You're right, I'm left, she's gone.
Even after the police have left, an uncomfortable tension has filled Phantom's guts. Gray feels it in every breath he takes, every step. Meredy's scene is over, but her presence, and the commotion she and Mard kicked up, are heady throughout the club. People whisper below the pounding music. They shift their gazes back and forth, looking for more police, or more trouble. It's the most interesting thing that's happened in Phantom since Jellal Fernandez OD'd in the Men's months ago, and Gray is afraid he's there again, ready to plunge into the deep dark depths of the unknown despite their conversation by the bridge.
It's exhausting being around someone so emotionally dependent. It's exhausting trying to find reasons for them to live when sometimes, you question those reasons yourself, forging forth on the blind faith that you have a purpose and things will get better. But Gray hasn't given up on himself, and he isn't ready to give up on Jellal, either, so he takes a deep breath and plunges into the gullet of Phantom, preparing himself for the worst, another moment of pure chaos when he opens the Men's door and finds Jellal slumped against the wall, soaked in his own vomit, another moment of desperation where he prays that he won't waste precious time trying to wake him and he will just dial for an ambulance, another week of drying Ultear's tears and then beating his own anger and sadness onto the flesh of some poor sap that doesn't deserve it.
Gray doesn't realize he's holding Juvia's hand until she squeezes his fingers reassuringly. She's wide-eyed and stuck on Meredy's drama, but at least part of her is thinking about Jellal. Gray is struck by the purity in her, and the assurance that she will be trampled upon her entire life. She isn't savvy enough to keep herself from being hurt time and again, she needs too much, wants too much, gives too much, from a world that will offer nothing in return if it can help it. He wants to tell her to protect herself, but he also wants her unconditional reassurance at his side, and in the end, Gray thinks he's as selfish as everyone else, encouraging her onward through Phantom's dark innards and not telling her to get back to work before Jose notices that she's not at the bar taking instruction from Mira.
Gray steadies himself before he opens the Men's door. Behind him, Juvia doesn't hesitate—she's put all her anxiety regarding Meredy into finding Jellal. Gray is loathed to think how she will be if they cannot find him. He's noted her mania, her hyperfocus, her obsessive compulsions, and after the disaster earlier if she doesn't succeed in this one act, he thinks she will spiral, break apart, float away in small, cut you to ribbons, pieces. Heaven help anyone that tries to stop that disaster.
Before he can open the washroom door, it bursts inward, leaking weak light into Phantom's velvet dark, and a short and stout man exits. Gray steels himself and enters.
Part of him knows even before he's stepped foot into the washroom that Jellal isn't there. The exiting patron isn't nearly panicked enough for someone who has borne witness to the unravelling of Jellal Fernandez. It's still disappointing, however, to see the barren graffiti walls and no one having an existential crisis against them.
Gray spins on his heel and storms out again. Juvia is hot behind him, silent, worrying his fingers even more frantically as she feels Gray's anxiety grow.
The noise in the club has risen a few decibels. Now that the shock of Meredy's arrest has moved on, people are gossiping about the whole thing, giggling in some cases, concerned whispers in others. Gray thinks he should also find Ultear. She will be like Juvia, beside herself with guilt and gunning for a night of intemperance.
She asked why she surrounded herself with people like Jellal and Gray. Gray wonders why he surrounds himself with people like her and Jellal. Maybe we're all awful, he thinks fleetingly. Awful together, and awful apart. But at least they pretend to function when they're a unit, with only a few misfires here and there to belie their unanimity.
"Do you see him anywhere?" Gray hears the desperation in his voice and tries to reel it in. Jellal isn't a puppy galloping down the edge of a busy highway. He's an adult. He's supposed to be rational. Though he's very rarely ever been that.
Juvia pulls out a chair at an empty table and stands on it to get above the crowd. Still, she holds Gray's hand, still, she worries it. He feels her fingers flex as tension runs throughout her body. She points across the club toward the stage. Gray rises on the tips of his toes to see what she's pointing at and feels his heart sink.
It's not Jellal slumping against the wall of a filthy bathroom, true, but he might as well be opening a vein, leaning into Erza like that. She likewise leans toward him, her body warring with her thoughts as she considers whatever it is he says, whatever punishment he's begging from her. Does she want to be around him enough to berate him as he wants? Begs? Is she still furious enough to strike him bloody? Does she hate herself enough to remain there, bent, like the shadow cast by a sun?
Gray sees the truth before Erza slaps Jellal's hand away and pushes him back. Jellal looks wounded, and still somehow eager for more. He is an addict in more ways than one, hungry for every form of self-destruction. He hasn't come here for Erza's forgiveness. He's looking for another way to stand in front of a train, arms spread in welcome. Erza is usually aware she's being used as a vehicle of destruction, but she's frazzled enough by Jellal's unexpected presence that she doesn't stop herself as she streams all the words that Jellal longs to hear, cuts without a blade, makes him leave his lifeblood at her feet.
Gray pulls Juvia off the chair and dashes through the crowd to them. He can hear Erza's voice has raised a pitch above the rest. They're attracting attention from those around them, who watch in delight as Erza methodically destroys Jellal one word at a time. Even at a distance, Gray can see the light leave Jellal's eyes. He's thought he's wanted this, but when hit with it, he crumples.
"Erza," Gray snaps when he's barely within hearing range.
Erza starts; she's forgotten where she is, and that they have an audience. Her eyes find Gray, one bright and dead, glass, the other too alive and shiny with tears. She turns away from Gray without acknowledging him, wanting to get the final word in. "I won't be a participant in your deliberate abolition. Find something to live for. Get help."
Gray can tell she wants to add something else; something too mean for someone like Erza Scarlet to utter, but she's tempted because she's hurt and she wants Jellal to hurt, too. She can see his shattered-glass heart, though, and holds back. Gray sees then she still loves him, and that's why she allows this to continue, why last time, it was Erza that sought him out, trying to see if anything had changed. Of course, the only thing that had was Jellal's level of melodrama. He is such an idiot. Gray wants to grab him and shake him, but he's afraid Jellal will fall apart if he touches him now.
Juvia isn't so reserved. She closes the distance between them, pulling Gray along, and takes Jellal by the hand. It's an innocuous motion, but it's intimate, and Erza misses nothing. She closes down as Juvia pulls Jellal toward them, out of Erza's blistering aura, and into relative safety. She doesn't stop until she's as far away from Erza as she can be without leaving the club completely.
"Where is Ultear?" Juvia asks. They're surrounded by tables heady with empty glasses and bottles. This is Juvia's section, and her absence is apparent.
"I'm here." Ultear slips from the crowd. She looks vibrant to Gray, her cheeks rouged with exuberance. "Are we leaving?" She addresses Juvia with the question.
Juvia shoots a surreptitious glance at Jose's office on the second floor. The door is closed, and he is nowhere in sight. It would be easy to slip out and away, and she wants to, badly, judging by the longing in her eyes, but she holds back and shakes her head. "I have another hour of work."
Jellal says nothing, has said nothing for long moments and looks like he doesn't want to say much, either. Ultear sighs when she gets a look at him. "I fucking told you." Her words are harsh, but her tone is soft, a pillow for him to fall against and fall apart. Jellal chews his cheek, making his cheekbone sharp. Still, he remains silent.
"Do you want me to take you home?" Ultear offers. She doesn't specify his place or hers, but Gray assumes Ultear means home to her bed, in her apartment, where she can look at all Jellal's shiny broken pieces and muse about putting them together again.
The lights dim on the stage and the music changes as Ultear speaks. One girl exits and another enters. Gray rolls his eyes seeing Erza up there. She doesn't look as weary or as anxious as Jellal, but there is something about her movements that speaks to her state of mind. They're quick and short, distracted, and a bit furious.
Jellal shakes his head after a long pause; he's not yet finished destroying himself this evening.
"I'm going to need more whisky," Gray grumbles.
"Mira's looking for me at the bar," Juvia says. She looks as road-weary as Gray feels. Guilt, he thinks. She didn't mean for any of this to happen tonight and feels responsible for Jellal's fever. Gray wants to assure her that it's never that far away for Jellal and not to feel bad, but he can't seem to get the words out, they jam in his throat and make him feel awkward and out of place when he considers how to word them. He's never been good at emoting. It frustrated him in his youth; now it's just something he lives with in resignation.
His hand is cold when Juvia releases it and slips back through the crowd.
"Let's get our table back," Ultear announces. Despite everything, she still looks too pleased with herself. Gray, for no reason he can name, feels the urge to destroy her happiness. She should be as miserable as the rest of them.
"Meredy and Mard were arrested."
Ultear's steps falter. She spins on Gray. "What?"
"The cops found dope in Mard's car and Meredy told them it was hers. It just happened."
Ultear bites her lip white. "Why would she say it was hers?"
"Maybe it was," Gray says.
"Shut up. It wasn't."
Her vehemence catches Gray off-guard. Ultear, above all, is practical. She doesn't have blind faith in people the way Juvia seems to, or the way Ur does. She's a realist and doesn't let herself get caught up in hopefulness. She knows how unpredictable people can be and knows that those drugs could have very well been Meredy's. She was determined enough to get her hands on them, after all.
Jellal doesn't weigh in on the subject. He still watches the stage, even as they slip through the crowds of people, and it seems like Erza watches him, too, both silently asking the other to concede and both too stubborn to do so.
Erza finishes her routine and leaves the stage and Jellal reaches for Gray. Gray allows it, taking the hand that Juvia had released, imagining he's holding Jellal steady in the storm instead of adding to the turbulence.
Morrigan: My take on Jellal is always I cannot make him better, so I might as well make him worse :D As always, I appreciate your readership! xoxo