Final Fantasy VIII: Ace in the Sleeve

Irvine watched the girls he had been talking to walk away, giggling as they went, and smiled to himself.

"You're such a flirt."

Irvine turned in his chair to face Selphie across the table, and picked up the construction paper and scissors he had been working with before his guests had come over. "I was just being friendly." He started cutting out the traced flowers, thinking that after this festival was over that he never wanted to see a flower made from construction paper again.

"And flirting." Selphie smiled as she worked, hands moving through paper and glue and glitter faster than anything Irvine could ever manage. "It's like you do it automatically to keep them at a distance."

Irvine stopped cutting his paper and frowned. "Pardon?"

Selphie didn't even look at him. "You flirt with all these girls but you don't really talk to them. Why is that?"

Irvine felt trapped, and debated making an excuse to leave, but that was likely what Selphie wanted him to do, so she could harp on it later. "So, being a nice guy is a defense mechanism now?"

"Yes." She rolled her eyes at him. "The way you do it is. Quistis explained it really well, she said you keep yourself as a symbol, instead becoming a person." She laughed. "Quistis being all thinky again, but I understood." Irvine considered the implications of Selphie and Quistis discussing him, and wondered at it.

Irvine shifted in his seat. "Is this because I don't flirt with you?"

Selphie threw an empty glue stick at him; it bounced off his elbow and hit the floor. "No." She paused. "Well, maybe, but we've shared a blankie, so I have one up on everyone else."

Irvine winced. "Oh, yes, please spread that around."

Selphie finally stopped what she was doing. "You use it to keep people from getting too close." Her cheeks colored and she wouldn't meet his eyes, and Irvine suddenly wondered when and where he had missed all the signals he was suddenly getting. "But you don't use it on me, so—"

Irvine laughed, and then sobered at Selphie's hurt look. "I don't flirt with you because it doesn't impress you. You've got some mighty high standards, Tilmitt."

Selphie gaped. "High standards?"

Irvine grinned. "I'm not the only one who knows how to keep the wolves at bay." He thought he was good at reading people, and he had read Selphie loud and clear months ago: hands off. She sent it out like a beacon. She was friendly, but that's all she was. Irvine thought it was a fine thing for her to accuse him of using his charm to keep people from him, when she did the same thing. He doubted she would appreciate him pointing it out, though. Instead, he did the next best thing, and nudged her foot under the table.

"Hey," he said when she jumped and flushed again. "Want to go somewhere and neck?"

She threw another glue stick at him, but Irvine was pleased when she didn't say no.