Underneath A Canopy Of Cherry Blossoms (Nalu AU)

{3} A New Start

I stepped into the bustling cafeteria with a small plastic tray of the best food in the world - tomato soup and a grilled cheese sandwich. I'm sure it won't be as good as when my dad makes it, but it's still my favourite food nonetheless. My gaze shifted back and forth as I tried to pick out Levy in the mass of people swarming the cafeteria. This is my first time in this room and it's absolutely enormous. The whole area is so bright due to the entire wall of windows on the far side, and there are a ton of round white tables with benches surrounding them. A few garbage cans are placed randomly between tables and the hoard of students gathered here is so loud that I can hardly even hear myself think.

"LUCY!" I heard someone scream loud enough to silence the whole room, and my head snapped in the direction of the sound. It was Levy standing up on a bench that was attached to a table already full of people, grinning ear-to-ear and waving her hands wildly in the air to gain my attention.

My face began to heat up in embarrassment because by this point everyone was staring at me, I bowed my head down and fast-walked towards her, not wanting to gain any more unneeded attention from my peers. She noticed that she succeeded in coaxing me over, so she sat back down, and linked our elbows, pulling me right onto the bench beside her. On her other side was a really intimidating guy with a ton of piercings and long black hair. I'm assuming that's Gajeel but I was expecting something completely different with the way he was described to me.

I took a quick glance around the rest of the table to see everyone that I was about to meet. There were two long benches curved around each side of the circular table. On the other bench there sat four other people, I immediately recognized the touchy couple from my English Literature class on the first day as well as a certain pink-haired boy who happened to be sitting almost directly beside me.

The tips of my ears still felt hot from my embarrassing fiasco with Levy at the beginning of lunch, but now my stomach is full of butterflies at the thought of interacting with the cute guy from my second period class once again. I took a glance beside him to see a beautiful girl with long red hair who seemed to be seated very close close to him. I'm a little disappointed that they're together but there's not much that I could do about it now. Shrugging it off, I looked over at Levy who smiled brightly, reassuring me that it was going to be okay.

"I want to introduce you to my new friend Lucy, she is new here and will probably sit with us more often so please welcome her to our lunch table" she paused for a moment and looked around at her silent friends, obviously waiting for her to say something else, "umm, yeah" Levy stumbled over words and smiled meekly as the whole table bursted into a roar of laughter at her.

After the group calmed down, she began going around the table stating names, starting with the person beside her, "We have Gajeel, then on the other side we have Juvia, Grey, Erza and then Natsu on the end there" she pointed to each person individually and my mind started to put their names to their faces. I pieced together that the boy sitting next to Levy was indeed her boyfriend, and that the boy sitting to the right of me must be the same Natsu I heard those girls gossiping about on the first day of school.

They were all smiling and looking at me as if I was supposed to say something groundbreaking and life changing but I couldn't think of anything, so I simply muttered a 'nice to meet you'. They began their regular conversations again and Levy turned to me, "dont worry they will warm up to you, just join in on conversations with them and you'll see."

Her words comforted me slightly and I decided to try and engage in conversation but that mostly just consisted of me eavesdropping as I ate my lunch in silence. They began to talk about a festival that was going on this weekend, and were debating on whether to go to it tonight or tomorrow. What really peaked my interest was that it was a festival for flower viewing - I ended up zoning out of the conversation completely to focus on my thoughts about the cherry blossom festival and how much I've always wanted to go.

My home town Hargeon never really had anything like that and I have always heard about it happening in Magnolia ever since I was a little kid. My dad never wanted to take me all the way to the city just to see the same flowers that we could see out of the window of our family home, and he wouldn't allow me to go there alone, as most of my friends did. My eyes scanned over the table as I thought, and when my gaze wandered over to Natsu I was taken aback to find him leaning towards me, staring with a look of interest in his his eyes. I blinked a few times, letting his face come into my view fully, "What?" I questioned, confused by his actions.

"I was trying to talk to you for a while but you were off in dreamland" He chuckled and backed away from me "Since you're hanging out with us now, do you want to come the festival with us this weekend? We plan to go on Saturday." At the sound of the festival, my heart skipped a beat, and I knew he could tell how excited I was because he smiled broadly as he finished his sentence. Without a moment's hesitation, I nodded my head wildly.

"I would love too!" I could barely contain my excitement but I was trying my best since I didn't want to make a complete fool of myself in front of my new friends.

~Time Skip~

Full of energy, I headed home eager to tell my dad the great news. This was one of the first times that I had been invited somewhere with a group this big.

My dad wasn't home yet so I went to my room to look for an outfit that I can wear to the festival tomorrow while I waited for him. I opened my closet to find a few shirts hanging up and a bunch of empty hangers. Shit, all of my stuff is still packed up because I only took out what I needed for school. I started unpacking all of my boxes of clothes until I heard the front door open. I bolted out of my room and bounded down the stairs, tripping over discarded boxes in the hallway. I emerged into the living area to see my dad kneeling on the ground and taking of his shoes.

"Woah you are beaming! What has got you so excited?" He questioned, lifting an eyebrow as he set his keys down on the coffee table.

"Well I made some more friends today thanks to Levy, and they invited me to join them out to the cherry blossom festival this weekend!" I shouted, beginning to bounce around the room out of excitement.

I looked back towards my dad and he was smiling at me but I could still see the familiar look of concern written in his eyes as I stopped jumping, a little out of breath. I moved towards the kitchen table, taking a seat as my dad wandered over to the fridge and opened it to take a look at what we had, which wasn't much. I knew that we would be having takeout for dinner again.

As my dad turned to look at me, I could tell that he was thinking, "are you sure you can do that much walking in one day?" he walked over to me and rested a warm hand on my shoulder.

"Yeah I haven't done much lately so one day shouldn't hurt" I looked up and smiled at him, trying to get him to believe me. Reluctantly, he nodded his head and sighed.

I stood up and gave him a quick hug to thank him before I ran up to my room to grab my phone and send Levy a text that I am good to go.

I can't wait to finally go to a cherry blossom festival with my friends. Tomorrow is going to be so much fun.