"Wake up, flame brain! It's time to get up!"
Natsu groaned and forced his eyes open to blink up blearily at the grinning face looking down at him. His groggy incomprehension turned into angry irritation.
"What the hell are you doing in my house, ice block?"
"Happy let me in."
Natsu's nostrils flared. "Where is that stupid cat? I'll strangle him."
"He already went to the guild."
"Without me? Well, I'm going to go give him a piece of my mind!"
"Sorry, you can't do that right now. The guild is already setting up the surprise party. I'm just here to keep you busy so that you don't walk in on them until they're ready."
"Surprise party?" Natsu repeated blankly.
"Yep." Gray had leaned back and was picking at his thumbnail in a bored fashion, but now added, almost as an afterthought, "Happy birthday."
Birthday…? That was right. Natsu sat up abruptly. Today was his birthday.
…Although he rather wished he was allowed to sleep in on his birthday if he wanted to. It was too darn early.
"It's not really much of a surprise if you're telling me about it, is it?" he asked acidly as he pulled himself out of bed and searched the floor for some clothes that didn't smell too bad.
Gray shrugged. "Surprise parties are fun, and we wouldn't want you to have too much fun. Just pretend to be surprised when we head over there. I'm only here because Erza is forcing me to play nice for a couple hours beforehand. Unfortunately, her instructions specifically said that my methods to distract you could not include fighting."
"I bet they also specifically said that you couldn't tell me there was a surprise party," Natsu said dryly.
"Huh. You're smarter than you look. Hurry up, squinty eyes. Let's get going."
Natsu paused in his search and blinked down at the wrinkled vest in his hand. Actually, if he wasn't allowed to go to the guild yet, then why couldn't he just stay here?
"Nah," he said. "I think I'll just go back to sleep. You can wake me up when it's time to go."
Gray rolled his eyes and slouched back against the wall. "No can do. Erza wanted me to keep you occupied and distracted, not asleep."
"She also wanted you to keep the party a surprise, and you didn't have a problem messing that up. Anyway, the secret is already out. I know you're just trying to keep me away from the guild, so can't I just get some sleep? I'll tell her that we did whatever."
He flopped back over on the bed and closed his eyes, willing the annoying intruder to go away. There was a long pause, which gave him hope that Gray might actually take him up on the offer. After all, he doubted that Gray himself had been terribly pleased at being conscripted into this. The two of them might be friends, but that didn't mean they necessarily spent a lot of time together unsupervised. That usually just led to fighting.
"The Dragon Festival is in Magnolia today," Gray said.
Natsu's eyes flew open and he shot upright. "What? I thought that was still two weeks out!"
Gray watched him through half-lidded eyes, the workings of his brain as incomprehensible as ever. "Guess they decided to show up early. They're here."
The Dragon Festival was the best festival in all of Fiore. Even better than Fantasia, although that was probably only because it had dragons. Dragons made everything better. There was no way Natsu could not go.
"Let me get dressed," he said, snatching up a mismatched assortment of garments and tugging them on.
"Your shirt is backwards," Gray observed in that stupid lazy drawl of his.
Natsu fixed the offending garment and started for the door, hopping on one foot as he pulled on one sandal and then the other. "I'm heading out!"
Gray sauntered along after him with a small smirk. "I'm coming too."
"Not necessary. Go away. I'll even tell Erza we hung out and you were on your best behavior if you'll leave me alone."
"Please. Like I trust you that much. I don't fancy getting skewered, so I'll tag along."
And he did, no matter how much Natsu tried to shake him off or convince him to go away. He thought he was supposed to have some say in what went on for his birthday, but apparently Gray had missed the memo. Not cool.
But Natsu was going to the Dragon Festival either way, tagalong or not. And, to be honest, it might be fun going with Gray. Annoying and frustrating for sure, because Gray was very good at being annoying and frustrating, but he also knew how to have a good time. And without Erza breathing down their necks, they could fight all they wanted.
The streets on the west side of the city were draped with cloth and banners and streamers in all manner of brilliant reds and golds and oranges. The air was filled with laughter and shouting and loud music, the streets were crowded with excited spectators and performers and vendors, and an air of celebration hung over the festivities.
Natsu wandered along, gaping at everything like a goggle-eyed fish out of water, while Gray stuck annoyingly close to his side. He ignored the fortune tellers—most of them were frauds, and he could always get Cana to do her fancy card thing if he was really that curious—and most of the stalls purporting to sell artifacts from real dragons. None of these people had even seen a real dragon, much less managed to get their hands on genuine scales or fangs or any of that. Good enough tourist trap, but Natsu was only interested in the real deal.
One thing in particular did catch his eye, though, as he strolled down the line of decorated stalls crowded along the sidewalk. He paused and peered closer at the small figurine. It was a little dragon covered with red scales and accents of yellow, coiled up and staring out at the world with beady black eyes. It seemed somehow familiar.
"Whatcha looking at?" Gray asked.
"Looks kind of like Igneel," Natsu mumbled. "I mean, except that Igneel was a lot bigger and could fly and breathe fire and had sharper fangs and was more badass."
The impatient shifting beside him stilled, and Gray was quiet for a long moment. "Dunno," he said finally. "Seems pretty cute to me."
Natsu scowled and rounded on him. "Dragons are not cute! They are fearsome!"
Gray's dark eyes were wary, maybe a little uncertain, but the smirk stayed plastered on his lips. "Aw, look at the itty bitty teeth."
Natsu opened his mouth to tell the jerk off some more, but was interrupted by a fearsomely loud growl from his stomach. Hunger hit him full-force, and he was instantly distracted by the pangs.
"I'm so hungry," he groaned. "Why did you make me come out here before breakfast?"
Gray rolled his eyes. "I never said you couldn't eat first. You're the one who decided to come running out here as soon as you heard the word 'dragon'. Well, come on. Let's find something to eat."
They abandoned the main festival to duck into one of the restaurants on the periphery. It was more crowded than usual with the festival going on next door, but at least not as jam-packed as the venues inside the designated area for festivities.
Natsu guzzled down several plates of food, while Gray leaned back in the seat across from him with his arms crossed over his chest and watched expressionlessly.
"Don't you want to get anything?" Natsu asked around a mouthful of food.
Gray's lips twitched in disgust at the display. "No, because I'm going to be stuck paying for your meal as a bribe for you not to tell Erza that I ruined the surprise, and that's already going to be ridiculously expensive. You're a bottomless pit."
Natsu's face lit up. "Well, if you're paying, then I might as well order another plate!"
Gray closed his eyes and dropped his head back against the seat, a long-suffering look plastered on his face. Natsu snickered in delight and ordered fifths.
When the check came, Gray's eyebrows shot upwards and he paled visibly. "Damn."
"I like bribery," Natsu said cheekily. He leaned back and sighed in contentment.
"Well, I hope you enjoyed your present," Gray said as he handed over an exorbitant amount of jewels to the waiter.
"What? This was bribery, not a present."
"I knew you'd eat me out of my entire savings, so I didn't bother getting you a real present. This is expensive enough, thanks."
"That's not fair!" Natsu whined. "It's my birthday!"
"And happy birthday to you," Gray said dryly. "Let's go."
Natsu huffed at the injustice of it all, but quickly forgot his indignation when they walked back to the festival proper. There were so many cool things to see, especially the giant dragons winding down the street. So sure, maybe they had a bunch of human feet sticking out beneath them, but it wasn't like these people would be able to find a real dragon for their parade.
There were also tons of awesome street performers, although it was hard to hear them over all the loud music. Natsu's favorite was some guy who could eat fire. Just like him! Except that he wasn't even a mage. Natsu had no idea how he did it, and even Gray seemed impressed. The only downside was that Gray refused to let Natsu steal any of the fire, saying that he had already eaten enough for five people without ruining the guy's show.
"It's probably late enough to head back now," Gray said finally, raising his voice to be heard over the commotion.
But Natsu didn't want to leave. Any celebration of dragons was awesome. And, weirdly enough, it was kind of fun to be here with Gray. Natsu lived for the snarky banter, and it had been a while since he had hung out just with Gray.
"Five more minutes!" he whined.
Gray hesitated, and Natsu opened his eyes wide in Happy's patented kitty-cat eyes technique. Gray blinked at him for a second and then looked away, a small smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.
"Whatever," he said. "But you get to explain to Erza why we're late."
"Yay!"
Five minutes turned into more like twenty, but Gray didn't try prompting another exit. Still, Natsu was smart enough to realize that he wouldn't be immune from Erza's wrath even on his birthday, so he eventually conceded defeat.
"That was great!" he said happily as they left the festival behind and he bounced down the street toward the guild. "It's so cool that they came early this year. And on my birthday, even! It's like it was meant to be!"
Gray was watching him with a small smile that he didn't know how to interpret. "Well, glad you had a good time. Now, just remember, pretend to be surprised when we go in, okay?"
"Yeah, yeah."
Natsu could totally get Gray in trouble with Erza—bribery only worked about half the time when it came to the two of them—but he decided to let it go. The festival had been fun, and Gray had been a surprisingly good sport about it even though Erza had forced him into it.
"Alright, here goes."
Gray shoved the doors open with a bang, and they were greeted by a sea of grinning faces.
"Happy birthday!" everyone yelled. Someone threw big handfuls of red confetti into the air, which fluttered towards the ground like scarlet snow.
"Wow!" Natsu said, opening his eyes wide. "What a surprise!"
He glanced over to see if Gray found that satisfactory, only to see him rolling his eyes and shaking his head. Had it been a little too much? Natsu brushed it off. He was already more than a little over the top and dramatic, so he doubted anyone would catch on to the deception.
"Time to break out the booze!" Cana whooped, running off to the bar to argue with Mira about the alcohol limits for the party.
The hall was decorated with crimson and gold streamers—like fire!—and colorful balloons. A huge cake sat on a table in the center with a little wax dragon figure on top, and a big pile of presents wrapped in a veritable rainbow of colors waited nearby.
Everyone was talking and laughing now as someone turned on music and the party fell into full swing.
"Happy birthday!" Lucy said again, bouncing over and throwing her arms around Natsu. He patted her on the back awkwardly until she let go. "I hope you enjoy your party!"
"It's awesome," Natsu said with a smile. He raised one eyebrow at Happy as he flew over. "But I hope you know I'm not pleased that you let Gray into the house."
"Sooorry," Happy said. He flopped over onto Natsu's head. "We needed someone to keep you away from the guild."
"Don't see why it couldn't have been you," Natsu muttered. He might not be the brightest crayon in the box, but even he was smart enough to realize that Happy would be the most obvious choice if they'd wanted to keep the party a secret.
"Did Gray behave?" Erza demanded. She slashed a hard look at the ice mage, who held his hands up and stepped back. "He didn't just start a fight, did he?"
"No, we went out." Natsu grinned, his eyes lighting up. "Did you know that the Dragon Festival is in town? I thought it wasn't going to be here for a couple more weeks!"
Lucy smiled over at Gray. "I still have no idea how you managed to singlehandedly persuade the organizers to move the festival forward two weeks."
Gray flushed and flapped his hands in an unsubtle 'shut up' motion. "Oh crap, someone had better go stop Cana," he said quickly, before hurrying off to where Cana was stirring up a ruckus by the bar.
Natsu blinked after him blankly. "Huh? What do you mean?"
"He must've jumped through hoops to get the whole festival moved." Lucy shook her head in fond admiration. "I don't know if he convinced them or called in a favor or bribed them or scared the crap out of them or what."
"He…got the whole festival moved? To today?"
"Yeah," Happy said. "He put in more effort than I thought he would."
Natsu frowned over at Gray, who was trying to mediate between Cana and Mira and almost got swatted for his trouble. So much for the festival ending up on his birthday being a miraculous coincidence, but it was even more mindbogglingly miraculous that Gray was the one who had made that happen. Seriously, Gray of all people.
"I'm just glad he didn't mess it up," Erza said with a sigh. "I was kind of worried about letting him be the one to keep you occupied, but as long as he didn't start a fight or anything, I guess it's okay."
Natsu's puzzled frown deepened. "If you were so worried about him messing things up, then why did you make him do it? It would've been easier to have Happy do it."
"I didn't make him do it." Erza rolled her eyes. "He definitely wouldn't have been my first choice. But he volunteered, so…"
"He…volunteered?"
"Mhm. And he was making a clumsy mess of things around here, so I let him. Maybe I was being unfair, though. It looks like he did a good job."
Natsu shook his head slowly. Every time he thought he had started figuring Gray out, the idiot threw out something new to surprise him.
"Time for presents!" Cana slurred, wobbling over to shove a sloppily wrapped blue package into Natsu's hands.
Unsurprisingly, the package contained alcohol.
"Ooh, presents are the best!" Lucy squealed.
She rushed over to the gift mountain to retrieve her contribution. This was apparently a signal to everyone else, and the whole guild swarmed Natsu with presents. He had great fun tearing them open—gifts were the best part of birthdays, except for eating the fire from the candles!—and examining his haul.
He was just finishing up when Gray shoved a small, flat box wrapped in red paper at his chest. Natsu eyed him suspiciously, pretty sure he had said there would be no present after the whole breakfast bribery thing, but Gray just rolled his eyes and crossed his arms over his chest.
Natsu grinned and tore into the paper. If nothing else, it should be worth a laugh. He and Gray had a long history of giving each other gag gifts instead of serious presents. Like last Christmas, when he had given Gray a tiara with a tag reading 'For the ice princess'. Or before that, when he'd snuck into Gray's apartment and filled it with bottles of tabasco sauce, or that time when he got a hot pink shirt two sizes too small and said maybe it would be harder for him to unconsciously strip off. Gray gave as good as he got. One time he'd gotten Natsu a working model train—"To fondly remember all the motion sickness of jobs past"—and last year he'd handed him a box with a small lizard and said, with a completely straight face, that lizards were basically baby dragons anyway.
The goofy gifts could sometimes be a little annoying, but they were usually at least somewhat amusing as well.
Natsu opened the box and picked up the card inside. He stared at it, blinked a few times, and read it again.
"What the hell?" he asked.
"Our train line has a program where you can pay upfront and the funds will be transferred to the prepaid card." Gray flashed him a grin that was all teeth. "Now we can drag you all over the country and take all those fun jobs really far away without you whining about everything. I see lots of motion sickness in your future."
Lucy let out a low whistle. "That must have been really expensive."
Gray shrugged and waved her off.
Natsu's confusion, meanwhile, was quickly turning into anger. He could take a joke and appreciate the humor behind even the most irritating gag gifts. He was used to Gray poking fun at his motion sickness. He was even used to trains being a recurring theme in all of this.
But this was, he felt, going a step too far. Even the toy train hadn't riled him up this much. That had just been teasing about his transportation issues, but this here was taking it to the next level. It was not only making fun of him for his motion sickness, but actively prodding him into suffering from more of it. Gray sounded way too smug about opening up the options to drag Natsu long distances on trains for the sole purpose of making him miserable.
"Wow," he bit out finally, his voice tight. "Thanks a lot."
Gray's smug grin morphed into something more cautious. "What now?"
"You're a total jerk, is what!" Natsu burst out, tossing the card aside. "It's one thing to make fun of me, but it's another to try making me more miserable!"
"Hey," Erza said in alarm. "Calm down, Natsu. It's a very useful gift. We're going to be going on jobs anyway, and this way you won't have to pay for the train rides anymore for a while."
"Only because he wants to see me miserable," Natsu snarled right back.
Gray shook his head slowly, disbelief glittering in his eyes. "…Wow. You really find this more offensive than the lizard?"
"That was messed up too! How dare you make fun of Igneel and then sit there with that smug grin on your face afterwards as you give me something that's supposed to make me sick! Just…go away."
Gray stared at him for a long moment and then narrowed his eyes. "Have it your way," he said coolly, turning and flouncing off to lose himself in the party on the other side of the hall.
"Was that really necessary?" Erza asked with a sigh. "You get gifts to annoy him too. Remember that tiara? At least this one is useful."
"Whatever," Natsu grumbled.
"He might tease you, but you know that he takes Igneel and the dragons seriously," Lucy said gently. She bent down to pick up the discarded train pass and handed it back to Natsu. "He singlehandedly got the Dragon Festival moved to today just so that you'd be able to go on your birthday."
Natsu still wasn't sure what to make of that, and was even less sure now that Gray had shown his true colors. Whatever the case, this dumb gift couldn't be excused by a pretty gesture or two. But he took the card anyway and shoved it into his pocket.
"Can we eat cake now?" he asked irritably.
So they lit up the candles and sang happy birthday, and then he got to eat the fire and a huge chunk of cake. He noted with some satisfaction that Gray sulked on the outskirts and didn't partake of the cake, although that might just be because he had some unfathomable aversion to things that were 'too sweet', which apparently included most cakes. What a weirdo.
Natsu ignored Gray and pushed the incident out of mind to enjoy the party. At first he thought the jerk had left, but then he reappeared and Natsu would catch a glimpse of him hanging around with someone else every once in a while.
Steadfastly ignoring the girls' suggestions that he should make nice, he threw himself into his party sans Gray. There was plenty of fun to be had even without him. Games and contests and cake and laughter.
This was what Natsu thrived on, and he loved being the center of attention. But eventually it started wearing a little even on him, and he slipped away to get some air. It was already getting dark outside, the last streaks of brilliant crimson fading into the black of night.
He stood at the top of the steps and breathed in the crisp night air. It was quiet out here. Too quiet. The sounds of laughter and merrymaking still drifted out from behind the doors to the guild, and Natsu decided that this had been a silly idea. He wasn't ready to end the celebrations yet—his birthday only came once a year, after all—and he'd rather be in the thick of things.
He was about to head back inside when the door opened and the sounds of revelry increased exponentially. A quick taste of the air told him that it was none other than his most annoying friend coming out, so he stayed stubbornly looking out into the street instead of glancing back. The door closed, muffling the party once more.
"I'm heading out," Gray said. Natsu said nothing, but deigned to make some small noise of irritation in the back of his throat. He could practically feel Gray rolling his eyes. "Still sulking?"
Natsu didn't think that deserved any kind of response at all, so said nothing. He tapped his foot impatiently as he waited for the intruder to leave, but there was no sound or movement from behind him.
Then Gray sighed into the night. "You're going to have to take the train anyway," he said. His voice was tired now, resigned. "We take a lot of team jobs. At least this way you won't have to also pay for what's making you so miserable."
Natsu turned around to blink at his friend in surprise before he could stop himself. That was almost exactly his logic from earlier, except turned on its head. Gray didn't seem like the type to put that much thought into a gift.
Gray was looking off to the side, at the ground. He didn't look up.
"And…" He shook his head. "We're always going out with the team and you go out a lot with just Lucy and Happy, and we…don't really hang out anymore. Outside of the team. You know. I thought that maybe we could take a job or something sometime. I mean, it's not like you'd even have to pay for it now, so…"
Gray trailed off and shook his head again, rubbing at his eyes with one hand. "Never mind. You're right, it's stupid. Forget about it. Here."
He shoved something at Natsu's chest, and the dragon slayer took it automatically. Natsu didn't have time to examine it, because Gray was already tramping down the steps and heading off into the night without a backwards look.
Natsu stared after him and bit his lip. He would never have thought that Gray just wanted to hang out more. Why hadn't he just said that? Then again…of course he wouldn't. The two of them didn't talk about things like that, and instead had to resort to stupid, easily misunderstood gestures like this. Come to think of it, hadn't Erza said that Gray had volunteered to hang out with him this morning?
It was true that they mostly hung out as a team now, or with just him and Lucy and Happy. He hadn't really thought that Gray might want to occasionally just be with him too, outside of all the team dynamics.
"I'm going out with Lucy and Happy tomorrow," Natsu said. Gray paused and turned back, guarded eyes glittering darkly. "Erza wants to do a team job after that. But I'm free towards the end of next week."
Gray raked a suspicious gaze over him, and it was a long moment before he turned away again and started back down the street. "Sounds like a plan."
Natsu watched him go, the corners of the box digging into his palms as he tightened his grip. Gray was an idiot. An annoying, incomprehensible, confusing idiot.
But he was also Natsu's best friend.
When he disappeared from sight, Natsu finally turned his attention to the box and turned it over in his hands. What could it be? A backup gift? An apology? Something to spite Natsu for his earlier behavior? There was no note or card or explanation.
Natsu opened it and squinted against the darkness to make out the features. He snorted.
Inside the box was a familiar-looking carving of a small red dragon.
Note: They're such dorks.
emmahoshi: Yup, the one you've been waiting for lol Ha ha, that would be totally in-character too. Gray can be such a troll sometimes XD Yeah, I hate being the center of attention too. I want to eat some cake and relax in the corner somewhere XD Hey, that's a good idea. I should buy a cake for myself too... Yum XD