where I was going. It ended at 20 when he had to move away to a better job in the big city of Esthar but it seems that didn’t work out and now he was back, moved back in with Seifer after only one year. Later on the same year that he left me Irvine was the one to make me smile again. Now 21 and with Irvine for a year, he comes back saying he always regretted going and if he could do it again he wouldn’t have left me. I told him about Irvine but he didn’t think too impressed, Nida had joined the group while we were together so he knew Irvine and all the conquests. He said I could do better, maybe that was right but did I want better?
I live with Irvine now even though a lot of my stuff living with Squall still to give me somewhere to go if my relationship when worse and I still paid rent there, there was where I hung out the most anyway sometimes with Irvine. My boyfriend didn’t make me pay rent because daddy paid for it. Our old headmaster at school Martine was Irvine adoptive parent and he paid for the house, food and most things. Irvine didn’t have to work like I didn’t. Rinoa worked in a pub so why not me? Oh no I had to work at Toni’s toy store in Deling. I know that didn’t sound too bad yet but I had to stand at the door giving out savings catalogues dressed as a blue dinosaur. The stupid brats were forever tugging at me to get me to play or because they didn’t believe I was a real dinosaur. That was real bright sparks in that place, honest. Didn’t they realize I had work to do? I was Toni the dinosaur, Toni the stupid FEMALE dinosaur and I mean Toni? What sort of crap dinosaur name is that? What happened to Barney? Or Denver?
I shivered outside the college. Thank god I only had to work on Sundays.
Squall finally caught up and gave me a look. "You okay?"
"Yeah, just thinking."
"You thinking? Really? Careful you don’t strain yourself."
I frowned. "Shut up Squall! I was thinking about you and your love of house plants."
"And how many of those things have you filled my house with since you moved in?"
I smiled. "Oh come on Squall you love them really, they’re natural looking and stuff."
He made a face. "You guys doing anything tonight?"
"Probably not, why?"
"Want to stop and grab some DVDs?"
I grinned. Saturday used to be our movie night but I don’t live there anymore and we haven’t done that for ages.
"But can we agree on a movie?" I asked
He smiled. We never agreed on a movie. I liked action and adventure with some comedy. Squall had a secret love for romantic comedies but no one knew except me and Irvine, and Selphie but Squall didn’t know that she knew. Irvine was easy to please all he wanted was someone to look at in it. So taking all this into consideration we wanted something funny maybe a romance/comedy for Squall with some sexy actresses and/or actors. Irvine was the only Bi one but Squall and I didn’t need sexy people to make a good movie.
We stared at the huge wall of DVDs in from of us. The tattooed man at the counter winked at me and I shuddered and not in a good way. Irvine had made me take his tapes back so many times now, all porn tapes, mostly gay ones. I guess the slimy toad at the counter thought I was a perverse single gay guy that sat alone all day watching porn. Right about the gay thing, wrong about the rest.
Squall picked out a DVD but grimaced and put it back on the shelf.
"What about Bridget Jones’ diary?" He asked.
"Again?"
"Zell you only saw it once and that was a long time ago."
"See if there’s anything better first."
He didn’t look very happy but he did as he was told. "What about Shallow Hal that’s funny, right?"
"What about Irvine?"
"You could sit naked throughout the movie."
I frowned. "No!"
He sighed again and we looked again.
"What about Lord of the rings?" He suggested. "We haven’t seen the second one yet."
"I thought you hated that."
"I never said that."
"But you’ve seen the first one three times and still can’t remember the names of the characters."
"So?"
"Okay we could get that I guess."
"Irvine should be happy with that right? There’s a girl in that, the one with the hair."
I stared at him. "What does that mean? All the girls have hair."
"The one with the strange ears."
"Arwen?"
"Probably." He shrugged. "And there are lots of guys in it, the one that likes the girl with the pointy ears…."
"Aragon?"
"Yeah and the girly blonde guy."
"Legolas?"
"Probably, do you want this thing or not?"
"Yeah that will do, it’s long enough."
"Great you go pay for it ‘cause the greasy guy likes you."
I grimaced but still took the DVD to the counter and paid for it, the man put it into a bag for me and gave me a greasy grin.
I shoved Squall out the door quick to get away from him, to go home and watch our DVD.