Pure as Snow
"I remember Aerith a lot," I told Bugenhagen that day in Cosmo Canyon. Then I'd realised, corrected myself.
"No, that's not it. You haven't remembered. You haven't forgotten."
And that was the truth. Would it ever really be possible for me to forget her? Could anyone really forget her? Somehow, she always managed to bring forth laughter and easy smiles to us all. It was her gift. And she was my gift. Aerith always brought out my mischievous side; a side of me that I wasn't aware existed. She'd tease me mercilessly, and then pretend to be offended at my playful retorts.
"Oh!" she'd cry. "You really are terrible, Cloud!"
I remember one afternoon on a cold day in Wutai; she decided to climb Dao-Chao, the mountain at the north end of the village.
"Yuffie says you can look out over the whole of the village from up there, Cloud!" she said excitedly. "Don't you want to see it?"
"We can see it just fine from here." I told her, sitting up on the futon. "Plus, it's - "
"Dangerous, too cold, we could catch our death in this weather, blah blah blah," she finished for me. "Honestly, Cloud, you worry far too much about things."
"I'm just trying to look out for y - the group." I frowned, and she grinned.
"I'm capable of looking after myself, lived in the slums, remember?" I folded my arms, looking away. "And don't sulk."
She strode across the wooden floor to my futon, grabbing my hand and pulling me to my feet, then leading me past the small pond, out of Godo's house, past the town's general store and down the path towards Dao-Chao's base, ignoring my protests.
"Come on, Cloud, it'll be fun."
"It'll be cold." I grumbled, but for some reason, I couldn't let go of her hand just yet. I fell into step beside her as she carried on up the mountain path, any further protests dying on my lips as she smiled, entwining her slender fingers with mine.
We talked about a lot of things, that day. Aerith told stories of her childhood back in Midgar, her faint memories of a snowy village she thought was her birthplace, her many narrow escapes from Shinra troops - easy to outwit, she said, and looking back on our infiltration into the HQ in Midgar, I had to agree. At her prompting, I talked about places I'd visited during my time as a SOLDIER and the missions I'd been sent on. By the time we got back to Godo's, it was dusk. Aerith's face was flushed with the cold, her red cheeks striking against the paleness of her face. Her fair skin tone struck me as somehow reminiscent of winter mornings back home in Nibelheim, the pristine carpet of snow before the villagers' footprints disturbed it. Fresh, pure, unspoiled.
I guess that's how I'll always remember her.