Okay so I actually wrote this a couple weeks ago, and well, I forgot to post it. lol Yeah my brain is weird. Anyway, it's nothing special. Just a little drabble I wrote in the hopes of kicking this annoying writer's block. And really, it might suck! Just warning you! lol

Anyway, without further ado, here's something new from me - a story about Wendy.

The Winds of Change

Wendy had heard it all, and she was sick of it all. She was too young, too inexperienced, too innocent. And maybe all that was true, but she wasn't a child anymore. She had seen things, done things that had changed her forever. She'd faced more than her fair share of trials, and she'd come through stronger than before.

She was smart, driven, and she was tired of being told "no". When would she be old enough in everyone's eyes to go off on a job on her own? When could she go on a date without her pseudo brothers arguing over who got to accompany her?

It had gotten to the point where she'd finally stopped trying. Because what guy wanted to go out with a girl and her brother? Even hanging out with Romeo had been a problem. Romeo had been a trooper about the whole thing, probably because he was used to it, but Wendy hadn't been able to relax enough to really enjoy her time with him. So she'd settled for short visits with him at the guild.

And it was never enough.

In short, she was lonely. All the talk about Fairy Tail being a family was true, but what they didn't realize is that sometimes, a person needed space. They were protective of her. She got that; she really did. But there was a line, or at least there should be. Because sometimes, she didn't need a brother or a sister. Sometimes, she just needed a friend, and because of their constant shielding, she felt like she had none.

Yes, she had them, and they were her friends. But she was younger than them, and they always felt like they had to watch out for her. And that left her feeling more like a duty than a joy.

Honestly, she was at the end of her rope, and if it weren't for the fact that her eighteenth birthday was right around the corner, she would have seriously considered taking an extended vacation without telling a soul. Of course, that would have been running away in their eyes, which would only give them even more reason to view her as a child.

It was so frustrating! Hadn't she fought along side them? Hadn't she stood toe to toe with a dragon? Demons? Hadn't she earned her place beside them, not behind them?

She just didn't understand. How could they view her as an ally in battle and then turn around and act like she was incapable of taking care of herself? She was seventeen, not five.

She shouldn't have to keep trying to prove herself!

Maybe once she turned eighteen, they would lighten up. Maybe then, they would see her as she really was instead of the memory of the girl she used to be. She hoped so, because she wasn't sure what she would do if things didn't change.

Wendy closed her eyes and sighed, imagining herself in a few days time, eighteen with the whole world in front of her. She couldn't wait. She would finally be free! No one could tell her to wait or stop; no one could hold her back.

She would finally live as she wanted. Making her own choices. Facing her own battles.

And she had a plan. She'd been working on it for the last two years now. She'd been careful with her money, putting aside the majority of the jewels she made on the jobs she'd taken with everybody, and now, she had enough to put down on her very own place.

She'd even found the perfect spot for herself. She'd come across it by accident and had fallen in love almost instantaneously with the cute little cottage. It sat proudly atop one of Magnolia's largest hills, facing the ocean, and from the front porch, she could see everything. E

It was everything she could have wanted in a house, from the pale blue siding and big bay windows to the constant breeze that drifted in off the water. She felt at peace there, like she could finally breathe.

That was what struck her first about the place – the stillness it evoked within her. She hadn't even realized how restless her heart had become until she'd stood on that hilltop for the first time and felt a rush of relief. And she knew – this was it. The place she belonged.

She'd been ecstatic, but the feeling hadn't lasted. Charle, who had deemed the trip too dangerous for Wendy to do alone, had frowned on the whole idea. While she'd liked the house, she thought it was too far from the guild, too isolated. The Exceed hadn't understood why Wendy couldn't just continue staying in Fairy Hills. In Charle's mind, it made more sense to stay where she was. Fairy Hills was close to the guild, as well as her guildmates, and small, which she felt suited Wendy just fine because Wendy didn't have much in the way of personal items.

And all of that was true, but what Charle didn't get it was this need for more was beyond Wendy's control. Wendy was a Dragon Slayer, a Sky Dragon Slayer, and because of that, Wendy desperately needed air. And not just to breathe. Being cooped up in that tiny room at Fairy Hills was making her claustrophobic.

There was all this magic inside of her, elemental magic that just wouldn't be contained, and sometimes, she just needed to let it out.

She couldn't live like this anymore, feeling trapped. The spirit within her, the wind that pulsed beneath her skin couldn't bear it any longer.

It was time to be free, and in a few days time, she would be. It was time to take that step, to move beyond what everyone expected of her and be her own person. Be the person she was always meant to be.

And that was exactly what she was going to do.

And this time, no one was going to stop her.