Their walk to Fairy Tail that morning was relatively quiet.
Thoughts and speculation ran through Lucy's mind at breakneck speeds as she overanalyzed just about every single one. It was vexing because there were too many questions she didn't quite have the courage to ask, weird because she never expected to be in a situation like this in even a million years, and vexing again because damn it why did he look as upbeat and normal as he always did while she was left floundering?
Yes, he was strolling along confidently, easily while the morning sun glimmered off his hair and his arms were bent behind his head and his eyes were shut and his mouth was curved in a contented smile. It seemed a crime for him to be so relaxed while it was all Lucy could do to not slouch over and emit a zombie-esque aura.
All in all, Natsu was oblivious to Lucy's discomfort, but at least the silence between them wasn't unbearable. It wasn't entirely comfortable (at least for Lucy), but it wasn't horribly awkward either, a fact which was easily evidenced when they neared the Fairy Tail building and Natsu said, "Hey, Luce, wanna go on a mission today?"
Lucy made a small hum of contemplation. "I'm not sure, I do have a lot of chores to do. Not to mention, we just went on one yesterday."
"It's been a while since we've only had one with you and me, though," noted Natsu. "Well, and Happy."
"Mm, well, we'll see," said Lucy nonchalantly as a small thrill ran through her gut at the implication that Natsu wanted and possibly liked going on missions with only her...and Happy.
"Oh, it's Gajeel!" said Natsu jubilantly as the Iron Dragon Slayer left the guild and headed towards the two on the same trail. Pantherlily hung from his shoulder, an amicable expression on the Exceed's face as he recognized the two coming up the path while Gajeel bore one of his usual indifference, though there was a rare shine of glee in his eyes.
"Blondie, Natsu," he acknowledged with a slight nod at each of their names, resulting in a grin from Natsu and Lucy barely resisting the urge to roll her eyes.
"Good morning, Lily," she said instead with a polite smile, turning her attention towards the cat.
"Lucy," Pantherlily greeted in return. "Are you two heading into the guild?"
"Yeah. Are you guys heading out onto a mission?" replied Natsu.
"Not exactly a mission, just somethin' interesting I want to check out," said Gajeel, exchanging a knowing look and smirk with Pantherlily.
"Then we'll get out of your way," said Lucy, side-stepping Gajeel as Natsu followed suit. Turning around to look at the man and the Exceed without breaking pace, she called, "Be safe, alright?"
"Sure, Ma," said Gajeel lazily as he continued on his way, leaving Lucy and Natsu to turn forward again and continue their way to Fairy Tail front-side first.
"He looked happy, huh?" mused Lucy. "I don't think I've ever seen Gajeel so excited before."
"Yeah, maybe he found a new training buddy," said Natsu, expression newly morphing into a determined kind-of-getting-fired-up way.
Lucy chuckled. "Somehow, I don't think that's really the case," she said as they finally reached the Fairy Tail building's entrance. Natsu reached out to pull open the door for them, and he went in after Lucy did so with a quick word of thanks.
It was about ten, so the guild was already bustling. Half of the members who were planning to do a mission that day had already left, and everyone else in the front room—including the ones staying in for the day—constituted about a third of the base's total mage count. Lucy quickly found Levy in the middle of the dining hall, and after a smile and a "see you later" to Natsu, she made her way over to her friend to excitedly tell her about the progress she'd made on her book last night.
Natsu watched Lucy meander away for a few seconds. Judging by the direction in which she was heading, he assumed that she was aiming for Levy. His guess was proven correct a few seconds later when Lucy slid into the booth that Levy was occupying, and the two automatically launched into chatter. With a slight shrug, Natsu looked away from the two and scanned the room for anyone he could talk to.
His answer came in the form of a certain half-naked Ice Mage who was slumped over on the bar counter and clearly suffering from a severe hangover.
Natsu grinned. Dumbass.
He ambled over to Gray with a slight bit of cockiness in his step until he was right next to him. Then, leaning down until his mouth was beside the Ice Mage, Natsu said loudly, "Yo, idiot!"
"Go away, you ass," was the curt, grumpy reply. Natsu reveled in the fact that Gray had noticeably cringed at the loud sound of his voice.
"Why don't you just get a hangover treatment?" he asked, taking a seat on the bar stool next to Gray's.
"Mirajane says I deserve it and won't give me anything, and my head hurts too damn much to lift off this counter," muttered Gray. Under his breath, he added, "Devil woman."
"I heard that, Gray," was the lilting remark a few yards away, courtesy of said "devil woman". Natsu looked up to see a smiling, all-too-innocent Mirajane drying off a plate, and he grinned in response.
"Dumbass," said Natsu, returning his gaze to the Ice Mage in front of him. A slight sense of satisfaction spread through him as he finally voiced his initial judgment of Gray for the day aloud.
"How are you okay?" grumbled Gray. "If I remember right, you drank just as much as I did last night."
Natsu shrugged. "Lucy helped me out this morning."
"You went over to her place last night?" said Gray apprehensively, turning his head to look at Natsu. "Drunk?"
"Yeah…? What's the big deal?" retorted Natsu.
"Ugh, never mind," muttered Gray as he pressed his forehead into the polished wood of the counter as if somehow trying to rid a headache.
"Hey, speaking of which, d'ya still remember our bet from last night?"
"Uh...bet," said Gray, pinching his brow in concentration. After a moment, he started inquisitively, "Something about your virgini—" but was cut off (yet again) by a punch to the face.
"Don't say it out loud," hissed Natsu, leaning into the Ice Mage slightly to prevent giving any satisfaction to nearby eavesdroppers. He looked around shiftily, and after Mirajane left the bar with a small clipboard and he decided that no one was paying attention to them, he turned back to Gray.
"Screw you," Gray eventually spat as he gingerly nursed his cheek with one hand while attempting to massage away his evidently intensified headache with the other. "Keep doing that and I swear I'll kill you once I'm done with this hangover."
"Yeah, yeah, keep talkin', Ice Brain," said Natsu, rolling his eyes. "Anyways, is our bet still on?"
"The one that's going to end in your total humiliation?" said Gray, smirking. "Hell yeah it is."
"Good," said Natsu with a smirk even more confident than Gray's, a dim fire blazing in his eyes, "'cause I've been waiting for some easy pocket change."
Some twenty minutes later, Lucy and Levy were just wrapping up their discussion of their latest plot bunnies when Mirajane headed towards their booth with a plate of steaming omelettes, pancakes, and hash browns.
"Here, Lucy," said Mirajane cheerily as she set the plate down in front of said blonde, along with a set of basic silverware.
"Thanks, Mirajane, this smells wonderful," said Lucy, smiling as she ogled the delicious food. She then looked up at the blue-haired mage sitting across from her. "Do you want some, Levy?"
"Ah, tempting as that sounds, I have to go soon and I'm afraid that if I start, I won't stop," laughed Levy. "Besides, I already ate."
"Can I get you two anything else?" said Mirajane lightly.
"No, thank you," said Lucy as she unwrapped her knife and fork. "Levy?"
"I'm fine," said Levy. Mirajane nodded and turned to begin to walk away, and then Levy eagerly resumed her and Lucy's conversation with, "So, what kind of wizard do you think you'll make her?"
Just as Lucy was about to reply with something, Mirajane paused and turned back to the two, a thought having struck her. "Lucy?"
The blonde's mouth was open but the answer to Levy's question didn't come out, so she closed it before giving Levy a meaningful look and then tilting her head to Mirajane. "Yes?"
"I don't mean to pry, but…" she began as she took a few steps back towards Lucy and Levy's booth, her face the epitome of kind innocence. "Did Natsu ask you a...favor yesterday?"
Mirajane watched as Lucy's smile froze for the better part of a second, and shock and a slight tinge of fear crept up into the Celestial Sprit Mage's eyes. Her cutting of her pancake faltered for a moment before resuming, albeit slowly. Both of them ignored Levy's confused expression and question of, "Favor?"
"Ah...yes," Lucy eventually said carefully, her eyes now clearly gauging every one of Mirajane's movements. "How did you…?"
"You hear things while on the night bar shift," was her easy, laughing response. "What did you say?"
A visible blush crept up Lucy's neck and cheeks, and she shifted her gaze to stare determinedly at her food. "I...I said okay."
Mirajane blinked. She hadn't been expecting that.
Lucy looked up at the older girl again, now shy and clearly embarrassed out of her wits. "Don't...don't judge me, okay?" she said, her voice teetering on a whimper. Then, after a pause, she added in a whisper, "And don't tell anyone either!"
"Your secret's safe with me," Mirajane assured with a wink. "But I can't say I'm not surprised. After all, out of Team Natsu, you're usually the sensible one," she mused, resting her hand on her cheek thoughtfully. Her words resulted in Lucy emitting a small groan.
"It's...payment for everything he's done for me," said Lucy weakly.
"It's still a bit uncharacteristic of you, Lucy," Mirajane noted. "Well, as long as you know what you're getting yourself into."
Lucy nodded stiffly, the flushing of her skin finally beginning to ebb away.
"Be careful," warned Mirajane lightly, to which Lucy nodded again solemnly. After shooting the blonde one more smile, Mirajane took the lingering silence as her cue to turn and leave. In her wake, she heard Levy's excited yet hushed voice ask, "So what was that all about?"
"N-nothing!" she heard Lucy retort in a tone just as quiet, and even when Mirajane was out of earshot from the two, a knowing smile still loitered on her lips. Somehow, she had a feeling that there was more as to why Lucy had accepted the favor, even if Natsu was a very good friend.
It was another page to fill in her Natsu/Lucy notes, but this time, she was rather convinced that this would cause several dozen more.
About three-fourths into Lucy's breakfast, Levy said good-bye to Lucy and got up to leave the Fairy Tail building in order to run a few errands. Not even thirty seconds after the Solid Script Mage left, Natsu slid into the previously occupied seat with a hearty grin, leaving Lucy to stare blankly at the Dragon Slayer with a forkful of hash browns halfway to her mouth.
"So, Lucy, wanna do a mission today?"
Lucy shrugged nonchalantly, and even though a part of her wanted to shy away and say no because it was a bit awkward to be around him right now (even if it wasn't the case for him), she still found herself replying, "Sure. Do you have one in mind?"
"Nah, but we can check out the mission board after you're done eating."
Lucy nodded, resuming the consumption of her breakfast. The only difference between before and after Natsu got here, though, was the feeling of being meticulously watched while she ate.
A comforting sensation, indeed.
"So...by the way," said Natsu after about half a minute, his mouth splitting open to reveal a toothy, sheepish smile. "When are you gonna keep teaching me?"
Lucy nearly choked on her food but fought against it, suavely ridding the dry, uncomfortable sensation in her throat with a swift gulp of water from her glass. She looked up at Natsu, who hadn't seemed to have noticed any sign of discomfort from her and was only grinning expectantly at her.
"Um…" she began, slightly hoarse. "Well, just to clarify, I'm teaching you how to impress a girl enough for a one-night stand, right? And also the details of that one-night stand."
"Yeah, something like that."
Lucy exhaled a sigh of exasperation as a shade of light pink crept into her ears. "Okay, well...the next step is the first part of the night, right? In other words, the meeting, flirting, introducing."
Natsu nodded gravely.
"So here's what we'll do," said Lucy, daring to look up straight at Natsu. "Tomorrow, sometime around early evening, we'll go to the Magnolia Maple. Do you know where it is?"
"The bar on the other side of town?"
"That's right. We'll go in separately, pretend to be strangers, and when I sit down, you can come over and try to flirt with me. We'll stop the act when you mess up—"
"When I mess up?" echoed Natsu, obviously slightly insulted.
"—and I'll tell you what you did wrong," said Lucy, a small smile playing on her lips. "Then we'll keep going and maybe even go through a few rounds of it. We'll have dinner while we're at it, and then eventually, we'll come home."
Natsu considered this. "Sounds good to me."
"Alright," said Lucy, finishing the last of her food and getting up. "It's a date."
-*-x-*-
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