A/N: Thank you from the bottom of my heart Koalanoob for your insightful review of my work. I'm not sure if this is any better, but I sure hope so.
one two, it begins anew
I hear knocking at my door, quiet but persistent. I open it to discover Gray there, his cheeks glistening. He is panting heavily and I can already tell what this is about. Gray and Juvia are like two rusty gears that grind against each other to keep the machine of their not really relationship running. Sometimes the grinding may pause as Juvia grinds Gray down and he needs time to be fixed, but it will resume again. It always does. In the end he will always come back to her, because Gray wants to be a knight on a white horse riding to the rescue of his princess. He wants to be the Lancelot to Juvia's Guinevere, when really he's the Don Quijote, tilting his lance endlessly at the damn windmill.
three, four, we say these lines as if we haven't before
"Let me guess, " I tell him, "You told Juvia you loved her and things didn't turn out so well?"
"She told me not to get ahead of myself, she barely even can stand me, that I'm more like a pet to her."
"Hmmph, you let that get you down? And you call yourself a man? You've been through this before like a hundred times. At times I wonder f your brain's really working Surge, or has your endless pursual of Juvia destroyed your intellect? You know Juvia has issues with the L word."
He's trembling now with barely suppressed rage, and he half screams, " You think I want this? I wish I could say I'm a big enough man to love Juvia for her faults, but sometimes I hate her for them, but every time I think this it, this is the last time I'll let her hurt me, this time I've taken all the damage I can, I remember waking up in the morning, her snoring so cutely by my side,or some other moment we were happy, and I know I can't quit. So I'll keep pushing and pushing til the day I die. But I want that happy ending Lucy, I want it so bad, and one day, I'll get it."
It seems that my harsh words have the desired effect, and now that Gray's vented his rage, it's time to soften the blow the way Juvia would never do for him "Well, this time isn't as bad as some of the other things she's said to you when you told her that you love her. Remember that time when she called you an itch to scratch? I think your happy ending is just around the corner."
Gray immediately perks up and asks, "You really mean it?"
five, six, Gray's a phoenix
I just kick him out of my house, then I collapse on my couch. I feel annoyed by the encounter, a little used and bone achingly weary with the knowledge that next month we'd have the same conversation over again. He lopes off to go and see her, grinning like an idiot, and I know that things will be alright until the next time he and Juvia fight. I wonder how they've managed to keep this merry go round going for so long. Their relationship began several years ago with a one night stand. Juvia had been lonely and bored, and Gray was practically begging for it. Then that one night stand turned into several and soon Gray and Juvia began having sex on a regular basis. All the while Juvia tries to set arbitrary lines to keep him at arm's length because she's a girl who's seen the worst side of love, but it is no use. Gray is a fanatic. Juvia is his goddess, love is his religion and the slow burn he is put through is his test of faith like the afflictions of Jacob. His faith will be tested and it will waver but it will not fall.
seven, eight, must be fate
Occasionally I wonder if I'm a bad friend for encouraging him to pursue a woman who constantly scorns his advances, if I shouldn't just try and set him up with someone who'll love him back, and treasure him. But I know that it wouldn't work even if I tried. No matter how much Juvia hurts him, Gray will always belong to her. I can at least take comfort in the fact that he comes to me to grieve when Juvia has finally overwhelmed his capacity to hurt, and that I can at least stem his desperation a little bit so he doesn't just throw himself at her feet and beg the next time he sees her.
And in a way I admire him. He sacrifices and bleeds for a reality that only he can see. If he's Don Quijote, then I'm his Sancho Pancho, too practical to believe he'll make any progress against the barriers around Juvia's heart before he dies, but too taken in by the strength of his delusion to do anything except hope that things will work out for him. In the meantime, the gears of this machine grind and grind and grind.
nine, ten, round and round we go again