Merry Christmas all! I hope you all had a lovely holiday full of love and cheer. Mine was a mixture of emotions... loss of a family member does some weird things to Christmas joy.

Anyway, I hope you all enjoy this chapter. I never imagined this story would be this many chapters or go into the next year; it was supposed to be a short story to keep me preoccupied... whoops.

Please review, I love to read them all!


Natsu and Lucy walked up to see the area was surrounded by a large crowd of people on all sides. In all the years of the festival games, she had never seen so many people at one event. The crowd roared when they noticed the two walking up to the court. Lucy could see Grandine, Igneel and Wendy sitting together with makeshifts signs for her and Natsu. Lucy waved to her father who was oddly holding a meatball sub. Is he supposed to be eating that? she thought. She shook her head and refocused on the game.

"Mr. Heartfilia, you shouldn't be eating that. The doctor said to avoid those kinds of foods." Mrs. Spetzo pleaded. Jude brushed her off as he took a large bite. "Please, dear, this is my vacation; I'm enjoying myself." The two joined in as the crowd cheered for the teams as they entered the court.

Natsu and Lucy took their places on one side of the net while Gray and Juvia stood directly opposite them on the other side. The referee walked from the edge of the net towards the middle to meet the two teams. None of the players listened to the ref when he droned on about the rules; instead, they stared at one another trying to increase the intimidation factor. "I want a good clean game, alright?" he finished but everyone simply nodded in reply.

"We call skins," Gray called out. Before anyone could say anything to correct him, Gray and Juvia ripped off their shirts, exposing their bare skin underneath. "A little dramatic, don't you think?" Natsu whispered as he leaned into Lucy.

"Players, take your places," the ref called out as he motioned to the two ends of the court. The ref excused each team to their side to begin the game. Lucy took her place at the end of the court with Natsu standing against the net. Gray glared at the pinkette through the netting; Lucy guessed the two were mumbling curses at one another by the way they were acting. She hung her head a bit and shook it from side to side before serving the ball to the other side.

Grandine and Igneel settled into their chairs; if the entire match was anything like the first volley, it would take forever. All four players were exceptionally good and competitive. It was also very back and forth. Natsu and Lucy would score then Gray and Juvia would turn around and score right back. Most of the bystanders had left to go watch or participate in other events.

Due to the time, the referee needed to call the game. "Alright, whoever scores this point is the official winner." Lucy huffed as she bent at the waist to stare at the blunette across the net from her. She was winded; she hadn't done much for heavy exercise in a while plus she had to keep up with Natsu. Whenever he got competitive, she would try to stay on the sidelines as to not get sucked in. Boy was she in it now.

She looked at Juvia in the eye and was stunned to find a sense of determination within them. Why would she fight so hard against them? "Hey, Juvia," Lucy whispered. Lucy figured the girl heard her since she perked her head up a bit. "Why don't you let us win? I don't get it."

"Juvia can't let her Gray-sama down. Plus… Gray-sama promised to take Juvia out for a romantic dinner tomorrow if we won."

Lucy sighed and bowed her head before raising it once more with a look of determination, "Juvia, we made a bet with Gray. If we win, he has to ask you out in front of everyone." Juvia's determined face dropped. "He what?..."

"He made a promise to us; what do you say, Juvia?" Both girls jumped slightly when the ref blew the whistle. Natsu exhaled harshly before serving the ball over the net towards Gray. Time seemed to move in slow motion as Lucy watched the ball head towards Juvia. She could see the girl wrestling within her. Juvia simply raised her arms and let the ball bounce off them.

Lucy smiled; the blunette was on their side. "What the hell, Juvia?!" Gray called as he ran after the ball, which was whizzing out of bounds. "Forgive me, Gray-sama… Juvia wants to hear you ask her out." Natsu and Lucy couldn't help but smile as they watched Gray struggle to run to the ball in an attempt to save himself. Gray reached out his arms as he ran towards the ball, never keeping his eye off it. Again in slow motion, Lucy watched as Gray dove forward, connecting the ball to his arms.

Natsu and Lucy's jaws dropped as they watched Gray not only successfully hit the ball but send it in their direction. Natsu jumped straight up in an attempt to block the stray ball. He let out a curse as the ball sailed over his head and headed for the deep corner of his and Lucy's court.

Lucy ran towards where the ball was landing; she pumped her legs and dug her feet into the sand to try to get her to the ball before it hit the ground. I'm not gonna make it… I'm not gonna make it! She shut her eyes as tight as possible and took a leap towards the ball. Lucy felt her arm sink into the sand; so much so, she could feel each of the grains of sand brushing against her skin. Her arm burned and she knew it was more than the sand.

She peered through her eyelashes to see her arm scraping against the stake indicating the corner of the court. From her arm, she could see bits of sand flying past her to hit her face and run down her arm, she could see blood. This is definitely gonna hurt later, she thought.

Her eyes flicked up towards her wrist and was shocked to see the ball hit off her hand and not the ground. As she continued to slide into the sand, she turned her body to watch the ball fly into the air. What amazed her even more was Natsu, who appeared over her in a flash. With such grace, he swatted the ball from its position above her and over the net. Gray was still on the ground recovering from his save to be able to make another. He pushed himself onto his knees before attempting to launch forward to dive once more. Gray landed with a face full of sand just millimeters from where the ball landed with a plop.

The crowd stood and cheered (Lucy was unsure if it was because they won or because the game was over). Lucy laid on the ground, partially stunned at what happened, and saw Juvia walk over to a defeated Gray, squat next to him and smile. She could only imagine what the two were talking about at the moment, but she was dying to know.

She was shocked out of her thoughts when Natsu stood over her and helped her up. Lucy started dusting off the sand from her body but was stopped when Natsu gently grabbed a hold of her wrist. "You were awesome, Luce! I can't believe you actually saved that!" Lucy couldn't help but chuckle at how absurd he was.

He gently turned her arm over to view the damage done to her. Lucy had a long scrape starting from her wrist and traveled down her forearm, past her elbow and ending into her tricep. "Luce…" he said in a worried tone.

"It's not that bad…" She questioned but was met with a disappointed glare.

"Luce, your entire arm is falling off."

"Okay, you're being over dramatic," she deadpanned back.

"I'm gonna get you some bandages; wait here." Before Lucy could respond, Natsu took off through the crowd. Lucy just stood there holding her arm against her body while the crowd came to her.

"That was amazing!" Wendy called as she hugged Lucy. The blonde couldn't help but cringe a little when the girl put pressure on her arm. "You okay, Lucy?" Grandine asked as she walked up.

"That was quite a tumble you took," Igneel added.

Lucy shrugged, "I scraped my arm a bit."

"Let me see," Grandine stated as she reached for Lucy's arm. She figured it was easier to comply than to resist Grandine. The woman raised Lucy's arm just as Natsu had and she even had the same response. The group collectively gasped at the sight of the wound. "Lucy, we need to get this treated immediately."

Lucy pointed over her shoulder towards the direction Natsu disappeared, "Oh… Natsu is getting me some…" Grandine grabbed onto Lucy's hand and pulled her away from the crowd. "We will go to the house. I've got all we need there."

"I'll go tell Natsu not to worry about it," Levy called out at the two. Grandine responded by waving back at the blue-haired girl.

Lucy cringed when the water hit her open wound. It was a necessary thing to clean it but why did it hurt so much?! "Sorry about this," Grandine apologized, "It will be over in a second." The two didn't speak for a moment, just letting the sound of the running water run down Lucy's arm could be heard in the house. The blonde stole a quick glance at the woman before speaking, "Thank you for this."

Grandine smiled without taking her attention from Lucy's arm, "You're welcome. Happy to help my future daughter in law." Daughter in law… she let that sink in. She would love to be part of this family; would she ever get that chance?

"I have to say," Grandine stated as she turned off the faucet and began rifling through her medicine bag. "Natsu has been so much livelier since you've been around."

Lucy was stunned and all she could muster was, "Oh." Grandine began placing gauze pads over the wound. "Natsu has been in kind of a funk lately but seeing him here with you and the smile he has when he is around you… it warms my heart."

"I wouldn't say that's all my doing," she replied nervously.

"Nothing is ever one person's doing, but what you are doing simply helps."

Lucy looked in Grandine's eyes, "What is that?"

Grandine finished wrapping Lucy's arm before meeting her eyes, "Loving my son." Lucy couldn't hold Grandine's gaze; she stared intently down at her wrapped arm. She jumped slightly when Grandine rubbed her shoulder, "Come on, sweetie. We don't want to miss Gray's big statement now, do we?" That was one thing Lucy absolutely couldn't miss.

With a smile and a nod, Lucy hopped off the counter and walked beside Grandine out of the house. The two conversed as they strolled back towards the park. Lucy turned her head towards the path before her but stopped dead in her tracks at the sight before her.

Her eyes grew wide, her hands clenched into fists and her body shook. She couldn't believe the sight before her. Grandine stopped to stare at the blonde before looking at what she was so fixated on. When she saw it, she couldn't help but gasp.

Just a few yards ahead of them, Lisanna had her arms wrapped around Natsu's neck, and his around her waist, as the two shared what appeared to be a deep, passionate kiss.

The tears started to fall effortlessly from her eyes. Get out… get out now! Her body screamed but her feet couldn't seem to move her. The world around her was quiet; her thoughts racing but all to a negative downfall.

She jumped when Grandine touched her shoulder; seemingly spurring her into motion, her legs finally moved her, and it was far away from there. Lucy turned and ran furiously away from there, anywhere but there. The wind in her face burned her eyes so she squeezed them tight, hoping the image she had of the two of them in her mind would disappear. The harder she pressed, the more impressed the image became on her mind.

Grandine watched as the blonde ran away until she was out of sight. She glanced at the two once before turning around and heading after the blonde. Questions rolled through her mind but her main concern was to find the blonde.