Mirajane thought that she knew herself pretty well. She thought that most people knew her well, actually. She was pretty open, after all, with her feelings and thoughts. She had no problem with letting everyone know whatever half thought out, childish solution she had to their frequent problems, much less letting them see her cry when they would, inevitably, inform her of just how childish and not really thought out her ideas truly were.

She liked that she was emotional. That you could tell what was going on with her. She knew that she felt things heavily, that she had been forever changed with her sister's supposed death, and, of course, that her upbeat personality, while true to her, could also serve as a fascade at times, hiding her deeper feelings, deeper hurt over just what she'd lost in her parents, village, and for a short time Lisanna.

It wasn't lost on her that, while very strong, it took a lot to get that strength out of her. That she wasn't like Erza any longer, who could throw around her weight and magical prowess with ease. Mirajane had to think, first, weigh her options, decide if her strength was truly needed. It wasn't just a faucet that she could turn on and off.

Love was something that she fell into often, but rarely stuck. She enjoyed the thrill of something new and, when that newness wore off, rarely derived any pleasure from stagnancy. She thrived off meeting new people and seeing new places. Learning the names of all her new interests friends, where they liked to hangout that she'd never been before. Once she became privy to any and everything about the guy though, he sadly would become replaceable in her mind and, though Mira didn't like it about herself, she'd quickly find them to be boring and figure a way out of the relationship quickly.

She and Laxus were actually still in the stage where they were learning new things about one another when she found out something shocking about herself.

She did not like other women to take his attention.

Which, when phrased like that, sounded a bit off, but that wasn't fair. She didn't, like, hate every woman that was able to get the slayer to speak to her. No way. That would just be crazy.

Rather, she found out just how bothered she could get by other women one night when Laxus took her out to see some band that he claimed she'd enjoy and they just had to go. That was actually how they'd ended up together. Music. Mira had seen him when she was out one night, with another guy, at a bar where some rather obscure band was playing, a few towns over, and her plans fell through with her guy and his fell through with the woman he was with and they were both drinking and, somehow, they both just..

Just.

Things were complicated, as they slept together that night, drunk, without any thought to what would come next. Under normal circumstances, some awkward words following each subsequent meeting until both lost their embarrassment over the entire thing would suffice, but, unfortunately, Makarov had deemed Laxus ready to inherit the hall only a couple days before they slept together. He was mere weeks away from inheriting it and then he went and did that.

Well, did Mirajane, actually

But that was besides the point.

He and Mira were left to navigate where to go from there. He, after all, was going to be her boss. That alone would have been a big change to their interactions. Add in sleeping together (quite enjoyably, on both their parts) and, well, you just had a big mess.

For a solid month, they both tried to ignore just what had occurred, but it was impossible. So much of Makarov's passing the torch onto his grandson involved having Mirajane around, to teach him all the stuff that Makarov had kinda stopped taking care of and given to her to deal with. Even though Laxus planned, eventually, to use the Thunder Legion as his inside people rather than Mirajane and Erza, as Makarov had done, he still needed to learn just what their jobs involved.

It really wasn't that shocking to either Mirajane nor Laxus when they found themselves in bed together once more before thirty days were even up. And it was that night, when she left his apartment after the fact, that Mira admitted to him that she found him unbelievably attractive and wanted to see where things went.

Honestly, it was Mirajane who was at the disadvantage. Not him. He would be the head of the guild no matter what. No one could overthrow him. Mirajane, however, should things go south, would be the one who now had a boss that hated her and didn't want her around any longer.

So he left it up to her. He said that he never wanted things to get bad between them, business or personal wise, and that she should realize mixing the two would only lead up there. But she kept insisting that they were both mature adults and, honestly, weren't they both kind of relieved when relationships ended? And they got to do something new? She knew she was. Wasn't he?

This sealed the deal and, rather quietly, Laxus and Mirajane began to see one another.

Which they didn't do much, really, most days, as they were both up at the hall so much, but they got a lot of time to spend with one another there. Learning things. And Laxus did like to take her places, when they both got a chance to be away from the hall.

Typically though, it was learning new things about them that she enjoyed so much. Not herself.

That night at the bar, where they were listening to more of a duo than a band playing acoustics and definitely not something Laxus was into, Mira just knew, but was suffering through for her, Mira did learn something about herself. Something new and shocking.

Something that she did not like at all.

It happened when she and Laxus were seated at a table, him drinking heavily and her so enthralled with the music that her eyes never left the tiny stage where the two guys, one with spikey blue hair and the other with a nose ring sang their hearts out about how broken they were, to soft melodies and rhythmic strumming patterns.

"I'mma go take a piss, babe." Laxus mumbled that in her ear as he got to his feet. "Alright?"

"Mmmhmm. Yeah."

She didn't really look for him at all after that. Mira was all into the music and all into the lyrics and just, ugh.

Just ugh.

He was so good, the slayer was. So good at finding things that she'd love. Because if she hadn't been with Laxus, in that moment, she'd have been trying so hard after one of those two guys on stage. In her mind, which was quite fanciful for the most part, she already started to envision it, the way she did most things. How she and the one with...the blue spikes would fall in love and he and the other (his brother, maybe?) would be her opening act and they'd tour all over Fiore. He'd wait a year before proposing and she would say yes, of course, and they wouldn't have a lot of money, but would manage to make it back to Magnolia for the wedding, where she'd regal all of her friends from her former guild with tales of road life and she'd find out, not three months following that, that she was expecting his child and the baby would just be so musically inclined, wouldn't it?

Of course, it would end in a bitter divorce, after five years, when she became more successful than he and his brother and he'd probably be sleeping around on her, but she would be him too, by that point, and they'd hate one another's guts and it would be a horrible custody situation and their child would grow up so damaged, but so hot and musically talented because, you know, so where they, and would just repeat the cycle, but what can you do?

At least they'd always have that smokey bar, that she was in at the moment, where they first laid their eyes one one another.

At least.

She'd just come down off this emotional roller coaster as they'd finished a song and were speaking to the crowd about something or other. Mira would have eaten this up, did her eyes not take a moment to glance around the bar and land, unfortunately, not on the one on stage with the nose ring who Mira was pretty sure she'd probably have a better child with, actually, glancing at facial structure alone, but the marriage would definitely end the same, but rather on the man she'd come there with.

Laxus.

Her boyfriend.

Who was totally standing way too close to some random woman who- Did she… Was that her hand on his arm?

Mira felt suddenly cold, in the too cramped bar in the dead of summer, only dry air circulating throughout the building.

What was...happening?

For Laxus? Actually not much.

He'd come out of the bathroom and ran into this woman was clearly more intoxicated than him and was also very intent on talking to him.

If Mira wasn't over at the table (and kind of sort of his girlfriend), he'd have probably let things take him wherever they chose to go.

But Mira was there. And was kind of sort of his girlfriend. So…

So he wasn't going to be rude though. At least not to a hot chick. If she was bucktooth and greasy, yeah, he'd probably have shrugged her off because Laxus was shallow as fuck when it came to his relationships, sue him.

"I know you," the woman was saying as she leaned closer to him, after Laxus helped steadying her (he had sorta slammed into her, after all). "Don't I?"

Laxus only grunted, just a bit, before dropping the hand he'd used to keep her on her feet. For some reason when he did this, she reached her own hand out, grabbing onto his arm and holding him there.

"Yeah, I do! You're...that...wizard, right?"

The bar was dark, but Laxus had finally gotten a pretty good look at the woman and her, well, uh… Just everything about her. And….maybe...two things in particular that were definitely too large for the shirt she was wearing, but that was the point, wasn't it?

...He could talk to her. Couldn't he? That wasn't that big of a deal. He'd just...chat. She recognized him! He was a guild master! Wasn't it his job to give the guild good name? Good press? Right?

"Yeah." Laxus coughed and tried to shrug her hand off because, while looking was one thing, touching was another. And he didn't see he and Mirajane as, like, being together forever and always, but they were together at the moment and he wanted to keep it that way. She was great. She was...Mirajane Strauss. Who the hell wouldn't want to keep that together so long as possible? But even as he did so, the woman wouldn't let go of his arm. It was awkward, her movement with him when he tried to shrug her away, and she almost fell again, being so intoxicated, so he had to reach out with his other hand to steady her and… "Careful."

"Mmmm," she hummed with some laughter he steadied her once more. "You're so straw...strong. Mmmm. What kinda wizard are you?"

That time she tried to grab both his arms, but now it seemed more to keep herself from toppling over, so he allowed it after dropping his hand.

"Lightning."

"Light-en-en-en-ing."

"Yeah." Someone was walking by then ans Laxus had to move closer to her, to allow them to get by. Honest. Only reason. "Lightning."

"Zat's like...so...h...hot," she slurred, leaning forward a bit so that she could stare into his eyes. After getting to spend the past few months staring into the stellar deeps of his current girlfriend's, this did little for him. "You know?"

"Yeah." She might be looking him in the eyes, but he certainly wasn't meeting hers. "I know."

"I's gonna be a part of a guil' once."

"A gill, huh?"

"Yeah, a gill."

"That's weird. I'm not part of a gill. I'm part of a guild, but-"

"That's what I said!"

"Is it though? Is it?"

"Yes!" She was laughing then and he didn't grin at her, but his head was bowed towards her and he was just…

"What the fuck, Laxus?"

Getting shoved away from the woman.

Mirajane didn't know what came over her, as she'd sat at that table and watched interaction from afar. For some reason, it completely set her off to see him...flirting with that other woman. She didn't know for certain, of course, that this is what the slayer was doing, as the few times he even flirted with her, his own girlfriend, it was usually in such a laid back, almost nonchalant way, but still.

"What?" Laxus had let the other woman go and, luckily, she found her balance on her own, as he couldn't give two shits if she fell the popped that perfect little teeth right out of her jaw then. "What's your problem?"

Mira didn't know, honestly. She wasn't the type to...say that word. Fuck. Unless she was drunk. Or actually, you know, fucking and it was hot or something, to say it that way. But as a nonsexual expletive? Not really her thing.

So she just stood there for a moment, staring at Laxus, before finally glancing at the other woman who seemed to be so drunk that how could Mira be mad at her? At all? She didn't know what she was doing. She was so innocent. Laxus was so innocent.

...Then she reached out again, the other woman did, to lay a hand on Laxus' arm, and she'd had it.

"We're leaving," Mira told Laxus shortly. "I need to...go. Now."

Laxus' eyes had gone back to the drunk, but at her words, he made a face at his girlfriend. "Just go sit back down. Your little band is still-"

"I wanna leave, Laxus. Pay the tab and let's go."

He still hadn't gotten the woman to let him go yet, the other woman, as every time he pulled off her hand, she'd put it back on and it was a game, to her, and to Laxus too, probably, but not to Mirajane, who was sober, unlike the two of them, and it also wasn't funny. At all.

They might be innocent, but if she didn't get out of there soon, Mirajane would also make them both dead.

"Just give me a minute, huh?" Laxus, regardless of Mira's thoughts of him...flirting, was growing annoyed with the other woman, and finally shoved her hand off him. Wrong move.

"Who the fuck 're you to touch me?" she slurred at him. "You stu...pid lighten-ening mage!"

Laxus made a face, confused by this, but Mira was still in that state that she didn't understand. At all. She...was…

Angry. With the other woman. Which Mira usually didn't get, towards others any longer. Upset. She'd get emotional or cry, but you had to be the baddest of the bad to get the eldest Strauss angry. But that made her so for some reason.

"Who the fuck are you to yell at him?" Okay, so maybe Mira had kind of took a few sips of Laxus' drinks. She wasn't drunk though. So there. "Huh?"

And it was just so...stupid. All of it. Laxus had dated chicks before, that got off on that kind of shit. Going out somewhere together, getting plastered, both of them flirting with others, getting angry with one another about it, and then banging it out back at her apartment.

But that wasn't he and Mirajane.

At all.

And it wasn't then either as, for some reason, Mirajane didn't seem mad at him.

She just seemed mega pissed at the woman.

The clearly not on Mira's level woman who was also drunk and, oh, damn, Laxus was going to have to get his chick outta there.

Not just his chick.

Mirajane.

It was actually kinda...cute.

And funny.

Which Mirajane was not appreciative of him saying after they left the bar that night, the other woman being corralled by some of her friends before things got much further and Laxus just leading Mira out after paying his tab, the band she'd loved so much forgotten already.

And, honestly, that guy's bone structure wasn't that great. And his brother was horrible at barre chords.

So their relationships would have never produced beautiful musical prodigy children anyways.

"You," the slayer laughed as they walked down the street together, "were jealous."

"Shut up, Laxus."

"I've never seen you like that." He was laughing to himself as Mira, with his coat on her shoulders, only walked determinedly in one direction, wanting to get home as soon as possible. "All pissy and...damn, Mirajane, that was hot. You're so fucking hot."

"Oh, I'm so fucking hot that you were going to let that woman...touch all up on you?"

"Touch all up on me?" More cackling. Laxus' cheeks hurt from grinning so hard. "You're, like, a different person right now! My gosh, Mira, you're like...like...like you were before." He sobered a bit then, his grin falling, as he added, "How I'd imagined you were, before, I mean, I guess. If we'd dated then."

Right. When she was an angry teenager.

Yeah, he was actually correct. Mira could go batshit back then with jealousy.

But it was supposed to be one of those traits that got buried by false happiness she'd consumed herself with after Lisanna's disappearance until it became real happiness.

Mirajane Strauss, in her current incarnation, did not get...jealous.

She could get clingy, sometimes, right before the ending of a relationship, if she liked it a bunch, and needed a good cry before the memories of how great being single and entering a new relationship could be.

She could get pissy, at a guy, if he was cheating on her or neglecting her needs, leading to the end of the relationship rather quickly, typically.

And she could get disappointed, when she thought that she'd never run out of new things to learn about a guy, but suddenly, their time was up, it seemed, as everything became stale and stagnant and just wasn't going to work out.

Apparently though, Mirajane could get…

"You're possessive as shit, woman," Laxus went on. "Can't even let another woman touch me now?"

"Did I say that?"

"You showed me that!"

Walking faster than him then, Mira said over her shoulder, "They can'. I don't care. I'm not your wife. Do what you want."

"You're my girlfriend," he pointed out, which was odd, as it was usually her used the titles. Definitions. Not him. "I should know what pisses you off. And apparently that does. I mean, what? Next time I come over to fix that leaky sink of yours and Lisanna hugs me goodbye, should I slug her? For your sake?"

Hearing about how, apparently, he and her sister were already on a hugging basis usually would have made the woman rather happy, but at the moment…

"Of course not, Laxus."

"Then-"

"It different," she grumbled, "if we know the woman. And they wouldn't be touching you like that woman was touching you."

"How was she touching me?"

"Shut up, Laxus."

"You know, for someone that said we could have a clean break when the time comes, you sure are-"

"Oh, you want a break? Huh? Do you?"

"Of course not! Damn, crazy, calm down."

"I'm not crazy. And don't tell me to calm- Laxus."

He'd tried to rush then, to catch her, but he was still more than tipsy and he started to trip, so he had to catch himself then. To do so, he just reached out for her and wrapped her up in his arms, using her to keep him steady then.

He liked being kept stable by Mira far more than he did having to keep some random at a bar the same.

Bowing his head, Laxus rested it on her head as he whispered, "This was a weird night."

Mira, holding still as to continue holding him up, took a breath before saying, "Yeah."

"I drank too much."

"I know."

"You gonna come home with me? Gonna let me go home with you? Or what?"

"I don't care."

"Come home with me." He let out a slow breath. "Be Satan Soul and punish me. For being touched. By someone else. Fuck."

They were in the middle of the sidewalk and in the way of any that wanted to get by so, after another deep breath, Mirajane reached up to pat the arm he had wrapped around her before saying, "Let's go then."

"My jealous little demon." When he let her go, she only moved to take his hand and it felt good there, for both of them. "I didn't know you could get that way."

"Yeah." Mira, still rather embarrassed by the whole thing, glanced up at him. "Neither did I."

But Laxus was done making up, it seemed, as he grunted that time and fell quiet. The moment was passing and leading into another, but Mira was still hung up on it and thinking, rather hard, about many things.

Laxus related things.

She hadn't...figured out just yet, how she and him would end. Not like she new how she and the band members would have. Or her with literally every guy she started dating any other time. Her and Laxus knew one another since they were children, so she'd always chalked it up to that being the reason she couldn't figure out what their story would be.

But…

What if it was something…

More?

"I'mma need a smoke," he mumbled to Mirajane when they made it to his apartment and he went to get a cigar. "You can, uh, freshen up or whatever." Then his eyes seemed as ablaze as the lighter he was searching for would be when he flicked it. "Or transform."

Her smile back to him was uneasy, but he didn't recognize it and Mira slunk off to the bathroom to, at the very least, wash her face off.

And stare at the mirror, which is what she was doing then, as she replayed the evening in her head, and recalled every little factoid she knew about her personality and inner being.

How was it that she was in her twenties and still learning so much about herself?

How?

Blinking at her reflection, Mira shivered a bit, regardless of how it was actually a bit warm in the apartment, just as it had been in the bar, when the whole thing started. To the image of herself in the mirror, the demon whispered, "What is he doing to me?"

Honestly?

He didn't know.

Laxus knew that Mirajane wasn't usually like that. All...jealous and shit. He'd never evoked that out of her before and never seen her behave that way in all the years he knew her. Not since she was put out by Erza's clear rivalry to her strongest female mage in the guild shtick when they were teens.

But she'd been jealous. HE could tell. She might not want to admit it, but she was. Over that other woman. He'd gotten Mirajane Strauss, the hottest woman in all of Fiore, a fucking model, to get upset because some drunk at a bar with, fine, nice knockers, but not much else, touched him on the arm.

As he puffed, out there on that balcony, calming down and decompressing a bit before he went to fuck the demon (or got fucked by the demon), Laxus had to grin to out at yellow moon that hung in the dark sky.

Because he didn't know what he was doing to Mirajane, but damn if he didn't enjoy it.

This isn't a real sequel to the story I did for Miraxus Week last year, Don't Make Sense, but if you've read that one, this one could definitely be construed as following it. I tried to give it that same passive towards one another tone that the other had, but not as serious or tense because this was meant to be more light than that one. Maybe I failed or maybe I succeeded. I just wanted to write at least one of the prompts from more of Mira's perspective, since I do Laxus so often.