Me reading KJacket's review on chapter one in my One Shots: *Reads through once* *Reads through twice* *Reads through a third time* *Starts aggressively taking notes* Seriously, if I had planned this to be longer and more in depth, that is close to what I probably would have done. But, alas, this was intended to be shorter, so it's not nearly as intricate.
That being said, I do want to put some emphasis here on the fact that this was intended to be a shorter one shot. Even with as long as it has gotten, I will not be changing the dirction, nor will I be adding more scenes just because it has grown. It is still intended to be short, so it will still have plenty of wiggle room in it that I will not be filling in. I apologize in advance if that's a bummer for anyone, but I want to keep it the way it was.
As always, thanks for all the love and happy reading.
Lucy watched as the little boy visited her altar once more. His name was Natsu and he was eight years old. He was clearer today that he had been in the past. She still couldn't see much outside of her altar, but he had started to gain some features the more he visited. He had a vague outline of his face and wild hair, and while she still couldn't see the flowers, she saw them as a mixture of grays and black.
"Oh, and we went to the docks today. Zeref caught a bunch of fish that we traded for bread. It's the first time we've had it in forever." He sighed. "It was delicious. I wish we could have it more often."
Lucy's heart clenched and she covered her chest in surprise. It had been so long that she'd felt any sort of emotion, she wasn't sure what she was feeling at first until she listened to him continue.
Sadness. She was sad. Why was she sad? The other gods and goddesses had been talking about nothing but war and famine lately, it was nothing new. Had hearing this little boy talk about having so little, and only wanting bread, finally somehow made her care about what was happening in the humans' world?
Or perhaps that had happened when he started visiting. It was hard to only care about one when you realized there were many more like him in their world.
The little boy fiddled with his fingers for a while as he glanced around. "I still don't know what you're the goddess of," he said. "Or if you're a goddess. I just thought, with the colors, that you were, and the spot you chose didn't feel like somewhere a god would choose.
"Zeref says if we pray hard enough to the gods they'll grant us help or answer our wishes." He was quiet for a while, trying to find his words. "I don't visit the other gods so much anymore," he said, which made Lucy's chest tighten even more, "so I hope you're still here. I don't know how many offerings it takes to get something, but I'll bring you some every day for the rest of my life if-"
He looked behind himself, and then got to his feet. "I have to go now, but I'll be back again. Hopefully I'll get to meet you next time," he said before running out.
That was what he said every time he left. Hopefully I'll get to meet you next time.
She wasn't sure why she hadn't spoken to him yet. Perhaps she was scared. Scared that she would start to care too much. She knew a war was coming. The way the others talked, Natsu would be of an age to join when it happened. Did she really want to regain her emotions just to mourn him when he inevitably died? If not in that war, then the next, or when he got old? She wasn't sure.
For now, she was content to just listen to him talk to her. To pretend for a while that she wasn't alone.