Rinoa stalked down the dormitory hallway, en route to the room she'd been assigned, but stopped abruptly at Quistis' door. She needed to vent.
"Come in." Quistis' muffled invitation answered Rinoa's knocking. Rinoa availed herself of this hospitality and strode in with a sigh, flinging herself face-down across Quistis' bed.
"Ugh, he's impossible!" she cried into the sheets.
Quistis turned a page in the book she was reading. "Who is?"
"Who else?" Rinoa raised herself to her elbows and gave her an incredulous glare. "Squall, Squall! All he does is lay in bed and mope! I thought we were getting somewhere after he gave me a tour of the Garden—he was even kind of playful, at least by his standards—but then all that business with Cid and Edea and NORG messed him up again. I ask if he wants to talk, but he just shuts me out. He won't even take up my challenge to go to the Training Center."
"He has a lot on his mind. We all do."
"Yeah, I know." Rinoa rolled over and sat up, staring at Quistis sitting ramrod-straight in her desk chair. Didn't she ever relax? She was as bad as Squall. Maybe worse—even Squall had his little outbursts now and then. Rinoa had never seen Quistis as anything less than composed. Composed, detached, and—whether Quistis would ever admit to it or not—intensely melancholy. Maybe it was the result of being a SeeD for so long.
"Maybe that's the difference," Rinoa mused out loud. "I can't help but feel things and show 'em. If people don't like that, too bad. You SeeDs are so…so detached. Guess it's the training, huh? They train you not to feel—"
"Don't talk about what you don't know." Quistis' voice was edged with ice, her hands balled into white-knuckled fists on her desk. "We're not trained not to feel, it's just…easier that way."
"Easier? Doesn't it make everything harder? Feeling is part of living; how can you just turn it off?"
"We can't! We can't, okay?" Quistis rose quickly and faced Rinoa, a flush creeping into her cheeks, her lips set in a taut line. "We're just as human as you, and that's the problem! Don't you think we're worried about Zell and Selphie and Irvine at the missile base? Don't you think we're worried about the sorceress and Garden and what's going to happen today and tomorrow and a year from now, if we're even still alive by then? Don't you think we want to show it, want to break down, want to…want to…dammit!"
She pressed her hands over her face and sat heavily on the bed, a muffled scream coming through her fingers. Rinoa leaned forward, trying to catch a glimpse of her behind her hands.
"I'm sorry," she said quietly. "I didn't mean to imply you weren't human. It's just that you guys keep so much inside, I can't understand how you don't burst!"
"Because we can't." Quistis moved her hands to her knees and blinked rapidly. "We can't afford distractions on the battlefield. We can't afford to get attached to someone who might not make it through their next mission. We can't—" she stopped and bit her lip "—we can't let ourselves be vulnerable, because who else would take care of us? This job, this life, is like walking on a tightrope, with no net below."
"Of course you have a net! You have tons of friends here. They were so glad to have you back."
Quistis scoffed. "Those aren't friends, they're besotted children. They might profess to die for me, but you've taken more time to actually listen to me than they have, in all their years at Garden."
"Well, everyone needs an ear to bend." Rinoa smiled, then rubbed Quistis' shoulder. "And a shoulder to lean on."
Quistis crossed her arms tightly over her chest and angled her body away. "Rinoa, don't."
"I'm sorry. You don't like to be touched?"
"No…er, yes. I just can't afford to get used to it."
"There you go again, with afford. As if affection is something you buy. Even if it was, wouldn't it be okay to splurge now and again?" Rinoa continued stroking Quistis' arm, warmly, softly, the way she remembered her mother stroking her hair.
"Rinoa, please." Quistis' fingertips dug into her arms, but she instinctively leaned toward the touch.
"Please, what? If you want me to stop, just say so. If you want me to leave you alone with your books and your thoughts, all you have to do is tell me."
Quistis swallowed hard but said nothing. Rinoa let her hand wander to Quistis' back, as soothingly as she could. Just a few years of constant battles had already hardened her hand and made her touch heavy; she couldn't imagine what Quistis' hand must feel like, or how heavy her heart weighed in her chest.
Slowly, almost imperceptibly, Quistis began to relax, dropping her hands to her lap, arching her muscles into Rinoa's hand, her body so desperate for the touch she dared not ask for, her spirit so hungry for the affection she didn't feel she deserved.
"Rinoa," she said, an uncharacteristic whine in her voice, and Rinoa started at the feel of Quistis' fingers sliding across her lower back, stopping to trace the indent of her spine before hooking around her waist, drawing her close. Quistis rested her head on Rinoa's shoulder, and Rinoa reached over to intertwine the fingers of their free hands.
"It's okay," she murmured into Quistis' hair. "We all need this. We all need to hold onto someone, sometime."
"I feel so silly. So weak."
"Not at all. Like you said, you're just as human as me." Rinoa smirked. "Or does that mean you think I'm weak?"
"Absolutely not. In fact, I envy you."
"Envy me?"
Quistis leaned her head back to look at Rinoa. "Yes. You're confident and charming and strong. You know your worth, and you have no problem letting other people know it, too."
"Yeah, but a lot of that is bluffing."
Quistis grinned. "Better an ostentatious bluff than a conservative veneer." Her grin disappeared and she straightened with a sigh, keeping her eyes on Rinoa's. Her fingers left Rinoa's waist and danced lightly up her back, her neck, coming around to cradle Rinoa's face in her palm. She chewed her lower lip for a moment, drawing a bloom of color into it, then lightly drew her thumb over Rinoa's mouth.
Rinoa stiffened, not quite prepared for what she felt Quistis intended to do, but not unwilling to oblige her. She, too, hungered for touch and affection; genuine or not, one year without or eighteen, the ache inside both of them was the same, and the same anticipation thrummed through their veins.
"May I?" Quistis asked, her voice hardly above a whisper. Rinoa nodded and closed her eyes.
Quistis kissed exactly the way she did everything else: quickly, efficiently, cleanly. Sharp little pecks against Rinoa's lips, each one lingering longer than the last, until Rinoa opened her own mouth slightly and drew her in. She gently captured Quistis' lower lip with her teeth, urging her to slow down, to enjoy the moment, the sensation, the closeness. They both shifted to face each other fully, and let their hands wander along each other's backs, feeling the muscles move beneath, feeling the life and the fire within, pulling each other closer, desperate to eliminate the cold space between them.
Quistis moaned into the kiss, quietly at first, building up to a full-throated sound that vibrated through Rinoa's body. They pressed their mouths harder against each other's, the tips of their tongues flicking out in tentative exploration, fingertips digging into each other's shoulder blades, then pulled apart with loud gasps.
"Wow," Rinoa breathed, a giddy smile playing across her flushed face. "That was…wonderful."
Quistis stared at her for a moment, her eyes wide, a deep blush extending to the roots of her hair, before releasing her and turning away. "I'm sorry."
"For what? I said you could. Wait a minute, am I not a good kisser?"
"Oh no, you're great! That was amazing." She giggled and pushed one of her long locks of hair behind her ear. "Thank you for humoring me. I just feel bad that you had to do it. That you had to even see me like this."
"Don't be silly! We all need to hold someone, sometime, remember?"
Quistis nodded, but her smile faded a little. "I don't mean to sound ungrateful, but would you mind keeping this between us, at least for the time being?"
"Of course! I never kiss and tell."
"Even if you were to finally get Squall to kiss you?"
Rinoa tapped her chin, thinking. "Well, that would actually be an accomplishment, so I might bend my rule a little, there!"
Quistis laughed, her shoulders relaxing in relief.
"Besides," Rinoa went on, "I wouldn't want to get on the bad side of your fan club. Fans can be really scary when they're mad!" She rose and smoothed her hair and straightened the straps of her duster, then turned back to Quistis and patted her shoulder. "So, are you feeling better? Or do you need me to hang around a bit longer?"
"I'm tempted to ask you to stay, but work calls." Quistis gestured to the desk.
"Got it. Anytime you need me, though—if you just need to talk, or need a hug, or whatever—you know where to find me." Rinoa winked. "Catch you later, Quisty!"
Back in the hallway, Rinoa sighed contentedly. She had never kissed another girl before. She hadn't been against it; the opportunity simply never presented itself. But a kiss, she discovered, was a kiss, whether it was with an awkward Deling City boy, or with Seifer at the height of his charm, or with a para-military specialist whose loneliness mirrored her own.
Everybody needs to be held sometimes, she thought, entering her dorm room and sitting on the bed, clutching her pillow to her chest, trying to replicate the warmth and pressure of another body. Everybody wants to feel close. Maybe he'll realize that one day.
And maybe, by then, it won't be too late.