Lucy nervously shuffled around the store on her feet, hiding behind bookcases, avoiding the front door, and steering clear of all windows. If someone - anyone - who knew her or her father found out she was here, Jude would be livid. Not only was she sneaking out every Sunday, but just to visit a local bookstore because of their cat? He would lock her up in that wretched mansion for as long as she could live.
Despite that looming danger, Lucy couldn't help but let it fade into a distant memory whenever she spotted the weird blue cat that loitered in the bookstore. It had a small little green backpack on with a dangling golden tag around its neck.
"Happy" was engraved on it, and his name fit exactly what it meant.
Lucy almost giggled with happiness when the little cat trotted over to her, sending ecstatic meows her way as it rubbed its head against her calf. She bent down to scratch him behind his ears, he purred and nuzzled against her palm with content.
"Hey, aren't you the girl that lives over the hill? Lucy Heartfilia?"
Lucy jumped in her skin as she shot her head up towards the voice, alarms blared off in her head, telling her to run. Running now would make her suspicious, and cause even more attention to be turned towards her. If she stayed low and kept calm, maybe she could get away unscathed.
"No," Lucy replied back, casting a dazzling smiling towards the pink haired man. She could feel the sweat beginning to build up on her forehead. "I'm-" She paused for a second and glanced back down at Happy, who was still rubbing his head against her hand. No one knew her mother, she died before they moved here. "I'm Layla. I just moved into Magnolia a couple of weeks ago."
"I knew I've seen you around!" Red crawled up to his cheeks as he laughed. "You look exactly like her, well, I'm going off with how a friend described her. I almost thought I caught sight of a ghost." He tucked in a book that was pulled too far out. "No one in town has seen her for years, she's like this urban legend now."
"Huh," Lucy responded back, slightly amused. Had it been that long since she interacted with people outside of the mansion? "Do I look like her that much? I'm sure there's a lot of people who look like me." Lucy dismissed it with the wave of her hand, she focused in on the books in front of her, giving them an unusual amount of interest.
Cookbooks, pasta recipes. She had close to almost zero experience in cooking. She tilted one out of the shelf and flipped through it as if she were trying to look for a specific recipe.
"You looking for something specific?" He bent down next to her to get a better look at whatever she was flipping through.
The color drained from Lucy's face the moment the words left his mouth. "Yeah…" She stretched out the word as she flipped through some more stiff pages, rather frantically. Why did she say yes? She had a knack of making things ten times more complicated for herself. "A… spaghetti recipe?" She suggested, more to herself than to him.
"Spaghetti?" The man stood back up, her eyes followed him, then latched onto his name tag which hung loosely from the pocket of his white shirt.
NATSU. It was written in red, with flames on both sides of his name. A little hard to read, but Lucy liked the artistic side of it.
"Gramps actually has this really good spaghetti recipe. I can grab it from the back and you can take a pic of it?" Natsu extended his hand out for her to grab. Lucy shifted her eyes to his hands. They were calloused and rough, they looked warm.
Lucy grabbed the shelf and lifted herself up.
"That would be great, actually. Better than buying a whole cookbook for just one recipe."
"Exactly, this is just between you and me though." He winked, dropping his hand back to his side as if he never offered it. A smooth recovery, it didn't even faze him, yet Lucy still felt a stab of guilt in her gut. Happy stayed hot on her trail, sometimes going her pace, sometimes going ahead of them. He would meow whenever they were too slow for him, she smiled at him whenever they made eye contact.
The store was interestingly large for a small town bookstore, it had an upstairs balcony-like second floor near the back of the store with tables and chairs, along with more bookshelves that inched every piece of the wall. Downstairs, where Lucy had been, was riddled in many bookshelves and random knick knacks of journals, glass ornaments, jewelry boxes, and bookmarkers. She spotted occasional pins and stickers, but those only seem to be in stock every now and then.
"Alrighty!" Natsu swung behind the staircase, which revealed a small, tiny storage room. It was overflowing with loose pages, old dusted books, and several worn out lamps. Lucy's nose scrunched up as the dust around them began to flutter about when Natsu opened up one of the journals on the old wooden desk. "Let's see, let's see…" He mumbled as he flipped through the book. He muttered words of "gotch'a" and "not so fast" to himself as he caught loose pages almost flying out of their designated spots in the book.
Lucy kept her hands behind her back as she rocked back and forth on her feet, nervously glancing behind herself as she waited. This was weird. Beyond weird. This wasn't supposed to happen. So much for keeping a low profile. Plus, she hated spaghetti! Maybe she could say she had to run, she had an appointment or errand or something-
"Got it!" Natsu lifted the piece of paper into the air in triumph as he whipped around to face her, eyes gleaming with excitement as if he won the lottery and earned a million jewels. "Gramps' famous spaghetti recipe."
"Ah, I forgot my phone at home." Lucy fumbled around in her bag for her notebook and pencil, her eyes widened as her compact mirror and other spare pens and pencils clattered to the floor. "Oh-!" Lucy immediately dipped down to grab it, but Natsu was faster.
"I got it-" He held the compact mirror in his hand for a second longer than necessary, staring at the design. He ran his thumb lightly across it, the bumps were smooth against his skin. It was metal, beaded in such a beautiful design, he was mesmerized. The zodiac star signs circled around the edges, and in the middle was the moon. He could feel the ridges and indents of the moon, he could feel the dots on the stars that made each sign. The background, a deep dark blue, reflected against the dimly lit flame from the lamp; sparkling, glittering, like a thousand stars.
Lucy ripped it from his hands, he flinched back in response. Her knuckles were white from gripping it.
"Sorry-" He gathered the rest of her things and handed it to her. This time, she took it gently, her face flushed with embarrassment.
She opened her mouth to say something, but then closed it, only nodding her head in response. He lifted the recipe for her to see, and she quickly scribbled it down. They didn't speak the entire time, and the growing silence only made her writing shakier.
"It's really pretty." He said once she stopped writing. Lucy glanced up at him, afraid for some reason, but when she saw him she lowered the journal from obscuring her face. He was looking at her so softly, as if she were some mystical being.
"Thanks." She lowered the journal completely, letting the bottom of it hit her thighs. "My mom gave it to me as a birthday present." Lucy stared down at his shoes. They were faded, ripping at the sides. He shuffled back, his shoes went out of view. She glanced back up at him, his eyes were strayed away from her, as if he was embarrassed. Another pang of guilt punched her in the gut. She sucked in a breath and smiled. "Thanks for the recipe, I'll definitely try it out tonight."
His eyes lit up and his toothy grin returned, it made her chest feel warm.
"Awesome, tell me how it is next time you come!"
Lucy smiled back nervously, remembering how this wasn't even supposed to happen, before casting her eyes away this time. "Yeah, of course!" She took a step back, her leg bumped into something soft. Happy purred, circling around her legs. She almost forgot about him.
"Happy, always getting in the way," Natsu shook his head and picked up the cat, he nuzzled his nose against Happy's. "He really likes you, doesn't he?" Natsu propped Happy up so that they were both facing her. Lucy snorted at the sight of them both, they displayed their emotions flat out on their faces, they could've been the same person.
"He's the best," Lucy scratched him behind his ears again, Happy nuzzled back into her hand in return. "I've got to get going, thank you so much for the recipe!" Lucy walked back out of the storage room. "My aunt Spetto loves spaghetti and she's visiting this evening, I bet she'll love it." Another lie, another day. Miss Spetto and Lucy were as different as night and day, but she acted more of a parent than Jude.
"She'll never want to leave after tasting this, I swear by my soul." Natsu said solemnly, as if he was taking an oath. Lucy chuckled and stopped by the front door, giving Happy one last stroke on the head.
"If you need any fantastic noodle recipes, just find me! I know all of the family secret recipes." Natsu smiled wide. "We hope to see you soon!" He raised Happy's paw and waved it at her. "Say bye to Layla!" Happy meowed in response and playfully nipped at his hand until Natsu released his paw.
Lucy couldn't help but smile, she waved back.
A/N: Very creative title (^': This is just a lil short story I whipped up out of the blue! I wanted to make something a little more light hearted (I mean, compared to the rest of my fics this will definitely be on the more lighthearted side LOL), so here ya go! This will only be a couple of chapters, so it'll be a short series fic. Won't have a constant update schedule, but it shouldn't run for too long. I was missing writing these two, so I wanted to write something short for them whenever I'm free (this is like a no pressure fic, which I love). Hope you enjoy!