Disclaimer: I don't own Square-Enix or Final Fantasy. As always this is purely for fun, so forgive any typos or non-coherentness.

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"I'm in love with Rinoa."

The basketball dropped once before bouncing onto the grass as the three men stared at each other. Squall, having released his breath as he spoke those words, waited in apprehension for his friends' responses. He had been thinking of how to express this statement for the last week, and had hoped for a better response from the two men he could trust the most to help him. At the very least, he had expected a response. At all. Instead, he was met with silence.

Squall waited a good minute before his resolve broke, and he sighed and jogged to receive the basketball. He should've expected the responses. Never in his life had Squall ever uttered such a blunt, emotional statement, and for the people he knew best, he couldn't have expected anything less than shock. But it didn't help his disappointment anyways. What he had hoped would be a momentary pause in gameplay before entering into a casual conversation had turned into Squall playing one-man basketball. He tossed the ball in between his hands, looking into both his friends' faces before spreading his hands out and sighing, "Really?"

The words broke Zell and Irvine's silence, but the damage had been done. Before either could speak, Squall shook his head and pretended to be preoccupied with the basketball again. "Nevermind."

Irvine was the first to recover the situation, taking a tentative step toward Squall and saying, "Squall, we, uh...we mean. That's great. We're just..."

"Not sure why you told us?" Zell blurted, but quickly bit his lip at Irvine's glance.

"Yes, that, but also...is this a problem? Or. What?"

This had been the response Squall had expected, but even so, Squall found himself unprepared to respond. The need to express his concern over what he admitted was momentarily bitten back by the familiar humiliation that came with emotions, but after a few head shakes and attempts at dribbling, Squall finally stood tall and held the ball in-between his hands. "I don't know," he admitted, his hands slowing applying more and more pressure to the ball. "I. It is a problem. I want to tell her, but she doesn't feel the same way."

"She's told you that?"

"...no." His hands were starting to shake from the pressure being applied to the ball. At least, that's what he'd like to think was causing the shaking. "But she hasn't told me the opposite, either."

Irvine lost his cautionary composure and laughed at that point, raising his hands to receive the ball. Squall threw it to him, glad to have something else to focus on, even for a moment. "Love isn't logical or mathematical, Squall." Squall flushed at that – he knew it wasn't logical – but Irvine continued before Squall could protest. "Just because you can't prove one thing is false doesn't mean the other thing is true."

"I know that," Squall finally snapped. He had gotten the same 'love isn't logical' speech by everyone else in the group, including Rinoa herself. He didn't much feel like getting it again. "And I'm not making it logical. I'm just making it -"

"Depressing?"

"Realistic."

"Same thing." Irvine turned to shoot. The ball fell through the net effortlessly, and Irvine ran to retrieve it.

"I think you should tell her."

Squall blinked, having momentarily forgotten Zell's involvement. Zell hadn't moved from his rigid posture, but took the moment to finally turn his head to Squall with a look of determination on his face that Squall hadn't seen before. He had seen Zell be cocky and over-confident in his determination, but never had Squall seen Zell so simply serious.

"...why?"

"She..." Zell's serious demeanor slipped as he sighed, obviously unsure as how to phrase his next statement. "You know she talks to Quistis and Selphie. They're. Y'know, girlfriends. And well." Zell scratched the back of his neck. "I talk to Quistis and Selphie..."

"Zell?"

Zell cringed a little, though Squall's tone had been far from commanding. "They tell me what Rinoa says sometimes, y'know, when it's about you. Sometimes. So maybe I can talk to you about it..."

"Zell, just tell me."

"...she's afraid you don't love her. I mean like. Even as a friend, or something. And she's worried that if you don't love her, not only will the whole sorceress thing not work out, y'know, but also she'll just be...pushed out of the group?"

...pushed out?

"Because she's not a SeeD, right? She's technically not even supposed to be living with us, but we can't very well put her anywhere else. She's just..."

"Afraid. I got it. Irvine?" Irvine's dribbling stopped as he looked at Squall, wincing at the expectation of the next question. "You knew about this too?" Irvine's silence was enough. All of them knew about Rinoa's fears. All of them probably expected those exact fears. And Squall was once again oblivious of her feelings. Once again he had let her down without even knowing it. His knees nearly buckled as the sudden realization hit him. Realizing just how obvious Rinoa's feelings should have been...

Squall's hand ran down his face as he groaned. "Of course she's afraid. I just." Keep forgetting she's depending on me. Keep forgetting I'm not the only new to this relationship. Keep forgetting she has fears and insecurities of her own. I just. I'm so happy with her, and thinking about her...I can't think of her as anything besides confident...

"I'm just bad at this, aren't I?" Squall smiled, despite the sinking feeling in his stomach. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "I should tell her. Everything. Even if she doesn't love me that way, she should know I want her. Even as. Just..." A friend.

"I know it's useless trying to tell you you're not going to be rejected, but I'm still going to try." Irvine tossed him the ball, and Squall caught it just before it hit his face. The jolt was enough to wake him from his thoughts, and he looked up to Irvine as his height blocked the sun from his view. "You shouldn't worry, Squall. It's been two years. You don't think she would've given up on your depressing ass by now if she was gonna?"

Squall frowned at the comment, but let it pass. Guess that was supposed to be encouragement. He looked to Zell, who still stood off to the side, seemingly still unsure if he had overstepped his boundaries. As Zell realized Squall was waiting for a response, he jumped a little and coughed nervously. "Yo, I told you what I heard. That doesn't sound like someone who's gonna say 'see ya', right?"

"..." Squall didn't respond. Honestly, he didn't need to hear his friends convince him. He knew, he knew she wouldn't reject him. Perhaps it was the bond, or maybe he was finally starting to...trust, but he knew.

After a few minutes, Squall finally said, "I'm going to tell her." He looked to Irvine. "I'm still worried it won't be...the same, but I trust...us?" Was that the best way to put it? 'Trust us'? Was that what it meant to be a couple? Or was that what it meant to be them, Sorceress and Knight?

"Well then," Irvine patted Squall on the shoulder. "Now we just have to figure out how, eh?"

"...how?"

"Yeah, how!" Irvine looked at him like it was painfully obvious. "You can't tell a girl 'I love you' while...uh...eating hot dogs in the cafeteria." Off to the side, Zell perked up. "Well, Zell might. But you can't." Zell opened his mouth to say something but was quickly cut off by Irvine. "Do it someplace special. But not too special, because you should save the best place for the proposal. Oh, and definitely do not do it over the phone."

Irvine continued to tick off what not to do, to which Zell apparently took a great interest as he stepped closer to them, but Squall had stopped listening. He knew exactly how and when he was going to say it.

All he needed was a ballroom.