It was quiet in the shop.

It was a comfortable silence, heavy with concentration, and it had lasted for all of five minutes by now. If Gajeel were a man who smiled often, now would have been such an occurence. Finally it was peaceful.

He liked the silence.

Natsu whistled. Gajeel's pen scratched across his paper and onto the table. Natsu whistled again. Gajeel turned in his chair, glaring at the young man. Natsu stopped whistling. Gajeel turned back around. Natsu whistled.

His off-beat whistles soon turned into a hardly discernable melody, and Gajeel was ready to explode any moment now.

"If yer gonna sing, at least do it properly," he grumbled.

"Ain't singing," Natsu replied, glancing over at him. "I'm whistling."

"Well it's shit whistling."

"Still better than anything you could do. keh."

Gajeel turned in his chair.

"I sing."

"What."

"I sing. Do you wanna hear-"

"Hell no."

HIs eyes narrowed to slits before he turned back around, starting to hum a melody just to spite Natsu. "Levy likes my singing…"

"I heard that."

"So what! At least I got the guts to go out with the girl I like! Unlike another Salamander basta-"

"Aaactually," Natsu drawled - but was interrupted by the door swinging open.

In walked two people. The man was wearing a shirt that took 'V cut' to another level - it revealed a little too much of his chest, if you asked Gajeel. The short woman that followed behind seemed nice enough.

"Wow, when did you turn into a fucking brony?"

"It happened at the same time you became cool - never. Also pink matches my hair, so shut it Gr - wait, Gray?!"

"Hello to you too, asshole."

"You're here early, punk! Oh and hi Lis!"

"Hi Natsu! How are you?"

The girl named Lis exchanged a quick glance with Gajeel, one that said oh, yeah, i am used to this. She smiled, and he gave a small nod.

"I'm great! How was the trip?"

"Oi, why didn't you ask me this, hothead?"

"You jealous, iceblock?"

"Don't make me laugh!"

"Enough, guys!" Lis put her foot down, quite literally, and to Gajeel's surprise the two idiots halted for a second. Then Gray took a step forwards, probably to smack Natsu, but Lis pulled him back by his collar. "I said. Stop."

Then, with a deep sigh, she spun around to face Gajeel.

"I apologize for those two. I am Lisanna, it's nice to meet you! Thankyou for employing my friend."

She pushed a strand of white hair behind her ear. Gajeel wondered how much time and money it would take to bleach his hair the same colour.

"Gajeel. And, uh, you're welcome I guess."

He tried to look as friendly as possible. Usually that didn't work to well. But the smile on the young woman's face didn't waver. She was quite okay, he guessed. Surprisingly normal for a guy like Natsu. He'd have assumed all his friends would be batshit crazy.

But then she spun back around on her heels, and he watched her features change into an expression that made him retract every last of his thoughts.

Her eyes were gleaming crazily, she was squirreling over towards Natsu like a bee had just stung her, and her tongue poked her lower lip excitedly.

Lisanna was sparkling with mischief.

"So where is the Lucy we've heard so much of?"

"Aw, you just missed her!"

Natsu seemed oblivious as he grinned at her innocently. Lisanna's face fell.

"So we're only gonna meet her this evening after all, huh…"

"Lis," Gray almost rolled his eyes. "That's just a few hours from now."

"But still…" Lisanna pouted. "Oh well! I look forward to then! I guess we'll just do a little more windowshopping until you're off. We already saw the castle and all."

"You mean we're gonna wait for that flamebrain? Like we have nothing better to do…"

"You don't have to wait for me, McFlurry. I got better to do than see your face!"

"You wanna go!"

"You bet!"

"Not in my shop." Gajeel deadpanned. His word was law. "Or I'll slam you both into the wall."

Lisanna just laughed at the idiots around her, placing a calming hand on Natsu's shoulder. Her smile was sweet, but her grip was suddenly tight.

"Yes, you two. Three. How about you calm down. You don't want to destroy the shop, now, do you?" Her head turned to Natsu. "Or lose your job."

Even Gajeel shrank back from the aura surrounding her.

"Woah, she's getting more and more like Mirajane…"

They both swallowed, straightening their shoulders.

"So, we'll get going," Lisanna continued with a smile like honey. "Right, Gray?"

"Yeah… uh, see ya, Fir- Natsu…"

Natsu held his stomach as Gray stomped out of the shop, waving as Lisanna turned around once more, all genuine smiles as if nothing had happened.

"Bye you two! It was a pleasure to meet you, Gajeel. See you later, Natsu."

The door fell shut behind her.

"Fucking wanna-be stripper. No need to go shopping when you're gonna take off all your clothes anyway, pervert."

Outside, it was windy. Gray turned to look at his friend. She had that grin on her face again.

"We're not going windowshopping, are we?"

"Of course not."

With a playful wiggle of her eyebrows, Lisanna halted her steps and nodded at the sign beside them.

Faerydae.

It was quiet in the shop.

There was nothing to do, and Lucy had busied herself with scribbling onto a sheet of paper, starting to whistle a tune somewhere along the way. The tale she was spinning had gripped her.

It had come to her in her boredom, as she had stared at the fairy with the tail on the flowerpot beside the column, and the words had flooded her mind before she could stop them. Now the only way to get them out was to put them down on paper.

This was going great. Faeries, even dragons… they were creatures just itching to come alive beneath her fingertips. For once, Lucy didn't wish for customers.

But of course, fate was a cruel friend.

The doorbell jingled.

In walked two people. The first was a friendly looking girl in a frilly top that Lucy immediately wanted to keep, and a darkhaired guy who was attractive in every sense of the word - except his shirt's neckline maybe was a little too generous.

Lucy looked up with a smile, greeting her new customers.

"Good afternoon," she said as she shoved the paper to the side and stood up. She felt both their eyes glue themselves to her, as if they were trying to stare into her very soul. They both first grinned at each other and then at her. "How can I help you?"

The woman kept smiling at her - really, it was almost disturbing - while her companion just looked like he wanted to slap his forehead. Neither said anything.

"Uh… can I help you?"

"Ah, sorry! Yes! We're looking for…for…"

"…flowers," her companion stated calmly. The girl exhaled in relief.

"Yes. Flowers."

"Well… you've come to the right place?"

Ten minutes later Lucy was excitedly explaining how she preferred to arrange the colours in the bouquet she was currently binding while the woman, who had introduced herself as Lisanna, nodded intensely with her every word.

Gray didn't share their enthusiasm. Instead, he awkwardly looked around the room, occasionally inspecting one of the fairies. With his hands shoved into his pockets, he walked back to the girls to casually peek over thier shoulders.

"It's such a lovely bouquet!" Lisanna called. "Lucy, you're so good at this."

The blonde tried to hide her proud smile.

"Well, I practiced it a lot…fufu." she snickered happily.

Twenty minutes later three empty glasses stood on the counter, and laughter rang through the room.

"…and then she ate a whole strawberry cheese cake!"

"No way!"

"I kid you not! Oh but I'm sorry, I'm keeping you…"

"Oh dear, we've been here so long! I hope we were no bother."

"Not at all! It's lovely to have someone to talk to on quiet days like this."

"Oh, I'm sure you have some… colleagues to talk to, right?"

"As if anyone would want to talk with that g-" Gray coughed when Lisanna stepped on his foot. Lucy blinked.

Had she just…?

"i mean, not colleagues in here, but you know…from around…" Lisanna laughed nervously. Lucy blinked again.

"Yeah, sure," she replied with a slightly confused grin.

"That's nice! So I guess we'll keep going…"

"Wait, the bouquet!"

"Oh!"

"Actually," Gray said to Lisanna. "It'd be a little hard to transport. We're quite packed already."

"I didn't think about that," she whined while Lucy's confusion only grew, slowly ripening to suspicion when Lisanna suddenly turned back around towards her with a gleeful sparkle in her eyes. "You can keep it! You could give it to Na- to your friend. Colleague."

This time, Gray slapped his forehead.

"Subtle," he muttered.

Lucy crossed her arms over her chest.

When their eyes met, Lisanna dropped her head. Her cheeks were a blazing red. "Sorry… I got so excited…"

"So could anyone explain to me what is going on?"

The corners of Lucy's mouth twitched upwards, though she wasn't quite sure what was amusing her most. Whoever they were, they surely were a funny duo. And…

"Uh, we're… kinda Natsu's friends."

Of course. Crazy people like this just had to belong to Natsu. She should have known.

Lisanna. Lis. And the guy had to be Gray, then.

Lucy laughed softly, an elated grin spreading across her face.

"It's so nice to meet you."