A/N: This is my Tifa Week Entry. I hope you enjoy!
The Six Loves of Tifa Lockhart
There have been many men who loved her, but there were six whose love mattered the most.
She brought out my better side almost as soon as I first met her. She was youthful and sunny, her smiles bright even though sometimes they faltered under the weight of her inner contemplation. I couldn't help but feel drawn to that natural, hidden effervescence, but what stuck it to me was how much she needed someone who would give her an earful and still pulled her out of her murky and entrenched thoughts.
"Tifa, you alright?"
She turned away from the windows on the bridge of the Highwind, overlooking the waning sunlight that was beginning to crash behind the hills in the distance, darkness descending and bringing with it new miseries. The days since we'd escaped Junon had already grown too long, even though winter still cut daybreak short. The tragedies of the days that had passed had stacked far too quickly and with too much unpredictability, death and loss the gut punches that had been delivered over and over again until we were keeling over and out of breath.
We were leaderless and directionless at that point.
Tifa tried to hold us together, but I knew that she was hurting more than any of us had been at his loss. I found myself watching her every move, the way that her hands fidgeted at her sides and the way that she bit into her bottom lip, shaking her head with worry every time she made a decision. I'd only known her for a few short weeks, but already I was too goddamn close to all of these people, most of all her.
"I… I don't know what to do."
Her eyes were wide and sad, glassy red orbs that beamed up at me when she faced me. I could see the tears that lined their corners, ready to burst free and line her cheeks. The sight of it made something collapse inside of me, and I couldn't help but drop my hand to her forearm.
"Tifa," I said, "You got this. You're the best of all of us. Cloud wouldn't want anyone else in charge. He trusts you, not the rest of us dumbasses."
I watched her toss her head a little, but I could tell that my words were enough. I was never good with words, especially when it came to stuff like this. Usually when I spoke, I was cursing somebody out or pissing somebody off. I wasn't good at making people feel better, least of all women.
"It's just…" she started and then stopped, turning away from me again so that she could look out of the window once more. I caught the profile of her face, realizing that Cloud was one lucky bastard and that he had better turn up with his brain in one piece and not break this girl's heart.
I might kill him if he did.
"I just don't want to let him down," Tifa said. "And I have to find him. I'm no good without him, Cid."
"We'll help you, sis," I said. "We know how much he means to you, so we'll help you find him. That's a goddamn guarantee."
"Thank you," she responded softly.
"You know how much that idiot loves you?" I said. She had to know, didn't she? If she didn't, I was sure as hell gonna make sure she knew.
She looked up at me, her cheeks taking on the coloring of her eyes as they widened in surprise. She really didn't know, did she? The two of them deserve each other; both clueless morons.
"I don't - "
"I know a thing or two about this stuff," I interrupted her, reaching for a cigarette to sooth the way my nerves were beginning to jump. "I've been with Shera a long time, Tifa, and I know when a man is in love."
"You're not very nice to her," Tifa argued right away.
Sassy, this one here. It's one of the things I liked most about Tifa. She was the sweetest girl I'd ever met, the rosiest disposition you could find. But she surprised me all the time, quick little zingers like that catching me off guard.
"My relationship with Shera has been really complicated for some time now," I responded. "But I can't deny that she means the world to me. I fell in love with her years ago. And I see the way he looks at you."
Tifa shook her head, glancing back out of the glass. She heaved a little sigh, the melancholy at her loss sinking her expression.
"I hope so."
She sounded so fucking depressed and dejected that I had no choice but to reach out for her, cigarette dangling from my lips as I pulled her in for a hug. She tipped her forehead to my chest, and I realized a moment later that she was weeping.
"I promise you, Tifa, that he does," I said. "And when you find him, he's gonna make sure that you know it. If he doesn't I'm gonna kick his ass from here to Rocket Town."
She laughed lightly, but she didn't move, accepting the embrace and returning it with her arms around me.
But I wasn't joking. It had only been a few short weeks, but I would protect this girl anyway that I could. And I knew that boy loved her, but if he broke her heart, I wouldn't hesitate to take it out of his hide.
The sun was fading away into darkness when Tifa finally loosened and pulled away. She lifted her hand to her cheek, swiping away at the tears with a flick of her finger.
"Thank you, Cid."
I nodded, blowing smoke into the air and turning away to stare at the sky again, an endless sea of blue and black, putting all my faith in her and knowing that I would give my all to make sure that she smiled again the way she had when I first met her.
She's like a sister to me.
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Wind howled behind me, descending from the mountains that loomed overhead, bringing with it the blistering cold that lives only in desolate places like Mount Nibel. In these hills, I can see the valleys that lead to the village below, rows of tightly knit cottages lining the cobblestone roads, sequoias and aspens dotting the terrain below.
She was standing on an outcropping of rock, her back to me as she practiced her moves, kicks and punches against the wind. Of all of my students around the world, she was the most impressive, her body lithe and destructive even at the young age of fourteen. I had students who were older and had been training for far longer than she had, but none of them could match her raw talent or her determination.
I knew it was because of this very mountain that Tifa had given so much of herself to her training and its art. I knew that she hated this mountain, that she feared it, her near death experiences on its cliff-face when she was just a little girl burned forever into her psyche. It reminded her of her weakness, and when she came to me at the age of ten, asking to train, I knew that it was her reason for wanting to grow stronger.
I could tell as we stood there with the screams of dragons behind us that she was afraid. She hadn't wanted to come up here, but over the course of her training, I knew eventually we would have to venture into these hills. She needed to face her fears and overcome them, or else, her training would be for naught. I was determined to help her do that.
"Continue," I commanded, watching as she twirled and parried, angling her body to face mine with another roundhouse kick. "Too slow. A dragon will have burned you to ash at this rate. You need to show some force, some urgency! Now!"
She panted, wiping beads of sweat from her brow as she tore through another rotation, her legs rising even higher this time. Her eyes were narrowed with focus, her fist igniting flames in the air as she sent it forward.
It was time to push her, I knew. She needed to conquer this mountain, but she would never do it until she conquered her fears. I stepped forward entering the fray and swiping her legs out from under her with one unexpected kick.
She cried out, not expecting that intrusion, and I leaped back away from her.
"You need to do better, Tifa-san," I demanded. "This mountain and its fiends will ruin you if this is the best you've got. You must search deeper inside of yourself for your true strength, Tifa, and you must unleash with no fear and no hesitation."
She snarled, but I could see the terror in her eyes as another dragon roared above us. But I was not going to relent, because I wanted to build her up to the pinnacle of her potential, knowing there would likely be no other student of mine who meant what she did to me, who was so important and so powerful and like an extension of my own hopes and dreams.
We sparred against the crags, the air growing cooler as the night sky began to descend and the sun disappeared with a kaleidoscope of colors. I didn't hold back, but soon she was bringing with her all of the force in her body until she was backing me away to the opposite side of the cliff face where she finally pinned me to the earth.
"That's better," I told her, rising to my feet again as she somersaulted away from me.
From then on, she no longer feared the mountain. She held my hand, her resolve renewed and flashing behind her dark crimson eyes. Pride was swelling throughout my chest, and I held her to me, feeling tears at the corners of my eyes as I realized that she was not only my greatest student but something far, far more important than that to me.
"I feel better, Master," she said after a moment. "I think - I think I'm no longer afraid."
"As it should be," I responded, and she smiled and hugged me again.
She's like a granddaughter to me.
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They say these fights aren't worth it, that we're just as bad as our enemies when we resort to these tactics. They tear our posters down and slander us at community meetings, try to make us look like we're in the wrong.
I say, they can all go to hell.
When I first met her, I knew she wasn't like them. Her thirst for vengeance was quiet but shrouded in ugly storm clouds that chased her wherever she moved throughout the sector. Anyone who saw the look of determination on that young girl's face knew that she was carrying an axe to grind. We all were, I knew, Shinra having stolen one thing or the other from us over the course of the years that were painful in our rearview. I didn't know much about what they'd taken from her - only that it had been everything and had left her alone in the city - but whatever they had done was enough for her to begin to show up at our meetings and to take a job at the bar that was a cover for our activities.
Now she'd brought that friend of hers around, a surly pretty-boy, an ex-Shinra jarhead who had a nasty attitude and an even nastier mouth. He was tightlipped and not trustworthy, but Tifa had vouched for him, begging and pleading and even offering him up for work.
It didn't make a whole lot of sense to me, but I trusted her, so I let him stay. But I soon realized that their friendship was a whole lot more complicated than she had been letting on, and it wasn't long that I figured out that there was something wrong between them and that it was driving her mad.
"Tifa," I said to her one afternoon when the bar was slow and empty. It was the night before we were to bomb the reactor in Sector 1. "You sure we can trust this guy? I know you say he's your friend, but I don't trust anybody who did Shinra's dirty work. Ex-SOLDIER or not."
She turned to me, leaning over the bar. "I promise," she said. "I just - he really needs the work. And I'm worried about him. When I found him last week, he was very sick - he couldn't even speak. He's better now, I think - but I need to keep an eye on him. If he can't make any money here, I just know he's going to leave, and I can't let that happen. He's all I have left."
Tifa didn't talk much about her past, but that line was strange to me. I leaned back against the stool, tilting my head at her as I thought about her words.
"What you mean, Tifa?"
She shook her head. "I just… Cloud and I are from the same hometown. Shinra… well, there's nothing left of it. I thought I had lost everyone, that I would be forever alone in Midgar. Cloud returning to me means too much, and I can't lose him."
"You sure y'all are just friends?" I couldn't help but ask. The first few times I had seen them together ever since Tifa had first brought him around, I recognized the way they looked at each other, the way he watched her constantly and the way that she hovered over him and doted on him with the best drinks and hot meals she could find. I had been married once, and I knew a thing or two about this kinda stuff, and it hadn't taken long for it to become as clear as day to me.
I especially knew it from the coloring her cheeks had taken on.
"I do care about him a great deal," Tifa responded. "But we're just friends."
I knew well enough what that meant. I tipped back my beer, studying her face, Tifa turning away to wipe down the counter with her face still warm. She didn't need to say much else.
I'd kept watch over Tifa from the day I first met her. A girl as young as she was, alone and with no family or anyone protecting her had rubbed me the wrong way from the start, and even though she was sometimes more reluctant to participate in some of our more extreme rebel activities, her being a part of AVALANCHE was ultimately a way for me to take care of her.
I didn't trust this Cloud jackass as far as I could throw him, but now that I knew she was carrying a torch for him, I was gonna be up his ass and watching him like a hawk, knowing damn well that if he did anything to hurt her, I would blow his fuckin' head off.
She's like a daughter to me.
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I still remember my mom. I think about her all the time. She was pretty and dark haired, had the brightest smile and the warmest hugs. She would hold me whenever I cried, she told me stories about places far, far away, and she made the best food, especially her cream cakes that she baked every Sunday afternoon and served warm with fat scoops of ice cream.
But one day, when I was still so young that the spires of the towers above in Sector Seven seemed like giants and sentinels to me, she was gone. Both of my parents, buried beneath brick and mortar, left away to rot while I ran, hopelessly looking for someone to care for me.
It was a long time before I found them, but when I did, Cloud bringing me home when I was feverish and sick, I knew that I had found my home. No one could replace my parents, and even more, no one could replace my mother.
But when I met Tifa Lockhart, I knew that despite everything that had happened I would be alright.
High school has been rough for me, and sitting in the dining room of Seventh Heaven, I stared down at my PHS, quiet and miserable. I'm having a hard time making friends, and Marlene and I no longer attend the same school, her being two grades behind me. I'm tired all the time from the homework and the studying, and I feel lonely, like an outcast that nobody wants to talk to. It hits me again and again every night that I walk home, and usually, I go straight to my room and turn on my headphones, music raging in my ears and drowning out my anxiety.
But not today. As soon as I got home from school, Tifa stopped me from going upstairs. She ordered me to sit down at one of the booths, asking me to take my homework out and get started on it right away. I wanted to mope and refuse, but she was unrelenting, and so I sat down and got to my geometry problems while she got back to work.
She didn't bother me for the rest of the afternoon, but she did watch me as she served her customers through the dinner rush. Marlene soon came home, but Tifa sent her upstairs, and when the bar finally slowed and emptied, she came around to sit across from me in the booth, placing a slice of vanilla ice cream cake in front of me.
It wasn't my mom's cream cakes, but it sure did look good
I dug right in, not saying anything as Tifa watched me. A moment passed, and she leaned forward, tipping her head to one side.
"Denzel, what's wrong?"
I looked up at her, catching her eyes wide and expectant. Tifa was always so good at reading us. She always knew what we needed before we even knew something was wrong. She understood all of our moods, knew when Cloud was feeling broody or when Marlene was feeling lonely and sad and missed her papa. And she knew when I was down, always making sure to stop and check to see that I was going to be okay.
"I don't like school," I told her honestly.
She smiled, tipping her head to the side. "High school is very different from middle school, isn't it?" she asked. "You know, I only got to go to high school for one year."
I glanced back up at her. "Really?"
"Yup," Tifa replied. "My village burned down right at the start of my sophomore year. I came to Midgar right away, but I never returned to school. I had to focus on surviving all alone."
Her eyes had grown sad, and her words tore at me a little. Suddenly, I felt kinda bad that I hated school so much when her own opportunities had been taken from her.
"But I understand why you might be feeling that way, so it's okay," she continued.
"I don't really have any friends, Tifa," I whined, shaking my head. "I… feel scared to talk to people sometimes, and the other kids all ignore me. It was different in middle school when Marlene was there. She was always around, and our friends were all part of the same group. Here, I don't know anyone. And the work is too hard, Tifa."
I gestured to the stack of notebooks I'd pushed to one side of the table. I had tested into the gifted and talented program at the end of my eighth grade year, and I was taking all honors-level courses. The work the teachers assigned took hours to complete, and sometimes, I was sure that I was falling behind.
Tifa reached across the table to take my hand. Whenever she did this - it was one of her favorite gestures - It always helped to calm the nervous energy that was tangled inside of me. I looked down at her hand, watching as she squeezed mine gently before she spoke.
"It's okay," she said without hesitation. "I know it seems hard now, Denzel, but you're still adjusting. You'll make friends, just give it time. Friends that you will love and cherish for all of the right reasons. And you still have Marlene - you know how she looks up to you."
"Yeah," I agreed, feeling my face grow hot.
"And you're one of the smartest people I know," Tifa went on. "Even smarter than Cloud, and you know he's really smart."
At that, I had to laugh, watching the way that her face lit up with a bright smile.
"You're going to do fine in school," she finished. "And you know that Cloud and I are always here for you, Denzel. It might seem like it's too much, but know that it will soon get better. It's a big adjustment, but I know that you can do it."
"Thanks, Tifa," I responded, feeling the weights slide off of my chest. She held her smile, then stood, coming around to my side of the booth to offer me a tight hug, her hair smelling like rosewater as I held her back.
She's like a mother to me.
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Watching her run through sun-covered hills and orchids that were filled with flowers when her legs were barely strong enough to carry her across the grass had been one of the first moments that I had felt filled near to bursting with love for her. She looked just like my wife, even at that young, early age, her hair growing long by the time she was just four years old, her almond shaped eyes the same color as her mother's.
My wife had died some years later. I wasn't sure how I was going to cope with that gaping loss. My world, for years, had revolved around my wife, and when Tifa was born, it began to rotate around her too. But my wife was my rock, was the most beautiful woman in the world and had meant everything to me, and when she had fallen ill, I thought that I could save her and that I would have more time.
There was never enough time.
She died, and my grief forced me to bury my sorrows in drink, so much so that I didn't notice the way that Tifa began to fall apart, more deeply affected by the loss of her mother than perhaps even I was. I didn't notice when she cried in her room all day, her friends traipsing noiselessly through our home as they tried to comfort her, and I didn't notice when she got up and ran through the front door, taking off for the mountains where she would fall almost to her death.
I noticed her absence when the village boys came to my door, telling me that Tifa was in trouble, one of them even saying that Cloud Strife, the little boy next door, had gone with her up into the mountains. Terror gripped me, and I grabbed my rifle, running through the paths that led up into the dusty, windy peaks of Mount Nibel with a friend from town trailing behind me.
When I finally found them both, Cloud was lucid and crying, but Tifa was laying in the dirt, her body twisted and covered with scratches. Her hair was tangled in a halo around her, blood lining her forehead as I gently turned in her in my arms and lifted her to my chest. She was as limp as a rag doll, her head lolling to one side as she fell into my embrace, one arm dropping to dangle at her side.
I had been so angry that I didn't even look at the little boy who had gone up into those hills with her. I said my piece and turned away, my blood boiling as I resolved to keep her away from him for the rest of her life.
She'd been in a coma for a week now, and as I sat at her bedside for the seventh straight day, I stared down at her face, my heart bleeding throughout my chest. Now, more than ever, she looked exactly like her mother, her face so youthful and full but still carrying my wife's sharp, western features and that glossy spill of dark hair that was like endless ribbons of black silk. In the space of a week I was nearly losing them both, and I ducked my head, praying for the thousandth time in those stretches of days that she would come back to me.
"Papa?"
My head snapped up at the sound of her voice, and I looked up to find Tifa staring at me, her head still against her pillow but both scarlet eyes now open. I sat back instantly, my heart racing as I realized she had finally awoken from the slumber her brain injury had confined her to.
"Tifa," I responded instantly, reaching for her hand. "My sweet, sweet girl. You're awake."
"What happened?" she asked, looking around, a dazed expression on her face.
I explained it to her, and then I wrapped my arms around her. When I told her once more that her mother had died, it was as if she had already forgotten, and she began to cry again. I moved to sit on the bed, pulling her into my arms and rubbing her back as she sobbed. She was so, so small, and she fit against me with ease, crying her grief and losses into the tassels above my vest.
"It's going to be okay, Tifa," I said to her. "Papa is here. We still have each other, but I need you to be strong for us both, okay?"
She sniffed, looking up at me, wiping her eyes with the side of her fist. "Okay, papa. I will be. Is Cloud okay?"
I shook my head, not really wanting to think about that little troublemaker. I reached up to brush her hair out of her face, then slid her off of my lap and back onto the bed.
"He'll be fine," I answered. I started to tell her that I didn't want her hanging around that kid anymore, but she had just woken from her stupor and I didn't want to upset her. I let it go for now. "I'm going to call Dr. Samuels over to take a look at you. In the meantime, you must be hungry. How about I bring you some soup?"
"Okay," she agreed, her smile lighting up my entire world.
I learned that day that I would do everything I could to protect her after that, that I would never make the same mistake that I had a few short days ago, that I would never let anything happen to her.
She's my only daughter.
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Sometimes I stare at her from across the room, unaware that I've distracted myself from my maps or my ledgers, catching her as she moves effortlessly through the bar She always works so quietly, joyfully tending to her customers when she pours them a drink or brings them a hot meal, her sunny disposition leaving everyone to want to spend all of their time here for hours. She wipes down the bar and rinses glasses and cooks homemade specials and pours over her books from behind the bar, and all I can do is just sit there and watch her, the same way that I always have for all of these years.
I glanced down at my left hand and the thin band of mythril and silver around my ring finger. We solidified our promise years ago, when Marlene and Denzel were still young and when Tifa had come to me one night in our bedroom, quietly pressing my palm to her belly as she told me softly that she was pregnant. As soon as the words left her lips, I asked her to marry me, and it was only days later that I was buying her a ring and weeks later that I was carrying her over the threshold at the altar.
That had been years ago. Denzel and Marlene were both in college now, having left the nest and leaving us with our daughter, Aster. We were a small family again, extended across the world, but in our tiny little home, it was only us, the girl I'd loved since I was a kid and the life she had given birth to from where we'd come together as one, everything that I ever needed.
I had already put Aster to bed when I came downstairs again and found myself watching her as she finished up for the night. She cleared the tables and collected gil from the last of her customers, turning the sign on the door around to "Closed" as she announced last call. She looked so tired, exhaustion bleeding across her face, and I got to work right away, stacking chairs on tables and bringing dirty dishes to the sinks in the back, gently but firmly encouraging some of her more reluctant customers to get moving.
When the bar was empty, Tifa finally stopped. I locked the front door and turned to her, staring at her from across the room. Her eyes were closed, and she rolled her shoulders ever so slightly, her neck craning from side to side as her brows furrowed with pain. Taking off my gloves, I dropped them into my pocket and crossed the room to her, silently maneuvering behind the bar until I was at her side.
"Tifa."
She turned to me, finally opening her eyes again as she looked up at me, those ruby-red eyes growing wide. Even though I had snuck up on her, she didn't seem surprised by my sudden appearance, and she leaned into me, dropping her forehead to my shoulder.
"I'm so glad you're home," she whispered quietly.
Feeling the sweet press of her head against me set off all of my most deeply held feelings for her, feelings I had been holding on to for as long as I could remember. Without thinking about it, I gave her what she was silently asking me for, wrapping my arms around her and holding her tight to me. I learned a long time ago how to read her moods and how to uncover her needs, and I had promised once, years and years ago, that I would always give her whatever she wanted or needed, even if I had to deconstruct myself piece by piece to offer her anything that would make her whole.
She breathed softly into my chest, her breath warming my skin through my shirt. Words had never come easily to us, but we've gotten better at it over the years. Still, though, many moments like this transpired without us saying anything, touch and each other's proximity voicing everything that needed to be said.
"I'm here," I reassured her. "And I'm taking tomorrow off. I'm staying home with you and Aster, Tifa, and I want you to close the bar."
She looked up at me then, cocking her head to one side. "But tomorrow's Saturday, Cloud. It's my busiest day."
"You can take a day off, Tifa," I found myself scolding gently, unwilling to let it go. Just from the way that she leaned against me, I could feel all of the tension and the exhaustion in her body. She always pushed herself too hard, and if I didn't force her to stop and take these breaks, she would run herself into the ground. "You don't have to worry about the bar, Teef, it will be fine. But you need to take it easy. You're too tense, and you haven't been sleeping well lately."
She looked up at me again, shaking her head slightly as she offered me a smile. Her arms had looped around my waist, and she was holding on to me just as tightly as my arms had come to wrap around her shoulders, bringing us even closer together. Her hands slid under the hem of my shirt, and I felt the warmth of her palms against my bare back, instantly setting off fires under my skin.
"You worry about me too much, Cloud," she told me.
"It's my job, baby," I responded, and when she smiled up at me, I couldn't stop myself from dropping my mouth to hers, the softness of her lips sending me across the universe as we held each other and fused as one. My blood began the boil when she lifted herself to her toes and pressed the warm, soft front of her body against mine, and I squeezed her tight, soon scooping her up under her legs so that I could carry her upstairs and dote on her for the rest of the night like the goddess she was.
I finally broke our kiss, cradling her to me as I crossed the steps, bringing her into the bathroom where I could wash all of her exhaustion and pain away. But she didn't want to let go of me, clinging to me as I drew the bathwater, and I sat on the edge of the tub for a long time, still holding her in my arms as hers wrapped around my neck and she pressed her lips in a line over my jaw.
She was so giving and selfless that she would let herself fall apart if I didn't take care of her. And no matter how much time stretched in the years between us as we grew older, I would never again fail in my promise to her, a promise that I had renewed and avowed to her over and over and over again as the years passed us by.
She's my best friend.
The love of my life.
The mother of my children.
My entire world.