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Sometimes people just need coffee shops and sunsets and road trips. Need new songs and old songs. So, I packed my bag and went to the train station. I left my cellphone behind, so people wouldn't be able to get in touch with me. Even though I hate getting on at transportations, I still have to get the first express train I could find to get out of town. After a couple of hours inside the train, I finally arrived. I spent 20 minutes sitting at a bench at the train station, staring at the garden and I felt completely drained. I stood up and start walking, deciding it's time to get lost.

One thing I don't realize what people really need is, is the presence of other people. A living breathing people. But, I'm right here now, there's no Lucy or Gray, or Erza, or Wendy. Just me and the world. There's no backing down now.

I spent three full days by walking at the seashore. I could always find a comfortable place to sleep in the sand. Feeling collected with my sleeping bag. I'd make a fire from driftwood and roast some dried fish I bought from a local fisherman. Then I listen to the waves while I thought about my life. When I felt hungry I would nibble anything within reach, drink some water, and when the loneliness get the best of me, I'd treat myself with some alcohol. I didn't bathe, I didn't shave. This is how the three days went by.

The next day I move from town to town by train or bus or sometime by walking. Just because I hate transportations. I don't know where to look for Igneel, so I guess I just have to look at every place I can.

He's like a smoke. Sometimes I think I'm getting closer to find him, but when I reach out for him, there's nothing there.

When I'm not inside a town, I ended up at a campsite near the forest. I set up camp in a meadow surrounded by forest. As the night crickets chirp around me, I lay on my backs and gaze up at the clear stars. When I woke up the next day, I set for another journey.

One time, I get really lonely, sleeping by myself in the middle of nowhere so I search for a nearby telephone box and dialed Lucy's number. I had to hear her voice of course. Especially when I can't think of nothing but Lucy.

"You do realize you've been out of touch for nearly two months?" she asked. "Where are you?"

I looked around but I found myself trapped in this black world that I don't even know where was I. Only darkness found. "Um. Where should I be?" I asked.

"Here"

"I can't go back to Crocus yet."

"You called me and that's all you're going to say?"

"I think I still need some distance."

"Aren't we distant enough already?" her question is like a bullet shot through my head.

"What do you want? You want me to go back right now?" I asked.

"You. I want you. What do you want?" she asked back.

"You."

"Then why this isn't working?"

I sighed. "Because sometimes just wanting each other isn't enough."

"How long must one wait for it to be considered 'waiting'?" she asked.

"Maybe in a couple of weeks…" But Lucy hung up without a word or a warning.

Despite Lucy, I still went on with my travels. Sometimes when I feel like it I decided to sleep at some cheap hotel I could find, and take a bath and shave. Because what I saw in the mirror was only a terrible man. I looked like as if I just crawled out from a cave.

There was one night where it's impossible for me to go to sleep. That night I realized that I've been drawing some invisible line between myself and other people. I was so focused at finding the blurry image of Igneel that I forgot about the reality bitter truth and the living being that is my friend, especially Lucy who is pretty much alive and waiting for me. But, I don't want to connect myself with reality yet, I still want to get lost. Disconnected myself from reality was pretty much a bad thing, because then I can be lost for forever, but why is it such a bad thing to lose contact with reality? Have you seen reality recently? Have you seen my life recently? It's terrible!

Sometimes I find myself sitting in one spot for hours, staring at nothing thinking of nothing, feeling nothing, and, sadly, caring about nothing.

When I'm in bed, I will held my pillow at 4AM and thought about what Igneel once told me: An entire sea of water can't sink a ship unless it gets inside the ship. The same with negative thoughts. The negativity of the world can't put you down unless you allow it go get inside you.

Like the negativity gotten the best of me, I murmured: Holy shit I've destroyed my life.

All I've been doing was waiting to finally find Igneel, and waiting for it to happen, and waiting for it to happen, and… sometimes I guess I'm just tired of waiting. Like, I want to find Igneel, right now, right this moment, so that I can go back to my usual self in my usual place.

I know, I'm not the same anymore. I admit it, a lot of shit got to me. But when you're around someone so much for so long, they become a part of you, and when you're away from them, you just feel lost. And I'm lost now without them. It's like they are the only people who can keep me being me.

There is something wrong with me.

Everything happens and it's too much.

I am thoroughly depressed right now.

I need a donor heart beating in a mechanical system, which keeps me warm, oxygenated, with nutrient enriched blood pumping through. I need Lucy.

My journey turns from bad to worse. It's been raining for the last couple of days, and no matter what mood I am in, the rain tends to intensify my emotions. Whether I'm lonely or sad. I don't think it's rainy season already, but it doesn't matter though, raindrops seem to fall from the sky just to ruin the atmosphere. Just like loneliness, regardless of people, places and time, it will break your heart into pieces. Maybe each and every one of us has one's own experience, and rains fall regardless of season and without reason, just like the lonely feelings. It came to crush you. It came all so suddenly without a warning, so you can't prepare a barrier.

Sometimes I think I need a therapy for myself, but then maybe I just need to go home and see everyone.

I decided before I go home, I set out for another journey to visit my mother's grave at the far side of Fiore. I had a weird feeling since the morning I woke up and it makes me just wanna go home sooner, but it's been a long time since the last time I visited my mother's grave, and then I remember what I always learn from movies. Every time the main character is about to give up, something surprising happens, which leads to happy endings. And I'm pretty sure, something surprising will happen.

After I bought flowers, I found Igneel bending down in front of my mother's grave.

This is definitely not what I expected. It's surprising and not surprising at the same time.

"What the hell are you doing here?" My voice come out harsh but I don't care as I stand behind him. He ignores me. "Where have you been? We were worried about you." I tried to keep my emotions steady.

"We?" he asked without turning back to even glanced at me.

"Yeah, we." I pressed. "Wendy, Anastasia, Makarov, Laxus?" I elaborated.

"Sorry." He murmured.

"Is that all you got to say?" I murmured back. I took a brave step forward and put my right hand on his shoulder. "Tell me! What the hell are you doing here? I've been looking for you, for weeks, and you ended up here?" suddenly I'm yelling at him. "You told me you never want to get even near this grave. You told me that this place only brings back bad memories, what the hell is wrong with you?" I keep yelling at him.

"Natsu, calm down." He said but I keep yelling at him, but he only look at me with blank expression. When I was too tired to yell, he started to speak, "You know what people say, you don't get over someone until you find someone or something better. As humans, we don't deal well with emptiness. Any empty space must be filled. Immediately. The pain of emptiness is too strong. An empty spot in heart causes excruciating pain. That's why I run from attachment to attachment. But in the end I can only go back to your mom."

I know – better than anyone – that humans are obsessed with love. They say it makes them whole, and they say that the main purpose in our life is to obtained our other half. It's called soulmates. But what if your soulmate died? Seeing Igneel, somehow doesn't make me believed in the idea of soulmates anymore. But I start to believe that a very few times in your life, you might meet someone who was exactly right for you. Not because she was perfect, or because you are, but because when you combined all of your imperfectness, you both become perfect in a way that allowed two separated beings to unite.

But mom is not exist in this world anymore, Dad. Visiting her grave everyday will not make her come back to life. You can't make people – I don't know – undead or something. You just have to endure it.

"You disappeared from us. Just in an instant, without a word, how am I supposed to cooperate with that? I already got dead weights on my shoulder, and now you're one of them too. You never been there for me, and I accept that, I'm a grown man now, I can looked past that, but at least, the least thing you could do as a dad is be there for Wendy, can't you at least do that? You always told me, that I was born first because I have to protect what comes after me, and I did what you told me, I protect Wendy, but I got a lot things that I should give a fuck about, dad. I can't do all this shits alone, tell you though, doing exactly eight things at the same time is not easy. Do you want your son to be miserable for the rest of his life? Are you really that busy to even care about your own kids? Are you isolated yourself from the world? Why are you doing this so easily? Are you high?"

"I'm not on drugs, Natsu," he chuckled probably trying to lighten up this situations. He always do that. Getting his own way through everything.

"If you weren't on drugs, then, how come you disappeared from us so easily? Don't you care about me? About Wendy? Or Anastasia?" My voice suddenly get hoarse and I stop talking because no more words will come out. It's as if my tongue has been frozen. I begin to feel a warmth sensation on my eyes, it stings but warm, and then I realize, I think I'm sort of crying right now. After – for like 10 years – I'm crying again in front of a man, because I feel sorry for myself, and I cry for myself. I shouldn't be crying, Laxus said that men only cry for their comrades, but right now I can't take control of myself. I wipe my eyes and nose with the sleeve of my plaid shirt quickly, and then I sniffed.

I looked down, but I can see Igneel's feet are moving closer towards me, and suddenly I can feel his big warm arms wrapped around me. My arms end up returning the hug and I cried. It wasn't a girly cried, but I sobbed and make the shirt that Igneel is wearing soaking wet.

I hope that, for all the lonely individuals in this world, someday, someone wants to hold you for five minutes straight, and that's all they do. They don't pull away, they don't look at your face, they don't try to talk to you. All they do is wrap you in their arms, without any intensions in it.

Suddenly, Igneel whisper something strange, something he never said to me for – at least the last five years – "I'm sorry." And then Igneel repeated the same sentences over and over until I'm sick of it.