(A/N) I decided to update a few days early, just so I could wrap up this story. :3

Holding On
Chapter IX

I only stayed in Nibelheim for a few months after receiving the news of Cloud's death, until I finally couldn't stand being there anymore, because the memories of him were everywhere and they were all just too painful for me to stand. At the age of seventeen, I left the little town that I grew up in and went by myself to go live in Midgar, eventually ending up renting an apartment in the slums and working as a waitress in a local café.

It was a frightening thing, being all alone in a city that enormous, but it did ease the pain in my heart to be somewhere unfamiliar. I had been living there a few weeks when I made my first friend; a kind girl named Aeris that showed up in the café where I was working. The two of us quickly bonded, brought together by a common event in our past. She too had lost a man she loved to the Wutai war, who I later found out had actually been Cloud's friend that was in SOLDIER, Zack.

Time passed by steadily, and the longer I was away from my old home the easier it became to come to terms with all of the things that happened to me there. About three years after I had been living in Midgar, a man with short dark hair and kind brown eyes came into the café to have a cup of coffee. I didn't pay him any mind at first, but he insisted on introducing himself to me, so every time that he showed up in my workplace after that the two of us begin talking and steadily getting to know each other. Soon I began to see him outside of the coffee shop as well, and he eventually became one of my closest friends.

Though my heart still hurt from losing Cloud, he made me happy, and before long I even began to consider him to be more than just my friend. By some miracle, he was able to understand the pain I was still dealing with, and being with him started to heal me. We dated for several years after that, and when the time came that he asked me to marry him, I was ready to say yes.

It's been ten years now since the day I learned that Cloud wasn't going to be coming back to me, and I now live in a small house on the upper plate of Midgar. I've been married for almost five years now, with a nearly four year old son and another one on the way, growing inside of my belly. I fell in love with working in the coffee shop below the plate, so I now run my own café that's down the street from our house, called Seventh Heaven. It's a simple life, but one that brings me daily joy.

While I'm doing dishes one afternoon, there's suddenly a knock at the front door. I hesitate, trying to figure out how I'm going to be able to answer it, because I'm covered in soapy bubbles up to my elbows. My son is playing at my feet too, so I don't want to leave him alone in the room. Luckily though, as I'm leaning back to peer out of the kitchen and towards the front of the house, I see my husband come down the stairs and walk over to the door.

I sigh in relief, glad that he heard it without me having to call for him, but I decide to dry my hands off just in case whoever it is at the door has come to see me. I rinse the soap off of my skin quickly, and after drying off on a dishrag and lift my son into my arms, balancing him on my hip as I start to move towards the front door. Sure enough, my husband comes around the corner a moment later, looking confused.

"There's someone at the door asking to see you," he explains, taking the little dark-haired boy from my arms.

I walk past him, puzzled as to who could be at the door that my husband wouldn't already know. I pull the door open when I get to it, and when I look up at the face of the man standing outside my heart nearly stops beating. He's quite a bit taller, a lot more muscular and his cheeks are covered in blond whiskers, but the bright blue eyes staring back at me leave no doubt in my mind; this is Cloud.

He stares back at me silently, seeming to realize that I need a moment to get my vocal chords to start working again. Even when I am able to force words from my lungs, they still come out in a faint whisper.

"Cloud?" I ask, though there's really no need for me to verify who he is, because I'd know him anywhere.

A wry smile lifts the corners of his mouth slightly. "Hey, Tifa," he says quietly.

The sound of his voice, though it's a little deeper and more raspy than I remember, sends chills down my spine from hearing it after believing for so long that I would never get to again. It takes me another moment to regain my composure, but then I tell him the first thing that comes to my mind.

"They told me you were killed," I choke out, realizing that it's still hard for me to talk about, even though he's standing right here.

Cloud glances away from me, and I see a look of pain flash in his eyes. "ShinRa covered it up," he almost growls, and then he turns back to me, drilling me with a serious stare. "Sephiroth, the first class SOLDIER that everyone praised as a hero, he lost his mind during one of his missions in Wutai; slaughtered every one of the men that were under his command."

I swallow, nearly frightened by the emotionless way that Cloud says this, but trying to keep my focus on the information that he's giving me.

"What does that have to do with you?" I ask hesitantly.

His face softens a little when he seems to realize that he was scaring me, though his words aren't any less horrifying as he answers my question.

"The squad that Zack and I were in happened to run across the scene right after it occurred," he explains. "ShinRa couldn't afford any information about one of their best men committing a crime like that getting out to the public, so they couldn't risk letting any witnesses to that crime walk free."

I shiver involuntarily, knowing that this must be the reason why he was gone, and the explanation for why Zack was suddenly declared to have been killed in action in Wutai, just like Cloud was. A faraway look appears in Cloud's eyes as he speaks again, and I know he must be reliving the horrors that he's telling me about now.

"Rather than killing us, they held us all prisoner," he continues gravely. "Me, Zack and a few other guys were able to break out of there a few weeks ago, but I think ShinRa probably already executed the rest, to prevent another escape attempt."

He's avoided my eyes for most of the time he was telling me his story, but when he's done he looks back up at me. It's easy for me to see the pain in his eyes, and how all of these horrifying things that have happened to him in the past ten years have changed him. As he gazes at me though, a smile begins to appear on his lips. It's one of those genuine smiles that lights up his eyes, and in that moment I catch a glimpse of the boy that I was in love with so many years ago.

"You look really good, Tifa," he says, his eyes drifting down to my swollen stomach.

I smile back at him, thankful for the change of subject. "You do too," I agree. I step to the side of the door automatically, realizing that I've left him standing on my porch this whole time. "You're welcome to come in, if you'd like," I offer.

Cloud's smile fades then, but he doesn't look unhappy, just resigned. He leans towards me carefully, and my eyelids slide closed as I feel him press his lips gently to my forehead for a short moment. He pulls back from me, though his face still remains mere inches from mine. When I open my eyes once again I see that his smile has returned, though it looks somber this time as he stares back at me for a long, silent minute.

"I will always love you," he says softly.

I close my eyes again, my heart squeezing almost painfully from his words as I try in vain to stop the tears from breaking free and rolling down my cheeks. Cloud's next words are nearly silent, but he's so close to me that I'm able to hear them clearly.

"But you have a life here," he continues. "And I don't belong in it anymore."

By the time I'm able to wipe my tears away enough that I can see, Cloud is already several yards from me, walking down the path that leads away from our house. I try to force myself to call out to him, to beg him to come back, but I just can't seem to find my voice. There's nothing wrong with my throat though, I realize; I just know that Cloud is right. We've been apart too long, and I've moved on out of necessity, so no matter how much I want there to be a place for him in my life, there just isn't one anymore.

I watch him go silently, knowing that all I can do is pray that he will find something to ease the ache in his heart, like I have. A small smile forms on my lips, because I realize that even after everything I had to go through, Cloud did keep his promise to me after all. We can't be together, and both of us will have to endure pain over this, but he came back for me, just like he promised he would.

xXxXx

It had been over ten years since I had last been there, but after seeing Cloud at my doorstep that day, I was finally have to return to Nibelheim, and go up to sit on top of our hill. It hadn't changed much, though the tree did look a bit larger, and once I got there I realized that this was something I needed to do a long time ago; to come back here so I could finally let go of the hurt I felt over losing Cloud. I had thought at one time that I had finally gotten completely over it, but I know that just like the locket he gave me when I was sixteen, the one that I could never force myself to get rid of, I had still been holding on to hope that I would see him again someday.

I'm happy now, and I'm more than grateful for everything that I have, but somewhere in the back of my mind I know I will always have to live with wondering what it could have been like if Cloud hadn't left to join ShinRa, and we had gotten to be together. I know though, that no matter how much time goes by, I will never forget the time that I spent with Cloud, and a part of my heart will always belong to him.

The End

(A/N) Because true love is wanting happiness for the person you care for, no matter what that means for you. :3

I cringe at having to write any kind of character/OC, especially with Tifa or Cloud, but maybe that's part of what makes this a tragedy. O.o I apologize for not warning about that pairing, because I know that, like me, a lot of people don't like that sort of thing. I felt that it would ruin the plot if I warned you though, and the ultimate message of the story is still Cloud/Tifa, so…don't kill me, okay? ;) I seriously need to figure out some good names for original characters; it gets tricky trying to avoid that all the time. O__O

Thank you so much to everyone who reviewed!
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And thank you to anyone that added this story to their alert or favorite list, and to anybody that will review/add this in the future. :D

-punkiemonkie