He Makes The Stars Shine Brighter [Sting x Reader] || First Book

25 : Stolen Kisses & Stolen Guild Mates

» edited: 05.16.2017

[a/n]: so i accidentally deleted the other chapter (great fucking going me,) so anywho enjoy the marvelous lack of exposition 

xx

Three hundred and sixty-five days, fallen past fingertips and eyelids. The air was warm and the sun was forgiving the way its rays slid over the skin of your arms like pure silk. The hearts were rich with the sweetness of revival, and the shoulders were shameless when they touched.

Having dear friends by your side painted the evenings of your journeys the dripping, sickly grey of loneliness. 

You remember the dawns, silent and freezing despite the eruption of new light, lacking the wonderfulness of other human beings; you remember the afternoons when the chirps of the wind played a fragile substitute for the cackles of your loved ones; you remember the evenings of the crackle of firewood as you lamented your losses and your victories, and the playfully frightening noises of wild animals in nocturnal passing.

You remember the only humans you've seen are the ones that root in cities too small and average to make a name for itself. Dressed in scarves and gloves and dark colors, eyes kept too low to see the kind politeness of your smile, nails too dirty and bitten that you can only feel the callousness of the pads of their fingers when you're jewels deep into business. They're much too somber to permit the pleasantries of exchanging names, and they only bend into themselves when you turn and leave, without a goodbye to speak, without a friendliness in the atmosphere. Just dull eyes and the jingle of money.

The noise of conversation is thunderous against the blows of the wind, but it's a loudness you welcome with a smile wide enough that would make the muscles of your face sore from how foreign the action's become.

"Good luck on getting Fairy Tail back!"

"Say hi to Gray for me!"

You take a step, and several others follow from all around you. Your shoulders relax and your smile remains.

"How long are you going to cry, Wendy?"

» time skip

The village was even smaller than the ones where you've traded jewel for goods, a crisscrossing weave of houses with disheveled roofs and soaked lumber, only a small patch of plainness on the massive fabric of the rolling meadows and the forests that rustle evergreen. There's a network of weeping clouds above the village, and the rain continues even when the sandals and the shoes are soaked and stained.

The windows are shut, the children are silenced, and the lamps are cold and dead. It almost feels like a graveyard when you walk over puddles that are naked without footprints around it. You and your friends make sure to dress it plenty with footprints, and as the rain drips cold into the deepest sections of your bones, you can't help but turn your head even through the water that design your lashes and the clouds that howl mournful breezes around your face.

Nobody's speaking. 

When you see another being that breathes the same heavy oxygen you do, it's dressed in garments that shrink from the wetness, and eyes so pitifully lifeless that mismatch the quiver of lips and the rise and fall of chests.

With a splash and a call of familiarity, you wonder if the clouds grieve for the woman with blue locks that stick closer together than even soulmates, who appears so unbelievably hollow and damned in the rain that pours still.

» time skip

"Juvia tried to look for Gray-sama but he was nowhere to be found, so Juvia decided to wait. Juvia's sure Gray-sama will come home. . .Juvia's sorry you had to see her like this."

"I'll find him for you."

"We'll definitely find him for you."

"I'm bringing everyone back together, so we can be a guild again!"

The statement leaves the room a little lighter, a little chipper, and the released breaths sound more like awkward laughter than frowned sighs. Juvia bares a smile despite her pain, settling into slumber not soon after.

Natsu looks at the rest of the audience in the room, and his eyes are steeled with seriousness. "We're going to Sabertooth."

» time skip

When Sting had cooed your name, you were certainly surprised to see him much different than how you'd left him three hundred and sixty-five days ago. He'd put on weight, and the buttons were muted yet screaming bloody murder as they were pulled against the vest and against the roundness of his stomach.

It was. Cute.

But your body was recoiling still from the shock, like a smoker who's packs were empty except for shaves of tobacco dusting the bottom, who's fingers were trembling from the absence of a crinkled cigarette.

"Sting!" you exclaim, and it falls out of your tongue a bit more contrived than you'd like, "What a pleasant surprise! Wow, you've- changed!"

"Baby, I missed you so much!" Sting charges towards you, arms outstretched and the tummy he's achieved bouncing just as happily as he was.

This is it this is how I'm going to die I'm going to get crushed by my boyfriend who's gained one hundred pounds after a year oh my God-

Moments before your untimely death (you could already hear the church bells crying the doom of the loss,) there was a chime, a few sentences, and Sting had transformed into a thinner, less hazardous version of himself- exactly how he was when you'd left for the journey.

Sting hugs you anyway, all tight and warm and comforting; when his hands held you by the waist, you finally realize how badly you missed having his hands to hold and his lips to kiss.

"You're finally back, I missed you so much, damn it." Sting chases the skin of your neck with the skin of his lips, and it's felt better than it's ever been.

"Oi stop kissing my guild mate and give her back," Natsu takes you by your wrist and pulls you away, leaving Sting empty and largely upset.

"You- you just took her from me," Sting gripes, "hey! Give me my (Y/N) back!"