Baby Blocks

Day 4: Thursday

Squall was using his break to nap on the couch, or at least rest himself, with Angelo below him. This was, of course, ruined by his girlfriend's entrance. She was playfully holding a box of kitchen knives. Squall twisted around sleepily from his position on the couch.

"What do we have knives for?" he half-mumbled.

"It's a wedding gift, silly."

"What do we need knives for? Oh." Rinoa's response didn't register in his head faster than his mouth could output. He was still half-asleep.

"I was thinking we could split it."

Squall raised his eyebrow.

"How much was it?"

"4,000 gil."

Squall was mildly offset. He hadn't agreed to get a wedding gift. And he hadn't agreed to give this gift. In fact, Rinoa hadn't talked about this with him at all. But he realized he actually hadn't thought of getting a gift at all and realized that he should have. Plus, he hated shopping. And this was more convenient.

"Come on, tightwad," Rinoa chided, watching the wheels in Squall's head turn.

"All right, that's fine." Strategically, and for the sake of convenience, he decided to go along with it. Part of being a leader was choosing your battles. Although he wouldn't have picked knives as a wedding present, he really didn't have any other ideas. Selphie and Irvine were going to need a lot more than that in their future life. Knives were going to be a luxury. They needed more basic things like tables, places to sit, baby stuff. Babies were especially expensive, and added to the normal cost of living.

Squall shook off the fatigue and got off the couch, moving to the kitchen counter to look at the box for his pseudo-approval. "Didn't you get knives for some other wedding present one time?"

"Sure, it's my favorite present to give. Everyone needs knives when they're just starting out." Squall had karmic visions of six boxes of knives as presents for their wedding. "Plus, I got it 30% off."

"I wouldn't put that on the card."

"Oh, the card," Rinoa lightly slapped her hand on the table. "I forgot. Shoot, do you want to help me get that one this weekend?"

Squall, of course, didn't want to. He hated shopping in the first place, and he needed a rest from this flurry of activity happening around the Garden that seemed to be localized in his group of friends. But Rinoa would want to spend time with him this weekend anyway.

"All right," he said nonchalantly as he went back to the couch and laid down, picking up a newspaper on the coffee table.

"Good, we need to pick up wrapping paper too." She took the box of knives and set them in an out of the way place in the kitchen. "So me and Selphie were talking about how you guys are gonna catch the garter."

Squall's eyes popped open. Oh, god, I forgot about that. Oh no.

Rinoa continued, "So we were thinking how just about none of you are gonna go for it. Since there's only gonna be four or five unmarried guys there and how all the girls are gonna practically be falling over themselves to get it." She laughed to herself. "We're all gonna be getting in shape," she said, flexing her arms.

"Uh-huh."

"Are you even listening to me?" she whined.

"Yes."

Rinoa tapped her fingers on the counter where Squall couldn't see, nor cared to, thinking of what to do. She haughtily walked over to the couch and pulled down the paper from his eyes. "Squall, what's wrong?"