She felt surprisingly light and serene, wrapped up in her dreamy slumber though her position said otherwise. Her body was completely contorted and sprawled across her queen sized bed. Her face was buried under a larger pillow over her head with her comforter tossed somewhere downwards, tangled near her feet while her arm was flung over an unused pillow.
She vaguely registered that it was now morning. She could hear the lull of the ocean waves even through her closed windows, in and out in and out like the steady row of a boat. The first thought that popped in her mind, as she tried to motivate herself to get up, was what to eat for breakfast. The little valley between her brows creased as she racked her memory of the ingredients in her fridge and pantry, debating if there was something worthy of cooking or if she should pop over to Tifa's bar and mooch off her breakfast. But then she remembered Tifa mentioning vaguely before cutting their conversation short that she may have gone out of town. Damn, there went her free breakfast.
Then, of course, hit reality. She recalled her murderous patient just outside her door and wished she hadn't woken up. Begrudgingly, she rolled over to check her phone and 9:00am blinked up on the screen. With a little sigh, she headed to the bathroom to refresh herself and changed into a loose long t shirt and a pair of grey leggings. When she felt clean and fresh, she walked towards her bedroom door and placed a cautious hand on the door knob. She was nervous. Would she greet him a cheerful good morning? Or should she ignore him until he said something? What did one do in this situation? Getting a grip on herself, she turned the knob.
She wasn't sure what she expected when she opened the door, but she was oddly surprised by how quiet the room was. If she hadn't look to her right, it would have felt like any normal morning. Her eyes lingered on her patient who seemed to be still asleep. There was an awkwardness there between him and her even though he was unconscious. She decided that the best way to handle the discomfort would be to just act as she had always done: she drew her curtains back as quietly as she could and the warm morning sunlight and the view of the hazy blue ocean greeted her.
She glanced back and felt relieved when he was still asleep. She was about to start cooking when she noticed that he still had the cloth over his eyes. He hadn't moved it even after she announced she was going to go to bed last night. He listened well for someone who very nearly killed her. She carefully reached over to take it off since it was dry by now. Her body was tense as she removed it cautiously, expecting some sort of reaction from him but there was not even a twitch. It appeared he was deep in sleep.
She took advantage of his sleep to observe him more. She definitely refuted last night's thought when she thought he should have been a model. It was literally criminal to be this handsome and NOT be a model. It was strange though, how normal he appeared with his eyes closed, how almost HUMAN he seemed. Granted, he was actually human; the amount of blood she wiped off from him proved that. Nevertheless the way he moved last night especially with his gun and almost no response as she stitched him up last night practically made her believe he was some sort of android. But now, with his eyes closed, he seemed eerily normal, as if he was some guy she picked up from a bar fight.
But she knew once those eyes opened, he was none of those things. There behind those eyes laid a deep mystery, eyes she could never relate to or even fathom an inch of what they have witnessed. All those experiences and memories made up this man who lay before her.
She shook her head. She was getting a little bit existentialistic and this was much too deep of an observation of a man she had just met. She stood up and headed to the kitchen. He wouldn't be able to eat much in his condition so she figured fixing him something that would be easy on his stomach would be the best course of action.
It was going to be hard cooking quietly.
The faint aroma of warm rice brushed against his senses like a nostalgic touch from somewhere deep in his mind that too distant to recognize. His eyes felt heavy to open as if every cell in his body was drowsily waking up, one by one. What he noticed first was color. There was light and there was color. He blinked once, then twice, and waited for something that did not come unfortunately. No matter how he blinked or narrowed his eyes, his surroundings would not focus into his view. Everything around him was fuzzy. The edges and lines melded into each other and it felt like looking at a blurred Picasso painting.
The woman proved to be true yet again; she could not cure the blindness. However, this was better than nothing even though getting around with this type of vision would take time. He did not bother getting up as there was no point. His body was still weak, maybe even weaker than yesterday. He wanted to be alert and tense in case something might happen but he was drained. There was no sense in fighting or scheming at this point; for now, the best course of action would be to go with the flow and trust his instincts.
Instead he decided to continue to lay there, listening to the light rhythmic chop of the knife against the grain of the wooden cutting board, the soft gurgle of some type of soup bubbling away in a pot. Turning his head, he now gave his attention to what sounded and smelled like the ocean. In the chaos of the night yesterday, he seemed to have missed that there was the ocean nearby, and the thought of that made him bite the inside of his cheek irately.
He should not have missed that, no matter what his body condition may have been. That was a keen detail he should not have overlooked. A pain shot up through his stomach, prompting him that he should not strain himself mentally and physically especially if he wanted to heal quickly. He forced himself to relax and leaned back against his pillows.
It was an odd sort of environment as he directed his attention to this house. It was definitely one he was not accustomed to if ever at all. There was a tranquility that radiated in this house, a stifling sense of normalcy. This was what a normal home must felt like to most people.
"Ah, you're awake," he heard her say.
"Here's some water." She knelt beside him and placed a glass of water in his hand, her hand surrounding his own to grip the glass and raised it to his lips. He surprised himself when he drank the water down greedily.
"Do you think you can eat?" she asked as she took the empty glass away from his fingers.
He did not answer, and sat there with a blank face.
"Oi, I know you're blind, not deaf."
"No."
Happy she got an answer, the young woman smiled in satisfaction. "Well, we'll try later then. I don't want to force you to eat when you don't feel like it. Do you mind if I go ahead and eat first? I'm pretty starving."
He shook his head.
The sounds of her eating felt as if it was magnified by the silence, so she swiftly turned on the television She didn't particularly cared for the news as it always made her angry or triggered old memories she did not want to relive, but she left it on since that was the rare channel that had good reception. Also, she tried to be considerate for her guest, assuming that he would want to know what was happening in the city after whatever he did. Last night she had glanced at the flyer the men gave her before throwing it away hastily, and it had appeared he had attacked and killed a lot of people, mostly people in government and the Shinra Cooperation. She recollected how for a brief second she had paled when she had seen the number of bodies he was responsible for.
As she chewed, she tried very hard not to mind the news.
"-City in chaos."
"It appears the terrorist organization AVALANCHE was responsible for the direct attack onto the Shinra E building, which was a generous donation from ten years ago from Shinra Cooperation to the government as an appreciation gift for the business deal-…."
People weren't stupid. Most of the citizens knew Shinra bought out the government essentially, and the very building was a symbol of that corruption. It was no donation but a very costly purchase by Shinra.
"Though the identity of the members of AVALANCHE has not been discovered, authorities managed to find a picture from the security footages of the man responsible for last night's terrorist attack."
Something about money reward. She chewed harder.
"A crack down on security…."
She took another large bite.
"…Access to city will be monitored…"
She drank her glass of water in one fast gulp.
"…Protect citizens…"
A telephone ring saved her from having to listen to the news and she hurriedly picked up the phone and ran inside her room.
"Yuffie."
She bit her lower lip and cringed. "Tifa, hi…"
"You never called me back last night."
"Y…yes…I forgot, sorry," she apologized as sweetly as she could over the phone, desperately attempting to evoke this emotion through the phone and hope that somehow it reached her friend and melted her completely justified, but terrifying anger.
All she heard was a heavy sigh. Her plan may have worked.
"Do you know how worried I was? I thought something happened to you! And I would have come over straight away if I wasn't out of town."
"I'm really sorry, I fell asleep right after."
"At least you picked up now. Seriously, I thought you got robbed or killed or something… Anyway what happened last night? Are you all right?"
"YES!" Yuffie said that too hastily, and she knew her friend would be suspicious even more. "Uh the police came by."
"The police?!" She could hear the alarm in Tifa's voice and no doubt she was panicking as much as she had last night. "Were they looking for you? How did they find you?"
"No, no, it wasn't me. There was a….an incident last night in the city and they were trying to find the culprit. He apparently was found escaping in this direction," Yuffie answered, silently relieved that she didn't have to talk to Tifa in person. She would have seen her face and know for sure that there was more to it than that. Tifa was an incredibly intuitive person, which was both a redeeming and frightening quality to her personality.
"He must have done something extraordinary for them to come out all the way here to find him," Tifa commented. Though she sounded mostly amused, there was an underlying sense of worry lined in her voice.
"He really did," Yuffie sighed. "It's all over the news, you can find out more on TV."
"I'll find out when I get back. They don't really have great reception over here."
"Where are you by the way?"
"I'm out in the country, near the Wutai Clan. I'm out doing quality checks from our suppliers here and also making a quick delivery, I should be back in a day or so. Is there anything you need, I can pick it up on my way back."
"You're going to kill me when you come home," Yuffie suddenly confessed. She never could keep a secret from Tifa too long.
There was a pause before she spoke. "What did you do?" she questioned in a knowing tone.
"I'll tell you when you get back but first I have a request. Can you get me some men's clothes?"
"What?"
"Men's clothes…"
"Wh…at? Do you have a guy there? Nope, never mind, I am not doing this over the phone. You have so much to explain to me when I get back."
"We can't talk about it over the phone?" Yuffie asked anxiously, chewing on her lower lip.
"No."
FUCKKK she mouthed silently. She hated direct confrontation, especially when it came to Tifa. Tifa and her stupid intuitive personality…and her stupid motherly instinct…and her stupid big boobs…
"Fine…" she grumbled. "But will you still get me what I need?"
"Yes, I will. What size do you need?"
"…Do you have anything for Big and Tall?"
She felt a little awkward to talk to him after her phone conversation with Tifa. Though she didn't reveal anything to her friend, she felt like she exposed him somehow.
The television was still on but luckily the news had past and they were showing reruns of an old show. She turned down the volume for him when she had a feeling he was starting to get annoyed from the noise.
"You should eat something now to regain your strength," Yuffie said as she headed towards the kitchen and turned on her stove. "You put off eating for too long now."
Once the food was reheated, she brought the tray next to him. The nutty smell of miso hit him first before the warmth that breathed from the hot soup. The aroma and warmth stirred his appetite though one wouldn't know from his expression.
She lifted a bowl in her hand and mixed the rice porridge with a spoon. "I'll have to feed you for now because of your blindness. Don't make that face, it's nothing to be embarrassed about," she scolded. Truth be told, she didn't know what he felt since he always had that stoic expression plastered on his face like a stone statue, but she had a feeling he was unhappy with the idea that she was going to feed him.
She gently scraped the top layer of the rice porridge, making sure not to dig too deep into it or else she would scoop out the hot under layer of the rice porridge. The top layer was usually where the perfect temperature of the food was in hot foods like this.
"This is the rice porridge, I didn't season it with anything so it can settle your stomach," she explained. "You should be able to gauge where the spoon is though right?"
She accepted his answer which was to open his mouth and take the food.
"This is the miso soup," she said as she scooped up some of the hot soup. "It's a little hot so be careful."
He could tell she used a very small amount of miso in the soup, probably to make sure he didn't eat anything too strongly seasoned. He was thankful of it in the back of his mind since he knew his stomach was a bit sensitive.
She continued the same pattern: telling him which food it was before lifting it to his lips to eat. She would pause as close as she could without actually touching his lips so he could feel the temperature and gauge where the food was before opening his mouth to eat it.
"How is your vision by the way, I forgot to ask today," she said as she paused in feeding him.
He always answered with silence first before he spoke and she wasn't sure if it was just the way he spoke in generally or just around her.
"I can see colors very faintly but my eyes will not focus. Everything appears to be blurry."
She nodded in understanding, "That's usually the case. How badly unfocused is it? Is there a specific distance your eyes will focus at?"
"I do not know."
He heard her place the bowl down and his eyes widened when he saw her close in on him. He, of course, couldn't see her exactly, just the faint colors that made her physical existence.
"Can you see me? My face?" She asked curiously with excitement in her voice. They were nearly touching noses.
"No."
"Do I look a little bit clearer though?" She asked again.
"No."
"Oh," she said in disappointment and returned to her seat. "Sorry, I didn't mean to lean so close like that," she apologized, just now grasping how close and invasive that must have been to him. After all, she was still just a stranger. Trying to erase the awkwardness, she scooped up some of the rice and fed him some more.
After a few more spoonful, he turned his head slightly away from her.
"No more?"
He nodded.
"I guess this is good enough," she said as she saw the rice bowl and it was down by half. This was better than what she had expected, considering how deep that gash was on his abdomen. She let him drink a bit more tea before refilling it and guiding his hand so he felt where she left the cup in case he wanted to drink more.
"Why didn't you turn me in?" he suddenly asked when she turned away to rise from her seat.
It was now her turn to respond with silence.
"It would have been easy to do so considering the state I was in," he said emotionlessly, as if he wouldn't have blamed her if she had done so. "You could have been rewarded by them."
He heard that little sigh seem to hang from her lips. "I wish I knew," she said softly.
"You're lying."
"I didn't know you were so talkative." He could feel her glare. "Will I be able to ask you this many questions about yourself as you are asking me?"
He stayed quiet again.
"I honestly don't know," she answered reluctantly. "At first, I thought you were some burglar but CLEARLY that wasn't the case when I took a good look at you. But I suppose, after I saw your injuries, my instinct as a nurse came first."
Also I figured you couldn't be too bad considering you didn't shoot me right away. Even with my amateur eye, I could tell you weren't a normal burglar."
"I could have not shot you in case they heard the gunshot."
Yuffie snorted at his remark. "You had a silencer on! They wouldn't have been able to hear that regardless"
His usual stoic face now had a somewhat stunned expression though it was a very subtle change in his face.
"I may not be familiar with weapons but I've seen enough movies to know what it is."
Another moments of silence passed. This time it was his turn to speak.
"I take it that was not all."
She cursed inside her mind; what was it with her and meeting people who were so freaking intuitive? She realized maybe it wasn't that others were intuitive, but that she was just too obvious.
"…the real reason…" she started slowly, wavering a little bit. "Is…I met someone like you once." Someone wanted by THOSE people. Someone who got caught by those people…
He turned his head towards her directly now so they were face to face. There was intensity behind those seemingly blank and blind eyes, and it made her uncomfortable. Fortunately, he couldn't see that she avoided his eye contact.
"I don't want to get into it too much…because I have my own reasons like you," she murmured quietly, referring to him not wanting her to ask so many questions about him. "I met him once…or maybe it was twice, through a friend. She was the one who knew him personally, and I figured if she trusts him then he's not…such a bad person, maybe."
She didn't notice the way her fingers became stiff from the cold that slowly crept throughout her body as she spoke about that eventful day.
"Do you know his name?"
The memories came crashing like a brick chucked at a window, except it was happening over and over again like a broken record. She knew his name. She could hear his name, being shrieked in that horrified voice.
ZACK!
ZAACCKK!
"….I I I…h..h..h..is…" She was not even aware that she was stuttering severely as her mind was completely consumed with scenes and voices she had strained desperately to hide deep inside her memories. It was hard to tell if her stuttering came from her voice or from her body actually shaking violently.
Little whimpers trembled from her lips when unexpectedly a large steady hand grabbed her forearm.
"Oi," he said sternly. Did he just mimic her? The oddity of his action brought her halfway out of that dark place. That was the only thing he said and nothing else. No words of comfort or support except for that strong hand that kept her in place. She was so fixated in trying to regain her composure that she missed the way his thumb rubbed her skin tenderly.
"S…Sorry," she managed to murmur.
He didn't try to pry any more than that. Blindness aside, he didn't need vision to know this was a completely sensitive subject for her though he was intrigued by her reaction in that it mimicked a person who had post-traumatic stress disorder. Clearly, she had gone through something that really scarred her deep inside. He wasn't a cold person by nature though and he could respect her for telling him this much considering the fact that he had told her nothing about himself. He also felt a little bad that he triggered such a response. Just a little though.
Now feeling thoroughly embarrassed, she stood up abruptly and headed towards the sliding glass doors overlooking the small deck behind her house. "It's getting a little chilly outside, I'll close this," she said with a sniffle.
"Vincent."
She stilled but didn't turn around while her hand paused on the handle of the glass doors.
"My name is Vincent. Vincent Valentine."
For a brief moment there was a tightening inside her chest but it left as quick as it had come. "Thank you," she replied softly.
She sniffled again before clearing her throat and gave her head a little shake, "I'm Yuffie. Yuffie Kisaragi!" She said suddenly upbeat, "The best damn nurse this area has seen in a long, long time!"
It was a strange introduction, but he knew she was a bit strange. At any rate, her weirdness told him she was back to normal, or at least she was attempting to be herself once again and it oddly comforted him. He nodded in acknowledgement and with that same stoic face he replied, "I am in your care, Yuffie Kisaragi."
His reply incited a laugh from her which seemed to fill the room. It was a pleasant laugh.
"Don't worry, Vincent, with me as your nurse, you'll be back up and back with your friends in no time!"
Their exchange of names unofficially marked an unspoken mark of trust between them, unknowingly binding them to each other until the end.
