Disclaimer: I do not own Fairy Tail.
AN: I'd to thank the readers who reviewed, as well as the ones who added the story to their favorites and alerts. So, thank you!
In this installment, nobody respects the sanctity of the bond between a man and his cat. Something of a follow-up to the first story.
Another Rainy Night:
Gajeel was a bit odd, something Pantherlily had discovered since coming to Earthland, but the Exceed had nonetheless learned to accept many of his strange habits. These habits included his need to instigate a fight at the guild hall at least once every day, his compulsive hoarding of shiny metal objects, as well as his regular ingestion of said objects, to name just a few. However, there was one practice to which Lily had yet to become accustomed. It was the most confusing one discovered thus far, and much to his chagrin, it took place on an annoyingly regular basis.
It was this activity that was currently being carried out in the apartment Lily shared with Gajeel. The latter was seated in the kitchen, turned away from the table, hair trailing down his back. Meanwhile, Lily was positioned on the tabletop behind his friend, a hairbrush in one paw and Gajeel's long black locks in the other.
"I swear you haven't brushed your hair at all since last week," Lily complained as he viciously pulled the bristles through the stubborn knots, tearing out tangles and roots alike.
"Hey! Not so hard," Gajeel growled as his head was pulled backward with the force of the tugs. "Besides, it's your fault for being gone all week."
"You could have done it yourself," the cat argued. "What did you do before I came to Earthland?"
"I just let it be," Gajeel replied with a shrug of his shoulders.
Lily could only regard the tangled mess before him reproachfully. He couldn't even remember how Gajeel had convinced him to perform this ritual in the first place, but it had been a constant pain in his ass from the very first. It would be so much simpler if the man would just cut off the long mane. Lily had even helpfully offered to do it for him many a time, but Gajeel always refused. If he had known beforehand that this would happen, he would have hacked off the annoying thing back when they had fought on Edolas. A flick of the wrist and his Buster Marm would have sliced clean through… Well, Gajeel had his iron dragon scales for preventing decapitation—that's what they were there for.
Realizing it was a hopeless dream, Lily let out a lengthy sigh before resuming his count. "One hundred and ninety-eight. One hundred and ninety-nine. Two hundred." Finished at last.
"Okay, your turn." Gajeel turned on his seat and plucked the brush from his paw.
At his words, Lily made a desperate dive off the table, but was grabbed in midair before he could make his escape.
"I told you, I don't want to be—"
The complaint subsided as bristles were applied to his fur, and he stretched out on the wooden surface—against his will, he reminded himself—while Gajeel commenced brushing him from the crown of his head to the tip of his tail.
Anyone who might have been watching the scene would have noticed an enthusiasm that Gajeel rarely displayed for anything outside of fighting, but to the solitary man, this act was almost as important as his brawls. After all, he had to keep his partner looking his best, because while it didn't matter what other people thought about his own appearance, he couldn't have anyone insinuating he didn't take good care of his cat. This was just one of the many necessary measures to that end.
Besides, the purring that emanated from the tiny body told him that the feline did, indeed, enjoy the attention, no matter what was said to the contrary. There was still the occasional grumbled protest from the Exceed, but Gajeel knew the truth.
Lily's body was small, so the task did not take much time. Once the ordeal had ended, he informed Gajeel that he would be heading out, and prepared to leave.
"You're not going to eat dinner first?" Gajeel asked, brows furrowing in a frown.
Lily shook his head as he looked out the window. His friend followed his gaze to the dark clouds in the distance, and he knew the other had immediately understood his concern.
"Fine," Gajeel huffed at last. "Just make sure you eat something when you get there. They'd better not think they can starve my cat and get away with it."
"I am not a child, Gajeel," he reminded the man. "I can take care of myself."
"Yeah yeah," Gajeel grumbled, returning to the kitchen and leaving Lily to chuckle at his protectiveness.
Not wasting any time, Lily grabbed his bag and left to meet up with his friend.
It normally took about an hour to reach the other side of town on foot. It would have been faster to fly, but he preferred not to be in the air on days like these, where he would be too close to all those frightening elements for comfort. And besides, he was making good time. Before he knew it, he was climbing the steps up to his friend's residence.
"You made it!" Levy stood at the entryway, clearly relieved to see he had arrived safe and sound. Her concern was probably due to the fact that on his first visit to the dormitory, he had been a shivering wreck that she had needed to carry there in her arms. It was an incident he tried not to dwell on, for the sake of his pride.
"Good to see you again, Levy," he greeted, following her into the building and up the stairs.
"Have you eaten yet?"
"Not yet."
"Great! You can eat with us." She checked her watch. "We're not set to start cooking for another hour, though."
"That's fine," he assured her as they reached the second floor landing and proceeded to her room, a route familiar to him by now.
Once inside, Levy made space for him at the small table in the back. The act consisted of picking up the stack of books that had been there originally and adding them to an existing pile on the floor. He saw her crouch in front of the volumes, eyes on the tower as it slowly leaned against the wall. Seemingly satisfied, she excused herself to go put the kettle on in the kitchen downstairs.
After she left, Lily looked around, noting that not much had changed since his last visit—that is, until something in the corner caught his eye. Hopping off his perch, he made his way over to the space and discovered it was a rather deep indentation on the hardwood floor. With a frown, he ran his paw over the groove.
The sound of soft footfalls alerted him to his friend's return.
"Something wrong, Lily?" Levy asked from behind him.
"Is this a new dent in your floor?" He was almost certain it had not been there previously.
"Huh? Oh, uh…"
When she didn't reply, Lily turned around in time to see the girl set a tray on the table before looking down in embarrassment. When he climbed back up to his seat, she was wearing a sheepish expression on her face, strangely focused on pouring tea into two cups.
"I was in a bookslide the other day," she finally admitted after a moment of silence.
"What is a bookslide?"
"Like a landslide, except with books. I came up with the word myself."
"I see…" That explained why she had been watching that stack so closely earlier. She had probably been trying to prevent a repeat incident. But a bookslide?
"Do you think novelanche is catchier? I was considering that one too," she asked after placing a cup before him, as if she had heard his thought.
"Well… Which one do you prefer?"
The girl tapped her chin thoughtfully, considering his question. "I think I like both words. In fact, I'm going to start slipping them into daily conversations until everyone starts using them!" she declared with a grin.
Lily smiled as well. Inwardly, he thought that Levy was probably the only person in the guild who would ever need to use those words. He pictured the petite girl accidentally knocking over one of her leaning towers of books and becoming trapped underneath a mountain of dusty tomes. If the amount of scuffs and depressions on her floor was any indication, this was a common occurrence.
"Would you like more tea?" her voice interrupted his thoughts.
Looking down, he realized that he had finished his drink. Slightly abashed, he held out the cup. "If you wouldn't mind."
Levy nodded and picked up the teapot. When she leaned over to take his cup, she commented, "Your fur seems especially glossy tonight."
Surprised, Lily thanked her for the compliment, and quickly followed it up with a question. "So, what do you like to do in your spare time?"
He winced at how obvious the attempt at a subject change sounded, but it couldn't be helped. Although it had only been a casual remark, he needed to steer the conversation in a different direction before any more questions were asked about his fur. How it came to be so soft and shiny was not information he wished to disclose.
Luckily, Levy didn't appear to suspect anything about the sudden topic change, and eagerly jumped into a talk about her beloved literature. As they discussed their various hobbies, Lily idly wondered what Gajeel was doing at this time. Playing with his metal contraptions, no doubt—and he told Levy as much when she asked.
After eating dinner alone, Gajeel chose to do something that would keep his hands busy. After all, it was still too early to turn in, and there was no point going outside just to get soaked. Clearing off the kitchen table, he began to tinker with some gadgets he had collected over the week, taking them apart, figuring out how they worked, and then putting them back together—as well as occasionally popping a few pieces in his mouth as a snack.
This activity occupied his attention for a couple hours, but he eventually grew bored. Once that happened, he tidied up the area and retired to his room. Falling into bed, large arms crossed beneath his head as he stared despondently at the dark ceiling. Messing with the gizmos had been a good distraction, but with nothing else to do, he couldn't help but feel distinctly abandoned—it was hard not to in this situation.
Lily had been going out a lot lately, ever since Magnolia had entered its rainy season. His cat hated this type of weather, and frankly he was beginning to as well. He didn't mind the wind and the rain so much. As annoying as they were, they were a welcome change to the heat and humidity. What bugged him was the fact that Lily had been spending less time with him lately because of the accompanying thunder and lightning.
Gajeel understood his reasons, of course. He didn't need heightened senses to know that the thin walls around him were far from soundproof. Then again, he wasn't the one afraid of rumbles in the sky. Normally, his cat would curl up in a ball beneath a pillow until it was over, which was neither comfortable nor effective. But up at Fairy Hills, he didn't have to do that. He could sit right out in the open and act as if there wasn't even a thunderstorm raging outside. It was steps above hiding under a pillow—of course he'd rather spend his time there.
Gajeel sighed, realizing there was no point being jealous. Even though it felt like other people got to spend more time with his cat than he did these days, he couldn't begrudge Lily his safety and peace of mind. In the end, that's what really mattered. He could sleep easier too, knowing that at least there wasn't an old bat with a hundred cats trying to add the Exceed to her collection.
Thunder boomed outside as Gajeel suddenly shot up in bed, mind racing. Hadn't Lily told him one of the girls there kept an entire farm in her room? What if she wanted to make his cat a permanent part of her zoo?
Gajeel cursed, becoming increasingly convinced that everyone was after his cat.
