Chapter 6 – Rain

Cosmo sat silently on the window sill, wishing that the heavens would open and cascade their rain upon the dirty earth. He often felt this way about his home away from home, like it could use a good scrubbing and a healthy dose of innocence. There was just so much wrong with the planet, so much pain and hurt that the population chose to inflict upon each other. As if humans weren't fragile enough, needing so much to survive and always coming up short. As if life wasn't hard enough for them already. Cosmo had tried to understand it a thousand times, but he had never managed to. He stared at the sky and sighed. There wasn't a cloud to be seen.

The rain always helped him think, too. Cosmo knew that he wasn't the smartest guy ever to come out of Fairy World, but his heart was always in the right place. He always knew what had to be done to make those he loved happy; he just didn't know how to go about doing it. The rain reminded him of the one time Cosmo had known he had been absolutely right, the only point in his life when he had ever been certain. It reminded him of the first time he ever met Wanda.

-

It was raining hard, and Wanda and her friend had ducked into the diner just to escape the weather for a little bit. They had dived into the first empty booth they saw and shook their hair, despite the fact that they could have dried themselves with their wands in seconds. Cosmo had been behind the counter, wiping glasses dry when the two girls burst in. His eyes hadn't left Wanda once, and for some crazy reason that he couldn't quite understand, his feet seemed to be carrying him towards the pink-haired beauty. His head screamed at him to turn back, but Cosmo had a hard time hearing it over the booming voice of his heart.

"Take your order?" he asked in a squeaky voice, addressing the question to the napkin dispenser and hoping that his pimples weren't too prominent under the fluorescent lights. Wanda's friend had giggled, but Wanda herself just stared at the nervous fairy, as though trying to place where she had seen him before.

"Two chocolate shakes please," Wanda had replied, in a sweet voice that reminded Cosmo of silk. Cosmo had only touched silk once in his life, it had been his daddy's tie, but he would never forget. With a nervous smile Cosmo had disappeared back behind the counter, the relief washing over him like water, but it was quickly replaced by disappointment. If that was the only exchange he and that beautiful girl ever shared, he almost knew that he would never be happy again. He grabbed two clean glasses, the cleanest ones, he remembered, and filled them from the machine, taking his time and yet wishing he could just hurry up.

He walked carefully back to Wanda's table, careful not to spill a drop of their drinks. He had a strange sense in his stomach that Wanda wouldn't take kindly to such a reckless abuse of chocolate. He smiled, slightly, and it caught Wanda's eye. It almost forced her to smile back.

"Here are your shakes," he said nervously, and Wanda's friend giggled. Wanda fixed her with a frown, and then looked back to Cosmo.

"Thanks, uh… Cosmo," Wanda replied, still smiling and squinting at Cosmo's name badge. Suddenly, a dawning of realisation came over her face. "Hey, Cosmo! I know you from school!" she said suddenly. Cosmo smiled. Somehow he had never noticed this amazing beauty but she had taken the time to notice him. She even knew his name. His heart fluttered and felt as though it would burst.

"Um, yeah," he said slowly, feeling utterly stupid. "From school." Wanda smiled, but even Cosmo could tell that she was wishing she hadn't said anything. The conversation had dwindled into an uncomfortable silence before it had even gotten started, and as Cosmo watched Wanda stir her drink with her straw he knew that he couldn't have felt lower.

"Did you want something?" Wanda's friend cut in suddenly. Cosmo looked up, hurt.

"No," he said quietly, shuffling back to the counter. "Nothing at all."

Cosmo still kept his eyes on Wanda while she and her friend drained their drinks. The rain was still pouring down heavily, so neither girl was making much of an effort to be finished with their shakes. Cosmo didn't know that he could feel heartbroken so soon after he had fallen in love, but he knew that it was love. It sounded crazy, even to Cosmo, to think that he had fallen head over heels for a girl he had only met properly five minutes before, but he just knew. He could feel it.

The bell over the door of the diner gave a cheerful little tinkle, and that light sound was the beginning of the worst year of Cosmo's life. A masculine, handsome fairy floated into the diner, the charm radiating from him in waves and making every single girl look up from their meals. Cosmo snorted. He had seen men like that before, men who were far too in love with themselves to ever give their heart to someone else, and Cosmo knew that they only went out with the girls with more beauty than brains. Or at least, he thought he knew that.

"Wandissamo!" Cosmo blinked his eyes at the love of his life. There was no chance that a woman as beautiful and smart and kind as Wanda could want anything to do with this narcissistic beefcake. It was only when Wandissamo planted a wet kiss on Wanda's cheek in front of a dozen pairs of jealous female eyes that Cosmo knew he was wrong. Very wrong. Wanda did just know Wandissamo, she was dating him.

For every day that passed since the day Wanda and he had first met, Cosmo's love for the pink-haired girl grew and grew. It filled his heart so much that it hurt just to look at her, and there wasn't a waking moment in his life when the fairy didn't fill his thoughts. He stopped being able to sleep, he went right off of his food, and he couldn't hold his head up anymore. Everything he did was about Wanda, and nothing else seemed to matter. It nearly killed him to watch her in the arms of Wandissamo, loving someone he could never be. There was no chance of him giving up though, no chance of him ever shutting his eyes to Wanda. She was the one for him, he was certain, and if that meant he had to suffer alone for the rest of his life then so be it.

-

Cosmo rested his chin in his hands and listened to his wife breathe gently behind him. He tried to think about how it would feel if Wanda ever left him, but he couldn't take it. The pain in his chest was so great that he felt as though he was being crushed. There were tears in his eyes.

"That must be how Vicky feels," he mused quietly.

"What did you say sweetie?" Wanda murmured sleepily behind him. Cosmo grinned. Wanda was his wife, she loved him. In the end he had won her heart from that moron Wandissamo, and he hoped that she had never looked back. But what if he hadn't? What if Wanda had never given Cosmo the chance to prove his love to her and stayed with Wandissamo? Would he still be alone? Probably. Would he be wasting away, hidden in some dirty room praying for the pain to stop like Vicky was?

Probably, because true love never leaves you behind. It stays with you forever.

"Nothing Wanda," he replied softly, and he heard the relived sigh of someone who desperately hoped it would be nothing so that they could get back to sleep. He wondered briefly why he didn't tell Wanda what he had heard Vicky say on the path, but he knew the answer almost instantly. Wanda had never felt it. She didn't know what it was like to love someone so much that it was killing you, because they didn't love you back. She didn't know how much it hurt to have your feelings dismissed as though they were nothing but a silly crush when you knew that there could never be another. Cosmo knew it all too well.

Cosmo buried his chin back into one hand and with the other he raised his wand above his head. He wanted to make rain clouds, but Timmy hadn't wished for it. Defeated, he lowered his wand again. Cosmo was no good and figuring things out by himself. Perhaps he should have told Wanda, she could have helped him, or told him what it would be best to do.

Timmy would never love Vicky, just forget it Cosmo.

That's what Wanda would have said. She would have said that Vicky had tortured Timmy too much for his feelings towards her to ever change, and though some defeatist part of Cosmo was forced to agree he just didn't want to believe it. When Vicky had whispered her gentle confession Cosmo had heard echoes of his own voice, certain that he loved Wanda even if he couldn't have her.

He had to admit that he wasn't particularly fond of Vicky, or at least he hadn't been. Her cruelty to Timmy when he was younger had been so severe that even the kindest man would have had trouble finding sympathy for her. But in her older years Vicky had changed. Not just in her attitude towards Timmy but in every aspect of her life. She wasn't the bully she used to be, her voice was softer and her fists were seldom used. Cosmo recognised the signs. It was only love that could have done that to a person.

And perhaps Timmy could be happy too.

It wasn't Trixie Tang, not by a long shot, but Cosmo knew that Timmy wasn't in love with Trixie Tang. He might have claimed he was, but he functioned far too well for that to be true. He had a fine appetite and he slept like a log. No one in love with someone who didn't care about them could have done that. Cosmo checked the clock. It was almost four in the morning, and he would have bet everything he owned that Vicky was still awake.

Cosmo knew he wasn't smart. He knew he wasn't sophisticated. But he felt that the time had come for him to stand on his own two feet and find a way to make something amazing happen. There was no one he could tell who would understand, he just knew it. Not Wanda, not his mother, no one. Cosmo had to do this alone.

Helping Vicky was not something Cosmo thought he could have ever done. He didn't know where to begin, what to do, but he knew that if he didn't do something soon the damage would be irreversible. Vicky was a mess, all over Timmy. She couldn't handle this feeling at all.

A fine sheet of rain began to fall from the sky. Cosmo smiled, and felt that even though what he had so desired had now arrived, it really was time to go to bed. He snuck under the covers as quietly as he could, trying his best not to disturb his sleeping wife. To his surprise, however, it was the pink-haired fairy that snaked her arm around her husband's waist without so much as opening an eye, and Cosmo noted with a contented sigh that being in Wanda's arms was the safest place on earth.

A/N: Sorry, I know this has taken forever. Sky.