Chapter 3

Helianthus

The air was warm and friendly on this sunny September morning. Lucy was in her kitchenette, drinking some black coffee to wake up. She already had put on her school uniform and packed her bag, so she was going to finish her coffee and then start walking. She quickly chugged it down, far too excited to just stand there, placed her mug in the sink and ran down the stairs into the restaurant.

Alex was there ready to greet her, he knew it was her first day at fairy tale high school and was beyond proud she was able to get in on a full scholarship.

"You ready Cee-cee? Nervous? Did you pack a lunch? How about water? Do you need pencils? Paper?" Alex asked her nervously; he was excited and scared for her.

"I'm alright big brother don't worry! Ill be fine." She smiled at her brother before giving him a hug. "I'll be home around 3:30 okay? I'll see you later, luv ya byeeee." Lucy quickly ran out the front door of the restaurant and began her walk to school. She didn't live too far to walk to the school, about 6 blocks or around 30 minutes. She popped in her earbuds and threw on Golden Hour by JYKE which is one of her favourite songs right now. Time flew by as she excitedly walked to her new school. She had put her hair in little pigtails at the top of her head but left the rest out and down in her natural beach waves. Before she knew it, she was there, Fairy tale high school. Fairy tail was actually technically a middle school too as it spanded from grades 7 to 12. Lucy was in grade 10 so she new she would be the new girl, but that excited her; at last, a fresh start.

In accordance with her fresh start, when Lucy filled out the paperwork for her new school she lied about her last name. She did this out of fear people would recognize her last name since the Heartfilia empire was well established within all of Fiore, but also so that in the case her father came to look for her, her name couldn't be found in the registry. But what last name did she choose? Lucy spent good time pondering this decision, she wanted something that still had meaning to her, she was close to going with her mother maiden name but decided against at the last moment. Instead, she chose Helianthus, the scientific name for sunflower, her mothers favourite, and her nickname for Lucy.

As Lucy stood before the school, she was awed by its glory. The school was surrounded by large golden gates that wrapped the entire ground of the school. The school itself was white and navy blue with gold trimmings here and there. The school was 5 stories high and was so wide she had to turn her head from side to side to see the whole thing.

Lucy looked at her iPod and saw the time, "8am already? Better get head to the office to get my schedule before I'm late." She walked towards the school, passed the line of expensive cars all dropping off their kids off. She walked through the large golden doors and immediately realized that this school was too large for her to navigate. She started down the hallway to her right, figuring she better start somewhere and followed the large wave of students running to find their classes. She took a left, than another left, than a right and another left. She soon stopped when she realized there were no more students lining the halls, worse off, that meant she had no body to ask for directions.

"You're telling me a school this big couldn't invest in signs for directions." Lucy muttered to herself. She sighed, unsure which way she even came from. That when she saw a girl coming from the opposite side of the hallway. Lucy took her chance.

"Hey! Sorry! Excuse me." Lucy ran up to the short blunette. "Do you know how to get to the office from here? I'm a tad lost."

"Oh my! Of course, I'll just bring you there myself because giving you directions will probably just result in you getting further lost." The girl laughed. "Not to be rude of course! This place is just a maze if you don't know your way around." She finished with a laugh

"Thank you so much! I really appreciate it. My names lucy." She stuck out her hand for the short girl to shake.
"My names levy." She shook lucy's hand, "Pleasure to meet ya!"

The two girls walked all the way back from where lucy had came, if she had only turned left… Within 5 minutes the girls were at the office.

"I'll wait here for ya that way I can walk you to class, don't need you getting lost once more!" Levy joked. Lucy laughed and nodded before walking up to the receptionist and getting her schedule.

Upon her return, levy grabbed the paper out of Lucy's hand and read it. "Oh, Lucy we have so many classes together except English and music. Cmon, we have first period together you can follow me!" Lucy swiftly grabbed Levy's hand, and they chatted about books as they made their way to the 4th floor for chemistry class together.

Levy and Lucy walked in 10minutes late, something their teacher, Professor Alzack, gave them a look for. The two girls sat next to each other. To Lucy's left though sat a familiar redhead.

"Hey Levy, good to see we have chemistry together." Erza said to Levy speaking across Lucy's desk.

"Yeah, good to see you here too, means were both gonna ace this class, this is Lucy! Its her first day today!" Levy chimed

Erza offered lucy a warm smile. "Nice to meet you Lucy but you know technically Levy, its everyone's first day today. It's the start of the fall semester."

Levy rolled her eyes. "I mean its her first day attending Fairy Tail high silly." Erza laughed and the three girls chatted until Prof Alzack began his lecture.

"Alrighty class! Today we start our introduction into unit one which is organic chemistry, we will be doing weekly labs during class time and write ups will be due exactly one week after the lab was preformed. As for the subject of Lab partners, I have created the pairings myself. This list is posted on the door which you can check after class." To that the students sighed.

The lecture drawled on for what felt like forever to lucy, but she didn't mind, she missed being in a real school, with actual students and a professor who had a face you could put to the name. During online school the classes were posted as YouTube videos with the teachers mostly doing voiceovers. Her only communication during online school consisted of emails to the teachers and TA's when she had a question. Soon the bell rang and lucy was off to music class, completely forgetting to check the lab partner pairings list.

Lucy waved bye to levy and Erza, who offered to meet her at the end of class at her music class since she wouldn't know how to find them if she left from there. Her music class was on the first floor. As she entered, she was amazed by what she saw, private soundproof music rooms that could fit 2 people lined the entire classroom. Instruments of all kinds were strung up in every other free space the room had to offer. But the best part for Lucy, the pianos in each of the private rooms, she would be making use of those often.

"Alrightly Class! My names Mira and I'm actually a grade 12 music major here. I'll be your TA for the class but some of you may also know me as I manage all the bands that play at this school! Its truly my pleasure to make your acquaintance." Mira said with a kind smile. "Instead of boring you all with music theory you probably all know by know, we will instead start with a music placement test. You will spend todays and tomorrow's class creating a song with your instrument of choice. On Wednesday you will present it to the class and will be graded. Don't worry if it doesn't go as you would like though! The grading is just to see where you are in your musical capabilities, that way we know where to start off for the class."

A boy with grey hair sitting at the far end of the class shot up his hand, "Sorry Mira, is this group work or will we be working alone." The boy asked.

"Great question Grey! That is completely up to you whether you chose to do a duet or go solo. Just know even if you work with a partner, you will both be graded individually." Mira answered.

"You all know what to do, if anyone needs me, I'll be at the teachers desk doing my own schoolwork." She said while scratching the back of her head. Mira sure had a lot of responsibilities for a high school student. With that all the students stood up. The music room had 20 private soundproof rooms, with around 25 students there would be enough if some people chose to pair up. Quickly rooms were being taken as students found their instrument of choice and headed off. Soon it was just Lucy sitting at her desk and another boy who you could hear snoring.

"Hey Flame brains, nap-time is over, get up and get to work." Grey said to the sleeping boy, kicking his chair until the pink haired boy fell out of it was a startle.

"Hey what the hell Grey! Don't you know sleep is important to a growing boy." Natsu said to grey, shaking his fist at him as he rose from the floor.

"Yes, boy, you sure are a child Natsu. Now get to work." Grey responded, he then walked off to one of the private rooms that another girl currently occupied.

Lucy instantly recognized the boy on the floor, Natsu, the boy who stood up for her at the restaurant last year. "He probably doesn't remember me." Lucy thought, and with that she got up from her seat and headed to a free private room. She would have to work alone since she didn't know anyone in the class yet, well she did, but she thought it would be weird to walk up to the boy and asked if he remembered her. Sparing her dignity, she found a room in the far-left corner and plopped herself into the piano chair. Before she could start playing, a familiar boy barged in.

"Ahh, I found one I really though there would be no rooms lef-,"Natsu was cut off by the sight off lucy sitting on the piano bench, hands splayed across the piano, ready to play.
"AH Shit! Sorry! The light outside the room wasn't on so the thought it was still free… hey wait! Don't I know you from somewhere?" Natsu asked Lucy. Her eyes widened, so he did remember her.

"Hey Natsu, yeah it was last year, you helped me get away from some rude customers." Lucy reminded him while looking at the piano, she was nervous to even look at him.

"Oh yeahhhhh. It's Lucy, right? Wanna work together than?" Natsu asked her.

"Sure! What instrument do you play?" Lucy asked him

"Actually, I play the piano like you, but I also play guitar, for the assignment I can just play that if you wanna play the piano alone." He offered as he walked further into the room and closed the door behind him.

"I've never played a piano duet with another person before, sounds fun! I say we should do that If you don't mind?" Lucy said while smiling. She finally met his eyes and immediately blushed, she never really noticed how handsome he was. He was wearing a black muscle shirt so tight she could see the lines of his abs and arms through it. He also sported grey sweatpants but confused her was the scarf. Adorning his neck was a white and black scarf, a tad out of season considering it wasn't that cold in early September but she's sure he had his reasons.

"Earth to Lucy, Lucy? Luceeeeee." Natsu said waving his hands in front of her face.

"Huh? What? Sorry I uh zoned out for a second there." She said blushing even harder. He really just caught her staring at his abs, she wanted to crawl under the piano that moment and cry.

"I said scoot over so we can start playing." He laughed. He then turned to the wall and flicked one off the two switches there were on the wall. One controlled the lights but the other one turned on a light outside of the room that alerted others that the room was currently in use and to not barge in on the students during their music sessions.

Natsu spun on his heels and sat to Lucy's left. "Okay so I control the lower octaves and you have the higher ones. If we can manage this well, we can actually cross hands and you play lower while I play higher. But that's something we can try another day." Natsu said with a fat smile.

"He has the most beautiful smile." Lucy thought to herself, his smile filled her stomach with butterflies. Not to mention they were so close their legs brushed up against each other. Shewing away all her teenage hormonal feelings she asked the boy,

"So, what should we play? Have anything in mind?"

Natsu shook his head, "Nah we gotta make a song from scratch, I have a few but I think it would be more fun for us both to write something new."

"True, okay well what theme you feeling? Happy, sad, angryyyyy. " She said making a face with each emotion she stated. Natsu laughed at her looking so funny. Regaining his composure he said,

"Happy is always fun but love songs are just really easy to write… blah blah blah love, blah blah sappy shit, blah blah insert random girls name here." Natsu said while playing some basic piano chord all exaggeratively. Lucy laughed, Natsu was right as most mainstream love songs all sounded the same.

"I'm down for either honestly. I say we play some random chords until they start to match up then go from there." Lucy suggested. Natsu nodded and both began to play random chords. At first it sounded terrible, but soon, ever so slowly, the began to match each other. A melody slowly revealed itself. Lucy could almost see the lyrics in the air in front of her. She pulled out her iPod with one hand and placed in on the piano and pressed record. She began to sing.

(Keep driving by Harry Styles)

"Black and white film camera

Yellow sunglasses

Ashtray, swimming pool

Hot wax, jump off the roof."

Natsu looked at her with awe, they both immediately transitioned to a chorus and Natsu started singing

"A small concern with how the engine sounds

We held darkness in withheld clouds

I would ask, 'Should we just keep driving?'"

Lucy continued to the second verse.

"Maple syrup, coffee

Pancakes for two

Hash brown, egg yolk

I will always love you"

Lucy nudged Natsu to sing the chorus again, to which he did.

" A small concern with how the engine sounds

We held darkness in withheld clouds

I would ask, should we just keep driving?

Should we just keep driving?"

Lucy continued the song with the bridge.

"Passports in footwells

Kiss her and don't tells

Wine glass, puff pass, tea with cyborgs

Riot America, science, and edibles

Life hacks going viral in the bathroom"

Natsu jumped in to finish the bridge

"Cocaine, side boob

Choke her with a sea view

Toothache, bad move

Just act normal

Moka pot Monday, its all good

Hey, you

Should we just keep driving?"

The two began to sing together now for the end.

"Should we just keep driving?

Ohh-ohh, ohh

Should we just keep driving?"

The two of them looked at each other, astonished at what they had just done.

"Dammit!" Natsu said placing his face on the piano, resulting in a terrible mix of keys being played in unison. "We should've stopped to write the lyrics down or even the general chords, that's probably the best song I've co-written and now its gone." Natsu mumbled against the keys.

Lucy laughed. "Don't worry Natsu, the second I had lyrics come to mind I started recording on my iPod, we have all of it on video. We can just recreate the song of what we hear, and I can type up the lyrics tonight." She said with cheer.

Natsu sighed with relief and took his face off the piano, he had the lines of the keys ingrained in his forehead. "Good thinking Luce!" She blushed at the nickname.

"So, we still got half of class left, watchu wanna do now?" Natsu asked Lucy. He didn't feel like trying to write out all the piano sheets now, he could procrastinate on that.

"Maybe we should brainstorm some alternative lyrics… I don't think Mira will appreciate us singing about Cocaine in class." Lucy said

"Nahhhh, trust me your gonna hear a lot worse than that, I promise." Natsu reassured her

"Ummm, well than I don't know, any suggestions?"

"How about 21 questions? You know, I have a rule: I don't sing with strangers." Natsu said in a matter-of-fact tone while said holding his finger up.

"Stanger? Me? Wow how rude." Lucy mocked hurt. "Okay well rules are rules, so I'll ask the first question, why do you attend this school?"

To get into Fairy Tail you either needed outstanding grades because they offered advanced courses that could even count as university credits. But you could also try out for one of their specialized programs such as literature, general arts and music, and athletics.

"Well, my dad, Guildarts, has a dojo in town so I grew up learning how to fight, I originally applied for the athletics program but changed my mind at the end for music." He responded

"Do you like fighting?" Lucy asked, interested in his response.

"I mean like it? Yeah, sure who doesn't like having the ability to whoop-ass. But I have a passion for music. I just feel like sometimes the music I play conveys how I feel much better than words ever could." He replied honestly. It was a very real response which surprised Lucy, she expected a more stereotypical and superficial answer.

"Okay my turn now! Where did you learn to write lyrics so well, you came up with the entire song on the spot. I've never seen someone do that before." Natsu said sounding genuinely impressed. He was, seeing her sing like that, such unique lyrics, that takes skill and soul; something that made Lucy stand out to him in his heart.

"Well, my mom used to love singing, we would wander our garden picking flowers and would just come up with the most beautiful songs on the spot. I guess I just picked it up." Lucy said with a melancholy look.

"Wow you're mom sounds awesome, its cool you picked up her talent, she must be happy." Natsu said

Lucy's eyes closed a little as she looked to her shoes, her smile mournful. "Yeah, she was the best, I'll never be as good as she was. She used to love to hear me sing, but I was really shy, so she would start singing and when I chimed in, she would slowly stop singing just to hear my voice."

Natsu frowned a little, Lucy looked like her mind was in the past. He asked another question.

"Luce, can I ask what happened to your mom?"

She looked up at Natsu, her eyes just a bit bloodshot like she was about to cry. "Do you remember that influenza that went around years ago? It was an epidemic that nearly wiped out one quarter of the population." She asked him softly

"Yeah, I remember, not even doctors knew what it was." Natsu said

"Well, my mom caught it, by the next day she was gone. I was six." She said, she looked to the piano as she tried to calm herself. She rarely spoke of her mom with others. After she passed, her father never brought her up and did everything to erase her memory, servants never talked about her out of fear of making Lucy sad. Her mothers passing still weighed heavily on her.

"I am really sorry Lucy, you were just a child. We don't have to talk about her if it makes you sad, I didn't mean to upset you." He said and he placed a hand on her shoulder to comfort her.

"No really its okay, I like talking about her, after she passed no one would ever bring her up, I knew they did it to avoid upsetting me, but it made it feel like she disappeared from everyone's mind, like I was the only one who even remembered she existed." A tear spilled from Lucy's eye. She lifted her arm to hastily dry it with her sleeve, but Natsu grabbed her chin and lifted her face to look at his. He wiped her tear and said. "I know how that feels Lucy, my dad is actually my adoptive father. He took me in when I was two after my parents died in a car wreck. I was too young to remember them really well, it's the memories others share of them to me that lets me helps me remember them by. I can't imagine what it would be like if no one ever told me about them. How about you tell me all about her lucy? Okay?" Natsu said softly, rubbing her cheek slowly as it wiped away the new tears that fell. Lucy smiled and nodded. The spent the rest of class talking about the Lucy's best friend and mom, Layla.

The bell rang signalling the students to pack up and head to lunch. Natsu and lucy, who spent the rest of class talking about her mom and Natsu's childhood, ended the class laughing.

"You're telling me you strapped cardboard to your arms and jumped off the roof because you were convinced you could fly." Lucy was hunched over laughing her ass off. Natsu, embarrassed he even told Lucy, blushed.

"You've got it all wrong Luce." He interjected. "I didn't think the wings alone would get me flying. That's totally stupid. I had also drank half a bottle of hot sauce. I thought it would give me fire power to fly. The wings were for navigation, duh." He finished while standing up to grab his backpack.

Lucy, who was attempting to stand up, fell back onto the piano bench after hearing Natsu's last remark. She was laughing so hard she was almost crying. Natsu grabbed Lucy's backpack and held out a hand to help her up as she continued to laugh her butt off.

"Oh…. God that's too funny, Natsu you're an absolute dumbass I just hope you know that." She said after regaining some composure. The two walked out of the private room and into the hallway.

"Hey! I was 5 alright, in my head it was sound logic." Natsu defended himself. Truthfully all it did was burn his tongue, give him a terrible tummy-ache and a broken arm. It also confirmed that he could not fly but even after the event he still felt unsure about that.

The two walked to Natsu's locker, Lucy still hadn't gone to hers yet, he threw his bag inside and grabbed his student card to buy lunch.

"Hey, do you mind If I put my stuff in your locker? Just for today, I don't know where my locker is and I'm scared I'll forget how to find it and be trapped in this maze until midnight." She asked, she was a bit nervous to ask but the fear of forgetting where she stored her backpack and house keys scared her more.

"Sure Luce." He grabbed her backpack off of her and hung it on the hook of his locker. Lucy grabbed her lunch from home, Alex insisted on making her lunch for her first day, and let Natsu closed his locker.

They then headed to the cafeteria, Lucy walked with Natsu as he went into the lunch line and started grabbing food from the buffet the school offered. He grabbed 2 hamburgers, an apple, and fries before swiping his student card and heading to the usual place him and his friends sat for lunch.

It was at that moment Levy and Erza barged into the cafeteria, making all the students there look at them like they were crazy.
"Lucy! There you are!" Levy screamed across the cafeteria. Erza and levy made their way to the table and hugged her. "We thought you got lost again, did you forget we were gonna get you from art?" Levy asked

"Shit! Sorry Levy! I was so focused on Natsu's stupid story It completely slipped my mind. I'm so sorry Levy and Erza, I didn't mean to stand you guys up." Lucy said with a frown, she felt terrible.

"Oh, don't worry about it Lu! Its your first day I'm sure your brain is in overdrive, don't sweat it." Levy said with a grin. Erza nodded with a smile. The two girls headed to go grab some lunch and returned in a couple minutes. During that time Lucy and Natsu joked around while eating their lunches.

"Luce what are you munching on? It looks sooooo good." Natsu said almost drooling into Lucy's lunch. Alex had packed her risotto, which lucy definitely could say was one of her top three dishes on the menu. She pushed her risotto over to Natsu, who looked at her as if she was an angel.

"Really, I can eat it! Are you sure?" Natsu said

"Yeah of course! As a thanks for everything today, plus he made me enough risotto for an army, so I don't mind at all." Lucy replied with a grin. Natsu took no time to start scarfing down Lucy's lunch, he was so focused he didn't see the entire group join them at the table.

Levy, who had returned with a veggie wrap and fruit salad, introduced Lucy to the group. "Alrighty everyone, this is Lucy. Lu, this is Gajeel (she points to a tall boy with jet-black hair and piercings), Grey (she points to the boy with black hair), Loke (pointing to the boy with orange hair), and Juvia (She lastly points to the girl sitting next to gray with blue hair). And of course, you know me, Erza and Natsu." Levy finishes her introduction with a smile.

"And I'm Jellal, Nice to meet you, Lucy." The boy with blue hair says as he sits next to Erza, joining the rest of the group.

"It's a pleasure to meet you all!" Lucy says cheerfully. Lucy had never had this many friends before, in her middle school she didn't have many friends. She was a shy child and so she spent most recesses either in the schools garden or in the library with her nose in a book.

The rest of lunch passed seamlessly, well as seamlessly as it could go, with Natsu and grey arguing, Juvia trying to calm grey, Erza threatening to kill them both, Gajeel flirting with Levy, Jellal speaking quietly with Erza, Loke tryna flirt with Lucy and Lucy just watching it all go down.

The lunch bell soon rang, and Lucy followed Natsu to his locker. The rest of the school day consisted of Lucy trying not to sleep in class or chatting with her new friends that were in her classes and trying to navigate the school. Before she knew it Lucy was already walking home with a beaming smile on her face. "So, this is what life should be like," Lucy thought to herself as she walked home to tell her big brother all about her day.

Authors Note: Okay here is chapter 3. I think it is a bit longer. I know this chapter may have been a bit bland but I promise it will get good soon. I hope you enjoy:)

THIS IS NOT MY STORY, all credits belong to the creator of Fairy Tail:)