It started with a kiss when we'd both been drinking. You were this ethereal presence in my life before that, coming and going between towns. The jaded part of me told me that I was cheaper and more practical than an inn. The younger diehard hopeful part of me – the one that willed me to look at Sephiroth without flinching and throw my first punch - told me that some part of you wanted to be here; wanted to be amongst people that you knew, even if sometimes it was only me on my lonesome. Me and the children.

I never asked you if you had any family, Vincent. Brothers and sisters, maybe. I think that you would've made a good older brother.

Years don't matter very much to people like us, do they, Vincent? No, I don't think that it's pretentious to say 'us'. You, Cloud and I, we're the ones who really lost in all of this, aren't we? Barret's loss was an old one and Yuffie was too younger to understand hers. Even then, theirs weren't as... personal, were they? Barret lost a wife to the Shinra but gained a daughter and Myrna's death was incidental. Yuffie didn't lose anything more than all of her other countrymen. Ours were more... intimate. We are the project, Vincent. It burnt down my home and murdered what was left of my family, stole your life from you, and turned Cloud into an echo of someone that he hadn't wanted to forget.

I reached out to him because – because – because a sixteen year old me had loved that boy and when you have nothing else you hold onto things like that. I loved him – and I still love him – but Aeris was the first to teach me that love happens in a thousand different colours. Cloud and I, we're attached like two beats of pulse … but that doesn't mean that we'll ever need to be together that way, the way that people expect us to be. It took me years to understand that, Vincent. Years.

But years don't matter very much to people like us.

We'd been sitting on the floor with our backs against the sofa, something silly that I hadn't done in ages. That red cloak of yours was strewn all around you, like some bit of cloth that had fallen off of a seamstress's table. We'd been drinking red wine, some biting vintage, and I'd been talking to you. You, you'd been listening in that all-encompassing way you have, making me feel like I was being devoured whole. Oh, if I didn't know you, Vincent Valentine, I'd assume what most people do about you. If I didn't know your tiny secrets – that you love a good pasta, swear when you cut your fingers accidentally, and spend as much time watching the stars as anyone else – maybe then I'd make the same mistakes that everybody does. But I never could, Vincent. Not after what we've been through.

I laughed at something - hopefully not my own joke - but red wine always goes to my head. I lurched a bit too far forward and you, frighteningly attentive reflexes that you have, caught me. Hands right on my shoulders, that claw of yours grasping just a bit more lightly. Always so careful, Vincent Valentine.

I caught your eye and kissed you then, all brilliant irises and steady hands.

I feel it Vincent, like a pulse that keeps me connected to everything else. You're like a thrumming under my skin. You're, you're – you’re better than breathing.

You were the one that stopped it, of course. Those hands against me that had been two inches from pulling me closer went rigid and you pulled away. You were breathless – not afraid but your eyes were wide and I swear that I could feel the pulse in your fingers.

A younger me would've been ashamed or frightened by what I'd done but this older me knows better. So much expression, Vincent... can you feel me under your skin too?

You stood so fast – but it felt slow – and looked down at me still sitting on the floor. I didn't stand in part because I wanted to sit looking up at you.

Unapologetic, Vincent Valentine.

You swallowed and your chest heaved and I watched you try to shake off the touch that had ripped open your skin. Like two murmurs in the same whisper, Vincent. That's what it feels like.

When you turned to leave, I stood because my sensei had taught me to be a fighter. Whatever my life has made of me, I'm still that.

"I'll still be here, Vincent," I said to your back, voice crisp and clear in my empty home. A voice to shake the ground, maybe; or at least attempt to ground you.

You turned your head halfway so that I could see the profile of your face. That and nothing else.

You left after that.

I'm going to teach you that you're still human, Vincent Valentine. It's not some silly project or delusion or pity. It's true and I won't rest until you can see it too.

I can feel you under my skin now and that's not the kind of touch that goes away.

Four months wasn't as long as I'd thought it was going to be, Vincent. I suppose that you could call that an improvement. Half of me was sure that I'd made you disappear for good... but that was a weaker part of me, the part that doesn't know enough to have faith in people.

Or myself, rather. It's hard to have faith in someone when they don't have faith in themselves. Sometimes I swear that I know you better than you do. I'm not as blind to it.

Oh, I haven't been waiting on baited breath, precisely. I kept living much like every other rational person would. I found a few of the children homes; I found a few more that needed a home. I have a fourteen year old named Vera now. You'd like her, I think.

The older ones are always more difficult; too set in their ways. I had to win her over with a promise of a free bed and an open door. She could disappear tomorrow and I know that I'd never be able to find her. Sometimes you have to hold these girls so lightly that they don't even know that you’re attached to them. I don't know anything about Vera besides her name. She comes and goes gods only know where. I want her to learn how to trust me – and herself, maybe – but the distrust runs deep in that one. I'm patient; I'll give it time. There's no guarantee that she'll ever tell me her story... but I'd rather her sleeping upstairs than alone in the places I've seen out there.

Midgar hadn't been the kind of place that was good to young fourteen year old girls. We try to do better here but Edge is much the same.

It was Wednesday night, not too long past closing, when I heard your knock on the glass of my door. I'd been cleaning up around the bar, planning on having a hot bath and watching some tv before bed. Of course the sight of you threw me, Vincent. Clearly I hadn't been expecting you.

But I've been waiting for you to show up again ever since you left that night and so I imagine that a Wednesday night was good as any other.

I left the counter to answer the door. Still all red and jagged edges, Vincent? People are going to start thinking that I court vampires.

There was this weird moment that passed where I was standing with my door half open, my shoulder leaning against the edge of the frame, and you were looking down and to the left of me. It was this tiny instant where you could've turned and walked away again and that time I'm sure that you wouldn't have come back.

It passed. I stepped back from the door and held it open for you.

"Would you like to come in, Vincent?" I asked and you didn't quite hesitate before walking in and past me. You headed towards the middle of the room, putting a conspicuous amount of distance between us, towards where all the circular patron tables were. I'd already stored all the chairs away and so, really, there was no where to sit besides the bar. Maybe you felt more comfortable standing.

You stopped about a third of the way into the tables. I didn't quite sigh and walked over towards you. I stopped about two feet away and leaned my back against one of the table's edges. You followed suit.

There, this almost feels comfortable, doesn't it Vincent?

We both knew that I wasn't going to speak before you did. If the silence stretched out, that was hardly my doing. I was waiting for what I knew that you wanted to ask me.

"...Why did you do it?" you finally said, and gods above me, I know you, Vincent Valentine, but those eyes can still make my breath catch and make me feel like... like...

Why, Vincent? Do you know that I've been wondering since the moment it happened? Do you think that I planned all of this, that I had some great, cosmic scheme to get you out of that damn cloak and into your own skin again?

No – but... but I'm probably the only one out of the two of us who knows how to take things as they come. The thing that you like to forget, Vincent, is that we're both just human. We're allowed to make mistakes. We're allowed to fail.

You have an overstated view of your own importance. No woman is worth thirty years of grief, Vincent. Lucrecia didn't deserve it and you had no place to give it. Do you think that you're the only one who's lost people, Vincent? Do you think that you're the only one who's failed the people they loved?

We've all been so wrong in all of this for so long... You had no right to turn that woman into a symbol, that woman had no right to steal your life from you, and Hojo – Hojo – Hojo was blind and a fool. No woman is worth that kind of revenge. He...

I don't know if you realize this, Vincent, but I remember the faces of the different people I've killed. Maybe you had some sort of training to forget that sort of thing. Or maybe you didn't because even after all these years I can still see a bit of madness hiding behind those irises of yours, sometimes. At the worse times. I wonder if you ever see echoes of it in me as well.

I'd never felt so justified in my entire life. It wasn't just about you, Vincent. It was Aeris and her mother and Marlene and Cloud and – everyone. That man who in his own blind arrogance decided to make a monster his god; can't you see how you weren't the only one who suffered in all of this? We're all tied up in this damn project. If you could see the ties that bind all of us together, maybe then you'd learn enough to stop shouldering it all yourself.

You were just one person, Vincent. You tried; all you can ever do is try.

So, why? Because no one has the right to be so unilateral in their grief; because you're too much of a damn fool to see it all on your own; because all the parts that I like about you only come through in echoes and just once I'd like to have you all on my own.

Because I know how to look at you without flinching, Vincent, and I stopped being afraid of things ages ago.

I pushed myself off of the table and walked up slowly to you. Your brow furrowed but I kept my eyes on you. To your credit, you didn't back away.

I know that you're brave enough for this, Vincent. You really need to learn how to stop running from things. But only a fool would do something like this completely for another person. So why did I do it, Vincent?

Because I wanted to and because I want you. I want all the things that I see in you. No excuse, no regrets; nothing more or less than everything that we actually are.

I took your hand without taking my eyes off of you. I loved the feel of it, you know – a good solid hand with just a bit of a callous. Little things like sturdy hands give you away, Vincent.

That and the fact that you still didn't pull back from me.

I held your hand in both of mine and brought it up between us. You glanced down at our entwined fingers and then looked back up at me.

I couldn't help but grin a little.

"See," I said simply, never once taking my eyes off of you, "you didn't disappear."

I slid in close and did that dangerous thing again. I caught your lips and put just enough pressure there to make you need to steady yourself against the table. That hand that I'd been holding fell down and then...

It felt so damn good against my back, Vincent. Like it belonged there. Strong and steady and I bet that if you'd pushed just a little bit harder I could've felt that callous there too.

I pushed against you a bit more but that table gave us nowhere to go. My breath caught when your hand skipped down, pulling me closer to you until there was no space left to breathe between us. No space at all.

My hand went to your cloak and we both went down together.

It retrospect, it probably would've been better if we'd made it up to the bedroom. I probably could've chosen a better way to go about this. I had the vague feeling that my back was going to cramp up as we both lay together on top of that table.

But I couldn't really complain with you so warm beside me. Your nose was barely touching the line of my neck and that claw of yours was what you had encircling my body, far enough over that I wouldn't shiver if it touched me.

I was grateful for the redness that covered about half of us when we lay there. Still, I have to say... there's something beautiful about you when you're just in your skin, Vincent. I could hear both of us breathing.

You shifted beside me and raised your head enough to look at me. I turned to look at you. I've seen your eyes look so many ways – wild and fey and frightening – but right then they just looked like you, Vincent. Not that younger you that I never knew but who you are now. That's all that I ever wanted to see.

I was waiting for you to speak again but you did something that surprised me. You leaned in and kissed me again, the kind of kiss that you give a woman when you've finished making love. Long and soft but without that pent up desire; the kind of way you kiss a woman to tell her something and hear her answer in return.

When you were done you rolled onto your back and I moved with you. I fit quite nicely against your shoulder. Your good hand wrapped around my back and your other one tucked a bit of hair away from my face before you let it rest against your stomach.

I was devouring the lines of your skin that I could see against you. I remember that there was a tiny little fleck of a scar against your collarbone. I liked it there.

You rested your cheekbone against the top of my hair and it felt right and good and warm. It felt like I belonged there and that you belonged there and that’s all I that wanted to know.

"...You're a beautiful woman, Tifa," you finally said, voice dusty-soft in the empty bar. I laughed quietly against your shoulder.

"No Vincent, I'm just Tifa. But thanks all the same."

You looked down at me and I looked up at you and you caught the bit of a grin on my lips. It didn't take much for your mouth to curve up as well. You kissed me one more time and I leaned back to let you. When you didn't stop, I certainly wasn't complaining much.

Oh, eventually we got our clothes back on. I showed you to the upstairs bedroom and we made full use of the covers.

Now the sun is slowly rising and the birds will start to sing soon. Dawn comes like a welcome stranger every day in Edge. It's my favourite part of the city.

I know that if I watch you sleep too long you'll start to stir. You still are a restless sleeper, Vincent. I think that I can help you with that. Among other things, maybe. I'm sure that you'll teach me things too. Balance is important like that.

You look more like yourself when you're sleeping, Vincent. The lines of your face soften a bit and you breathe a bit more softly. But you can groan and stretch like every other person. I think that that's the best part.

I slink back down to lie beside you and you stir a bit. I pause, waiting and listening, but I didn't wake you. That's good. I take one last glance at the sun that's starting to colour my windowsill before closing my eyes as well. Your breath stirs a bit of my hair. I lean in close to you like we're sharing a secret and I can't help but smile.

I think that today I'll take you shopping. You could use some new clothes.