Another's Notes: I don't believe that I've ever once set out to try and write a multi-chapter fic. They tend to just happen to me. Contact was never supposed to have a continuation… but it does. In fact, I have quite a few chapters written up that I'll be posting here bit by bit.

I have to say thank you to everyone who reviewed my first chapter. I don't often tackle Vincent stories and so I always appreciate the input. More than that though, I'm very, very glad that you're enjoying this story. I hope that I won't let you down with this new chapter.

I'd like to extend my thanks to Cendrillo and Sabriel41. Their constructive comments were very much appreciated.

Okay, on with the show.

Contact (pt 2)

Your lips taste like dried paper.

It's a strange observation. You have soft lips but… they aren't smooth. They're a tiny bit rough. There's nothing… soft or beautiful or wonderful in this. I think that every day you kill off another one of my illusions but I can't hate you for it.

I should feel something… I know that I should. It's just a kiss. A tiny, infinitely small, soft kiss. A kiss is a greeting; it doesn't have to mean anything.

I… I can't believe that I'm doing this. I don't think that you can either. It's hardly even a kiss, just a flick of lips that touch each other briefly. It's hardly even a kiss… just two lips being pressed against it's other, like there's a pane of glass between us. Will we always be so separate, Vincent?

There is one illusion that is still true; time does slow down. For this brief, aching moment, time stops for both of us. There is this instant of clarity that I feel with you. For this tiny moment, we can step outside of each other and, yes, we can touch while you are standing in my kitchen. It's late – it's always late here – but I feel like I'll never have to see the morning again.

I know that time has stopped because you're still here. I'm just waiting, like the moment before an exhalation. This is … this is more than your comfort and more than a dance and more than all the many terrible things that we have done together. This may just go beyond contact. This… could pick us up and shatter us all over again. I don't know what I'm thinking. I don't think that I can think anymore. I've spent too long learning from you, coping with you – and we are so at coping, you and I – that I've stopped thinking. I never should have done this. I never…

My eyes flutter closed just for a second, not because this is romantic or intimate, but because I've never been able to look at the face of my shame. I don't want to open my eyes again because then I'll have to see you and I don't think that either of us can handle that.

I could've been kissing glass. You don't react. Oh, you freeze, you tense, but that's an animal instinct. Someone is in your space, Vincent Valentine. You're an animal being stalked by a terrible predator. Though, considering your experience with women, perhaps that's not such a terrible allusion. That's right. I'm…

You don't want this, do you Vincent? This isn't what you bargained for. I'm sorry. I know that I shouldn't push you the way I do. I'm just so…

But you already know, don't know? I don't know why I can't just… be… the way I used to. I never should've reached for this. I'm sorry.

With the realization comes the exhalation. Loss. Oh, yes, I remember this feeling very well. For a tiny moment, my eyes are open and I'm looking up at your face. There's… there's something written there but gods above me I could never hope to read it.

Then, something surprising, something that neither one of us expects; two fingers come up and touch the base of my jaw line. Your fingers are feathery light. I can't tell if it's an invitation or a weak defence but your hand is touching my face. Never intimate – this isn't romance – but it's there. It's contact.

Then we really are breathing again and time is finding its pace between us. You move away from me – I'm not the only one who's hiding – and you turn towards the kitchen window. There's nothing out there tonight Vincent; it's over-cast and there are no stars.

"Please, don't do that again," is all you say.

Your back is turned to me; I can't even see the profile of your face. Your voice is cold, distant. I swallow a lump in my throat. I shouldn't have…

I'm sorry.

I leave you alone in the kitchen.

If there's ever been a night that I should cry, I know that it should be this one. I haven't cried since the night you almost held me. It's something that I can't bring myself to do. I can't cry for him – though I did cry for her, years and years ago – and it seems that I can't cry for either of us anymore. I wish that I could. I honestly wish that I could. Maybe it would break me out of this desolation. I don't, I can't…

There's nothing here. I'm just… we're trapped here, we two, aren't we. Have we done it to ourselves? Did we do it to ourselves? Maybe it wasn't Cloud – oh, don't say his name, don't don't – and maybe it wasn't Aeris or Lucrecia or Meteor or anything else. Maybe we… maybe we just can't be anything else. Maybe this is what we've always been.

I don't… I don't want this to be my reality. I really wish that I could…

I roll over in my bed and bury my face in my pillow. I may not cry tonight but I certainly won't sleep either.

There's a surreal feeling to a morning comes without you sleeping the night before. You feel like time has been stolen from you. The morning dawns clear and fresh but you still feel like it's midnight. There shouldn't be light outside because it still feels like night time to you. It's a dirty, dreary thing.

I sit in my bed for a long time, debating. I want to go about my daily routine. I want to go shower and get clean and sip some coffee in the kitchen. Routines are a saving grace for both of us. I shower in the morning and you shower in the evening; it keeps us from awkwardness. I know that I should leave my room. I know that I should. But…

But I'm afraid that this will be like another morning where I woke up to an empty house and the cold reality that, yes, I had done this to myself. So I sit here, in my bedroom, and I don't come out.

My stomach hurts. It's the first thing that I'm really conscious of. I've drifted off to sleep and when I wake up my stomach is protesting very loudly. I'm hungry, painfully so.

I look around my bedroom and note that there's no light filtering in from my window. It's evening again. What woke me?

I listen for a moment, startled to wakefulness. There's… something amiss.

My eyes turn to my door and I glare at it in the dark. There's… something. A presence. Someone is standing right outside my door.

I couldn't tell you how I know; my silent stalker doesn't make a sound. I can still feel him out there though; somebody listening to me listening to them. It's that prickly feeling you get when someone is watching you in a large crowd. You just know.

And just as suddenly it's gone. I let out a breath that I didn't know I was holding and slowly lower myself back down to my pillow. I lie there with my eyes open for a moment or two. A realization slowly creeps up on me.

The shadow by my door. That suits you Vincent.

I must've fallen asleep again because when I wake up my stomach is screaming at me in protest. I choke up and then gag on the feeling. That reflex deepens and then I'm falling out of my bed, rushing to my dresser. Gods!

Dry heaving. I should've known better. Gods, I can be so stupid! I…

Oh, the feeling is aching and terrible. All of my insides are cramping up together. My fingers are shaking over my tiny waste paper basket. I feel a sweat break out of my back.

You're just suddenly there. Vincent, stop protecting me. Help me or…

I can't force the words out of my mouth though. Nothing but my sickly saliva escapes there. I moan a tiny bit and your good hand starts to rub my back sympathetically. Your claw deftly pulls my hair out away from my face. Why do you take such good care of me Vincent? Put my pieces back together, put me on a shelf. Why do you…

A particularly painful cramp flies up and I let out a tiny little shocked yell. I can almost imagine your brow knitting together. There's nothing you can do though; I did this to myself.

Eventually, my stomach stops punishing me for my indiscretions. I slump forward and, yes, once again those protective arms of yours are lifting me up. You carry me back to my bed but I feel too empty and ill to thank you or protest. You pull my blankets up over me and pause a moment by my bedside. You still refuse to speak to me. After a moment's reflection, you walk over and pick up my sorry little waste paper basket and leave it beside my bed as well. You disappear and leave me alone in my room. My troubled body forces me back to sleep.

It seems like an instant between the time you leave me and the time you wake me again. You flick on the light on my beside table and I squint at you in the sudden light. You're standing by my bed and you have… Oh.

You hold the bowl of soup in front of me, a serious look on your face. It's hardly even soup; I think it might just be chicken broth.

My stomach cramps looking at it and for a moment I think I'm going to be sick again. You draw back from me and give me a moment. When I finally turn my guilty eyes to you there's no pity in your look. I think that you're... no, I'm sure of it. You're annoyed with me Vincent. It was fairly irresponsible, going two days without food. You have every right to be annoyed. Maybe another Tifa would've been insulted by this treatment but I'm just…

Gods, when did I become so used to shame?

I look away from you and I can feel your countenance change. Oh, Vincent…

"Tifa… please."

I swallow. Without looking I murmur,

"Thank you, Vincent."

Night time again and I'm eating my soup. I can hear you down the hall. You're being deliberately noisy because I can never hear you this clearly. Ah, there again. You just opened a cupboard. I heard that.

I believe you Vincent. You don't have to tell me you're here. I believe you.

My stomach threatens me a few times as I'm eating, forcing me to stop and breathe slowly before I can continue on again. You pause every so often when you're cleaning in the kitchen as well. Your hearing never ceases to amaze me. That amongst other things.

Soup is as good an excuse as any. I'll focus on this.

Thank you Vincent.