Have I told you guys how awesome you are? No? Well, you guys are awesome. Everyone who reads and reviews…I love you guys. You really keep me going, you know? It's really important for a sort-of aspiring writer (I'm aspiring to be more of an artist, really, haha) to get such great feedback, so thank you!

Now that I got the sentimental crap out of the way, I'll just go ahead and get on with it! Until She's Home Again, chapter 5.

Enjoy! XD

My last articles of clothing were packed and I paused to stare at the single suitcase. The corners were ragged from those two years of hard travel before I found the town of reason, the black leather scuffed and faded. Briefly, the thought crossed my mind that I didn't have very many things, but then I reminded myself that I had made a point of not acquiring too many possessions. To garner too many belongings would tie me down, increase my attachment to whatever place I called home. And if I were to be honest with myself, staying in Reason for as long as I had was just as bad as buying and owning various items. I had told myself when I settled there that I would leave within a few months, but I never had. My first attempt to leave had been thwarted by Harrah. Her pleas for me to stay had just seemed far more convincing at the time than my own reasons to leave.

Standing in front of the quaint little café, I allowed myself one last glance at the dark, quiet building. The night was calm around me, the only noises coming from nocturnal insects and an owl somewhere in the trees surrounding the town. Three months had passed since the kindly woman who owned the little eating place had let the apartment above out to me for free, and I felt that I had already overstayed what welcome my good deed had offered.

The stars in the night sky were reflected in the glass windows of the shop, and I was just a dark silhouette among them. I could see the moon on the other side of the structure, peeking out above the trees and casting its soft rays of light down upon Reason. It was such a picture perfect setting, I almost wished Reedus could see it and come to draw it.

I could just imagine the painting it would be; I could see Gray snoring under the tree that was planted right next to Harrah's café, Natsu nearby. Happy would have fallen asleep on Natsu's chest. They would be worn out from their most recent fight, and Erza would be staring up at the sky, deep in thought. The moonlight and starlight would glint off the Titania's armor and scarlet hair, giving her an ethereal beauty that would be unrivaled. Elfman, I could somehow picture, would be weeping at how beautiful it was and saying something along the lines of, "It's manly to recognize true beauty when you see it!". Lisanna would probably be admiring the stars, joined by the adorable little Wendy. The beautiful Cana could be seen setting out her cards, trying to make a reading by the moonlight with a sort of serene little smile on her face. I couldn't see Gajeel caring, and Pantherlily would probably just be looking up, expression unreadable. Charle would be watching over Wendy, features softened by the moonlight. Juvia would be hiding somewhere near her Gray-sama, watching him as the moonlight shined on her hair. I preferred to picture her with the short, straight haircut she'd sported for a while, rather than her strange curly hair. Levy would probably have fallen asleep struggling to read, and her teammates would be watching over her like loyal guard dogs. Bisca and Alzack would be sitting together, even closer to realizing their feelings for each other than ever. I knew Mirajane would say something about how romantic it was, and suggest I spend the evening sitting around with whatever guild member she decided liked me at that point in time. Smiling to myself, I figured she would have picked Natsu again, because she had become more prone to trying to push us together with offhanded remarks like her initial, "Don't you think Natsu might like you?"

A soft chuckle escaped at my thoughts. Wherever they were, Fairy Tail would still be Fairy Tail, after all, and I couldn't picture them any other way. And if I did picture them differently, they would all be in a heap together, smiling in their sleep after the most recent guild-wide brawl.

I then remembered my original intention, and it wasn't to admire the scenery, as gorgeous as it was. I took a deep breath to ready myself, and looked back up at the café, a long look to make up for how distracted I'd been a few moments earlier. I took in the ledge that would shelter an errand runner or child from the rain and the sign that boldly welcomed customers, painted in black and gold. I could just make out, "Café Reason" on the sign. It wasn't a very original name, I remembered thinking before, but it somehow just fit.

I closed my eyes, holding the image of the diner in my mind, willing it to memory, as I turned and clutched my suitcase by the handle. I opened my eyes when my back was to the building, and started to take measured steps away from it.

"Leaving so soon, Layla?"

The voice came from a bench beside the town's fountain, and I looked to see the motherly Harrah herself sitting there. Her hands were delicately clasped in her lap, and her head was down so that her graying blond hair hung over her eyes, hiding them from sight. Her hair shined in the light of the moon and stars, just like everything in this little town seemed to do, and finally she turned her head up. I still didn't answer her.

"You don't have to leave."

I let out a sigh, and told her, "I'm not much help to you here. I'm just a freeloader, and as a traveler I really shouldn't have stayed this long in the first place. I can't let myself get attached."

"You're plenty of help," the older blonde stood up. "You've been giving Rex pointers about his magic, and you've done the same thing for all of our other mages. They're finally making progress, and you're just going to give up on them now?"

"I'm not giving up on them," I said softly, "I trust that they'll get better on their own from here."

"We still need someone like you, Layla, a strong mage who can handle the bigger jobs. The forest around here is riddled with beasts that sometimes attack, and until our own people can handle it, it would be a huge help to have you here. The citizens here aren't strong enough to protect ourselves just yet."

My gaze averted, I winced. How did this woman seem to already understand that my weakness was helping people? Or was she just saying what she truly felt? Whatever it was, it made me sigh. Probably realizing that my resolve was crumbling, Harrah continued to plead with me to stay.

"If it's rent or something like that you're worrying about, don't!" she laughed a little, almost a nervous sound. "And if you're still going to worry about it, I could use a hand in the café every now and then. Rex always complains about it, and his mother's the only librarian here, so she can't exactly come in and help. Everyone else has some sort of job to do, and there's only so much I can deal with in days that my only other worker is off, without running myself ragged. And I've been giving her a lot of time off, because she's got three small kids and another on the way. I can't expect a young mother to do too much. Please stay, Layla."

I cursed my weaknesses.

"I'm going to help every day," I said, just avoiding the urge to grit my teeth against the words. "Whether you want me to or not. It's the least I can do. And if I don't help, it's because there's some sort of job request that needs my attention. That's my deal."

I saw the beam spreading across the woman's face just a second before she threw herself at me, wrapping her arms around me in a hug.

"Thank you, Layla!"

"It's different this time," I said quietly, almost scolding myself. "Harrah knows I'm leaving this time, and she approves. She's not going to try to stop me if she thinks there's a chance of them recognizing me."

I laughed a little at the fact that I voiced my thoughts, and toyed momentarily with the thought that I might just be losing my mind. I dismissed that thought though, almost as quickly as it came to mind. I may have been talking to myself like a crazy person would, but it was only so I could pump myself up. It was as if, somehow, saying that I would finally leave Reason out loud made it all sound more final. I thought that being resolute would make it much more bearable than it seemed, but I could just be kidding myself. Leaving Reason would be almost like leaving Fairy Tail again, minus the fact that I was attached to fewer people. Yet I was still attached, an occurrence I had struggled against to no avail in the end. No matter how I tried to distance myself from her, the kindly Harrah had become like a foster mother to me, filling part of the hole left in me by the loss of my own mother and my friends. Of course, losing my friends was all my fault because I'm the one who left them behind of my own volition.

A few minutes passed, and I trailed my fingers along the wooden headboard of the bed I'd slept in for a year. The wood was weathered but well-cared for, and didn't stab a person with splinters if they touched it. As trivial as just the bed seemed, I would miss it. I'd miss it just as I'd missed my own bed in the first few months of my self imposed exile. A bed you were familiar with gave you an odd sort of comfort that was hard to come by when you were all alone in a strange place. And the same could be said about the surroundings of the room in which you stayed. If you were acquainted with the room you would have a more restful sleep, and you would be more at ease.

Forcing my eyes away from the room, I picked up the suitcase and forced myself to walk to the door of the flat, looking back upon the small apartment with a kind of wistful feeling. Shaking my head, I let a small smile grace my lips as I turned and closed the door behind me, heading down the stairs. It was dark out by this time, and the café was closed. The lights were still on in the kitchen, but off in the dining area, and I found out why when I reached the bottom of the stairs. There stood Harrah, smiling at me, with a sack in her hands.

"I've packed some food for you," she said, walking over to me and handing me the knapsack. I took it wordlessly and slung it over my shoulders, nodding to her in acknowledgment. "You should eat the fruit before it spoils, but the bread and jerky will last a bit longer. I just finished baking the loaves. They're my special recipe, the one you like. With the honey flavor."

"Thank you," I finally spoke, smiling at her. And then I did what I told myself I wouldn't do, and leaned forward to embrace the woman in front of me. I had promised I wouldn't do it, because I knew it would just make the attachment I felt toward her, and she felt toward me, even stronger than it was before. That connection would just make it hurt so much worse for the older woman, since she knew that I was on my last legs of life. But I couldn't leave her like this, and I had to reach forward to embrace the tearful woman at least once. How could I not? It was the least that I, a girl who she admitted seemed like a daughter, could do to comfort her.

"There's also a jar of honey in there," the incorrigible woman managed, even though I heard the evidence of crying in her voice, "because I know you like sweet things like that, even if you don't like to admit it. Just do me a favor, won't you, Layla Heart? Or maybe it should be Lucy Heartfilia…"

"What favor…?" I asked, and Harrah squeezed me tightly.

"Take care of yourself."

I gently squeezed her back, and said, "I'll do my best."

We released each other, and I wasn't surprised to see glistening streaks down her cheeks. I also wasn't surprised to realize that I had a telltale dampness on my own. I reached up to brush them away as I let myself give the older blonde woman one more small smile. I leaned down and picked up the suitcase I'd discarded moments before and hiked the knapsack higher upon my shoulders before turning and heading to the door. Walking across the café felt like it took several minutes, but in reality I knew it only took about twenty seconds to traverse that distance. At the threshold, with my hand on the handle and preparing to push the glass door outward, I glanced back at her.

"Take care," I repeated her sentiment partially, before turning and walking into the darkened streets. I felt her eyes on me as I disappeared into the night, my eyes adjusting to the darkness around me as I followed the same path that my nakama had taken earlier in the day. And still, even after the dark had swallowed me, I knew the motherly woman kept her eyes facing the direction I had vanished.

I never liked long goodbyes, anyway.

I walked through the night until I reached the harbor town. It was almost nostalgic to end up here after a year on the island, and it reminded me so much of Hargeon, where I'd first met Natsu. This town was known as Yelnon, which I had found on my first visit here odd. The name rolled strangely off the tongue, and my first night in the town last year, I'd sat up for thirty minutes longer than I had planned to, trying to make the name sound as natural as the town's inhabitants did.

The effort didn't work, but it didn't matter because it was only two days until I heard about Reason and wandered off in that direction.

Being back here was definitely a blast from the past, smelling the salty sea on the nighttime breeze as it swept gently through the streets. I closed my eyes and let it brush past me, making the hair of my wig lift slightly in its wake. Slowly opening my eyes, I made my way to the inn, which was still lit up, and managed to procure a room for the rest of the night. Getting a room was easier to do than I had expected, and I also made an arrangement to be woken an hour before the first boat to the main continent left–if I wasn't already awake by then. I laid down in the unfamiliar bed to catch four or five hours of sleep, not even bothering to change into pajamas.

"Natsu!" I whined at the dragonslayer, breathing heavily as I surmounted the next obstacle in my way. Natsu was much farther up the rocky mountain slope than I was, and I couldn't call on Horologium because he'd already timed out. Happy wasn't here for me to beg him to carry me for a while, so I had to struggle with climbing over all the boulders and random outcroppings.

"What, Luce?" he called back, pausing in his scramble up the slope to look down at me. "You're really slow, you weirdo."

"You're too fast, idiot!" I wailed, then had to clutch the next handhold before I slipped and fell twenty feet down to the last ledge we'd stopped on. To myself, I grumbled, "Why can't we go on a normal job for once? No, the one he picks for the two of us to do requires climbing an entire damn mountain!"

Not to mention that the object of this job request was to retrieve a wedding ring that had been lost amid the slate grey rocks and the light dusting of snow. I guess we could be a little thankful that it wasn't a really tall mountain, so there wasn't, say, three feet of snow. That would make an already nearly impossible request entirely unfeasible. But there was no helping it. We had already accepted the task and we never stopped until we met our goals, no matter how much I whined. And even when I whined, it wasn't to get Natsu to give up, but to entice him to speak to me. Almost a plea for his attention, like asking him to see me for more than his nakama, kind of like how I saw him as so much more than one of my friends even though I tried to hide it. But when he was entirely focused on what we were doing, he sometimes seemed to forget I was there, even though I knew that wasn't the case. I tried to ignore the pain it caused in my chest when I thought that way, but when you cared so much for someone it did hurt to think that they didn't realize you were there. If we weren't on a job, I wouldn't feel the need to gripe so much. Usually, it's so easy to get him to talk to me, but he's so focused when we're working and it's harder for me to get him to pay me any heed. I wanted him to notice me.

But who was I kidding? It was Natsu. The chances of him feeling the same were like one in a million.

So I just continued to climb, following after my pink haired nakama. Sure, I complained, but Natsu knew it was halfhearted, and sometimes he just laughed at the more ridiculous of my critical comments. This was how our friendship worked. And when I finally reached the summit of the small mountain, there was his large, calloused hand reaching down to help me up as the boy himself wore that same toothy grin he'd worn when he first brought me back to the guild. A grin I'd grown really fond of over all of the things we'd been through.

"Thanks," I smiled at him, dusting myself off as I stood and glanced around. I wonder if Natsu realized the near futility of the quest.

"No problem, Luce," he replied, already off and looking around.

I sighed and asked him, "Natsu, you do realize we're looking for something really small, don't you?"

"A ring," he replied, lifting a rock and looking under it.

"Yes," I walked forward, examining the ground where I walked carefully for any signs of the small circular object we were looking for. "A woman's wedding ring. And do you recall that the lady said it was silver? So it's more likely to blend in. Seriously! If you're going to have a wedding ring, at least do the whole thing right! They're usually gold! If it was gold I bet she could have found it on her own, but no, since she had a silver ring, we're up here in freezing weather to search for it! Do you know how long that might take?"

Okay, so I complained again. But really, didn't people nowadays know how to do things right? At least there wasn't any snow up here yet. That might make it easier to find.

"What, you'd want a gold ring for the wedding, Luce?"

"Of course I would!" I said, kneeling down to look under a small, scraggly bush that was actually growing way up here. I rubbed my arms to create a bit of warmth, since I was still cold even though I was wearing a winter coat.

I wouldn't realize the possible implication of his question until we found the ring, gave it to the woman, got the reward, and were home again. I was relaxing in a nice hot bath when the sentence replayed in my head and I felt my face begin to burn. In my mind, I was screaming at myself for not realizing it, and then I was berating myself.

"He said 'what, you'd want a gold ring for your wedding?' and not 'for the wedding'," I told myself, pinching my cheeks. "And even if he did say the wedding, he didn't necessarily mean the wedding would be ours. Yeah, you're just over thinking it all, Lucy. Forget about it."

But I didn't, I couldn't. Forget about it, that is.

I woke up then, opening my eyes. I couldn't wipe the smile off my face, thinking about the dream I'd had that was actually a memory of mine from three months before I left Fairy Tail. It was one of those rare missions Natsu chose that actually wasn't life-threatening, and it had just been the two of us. Despite my constant halfhearted complaints, we had both enjoyed the time together and came back to the guild unscathed. I hadn't even almost fallen off the mountain, like I had been afraid of doing to start with.

I glanced at the clock, reminding myself where I was, to find it was about the time that someone was supposed to come and wake me. And just as I realized that, there was a knock at the door and a timid, questioning, "Miss Heart? Are you awake?"

"Yes, thank you!" I replied through the door, and the shy voice answered so softly I couldn't make her words out. I heard her footsteps leave, though, and got up, stretching. I pulled out a change of clothes from my suitcase that consisted of undergarments, a dark blue pleated skirt, and grey tank top. Then I made my way into my room's bathroom for a quick shower before indulging in a breakfast of some of Harrah's fruits and a few slices of bread with some honey. Then I did everything else that was necessary in the way of personal hygiene, like brushing my teeth and my real hair. Carefully, I clipped and pinned my black wig over my blond hair after running my fingers, almost longingly, through the golden strands. I missed being blonde.

My gloves today were just regular, fingerless gloves that ended at the wrist rather than the elbow. My last pair of long ones had been destroyed when I'd introduced Nara to the wonderfully painful world of Magical Overflow. Well, the gloves hadn't been completely destroyed, but they were reduced to pretty much useless rags so it amounted to pretty much the same thing.

A glance at the clock told me I had twenty minutes left to get to where the boat would leave from, and so I made sure my suitcase was packed and I lifted Harrah's knapsack of food onto my shoulders and took my other baggage in hand. I checked out of the inn, paying a nice tip to the elderly lady for their kindness, and headed off to the harbor. I'd pay for my passage, even if I was too late to get a cabin or room of my own, since there weren't very many of the private rooms in the first place. I didn't mind sleeping in the storage compartment if that's what it took to take this boat back.

I didn't have to worry though. There was still plenty of room on the vessel, because it was kind of out of season for tourists, so I just had to pay and they let me go ahead and board, taking me to the cabin that would be mine for the next twenty four or so hours. I thanked the sailor who had taken me to my room before I carefully stowed the suitcase and knapsack under the bed. I pulled an old, worn novel from my suitcase first, though, and laid it on the bed. I made sure my celestial keys were tucked safely into the pouch meant for them, and I kept that on my belt. I didn't want to chance the possibility of my spirits coming out, especially Loke. Leo the Lion would love to take advantage of a situation like that. After all, I was sure Team Natsu would be on this same boat, and it wouldn't do for them to recognize me because they saw one of my zodiac spirits wandering around on deck looking for me.

Once everything was out of sight, I picked up the book and made my way onto the deck, asking a passing crewman if it was fine that I sat on deck for a while. He kindly pointed me to a spot where I wouldn't be in the way, and I thanked him. I went to sit there, kind of leaning back against the railing, the balusters of which were spaced close enough together that I wouldn't slide through them and fall into the water.

If I did that, Aquarius might try to force her way out.

I settled into my spot quite easily before cracking on of my favorite books open and beginning to immerse myself in the wonderful fictional world portrayed in the pages. It was an escape that I had never been able to fully remove from my day to day life. The old Lucy Heartfilia had always loved to read, to lose herself in the stories she read so thoroughly that it took a lot for someone to pull her out. 'Layla Heart' had remained that way, no matter how much I tried to drop the habit. It was especially hard to leave that part of me behind when Harrah's sister, Rex's mom, was the librarian of Reason and I often went to deliver messages to her from Harrah.

"Layla! Could you do something for me?" called Harrah from downstairs. Knowing that the flat above the café was soundproofed by magic, I stepped out onto the landing before replying.

"Yeah, I'm on my way down."

When I reached the café level, the graying blonde rushed over with a bento in her hands.

"Can you take this over to the library? My sister, Rex's mother, you know, is there and I was just told by Rex that she had a lot of organizing to do since she just got a new shipment in, so she was planning to skip lunch. It's just some chicken, noodles, and rice, with a slice of my strawberry cake, but at least it's something. It was the best I could put together in such a short time. So, could you take this to Nell?"

"Sure. Where's the library at?" I asked, taking the box she handed me.

"Thank you! All you have to do is go to the mayor's house across the square from here and take the street that goes left. It's the third building to the right, you can't miss it!" Harrah said, patting my shoulder. "I'm sorry, we've got a few tourists in today, otherwise I'd go and give it to her myself."

"It's fine," I said, trying to keep from smiling at her. "I'll be back in a little while."

And sure enough, the library was quite easy to find. It was a nice little building, made of stone with pretty decent masonry. It was nothing like Magnolia's library, but it was just a small library for a small town, so it was probably all they needed. I went in without hesitation, looking around until I saw a brunette going through a box labeled, "Reason Town Library Shipment", and so I figured I'd found my target. The archive magic she was using helped her to speed through the process with relative ease, I noticed.

"Excuse me, are you Nell?" I asked, stepping nearer to the information desk behind which she stood. She looked up quickly, and I could see the same piercing eyes that Harrah possessed.

"That's who I am. You're…? Oh, never mind! You're that freelance mage staying at Harrah's café, aren't you? Layla, right? I'm sorry, I'm a little busy right now, but you're welcome to come back later."

"Actually, I'm not here for a book right now," I said, offering her the bento, "I brought you a lunch from Harrah."

The brunette woman, who seemed to be in her middle to upper thirties, looked at the box blankly for a minute, then sighed and smiled at me. "Thank you very much, Layla. That sister of mine is always such a mother hen, have you noticed? Taking care of everyone else before even considering doing something for herself."

"That's what makes her such a good person," I said before I could stop myself. It was a bit too nice for the persona I was trying to portray, but Nell didn't seem to pay much heed.

"Yes, I suppose so. By the way, have you ever heard of the book Maya's Forest?"

My heart froze in my chest, and I looked at her. She held up the exact book that had popped into my head the minute she said that, and I couldn't breathe.

"Somewhere," I said offhandedly, "what about it?"

"Well, there's nothing else by this author, and I find it a decent book. It didn't sell very well at first, because it's kind of a retelling of a few different fairytales put together, and because it's from an unknown author. However, the retellings are fresh and new, and I'd like to see more by this person. I'm so sure that this name is just a penname, though. Maybe she writes by several different names…?"

"Her name is Lucy," I said, then covered my mouth as Nell's blue eyes looked at me inquisitively. I quickly said, "Sorry, I've got to go. I'll drop by again sometime to see what kind of books you have!"

I had practically run from the library that day.

I did stop by again to see what type of books that the small library had to offer. And then I frequented the library, dropping by once or twice a week for new reading material and to return the books I'd borrowed. I read anything from romance novels to historical fiction. I re-read Maya's Forest, even though I practically knew it by heart since I'd been the one who wrote it. And after a while I began to tell myself that keeping my old bookworm habit would be fine, because it wasn't really a big enough indicator that someone would go, 'Hey! Look over here! It's Lucy Heartfilia! It's got to be her, because she's reading a huge old book!'

Shaking my head for what seemed like the hundredth time, I returned my attention to my book and started to read, letting the words engulf me. It was a nice feeling, to once more be in the comforting realm of a world not my own, even if it was only made of little markings on a page.

I only got to enjoy the blissful feeling of reading about the protagonist's adventures for about ten minutes, because that was when a ruckus sounded, footsteps approached, and then a voice called out.

"Hey! You! You're that girl from that café!"

I looked up, almost agitated, to see Natsu pointing accusingly at me from about five feet away, with Erza, Gray, and Happy nearby. Erza hit Natsu in the back of the head, mumbling something about minding his manners, and Gray remarked about how he thought Natsu would already be getting sick. I didn't let the grin show.

"Oh, it's you four," I said instead, closing my book and standing up. "I guess we'll be on the same boat back to the main continent, huh? And here I thought I would never see you guys again. I'm really starting to think that this is a small world."

Small world, indeed.

The fact that I'd planned to be on the same boat as them from the start didn't need to be mentioned.

Soooo…here's chapter five. Uneventful. A bit shorter than others. Maybe even, dare I say it, a bit boring. But you have to have chapters that lead into the rest of the story, and this happens to be one of those.

I hope you guys like it anyway. XD

Reviews are very welcome and very much appreciated ^^

And Ari-chan, thank you for your work in editing yet another chapter! J