The original intent of this story was for it to stay as a one-shot but I can't leave it alone. I suppose it's a flight of fancy to distract me from other things that aren't coming out so well, but it doesn't really matter because here we are.

This is pretty dark. I've changed the summary/tags to reflect these things but I'll be exploring subjects that aren't for the faint of heart.

**Content warnings for rape mentions and references, self harm, suicide, hospitalization, medications, mental illness, and possible misuse of prescription medications.

Erza picked at the bandages on her wrist and arms. She didn't like how the medications took away her ability to feel. There was only a dull ache now. One side of her mind wanted desperately to sleep, the other was terrified of the venom finding it's way into her bloodstream again. The serpent haunted her dreams and its teeth had a craving for her skin. She still wasn't sure if the snake was real or if the poison was real or if anything was real. The last thing she truly remembered feeling was the utter horror and despair of her mother's tears and the many arms caging her and pulling the little paring knife – the first knife she'd seen in the drawer – from her hands.

This room was real enough. Erza knew every inch of it. She'd searched it from corner to ceiling on her first night. And again every night since. She thought maybe it had been a week of nights. Or maybe two?

In Erza's dreams she had an entire arsenal of knives and other blades. She could pull them out of nowhere. The violent purple of the serpent's body was the brightest color she saw anymore – and even that was only in her memory. Her doctor wanted her to talk about what happened but none of Erza's explanations pleased him. Every session was an ocean of words and Erza felt like she was drowning in them. Now that her head was the topic of every conversation, Erza couldn't help but wonder if anything she'd ever imagined or conjured or dreamed was part of the problem. Was Other Erza something she'd made up on her own to help her feel strong when she was helpless part of the cure or the disease? She didn't know. The worst part of everything, except for the dull swamp of her thoughts, was hurting her mother.

Erza's feet began to shuffle in a familiar circle. She catalogued her room once more.

The sun hurt her eyes but she wanted to feel it. The way her arms itched under the bandages meant something was healing but Erza felt like she should've felt the pain before the itch.

"Hey."

Erza spun around and nearly slid off the edge of the picnic table bench. The boy's smile was crooked and wide. She wasn't sure if she liked it or not. A curl of smoke rose from the cigarette in his hand and she could see his fingers were dusted with something other than cigarette ash. Something grey or black.

"You aren't supposed to smoke out here," she said weakly.

"No?" He feigned shock.

"No, there's a sign right there on the wall."

"My bad." But he made no move to snuff it out. "Does it bother you?"

"Not really." Erza shrugged and turned back around to face the table and leaned forward to rest her chin on folded arms.

"You're the girl with the snake thing, yeah?"

Erza bristled. It wasn't untrue but she didn't care for his nonchalance with her personal information. "I guess."

"Intrusive dreams can be a real bitch." Erza heard his feet crushing the grass and she jumped when he plopped onto the bend across the table from her. "Not everyone wakes up thinking they're real and hacks themselves to bits, though."

"I didn't hack myself to bits," Erza insisted.

"No?" He reached out and touched the bandages that littered her arms.

"I'm still in one piece. Not bits."

"Why'd you do it?" He leaned across the table and folded his hands in his lap. Erza glared at him. She'd seen this boy before wandering the halls of the hospital wing, lounging on the couches in the common room, and leaning back in his chair, staring at the ceiling instead of paying attention in group therapy. His hair was a perpetual mess and a tattoo scrawled across the right side of his face. He didn't seem like he was prodding her for any other reason than pure curiosity but trust wasn't a thing Erza gave lightly.

"I don't know. It felt real at the time."

"Like a hallucination?"

"No. Like it followed me out of my dream. I don't know."

"You seemed to know in the moment. I was here when they brought you in."

"I don't remember," Erza snapped. "Why are you here?"

"Because I'm crazy." He shrugged casually. "Sometimes I'm me, sometimes I'm… more. Sometimes less. Something else."

"What are you right now?"

"Just me." He smiled again and Erza wanted to hate it. She didn't want this nosey boy who smoked where he wasn't supposed to, this rule breaker, to know anything about her. But she didn't hate it. His smile was the best thing she'd seen in weeks.

"And when you aren't just you?"

He laughed once and his smile faded. "I'm… unmanageable."

"Your meds don't help?"

"Sometimes," he said, smiling again. "But I don't like taking them. The world isn't meant to be so grey."

"You don't like grey?" Erza asked, finally allowing herself a small grin.

"No. I like red."

Unmanageable was an understatement. Two days later the boy with the crooked smile and tattoo was pulled off the roof of the hospital. She could hear him shouting an entire hall away.

He wanted to fly, he screamed. He wanted to touch the stars.

The next time she saw him, he was stretched across a window ledge that wasn't meant to be a seat. His hands were folded behind his head and his ankles crossed casually. Rain pelted the windows and he looked lost in the storm.

"My dad was here," he said in a low voice that the rain nearly drowned out.

"Because of the roof thing?"

"He thinks I'm like my mom was."

"Are you?"

The boy's gaze fell to his fingertips. He pressed his thumb and forefinger together and smeared the remnants of whatever it was that dirtied them together.

"Yeah," he whispered. "I am."

Erza leaned awkwardly against the wall near his feet. He didn't turn to her for a long moment and when he did, she missed his smile immediately. It was obvious he could see nothing but grey.

Her mother pushed the box across the table with a smile Erza hated. It was fake. A fake smile meant to lighten a mood that was too heavy for the effort.

"I cleared it with your doctor but I thought you might like them." Eileen tilted her head, her smile fading. "Don't you want to open it?"

"Sorry," Erza muttered. She suddenly felt like crying. Inside the box was a handful of her favorite strawberry Jolly Ranchers. She always kept a bag of them in her bedside table at home.

"I thought maybe you'd like to have something sweet." Eileen twisted her fingers together. "You don't have to take them, Erza."

"Thank you, mom," she whispered around the tears. She didn't want to be the sad girl in the hospital. She didn't want to wake up in the middle of the night so afraid like Other Erza wasn't. She didn't want to hack herself to bits, as the boy with the tattoo called it. "I love them."

"Oh, honey." Eileen slid onto the bench next to her and brought Erza into an embrace. Her mother smelled the exact same as she always did and it was a scent she cherished above anything else. Breathing in her mother meant she was feeling. "I don't know what else to do. I've only ever wanted to keep you safe. But I can't save you from what goes on in that head of yours."

"I know, mom. I'm trying. I just –" Erza swallowed her tears. "I just need to figure out how to sleep again and it'll be fine."

Eileen pulled back and brushed the damp strands of scarlet from Erza's face.

"Do you have everything you need here? You would tell me if you needed something, right? Anything? I'd bring you home if I thought…" Eileen trailed off and Erza felt her mother's gaze so strongly she almost broke completely.

"It's not safe at home, mom. Even here I'm afraid." She shook her head. "What if I woke up again and – sometimes when I haven't slept and finally doze off I… I see things."

Eileen hid her expression by pressing a kiss to Erza's forehead. A nurse passed by and tapped her fingers on the table. Their time was nearly up.

"I'll be back on Wednesday, okay? I have a short trip and I'll stop by as soon as I get off the plane."

"Okay, mom." Erza poked at the box of candies. "Thank you."

"You're welcome, love." Eileen brought her into a final crushing hug and stood. Erza didn't watch her go but she listened to her heels click all the way across the floor.

She found him under the outdoor cover in a position much like she'd been when he found her first. His body was hunched over his arms and he drew circles with his fingers on the tabletop. Rain still fell in sheets and Erza vaguely wondered how her mother's plane would fare later that evening. She'd always preferred the redeye flights.

Erza stepped over the table bench and watched him watching the rain. She thought maybe she only understood a little of his low. Numbness was no longer a stranger but to lose everything…

"I'm tired," he whispered. "I fell asleep earlier but I'm still tired."

"I'm jealous," she joked. "I'd love a nap."

"Want to get in bed with me?" he said, finally sitting up and glancing over at her. His smile was hollow. Erza reached out on impulse and touched one of the messy strands of hair that brushed his forehead.

"Maybe some other time," she whispered. He nodded and folded in on himself again. Erza swung her leg over the bench and the candy box in her pocket stabbed her thigh. On yet another impulse she pulled out the box and shook two of the candies into her palm. He didn't flinch or move when she slid them into his pocket before leaving him alone at the table.

Erza bolted upright in her bed and felt the cool air swirl around her damp skin. The serpent hadn't come for her this time but a woman. A terrifying beast of a woman with claws and horns. Erza sucked in deep breaths but still couldn't quite breathe. Her skin crackled with whatever the woman in her dreams had done to her. First pain then pleasure. Both equally horrific.

The floor was slick against the soles of her feet but Erza couldn't be bothered with things like socks or slippers. She left her room behind for the toilets and emptied her stomach. More cold water on her face and the startling taste of her toothpaste left her shivering. The scabs on her arms itched. She wanted to scratch them raw and make everything bleed all over again. Maybe the serpent's poison had already rotted her from the inside out. Erza backed away from the row of mirrors and sank down to the floor. She wasn't sure if the numbness was worse than the cold that gripped her.

"Hey," a voice called from what sounded like ten million miles away. His warm hand on her arm felt better than anything else. "Hey, red."

"What?" she gasped. She wanted to wipe away her tears but couldn't unclench her fists. "What are you doing in the women's bathroom?"

"I could ask you the same question. It's dark and cold and you're wet." He grinned. "Did you fall in?"

"No," she whispered as if his question had been serious.

"Bad dream?"

"Yeah."

His hand closed all the way around her arm and he pulled her to her feet. Once she stood, he slid his hands into his pockets.

"You need some help? I can call a nurse."

"No, please don't do that. I don't want to take anything else tonight. I'm tired but I think I'm done sleeping." She blinked. "What are you doing out of your room?"

He shrugged. "I wanted a smoke."

"In the middle of the night?"

"I woke up and felt the urge." The boy backed toward the door. "Come on, I'll walk you back to your room."

Erza followed him down the hallway and felt the cold creep back into her with every step she took toward her room. "Can we go somewhere else?" she blurted quickly. This boy seemed to bring out her impulses.

"Like?"

"Anywhere else. If I go back to my room I'll just pace and look again."

"Look?" He raised one eyebrow.

"Yeah," Erza fumbled her words. She hadn't meant to admit she still searched her room for hidden things with poisonous fangs. The boy shrugged again and took a left at the fork in the hallway instead of a right. Without a second thought Erza followed him into his own room – which was starkly different than hers.

His walls were covered from floor to ceiling with sketchpad pages. He drew with charcoals and it explained why his fingers were always vaguely dusted. The images were mostly landscapes and faces of a woman she didn't recognize. He quickly crossed the room and shut the open pad of paper on the small desk.

"I didn't know you were an artist," she whispered, turning around to see the full scope of his work.

"You never asked, red."

"It's Erza."

"I know."

When she tore her gaze from the walls to look at him, he smiled. Not the grey smile but the one she'd seen before. The one that liked red.

"Thanks for the candy. I think sugar makes me want to smoke sometimes."

"Sorry."

"Why?"

"I hope it didn't keep you awake."

"I'm on ten million different meds, candy would never keep me awake if I didn't want to be."

"I'm glad you're feeling better," she said awkwardly.

He grinned and stood directly in front of her. Before she could stop him his fingers were curling strands of her ponytail.

"It comes and goes. One day I'll find the mid-point and level out."

"Did your mom figure it out?" She hadn't meant to ask such a personal question but he didn't seem to mind. His smile widened.

"No, she didn't but I like to think she'd be proud of me for trying."

"I'm sorry."

He shrugged and inched closer. "The world isn't better when we pretend things are different than they are."

"How can you be so brutally honest and still smile like that?"

His laugh fanned across her face and Erza could smell the strawberry Jolly Ranchers on his breath along with cigarette smoke.

"Because I don't like being miserable, red."

When he kissed her it was both a surprise and a relief. Erza hadn't realized how much she'd wanted him to kiss her until he did. His lips were soft but his kisses weren't. Everything Erza thought was dead inside of her came to life. She clutched at his shoulders and a desperate sound clawed its way from her throat.

Their pajamas were both the same pale blue and mingled in one heap on the floor. His bed wasn't as soft as hers but Erza welcomed the firm press of his mattress against her back and his chest against her front. His greedy fingers and palms claimed every inch of her skin.

Erza wasn't a virgin but she wasn't exactly an expert lover. She didn't consider sex to be a thing she craved or needed. Every other experience had been planned. Controlled. This boy, just as unstable as her, was neither. His body was hard with muscle but his skin was smooth. Erza hadn't ever wanted anything as much as she wanted to drown in his kisses and the way he made her heart pound so fast it almost hurt.

She gasped when his fingers found her wet and waiting. When he slid inside of her it was with a practiced fluidity – or maybe she was too drunk on the sensation to feel anything other than total satisfaction. This pleasure was more intense than the clawed woman in her dream. It was real. His hand moved from her waist to pin her wrist against the bed. He kissed her until Erza thought her lips might bruise.

The climax was a breathless drop and when she opened her eyes again his eyelashes were still brushing the apples of his cheeks. She pressed her lips to his and felt a final pulse of excitement leave her body when his tongue sought hers.

"What's your name?" she whispered into the space of humid air between them.

"Jellal." He rolled off her and brought her with him onto her side. His fingers touched the naked skin of her shoulder and pried the ropes of scarlet away. "Will you stay for a bit?"

Erza watched him watching her and slid her arm over his hip. "Yeah."

His eyes drooped sleepily but he smiled anyway. "Did I tell you before that I really like your hair?"

She left him before his eyes opened again.

The sunrise was like an oversaturated photograph. Rays of orange and red and yellow bled together and reflected off the scattering rain clouds. She smelled his cigarette smoke before she saw him.

"You missed breakfast," she muttered, not looking away from the horizon.

"These new meds make it hard to wake up."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be."

He took a sat across from her. His hair clashed with the colors of the sunrise but Erza decided she liked blue just as much as he liked red.