"A little simplification would be the first step toward rational living, I think."
- Eleanor Roosevelt
-. Wait For It .-
Chapter XIV: Rational Numbers
"Aww, hell..."
"Marlene! Language!"
"Sorry. Didn't mean it."
"Fine. Where is your tie?"
"I don't know."
"Damn it!"
"Denzel!"
"Sorry!"
"Argg! Where did my bag go?"
"It's in the kitchen. Make sure you have your lunch."
"Crap."
"DENZEL!"
"SORRY! But these shoes don't fit right."
"What? They were fine last week?"
"Well, apparently, I'm bigger."
"Umm, did you put almonds in my pudding? I can't eat them, remember?"
"Dammit."
"Cloud!"
"Sorry."
"For the love of..."
"Tifa!"
"I'm sorry!"
"I'M HERRREEEE!" Yuffie jettisoned herself across 7th Heaven's threshold with a twirling flourish, fully prepared for a stampede of excited squealing and hugs. This was the day of all days after all. Every Midgarian child she had spotted over the past week had been buzzing with anticipation, proudly strutting with their uniforms and books, almost salivating at very notion of learning. It was a celebration which she strived to bask in during its inevitably short lifespan of, best case scenario, forty-eight hours.
Alas, the Strife-Lockheart-Wallace household seemed to be distracted with other things. Though she could hear the jumble of their voices close by, no one was making any effort to greet her.
"Hmph," she muttered with her hands on her hips. "And after all that effort I made to-"
"Yuffie!" Tifa unexpectedly came barreling through the kitchen door. At least, what used to be Tifa did. The wide-eyed, mess of a woman approaching was wearing a stained tank top and sweatpants, her usually free flowing hair was a half-done, unwashed braid and her face was dotted with flour; hardly recognizable as the owner of this notoriously fine establishment. In one arm she was balancing a precarious heap of folded gym clothes, various luncheables and textbooks while the other had a life-threateningly firm grip on one of the house phones.
"Thank you. Thank you for coming so fast. I owe you." Hurriedly, she dumped the larger burden over and took a grateful step back, hugging the phone to her chest. "Don't forget to tell them about Marlene's allergies. Or-or that Denzel should probably be moved into advanced mathematics. Okay? I have to go. Thanks again." Without any more instruction, she suddenly spun and ran, leaving her bewildered and speechless friend struggling to balance the mass of stuff in her arms.
"Tifa, wait!" No sooner had she disappeared up the stairs, that her partner exited the kitchen, also looking uncharacteristically disheveled and, frankly, a little lost. He paused with one foot on the first step to follow her but then, slowly, stumbled back into the landing instead. There he lingered with his eyes focused so strongly on his toes one might think they were about to sprout talons.
Yuffie, feeling increasingly uncomfortable, eventually cleared her throat.
His eyes whipped toward her then with obvious surprise, offering only a brief nod to acknowledge her presence before also disappearing up the staircase.
'What the heck...?'
"Ready!" Marlene popped out of the kitchen, all smiles and sunshine in her new, pristine uniform and blindingly pink backpack. The sight of her was enough to bring Yuffie to instant tears and forget all about the parental unit's oddness.
"Ah! You look so gosh darn beautiful Marley!" she sputtered in genuine awe.
"Why thank you Madame," she answered in her best, grown-up lady voice followed by a deep curtsey, holding out the hem of her navy tunic. Yuffie's heart nearly exploded with pride.
"Wonderful! And where's your handsome brother on this most epic of days?"
"Here." Behind her appeared Denzel, his eyes downcast with an unexpected air of misery. He was dressed in the standard navy pants and burgundy tie with the strap of a brand new leather bag slung across his chest, but was obviously not very happy about any of it. "I don't see the point in even going to school," he insisted. "They're just going to relocate us any day now anyway."
"You know that's not true." Cloud had returned, tripping on the last few stairs as he rushed forward to adjust Denzel's collar and brush off some invisible dust. "There are new standards now that Deepground's contained. The appeal went well. We just have to-"
"Whatever." Roughly, Denzel shrugged himself out of his once beloved guardian's clutches and moved to stand in front of Yuffie, gaze still fixed to the floor. "I don't care. Let's just get it over with."
"Denzel!" she exclaimed, shocked to the core since the boy had never shown anything but respect toward the man who had taken him in. She tried to meet Cloud's eyes, to come up with a silent, mutual plan to re-encourage him, but the SOLDIER was obviously distracted.
She realized then that something was wrong. Immensely wrong. For long, anxious seconds, the four of them stood awkwardly by the entranceway, waiting for someone, anyone, to break the tension.
It was the phone that did it in the end. A shrill ring that, for whatever reason, made Cloud suck in his breath. They all listened to the click of it being answered, the muffled voice of the greeting from upstairs, and then, an inexplicable, unnerving silence.
"You should go. You're going to be late," Cloud prompted, guiding the three of them toward the exit. But upon his hands landing on Yuffie's shoulders, he found she could not be budged.
"Unburden me, little ninjas," she commanded, and without further instruction Marlene and Denzel knew to empty her arms of their contents so that she could cross them over her chest and seem more menacing. "I think we'd all very much like to know what is going on here?"
"Yuffie...this isn't a good-" his eyes shifted to the ceiling just as a muffled shriek penetrated the house. In reaction, Cloud's hands moved to rub down his face as Marlene and Denzel shared a deliberate, disturbed look. She may have been out of the loop, but it didn't take a detective to figure out the basics. Especially when something smashed on the floor above, loud enough to make every one of them jump.
"What the heck did you do Strife?" she hissed menacingly.
Even if he wanted to, he didn't get a chance to answer. For seconds later, a blurry-eyed Tifa burst through the doorway with obvious fury on the tip of her tongue, the cordless phone still gripped in her hand, before she noticed the larger-than-expected audience.
"You-You should all be in school," she muttered to no one in particular, her fingers clenching and unclenching like a genuinely deranged person, "why aren't you in school?". As a collective unit, they all took one cautious step back.
"We're on our way," explained Yuffie with a raised eyebrow, her pupils swiveling between all the other family members, hoping for some sort of explanation in their stances. None of them had any to offer. "Relax Teef."
"Relax?" she repeated with an uncharacteristically shaky grin. "You want me to relax?"
"Tifa," Cloud found the courage to step forward, as strangely frightened though he seemed. "So...it's true?"
The barmaid took a deep breath, but her eyes filled with thick tears despite the effort. "You- you said this couldn't happen. I was told this couldn't happen, years ago. How do two 'not-going-to-happens' equal it happening! It doesn't make any sense!"
"Tifa please. Calm down."
"YOU CALM DOWN!"
The phone was then vigorously chucked at him before she ran back up the stairs, but thanks to his still relatively fast relaxes, Cloud was able to catch it a mere inch from his face with little concern.
If the children found this odd, they said nothing. They merely began organizing their various school supplies into their bags while Yuffie stood there with a nearly unhinged jaw. She had never seen Tifa lose her temper like that. Even when fighting for their lives, she had always maintained composure, a master of her rage. It was practically unearthly for her to act in such a, frankly, crazy manner.
"Seriously Cloud. What did you do?"
"Tifa's just been sick," explained Marlene with her usual optimism. "It's nobody's fault."
"Yeah," agreed Denzel as he closed his bag's zipper. "Since the Deepground attack, living in the caves, rebuilding, she's been a little...weird. It's no big deal. Just stress."
"You mean this has been going on for days?" Yuffie asked, stunned. "Well, what if it has something to do with those mako treatments she was on, huh Cloud? Have you asked one of the doctors about it?"
"Yes. Yes, of course we have," he muttered while rubbing the phone antennae between his closed eyes. "You guys...you'll be late for school. Get going."
"What? We can't just leave-"
He grabbed her bicep then, more roughly than he ever would have dared to in the past, and pulled her closer to his lips.
"Not now," was his urgent plea. "Not today. Let them have today."
"Please," he finished out loud as he pulled away, knowing that the children would, thankfully, continue to play deaf.
Despite her curiosity, now turned to genuine worry, there was no ignoring that tone in his voice. Yes, something big was happening in this household. But she was no longer sure she needed or even wanted to know what it was.
"Marlene? Denzel?" Yuffie held out her hands and they, like the amazing and still anxious children that they were, eagerly took them. "Let's get you educated."
It was indeed the promised morning of epic proportions.
To celebrate Deepground's defeat in addition to the school's opening, the WRO had set up a small festival to welcome students and their families to Edge Elementary. Though it wasn't the most instructive version of a home-room class, Denzel and Marlene had both immediately dropped their tense demeanors as soon as the inflatable castle came into view.
It had been just what they needed to get their minds off of Tifa and Cloud.
Yuffie, however, didn't have the luxury of such a short attention span. Despite what others may think.
And though she bounced with them, slid with them, ate cotton candy and cheered louder than anyone after Reeve made his introductory speech, her mind always reverted to her two friends in their emotionally dilapidated bar, obviously going through something major. And when the time came to part with the children so that they could actually start learning, she feigned resistance, even going so far as to steal the air generator. But after a short chase and expected laughs, after all the kids were all lined up into their classes and marched into the beautiful new building, Yuffie stole away as fast as she could toward 7th Heaven and prepared to face whatever horrors it contained.
Of course, she was in-part simply curious because of her shameless drama-addiction. That would never change about her. Of course, selfishly, she worried how it may affect her taking over the bar's Edge location as a franchise, seeing as their new place in the country was nearly complete. But most of all, to her surprise, she worried about the Denzel specifically. Just seeing that look on his face, as if the case was already thrown out and they were all merely procrastinating packing for the orphanage. As if he was expecting it, just another harsh blow dealt by fate as soon as he started to feel safe again. Honestly, she wasn't sure if his bruised and battered spirit could handle another such loss. She didn't think he could survive it.
All of them, that entire family, had been through too much for this not to work. They just needed a little more time to prove how loved those kids were. Though, now that she thought about it, it may not be the best of times for someone to seek evidence of Tifa's mental stability.
Yuffie returned to the 7th Heaven to find Cloud exactly where she had left him a couple of hours prior; in the bar. Except now he was perched on a stool with a half-emptied glass of burgundy liquid in front of him and his forehead on the counter top.
Definitely not a good day to prove parental competence.
Gingerly, as if approaching an easily startled wild animal, Yuffie slid herself into the seat next to him and waited. On the upper floor she could hear the echo of someone stomping around, but decided that the other half of this enigma was still beyond the reach of reason.
"Sooo..." she began, tapping her fingers on the bar just beside his head. He twitched but otherwise remained ignorant of her presence. Nevertheless, she lingered, both sympathetic and persistent in her silence, knowing that his once infallible apathy had since become rather fragile.
"She's going to kill me," he eventually mumbled into the granite. "I intend to stay here until she does."
"Ah." Yuffie nodded, as if such an answer was expected. "Can't say I blame her."
"It's not my fault. They said it was extremely unlikely. One in a million, that's what they told me. Therefore, it's really not my fault."
"Agreed."
That one word finally encouraged him to turn his head sideways on the counter and look at her, his glazed blue-green eyes searching for some sign of acceptance. Alas, despite her best efforts, all he found was bewilderment. "Never mind," he returned to pressing his face into the stone. "You don't understand."
"But I do...actually. I get it."
And suddenly she did, to her own surprise.
It was obvious once you stepped back from the situation and stripped away the labels of 'war hero' and 'business owner' and 'adoption applicant' and 'mako guinea pig' plus all the melodramatic baggage they included. There were already enough complications to choose from in simply being a man and a woman in a relationship. And this one especially, if her assumptions were correct, was quite the "complication". This couple in particular probably would have preferred another life threatening battle as opposed to such a relatively common, yet horrendously ill-timed game-changer.
She was about to console him, about to give him a rousing speech of how lucky they would find themselves in the end and how she'd to be around to help as often as she could, but then one strange fixation stuck out in her mind.
"Question: how exactly, except in the obvious way which I don't want to know anything about, are you responsible for this? Why is it, specifically, your fault?"
Cloud sighed while blindly reaching out to drag his drink closer. This was the stupid part. "I skipped that test and didn't tell her. I didn't want to know, since the odds were so bleak anyway due to my lengthy exposure to mako plus Tifa's accident. I wanted to...pretend I was normal. If only in some minute way. I assumed it wouldn't matter."
"Uh-huhhhh..."
Tifa really was going to kill him, and by the laws of sisterhood and common decency, she could do nothing but sit back and watch. "That's pretty bad Cloud."
"There's more," he lifted his head long enough to take a swig of the thick, potent wine. "The supplements she was on, I ordered the purest dosage, without any of the recommended additional safeguards. I didn't think she'd want any more hormones and drugs pumped into her than strictly necessary. She hates medicines, you know?"
At this point, Yuffie had to sit on her hands to repress the urge to strike him. "Really? You didn't even talk to her about the options or risks? You simply figured 'it'll be fine' and just...wow. That's...quite terrible."
"One in a million," he reminded her with a solitary finger in the air above his head. "It's a freak of nature...just like me."
For the sake of her girl friend, she tried to hate him. She really did. But something about seeing this legendary warrior so anxious and helpless, it couldn't help but tug at her heartstrings.
"There, there," she muttered while giving him some stiff, half-hearted pats on the back. "Everything will turn out fine, you'll see? It's a surprise, but as far as surprises in our rather theatrical lives go, at least it's not the end of the world this time."
"There's...so many complications." Cloud finally pulled his head off the counter and took a deep breath, staring aimlessly into the drink shelves as if wishing to be lost in them. "Physical and emotional and social. She's angry at me for hiding things. Money's tight. We're fighting so hard still to keep Marlene and Denzel. I'm terrified she'll get hurt or...or killed by it. This...this complicates things."
That was putting it immensely lightly. There was so much to do and they barely had time to even think about doing all of it. Tifa may have to check into one of those dreaded research facilities, possibly for her entire term, if she hoped to get through it alive. The new bar opening would have to be delayed, meaning they wouldn't have the money to pay back the builders on time, which meant further loans, which meant more work hours, which they wouldn't be able to do if they were in confinement.
And Denzel and Marlene...if they didn't get an answer regarding the appeal soon, they would be shipped to the orphanage by the end of the month. They would have been sent already if Deepground hadn't appeared and rearranged the WRO's priorities. Worst case scenario, he had promised to go visit them every weekend while they tried to arrange for foster care. But if Tifa's case proved complicated, which it definitely would be, they may have to relocate to the Wutain center. They'd have to abandon them. Again.
He had also promised Barret he'd take a contract to test alternate energy sources. And Reeve with his military scouts training. And the school's spring-fling fair he had volunteered to help decorate.
All abandoned.
And for what?
"I don't think I can do this," he heard himself whisper to no one in particular, already mentally packing his bags. Just like Denzel had.
So he had failed. They had all failed in making their unconventional family work, despite true efforts. There was no shame in it. A lot of people merely bit off more than they could chew and ended up choking. It happened every day. He had known the risks when he moved in with Tifa and Marlene, started the business, then brought in Denzel, his proposal, the first time he kissed her...He had always known it was a precarious situation; building blocks one on top of another simply adding to the structure's instability.
"I can't do this," he finally concluded, and the admission gave him nearly euphoric sense of relief.
He was too young, too nomadic and obviously too careless - as proven by the fact that this happened in the first place. The kids would find a more suitable family to adopt them. Tifa would take care of herself and do what needed to be done without his presence muddying the waters. Everything would sort itself out for the better if he simply disappeared.
It was at that point, just when he had settled on reprising his role as the lone mercenary, that Yuffie could no longer restrain herself.
So, naturally, she slapped him.
Slapped him harder than she had ever slapped anyone across the back of the head. Hard enough that he reeled forward and almost smashed his face into the counter.
"You can't do this? YOU?" she screeched, leaping to her feet so swiftly that her stool fell over. "What do you have to do but sit around and wring your dainty, ghost-white hands?"
She was on the brink of hysterically raging she noticed, but didn't care. If ever there was a time and a place and a person who needed to be raged at, it was Cloud Strife right here and now.
How dare he. How dare he even think about giving up.
"What about her, huh? Do you have any idea what she must be feeling? Here's a hint: take your petty moaning and multiply it by about a thousand. That'll be close. So get off your cowardly ass," a firm shove had him off the stool and stumbling towards the staircase "and go talk to her. NOW."
Fists clenched, at the ready to at least knock out a few teeth should he try to run, Yuffie watched as Cloud hesitated on the landing. He stood there for several seconds, hardly moving a muscle, watching his life up till now pass before his eyes and debating where it was meaning to lead him next. Though the road remained treacherous as far as the eye could see, though there were more dead ends and storms and traps than he could count along the way, only one thing had remained constant so far.
...and she was waiting for him.
Soon enough, the ninja saw him move up the stairs and her body automatically relaxed. Though it was probably a little callous the act so aggressively towards a man on the brink of ruin, she thanked every god imaginable that he was smart enough not to need to be told twice.
He strode to their bedroom with urgency, hoping that he could use a "ripping-off-the-band-aid" type of approach to this inevitably dreadful conversation. As long as he kept focused on one task at a time, one foot in front of the other, the panic attack threatening to drown him could be held at bay. For though his strength was being tapered due to the mako treatments, his emotions on the other hand had recently been known to run rampant.
It was quite exhausting, being normal.
"Tifa," he knocked on the door. No answer. The panic swelled a little higher. Emboldened by pure desperation, Cloud opened the door and stepped inside, only to find it vacant.
"Tifa?"
He checked the bathroom where she spent a lot of her time being sick these past few weeks, from what they assumed was remnants of her own treatments.
Empty.
He checked the office, thinking she may have wanted to distract herself with work.
Nothing.
She was known to straighten Marlene and Denzel's room between bar shifts, but she wasn't in there either.
He found himself in the middle of the hallway of an apparently deserted floor, feeling like his heart was trying to escape from his chest and mourning the failure of the band-aid solution in addition to everything else. It certainly didn't help to imagine her wandering the streets in her delicate physical and mental condition.
He was about to give up, to begin combing the city with Fenrir, when a strange creak cause him to pause. Strange because not only had he not moved, but it seemed to be coming from above. Cloud's eyes shifted upward and felt his spirits lift when the attic trap door came into view. In a few creative vaulting movements, he managed to kick in the cover and pull himself up into the space. All too soon, he was facing her.
"Tifa..."
She sat in the corner cross-legged, silhouetted in a halo of light from the single rounded window and surrounded by opened boxes. How she got up there without a ladder, he didn't want to know. There were too many months to go to start getting paranoid now.
"Tifa," he began again, daring to take a single step closer. Sadly, he had no idea what to say any further than her name. 'I'm sorry' was simply too weak for the situation he had put them in and 'It'll be okay' was just a blatant lie.
Luckily, she robbed him of the necessity.
"Cloud, look at this," she insisted, offering up something pale and flimsy in her hands. Cautiously, he approached, hands in his pockets, and waited for his eyes to adjust.
"...Something Nanaki coughed up?" he guessed once he was near enough to the ratty, moth-eaten scrap.
Tifa laughed, albeit softly. "No. Here. Take it."
Despite to urge to put on gloves first, Cloud accepted item and made to sit down across from her. It was a dress, he gathered eventually. In the light it was revealed to be vaguely pink, at least it had been once upon a time, with the remnants of a white, lace collar.
"It was Marlene's" Tifa explained, shuffling a bit closer. "It was what Barret found her in when he rescued her from Corel."
"That explains the soot." Parts of his fingers had become black where he touched the thing. "If you want to keep it for her, you should consider having it cleaned and vacuum sealed."
"Oh, its complete garbage now, I know. I just..." She learned over to snatch the garment back and then delicately spread it out over her lap. "Can you even imagine her ever being this tiny?"
'No,' Cloud answered himself honestly. He couldn't, and he had never cared to. He loved Marlene and Denzel for who they were in the present and who they may someday become. They had always been mature for their ages, and their households had joined years after someone else already taught them to be generally self-sufficient. Whatever had once fit into that dress was an entirely different sort of creature. One of the most terrifying he would ever encounter.
"She was only around ten months then," Tifa continued, completely ignorant of his catatonic state. "I didn't meet her until she was two and by then Barret had done all the hard work. She was so sweet. Not one tantrum that I ever witnessed, though he swore they happened sometimes. However, once she did put a couple of snails in my pillow case after I wouldn't let her stay up past nine."
She laughed again, but it didn't hold long. Soon she was merely wheezing, and not long after, she was quietly sobbing.
She had officially cried more times in the last few months of their relationship, than she had in her entire life before. This realization broke Cloud's heart.
Without worrying whether she was comfortable, without caring about the delicate relic on her lap or the high probability that she had a weapon with which to take her revenge, he drew her into an embrace. And she let him. Thank goodness she let him.
For as scared as he still was, it was so much easier knowing you weren't the only one.
"I-I don't think I can do this," she mumbled into his neck, unknowingly repeating the exact same words he had said to Yuffie a few minutes previously. "I...I can't do this."
"Tifa," he whispered, running his hands through her hair and down her back. Anything to give her some sense of comfort, though he had always been considered a poor provider of such things. "If there's one thing I'm sure of in this world, is that if you set your mind to it, you can do anything. Anything you want."
This was said not so much for mutual reassurance, but as a plain, inarguable fact. Many things once deemed impossible had been achieved by Tifa in her lifetime, the most notorious of which was him ending up here, in a home he helped build with an ever expanding family, in the arms of a woman that he could now freely admit he loved.
It may have taken time and effort and many days of screaming and tearing out hair as well as an equivalent number of days in utter wretchedness. But, in the end, it had been worth it.
It would always be worth it.
"This wasn't supposed to happen..."
Cloud chuckled. "I am very well aware of that. One in a million chance they told me."
"A statistical miracle, they told me."
"Then...who are we to deny a miracle?"
Tifa stiffened in his arms. Then slowly, experimentally, pulled back, only far enough so that she could see his eyes. To confirm if he was serious.
"Do you think...we can do this?"
He could only shrug with failed nonchalance, hoping she didn't notice that he was holding his breath. "I'm up for it if you are. As long as it's deemed not too dangerous for you. It...it could be fun."
Her eyes widened. "Fun? Really?"
"Well," he gestured with his chin toward the scattered pieces of Marlene's old clothing, "at least you'd have an excuse to replace some of these bio-hazardous materials."
"Uh-huh...and if it's a boy?"
Cloud felt a small influx of exhilaration enter his veins at the prospect, thrilled at finally having an answer. "Boys are simpler, trust me. They can survive off of two interchangeable outfits until they fall to pieces. Just ask Denzel."
She was about to give him a harsh lesson on the truths of infant-care, but decided to let him stay naive for a while longer. In fact, not analyzing things may just be the only way they could get through this in one, sane piece.
And so, with a deep breath, she expelled all her concerns with money, the adoption, the new bar, the physical challenges ahead, everything. Tonight, all that mattered was that she and Cloud were - for all intents and purposes - going to have a baby, and she suddenly couldn't wait to tell everyone about it.
"Call the gang please," she instructed, pushing herself to her feet and slapping the dust off her palms. Back as the resilient, optimistic barmaid they were all accustomed to. "We'll have a celebration tonight, for Marlene and Denzel's first day of school of course."
"I don't think we'll need to call..." he responded with furrowed brows. It took her a moment, but then Tifa heard it too. Running steps, still far away but not more than half a block. And then voices, their children's voices, practically shrieking all the way down to street.
"CLOUD! TIFA!" It was Yuffie from right below them, accompanied by what seemed to be three different phone lines ringing simultaneously. "WHERE THE HECK ARE YOU?"
"In the attic!" she called back while heading to the open trapdoor's edge.
"Wait!" Cloud interrupted her mid leap, pulling her back a few steps. "You can't be doing stunts like this anymore. Let me get a ladder."
"A ladder? Psht. I'm pregnant, not eighty."
"GUYS GET DOWN HERE, NOW!"
"We need a ladder!" he yelled back.
"A LADDER? WHAT ARE YOU, EIGHTY?"
"CLOUD? TIFA?" They heard Barret call from downstairs.
"THEY'RE UP IN THE ATTIC!" Yuffie responded. "APPARENTLY, THEY NEED A LADDER."
"A LADDER? WHAT, ARE THEIR LEGS *$#%&(#$ BROKEN?"
"For goodness sake..." Frustrated, Tifa pulled Cloud toward the hole and pointed. "You go first and then you can lift me down. Okay? Compromise."
"Fine." Cloud had just put one foot forward when it was suddenly halted by the appearance of their largest crew member, his shoulders filling up the entire opening.
"GUYS! It's in! You won! You %($#*#& won! Ha ha!"
"Won?" Tifa and Cloud exchanged confused glances. "Won what?"
"Won what? WON WHAT? BAM!" The exuberant man's metal hand slammed onto the attic floor so hard that the entire house shook. And when it retreated, a thick stack of papers remained, all stamped with the WRO seal and headed by the bold word Congratulations.
It didn't take long for his meaning to be deciphered.
"We won the appeal." Tifa stated in awe, not daring to touch the document lest it be a mirage. "Cloud, we-we won the appeal!"
"Damn straight," confirmed Barett with a haughty grin. "I got Reeve on his way to notarize. After you all sign these documents, Marlene and Denzel are here to stay FOR-&$#%(#-EVER! Booyah!"
As soon as he heaved himself up into the attic, he was followed by what seemed like a never ending stream of eager well-wishers. First their children, no longer orphans in the eyes of the law, barreling into them both with desperate hugs and tear-choked thank-yous. Then Yuffie with a punch to the shoulder and knowing smirk. Cid, Shera, Red, Vincent, neighbors, clients, even the uninvited Turks showed up - though it was most likely a coincidence since they were frequent patrons of the liquor store.
7th Heaven was the busiest it had ever been that night, filled to the point of bursting yet still running efficiently thanks to Yuffie and her small team of hired help. For the first time in her life, Tifa felt comfortable merely resting in a corner booth along with her close friends and was blissfully ignorant of the chaos surrounding them.
After all the dread of the past weeks in limbo, she had swiftly adopted an almost eerie sense of calm. Simply knowing what they were up against and confirming that they would face it together, no matter what - well - it was just the prescription she needed.
Upon being overwhelmed by the first wave of guests, Cloud and Tifa had wordlessly decided not to tell anyone about their situation. At least until they visited the mako center and had some more solid information on the subject. Though this court-victory had eradicated a huge chunk of their worries, they knew there were still going to be many more bumps along the road and it was best to deal with them only as they appeared on the horizon.
It was the only way they could survive the journey.
Later into that celebratory evening, as he watched her throw back her head and laugh from across the table, Cloud reflected on how he had changed or, more appropriately, grew over the past year of his life. It was strange to remember that only a few hours previously he had been seriously debating going off on his own again, as if it would have been so much easier for everyone. As if he could ever live with himself if he went through with it. As if he could ever find some semblance of happiness anywhere else. And now, seemingly out of the blue, he was a father of three. The numbers were slightly overwhelming, and the mako-suppressing medication he was on certainly didn't help with the room's lack of oxygen.
"Whoa, Spikey...everything okay?" Barett asked with genuine worry as he noted his friend's breathing becoming slightly more laborious than usual. Tifa met his eyes then, the remnants of a giggle still on her lips as she fiddled with the stem of her untouched glass of wine. He noted with pride the promise ring he had given her still glittering on her finger - awaiting the addition of yet another birthstone.
The answer came to him easily then, and with conviction.
"It will be."
Author's Note: So I had a record low number of reviews last chapter from any of my stories ever :(, which I figure was caused primarily by the ridiculously long pause between updates. Thus, as a thank you to those new readers I've collected, a fast one for you all in an attempt to re-spur this story for its final few chapters! And hopefully prove that I'm still serious about it.
I struggled with the cheesy pregnancy tangent since it's such a stereotypical way to end a fanfiction, but it had to be done since I kind of alluded to it since the beginning and it was in my original outline. Despite the speed of writing this, I hope it was portrayed alright and the characters aren't too OOC. Please let me know what you think as I do take it to heart in future writing.
Again, thank you all for your support.