Disclaimer: I don't own FFVII. None of my work aims to detract from it in any way.

AN: Some fucking bastard stole our newest PC yesterday. I hate burglars! They should die very painful deaths, preferably by being poked a thousand times with long needles (or katanas, or shuriken, or kunai) until they die slowly from the internal bleeding. Arg…at the very least, this computer is (obviously) still intact. Sorry for the slow updates, but I'm very bogged down with SAT prep. I'm taking the April Fool's Day test, and my piano test is on the same day…so don't worry, all the promised fics will be posted some time after the tests. Short chapter today.

Soundtrack: "The Color of Love," by Rainie Yang, who is a very cute Taiwanese pop princess

.:Vicissitudes:.

The boy is nervous as he sits on the stone bench, fidgeting with the small bouquet of white lilies held loosely in his hands. Vincent is faintly amused as he watches the youth from the other end of the bench. In the pagoda courtyard before them, the sakura trees are blooming, shedding their wayward petals of pink into the scented air. The air is thick with shifting waves of the soft flowers, and they cover the ground with snow that is does not melt. The boy is unmindful of neither the beauty nor his watchful gaze, and he licks his lips and sighs, trying to calm himself. Seeing him, Vincent can not help but remember those times, and he asks.

"Who is she?"

The boy turns to him in surprise. He can not be more than sixteen. "Huh?"

Vincent looks pointedly at the lilies. "The one you're giving flowers to."

He laughs. "Um…well, she's so pretty, even though she doesn't think so, and she's really nice, except when she hits me…and I'm supposed to be waiting for her here," the boy says, his voice trailing off in embarrassment. A ghost of a smile appears on Vincent's face as he hears these little cliché sentiments; he wonders if he sounded the same so many years ago—how long had it been? A decade? A century? He doesn't remember anymore.

The boy looks at him curiously, at the plain Wutaian yukata that he wears. The sleeves are unusually long, covering over his hands so that only his fingers are visible. His raven hair falls in an unruly wave down his back, and the man has taken no attempt to control it. The boy can't see his eyes, but the nostalgia in his eyes is clear.

"Did you ever have a, um, girlfriend?" the youth asks, inquisitive.

Vincent doesn't answer immediately, and the boy waits uncertainly. After a minute, the teen gives up and begins to brush sakura petals off of his hair. That is when Vincent's voice surprises him.

"She always loved the sakura, she told me once. She said it was because they were so deceptive—they are famed for their transience and frailty, aren't they?" he said, and the boy nodded. Sakura were the symbols of the ancient samurai of Wutai, for their lives were as short and intense as the cherry blossoms.

"But she said that no one ever knew what they truly were. Sakura aren't ephemeral harbingers of spring, she thought. They were little gifts for the trees to cajole them into summer, into another year of sticky red cherries under the sun. Another year, and yet another year, for the trees were the true strength of the season, and the flowers their celebrations." He smiles and picks a fallen blossom up from the worn stone tiles. The boy is enraptured by the cadence of his words. "That's what she said, but I think she secretly loved them for their beauty too, but she would never admit it. And she made me promise to come every year, and to feel the warmth of sunshine through the flowers."

"It sounds like you loved her very much," the boy says respectfully. Vincent doesn't respond, but merely blows the blossom back into the dancing breeze. "The sakura sure are nice this year, huh?"

"…"

The boy forges on bravely. "Heh, there hasn't been so many flowers since the year Lady Kisaragi died twenty years ago," he says, not seeing the sudden light in Vincent's eyes. "I wasn't even born back then, but my mom says it was like it was raining sakura petals all over the pagoda, like Leviathan had granted Lady Yuffie's last wish or something." The boy turns to Vincent. "Hey, your girlfriend's kind of like Lady Yuffie, isn't she?"

Vincent stands up suddenly, and the boy starts. "She is here," says Vincent softly, looking to the grassy path that leads to the pagoda. A smile lights up on the boy's face as he sees her waving at him, a basket on her arm.

The boy turns back to him, and says, "Thanks for talking with me, mister."

Vincent nods in acknowledgement. "May your love last as long as the sakura trees," he says, and walks off as the girl bounds up the steps into the boy's arms.

And as he strolls back to the little house beside the bell where he has been living for years now, he smiles as the petals flutter in the zephyr, touching his face lightly.

"I've kept the promise, Yuffie," he says to the wind. "I've returned every year, and I haven't wept. And every year, the sakura blooms as our love did."

AN: Thank you for reading! Rainie Yang's music can do wonders to your mood. The other fics are coming along, but I need to prepare for the SAT, so I can't finish them yet. Please be patient!