how to become a wildfire

survive

TW for description of injuries from abuse

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sur·​vive | \ sər-ˈvīv
transitive verb
:  to continue to live or exist after

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xix
november

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When Gray wakes up the next morning, Natsu is still asleep. Gray must have rolled over at some point during the night, and Natsu's curled up behind him, arm wrapped around Gray's stomach, nose pressed into Gray's hair. He's snoring softly, and Gray can feel each breath on the back of his neck.

There's a soft squeak, and Gray turns to see Frosch sitting on the bed next to him, looking at him curiously. She rubs herself against his arm, making another strange, high-pitched purr as he slowly reaches over to pet her.

"Hey," he whispers, and immediately regrets it. His throat feels like he swallowed broken glass – sharp and raw.

Everything hurts, but he can't think about it.

Gray looks over at Natsu's face - open and peaceful in sleep. His hair is in his eyes, and Gray reaches over to tuck it behind his ear, running his fingers over the freckles on Natsu's cheek.

Natsu saved his life.

Vague images of yesterday are starting to come back to him – Gray remembers everything, but he's putting it in tiny boxes, hidden away in pieces so he doesn't have to think about anything as a whole.

He watches Natsu sleep for a while longer, then slips out from under his arm, pushing himself to his feet and trying to stretch. The painkillers from the hospital are nowhere to be seen and Gray sighs, heading out into the kitchen to find them.

Rogue is up, sitting at the kitchen table with a cup of coffee and doing the crossword. When Gray comes in the room he looks up and smiles, setting down his pen and stretching.

"Coffee?" he asks, then glances down at the marks on Gray's neck and shakes his head. "Sorry, stupid question. I can make a smoothie if you'd like? Sting keeps buying bananas and never eating them, so we have about twenty of them in the freezer."

Rogue rolls his eyes and Gray feels his lip curl up in a tiny smile as he nods. He settles down at the stool by the island, rubbing his eyes and wincing, and when Rogue passes him a couple pills and a glass of water, he tips his head in thanks.

"One of these days I should just make banana bread," Rogue says, pulling open the freezer and gesturing at all the bananas. "I hate baking, though. Do you bake?"

Gray opens his mouth to say something, then thinks better of it and shakes his head instead.

"Sting's actually pretty good at it," Rogue continues, rummaging through the fridge. "Except he's so forgetful that he sometimes leaves things in the oven until they're black. He almost burned our last apartment down when he tried to make a cake for my birthday."

Gray huffs out a quiet laugh, then leans forward on his elbows as he watches Rogue move around the kitchen. Rogue keeps talking about nothing – how their wedding photographer is charging way too much, how Sting never puts his laundry in the basket even though it's right next to the bed, how Sting really needs to get his paperwork together so they can finally file their taxes.

The words blend into quiet background noise, and it reminds Gray of talking to Natsu on the phone – pointless nonsense that takes him away from the thoughts racing through his head. Gray wants to say thank you, wants to tell Rogue how much his normal, everyday conversation means, but he can't make the words.