Strife

there's a note at the bottom in regarding edits. Also just to be on the safe side, this fic discusses anxiety and panic attacks. Also this fic gets saucy.

Barret pops the cap of a beer and hands it to him.

'You're shaking,' he says, referencing the leg Cloud has propped on the rail pipe under the bar, heel bouncing.

He stops immediately.

'Thanks,' he says as he takes the drink and his palm goes damp from the condensation.

'You nervous or something?' Barret asks, climbing onto a stool.

Yes. No. He looks at Tifa without meaning to.

Barret notices, gives a long-winded "ah" that's a mite too condescending.

She is the centre of a lot of hubbub. Denzel had never seen her in action before now, so he was suddenly obsessed to measure her strength. Pick me up! Now pick me and Marlene up! Now Yuffie! Now Mister Valentine! Marlene says you broke a big church seat with one arm! Show me?

Her laugh is helpless, breathless. She snorts a little when she can't help it. Denzel has been bedridden for a long time now, and he is an entirely different boy. Animated. Cloud can see her, tired, and her heart filling up too much. She's got the telltale sign of tipsy written over her cheeks and nose. She's so, completely, happy.

'Yeah, Teef, show us how strong you are and see how far you can throw old Cid down the street! I'll give you some secret-stash materia if you hit fifty feet.'

'Brat, I'll throw you down the street for free.'

He feels a broad arm go around his back, and an embrace from Barret is like hugging a muscle car, all bulk. 'Wanna tell me why you're sulking?'

'Tired.'

'Sure, sure, understandable. Or maybe you're just being a big pussy.'

Cloud shrugs Barret's arm away. 'Thanks for the pep talk. Helpful.'

'Do you ever think that maybe you just overthink shit too much?'

Cloud takes a long pull from the beer. It hurt his throat, almost. Crisp and bitter. And then warm. 'Every second of my damn life, probably.'

'Ain't nobody gonna tell your stubborn ass what to do, but hear me out. This is something you don't really sit on the sidelines for, yeah?'

'I'm not.'

'You are, buddy boy. You know you are. This family, right here.' He jabs his mechanical arm at the sight to their left. Their friends. Their family. Their smiles. 'This is important. And y'know, I really appreciate everything you and Tifa have done for Marlene-'

'Tifa. All Tifa.'

'Hey, delivery boy. You might have been a quitter on life, but you still kept ridin' around so you could help put food on the table for my kid. So I'm thanking you for that.'

He wants to argue further, but you didn't really argue with Barret when he was four beers in. Or ever.

So he nods.

'Trust you to doubt yourself after saving the world. Twice. I see you sittin' here, alone, cogs turning in that head of yours, and I'm tryna tell you that it ain't have to be so complicated. These are the good times.' Barret climbs down again, and holds his arm out wide, an invitation. 'Switch that brain off. Get over there and enjoy them.'

He has nightmares.

It's a total, utter gorefest of those he loves getting skewered. He had the pleasure of watching Aerith dying and the whole thing was practically burned into his skull, so it wasn't hard to substitute. Tifa. His mother. Yuffie, Barret, Vincent, Cid, all of them.

The worst was the kids. Ruthless. And Barret blaming him. Everyone blaming him for letting it happen. It was all ripe flesh and open organs and feathers that stuck to the blood.

There's Sephiroth making him relive the moment of being stuck to the end of Masamune, somewhere close to his heart. Ripped right through.

He always opens his eyes to the world crashing down on him.

And as it does, she does too.

She was a night owl, has been ever since she was a kid. He still struggles to hold onto childhood sometimes, in and out it came, but he remembers in that moment. Words, and eyes, wistful on the stars.

He goes down the stairs to be somewhere different, other than his own head.

And there she is, sitting on the bar and squinting into a manifest, probably weighing the cost of all the alcohol they'd just drained out of her. Legs crossed and a sleeve falling down her arm and her hair up high, an image that strikes him as so solid and peaceful it made his throat hurt. She keeps only a low light on, subconsciously leaning into it. As much as this was her time, she did not wish to disturb how the night was supposed to work.

When she sees him on the stairs, she knows instantly. She knows that he needs air, there must be something claustrophobic in his eyes, that always glow too brightly at night. Seventh Heaven feels dense. So they went out onto the street to sit together on the front step. She brings the candle with them, it smells like chocolate and spice, but the streets smell industrial, and bites against that sweetness. It was three in the morning, but bikes and cars roll by, the occasional group of twos and threes, and they felt hidden by the sound of it all.

He doesn't have it in himself to paint the picture of his violent, hyper-realistic dreams for her, but he tries to explain that in the nights since he's come home, he lies there with his fingers dipped into the mattress, marveling at it, terrified by it. An inhalation of deep breath and dust. An eyeful of a ceiling, with crags and splinters he'd once learnt. The house feels like a living, breathing organism while their friends are still there. So many bodies, in various corners of the house, often dead, drunk weight. His family. The kids just down the hall.

He thinks that this is all much too delicate.

It was an inherently selfish thought, but the last time he believed everything was going to be okay, he had gotten the stigma. The last time he believed Sephiroth was dead, life had willed him back into being. He's been reliant on a hard church floor, conversations through ignored phone calls and banked messages, and human interaction narrowed down to the collection and delivery of a package, either side of long stretches of endless road. His inevitable death.

But he'd emerged from that pool of Aerith's rain, alive after death. Her forgiveness was symbolic like that. The world had breathed easy, healed, smiling, laughing. If only for a moment. It was a lot to hold onto.

'Barret told me to stop thinking so much. To "enjoy the good times".'

'Barret's usually right, y'know.'

'Yeah. It's annoying.'

She nudges him gently, smiling at that.

'Don't know why I can't get my head around it.'

'It's okay. I sometimes think that the calm after the storm is the hardest thing about it,' she says softly, mirroring his thoughts.

Cloud doesn't have to nod.

He wishes for a peek inside her mind, for a reason why there is anything other than disappointment in the eyes she puts on him. She's to a hard rock, and he was a crashing tide, and he'd tried to wear her down, down until she was smooth like a pebble, but she was so resistant. She still sat before him a wonder of shape and angle. A full spectrum of color in a world he often saw in stark black and white.

'You know… nobody expects you to be fine straight away.'

He mulls over that, doesn't quite agree. 'I have a lot of time to make up for.'

'Hey. You have all the time in the world.'

'You ever get tired of forgiving me?'

'Nah,' she promises. She lifts his face up and to the side with two delicate fingers, so he can see how serious she is about it, and so he can't keep staring at the space between his heels, where a spot of tar stuck to the pavement. 'Especially when there's nothing to forgive.'

Nothing to forgive, because that was the type of person she is. She tries to understand people, maybe a little too much. He can't help but think that it was he did to deserve such people in his life, to have known them, who searched so hard for the good. He sees her trying to understand his reason for leaving to die alone. For the life of him, he can't understand how she doesn't doubt that he'll up and leave as soon as everything goes to shit again, because he wasn't sure of that himself.

'We're all just trying to survive, right? Live our lives the best we can. I'm proud of how you chose to live yours.'

'Running away to die?'

'For coming back, just in the nick of time.' She smiles, all teeth, and he can't help but feel that mounting panic subside from the base of his neck. And then Tifa shuffles closer, so much so he has to open an arm to her. He's all hesitation at first, but Tifa is a comfort, and familiar. For the first time in a long time, he holds his friend close.

He holds onto the moment, too. Tries to commit it to memory so that he has something to look back on. It was neon light catching an exposed shoulder, and the baby hairs framing her face. It was the smell of her recently washed skin. It is an electric charge that's been missing for too long with his absence.

It's remembering how this woman makes him feel.

It was home.

'Don't put so much pressure on yourself, okay? Pretending that everything is going to be alright doesn't work for everybody, not for you and me. You can only do what you can, right?'

'I don't know if I can ever be what people need me to be.'

'Cloud. You're enough.'

She says it a few more times, hoping it hits home.

The night works for the both of them. He starts to wonder if she's staying up in case he needs somebody to talk to, and it's something else to add to the selflessness of Tifa. Maybe she likes talking with you.

She whispers to him one night, 'I heard Barret saying that he might try and make it work and take Marlene with him this time, I don't know if I can handle that.'

It strikes him not for the first time that this love she has for a child that isn't hers makes her beautiful.

The bar stays closed to the rest of the world for at least two weeks. Nobody has time to enjoy a drink anyway, while they're trying to rebuild and cherish their families. They take a deep breath of fresh air together, but eventually they must part ways, and the group splinters off one by one, and the bubble bursts. The rush and bustle of them is a distraction that helps, but by the time Yuffie's done squatting in the living room, he's desperate for some peace and quiet.

Barret is the last to leave, and he makes his offer to his daughter. Marlene surprises all of them when she asks to stay. She has to keep an eye on Denzel and Cloud, after all. Denzel doesn't cry, but he's got a face like he's about to.

Barret doesn't cry, either, even though his heart might be breaking, but he has places he needs to be, just like her. She's his tough, smart, perfect girl. He has a world to change, so he says goodbye with hugs that seem to last a lifetime, with promises to visit as much as he can, much more this time.

Tifa cries. Much later, after the kids have gone to bed. Relief, but sadness to see a father walk away from their child, if only for a little longer. She's embarrassed to show it in front of him, and he's a little lost, because Tifa is probably the strongest person he knows.

And then it's the four of them. Life kickstarts, the bar reopens. He's back out across gaia. One, two, three days go by, and then a week, and then two, but the world doesn't implode on itself. The sky doesn't turn black and a singing sword wasn't ripping through his roof and sticking him to the bed.

You don't have to pretend everything is alright.

But he does sometimes, because Tifa has night-owl eyes. Saw everything. And she has better things to worry about than a grown man battling with a few bad dreams and crippling pessimism, so he doesn't tell her that a nightcap helps him settle easier, makes his sleep a little more peaceful.

There are small things that are different this time. There is more to that long stretch of endless road. When she calls, he answers. Deliveries often turn into jobs, because lots of people in the city need help now. She calls with errands, or a simple reminder to eat and sleep, even though he wasn't her obligation when she wasn't under her roof, and even then.

She does it because she loves you.

She probably does it because she's trying to remind you she still exists.

It might be a little bit of both, because he's not completely daft.

It's shocking at first to see the way she visibly relaxes at the sight of him returning. And she's not keeping the bar open long after her standard hours for the money. He can't help but think its to hide the fact that she waits up for him on the nights he has to stay out late. She was this confounding mix of overbearing and respectful in how badly she wants to stay in his life and take care of him.

Sometimes he got a feeling like a gnawing in his gut like he shouldn't even be there, except that she's asked him to be.

It's taken many night conversations to drive the point home: his presence in Seventh Heaven is a permanent thing.

Cloud, of course you can move back in. The kids would love that.

I'll keep your delivery business going on this end, don't worry.

He asks if there's anything he can do to help with the bar.

You should be my bouncer.

He'd snorted at that one.

'Tifa, you don't need a bouncer.'

'That's sweet. But do you know how quiet business gets after I have to resort to being my own security guard? Do you know how much those grabby jerks make me? Lots, Cloud.'

So he doesn't go straight up to his room much anymore.

Sometimes it was like his insides melting, watching her on her feet like a one-woman army.

He tries to help out, do more than just stand or sit around looking grumpy, but it is clear that reigning in the chaos was one of her favorite parts of the job, she has a real knack for carrying a haphazardous amount of things at once and serving five people at a time. She dismisses it when he suggests she hire some help. Laughs and smacks his arm when he says the kids would make great waiters.

Really, he doesn't ever have to do much. Her patrons are good, and thankful to her. When they do touch her, decidedly friendly or not, she's good at shrugging them off.

But there was always that one grabby jerk, as she said.

But it came with fighting with her, he guesses. Knowing her body. A look from her, the way her fists and her throat tighten when she starts getting heckled or violated, and he's out of his seat. He's prying the hand off of her chest or her ass or anywhere else she doesn't like. He's only had to use his fists once, on an asshole that kept trying to come back inside.

It took less than a month, and one instance with a gang (that had been a wild night) where his sword came out from behind the bar, before he became recognizable in Seventh Heaven again.

Tifa had broken a couple of jaws that night, too. After that, nobody really put their hand on her.

One night, he hears the term "power couple" being thrown around by a group of young women that keep glancing amongst one another, and then at him, and then at Tifa, swooping between patrons.

Then he starts getting recognized as "The Hero". He hates it. But the women love it. They want to hear all about it, see his "sword", make him blush beet red. And more than once he finds himself in a swarm. It makes him feel like he needs a bouncer himself.

Tifa was no help.

'Hey, hero. You want a drink? For all your hard work?' She was always winking at him. He'd be blushing for the rest of his life.

Being able to watch Tifa from within the same room was a combination of therapeutic and unbearable.

You're enough. You don't have to pretend everything is okay.

He was pretending. Cogs turning.

The dreams don't take a step back. They start running. A nightcap turns into a few glasses.

And Tifa is…

Well.

He likes the way men stare at her with something like trepidation after any and all of their interactions. Were they a thing? Is she taken? Are they in love?

In his mind, maybe they are.

It is an awful thing to pretend.

Because with time, and quiet, came a stewpot of old, old decrepit feelings and some new ones.

It's a mix of the old hopeless infatuation of their childhood, where she'd seemed like a whole other species, bigger and better than he'd ever be. And then he was leaving to be a SOLDIER, and she was a girl he wished he'd always been able to stare at the night sky with, making gentle promises.

And then there's everything else that they've been through together. A lot of it is tragedy. A lot of it is very, very confusing.

One thing that is not, is that she is Tifa. And Tifa is one of the best things in his life. His head is full of warm static and his stomach, feeling off, or just right, watching her.

He compliments her latest drawing, another one in a long line of family portraits, holding hands, ridiculous spiky hair. He was even smiling in this one. Marlene holds it to herself proudly, smiles as he praises it, and watches him carry a heavy slab of beer into the bar that he's got a good grip on, until she asks,

'When are you and Tifa gonna have a baby?'

He slams it onto the bench without meaning to, turning on her.

She doesn't see his panic.

'Um. "When"?' he repeats.

'I wanna draw a baby on here.'

'Just… draw one.' he offers helplessly.

'No, I'll wait, I want it to be yours! I'm sure it'll happen someday. Daddy said it would. I wonder if they'll have big spiky hair like you, or if they'll be as pretty as Tifa. Or maybe they'll be spiky and pretty. What do you think?'

'I have to… beer.' He points at the door like an idiot, where Tifa and a whole other palette was waiting. 'Nice drawing, Marlene.'

He tousles her hair for good measure, pretends he isn't screaming on the inside.

You couldn't bring a kid into this world.

You can barely take care of yourself.

Tifa is an amazing mother.

He acts weird for a solid three days by the time this newfound panic finds its way to her. He admits it in a rush. Marlene had scared the fuck out of him. Granted, she's seen and understood more than most kids, but he doesn't know why such an innocent, offhand comment from a child has got him so riled up. He expects her to laugh, or share his trepidation. Or completely agree. You're no father. You couldn't ever be.

It's not like he ever really had one.

She looks very serious. She sets aside her papers and pen, finishes chewing and swallowing on a piece of ice, and then she kisses him. And that mile-a-minute pace of his brain stops, practically screeches, like rubber on road. He feels it all the way down to his toes.

'Sorry,' she says after.

There's a lingering cold on his mouth.

He stares at hers and he's thankful that she understands visual queues, that she can see something in his face that tells her he really, really wants her to do it again.

She does. It's just as good.

And then she says, 'You think I need to talk to Marlene about babies? You know, "talk"? Is she too young? Should I leave it for Barret?'

She opened a floodgate with that mouth.

Someone calls her a prude, somebody she'd politely turned down. He called her a goddess of tits and ass, but a waste of one.

Tifa has given him pretty strict rules about who to kick and not kick out of her bar, and kicking somebody out just for running their mouth, quietly to their buddies no less, is not warranted. But it's hard to sit here and listen to people talk about her like an object, to know people were undressing her with their eyes and not see the person inside.

But the prude bit… that might have been true. But he should have figured.

That little mini skirt and tank weren't for people that didn't know they had a killer body.

And then he saw her at five in the morning, leaving her bedroom in a little black thong.

And nothing else. Absolutely nothing else.

No doubt she was still getting used to not being the only adult in the home again, that these halls were safe to walk naked down in the wee hours.

And what an image that had been. Hair that had tossed and turned with her in her sleep. What would that asshole say at the sight of early-morning Tifa, squinting almost in frustration, much too early for her. They were opposites like that. The morning was his time.

Hands on her breasts that wanted to spill out everywhere, hipbone and small waist, all tone and muscle, seared behind his eyes.

She hadn't done much other than look a little less annoyed by the ungodly hour, and motion for the bathroom without exposing too much more of herself.

'You, uh… you want the bathroom first?' she had asked, croaky from sleep, palms barely covering her nipples.

He had said no, to be polite. But mostly because he was already getting hard just from the sight of her and needed to stay in the shadows. And even more so because he wanted to see her ass framed in a halo of bathroom light before she shut the door on him.

Not a prude. Modest. Probably knew she was gorgeous and was unashamed of that fact in her own home.

Sometimes he doesn't need alcohol to sleep. Sometimes he thinks of her icy mouth and her naked body.

It was like an awakening, as ridiculous as it sounded. A side of him that had been dormant by necessity now going into overdrive.

He tries to touch the mattress under him, pretending that the feel of it was still otherworldly. But it wasn't. It was his norm now. It was his empty, nightly routine.

Hyper-aware of an outside breeze curling along his eyelids, his bare chest, as he starts touching himself, hoping that it might ease some of that tension, always forgetting that it just creates more and more.

He's trained on his name leaving her mouth. His name. He likes it in all variations, because she uses it and singles him out and reminds him that he's in the room. Reminds him that he'd left his gross riding boots on the bathroom floor again. It came with thanks from a steady paycheck, or a hand in cleaning the bar after close, or offering the first dibs at the shower. For the hot coffee he tries to be there to hand to her every morning, because what came with being a night owl was the utter detest of the early morning, and forcing two children out of bed. It's a small thing he can do. A moan into that coffee, trailing into, thank youuu Cloouuud.

To get his attention, so she could put a hand along his jaw and rise to her toes to kiss him.

Really, it was just a name, and it was his. He never liked it. But she says it like she loves it.

He just keeps thinking about whether or not she would say his name while they fucked.

It was nice in theory, but the truth is, if she started saying his name, he would associate it with doing something very wrong. He'd want her so out of her mind that words were lost on her.

Maybe she was a silent type? Maybe she was a talker and she would beg for it? Would she like to be in control? Would she mind that he wanted to put his tongue everywhere? Did she like being on top, back bowed and crown of her head reaching for the roof?

He knew her soft lips and her hands on his chest, opening and closing on his clothes, and it was enough to make it feel real.

It was bliss, and then emptiness, and then a mess he was never prepared for.

And Tifa sleeping down the hall, wearing nothing but that black little number.

Yuffie visits often. Much too often.

'You know what I think? I think you need to get laid.'

His brain shuts down, reboots barely quick enough to get out, 'Because I won't let you change the channel?'

But she's seen it. Something. In his face. It has been a while. A long fucking while.

She says it in the heat of the moment, childish, about as childish as the fact that they were currently wrestling over the remote. It was his day off, he was gonna damn well watch what he pleased in his own home.

The situation was quickly deteriorating further. He recognizes the way Yuffie manically latched onto a thought or idea. It wasn't like much ever stayed in her attention span.

His sex life? Sure. That was a humiliating enough topic to wrap her grubby little brain around.

'I mean I guess it makes sense. Nobody wants to screw McBroody-Pants, who lives on the floor in an old stuffy church, do they?'

'Yuffie.'

'Sorry… low blow. Okay, so you've had a lot going on. Fess up, how long has it been, then? A month.'

'Yuffie, please.'

'Six months?'

'Seriously-'

'Holy shit, it's been over a long time, hasn't it? That is not healthy. I'm being serious! You need to… you know… it's not good for the little guy-'

'Please, stop. Please.'

'I'm just trying to look out for you!'

'Don't.'

'I mean… you do realise you live in a freaking bar, right? You know girls love an angsty pretty-boy like you. Dumbs girls. Like straight up idiots. They die over a Mister McBrood-Pout-Pout-Pointy-Face.'

Did that make Tifa an idiot? Probably. Misguided, at least.

Yuffie was still talking. 'It's just a vicious cycle. Blue balls, bad temper, bluer balls, jerkin' off sad and alone-'

'Get out of my house.'

Yuffie snorts. 'It's not just your house. I'd like to hear what Tifa has to say about that. Hey Tifa!'

Cloud hears Tifa sigh very, very deeply, before poking her head up the staircase. 'What?' Her voice echoes up.

'Cloud's trying to kick me out.'

'What did you do?'

'Wha- nothing! Way to take sides. This jackass,' she elbows his gut, 'thinks he's the damn freaking king of this joint. Well, what say you?'

'Can you just maybe not act like children… maybe?'

'Thanks, Tifa, you can go back to being the world's hottest number one barmaid now.'

Another deep sigh, and retreating footsteps.

'I wonder why you haven't taken advantage of the opportunities surrounding you.'

He makes a face at her. 'Don't make me vomit.'

Yuffie screeches and pretends to heave over the couch. 'Gawd, Cloud, no! Yuck! Dumbass. All joking aside about your blue balls, it's been like two months since you moved back in and you still very clearly have not done a single thing to make a move.'

She takes advantage of the way his brain finally breaks and steals the remote out of his hand, and for a moment she flicks through the channels, deep in thought, before she settles for a news broadcast describing the miserable winter weather. Something he was probably going to watch, anyway, so he could prepare for the next week of deliveries.

This was all for nothing.

He tries fine-tuning his senses to the television, but she is a living, breathing ball of horror, and is nowhere near done with this conversation.

'So what's your excuse?'

'I don't...'

'Nah, you're either stalling or you're... are you not into girls? It would explain a lot. They always said you were just real thick and clueless, but maybe you're just gay? Look, if Cid's right, and you just don't know where all the great gay bars are at, this gal can give you a hand. Shit, Cloud, you can't let Cid win the bet!'

'I'm not gay. What bet?'

He saw her calculating how she was possibly going to get out of explaining this one. 'I don't know if you should… ah, whatever. We're betting how long it's gonna take for you guys to finally get together. Cid had the gay vote. Don't worry, I got your back though. Three months tops, I said. Vince was cruel. He said deathbed.'

Fuckity fuck. His relationship with Tifa is complicated enough, and he doesn't need a bunch of idiots… idioting things up even more.

He must look as helpless as he feels, because she laughs, vindicated.

'You really don't know what you're talking about.' he tries.

'Um, yes, I do. I am a Great Ninja, I see everything! And I've seen the way you look at her. Everyone has, idiot. Honestly, the pair of ya!'

'This isn't funny.'

'You're right, it's not. This is your happiness you're just letting scoot on by. You never struck me as a coward before, Spiky. Clueless, maybe. But you gotta see how bad she has it for you, right? How bad she's allwaaays had it for you.'

How the hell was he getting a lecture on his love life from Yuffie?

Was everyone in AVALANCHE just lining up to take a shot at it?

'It's not that simple, alright? I can't just… she isn't…'

Each word is emphasized with a hard clap. 'This. Isn't. Hard. Cloud. Love is literally the easiest thing there is. You have to stop holding yourself back!'

'Why are you talking to me like you know anything about.'

'I happen to be a genius when it comes to love.'

Cloud scoffs loudly.

'I really want to win this bet. Let me help. I could go down there with a wink-nudge right now. Let her know all about your little problem.'

The most horrible grin fills up her entire face.

'Yuffie, drop it.' he warns.

'Hey, Tifa! Tiiifa, when are you and Cloud gonna stop wasting time and get to fuc- LET GO OF MY HAIR!'

He's never literally thrown her out before. Cross that off the bucket list.

'Ow, ow, ow! Okay, I get it! I overstepped some boundaries!'

'Try leaping and bounding over them.'

He drags her down the stairs. It startles and upsets some of the evening patrons that had just started to trickle in, but most knew about the eccentricities that came with the family living above Seventh Heaven.

He slams and the door on the sight of her scrambling back towards him, and holds it tightly shut.

He comes face to face with Tifa. They both ignore Yuffie's screeching as she pounds on the door.

His stomach tenses at that gaze. She smiles, amused, but probably a little annoyed by the scene they just made in front of her customers.

'Do me a favor and make her sit out there for at least twenty minutes before you let her back in.'

'Wow. She really ground your gears, huh?'

He shrugs, for lack of anything he'd ever be willing to say about the conversation he and the brat just shared.

'Don't forget to pack an umbrella for tomorrow.' she says, like a reminder, as she turns on her heel for the bar. 'The weather forecast says it's gonna be a doozy.'

Ears of a night owl, too.

He watches her hips sway.

Was he really that obvious?

On the surface. It was tender moments when nobody was looking. She always kisses first. He always lets her..

Under, its strained. Her easy kisses make him realize more and more how uncomfortable he is in his own skin.

The physicality of her is mind-boggling. Tapered in all the right places, and curves to die for, a hybrid of softness and muscle.

Her hands. He's seen her split her knuckles on a face. He's seen her beat the living daylights out of somebody. He's watched her take her gloves off and flex out delicate, manicured, slender fingers. You have to touch them to feel the callouses that came with the hard work.

And that mouth. Those eyes. The flecks of amber.

She was constantly breaching the gap between them. Smaller intimacies. Offering massages, because riding wasn't always great on the neck and shoulders. Nudging the hair out of his eyes, always getting caught in his lashes. Simply passing him in the hall, and being okay if her shoulder bumps his.

And yet he can't just reach out and touch her. So scared to instigate it.

She's so gentle and touchy with you because she's worried you're gonna run off again.

You're scared because you think you probably will.

I wonder if I'm going to wake up tomorrow and find out I have some rare, fatal disease.

He can't blame Yuffie, even though he certainly hadn't needed it spelled out to him that everyone and their damn dog could see the way he was still grovelling after her, and that it wasn't just a side-effect of not being laid for a few centuries (as she had recently put it, desperate to win the bet). It went beyond the natural inevitability of sharing a duty to two beautiful kids, a house and business, and a quiet companionship that they'd always had, sometimes needed work to find. He's ruined it once before… more than once, No doubt he'd end up hurting her again. No doubt she would end up hurting him.

You're a fucking asshole, Strife.

Tifa probably deserves to hurt him back a little.

Maybe a lot.

He fucks it up.

She still loves how gentle they are, but she's human. Maybe she feels like she's gone easy on him for long enough. Doesn't know he's walking on a precipice.

'I think I can get away with having the bar closed. Hopefully the locals won't be too upset.'

'Mm.'

'Remind me to get all the couches set up.'

'I will.'

'It'll be nice to have everyone in the house again, don't you think?'

Cloud nods, distracted.

'Cloud, you know you can kiss me whenever you want.'

That gets his complete attention.

They haven't really spoken about it, the dos and don'ts. He's been terrified of them. He's instantly terrified now.

'I know.' He doesn't, but he knows anything else he says will hurt her. He knows that she wants him to show initiative. She knows that she's had to take the reigns for a while now.

It's almost too bold for her. She takes a hold of his wrists and slowly drags his hands across her, like she knew he was constantly, pitifully terrified of touching her.

He's so unprepared. They are just in the kitchen. She is getting the pint glasses clean and ready for the night, talking about their reunion, and he's looking over a contract for a delivery he'll have to leave extra early for in the morning, if he wants to get home early enough to help set their home up for AVALANCHE tomorrow.

He is so awkward at first, timing all off. But she urges him on. Suddenly she gasps softly into his mouth, as he was palming her stomach.

Then it's like something snaps. Then he is desperate, and everywhere.

It was fast. Too much. His heart is racing and hurt in his chest. Exactly like a first time. He felt young and stupid and completely out of her depth, her requirements… and she was gasping at how desperate his tongue is, suddenly inside her mouth and how hard he grabs handfuls of her ass.

She first yanks at his hair and then urges him to do something. Anything. Harder, and faster, going onto the tips of her toes to grind herself up against him.

She was a whimperer, after all. Beautiful noises that went in and out of breathless, and high-pitched as he thrust a thigh between hers and tries to give her what she wants.

'I want to fuck you,' he gasps, and the admittance makes him want to cry.

Her response is to pull him towards the bar and climb up onto it, with his belated assistance.

Then, she is begging for it. Hands almost frantic in the search for his dick, shoving clothes aside. Legs locked and high on his waist.

He suddenly realizes that his heart is racing because this is a full-blown panic attack.

It's a blur. They're on the floor. Clothes askew. She's nearly crying, but being strong for him, hand over his heart.

'Breathe, Cloud. Breathe. Here, hold my hand. Tell me three things you feel.'

He squeezes her. So hard to focus and to breath. He tries to steady his breath by breathing through his nose but it comes out in time to a shudder and hurts. 'Your hand.'

'Yes.'

'My heart.' he gasps. 'My clothes.' Itching his skin.

'Three things you see,' she asks softly.

'You.' His heart breaks. 'Crying.'

'Shh. What else?'

'My ring,' he says, startled. On a chain, freed from her shirt in their desperation. He never knew she wore it.

He's coming back to himself by this point, taking deep breaths at her instructions.

Then he wants to sleep.

'I'm so sorry,' she chokes. 'Are you okay?'

He knows it only takes a word. The truth. She would understand.

Trying to assimilate himself back into this perfect, fragile life wasn't- coming together. Like it should.

But he can't help but see the reaction, how she would be heartbroken that every careful step she's been taking with him was worth nothing.

For a long time his thoughts had not been his own. Like broken glass, and he's spent so long trying to fill the gaps and find something clear, something that looked back at him that he could actually recognize.

But now all it was, was slippery. No doubt if he starts holding on tight again, it would start to splinter.

What if he did this every time? What if all she could associate with their intimacy was his panic, never being able to get anywhere? What if he couldn't satisfy her ever?

Leaps backwards, after the tiny steps to get himself to the rational point in which Tifa and Denzel and Marlene and his friends had brought him.

Suddenly leaving her there on that floor is a blur, too.

And there it is. Most nights he is already terrified by whatever it is his brain is going to conjure up for him. It is four in the morning and he has already woken up twice in a cold sweat. His hands were shaking by the time he got them around whatever he could find. Something hard and burning.

He hadn't meant to get so drunk before the party.

He sat through most of it with the worst hangover he's ever had, pretending he was enjoying the company of his friends. Cid and Barret's propensity to mock the living shit out of him. The kids and the way they never seemed to slow down. They don't seem to notice the awkward charge, how uncomfortable he and Tifa are.

He did. It suffocates him.

And Yuffie.

By the time he's had all he can stomach, she's standing between him and the exit, the solace of his room. 'So how's the mission going?'

'Mission.' he repeats.

'Mission Profess Undying Love To Tifa Before I Go Grey.'

'Yuffie.'

'With side project Get Into Tifa's Pants Before My Grave. Nicknamed Tifa unLockherHart. Get it?'

'Yuffie.'

'No luck? Nothing steamy to report?'

'Stop it.'

'I'm really disappointed in you.'

'Stay out of my damn business.'

'Yikes. You smell like a bar, by the way. And not Tifa's nice bar. A gross sticky one. What the hell is wrong with you, why would you waste your time getting tanked when you could be getting bus-ayyy-'

'Yuffie,' he snarled. 'For once. Fuck. Off.'

The room went dead silent. He says it much louder than intended.

She stole his materia. He could handle that. She drove him to the point of exhaustion with every visit, but he's never felt anything but affection and more often than not toleration for her.

He never thought he had it in himself to be cruel to her.

'That was rude,' she says, clearly hurt and trying to play it off, not so full of herself anymore.

'That's rich, coming from you.'

'I'm sorry that I was just trying to help you.'

'Help? Grow the fuck up. Ever think you have more important things to do than stick your nose where you're not wanted?'

'Fuck you, Cloud, drunk asshole.'

'Hey, hey, can we cut the foul language in front of the kids, yeah?'

He's shocked more than one person in the room. Including himself.

He sees the various clenching of fists, and teeth. Barret is fuming, moments away from burying him under the floorboards. Yuffie stares at him like she has just been slapped, before storming out. Mild, initial distaste from his friends hurt, but not as much as the look Denzel and Marlene give him. Wondering if they should be scared of him. If they should expect to be spoken to like that.

And Tifa.

'You better go apologize to her before I knock your teeth out.'

He does, but not because he is scared of Barret's fists.

The look on her face.

He almost wants to blame her. The first domino for this collapse. She'd let him believe it was okay to succumb to his doubt, sink to these levels.

Bullshit.

Tifa did nothing but build him up. It wasn't Tifa who made him yell at his friend, Tifa didn't tell him to drink. She wasn't that little voice in his head that screamed unworthy as soon as he stepped into Seventh Heaven.

In a panic, he thinks he's no good.

In a panic, he thinks about leaving.

Starts writing a note for it.

Passes out instead, paper stuck to his face.

He wakes to her saying his name. He lifts his head up from his arm, partially stuck, and imprinted with red and drool.

She stands there twisting her fingers together, and stares at the empty bottle next to him.

He looks over to it and sees that it was on its side, and balancing drastically over the side of his desk. He sets it straight, and stretches back into the chair.

'Cloud.'

He squints at her.

She looks tired.

'I saw your light was on.' she says softly.

He doesn't know what to say, so he just stares at her.

Her face perfects calm as she came towards him, offering a hand. 'Let me help you get to bed?'

'I'm fine.'

She moves back respectively as he climbs out of his chair, half asleep, in the dregs of a two-day bender. The room seems to condense one moment and then expand the next.

Tifa bites her lip. 'Are you sure you don't need help?'

'I'm fine.' he repeats.

'I'm sorry.' she says, so meek, reaching out for him.

She was sorry.

He steps away from her touch, because he can't handle this backwards world where he deserves her comfort and yet have her blame herself for all his shortcomings.

'Don't do that.'

'Do what?'

'Take on my shit. Look at me. Don't you ever think for a second that you're wasting your time?'

'No,' she promises, desperate. 'Not for even one. You just need to speak to me, I promise I will understand.'

'You're not my shrink.'

'Do you need a shrink?' she asks very seriously.

He laughs. A mean sound. 'Probably.'

She reaches to pick up the empty bottle. 'You finish a bottle like this most nights?'

'It helps with the nightmares.'

'You're having nightmares?' she echoes, sounding heartbroken. 'Me too. All the time. Why don't you talk to me about them.'

'Because it's not your job, Tifa. You don't need to hear them. It's not your problem.'

'I'm sorry you feel that way.' she says, so softly, like anything louder and she would choke on it. 'I'm sorry that you can't talk to me. But together we can find someone or something that can help. Just let me-'

Sorry, sorry, she was so sorry. She couldn't be anymore wrong about that.

'I thought about leaving.'

She makes an audible gasp, and a hand flies to her mouth. He gives her a few moments as her shoulders tremble and she tries desperately not to overreact.

'Do you think that would help?' she practically squeaks.

'I don't know.'

'Where would you go? Back to the church?'

'I don't know.'

'Is it me?' she asks weakly, unable to help herself, in a voice that made his heart hurt. She tugs on her arm like a scolded child. 'Did I push you too hard? I'm sorry.'

'Tifa,' he bites out. 'Stop. Stop apologising. It's not you.'

'Then explain it to me.'

What was worse than the thought of giving her excuses was that he had none. He didn't. And worse still was turning away from all this having her believe she was the reason for his most recent failure. It was just his brain, self-sabotage, whatever.

He just needs to leave this family alone.

'I just don't think I'm supposed to have… this. Maybe it would be better if I left and you-'

'No. No. Don't say that. So it's not going as smoothly as you hoped. And you had a panic attack. It's not your fault.'

Cloud rubs his eyes hard with the heel of his hand, overwhelmed. He doesn't want to be having this conversation with her. 'Tifa… just, let's not talk about this right now.'

'I'm- no, Cloud. We need to talk, please talk to me.'

'I don't have anything else to say,' he says, too harsh. It makes her shoulders snap straight. 'Just go to sleep.'

'I can't go to sleep not knowing if you're still gonna be here when I wake up!'

'You would be better for it.'

'I wouldn't be,' she says defiantly.

When he reaches for her, she lets him. Until she realizes it was to urge her out of his room, and he pleads with her, with eyes only, to let it be. Just let him be.

She struggles so much he has to dodge a misplaced elbow, and he has to take a big step back.

They stare at each other for too long, and he feels sick, sick to his stomach to see her like this. He can only imagine what it was she saw.

He swallows so hard. 'There has to be. Has to be something wrong with you.'

'Something wrong with me?' she demands, her voice getting wet and suffocated. 'For wanting to take care of you and wanting us to be a family? For loving you and hoping I could be enough for you? There's something wrong with me for that? I told you, you don't have to be okay, you stupid- you-' she's started crying through it, started clenching and unclenching her fists, she suddenly grabs the shirt off his chest and in a motion crushes him to her.

She sobs, but the material dulls it. And it vibrates through him.

Cloud blinks at the sudden familiarity of the large shirt draped over her, the one that had disappeared after she'd done his washing one time.

And he just…

'You love everyone,' he tries to tell himself, more than her.

She shakes her head furiously at that. 'No. No. Not like I love you.'

'You're gonna keep getting hurt.' he whispers into her hair.

'The only thing that hurts is you thinking you're not worthy of this family, and me. And watching you isolate yourself. When it's the- it's the other way around, don't you see? Don't you see what you've done for us? And that the kids idolize you. And I… I just want to be with you. You're my best friend.'

'What if I can't… satisfy you.'

She nearly laughs, turns into a mild sob. 'Cloud, your mental health is more important.'

'I'm… I've never been good at this.'

'I know. You've always been so oblivious to my feelings.'

'No, just… not myself.'

He brought his thumbs to her cheeks, wiping the tears from her under eyes.

They both stood in the shock of it. The easy way he touched her.

He breathes deeply, exhales his words. 'I'm just… terrified of everything. I… I don't know why.'

He watches her thick lashes flutter closed over her eyes. Cloud brushes away the mess of hair that was sticking to her cheek, tucking it behind the curve of her ear.

'I am still terrified,' he admits. He thumbs the corner of her mouth, and says quickly, to quell her flicker of worry, 'maybe not so much of touching you.'

Tifa releases her breath. 'What of?'

'Of hurting you. And this family. It means too much.' he forces out, through the lump in his throat. 'This happiness. To me it just seems like… us loving each other, and me being the way that I am. It just won't ever work.'

'The way you are,' she echoes, and looks thoughtful. 'There was one thing that my dad taught me. He said, that in a relationship, sometimes one person can't be their best selves. And that's okay. It's okay for one of you to share the load. It's okay for one of you to hurt.' She is crying again. He is about to, too. 'I… I don't want perfect. I don't expect you to feel like you can handle this all the time.'

'Sometimes I feel like I don't deserve forgiveness.'

She abruptly puts her hands on his face, and pulls his brow down to hers. 'I can't- nobody can- ever make you believe that there is nothing to forgive. For Aerith. For the past. For leaving. For all of it. I mean... do you forgive me?'

The question was sudden, as was his confusion. 'You never did…'

'I lied to you, remember?' she insists. 'I lied about who you were, because I was scared. And I was so jealous of Aerith, even up until the moment she died, of how easily she gave her love to people. To you. I've always hated myself for that, for feeling that way even after she was gone. Instead of trying harder… I just let you leave.'

They hold each other for a long moment. Her words sober him. Made him feel like he was seeing things clearly for the first time in a long time.

'I'm sorry,' he says.

'It's okay,' she hushes him.

'I'm so sorry.' his voice breaks.

She hushes him again, and kisses his cheeks and eyelids until there is no evidence of tears.

When he is done, she is suddenly like an angel. Glowing in his arms, smiling with a reassurance he believes.

She would have given him months, years, to slowly fill the gaps between them.

He gives her a week. By then his head is clear. By then he has apologised to Yuffie. By then he has assured the kids that he's okay. That he's going to be okay.

By then he's back to thinking about her, this time it's about how good she looks in his shirt.

He's still walking on a precipice, but by the next time he gets her alone, he feels like he wants to take a running leap.

She has a place in his room now after that night. Until then she has kept her distance, given him his space, his privacy.

He catches her after a shower. Sticks his head into the hall and calls her name softly. He's not sure what drives it, this need to have her in his space, to catch a quiet moment.

He misses their late night conversations.

He swallows hard, his doubts and fears and the lingering feeling that this is fake, that Tifa is fake and she couldn't possibly want and need him, except for the fact that she's locked the door behind her and she's melting in his arms. And kisses her, shyly. Soft, and fleeting.

She's shaking so much. It feels different.

'Yuffie… got in my head before.' she whispers.

Fucking Yuffie.

'I thought that she was just being stupid when she told me that... that you wanted to fuck me.'

'Not stupid. But she wanted to win a bet.'

'What bet.'

'It's not important. She's a little shit.'

'She told me that you thought I didn't want you. I've wanted this… I don't know. Always. I guess I thought I was doing the right thing, so you didn't feel like you had to instigate anything.'

That's why it's easier to put his hands on her the next time he does it. She instantly turns to gooseflesh and holds him tighter, tighter.

Says, sweetly, 'You don't have to.' Because it hasn't been that long since they'd come to that agreement, that understanding.

He doesn't have. He gets that now. He just has to want to. And he really fucking wants to.

He turns her face up to press his lips on hers, which are streaked and salty.

Grabbing fistfuls of her hair, holding her face, twists his shirt up off her body to expose skin.

Then they're right where they left off.

Maybe he has always wanted it to be slow. They've had enough of a fucking build up for it to be the most luxurious time-consuming consummation of his life. It wouldn't have been on his desk. He probably would have made her come with his fingers a few times, a few times more with his mouth. He has imagined soft places, her bed and her scent everywhere, more of those candles and private light.

But she's wriggling, arching. And he's leading, or trying to. Trying to remind himself it's okay. To go fast and take. Because as much as he would love to take his time, he's already yanking the shirt off his back and shoving their underwear aside.

And it is almost too sudden for him to be inside her, glorious and inch by inch as her mouth falls open. He's always had this image of her. She was an old memory, distant and fading at times. How much he's wanted her even when he was with somebody else. He's never imagined her to be trembling so much, but it's hard, without reference, for the brain to fully capture how close a moment like this was, and how hot, and how deep each trembling breath came from her.

Startlingly clear and real.

'Is this too much,' he asks, without meaning to. The doubt again, rearing up. 'Is this going too fast? I-' he lost his words in a long, languid moan as she put a hand gently over his mouth and gave a roll of her hips that made him want to weep. A whole feeling, from her belly to her hipbone to the way her legs and her pussy clench up and down him.

Properly shushed.

Shape and angles. Spectrum of colour. So happy when his pace picks up, turns shallow and hard and the back of the desk starts edging forward and slamming back into the wall. They both flinch at that, suddenly remembering the kids definitely didn't need to be hearing this.

So she hops into his arms even before he starts hoisting her higher, somehow finding the bed.

It was nail on skin, teeth on her mouth, and his. She made oh noises on a varying scale of bliss, and the harder she holds his face close to hers the more he knew she loves it. Already learning her tells. It comes with fighting with her.

She came fighting. She came with a sudden slam of her palm against his shoulder without meaning to, startling him. He sees her instantly regret and let go of her pleasure, but its done the opposite to him. He is suddenly so eager to watch that he bows back and plants a knee on the edge of his bed, and starts fucking her hard to make the feeling go on and on, and he watches her come apart. Come with her body arched beautifully back over his sheets, like something carved out of marble. But also so real as her chest heaves and a nipple peeks through the long dip in his shirt. A convulsion around him that makes his eyes roll back into his head, his head is ringing with her oh, was more like oooohhhh my god.

He's proud of himself for even holding on this long.

He rides out, buried to the point of their hips clashing, what he considers to be one of the best orgasms he's ever had in his life, and then crashes into her arms as she pulls him close and lets him shake against her.

He can't do anything for minutes after, trying to suck oxygen back into his lungs, a thousand miles away in some otherworldly plain of existence.

When he can, he dares to venture a look into her eyes.

She looks a little nervous.

'Tifa,' he tries, voice hoarse. He licks his lips. 'I don't think people tell you enough that you're amazing.'

Her face and throat go completely red. 'I'm not.'

'You are.'

'I'm really not,' she laughs, as he leaves a descent of kisses along her neck and chest, down the deep neckline in his shirt. Which he loves on her, maybe a little too much.

This affection came easily. An appraisal of her body he's always wanted to give.

He smiles at her. 'You have to be as dense as me not to see that.'

'Well, and you are pretty dense.'

'Thiiiiis is Yuffie Kisaragi, ninja extraordinaire, how may I help-'

'Just shut up for one second.'

'Cloud. The heck does your broody ass want this early in the morning.'

'To apologise.'

'Well that's a great way to start an apology. Also, you already did that, remember? And because I am a gracious person, I accepted.'

'Great. I'm not talking about yelling at you. You were right.'

'Say what now? Hold on a second. Reeve! I'm putting this on speaker. Can you record it? Okay. Can you say that again. Particularly the part where I'm right and you're wrong?'

'Idiot. What I'm trying to say is… mission accomplished.'

'Oh.'

'Mm.'

'Ooohhh. Well. Good. I'm glad. That makes me happy.'

'Guess that means you one the bet.'

'Hey, you're right! Just under three months right? I won! So you came through for me. Does this mean you guys are gonna start pumping out babies? I am not babysitting. Maybe I'll start another one with the guys for how long it'll take you two to knock one out, if you know what I mean. Three months, yeah?'

Click.

'What was all that about?'

Yuffie tossed her phone back down in the pile of her clothes and turned back to Handsome Goatee, very pleased with herself.

'Oh, nothing. Just Kisaragi, saving the day and finally getting the damn recognition she deserves.'

'You meddled.' he accused.

'Hardly. Just enough to ensure two idiots get the happy ending they deserve,' she sighed, snuggling back up to him. 'He owes me big time. After how rude he was to me. You think I have a knack for matchmaking?'

'Not really.'

'I got Cloud and Tifa together, didn't I?'

'That's just… destiny.'

'I ended up getting in your pants, didn't I?'

'That's just… extremely poor judgement.'

'Nuh. I promised you it would happen. Come on, didn't I say it would happen?'

He sighed. 'Yes, you did.'

'Yeah, you mind repeating my words of wisdom?'

'"Soon Cloud is going to snap and freakin' ride Tifa up against the bar or something, and I'll totally catch him in the act so that I can rub it in his face".' He mimicked, flicking his wrists in addition to his girlishly pitched voice. Reeve rubbed his face down tiredly. 'You should be very proud of yourself, princess, you accomplished half your goal. And what goals they are. Can I go back to sleep now? Unlike somebody, I have to get up in an hour.'

'Alright Mister Grump.'

There was silence, but he'd spent enough nights in bed with Yuffie to know her dead weight. Plus, there'd be snoring with her on her partially on her back like this.

So it didn't shock him at all when he felt her mouth move against his throat with a quiet, 'Reeve?'

'Mm?'

'Was it really just poor judgement?'

This soft uncertainty made his arm go a fraction tighter around her, and made him smile.

'Of course not.'

'Really?'

'Yes. I said it was "extremely" poor judgement.'

And before she could clap back he already had both his arms around her, and his mouth on hers.

She was indignant, and then the Yuffie he knew. Eager, and giving, and all parts attentive.

He could have a nap at his desk later, to make up for the hour he was going to spend making sure that the Great Yuffie Kisaragi knew she was just that.

update:

Hi guys! So as of 2018 this fic has pretty much been completely rewritten. For a multitude of reasons. I've changed, matured, as my writing definitely has, and I guess going back and trying it again is a fun way of seeing your progress? That being said (without tooting my own horn), if anybody who has read this before, doesn't appreciate the changes and wants the old version, I'm happy to post it as a second chapter? If anyone actually cares lmao.

Anyway, I feel like this version captures something about Cloud and Tifa's relationship that my limited experience didn't allow me to before?

New and old readers, let me know what you think!

OKAY I PROMISE NO MORE EDITING. That's it. This fic is done. Promise.