Farm Boy
"That was quite the story you had to tell earlier today."
Tifa turned at the thick voice that rumbled behind her, a light chill racing down her back like a bolt of electricity. His voice was soft and familiar, but even more than a week after they'd reunited, she was still getting used to how grown-up and manly he now sounded.
Cloud.
Blinking, Tifa let her eyes fall away from the starlight up above before she turned around to face him. She had come out here for a little fresh air and to watch the sun go down. Their party was sharing a pair of rooms in the farmhouse owned by Chobobo Bill, and things had gotten crowded rather quickly. Not to mention, Tifa was still feeling overwhelmed by the story Cloud had shared in Kalm the night before, trying to piece together the parts of his recollections that seemed out of sorts and the fact that none of it matched what she could remember. She found herself frequently anxious whenever her thoughts returned to the matter, and the only thing that seemed to help her clear the storm clouds it dragged over her was a little bit of solitude and some good old-fashioned exercise.
Cloud always knew how to find her, though.
She smiled at that thought as their eyes met, and she found him standing across from her with his arms crossed over his chest, his aquamarine eyes glowing faintly in the falling darkness. He was smirking lightly at her, a playful expression on his face that he only seemed to wear when he was feeling relaxed and at ease. Which, Tifa couldn't help but notice, he only seemed to be when he was alone with her.
The sight of that expression on his face only made her smile in tandem, and Tifa couldn't help but blush slightly, shaking her head. With the way he was standing, his sweater was pulled taut across the muscles of his pectorals, his soft blond hair glimmering under the moonlight. Even the chiseled cut of his chin seemed sharper with the way the shadows danced over his skin. She hated to admit it, but the sight of him was intoxicating and even a bit debilitating.
"What do you mean?" she managed to ask, keeping her voice light but not failing to notice the way that it strained.
Cloud's smirk deepened as he moved towards the fence that enclosed the chocobo pen, leaning back against it with one foot perched up behind him, his knee bent. Most of the chocobos were already stabled for the night, though one lingered in the pen, resting peacefully in a large pile of hay and padded grass, her feathers tucked under her body. Tifa remembered Chloe telling her that that particular bird hated sleeping indoors.
Cloud glanced at her, keeping his arms folded as his gaze fell up and down her face and then her body. Tifa could feel the scorch of his stare as if tiny sunbeams radiated from behind those mako-enhanced orbs, and she couldn't help the way her cheeks flushed even further when they met eyes again. The intensity of his stares only seemed to grow deeper the more time that they spent together, and ever since the night in Aerith's garden, Tifa had become well aware of how it seemed that whatever space had once existed between them in these simple kinds of interactions had seemed to almost completely evaporate.
"When we were hiking over here," Cloud finally responded, his words whispered through the small gap in his lips. "When you were talking to Aerith."
Tifa thought back to their trek across the grasslands after leaving Kalm and the conversations they'd shared while the others either actively listened or eavesdropped, hovering just out of earshot. Tifa hadn't thought Cloud was paying much attention to the stories she'd shared, but looking up into his inquisitive and mildly amused eyes, her cheeks glowed as she realized what he must have heard.
"Oh…" she trailed off, averting her eyes. "About Nibelheim."
"Tea parties," Cloud snorted.
Tifa turned back to him, finding him with his eyes now cut away from her, staring off into the distance as tall blades of grass blew back and forth in the misty evening breeze. His eyebrows were turned downward into a sharp 'V', and there was no mistaking the note of annoyance in his tone. The realization of what it was he was ticked off about made her smile.
"Got something against tea parties?" she asked him teasingly, stepping closer and leaning towards him, unable to resist the magnetism that pulled back and forth between them.
Perhaps that was the tightrope of tension Tifa had been feeling that past week that had finally burst with all of her tears in the garden a few nights ago and that had erupted into a new boiling cauldron in Kalm. There was a natural, cosmic attraction that coiled between them, and though these moments alone were far and few in between, they were always charged. Tonight was no different. In fact, tonight seemed more tense than usual, and Tifa wondered if it was because they hadn't had a moment alone together since they'd left the last village.
Cloud made a light scoffing sound under his breath. "Not really my thing," he answered.
"I guess you're right," Tifa conceded, leaning against the fence next to Cloud. The stars were bright and unobstructed by smog here, and the air was filled with the fresh, rural scents of tended farmland. It reminded her of home. "You never did strike me as the type who enjoyed sweets. More of the 'hard and bitter' sort."
Cloud shifted slightly on his feet, and whether it was out of nervousness or an attempt to look cool, Tifa couldn't be sure. Either way, it was genuinely dorky the way that he maneuvered to face her, dropping his arms to either side of the wooden fence as he leaned back in stride. Only with her would he open himself up so much, she thought.
At least, she hoped, a worried voice nagged at the back of her mind.
"True," he answered, leveling that sapphire stare at her once again. "But I like sweet stuff, too."
He was leaning in closer, his eyes like the flames of a stovetop. The air between them singed with the heat of it. Her entire body seizing like a tension rod, Tifa swallowed carefully but didn't dare look away, captivated by the swirl of colors in his eyes which only a week ago had terrified her with how much they had changed.
"You didn't much like them when we were kids," she managed to shoot back.
"We aren't kids anymore," Cloud breathed, the undergirded tenor of his voice nearing a growl.
The heat was a full-on furnace, but even as Cloud inched closer, his face mere inches from hers, Tifa didn't back away. Her heart was racing, blood pumping through her veins so loudly she was certain he could hear it. She was surrounded by his scent, the faint masculinity of sweat and salted earth punctuated by leather and steel. His bangs draped across his forehead and framed his beautiful face, and all Tifa could think about as his words began to resonate was how he had always been her star.
Her true north, no matter what.
It was the reason she followed him faithfully and put every ounce of loyalty and belief in him as their leader, even when she worried constantly about his health and when his words and his memories felt off and as if they might lead them astray. She knew the others were skeptical and full of questions, but Tifa always defended Cloud's leadership and she always defended his judgment. Because no matter what truly was happening or how much things may have been going wrong, Tifa believed in him.
It certainly didn't hurt that she was in love with him, either.
And so that was the reason her heart was climbing its way to her throat, why her hands were balling into fists in front of her and why her breath was leaving her lungs. That was why she shivered where she stood despite the mild temperatures and why every nerve ending in her body was suddenly awake, including ones she never thought about and ones she hadn't even been aware of until he came back into her life. And that was why her vermillion eyes widened like ruby discs, watching his lips part as he closed the final distance between them.
And kissed her.
It was like the night in the garden, only this time in reverse, him making the move on her. As soon as his lips landed - softly and somewhat unsurely - Tifa felt as if she had been electrocuted on the spot. Sparks soared through her from head to toe, her body a live wire, dangerous to the touch. As if he didn't care, he reached up and pulled her closer, leveraging his weight completely against the fence so that he could grab her waist and hips with one hand and the back of her head with the other.
"Come here," he commanded softly against her lips.
As if she could disobey him. They were partners in everything they did, but Tifa always followed Cloud's lead. And she had been daydreaming about this moment since she'd found him in Midgar, the tension and excitement only growing between them as the days wore on. But it was their hug hidden among the flowers that had changed everything between them, a moment of unspoken and unplanned intimacy that made every subsequent interaction feel more special and meaningful than the last.
And now - here they were.
She fell against him, placing her hands against his shoulders to keep from colliding with him completely from the force of his grab. Closing her eyes, she parted her lips slightly, allowing him to slot his over hers to deepen the kiss. It was the first time she had ever shared this kind of closeness with anyone, and that she was sharing it with Cloud Strife of all people was enough to melt her into nothingness.
It was so electrifying that she squirmed where she stood between his legs, her feet shifting and sliding back and forth against each other, her thigh bumping against the stiffness that she realized was his very hard erection. Tifa's cheeks exploded with warmth.
"I'm sorry," Cloud murmured into a broken kiss, sliding away slightly. She opened her eyes again, finding his hooded and the mako in them blazing bright. "You're just…"
He trailed off, his cheeks pink but his eyes unwavering from her face. He was staring at her almost defiantly, the lust and desire plain in his stare. It was almost unnerving how openly he was looking at her with want, how unguarded his feelings and intentions were.
Cloud was usually shielding things from everyone. But with her, he laid it all out on the table. She panted lightly, her own feelings of yearning and need swirling low in the pit of her belly, sending tingling pulses across her flesh.
"I'm what?" she responded, leaning in closer to steal another kiss. The feeling of their lips melding and their tongues flitting against one another was too divine, and she missed it already. "Please finish your thought."
Cloud chuckled lightly, indulging her demand for his kiss. It was rougher this time, more passionate and eager, less tentative and afraid. Less seeking and more taking. The top row of his teeth scraped across Tifa's bottom lip, and the resounding reverberation of pleasure that careened through her entire body had her back arching in his hold, her nipples stiffening against the too-tight fabric of her tops.
He nuzzled her, and the prolonged teasing as his hands danced and squeezed her exposed midriff and pressed into the line of her spine only pushed her to the edge of desperation.
"Please," she found herself begging.
"You're beautiful," Cloud finally responded, breaking the kiss and letting his words follow the trail of his lips as they searched her jaw and then her throat with light nips and kisses. "Sexy, powerful, amazing. And sweet."
She arched again, his sentiments a worse poison than his touch or his kiss. For days now she'd found herself flustered by his endless and surprising compliments, but more often than not she'd been able to field them.
Now, she was surrendering to them.
She didn't know what to do with her hands. They were trembling, scrambling over his shoulders and over his biceps, looking for purchase and trying to keep busy. She wanted to touch him but unlike him, she couldn't muster the confidence to be so bold, even as his lips devoured her. She was still amazed that they had even managed to cross that line, and out here in the open of all places.
"Come here," he was demanding again through another harried kiss. It was as if he sensed her insecurity that was tempered by her desire, his body moving against hers and only making her need surge. He pulled her closer, reaching for her trembling and unsure hands to pin them behind her back with both wrists in his grip. He pinned her body against his, another deep kiss plunging her deep into her affection for him, her entire body so alight that she was doing her best not to crawl all over him in desperation.
"Cloud-"
"It's okay," he murmured greedily between kisses that he stole eagerly. He tightened his grip around her wrists and the feeling of restraint only made her wilder, the heat growing dangerously between her thighs, the slickness there that she had been trying to ignore staining her panties. She purred a wordless sound into his mouth, the feeling becoming so overpowering that she couldn't stop herself from lifting one leg and climbing over his outstretched thigh.
Cloud was obviously delighted by this because she could feel him grinning into their kiss. "Good girl," he groaned, rutting his erection against her core with a twist of his hips. Tifa almost passed out from the ache that rocked through her center; the lack of friction she was feeling was driving her mad. Breaking their kiss, Cloud lifted his free hand, sliding it up her throat and past her jaw, his index and middle fingers finding their way to her mouth as he slid them across her tongue.
"Wet them," he said gently.
She did as he asked, closing her mouth around his long digits and coating them in her saliva. The taste of leather from his gloves was rough and worn, and it briefly flashed through her mind how terribly dirty and naughty she was behaving. But she didn't care.
She was with Cloud.
Before she could think on it too much longer, he slid his fingers out of her mouth and trailed them down the front of her body, stopping only to brush over her pert and oversensitive nipples. It took everything in her power to keep from crying out, and as if he knew, he swallowed her stifled sounds with another quick kiss.
"Try to keep it down," he warned.
At first, she wasn't sure why he said that. Not until his hand fell between her thighs, his knee rising on the fence to better part her legs where she was positioned practically over his lap. Hands still holding her wrists and keeping her in place against his body, his fingers drew lines over her inner thighs, the soft leather leaving trails of her saliva on her skin as they rose higher towards her center.
Tifa shivered, her body a lightning rod of tension. She couldn't hold in her gasp of pleasure when his fingers swept across her panties, brushing a line up and down that sent a light shiver through her clit as he pressed down. Her vision whiting out, Cloud kissed her harder in an effort to prevent her from growing loud, his fingers working back and forth and then settling over her sensitive nub once he'd realized the hidden gem he'd found there.
They kissed eagerly as his fingers rubbed her back and forth, the friction of cotton over her tiny button building the pleasure higher and higher but not enough to send her over the edge. It was maddening, her hips rolling with abandon, her arms struggling against his hold. Cloud kept her firmly in place, his body responding to her gyrations so that the thick ridge of his erection rubbed against the thick softness of her thigh.
"Please," she pleaded through another kiss, biting messily into his lip to showcase her eagerness. She had never experienced anything like this before, but she badly needed release. And she needed him to give it to her.
"Shhh," he scolded her, though somehow, his tone was reassuring.
His fingers hooked into the fabric of her panties and pulled them aside, leaving her wet folds and aching clit exposed to the cool night air and the heat of his leather-bound touch. His fingers stroked her bare clit, rubbing circles over it and tapping gently, collecting the wetness that slid out of her tight, untouched opening. She whined and Cloud kissed her again and again, his fingers exploring and grazing and slipping inside of her, teasing her clit until the coil in her tummy was about to snap.
" Cloud -"
When she finally came, she was so blinded by the starburst of ecstasy that she hadn't even noticed the way that Cloud guided her hips over his so that he too was gently coming right alongside her, losing himself where he stood and groaning quietly into the crook of her neck. Her breaths left her lungs in raspy moans and gasps, and Cloud's hand had tightened so roughly around her wrists she could feel her fingertips begin to numb.
They leaned against one another, both bodies trembling as the bliss quietly abated, their hearts pounding in unison. She could feel Cloud's breath, hot against her skin, gently fade as they both came down. After long moments passed, he pulled back enough so that he could look up at her, releasing her wrists and sliding his fingers out of her underwear.
"You're amazing, Tifa," he told her, his eyes almost royal blue, hazy with happiness.
"Me?" Tifa was dumbfounded. She was so awestruck by what he'd just done to her that she could barely stand. How was she the amazing one?
Cloud offered her a smile, one that was less smirk and more dorky grin. It warmed her heart, especially when he reached up and brushed her bangs out of her eyes, his fingers tracing her cheek.
"We should get inside and get some sleep," he said instead of answering. "It's getting late. Big day tomorrow. And… I need to clean up."
Right. Tifa nodded, blushing when she realized she was still perched up over Cloud's legs. He was bright in the face too, and as she backed away and fixed her clothing, he turned away, adjusting his pants, his eyes downcast even though she could see he was still smiling.
"Do you think anybody saw us?" Tifa asked after they'd adjusted themselves and Cloud had turned back to her.
Cloud glanced over his shoulder, his hand falling to the small of Tifa's back as he guided her back towards Chocobo Bill's farmhouse.
"Wark!"
"…the chocobo sure did."