Day 3

January 12th

6:00 a.m.

Ordinary day expected today. (As normal as it can be at this place…) Kids go to school, Barret's off to search for more energy resources, Cloud has deliveries to make, Yuffie is planning on leaving around noon, and I'm just working in our home-slash-bar.

6:32 a.m.

I would have forgotten the pancakes if it weren't for this note on the fridge door.

Tifa-

Went to the corner store to buy maple syrup.

We're out of it, and everyone knows you can't have pancakes without syrup.

It's unheard of.

-Cloud

P.S. Borrowed Denzel's grey beanie. If he runs out of his room panicked, tell him a robber came and stole it.

Tell me his reaction later.

Nice, Cloud. Real nice.

7:17 a.m.

Pancakes cooked and eaten, Cloud's hair fixed and the kids are off to school. Yuffie just cut a few spikes off. I made it look (somewhat) decent by pasting some blond hair from one of Marlene's old dolls. If you look real close, it's obvious that it's fake but from a distance it looks fine, so until his hair grows back he'll be alright.

Poor Cloud. His spiky hair is one of the things he's most proud of. Plus, his hair is naturally spiky. (At least now it is. A few years ago he used some hair cement when his hair was at it's longest.)

Well, it's almost time to open the bar. I'll write during slow hours.

9:11 a.m.

Bored. So bored. My bar in the slums always had something going on. (Mostly fights.) This new Seventh Heaven is more of a family-type place during the day, which is good because better people are here, but it's just a little boring. I wipe counters, wait for customers, serve customers, wipe counters, wipe counters while serving customers, etc.

At night, though, especially during Happy Hour (Tuesdays at 7 o' clock), I'm constantly throwing people out (literally) and serving customer after customer.

It is very Coolstuffz.

Coolstuffz: Something Awesome, cool, or SWEET. The cool type of sweet, not "Awww! So sweet!"

Word 29 of Yuffielinian.

(Yuffie used it this morning. She nearly started crying when I told her I was keeping track. She was Blegmeggeled, word 24 of Yuffielinian, which basically means 'Speechless'.)

Well, off to a boring day.

10:12 a.m.

A talking frog came in a few minutes ago and ordered a Maiden's Kiss. Her name was Flynn. You think that after seeing everyone get turned into frogs constantly by Frog Song would help me get used to it, but it's still so… creepy when you're minding your own business and suddenly a green thing appears out of no where, and when you're expecting it to say "Ribbit" it says "Hey you! Maiden's Kiss, A.S.A.P!"

I guess it's not as creepy as the "Mini" materia.

The thought of people shrinking themselves and sneaking into your homes through cracked windows, going into your room and…

I once found a mini man hiding in my underwear drawer. Cloud put him into a hamster cage until he agreed to quit the "Mini" effect. He continued to use the materia for three days until he finally ran out of MP.

Thankfully, few people can properly use that sort of materia, so we don't have to worry much.

I still can't help but feel a bit creeped out though… When I see a frog I sometimes talk to it to see if it's really a person. Sometimes people think that I'm a little crazy because of that.

12:09 p.m.

On my lunch break. The best part about being your own boss is picking your breaks. My very first real job, (working as a waitress in a bar called "Lively Tavern" when I was 17. The name of the place is now "Honeybee Inn". I'm very happy I quit when I did.) my boss was a complete moron. No breaks, no tips, no smacking perverted guys if they say anything out of line to you, nothing.

My second "real" job was a house cleaning service, my third "real" job was babysitting, and my fourth "real" job is my current job as my own boss/Bartender/Foster Mother/Chef. In between my jobs I did lots of miscellaneous work to support myself, like photography, being a bodyguard, etc. When I first opened Seventh Heaven in the slums, I never expected it to become this popular, and I certainly didn't expect that I would love working here this much.

Well, enough about work. Writing about work during a break isn't very relaxing.

12:39 p.m.

I didn't realize it, but a lot of the things I did at my past jobs, I still do at home. I'm still a waitress (pretty much), I'm constantly cleaning our home-slash-bar, I still baby-sit (Well, I hardly call living with Marlene and Denzel babysitting, but, yeah, sort of), Cloud and I protect people that need protection while traveling from here to Kalm, and all of the pictures that I take are hung up on several walls in our home-slash-bar.

Hm. I guess the jobs weren't in vain after all.

2:34 p.m.

About five hours till Happy Hour. Maybe I'll be able to use that new move I've been working on if it get's bad…

At the moment, it's a perfect family atmosphere. Some teenagers are here with their grandmother for her 68th birthday, a woman and her toddler are drinking chocolate milk together at the bar (which is a milk-bar until 5 o' clock when I start to serve alcohol) and some newly weds are having a nice late lunch. (I know that they're newly weds because they haven't been able to get their hands off of each other long enough to take a bite of their salads.)

Yuffie is still here. When I asked her when she was planning on leaving, she said "Nuuuuuuuuuh! Thinthent canth hear meh talk lack thith!" Which I think meant "Nooooooooo! Vincent can't hear me talk like this!" She'll be staying with us for a while, then. Too bad none of us knew that Cact-tards have numbing needles inside their bodies to protect them from predators… Then again, no one thought they needed to know because people don't usually bite Cactuars.

4:05 p.m.

The same man has been coming here every day at 4 o' clock for the past five weeks, and he stays for hours. Tired eyes, spiky brown hair, and piercings all over his ears… He never talks. Ever. Not even when he orders. He just grunts and points at what he wants on the menu.

Hm… Should I be worried about this guy?

5:16 p.m.

Cloud made it back from the delivery a few minutes ago. It was for the Chocobo farm. He had to deliver 10 bales of Mimett greens. Cloud's bike can only hold 2 bales at a time, so he had to drive back and forth between the farm and Kalm, which took hours.

Yuffie is dancing around him singing "Ah nuh ah song tha wuh geh on yuh nuhvs, geh on yuh nuhvs, geh on yuh nuhvs!" over and over again to, none other than, get on his nerves.

6:13 p.m.

Poor Cloud. Yuffie's still singing. (She has incredible lung capacity…) Cloud can't do much to stop her. He seems to be trying to tune her out while looking at customers helplessly.

6:28 p.m.

Just when I thought it couldn't get any worse for Cloud, Yuffie discovered that she had some needles stuck in her tongue, and she-believe it or not-licked Cloud's face. The left side of his face is frozen. Completely numb. He can't smile, frown, or talk.

All while listening to "Ah nuh ah song thaw uh geh on yuh nuhvs, geh on yuh nuhvs, geh on yuh nuhvs!"

He gets extra pancakes tomorrow.

6:57 p.m.

Almost to Happy Hour…

7:00 p.m.

And so Happy Hour begins. The "Slash" door is locked, the Happy Hour sign is on the door, and Cloud is on standby (he's not numb anymore) in case I need assistance. (Like if I'm too busy to break up a fight.)

By the way, the "Slash" door is the door that separates the bar from our home. When it's open it just looks like a large doorframe, and when it's closed it just looks like another part of the wall. It's a safety thing so a drunk man won't wander around our house. (It's the "slash" in home-slash-bar. Get it?)

7:10 p.m.

So far, so good. There's about 40 people here, the most I've seen in a while.

7:15 p.m.

There's a line forming outside of the bar. It's already getting really crazy in here… I've already made twice as much gil as I normally make on a Happy-Hour-Less day. If I added another hour, how much gil would I make then?

7:22 p.m.

Bar Fights (So Far): 1

I'm expecting five to break out this time. Last Tuesday, there was only two, but there is a lot more people here today. (Probably around 50-55 if you count the ones outside.)

Is it bad that I'm almost hoping for fights to break out?

7:30 p.m.

Bar Fights: (So far) 3

A lot more women are here today. There's usually only two or three at a time at night, but there must be at least ten. I wonder why?

7:34 p.m.

They're chatting up Cloud. All of them started to hit on him in a pack, like animals. Cloud seems to be handling it well. He's in his "cocky" side.

Cloud has two main sides to his personality.

1. Real Cocky side (The side everyone sees.)

2. Somewhat dorky side (The side only Marlene and I see, except for some moments such as "Everyone, let's mosey!" and "Aw, you look like a teddy bear wearing a marshmallow!" He is a pretty smooth guy, but like everyone else, he has moments of dorkiness.)

I should stop writing in this until Happy Hour is over. The customers are getting a little Angrissed.

12:33 a.m.

Bar Fights: 20 (technically.)

A riot broke out. Cloud, Yuffie and I fought away people for hours to get them under control.

Downside: I'm completely exhausted, my "perfect family atmosphere" could possibly be destroyed if word gets out that there was a riot, women might start coming here only for the chance to see Cloud, some of my favorite pictures were knocked off of the walls and broken, and while I was fighting I was groped by a man and I didn't get the chance to injure him properly.

Upside: We made thousands of Gil, and in spite of the downsides, it was pretty fun.

And one more thing that's not really a downside or an upside…

Yuffie fell asleep on me. I was lying down on the floor, talking about what happened today, and she just fell over. (She was sitting down next to me.)

I text messaged Cloud to come and carry her up to my room. He's in the house, but if I yell for him I'll wake Yuffie.

12:40 a.m.

Alright, Yuffie's in my bed, Cloud's on the floor, and I get his bed because I'm making extra pancakes tomorrow.

I got a Polaroid picture of him chewing on his hair.

And I'm framing it and hanging it in my room tomorrow. I'll look at it whenever I need a good laugh.

All in all, today was a good day.

12:49 a.m.

Last entry for today-I swear.

I found pictures under Cloud's pillow.

Pictures of all of us. Everyone. Zack and Aerith, too.

I wonder, does he miss everyone when they're all away? We're all pretty close, and even though he acts like they all get on his nerves (which they do), I know he doesn't hate them.

Awwww.

He loves us.

A/N

The longest chapter so far. Whew! The next chapter will be just a little bit shorter, probably.

Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed it!

-Lunatic