When I was 6, my whole life changed. Not only because I was entering primary school, but also because the biggest thing that happened to me was that we just moved into our new house. My parents wanted me to be closer to school, or was it that they wanted to be near their job? I don't remember the specificities but I do remember feeling lost, and extremely sad. My dad told me that before school started, I refused to go out and explore our new neighborhood, I would stay in my room, looking through the window and dreaming silently.

I wasn't scared of making new friends or encountering new teachers or new neighbors, I think I was just not prepared for the change yet, I felt like I still had a lot of adventures to live in my old home and that we moved out before I got to experience them. It took me some time before opening up to my new home and going out but I was finally ready for that new chapter of my life.

When school started, I tried my best to fit in and to find new friends and I did find a few. My parents were always proud of my capacity to make friends, perhaps that's one of the reasons they decided to move out in the first place. Because they knew that I'd find new friends no matter what? Then one day, I noticed him. He was alone, leaning against one of the school's walls, and was watching everybody else. Then his eyes met mine and I immediately thought that his eyes were the most beautiful eyes I've ever seen. I think I approached him that day, and the day after, and the one after that. He always refused to talk to me, so I just stopped, thinking that I was bothering him. One day, on my way home, I tripped and fell, scratching my knee in the process. I don't remember much but I know that he was there and he helped me get up. He held my hand the whole walk home and when we parted ways, he smiled at me, and that was when I knew that I would never leave his side. That day was when Gray Fullbuster and I became friends.

We quickly became inseparable, at first he was hard to approach, and pretended as if nothing happened but I insisted and he eventually gave up. My favorite days became school days because that was when I would be able to play with him, then my mom became friends with his mother and we quickly got to see each other out of school too: play dates, dinners, sleepovers… We grew up together and experienced so many things together. I know my family considered him as family too, just like I know his family also considered me the same. It was like that for a very long time, us against the world. It's not that we didn't have any other friends, we had a few, and we could spend days without being joined at the hips all the time. But we'd always organize a play date to catch up. We were kids and everything was just easier.

Then we went to secondary school, and now that I think about it, that's when things started to change little by little. At first, it was not noticeable, it was just some days missed, not calling each other's home to catch up, or doing our homework together. It didn't help that we weren't in the same class. I grew close to new friends and so did he. We'd try to eat lunch together from time to time but secondary school is when people are the stupidest. Rumors started to spread and even if we honestly couldn't give a damn about it at the time, knowing better, the looks some of the girls gave me, how they whispered whenever I got near them was enough to throw me off my game and to shatter the bubble I was so comfortable in. That is also when I realized what I have never seen about Gray. We grew up together so I just never noticed any changes but he did change. And by the end of secondary school, he looked nothing like the child I knew. Puberty hit him, it hit me too. We both changed and I wonder if that is when everything started. I would look at him longer than necessary, I would try to initiate soft touches, and would daydream about him. I never meant that. He always said how much he hated the attention the girls gave him, saying that he wasn't interested and that relationships were a loss of time. I suppressed everything, deep down in me, trying my best to not show him what I felt toward him. But the damage was already done: I had the biggest crush on him, the guy I had known since my first days in this new city, the one who held my hands to make me feel better when I fell on my way home, the guy who would always wait for me after school to walk together… But again the damage was done. He never suffered from the rumors the other kids threw at me. My friends would always tell me to talk to Gray but how could I? What good would that bring? Nothing. And I never liked to be a burden. My only response was to get away, slowly and slowly. And it killed me just as slowly, I couldn't bear the rumors and waited for them to disappear. I thought that if I stopped seeing him in the open, at school, they would leave me alone. And they did so for a while, but my relationship with him paid the price of such behavior. During our summer before high school, I reached out to him, apologizing but never explaining the reason for my sudden distance. It took a lot of time but he decided to let it go and we were able to walk to school and come home together again. Eat our lunch together from time to time. Little did I know that high school was going to be the last time we'd talk to each other…

In high school I had a lot of activities, I did a lot of things which made me incapable of coming home with Gray and sometimes I was also unable to walk to school with him. And when I was available, he wasn't. But it was okay because we tried hard to at least see each other every week to catch up, do our homework together, and talk about the future. The only thing I was certain about was that I didn't want any future without Gray in it.

High school was the time when my feelings for Rintarou came back in full force, and the worst was that, at times, I was under the impression that he might feel something for me too. Something other than friendship. But I was way too scared of damaging what we had, after my mistake in secondary school, I decided to never make him leave me. To never leave him. But… even if I remember all the good times, I also remember all the times when he made me suffer so much I would cry alone in my room. When his friends joked about me he kept silent, when he would stand me up at the last minute for something else, or when he dated a few girls despite him telling me all the time that he wasn't interested… He became popular in no time, leaving me behind but I stand strong. I was happy for him, he was such a crybaby when he was a kid, it was a big evolution and I was very content. So naturally I stepped aside. He was changing and I wasn't there to see it. And everything was for the best.

I did things by my side and experienced high school with the shadow of Gray behind me until we started to lose touch. My feelings for him were still burning hot and every minute spent without him was pure torture. We naturally got very busy, so busy that we couldn't even call each other, we lost the privilege of walking home together and I was desperate for some quality time together. I was desperate to go back to our childhood. I started to envy and hate those pictures of us. Those became the only living proof that we knew each other.

But things started to break in the last year of high school. At this point, it's not that we weren't friends, it's that we were busy with our group of friends and considered it pointless to try to see each other, we knew beforehand that the other would be busy. We'd see each other only when our parents would organize dinners or some events and during our birthdays. Sometimes it was my doing, me urging my mom to organize something so that I'd have a natural reason to see him. But he wasn't there, or he'd be there for dinner, chat a little, and then leave for god knows what.

I think I might just know the day I truly understood that nothing would ever be the same when we stopped being close. Since we became friends, especially when our families also became friends, we'd celebrate our birthdays all together as one big family. Even when we lost touch in secondary school, we still showed up. It was a way of saying that we still care, the only times when we missed one another's birthdays were whenever we'd be too sick to go out, and even then, we'd still make sure to wish a happy birthday. One night, during the same senior year in high school, they were invited over to celebrate my birthday. I was more than excited, it had been months since I properly talked to him, so I was ready to spend the whole night with him. We never missed each other's birthdays, we promised. But that night… He wasn't there and when I asked the parents, they looked at each other before saying that he was sick, caught something. I never felt lonelier than during that night. It was hard to put on a smile and tears were threatening to fall. It wasn't his fault, right? He was sick, it's understandable and perhaps he caught something really bad for not even texting me a happy birthday. God, if he knew that I cried he would have called me a crybaby. However… However, the next day at school, I heard. I heard it again, and again and again. The night of my birthday, he was on a date. He was on a goddamn date and decided that it was more important than my birthday. He NEVER cared about love, or relationships, or any of that. Of course, we stopped talking and I didn't mind being demoted to the background of his life, as long as I was still in it. But to hear everyone say that he went on that date… Not only did it destroy any hopes of salvaging our friendship, but my heart broke into thousands of pieces every time I heard someone talk of that date. That day, I knew. Nothing would ever be the same and I was no longer part of his story.

That night I went to talk to him. I had to. Let's finish this once and for all right? So I went to him and once I found him he was perfectly fine. He saw me and it took me everything to not cry right on the spot. The funny part is, I never wanted to hear the truth, I didn't. I still don't to this day. I just wanted the pain to end. Unfortunately, I backed out. Instead, I looked at him, pleading in silence with my eyes for him to tell me something, to do something. But we stood there in silence, and he never met my gaze, watching some other way with this stupid bored expression of his.

It shattered every bit of confidence, every happy memory, our friendship, and my heart to billions of pieces at the very same time. That's when I knew, nothing would be the same. He moved on and so should I. Perhaps it wasn't fair of me to not say what I had in mind, he couldn't guess what was going through my mind, but again if he had been fair to me from the start, none of that would have happened.

Since that day we stopped everything. I'd find an excuse every time our parents planned something, we stopped walking home together, we stopped trying to catch up, we stopped being friends. As I said earlier the only living proof of our friendship are the pictures on the walls. Three years later and I still don't have any closure and miss him every single day knowing damn well that I should have spoken up about what was happening to me in secondary school, that was my fault. But high school… High school was his and he never apologised for that. I lost the most precious person in my life that day, and I would never forgive him for that.

Hello !

It's been a while since I last updated something in here but I thought I might try to make a comeback with a little something, not too big, just enough.

English is not my first language, so please, be nice about spelling mistakes :)

Also, I belive that Juvia would have been the type to befriend anyone without the drama (thanks the modern setting for that) so that's why I pictured her that way, hope you understand my choice!

I would love to hear your opinions about this story so please do not hesitate! I might even add a second part to this... Would it be something you would like to read?

I hope you enjoyed this bit and see you next time :)