Their houses are right next to each other, and Gray can literally crawl through his open window into Juvia's house if he wants, not that he ever gets the urge. Also, he has horrible luck, so he'd probably fall through the two foot gap between their rooms and plunge to his death, or to break a few bones, seeing as they're on the second floor.

So whoever designed their houses was fucking stupid, but that's okay because he knows Juvia kind of well now.

And, well, they're not Natsu and Lucy close – the two live in the houses across the street, which are designed the same way. Gray still remembers Lisanna, who used to live in what is now Lucy's house, and how she and Natsu used to be best friends.

Gray and Juvia are a little past that stage, he thinks. Or maybe they aren't, but he thinks that their path of friendship is going in a different direction, so he can't really be sure.

They're definitely not like Natsu and Lucy, though. Apparently Natsu has this thing about becoming best friends with the cute girls that move in to the house conveniently next to him and occupy the rooms that very nearly share a window with his. The thing is, however, that his creepiness level has maximized with Lucy. It's been proven that he often crawls into her bedroom and spends more time in there than he does in his own. He even supposedly sleeps in Lucy's bed with her at night – Lucy's complained about it a lot.

It's funny how she hasn't, y'know, closed her window on him. And then there was that time when Natsu collapsed in bed after basketball practice instead of going over to her room, and she allegedly climbed into his bedroom and ordered him to scoot over so she could clamber onto his bed, admitting that she couldn't sleep without him anymore in the form of an angry rant that blamed Natsu for being an idiot.

Gray knows this is fact because Natsu wouldn't stop bragging, and Lucy's face turned the color of the flamehead's extra-spicy noodle soup.

So, no, he and Juvia aren't that close. Not that he wants to be. Nope, not even a little.

Although he's pretty sure he saw a doll of himself on her bed, which was more than a little creepy.

Actually, he's pretty sure Lucy wouldn't even consider having a doll of Natsu… you know what? He probably should stop thinking of Lucy near Juvia. She can probably sense it using her not-at-all amusing or cute stalker powers and come rushing in, rambling about her "love rival."

Speaking of which, he's thinking this while Loke is over at his house so that they can play CoD, aka Call of Duty or The Best Game Ever or Terrible Mainstream Shit Gray Shouldn't Own, and Juvia has just walked into her room and her hair is down today – it's wavy and he likes that better than when her hair curls up weirdly at the end. He doesn't know why she bothers trying; he knows it takes her longer to style it that way but it looks better when she doesn't so why does she even do it?

Anyways, he can't be caught staring or Loke will never stop laughing like the dickhead he is, so Gray turns back to his game and begins designing a new Custom option because fuck how does he not have one with BAL-27 in it? Except he can't remember which custom label he can replace due to its suckiness… was he using Custom 2 when he got knifed by Loke for the bajillionth time?

That's when he hears Loke making some sort of a strangled choking noise, so he turns around to see him openly gaping at Juvia's window.

"Hey, what do you think you're-" He breaks off mid-sentence as he sees Juvia peeling off her shirt, leaving her in nothing but her bra and skirt. Loke makes some sort of an unidentified gurgling noise.

Gray's face flushes red because what-the-actual-flipping-fuck-is-she-doing? and he sprints to his window like he never quit cross country, leans over the edge, and screams, "Juvia, CLOSE YOUR FREAKING WINDOW NEXT TIME" before slamming his own window shut, panting because that was the most exercise he's done all day.

Lyon, the sorriest excuse of a brother ever, busts into his room like he's on some cop show and Gray's half-expecting him to say, "Put your hands up!" except all Lyon says is, "Did you say Juvia? What happened with Juvia? Did something happen with Juvia? JUVIA?"

Man, what a let-down.

"Get out of my room!" Gray screams like the brat he is, or maybe more like Ultear – and oh, look, speak of the devil; she's right there and she looks pissed – as he pushes Lyon out of the doorway, which proves to be somewhat of a challenge as he's flailing to reach the window.

"Shut the fuck up!" screams Ultear, knocking them both swiftly to the ground. "I was doing chem homework, but guess what? I couldn't becausesome little kids were having an actual freaking catfight, and God, Gray just let Lyon have your freaking room so he can stalk that weird girl in peace and we can actually have some semblance of quiet in here!"

"Yeah, Gray!" chimes in Lyon, but Ultear twists his arm painfully. "Ow, ow, 'Tear please," cries Lyon in pain, and ha! He deserves it.

But Lyon remarkably morphs back into his cool, composed, and I-haven't-seen-or-heard-of-Juvia-recently state, and he draws up enough of his dignity to say, "I didn't know texting your new boyfriend counted as doing chem homework."

Ultear drags him out of the room kicking and screaming to his inevitable death. Gray thinks it was a noble sacrifice, and God bless him for having at least one moment of awesomeness. Even though they're atheist. Whatever.

Meanwhile, Loke seems to have recovered from the whole accidental spying thing, and he pushes his glasses smoothly up his nose and smirks like he hasn't just been spluttering like some idiot. "So…" he drawls, his eyes shining with evil intent, "You get that view often?"

"That's it. Get out of my house."