The Waiting Game ( Fairy Tail Fanfic )

Fond Memories

Ch. 7 – Fond Memories

The leaves have started to change color and the weather grows colder every day. And with the season and weather changing, sickness comes along with it.

For once in her life, Erza Scarlet was sick. For as long as she could remember she had never gotten a cold before. She considered herself lucky in that aspect. She had been focusing on her thoughts lately and not enough on her health. It's no wonder it ended up this way. She decided to blame it all on a certain ice mage.

Erza was stuck in her room at Fairy Hills, lying in bed and her body covered with multiple blankets. She felt way too hot and wanted to discard all of them. Earlier she was caught when Levy entered the room and saw her throwing the covers across the room in a rage. Levy had to call for backup and all the girls in the dormitory scrambled to restrain her. After they were finally able to calm her, Erza was given a stern lecture form Levy. She was told that she had to keep herself warm if she wanted her cold to go away. Erza, not knowing how to take care of herself in these circumstances, chose to listen to her friend's advice.

Levy told her to get some rest, but experiencing a cold for the first time was somehow exciting for Erza. She was unable to fall asleep. Instead, she took the time to reflect on things to pass the time.

Erza always loved this season. The various colors brought back memories of when she was a kid. She could close her eyes and relive each moment as if it were yesterday.

On an autumn day several years ago, it was Gray and Natsu's turn to rake up the fallen leaves surrounding the guild. Being the boys that they were, they wanted to have a bit of fun while doing it. They would rake the leaves into piles and then take turns jumping in them. They did this for who knows how many times. They also had contests over who had the most leaves in their piles and fought over it. Erza was always the one to find them goofing off and this time wasn't any different. She caught them jumping into their separate pile of leaves. The look on their faces when they realized Erza was there was priceless. After she finished disciplining the boys, she dismissed them to go and find a different chore for them to do.

As the boys walked off, mumbling to each other, Erza looked back at the messy yard. There was still a pile of leaves ready to be jumped in and it was calling to her. She didn't understand how they had fun playing with leaves. She only wanted to see what all the fuss was about, that's all. When Erza saw that the coast was clear, she jumped into the pile. When she popped her head out of the leaves, her face was filled with amazement. She was wearing the biggest grin imaginable. She had no idea it was that much fun. Erza quickly raked the leaves into big piles and jumped in them over and over. She liked the crunching sound she heard every time she landed in the leaves. For some odd reason it had a sort of calming effect on her and all the tension she had built up inside of her just floated away.

Gray was the one to find Erza just as she was jumping into a fresh pile of leaves. She completely froze when she saw Gray was there looking at her sitting in the messy pile of leaves. Erza grew more and more guilty and couldn't look at him. She felt embarrassed and was worried that he would be angry. Instead of calling her a hypocrite, Gray told her that dinner was ready. When Erza looked back at him, he was smiling and acted as if he didn't see anything. They quickly raked up the leaves into a big pile and walked back to the guild together.

It wasn't until recently that this particular memory came back to her. Memories of Gray were flooding her mind lately. She also blamed that on the ice mage.

Erza was startled when she heard a knock on her door. She had been spacing out again. The requip mage assumed it was one of the girls coming to check on her. They hadn't come up to her room to see her in quite a while. Erza invited them in, whoever it was, without a second thought. "Come in."