Anywhere You Are

by pinkpower

An AU in which Cloud and Aerith meet as children.

2. Happy Tears

Disclaimer: For legal purposes, this is just a fanfiction. None of the following characters belong to me.

Only a month had gone by since the Gainsboroughs moved to Nibelheim, but Aerith and Cloud behaved as though they had known each other their entire lives – best friends in a heartbeat. Every day since their first meeting, Aerith would skip down block after block and house after house to see if Cloud was available to play. Most of the time, he would abandon whatever he'd been doing previously to join Aerith for a game; sometimes, Claudia had to reiterate the importance of finishing work before playtime – stressing to her son that fun tasted that much sweeter and lasted that much longer when all was right. After all, he still had responsibilities to tend to.

But that was okay. Luckily, his new friend possessed the power to change any mundane task into a grand, old time. If the leaves required raking, she would grab a long stick from the ground and the two children would pretend they were swashbucklers sword-fighting over a sack of treasure. If his laundry needed cleaning, they would simulate rounds of basketball, where they would ball up his clothes and the washing machine would serve as the basket. If the dishes needed washing, then Aerith and Cloud playacted as deep-sea explorers, on an expedition through the ocean to discover new species of sea life and rescue them from pollution and fishnets; Aerith enjoyed saving the spiky-haired, silver seahorses (the forks) the most, because they were more stubborn to clean and she took great pride in overcoming the challenge, while Cloud found peace in piloting the submarine (using the plates and faucet mechanisms as steering implements) to show the girl all of the untamed, beautiful wonders of the ocean blue.

There was never a dull moment with her around.

"Come on, you two. The adventuring can wait a little while. It's time for lunch," Claudia answered to the pair of children, interrupting their game of deep-sea expeditions.

"Ah, man!" the blond boy whined in a hushed breath, reluctant to break for lunch. "But, Mom, we're having so much fun. Five more minutes?"

The matriarch of the Strife family household emitted a small laugh, pleased to see her son so eager to complete his chores, but shook her head all the same. "You need to eat and keep up your strength. Don't you want to grow up big and strong?"

After drying off her hands on a beige washcloth, the 4'4 girl hopped down from the stood and lightly tugged on the black sleeve of her friend's shirt to follow. "Cloud, you silly, we can out of fish to find anyway. Plus, I'm really hungry."

"Oh, okay." Obediently, Cloud drained the sudsy water from the sink, washed his hands, and joined Aerith on the floor.

Again, Claudia couldn't help but laugh to herself, amused at the sight of Cloud scurrying around to simply please Aerith, who had become his key motivation for doing just about anything these days. It wasn't that he was ever lazy or belligerent before, but that pint-sized manifestation of sunshine brought such energy and joy to Cloud that Claudia once doubted he would ever experience. Most parents hated hearing the voluminous chatter of their children – laughter so loud that it drowned out their inner monologue, but the Strife family had been barren of such sweetness for so long, the silence dehumanizing. There was no sound more precious to Claudia, no sound more melodic, than her sweet baby boy's chuckles rumbling throughout the kitchen, intertwined with Aerith's delighted squeals.

Moreoever, Claudia was grateful to whichever higher power granted Cloud a good influence of friend to oblige and appease and become smitten with.

"I already set the table outside on the porch. It's a nice day, so I want us all to enjoy it," Claudia said, leading the kids outdoors.

"Ooh! What a great idea!" Aerith exclaimed, walking a few feet behind. "May I ask what is for lunch?"

"Just some leftover chicken and pasta from last night's supper," Claudia answered, swiftly stepping off to the side when Cloud jogged ahead to open the backdoor for both ladies. "Thank you, sweetie."

"Thank you, my good sir," Aerith murmured, pausing to curtsy at the young gentleman in appreciation.

Awkwardly, he nodded in return – a little caught off-guard by the way his best friend fluttered her eyelashes at him, which caused his stomach to flip and flip in a manner that racked his nerves from end-to-end, fore he was both nauseated and uplifted at the same time. Close the door behind him, the nine year-old boy caught up and joined his mother and best friend at the small, circular patio table for their afternoon meal.

While the three consumed their plates of lunch and sipped at their glasses of milk, Claudia asked, "So, Aerith, is Nibelheim to your liking so far?"

Placing an index finger on her chin, the brunette considered her response for a moment. "It's quieter here in Nibblehelm," she began, her mouth fumbling gracelessly around the town's name, "a lot less to do. I don't know."

"Wow, I could hardly tell that our village is so boring to you." Not that Claudia blamed Aerith for feeling that way. She had always dreamed about living a more fast-paced life in a bustling, colorful city. It would have been a great deal more thrilling. "I was under the impression you had no troubling adjusting here."

"Well, it's not so bad," Aerith said, releasing a giggle when her round, earth-green irises briefly met the sky-colored ones of Cloud, who nervously glanced away. "No one... really liked me that much in Midgar."

Expressions of downright shock struck both of the Strifes' visages; Claudia outright gasped as though she witnessed an adorable, fluffy bunny get snatched up by a coyote, while Cloud appeared as though there was an awful stench in the air, his nose wrinkling and his eyebrows lowering. Neither mother nor son could even comprehend the notion of one person disliking the bright and spirited girl, let alone multiple people.

"That's outrageous," Claudia stated, shaking her head in disbelief. "Are you sure, honey? Maybe you misread the situation."

"Yes, I'm sure of it. I don't think anyone hated me, but a lot of people treated me like I was contagiously ill. The grown-ups were polite about it, but basically the same," the little girl elaborated, her cheerful disposition slightly dampened, as she shoveled pasta noodles into her mouth.

"But you're a ton of fun," Cloud grumbled as he also continued eating his mother's homecooking. Although his statement was complimentary, the young lad couldn't mask the ire in his tone. "Doesn't make any sense how people didn't like you. You're the best."

Nervously, the ten year-old girl cast her emerald eyes downward at her plate of food, while heat took real estate of her cheeks. She held herself back from exploding into shrieks of giddiness. "As long as you think so, that's really all that matters to me. Anyway, Nee-bale-helm is nice, because Cloud is here."

"I have always thought so, too," Miss Strife concurred, albeit her tone sounded somewhat distracted.

As Cloud and Aerith became engaged in a discussion about something else entirely, Claudia couldn't help but ponder the way Nibelheim townsfolk treated her boy. Before the incident upon Mount Nibel, they had always been more dismissive of Cloud than anything. Polite, perhaps more curt, but not shamelessly unkind. The young matron learned early on not to rely upon any of her neighbors for support. When she struggled to sooth her baby's tantrums at the grocers, the clerk would request that she evacuate the premises because his crying was disturbing the other customers rather help; when she was busting her rear to make ends meet, everyone wished her well and hoped her finances improved, while fellow parents, who were also going through hardships, invited each other for meals, bringing over casseroles and patisseries; and when Cloud needed anything, such as aid reaching an item on the top shelf at a food market, people simply glanced at him, maybe offer some words of encouragement, and walk away.

After the Mount Nibel incident, everyone's bothersome negligence and quiet disapproval turned into inarguable cruelty. He endured pitiless verbal abuse from his peers and horrendous gossip from the adults. Claudia loathed how dull-minded the people of Nibelheim were and she was downtrodden to learn Midgarians were no better. Children, like Cloud and Aerith, should never know the terrible sting of rejection.

Suddenly, several sharp knocks echoed all the way from the front door to signal a new arrival. Quickly, Miss Strife dismissed herself from the wobbly patio table and went to open the door.

"Good day to you, Claudia," Elmyra greeted the younger mother. "I'm coming to retrieve my Aerith for her math lessons."

"Oh, yes. She's finishing up lunch right now with Cloud."

"Oh, Good. That means I don't have to concern myself with feeding them."

Them. The burning sensation of resentment in Claudia's stomach started to ebb away with Elmyra's presence. She loved the automatic invitation for Cloud to join the Gainsboroughs for some schooling. In the last month, it actually became a bit of a routine between the two households, switching their children back and forth. Just as Aerith delivered her vivacious and fun spirit to any task Cloud was charged to complete, it was his job to help settle her down for whatever school subject being taught that day. They shared the most perfect, mutual symbiosis.

"You know that boy has a real knack for arithmetic," Elmyra continued casually, leaning against the door frame. "I'm afraid it's not really my strong suit, in regards to teaching it, so I have to rely on textbooks to get the point across. But Cloud helps breakdown the lesson in a way Aerith actually understands. He's such a little genius. What a gem. You're doing a great job with him, Claudia!"

That was it. Despite all the horrible things Nibelheim said about her – from criticizing her decision to fall in love with a mysterious out-of-towner to constantly insulting her son by accusing him of being an attempted murderer and 'an accident of birth,' (ridiculous!) to spouting vile, treacherous nonsense such as Cloud was failure-bound, because his mother was a do-nothing failure herself – she never allowed herself to shed a single tear. No matter how much their judgments plagued her mind, no matter how their cruelty crawled beneath her skin like sticky spider legs, Claudia still had a son to raise and she refused to teach him to break or buckle at the stupidity of others. But, as Elmyra showered sincere words of praise at Cloud's intelligence, she experiences an abundance of the most wonderful pride. On top of that, no one had ever breathed even a kind syllable on the young, single mother's parenthood.

And so, Claudia could no longer reserve her emotions and let warm, happy tears trickle down the sides of her face.

"Oh, Claudia! Did I say something wrong?" inquired Elmyra, who instinctively embraced the slightly shorter woman into her arms for solace. "I'm so sorry!"

"No, no, no. You've done nothing wrong at all. I'm just being ridiculous," Claudia answered in between weightless giggles, as she hugged Elmyra in return.

"You don't need to lie to me," the elder of the two blonde women said, lightly patting a hand against Claudia's back like a mother consoling her child.

"Hey, Mom!" shouted Cloud when he and his playmate gathered into the living room, toward the front door. "We're all done with lunch! Do you want me to..." As Miss Strife turned toward her precious son, the latter's heart dropped into the base of his stomach like a heavy bucket down a well. His smile fell. "Wh-What's wrong?"

To and fro, Claudia shook her head as Cloud timidly approached her. "Nothing, sweetie. I'm just proud of you. That's all. That's the honest truth. These are happy tears."

"Happy tears?" Aerith echoed, her tiny voice quizzical as well as skeptical.

Claudia squatted down so that she was eye-level with both kids, and stroked one hand through Cloud's soft, hay-colored spikes of hair before playfully ruffling them. "You see, sometimes when a person is happy, that emotion can feel so enormous that they cry. I'm crying for that same reason. I am so happy." She spread her arms out wide and then brought both children closer for a warm, tight embrace – blowing raspberries against Cloud's cheek to make him laugh.

"Mom!" he protested through a fit of giggles, trying to escape her grasp and tickly kisses. "Mom, stop it!"

Squealing from the humor of the moment, Aerith readily accepted Cloud's mom's hug and returned it in full.

Witnessing everything from the sidelines, realization finally swept across Missus Gainsborough's mind. Claudia wasn't alone anymore, nor was her son. Neither was Aerith, nor her. And that was definitely something to be happy about. Elmyra supposed it was simple enough to forget how burdensome being a single mother could be, especially to someone as young and untraveled as Claudia Strife, especially because one would never be able to guess at her areas of ignorance. She shouldered motherhood with the greatest of ease – offering kind smiles to everyone, even those who spoke ill of her family, all for Cloud's sake; and for someone who resided in a village her entire life, Claudia was uniquely well-educated and open-minded. She certainly didn't look or behave like someone who struggled often, but she was. Used to.

"C'mon, Ellie, get in here!" Claudia exclaimed, inviting her mom friend in on the group hug.

"Yeah, Mom!" agreed Aerith in excitement. "Happiness is a group activity!"

/ / /

"I don't believe Aerith would mind having a roommate for awhile. The girls seem to get along well enough," Elmyra spoke to Brian Lockhart, engaged in a discussion of where Tifa would stay while parts of the Lockhart home needed to be torn down and rebuilt after a kitchen fire evolved into a house fire. "Two weeks, you said?"

"Two weeks," Mister Lockhart confirmed, shifting his weight from one foot to the other in an uncomfortable manner. "Tifa is a good girl, Missus Gainsborough. She does her chores, she's more than decent help around the house, can manage with a needle and thread just fine, she can cook simple dishes, and she's tidy. She wouldn't be any trouble to you."

"Save your breath. I don't need any convincing," Elmyra replied, offering Brian a neighborly sort of smile – polite, warm, but not quite friendly; the sharpened edges of her mouth lifted in a halfhearted attempt to reassure Brian that his daughter would be treated as a welcomed guest, though the smile didn't quite reach all the way to her eyes.

"It was Tifa's idea, honestly. She's eager to spend time with a girl about her age."

"I'm sure it will be a pleasant experience for the both of them."

"Aerith is a darling, don't get me wrong, but she is much too tolerant for her own good."

A dirty blonde eyebrow ascended about two centimeters in reaction to Brian's queer remark. "I don't catch your meaning. What specifically is my daughter too tolerant of?"

"The Strife boy, of course," Brian answered, unaware of how he was grating on the Gainsborough matron's patience. "Aerith's kindness is an admirable quality, but I just don't think that little rodent has done much to deserve it."

"That little rodent?" Missus Gainsborough repeated incredulously. Both arms crossed over her chest, both eyes closed and reopened with a sharp blink. "You must be joking! Cloud Strife is a child!"

"And a violent menace, one who almost succeeded in killing my daughter," Brian responded. He tried to keep his town casual and composed, in spite of Elmyra's difficult attitude. "He's plainly not safe to be around. To be frank, you put Aerith at risk by allowing him to waste so much of her time."

As the conversation escalated into an argument, it eventually became glaringly evident that Brian was under the impression that Aerith gave her time and energy to Cloud out of charity – pity – and fear that she'd be the next victim of his 'delinquent rampages' if she stood her ground against him. Elmyra could only guess that these stories originated from Lester, Tyler, and Emilio, all of whom took an alarming amount of entertainment from tormenting Cloud. Granted, just about everyone in Nibelheim wanted to believe the worst possible things about the sweetheart of a boy, and they were not opposed to pinching an ugly narrative out of thin air, no matter how ludicrous. She did her best to convince Brian that Cloud was a good kid, that he wasn't the horrible, ill-tempered, irrational menace he was assumed to be, and that Aerith earnestly enjoyed her friendship with him. Those two were the best and most inseparable of companions, and Cloud would have never even considered harming her.

Alas, Brian was stubborn, grudge-filled man with a thorough belief that the boy was, what he called, malicious scum, who earned the poor treatment he got from the village by being malicious scum in the first place.

"He is nothing of the sort!" Elmyra yelled, though she tried to keep her voice low enough to avoid alerting their respective daughters, who where both inside of the Gainsborough home, of their heated confrontation by the letterbox. "I have spent a great deal of time around Cloud, and he has always been gentle with Aerith."

"Listen," Brian started, forcing out a sigh of calm, "I have no choice but to respect your perspective. You're right. You have spent more time around the Strife pest, but I still don't trust him."

"Go on," Elmyra prompted, fixing a frosty glower on the widower's facial features, and sensed there was still more he longed to say.

"I would appreciate it if you also respect my point of view and my daughter's safety by disallowing Cloud and Aerith from spending any time together, just while Tifa is in your temporary care. Just for two weeks," the Lockhart patriarch requested, so confident that his words resonated with reason and solid rationale.

All the while, the now ten year-old boy observed the entire confrontation, almost from start to finish, keeping himself obscured behind the deep, long shadows of a tree in a neighboring, fenceless yard. A small part of him was surprised to discover just how deeply Mister Lockhart's hatred for him ran, to the point of commanding Elmyra to ban him from her home, though Cloud would never think to blame the concerned father. After all, he was only looking out for Tifa, who was his whole world now. Still, Cloud was hurt by Brian's request nonetheless. Although he did have faith that Missus Gainsborough would refuse his order, the idea alone – of being forbidden from seeing Aerith – caused the acids in his stomach to gurgle. That wasn't fair.

"Well," Missus Gainsborough began, huffing out a singular breath laced with impatience, "as a matter of fact, I don't respect your narrow-minded, ass-backwards point of view and it makes me sick that you would ask me to honor any amount of ignorance. You and this whole town can kiss my ass!" was what her lips burned to shout, to rant and rave at him, and shoo him from her property, but her dignity was steadfast. She swallowed the words down her gullet, and actually continued, "My daughter would be devastated if I told her that Cloud would have to stay away, but maybe you would have better luck persuading her."

Lowering his eyebrows into an umbrageous scowl, Brian started tripped around the swell of his tongue in reaction to Elmyra's challenge. "We-W-Well, I-I-I, uh-"

"Right. Tifa is still welcome to stay here, but I suppose you'll need a few minutes to consider your options."

A tiny grin of satisfaction buttered across the voyeur boy's mouth at Elmyra's curt, yet well-crafted dare. Her utter refusal to carry out Mister Lockhart's dirty work encouraged the lad to emerge from his hiding place and join the pair of adults by the fence – sporting a nonchalant, unburdened walk as though he hadn't heard a thing. "Good afternoon," Cloud nodded respectfully toward them both.

"Hello, Cloud," Elmyra nodded back, opening the gate entrance for him. "Doing alright?"

"Just fine, thanks. How about you?"

"Peachie keen, dear."

"Strife," Brian grunted, acknowledging the decade-aged boy with a begrudging, forced smile. "Are you intending on going inside?"

"Yeah."

"Well, you know, Tifa is inside, too. She and Aerith are probably talking about whatever girls talk about."

"Okay...?" The blond child sensed that Mister Lockhart was attempting to stall him from making his way indoors, albeit the excuse was quite poor. If the adult man could have had it his way, he would have barked at Cloud to drag himself back home.

"Just... give me a minute, would you? I need to go inside, and I'd rather not do it with a judge and jury watching," Mister Lockhart queried, wearing a mask of total apathy, before marching inside of Elmyra's house.

Cheesed off by the whole ordeal, Elmyra shook her head and placed a hand upon Cloud's shoulder. "There are days where I think Nibelheim might be the breeding ground for people with the smallest hearts in the entire world, with mouths to overcompensate."

"Is today one of those days?"

"No, in fact. Today is the kind of day where everyone's bigger than the mold they're born in, at least I hope so." Her statement, spoken in a sympathetic tone, was about Tifa, the true victim of Brian's prejudice against the Strifes. She was the one who would miss out on knowing friendships that weren't based off appearances and pretensions; she was the one who would grow up without friends to truly balance her imaginations and her ego; and she was the one who wanted so much to reach out to someone new, for someone to help her mature and blossom, but her roots were too strong. Too timid. Too comfortable in one soil.

Three minutes later, Brian and Tifa emerged from the house, the latter rolling her suitcase down the path. Tifa kept her burgundy eyes superglued to the ground, desperately trying to train her facial features from crumbling into a forlorn, heartsick expression, while Brian's complexion seemed to sizzle as though he had walked out from a sauna. He was some type of shocked. Whatever Aerith had said to him in there, he truthfully wasn't anticipating – not to the point of sparking his vexation, but embarrassment rather.

On the one hand, Cloud yearned to chuckle at Mister Lockhart's bemused, beet-red appearance – looking as though a ghost must have popped out from a closet. After all the insults he'd endured from Brian, perhaps Cloud deserved to emit a small bit of laughter at the man's expense. On the other hand, Tifa's downtrodden, disappointed nature gave him ample pause as she sucked in a long, sharp breath to steady the tears. He didn't exactly understand why she was upset, but he felt sympathy for her just the same.

"Change your mind?" Missus Gainsborough inquired. She was frustrated by Brian's grudge serving as a hurdle for his own daughter to overcome, but surprise was the last thing on her mind.

"Your daughter is as stubborn as a mule, Ma'am. I wish you both to have a good day," Brian retorted, quite sour still. "Pick up the pace, Tifa."

"Yes, Sir," the nine year-old girl sniffled.

Once the father and daughter duo exited the gate, Cloud wasted no time in making a mad dash inside to swiftly locate Aerith upstairs in her bedroom, tidying up. She donned her usually pleasant expression as she hummed along to a song streaming from her record player. One would have thought it had been a completely normal day with the way she carried on, prancing about the room without a care in the world. So contrary to Mister Lockhart.

"Goodness me! A rogue!" the young girl gasped out in excitement, clapping her hands against her cheeks. "A grim fortuneteller visited my castle chamber mere moments ago. He desired safe quarters for his daughter, the princess. In exchange, he would offer me insight to the future."

Chortling, the blond boy cleared his throat and got into character – grabbing a spare hanger off the ground and pretending it was a sword. He angled the edge to Aerith in mock-suspicion. "That was no mere fortuneteller, milady, but a wizard well-versed in the dark arts."

"An evil wizard! How can you tell?"

"Mustache kinda gives it away."

"True, true."

"And what pray tell did the rapacious rapscallion say to you?"

"He predicted that a rogue with hair like a chocobo mane would barge into my tower and steal me away to go on perilous quests that would certainly result in inevitable harm." Aerith giggled toward the end of her sentence as she help up her arms, gracefully stepping around to eventually pick up her own makeshift weapon – a mop handle.

"What response did you give?" Cloud questioned, playfully glaring at her as they continued to circle around each other.

"Me? Why, I laughed at her fortune and said, 'Sir, I welcome the adventures, fore I am sure the rogue also longs for a friend. I would do good by him. You should do good by him.'" Slowly, Aerith lowered the mop to the floor as a gesture of peace.

"You tried to change his heart?"

"Aye. It didn't work, but it was worth a try." The brunette nonchalantly shrugged. "My words unsettled him and he took off with the princess. Poor thing. She's as starved for daring quests as I."

As a gentle smile dressed across the girl's lips from corner to corner, an enigmatic wave of awe and tranquility crashed over the boy. He admired Aerith immensely for her collected composure and the resilience to maintain compassion in almost any situation, but this felt like a whole lot more than mere admiration – the giddy stimulation buzzing and fluttering betwixt his stomach and chest. Affection maybe. Sometimes, Cloud was pleasantly surprised by Aerith's total disregard for the village's status quo. It took an exorbitant amount of bravery to stand up to anyone, let alone a strong-willed adult for the honor of the town screw-up.

"Thanks," Cloud said, quite bashful as he perched himself atop Aerith's mattress, "for not listening to him."

"Your friendship means everything to me. I want a chance to get to know Tifa better, sure, but never as a trade for you," his best friend went on to deliberate, sitting beside him.

It was nearly stupefying how loud his heartbeat thrummed, how the tempo quickened, as her words settled in his ears, calming him and thrilling him all at once. At times like this, Cloud wished he was more eloquently spoken; to be able to summon any words of reciprocation, the words he ached to say in return, would have been awesome. "I... I feel the same way. You know I wouldn't let anything bad happen to you, right?"

"Ah. A rogue turned bodyguard. The fortuneteller certainly never predicted that." Aerith launched herself from the bed's bouncy surface and returned to their play. "You will have to be diligent then! I want to face-off with dragons and ogres and sky-giants!"

/ / /

"Personally, I don't get it and I never will. Why do they spend so much time together?" Tyler complained to his group of friends, watching from the long, long shadows of the hillside, while the towns' outcasts played atop the hill. Steam seemed to leak from his ears as he spied on them through a clunky pair of binoculars, furious at the fact Aerith should have been part of his pack of friends.

"She's a freak, same as him," Emilio casually stated, then took a large, chunky bite out of a meatball sub. "Have you seen the way Aerith talks to her garden? Having entire conversations with weeds and dirt. She's a lunatic"

"I think she's cute," Lester remarked, standing adjacent to Tyler, as Emilio and Tifa nibbled at the picnic food the Four Fiends packed with them. "I just wish she'd act more like Tifa and stop hanging out with that loser."

"C'mon. Everyone knows she's friends with Strife because she feels sorry for him. Girl's an angel," Tyler concurred, lowering his binoculars to let Lester have a gander. He took a seat at the edge of the checkerboard-patterned blanket and grabbed a piece of celery. "Wish I could get her alone, but that spiky-haired puke is always around."

"Ooh. Are you trying to become Mister Aerith Gainsborough?" taunted Emilio, belting out a hearty guffaw and chucked a carrot stick at him. "Aerith and Tyler sittin' in a tree! K-I-S-S-I-N-"

"Dude, shut up," the butcher's son seethed through clenched teeth, launching the carrot back with a more violent intention.

"Stop throwing food, and stop staring at Cloud and Aerith!" Tifa snapped at the boys for their blatant immaturity, knitting her eyebrows together to form a commanding glare. "I don't want to hear another word about Cloud this or Aerith that. You're gentlemen, so you better start acting like gentlemen or I'm going home!"

"Sorry, Tifa," the three of them mumbled in unison. Submitting to the young girl's orders, Lester and Tyler gave up on spying on their shunned peers, and joined their two other friends on the picnic cover.

"Really, really sorry, Tifa," Lester mumbled again, nervously scratching the backside of his neck. "It's just hard to deal with how Cloud stole Aerith from us with how pathetic he is."

"Right. I warned you." With that, Tifa arose from the cotton-polyester material, with her nose stuck firmly in the air, and began to walk off. Naturally, the trio jogged after her, shouting apologies and begging to her stay, but their efforts were met with a sharp, venomous, fury-fueled, "Leave me alone!" which successfully resulted in the boys backing off.

Never before had she bellowed at them with such ferocity in her tone, nor scowled at them with such wrath blazing in the maroon of her eyes. Emilio, Lester, and Tyler were left on their own to speculate why the eleven year-old girl's temper flared, concluding that it through no true fault of their own, but that their fairer-sexed friend's bad mood was influenced by 'that time of the month.'

In truth, Tifa could no longer tolerate the boys' whining anymore. She loathed the constant reminders that Aerith Gainsborough and Cloud Strife were very visibly enamored with one another, practically fused together at their hands ever since their first meeting; she hated to watch how the two formulated their own special world – their own safe haven – that the rest of Nibelheim couldn't hope to disrupt, as they played and talked for hours; she despised them both for being unbothered by the town's incessant gossip, as though being misfits was some sort of blessing in disguise or an achievement. In truth, Tifa didn't want to sit under that tree with her friends and continue to gaze up at Aerith and Cloud while they whispered, laughed, and went about their carefree time together, to stew in an ugly feeling that made her yearn to hurl stones at the twosome – that made yearn to become part of their special, little world.

But more than that, the young girl didn't want to bake in the fear she experienced watching Aerith. Tifa was too young to understand and her village was too ignorant, but she knew that the wonderful fright she felt flickering around her stomach at the mere sight of the thirteen year-old gardener was forbidden, monstrous. With enough distance, Tifa could forget the thrill in heart at the sound of Aerith's laughter chiming through the air, could stop focusing on the sweet view of her smile, and didn't have to consider how Aerith must have experienced the same curse of dizziness, but for Cloud.

"Hey, sweetie. How was your picnic with the boys?" queried her father, who casually thumbed through a newspaper from his spot on the couch, as Tifa downtroddenly entered the house.

"Terrible. All they ever do is talk about Aerith Gainsborough. Aerith this and Aerith that. Aerith has gorgeous, brown hair. Aerith is so pretty in her new sundress. Aerith, Aerith, Aerith!" Tifa griped. She leaned back against one of the living room walls, keeping her head down so that her thick, long curtains of indigo-black hair shielded the strawberry blush sizzling on her cheeks.

"You know those boys worship the ground you walk on," Brian chortled, yet to glance up from his reading material. "Trust me, you don't have to be jealous of Aerith Gainsborough."

"Jealous..." Tifa murmured, tasting the syllables upon her tongue as though the flavors were ruthlessly bitter. Was she actually jealous of all the attention the pretty flower girl received? No. That didn't feel quite accurate.

"Besides, Aerith has only just turned thirteen, and boys are usually fascinated by, uh, maturing girls, but they all love you," Brian continued. He arose from his resting position on the sofa and approached Tifa with a soft, warm smile plastered on his features. "Just do me a solid – don't grow up too fast."

Expelling a deep sigh, Tifa falsified a smile for her dad's benefit. He had no clue what was going on inside of her head – despite the telltale symptoms of puppy love transcribed across her visage – but she knew that was for the best. It just sucked that the only one person in the village she could relate to was the boy who lived next door, the one who Aerith undoubtedly loved, the one who walked up the pathway to the Strife household at the very moment with calm, but nonetheless blithesome grin adorned across his mouth without any need to obscure his crush. Tifa resented Cloud for that, yet she also wished that she could talk to someone about how amazing and exciting it was to shoulder fondness for Aerith.

/ / /

Aerith Gainsborough was quite the accomplished horticulturist – with a colorful variety of flowers sprouting from the soil of her front yard and the delicious array of fruits, vegetables, and herbs lovingly tended to in the backyard. The clever, savvy girl was able to amass a humble fortune from the townspeople of Nibelheim whenever they stopped to purchase flowers to adorn their dining room tables, requested edible plants for their meals, and asked for her service to assist them with their own gardens.

Yes, it couldn't be denied that Aerith possessed a natural gift for bringing some color and life to Nibelheim, but she was also a talented healer. Even without the convenience of magic, she could concoct miracles from her beloved plants. It was often said by the villagers that she would make a lovely nurse someday, or perhaps a pharmacist's assistant. In all honestly, she was proud to build the skills of it took to become a healer, on top of her proclivities for potion and elixir making. It made her feel like she was doing her ancestors proud, like Ifalna would have been proud of her.

And yet, she was not immune to vindictive musing about specific people, quietly thinking to herself that some people didn't deserve gentle aid.

"Uh, thanks for coming over, Aerith. I didn't think you would after yesterday," Lester said to his across-the-street neighbor, uncomfortably piercing the wrathful silence poisoning his bedroom. "It's real nice of you."

"My mom forced me," Aerith confessed, her voice saturated with artificial sweetness, as she busily applied a mixture of garlic, calamine, and ginger the to twelve year-old boy's swollen, hideous gash.

"Oh. Well... Still... Thanks, I guess."

"Mm-hmm."

"You look pretty today."

"Thank you."

"C'mon, Aerith. Don't be like that. Cloud started it!" he whined, sounding more like an insufferable toddler. "The guys and I were just trying to- Ow!"

A small, discreet smirk smeared across the healer's lips as she penetrated a needle and thread through the tenderized flesh of Lester's calf, not even pausing to warn him of the inevitable pain. "Your parents may fall for that crap, but you need to have more respect for my intelligence, unless you want this next part to really, really hurt."

"Alright, alright. So maybe we goofed on him too much," he begrudgingly conceded.

Sans intent to harm, the Ancient carefully spread a large glob of the medicinal, multi-purpose paste along Lester's gruesome wound, numbing the area before she resumed sewing the gaps of skin back together. Her neighbor winced and ground his together, though the sight of the procedure looked a lot more severe than it actually felt.

"I will never understand why you and those two other goons are so happy to bully Cloud. Don't you ever get exhausted from burdening so much hatred for someone you don't know." Despite the malice in Aerith's tone, her touch was warm and tender; her adept fingers gingerly tending to his injury. "You know and I know the reasons you hate Cloud are all made-up. I'm not friends with him out of pity or fear, and you know that he never meant for any harm to come to Tifa. So what gives?" Eyes of lush, vibrant earth gazed at the boy's perplexed visage, while her hand rested in her lap. She was finished applying medical care and lingered only to get to the bottom of it – figure out why the boys found Cloud to be despicable and maybe lay it to bed once and for all. It was the only thing that motivated her to be of any use to them.

But, as Lester broiled underneath the iron-will of her stare, he provided her with no answers, at least not an answer that would satisfy her curiosity. "I don't know. It's just the way things have always been, for as long as I can remember."

The status quo. It's just the way things were in Nibelheim.

"And you don't see anything wrong with that. You don't have any real ways to justify how treat him. You're okay with going along with the system, obedient and loyal. Have you ever even considered what you're putting Cloud through? Do you even care?"

The exasperation sewn through Aerith's tone caused Lester's stomach to flip around and around, burdening him with the shame of his actions for the first time in his life. The boy sat up straighter in his bed, no longer relying on the headboard for support, and thought for a little while longer. His brain marinated in the disappointment soaked around Aerith's statement, and he wondered if he actually ever hated Cloud. He never appreciated what happened on Mount Nibel and how Tifa was comatose for an entire week. It was easy for a kid to believe that Cloud, probably out of jealousy or anger over never being included in the Four Fiends' playtime, orchestrated an event that would take Tifa's life; it was even easier for a kid to believe that drivel when the grown-ups seemed to believe it before he, Emilio, and Tyler could explain.

"Was this is all Cloud's doing?" "That little menace dragged poor Tifa up the mountain, didn't he?" "Did he convince her to go with him?" "He probably told that poor, mourning sweetheart something about her mother. What a monster of a boy." "He bullied you boys into staying behind! I knew it! There is no way any of you would choose to Tifa alone with that cockroach." "Do you believe he wanted to hurt Tifa?" All of those questions were easy to say yes to, easy to go along with, especially because the boys were showered in praise for depicting Strife as a juvenile delinquent, rewarded for obliging their prejudices, and were even told they were heroes for it.

Yet, Lester wasn't that young or naive anymore. If he thought about it logically for a minute, Tifa was distraught over the loss of her mother and was desperate to climb up Mount Nibel, convinced that she could hear Thea's voice again; she would have gone up there no matter what. The town... They wanted to lay all the blame on Cloud, who was also just a kid, who would have gone along with any scheme, no matter how ill-conceived, if he thought he would earn a friend coming out of it.

"My parents made me a special dinner last night when they thought I beat up Strife. My dad cooked my favorite foods and my mom baked a pie. I thought being mean to him was the right thing," Lester finally began to explain. Nauseating shame embedded itself into the bruised depths of his facial contours as realization struck his senses. "Oh, god, I'm such an airhead!"

"Finally, that's something we can agree on," the young, budding Cetra remarked, pleased to watch the shapes of Lester's face change from confusion to understanding to utter mortification, before he buried his face between his hands. "Things can still change, if you want them to."

"But the guys-"

"What about them? Do they own you?" Aerith inquired, quirking an unsympathetic eyebrow.

"You wouldn't understand. You don't mind not fitting in," Lester retorted. "But I guess you're gonna say that's an even worse excuse. If you and Cloud can stand united against gossip and preening, then I can, too."

"No," bluntly stated the gardener. "I would never expect a coward to do anything that doesn't benefit themselves."

Lester's initial reaction was to scoff, but he managed to stifle the urge. Instead, he responded to Aerith's ice-cold judgment with a solemn nod. "But you still believe things can change?"

"I do," she confirmed. Standing up from her neighbor's bedside, the half Cetra collected her vials of herbs into a duffle bag. "Gardening really is not as easy as it looks. There are pests you have to deal with, roots so deep into the ground they seem to cling to the planet's core when you pull, and different plants require different types of care. But the results are so worth it when you've put in the work. I love my garden."

Twice more, Aerith visited the houses of the seriously injured boys to fix their wounds. Twice more, she discussed with Emilio and Tyler, respectively, how backwards and callous their treatment of Cloud was. Twice more, she dared to hope out loud for change, for a small sliver of growth from the morally desolate villagers. Emilio, naturally, was the most resilient to the seeds she tried to plant in his head; he wanted to cling to the idea that he was somehow Tifa Lockhart's mighty protector and that it was his obligation to keep Cloud from sniffing around too close to his girl, though Aerith rationalized that she was Cloud's mighty protector and now she was also a mage in training. Tifa's presumed future husband got a chuckle out of the insinuated threat – the sharp pain surrounding his ribcage served as a good reminder why he should take her more seriously – but the bully was stubborn.

Tyler, on the other hand, attempted to bargain the flower girl for a kiss; he was perfectly fine with the way things were, but if she really, really wanted Cloud to be left in peace, then he would humbly accept the payment of one kiss. Just one.

Turning away from the cheeky, awful boy, Aerith touch the soft pads of her fingers against her virgin lips, as an outraged gasp escaped from between them. "Is that the best way you can get a girl to kiss you? By force?"

"Force?" Tyler echoed, an arrogant, but incredulous snort emanating from his nostrils. He gestured up and down at his beaten up body, and carried on. "I can't force you to do anything. Your lame boyfriend crippled me. Good nurses give their patients' boo-boos kisses to make the pain go away, and I'm generously offering to forgive that chocobo farm reject for what I'm already owed."

Although Aerith didn't know him well enough to guess it and although his brand of humor tended to border on inappropriate, Tyler was only messing around with her. In the past three years, this was the longest they'd been around each other and he had no concept of what to say or how to act, and for some reason a total jerk had taken possession of his voice. Every word out of his mouth was a mistake, a regret. Granted, there was a part of the butcher's son that longed to get even with Strife and sharing one kiss with the person who mattered most to him would have satisfied that craving for revenge. He also found himself attracted to the tenacious personality within the older girl in front of him. Aerith was spirited and feisty and fun.

But there was also a lot of sense in the things Aerith told him earlier, that much he could admit to himself.

Turning back around, the thirteen year-old girl's signature cheer had been corrupted by acerbic contempt. "You really are a toad."

"Come turn me into a prince."

Hesitantly, as though she wore cinderblocks for shoes, Aerith stepped closer to Tyler. Her fists balled against her sides. "You'll really leave Cloud alone if I kiss you?" Deep down, she suspected that Tyler couldn't be trusted to keep what was probably going to be the most humiliating incident of her life a secret; she predicted that he was already plotting to rub it in Cloud's face, but if she could stop him from ever getting hurt again, selling her first kiss would have been worth it. "You swear?"

"I..." Well, he wasn't a complete bellend. "I don't want my first kiss to happen with a girl who feels coerced, and who's in love with another guy, even if that guy is total chump."

"What? But you said-"

"Forget what I said. I'm high on painkillers." Which was also true. Tyler then slipped beneath the welcoming warmth of his bed covers, carefully shifting himself away from Aerith. "I was joking around with you before, okay? I'm sorry."

"Your jokes aren't very amusing, Tyler. They're hurtful," the teenager retorted, confused by his abrupt change of mind. She couldn't conceal the reality that she didn't think very highly of him, but she did take one more step forward. "Why-"

"Because you're right. About everything. You always have been, but I don't care."

Now that was something Aerith, for as intelligent as she was, could never understand – how someone could have been satisfied with Nibelheim being the way it was at the expense of others.

None of the boys ever did end up apologizing to Cloud; each one of them were poisoned by their pride and fear; but things did change. Lester became more likely to give Cloud a nod of acknowledgment when their paths crossed; Emilio ignored Cloud's existence altogether, and Tyler started talking to Cloud more often, though not for very long and never about anything important. Most importantly, none of the three boys, who would be launched from their nests soon enough and become men, bothered Cloud ever again. They never viciously spoke of him, if they spoke of him at all. Neither Lester, Emilio, or Tyler want to be cowards and bullies, or to mature into cruel adults. Aerith's words had been planted into their minds and sprouted into small, subtle change – contrary to what they'd said to her in private.

Meanwhile, Cloud never did find out why his male peers gave up harassing him every day, but he was smart enough to deduce that the girl he cherished most had done something to mend the wounds within this sorry, little village. Someday, maybe it wouldn't quite be so sorry. The adults' suspicions of the blond-haired neerdowell never ceased, but the gossip did. The malice stopped. All because Aerith had the courage to nurse a few boys back to health.

/ / /

"Be careful right here. The last step is steep."

"I wouldn't have to be careful if you'd let me take off the blindfold."

"That would spoil the surprise."

"Alright. Just don't let me fall."

"Have I ever?"

"Not once," the flower girl answered sincerely as she affectionately squeezed her best friend's hand, cautiously stepping down the unstable set of stairs. Her guide through Nibelheim Park insisted on keeping her blindfolded throughout their journey, knowing how much she delighted in surprises. "So, let's see here... My birthday is still a long way off and you just passed."

"Yeah...?" Cloud conceded, quizzical about where her train of thought may lead. "This is a special we-don't-need-a-reason-to-celebrate celebration."

"But we are celebrating?" she inquired curiously – suspiciously. "Something special?"

"Okay. You got me there."

"It was easy enough to figure that out." Both Claudia and Elmyra advised the fifteen year-old girl to wear a nice attire for the day, though neither a skirt nor a dress would suffice, which clued Aerith in that something was afoot with her longtime best friend.

"Okay, now step a little bit this way," the blond fourteen year-old softly instructed, guiding her to stop more to the right where the sun no longer clamped down like a bear trap on her exposed shoulders. "And..." the young man began, untying the yellow ribbon from her head. "What do you think?"

For nearly half a year, Cloud toiled over a mountain of mechanical contraptions to build what he vowed would someday become a motorcycle. Almost every single day, he cleaned, fixed, and assembled each other the pieces together, often losing track of time to precious work to the point where Claudia or Aerith needed to remind him to eat or sleep. The Strifes' backyard had been consumed by a flood of boxes and bike parts, waiting to be added to Cloud's precious project, longing to make it perfect. Not to mention the times he visited the hardware store and stared at a wall of paint samples for Gaia-only-knew how long, agonizing over what color his bike should be. Black, practically a non-color that was universal for simplicity, yet equally stylish, or red, another socially acceptable boy color. His every thought was owned by that bike; it was all he seemed to care about or talk about.

In a way, no matter how silly it sounded, Aerith felt that motorbike was her competition for Cloud's attention.

Of course, he never left Aerith out of the process – she assisted and enabled Cloud's obsession by passing him tools, polished parts, and nursed wounds if he got a little too overzealous or careless with his passion. And even more importantly, she provided a generous ear for him to freely speak his mind to and why precisely the motorcycle was so significant to him. 'It's my ticket out of this dreary hole,' he would tell her, twisting away at a wrench. 'I'll leave in style, with my dignity, and become a man these people might actually accept.'

To Aerith, not only was the vehicle a contestant for her best friend's energy, but it was also a reminder – a clock, a countdown – that her only confidant would no longer be at her side every day, that her childhood days were quickly screeching to an end, and soon he would belong to the world. To the Turks. To Shinra. It pained the young Cetra to imagine how droll life was promised to become without Cloud to fill it with joy and laughter, to pretend that she was excited for a new phase of his life was on the horizon.

And now he presented the very thing she hated as a gift?

There, the motorcycle stood, all shiny and new, beneath the shade of a tree. "I don't understand," murmured the puzzled brunette, as the shimmer of the sun slipped through the leaves and bounced off the fuel tank – the enemy seemed to smugly wink at her.

"I thought we could go for a ride, just you and me," Cloud explained, nervously scratching the back of his neck as he stepped in front of her. "There's a lot of land out there we haven't seen yet, and it would be a good time to see how this baby performs."

As though she hadn't heard a single word out of his mouth, the teenage girl drew closer to the contraption. Her curious eyes accessed the vibrant color along the shells of each part. "Purple," she couldn't help but observe aloud.

"Wine," the freelance mechanic added, "but yeah, purple."

"When you suggested purple, I never seriously thought you'd go for it."

"I didn't ask for your help to shrug it off, Aerith. You put almost as much work into the bike as I have, and I want it to be something you think looks good," the someday Turk rationalized, clearly anxious for her approval. "So what do you think?"

It was good of Elmyra to each Aerith the wisdom in never speaking her meanest thoughts out loud, because somehow her loathing for that damned bike burrowed deeper into her core. "It's beautiful, Cloud." And it was, but it didn't lift her spirits any to realize that she helped design and build her worst enemy. "You did a really good job."

"We did a really good job," the spiky-haired teen gently corrected his precious friend.

In response, Aerith nodded her head and tried her hardest to counterfeit a convincing smile. "Right."

"So... That ride?"

"Hmm?"

"Do you want to go for one?"

"Oh, I don't know, Cloud. I-"

"C'mon, you'll have a blast." He had already started saddling up, taking to the bike like it was second nature.

"Are you sure about this?" Skeptically, the Ancient started to grit her teeth, as the pace of her heart picked up. Her every fear and instinct warned her that this was a bad idea.

"Do you trust me?" his soft-spoke voice queried; the same question twinkling in the azure hue of his irises. One hand reached out for hers as if somehow he had already predicted her answer. Without another word, Aerith relented and mounted the motorcycle seat. "Wrap your arms around me tight. Don't let go."

Before Cloud could even start getting the bike's engine revved up, the butterflies in Aerith's stomach twisted and swirled around in a hurricane – just from holding onto him. A dizzying, raspberry blush spread over the complexion of her cheeks like wildfire, and she had to force herself to resist the urge to pour her heart out to him then and there.

Then, in a matter of seconds, they were mobile.

Nearly in tune with the perfect humming of the engine, the local gardener expelled a squeal when the motorcycle set out on an adventure, which also earned a lighthearted chortle out of Cloud. Quickly, every ounce of ire Aerith once felt for the two-wheeled mode of transportation was forgotten, lost to the farthest reaches of her mind. Adrenaline and exhilaration now coursed through her bloodstream as she clung to the primary rider. Aerith felt like she was on a magic carpet – zooming through the fresh, cool air as the world roamed passed, just beneath her feet – while Cloud drove for miles and miles – the pair speeding past the greenest acres of land that they had ever seen, chocobos leisurely grazing in the grass, and nothing but infinite sky and freedom on the horizon. It was nothing short of incredible.

There was even a moment where the fifteen year-old, young woman felt courageous enough to uncircle one arm from Cloud's abdomen, extend a hand skyward, and point up at a bird. A dove perhaps. "How beautiful!" the flower girl exclaimed, mesmerized by the sight of such a gorgeous creature flapping its wings against the mild wind.

"We're almost there," the fourteen year-old announced, taking a road through the trees.

"Almost where?"

"You'll see."

"Cloud Beaufort Strife, is this another surprise?"

"My middle name isn't Beaufort."

"It is when you're being sneaky."

Just beyond the long tunnel of tall trees and surrounding darkness laid an opening of unmatched beauty. The soft glow of the sun streamed betwixt the hovering clouds, feeding life and energy into the beguiling assortment of flowers within the meadow. Bluebonnets, lilies, pinkladies, coneflowers, daisies, violets – it was as though some sort of divine entity traveled through this part of the forest and left strokes of colors and vibrancy behind.

Of course, the meadow's most recent discoverer was careful not to drive through the flowers and put the motorcycle in park just a few yards away, closer to the cover of the trees. The duo of friends hopped off the ride. Aerith, awestruck by what she believed was a goddess' personal garden, stepped into the grassier portion of the field. She couldn't register everything she was seeing – from the kaleidoscope of butterflies gathering pollen from the dozens of flowers to prepare their nectar, to the different colors of petals drifting and swirling through the sway of the breeze; she couldn't believe everything she was feeling – overwhelmed from simply standing in a tiny patch of heaven with her favorite person, having flown from one high to another.

Lucky. She just felt really lucky – that she was here now, with Cloud.

"Wow," the flower expert murmured; her voice sounded somewhat strangled after holding onto a breath. "Cloud, this is amazing... Beautiful! Don't you think so?"

For a moment, the male youth's brain hadn't caught a single word she said. He was too lost, too busy concentrating on the way the flaxen sun rays accentuated the almond-brown streaks of her hair, how her berry-pink lips moved in such a graceful way when she spoke, and the pattern of her freckles. Cloud could have watched Aerith for hours from his spot in the shade, as her evergreen eyes drank in the breathtaking vision of the peaceful meadow. If only he owned a camera, he would have taken a photograph of Aerith amongst the flowers and kept it in his wallet.

"Cloud...?" she whispered, concerned that her question had gone unanswered.

After another second ticked by, the motorcyclist shook the dazed grin from his face and replaced it with a more sheepish one. "Yeah?"

Expelling a small laugh, Aerith teasingly told him, "You're such a dope," and gestured at him to come join her in the clearing. "How did you know about this place?"

"My mom. She told me a story about how my fa-" he paused, struggling to get the rest of the word off his tongue.

"Your father," Aerith offered gently, relating with his reluctance to accept he ever had a father. It was similar to the way she thought about Gast.

"Yes, thank you," the fourteen year-old guy nodded in gratitude. "Anyway, he brought her here once, and that's when she knew that he was the one and I've always wanted kind of wanted to see this place. Just never could without a way to get here." Without another word of explanation, Cloud dropped like a sack of potatoes into the grassbed, and made himself comfortable amongst the tall, soft surface of green.

Finally, Aerith began to understand – why exactly Cloud worked vigorously on the motorcycle day after day, with such conviction that it would help him sample that first taste of liberation. "Thank you for bringing me here." The half-Cetra was much more dainty and delicate about lying down in the grass. "I wish we could build a house here in the woods and visit this spot every day."

"I'm glad you like the surprise." He knew that she would. "I just wanted us to go on one last adventure before I leave."

"I'd rather not be reminded." Her reply was soft and quiet, though she found it challenging to choke her frustration down her throat. Everything had been going so well. Why did he want to spoil the moment?

But Cloud wasn't nearly as oblivious as she thought. His ears caught the subtle crack in her voice, and he knew that she was going to miss him – a truth that had rested bittersweetly on his mind for six months, fore he was flattered by the obvious way she cared for him, but he also couldn't bear the idea of her being sad. "Our last adventure for now. I'll come back, you know."

"Cloud, please, I'm begging you, don't-"

"When I do come back, I want... I want to you..." As Cloud shifted to lay on his side, he perched his chin atop his knuckles, while his baby blues gazed down on the flawless, celestial artistry of Aerith's visage. "Will it be alright if I kiss you then?"

Marble-white pillars of teeth gingerly embedded themselves over the bottom length of her bottom lip, while her mind digested what exactly Cloud had just asked her. This was it. It was really happening. "Why do you want to wait?"

"Wh-Wh-What? What do you mean?"

"You can kiss me now. You don't have to wait."

"I can? Are you sure?" Honestly, Cloud had been expecting a simple yes or no. He hadn't planned for Aerith to respond any other way. Silly of him.

Gingerly at first, the sweet girl rested her petal-soft fingers over the back of Cloud's neck, then urged him down. Instinctively, he followed her guidance and closed his eyelids. What followed was a chaste meeting of the lips – a physically chaste kiss, however emotionally intimate. Two teen hearts accelerated from the fervor and elation of it all; the inspirational rush of driving around on a motorcycle paled in comparison. Nothing could have overpowered the fear of venturing past the borderline of friendship into the wondrous relief of having their deeper, romantic feelings expressed. There was no going back or pretending they were just kids being kids.

Suddenly, Cloud swiftly retracted his lips as soon as Aerith emitted a sharp hiss to announce her pain. "Wh-What's wrong? Did I hurt you?"

"No. No, of course not," the half-Ancient girl retorted in lightheaded amusement. "I just... Well, I had to pinch my leg just now. Just to make sure that I wasn't getting lost in a daydream."

In response, the spiky-haired lad shook his head side-to-side, though his own mouth wore an pleased, slightly relieved simper.

"Our childhood really is over, isn't it, Cloud?" Aerith questioned.

"Afraid so," the young man answered. Gently, he grazed a thumb against the supple skin of her cheek as crystalline tears began streaming from her glazed over, emerald eyes. "Aerith, come on, don't cry. Everything's gonna be okay. I'm enlisting in the Turks to spend more time with you. Believe in me. I'll come back for you every chance I get."

Once more, Aerith shook her head back and forth, emitting a small, slightly strained laugh from her chest. "I know, Cloud. It's just that sometimes I can't believe that you can love me as much as I love you, but right now I believe it more than I believe that the sky is blue. I'm crying, because I'm so, so happy."

Author's Note: Sooooo... I don't know that this is the end or not. I have some more ideas for scenes going forward, but I also don't want to make any promises that if I were to update this story that it wouldn't include more stories of Cloud and Aerith just being kids. I want this story to primarily be about their childhood innocence, and how being in each others lives would have changed their personalities as well (Cloud is definitely more optimistic and Aerith is slightly edgier). I am considering whether or not to address how drastically different I imagine the Nibelheim incident to have played out as well as FFVII. Either way, hope you enjoyed this addition!