Author's Note: Since I don't see much of the "already in a relationship" scenarios in the Nalu shipping when in the romance genre, I decided to kick another in the list. And I get why since you wanna plan out perfectly how they meet or meet again and the dramatic first kiss thing I get it. But, you know, there are flashbacks too. Plus, guys just so you know this is NALU as much fighting and other love–interests I put in here, it's NALU (And some other ships, of course).

I also apologize if some characters are OOC. Alternate Universe tends to do that since as of I–forgot–where–this–is–from–(think it's Divergent or at least in the series): "What makes up a person and their personality is not their genes, but their past experiences that made them stronger and still continue to." (It's not the exact words but same idea/thought.)

And so because of my snazzy excuse, characters are either acting on or close to their original characters. If not, it's due to their shift in their pasts that make them a different person. But I do like how people portray different characters as because it kinda makes it more notable and unique as an individual story.

Chapter 1: It's Okay if You Don't Love Me

{We weren't meant to be anyways.}

"I love you, Natsu."

Those words had started it all. Laying on the park bench and a hand shielding his eyes, Natsu laid in his school uniform, thinking.

"Natsu, Natsu! I love ya!"

She's so cute. Blond hair bouncing off her shoulder, she giggled and smiled with ease. No hesitation at all.

What happened?

"Oh it's Natsu," she glanced in his direction, eyes glazing over with cold and hurt, "He's so dumb."

Natsu glared back at her, sitting up from his laid-back position while throwing his arm to his sides. Her blond hair brushed off her shoulders as she turned away from him to pass by the corner with one of her "best" friends.

Lucy's such a bitch.

"Oh, it's Lucy," he imitated her sarcastically, rolling his eyes and talking with his tongue in his teeth, "She thinks everybody wants her tits. Truth is, Lulu, we all know they're fake."

"What did you say?" she whipped her blond head back, her voice raising as she backed up and met his eye.

"I said," his tongue slightly hung from the side of his mouth, "Lu, hon, you are such a horny bitch."

Her friend peaked from the corner, staring in awe as Lucy strutted straight up to Natsu, towering over his temple on the bench.

"Ugh, it's Natsu," she battered her fake eyelashes and crossed her arms, rolling her eyes, "I can't tell if it's a boy or a girl because of its retarded pink hair."

"It's fucking dyed, you dumb blonde," he snapped as sitting all the way up on the bench, dangerously pulling trigger through the dark in his irises.

"I have A's for your information, Natsu," she scowled while her eyebrows scrunched. "Now, sweetie, let me do an impression of your daddy," then Lucy twirled around from him and stomped away from him with a thud chopping at her heels.

"You don't get the last word, Heartfilia!" he screamed, pouncing onto his feet and off the bench, as his voice seemed to strain louder, "You're not all fuckin' everything, you snobby whore!"

Her back still facing him, she waved a hand off to him while she disappeared into a corner out of his sight. A distinctive smirk was smoldered on her face as he could hear her haunting voice in his head.

"1-0 Lucy."

"Go to hell," he whispered, his body slamming back onto the bench and panting angrily.

If death could be explained in words more strategic, those words would be "Lucy Heartfilia" and "Natsu Dragneel".

"Lucy, you didn't attend class last week," the student council president, Erza Scarlet, stood in front of the blond haired girl with her arms crossed and a scowl on her face.

"So?" Lucy hummed through her lip gloss as she carefully applied it with the help of a hand mirror in her other hand, "I was busy. Don't you ever get busy?"

"On the contrary," the scarlet girl pushed up the side of her glasses with a finger, "I am always busy. Defending student's rights and fighting evil, I am the sole body of the entire school. I am the student council president!"

Her eyes dazzling with pride as Erza held up her signature pose she did every time everybody question her authority indirectly or not. A knee to the ground and an arm pumped with a fist in the air; the pose of the idle famous female wrestler, Titania.

"Yeah, yeah. I hear your speech everyday," Lucy waved off the president with her lip gloss as she put down her hand mirror, turning her head to look at her, "I'm busy, okay? I'll get good grades or whatever so just calm down."

"Just getting good grades isn't enough, Lucy," Erza Scarlet retained her sense of logic and stood up from her position, arms crossed again, "Attending school is better for your college record, professors look for students who commit and aim to rise higher than they can reach."

"Isn't that just being a dreamer?" Lucy eyed Erza as tucking hair behind her ear, "I'm not my mother's daughter, Erza. I'm not aiming to be the best of the best. That's plain stupid."

"Lucy, don't talk about your mother like that," Erza warned her while her fingers subconsciously curled around the rim of her glasses, "That's not very nice."

"I think taking off those speculars of yours will suit you better," Lucy commented blankly as standing up from her seat, hands pressing on her desk as support, "It'll bring out more of your hair and eyes."

"I don't want a boyfriend, Lucy, if that's what you're implying," Erza's glare gritted through Lucy's fear chords as the blonde immediately sat back down in her chair with a jolt.

"Touchy subjects for both of us, haha." Lucy spoke quickly and nervously chatted with her, sweat dripping down her forehead while she did tense hand gestures, "Ya know. My mother and your imaginary boyfriend."

Erza's eyes locked onto Lucy's face dangerously.

"Wa–wait! I mean, haha. He's just some kid from elementary, right? No hard feelings or anything, hehe."

"Please don't hurt me," Lucy whispered desperately. The last time she and Erza had an actual, real fight, Lucy couldn't walk for months and constantly went to a therapist for mental repairs. That was not a fun time for her.

"Fine," Erza stubbornly growled before walking off out of the classroom with steam smoking out of her ears, her arms still folded across her chest.

Lucy sighed with ease as she leaned back in her chair, her shoulders slumped lacking in the stiff department. Erza was a landmine. Get her mad, you might die. Get her happy, you might die anyways. You just had to be right in the middle, between the mines constantly hopping back and forth.

It was scary.

Lucy twisted her head to stare outside the window to the classroom where a few students hung out during lunchtime. She blinked as the remembrance of her encounter with Natsu Dragneel passed her mind. She'd done good, hadn't she?

He was mad at her.

She didn't give a fuck.

"Haven't you heard yet?" a whisper muttered from his left as he ignored it, his hands in his pockets as he strolled down the hallway.

"Natsu Dragneel and Lucy Heartfilia broke up," another voice cracked quietly as it jumped into a normal tone, "again."

Natsu snapped his head back and a dark aura shot a beam at the two conspiring voices talking jack about him. They shut up on contact with his monstrous dark eyes switching to a hazel and hardened into stone statues as his head whipped back, his feet walking in the direction he was formerly was heading.

"That's better," his voice rang casually.

"Lucy?" Yukino sat beside her, legs swinging back and forth as Lucy sat outside as classes were about to begin, "You should be heading to classes right now."

"I don't need to learn about how the U.S. gained independence from Britain again," Lucy fixed the bow of her uniform, "I learned that in first grade."

"It was third," Yukino corrected her as sitting down next to her on the bench, "You don't wanna go to that class because Natsu's there?"

"That's my shitty ex, Yukino!" Lucy snapped at her, standing up from her seat as pointing a finger at her, "I don't care about him! He's some punk who dyes his hair pink for some creepy fetish! I don't love, or even like, him!"

"He's just an ex. That's it." the blond girl finished her statement then faced her back to Yukino and walked away from her.

She didn't need to cast around her thoughts about some guy she'd dumped a few days ago. There was nothing to talk about.

"Lucy!" she rammed into his side on accident as she slammed into the floor. Her body was next to his as they laid side by side, both with irritated looks on their faces.

"Natsu, I just had to run into you," Lucy rolled her eyes as she sat up and began to fix the damage done to her hair by the fall.

"God, you made me sound like cancer," Natsu copied her gesture out of habit, eyes circling and hands lost in his pink hair.

"I feel sorry for people with cancer then," she pulled hair into a side ponytail, twisting a blue ribbon into it, "They have to deal with something as dumb as you."

"Hey!" his eyes narrowed and his mouth shouts while he fixed his messy hair into the way he liked it, constantly brushing over it with his fingertips to ensure that it was perfect, "At least, I'm not some cocky blond chick with self–esteem problems."

"I do not have self–esteem problems," Lucy slapped him in the arm hard.

"Hey, I never said it was you," his head dipped down a bit, his tongue hanging out of his mouth, "Luce." He was being sarcastic.

"You know how much I hate that nickname, Nashi," she pouted.

"Shut the fuck up, I was five," his body suddenly stood up and grabbed the collar of her shirt to bring her face closer to his.

"And I was five, too," Lucy tossed her head with the little space she had and smirked.

"Luce."

"Nashi, baby."

He growled as his eyes were shifting from obsidian to hazel again because of Lucy's constant look–so–innocent smirk across her cherry glossed lips. She was so annoying and just unbearable! Always being so. So fuckin' selfish!

Her hands pressing to his cheeks in the next moment, Lucy pulled him into a quick violent kiss, only lasting for probably a second, before she pushed him away and returned to her daily routine of smirking.

"Don't kiss me, Heartfilia," his onyx eyes focusing only on her as he wiped the gloss off of his mouth with the sleeve of his uniform.

"Shut up, you kissed me back," she smiled, the lip gloss on her mouth slightly smoldered.

Dammit. She was hot.

As of the morning of the next day, Lucy found herself laying on her couch and not in her bed.

"Natsu?" she glanced, her voice a little mumbly from just waking up, over to the out–of–place boy in her kitchen, currently flipping pancakes on the stove, "What did we do last night?"

"Don't worry, Lucy," he absently flipped another pancake, looking over his shoulder to get a short glimpse at her before returning to cooking, "We didn't do anything serious. Making out and Netflix."

"Oh, right," she placed her hand over her forehead, dazed, "Netflix."

"Did you take something last night?" he began to place a stack of pancakes on a plate and decorate them with syrup, "You're usually more alert in the mornings."

"Natsu, what time is it?" her head on the arm of the couch, she looked up at him with sleepiness hoarsing her voice.

"One in the morning."

"What the fuck, Natsu!" she suddenly sat up and threw one of the pillows near her at him, "Nobody fuckin' wakes up this early in the morning to make pancakes! Are you high or something, dumbass!?"

"I'm not high, Lucy!" he yelled back at her, thrusting the pillow smacked at his face away from him, "I eat breakfast everyday at this time, okay!?"

"Have you been doing this–no, how long have you been doing this?" her voice lowered as she awaited his response.

"Ever since fourth grade," he stated nonchalantly, returning her stare.

"Oh my God, Natsu," she facepalmed and fell backwards into her couch, exhausted with his stupid, childish ways, "Go. To. Sleep."

"After my pancakes, Lucy," he stuck a fork into his pancakes stacked higher than the domestic people who eat at a time.

"Natsu!" she screamed, chucking another throw pillow in his face.

"Juvia thought you two broke up," Juvia stood in front of the two, her hands rubbing her eyes to check whether she was dreaming or not. Well, turned out she wasn't.

"We did," Natsu and Lucy both responded at the same time in unison then glanced at each other before shrugging.

"And you two decided to sleep with each other as exes?" the blue haired girl's hat nearly fell off her head as her mouth gaped open.

"Making out and Netflix," Natsu corrected her with hesitation, his hand scratching the back of his neck, "Two different things, captain."

"I'm not having sex with my ex," Lucy rolled her eyes as combing her hair with her fingers, "I'm not that low."

"You are low, Luce," he turned to her as her hand slapped his right cheek and returned back to his left.

Her blond hair swayed as she commented with her other hand pointing at him, "Nashi, you're stupid."

And all the way to school, Juvia was forced to listen to the ex–couple fight and bicker around petty subjects like nicknames from when they were five. Why was she neighbors with Lucy again?

"You guys are unbelievable," Juvia's hand smacked her face for the forty–eighth time that morning.

"Do you have a problem with it?" they both paused their fight, Lucy pulling Natsu's cheeks and Natsu's hands tugging Lucy's hair, and gave Juvia their attention.

Juvia frowned.

They had arrived at the school's entrance as a certain familiar figure stood waiting near the entrance.

"He's waiting again?" Lucy's head tilted as she and Natsu released each other of the other's touch.

"Juvia knows she's not going to come," the swim captain commented quietly, almost so they couldn't hear it but did.

"Wa–wait," the blond of the trio darted her gaze at her companions, a questioning look on her face, "What was his name again?"

"Gajeel Redfox." Natsu answered her with a nod, "I remember him well. Fifth grade, had piercings, and in my class. Got suspended the first day of school and kicked out the following week."

Juvia shook her head, "Juvia says that Gajeel just has some issues. The fight wasn't his fault."

"I never really heard the entire story," he glanced back at her as their little group began to approach the school doors, past the "Gajeel Redfox".

Every step they took, Natsu became more conscious of himself. Gajeel Redfox, the little eleven year–old with a nose piercing whom he had not seen since last summer at the supermarket was standing next to him, breathing, as he walked through the school's glass doors into its building.

He absently grabbed the sleeve of Lucy's shirt.

When he made it through the doors and deep in the hallway out of Gajeel's cateye sight, his breathing started up again while his brain replayed Gajeel staring at him tensely as he passed by, too nervous to make eye contact.

"Nashi," her chocolate eyes watched him out of its corners, "You can let go of my shirt, you fucking pansy."

"Says the bitch with yellow hair!" he screamed back at her on instinct and lunged for the collar of her shirt so he could pin her down.

"Natsu Dragneel."

"Natsu Dragneel!"

"Is Natsu Dragneel here or is he–"

"Here I am, bitches!" the pink haired boy crashed through the door, breaking it down with only his shoes as he raised his hand to the teacher as she frowned disapprovingly.

"No 'bitch' is here except you, Dragneel, so get back in your seat or I'm calling Titania down here," Ms. Lilica fired back at him as an echo of "ohs" came from the other students in the classroom. "Same goes for you all," her harsh voice snapped back at the class with a pointy nail polished finger at them. They all shut up instantly as Natsu did beforehand at the mention of Titania.

Natsu did a lopsided frown and strolled over to his seat next to some punk named Gray Fullbuster, tossing his backpack under his desk.

"You got owned, Dragneel," Gray scoffed as doing random tricks with his pencil.

"I'm not an ice cream obsession like you," Natsu joked, his hand casually slapping his best friend's back.

"Dude," Gray glanced at him sideways and flipped his pencil in the air then caught it, "I'm not your G.F."

"I just got out of a relationship, Grapes," he stuck his tongue out and pulled back his hand.

"No, I meant, gay friend, you dope," Gray smiled, his quite attractive pearlies showing themselves off to him.

"If you keep doing that, I might actually fall in love with you," Natsu's head pressed against his desk, a fake dreamy glint in his eyes.

They both laughed in unison from the second row. Hands on their stomachs and backs bending back and forth like twins, these boys were the best of friends ever since sixth grade.

"Fullbuster! Dragneel! Professional buffoon classes for both of you!" Ms. Lilica's pointy finger returned and shot at the two.

"It's detention, you idiot!" Natsu said between his laughs through his teeth carefreely.

"Hi, I'm sorry to interrupt, but," a girl in sunglasses suddenly approached Lucy, who was about to pour a cup of coffee into her mouth, with a clipboard in her hands, "do you know where Vermillion Academy is?"

"Seven blocks from here, pass the flower shop, turn right, and ta–da!" Lucy responded with her arms spread out in sarcasm, "You're there!"

"Haha," the girl laughed after her smile and handed Lucy a strange piece of paper on its back side, "Thank you very much for the show."

"That was weird," Lucy shrugged and drank the rest of her coffee, stuffing the paper into her skirt pocket. It was lunchtime, and Lucy was spending out in the outside quarters of a café. A café with good coffee to be exact.

"HOLY CRAP, LUCY!" a blue haired girl came sprinting full–force at her out of the blue, slamming her body into the chair across from the blond and falling to the ground.

"Hey, Levine, you still breathing?" Lucy cocked her head as looking down upon her friend.

Her breath uneven and pink flushing her skin, Levy placed her hand on her chest, "Running a little more than I should, but Lucy!" Levy suddenly bounced off the ground and grabbed Lucy's cheeks, shaking them, "Have. You. Seen. Mirajane's. Cute. Little. Sister. Yet."

"First, let go!" Lucy shoved her hand in front of Levy's face, making the blue haired girl's hand fall of her face, "And what are you talking about?"

"You know! The model we saw last year on our trip to Canada! Mirajane–freakin'–Strauss!~" Levy's feet jumped off the ground and twirled in a circle. Lucy couldn't help but smile a bit. Levy was a good kid.

"Uh–huh," the blonde nodded with a stupid smile on her face.

"Well," Levy's twirling intensified as she began to hop about with her arms in the air, "turns out her sister's moving out here in Magnolia, and we might be able to get snapshots of her to sell on Ebay!"

Lucy exploded into laughter as Levy grinned contently, completely halting her dancing to watch Lucy's giggle fest.

"I thought you wanted to meet her or something," Lucy's laughing squeezed in between her words as her laughing only got louder when she attempted to seize it, "Instead, you just wanna sell photos of her online!"

"Levine McGarden, you genius!" Lucy jumped up from her seat and wrapped her arms around Levy, now both filling the cafe's empty air with snickering and slapping on the knees. Customers around them awkwardly stared at their little scenarios of laughing while rolling around on the concrete.

"Anywho," Levy closed her mouth, a smile peeking through the struggle of not laughing, "I'm gotta buy a horde of books with the money. You in or what?"

Levy's hand stretched out in front of Lucy, both of them laying down on their backs.

"Of course!" Lucy squealed with a slap on Levy's extended hand to her as they both continued to smirk and pick themselves off the ground.

"I heard you wanted to kiss me," Natsu leaned forward as she struggled against a wall, trapped by his snare.

"Natsu, that was horrible," Lucy's arms crossed, eyes glaring up at his position that nearly made out with her, "I thought you were better than that. Was your flirting always so straightforward?"

"Well, 'cause it always worked on you so I guess," he paused and looked up before continuing, "I kinda threw everything else I knew out because I thought that you were the one."

"Am I still the one?"

They both stared at each other.

"Are you fucking kidding me?" he quickly stepped from her, his back pressing the opposite wall of the janitor's closet, "You broke up with me, Heartfilia."

Her voice raised like it always did when she was being defensive. Being a hypocrite. "It was–"

"Shut up!" he covered his ears as he raised his flag to start a war, "I hate this about you, and how you think you're always right!"

"It's because I am!" she stepped closer to him, easily sizing up to his roars, "All my life I've been devoting to studying all kinds of subjects!"

"You're such a bitch!" his voice was cracking as his throat felt awfully raw, "Just because your GPA is higher than average doesn't mean you're better than anyone else, especially me!"

"So what!?" she growled, her teeth clenching together as she moved toward him, "I've spent all my time learning every single thing in my father's library to the stars in the sky to how many possible factors is there to make somebody voluntarily go to the mall!"

"Oh, so you're admitting that you think you're smart and the best 'cause you are just some little kid who says big words!"

"A little kid!?" Lucy's voice snapped while she was an inch away from him, her hands on his chest, "You're the freaking little kid here whining about my GPA! All I asked was if I was still the one, it was a–"

"Ever since we first met, I thought you were nice and cute, but now you're just a horny whore with the habit of toying with guys with pink hair!" he argued, his hand gripping her shoulder.

"You're the one who dyed your brown hair pink!" she shoved him hard into the wall as he cried out in pain, her voice amplifying louder, "You're the one who asked me out first!"

"You're the one who broke up with me first!" his hand snatched the collar of her shirt like it always did and dragged her close to him, close enough so his words injected her harder, "You're always the problem!"

Soon, they both crashed into the floors of the janitor's closet with Natsu on top of Lucy, close enough to kiss her neck.

"Don't touch me," Lucy struggled under Natsu as he pinned her down, the smallest bit of tension in her throat.

"You know what?" Natsu's eyes switched to its poisonous overdrive mode, his teeth biting his teeth harshly, "Yeah, yeah. Let's get back together, Luce."

He shoved his mouth into hers and sharply kissed her for a moment, Lucy grasping for air in his coarse actions. He swiftly pulled away as his eyes held onto her desperate position, feeding into the fright smoldered on her lip gloss.

"Now, Lucy, I'm breaking up with you."

Heavy breathing and slaps on the cheek, Natsu draped his arm over his eyes as his back leaned on the wall for support.

"Leave me alone, Natsu!"

He had done something wrong, and he knew it. Sometimes, he pretended there was such thing as true love, and that crying was just a concept found in fairy tales just to create dramatic, suspenseful scenes.

"I wish I'd never met you! I hate you!"

His eyelids fluttered shut while he waited in the hallway, patiently. Yes, he regretted it. No, he didn't send Lucy to the hospital again. Yes, he hurt her. No, they hadn't made up yet.

He was sick of this. Getting back together to just break up again. He was stuck in a loop with an "on and off" relationship with the beautiful Lucy Heartfilia whose reputation once held up her personality.

"Yes, you're still the one," Natsu listened to himself softly mumble as flashes of a blond haired girl came to mind, "No, I don't think I'll ever get over you."

Author's Note: I'm kinda having fun writing Lucy as this indecisive, delusional character whose sorta of a bitch and sorta not. It's hot. And Natsu being a tiny bit nervous and not confident at situations (Edolas–ian trait possibly) so I like this. Alot.

Anyways, tell me whatcha guys think in the comments and maybe I'll type up the next chapter soon since this has been in my drafts for a like a week or two now. Reviews!~