Work Text:
Somehow, they had managed to find him.
The front desk had the letter waiting for him, his name on the envelope in Cid's messy scrawl. Though it puzzled and intrigued him, he took it upstairs, starting and finishing a whole pot of coffee before he opened it. Something fell out as he pulled the letter from the envelope, a newspaper clipping.
The front desk clerk was only slightly astonished to be checking Mr. Valentine out of Room 146 an hour later.
It took Vincent a day and a half to get there, a day and a half to find that Nibelheim wasn't such a sleepy little town anymore, and that the hotels couldn't keep up with the death of the town's favorite son.
Not that anyone actually remembered him, thought Vincent wryly as he walked to the address written in the letter. Taking the six steps two at a time, he knocked on the door of the house that Tifa and Cloud used to eat their dinners together in.
Yuffie answered. She looked older than he remembered; her cheek was thinner and the dusky marks of leadership lay under her eyes. She beckoned him in with a weary hand, gave his arm a squeeze, and led him into a room full of solemnness and heartache.
Denzel and Reeve were talking quietly in a corner, Denzel casting an occasional worried glance at where a very pregnant Marlene sat with her father, softly crying. Cid glanced up and immediately eased his shoulder out from under Shera's head, hurrying to Vincent and walking him out into the hall.
"Hey, so glad that damn letter finally reached you, though it looks like it got there a little too late. Real sorry about that. The funeral was yesterday."
The regret in Cid's voice matched Vincent's own. "It was? I apologize for not being able to arrive sooner then."
Cid cast a backward glance at the living room and led Vincent outside, through the back door. He immediately reached for the cigarettes in his pants pocket. "Fuck. I've been craving one of these for the last four fucking days. Shera wants me to quit now. Says she doesn't want to lose me too early too..." He blinked a few times and shrugged. "She'll forgive me this one. It's been pretty hard on all of us."
"How is Tifa?"
The hand holding the lighter paused. "Tifa... Yeah." He finished lighting up and took a long drag and a few rapid blinks before blowing the smoke out.
"That's what I wrote you for, Vince. We're all pretty worried about her. She's taking it something awful, ya know? Can't blame her. Married sixteen years, and now learning how to sleep in a bed all alone."
Cid took another thoughtful inhale and exhale, and continued, "We all... we've all been here for the last two weeks, you know, since before they unplugged him and all." He shook his head and gave a rueful laugh, scratching at his lip with his thumb. "I think the fool woman honestly meant to go through this alone—only, she broke down at the end... called Denzel, and he called the rest of us."
Except for me, Vincent thought.
"We all got here as soon as we could. Nanaki was here earlier, you missed him by a day. His mate's expecting or some shit, left right after the funeral. And the funeral..." Cid's expression darkened and he took another puff on his cigarette, "What a fucking circus. We took his body late last night. Buried him in a new secret place, away from all the grave robbing assholes, somewhere by the cliffs Tifa said they always went to. She said he'd like it there."
Cid fell silent, smoking and blinking furiously. Vincent wished he could've been there, was secretly glad he hadn't been.
"Anyway, Vince. I'm glad you're here. We tried contacting you when we all heard the news, but I guess you were two weeks too hidden, huh?"
Vincent nodded slowly.
"And now I'm going to be the asshole here and ask you for a favor."
He knew this was coming. The man was a little too glad to see him. "What is it?"
"Like I said, we've all been here puttin' stuff on hold for the last two weeks, but we can't do this shit forever. I love Tifa, I really do. We all love Tifa, we all loved Cloud. But Yuffie's got a whole country to run. Barret, he's got a company to manage. Same with Denzel and Reeve—WRO stuff, you know. Myself, I've got a fleet and a new grandkid to get back to. So, hell, I'll just say it: Vince, we'd like you to stay with Tifa."
Vincent raised his eyebrows. "Me?"
"Yeah, I'm real sorry to spring this on you all sudden-like, but you seemed like the best person. You guys were pretty close once, right? And you don't really have anywhere to be, do you?"
Not specifically, no, but it didn't mean he was happy for the unanimous nomination. "I suppose not, but—"
"Listen, just come talk to her, huh?" Cid crushed out his cigarette and brushed off his hands. "You'll see what I mean."
Damn the man, Vincent thought, following him back into the living room. Cid knew he wouldn't be able to refuse a crying Tifa.
She was standing at window, so still and silent that Vincent had missed her the first time. Cid touched her arm tenderly and she slowly swiveled her head to look at them. Her eyes were vacant and flat, but she managed a smile in spite of it.
It was the smile that decided it for him.
The last time he'd seen her was at her wedding, nearly two decades ago. She had been the most beautiful bride he'd ever seen—full of life, joy and love. He'd danced with her twice and she'd laughed, sparkling, at his awkwardness. The smile had never left her face that day, or the face of the man she had pledged her life to, and it had made Vincent smile too to see them get everything they wanted, made him believe that some people deserved their happy endings.
On her face now was a horrible mockery of a smile. Something died in him to see it.
"Vincent," she said, by way of a greeting. "So glad you could make it."
"I'm sorry I could not arrive sooner. I didn't find out until yesterday."
"You didn't miss much, the funeral... I can show you where we put him, later, if you want to see him before you leave."
Cid cleared his throat. "Tifa, honey, Vincent's going to stay here with you for a while, if that's okay. He's really got nowhere else to go."
Crafty son of a bitch. Cid also knew that Tifa couldn't resist a stray.
"Oh." She blinked. "I guess I won't have to show you right away, then. I should go get a room ready for you."
"Me and Shera can do that. Don't worry about it, Teef," Cid smoothly put in. "It's the least we can do, you having put up with us and all."
Before she had a chance to protest, he collected a confused Shera and disappeared. Tifa turned back to resume staring out of the window, either forgetting or ignoring Vincent's presence. He cast his glance around the room, unsure of what to do. He caught Yuffie's sympathetic eye and she patted the chair across from her.
"So what's new with you, Vincent? Hiding? Seeking?"
He settled into the chair, removed a pillow from behind him. "Perhaps a little of both."
"Still alive, I see."
"You could say that. How's Wutai?"
"Still alive." Yuffie smiled, but her eyes were hard. "Where've you been, Vincent? It took forever to find you... You should've been here."
"I didn't get the letter until yesterday."
"I'm not talking about the funeral. You should've been here, period. What the fuck were you thinking, disappearing for sixteen years like that? Not really keeping in contact with anyone? Tifa worried about you all the time."
She did? "It's really none of your business. It's personal."
She snorted in disgust. "What's more personal than your friends, Vincent? If we are your friends... You know, I told Cid this was a stupid idea and I'm still not convinced that it isn't." She sat forward and angled her head at him. "Tifa's my best friend and I swear, if you do anything less than your very best to take care of her, I will personally make visiting Wutai a very bad idea for you."
He was getting slightly irritated at being threatened when he was the one doing everyone a favor. "Tifa's a friend. I promise, I'll look after her."
The look she gave him as she rose to her feet told him she had doubts—and the power to make good on her threat. She joined Barret, Marlene and Denzel at the window, each taking a turn at giving Tifa a long, sad goodbye. Barret held her the longest, told her to keep her chin up as he walked with her to the foyer.
Cid and Shera were waiting for everyone by the front door. More farewell hugs were exchanged, more promises made to call later.
Shera pulled Vincent aside and led him into the kitchen. She opened the freezer. "There's about two weeks' worth of casseroles in here, maybe more if you guys are light eaters. Just pop them in the oven at three hundred for twenty minutes. There should be enough in the pantry for a few weeks, though you'll have to go out for fresh produce."
She yanked off her glasses and rubbed at her tired eyes. "Gods, I don't know what I'd do if it were me and my Cid. You take care of her, Vincent." She gave him a swift hug and rejoined her husband at the door.
Cid had released Tifa from his own embrace and was rubbing her upper arms. "Take care, kiddo. This old man doesn't have anything to say that'll make you feel better, but we all love you, you know that."
Shera gave her a long hug and whispered some things into her ear, while Cid shook Vincent's hand. "Call me if you have any problems. I can have the Shera here in no time."
The door opened and then closed, and Vincent was left alone with a woman he didn't know anymore.
He walked by her room on the way to his own later that night.
The door was slightly ajar; the moonlight was bright spots in the room. She was stretched out in bed, lying on her side, nightgown riding high upon her calf. That sad, empty expression was still hanging about her, and her knuckles were stroking the empty spot next to her.
Cloud's side of the bed, he guessed.
What was he doing here? Filling the role of a caregiver or of a friend? He was barely acceptable as a caregiver—she'd taken three bites at dinner, despite his urging. And as a friend...the expiration date had passed on that a long time ago.
As he stood ruminating, a wretched cry sprang from her. She rolled to Cloud's side and began sobbing into the sheets, clutching at them piteously.
Vincent felt a very old, long buried ache in his chest, and he nearly fled to his room.
"Well, here we are."
Vincent stared at the fresh mound of dirt, wondering what to say. He had never been any good at this kind of thing.
"It's pretty bare, I know. We just did it two nights ago so it can't really be helped. Still, I should probably do something to spruce the place up, huh?"
She was staring at the new grave with a faraway look. In the daylight, Vincent could see the changes time had wrought on her. Her hair was cut slightly below her shoulders now, a few silver strands breaking up the brown. There were laugh lines around her mouth and at her eyes, expected and attractive, adding character and readability to her face. Her body was a little fuller in some places, but still very strong and capable.
Still the most beautiful bride he'd ever seen.
"He'll like it here," she said, taking in the wind, the trees, the view from the cliff. "This was our favorite place to come, you know. Sometimes we'd even sleep out here, make love out here, under the stars."
There was such a look of naked longing on Tifa's face that Vincent felt like a voyeur.
She closed her eyes, took a shuddering breath and smiled. "Yeah, you'll like it here."
Denzel, making good on his promise, called a few days later.
"Hello, Vincent? Is Mom there?"
"She is, but she's in the bath. Would you like me to get her?"
Denzel chuckled. "Oh, no, don't do that. I can always try back some other time. Mom doesn't like to have her baths interrupted. Dad was the only one she'd make an exception for..." There was silence. "How is she?"
"I'm not an expert on how to handle grief, but I think she's doing a normal job of it."
"What do you mean?"
"She eats, she sleeps, she goes outdoors, she cries. She's existing. Aside from that, what else can we expect of her right now?"
"You're right, Vincent. I'll take it as a good sign then that she's... existing. Listen... it wasn't really fair of us to ask you to stay with her, and Marly and I have been talking... We've been thinking about moving to be closer to Mom. We'd both like to, and I know she'd love to have grandchildren around. She and Dad were... were real excited about—"
He trailed off, and Vincent heard broken breathing on the other end. After a long moment, Denzel cleared his throat. "Sorry," he apologized. "I'm still dealing with it myself. You'd think that the way it happened, time to prepare and all that... Well, it doesn't make it any easier... Tell Mom I'll call again later."
He hung up then, before he had a chance to break down on the phone.
Vincent made his way up the stairs to knock on the bathroom door. "Tifa? Denzel just called."
No answer.
He knocked again. "Tifa? Are you all right? You've been in there for an hour."
Still no answer.
"Tifa?" He tried the doorknob. It was locked. He banged on the door louder. "Tifa! Open up! Let me know you're all right or I'm coming in."
When she didn't answer for a third time, he rammed the door open with his shoulder—his momentum carrying him further into the bathroom than he would've liked. He swallowed and politely faced the wall, face red, the memory of her nude body already burned into his brain.
Tifa turned her head slightly and pulled her headphones off. "Vincent?"
"Denzel called."
"Did you take a message?"
"Ah, no. He said he'd call back later."
"Okay. Is there another reason why you're in here?"
"I, ah, knocked but there wasn't an answer. I began to worry."
"Oh." There was the sound of water around a shifting body. "I listen to music when I'm in here. I guess that's why I didn't hear you... sorry. Could you...leave, please?"
Vincent coughed. "Yes, of course. Forgive me." He closed the door quietly behind him.
Hours later, in the early light of dawn, on his way to the bathroom, Vincent peeked through the crack of her bedroom door. He caught a reassuring glimpse of nightgown, calf and dirty feet.
Later that day, he found her surveying the backyard, hands on her hips.
She didn't look at him or acknowledge him, just launched into conversation. "You know, I always hated those flowers." She pointed to a bed of yellow-gold blooms. "They smell like honey and I hate honey."
She smiled. A true, genuine smile. Vincent turned his head to marvel at it.
"He loved them though. Always gave me a hard time about them, would make bouquets out of them just to piss me off. I should finally do something about removing them."
He took it as a good sign that she was contemplating it. "Why not?" It would do her good to start exorcising parts of her life.
"Yeah, why not? No more stupid bouquets."
Her sigh sounded more regretful than relieved, however, and Vincent guessed she had never really been pissed at all.
It took him about a week to find his way to the laundry room. It was neat and tidy, as with most things in Tifa's house, but there was a little pile of unwashed clothes in the middle of the small room. He sidestepped around it and started up the washer, making his own small pile at the bottom of it. He glanced at the clothes on the floor. There was room in his load, he could just throw it in with...
"No!" Tifa appeared in the doorway. She snatched the shirt that Vincent was about to add to the washer. "No, don't worry about these." She sniffed the shirt. "They don't need laundered."
She gathered up the rest of the clothes from the floor and hurried out of the room, making Vincent wish he had paid more attention to whose clothes they were.
That night, after her bath and after they had made some pretense at going to bed, Vincent walked by her room again. The door was fully open, but her bed was empty. He looked around her room but there was no sign of Tifa. There was also no sign of the clothes from the laundry room.
A sound outside caught his attention, and he moved to the window and peered out. There was nothing but the still and shadowed backyard. He had almost turned away when something caught his attention.
There she was, digging in the bed of the much-hated flowers. There was a bucket next to her that she was "exorcising" them into. She stopped long enough to scratch at her nose and then started attacking again with renewed vigor. He smiled to himself and went to his room with a lighter heart.
And in the morning, when he walked past her door and caught a glimpse of dirty feet, he nodded in satisfaction.
It was Cleaning Day and the radio was on. Tifa flitted around the room with a duster; Vincent dutifully ran the vacuum.
He'd noticed a change in her lately. She'd been happier—or, if not happier, then not as moody—and she was smiling more. Real smiles that made his heart stir a little.
He couldn't say they'd gotten closer during the last few weeks, certainly not as close as they'd once been, but there was the potential for closeness, he thought. She could look across the kitchen table at him without that empty look. He could trust to find her in her bed every morning without having to check on her every night. The easy banter between them of her youth was still missing, and he doubted that it would ever return. Tifa was older, wiser and a widow, a far cry from the optimistic girl who followed her heart.
A slow song came on and he shut off the vacuum. He'd been thinking about this since her wedding day.
"Dance with me?"
Tifa stopped dusting and pivoted to stare at him. "Dance? Now?"
"Yes. Will you?"
Tifa toyed with the handle of the duster while Vincent held his breath. "All right, but wait a second. I'll be right back." She exited the room and he heard her feet on the stairs.
She'd been doing a lot of that lately too—disappearing up the stairs for a few odd minutes, here and there. But why now? Was she using the bathroom? Maybe she kept a journal, maybe she'd come back smelling like perfume...
She came back smelling a little like dust, but there was a smile on her face that erased all other thoughts. He clasped her hand in one of his and put the other at her waist. She leaned into him, much to his surprise, and put her cheek against his shoulder.
They swayed to the music in the middle of the living room, and Vincent found it easy to pretend that they were both happy and content with life, with each other. Did life offer second chances? Maybe it did. Perhaps he could fix her, heal her—as she had fixed and healed him once. Perhaps he already had. He hadn't seen her cry much lately.
As the song ended, she pulled away and let out a happy and content sigh. And he began to hope.
The phone rang and it was Denzel, doing his near daily check-in. Tifa took the call out on the front porch.
He had called earlier to speak with Vincent, to talk about his and Marlene's plan to move to Nibelheim. They had decided to wait until after the baby was born—Marlene didn't feel comfortable switching doctors late in her pregnancy and both felt that Edge had better hospitals. He wanted to be sure Vincent was comfortable with staying there a little longer.
Truthfully, after only a month, Vincent couldn't imagine being anywhere else.
His toothbrush occupied the same cup as Tifa's. He read the paper every morning. The local grocer knew him by name. He was brewing a pot of coffee that they would end up sharing. He was pouring it into a mug that he used at least three times a week. He had a routine now; he had a life.
When he no longer heard her voice outside, Vincent cautiously opened the door, fingers threaded through the ears of two mugs. Tifa sat on the porch swing staring at the sunset. When the swing creaked as he sat down, she came out of her daze with a frown. He offered her a cup in apology.
She accepted it and smiled. "I didn't like coffee for a long time."
"I know." He remembered that about her, was surprised to find that the older Tifa did.
"Cloud turned me on to it. He would bring it into the bedroom every morning, take a sip, and make me take one too so we'd both have the same breath."
She took a sip then and closed her eyes, resting her head on the back of the swing, lips tremulously parted in a sweet smile.
Vincent wondered if the kiss ever came.
He was standing at the sink doing the after-dinner dishes when it happened. Tifa came down from upstairs, marched up to him and planted a big one right on his lips.
Shock, astonishment assaulted him. Would a kiss from Tifa ever fail to take him by surprise? He yanked his hands from the water and groped blindly for a towel. When he came up empty-handed, he hoped she'd forgive the wet patches on the back of her shirt.
He'd managed to get in one sweep of the tongue before she pulled away and clapped a hand over her mouth. Vincent looked at her in confusion.
"Tifa, I—"
She turned abruptly and ran for the stairs. Vincent debated with himself for all of two seconds before running after her, determined to find out what was going on. When he reached the top of the stairs, he saw that her bedroom door was open. She was kneeling by the open trunk at the foot of her bed, her face pressed into a shirt—a shirt Vincent recognized from the laundry room floor.
Things were starting to piece themselves together.
"Have you been pretending I'm him this whole time?" he said from the doorway.
Her head jerked up. "What?" She threw the shirt into the trunk and slammed the lid down, getting angrily to her feet. "You could never be him," Tifa said, brushing past him and heading down the stairs.
For the second time that night, he was stunned. He strode over to the trunk and flipped the lid open. Socks and shirts mostly, there were a couple pairs of pants, a belt and a pair of boxers. All men's clothing.
All Cloud's.
When he returned downstairs, he found her sitting calmly at the kitchen table.
"I think you already know by now," she said, "but, yes, that was Cloud's shirt."
"I know."
"I thought so. Do you know how he died?"
Vincent took the seat across from her. "The newspaper said—"
"'Blunt impact injury of head with epidural hematoma'—something clinical and newsworthy for such a great man, right? It's all bullshit. It was because of something stupid and unfair and personal...and it was all my fault.
"He died because I just had to scrub the floor that day. I just had to be standing at the counter in a way that made the stupid fool want to sneak up on me. He just had to fall, just had to slip into a coma, and I just had to sign the papers. That's how he died. Pretty glorious, huh?"
She rubbed at the creases in her forehead. "Gods, Vincent! I'm so angry! I miss him so fucking much! You can't believe how much I want him back with me. He told me how much he loved me on the way to the hospital. Told me he was sorry we wouldn't be able to take that trip in Cid's rocket. Told me how sorry he was for not giving me the kids I wanted...
"And what did I do? I cried... I bawled..." She was bawling now. "...And b-by the time I could say anything...it was too late. He was...g-gone."
She slid jerkily off her chair to curl up on the dirty kitchen floor, and Vincent shot off of his chair to follow her. Cid had told him on the phone once that she refused to clean it anymore. Shera had tried, but Tifa had raised such a "godawful stink about the fucking thing" that they all had settled for trying to be as neat as possible when eating.
Now he knew why.
He curled down next to her and she turned, burying her face in his shoulder. "I know you're not Cloud. And I know you never can be him" —she rode her way through a huge, wracking sob— "And I'm so sorry... I'm so, so sorry..."
Vincent lay there on the cold, dirty floor and held her until he knew she had fallen asleep. He lifted her and carried her up to her room, tenderly laying her down on what he knew was her side of the bed. He pulled the blankets over her, touched her cheek, and whispered the words that he'd carried in his heart for the last eighteen years.
In the morning, Vincent pushed open the door to her room only to find it empty.
Her name sounded throughout the house, in every room, even the backyard, but no answer—and Vincent felt the icy promise of fear beginning to seep into his mind.
He cursed her—for believing that Cloud's was the only road worth traveling. He cursed himself for being too late.
He finally found her stretched out next to a green and growing grave. He hadn't been back here since that first day, but she'd come here often apparently; he couldn't imagine her letting anyone else tend to it. There were little rubbery shoots that smelled of honey, and Vincent finally understood the real reason why the garden in the backyard had disappeared.
He closed his eyes, feeling a prickling behind them.
She lay motionless on her side—the hem of her nightgown riding high upon her calf. Trees had mourned into her hair and her cold knuckles were touching the hiddenness of her dead husband. A sweet smile was frozen on her lips, as if she were doing nothing more than waiting for someone to come wake her up with coffee and a kiss.
His heart broke to see it, made him want to weep from the tragedy of it. But as he took one last look before setting off to the unjoyful task of making phone calls, he found that he could not.
Cloud had found his side of the bed again. And somewhere, Tifa was smiling for him.