For some reason Barret and Cid and Vincent are already there when I open the door. There is no sobbing or murmurs of comfort because I went in the wrong door and found an old woman telling a sob-story about how run-down her neighborhood is after Cloud's last fight. I find the right room five doors later. Some kind of lab or infirmary. It reminds me of a loony bin, but I decide not to say anything.
Barret is fiddling with his fluffy vest and Vincent GothDude Valentine is leaning on the wall and Cid is on one of the only four chairs in the room. Denzel and Marlene share another chair and Rufus is on a plush and cushioned recliner thingy with the Turks gathered by him like little hatchling chicks around a mother hen. A serious-looking doctor stands by the wall. Tifa is leaning over Cloud and Cloud is sitting in the last chair.
A wheelchair.
Cloud is in a wheelchair and my mind finally manages to respond. This is wrong.
Cloud is strong and able and stands tall and zooms on the newly made highways at a kazillion miles an hour on his bike.
Cloud was strong and able and stood tall and zoomed on the highways at a kazillion miles an hour on his bike.
Past tense makes it sound so different.
Barret's face is scrunched up with some sickening mix of worry and fidgety-ness and I can almost see text scrolling across his face. It wasn't supposed to be this way. Cid is pumping enough smoke to turn my lungs black as a passive smoker and it shrouds his already stormy expression in a hazy smog. Vincent's face is icy and betrays no emotion. I can tell from the way he drums his clawed fingers that he's agitated.
Rufus catches my gaze and gestures very pointedly at Tifa with his eyes. Tseng clears his throat lightly, Elena looks away sympathetically, Reno blows his bangs out of his eyes and Rude shifts his feet. Before I know it I'm standing in front of Cloud's wheelchair while Tifa bends over him, talking softly like you would to a sick person.
I have time to think Cloud broke his leg or dislocated an ankle but his legs and feet look okay. There are no bandages on him so I almost think Tifa forced him into the wheelchair because she's so overprotective.
Then I see his face and something just feels terribly wrong even though I can't place it. The Great Ninja Yuffie struggles to see what's wrong. Bite lip nervous twitch twitch run eyes over Cloud and then I finally see what's wrong.
His chest expands and falls gently as he breathes. In the silence of the room I almost swear I can hear his heartbeat. Pitter-patter. Pitter-patter. His face is fixed in some kind of stoned expression. Frozen. He blinks every now and then. Very slowly. I almost check my watch to make sure time is going at the right pace.
He blinks once, twice, thrice. I watch him blink but he doesn't see me. In the background I hear Tifa talking to him like he can hear her. Before I realise it I am sitting on the floor with my hands under my head on his lap. His legs are warm and I half-expect him to shove me off. I imagine Barret and Cid and Vincent looking surprised because Yuffie doesn't act this way.
Yuffie laughed and said hee hee hee like a demented doll when Aerith died because she couldn't say anything else. Now she lays her head on Cloud's lap and tried to remember what it was that made everything go bad. What sort of little problem brought down a big man.
Big Cloudie Spike who means a lot to everybody. Because it's Cloud and company and not Yuffie and company, or Cid and company, no matter how much we want it to change.
Because it's Cloud and family. Cloud and Tifa and Marlene and Denzel. Because Tifa and Marlene and Denzel made me think of widows with children and no husbands and Tifa wasn't even married.
I imagine Cloud and Tifa getting married and myself throwing the most rice at them just because I want to see what they look like with rice all over them. I imagine being GREAT Auntie Yuffie to Marlene and Denzel and whatever kids they might have.
If Cloud can't get his happy ending it means none of us ever will.
If Cloud couldn't get his happy ending it meant none of us ever would.
How come past tense makes no difference now?
