Soulmates of a Kind Chapter 2: Spilt Milk, a fairy tail fanfic

Just getting back into the flow of writing. Here's something that's been marinating in my folders for years now I think. I personally like the name of Storm because it kinda suits the personality of this gruvia kid. Greige is a soft heart like his mum while Storm would take more after his father. Enjoy!

"Mum, you've gotta resume Pinocchio's story! I wanna know what happens after he gets swallowed by the whale." Storm jumped on the bed with a puffed up face. The four year old Gray's lookalike had recently taken an interest in reading and had been eager to read out something he had learnt in school. His infant sister, Sylvia who had barely begun to crawl had pulled a blanket onto herself and both Juvia and Gray had to rush to her rescue, leaving Storm alone at the table.

Juvia sighed as she settled on the bed. Before she could read out Storm's story, she had to put Sylvia to bed and for that, she needed to feed her after bathing her. Juvia hadn't been able to spend as much time with her elder one as she wanted to; Sylvia took up all her time. She just wanted to close her eyes and fall asleep. It was weary to take care of two children, one who wouldn't stop crying and the other who silently craved his parents' attention. And it didn't help that Gray was leaving off for a mission early the next morning.

"Okay." Juvia gave a weary smile. "Let's see what happens to Pinocchio."

Juvia fell on the bed. Storm already had the book — a huge, red picture book — open and he slept on his belly, moving his feet in the air. Juvia reached out to pick her daughter off the floor and proceeded to lay her on the bed. Holding a hand over her infant's belly so that she wouldn't fall off the bed, Juvia turned to Storm with a smile. Juvia shuffled in under the warm comforter and like her son, she landed on her belly. She ruffled Storm's dark mess of a hair before reaching to plant a kiss on his temple, the way they were aligned on the bed.

"Baby, I'm so sorry. I couldn't listen to you today." Juvia rubbed Storm's back, soothingly. "I know that you're learning a lot of interesting things at school, and I want to listen, I really do. It's just that Sylvia takes so much of our time, we're so tired." Juvia winced, knowig how hurting her words were. But there was no other way she could have told him. Like his father, Storm preferred the bitter truth over honeyed words.

Storm nibbled on his lip and looked away with a frown. "It's okay. I know that Sylvia needs you." His voice was heavy, on the verge of crying. Juvia winced. She wasn't in the right state of her mind. She really needed to learn how to frame her words better.

Juvia ran her fingers through Storm's dark locks and inhaled a deep breath. "Shall we see what happens next?"

Storm turned to the book. Juvia caught hold of something glistening in his dark eyes before Storm blinked. Juvia let go of the hand that held Sylvia on her back to hold the book and curled the other hand around Storm, pulling him closer. Juvia wanted to apologise once more but she knew that now wouldn't be the time, neither did he like it when she apologised. Perhaps she could make Storm's favorite dish the next day. Only if that shrewd brain of his didn't catch on.

Juvia had passed through a few pages of the story, and they were nearing the ending. Juvia was close to shutting the book down as the day's end dawned on her. Storm was enraptured by the story, his eyes widening at the betrayals and sniffing at the sad endings. Storm had once mentioned it to her that instead of words, he could see the characters themselves and their interactions when he read books.

Juvia let out a cry of pain as her hand went to her hair. She looked over her shoulder at Sylvia who had begun to pull on her blue curls. Easing her hair out of the baby's tight grip, Juvia returned to the story. A few minutes later Juvia felt Sylvia crawl over her. With the hand that held Storm, she pushed Sylvia carefully to the side she had begun climbing from. She had to glance a few times over her shoulder mid story to make sure Sylvia wasn't near to the edge and that certainly broke the flow of the story on many occasions. For the umpteenth time, when Juvia looked over her shoulder, she could sense Storm's irritated gaze on her and his sister. Yet he never complained. Not once.

Just like his father.

"Sorry," Juvia whispered a little ashamed. She couldn't even handle an infant, such a shame.

"It's okay." Storm said indifferently. "Let's finish the story and go to sleep."

Storm shrugged his shoulders and rested his jaw in his palm, his eyes silently moving over the words. Juvia knew he was hurting. He had been hurting for the past few weeks. Just like his father, he held in all his emotions and was easy to read like an open book. And at once he'd release all his pent up anger.

When Juvia sensed her dark eyed daughter crawl towards her shoulder, she flipped her long blue hair towards Storm's side. The story was a page away from the ending and she really didn't want to ruin the mood by getting her hair caught up with Sylvia. Juvia read out the story, but from the corner of her eye, whenever she had to pause for dramatics, she glanced at her daughter who was oblivious to what bonding was going on between mother and son.

Juvia folded the book so that the one last page was flipping. Her arms were tired from everything Sylvia to holding the book. She just had a few more words. Pinocchio was going to turn into a human boy from the puppet he was. She was a page away when —

RIIIP!

Sylvia tore away the page and crumbled the paper. Juvia could only make out the human version of Pinocchio pressing his nose in a crumpled joy before Sylvia began stuffing the paper in her mouth. Juvia opened her mouth to reprimand Sylvia softly when a small voice outraced hers in reaction.

"SYLVIA! What did you do?!" Storm straightened up, eyes wide with rage. Sylvia looked close to crying. Her lips began to tremble. "Give that here!" Storm snatched the paper from his sister without remorse. Storm gritted his teeth as he straightened out the paper. Pinocchio's nose that had shortened in length now looked crooked in between paper folds.

Sylvia burst out crying. Her face contorted in what seemed like the worst possibility. Juvia's heart tore in between getting her girl to stop crying and to pacify her son. Storm's hands trembled as he brought the paper into his reading sight.

Pinocchio turned around as he looked at his new body. He stretched his arms front and squeezed his fingers close and open. 'Dad, I am human!' There was happiness in his eyes.

Juvia bit down on her lips as she took in the crying Sylvia into her lap. Sitting cross legged on the bed, she rested Sylvia against her chest, patting the infant's back and rubbing her slowly. Juvia raised her eyes to meet Storm's.

His were livid with rage.

"See, you picked her up. You always focus on her." He started out slowly. "Always worried about her, only about her. When she's asleep, you're asleep. When she's awake, you are awake. And me? You don't care about me."

"Storm," Julia furrowed her brows. "Baby, I'm sorry. . ."

"No. Don't." Storm raised a hand as he sat back. Tears threatened to fall off. "I know what it is that you're going through. I know babies need help when they are small. I know that I should be a good brother and help you. But you don't think about me." A tear trickled down his pale face.

"I learn so many interesting things in school and I'm really excited to tell you about it. You're never there to listen to me. It's always, Sylvia this and Sylvia that. Like there's nothing else you should worry about!" Storm screamed amidst flowing tears.

"Storm. That's enough." Storm's head whipped to the door. In the door way, Gray stood, a hand on his waist, a cold expression in his eyes. Gray met Juvia's eyes. "Get her to bed. She's cranky."

"Gray-sama, have you readied everything for tomorrow?" Juvia glanced at her shirtless husband. Juvia lowered her eyes before glancing at Storm. Storm had lowered his own head as he silently continued to flatten out the page. He didn't meet her eyes and Juvia knew she had to go.

Juvia placed a hand on Storm's shoulder. "I'll put her to sleep and I'll be back soon, okay?"

Storm didn't reply to her and instead looked away. Sylvia was still sobbing into Juvia's chest and Juvia pushed herself upright. She stood up and walked towards the door.

"Gray-sama," Juvia pressed her husband's arm. "Don't be too harsh on him. It's not his fault. It's ours as well."

"I know." Gray looked at her and nodded. He leant forward towards Sylvia and planted a kiss on the infant's forehead. "Just get her to bed, bath, whatever. Leave this one to me."

By the time Gray turned towards Storm and Juvia walked out into the nursery, Storm had pulled the huge comforter over his head, turning into an oddly shaped cloth ball. Gray rounded around the bed and sat on it, pulling one of his legs onto the bed. He stretched his hands towards the torn book and flipped open the pages. He came upon the last page and realised that it had been torn irregularly.

Gray sighed as he lowered the book onto his lap. "Storm, do you know what Sylvia did the other day when you went to school?"

The cloth ball shifted and Gray sighted Storm peeking from under. Gray shifted on the bed and soon enough, sat cross legged, facing Storm.

"I had come from a mission and your mother asked me to take care of Sylvia while she bought something from the market for the night's dinner. She put Sylvia on this bed." Gray said as he watched the cloth ball distort and Storm's hair stuck out. "Incidentally, the clothes she had pressed in the morning were stacked up on the same bed and I fell asleep."

"What happened then?" Storm was still sniffing but he looked at Gray expectantly. The boy's face was red and the eyebrows furrowed in anticipation.

"I woke up just in time to see that your sister had destroyed the stack of clothes into a pile. Everything pressed — your uniforms, my shirts, your mother's favorite party dress — it was a crumpled mess on the floor and your sister was about to fall off as well." Gray said, chuckling at the memory. Juvia had whacked him on the head and he hadn't had dinner that night as punishment.

"She did that with you too?" Storm sat up in disbelief. He reached out and pulled his story book back into his lap. He opened the page and traced the torn edges with a frowning face. At least he's not curled up under a blanket, Gray thought in relief.

"It doesn't mean that I should be scolding her though." Gray arched his head up with a sigh. On the wall facing him, a picture of his family, the four of them in the hospital room. Sylvia was crying and Juvia was cajoling her. Storm stared at the camera with a soft smile and Gray was in the middle of a chuckle. Only if he knew how rare that smile would become in the coming months.

"Sylvia's a baby. She cannot understand whether what she's doing is right or wrong. She doesn't know that you scold someone when they make a mistake." Gray lowered his gaze to the book and pried it from Storm's hands. "Shall we get this fixed?"

"But she is the one who messed up the clothes. It is not your fault..." Storm's voice trailed away as if he knew he was wrong. Yet Gray was glad that he spoke out. Better out than suppressed within.

"How did you feel when I raised my voice just now? Even if you didn't cry, you would have been scared." Storm nodded to Gray's words. "Sylvia cannot hide her tears. She'll cry at the slightest raise in the voice. It is you who has to understand how to tell it to her. The way you yelled at her was wrong, that's it. She needs to be a little older in order to be scolded. For now you make sure it doesn't happen again."

"She tore my book." Storm whined, a little calmed down but still upset.

"We can always fix it." Gray said as he reached behind for the bedside drawer. Gray pulled out a tape dispenser and brought it to the front. "We can always press the clothes again. But what's important is that we learn from the mistakes. Both yours and someone else's."

Storm nodded silently and passed the crumpled paper to his father. Gray flattened out the torn edge as much as he could and taped it up. It would look awkward the next time Storm read the story but at least it was fixed.

"I learnt never to put Sylvia and pressed clothes on the same bed. Same with my mission stuff as well. Never within Sylvia's reach." Gray chuckled. "And Storm, you learnt never to read a storybook with Sylvia close to you. Didn't you?" Storm nodded to himself. A small smile made its way onto his face.

"Sylvia's had other disaster timings in her name as well." Gray could see this had piqued Storm's interest. He put aside the kinda fixed book and beckoned Storm closer.

"You remember that time the kids in the street broke the kitchen window? A while ago, Sylvia was playing about that area and tiny glass pieces were still on the floor. She could have cut herself." Gray sighed as he recollected the speed with which he had picked the baby, nearing eight months as she was. Juvia had vacuumed the entire house that day. "But we learnt, to clean the house everyday, so that Sylvia would not step on glass pieces and neither would you.

"One time Sylvia crawled into the bathroom and found an old blade in the cabinet under the sink. After giving her a few injections, we learnt to lock all the doors whose door handles are within her reach." Gray let Storm crawl into his lap and ran his fingers through the black mop of hair. "What has been done, has been done. We can only learn from it."

"I had learnt something in school. A proverb: there is no use crying over spilt milk." Storm looked up at his father with a glimmer in his eyes. "We need to learn not to spill it again."

"Exactly." Gray laughed and planted a kiss on Storm's cheek. He wrapped his hands around his son and began to smother his neck with noisy kisses. Storm clawed at his father's face amidst laughs. Soon, Gray began to tickle Storm's sides and Storm wrapped his arms protectively about his sides. "You're a good learner."

"Dad, stop that! Stop it!" Storm laughed and boy, was it music to Gray's ears! He hadn't heard his son laugh so hard in months. He pulled back for a moment to let Storm take his breath. Storm was breathing heavily as he slumped a hand over his midsection. But there was a cheeky smile on his face that Gray admitted looked a lot better, a lot child-like. Gray resumed the tickles and Storm began to laugh again in madness.

"One more sound..." Juvia lowered her voice as her eyes fell on the scene in front. Storm was on his back rolling in pain as his father tickled the hell out of him. She saw Gray notice their presence and he pulled away, heaving. Juvia stood by the door with Sylvia on her waist. The infant had just had her bath and milk and her blue hair stuck to her face. Sylvia blinked at the Fullbusters. Juvia struggled to suppress a relieved smile on seeing her kid feel all better, but she wouldn't forgive any ruckus they would create for the next half an hour. "You two are going to shut up for the next half an hour while Sylvia falls asleep. One word and I'll drown you, Gray-sama."

"Why me?" Gray offered a tired chuckle. Juvia watched his knowing glance. He knew why she was in a bad mood. Seeing Storm all pumped up with the laughs and tickles had turned her mood a bit better. But she knew that a few minutes of cajoling, half an hour of patting wouldn't put Sylvia to sleep, neither would singing. It was late in the night, and Juvia was close to dropping asleep.

"Let's get you asleep, shall we?" Juvia adjusted Sylvia in her arms and rested the head on her shoulder. The baby had stopped her crying although her nose was red. Sylvia looked over her shoulder at the dark haired men and pointed a finger at one of them.

"Tomu." She said. Before Juvia could react, Sylvia was leaning away from her and stretched both her arms in Gray's direction. She began to make crying noises and Juvia had had enough of wailing. She walked into the room as Gray made his way to the edge of the bed and received Sylvia into his arms. The baby pressed her weight on Gray's chest as she pointed at Storm. "Tomu."

"Did she just call my name?" Storm pointed at himself, glancing in confusion at his grinning father. Gray lowered Sylvia onto her back and Sylvia turned over her belly. As she was dangerously close to the edge, Juvia walked slowly along the edge and Sylvia began to crawl with a heightened speed.

Sylvia was grinning as she paused in front of Storm and looked up at him. Storm merely blinked back in fear and confusion. "Uh, Dad. . ."

Sylvia threw herself onto Storm's lap and Storm nearly flinched with the sudden contact. Sylvia began to slap Storm's thigh as she laughed at her mother. "Tomu, Tomu."

"Yes, yes. That's Tomu-chan." Juvia struggled to keep a straight face. Her 'inner mother' was banging her head everywhere in happiness. Juvia sat down on the bed and pushed Sylvia so that she was in the center of the bed yet within slapping reach of her brother.

"Tomu, Tomu." The baby slapped her brother again and at this time looked at Gray with a toothless grin.

"I know." Gray had crawled his way to his children and ruffled his daughter's damp hair. "How about we let your mother dry your hair up? You need to sleep, girl."

Sylvia merely grinned at her father and finally, finally, sat back. Everyone watched her expectantly. Sylvia lowered her head and puffed her cheeks. The baby swallowed and barely had opened her mouth. Juvia reached out in a lightning fast reaction, sweeping Sylvia back into her arms.

And Sylvia vomited on Juvia.

Storm widened his eyes. Juvia's dress dripped with milk and Sylvia's night suit was ruined as well. Juvia formed her mouth in an 'O' eyes wide. "Oh, no. Not again."

Gray grimaced, pressed his palm to his face and shook his head. A sigh later He watched Juvia adjust Sylvia so that she didn't touch anything else.

But the highlight of the occurrence was Storm guffawing hard. Gray didn't understand what he found so funny but he didn't need to know.

After all there was no use crying over spilled milk.