A/N: I would like to take the time to thank everyone that has left reviews on my stories. I don't ask for them because I write for the fun of it, but I really do appreciate the time it takes to make those comments. They mean a lot, and I wanted you to know this. Thank you!
Summary: One-shot. Cloud Strife has return from the Lifestream through the graces of Aerith and Zack. But can he convince Tifa to forgive him for his many transgressions? How is a man unskilled with words to explain what lies within his heart and soul? Just a little taste of citrus in the end, dear ones, just a little hint. Set minutes after Final Fantasy: Advent Children ends.
After the Return
By Ivy Elise Tanté
Cloud pulled himself from the pool of water onto the splintered and worn wood of the church floor. All around him, friends and family gathered to pat his back, shake his hand, hug him, hit him or shake him, whatever their inclination. Even Nanaki came forward to lean into his side affectionately, causing Denzel to hurriedly duck before he got a face full of beads and feathers. The boy had climbed out as soon as Cloud had and established himself in his hero's lap. Only very grudgingly did he make room for Marlene a few minutes later.
It was painful for both children to watch as Tifa hunkered down near them, but she made no move to reach out to Cloud. Exchanging glances, Marlene then hopped up and dashed to Barret, motioning for him to lean down. Once the gunman did, she proceeded to whisper frantically at him, making all these dramatic gestures that no one -including Barret- really understood. In the middle of all the wind-milling of her arms, his PHS rang. Barret answered it while still trying to listen to Marlene, nodded a few times, then hung up with a thoughtful look on his face. Focusing back on the tiny girl in front of him, something of what she was saying got through, because he straightened up and raised his hands to gain everyone's attention.
"Okay, folks. We be taking this to 7th Heaven! Reeve Tuesti has a transport so no one has ta walk. Outside, everyone!" And Barret began to herd all the children from the water and down the aisle, gesturing for his former AVALANCHE members to join them. When he reached Cloud, Barret scooped up a protesting Denzel without pausing and said firmly, "The two of ya stay, ya hear?"
Within a few minutes, the chatter faded away, leaving Cloud sitting in a rapidly-growing puddle of water and Tifa looking about her uneasily. Sighing, he rose and toed off his soaked boots, then started unbuckling all the straps that bound his armor to his body. He sank down onto his knees before her when he was finished and his hands had nothing else to do but twist anxiously in his lap.
"Tifa," he murmured softly, raising those too-blue eyes to her face. His gaze traced every line of her face, her hair, her neck as though trying to imprint them permanently in his memory. "I... I'm so sorry. I never meant... never wanted to hurt you." There was a plea in his eyes for forgiveness as he tried to explain in his broken manner, "He was there... Sephiroth. In my head. And I was so afraid... so afraid he could... use me again." Hesitantly, not knowing if she would accept or reject, he held out a hand to her, still clad in sopping wet leather.
The sad smile she gave in return was like a knife in his heart. But Tifa reached out and stripped off his glove, then took that hand in both of hers. "I know, Cloud. I... can understand why you were afraid. But you left me, left our family, left our home. I didn't even know if you were alive or dead half the time. Every time the phone rang, I feared it was someone calling to tell me you had died." Emotion had her throat closing up before she could say more.
But he -for the first time in months- was trying to open up to her, and she wasn't going to close herself off from him for spite. Tifa had promised to listen if Cloud wanted to account for his actions. Nearly losing him had rattled her far more than she let on. If Aerith and Zack hadn't sent him back... Everything within her shied away from that possibility. Cloud was here, he was alive, and trying in his clumsy manner to apologize.
Shifting closer, Cloud leaned forward and told her honestly, "Everything I am would have died if he forced me to hurt you."
Tears glinted in her eyes as she placed her other hand on his chest, right where Loz had shot him. "Cloud," she whispered softly, and didn't try to stop him from snatching her up and into his arms. Despite the wetness of his clothes, there was warmth radiating from him and she burrowed into it, held on tight as the tears flowed freely. How long had it been since she'd felt his body pressed so hard to hers? How long since the scent of his skin and hair had filled her senses? Too long, she thought, hating that she could even think that way.
Where the strength came to push him away, she didn't know. But she separated from him determinedly and sat back. Cloud seemed to brace himself and waited for her to speak. That he did nothing to stop her wasn't lost to her attention; whatever was to come was her decision. Accepting it, she told him, "I know you have trouble speaking your mind, Cloud. But I have to understand before we can move forwards. I can't... keep waiting for you to catch up. I have to know how you feel - not just about me, but our family, our lives. Do you want to be a part of that at all? I have doubts, and sometimes it feels like it's ripping me apart not to know."
Shuddering, Cloud momentarily turned away, trying desperately to organize his thoughts. After all the mental attacks on his mind from both the remnants and Sephiroth, it was almost strange to be thinking clearly. The only voice in his head was his own, and it gibbered at him frantically to say something, anything at all that would keep Tifa from walking away from him. Just as he had walked away from her.
Slowly, the words began to come. "I... love you, Tifa. I've loved you... since we were little kids. Your light, your spirit... the warmth you project." Looking down at his hands, one naked and the other still sporting bracer and glove, he blinked. Mechanically he peeled the wet leather from his skin and tossed it into the pile of his armor. "Our promise... it was the goal I wanted most to obtain. Not ShinRa, not SOLDIER... just you. It has always been you."
Since he wasn't looking at her, he couldn't see the wonder in Tifa's warm ruby-brown eyes. Didn't see the hand over her mouth, her other pressed to her heart. Tifa sat as still as possible, not wanting movement or sound to distract Cloud from speaking in a way he'd only done once before; in the Lifestream when they were both trying to piece his fragmented memories back together.
"But I've never felt... worthy. Always a failure of some kind, never good enough. Nothing I did succeeded... nothing I aimed for ever came close. Then Hojo..." Cloud's voice choked off. But only for a minute, before he forced himself out of the slump and straightened his shoulders. "... and Zack. I always wondered how in the world he could have struggled to take care of me as he did. Then Denzel... he taught me why." For the first time since he began speaking, Cloud turned his head and looked at Tifa. "And you taught me how... I didn't know all the little ways of making someone feel that you love them. But I found that I could learn because I wanted to."
Unable to sit any longer, he rose with a fluid grace that under better circumstances might have made Tifa drool. There was such agility in that lean frame, so tightly controlled and rigidly disciplined. Twice in the past they had made love - both times had been incredible, leaving sweet memories for her to savor deep in the night. But only twice, and much of that was Tifa's fault, she knew. She just didn't know how to reach out to him, or have the courage to show how much she wanted him, needed him. So many of their friends thought Cloud was crazy to hold her off, when in fact he was the one waiting for her. And she had never corrected his assumptions that she was hesitant to continue their physical relationship. It haunted her now, made it difficult to watch him pace back and forth as he battled to speak of what lay deep inside.
"When everything was over... when the planet was saved... we were together then." And he was talking about the second time they had made love to each other. "It was so..." he fought to find a proper description and had to settle for the mundane, "...beautiful. Loving you, pleasuring you... it was heaven, Tifa. Absolute heaven."
Never in her life had she been so glad those too-blue eyes were gazing elsewhere. The blush felt hot on her cheeks as she ducked her head. Tifa remembered; oh yes, she remembered. Whispered words, silken caresses, the staggering feel of skin on skin. The taste of him, hot lips wandering and exploring, hands everywhere. There had been no shame, no shyness the second time. No hesitation, no regrets. Just need and want and a little greed to have at each other.
"And I thought that was all I needed. But... the guilt just kept eating at me. Why was I... allowed to be happy? What had I ever done to deserve anything like you? I pulled away... I was... just so afraid it was all just a... dream. It couldn't be real." Cloud looked at the back of his left hand where the Geostigma had first appeared. "But I never considered... with all that I've lost... I might be the next thing to be taken away."
It hit Tifa then, the truth of his words. Why he was fighting so hard to make her understand. At the time of his illness, guilt had brought him down so far as to make him feel he deserved his fate. That he should be taken away from those that loved him because he'd done nothing to earn that love. And so he had left, truly believing his family was better off without seeing the end of the long downward spiral he traveled.
"At first I was going to stay. I wanted... needed... to be near you, to feel your comfort and warmth. No one has ever made me feel the way you do, Tifa. But... that last delivery changed everything. I was nearly home when the first attack came. It was so bad I lost control of Fenrir, sent it into a skid and slammed into one of the canyon walls. All I could see was his face, his cold green eyes. His voice was in my head again, as it hadn't been in over two years. That insidious whisper of Jenova, Reunion, Sephiroth... and an image." Here he stopped, shaking from his head to his toes. "An image of you, burning. Of the Fusion sword striking you, of cutting you down. He was going to use me to kill you as punishment for defying him." A shuddering breath filled the silence as he began to speak more firmly, more determinedly. "I couldn't return to you, even though I ached to be in your arms. The days were torture, the night pure hell. Every time I heard your voice I yearned. And every time those damn bruises burst and wept black blood I felt his hate pouring over me, yelling at me to kill you. I couldn't take the risk."
Cloud walked over to the edge of the water and knelt to dip his fingers into the cool, crystal clear fluid. "When I found you here, among the flowers, I almost ran in the other direction. I could feel him gathering his strength, preparing to launch all that he had left to force me to obey him, to control me. But I couldn't turn from you a second time. I ran to you, and he struck just as I knew he would. All that hatred washing over me." His fingers balled into a fist, anger shooting like sparks from his too-blue eyes. "Not this time, you bastard. I'll die before harming a hair on her head, you hear me? And all of a sudden this white light blasted all the images away and the pain dulled. I think Aerith heard me and shielded me as much as she could. Then I awoke in the bed beside yours and could breathe again. You were safe, I hadn't hurt you. Never have I known such relief."
The words shattered her defenses and had Tifa lurching to her feet.
In a lightning-fast move most would have found unsettling, he rose just as she began to run. And they met in the middle, arms outstretched to the other, hunger evident in both their eyes. The first kiss was sheer bliss and didn't last nearly long enough. The second was better because by then their bodies were entwined to the point they couldn't stay vertical and were sinking to the floor. The third... was interrupted by their frantic efforts to disrobe each other as hands tangled together and added to their frustration. The fourth was broken by sweet sighs of completion as arms wrapped tightly around each other, naked skin to naked skin.
Yearning, needing, wanting, aching; it all collided within them, there on the cracked and fractured wooden floor of Aerith's church.
And this time, Cloud Strife promised, in his mind and whispered into Tifa's ear, he had no intentions of ever letting go...