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“Oh wow! This is quite a Valentine’s Day surprise!” Happy exclaims.
Both Touka and Carla were currently standing in front of him, each one of them holding a box of chocolates in a heart shaped box, traditional for the Holiday.
“No one’s ever given me chocolates for Valentine’s Day before, and now this year, the first time I’m getting chocolate it’s not just from one beautiful cat but two!” Happy exclaims and little hearts float around his head.
“I must be the luckiest Exceed alive!” He cheers.
“I wasn’t sure what kind you like, so I got you an assortment of a bunch of different flavors” Carla says. “But knowing what gluttons you and Natsu are, I’m sure you’re not too particular about flavor anyway.”
“How rude of you Carla!” Touka exclaims. “I only just got separated from the White Wizard yesterday thanks to your Dragon Slayer’s magic, and I was still able to muster up enough energy to make homemade chocolates for my Savior on this day of love!” Touka opened up her heart shaped box and presented the treats to Happy. “Do you like them Happy-sama? Natsu told me how much you like fish so I cut up some pieces of a raw fish and put them inside each chocolate just for you.”
“That sounds disgusting!” Carla huffs.
“That sounds delicious!” Happy exclaims and his tail wags excitedly behind him. “How ever will I choose which one of you will be my Valentine!”
“Valentine?” Natsu asks.
He had been standing behind Happy and was very confused by what his Exceed partner was currently experiencing with these two.
“What the heck is a Valentine?” He asks.
“I would love to try to explain it to you but I doubt you’d understand.” Carla sighs.
“I can explain it!” Happy says. “It’s a Holiday where if a cute girl gives you chocolates it means that she likes you and wants you to be her Valentine!”
“Okay so now I understand the candy part, sort of, but I still don’t know what the heck a Valentine is!” Natsu groans. “What does it mean when a girl wants you to be her Valentine?”
“You’re a smart guy Natsu!” Touka encourages. “Just look at what’s going on with the townspeople and your guild mates around you, I’m sure you’ll be able to figure it out.”
Natsu frowns and looks around to observe what was going on with his friends and the other people in town. He noticed the women going to different stores and meeting up with people and giving them boxes of chocolates, all of them with the same heart shape box. Then he noticed Gajeel and Levy walking together, holding hands and Gajeel was carrying a box too while Levy’s free hand was resting over her womb.
On the other side of the street, Juvia was squealing Gray’s name and he turned to see her holding a heart-shaped box of chocolates in front of his face. Gray scoffs and looks away from her, seemingly rejecting the gift and a look of disappointment came across her face. Gray looks back and blushes when he notices how sad she looks so he quickly takes the box out of her hands and hides it behind him while leaning down to whisper something in her ear that makes her squeal before covering her mouth with her hands while her face turns bright red. Gray’s face was just as red and he quickly took her hand and led her away somewhere while Juvia’s eyes had turned into two pink hearts and more were floating around her head.
“Okay I’m still confused.” Natsu huffs.
“Really?” Touka asks in disbelief. “I thought it was so obvious.”
“You would think so but Natsu is a special kind of oblivious” Carla explains to Touka. “He doesn’t even realize it when someone literally has feelings for him!”
To prove her point, Carla points her paw towards Lucy who was standing on the sidewalk a few feet behind Natsu, holding a heart-shaped box of chocolates in her hands and blushing.
The poor girl was anxious enough as it is. She was originally not going to even bother with getting Natsu chocolates because she knew he wasn’t interested in romance. But after that close call with Touka, and everyone thinking she had feelings for him even if it turned out to be Happy instead, it still got her a bit worried and kind of jealous. That along with the encouragement of the other girls, had pushed her to give this a try. She had been harboring this crush on him for awhile now and Cana was right. If Natsu doesn’t know how she feels about him, there was a chance, albeit a small one, that another girl could come along and steal him. But more importantly, Natsu was her closest friend and she loved him. He deserved to know the truth. So with a deep breath, she walks towards him and taps her shoulder.
“Hey there Natsu.” She says softly.
Natsu turns and smiles when he sees her. She couldn’t help but give him a small smile in return. She loved that goofy grin of his.
“Hey there Luce! What’s up?” He asks.
“Nothing much. I just wanted to give you something to celebrate the Holiday today.” Lucy says and presents the box of chocolates to him.
Natsu looks surprised and the three Exceeds hold their breath in anticipation.
“So you want me to be your Valentine?” Natsu asks.
Lucy’s blush grows darker and she casts her eyes to the ground as she nods slowly.
“Yeah, I do. Do you want to be mine?” She asks.
“Of course!” He exclaims happily.
She gasps and looks up at him, hope shimmering in her eyes, only to have it shatter as she watches him hungrily wolf down the chocolates.
“I’d never turn someone down when they’re offering me food! These chocolates taste really good! It’s awesome that there’s another Holiday aside from Halloween dedicated to giving candy to your best friends!” Natsu says.
The three Exceeds facepalmed.
Lucy looks disappointed and sad as she lets out a melancholy sigh.
Natsu immediately halts his chocolate feast when he sees how upset Lucy looks.
“Hey Luce, is something wrong?” He asks.
She puts on a fake smile for him.
“No. Nothing’s wrong, this went pretty much how I expected it too. I’ll just be going now. Enjoy your chocolates.” Lucy says with feigned happiness as she turns and briskly walks away from him.
Natsu watches her leave, not entirely convinced that she was telling the truth, but he wasn’t sure what else could be bothering her so he decides to continue eating his chocolates instead. That was the plan anyway, until Touka grabs the box out of his hands.
“Hey Touka what gives! Lucy gave those to me because I’m her Valentine!” Natsu shouts angrily.
“Exactly! You’re supposed to be her Valentine, but you didn’t even acknowledge her feelings!” Touka retorts.
“I agree with Touka. It took Lucy a lot of courage to confess to you, and you don’t even have the sense to recognize it! If you can’t do that then you certainly don’t deserve her chocolates!” Carla agrees.
“Hey it’s not my fault no one ever told me what a Valentine is!” Natsu argues. “I didn’t mean to make her upset, I just don’t understand what any of this means!”
“It means that she looovvveeesss you.” Happy says and holds his paws and bats his eyelashes at Natsu.
Suddenly, Natsu felt his heart drop to his stomach.
“Lucy loves me?” He asks.
“Yes Natsu! That’s what a Valentine is! It’s the person that you love! Do you love Lucy back?” Touka asks him.
Natsu turned away from her to look down the path that Lucy had left on. After a few moments he jogs down the sidewalk and the three Exceeds smile, knowing that means he knows what his answer is.
He spent all day looking for Lucy. He tried to track her scent but that was hard to do with five different cities she could be in to choose from. When Natsu finally found Lucy it was nighttime and she was sitting under a tree in a park. He smiles to portray an air of confidence even though on the inside his heart was pounding as he approaches her.
Lucy looks up and sees him standing in front of her and frowns.
“Hmph! Let me guess, you’re here to ask Virgo to dig another hole for you or something?” Lucy huffs.
Natsu couldn’t help but grin, remembering that night he had asked Lucy to meet him in Magnolia Park and she had gotten upset. He hadn’t understood what made her so mad then, but he definitely knew now.
“You know, I never told you that night but I thought you looked beautiful.” He says on the fly.
That causes Lucy to gasp and blush as she suddenly looked up at him, eyes shining with tears that threatened to spill at any moment from his unexpected endearment.
Natsu knelt down in front of her, and took a strand of her hair and stroked it between his fingers.
“You look beautiful tonight too. You always have. You’re so radiant Lucy, and I’ve been a fool not to notice it.” Natsu admits.
Lucy was too stunned to speak. The tears that were forming in her eyes now spilled down her cheeks as her brain tried to process what exactly Natsu was saying to her.
“Natsu…” She whispers.
This couldn’t be happening right? This wasn’t real. Natsu never says anything romantic ever. He’s as dense as a rock when it came to romance, surely him telling her he thinks she’s beautiful has to be some sort of tee-up for a prank or nasty joke! Well if it was, she wasn’t going to stick around to have her heart broken again.
Lucy got up to run away and that’s when Natsu grabbed her in his arms and the next thing she knew his lips were pressed against hers. She immediately went limp in his hold and accepted the kiss as his strong arms tightened around her waist and his hands rested on the small of her back. Her heart was pounding faster than it ever had before, and she knew that was because of him. She couldn’t believe he was actually kissing her right now, she had wanted this to happen for so long, and now his lips were finally on hers and she couldn’t help but kiss him back as tears of joy streamed down her cheeks.
Natsu was surprised by how warm and happy he felt when he kissed Lucy. Her lips were soft just like the rest of her, but when he had his lips against hers something inside of him clicked. A feeling had awakened that he had never felt before, and it felt like a new kind of fire was burning in his heart, and he loved how it felt.
When their lips parted he looked into Lucy’s eyes with that soft look that he only ever looked at her and Happy with.
“So is this your way of saying you’ll be my Valentine?” Lucy asks.
“Yeah but I don’t want to just be your Valentine Luce. I don’t want this to last for just one day. It took me a long time to figure it out, but I love you Lucy.” Natsu admits.
Lucy gasps and tears up at his confession as a small smile spreads across her face.
“I’ve felt this way for awhile now. I was going to tell you before we went on the 100 Year Quest but I got cold feet and decided that I should just tell you afterwards. I’m sorry for all of the mixed signals and keeping you in the dark for so long, I didn’t think it would make you so upset and that’s the last thing I would ever want to do to you. I’m not good at this whole romance thing. I’ve never paid it any mind for my entire life until I met you, and then I realized what it was all about, but I still had no idea how to show you and I still don’t. I’m not like Loke or those guys you read about in those romance books who could sweep you off of your feet or come up with cheesy poetry about how pretty your are or something sappy like that like Gajeel does for Levy” Lucy laughs. “So I’m telling you right now that I love you, and I’ll never feel this way about anyone else. I want to spend my whole life with you at my side going on adventures together with Happy and hey maybe even a couple of kids along the way” they both chuckled at that. “That is, if you’ll have me?”
“Oh Natsu, of course I will! I love you you big dummy!” Lucy exclaims and throws her arms around him and hugs him tight.
Natsu nuzzles his cheek against hers and brings one of his hands up to the nape of her neck and pulls her back to gently wipe a few tears from her cheek while kissing away the ones on the other.
“I don’t care that you’re not a suave romantic like the characters in my books. I fell in love with you because of the person you are, you don’t ever have to change. Just knowing that you feel the same as I do is enough for me, honestly. We’ll be together forever, and not just for today, I promise.” Lucy says.
Natsu nods and then they both lean in and kiss each other again.
Lucy lifted one of her legs off of the ground and bent her knee, popping her foot behind her as she and Natsu kissed, and as if it was something straight out of a fairy tale, a bunch of shooting stars streaked across the night sky above them, a good omen for this new step in their lifelong relationship with each other.