Chapter 1: No Shortage of Boxes
The chestnut colored wooden planks that lined the floor could barely be seen due to the incalculable number of cardboard boxes piled ceiling high and overflowing with a variety of items from worn out books to dusty weapons. Thin rays of yellow sunlight penetrated through the lone, cobweb-covered window that was located in the small attic’s far wall.
No wind stirred, nor could a creak be heard, in the lonesome space that seemed as if forgotten and left to age without disturbance. This remained true until one day when the leaves were reborn and spring with all its flowers came to reside in the house. It was then that the attic door, with a few pounds and a quick jerk, was pried open and a man stepped inside with a few loud “clunks” of his work boots.
The man sighed, breathing in the stale, dust saturated air that caught in his throat and plagued him with an immediate, but short lived, coughing attack. After regaining his breath and clearing his throat a few times, he ran his hand through his blond hair and with a slight hesitation, began.
Starting from the top of each column of boxes, the man worked his way down, sorting, cleaning, repackaging, and of course throwing away item after item. As time slowly slipped on by, it became a process that repeated in a machine-like cycle: Spray-spray, dry, sort; Spray-spray, dry, sort; Spray-spray, dry, sort. With this rhythm, everything in the room sang: resurfaced clocks clicked, boots clunked, and even the man’s breathing kept the beat.
Opening a dust coated wooden case, the man extracted a long sword. Sweeping the weapon through the air a few times brought back a rush of memories. He remembered all too accurately the surge of energy after a fight, the pain that came with an injury, and the atrocious mistakes that could lead to death. Holding the sword in his hand, he also remembered the eyes… watching, peering into his soul….. they were hard and cold, so full of hate….
An unexpected noise provoked the man to suddenly jerk around, facing the attic door. Positioning himself in a battle ready stance, he held the weapon with confidence and a touch of familiarity. He had felt eyes on his back before, and had turned just in time to spot two tiny, bright blue eyes situated in a plump little face that was topped with blond hair.
The boy gasped at the sight of the sword and the swirl of anger in the eyes of its holder, shutting the door promptly behind him. Dad always was saying strange things about Uncle Cloud, but he hadn’t really believed any of them until today.
“Come on out,” Cloud called, his voice directed at the door, and then, on second thought added, “It’s alright. I put the sword down.”
With a slight hesitation, the attic door creaked open slowly to reveal a wide-eyed boy, no more than four years of age, who stepped cautiously forward into the room.
“What’s up, kid?” Cloud asked with a tinge of annoyance. After all, the attic was only half finished, and if he was going to be done by dinner, Cloud would have to avoid all unnecessary interruptions.
The young boy’s lip quivered as if he was going to speak, but he only proceeded to advert his eyes from Cloud’s, stare at the floor and mumble a few incoherent words while shuffling his feet nervously.
“Did you just say that Cid’s been transformed into a flying baboon with a green tongue?!?” Cloud proclaimed, pretending to be serious as if something that ridiculous happened all the time.
Skylar looked up and grinned. “Noooo, my daddy s’not a fyin’ baboon wit a gween ‘ung!”
Cloud nodded in agreement, “I didn’t think so.”
“Aun’ Tee-fa told mommy that you was to pway wit me today, Uncle C-oud,” Skylar explained.
There it was. Cloud’s worst anticipated possibility coming true with the meaning behind that one statement: Tifa had signed him up to baby-sit Skylar. It wasn’t that the kid was especially bad. Actually, Skylar was blessed with many of Shera’s good qualities, but he still had a strong dose of Cid incorporated into him. Besides not having the time, Cloud knew that this was just an attempt on Tifa’s part to get him to realize, as she puts it, “what a treasure children are.”
“Well, Sky, I have to do some cleaning so if you want, you can go downstairs and watch some television,” Cloud suggested as he picked up the cleaning fluid and rag.
“I’ll ‘elp,” Skylar told Cloud with a smile as he reached down and picked up a broom, holding it awkwardly because of it’s big size compared with his height.
Cloud looked at the little boy skeptically, but before he could protest, Skylar turned around, swinging the broom handle, which knocked into a tower of boxes. Like an avalanche, the cardboard boxes came crashing down on top of the little boy who was quickly swallowed in the debris.
“Sky!” Cloud yelled as he came pawing through the boxes until he uncovered the breathless boy.
Skylar, eye’s wide and wet, had a small cut on his forehead, and although he wasn’t crying, his lips quivered uncontrollably. Cloud scooped the small body up and placed him back on his feet.
“You okay, Sky?” Cloud asked with a mix of worry and disappointment. All his hard work and now not only did he have another mess to clean up, but he also had to deal with a bleeding kid.
Skylar wiped his nose on his sleeve and shook his head, “Yeah, but my head has an owwie.”
Cloud nodded. “We’ll go fix you up and then I’ll clean up this mess…”
“But I wanted ta ‘elp,” Sky whispered sadly. “I’m saw-wee, Uncle C-oud.”
Skylar, in a desperate attempt to fix his blunder, picked up an old paper that laid next to his foot and handed it to Cloud.
Cloud smiled, “You got determination, kid.”
With that, Cloud lifted Sky up, carrying the boy and the old paper down the stairs to the kitchen. Placing Skylar in a chair at the kitchen table, Cloud dropped the paper casually onto the counter.
“I’ll go get a band aid,” Cloud said after ruffling Sky’s blond hair playfully before leaving the room.
Skylar sniffled and then turned his curious round, blue eyes toward the counter. Slipping out of the chair, he reached up and swiped the paper from the place Cloud had nonchalantly left it. Skylar unfolded the yellow stained paper to uncover an old photograph.
“What are you up to, you little delinquent?” Cloud raised his eyebrows in suspicion. “Sit back down and let me bandage you up before you bleed all over Aunt Tifa’s kitchen.”
Skylar, picture in hand, immediately obeyed and flinched only once while Cloud went through the procedure of cleaning and wrapping up his small cut.
“Now that you look like your part mummy,” Cloud teased.
Skylar merely grinned. If what Uncle Cloud said was true, maybe he would be able to scare his little sister, Lark, who was spending the day with Mommy at the park, later tonight.
“Uncle C-oud? Who’s in this pic-tour?” Skylar asked as he produced the old photograph, handing it to Cloud.
“Oh man, where’d you find this, kid?” Cloud questioned with pure astonishment in his voice. “This is me and your Aunt Tifa when we were kids.”
“Before you was mar-weed?” Skylar inquisitively asked.
“Yup,” Cloud responded with a smile. “This was taken a long time ago, when Aunt Tifa and myself went to camp together.”
Skylar nodded, “An’ who’s the pink gwirl in the back-gwound?”
Cloud frowned and did a double take. Who WAS the pink girl, hidden in the background, seated beside a black haired boy? On closer inspection, Cloud realized that this was not a picture from his childhood summer camp. Instead, it was from the “problem development program” he and Tifa had been sent to for a week one summer long ago. The entire event had been completely erased from his mind and the shocking picture brought back a rush of flashes and bits of memories. Forcing himself to think back, Cloud found that he knew not only who was in the photograph with Tifa and himself, but held the knowledge of the events of that week which had changed his relationship with Tifa forever.
And then Cloud remembered it all as clear as a cloudless star jeweled sky..……