Natsu tapped his fingers in a continuous rhythm on his desk. One by one the seats around him began to fill with students, all as uneager as he to partake in their early morning chemistry lecture. Natsu listened as everyone around him whined about the falling snow outside. To them this change in weather seemed to be catastrophic, but to Natsu he hardly even noticed the difference in temperature.
To be completely honest, Natsu didn't mind the snow, but since that stupid ice popsicle Gray loved the snow that means that Natsu absolutely despised it. Anything Gray enjoyed was automatically Natsu's worst enemy. Therefore, much like everyone else, winter was Natsu's least favorite season.
As Natsu scooted his backpack over so a boy could climb over him to get to a seat in the middle of his isle, and get his backpack soaked from the boys wet boots in the process, his ears perked at the sound of a squeaking chair in front of him. Just like he'd hoped, a head of blonde hair was now in his view. She was cutting it close to the beginning of class, which had been making Natsu antsy because if she would have skipped class then his whole morning would've been ruined.
Chemistry wasn't exactly Natsu's class of choice to be attending at 8:50 in the morning. Not because it bored him, however, more like the opposite. As a grade A pyromaniac chemistry was his topic of expertise, so attending this class was in short, a waste of his precious time.
Natsu showed up to the first few lectures simply because he had no other options. They were mandatory for his grade. His plan was to just sleep through the lecture entirely, but when he noticed the girl in front of him was taking notes a computer instead of her notebook he was intrigued. At first, he just thought she was just being a typical nerd. Another one of those front row kids with the twenty highlighters… not the type of kids who he usually conversed with.
Then a few minutes into lecture the girl switched to a new screen and Natsu's interest immediately peeked. She was now on the Buzzfeed website, and Natsu knew he was in for a treat. That entire first lecture was spent with her taking weirdo quizzes that ranged from as normal as 'What Disney princess are you?' to 'What deodorant brand would you be?' Ever since then Natsu has been coming to this lecture, just to see what that girl will be doing on her computer instead of actually paying attention.
Sometimes Natsu will even look up the quizzes on his phone and play along.
Natsu learned her name about a month in to the semester because occasionally she goes on her Facebook as well. At first he thought her name was Luigi, it's really hard to read the screen from so far away, but a week after that he decided that it definitely said Lucy. However, he still calls her Luigi in his head, just because he thinks it fits her better.
Especially after she took that Mario quiz and got the character Luigi. That might have been the best day of Natsu's life. If only there was somebody he could tell who would understand why he was so happy and not think he was the biggest stalker on the planet.
The lights in the room finally dimmed, signaling the beginning of lecture and Natsu was practically bouncing in his seat he was so excited. He was starting to think he should get a hobby if taking Buzzfeed quizzes was becoming the highlight of his week. As is her routine, once the professor began talking, Luigi opened her laptop. Much to Natsu's excitement Buzzfeed was already displayed on the screen.
The first quiz she took was a 'What kitchen appliance are you?' quiz. Natsu smirked, she always goes for the weirdest ones she can find first. It also takes her at least two minutes on every question, even the most ridiculous ones. As if figuring out which kitchen appliance she is really is going to make an impact on her life. Adorable.
After about 7 minutes of ridiculous food and utensil questions she finally gets an answer, and Natsu can't help but actually laugh out loud. Toaster. Lucy is a toaster. He doesn't know why he finds that so fitting for such a weirdo like her.
She must have heard him laugh because she whips her head around and looks right at him. For the first time, he is face to face with the girl who he's been kind of creepily watching all semester. Of all the quizzes she's taken and ridiculous results she's gotten, why oh why would a toaster be his demise?
His mouth opens and closes as he searches for something to say, but all he can think is-
"Your eyes are brown?"
She raises an eyebrow at him, and oh my god he said that out loud.
"What?" She whispers at him.
"It's just that last week you took a quiz that said your natural eye color should be green… so I… assumed…" He could tell that by the way her face looked more and more creeped out by every word that came out of his mouth he should probably stop talking.
Slowly, without a single word, she turned around and closed her laptop. For the rest of lecture Natsu sat with his head on his desk. His one chance at talking to Luigi, or Lucy, or whatever quiz girl's name was and he ruined it… No more entertaining quizzes for him. And no more talking to Lucy who probably thinks who's a huge stalker. Which he's not… right?
Natsu lifted his head a few inches to look at the girl in front of him, well to look at the back of her head anyway. No, he's not that weird. And he definitely doesn't want Lucy thinking he is. Although Natsu isn't really sure why he cares so much what this girl thinks of him, but he supposes that it's because it's almost like he knows her personally after watching her take all those online quizzes. As if she's a friend Natsu's known for a long time, and he definitely doesn't want to give up the opportunity to actually get to know her because she thinks he' s a creep.
The bell rang to signal the end of lecture and Natsu bolted up, jumping over some poor soul to insure that he'd make it to Lucy in time. Sure enough, just before she opened the door to leave the building Natsu was able to grab her wrist and get her attention.
"Wha-" She turned around to see him staring back at her with a huge smile on his face. Taken off guard Lucy took a step back, holding her wrist to her chest.
"I'm sorry if I sounded a little weird in there. I just panicked and couldn't think of something to say to you!" He felt his cheeks warm as he brought a hand up to rub the back of his neck. "You just… make me nervous apparently."
Her cheeks turned a light shade of pink and she looked to stare out the entrance of the building. Natsu thought he'd said something wrong again. He opened his mouth to try again, but she cut him off.
"You said something about my quizzes…" She turned to him, looking up at him with those newly discovered big brown eyes. His breath caught in his throat. "Have you been watching me take them every lecture?"
"Yeah... I mean it's really interesting though. You're basically the reason I show up to class." Natsu laughed a little and then went wide eyed when he realized what he said. He must be red as a tomato right now because he feels like he's on fire. He looks up at her when he hears a small giggle.
Well, Natsu supposes that having her laugh at his embarrassment is better than her running out the door in fear of her life. This is going much better than he expected. Clearing his throat he held out his hand to the blonde.
"My name is Natsu, and I'd like to prove to you that I am not a stalker." She raised an eyebrow, and well, Natsu could now see this going downhill again. "I mean if you'll let me. Cause I really don't want you thinking I'm a stalker, you seem really nice and now that I'm looking at you you're really pretty and I should stop talking, but I can't cause I'm nervous and oh my god this is going just as bad as I thought it would now and-"
Lucy burst out laughing. Not a cute, girly giggle like you would picture from a pretty blonde like her. This was a bending over, arms around the stomach laugh, which honestly just intrigued Natsu more. Yet, also was very discouraging all at the same time.
So Natsu just stood there deflated as he waited for Lucy to finish laughing at what he assumed was his feeble attempt at asking her to hang out with him. Looking back he supposes it was pretty foolish.
"Would you like to go get coffee, right now?" she asked. When she smiled up at him her eyes had fresh tears in them still from laughter. They looked so pretty he almost didn't hear the words that had come out of her mouth.
Almost.
"I'm sorry, what?" He blinked a few times. Wasn't she just laughing at the very thought of him asking her out in any way?
"Coffee? Now?" She pointed her finger towards the falling snow outside. "It'd be a nice contrast to the weather. Also I'm exhausted from getting up this early to be honest."
This was not what he expected to happen, but he was not about to turn this opportunity down.
"That sounds great! I know the perfect place! It has coffee, food, and everything!" He quickly fixed the scarf around his neck before reaching for the girls hand to pull her outside into the snow. "C'mon! You're gonna love it Luigi!"
"What! Slow down! Wait a second, Luigi!? My name is Lucy!" She hollered from behind him as he pulled her down the slippery sidewalks of their campus. He barked out a laugh and turned around to look at her. She was puffing out her cheeks in protest, and her nose was already red from the cold. His stomach did an unfamiliar flip.
"I know!" He smiled.