"Life is simple, but we insist on making it complicated"

She gasped for breath, and it was only then that he realized he been holding his. She breathed once, and then twice, and then again and again and again until he was finally certain that she was alright and she was alive and she hadn't been killed by the shock.

After a few seconds the breathing slowed down and relaxed, and everyone seemed to relax along with it. Except for the boy. He remained tense and motionless, his own breaths coming in short gasps. They told him to sit down. He refused.

A few seconds more and her color started to return. She lost the appearance of a corpse and her cheeks began to take on a rosy hue.

Her eyes came next, which she fluttered open the way a butterfly might flutter its wings. Because the truth was, the only things that ever fluttered were butterflies and eyelids, and when it came to the girl her eyelids almost always fluttered. The boy found his eyes fixed upon her face, glued to every detail of it, from her delicate eyelashes, to the little bump in her nose. A sinking feeling began to penetrate his core. He realized that he could have killed her. He'd almost destroyed everything about her; her intrigue, her wildness, her peculiarity, her effervescence. Everything. Vacated. Murdered. In just a second. Because of him.

~Xandria's POV~

I inhaled deeply, and almost crinkled my nose upon doing so. The air was sour around me; it smelled as though something had been burnt, and very badly. I hesitated, taking a series of shallower breaths before I dared to sniff again. And, after I'd built up my courage, I inhaled once more. The scent of burning shrubbery met my nose again, mingled with a fainter scent that I had never smelt before—something like thyme and earth and musk all on top of each other. Another sniff, and the stronger that scent became. A person, I realized. I was smelling a person!

My senses were coming back, somewhat dazed, and the distinct feeling of being carried dawned across me. Arms were snaked around my body, under my knees and behind my back. My shoulder bumped against the person holding me; whoever it was they were warm and awfully hard underneath me. Their body must have all been made of muscle, because the sinewy, solid tissue was all I felt behind me.

I blinked my eyes open, and slowly but surely it came back. The fight, the shock, the fall. My eyes came into focus, and I peered up into the face of Laxus Dreyar. He was giving me a very unsettling look.

"Wo-" My voice croaked, and I tried again. "Would you mind setting me down?"

"You sure you can stand?" He asked, and I fixed him with a withering look. Laxus complied, and I was met with a series of concerned questions and areyoualrights as soon as my feet touched the ground.

I waved them off, "The only thing that hurts is my pride."

"I thought you'd died," Evergreen squawked.

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure your heart stopped."

"You stopped breathing."

I rolled my eyes, "You're crazy, all of you. It'd take a lot more than a little lightning to get rid of me."

"It wasa lot more than a little lightning," Evergreen chided, bustling forward to brush some of the earth off my clothes. I tried to bat her away, but the woman kept fretting.

"Will you stop your fussing?" I demanded, and she stepped away with a huff of indignation.

"Somebody's gotta fuss over you, Xandria," said Evergreen. "You don't fuss over yourself enough." I ignored her and turned to Laxus, his features still stormy. What a ham.

"That was fun, you know? I haven't gone all out with someone in quite a while, so it's nice to get some practice in."

The statement seemed to cause him to brighten, and the feckless grin he'd worn before reappeared, "You're not too shabby yourself, considering you're an amateur," Laxus teased. I let out a derisive bark of laughter.

"I could say the same to you, considering you're a dick."

A laugh blossomed from his lips and he shook his head. "'Spose I deserved that one." I grinned.

"Yeah, 'spose you did."

"It's not often that someone can hold their own against me," he remarked.

"Laxus, she almost beat you," Evergreen retorted. Laxus folded his arms, and raised a brow.

"But she didn't because I activated my dragon slayer magic, now did she?"

"He's definitely a formidable opponent," I conceded, glancing down at my hands. "Nothing I couldn't handle though."

The lightning man snorted, "Oh really? Last I recall, you were the one lying flat on her ass."

"Please, it's not like you're that much better than she is," said Freed, and with a conspirital smile he turned to me. "Last time he was defeated it took two dragon slayers to wipe him out, and even then he barely lost."

"I thought he'd kill Natsu that time," Evergreen added, glancing through heavily lidded eyes at me. "Thought he might've killed you too."

"I can handle myself in a sparring match."

"Yeah, I know. This bruise here is certainly enough to serve as a reminder." She rubbed a gentle hand over the side of her face, were a purpling mark was blossoming on her skin. I gave her a sheepish grin.

"Sorry about that, by the way."

"Oh don't apologize to me; I've seen worse."

"The real person you should be apologizing to is me." Laxus interjected, and I my lips lifted upwards in a smirk.

"Sorry about hitting you in the balls, then. Hopefully your future children won't be affected by my brute strength."

"What future children?" Evergreen snorted, earning a scowl from the blond man.

"I'm perfectly suitable to be a father, thank you Eve."

I laughed, "You, with children?"

"Oh what, like you're some kind of kid-whisperer?" Laxus fired back.

"For your information, Sparky, I'm wonderful with children. Between my sparkling personality and sense of humor it's not hard to see why."

Laxus hmphed, and then all of us were laughing.

We laughed the whole way home, and the day, and the rest of the week. Our lightheartedness carried on until, eventually, we wound up laughing ourselves through an entire month. The days succeeded one another in a doting kind of litany. Monday would give birth to Tuesday, who'd father Wednesday and so on and so forth until finally it was May. And maybe we'd almost killed one another because of it, but the fighting had certainly lifted our spirits. Laxus stopped breathing down our necks; Bickslow and I reconciled; Evergreen and I squabbled and squawked and lovingly berated each other; and Freed and I even established a bond. He would smuggle in my favorite sweets under the noses of the others, and in turn I would acquire for him various forms of homoerotic pornography. It was, in my opinion, the beginning of a wonderful friendship.

Laxus, on the other hand, seemed as though he was trying to avoid me. At first I thought I was misreading it, or that I kept bumping into the dragon slayer at all the wrong times. Then he kept excusing himself. It was small things to begin with. He had to use the restroom. He'd forgotten his wallet. He had to go meet Freed somewhere. Then the lies grew bigger, more elaborate, and I realized that the only interaction I'd had with the mage was the occasional small talk or passive remark. And Laxus hated small talk. Whatever. It's wasn't like I minded him distancing himself; in fact it gave me an opportunity to focus on much more important things, like my magic, for example. It felt amazing to really practice for the first time in a while, without having to worry about an opponent annihilating me if I made one wrong move.

I yawned and raised my fist, and a hollow knocking sound met my ears as my knuckles tapped against the thick wood of the hotel door. There was a resounding groan on the other side of it, succeeded by a thud and a soft shuffle. I rocked backward on my heels and tugged absentmindedly at a stray lock of hair.

The lock clicked and the door creaked open. Laxus stood no less than a yard in front of me, bleary eyed and groggy—which was surprising, considering it was only six o'clock.

"Wut?" He grunted, and I shifted the book anchored at my hip to my hands. He looked at it in disdain.

"I came by to give this back to Freed," I said, and with a gruff pull he took the thick book from my hands, a volume that had hidden an ample supply of taffy strips and sour lollies. Laxus' upper lip curled at it, and his eyes flitted back up to find me.

"Freed's not here."

"Yeah, I know. Eve and him went shopping."

Laxus squinted at me. "Why are you here if you knew he was gone, then?"

Why am I here…?

"Guess I just got bored," I remarked, my eyes returning to his. He grunted again.

"I 'spose I should let you in, then. Unless you'd like to stand in the hall for an hour," said the dragon slayer, and on second thought he added, "which I wouldn't mind, by the way."

I glowered at the man and he let me in.

"Guess I'm stuck with you now," I said, my lips turning upward on the ends. Laxus mirrored the look.

"Looks like I'm stuck with you too."

"Count yourself lucky, then."

He sank into a plush chair, and I sank into the bed across from him.

"I'll consider myself lucky when you finally leave," Laxus retorted, and I laughed.

"Whatever you say, Sparky."

I finally earned a chuckle out of him, and with a grin I leaned back on my palms. Laxus glanced away, out a window, and I observed him. His hair was messy and lacked its usual spike. Soft clumps of blond fell into his face in a way that made him seem far more boyish than he was.

"Did you just wake up?" I asked, and he turned his face back to me.

"Yeah, why?"

"It's six o'clock, Laxus."

"So what? You don't just look this great naturally—takes lots of beauty rest," he retorted, and I laughed. A twinkle danced across his grey eyes; he looked so much younger.

"I apologize then, Sleeping Beauty."

We both chuckled, and I drew my knees up to my chest, wrapping my arms around them. He watched my movements with an attentive eye, and I, in turn, observed him as well.

"So how was the candy?" He asked after a moment, and though surprise might have flashed across my face for a brief moment, I quickly masked it with confusion.

"What do you mean?"

"Oh you know exactly what I mean, Alexandria," said Laxus, and when he saw me open my mouth to protest he added, "and don't try to pretend like you don't."

I huffed. "Did he tell you?"

"I noticed a box of Bobby's Bubble Blasters on his bed last week, and Freed hates gum."

"Wow," I remarked, my tone lilting over the words. "Turns out you actually do have a brain in that thick skull of yours." He leaned forward, his features drawn.

"Do your hear that? It's the sound of no one laughing."

I pulled back, "Sorry, I didn't quite catch it. All I heard was the sound of an asshat talking."

"An ass hat?"

There was a pause, in which he lifted his brows and I wondered, rather halfheartedly, if I'd crossed a line of some sort. I was just about to open my mouth again when Laxus burst into a spluttering bout of laughter. I didn't know what to do at first, but then I noticed exactly how ridiculous his chuckling had become. It wasn't until his voice cracked with a squeak that I joined him, heeing and hawing until our smiles were the only thing greater than our uproarious guffaws.

It took a few minutes to rein ourselves in, and even then our breathing came in desperate gasps.

Laxus was the first to speak. "You're ridiculous," He wheezed, and I met his eyes with a mirthful pair of my own.

"So are you."

He hummed in a kind of contented agreement and l mimicked the action, a dazed kind of smile slipping across my features. It was quiet. A thick, but by no means uncomfortable, silence settled in. I glanced to the side, my eyes observing the street below with interest. People were bustling by, and magical vehicles were moving to and fro. A few peddlers sat on the edge of the road, and occasionally a passerby would toss a bit of change at them. One woman offered up her coat.

Something burned the side of my face, and I turned my attention back to Laxus, only to catch him staring at me. He blinked, either surprised that I had caught him or surprised that he was staring, and with a slight frown I met his eyes. My brows lifted; my lips tilted—a challenge was written plainly across my features, just daring him to deny what he'd been doing. Laxus called up a mask almost as quickly as I'd called up the smirk, and his features hardened in a mix of confusion and what I considered to be constipation. I refused to look away.

My eyes wandered slightly as we continued our stare-off, and suddenly I couldn't help but let them latch onto the most distinctive feature of his face. Aside from his strong jaw and proud nose, sharp eyes and thin lips, the lightning shaped scar that tore through the flesh surrounding his right eye seemed to stand out more than usual, thrown in relief against the rest of his face. I was mesmerized by it—the way the scar stretched from the center of his forehead through his right eyebrow, curving down from his brow bone onto the flesh that covered his eye, down, down over a proud cheekbone and sharpening to a point centimeters above where his smile would've formed, if he were to be smiling at that moment. The thin, bulging line of skin rose above the plane of his face like a small hill, yet it blended so seamlessly with the rest of his weathered face that I was almost surprised there was some point at which it had never been there before.

And before I could stop myself, I felt the words tumble out of my mouth.

"How did you get your scar?"

I knew I was crossing a line before I realized exactly which line it was I was crossing. The effect on Laxus was immediate. He stiffened, then grimaced, and finally jerked his head away from me. His fists tightened at his sides, and whatever drowsiness he'd been feeling was gone, replaced with lightning-like clarity.

"No," he said. "Don't ask me that."

"I was just asking how-"

He face snapped back. "And I'm not going to tell you."

I paused, hesitating slightly before I spoke again, my voice soft.

"But what if I-"

"But nothing," he hissed. "I said no and I meant it, so shut up."

I faltered. "Laxus, I," I swallowed. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to bring up bad memories or hurt-"

"Well, you know what hurts, Alexandria?" He asked, and didn't wait for me to respond, "You fucking trying to reopen old wounds. You can't leave well enough alone."

Sometimes, when people were wounded they tended to act defensive. I knew this. I have always known this. However, I chose not to believe it. In my mind, Laxus was being a ridiculous jerk.

"You know I've got-"

"I'm going to stop you right there, then, because I'm sure that whatever the hell you're about to say will be some great pile of shit and I don't really feel like listening to it."

My mouth dropped open at his audacity, and I shouted at him. "Screw you, Laxus! Next time I start to worry about you remind me how much of an asshole you are again."

"If you didn't want me to get mad at you, you shouldn't have poked your nose in my business."

"Look, I was curious, and I was only trying to help…"

"God, Alexandria, can't you see that you aren't helping?" He blurted, turning back around to look me in the eyes.

My scowl faltered, and I froze. The expression written across Laxus' face was so foreign, so unfamiliar, that I could hardly recognize the man in front of me. He couldn't have been Laxus—Laxus wasn't vulnerable, I doubted the dragon slayer even knew what the word vulnerable meant.

Yet, here he was, with an unguarded, naked expression covering his face.

It wasn't like looking at a person; it was like looking into a soul. I'd pushed him too far and a wound had ripped open—a wound gouged so deep it cut down past flesh, past bone, so far it reached deep down into his very core.

He looked away, redness flooding his cheeks and it dawned on me that I had been gawking. I shut my jaw. He swallowed and tightened his.

I felt like I was intruding on a desperately private moment.