Sweetheart

38

"Yo Aina, come here for a second!"

The trio looked across the hall to see Sting and Yukino waving her over. She looked back to her friends and shrugged before making her way over to the couple.

"What's up with you?" Aina asked. "You're louder than usual."

Yukino giggled at her words as Sting slightly pouted. He regained his usual cheerful demeanor a second later, and he placed them all in a huddle.

Sting whispered, "So I was thinking..."

He swiveled his head around to make sure nobody could hear them, which caused the two girls to start laughing.

"We should totally all go on a group date together."

"Uhh..."

"Come on, Aina. It'll be fun! We could go mini-golfing--"

"You were banned," Yukino and Aina responded in unison.

"Okay, then we can go to the arcade--"

"Sting," Yukino groaned, "you were banned from there too."

"Wait, seriously? How on earth did you get banned from the arcade?"

"There was an incident involving a kid trying to steal my tickets. Anyway!" Sting mumbled before regaining his excitement. "We could go ice skating!"

"Sting--"

"Before you say anything, I was absolutely not banned from the skating rink."

"It's not that," Aina shyly stated. "I, uh, don't know how to skate."

-------

"I can't believe I let you talk me into this."

Sting just grinned at Aina and continued to drag her inside the lobby. She resisted as best as she could, but she couldn't deny that Sting was a lot stronger than her. Yukino sighed and followed her boyfriend to the skate rental stand. The three of them received their skates, and patiently waited.

"Is he even coming?" Aina muttered.

They caught sight of tuffs of pink hair, and Sting shouted at him from across the room.

"Sting," Yukino hissed, "if you get us banned from the rink I'm never going out with you again."

"Oh come on, they won't ban me for yelling," he reasoned before turning back to Natsu. "Hurry your ass up!"

Natsu joined them and gave Sting a bored look, but the blond just laughed it off. He gave a small smile to Aina and waved at Yukino before turning back to his friend.

"Is there a particular reason you forced me to come here? We could've been doing anything else."

"It's a group date, Natsu. We needed somewhere fun."

"This is stupid," the pink haired boy muttered before announcing, "Look. She can't even tie her skates."

"Shut up!" Aina yelled, embarrassed. "I'm trying my best."

Natsu knelt down in front of the salutatorian and grabbed the laces. Aina's hands returned to her side as she watched Natsu loop and cross the laces. Her blush was apparent, but she couldn't shake it off.

"You know, I didn't think that there was anything you didn't know how to do. Guess I found your weakness, sweetheart."

She scoffed and held up her other skate for him to tie.

"Ow. That's too tight."

Natsu sighed and quickly re-tied it, standing up again and giving his signature smirk.