TW for poorly managed mental illness, drug use, drinking, references to self-harm/cutting, references to suicide attempt


"Let's go somewhere." Natsu's voice is soft and his eyes are wide and Gray says yes because that's all he'll ever say to Natsu.

"Where to?" he asks, keys already in hand, watching Natsu scribble something on his arm in black ink – it weaves between the scars that draw patterns over his dark skin.

"Anywhere."


When they pull into Crocus in Gray's beat-up Ford Pinto, everything is smoke and neon and flashing lights; dark streets full of people and dogs and motorcycles and the scent of Indian curry. Natsu presses his face to the window – black eyeliner, red lipstick, thrift store shirt from some obscure band Gray's never heard of. He's pretty sure Natsu's never heard of them either.

"Here?" Gray's voice is rough and Natsu says it's because he smokes too much, which is probably true, but Gray thinks the real reason is because being around Natsu makes it hard to talk. Natsu nods, face bathed in the cold light of the streetlamps. He looks supernal.

Gray parks the car in a back alley behind a store with bright lights that flash palm readings done here - $15. Gray knows before Natsu asks that this will be their first stop.

Natsu changes into skinny jeans and combat boots before they leave the car, feet kicked up on the dash as he slides out of the sequined skirt and into dark denim. He tugs on a leather jacket and leaves the skirt hanging up on a chain-link fence.

"Maybe someone else needs it," he explains, grabbing Gray's hand and stomping through dirty puddles that reflect the half-moon and all the neon lights. "It's my lucky one."

"Why not keep it, then?" Gray asks.

"Don't need it," Natsu says, tugging Gray toward the palm reader. "Got you."

Gray's chest hurts. He wishes Natsu would say those things when his eyes weren't the kind of bright that makes Gray know it's not real.

The door opens to a set of narrow stairs that are thick with smoke and incense. They push back a bead curtain and walk into a room that's so crowded they can barely move. Natsu immediately runs over to a table that holds a typewriter and several old phones. "Look!" he says, running his fingers through the cords and dragging the dials to zero.

So Gray looks, because he can't deny Natsu anything, and it means that Natsu will touch his arm and give him a smile that's so bright it hurts. They look at crumbling paperbacks with hand-written notes inside, at chipped china plates and matching teacups, at vintage records of Queen and The Rolling Stones, at packets of incense and jewelry made with stones that claim to heal you or calm your mind.

Natsu touches everything, fingers drifting over vinyl, plastic, weathered paper.

"Do you want to know?" Someone appears behind the glass-topped counter – a slip of a girl with braided hair and smoky eyes, and a deck of tarot cards between her fingers. Her nails are bitten, dark polish flaking away. Her hands are dirty.

"Know what?" Gray asks, but Natsu has already said yes and is following her through another curtain, dragging Gray behind him.

This room is even more full of junk, stacked high to the ceiling along each wall, and they have to cram together around a tiny table in folding chairs. The girl shifts the cards between her hands. They're old, ragged around the edges and hand-painted, and when she lays them down on the table, they don't look like any tarot Gray has ever seen. Thanks to Natsu, he's seen a lot.

The girl studies both of them intently – her dark eyes are ringed with even darker liner, and it makes it feel like she's a demon of sorts. After a moment she smiles, dry lipstick cracking, and pulls a flask from her pocket. There's an ankh engraved on it, and she takes a swig, licking her lips and giving them a smile.

The first card she draws for Natsu has four hands, reaching to each other and touching in the center around the word help. Gray watches carefully as Natsu's face changes from enthusiasm to something that's almost angry. Natsu doesn't want help. Gray knows that. He's tried.

"Might not be you," the girl says gently, and the lines around Natsu's eyes relax a bit. The next card is a sketch of a large set of arms wrapped around a smaller figure. They're surrounded by trees, and the word sanctuary is scribbled across the bottom. She sets it cross-wise over help, and slides it so it sits between the two of them, giving Natsu a significant look.

Under the table, Natsu's thumb moves across Gray's knuckles.

She turns to Gray and studies him for a moment and he frowns, shrinking back a bit from the intense gaze. "You're another question entirely," she says softly. She taps the deck, then leans back toward the door. "Mira!" she calls.

There's silence for a while and Gray is starting to find the sickly-sweet incense oppressive. He wants a smoke. Or a drink. Or both.

Then the curtain parts and another woman comes into the room, and she is something else. Her hair is white and she's got a tattoo down the side of her face that says don't wake the demon. It's surrounded by flowers, and Gray thinks she looks just sweet enough that he believes those words.

"What do you need, nyingdu-la?" She touches the girl's face fondly, then locks eyes with Gray and gives him a smile that makes him want to run. "Hmm." She reaches into her breast pocket and pulls out another deck – these cards are barely the length of Gray's thumb. Closing her eyes, she spreads them out and runs her fingers over them, and Gray is entranced by her sharp teeth, her sharp nails, her sharp gaze.

She draws a card and hands it to him, and her skin is hot when he touches her fingers. The card is black, and བརྩེ་དུང་། is carefully traced on it in white ink.

"What does it mean?" he asks.

"Whatever you need," she replies.


Gray keeps the card tucked in his front pocket. He doesn't believe in this stuff, but he's feeling strange tonight. Being with Natsu is always risky, like standing at the edge of a bridge and staring down in the dark waters, trying to decide if he should jump. Gray always jumps.

When they're a couple blocks away from the store, Natsu reaches into his pocket and pulls out a cassette tape. He hands it to Gray with a wild smile, letting go of Gray's hand and walking backward in front of him. The tape has my suicidal affection printed in neat black letters across it, and there are skulls and hearts drawn around the words.

"Your car's got a tape deck, right?" Natsu's eyes are intense, dark, hopeful.

"Did you steal this?" Gray asks, already knowing the answer is yes. Natsu ignores the question, turning to look down the street.

Gray has no idea where they are but Natsu doesn't seem to care. The street is dark and wet from the rain, and Natsu makes sure to step in every puddle as they pass food trucks selling singara and sambal sotong and momos and hot tereré. Easy girls and boys lean against brick walls, faces adorned with sequins and glitter, breasts exposed, piercings in strange places.

Someone who's not quite girl or boy approaches Natsu, touching his face and smiling. Their head is shaved and they have a tattoo of a bleeding tree on their neck, and their eyes are the kind of wide that only comes from angel dust or snow. They lean in and kiss Natsu sweetly and he returns it while Gray's nails dig into his skin.

The person disappears and Natsu turns back to Gray, and the ache is suddenly gone because Natsu looks holy in the light of the streetlamps. His eyeliner is smudged and his hair is mussed, and Gray can't stop staring at his lips.

"Wanna dance?"

No, Gray thinks.

"Yes," Gray says.

Which is how he finds himself in a basement club with strobing lights and deep bass, watching Natsu follow some a blue-haired girl into the crowd and toward the washrooms. Gray knows she's got dust in her pockets and he could stop it, he could take Natsu's arm and drag him away from here, take him home and wrap him in blankets and make him take the drugs he needs, not the drugs he wants.

Gray's done it before, but somehow, they always end up back here.

There's a hand on Gray's hip and before he can push it away, he's enchanted by a set of golden eyes behind tinted glasses. Gray tosses back his shot and licks the sweet liquor from his lips, then gives one last glance to the pink moving through the crowd.

He lets the boy drag him into the crowd, through the sweaty bodies until the two of them are pressed together, hips moving to the unfamiliar beat. Gray's lost his shirt – can't remember how, probably Natsu's fault – and the boy runs his fingers over Gray's back, around his waist, over his stomach. Gray lets him.

When they kiss, the boy tastes like candy. His lips and hands are hot against Gray's skin and Gray pulls the boy tight, grinding against him. Lips on his neck make him gasp – everything's blurry, lights blending together in so many colors that Gray can't keep up.

If Natsu's going to destroy himself, Gray might as well too.

Gray feels like hours pass. Days, maybe. Then a different hand on his hip pulls Gray away from the boy, drags his gaze away from golden eyes to dark green ones, pupils barely visible. Natsu's grinning, biting his lip and turning Gray towards him, ignoring the other boy as he touches Gray's cheek.

"C'mere," he says, voice soft, and Gray knows this won't last but he just doesn't care anymore. He'll take what he can get. He pushes the other boy away and lets Natsu kiss him, tongue hot against Gray's lips, fingers dragging through Gray's hair. Natsu's so high he's shaking, body vibrating under Gray's fingertips.

Natsu's a disaster, a forest fire, a car crash, and Gray's just along for the ride.


There's a diner a few blocks away that serves shitty coffee and lets them smoke inside. Natsu doesn't eat, just watches the way Gray drags at his cigarette, lets the smoke press through his lips and up around him. Gray won't give Natsu a cigarette. Last time he did, Natsu put it out on his skin just to feel it burn.

"Why'd you stop taking them?" Gray asks, flicking ash and pushing his hair out of his eyes. There's a plate of pancakes between them, but they're wet with syrup and Gray doesn't want them. They're too sweet. The coffee tastes better.

"Stop taking what?" Natsu asks, but his expression says he knows exactly what Gray's talking about. There's a container rattling in Gray's pocket, full of the pills that might bring Natsu back from the edge he's so desperately pushing towards. This isn't the first time Natsu's stopped taking them. This isn't the first time they've had this conversation, and it won't be the last.

"You're gonna crash," Gray says. Natsu plucks the cigarette from his hand with shaking fingers and takes a drag, and Gray's eyes flick down to the round, white scar on Natsu's wrist. "You always do."

"I know." Natsu lets Gray take the cigarette back, and when Gray runs a thumb over the scar, Natsu lets out a soft sigh. His shoulders slump, suddenly, like everything is deflating. When his eyes meet Gray's, they're still too bright, but Gray can see Natsu behind the high.

"It's gonna hurt." Gray's thumb moves up to other scars, remembering bright lights, the cold white of the hospital, hands stained red, so many tears.

They sit in silence for a long time, pancakes melting between them, Gray smoking three more cigarettes before Natsu asks him in a quiet voice, "Why do you stay?"

Gray sighs. He can't look up because he knows there's tears in Natsu's eyes, wet tracks down his cheeks, and Gray doesn't know if he can handle it right now. Not here, in the middle of a diner at four in the morning, surrounded by girls in fishnet and boys with gold earrings and waitresses with tired, sad eyes.

"You know why," Gray says.

Natsu shakes his head. "Everyone else leaves," he whispers.

"I won't," Gray says. Maybe if he says it enough times, Natsu will believe him.


They watch the sun rise from the roof of an old apartment building. Natsu convinces Gray to hoist him up to the fire escape, and they end up sitting on the ledge with their feet dangling, kicking against the bricks. Gray wraps an arm around Natsu's waist, terrified to let go. Terrified Natsu will let go.

"I don't want to die," Natsu says as pink lines streak across the sky and bright orange flares on the horizon, dragging the shadows away from the corners and bringing pale color to the dirty city streets.

Gray doesn't say anything, just runs his fingers over the scars on Natsu's arms. There's so many of them, little games of tic-tac-toe, white on dark. Natsu's written words like nothing and empty and infinite between the scars, as if they're ruled lines on notebook paper.

"You're more than this," Gray says.

"No, I'm not," Natsu replies. His hands shake as he follows the pattern of Gray's fingers.

Gray knows what he's thinking. "I'm real," he says, threading their fingers together. Natsu hums uncertainly, then looks back up at the sunrise. Tall buildings are silhouetted against the light, shadows falling across the city as it wakes.

They sit like that for a long time. By the time Natsu's heart has stopped pounding and his breathing is back to normal, the sun is hovering weakly above them and the sky is a thin shade of blue. The streets look different in the day – neon signs dark, traffic sounds replacing deep bass, pretty people gone home to sleep off their mistakes.

They should go home.

Natsu rests his head against Gray's shoulder, squeezing his hand tightly. His breathing is choked, like he's holding in heavy tears, and all Gray can do is run his fingers through Natsu's dirty hair, kiss his temple, keep him from leaning forward and falling.


They walk back to the car on the dirty streets. Natsu ignores the puddles this time – he clings to Gray instead, steps uncertain, eyes on the ground. In the thin sunlight, nothing can hide. Flyers for indie bands fall from posts and are torn to pieces beneath their boots; gulls caw and rip at scraps of garbage while people with dark eyes and torn sweaters and shaking hands ask for change.

This is why Gray doesn't leave.

Natsu can't end up here.

Gray watches them – the beggars and junkies and barefoot children, and hard girls who roar past on motorcycles. He wonders if any of them feel like this, like they're walking on the edge of something sharp and dangerous, not knowing if they're in love or terrified. Maybe a bit of both.

When they get into the car, Gray digs the mixtape out of his pocket and pops it into the deck. It ends up being a lot of My Chemical Romance and Fall Out Boy, which brings a bit of a smile to Natsu's tired face as Gray pulls out of the city. Natsu doesn't sing along, but he taps his fingers against his arm, smudging the words between his scars.

Fields stretch out on either side of the highway, and Gray can almost see the white caps of the mountains to the west. Natsu falls asleep with his head against the window, soft breaths puffing against the glass to remind Gray that sure, they're dirty and messy and tangled in knots, but the sun is shining and they're both alive.

They're almost back in Magnolia when Natsu jerks awake, gasping and shaking and digging his fingernails into his arms, and breaking the soft way that everything might have been okay.

"Can't," is all he says, dropping his head to his knees. "Fuck, I c-can't."

"Breathe," Gray says softly, reaching over to touch Natsu's arm. Natsu just tugs at his hair, and the quiet sobs that he tries to hold in break Gray's heart.

He pulls over to the side of the road and tugs Natsu into the back seat, head in Gray's lap, Gray's fingers in his hair. Natsu's gaze is soft and empty, and tears just fall and fall. There's static on the mix tape, and then the song changes and Gray wishes he could reach the tape deck because this isn't what Natsu needs to hear right now.

all of your flaws are aligned with this mood of mine
cutting me to the bone
nothing left to leave behind

"I don't want…" Natsu holds Gray's hand tightly and stares out the window, and Gray wants to cry at the emptiness in his gaze. He wants Natsu to kiss him again, wants his eyes to be bright and warm and alive, even if it takes lines of powder in a dirty bathroom to get him there, because anything is better than this. "I don't want to die," Natsu whispers again. "But I don't want to be here."

"Here with me?" Gray asks, and Natsu shakes his head vigorously, looking up at Gray with sad, dark eyes and chapped lips and the scar on his neck that makes Natsu sigh when Gray traces it with his fingers.

"Just." Natsu lets go of Gray's hand and rubs his eyes, then curls up so his face is pressed into Gray's sweater and the scar is right there, right under Gray's fingertips, rough and pale and a reminder of all the shit that's happened. The dark, angry things that neither of them can forget. "Run away with me?"

The words are muffled against Gray's sweater and at first, they make no sense – they're just noise against the lyrics of this stupid fucking song.

You hurt me one time then I love it
You hurt me two times then fuck it

"Where would we go?" he asks softly. He tips his head back against the seat, trying to find patterns on the ceiling of the car. He feels like crying, but he's too tired.

"Does it matter?" Natsu says, fingers tight in Gray's sweater, forehead pressed against Gray's stomach. Part of Gray wants to push Natsu against the seats, to kiss the pain off his lips and touch him in all the ways that make Natsu feel alive. They've done it before, Gray's fingers in Natsu's hair, Natsu's nails digging red lines into Gray's back.

"What about home?" Gray asks quietly. Their tiny apartment with cupboards full of dry ramen and crackers, the bed that Natsu sometimes doesn't leave for days and days, the locked cupboard above the sink where Gray keeps the pills and sharp things when Natsu's not good.

"You're my home," Natsu says.

Gray wipes Natsu's wet cheeks, then tucks his dirty hair behind his ear. All they have in a car is a duffel bag with some clothes and a toothbrush, two blankets, a pillow, and four hundred and twenty-six dollars. It won't get them far.

Gray digs into his pocket and he pulls out Natsu's pills, running his thumb over the label of the bottle and looking down at the beautiful, heartbroken disaster of a boy in his lap.

Something is tucked behind the pills and Gray pulls it out. It's the card from the fortune teller, wrinkled from sweat, but the symbols are still legible. བརྩེ་དུང་།.

What does it mean?

Whatever you need.

The song ends and the tape clicks, waiting to be flipped over to side B. The silence in the car is only broken by Natsu's soft hiccups and the shaky breaths he takes.

"I can be better," he says, voice breaking. He takes the pills from Gray's hand and tucks the container against his chest. "I'll take them. I'm sorry. Please."

Gray pulls Natsu up against his chest, wrapping his arms around Natsu's shoulders and running his fingers up and down Natsu's arms. "Where to?" he asks, keys heavy in his hand.

"Anywhere," Natsu replies, and Gray says yes, because the paper beneath his fingers means love, and he promised to stay.