Author's Note: I'd just like to say thank you for reading, and reviews are always welcome! =)

Disclaimer: Final Fantasy and its characters belong to Square Enix, not me.

Chapter 2: Mouth

Zack

Cloud's mouth drove me crazy.

Not enough words came out of it. He was so gentle and quiet, too polite if you ask me. His mouth said so little. But it expressed so much.

His smile gave me the weirdest mixture of happiness and sadness. I had this freaky gut feeling that it might not last long, that maybe one day he wouldn't do it much anymore, so I tried to make him smile as often as I could. It wasn't too hard to make him smile. Sometimes he laughed. Man, I loved it when he did that. Usually it was this shy little chuckle, covered by his hand, and he'd turn away like he was trying to hide it. He had to be trying to be cute, right? Did it seriously just come naturally to him? But when he full-out laughed, he didn't hide it. He threw his head back and laughed that unforgettable kind of laugh, that kind of pure and genuine sound that made anyone happy.

Then there were those tiny things that his mouth did. Things that probably no one noticed but me.

I'd already found myself staring at him sometimes when we first met on the Modeoheim mission, in the snow. Right off the bat, talking to him felt like the most natural thing in the world. Like we'd known each other for years. And I was already noticing those little things he did with his mouth. Like me, he was kinda childish in some ways. Every now and then he'd stick out his tongue to catch a snowflake, lick the tip of his finger to get it off. At times he'd let out a long exhale to watch his breath form mist in the air. He'd lick his chapped lips even though they'd get chapped again within seconds in that weather. I don't know why I noticed things like that. Or why the hell I was staring at his mouth in the first place.

And I kept doing it. When I caught him sleeping, all curled up in one of the two beds in our apartment, I noticed the way he breathed - as evenly and quietly as a little kid, lips slightly parted, his breath lightly blowing against strands of blond hair that fell into his face. I watched his mouth when he drank something. When he licked a stamp, I watched his tongue. Then I started wondering. Wondering what it would be like to feel his mouth and his tongue on mine.

And he did this thing where when he cut his food he'd lick the knife, just for a second, to get the scraps off. He had to be taunting me. He had to know how much attention he was bringing to his mouth. But once when I noticed him do it, he looked up, asked me if something was wrong, why I'd sighed. I just blinked at him, dumbstruck. Did I really sigh? What've I been doing every time I watched his mouth? He demanded to know if I was getting enough sleep. I wasn't, and it was because of him, because of his mouth and the way he licked the damn knife and the way I could taste him on the juice container and the way his scent was all over my clothes and my bed.

But I didn't say that. I just scratched my head, grinned, told him to forget about it. He looked like he might try to argue more. But he knew by now that he'd be wasting his breath, so he just shrugged and licked the knife again before going back to cutting.

Cloud's mouth really drove me crazy.