A Nice Girlfriend

[11.07.01] » by Del Greer

"I'd feel much better if you just settled down and had a nice girlfriend."

Letters from Ma. It had been months since Cloud had seen his mother in person, but the words still rang from the page as clearly as if she was standing next to his bed in the barracks, criticizing him personally.

It was his own fault, really. He had never lived alone in his life, and therefore his mother was morally certain that he was incapable of surviving under such conditions for more than a week. Never mind that he was a professional survivor, so to speak...he had been a SOLDIER for some time now, and while he had no front line experience, training kills as many men as combat ever did. But he had learned. He had watched Zak, his platoon leader, and learned a lot. Fencing, materia use, limit breaks, the care and feeding of summoned monsters, and a million other things that help a man to survive in combat.

As far as living alone in the big city...well, millions of people did it. From the slums to the apartment on the upper plate that rose nearly as high as the Shin-Ra headquarters building, there was nowhere else in the world where as many people lived closely together as in Midgard, and there was nowhere else in the world where as many people lived alone. His mother, he knew, didn't even want him to be seriously involved with anyone; she just wanted him to find some girl to cook and care for him. Not a romantic relationship so much as a janitorial one. Nonsense.

So, he had decided, there would be no girlfriend. He was perfectly capable of making it on his own, and he would do so. Next month, he would test for SOLDIER First Class, and when he made it, he'd take the extra pay and the extra off time, and he'd find himself a nice place somewhere in an inexpensive part of the "pizza", and he'd live there alone.

He put pen and paper down on the desk, closed his eyes, and cleared his mind, preparing to compose a reply to his mother. Still the words echoed in his head. "...if you just settled down and had a nice girlfriend..."

A NICE girlfriend? This would be a girlfriend, who was a woman, and also nice? Did they make those? Jumping Jenova on a pogo-stick, Ma! Look at the major female influences I've known in my life. There was you, and you've done nothing but criticize me and fret over me and generally make me feel like an incompetent loser ever chance you got. There were the girls at school, who laughed at me and made fun of me and generally did the same. There was Tifa Lockheart... Man, was there ever.

Tifa. With your dreamy moonlit promises, and your cruel friends, and your arching eyes that saw ... that HAD to see what I felt for you, even when we were kids, and overlooked me all the same. Tifa Lockheart.

Intervening years vanished, and Cloud found himself sitting on a wishing well that he would always remember, with a girl he would never forget. "Promise me, Cloud," her soft alto murmur echoed in the night. "Even if you never do, promise me that if I ever need you... you'll come and rescue me."

"I promise."

And she had gone back to her house, and he had gone off to Midgard, and that was the last he heard of her. A silly girl falling in love with some romantic image, some picturesque armor-clad knight and horse, and he just happened to be the right face to put on the horse's ass.

And yet, years later, he had never forgotten the promise. He had never forgotten her. And she, he felt sure, had never given it a second thought.

The pen broke with a sharp report in his clenched fist, bringing him out of his reverie with a start. Cursing softly, he wadded the ruined sheaf of paper together and threw the whole damn mess in the trash, then set about cleaning off the ink from his hands. He heard the voices in the corridor outside, the other young SOLDIERs come back from their day's duty, excited at their plans for the coming evening. They would go, as they always went, to some dance club or another and unsuccessfully attempt to impress women with their tales of madcap daring and exciting escapades, and one or two of them would engage in a conversation with an attractive member of the opposite sex, and when the SOLDIERs reconvened the next day, those lucky few would have compelling tales of pure fiction about their sexual prowess and success. The cycle repeated itself three or four times a week; it was never-changing, and Cloud had never participated in it.

He asked himself why not, as he dried the stains of unrequited frustration from his hands. Unable to find a good answer, he changed out of his blue-on-blue uniform, ran a hairbrush through his generally untamed mop (SOLDIERs generally wear short hair not only because it's safer, but because helmets make anything long completely unmanageable), and joined his comrades for a night on the town.

A nice girlfriend, he told himself, had to be better than memories of someone who never gave a damn about you to begin with.

*

At the same time, a thousand miles away, a buxom girl with long dark hair finished a hard day's workout. Tifa was many things ... a notable pianist, a mountain guide, a martial arts expert and instructor ... but at the end of a training session like that, what she was most was a tired girl.

She walked back into town with her class, laughing and joking with them as they hiked through the mountains. Like the legendary monk Yang, she preferred to train in the thin air of the mountains, and her class hated it enough that she knew it must be effective.

She spent an hour showering, fixing something to eat, and generally relaxing away the stress of the day before she turned to the stress of the evening. She sat at her desk in the tiny bedroom, crowded with relics of her youth in addition to an unnecessarily large piano. There was really no reason she couldn't have moved it downstairs; keeping it in her room was just silly. If she woke up in the middle of the night with some grand musical inspiration, as had been known to happen, she still couldn't play it unless she wanted to wake up her parents. Somehow, though, she loved the old instrument, and she just couldn't see waking up without it within easy reach.

She gazed idly out the window for a moment, caught herself visualizing a wild-haired blond-headed boy through the window, strolling up the walk. Enough stalling. Time to write this thing...

Cloud ... I'm still trying to understand what I've done wrong. I guess it's just that I can't let go of something I held so dear for so long; the dream of seeing you again someday is such an important part of me that I can't stop dreaming it. I wish you felt the same.

I know you must get tired of me saying the same thing over and over again; in truth, a part of me believes that by now, you're just throwing these letters away without reading them. Certainly it would save you a lot of time. And logically, I know you must have forgotten me after all this time. Your mother has shown me some of the letters you've sent her, and you don't even mention me in them, let alone the pounds of paper I've burdened the mails with.

If you'd even say a word; if you'd even include a scrap of paper, a cocktail napkin, with the letters to your mother, anything at all to say you still care... you have to know it would mean everything to me.

I still believe that our hearts, our souls that were so close to each other all our lives can't have grown so far apart. I still dream of you, and I still can hear your voice promising that one day, you'd come back and save me, when I needed you most.

Cloud, I need you! I'm alone, and my arms need to hold you now more than ever before! I write you every night, not just because I miss you, not just because I love you, but because I need you! I need you to rescue me!

I hope that someday, you will need me, too.

Love always, Tifa

*

Dusk fell, dawn broke, and another day had begun in Nibelheim. Cloud's mother was up at first light, and busied herself by brewing some tea and sweeping out the kitchen until the Lockheart girl showed up. Every morning for years now, Tifa had shown up before a body could eat a decent breakfast; Mrs. Strife had learned to postpone cooking until after her daily visit.

The girl came as scheduled, talked about inconsequential matters for a few moments, gave Mrs. Strife the letter, and was on her way. The mother watched Tifa walk down the steps and into town, bravely maintaining her composure, though she must surely want to burst into tears. After all these years of writing Cloud a letter every night, and never getting a response, what could she have left to talk about?

Hmph. Mrs. Strife had never approved of Tifa; the foolish child never learned how to be a proper lady, and had been leading Cloud into trouble since he was eight years old. Mrs. Strife had faith that eventually, Tifa would lose interest and transfer her foolish notions of love and romance to some other, less elusive target. As long as it wasn't Cloud, his mother would be satisfied. Her boy was too young to waste time on such nonsense; he just needed a nice girlfriend to take care of him until he was old enough to take care of himself.

She tossed the letter into the wastebasket, the same fate that had befallen so many of its predecessors. If only he would just find a nice girlfriend...

Author's note...This was supposed to be a humorous thing about Cloud's trip to a single's bar in Midgar, where he would be shot down and otherwise humiliated by various and sundry Shin-Ra employees and flower girls. Obviously, it did not turn out that way, but I think I like this better anyway. If someone else wants to write the single's bar story, please feel free...