Of Burning Hearts & Metallic Roses

(Late) Natza Week: Trust

"You may be deceived if you trust too much, but you will live in torment if you don't trust enough."

A young Erza had lived most of her life not trusting anyone anymore. The countless times she's been abandoned by the friends she so once called.

Abandoned, turned to slave. It did not matter to her anymore.

After she had joined Fairy Tail, a mage guild filled with cheerful mages, she still had not learned to trust anyone.

Always keeping to herself, always bottling up her feelings, she didn't try to invest as much trust into these people, regardless of their personality. She knew more than enough that sooner or later, the people you call friend or friends, will abandon you. If it is not now, it will be later, that she was assured of.

It had been a peaceful evening. Erza was enjoying herself alone, sitting at one of the tables. She was reading a book lent by Levy who was eager enough to let her borrow one of her books, being a bookworm and all.

She sighed as she was just about to finish her current book, The House of the Scorpion, as it was called in red letters at the front cover.

From one of the corners of the guild, near the bar, sat Gray, an ice mage, staring at her direction and in many others, just to see what his guildmates were doing.

"You want more orange juice?" Macao asked as he was the one behind the bar.

"Uh, yeah, sure." Gray answered.

As he continued to watch his surroundings, a familiar pinkette had arrived through the front doors of the guild and walked towards him. "Hey Gray." He greeted.

"Hey Natsu." The small pinkette took a seat right next him. Natsu was the newest mage that joined the Guild. He'd only stumbled into the Guild only after looking for his dragon father who had left him for some unknown reason.

"What you doing?" Natsu asked him, observing the boy who apparently had no shirt on.

"Just checking around that sort of stuff," he answered. As he brought his orange juice near his face, he accidentally lost a bit of his grip and managed to spill some on his chest. "Aw crap!"

"Well sucks to be you." Natsu snickered at Gray's misfortune.

"Here." Macao brought some napkins for Gray then retreated back to the bar.

"Goddammit!" Gray cursed. It was more unfortunate t say the least when he had no idea where he put his shirt, after all, his habit of stripping without noticing was a hassle for him to handle.

Natsu then looked into the direction in which Erza was. "Who's that?" Having only been here a few days, he still had no clue who was who, what was what and where was where.

"Oh that's just Erza," Gray answered as he got another load of napkins to clean his chest of orange juice. "She was here longer than me but to be honest, don't know much about her, she mostly keeps to herself, locks her mind down stories and books and such."

"Hmm." Natsu couldn't help but to continue to stare in her direction. She looked about his age.

"Yeah, I think she has trust issues or something, I don't know," Gray continued. "I'm no psychologist."

"Well you don't have to be one to clearly see it, I think," Natsu got himself off his chair. "I'm gonna go talk to her."

"Knock yourself out, she might not want to talk though." Gray warned.

"Eh, I have talked to worse." He remarked and now made his way into her vicinity.

As her eyes wore on her book, she didn't notice the pinkette right next to her.