Disclaimer: Compliation of FFVII does not belong to me.

Author natterings: (There is no specific reasoning behind the title. I am bad at coming up with titles.) I wrote this yesterday because I felt like writing the adorable dyanamic of "CloTiDenLene". (I came up with that 'word' on my own, you know.) Then it just exploded when I realized it was Tifa's birthday and Vincent got in there and so did Cloud's Socially Awkwardness. I'm thinking this should blossom into something bigger. I'm in complete love with the Advent Children continuum. Reviews are great if you're in the mood to give one. Thanks for reading!

You could track a life in many ways, Tifa thought. She stood in the cold of the open refrigerator, letting it chill her bare calves. She lifted carrots from the vegetable bin and placed them on the countertop, and swung the refrigerator door shut with a leg.

You could track a life through garbage. You could see if a person lived alone, or if a person lived with someone else, two someone elses, three someone elses. The volume increased, the variety of stuff increased. Tifa pulled out the garbage bin from under the sink and peeled carrot skins.

Denzel used to throw out bandages. Bandages, bandages, bandages. Now he parted with broken toys, botched portraits, and old underwear. He would also occasionally sneak some asparagus into the disposal when Cloud and Tifa weren't looking.

Marlene threw away bits of paper from cut-out snowflakes. Dried-up gluesticks. Tape that stuck together and could not be pried apart. Marlene did not throw away much.

Cloud threw out empty toothpaste tubes and useless mail. He didn't throw away much either. How else did his office get so cluttered, do you think? Pictures and letters galore stayed tucked in drawers or pinned to walls to fade with sunlight. Old clothes were cut up and made into rags to wipe the bar countertop with, to shine motorcycles with.

Tifa threw out empty bottles that once held alcohol, brooms with worn out bristles, flowers she had kept until they wilted completely. Some things were too precious to throw away. Boxes that once held earrings that she always wore now. Red ribbons the perfect length to tie around an arm, too worn out to keep on. Some things she held onto for as long as she could.

Tifa hit the bottom of the dressing bottle, dressing came slowly out. She turned it right side up and screwed the cap back on. She made her way up the stairs in her ankle socks, the fabric muting her steps on the wood.

Denzel was in a highly funny stance that Tifa speculated was supposed to be mirroring battle stances warriors took. Marlene had a doubtful look on her face, her feet together and hands hovering midair.

"Are you sure, Denzel?"

"Of course I'm sure!"

"Marlene, Denzel. Have something to eat."

They whirled to take in Tifa standing in the doorway, now crossing through the middle of the room. She had a plate in both hands, upon which carrots and dressing and pretzels were all balancing (well, the dressing was more wobbling). She carried the plate in both hands and not one. Subconsciously, she did this because she served patrons at her bar with platters balanced on one hand.

Denzel hopped energetically over to the sensible beside table and picked up a carrot, cut small enough for his small teeth. He was losing some now, actually, and whenever he placed one under his pillow, sure enough, the gil appeared the next morning. He bit into the carrotstick.

"I'm getting water, okay?" Marlene asked generally, and half-ran to the top of the flight of steps.

"I'll come," Tifa called after her, but not before grabbing a carrotstick and dunking it in the dressing.

"Me too," Denzel said through a mouthful of carrot, and proceeded to tag along.

When they came down one by one, they were greeted with the sight of Cloud standing at the calendar.

"Hi, Cloud," Marlene said.

"Cloud," Tifa said.

"We're getting water," Denzel said.

"When did you get home?" Tifa asked, deviating just a bit from her original plan. Behind her, Denzel started to climb the counter to get a cup for Marlene.

Cloud had a hand in his hair, rubbing at the side of his head. "Just now. I'm surprised you didn't hear." He smiled a little at her.

"We were all upstairs," she told him. Most days, they heard the rumble of the Fenrir signalling Cloud's arrival back home. Marlene and Denzel sometimes hid from Cloud, and Cloud always played along.

Now, Tifa looked to the calendar to possibly decipher what Cloud had been doing before they had arrived.

When her eyes landed on the date, she was surprised that she was surprised. She had known it since she had awoke, but seeing it in black print reminded her.

Cloud saw this as well. So, he said "May third."

"Tifa's birthday!" trilled a girlish voice to the right of them.

Tifa smiled a little at this, at Marlene's sheer happiness and excitement for the birthday of a person she cared about. She looked back at the calendar, the words glowing at her. They were written in Cloud's slanted print. The pen must have died, because TIFA'S B was in blue and IRTHDAY was in black.

"How old is Tifa?" Denzel asked, his face upturned towards Cloud. Tifa's smile fell a little. It was silly to be sad, she thought to herself. But it was her he was asking about. He didn't need to ask Cloud.

"Twenty three," Cloud said with certainty, a shade of something hidden in his voice. He saw it too, even more how it affected Tifa. He bent down on one knee, a hand on the linoleum. Denzel read the gesture in a second and walked into Cloud's open arms. He hugged Cloud loosely.

"Twenty three!" Denzel beamed at Tifa now, and she had to push away the previous sadness at this sight. His smile was a rare thing. Actually, Denzel was almost suspiciously happy today. But then, Cloud was home early.

"Twenty three," Tifa echoed. Then, after another glance at the calendar - "Let's go finish those carrots."

"Right!" Marlene sprinted up the stairs, miraculously not spilling her water everywhere. Denzel followed, moving fluidly out of Cloud's arms.

Tifa sighed and dug into the sore muscles of her lower back with her knuckles, preparing to tail them.

"You're not sad about turning twenty three, are you?" Cloud asked from behind her. She realized belatedly that she was still looking at the staircase, now empty.

She spun, dropping her hand from her back. "No. Does it seem that way to you?" And she surprised herself by laughing lightly.

Cloud's eyes brightened - she loved it when they did that. "No. You just don't seem like you want to talk about it."

"Hm." She tilted her head thoughtfully to the side, exposing one teardrop earring and the line of her neck. "There's not much to say. We're not celebrating until Saturday anyway, when there's no work to distract us." She grinned as she said this though, to show that it wasn't a complete attack on Cloud's famous work ethic.

"Says the combination bartender, sensei and supermom." Cloud raised an eyebrow back at her.

"Nice, Strife, you know the teaching was just one time." If she was eight years old, she would be sticking out her tongue right now. "And that was because your punch was terrible."

"It wasn't that bad--"

"Terrible," she repeated, fixing the blonde with a serious look.

Then they both simultaneously burst into smiles.

The bell above the door chimed.

"Hello-- Vincent!"

"Hello," Vincent greeted the pair, raising his eyebrows. Their smiles were million-watt ones - something had been going on. Well, all the better for Cloud, he supposed...

"What are you doing here?" Tifa asked, obviously surprised. "Not that you aren't welcome, of course."

Vincent turned his raised eyebrows solely on Cloud now. "I believe that Cloud could clarify."

Cloud turned to Tifa, his blue eyes looking straight into hers. His expression was of barely contained excitement, and it was sweet in the purest way to see. He took a breath in. "He's filling in for you."

Tifa was confused immediately. When neither of the two men spoke, she vocalized a theory. "Vincent is teaching you a proper right hook...?"

Vincent made a sound that may or may not have been a snort.

Cloud let out a short laugh, then rumpled his brow, sweet intentions still dominant on his face. He was a little disappointed Tifa hadn't caught on as quickly as he'd thought. "Vincent is managing the bar tonight."

The veil of confusion was slowly lifted from Tifa's face, replaced with an impressed look. She looked from Vincent to Cloud to Vincent again. She opened her mouth to speak. "So you're giving me the night off?"

"Yes," Cloud said, the wrinkle of his brow disappearing instantly. Surely, she understood by now. She was impressed, even!

Vincent nodded silently in agreement and began to remove his cape, fingers dealing swiftly with the buckles.

Cloud was just about to grab Tifa's hand to leave when--

Said hand jolted forward along with its owner. Tifa was walking toward Vincent, taking his cape and folding it carefully. Cloud watched this with a mildly bewildered face. Maybe she didn't understand...?

"You know how to mix all the drinks, right? You remember from last time? Seventh Heaven special is--"

"I remember, Tifa," Vincent assured her in placating tones. Vincent didn't even bother to raise his eyebrows at Cloud this time.

Cloud responded by taking a step forward. "Tifa--"

"Mister Valentine!" Marlene exclaimed from the stairwell, looking like all her Christmases had come at once. She turned to call up the stairwell. "Denzel! Mister Valentine's here!"

There was a beat of silence. Cloud contemplated saying something again, but proved too slow against Denzel's thundering down the stairs. When Denzel arrived, he had two carrotsticks sticking out from beneath his lips like--

"I'm a walrus, Vincent!" Denzel sped across the wood floor to Vincent, his socks providing little friction enough so he could slide.

"Denzel, that's dangerous," Tifa told him.

"Vincent thinks it's cool, right, Vincent?" the redhead asked, his orange 'tusks' still in place.

"It's dangerous," Vincent said with his usual economy, though there was a note of tenderness in that voice, somewhere. "You should eat those."

Denzel laughed and took them out while Marlene giggled in the background.

"It's been awhile since you've been over, Vincent," Tifa said fondly. "We should all sit and catch up while there's no one here, hm?"

Cloud worked his mouth in silence.

"Cloud thinks so, too, see?" Tifa laughed, attributing his look of mild perplexity to Denzel's recent skating show.

"Yes, I can see that," Vincent replied dryly. Vincent looked at Cloud as if to say, Just how much of a loser are you, anyway?

"Tifa..." Cloud tried not to squeak as all other occupants of the household brushed past.

He was too quiet, and Tifa hadn't heard. "We're celebrating Saturday," she was responding to some (probably so not funny) comment Vincent had made. The collective gust stirred by all of their walking lifted up the pages of the wall calendar. Cloud followed them.

"Vincent, I want a juice."

"I'll drop in, then," Vincent said to Tifa as he emptied the container of Denzel's favourite juice. Garbage.

"Thank you."

"Why is your cup so big?"

"Because I'm big."

"No, you're not."

"At seven."

"Alright."

"Barret's coming too. Cid is, I think. Yuffie--"

"Tifa," said Cloud. She turned to him in response.

Cloud also noticed that all other conversation had stopped. Denzel bit into a carrotstick.

Cloud cleared his throat. "Tifa, we should... let's... could we go upstairs?"

"Oh... kay," she said, not even hiding her look of skepticism. She came out from behind the bar promptly though, her long hair trailing behind her as she walked to him. Marlene blinked at Cloud thoughtfully as this happened.

"Come on." He thought about taking her hand, but dropped the thought as quick as it had come. He felt her presence behind him as he climbed the stairs, and led her to their shared room. Over the past few weeks, those beds were being pushed slightly closer to the middle of the room. Cloud felt like a little boy for mentally blushing and hoping that it would continue.

She had left the door slightly ajar. "Cloud?"

He looked over from the gap between doorframe and door to her face. She was always pretty, the kind of girl who favoured natural beauty over anything else. But right now he wished there was a little gloss on her lips, a simple coat of polish on her nails. Anything to indicate that she knew that he wanted to take her somewhere nice.

"Cloud? What's going on?" One of her eyebrows was piqued.

A pause. "It's your birthday," he blurted, his brain apparently not connected to his mouth anymore.

Now she looked quite amused. The warmth displayed on her face did indeed seep into her tone. "Yes, Cloud. It's my birthday."

He started a lot of sentences in his head. But none could phrase this exactly the way he wanted. He was sure he 'umm'ed a lot. He unconsciously tugged off his arm covering.

Tifa waited, tilting her head so it moved her hair, so her hair stirred her scent into the air. Their neighbours were karaokeing.

"So we should go out," Cloud said. "I mean- it's your birthday. So we should go out. To dinner." Why did he feel the need to double his breathing?

She furrowed her brow. "But, we're already--"

"Yeah, but... but it's your birthday. Your real birthday." He crumpled the fabric of his sleeve nervously in his hand. "We should... do something special." He bit the inside of his lip. "The two of us."

The bass of a pop song filled the short silence.

"Oh," she said softly.

Cloud looked briefly at the floor.

"Well, get out so I can change, then," she told him, and placed a palm between his shoulderblades to push him out into the hallway.