Lucy all but collapsed when they all piled into the small train compartment just before it departed for Magnolia. She didn't even have the energy to tell Natsu to stop leaning on her as she rested her head against the window. The last three weeks had honestly been exhausting, and for the first time, Erza had been spot on with how long a job would last. It was three weeks to the day.

But, it was still a four-hour train ride. However, that also meant she was only a four-hour train ride from Bickslow, and she missed him a lot. She could only wonder what he'd been up to in the last three weeks, because hers had been, well… A little complicated and frustrating.

When Erza had said Protea Valley was a little chilly, it had been an understatement. It was absolutely freezing there. She hadn't been able to get enough layers on (partly because she hadn't packed them) while Gray had walked around stark naked half the time, not that that was any different from what he usually did. Natsu, on the other hand, hadn't even been able to set himself on fire to try and keep warm, since the icy wind that had never let up had made it near impossible.

If the weather wasn't an issue, it was that the job description on the flyer had been way off. It hadn't just been one dark guild. It had been seven. Seven dark guilds had decided to form an alliance in an attempt to take over the small township of Protea Valley once and for all. Somehow, they'd all managed to come out alive (scathed, but alive, mostly thanks to Wendy), even though they'd been up against several hundred mages. Taking out each of the dark guilds would've been time consuming, so it had required a thorough plan in order to do so without causing too much destruction for once, making their job even harder, but… they were Team Natsu. They didn't know the meaning of thorough plan and it was precisely why they'd spent the last three days cooped up in the inn they'd been staying at in town to try and recuperate, since a certain pink-haired idiot had decided to cause trouble one afternoon and had led all seven of the dark guilds' members back to where they were staying.

Even though their own team was strong, five (plus two cats) versus several hundred was an incredibly tough fight, especially when more than half of said several hundred had already been beaten by either Erza, Gray, or Natsu (or even Lucy herself) in the prior weeks when they'd tried the planned approach and they all had a bone to pick with the fairies.

And if either of those two things weren't reasons enough to frustrate Lucy, it was that she had been so close to telling Erza about her relationship with Bickslow so many times. Every time she'd find the courage to bring it up because it seemed like the perfect opportunity, she'd instantly chicken out.

It had been late one night when Wendy was in the shower and Lucy walked back into their shared room, ready to just come out with the news because it was no secret that Erza was the biggest issue they had – not the guild, just Erza. But when Lucy had walked in, the Requip mage just had to be sharpening her swords, of all things she could be doing. The swords that she'd most likely be running through Bickslow when they got back, Lucy had realised. That thought alone had been enough to send her running out of the room.

So if it wasn't Erza being unintentionally terrifying, it was that something would always interrupt them and she'd never get a chance to do it.

So she'd left it for the remainder of their job. There'd been no point in trying, and after all, she'd never actually spoken to Bickslow about it and maybe he wasn't ready to die just yet.

But either way, she could bring that up at a later time. All she wanted at that point was to be back home in Magnolia and out of the freezing town she'd spent the last three weeks in.

Her ability to always be able to sleep on trains came in handy for the journey home, because by the time they'd reached Magnolia, Lucy wasn't as completely exhausted as she had been, so she didn't need to go back to her own home and nap before going back to the guild. Instead, she could just quickly stop by and change into some cooler clothes.

So when she walked into the guild a little while later, she didn't automatically go and sit with the members of her team that had already made their way to the guild, nor did she go over to the bar. Ahe went straight over to where Levy sat with Gajeel and the rest of the Raijinshuu.

"Oh, thank god she's back," Evergreen complained as Lucy took the seat opposite her and next to Levy.

"I second that," Gajeel muttered.

"Uh… Hello to you too," Lucy said nervously. "I'd love to know why you're so glad I'm back."

"Bickslow has been miserable," Freed deadpanned.

Evergreen nodded along with Freed as she looked to the blonde. "Miserable enough to make this guy even more depressing than usual," she added.

"Be quiet, Evergreen," Freed mumbled, resting his chin in his palm.

"So… where is he?" Lucy asked quietly.

With that, Freed and Evergreen both turned to look at each other before they both looked to Gajeel who just shrugged. "Uh… We have no idea, actually. We haven't seen him last Friday…" Evergreen said quietly as she looked down at the table.

Lucy sat back in her chair as she tried to think of all the places Bickslow could be, but she realised she didn't know what those places were. In the time they'd been dating, Bickslow had never really strayed too far from the usual – his house or the guild. But his team knew him better than she did and Lucy wasn't afraid to admit that, but if they didn't know where he was, then how was she supposed to know? They must have at least checked, otherwise they would've just been saying that he's probably in his apartment. But they really did have no idea.

Her mind went over every possible place he could be. His apartment, Cade's bar or any other bar, the top of the toy shop, and even the library. She didn't think he'd be in any of them, and even so, no one had seen him for a few days so she found herself wondering if something had happened to him while she was gone.

But she was brought back from her thoughts as Laxus sighed loudly. "He's in Hargeon," he said.

"What? Why?" Evergreen asked.

"Huh," Freed muttered, staring at a blank space on a wall behind Lucy. "He's at the old training building, isn't he?"

Laxus nodded slowly as he turned to look at Evergreen beside him. "What?" he asked. He didn't like it when Evergreen glared at him.

"How did you even know that?" she demanded.

Laxus shrugged as he tried to lean away. "He might have mentioned it the other day…" he mumbled. "Didn't see the point of bringing it up."

"Uh… so where exactly is this building?" Lucy asked as she shifted uncomfortably in her seat, watching as Freed pulled out a pencil and a small piece of paper from his breast pocket, writing down an address before passing it to her. Nodding, she stood up and smiled at them. "Thanks guys."

The old training building in Hargeon was actually an old warehouse that Laxus and the Raijinshuu had purchased not too long after officially becoming a team, and they'd converted into a space that they could all use for, well… training. The best part was that it was right next to the marina, and with the loft that had been turned into a living space, you could literally just lay in bed after training all day to watch the sunset, and honestly, it was a pretty nice view.

A lot of the actual downstairs space was Bickslow's. Freed's took up only a small portion, much like Evergreen's, while Laxus had a decent sized portion dedicated to his own equipment – most of them being weights of varying sizes, but he'd only really used any of it a few times. All of that being said, Bickslow also had the largest pieces of equipment between the trapeze set up down one end and the tumbling floor that ran down one side. Honestly, he didn't have half of the stuff he did for actual training, it was more for fun than anything.

But for the last few days, Bickslow hadn't been there for fun. He'd been there because he'd needed something to take his mind off of how much he missed Lucy. Three weeks was relatively nothing when his own team quite often went on missions for months at a time, so Bickslow found himself worrying about how he'd cope when they started going on the longer jobs. He didn't even know if he'd still be dating Lucy by the time that came around again, but he could still worry about it.

On that particular day, he'd spent most of his time on the tumbling floor. He hadn't been on it since everyone went their separate ways as they trained for the Grand Magic Games, and he was honestly a little sore from the amount of, well… tumbles he'd had.

When he'd had enough of hurting himself for another day, he went back to the trapeze, like he had every other day. He hung from the bar by his knees, his eyes closed as his arms dangled down by his head as he focused on his breathing. He'd always loved the feeling of hanging upside down, no matter how strange it was. Somehow, he'd always be able to see things clearer when the world was upside down.

When Lucy finally found the building with the address that was written on the small piece of paper, she stared at the building for a few moments. It was an old brick warehouse right on the marina, and honestly, it looked like no one had visited the place in a while. But she checked the address twice, looking down at the paper and back up to the small sign that hung above the door, and with a sigh, she shoved the paper into her bag once again and pushed open the heavy door.

She walked into a small reception area with just a a small desk with a bookcase on one side and a leather lounge on the other. She supposed it was more for show than anything, so she moved forward and through another heavy door.

Honestly, Lucy didn't know what she'd expected to find given it was an old warehouse, but she hadn't expected to see countless mats of all colours and sizes, weights, various dummies with targets on them or even the many pieces of gym equipment she honestly couldn't put names to, because she'd never really stepped foot in a gym before. Least of all though, she didn't expect to see a trapeze down one end with an upside-down Seith mage.

She moved forward through the large room, stepping over the skewed mats that lay around the place and towards Bickslow who still had no idea she was there.

"What are you doing?" she called from where she stood, continuing to navigate the floor.

Bickslow's eyes shot open as he fell from the trapeze, landing in the net before he scrambled to the edge to jump down from it. He honestly didn't think he'd moved so fast in his entire life as he hopped over the items in his way.

Lucy laughed as she watched him navigate the obstacle course of the gym, and soon she was picked up off the ground with his arms around her waist as he buried his face in the crook of her neck. "Hey," she giggled

"Holy fuck, I missed you," Bickslow murmured. It had only taken hearing her voice to realise just how much he'd missed her, and truthfully, it was more than he'd originally thought.

"Is that why you were miserable?"

Bickslow pulled his head back to look at the small smile on her face. "Who said I was miserable?"

Her smile grew brighter and wider and Bickslow couldn't help but return his own – it was contagious, it really was. "Gajeel… Evergreen… Freed…" she mumbled.

"Okay, I wasn't that miserable." Maybe just a little…

"Sure you weren't," Lucy giggled again before she lowered her head to press her lips to his. Three weeks. The absolute longest three weeks ever. Even though she'd been busy and her mind had been otherwise occupied, there still hadn't been a day where she hadn't thought about how she'd rather be back in Magnolia with Bickslow. And somewhere deep down, she knew she shouldn't be at the point where she'd rather spend every second of her day with Bickslow, but each time she saw him she could forget about that voice that told her otherwise.

Being with Bickslow made her happy, and was it really so bad that she wanted to be happy all the time?

When they pulled apart and she rest her forehead on his, with another smile on her lips, she said quietly, "But you're not miserable now, I hope."

"Not even close." Being able to hold her again after what felt like the longest three weeks of his life made him forget everything again. Lucy was the only thing that mattered.

Lucy absentmindedly ran her fingers over his collarbone on the shoulder she was leaning on. Bickslow honestly didn't know whether to be creeped out by it or not, but in a way, it was a little soothing so he left it. He still had to fight the urge to squirm since apparently it was a sensitive spot, but he wasn't going to tell her that.

She adjusted herself on the bed to look out the windows that took up the entire height of the wall, from down at the ground floor to the tops of the ceiling, the orange and pink hues lighting up everything on the floor of the gym and casting shadows across the ground.

"I'm surprised you guys aren't fighting to spend all of your time here. The view over the water is beautiful," she murmured as she stared out past the loft railing and through the large windows.

"Yeah, but… I can think of more beautiful things to look at," Bickslow said quietly before kissing her temple.

"God, you're a dork," Lucy scoffed.

Bickslow grinned. "Oh? You thought I meant you? I meant myself in the mirror." He couldn't hold back the laughter when the blonde shoved a pillow in his face. "Well… I guess you're not too bad. If I squint, I can totally see it."

"Oh, shut up."

So as she laid there with Bickslow, they talked about everything and anything – her job, how she came to have a bandage around her elbow and how stupid the reason was, how she almost told Erza, the fact that no one on Bickslow's team had visited the building for months, and where exactly they were going to go for dinner, when they decided to get out of bed.

It didn't matter to Lucy what they talked about though, because all she could focus on was how much Bickslow had changed in the last three weeks. When she'd left for her job, he'd still been finding it hard to smile. Now, he was there laughing and grinning like he usually did and although he was honestly annoying the living hell out of her with the way they couldn't come to an agreement on a place to eat and how he kept tickling her when things calmed down, just to get her to laugh again, she couldn't help but wonder just what had happened over the last three weeks for him to go back to his usual self – if not a happier version of himself, because Lucy didn't think she'd ever seen him so cheerful.

Even though Bickslow thought that Lucy being gone for three weeks would make him fall into the hole of self-loathing she'd been helping him climb out of three weeks prior, it really hadn't. Even though he missed her more than he could put into words, her being gone had been a blessing in its own way. With her there, he could forget about everything, but when she wasn't there, Bickslow was forced to face all of his problems head on.

He'd had to completely accept that what he'd done was in the past and there was nothing he could do about it anymore. He still hadn't forgiven himself, and he was beginning to think he never would, but he could accept it. Because each day it hurt less and less to think about, and that was because he remembered that she was still there with him, through everything he'd done.

And honestly, Freed had been a big help too. That was the reason they were a team. Not because of Laxus, but because they were all able to help each other when things got tough. To them, that was their family - not so much the guild as it was each other. Freed had helped him realise that for Lucy, he needed to accept things and move past them. Because even though to that day, Levy and Gajeel had been the only people to actually see them together (apart from that time Freed caught them in the library), it hadn't been hard to figure out that him hating himself and sinking further and further into the hole of self-loathing again would hurting Lucy just as much as it had everyone around him.

What would she think when she'd come back only to find Bickslow withdrawn and depressed again?

That was all it had taken for Bickslow to snap out of it. Without realising it, he had been hurting her again, just by hurting himself. He wasn't going to let that happen anymore.

Day in and day out, he'd gone to the guild because he knew that's where it would be easiest to be. Because if he'd been alone, he'd just have ended up falling into that hole again and he hadn't want that. It was hard at first, but his team had been there. Freed and Evergreen had occasionally reminded him that he couldn't let the fact she was out on a job get to him too much.

And with each day, with the little things that the people at his table had said and the way they'd almost gone out of their way to make him laugh or do something stupid, it got better. Things got better and he was slowly accepting everything. He wasn't forgiving though.

Bickslow being miserable hadn't actually been him falling into the hole of self-loathing again. It had been him just missing Lucy, and even though he'd been getting back to his usual self with each day, he'd just missed her more and more. He'd missed the way that occasionally her laugh could be heard over the ruckus in the guild and how she'd occasionally have to step in to tear Natsu and Gray apart when Erza wasn't there. Hell, he missed the way her team in general would somehow always be the centre of every brawl, and that was something Bickslow didn't think he'd ever be thinking about.

He knew his team had been getting sick of how miserable he was and it wasn't just his team who had noticed anyway. He'd been leaning with his chin on his arms one day when Mira had come over with refills for the table, and she'd looked down at Bickslow as she tucked the tray under her arm and asked, "Are you okay, Bickslow?"

Before he'd had a chance to response, Gajeel had done so for him, making him mutter a curse under his breath that he knew the Dragon Slayer could hear. "He's not getting laid," Gajeel had said, causing Levy to snicker as she hid her face in a book. Hell, even Laxus had smirked.

The fact that he hadn't been getting laid was irrelevant. Sort of. Although he'd been just a little concerned about how Gajeel knew that fact. Bickslow had only been a little grateful that Mira had listened to Evergreen when the woman decided to join the conversation, saying that he'd just been losing his game.

But by the Thursday before Lucy had returned, he'd reached a whole new level of miserable. He'd needed to get out of there and go find something to occupy his time with, and that was how he ended up spending the last few days in the old training building in Hargeon. He wasn't even worried about being alone anymore, because by that point, he knew he was okay. It was close enough, at least.

For whatever reason, Bickslow couldn't sleep in the next morning, and after a while of staring out at the calm sea through the windows, he decided he needed to get up. So carefully, he pushed the blankets and sheets back just enough to slide out of the bed without disturbing Lucy, and for once, he was thankful that he wasn't being used as a human pillow.

He silently went around the bedroom in the loft, finding a pair of shorts on the floor and pulling them on before grabbing an apple from the small kitchenette.

It wasn't long before he was back on the floor, stretching his arms and legs as he stared down at the spring-loaded floor. That's how he'd started every morning he'd been in Hargeon, and honestly, Bickslow was beginning to wonder why he hadn't been back to the gym in so long. It was good way to start his day.

With one final deep breath, he began his sprint for the mat, and then, when it was close enough, he started with the basic cartwheel just to get him going backwards and then he was half way down the mat, each time he kicked off from it with a flip, whip, or roundoff, the sound it made would echo throughout the open room.

Over and over he'd do it again, running up just to get the speed he needed to get the power he needed, but each time, he'd get halfway down the mat and through his routine, through the whips and handsprings alone, and then he'd be staggering off the side of it and onto the crash mats that lined each side of the spring-loaded floor. One particular move. It was just one move and no matter what he did, he couldn't get it right anymore. Twisting too late, twisting too early, completely missing the mat when he twisted too much, or he didn't twist enough.

So back he went to the beginning. Running, cartwheel, handspring, whip, whip, barani back, layout, whip, and then the dreaded skill he couldn't pull off that had him landing on his back that time with a loud thud, knocking the wind out of him as he stared up at the rafters in the ceiling.

It frustrated him to no end that he couldn't do it, but he knew that's what happened when you didn't do anything for nearly six months. He'd lost it.

Lucy was leaning with her elbows on the railing of the loft, the sheet from the bed wrapped around her. She'd been awake since Bickslow got up but she honestly hadn't wanted to move from the bed, but she'd decided to go and investigate the noise that had been coming from the main floor.

So she watched as time after time, Bickslow ran up to the springy floor, watching as he did flip after flip, all within a second of the last. Lucy had never known he could do anything like that, and the fact that she was still learning things about him was something she loved.

Lucy was in awe, honestly. The way he looked so graceful when he rotated himself in the air to the way she swore she could see each muscle rippling as he moved (the lack of shirt was also something she loved). She could barely do a cartwheel, and there he was, able to do it and things beyond that like it was the easiest thing in the world.

She knew that Bickslow wasn't excessively strong, and she'd known that for a while. Lucy also knew that that was only because he didn't need to be physically strong. He was a long-range mage so he rarely got involved in actual combat. What she was seeing then made her realise that he was powerful. Not only that, but his strength was a different kind.

When she thought of strong people in the guild, it wasn't a surprise that her mind would instantly wander to people like Erza, Gildarts, Natsu, and Laxus, and even Elfman too. They were all the types of people who were physically strong. And sure, Bickslow was physically strong too, since he had to be to pull off the stunts she watched him do over and over, but it was… different. While people like Erza and Natsu were strong because they got physically involved in fights, Bickslow was strong in a slightly different sense because he employed every muscle to push himself into the air.

It was to keep him out of the way of trouble, unlike the rest of her team.

But as she watched without him realising she was awake, she also saw that each time he'd get to a certain skill, he'd mess it up in some way, dropping his head in frustration as he walked back to the start. That meant she also saw when he'd landed flat on his back on the springy floor with a loud thud, and she hadn't been able to help but cringe.

Damn, I'm getting out of shape, Bickslow thought as he breathed heavily, still trying to catch his breath from the strenuous activity. He turned his head from where he lay on the floor, looking up to the loft that was on his side. "Morning," he shouted. He couldn't stop himself from grinning up at her.

"Morning," Lucy called back, her voice travelling throughout the room. "That looked like it hurt."

"It did," Bickslow said, sitting up slowly and wincing slightly from the pain that shot down his spine. "Are you still going back to the guild today?" he asked with a deep breath, recalling one of their conversations from the night before and how she'd need to leave in the morning before her team started freaking out again.

"Yeah. I should probably leave soon an—" She couldn't even finish her own sentence as she sneezed, biting her tongue in the process. "Anyway, was what I was going to say," she said with a sniffle. "You should keep working on whatever it is you're trying to do. You'll get it eventually." She smiled down at him as she turned from the railing, dropping the sheet as she walked towards the small bathroom.

His eyes followed her until she was out of sight and he pushed himself back up as he chuckled to himself, shaking his head. Not so shy anymore, he thought as he stretched out his back once finally standing.

He wasn't going to leave until he got it back. And somehow, just Lucy believing in him even though she didn't really understand it was enough to make him believe he'd be able to do it.