I don't own FF7 or its characters and don't make one red cent from writing these stories.
"I don't like the look of it" Tseng remarked.
"And what are these for?" Rude asked holding out the plastic sack of suspicious looking organs he'd found inside the creature.
"Those are the offals. Some people like to cook them with their turkey" Reno said in a voice barely above a whisper while looking worriedly at the baby monitor.
"You don't know how to cook. How would you know?" Tseng asked him suspiciously.
"Tifa explained all of this to me. Now are you guys going to help me or not?" he demanded.
"But you can't cook" Tseng insisted again. "If you're trying to take down ex-AVALANCHE members, leave the TURKS out of your food poisoning plans."
"I'm going to make this dinner with your help, if we can infiltrate tight security and get out of impossible situations, we can make this dinner" Reno insisted.
"But Tifa only gave birth two weeks ago, why have Thanksgiving at your place at all?" Rude asked him.
"Tradition, it's a special time of the year for her" Reno explained. "Tifa needs her rest, so I volunteered us. Besides, you guys got me into this mess, no I stand corrected. Rufus did when he suggested that :perhaps one of us should ask Tifa on a date to see what AVALANCHE is up to these days? I could have answered that a long time ago; they are disbanded and broken up as a group, they remain together only a friends. Rude even volunteered, but Rufus insisted it had to be me because she has a thing for guys with spiky hair" Reno said with exhaustion in his voice. How had he ended up here? He wondered.
"Be that as it may. No one asked you to take her on the next date, or the one after that, or the one after that. I'm sorry, how many dates was it before you made her pregnant?" Tseng asked him.
"Eight dates before we had sex and the condom broke and Tifa caught right away. Being a bastard myself, I did what I thought was right" he said with frustration, she had agreed without protest stating that, "a child should know its father." Had it been the right thing to do? He questioned himself in hindsight.
"Tifa seems to like you" Rude ventured.
"Come on, let's figure out how to get this bird ready. We have the recipes, how hard can it be?" Tseng broke in. "First we wash it and pat it dry, then stuff it, put some butter on it and water at the bottom of the roaster pan and put it in the oven at three hundred and twenty five degrees" he read.
"Stuff it where and with what?" Reno asked him in a mystified voice.
"Here's the stuffing recipe and you stuff its anal cavity" Tseng read.
"It sure sucks to be a turkey" Reno commented.
"You get to chop up the dried bread while I get the onions and celery fried, I don't trust you to do anything else food-wise" Rude said to Reno.
They got the turkey ready and stuffing done, when they got into a squabble about how much stuffing to put into the turkey. "You're packing it too tightly, half that amount should go into it" Tseng insisted.
"It's the perfect amount" Rude snarled back.
"Shut up or you're going to wake Tifa..." Reno said when that said person swooped into the kitchen, wearing a practical nightgown with a face like a thunder cloud and yelled in a way that would have made Cid proud of her
"Do you fuckwits have shit for brains? You're fucking going to wake Elora up!" and all four people turned when her mother's yell did this just that and a baby's cry split the air. "Fucking hell, I can't get any sleep around here" she raged as she shoved her hair back.
The men were shocked when Reno stepped forward and caught the exhausted woman in his arms and gently kissed her. "It's okay Tifa, we're sorry we were loud. You go rest some more, we'll be as quiet as a mouse" he assured her, glaring a challenge at the other men. "We'll take care of everything and I'll see to Elora. If she's hungry, I'll feed her milk you expressed. Come on, let's put you back to bed" he said, leading her there and she sagged against him. Grateful for his support, she was grateful for everything he did, if only he were...she sadly thought.
"Thanks Reno, that's kind of you" she said, not sure how to act around him. She had only slept with him the one time, wanting to be loved even if it was just physically. She'd kept her pregnancy secret from him as long as possible, thinking he would reject her, instead he had bought her a ring and married her in a courthouse that same day when she told him, never asking once the dreaded, soul destroying question every pregnant woman fears "are you sure it's mine?".
She'd barely known what lurked beneath his adorable drunkard playboy persona and he was proving to be lot more serious then he led on. He'd taken her into his home when they'd barely known each other and treated her with kindness and respect and asked for nothing in return. He'd curtailed his activities with other women, but allowed her to sleep in another bedroom until she was ready.
It was pregnancy hormones that made them unite as husband and wife and he gave her pleasures such as she had never known existed. He was gentle with her and satisfied the confused young woman and she tried not to compare who she'd married, with the man she thought she'd been in love with her whole life.
Reno had been a reluctant father, but had been with her every step of the way, learning how to care for an expectant mother, to prepare for the birth of a child and then childbirth itself. She'd never seen Reno look at anyone so lovingly then when he held Elora the first time. Not even her, Tifa cared for Reno but didn't love him and knew he felt the same. They were together but not together, two relative strangers caught in limbo sharing a home, marriage, life and baby. But not love.
Reno tucked her into bed "get some more rest. I've got Elora" he said to her with a reassuring smile. He was so kind and caring and handsome in his own way, if only she could get over...
Reno softly closed the door to their bedroom and went to where his daughter was still wailing. "Hey there squirt, you're keeping your mother awake" he chided her, picking her up and bouncing her. He checked her diaper and then sat down on the rocking chair and smoothed the bright red fuzz on her head. "Your mother needs her beauty rest, not that she's not beautiful already. Your mother has always been beautiful inside and out. You're lucky to have her as your mother. Me as your father, well, not so much. I wasn't meant to be your father, but here I am. She had another father picked out for you, I just kinda happened. I'm sure you'll meet your Uncle Cloud and think he's really handsome like all the other girls do. That's okay as long as you love me the best" he said to her, he didn't know Tifa was listening in the hallway. "Hey I'm no slouch either, I don't smoke anymore, haven't for years. I'm reliable. Wait, this isn't a job interview. You're my daughter, so you're stuck with me. I see you have my eyes, try to look more like your beautiful mother though" he teased her. Tifa smiled at this. He looked down when a tiny fist grabbed his finger, he couldn't believe how much he'd fallen for the tiny girl since the moment when he'd met her. He would kill for her and die for her. She was his...even if her mother wasn't. He quelled his negative thoughts and focused back on Elora.
"No wait, that means I'll have to keep an eye on your future boyfriends. Don't worry, between your mother's martial arts and my "other" skills, you'll know how to defend yourself and kick some serious male teenaged hormone driven butt. I know you can probably sense it, you were a surprise to both of us. I don't love your mother...yet, but I think I'm falling for her and I'm too irresistible not to sway her into loving me. I don't know what's going to happen, but if we separate; know that we both love you. But I would love to keep you both" he said with such passion in his voice that she heart skipped a beat. She ducked out of the way when he carried Elora to see what mess his co-workers had made of the dinner.
He was surprised to find the turkey was in the oven and they were peeling potatoes.
"Everything okay?" he asked them as he got Elora's bottle ready.
"Everything fine. "How's my goddesschild?" Rude ask him, peering at Elora.
"Do you want to hold her?" he asked him.
"I'm afraid I might drop her" Rude said.
"It's easy, just move your arms like this and support her head" he said putting her into the other man's arms.
"I want one, you're a lucky man" Rude said. Reno frowned at this, unable to decide if he was or not, he hadn't planned to have a family but couldn't imagine being without either one of them now. He felt a fierce pride in them he wondered if he was warranted to. After all he and his wife were little more than near strangers, exhausted from having an almost newborn to tend to and having little time for each other. Perhaps with time...
"Why Elora?" Tseng asked him and wondered where Reno had learned to care for a baby as he expertly fed his daughter and burped her with a towel over his shoulder. However he remembered Reno as a TURK in training and knew he could accomplish anything he put his mind to. Apparently even fatherhood.
"It was my grandmother's name and she was the most important person in the world to me, until now" he said, he could never get enough of looking at Elora, touching her and seeing the resemblance to himself that was stamped into her tiny features even from the first. It was upon holding her the first time he realized the difference between inseminating a woman and being a father. To see to the care of a woman carrying his child, to see it on ultrasound and feel it kick the first time in the palm of his hand had been a little terrifying for the ex-playboy but to see his own child for the first time made him commit to her on the spot.
"It's a beautiful name, she's going to be a knockout. I'll bet you'll have boys beating down your door before she's fourteen..." Rude gushed at her until he noticed the murderous intent coming from Reno and caught Tseng's look of warning.
"I shall be going on all of her dates with her until she get married. I know what men want" he said and both men laughed and set the table while Reno carried his now sleeping daughter to her crib and then he checked in on his wife and settled the blankets a little higher on her shoulders feeling a rush of tenderness towards her as he often did.
Tifa woke up and put on a nice wine coloured corset backed dress, wanting to look nice for Reno. She still had a bit of pregnancy weight and her boobs were bigger but she still looked pretty and went down to find the house in good order and the food all ready to go. His eyes widened in appreciation at how pretty she looked and she felt a little shy at this.
'You did all of this?" she asked Reno.
"I had some help" he said with an endearing smile.
"We could have cancelled, you haven't really been sleeping anymore than me" she said.
"No, I know how important this day is to you and it will be Elora's first Thanksgiving. Even if she can't eat it" he joked, putting his arms around Tifa, truth be told, he loved to touch her even in the subtlest ways. "You look beautiful" he said. "Too bad that the wrong guy shall be hosting it with you" he said in a voice he meant to sound like he was joking but it fell flat and he blushed slightly, ill at ease.
She leaned back so she could look into his face and stroked his cheek. "I don't know about that, I've been clinging to a past that never was and never will be and have been trapped there as result. Clinging to that never made me a wife or mother. You did. Perhaps I needed someone from my past, who witnessed what I did and knew what happened to drag me into the future? The past is where it should be; in the past. You and Elora are my future" she said and kissed him, extending him an olive branch into her heart and his own took flight as he kissed her back.