Valentine's Day

It was a sunny day in Magnolia.

That was quite a relief since over the past few weeks, rain had been falling almost relentlessly. It had dampened people's mood overall. As such, the whole town seemed to awake after the rain had stopped.

More, it was Valentine's Day and that meant that there would be some excitement. And flowers, a lot of them. As well as chocolate, as boxes of chocolate were handed out as a means of a declaration.

Natsu was fidgeting.

For some reason, he'd decided that he would make some chocolate and hand it to Gray.

Well, that reason had a name, or rather, two of them. Because Lucy and Happy had joined forces and had been adamant about him doing something besides some strangely muted pining from the distance and sometimes complaining before going out and punching something.

The whole process of making the chocolate by himself had been… eventful, to say the least.

Natsu may be an expert fire-wielding mage who could control temperatures at will too but there was one thing he lacked immensely. He was impatient.

Impatience was a sin when attempting to be a chocolatier for you had to take your time while tempering the chocolate.

Natsu had burnt so much chocolate. His kitchen at home was a definite mess, after his late nights of trying to make the little chocolates. Happy had had to go sleep at Wendy's because it had gotten too much for him!

But Natsu was nothing if not persistent.

So he kept going. Slowly getting the hang of things. He was able to experiment a little with ingredients too. Fortunately, the weather had helped, even if the trips to the market had been slightly wetter than usual, he'd gotten a good supply of ingredients and was confident that what he made was not only edible but good. His optimism had carried him to the end line, of one goal, at least.

But then, the actual day had come and it was a little overwhelming.

First, it was the sun, shining so bright in the sky that made him jump, stretch his limbs, go hang out at the guild and have a good time. His good mood was assured.

At the start.

Then he got to the town and the scent of flowers was strongly in the air. So many pink flowers decorated what looked like every corner, every possible nook. Light pink, bright pink, dark pink. All the colours mixing and at certain places being accented with blues, purples, yellows. All the windowsills decidedly had some. And his nose wasn't too fond of it. It didn't take long until Natsu was starting to sneeze.

When he got to the guild there was some reprieve to the flowery scents because while there were some inside too, the stronger scent of food, drink, and the amorphous mix that he could only call "home" and "family" overpowered it.

But once inside, the next goal needed to be reached.

So.

There was a rule that went unsaid at the guild that everyone was supposed to hand out chocolates to everyone. And the most common was for those who were closer to exchanging chocolates. The rule that went even more unsaid was that one would offer handmade chocolate to the recipient of their affections while to the others it was bought chocolate.

Doing so would assure more luck to the one handing the chocolate. Or so tradition said.

Natsu had bought some pretty chocolates. He was going to hand them to Erza, Lucy, Wendy, Cana, Mira, Lisanna, Gramps, Gray, and none for the cats because chocolate was harmful to them. He also had a couple of extra boxes to give to whoever caught his eye at the moment. You never knew. And chocolate was great to bring happiness to his friends.

The small thing was that the chocolate box intended for Gray had more diversity than the others. And a different coloured wrapping, of course.

Natsu walked towards the usual table where some of his friends were already sitting.

Happy flew quickly towards the fire mage, right into the other's arms.

"Natsuuuuu! You're finally here!" Happy said loudly, picking up one of Natsu's hands and starting to pull him towards the table. Then, in a lower voice he asked, "so, are you ready?" he seemed to be brimming with excitement.

"Yeah, yeah. I did." He muttered before clearing his voice and greeting the others. "Good morning! Did you guys see the sun? Told you it was coming back soon."

"It certainly came right on time," Lucy said in a teasing voice. "We'll have a lot of fun today."

Natsu looked at her and blinked. Because, yes, he'd definitely imagined the ominousness of those words.

"Fun and, most importantly, food!" Natsu declared. "Have you guys been handing the chocolates yet?"

"We're waiting for Gray and Juvia," Erza stated, taking a sip of her tea. "They had someplace to go before here?"

"Ah, nice," Natsu said noncommittally. "In that case, I'm going to go get some food. Getting hungry."

"If you weren't hungry we'd be surprised." Wendy teased amicably.

"Pffft." Natsu waved her off and went to get some food. On the counter, he gave Mirajane, Lisanna and Elfman some chocolate boxes. In turn, he got some himself.

To be honest, the action of handing in the chocolate boxes wasn't stressful. But Natsu had placed a note on Gray's box and it was stressful. And fortunately, the girls had passed the phase of placing jokey notes on his chocolates because some of it had been slightly terrifying. Getting a note from Mirajane back then had not been the most fun – Natsu remembered not being able to enjoy the chocolate.

When he got back to the table, Gray and Juvia had joined them and were all conversing and relaxing.

"With Natsu back, we can exchange our chocolates now," Erza said, starting to pile the boxes that were wrapped with too many hearts and arrows and ribbons. Very bright colours too.

Everyone followed her lead.

And then for a few moments, it was chaos because everyone was moving boxes, knocking them against each other's and then trying to dodge the next box but ended up knocking against someone else's box. There were a lot of orders and laughter and a near disaster but everyone got a few boxes of chocolate.

After this, they kept chatting, with Lucy, Wendy and Juvia opening one of the boxes and experiencing the excitement and enjoyment that came with the exchange. It didn't take long for them to each go their way and go find more recipients to the chocolates.

Then, it was time to eat and the usual chaos settled throughout the guild. Mirajane got to sing some very famous love songs and during the afternoon the customary brawl broke out.

All in all, it was a lot of fun, for Natsu. He managed to forget about his nerves. Until he got home, that was.


Gray got home quite late. He was still giddy with the whole fun he'd had during the day. Maybe some of it had to do with the several spirits he'd tried, plus the different liquor chocolates he'd eaten. Or maybe it was neither of those things.

But it had been a good day.

Gray spread out the several boxes on his kitchen table, made some piles with all the chocolates he'd gotten, and placed the two ones that were slightly different and did not seem to be store-bought. Oh, there were some from the specialized store and they must've cost a pretty jewel but these other two were different.

Could he have two suitors?

That would be interesting. But Gray knew that the person that had his attention was most likely not one of them.

Gray sighed.

He opened the one on the left. The wrapping paper was pretty, in shades of lilac, purple and blue and it had small hearts in a large pattern, several colours, and then some stripes in a darker shade of purple. Upon opening it, a note was written on a postcard that nearly jumped to Gray's hand as soon as he opened it. The writing was clear and elegant, the looping waves of the writing almost moving off the page.

Juvia.

It was surprising she had left a note, at long last. But no, she wasn't it for him. She was just a good friend.

Then Gray looked at the other package. This one's wrapping paper was in silver and orange colours. There were small red dots at odd places. It was an unusual paper, with the colours twined abstractly. It had caught Gray's eye instantly. Gray ripped the paper open and there didn't seem to be any note. Gray took one of the chocolates and took a bite.

Mint?

He did not expect that but the small solid bits that dotted the inside of the chocolate were very well balanced with the flavour of the chocolate.

Then Gray tried another one. This one had hazelnut inside. It had been a while since he'd had some and that had Gray letting out a pleased noise. He picked up the box and noticed the piece of paper that fluttered to the floor. Curious, Gray placed the box on the table and crouched down to pick it up.

I like you.

Gray read and reread the note. It was a simple square of paper with the words written boldly in the middle in black. There was something that he was not registering yet. It was there, on the note! But Gray couldn't reach what it was.

Then it clicked.

The handwriting!

He was very familiar with this handwriting. And there was only one person…

Gray let go of the note as if he'd been burned.

"Oh shit. This is Natsu's! And he likes me?" Gray let out a laugh as sat down on the kitchen chair. Distractedly, he popped another chocolate into his mouth. "Hm, orange liquor? Damn, he sure worked hard." He was grinning without noticing. "I think I know my answer…" he mused before starting to clean and store away things.

But he left Natsu's box on the table for there were still a few more chocolates he had to try out.