crash & burn

7. ten of swords

TW for panic attacks and mentions of past self-harm

__________

god it's been so long (wide awake)
that i feel like someone else
i miss the way that you saw me or
maybe the way i saw myself
- marianas trench, "who do you love"

"Gray, come here and let me read your future!"

Gray glanced across the room at the Youth Center to where Natsu, Erza, Lucy and Cana were sitting. It was Friday, and Gray had managed to survive another week in the group – although if Gray was being honest with himself, he looked forward to spending every day sitting next to Natsu.

Cana grinned at Gray, a set of tarot cards splayed in front of her, and beckoned him over. Gray liked Cana – she was honest and raw in a way that he wasn't, and it both scared him and made him admire her.

"My dad left when I was fifteen," she'd said in group today. "Just fucked off and didn't even say goodbye. And it hurt, just hurt everywhere, like a giant ball of pain spreading through my body." Gray had nodded along, feeling the ache of his missing parents keenly in that moment. "And I just wanted to make it stop, make everything go away, so I broke into my mom's liquor cabinet and downed the first bottle of whatever I saw. I felt so numb. After that I just found older kids to buy me booze, and drank until I couldn't feel anything."

Gray remembered trying that a few times, but the alcohol hadn't mixed well with the OxyContin, and Ultear had given him hell after he had puked until he felt like he was going to die.

He shrugged now, tucking his journal away and making his way across the room. Sliding into the chair across from Cana, he glanced over at Natsu, who didn't look up. He was busy fiddling with the sleeves of his hoodie.

Gray frowned – something still seemed off about Natsu. After their trip to the pier on Saturday, Natsu hadn't talked to Gray as much. They'd been friendly, but Natsu's excited enthusiasm from the day they met was tempered by something darker.

"Luce, can you pass me those scissors?" Natsu leaned back toward Lucy, who looked at him hesitantly. A look of confusion crossed his face, which slowly turned to anger. "I just wanna cut thumb-holes in my fucking sweater, Luce. Jesus Christ." He shoved his chair away and leaned over, grabbing the scissors himself. Gray was shocked – he'd never heard Natsu speak to Lucy like that before.

Lucy whispered something soft that Gray couldn't hear, and Natsu's frown deepened. He jabbed the scissors through the fabric of his tattered sweater – did he ever take that thing off? – then threw them down on the table and stalked away.

"What's up with him?" Gray asked, frowning as Natsu stormed out towards the front door. Sure, he'd been acting a bit strange lately, but nothing like this.

"He has... moods," Lucy said quietly, tucking her hands into her pockets. "It's pretty normal. He'll come back." Gray frowned. Shouldn't someone be going after him?

"All right Gray, pick three cards and lay them on the table."

Gray turned his attention back to Cana, who had shuffled the deck and was holding it out to him. He tried not to roll his eyes – tarot reading was a silly, inexact pseudoscience, but he didn't want to hurt Cana's feelings. He reached out and plucked three cards from her hand, and spread them out in front of him.

"Oh." Cana's eyes widened. Gray looked down with a frown – a tower, some guy maybe hiding somewhere, and... a dead body being stabbed with swords. Well, that couldn't be good. Not that he believed in this shit anyway.

"So, what's my future?" he grumbled, trying to ignore the pensive look on Cana's face.

"Well, I'm not great at this," she began, chewing on her thumbnail. "My Gram's better at it, she does this for a living. But... hmm. You've had some sort of disaster in your life. A change that can't be unmade." Gray stiffened a bit, but relaxed when he realized that could describe literally everyone in this program. "The hermit—" here Cana tapped on the hiding man "—is reversed, which indicates isolation or withdrawal from people you love." Also true of everyone here. Even so, Gray felt his pulse rise uncomfortably.