Melting Gray [Gratsu]

34

Chapter Thirty-Four

☆ Natsu Dragneel ☆

A/N: Now I want nachos.

I stared wide-eyed at the menu of the food area of the Retrocade, weighing my options. Every single option was chock-full of hydraulic acids, an abundance of salt, and high-fructose corn syrup. If you left it out in the sun to rot, you could still eat it two months later.

That didn't stop me from ordering the nachos, however.

As I was dripping hot cheese sauce on my pile of corn chips from the condiment nozzles, Gray carried over his tray of pizza and two medium-sized cups, setting it down carefully on the rack.

"What flavor slushy do you want, babe?" Gray grabbed one of the cups, positioning it hesitantly between the blue raspberry and cherry frozen ice flavors.

"Watermelon," I answered. "...Babe," I added, smirking.

I watched Gray's profile twist into a pout. "Shut up." he filled up the cup with light pink watermelon for me and blue raspberry for himself. "Blue raspberry is so weird, you know," he thought aloud. "Like, the fruit doesn't even exist. Where did they come up with such a weird idea?"

"It's actual raspberry," I told him. "The original creators just had a bunch of blue synthetic dye sitting around unused, and one day were like 'screw it' and added it to the raspberry flavor."

Gray whirled me around and gripped my shoulders firmly, staring me down. I noted that the height difference between us was still around four inches, and that irked me. I held on to my nachos tighter. "Has anyone ever told you you are a dork?" he said with a low voice.

I stuck my tongue out. "By you, several times."

"Your brain just me bursting with unnecessary information," Gray ruffled my hair, like he always does, and I swatted his hand away, again, just like I always do. "Come on, let's go sit down in one of those booths that probably haven't been properly sanitized in years."

"What a pleasant thought," I shook my head. "Let's."

We sat across from each other in the booth, which was bright purple and green and, as Gray correctly assumed, was not sanitized. I flicked a piece of chips away from my seat and rested one elbow on the table.

"What a fun date," I talked into my nachos, scooping one up. "We've played games and now we're dining in style," I ushered around to the nasty booth between us.

"Doesn't get much better than greasy pizza and fake cheese sauce," Gray agreed pleasantly, taking a bite of the slice. "Ugh, how does something so unhealthy taste so good?"

"You're going to become obese," I teased. "Eating all those unsaturated lipids."

"What the hell does unsaturated lipids even mean?" Gray was incredulous. "God, you are honestly too smart for your own good."

"I try, I try," I shrugged, plopping a corn chip in my mouth. "No seriously though, this actually is really fun. I'm totally enjoying myself."

"Well, that's good to hear. You'll also be happy to find out the evening is not over yet," Gray smiled mysteriously.

"Oh?" I rested my chin in my palms, staring at him intensely. "Do spill."

Gray raised the straw of his slushy to his mouth and took a sip, shaking his head. "Nope."

"Are we going rollerblading?" I guessed, looking over his shoulder at the double doors that led to the roller rink.

Gray looked cross. "Well, if you want to, we can," he offered. "Or mini-golfing."