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Delivery 37: Offended

Cloud was convinced that there was something very wrong with him and the hurt in Tifa's eyes further confirmed what the stinging pain in his cheek declared, he had hurt Tifa's feelings. Cloud slowly turned his head back to face Tifa, the red hand print throbbing in pain. With the punches she threw, he knew she could slap very hard, but it was the offense in her eyes that hurt the most. "How can you be so insensitive?"

Cloud's mouth moved but he only chewed air, no words came out, no matter how hard he tried to say something. Then he glared at Reno, whom he had been talking to before Tifa stormed out of the kitchen, marched right up to him and imprinted her hand on his face. She had been doing dishes and Cloud had to tightly close his eyes to protect them from the soap, a few soap bubbles and foam stuck to his hair, but he didn't notice, or didn't care.

"What did I do?" Reno raised his hands in the air. "Tifa storms in and slaps you and you're blaming me? I'll admit I've done my share of the mischief in the past, but this time, I don't even know what this is about." The red haired Turk paused for a moment, until he broke free of Cloud's glare and gave Tifa a puzzled look. "Mind letting me in on the information?"

Tifa huffed, "don't worry about it Reno and thank you." Stomping her feet, Tifa returned to the kitchen.

Cloud growled, teeth clenched and glare deadly. "Reno..."

"I swear I don't know what this is about. I didn't do anything!" Reno thought for a moment, as if collecting his memories and doing a double check, "nope, I didn't do anything, not to Tifa."

"Tifa isn't angry at you, she's angry at me and I know it's your fault!" Cloud was at the end of his patience with Reno.

"If I did anything bad, then Tifa would be angry at me instead, so that proves I'm innocent! Besides, she said thank you, I don't know what for, but she did." This was very confusing to Reno, but his main focus would be to try to prove his innocence, though that wasn't looking good.

Cloud was about to take the fight outside, certain that this disaster, which he still did not fully comprehend, was somehow Reno's fault. However, Tifa's voice interrupted that plan, "enough! Cloud, don't take it out of Reno, the words came out of your mouth, he was defending me."

Both men looked at Tifa, who had returned to stop their argument. Reno nodded energetically, though he didn't know how he defended Tifa and did not remember doing so. It didn't matter, this would surely be beneficial. "Yeah, I was defending her!"

"From what?" Cloud demanded.

"From you," Tifa accused.

Cloud was in shock, "what did I do?"

"You know what you said," Tifa glared.

Cloud was so confused and cornered, he didn't have the energy to fight anymore, instead he turned to Reno for the answers Tifa denied him, "what did I do?"

"You said that thing and I said that other thing," Reno had no idea what was going on and that fact became apparent to Cloud. Nevertheless, Tifa understood Reno's riddles to perfection and nodded in agreement.

"I'm sorry!" It was the only thing Cloud could think of saying. "I don't know what I did, but I'm sorry! Tifa, you're the most amazing person I know, kind, nice, sweet, considerate, beautiful, strong, talented and a great cook!"

As Cloud babbled out compliments, Tifa's face softened, despite fighting to keep a stern expression. "If that's what you think, then why were you telling Reno I'm stupid, fat and can't make a decent meal?"

There was a long pause as both Cloud and Reno processed what Tifa was saying. Minutes earlier, they ran into each other on the street and talked while they headed towards the Seventh Heaven. Tifa had only caught part of their conversation.

"She's stupid, fat, and can't possibly make a decent meal," Cloud had insisted.

"Shh, not so loud, Tifa will hear you. Besides, I don't agree, she's all the opposite!" Reno had argued.

As the conversation replayed in their heads, they realized where the misunderstanding came from. "We weren't talking about you!" Cloud wasted no time to clarify. "We were talking about that chocobo. There was this really stupid and fat chocobo at Healin Lodge and whenever I tried to deliver something, she would peck at me. Elena would sometimes call her off, but she didn't really listen. I saw her eating rocks a few times, no wonder she got so heavy with all the rocks she ate. Anyway, since there's no way she can race; Reno was telling me they're going to cook her. I don't think a chocobo that ate rocks would taste very good."

"Don't listen to him," Reno countered, "the roasted chocobo will be a good will gift from Shinra and it was supposed to be a surprise for you, but Cloud ruined it and that's not what the chocobo is like, it's a high quality chocobo!"

"Oh, that's-" Tifa started, but Cloud interrupted.

"Good will gift? Rufus just wants to play a bad joke on us! What does he hope to get out of this?" Cloud looked at Reno suspiciously.

"I'm-" Tifa tried again.

"Nothing!" Reno was quick to defend, though his argument fell, "he just wanted Tifa to put up a couple of fliers here, so that the customers can see them, nothing big."

"Cloud," once again, Tifa was ignored.

"I knew there was a catch!" Cloud continued the argument.

The entire time, Tifa tried to communicate that she understood what happened and wanted to apologize to Cloud. She was also very flattered by what he said and wanted to thank him. She wanted to make it up to him for the false accusation, but she couldn't get a word in. Feeling ignored, Tifa retreated to finish washing the dishes and left Reno and Cloud to their argument, maybe he deserved that slap after all.

End of Delivery 37

Delivery 37 was requested by Houkaru Kisaragi, the concept was Cloud accidentally offending Tifa. Disclaimer, I don't own Final Fantasy VII.