Chapter VIII :: Haine, Part II

I stepped forward, towards her glaring figure. My hip collided with something sharp and solid, and I glanced down, staring at where should have been a white, marble-tile floor and instead stood a dark, beaten piano. Sheet music cascaded to the floor, as I stared around me. We weren't in the hospital anymore—we weren't even in Junon. My feet thumped on wooden panel flooring, and the sound resonated throughout the small house. Tifa, startled, backed away from me, bumping herself into the window seat in her bedroom.

"What are you doing here?" she asked again, in a tone that suggested she was more than slightly annoyed with my presence. I grinned, picked up the fallen paper.

"I should be asking you the same question, Tif. I've been looking all over for you…" Searching desperately for the conscience she had hidden away from everyone. I took another step, and she backed away, her eyes darker than before. "Tifa, what's wrong…?"

Her chest heaved, as if she were having trouble breathing. "Go away."

"But it's me! Cloud. You have to—"

"I know who you are. I'm not stupid," she retorted. "I don't care who you are. What are you doing here? I don't want you here. Go away." The words came out hot and broken; I couldn't believe what I was hearing—there had to be some mistake…

"Go away? But…"

"Don't you listen? I don't want you here! You're not supposed to be here—no one is." She paused. "I'm not going with you! Leave me alone!" I had never thought it possible to be this confused. I knew better than to attempt to shorten the gap between us, distressed as she so clearly already was, so I stayed. My pelvis had begun to throb slightly.

I glanced up, to the mahogany beams in the ceiling. The sun was beginning to set outside, and the room was drowned in purple, humid colors. The side of her face burned orange, making her eyes glow from the depleting sunlight.

"I don't want you here," she hissed between her teeth. "I came here so I would be alone! Surely you of all people should know the meaning of that word."

"What?!" I stared at her incredulously. "What in the world are you talking about? Why would I…?"

"Leaving all the time, leaving me, leaving everyone. You're so selfish, you wouldn't understand how any one else feels even if you tried. I told you I didn't want you to be here and I meant it! I'm supposed to be alone now." She laughed somewhat, but without humor. "The one time I want solitude you decide to come looking for me. How ironic." My brow furrowed; something was very wrong with this picture, with Tifa herself—never had I heard her talk to anyone this way, much less me. All her characteristic amiable features were gone—all I could see was anger, an emotion unnervingly close to hatred. "So go. I'm giving you my blessing to leave me alone. I don't want to see you anymore. I want to forget about you; I thought I was doing a rather good job, too, until you showed up." She straightened, her lips pursed together in a defiant white line.

"You heard me," she said, her voice rising. "Get out!"

"Tifa, please, listen to what I have to say…" I thought I had some idea of what was going on, if I wasn't pretending at this point.

"Get. Out." She stood, her entire body pulsating with rebelliousness, before me, every muscle tense with what now I was certain was hatred.

"Tifa, please, you have to listen to me. You have to wake up—if only you could see yourself…"

"Go away! Leave me ALONE!" It was more of a shriek than anything else, and I forced myself to keep my hands at my sides, not to cover my ears; even with all my years of knowing this woman, I never knew she could scream so loudly. "I can't take it anymore!—You never understood. You still don't," she spat, "that all I want is to be left. Alone. Away from everything. Away from you! I can't stand being around you!" Her words stung, so much as to threaten my will. These were the lies, the little lies she had whispered to herself in the night, the consolation she had used as a replacement for me.

Trying my best—it wasn't good enough; I couldn't give up. For her. For me.

"Listen to me! Please, just give me second to explain—" For a moment I expected her to leap at my throat, as she stood and fumed. But she remained still, gaze unwavering in the receding light.

"What's wrong with you?!" she shouted. "God, I don't know what I saw in you! You're too stupid—you don't get it! I came here because I wanted to! I want to be alone, I don't want to have to listen to your excuses anymore! All you've ever done is hurt me! Every single goddamn time you never fail to make me feel like complete shit!" Her eyes narrowed into slits, focusing the venom. "And now you managed to follow me here—my sanctuary, and expect me to go with you, back so you can hurt me even more."

I glanced around once more. "To Nibelheim?" How had I gotten here? How had she gotten here?

"Yes, Cloud, to Nibelheim. My Nibelheim, my home. Now get out!"

I wanted to scream at her, as she was to me, but I knew that it wouldn't do any good. The rage that seethed and tumbled in those fiery irises frightened me, and as I looked at her, I realized with a sudden jolt that this wasn't Tifa. Not completely—it couldn't possibly be. It was only a part, a segment, a strand of the fabric of the emotions that had swept her under the waves, and had locked her in this undercurrent without any chance of resurfacing, of breathing again.

"Tifa…"

"Get out." Her knuckles were pressed white, and blood had begun to seep through her fingers from clenching her fists hard as she was. "Get out! Go back to your flower girl and forget about me! So I can finally try and heal!"

I stopped. "Flower girl…?" She sneered.

"Yes, Cloud. Your flower girl. Or did you forget her too—maybe you're just so oblivious you didn't even notice her existence either. Maybe you're just too stupid to realize that she's dead!" I didn't know what to do, I was so angry; so confused.

"What?!"

"You heard me. She's dead and there's nothing you can do about it—oh, you could have. You could have stopped her from being murdered, but you just stood there and did nothing!" At the moment, I couldn't breathe. "Maybe you didn't care about her, I don't know. No one knows what you're thinking, ever, if you are thinking." She seemed proud of herself for making this observation. "And before you go making stupid, rash decisions let me tell you that you can't do anything now. Coming here was useless because you can't change anything. I like being here, because I don't have to deal with people like you."

She's lying to herself, convincing herself she's happy where she is, away from everyone.

She was putting up an awfully good fight, though. It was very near like trying to reason with a cement wall, not a crack or missing shard to mar her livid resilience. I wondered, among several other things, if at all there would be a break, an opportunity to show her what lies these were, the malice that flew from her mouth; Tifa was shooting me hostile looks not even Sephiroth had gotten the privilege of receiving.

"I should kill you—the world would be so much better off." She bared her teeth, like a rabid animal about to pounce. "I should rip your heart out and make you eat it, shove it down your lying gullet and make you suffer for all those times you treated me as if I was nothing. I'm not NOTHING, Cloud!" I winced as she screeched again. "You can't treat me as if I'm a piece of garbage you can just throw away whenever you feel like it! I'm not! Youcan't treat me like that!" I hadn't realized she felt that way, I hadn't…

"Tifa…" I fished for the inspiration; even if it was a dream. "I'm sorry if I made you feel that way—I hadn't realized…" She ceased to move, waiting for that exact moment. I swallowed. "I wouldn't want anything to happen to you," I started again. "You're my best friend, the one who's always been there for me. Aeris is dead." I knew it. "But you're not, you're still alive. You just have to wake up, just wake up and see that I'm there with you…"

She inhaled sharply. Then it died: the resentment, the hatred and spite that had driven her to threaten my life, disappeared as quickly as I had seen it grow and control her. Her expression softened—the light, rapidly dimming, cast hard shadows across her eyes, masking them from me. She stepped back, further from the sunlight.

"That's it then." It wasn't a question.

She recoiled further, escaping entirely the small plane of light spread across the wooden floor and becoming swallowed in shadow. Like an ember losing the heat that had kept it alive, she dwindled and wavered, leaving her open, unprotected. She shivered, just slightly, as though cold. I held my hand out to her, knowing better than to physically move closer, knowing her response. "Just come with me," I said. "Wake up and see." She shook her head, folding in on herself.

"No. I don't want to go." She sounded small, meek, like a child afraid of peaking from the security of under the bedclothes, afraid of what she might see.

I was surprised at how drastic and quick the change was. Where once she had been poised to murder, now she acted as if I had stabbed her. Whatever I said, it had struck a cord somewhere. It had broken through and found her.

"C'mon, Tif. It's okay. Just open your eyes…"

She closed her eyes and shuddered. "Don't try, please. It's too late."

She had backed herself into a corner, hidden until all I could make out was the outline of her pallid face, the darkness of her lips and the emptiness of her eyes; I could see the contrast between her free-falling hair and the wall behind her, black against the whitewash. She hugged herself, and her mouth formed words I was too far away to hear. She was trapped, there was nowhere for her to run, nowhere she could go. I could confront her now, take her and hold her, show her that I was real. I attempted a step towards her, only to find that I couldn't move—someone's hand was on my shoulder. I shifted, tried to jerk it off, but whosever hand it was had an iron grip, and I remained where I was, so far away from her. I called at her to come to me, only to find that the more I said, the more she cowered; the more I struggled, the tighter my oppressor's grip became.

I awoke with her words ringing raucously in my head, "…It's too late."

The nurse stared down at me with large, blue eyes—so light they were almost grey. Sensing my waking, she brought her hand back, and stood staring at me as I collected myself, trying to make sense of what had happened. Tifa lay where she had when I'd left her, utterly unconscious. Had it been a dream…?

"Visiting hours are almost over. You should go home, get some sleep there," she said. Her crinkled face stared morosely at me, then briefly settled on the bed's occupant. Tifa hadn't stirred. "Y'shouldn't be sleeping here."

I stepped out into the street, slightly dazed and thoroughly confused. It had to have been a dream, as disturbing and unsettling as it was—Tifa never would have yelled like that to anyone, had she been awake. Dreaming was the only things that made sense…

…her mind, it's locked away. You are the only one who can reach her…

I thought.

Past the towering buildings and the spread of asphalt, across the ocean, the sky flamed in the dying heat of sunset.

And the lesson of today's story, children, is that when Tifa gets pissed, she gets pissed. I surprised myself when I reread this. Heh. I have to agree with relena55 in that it is somewhat satisfactory to see Cloud suffer, if just a little. Anyway, here's the next chapter, as promised. I hope it won't be too hard for me to concentrate from now on, as it has been lately, even though I have to live with the next few months knowing that I practically have a reserved copy of Advent Children waiting for me when it comes out (it's good to have connections). Thank you so much for your support! It keeps me going. Raine