When he's there he takes her breathe away.
She welcomes him home with open arms and an open heart.
She tells him all he's missed during his absence(s?), and he just nods. Face passive as ever. If only to hear her voice just a little longer.
Only he holds the knowledge of the empty bed she would come to discover soon.
He has always been one to carry all the troubles of the world on his shoulders, never realizing that everything he believes is not and never will be his fault.
(This is what kills her the most)
The war that rages on in his mind and body. The darkness within him that eats away at his sanity, that claws at the walls of his soul, trying desperately to break free of its confines and bring hell upon the boy its made it's host.
To feed.
To destroy.
To conquer.
Even with this knowledge there is nothing she could do. He would never let her. Never even try. So all she can do is hold the broken man in her arms and let her tears of anguish loose. It is in these small fleeting moments, she realizes, as he wraps his arms around her and rests his head in the crook of her neck, that he lets go. Willingly pushes aside the darkness; just to wipe away the tears that have escaped tightly shut eyes.
It is then that she breaks down.
Completely and utterly shatters.
She sobs uncontrollably, clutches him tightly, watches the pieces of her carefully constructed walls fall like rain. A wall that has held back so much sadness and pain. A wall that has always locked and hidden away her fears and offered forced smiles in the darkest of times.
She cries.
He's broken it.
And as she too -in her own way- breaks, blood seeps through the bandages wrapped carefully around his chest. The wing may have disappeared but the darkness has found other ways to leave its mark, when it touches her skin, it is colder than ice and as dark as the night sky.
Black.
When he leaves she dies.
The sun doesn't wake her that morning. Nor does the usual early chaos that starts the committe's day. What wakes her is the burning hole that is starting to grow in the pit of her stomach. She opened her eyes just as the door to her bedroom started to close, and of course when she turns to her right there is no one there. She sits up in bed letting the covers fall down, and shivers slightly at the sudden chill that hits her skin, it is 3:30 in the morning.
He left.
He was gone.
Only god knew how long it would be before she ever saw him again.
She falls back against the pillows and shuts her eyes, blinking back tears, she really believed he was going to stay, if only for a little while. Holding the covers closely to her skin she could make out his half of the bed completely made up, but something caught her eye. She turned on her bedside lamp and picked up a folded piece of paper. Opening it up she noticed the writing almost instantly, he had writtten it.
Aerith,
I'll come back soon. Don't worry.
Last night made me realize something. I wont be gone long.
- Cloud
She smiled. His words were reassuring, but it still did little to heal the immense pain she felt everytime he left. Hopefully this time she wouldn't be waiting forever and a day for him to return. The sun started to rise casting a magnificent glow about the room, pressing the letter against her heart her eyes softened, no matter what she would always wait for him.
And somewhere his hold on the hilt of his buster sword tightened.
Sephiroth needed to be defeated.