"What's up with all the glances you've been sneaking at them lately?" Lily asked interrupting Gajeel from his current train of thoughts.

"Huh? Tha heck are you talking 'bout?" he growled at the exceed who didn't even flinch at all.

"you know what I mean, you've been sneaking justa as many glances at Lisanna and Gray as Juvia has this last day. And speaking of glances you've increased your amount of glances at that blue haired reader as well." at that last comment Gajeel's cheeks flushed a bright pink and even if it was ever so briefly this did not go unnoticed by Lily who mimicked Gajeel's regular smirk.

"it's so obvious to all of us others so why not just go ahead and ask her out already?" This time the ping in Gajeel's flushed cheeks stayed there quite a while longer and he couldn't quite seem to manage a response. Instead he found himself mesmerized by the way Levy twirled a lock of her hair that had been hanging in front of her eyes.

He didn't realize what he'd been doing until Lily snapped his fingers and he almost fell off the chair.

"What's the big idea?" he snapped

"Oh I get it!"

"You get what?" Gajeel responded now getting quite angry.

"The reason why you don't ask her out, you don't know how and so you've convinced yourself that you're okay just staring at her from afar."

"I know how to ask her out! I just…" the last few word became incomprehensible mumbling , but Lily had a pretty good idea of what he'd meant to say.

"what was that last part again? Gehee!" Lily responded and instead of turning bright pink like before, Gajeel now turned a dark shade of red.

"Scared of rejection I see." Gajeel could only sit there quietly while hoping that the exceed somehow thought that his guesses hadn't been spot on. Which they had been of course.

"Let me leave you to your moping then." Lily said and flew over to where Levy was sitting and started a friendly chat. Gajeel was keeping himself as calm as he could manage, but he was secretly worried that Lily would tell Levy of their previous conversation. Especially with all the secret smirks and glances that lily kept sending his way. It got to the point where he couldn't stand it anymore and he exited the bar to get some room for his thoughts.

Gajeel felt quite certain that Levy held feelings for him. It was just that tiny part of his brain that held him back. The nagging thought that she was still afraid of him after what he did while he was still a member of Phantom Lord. It was all that sttod between him and asking Levy out with a confident smirk.

"Why don't you do something about your "not so hidden" feelings Levy?" Lily asked as soon as Gajeel had exited. Gajeel was the only one Lily had ever bothered trying to mock, mostly because he took pride in knowing he was the only one capable of getting him even remotely embarrassed.

"I am trying to do something." Levy complained,

"It's just that he won't take a hint, no matter how obvious it might be." She told him and turned the cover so that Lily could see it, it read: the art of iron forging.

"Well maybe you should just take the initiative yourself if he can't figure it out?"

"I couldn't do that! You know how he is, he's too proud so he might reject me just because of that."

"Yeah you're right, he is really stubborn about his beliefs."

"Yeah you would know." Levy replied as she stood up to leave.

"What's that supposed to mean Levy?" Lily asked, but Levy merely flashed him a grin before sipping her lips together and I a few seconds she was gone.

As Levy entered the room that she shared together with Juvia, the first thing she notices was her favourite book lying in the middle of the room. Several thing were wrong with that picture. The first thing being that since it was her favorite book it never left her room in fairy hills, so how it had suddenly found its way to Crocus was beyond her. Second was that it was simply lying there in the middle of an otherwise clean room. Back home this wouldn't be very strange, mind you if it was any book but that one. Still with Juvia being the germ and neat freak that she was it was simply not possible to that it was here. Still the most terrifying thing she saw was the small notes sticking out from the book.

"Noo!" she screamed and ran for the book. She opened it at the first page that had a note stuck to it, ready to rip it off immediately. she stopped however when she noticed the word "midnight" underlined. She opened the next note and this time the word "Crocus was underlined. She repeated the process a couple of times and found the words "moon" and "Balcony" before she ran off to find the culprit.

The words had led her to the restaurant named "Croqus moon" where she now stood with the book in her hand and waited impatiently for the clock to turn twelve.

"What the heck are you doing with my book shrimp?" a voice boomed behind Levy and the book was dragged out of her grip.

"Excuse me you vandaliser that book is…." She got no further in her ranting when she turned around and looked straight into Gajeel's blood red eyes.

"Before you go accusing me of vandalizing your book at least check the last note." Levy frowned and turned the page that had the last note in it. She felt quite certain that there had been no note there when she checked in her room. What she read made her speechless because it was her favorite part of the book, only the name had been changed to Levy.

"Though you may not harbor the same feelings for me as I do for you, just knowing that we share something as common as a favorite book makes me feel closer to you than anything else ever has. So at least let me say it once before I escape into the realms of books forever. I love you Levy."

Levy stood the in shock as the realization of what she'd just read dawned upon her. Then she started crying like she never had before. Gajeel stood there frozen in shock and didn't know what to do. He'd been expecting her to be happy, heck even angry, but not broken.

"Levy? Are you okay? I didn't mean for you to get sad. Please don't cry. I will leave if that is what you want me to do." He said and turned to leave, but he didn't get far before something caught his wrist and prevented him from moving.

"Don't you dare leave me here Gajeel! Not like this. Not after you've done the best thing anyone has ever done to me. Don't you even realize that these tears are tears of joy?" she yanked him back into a hug while she continued crying.

"I love you too so don't you dare leave me!" she screamed. Gajeel put his own arms around her and pulled her even closer.

"I was so afraid that I had messed up everything with the dinner reservations and everything." Gajeel blurted out before realizing what he'd just said.

"Dinner?" Levy croaked out from Gajeel's chest.

"Yeah I have reservations for now so if you want to we can sit down and eat." Levy nodded but didn't dare to look up Gajeel walked her to the table that was theirs and eased her into her chair.

"Levy, look at me." Gajeel said because she'd done nothing but stare into her lap while tears still streamed down her cheeks. She looked up and Gajeel swore he'd just seen the most beautiful thing in the entire world.

"Did you really mean the thing in the book?"

"Not that I would ever be able to say the words myself, but yeah I meant every word.

"You really are amazing Gajeel."

"So are you Levy." He responded and pulled her in for their very first kiss.

Well it took way too long, shame on me and all that stuff. Honestly I have no idea of why this took so long. I've been writing nothing for the last century it feels like. If there were ever someone waiting for this update I'm so so sorry. I know it's usually my style to introduce strange couples in my stories, however this here is my favorite pairing in the entire manga so can't go wrong there. Of course with my sluggish writing skills I make a good attempt. I will try to update more, but please be patient with me.