Blind Love, Chapter 9: Beauty and the
Freak.
He loosened his collar another time and willed his knees to stop their little trembling without successes. His hair seemed awkwardly ruffled for as he came to pick up Elena from her house, a fashion sensitive bookcase decided to collapse on him. He managed to save the vase though.
He loosened his collar again. Elena giggled, but said nothing. Knowing her parents, he had a good reason to worry.
They climbed to the balcony of her parent's house. She was dressed in a colorful, flowerful dress that her mother had sent her last Christmas and she felt obliged to wear. She added a white, cute ribbon in her hair.
They exchanged glances. Elena's was reassuring, Vincent's was mildly hysterical.
She pressed the buzzard.
The door opened wide with both Elena's parents standing in the doorway. In unison, they scanned Vincent toe to head:
Black boots. Slightly pointy.
Black pants. Ironed perfectly.
Bronze metallic claw. With sharp, curving digits.
Black shirt. Turtleneck.
And jet black hair that made his blood colored eyes shine brilliantly and emphasized his 'death on a bad day' complexion.
"Holy… " Elena's mother mumbled in utter horror.
Vincent smiled sheepishly.
Elena's smile faded, leaving a hollow expression. This didn't start as she hoped it would.
It started as she hoped it wouldn't.
Then, with a roll of her eyes, Mrs. Soir fainted.
Vincent was the first to react, leaping to her side and grabbing her before she fell. He lowered her to the floor while Elena lifted her feet.
Elena's mother opened her eyes, only to meet Vincent's red eyes and faint again.
From there, Vincent knew, things would only get worse.
"Please, Mom, try to calm down." Elena begged. She, her mom and her father were in their bedroom. The mother had a damp towel on her forehead and was acting overly dramatic. Elena was miserable while Vincent awkwardly sat in the living room with Elena's young sister.
Elena's mother, Elisabeth Soir, was a broad woman in her late fourties. She had brown reddish hair and may have been pleasant looking in her youth. Now she was… Full.
"I'm trying, dear," She replied weakly, "I'm trying…"
"So." Elena's sister (Michelle) started a conversation, finally giving up on Vincent starting it. The later didn't even have plans in that direction. "How come you look like a refugee from the freak show?"
Vincent wasn't at all insulted by the remark, he was quite used to that kind of reaction. In fact, the blunt question brought a smile to his lips. Michelle was sprawled on the sofa, looking at Vincent intently.
"Heard about Shinra?" He replied, flexing his claw's digits absently.
"Sure I did," she retorted with a hint of insult, "I'm not that young."
"How old are you?"
"15.5" She stuck her chin up with pride. She had certain similarities to Elena, but her chin was stronger and her hair darker, not to mention shorter.
Vincent took a deep breath and tried to find the shortest, less detailed version of his story that wouldn't have to include the parts that he didn't like. It left little… Actually, it practically left only the connecting words. But before he could start, Michelle said,
"Is it true that Hojo did this to you 'cause you fancied his wife?"
Vincent was struck rather speechless, but managed to say with a frown,
"Yes… That's more or less it. How do you know that?"
Again she stuck up her chin, she thought it made her look older and more mysterious, when it actually just made her nostrils look big. She laughed and said,
"Elena has a soft spot for melodrama, you see, so one day she walks into the living room all mushy, so I ask her 'what's your problem?' and she's like sighing and stuff- all mushy, see, and so she tells me about this boyfriend of her's that has a really melodramatic life, and so I'm like 'what?', and she told me most of it, she's really has a soft spot for melodrama, you see."
Vincent simply blinked a long moment, his brain slowly interpreting the flow of words.
"I see." He finally said coolly.
"What do you think your parents think about me?" He asked awkwardly.
"Oh, they hate you," She said with a smile, "they didn't like any of Elena's boyfriends since they first met Tsang. They liked Shinra, see, they, like, got most of their money from investing in it, see, and when it fell, it, like, kainda ruined us a little, see, so they really liked Tsang 'cause he was, like, a Turk, see, and since then they hate every boyfriend she had, see," here she paused a short moment to draw breath, "Except James." She concluded.
Vincent raised one brow and asked a bit suspiciously,
"Who's James?"
Michelle opened her mouth to talk, or rather, to babble, but Elena's father, Smith, entered the room with a big, warm, forced smile. Vincent raised courteously as he approached. Smith's smile widened, and he reached out his hand to Vincent, who was glad he wasn't left handed.
"Sorry we weren't properly introduced before- I'm Smith Soir, Elena's father."
The handshake was short and weak. Vincent tried not to look too intimidating yet not timid.
"Vincent."
He decided best not to tell them his last name. If they were on the Shinra side, they might of heard of AVALANCHE and of his association with them. He was sure it wouldn't make them like him any better.
"A pleasure to meet you," Smith nodded his head,
Ya, right.
"Please sit down! Don't stand on my account." He gestured to Vincent to sit down and sat on the opposite sofa, forcing Michelle to move.
A long silence followed, disturbed by the distant organizing of dishes. Smith gave his youngest daughter a meaningful look, that she didn't understand, so she simply stared back at him. Finally he said,
"Go help you mother and sister in the kitchen, love."
She got up and went to the kitchen, more than happy to leave the center of tension. Vincent got up and wanted to go help as well, but Smith motioned him to sit down,
"Let the women do the kitchen work." He decided. Vincent nodded and sat down.
Another long silence came.
If he was the same as he was when younger, he would of never gotten up, but Lucrecia taught him differently… his cheek still would throb when the weather would change.
"How old are you, sonny?" Smith broke the silence,
Older then you are…
"27, sir."
Silence.
Then another silence, shorter this time.
"Come to the table!" Elisabeth's voice rang noisily from the kitchen. Vincent was sure to get up only after Smith did.
Sometimes thecourtesy they thought you as a Turk can be really useful.
He walked after Mr. Soir to the kitchen. Elena and Michelle were already seated and Mrs. Soir brought all sorts of meals to the table;
Steamed potatoes in sour cream, Smoked salmon with quail eggs, an assorted cabbages salad… Most of the dishes Vincent couldn't even recognize, but he suspected them to be no less fancy then the rest.
It seemed that while Shinra collapsed, the Soir family had managed to save a good portion of their money.
Elena seemed to deliberately avoid eye contact with him.
Elizabeth offered him a chair across to Elena, which he sat in, thanking her.
On his right side sat Michelle, sending curious looks in his direction. On his left side sat, to his horror, Elizabeth Soir.
They ate.
Vincent unleashed everything he knew about manners and curtsy from his Turks days, hoping not to make too many mistakes, and keeping his claw under the table.
"Pass the gravy, please…?" Elena asked timidly, (They hardly talked in dinner, the Soirs, so a dreadful, anxious silence loomed over the meal, taking away the little taste the food could have to Vincent.)
He had to pass her the saucer with both hands, what only increased the tension. He had to extend the bronze colored metal arm across the table to reach her.
It glimmered under the fluorescent light.
"Please, try not to scratch the china…" Elena's mother requested, mentioning the sharp fingers.
When Elena took the dish from him, he was quick to withdraw his hand back, knocking over his glass in the rush. Luckily for him, it was empty, and the claw only scratched the glass a little. Vincent was sure that without his enhanced sight, the scratch would be practically invisible.
While painfully swallowing down the food before him, he vaguely wondered why Elena refused to meet his eye, or why she seemed so uncomfortable with him around. Was she ashamed that she had such an atrocity as a boyfriend? Did she regret him coming? Maybe she was sorry that of all the men she could meet, normal and friendly, she met him?
It's hard to eat while everybody's constantly looking at you.
Except Elena.
If there was a time when Vincent wished that Sephiroth's plan did succeed and all life would be erased from existence, it was now.
After what seemed to Vincent like another thirty years of torture (and just as fun), the meal was over. The women got up and started tidying up. Still Elena wouldn't look at him, no matter how hard he tried to catch her gaze with his. He needed a reassuring smile now more then ever.
Maybe she is ashamed…?
"Vinnie boy," Smith opened. Now that dinner was over, the real torture could start. Vincent was never good at expressing himself. "What is it exactly that you do for a living?"
Vincent feared this question.
"I… I am not in any particular business at the moment, sir." He replied. He glanced towards the sink and saw Mrs. Soir holding up his drinking glass and examining it. She smiled a little, 'knew it' smile and before Vincent's eyes, tossed it into the bin. Vincent said nothing and returned his look to Smith.
"I see, why try something that you know you can't do, huh?" He laughed and Vincent smiled weakly, nodding vaguely.
He felt that he was expected to say something, so he said,
"I used to be a Turk, sir."
That made everybody in the room freeze for a split second. Except Elena, who was drying the dished like there was no tomorrow.
"You were?" Suddenly Elizabeth's attention focues on the red eyed daughter threat.
"Yes." He nodded, "It was some time ago, and one might say that I went on an early retairment." Smith smiled, presuming that he meant the fall of Shinra.
"What happened to that other Turk friend you had, love?" He called to Elena.
"He's dead father. Over a year now." She replied icily. Elena's father only smiled and looked back at Vincent.
"A pity. Was a nice chap. Did you know him, sonny?"
Vincent would wish Smith would stop smiling so much. Either that or he wished he brought his gun. He blinked away the homicidal thoughts with a "Pardon?"
"I asked if you knew that Turk chap? What was his name?"
"Tsang." Elena's voice was getting colder by the minute.
"Right. Tsang, that's was the lad's name- Knew him?"
"No, not personally, sir."
Elena's mother was standing near Vincent, scanning him from above. Vincent tried not to twitch or meet her eye, fearing she'll faint again.
Smith continued, oblivious. He straightened up in his seat and called to Elena again,
"Love, what was the name of that other blok? The one that came over the other day, looking for you?" A thunder rolled. A storm was coming
Elena carefully placed the last plate down. She looked at her father calmly, but if looks could kill, her father wouldn't have enough left of him to bury.
"James." She said with ice that chilled the room a few degrees.
"Right, James, nice blok, why didn't you invite him over as well, love?"
Vincent listened to the exchange with rising suspicion and even some dread.
Again? Another man? What was it with him and women who had boyfriends? At least this time she's not the guy's wife… Yet.
Again he felt the ever so familiar pain in his heart. Outside, his face remained unchanged.
The conversation continued a little while he wasn't listening. Elena's parents looked at her severely, and she seemed on the verge of exploding.
Vincent figured it must be something he'd done or said. She found out what he was and now she regretted the whole relationship.
There goes that pain again.
"Vincent," Elena turned to him. He resisted the urge to cringe under her hard look, "Could you please wait a minute in the living room? I need to talk to my parents a moment."
"Certainly." He said, then he left the room to the living room.
Once he left, Elena turned to her parents. Her anger had finally surfaced, her cheeks blushed and the lightning in her eyes competed with the ones striking outside.
She whispered angrily, remembering what she heard about Vincent's hearing. She knew he wouldn't try to eavesdrop- but she wanted to make sure he wouldn't hear.
On the sofa in the living room he sat alone. The storm out side pured down. Drops of rain streaming down the window.
He concentrated on the noise that the rain made to block out the conversation in the next room. He could hear it easily if he wanted to, but still he had no way of avoiding catching snippets of it, though he could not, and would not discern who said what. Words like;
"…Clawed freak…" "…No good…" "…James already asked for your hand, we said yes…"
He concentrated harder on the rain. The tiniest splatters each dropped met as it hit the window... Then thunder rolled and in the silence that remained after it he heard clearly as if they were standing by him;
"…don't want you to ever see that horrid monster with a claw again!"
Vincent's placid face was a stark contrast for what went out in his innards.
'Again? Why must it happen again? It's not fair! NO!'
The pain in his heart grew fierce.
His stoic, cold eyes scanned the room aimlessly, trying to find someway to ease the pain. Then he spotted just the thing.
'What have I done wrong this time? It's not fair! I tried! DAMMIT. It's not fair… What must I do? Have I no right for a little happiness? DAMMIT. Warmth… love… Caring… They aren't worth anything to me… I'll never… Am not capable of love… Being loved…'
A long time did the bickering in the kitchen continued. Elena was on the verge of tears as she stormed out of the kitchen. She called Vincent… she needed the strength he gave her…
She froze. And looked around. He was gone.
Elena picked up a little note placed on the coffee table, it read:
'To the Soir family,
Thank you for dinner.
Vincent Valentine.'
She read it out loud, disbelieve in her voice,
"Valentine?" Smith asked, "Isn't he from AVALANCHE?"
Elizabeth nodded, "Aren't they incredibly rich after all the mess last year?"
Both parents were silent a moment, then Smith looked at Elena and smiled,
"Too bad he's gone, wasn't such a bad blok, after all."
Elena shook with a wanting to kill them both. Her Turk instincts were hard to supress- anger a Turk only if you've got nothing to live for. She breathed in deeply and tried to think clearly:
Where could he go?
Another thunder rattled the windows, and Elena, peeking out of the window by the door, saw that the car was still in the driveway.
That means…