Reason to Live

By mihoyonagi

Chapter 13

There is an old saying that states 'you don't choose to fall in love,' and whatever bastard said it deserved the cold death that awaited him at the end of his life because he was masterfully and painfully correct.

I never chose to fall in love. I didn't wake up one morning, pull myself out of bed, to wholly and without a second thought decide that I would fall in love, and that Yuffie was the one waiting for me at the end of the rainbow.

Life doesn't happen like that. It never happens like that. Happy endings are few and far between, if ever.

Yet I found that for the most part, I was never more at ease with myself – never before feeling more like a man instead of a monster – than when I was with her.

She's the way life should be lived; anyway you damn well please.

And, as I began to understand, she was exactly what I'd needed all along.

The morning after we'd kissed, the mood was tight. I'd retreated to my bedroom after I'd left hers, locking myself in the bathroom until the early hours of the morning. I'd showered, and then sat on the toilet draped in nothing but a towel until dawn. Then, when my brain had run itself ragged inside of my head, I'd dressed and forced myself back into my daily routine.

I didn't wrap my hair or cover my eyes.

I went downstairs and began breakfast, something I'd become accustomed to for the nearing two years I'd lived in the manor with Yuffie. Bacon, scrambled eggs, pancakes; I cooked anything and everything I could, willing my hands to occupy themselves in order to distract my mind from the inner turmoil I wasn't able to cope with.

She'd been so forgiving when I'd stopped her; so understanding when she realized I hadn't know what I wanted.

I knew she was in the kitchen, despite her not having made a sound when she entered. She sat on the barstool in front of the breakfast nook, and I felt her eyes watching my back as I finished slicing the fruit.

"Morning."

What else was I supposed to say?

"Morning."

She was taking the awkwardness in stride.

"So, why'd you do it?"

I faltered and nearly cut my finger. Turns out she wasn't taking it quite as I'd first thought.

It was a long while before I spoke. She sat in silence, patient, waiting for my reply.

"Because I wanted to."

I finished cutting the rind from the cantaloupe and scooped it into a bowl, placing it on the counter top in front of her.

"Okay."

That was it. That was all that was spoken between us for the rest of the meal. That was all she needed to hear from me.

Here I was, horrified I'd done something perverse, wondering if I was even ready to open up to another woman again and Yuffie... Yuffie was just worried I hadn't meant it. She knew I was scared, but she was only fretting over the idea of me not having meant to kiss her.

We ate our breakfast in silence, and when we'd finished I felt better than I had in a long while. We put the rest of the fruit in little plastic tubs, stored them in the fridge, and went our separate ways for the remainder of the daylight hours.

On a whim, I decided to start a fire in one of the drawing rooms on the west side of the mansion when night fell. The particular room in question had grown on me, and I had been using the empty shelves that lined the walls as my own personal library. The shopkeep in town had started stocking more books, in which I presumed he did mostly for me and the fact that I bought at least two a week. Yuffie speculated that I was single handedly keeping the shop from going under.

What? I enjoy reading. What else was there to do?

It was nearly midnight when I heard her knock on the door.

"Come in," I answered, not looking up from my book.

"Hey." She stood near the door, as if waiting for me to give her more direction. I folded the corner of the page I'd been reading, and focused my attention on her.

The look on her face betrayed her emotions- guilt, curiosity, unease.

"Something you need?" I tried to keep my voice low, letting her know that while she'd interrupted my reading she wasn't bothering me.

"Yeah." Her voice was small, a characteristic not usually associated with her, and she was avoiding my gaze.

I reached over, placing my book down on the floor, and patted the seat cushion next to me.

She obeyed, still not looking into my eyes. She sighed, looking at the fireplace. It was obvious she was trying to gather herself, to find the right words, but that logic was escaping her.

"When I asked you this morning why you kissed me..." Yuffie's voice trailed off.

"I answered you truthfully."

Biting her bottom lip, Yuffie turned her gaze to her hands. "I don't pretend to understand you. I really don't. Sometimes I think I've got you down, but I... I guess I just want to know why you stopped, why you pushed me away, in your own words."

"What, then, is your speculation?"

Turning, her eyes scrutinizing as if she believed I was mocking her, she shrugged. "I don't think you'd like it."

"Try me."

"I'm telling you; you won't like it."

"Tell me what you think, Yuffie."

"I think you've got a self-righteous stick up your ass. I think you don't like letting yourself have something you want, or something that makes you feel good, because you're still hung up over your dead girlfriend and all of this 'penance' bullshit. I think you're pretending to be level-headed around me, but that you still feel the same way you did when I first punched you in the face two years ago. I think you can't let yourself go, let yourself be happy, because you're too worried you're going to fuck it up again. I think you're scared shitless over letting something new into your life. I think that if I were to leave, you'd end up killing yourself, just like you had planned. That's what I think."

I sighed deeply, not realizing how much I upset her.

"You're right. I didn't like it."

"Told you."

"But that doesn't mean that you're wrong."

She stilled and closed her eyes, her only movement the steady expansion and compression of her chest as she breathed.

"You're right. I do, as you put it, have a stick up my ass. I lost myself, my humanity and almost my life, to the last woman I trusted with my heart. Can you really blame me for being the way I am? You are the only thing tying me to this world, Yuffie, and for the first time in nearly thirty years I'm scared to die. That doesn't mean I don't want to, it just means that my life has a little meaning. Even if that meaning is making breakfast for us everyday. You count on me. That's enough for me to stick around."

He mouth quirked up in a fraction of a smile. "First time in thirty years? You're older than you look, that's for sure."

"I'm nearly sixty, Yuffie."

"What would you do if I left?"

It was a shocker. I hadn't expected her to ask a question like that.

"I don't know, Yuffie. I really don't know."

Her bottom lip trembled. "Would you kill yourself?"

The silence that passed between us was morbid and dank.

"Other than you, what else am I living for? I've seen Cloud and the others a handful of times since we escaped the crater. I spend my days with you, holed up in this musty house, reading and napping."

Her dejected sigh made me ache. Yet, I refused to lie to her.

"Take it however you will, Yuffie. You are my reason to live."

I watched her face, trying to gauge her reaction by it. Her bottom lip quivered, and I knew she was going to cry.

Before she let the tears fall, however, she leaned over and kissed my forehead, just as I had done the night before.

"Goodnight, Vincent." Her voice was flat as she stood and left the room.

I was too annoyed with myself to finish reading my book. My head ached as though it had been hit with something heavy, and my stomach was twisted into knots that made me think I was going to vomit.

Standing, I doused the fire and left the room, retreating to my own bedroom. On the way, however, I stopped outside Yuffie's door. I raised my hand, poised to knock, and stopped myself. Nothing I could say would make this better. Either we'd wait it out, or she'd punch me again.

I heard the gentle rustle of fabric behind the door. I heard her footsteps, and the occasional hiccup that signaled an end to her tears.

Once in my bedroom, I forced my body to sleep.

When I woke up, the house was silent.

I lay in bed for hours, listening to the quiet of the house, wondering what I'd gotten myself into.

All it had taken was a kiss...

I dressed, and, like I'd done for nearly everyday for the past two years, I descended the stairs and prepared to make breakfast. When I opened the fridge, however, I noticed that several containers of fruit were missing.

Dumbstruck, I closed the door and walked back upstairs. Pausing outside of Yuffie's bedroom door, I knocked too loud purposely and knew that I waited in vain. After a moment, I opened the door.

Things were missing. Subtle things; a hairbrush from the nightstand, the little black chocobo plushie she'd won on our excursion to Costal del Sol the winter before...

And on her neatly made bed sat a folded origami crane.

I unfolded and read it with shaking hands.

'I shouldn't have butt into your life. I shouldn't have stopped you from doing what you felt you had to. I shouldn't have forced my company on you for the past two years.

I shouldn't have kissed you.

But most of all, and it hurts the worst, I shouldn't have let you kiss me back.'

I sat down on her bed, realizing with cold clarity, that I'd chased her off because I couldn't open myself up. I curled up and simply let myself grow stagnant. My body was numb; my mind was numb. I cursed myself over and over for my blatant stupidity.

Why couldn't I change?

It was three days later when my phone rang. I knew it would.

"Hello?"

"Vincent, we need to talk."

Tifa. Shit. I was sure to get a new asshole ripped.

I stayed silent, letting her lead the conversation.

"What happened?" She sounded more anxious than angry.

"Nothing."

"Nothing? I find that hard to swallow, Valentine. We got a call from Cid last night, telling us that he was dropping Yuffie off as she'd just randomly showed up on his doorstep asking for a ride, and as soon as she got here all she did was mope. She's up in her room, pissed off and tired and won't even respond when Cid goads her. What the hell did you do to her?"

"Absolutely nothing, Tifa, and that's the problem."

"What?"

It was mine and Yuffie's business. No one else's.

"Tifa, I need something from you."

"Vincent, I-"

"Please, Tifa."

"... What?"

"Tell her... Tell her that if she ever wants to come home, I'll be here."

"Vincent, what the hell kind of favor is that? You need to-"

"Just give her the message, Tifa. Goodbye."