Work Text:
happiness is a cunning thing
Marlene takes a step back from the chair. The soft ‘one-two’ of her feet against the floor tells him something is wrong. When he doesn’t hear anything else, he turns around to face her.
Silence from a seven year old is never a good sign, but other than the look of shock on her face she’s healthy and intact, so Cloud analyzes the next thing that comes to mind: his hair.
He doesn’t feel it at first, fingers running from left to right, but then the jarring sense of something missing finally meets his touch and Marlene’s silence begins to connect.
It’s short. Abrupt. A clipped patch of tuft on an otherwise unruly head of hair. Not quite a bald spot, but the closest thing Cloud has ever come to one after a lifetime of long hair. If the word mistake could be a sixth sense, this feeling would be it.
“I’m sorry,” Marlene says, voice smaller than he’s ever heard before.
He cocks an eyebrow, turns around, and grabs the handheld mirror from the vanity. Maybe it doesn’t look as bad as it feels. Balancing his reflection between two mirrors he confirms it does, in fact, look as bad as it feels. It looks as bad as Marlene’s expression implies: frightening.
“Did you run a lawn mower through my hair when I wasn’t looking?” he asks, regretting the words immediately. Over the course of a year he’s learned that deadpan sarcasm is the best way to make any kid under ten cry. Maybe in another year he’ll learn how to curb it in time.
“I’m sorry!” she wails, dropping the scissors from her hands.
He sighs to himself, fingers reaching for his temple. His day off started promisingly, now he’s missing hair and in the presence of a crying child. Asking Marlene to cut his hair is competing for the worst idea he’s ever had. If not for the small sobs leaking behind him, he’s certain he’d laugh, because who the hell asks a seven-year-old to cut their hair? Cloud Strife, that’s who. The guy who can slash a building in half also thinks children are skilled barbers. Comical stuff, really.
“Marlene, it’s fine.” Something barely audible makes its way between her sobs. “Marlene, it’s–”
“Please don’t hate me!” she yells, promptly coherent.
He’s taken aback. Hate? She thinks he could hate her–for this?
“I could never hate you.”
“But I ruined your hair. I messed it up. I–”
“I needed it,” Cloud says abruptly, hand waving swiftly to drive the point. “I’ve been way too cocky lately, people have been complaining.”
There’s a line of snot running out of Marlene’s nose and her eyes are watery, but she stops crying if only to cast a bewildered look toward Cloud. His words didn’t register, but it stopped her tears and he’ll take it as a win. “You don’t need to be upset. It’s just hair.”
She sniffles. “You’re not mad?”
“I’m not mad.”
“Are you going to tell daddy?”
He contemplates this, finger on his chin to half-appease Marlene. On one hand it would be the responsible thing to do. He and Tifa have taken on the task of caring for Marlene while Barret roams the world for answers, the both of them acting as parents by proxy, keeping Barret updated on every major and minor event in his daughter’s life. On the other hand, he gave a seven-year-old a pair of scissors, which is anything but an act of parental responsibility. If they tell Barret, only one person will be on the receiving end of his wrath and it’s not the little girl with the bow in her hair.
“Do you not want me to?” Marlene looks at the floor, shrugging.
Cloud leans toward her, leveling their eyesight. “How about this? You promise not to tell your dad I lent you a sharp object and I won’t either. Deal?”
“Promise?” she repeats.
He sticks out his pinky. “Promise.”
Marlene’s smile grows. She wipes her nose and meets Cloud’s pinky with her tiny digit, repulsing him in the process though he dare not show it. “What about Tifa?” she asks, peering over Cloud’s shoulder when he faces the mirror again.
“I have to tell Tifa.”
“What if she’s mad?”
“When is Tifa ever mad?”
“She gets mad when it comes to you.”
For some reason the statement makes him chuckle, even though it’s a strange one when unbound by context. But Marlene is smarter than that, there is context–an entire year’s worth of slow, simmering emotion from the raven-haired girl who never uttered a word. Cloud was the only one who couldn’t see it. But that was a year ago. Things have changed.
“Don’t worry,” he says, facing the young girl, “she’ll only be mad at me.”
Marlene’s hands start gripping for each other. “That’s what I’m afraid of.”
“Afraid of?”
“I don’t want you and Tifa to fight.”
Cloud’s heart constricts. He reaches for her small shoulder, needing to offer her something more tangible than a few dismissive words. “We’re not going to fight over this, Marlene. Nothing’s wrong. You did nothing wrong.” He gets up from his seat to grab the pair of scissors scattered across the floor. “Here. Try to make it even and we’ll call it a day. You’ll still get paid.”
She tilts her head. “The whole five gil, right?”
“The whole five gil.”
--
“Oh my god, what happened?"
Tifa runs to him as soon as the groceries hit the counter. Her hands dive for his head, fingers running through every uneven strand of blond hair with zeal. It has Cloud lazily smiling. The concern on her face doesn’t match the way it feels to have her hands all over him.
“I fell.”
“What?”
He laughs a little, leans into one of her palms.
“Cloud!” She steps back from him. “What happened? The truth.”
“Shh,” he says, finger up to his lips. He doesn’t want Marlene to hear from the other room. “I asked Marlene to cut my hair.”
“Cl–!”
“Shh!” he repeats, hand over Tifa’s mouth. “I told her you wouldn’t get mad.”
“May I speak?” she asks through his palm. He drops his hand. “I’m not mad. I just have one question: what the hell were you thinking?”
Cloud shrugs, walks over to the counter and starts pulling out groceries. “I needed a haircut.”
“From a seven-year-old?”
“She seems so mature,” he says aloud, putting together the reason that first eluded himself. He really thought she could do it.
Tifa’s hand finds its way to her forehead. She’s treading lightly, calmly. It’s exactly how he expected her to react, down to the steady tap of her finger on her brow. He likes being right about these things.
“Marlene is mature, but how does that translate to a competent hair stylist?”
“My hair was getting long, she asked for five gil to buy school supplies,” he turns away from the counter to face Tifa, “we made a deal.”
Tifa chuckles to herself. “That was a very poor deal for you, Cloud.”
He smirks. “I’ll get it fixed somewhere else.”
Tifa leans into the counter, arms crossed over one another while Cloud paces the room with produce in hand. “School supplies… They’re running low already? I haven’t noticed at all.”
“I’m sure it’s just a pencil or two.”
“For five gil, Cloud?”
He shrugs, pulls out a box of pancake mix and thinks, the kids will like this.
“I’ve been too busy,” Tifa says, suspended in her worry, shaking her head. “I’ve been too preoccupied with the bar. All of these early mornings and late nights–I’ve barely been able to keep up with their schoolwork.”
Neither of them has. School in Edge is a fairly new endeavor. School for Cloud is a completely foreign concept. He remembers some things from his days in grade school–recess, bullies, walking past Tifa on the way there, trying so hard to disappear and stand out at the same time. It’s the other stuff, the actual school stuff, he doesn’t recall.
“I’ll have to schedule it in,” she continues, already springing into action to right the wrong. She walks over to a calendar pinned on the wall. “Dedicated times for homework sessions everyday,” she uncaps a marker, “that way there are no distractions,” and starts flagging every day with a capital 'HW.'
Cloud stops to face her. “Tifa…”
“I’ll get more supplies this weekend.” Black lines fill the ‘Sunday’ box. “Maybe I can do a weekly review of what they have in the mornings just before they leave.”
“Tifa–”
“I can push out picking up groceries if they’re low on anything–”
“Tifa.” He wraps a hand around her arm. Ink smudges into the margins. “You’re overreacting.”
Her expression is more confused than angry. “No I’m not.”
“I mean, the school year just started. They can’t be very far behind.”
It’s not the statement she wants to hear. Tifa pulls her arm from his grasp and refocuses on the calendar, red eyes scanning the page for any unclaimed window of time. He’s sure she’d stop sleeping altogether if she could–mark up those eight hours in her mental calendar for something more productive like laundry or cleaning or mending things torn by three other people.
“Tifa,” he says, implanting his head into her view, forcing her to look at him. “I can get supplies tomorrow on my way back. We can make it my weekly task.”
She blinks. “Really?”
“Really.”
“Well, okay…I’ll make you a list.”
He nods, relieved. It’s been nice, the way she listens to him lately–the way he’s successfully been a source of comfort for her. He wants to capitalize on the moment, talk to her about her lack of sleep, her overworked schedules, but Tifa’s face starts to contort and when she bursts into laughter he startles at the change.
Her head lands on his chest, shaking, cackling. Cloud stands there, confused, perturbed.
Warm.
“I’m sorry,” she says, head bobbing into his ribcage. “It’s just…your hair…it’s so…stupid.”
His face falls. He pivots immediately, forcing Tifa to look up and catch herself or risk falling into the sticky bar floor. Her grip lands on his bicep, but he ignores it. “Go away.”
“I’m sorry, I’ll stop! Just look at me!”
“No!”
“I’ll cut your hair!”
He stops, throws a glance over his shoulder.
“You?”
“Me.”
“You know how?”
“Of course I do. I’ve been cutting my own hair for years.”
Without turning fully, he eyes her, the honesty in her expression and then–stupid beating heart temporarily ignored–he eyes her hair. It’s long and straight and pitch black. He never believed otherwise, but in the moment, it’s unmistakable just how opposite their hair is from one another. He walks away with a resounding “no.”
“Oh come on,” Tifa says, dropping her hands from his arm. “Who do you think cuts Denzel and Marlene’s hair? I know what I’m doing and if it’s not perfect and you still want to see a professional, at least you won’t have to look like a rabid chocobo for the next 24 hours.”
“Rabid chocobo? I look like a rabid chocobo?” She smiles at him, coy and cute and a little demure. “Fine.”
“Good! Now go have a seat and I’ll be right back.”
Cloud watches her walk into the apartment, a smile creeping along his face in the momentary solitude. His hair is a mess, he was ruthlessly laughed at, and he’ll have to schedule an appointment for a haircut–a genre of human interaction he particularly disdains–but Tifa’s head on his chest felt nice and the smile on his face seems to agree.
She walks back into the bar in tow with supplies he’s never seen before. “You okay?”
“Just thinking.”
“Sit, please,” she says, gesturing to a chair. He does as he’s told. “I’ll be gentle.”
“I don’t doubt that,” he replies, imagining her smile behind him.
She commands him to tilt his head, and starts to comb the base of his neck. The feeling of her small, even strokes on his scalp is strange, ambiguously unfamiliar. Her fingers in his hair, he knows. He’s felt it a few times before, most recently by the bar, but more often at night, in the dark, while trying to censor his mental state of mind in an effort to stay quiet and, well, proficient. But this? This is different. This is a new take on the word gentle–an newly unlocked example of how to be emotionally vulnerable without speaking a single word.
“I’ll try not to cut the top of your hair. You can leave that mess up to someone else.”
“Mess?”
She giggles behind him. “It’s a nice mess. A cute, Cloud mess.”
Good.
She starts clipping his hair, gathering pieces between her fingers to trim the ends. He can tell she was right about her aptitude in the way her fingers move. It’s another thing to add to the list of things Tifa does best. Parenthood, breakfast, looking adorable when she’s furious, kissing him, loving him–they’re all scattered across the list, all added to and expanded upon when he discovers something new. The thought process would have once nauseated him, or at the very least embarrassed him, now he’s so deep in the stage of acceptance he happily lets it sway his judgment.
A few weeks ago, for reasons he couldn’t remember, Yuffie called him whipped–her attempt at lighting a fire below invisible burners. Tifa’s eyes darted toward him, wide and alarmed and terrified for Yuffie’s life, but he just shrugged it off and walked away, causing each girl an even greater sense of alarm. There were worse things to be accused of in life. So what if his affections for Tifa were evident? They were never quiet to begin with.
“What are you thinking?” she asks from behind.
He watches blond hair fall to his feet. “Nothing.”
“You’re a bad liar.”
“I know.”
Things have been good between them. Really good. Better than either of them may have ever thought possible. He once convinced himself he’d never be enough. Sometimes the way she acted around him, the way she looked at him with her large, somber eyes, made him believe she felt the same way. But after he came back, made peace with his past and decided to live differently, all the pieces of the Cloud and Tifa puzzle finally started to fit.
Cloud’s mouth is pulled by the thought. He thinks of happiness as a thief, though he knows that can’t be right. But something about it feels cunning and suspicious, sneaking up on him when he least expects it, taking away something he was hard pressed to let go of. What changed between this month and the last? Him. Only him.
Tifa rounds the chair to look at him. Her fingers poke at the sides of his face, running further into his hair to measure the evenness of her cut. He can feel his heartbeat skyrocket, feel his mind reeling to do something about. Too often, and always in Tifa’s presence, do the words ‘act cool’ flash through his thoughts.
“Are you blushing?”
“No.” His eyes dart to the ground.
Her palms graze the tops of his ears and it sends a current through him from ear to brain, to heart to stomach. His skin feels paper thin under her touch. She leans closer, hands reaching toward the back of his head and he starts to wonder how much of this is for her own indulgence–to touch him, to watch him squirm.
“I think it’s good,” she says, no hint of a joke in her tone. “Take a look.” She stands up, grabs the mirror from the table and offers it to Cloud.
He grabs it from her, breathing deeply. It takes him a few seconds to recognize himself. The change isn’t drastic, just…different. To his surprise, he looks older.
Despite his nonchalance when Marlene first maimed him, he was afraid the shorter hair would only give way to his boyish face, make him look younger and weaker and whatever else he tended to fear. Now, inspecting Tifa’s work, the word ‘mature’ bounces around in his head. There’s a quick pang in his heart at the thought–a memory of his mother when he first returned to Nibelheim. She had used the same word to describe his freshly chopped locks.
“So, what do you think?”
He nods, turns his head to the side, nods again.
Tifa’s hand is on his shoulder, dusting off strands of fallen hair. She’s bent at the hips again, head close to his with her arm extended. “I think you look handsome.”
When they’re eyes meet, he indulges her with a smile, the one that usually has her booking it for the door, and pulls her into a kiss.
It’s been so easy to be this way–to grab her, to kiss her, simply because he can–an impossible thing to resist after a lifetime of resisting, and damn it did Cloud resist. Too much, too quickly for no good reason. Now he kisses her in the middle of the room, seated on a chair while she hovers in front of him, no longer concerned about anything other than Tifa. Alive and out the other end and no longer concerned, period.
“Thank you,” he says, hand cupped on her jaw.
“You’re welcome,” she says and leans in again.