My Cat Happy
Prologue
A twenty one year old girl buried her face into her palms. A thick book sat idly in front of her with highlighted texts displayed on its pages. She had an important exam the next day, and it didn't help that she decided to omit studying the entire two weeks given and just cram everything in one night. It was already two in the morning and she was still on page two hundred out of seven hundred sixty-three. Her study lamp did a poor job of lighting her reading material, and her pens and papers were on the floor and somehow, in one of her kitchen cupboards. She let out a groan of frustration. It was practically a sure thing that she was going to fail the test.
She stood up and took her jacket, which was strewn messily on her bed, and decided to go out for a smoke outside her apartment building. Living in the city, that wasn't one of her best choices as gangs and rapists usually were on the lookout for young, vulnerable women that were stupid enough to venture into the poorly-funded facilities of the city streets. As she exited her apartment, she smelled the faint lingering scent of marijuana emitting from her perpetually high next door neighbor Charlie. Ignoring it, she went on into the elevator and waited to go down from the fifth floor to the third when it opened again, signaling someone was going to be riding with her.
She never liked it when someone else was alone with her in the elevator, especially at night. The people in her building were either beat up wives, drug addicts, thieves, and she was sure that guy from 32-B was a serial killer. She didn't like it and wished badly to move to a more comfortable space, but since she graduated high school and moved out, she had no choice but to make do with the measly financial aid her school gave her and the minimum-wage job that supported her.
Surprisingly enough, the person that entered the elevator looked neither like a drug addict or a serial killer, but a regular guy. Well, as regular as a guy with pink hair could be. He was holding a box filled with blankets. He grinned brightly at her as he entered and pushed the 'G' button, which proved to be unnecessary as Lucy had already pushed it when she entered.
"Hi," He said. "the name's Natsu. 37-C. You?" Lucy couldn't help but notice that he looked surprisingly well-off with his too-crisp shirt and jeans. Why would he ever move into this type of neighborhood?
"Lucy." She said, after moments of pondering, deciding not to tell a stranger where she lived.
"Well, Lucy," He said, testing the name out. "Just moved here today from Rhode Island. Actually, I just finished unpacking right now. Was gonna take these," He said, looking down at the box he was holding. "outside to the dumpster. Anyway, I'm having a housewarming pa-" He was cut off by the loud 'Ding' of the elevator, and to be honest, Lucy was grateful for it. She was never really comfortable with meeting new people. "Oh, um, it was nice meeting you, Lucy. I hope I get to see you around."
Lucy nodded vaguely and quickly got out of the building, brisking away from the strange man with the blankets and passing the sleeping receptionist/guard/building manager on the way. She took out her box of cigarettes and lit one, not having the patience to wait until she got down the steps. It was strange. The normal feeling of relief never washed over her as it usually did. Instead she felt a weird mixture of anger, sadness, melancholy, and confusion bubble in her chest. The next thing she knew, hot tears were rolling down her face.
"Shit." She mumbled with the cigarette between her lips. She angrily took the stick and held it between her fingers as she punched the cold, hard street lamp with her left hand. "Fucking shit!"
Her knuckles started bleeding but she didn't care. She kept punching and cursing and crying, not even noticing the half-burnt cigarette that now lay in a puddle and that she was now using both her hands to box the inanimate object. She even started kicking the pole until she felt a soft thing curl up next to her. Instinctively, she let out a yelp, thinking it was a giant rat that crawled out from one of the many sewer holes on the street. It turned out to be a cat. A blue cat. It was sleeping. She grabbed the cat, prepared to throw it to the street in blinded anger towards something she did not know what. As she raised her arms, the cat yawned innocently, rubbing its paw against its face and slowly opening its eyes. It wasn't fair. This stupid cat's dirty and smelled and yet it was much more content that Lucy ever could be. No, she could never hurt something like this. That wasn't her.
She didn't even know what had caused the sudden burst of anger. Perhaps it was seeing someone living a life better than hers, or maybe the stress of school, work, and paying the bills. She didn't know. Even though that may be so, it didn't change the fact that she was angry and sad and lonely and whatever the hell it was that she was feeling in her chest.
"Fucking cat." She lowered her arms and decided that for one night maybe the cat could stay at her apartment. Just one night, she told herself. She went in the building, ignoring the large 'No pets allowed' sign messily written on a piece of paper. After all, nobody ever followed any of the rules the superintendent laid out on each floor. What could one cat do? Besides, there were enough mice in the building to qualify as 'pets'. She evasively dodged the sleeping manager and slipped through the elevator. The cat stunk, but the elevator was much worse. It didn't matter if the cat stayed. No one would notice. She convinced herself.
As she got into the confines of her room, she put the cat down and laid on her thin mattress, not bothering to change. Tomorrow, her hands would be infected and she would probably have to get it checked out. Tomorrow, her apartment is gonna stink after months of trying to rid it of the stenches that managed to seep through from Charlie's apartment. Tomorrow, she's gonna fail her test and most likely will lose the scholarship she worked so hard for. But today, she doesn't give a single fuck and decides to go to sleep.
AU. It's my first time writing one for the fairy tail category. It's kinda short but it's just the prologue. Hey, maybe this could be a one-shot, what do you think? Hm, I'd really like to continue this though. Eh, depends on how I feel. Updates are going to be entirely irregular, from hours, weeks, months, to years. Just saying.
This story was inspired by a post I saw on tumblr. Later.
(Edit: The first few chapters are going to be very, very angst-y but I believe that it's necessary to emphasize Lucy's character development, so I apologize if you got the impression that this story will overall be one big ball of emotional drama since it is, after all, in the angst sub-category. The reason for this is that so far, as of July 15, 2015, it is still fairly angst-y. I'll change it once the tone of the story has calmed down. Thanks for understanding! :3)