"You have beer." Two accusatory blue eyes, and a quirked blonde eyebrow.

"Hey, I'm second class. Those are the perks."

"Right." One pale hand dove into the fridge, came out with two beers, fingers curled over each bottle neck.

"What are you doing?" The sound of the fridge closing sounds like a gunshot.

"Enjoying your perks." blonde eyelashes catch the lamplight as he turns.

"Spike, you don't drink."

"I don't have to. Nibelhelm has the strongest ale on the western continent."

"Bullshit. You need to come down south. And what does any of that have to do with you?"

"There's this flower that grows in the mountains there, it's better than any of the the regular hops. The towns people say it has a kick stronger than the chocobo raised up there. Everyone just assumes that since generation after generation has been drinking it, later generations are born with a tolerance."

"You beleive that?"

"No." he uncaps the beer. "But I'm ready to prove myself wrong."

"Strife, just when I think I got you pegged, you surprise me." a bottle held high, near the ceiling fan. "Cheers."

"What to?" he glances out of the side of eye.

"To...you making third class."

"And... to your second class perks." he laughs.

"To...friends?" Those blue eyes go dark, and the wings of the fan keep on casting shadows over his shoulders and face.

"To friends."

I wake up to the jingle of bracelets, and flowers.

"Zack wake up."

"Five more minutes..."

"Zack, you're crushing my flowers and it's really late." Flowers are comfy.

"How late..."

"Midnight." I sit up so fast I make myself dizzy.

"What?..."

"We fell asleep...for a really long time." I find myself checking to see if she has all of her clothes on. If I have all of mine on.

"I have to get home, my mom is probably so worried." I grab her coat and hold it out for her. She slips her arms in and zips herself up, pulling her hair out from the collar.

"I'll walk you."

"That's okay. I'll be fine." she smiles.

"You sure?"

"I'm sure, besides it might not be the best idea for her to see you."

"Hey, she know's you're a good girl." The way her hands touch where my collar stops, makes me wish she wasn't.

"Still, she thinks that you might convince me not be." Thank you Mrs. Gainsborough.

"Well... can I?" I touch her warm cheeks, feel them get warmer.

"Zack..."

"Can I?" I kiss her neck. "Hm?" She doesn't smell or taste like fruit, or any of the chemicals underneath. She tastes completely natural, like flowers, water, dirt. Really, I don't know why that does it for me. I feel her heart beating faster, I feel mine doing the same.

"Maybe you already have." Shiva, why does she say things like that? she smiles, pulls away. She and Spike are both full of surprises. I want to be able to sum her up some way, but she keeps on doing and saying things that make it hard. Sometimes I wonder if she's got some kind of vixen like atler ego. It's entertaing to think about, especially when standing at attention for year or two.

I had a dream once that she showed up at my door completely naked, and told me that she had been waiting so long and needed me so badly, and asked me if I was ready to get dirty, because we were going to plant flowers all night. I think I spent the rest of the dream planting flowers with a naked Aerith, and wanting to spear myself with her spade.

But it was funnier when I woke up, and even funnier (though not haha funny) when I realized that it was riddled with paralles to the real deal. But I didn't have much time to ponder my one meaningful dream when I realized it was probably a result of my roomate Danskun, who watches his pornos way too loud when I'm sleeping.

"Zack I have to go."

"Oh, alright." we both stand up and head out. But I'm not really ready to go. I'm not tired, I've just slept more than half of a day. I want her to stay so that maybe I can corrupt her a litte. Just to prove her how many times over it's worth it. Maybe to prove it to myself. And as I head on my way to my quarters, I think that maybe her mother might be right about me.

"How do you know so much about beer anyway?" The two original bottles of beer are lined up on the wall with about four others. Drinking the whole fridge tonight was not part of the plan.

"...My father used to work with it." But the kid doesn't clam up as much with some alcohol in his system. The kid has insisted on more beer. Says he'll buy more, but third classes can get in trouble even for a can of prohibited hairspray.

"Did he bring some of that Grade A Nibelheim ale home?"

"Yeah."

"So, you were knockin' em back at like.. three years old?"

"No, but I had my first taste at five, I got into my father's supply. No one was home." This is one of the few times he has talked about his family, the first time he's talked about his father.

"Rebellous."

"Stupid more like. I left off the top, like he wouldn't notice."

"Shit."

"Yeah."

"Well, what happened?" It's a loaded question, because the way the kid acts most of the time it's a given someone or some people at home didn't treat him the greatest.

"He came home, and I think he knew instantly it was me. So he found me, made me drink the rest. Of the bottle I mean."

"You serious?"

"Yeah. I actually didn't get too sick, but mom found out and I don't ever remember seeing them fight like that. That's actually the last time I saw them together. I don't remember much about my father after that.

"Whoa...is he...have you.."

"He's dead. Accident." The only sadness in those blue eyes is what is normally there.

"Damn. I'm sorry Spike."

"Don't be. I hardly remember him anyway. It's just that one memory I have of him. I...still wish I hadn't done that though."

"Hey, parents fight. Mine still do. I don't know why kids think it's their fault when it happens."

"I don't think it's all my fault, but I might have a better memory if I didn't do that. My father said, 'a real man can handle his ale.' He wanted me to be interested in it, I think. All the other boys wanted to be what their fathers were. I was never like any of them. I just wasn't interested." Spike is a funny character. He's mostly quiet, kind of melancholy, the definition of unassuming but…he'd shoulder the blame of the world if it was possible.

"What were you interested in then?" And then the name came, carried on a breath, and a laugh.

"Tifa. That's I was I was interested in."

The streets under the plate are really quiet at midnight, but not the everyone is inside quiet. The calculating quiet of all the women you could buy for a few hours, the creepy quiet of too many wakos and unscrupulous characters lurking in the shadows, and the quiet that only descends by default. This weird stark silence that only exists because of what is there pulsing and beating above it. ShinRa.

"Hey!" A girl's voice cuts through. "Hey…stop!" I turn around when I realize how close the voice is. And there running up to me is Lisa, the cute saleslady. When she catches up, she puts her hand on her heart and tries to catch her breath. Her nail polish is black.

"And I thought, it was hard to catch your attention earlier today." She smiles, and so I'm guessing she doesn't need help or anything like that. I just think it's insane that pretty girls like Aerith and Lisa walk around here at this time of night.

"Sorry, I was…thinking." How lame does that sound?

"Well, you must have loud thoughts." She smiles again, and oh, I know that smile. "So before you start thinking again, I'm going to cut to the chase."

"Listen, Lisa I-" have a girlfriend.

"Wait, wait," she cuts me off. That's one thing I've noticed about some girls. They could be blushing and hiding their faces and smiles behind their hands in the morning, but at night they were an entirely different animal. "I know where you can get some barrettes, right now." It wasn't at all what I was expecting, but with that shock, I do feel a little suspicious about it. Could this be the strangest come on ever? Where at this time of night would we get barrettes? Why does this feel like a drug deal?

"Where?"

"A store." Oh boy. That was when it no longer felt like a drug deal, but one of those offers of candy your parents always tell you to turn down. I laugh.

"Lisa, I have a girlfriend."

"Well, so do I." Whoa, stop the car.

"What?"

"I said, I do too, so there's nothing to fear. Even if I do think you are just too cute."

"Uh…"

"The only people who know about it are the ones I tell, but sometimes they tell other people so I guess I a lot of people know. Listen…."

"Zack."

"Zack, I just thought you looked like an honest guy in search of a present for his girlfriend."

"Are they pink?"

"Huh?"

"Are any of the barrettes you have, pink?"

"Yup." And so I went with her, because really, what did I have to lose? I wasn't tired, and maybe there was still hope for those barrettes. And if it didn't work out, I was sure I'd get a good story out of it.

I thought I knew every hidden route under the plate, but I guess I was wrong. It was like some kind of wild safari, or like trying to make my way through some of the most unnecessary routes in the Gongagan countryside, just without the trees, sky or any kind of vegetation. Just a lot of darkness, metal and dirt.

But when we got to the store, I knew something was up.

"This, is the store." I said.

"Not yet." And she got her keys out and opened the door to the most crooked, decorated house I'd ever seen. I knew it was almost Christmas, but damn. And I could already hear the music pounding inside. She could've just been up front and invited me to the party, if that was what she had wanted. When I went inside, it was like the ShinRa cafeteria at lunchtime. I'd say most of the guys there were SOLDIER, if not all of them. Most were dancing, all were attempting to get drunk. I had been there and done that. These guys were mostly all new second classes, which is when you start getting the big doses. And around that time you start to realize how much harder you have to work to get a good buzz. To get any kind of buzz.

"Follow me." She said. And I stopped.

"Upstairs."

"I run my store out of my room." I sigh.

"Of course you do." I only follow her up on the increasingly fattening chance she really does have those barrettes, and with the knowledge that I am an almost first class, and I can I get myself out of a bind if I need to. I am an almost-first class, strength speed and agility. I am an almost-first class, a SOLDIER. I am an almost-first class, and I will not be molested tonight. Besides, she can't be more than 90 pounds, all I'd have to do is exhale hard enough to fend her off.

But on my way up, I see a head of blonde hair among the crowd. A really familiar head of blonde hair. He is sitting on the couch with one of the other third classes, who clearly doesn't see that he would rather be sitting alone. That other third class is just talking and talking, and Cloud suddenly looks up, like he can sense me watching. He's searching for the presence, but I hurry upstairs before he can see me. I am an idiot.

I am actually the one to close the bedroom door behind us, and I'm breathing harder than I remembered. Lisa only smiles, pulls out a box from under her bed. I go and sit in a chair nestled safely in the corner, hold my head in my hands. There are some things that I don't understand, some things I am okay with not understanding. But this…it just keeps on coming back.

"Here." She hands me the box. "Pick the ones you like." She heads to the connecting bathroom and I watch the door close. I open the box and look in on all the shimmering barrettes, her room is hardly lit at all but they glimmer anyway. There's green cactuar barrettes, red ifrit head barrettes, and blue…blue…

"Tifa?" Not even when he said that his father was dead, did he look as sad as he did then, talking about this girl.

"Yeah, that's her name. The girl I told you about."

"Really, now? Go on."

"That's it. Nothing to tell."

"Uh uh, you can't lead in like that and then stop. What does she look like at least?"

"I don't want to talk about it." His hand clenches around the bottle, mouth clenches shut. He gets up from the edge of the bed. "Maybe this wasn't a good idea." He says, and hell, maybe he does have a tolerance. Because he's talking and walking fine, looking as sharp as he ever did. But then he sways into the wall, catches himself with his hands. Leans his head into the wall too. "I think I should stop now."

"Stop?"

"Drinking, talking…being here maybe."

"What?"

"I should probably go back to my room, it's late." He says, head still pressed against the wall.

"Wait, I have an idea." He turns, and he looks as white as the wall.

"What?"

"A game." It was supposed to cheer him up.

There were no pink barrettes in the box, and when I look up, I think I almost dump the whole thing to the floor, because Lisa is there, in front of me, naked. A dream about a naked visit is one thing, but this…this is another.

"Okay, I think it's time I headed home." I close the box and try to hand it to her, but she doesn't move to take it and so I put it on the chair. "Well then, bye." Just as I turn for the door, she moves in a naked blur towards the door. There is no way she just moved that fast.

"What the hell kind of vitamins are you taking?" I say just a little breathlessly because hey, I can't help it. She's naked and moving like she's on the same dose as the SOLDIERs downstairs. I know I've somehow reached a new level of depravity when I kind of want to see her do a few cartwheels before I leave.

"I workout." She says. "I'm actually in the mood for one right now."

"I bet you are." I look around for any windows. "But I gotta hit the roa-"

"Zack come on, it's a party." She comes toward me. I feel myself swallow.

"But I thought you only liked to party with girls?"

"I didn't say anything about only." It was then that I realized this girl was far freakier than I had thought. There had been a time when I had wished for a girl like her, but now, not so much. Now, it was kind of scary. Suddenly the doors flies open and I see a fellow second class. I actually used to room with him.

"Lisa, what in the hell…Fair? What are you doing with my girlfriend?!" Wonderful.

"I…she said…I…just wanted barrettes."

"What the hell Zack? What the hell?"

"This isn't what it looks like." Which is exactly what people say when it is. Damnit.

"What is it then? Because I'm about to-"

"Look, instead of talking to me, you might want to talk to-"

"You trying to blame this on my sweet Lisa?!" My mouth fell open, did the fact that his girlfriend was standing in front of me naked not quite reach him yet?

"No, I…"

"I've heard about you know." Uh oh, I can hear the ShinRa rumor mill a' whirring before it even hits. "I know how you are with girls, you go through em like peanuts." Right. Like Peanuts. That pisses me off a little because I haven't been that way since I was fifteen, and it pisses me off because of how ridiculous that is at this moment considering I haven't gotten laid for nearly half a year. And yes, that is as long as I've been in a committed relationship with my girlfriend, who I'm pretty sure isn't getting naked for strange men and/or women in her bedroom.

"You know what Anderson, maybe you don't know as much as you think you do. Why don't you talk about that with your sweet Lisa." I walk passed him through the door, knowing he knows better than to touch me and I head down the stairs. I push my way through the crowd, which is successfully boozy by now, and head for the door, shutting it behind me.

I stop on the stoop and take a deep breath of the cold, metallic air. I realize Cloud is probably still in there, a good friend would probably go in there and save him from that chatty third class who is probably still at it, but I am not a good friend. Good friends see dangerous things coming and don't drag their friends into it. Good friends don't avoid their friends. Good friends don't…

"A game."

"Yup, I tell you something about my girlfriend, and you tell me something about this girl. Purely description." He comes away from the wall and sits on the edge of the bed again.

"Alright."

"Hair color."

"Black."

"Black like how?"

"What kind of question is that?"

"Well, straight black, curly black, black black, black that's actually brown…" Cloud raises both eyebrows.

"You should stop drinking too."

"Eh, give it five minutes. The mako'll eat all the alcohol up."

"Right." He rubs his face. "Her hair is straight and black, but it's brown in the light, I guess. She ties it up sometimes, she's uh…always doing something. She doesn't like it when her hair's in her face."

"She plays sports?"

"No, she climbs mountains. Your turn."

"Okay, her hair is brown, straight naturally, but she always keeps it in this braid so it never is. Eyes."

"Brown. Dark brown." His mouth quirks. "Is that specific enough?"

"Nope. How do you feel when you look into 'em?"

"Seriously Zack? This is ridiculous."

"Seriously.

"Okay, I feel like, I feel like, I'm looking at a pair of brown eyes alright? I know what you're trying to do. You just want me to talk about her, you don't want to know what she looks like. I told you I don't want to talk about it."

"Why not? It's a good thing."

"You wouldn't understand."

"Try me, what do you have to lose?"

"Everything, Zack."

"Well don't you think that's a bit melodramat-"

"You know what? Fine. Her name is Tifa Lockhart. She's the mayor's daughter, and she is popular, and she's so pretty… prettier than my mother. Everyone likes her. But she's not like everyone, she's a good person. No one really cares what kind of person she is though, no one even cared that she cried when her mother died. And no one was there when she went looking for her." Cloud paused, looked passed walls and metal and whatever was outside the corporation. "Everyone knows that bridge is shit, but everyone still thought it was my fault. I guess I kind of was, I should've stopped her."

"Did she…"

"She didn't die, but got hurt really bad. I…only got a few scratches."

"Well then, everything's good right? She knows the truth."

"I'm not sure what is the truth anymore. I came here for her Zack. But now it's different. I'm different."

"What do you mean?"

"I…" he sighed. "The other day in basic training, the guys were talking about their girlfriends. And I thought about Tifa, and…I couldn't remember what she looked like."

"But you told me what color-"

"I know the color of her eyes and her hair, but I don't really remember how they were. I don't remember her face. I don't know if I'm here for her any more. It started that way but…"

"Being here for yourself is not a crime."

"I know but, there's still another reason why I'm here. Why I stayed here." A silence stretched on.

"Why?" Cloud's hands were shaking.

"I should go back to my room."

" Spike?"

"You wouldn't understand. You're happy with your girlfriend, you remember what she looks like. And I know you see her more often than I see Tifa, but it still doesn't explain why when she used to be everything, every reason I did anything, that now when I think of her, I just, don't feel it anymore. It's not the same. I'm not the same." I wanted to tell him that I did understand, how sometimes when I looked at Aerith I didn't feel what I used to. How I just wanted to kiss her, and do everything with her that would make me forget that emptiness between us for just a few minutes. How I didn't realize why, until just this moment. But I didn't say any of that.

"There's someone else who makes you feel that way though?" Cloud hesitated.

"Yeah."

That's tough." He looked at me, really looked at me. Got up from the bed.

"Yeah, it is. I'm gonna head back to my room."

"Yeah, it is getting pretty late." And when he left, my hands were shaking.

I put my hands in my pockets and started home, but I felt something in there. Two blue barrettes that I didn't remember taking, came out in my hand. And just like that I heard a different kind of quiet, not quiet of the whores on the street, or whoever was lurking in the shadows. Not the silence by default. But the quiet that comes on the wings of realization, right before your thoughts thunder over it. But I had already done too much thinking, so I threw the barrettes to the ground and jogged all the way home, and I listened to my feet, and my breath. But my heart kept beating fast and loud in my ears, and no matter what I did I just couldn't block it out.

author's note : well, this was supposed to be a two parter. XD But seeing as that the plot bunnies are running wild out of their cages, I'm just going to say that there will be a next chapter, though I'm not entirely sure if it will be the last chapter. I Let you know though, when I get there. Thanks for reading if you read, and totally review if you feel up to it, because I always enjoy hearing what you think. Thanks to those who have already reviewed. Hopefully you stick around for the next installment.