Chapter V :: Awakening

I couldn't breathe. I hadn't eaten since breakfast that morning, and it was already three in the afternoon, yet I wasn't in the least bit hungry. My eyes stayed focused on the cement and tar under my mud-caked boots, leaving it to the other passerby and lampposts and cars to avoid me. Occasionally I would walk close enough to see Barret's heels flash in and out of my limited field of vision, and I would drop back behind, keeping up the distance between us. Since he had stopped in the middle of the sidewalk on the way to the hospital, he hadn't said a word to me, and now on our way back to the apartment, neither of us said a word. I blinked, fighting the vertigo. Even in my deepest state of thought, the disease had not dissipated as I had thought it would—I could still walk, but barely.

I couldn't feel my heart beating beneath my ribcage, and that worried me. My hands shook inside my pant pockets, as I thought. As I knew. As I remembered.

"…Please, help her…" What could I do? How could I do anything at all? For the three months she had been that way—the way I had seen her, pallid and unmoving, her face and body frozen into an eternal pose—and now that I had shown up, did I expect her to suddenly awaken? Something inside me told me it wouldn't be that easy.

From my place constantly behind Barret, and with my view of his wide back, I hadn't a chance after we left Tifa to witness his expression as we exited the building; neither of us were eager for common interaction, and I wasn't sure I wanted to see what he was thinking in those large brown eyes. But Marlene took one look at her father and didn't bother to even glance in my direction. For the rest of the evening she set out cleaning and cooking supper, keeping herself busy to avoid both us men as much as humanly possible.

And when the two began a conversation at the table, I continuously found myself incapable of speech.

"Papa…?" Barret didn't answer, and I didn't move, both of us lost in thought. "I want to see Tifa."

To say he was stressed out was an understatement, and for a moment a look stretched across his face that suggested he would rather be comatose with Tifa than active with us, with the living. He blinked, and continued eating.

"No."

But giving up was not in her plans—after all, I had gotten to see the young woman, and God knew I was less emotionally stable than she was.

"I want to see her! Cloud got to—"

"Cloud," responded the black man, slowly, his patience clearly being stretched, "is a guest. And he's known Tifa a lot longer than you." The answer he gave would have been inadequate for me, but it was his voice that quieted any objections I would have had towards the unreasonable answer. And it was Marlene's fight anyway, not mine, as everyone clearly recognized; I stayed still. He refocused on his plate, chewing meditatively.

The little girl's face scrunched up into an expression of rebellious dissatisfaction.

"I haven't seen her at all! She's my friend too!"

"Marlene…"

"You're acting like she was only your friend. But…I miss her too." It occurred to me that Marlene did not know the full extent of Tifa's condition—not that way that either Barret or even I did, after witnessing it first hand: to save her fragile child's psyche, her father had tried to protect his daughter from the harsh reality of what had really become of her self-appointed mother-figure. "I haven't seen her since she went to the hospital. I want to see her!" Of course, she had to have heard his shouting, back when I was still ignorant of it, of everything.

Brain-dead.

The chewing stopped. Barret swallowed, and I could see him forming his words in his mind. And then, I realized something I had never before seen in him, in all the near two years I had known and grown to befriend him: I saw him as a father. The fact had never truly hit me, and now, as he tried to lay down what was to be a crushing defeat on Marlene's part, I knew I couldn't commiserate with his struggle. I knew I didn't particularly want to be able to sympathize with having to support and six-year old while at the same time providing for a surely hefty medical bill. I sat and I watched as he glanced up from his food, to stare at her, bearing his exhaustion like a last attempt for empathy. He sighed.

"There's nothin' t'see. She's asleep, just layin' in bed all day. She has a lota tubes in her arms, keeping 'er fed. Doctors say she won' wake up 'cause she's dreamin'," he explained. "There were a few signs of 'er wakin' up when she 'eard Cloud's voice. You'll see her when she wakes up. I promise." It was a comforting tale, whatever the lie that is was. I would have liked to believe it. For it to have been real.

For the second time in one day, I saw Marlene as the six-year old that she was. She took this information in, and after a few seconds of consideration accepted the fabrication as truth.

If only. If only it were that simple.

--

In the second, the transition from the last and final closing stages of sleep to the full awareness of being awake, I saw spots. That wasn't good, was it? It certainly wasn't normal. I blinked, soaking in the sunlight, and they disappeared. But still. I knew to take it slow as I crawled from the couch. And I made a special effort to watch my footing as I walked down the steps from the apartment, into the steaming, melting streets of Junon.

She was addicting. The woman in the wheelchair; the beautiful, hideous creature that had replaced the friend I had known. She was unavoidable in the ways I wanted her to be. I didn't like looking at her face, and usually kept my eyes towards anything that actually moved within the white confines of her new home. I couldn't leave her be because I felt guilty. I found myself constantly returning to see feed off of the fact that her body was still alive—a fortuitous accident that meant there was still hope for her return. I continued to come back, ceaselessly wishing and anticipating the day when her eyes would focus, or the twitch Barret had kindly made up for Marlene's benefit. I showed up even if I was alone, unaccompanied. When Barret was forced to work. When Marlene was in school. I became a regular, an expected occurrence, the everyday cheer whether I was sicker than normal or less enthusiastic than I needed to be.

But nothing ever changed. The nurses and keepers always steered her towards that same window, and wherever her gaze happened to rest was where it stayed. Her fingers remained limp and pallid, so small in my palm. Her eyes kept the dark rings, her joints sharp and jagged. I could always see the emaciated concavities in her collarbone, and the gaunt cheekbones that jutted from her colorless face.

I told her things. I relayed to her my day. On occasion I would describe and depict my ventures around the planet, visiting the towns where I knew no one and living on me and myself. I mentioned our friends as much as I was able, as much as I had seen them in the past year. I spoke of the gradually diminishing mako-borne monsters that were once so abundant. Things I knew she hadn't cared to give attention to after news of my death had spread. I imagined her smile when I told of Marlene's wish to see her, and I heard her mellifluous voice when I made references to past conversations, comments I had meant to question, subjects I had meant to investigate.

And as I had been dead to the rest of my only friends, I was again alive. Cid cursed me off for being so careless, chastised me for letting things getting so fucking out of control. Yuffie screamed in what was more of a high-pitched screech that I was jerk, and now that I was back it served me right Tifa's sick, after everything I've done to her. Red gave a smooth sigh of gratitude for my well-being, and prayed that my presence would do something to the situation we had all found ourselves in. Vincent said little, delivering his salutations and anticipation for my further recovery and Tifa's awakening. It wasn't so much painful as it was unbearable, the anxiety more grueling than the experience. And after the several weeks of sleeping on a couch and eating meals that needn't be paid for, I figured I had been through enough to be able to face any further obstacles that should arrive.

After three months, and the additional several weeks, Tifa remained hidden, a shell.

I grew tired, I became worn, and I was relentless.

Whoo. "…wasn't so much painful as it was unbearable" is the exact way I would describe writing this. But here it is. Like I said, it's a filler, used for reinforcing information, blah, blah. Hopefully the plot will start to kick up next chapter. For those of whom who are confused about it, yes Cloud is still sick. Mildly, but still feverish and dizzy and all that good stuff. You'll see why in the next chapter (scandal!). Oh, yeah, really sorry about the curse word in the second section. I would take it out, but it seemed right to me—so Cid. No offense to anyone. And major thanks to all the support I'm getting with this! I feel so loved! Raine