((So it's my first story as you might be able to tell. I kinda wanted to venture off into a different side of ClairexGray than usual. Every story I read is from Claires pov and how she moves to Mineral Town and within one season her and Gray are super close and he's secretly falling for her the entire time. As much as I love Gray and Claire, and as guilty I am for reading those... haha, it gets a little old. So I hope no one really hates me for this )

Ps: I'm starting this out at T.. but I'm not that certain if it belongs in M considering the direction its going in, so let me know if you think so :) ))

Barriers

All the commotion surrounding her arrival was absolutely, positively, one hundred percent unnecessary in my mind. Our tight-nit town in the boonies saw maybe one to two unfamiliar faces a year, and the fact that this one was planning on staying made it even worse. So of course this newcomer was inevitably the subject of everybody's discussions. I couldn't do basically anything without hearing her name spread like the plague. I would hear it everywhere; when I tried to have a nice meal at the inn, at the Blacksmith, and even at my one sanctuary for serenity and silence, the library. As much as I tried to tune it all out and go on about my day, it was inescapable. In all honesty, no matter how 'nice' or 'pretty' anyone thought she was, I couldn't even stand to be in the same room with her for more than a minute. I was just unable to wrap my head around why she had caused such uproar from all the townsfolk for this long solely concerning one girl. Even I had moved to this microscopic town in the middle of scenic nowhere around four years ago, there was only maybe a week of chatter concerning my new permanent residence in this small town. Of course, I actually had family residing in the village prior, my grandfather. I could see this kind of clamor for the first couple weeks, but this was just getting ridiculous.

Now I myself am a man of few words, and many people know me by that, and I don't waste anytime getting straight to the point. There's not enough time to ramble on and beat around the bush in my opinion. So if I don't like you, you definitely know. There's no reason in my mind why I should act like I'm all 'buddy buddy' with someone I can't stand to be around. But the one thing I could not find plausible, was why this girl wouldn't give up after I repeatedly told her I didn't like her. Now don't get me wrong, I didn't turn around right off the bat and scream in her face, "Hey you're annoying. I don't like you so piss off." I don't treat women with that much disrespect; I at least talked to her maybe a few times before deciding I didn't like her. Even my first encounter with her wasn't the most ideal of first run ins. She had to walk in at the worse time possible, but no, that was perfectly okay with her. I still remember that day.

For somewhere around the millionth time, my grandfather was yelling again. He was once again criticizing the piece I had so deliberately and tediously worked on for two weeks now. Nothing I made was ever good enough, and of course, I wasn't going to just sit there and take that from him.

"What!" I screamed, "What about it is wrong? Come on old man! Tell me!" He just glared right back at me. His face was almost tomato red with how much rage was built up within him.

"What's wrong with it!" he asked condescendingly. "Are you really asking me that question, Gray? You of all people should know exactly what's wrong with it!" He took a deep breath followed by a heavy sigh. His tone wasn't as harsh this time around. "Gray, you act as if you know everything, but you have so much to learn!" The last sentence had infuriated me an unimaginable extent.

"Maybe if I had a teacher who spent as much time training me as he did yelling, I would be getting somewhere!" I yelled back. His eyes burned with rage as he looked as if he was going to start to say something, but I cut him off. "You know Gramps, you gotta start getting your shit together before I hightail it outta here," This was nothing new for him to hear, I practically said I was leaving almost everyday while I was working at the shop.

"Gray…" My grandfather started.

"Um excuse me…?" a softer voice spoke up behind me. Still infatuated with rage, I wasted no time in telling whoever decided to show up to kindly get the fuck out.

"Uh what the fuck do want? If you have nothing to…" I trailed off as I had begun to realize who I was talking to. A young girl in her early twenties stood before me. She was short to say the least, maybe five foot four. I looked down at her once again. I had never seen this girl before. She had green-blue eyes and almost too long of dirty blonde hair. She wasn't the prettiest girl I'd ever seen by far, but she wasn't ugly by any means. Her expression was indescribable. It looked as if she'd watched her family die or something, she was on the verge of tears.

"Gray!" My grandfather yelled, now at the peak of his rage. "How dare you talk to a customer that way, nonetheless a young woman?" I froze up as I met the girl eye to eye, her glaze pierced right into me. I was at a loss of words. Sure I wasn't always Mr. Nice Guy, or Mr. Mean Guy for that matter, but I mean yelling at some poor innocent girl who I'd just met probably was not okay.

"Uhhhm…" I choked on my words, "I'm…sorry…" It was all I could force out of my mouth. This had to be one of the most awkward moments of my life.

"Welcome." My grandfather said to the girl, "Please ignore my grandson Gray here… He's not really good with people as you can tell." She perked up a little bit.

"Oh really its fine don't even worry about it!" she chimed almost a little too perky. She definitely had one of the most annoying voices I'd ever heard.

"Good, now is there anything I can help you with?" He asked.

"Oh no, I was just wondering around," She smiled an awkward grin, "I'm the new farmer down the road, I was just curious you know?" So this was her? All the commotion for her seemed a little strange, but whatever not my concern. My grandfather seemed a little more enthusiastic than I was of course.

"So you're the new girl around? Heard a lot about 'cha lately." He said. "What's you're name?"

"Claire." She said in that voice once again, "And yup! That's me! What's you're name?"

"I'm Saibara. I'm the towns' blacksmith around here. If you ever need work done on your tools or anything come and I'll help you out, dear." Claire smiled and nodded as she headed for the door.

"Thanks! I'll see you around!" She said way too cheerily as she left the building. I let out a heavy sigh as I retreated to the back of the store.

"Where do you think you're going son?" My grandpa questioned with a tone of anger. "Go tell her you're sorry."

"But I did-"

"That sorry excuse for an apology?" He raised an eyebrow, "No. Go, now." I wasn't going to waste time arguing with him about this, I knew better than that. I wasted no time heading for the door in search for that girl, Claire or whatever. Luckily, she hadn't gotten very far. She had traveled almost half way to the library by the time I caught up with her.

"Claire." I said from behind. She swiftly turned around, taken back a little. She shot me a questioning glance.

"Hi, it's Gray right?" I nodded and her face crept up into that awkward smile again. "What can I help you with?" I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, figuring I had come this far I might as well just apologize to her. No matter how much I wanted to just retreat back to the shop.

"I'm sorry… ya know for the way I acted back there and stuff." I managed to get out. "That definitely wasn't okay for me to snap at you like that. My grandpa just really knows how to push me to that breaking point…" I spoke a little more softly this time, really more to myself than her, "Sometimes I just want to quit…" She stepped a little closer, almost a little too close for my comfort. Her gaze met mine and maintained solid eye contact as she spoke in a more serious tone.

"Don't quit. That's as bad as just giving up." She said. "You can't keep barely sliding by expecting to improve. You have to work for it, its called training." I sort of half smiled at her words of encouragement, maybe she wasn't that bad. Or at least I thought until she spoke again, "I mean, I can definitely tell you kind of have some anger issues going on so I'm just not going to call you out on it after one little incident like that." I stopped dead in my tracks, bewildered at what she just said.

"Wait.. what?" I asked, wondering if she had really just said what I just heard.

"It's okay, Gray," She smiled once again. "I'm not the type to judge people because of what's going on in their lives. But if you ever need someone to talk to I'm always open ears!" I raised a confused eye brow as she waved and began to trot away.

"What the hell just happened?" I muttered to myself, "Anger issues? Me? This bitch is crazy." What right did this newbie have to waltz up to someone she had just met and outright assume they had some kind of anger issues? I had never met someone in my life so outrageously uncouth.

From that moment on I had decided to put up a barrier between her and me to create some distance. No matter how much she wanted to become friends with me after that day, I honestly wanted nothing to do with her. She practically infuriated the living day lights out of me. Although as much as I wanted to tell her to just piss off and leave me alone forever, I just couldn't bring myself to be that mean. This girl couldn't just take a hint. From the day we met, somewhere around the fourth of Spring, to today, the third day of Summer she hadn't given it a rest on trying to befriend me. She would come in practically every other day in attempt to converse with me and be all 'besties' or whatever. Even today she came in trying to make small talk and such. This Claire girl has to be one of the most oblivious girls I had ever encountered, that or she was just stupid.

I leaned my head back onto the lumpy pillow at the foot of my bed as I thought about all the fuss concerning this girl, figuring it would blow over eventually. Just as I began to rest my eyes my roommate, Cliff, barged in quite a bit more loudly than usual. He looked over at me and nodded his head towards me.

"Uh hey Gray," he said, there was a slightly frazzled tone to his voice as he spoke, "Umm… where's Kai? It's kinda late isn't it...?" I glanced over at the clock seated on my bed side table. Cliff was right, then inn was going to lock up in almost an hour and Kai, our summer roommate, was nowhere to be found. I just shrugged my shoulders.

"Don't really care, probably still with Popuri at the beach or somethin'." I said not really interested in Kai's affairs. Sure he was a pretty cool guy, fun to drink with. But he only cared about two things and two things only, Himself and hooking up with girls. He and Popuri have had the same off and on relationship since he started coming and working summers a few years back. Whenever he was here, she was inseparable from him. When he was gone they both acted like nothing had ever happed, and Kai would go out and get with as many girls as possible.

"Oh… yeah. Probably." Cliff said quietly. Cliff and I had become pretty close since he had come to Mineral Town last winter. He didn't say much, which I really enjoyed, and when he did talk it was always stuff I didn't mind talking about. He usually needed advice which I didn't mind giving him. I certainly could tell when something was on his mind at this point of knowing each other.

"What's up with you, man?" I sat up and turned my direction towards him, "You seem a little off today." He fidgeted a little and looked down at his hands.

"It's just Ann again," he sighed. As long as I'd known Cliff he'd had the biggest thing for Ann, the Inn Keeper's daughter. It was obvious she returned his feelings; they were both just too hard headed to really act upon it. That didn't stop them from arguing as if they had been together though. "She thinks I have a thing for Claire, when I definitely don't. Ugh so frustrating." My brow slightly twitched at the sound of her name. Was it possible to go one day without hearing someone talk about her?

"And why does Ann think that." I said flatly, not really interested in the subject now that Claire was involved.

"Just 'cause when ever Claire comes to see Ann, Ann thinks she's flirting with me whenever Claire tries to talk to me. She gets really self conscious like that all the time. Claire's just being nice…" He trailed off, eyes panning across the room.

"Maybe she'sdoing it on purpose." I said.

"Huh? Claire?" Cliff turned his head towards me again.

"Yeah. I mean… She kinda is a little shady if you ask me. I wouldn't doubt it." Cliff laughed a little.

"Are we talking about the same Claire?" Cliff asked skeptically. "She's pretty much one of the nicest girls I know." I rolled my eyes. Was I the only one who saw through her whole 'goody-two-shoes' act?

"She's fake. Trust me; she's just like every other blonde haired blue eyed girl in the city." I'd come across way too many girls in my days living in the city to not know better. They create this false persona of being sweet and innocent, but deep down they're just trouble.

"What do you have against Claire?" Cliff said as he raised an eyebrow, "I mean Gray she really is a nice girl. She practically just moved in-"

"Yeah, Cliff a season ago." I interrupted him. "I don't see the big deal. I've met her, talked to her, the whole hubbub. She's really not all that great; in fact she's actually unbelievably annoying."

"Gray, she's still new. You just haven't gotten used to her yet. I mean she's just trying to make friends here. You can't just exclude her from your life… you barely know her." I didn't have time for an insightful chat with Cliff. I was tiered, and most of all tiered of talking about Claire.

"I know her enough to know that I don't want anything to do with her." I spat. Cliff just sighed and rolled his eyes. And with that I lied down in my bed, facing away from my roommate, and waited to doze off.