Erza Scarlet was never an affectionate person.
She was never one for hugs, never one for the shoulder pats or the "well done"'s or the unnecessary I love you's.
It was all fake. All said out of necassity and obligation.
She found love feeble, so twisted and coiled and unnecassary, a concept overused and overdone and just so fake.
Then she locked eyes with him, soft, brown, kind eyes, and her heart slammed against her ribcage.
Suddenly, she's warm all over, her hearts stuttering and stuttering and hammering and she's suddenly drowning in warmth.
Her stomach is doing summersaults, and the butterflies, oh God, the butterflies. She'd thought those were myths. Her cheeks are suddenly rosy, and burning hot and she can feel the blood rushing to her cheeks. Rosy? She didn't even know she could blush, could feel.
Her voice catches in her throat, pitched and high and she can barely let out a squeak. Erza was usually so confident, so poised, so in control, but suddenly she feels so small, so tiny, and she wants the ground to swallow her whole and to shrink into a small bubble and just hide.
He says hello, smile toothy and perfect and she's in love. If her heart was hammering earlier then its positively exploding now, feelings all over the place, pulse getting louder and louder by the second. Love. Is that what it is? Is that what they all keep pestering her about? Love? Is it this warmth? This feeling?
For the first time in her life, Erza Scarlet felt love.
His name is Jellal Fernandes, and Erza has never felt so much affection towards another human.
She's soaring, and laughing, and crying and so, so positively inlove. There's so much warmth, so much laughter, so much love. She finally understands that bright, exasperated tone Lucy takes when she talks about Natsu, or that look that clouds Gajeel's eyes when Levy's laughter fills the air.
Then suddenly he's gone, gone, gone and she's drowning, her screams seem lost on ears and she's hurt, hurt, hurt and he's gone.
Gone.
And suddenly Erza feels empty, eyes blank, unfocused and filled with so much undisguised, raw hurt.
There's noise around her, voices and sounds and so much noise. She wants them to shut up, wants them gone, she wants to say she's okay, she's alright, that she'll have to be. But she can't. Because he's gone and she feels so sad and alone and pathetically hurt.
So, so alone, so pathetically hurt and weak and broken.
Erza Scarlet loathed love.