The following conversation takes place in total nothingness. No color, no shape, no weight, no smell, no feeling – not an up or a down about it.
There are only voices, two identical voices echoing back and forth in the dark.
"Hello," says the first.
"Who are you?" asks the second.
"That depends on who you are," the first says to the second.
"I'm not really sure who I am."
"Have you ever thought of going back home? You know, retracing your roots..."
"Home?"
"Nibelheim, where your family is waiting."
"The only family I ever had was my mother."
"Yes, that's right."
"But… she died."
"No, no. Your mother can't die."
"I don't understand."
"Come home and you will."
"Why?!" Cloud screamed, flailing in cold sweat.
The dream was over before he could ask, much less get an answer.
He sat up and shook his head, jarring his brain back into the reality. It was then that he realized most the "sweat" chilling him was actually dew.
He'd fallen asleep in the flowers again. It was the same spot where he'd woken from a similar dream two years ago, to discover that a girl named Aeris Gainsborough had entered his life.
He woke now to rediscover that she was dead, as he had done every other day for the past two years.
.
.
.
Tifa rose to the sound of a shrieking smoke alarm. With reflexes that would have made even her sensei shake his head in disbelief, she flipped out of bed, thrust her naked legs into a pair of jeans, and had already exited the bedroom before her feet could even touch the floor.
Terrible scenarios played through her head. Was the house burning? Had the terrorists from the North attacked their neighborhood?
Not quite.
She followed the smoke into the kitchen and found Barret, Red XIII, and Vincent crowded around a blazing pan of what had once been eggs and bacon.
"What the hell are you doing?"
"Makin' us some breakfast!" Barret shouted over the smoke alarm.
She pushed him aside and grabbed the pan. "Breakfast? You've practically made yourselves some napalm! Go turn off the alarm and open some windows!"
"What about the eggs?"
"I'll cook your damned eggs! Now move it!"
Soon following this the flames were quelled, the air was cleared, and Barret, Tifa, Marlene, Vincent and Red were seated to an impressive spread. By assuming helm of the stove, Tifa had unwittingly set herself up to cook for the boys, each of them wanting something different: salted potatoes and black bread for Vincent; yerba mate tea and two whole salmon filets for Red; eggs and grits for Barret…
They all thanked her tersely between bites.
"No problem," Tifa exhaled, sitting down to a light repast of coffee and cold leftover pizza.
Meanwhile, Marlene was pouring herself a bowl of Cocoa-b'os when something round and shiny fell from the specially marked box.
She held up her prize triumphantly. "Look Papa, what I got!"
"Is that a marble?"
"Yeah!"
"Huh. You can't play marbles with just one of 'em. I wonder what we should do about that?"
Marlene shrugged bashfully. "I don't know…"
"Maybe we could go to the toy store and get you a full set?"
"Can we?!" She threw down her spoon and glomped onto her Papa's knee. "Canwecanwecanwecanewe?"
"Yup!" he rumbled merrily, beaming like a big black Santa. "Today's our special day!"
Between Marlene's giddy squeals and Barret's raucous mirth, Red XIII's ever-vigilant ears picked up the faint sound of knocking.
"Someone's out front," he growled.
Barret didn't seem to take notice. Vincent was busy looking at… something.
"I'll get it," Tifa groaned.
She made her way to the front of the house just in time to catch a glimpse of a red-haired man hobbling across the street on a bamboo cane. He'd dropped something through the mail slot, a single envelope addressed to "Strife Delivery Service."
She pushed it aside with her toe and went back to the kitchen.
"Who's that?" Barret asked.
"Just another letter for Cloud."
"That spiky-headed fool doesn't pay you enough to manage his business."
"And you don't pay me anything to manage your breakfast. What's your point?"
Barret ceded with a shrug.
"So then," continued Tifa, turning to Red and Vincent, "any plans this afternoon?"
They shook their heads like reluctantly.
"Good. Some local kids are coming here at ten to work the lunch shift. The two with the long hair and the acne – Yoj and Kazoo are their names – could you tell them to fill in for me?"
"Ah, of course," said Red XIII. "But who's going to fill in for them?"
Tifa's smile sharpened. "You two can wash dishes, right?"
.
.
.
Cloud groaned and rubbed the crust from his mako-blue eyes.
Waking for Cloud was an unusual ritual these days, largely due to his diminished sense of time. When a man leads a life of monotony and solitude, it follows that all parts of the day and all days of the week should eventually congeal into one indistinct blob. The only thing that lent any sort of shape to the hours in Cloud's life was his part-time racket as a delivery boy, and that was the only good thing about the job.
He rolled over in his sleeping bag as something funny played through his mind. A week ago, a hobo in Sector Three had been playing a two-stringed ukulele and singing:
I don't care anymore,
Even me balls don't care.
When I wake up I go back to sleep,
Cuz I don't care no more.
Strange that it occur to him now, having passed by the starving artist and his song without taking notice of either at the time.
When I wake up I go back to sleep,
Cuz I don't care no more.
Cloud rolled over in his sleeping bag yet again. Something in his pocket pressed uncomfortably under his thigh…
The Bawaajige Nagwaagan: in addition to signifying one's scholarship at Cosmo Canyon, the circular weave was said to snare bad dreams before they entered the mind.
Yeah right, he thought, chucking the thing aside and lying back down.
The talisman whistled through the air and hit the floor with a faint thwack. Then a creak. Then groan.
The doors were opening.
Cloud scrambled to his feet and turned to face the intruder head-on. By now he was somewhat used to dealing with competing squatters and even the occasional city official looking to encroach on his hermitage.
He hoped this one fell into the former category; the vagrants were always easier to bribe.
"Cloud?"
He couldn't believe it.
After all this time…
"Tifa?"
"Surprise..."
"What are you doing here?"
"Packages," she explained breezily, dropping a bulky sack on the floor. "One of them is for the WRO rally tonight, so I guess you'll be attending whether you like it or not."
"Oh."
"So, yeah… Red and Vincent are going to be there too… did you know that they're visiting? I hope you don't mind if they stay in your--"
"How'd you find me?"
Tifa's simper vanished.
"Come on Cloud, I'm no fool."
"Well you never came before."
"And I don't know what I'm doing here now."
"Bringing those packages…" Cloud murmured pathetically.
"Yeah," Tifa sighed, "right…"
She paced around the church some, measuring the silence with loud, purposeful steps.
"So this is how you live," she said at last.
"Surprise…"
"Please, Cloud, I'm begging you! I don't care where you go, just leave this place!"
"Why should I…"
"For your own sanity! It's killing you, the way you cling to these old memories…"
"Old memories?" He shook his head. "Things as they are now, that's what's old. This city and its problems, you and your lectures – I've heard it all before."
"Oh yeah?" Tifa snarled back. "Well here's something you haven't heard before… I'm sick of caring about you! You think you're the only one who's had a hard time? This is Midgar! People are digging through the trash for food! Maybe if you weren't always feeling sorry yourself you'd notice!"
"I'm sorry. "
"I don't know why I bother… all you do is hurt the people who try to get close to you!"
"Maybe that's why I stay away," Cloud muttered.
"Oh yeah, real poetic." Tifa's voice trembled into dark territory. "You and I both know why you're here…"
"Don't–"
"You really think she'd have wanted it this way?"
Cloud looked at the floor with a grim face and exhaled loudly.
"No," he said. "I think she would have rather lived."
Tifa just stood and stared. There was something about the way he said it – a hint of resentment, an oblique look of spite – something about the way he said it to her.
The patina had been scraped from her eyes now; for the perhaps the first time in her life, she saw the man before her with painful clarity.
This was him. This bitter, sullen man was Cloud.
And she couldn't stand to be in his presence a moment longer.
Without another word, Tifa regarded him with a feeble nod and carried herself out the door on numb, automated feet. She felt hollow and nauseous. Her throat constricted and nearly pulled her into tears. She wouldn't allow it. She was a woman of endurance, a slayer of monsters and a mother to grown men. Tears didn't suit her.
Meanwhile, Cloud observed this turbulent departure with the dull perplexity of a startled animal. Already aloof by disposition, withdrawal from society had left the young man tactless as a cactuar; he couldn't understand what had made Tifa so upset. Why did she run out like that? He didn't say anything offensive. He'd done nothing wrong…
He fell to his knees and punched the floor uselessly. To hell with her. Was his pain too inconvenient? What a selfish and shallow-- and the way she'd called Aeris an "old memory!"
He beat the floor harder still, his anger doubling with each blow. Eventually, something gave way with a sharp crack, and his fists struck dampness. Cloud came back to his senses then, astonished as he blinked the rage from his eyes and saw what his stupid tantrum had accomplished: he'd punched straight through the floorboards and into cold earth below.
As with Aeris' flowerbed, here too, the soil was fertile. Only something else had been growing here, a different kind of flower. Without any sunlight, they shouldn't have been able to grow at all, much less bloom. Yet somehow there they were, having managed just fine. Even the blossoms crushed under the recently collapsed flooring looked as if they still might recover.
Cloud looked at them and felt an undefined and overwhelming sense of remorse.
Botanists call them Myosotis.
Everyone else calls them Forget-me-nots.