CHAPTER 6

Lucy woke up in Gray's arms. They both fell asleep in the weeping willow. They were on a thick branch, Gray's back to the trunk while Lucy was in his arms. She wiped her eyes and looked at Gray, blushing at the site. His head was tilted to the side, his face looking peaceful and stunning. This was the first time in a while that they hung out in the Meadow.

She slowly moved from his arms, trying not to wake Gray up. Lucy quietly climbed down the branches and dropped to the floor. The sun showed that it was already noon. Dang, we slept late… Lucy scratched her head, yawning. She pushed past the bushes and shimmied through the fence. It took her five minutes to reach her house.

She opened the worn down wooden door and loudly walked to the kitchen. Mirajane was at the dining table knitting a scarf. When she saw Lucy she peered up and took off her spectacles that she was wearing. "Ahem," Mira coughed. "And where have you been, Lucy?"

Lucy was about to say "Well, I was sleeping with Gray in the meadow." When she realized that wasn't the best idea. Mirajane would have freaked out and thought she meant the wrong way. Mirajane was known in town as someone who was obsessed with matchmaking. Yeah, Lucy didn't want Mirajane to start something that just… shouldn't even start in the beginning. Lucy didn't feel that way about Gray. Just a friend. That's all he was.

"I fell asleep in the meadow…" Lucy said, putting on a big cheesy smile. Mira knew about the meadow but she had never been in it. Mirajane knew that it wasn't her place to be.

Mirajane rolled her eyes. "Of course you did. You sleepyhead." She picked up her glasses and started knitting again. Lucy sighed and ran upstairs. She walked to her room and opened the door. She yawned, wiping her eyes. She glanced at her bed and saw a lump protruding from the blankets. "What…?" Lucy said. She slowly walked towards her bed and pulled the covers down.

In her bed was a sleeping boy. With… pink hair? "Oh, God no." Lucy whined. Not the boy in the bar. He was sleeping…naked. Lucy blushed and quickly pulled the covers back up. He had a warm wet towel over his forehead.

Lucy ran back down the stairs and into the kitchen. "Mira! Why is there a boy in my bed?" Lucy yelled, pointing to the ceiling. Mirajane looked at her, confused for a moment.

"Oh, I found him in the forest. Rolled in leaves and all. Had a fever, so I brought him home. Poor thing, isn't it?"

"Gosh, Mira! Don't just bring people home. And why in my bed? Not yours? Or the couch?"

"He's sick! At least give him a decent place to sleep. And I like my bed, thank you very much."

"Ughh. I have to sleep on the couch now."

"Actually, no. You're going to sleep on the floor in your room so you can be there if he needs anything."

Lucy rolled her eyes. "Whatever. But you owe me BIG time." Lucy stomped back up the stairs, huffing and mumbling to herself about how life sucks.

She walked back into the room and sat in a chair near her desk. It was weird because Natsu had spiky hair when he had straight hair in the bar. Natsu's eyes flitted open and stared back into Lucy's eyes. His eyes were... black? She could have sworn they were blue in Fairy Tail. And these eyes were more… intense.

Natsu slowly sat up and the towel fell off to the side of the bed. "Where…where am I? Who are you?" He questioned.

"Uh, Lucy? You're in my house, meathead, and you don't know who I am? I smacked you in Fairy Tail because you were drooling over girls?" Lucy said in a mocking tone.

"Huh..?" Natsu said. "Ohh… Samazu!"

Lucy was confused. "Samazu?"

"Yeah!" Natsu said.

"Uhh… care to explain?" Lucy said, getting impatient.

"You met my twin."

Natsu explained the situation, leaving out that they were princes.

Lucy was shocked. Twins… in this age? Usually one of the children was killed right after birth. So, why would Natsu and Samazu both live? They would surely be found out soon enough and taken to be executed.

Natsu said that he followed his brother from home, hoping to find out what he was up to. Lucy knew one thing was for sure, she was glad it wasn't the other boy in her house. That was just a recipe for disaster. She had gotten it all wrong, the Natsu in Fairy Tail was actually Samazu and the real Natsu had fallen ill on the way to Akemi and was in her home. Things became clearer.

After talking for a while, Lucy began to take a liking to the 'real' Natsu. This was the total opposite of what she felt to the other one, Samazu.

Mirajane soon came in to bring in dinner. Natsu's plate was filled with just a small loaf of bread and a wooden bowl of broth while Lucy had rice, carrots, celery, and a side of turkey soup. Lucy snickered while Natsu pouted.

"Not fair. Not fair at all," Natsu whined.

"Ah, shut your yap. Be lucky you've got something." Lucy said as she chomped on her warm food. "It's not my fault your sick. You've got to ease into the food, unless you want to be more sick. Andyou got the bed, so quiet."

Natsu thought about it before going back to his food. They ate in silence. After finishing, Lucy brought the plates down to the kitchen to wash. As she washed the dishes in a bucket of water, Mirajane sat in the candlelight reading a book.

"So, what do you think of Natsu?" Mirajane said, secretly looking over her book to look at Lucy's face. Lucy's face turned to a light rosy pink.

"Huh? What about him?" She said, still scrubbing the already clean plate.

"I heard you guys laughing earlier… Really loudly."

"Yeah," Lucy said nonchalantly. "We're now friends. Kind of."

"What about Gray?"

"What about him?"

"Don't you guys have a… 'thing'?"

"Uh, no? Where'd you get that?"

"I see the way he looks at you. And you two are so comfortable together, it just seems like that's the situation."

"He's just a friend, like a brother. I-" Lucy stopped. "Hey, wait a second! Why do you keep asking me these things? Gosh, Mira!" Lucy hurriedly finished the dishes and walked upstairs.

She opened the door to see Natsu already asleep…on the floor. He apparently rolled himself up in Lucy's blankets and fell of the bed while sleeping. Lucy silently giggled to herself. She had never seen a person so restless in their sleep that they fell on the floor and kept sleeping.

Lucy walked to Natsu and pulled at the blankets to untie him from the mess. She managed, but she couldn't do anything else because the next thing she knew, she was on the floor with Natsu. He was hugging her tightly, holding her close to his body. She became stiff as she felt his warm breath on her neck.

Lucy tried to pull herself from his grip but found that it didn't help at all. She was trapped. Thing was, she kind of liked being in his arms. Wait a second Lucy! You've just met him, stupid! Come to your senses! Lucy shook her head, stirring Natsu little bit. Oops.

Natsu whispered a word in his sleep.

Just one word.

One, which made Lucy freeze to stone.

"Lisanna,"

Lucy had stayed up the whole night wondering about that one word he said in his sleep.

Lisanna.

How did he know Lisanna? Surely it wasn't a different one than the one she knew because Lisanna wasn't a common name. What was their relationship? What ticked her off the most was that he had hugged her while calling another girl's name. Oh well, it wasn't Lucy's place to worry about Natsu and whatever he had with Lisanna. Not like she cared either. Or did she?

For hours Natsu didn't let Lucy go, but she was finally able to pry herself from him right before the sun came up. She quickly got up and dusted herself off. Sure that Natsu was asleep; Lucy got some clothes and changed silently. She then moved out of the house and to the bakery in the town.

She said hi to the baker, Boulee, who opened early, and bought a big bread bun filled with oozing cheese. She then proceeded to the meadow where she could relax and think. Gray and her had found the place when they were kids. Lucy remembered it was a few months after Gray moved to Akemi and they became friends.

FLASHBACK

"Gray! Look at what I found!"A young Lucy yelled, ushering an also smaller Gray to a fence. "There's a hole, want to see what's on the other side?"Gray bent down to inspect the hole.

"Sure! Why not?" Gray pulled the wired fence a little higher to make a bigger gap. He put his arms through the hole and crawled through the fence army-style. Lucy followed him, pushing the fence back down to hide the hole.

Gray pushed through many green leaves and bushes until he found a wide area. Lucy gasped at the beautiful sight. She had never seen such a beauty, trees and flowers surrounding her with a light and sweet smell that followed.

Lucy closed her eyes and took a breath, trying to take a whiff all of all the beautiful scents at once. She could smell the trees, the flowers, the clean air, the beauty.

She opened her eyes and stared at a small weeping willow in the middle of the meadow. She looked back at Gray and pulled him by the hands to the weak and fragile tree.

She reached the willow and said to Gray "Let's make the tree grow!" Lucy said, smiling, tilting her head to the side. Gray thought the idea was silly but was mesmerized by Lucy's radiance and smile.

He sighed, saying "Oh, fine."

Lucy jumped up in glee and started walking around the tree, inspecting every single nook and cranny."Let's see…"

She made Gray right the details all down on a notepad and then went to a gardening store, where they got soil and a watering can. Even though the soil was super expensive, Lucy still insisted on buying it. She never wanted something this bad.

She didn't want the little sick tree to die, she wanted it to grow tall and strong.

Lucy wanted the weeping willow to live.

So day after day, Lucy brought Gray to the meadow to water the tree and check its progress. On some days the two would stay and lean on the trunk of the tree and talk or just laze around. Lucy would pick flowers to bring home or listen to Gray read to her. Sometimes Lucy would read to Gray laying her head on his lap while he twirled her hair. These times of the day were Lucy's favorite.

After 5 years, the weeping willow grew into a strong and big tree. Lucy and Gray still visited the meadow, but not as much as they did as kids. Lucy felt as if they were growing out of the meadow they basically lived in as children.

Things were changing; Lucy and Gray met Lisanna and Gray got a new brother, Lyon. And one day, they just stopped going.

From time to time when Lucy was upset she would go to the meadow, but alone. She would rarely ever see Gray there. Now, she was going more often. She had more headaches and pain in her chest. She thought of telling Mirajane to see what she could do when Lucy realized that it was best to be quiet so she wouldn't worry Mira or Gray, or Lisanna. She'd sometimes even have nightmares about people calling her name, theirs bloody hands pulling at her feet. She would scream and scream, but no one would come. The nightmares would seem to last forever until Mira would come in to wake her up after hearing Lucy scream. It was torture, and the only place she could get some decent shut-eye was in the meadow.

Lucy went through the fence and walked to the meadow. She climbed up the weeping willow and ate her cheese bun while watching the sun rise. She leaned against the tree, closing her eyes trying to fall asleep. This time, she couldn't sleep. She was completely and absolutely awake. By the time she finished her bread, the sun was up. She hopped down, deciding to go to Fairy Tail.

Walking to the pub, she saw a crowd in the Town Square. "What happening?" Lucy said to herself as she jogged to the crowd. In the middle were Fiore's soldiers. One was in the middle holding a boy around the age of fifteen by his shirt collar. The other soldiers were holding some people back who were trying to save the boy. Others were watching silently, afraid to get in trouble if they spoke up.

The soldier in the middle was yelling at the boy who had dropped a loaf of bread on the floor. Apparently, he had stolen the bread to give to his starving brothers and sisters. Lucy was astonished at the soldiers. The soldier slapped the boy hard in the face, landing him on to the ground. Lucy had just about enough. She ran through the crowd and ducked under the soldiers' arms. The soldier was about to kick the boy in the stomach when Lucy ran to the soldier and pulled his arm behind his back.

"You know, it's not nice to hurt children. Has your parents ever taught you manners?" Lucy pulled his arms higher and tighter, making the soldier yelp and jerk. If she pulled any tighter, she would break his arm. "You should be ashamed, you know. Getting bread for his siblings? Is that such a crime that must make you punish him severely? Show some sympathy."

Soldiers were about to come after Lucy. She got ready to kick them in their faces and show them her massive moves when she saw a flash of black hair. Gray punched a soldier in the face, attracting attention to the other soldiers. "Gosh, Lucy. Do you have a self-conscience? Always doing such reckless things."

Lucy smiled, dropping the soldier's arm she was holding and kicked another soldiers face as he/she was about to hit her. "Actually, no, I don't. Do you?"

"Eh," Gray said, defeating another 'clone.' The audience watched silently in awe. The boy was still on the floor, looking up to Gray and Lucy in amazement. He had never seen such people fight before.

In the crowd was a pink-haired blue-eyed boy. He watched silently, his arms crossed. Lucy, you and you're love for saving people…same as always. It's just like how you saved me for a while. Samazu smiled to himself, content with the memories he was thinking of. He walked away from the crowd, knowing that Lucy would be alright, and in many ways he meant it.