Mostly because Darknightdestiny dared me. And I hadn't thrown Tifa into this crazy yet. Mwhahaha.

It wasn't that I had no where to go. I had plenty of places to go. Barret had offered me a place to stay, and I almost accepted on behalf of Marlene, but she didn't need me as a go between. She wanted her father. So I couldn't intervene there anymore.

Cloud. Well, he was off trying to figure out what this New Shinra business was, and it was starting to feel old being a third wheel around him and Reno. Men were sometimes so exclusive. I felt seven again around them, plotting and joking.

It was Cid's idea, that oddly brilliant man, that I come to stay with Vincent and his roommate Veld.

I'll admit, there was a fair bit of shock on the fact that Vincent owned any property. Apparently his uncle had owned the place, and since it was far enough out of Midgar proper, it was still in one piece. I'd bet he had to chase off some squatters in the meantime, any house that was intact was taken over by the homeless after the disaster, but then, Vincent could get scary when he wanted to.

And Veld. Well, I didn't know anything about the man. Only what Vincent had told Cloud before they went off on their own little buddy trip. My old partner. Some kind of Shinra lingo that Cloud seemed to understand instantly. So Veld had been on the fringe for a while.

Cid didn't trust him. That was part of why he'd sent me, other than his misplaced protective instinct. He figured that old Turks showing up out of no where were bad news. Very bad news.

I didn't share his paranoia, because only older men like him could be that paranoid. It was one of the sweet things about Cid, the way he looked after the people he'd claimed as friends like that; whether they wanted it or not.

And well, it wasn't like I didn't want to be around Vincent. I didn't expect much, but then, I never expected much. But hope, that was something that Zangan had taught me a lot about. A girl can always hope.

Hopefully Veld wasn't one of those chaperoning types.

---

"Tifa Lockhart, this is Veld Dragoon, and vice versa." Vincent didn't need to introduce us, but he did anyway. It felt a little awkward, maybe because it reminded me that Vincent was actually old. That people used to be sort of formal with introductions.

Veld didn't shake my hand, though. Vincent didn't see anything wrong with that. But after a few seconds he bowed, like I'd seen Tseng do so many years ago. I wonder if he'd learned that from him.

"Thanks a lot for letting me stay with you, again. Real estate is murder these days."

A smirk. So he had a sense of humor in with that sense of fashion. If only I could get some of the other guys in AVALANCHE to coordinate like that. Veld wore a suit like most men wore jeans.

"It was no problem." Vincent answering again. I knew some things about him, because of Aeris, actually. She had started talking to him first, because as I learned, he knew her mother. But he didn't tell me that until after she'd died. We weren't almost troublemaker kind of friends like he and Cid are.

But we were friends enough to know that he wasn't really gloomy. And I wasn't really always going to wait.

"What are you doing now, Miss Lockhart, now that your terrorism is finished?" The way he said it wasn't an insult, but a genuine question. There had to be something personal there, the way it first came to his mind.

"Cloud had mentioned wanting to start a delivery service, but he's too busy trying to make sure Rufus doesn't get a big head again."

He chuckled at that. I couldn't help but notice that he laughed like Zangan. "A courier is a steady profession."

"And what do you do, now that your assassinating and kidnapping is finished?"

"What most old men do, sit on their ass and pretend they're retired."

He was easier to talk to than Vincent. That surprised me. And yet, he was twice as guarded. More secrets, maybe. I could see why Cid didn't trust him. Cid was never one for subtlety.

"I should check and see if I can find some proper old man retirement gifts. Do you like golf?"

He smiled with his teeth. "If you could find me an old record player, I'll owe you dinner."

Maybe I wouldn't be able to trust him, but I could live with him quite easily. Especially considering that when he spoke in a friendly manner, Vincent had a hard time hiding the fact he was grinning like someone more his physical age.

---

I was beginning to learn that when around Veld, Vincent worked in patterns. I had gleaned from the strange glances and the edge in Veld's voice that he was used to being in charge of things, and that Vincent was used to Veld taking charge in some sense. Turks had ranks like soldiers did, so from my secret little research, Veld must have been a slightly superior rank to Vincent.

It was fascinating to watch. We all had our own rooms, but the two of them were always the first ones awake. Veld was no stranger to a stove and liked his eggs poached. Vincent liked his as runny as possible.

I liked mine scrambled. "So, what's on the agenda today?"

Vincent was reading the poor excuse for a newspaper that Reeve's WRO had gotten started. The pages were spare and mostly focused on getting people reunited and volunteers found. It had been years, really, years since things went wrong, but there were still people in those piles of rubble. And double agents needed to do their own kind of penance.

"I'm going to see another old friend today," Veld said, back turned. He was far too masculine to wear my apron. But I imagined that he did so long as I wasn't there, and I tried to be stealthier each morning to catch him. So far, it wasn't working.

Vincent raised an eyebrow. "She will not be friendly." An argument?

"Just because she didn't like you much doesn't mean that she's a horrible person." Back still turned.

"You can ask Tifa her opinion. I think she will agree with me." Veld pulled a plate closer to the stove and dumped my scrambled eggs on it. He then handed the plate to me and gave me a questioning glance. It was still reddish outside.

"Only if I know who you're talking about," I replied diplomatically. Veld usually finished with his eggs first, and took Vincent's yoked up plate to wash it. Unless he was reading, he usually liked to be moving.

I still hadn't gotten him a record player yet.

"Sarah Reid."

"Who?"

"Scarlet." Vincent said this with some disdain in his voice. I choked on my egg, and he patted me on the back until I could breathe again. Vincent was the sneaky kind of contact person. I would have pondered his mother if not for the fact that this meant that Scarlet was alive. And considering that the first and last time I'd had the pleasure of meeting her, she'd slapped me, this was not something to be pleased with.

"...Excuse me, but why?!"

Vincent looked smug. "I need information from her. And she was always polite to me."

"Most of the women in the office were polite to you."

"Better than other departments."

It had only been a week, but I had also determined that they must have known each other for a long time. Sometimes when they talked, it was like a code. But times like these it was as if they had picked up an argument right where it had been left off.

"What sort of information?" And I, like I always did, ran interference.

"Personal." Veld dried off the last dish and then his hands. Vincent didn't look up when he left the room.

"What was that about?" I wondered if I sounded a bit annoying, always asking questions. Always feeling a slight bit out of the loop.

"He is a very private man. It is probably best if you do not ask him any questions." Was that weariness?

I reached out and touched his hand. "Can I still ask you questions?"

He half smiled. "How could I expect you not to?"

---

It was a month and Veld still hadn't come back from gathering information. Vincent didn't look worried, but he wasn't the kind to look worried. He had nervous habits, though. Sometimes he came home late into the night, singing to himself. But today he had simply stayed on the couch in the living room, laying out like a lanky cat.

"So nothing to do today?"

He had thrown his arm over his eyes. He didn't move it. "No. Do you have business today?"

"Only if I want to sort through packages. But I was planning to take a day off this week." Whoever said running a business and being your own boss was good was clearly off their rocker. Then again, all I had for help was a couple teenagers that were bored otherwise.

He lifted his arm. I wasn't quite sure why, but I took it as an invitation. He was bony, but warm. Very bony. I had a shift a few times before I got comfortable.

"Do you mind if I laze with you too?" I'd already gotten permission, judging by the hand that was playing with the ends of my hair. Vincent really liked contact, despite what his appearance suggested. I bet he had a lot of siblings. I bet his mother was quite lovely and kind.

I hoped I was just a little less lovely and a little less kind enough not to remind him of her.

He didn't respond right away. And even then, he pulled something out of that strange brain of his. "Do you like living with two old men?"

"Why wouldn't I?"

"Sometimes... things can clash."

"Do you want me to approve of Veld?" He stopped twirling my hair and looked at the ceiling.

"His demons do not come out so easily. But they bite harder."

It was there that I learned staying awake for thirty years is worse than sleeping. I told him a story that an old woman had told me on my first package run. Nothing, really, but something to take his mind off of heavy matters. Old men sometimes needed young women to remind them that things wouldn't always drag them down. Cid wasn't nearly as old, and Shera was older, but that's what she did. I'd seen it.

I wondered who Veld's young woman was. But then, maybe he was still looking for her.

---

Vincent was out when Veld came back home. His jacket was torn and he smelled a little like gin, but mostly like vodka. But he wasn't drunk. Veld didn't seem like the type to allow himself to be drunk in the company of others. Especially not nonfamiliar female roommates.

"Where's Valentine."

"He's out."

"Damn well figures."

Vincent also cursed when Veld was around. Two months had passed since he'd last been here, though, so Vincent didn't really do it as much. But he was less sneaky with his hand brushes and sometimes he would wrap his arms around my shoulders and rest his chin on my head when I was cooking.

Vincent Valentine was easy to live with.

"Maybe I should get him a phone. You know, keep track of him." Veld searched around the living room, coming upon my little sewing kit. He clearly knew the tear was there.

"...You know, I could sew that up." He frowned.

Veld Dragoon was not so easy to live with.

"It's ok, I fixed Aeris's jacket once." It still hurt to say her name sometimes. Grief often appeared in the strangest places. I couldn't look at the red thread in my kit.

Had he just cringed?

"Alright." He took the jacket off slowly. He'd pulled something. "Make the stitches small."

I touched his hand through the fabric. It held no warmth.

"You won't even see them." How come I had never noticed the big uneven stitching of his scar before? Almost as if he had sewn it himself, with only his fingertips to guide him.

"I think I will go wash up." He didn't seem comfortable with my scrutiny. Or was it my sympathy.

"I can take care of that shoulder too, if you want."

"If there's one thing an old Turk knows, it's how to fix himself up after a scuffle."

I threaded the needle. "I bought some iodine. Please use it, I wouldn't want any cuts to get infected."

He nodded. I had to wonder if he ever let anyone dress his wounds. Even Vincent. While I made my stitches as close as possible, I had to wonder if he ever wrapped his arms around anyone when they were cooking.

Maybe that was why he always made breakfast.

---

"Valentine! Your hands are cold."

"Which is why I am using you to warm them up."

"Get a fucking hand warmer then."

Maybe I shouldn't have been surprised. Vincent liked contact, and Veld coiled away from it, and Vincent always seemed to do exactly what Veld didn't want. Kind of like children sometimes. So many secrets.

We each have our ways of being patient. There was silence for three days, not because there was anger; no, anger was loud, anger was bold. I didn't know how to break the silence.

So I took off on my own for a while. Packages and long rides into the dark and the dust. Most people figure that I would always stay in one place, but I needed wind sometimes. I needed distance.

Strange, the things you find along the way.

Something from my when I was a child, and they weren't really that young anymore. Veld had always mentioned records, but that was because Vincent's clock was stuck. But my clock wrapped around in shiny flat threads in plastic. Cheap. Scratchy. But real.

"My son loved that cassette, miss. He might have worn it out a little."

I smiled. "No, this is just what I need."

---

For the first time in--had it really been so many months?--I was glad to find that it was Vincent's turn for wandering. He was the easy one to live with, the mystery wasn't so mysterious that way. There were many sides to this.

"I am going to play loud music until you talk to me."

Impassive with that too good smelling tea cradled in his hand, he sat still. "About?"

I pressed a button. I had loved this when I was thirteen and judging by the slight twitch around his left eye, I gauged his reaction correctly. I let the bouncy music assault him before delicately hitting pause.

"The scar. Why you don't touch anyone except Vincent and only after he spends months pushing. What Vincent is to you. What I am to you. Everything."

I tried my best to look menacing, but it never worked out that way for me. Formidability was never ever the same thing as looking dangerous. I could very likely snap his neck in two moves, but he would have me in one. I was learning so much from him and he wasn't even trying to teach me.

I wondered if he could help that.

He flicked my cassette player aside. So much for interrogation techniques. "Do you fancy him."

"What?"

"Do you want the kids and the house? Do you think that he is going to give this to you. Do you think that somehow your collective loneliness will cancel each other out?"

My first thought was to deck him, but then, I realized that I had a sense of déjà vu unlike any other. Grief in the strangest places. Did he realize he had just connected himself to me?

"No, because only you are responsible for your own loneliness." A now ghost told me that. Please don't go with her.

"I understand responsibility, Miss Lockhart." White knuckles around the back of a chair. "I think you use the word too lightly."

So this was what you were trying to tell me, Vincent. I'm touched that you didn't want me to get bit.

"And I think you use it too heavily."

"Are you seeking my approval? Is this what this is?" It was always fear, wasn't it? Vincent used to use the word atonement, back when he was a mindless broken record. Cloud used failure. I used reluctance. Would he let me touch him not through Vincent?

Maybe that was too far.

"I can't just... I can't just watch." I breathed. "I've known a lot of ghosts, Veld. You don't have to be one."

He seemed to consider me for a long time, so long that I was almost afraid he was plotting something terrible. Why I had to stick my nose in... it wasn't just about Vincent anymore. Why did there have to be so much loss?

Why couldn't I say something that would stop this sick carousel for once?

He loosened his grip. "My wife had eyes like yours." I let him walk away, because honestly, he'd answered a question.

I hadn't realized that was where it came from.

---

Cid called. That's where Vincent had gone. Shera was playing with some new fittings for his gauntlet, so he was needed for a while. We were stuck together, Veld and I. He wouldn't go off on his wanderings because somehow we'd developed a rule. Our daily lives stayed as they were. Daily lives had to do that.

I found more cassettes, sometimes daring to play them in the late afternoon.

It was one of those days, while I listened to some emotional female vocals, the kind that in the right mood made you feel wonderful, and in the wrong mood made you want to tear your hair out.

He barely made a noise when he sat down. "You are from Nibelheim."

That certainly was an odd way to start a conversation. Then again, Veld was quite good at odd conversation.

"Yes. I was born there, but--"

"Transferred to Midgar."

I smirked. "Looking at my file."

"You have an accent. Most people can be readily identified through their accents."

So this was how he made peace. Veld knew a lot of things. He really couldn't help teaching things; maybe that was also how he made his peace. Stubborn people tended to be like that. I wondered if I ever taught anything. He liked linguistics better than killing, I supposed.

"You're not from anywhere. You have no accent."

The Veld variation on a smile was secretive. There was mischief there. "Maybe we sometimes erase things. And maybe that is more telling than anything."

Was he talking to me, or his dead wife? The thought crossed my mind, ever so briefly. She had to be dead, or else he wouldn't see her eyes in another woman. The creases around his mouth reminded me of Zangan.

But not a ghost yet. Not yet. "Doesn't make it go away. Just crops up somewhere else."

"One can hope not."

---

With them, time didn't seem to pass normally. I soon forgot calendars, only remembering times for deliveries, and the seasons. Rain was almost a season here, kind of like spring back home. We all still made our rotations like clockwork, but soon, I realized that more than the leaving, it was the returning.

It felt good to come home.

"I hate rain." Vincent scowled. Veld was reading in a chair nearby, undisturbed. I sometimes heard them arguing at night, but for some people aggression is better not left bottled up. Once or twice Vincent had curled up next to me, when Veld felt particularly annoyed with himself.

It was always himself.

"We used to tell stories, my mother and I, when it was raining. No one has to go outside."

Were we a family? I almost brushed Veld once, in the kitchen when we decided to cook together. Vincent had smiled and kissed me on the forehead, later. They sometimes didn't hide it when they were sleeping, like black and brown kittens.

Old cats as kittens. Strange what a little rest did for some people.

"What sorts of stories." Veld didn't look up from his book as he spoke, and Vincent brightened at the sound. It was getting easier to imagine he was young once. Very, very young.

"True ones."

The half grin that was designed to both annoy and enrapture women. "But those aren't the fun ones."

"I will start." Vincent pulled his lanky frame off the couch, disengaging himself from the both of us in one motion and two ways. He stood like a schoolboy would when reading a paper in front of the class.

"There was once a mission. And two boys that tended to get the short end of the stick as far as assignments were concerned."

He glanced over at Veld, who was halfway between a glare and a laugh. They both knew this story.

"Some pantyhose were—"

"You are done now, Valentine."

It was the speaking voice of a drill sergeant and Vincent seemed quite pleased with himself.

"But the shorter boy made such a pretty girl. I'm sure Tifa would like that, she mentioned an incident involving Cloud once."

Veld held his place in the book with a finger. "Maybe I should tell some stories then. Considering all you think about is tomfoolery and Tifa seems content to listen."

I nodded an affirmation.

His stories weren't sad, but they weren't happy either. It was hard to tell whether they were real or imagined or a combination of both. I could see that someone had taught him to speak very well once, as his diction never wavered, and his expression never betrayed anything, only enhanced the words themselves.

"...there are still witches about, only they aren't the type to fear like other stories will tell you. They're the loneliest people in all the world, you can suppose..."

He must have held so many faces in his mind. I was starting to see why Vincent had never mentioned Veld before. Why Lucrecia had so easily taken up the place as the symbol of his deeds. You couldn't fight for the storyteller, the man who was so mythically detached from the world that he was never one of the players. It was easier to fight for an idea, no matter how crazy it was, than a narrator.

Even if the voice, once you heard it at its most verbose, would never leave your mind and pull you in completely.

"...when there were old gods, they fought mercilessly. Not even the gamut of human emotion could compare to the primal force of the gods at war. Even they had a twilight..."

Pretty soon the rain was gone, and we were back in our shared and separate existences. Vincent slept in his own room that night and I had to resist knocking on the other door.

---

"She is dead. I did not want to tell you, but Reno found her grave nearly six months ago."

"You're just saying that to keep me here. Clingy bastard."

"Just shut the fuck up for a moment. I did not want to tell you because I knew you would react badly. Scarlet did not want to tell you. Reeve either. Hell, everyone has always been a little scared of you."

"That's real goddamn rich coming from you. I react badly to reality? I wasn't the one that locked myself up in a fucking basement mourning some tramp."

"YOUR DAUGHTER IS DEAD, VELD. QUIT BEING SUCH A DAMN MARTYR."

The door slammed then, and I finally let myself into the living room. I was home early, for once, and I knew I shouldn't have seen that. Or maybe I should have. Stubborn men. Only people that had known each other for as long as they did could find the right buttons to push.

Vincent was motionless. I'd never heard him shout before. It wasn't even a normal shout, more like a hiss.

"You're not going to follow him?" I didn't know why that was my first thought.

"No." He had that look about him, the one he got when he forgot what day it was, or where he was. Like he was just replaying an old conversation. The type of conversation that would drive someone into the mountains.

I wasn't going to be Vincent's shoulder right now, though. That was the Tifa that let things slip away. I couldn't imagine living with just one of them anymore. It was both or nothing and Vincent wouldn't yell at Veld again for a while.

So I ran.

He walked fast, so I was nearly out of breath when I caught up to him. Fighting was one thing, running with every impulsive idea I'd ever had was another.

"Veld!"

He ignored me. So I pulled on his arm, hard. He grabbed my wrist and twisted my arm behind me in turn. I shouldn't have been that easy to disarm.

"Go home."

"That's what you always tell him isn't it. Go home and wait on you to stop being such a asshole because somehow your grief is more important. Well it's not."

He gripped harder, and I realized why his arm was so cold. It wasn't real. What was it about Shinra and taking away people's hands?

"Just because you fancy yourself some kind of people reader doesn't mean that you have any clue, Miss Lockheart."

"I've lost people too. My parents, my best friend, my home! Don't you dare presume to tell me that I have no clue. Unlike Vincent, I'm not afraid of you walking out."

He let go. "He'll be fine."

"I'm not worried about him. He's at least trying. You're completely infuriating."

We were at this standstill, words hanging in the air and the mud on the back of my legs from running. It was starting to dry and I could feel it prickling.

"Why do you care, Tifa." That was the first time I'd ever heard him sound uncertain.

"Because it won't work any other way. We're survivors. Even if you keep trying not to be."

I didn't think I would ever know their overly complicated pasts. I didn't want to anymore, really. I didn't want to be the shadow in between them either. Aeris... she had made me understand how it would have worked, once. I think Cloud and her and me would have been happy. But her ghost wasn't enough for my old faith.

So I lost it. And I wasn't looking for another one, not really.

I knew that Veld was bad for me. I knew that Vincent was too. But I'd grown old a little too fast to be chasing around boys or be chased by them. I'd much rather shake them.

"Please. Live for us, and stop dying for them." Us. Yes, that sounded like the pulse in my fingers. That was right.

When he released the angry frown, he looked so much younger. Yes, I could see he'd been very young once too. And he was looking at me instead of through me.

"It should be a crime for you to have such common sense."

I grinned. "Someone has to."

He walked slower with me on the way back, quiet, but not uncomfortably so. I held his human hand because he let me, and it really wasn't so cold as the other. Old men apologized differently, but I think Vincent got the message. But then, I think he was used to forgiving, more so than I ever was.

I suspected there would always be fights, rough edges, hasty tugging into rooms. Never all at once; we didn't profane that way. But that was how it worked. People of great emotion are always such a pain to deal with.

Life was pain, someone very cynical once said. Really, though, pain was forgiveness.

That was what made it worth it.