She'd still give him that look sometimes.
Not when she thought he was watching, of course. It was almost as if she was afraid that he'd catch her in the act; almost as if she was afraid he'd catch her gaze and actually answer her question.

Why did you leave me in Magnolia, Natsu?

He ignored the question for as long as possible, knowing that it was fully inevitable that it be brought up in conversation. She had brought it up before but she was quick to shut herself down. It was almost as if she herself did not really want to acknowledge the emotion she expressed so blatantly in those cautious glances.

She felt betrayed.

It wasn't even a vengeful feeling of betrayal. She didn't act any differently towards him. She didn't seem to harbour any ill will. In battle, she was still the epitome of loyalty; standing bravely by his side and refusing to back down from any tyrant or demon or beast of any kind. But still, that question hung in the air in every moment of temporary peace. Why? Why? Why?

He would have a hard time explaining. Actually, it probably wouldn't be that hard. He was just stubborn. He knew perfectly well why he left her. He was able to explain it so perfectly to Gildarts. Lucy was…a different story. She was too close to the actual issue.

There was no way she could have come.

After going through the joy and grief of finding and losing his father all in the same day sort of opened his eyes up about something.

Yes, they were Fairy Tail. Yes, things usually came out okay.
But on that day, things did not turn out okay. Some may argue that they won against the Etherious and therefore, things were okay but to him, they had lost too much for that victory. There was a gap in their memories in the period that cube turned into that beastly cube thing but to him, one thing was certain, Lucy had saved them. He wasn't sure what she had done but on regaining awareness, was very alarmed to see the state she was in.

In a way, it made him feel as if he had failed. There was nothing more he wanted in the world than being close to his friends. He wanted to live in that endless adventure with Lucy for the rest of his life. Their life was a storybook and he was in love with the tale. He was in love in the way their life went on and on and nothing seemed to be too much of a problem. Everything had a solution. Everything was bright. Everything was lovely.

Then, there came reality, cold and harsh in the form of death. The destruction of their guild, the injuries of his friends and the death of Igneel just made him even more aware of his mortality, their mortality. That endless fairy tale illusion they were living in was shattered. Any day really, something could go wrong. There was a million ways things could go wrong but one stuck out to him, the fact that he was a weakling.

He was a weakling.
Natsu Dragneel was a weakling.

Someday, they'd come across an enemy that could kill him. It wasn't his life he was worried so much about. It was his nakama. Gray could get his chest ripped open. Erza, the undefeatable, was in fact, defeatable. Wendy…well, he didn't want to think about that too hard. She was barely into puberty but was used to being on the frontlines. Her death would drive him mad with guilt. Her and…

Lucy.
Story book girl.
The one that walked in and put a gold tint to everything by just smiling at him that first time.
The one with the flowing blonde hair and those brown, brown eyes.
Lucy, the one most dear.
He could never let it be her.
Never Lucy.

So, he left.
Picked up his bags, grabbed Happy and just…left.
He had to get stronger. He had to be able to protect his nakama always.
He needed to train and train and train until he could tear down any enemy that could possibly pose a threat to his family.

She would have come with him, of course.
She would have followed him to hell if he asked her to.
But, he couldn't have let her do that so he wrote her a half-assed letter. He, in some way, had to have some time to come to terms with his feelings about death and family and her.

It was unfair to her and he knew it.
They were a team. They always had each other's back. They did everything together. They trusted each other to the point of blind stupidity. He cried and followed her when she went to visit her dad but he still left her.

Stupid, unfair Natsu Dragneel.

No wonder she felt betrayed.

So here he was, squatting on that fated apartment windowsill on Strawberry Street in the dead of night. Here he was, soul too heavy with guilt that he couldn't dare step onto that soft bed spread as he had done countless times before. He couldn't go and plop down next to her sleeping form under the pretence that her mattress was soft but really because he thought her reaction to in the morning was hilarious.

She was lying on the far side of the bed, the back of her head peeking out from under her pink comforter. The way she had wrapped herself up made it obvious that she was cold. He could almost laugh at that. Why did you leave your window open then, weirdo? The room was dark save from the slight illumination from the street lacrima outside. In some way, it made him feel somewhat bare, raw even. It was as if the complete shadows of night exposed everything that daylight would allow to remain covered. It made the guilt unbearable. She was too nice to call him out of it but that didn't mean he was free. He had hurt her and that was hurting him. Ode to Asshole Dragneel.

"Lucy."
A shaky breath escaped him. God, just open your mouth and talk, Dragneel. Weren't you good at that? Talking even when everyone was screaming for you to shut up?

"Lucy, I am…I…I am sorry for making you feel like that. I'm sorry for making you feel so crappy because I left but I had to go."

He took another breath. Why was it so hard to talk to someone who wasn't going to answer or interrupt you because it was fuck-it-all o'clock and no one really said anything at fuck-it-all o'clock. It was time for teenagers to be thinking alone in their beds and for lovers to be panting but not a time for talking. Talking was for the daylight. Boys with pink hair who muttered words to the backs of girls with tattoos of the same colour were cowards.

He was a coward.

"I had to go, Lucy. I needed to. I'm sorry I wrote you a crappy letter to tell you but, I just couldn't face you. I couldn't see you because I wouldn't have been able go. I wouldn't have been able to say no to you. Lucy, I'm sorry."

His chest was burning. His voice felt heavy but he needed to get this out. He needed her to know.

"Just, it was hard. All my time in Fairy Tail, I always believed that Igneel was out there…somewhere. I kept looking for him because I thought I would see him alive. To me, he wasn't really, gone. I hadn't really lose him. Even with Lisanna, she died and then she came back because she wasn't really dead."

Again, breathe Dragneel.

"I never felt that…life altering loss that you guys know. You…Gray…Erza, you're all products of some kind of loss. I was a product of hope. I always felt optimistic about the future and all that. Then, in Crocus, when…you…the other you…when she…"

Swallow. It was a hard thing to talk about even now. Mess up your hair, it might help you stay calm.

"….when she died, it started. I started to feel that maybe, things could get fucked up in a way I couldn't fight. But, I buried it down. The future had changed. I believed that I could change any reality where you died because we're Fairy Tail and things usually work out if we fight hard enough. Then, we went through that whole Tartarus ordeal."

He was crying. As much as he had tried to keep his voice calm and even, the tears still managed to find themselves rolling down his face.

"Lucy, Igneel, he…he was right there. I had found him. I was so happy. He was there, actually there."

A smile found itself on his face as he worked to wipe away his tears. He couldn't allow himself to get overwhelmed.

That smile was gone almost as soon as it came.

"Then he was gone, Luce. I saw him get rip down right in front of me. It was real. I saw it. There was no way he could even be alive after that. There was no hope of him being alive after that. He wasn't going to get up and laugh or any of those things he used to do. He was gone, actually dead."

Breathe again. Keep calm. Don't let the waterworks start again.

"After all that, I looked around and I saw how beat up you guys were. You and Erza looked on the brink of death for God's sake. I just realised, like, really realised that any one of us could get killed at any time. And that made me feel weak. It made me feel…helpless Lucy. Lucy, what would I do if anything happened to you? Lucy, I would die. I would die right there with you. I love you, Lucy. I love you so much. I don't think I could stay alive without you. I spent all my time believing that we'd always be living life in that haze where everything was endlessly perfect then all of a sudden, death's too real of a consequence. We could go on a mission one day and get overpowered and that's it. We're dead. Like, really, dead."

He was rambling. Calm down. Calm right down Dragneel. Explain yourself clearly.

"I had to get stronger. The only way I could protect my friends, protect you, was by getting stronger. I needed to go do that and I needed to grieve, Lucy. I needed time to wrap my head around the whole death thing. I needed time alone to do that and I'm sorry, Lucy. I'm sorry I left like that. I'm sorry I made you feel like that. So please, please Lucy, please stop pretending you're asleep."

For a moment, there was nothing. It was as if he really poured his heart out to a mostly empty room save a sleeping girl. Then, she rolled over and looked at him with those big brown eyes that betrayed how hurt and tired she felt in her soul. She was so beautiful though. She was so perfect. She was his forever endless phantasmagorical story.

"Lucy, I –"
She stopped his words with a shake of her head. She turned over on her back, patting the bed beside her in invitation. Quickly, he discarded his sandals and lay next to her. He looked at her while she looked at the ceiling.

"Lucy, really –"
She reached for his hand, grabbing three of his fingers in her palm and squeezing. Her hand was trembling, her body was trembling and she was shaking her head furiously. Don't talk, Dragneel. Just shut up.

He wasn't one that could really just shut up.

"I'm so sorry."

Then, she was on top of him, knees plated on either sides of his torso and his collar grasped in her hands. He didn't really understand what was happening when she smashed their lips together, his teeth clacking painfully against hers. He vaguely registered how stale her breath tasted. It was only a second before she pulled away and mashed their lips together again. He couldn't appreciate it though because she was tearing open his shirt and trying to yank down his pants and just shaking so, so much.

He pushed her away, staring heartbrokenly at her tear soaked face.

"Lucy."

She grabbed two handfuls of his shirt and shook him, shouting at him to just shut up until her downstairs neighbours were knocking their ceiling, her floor, telling her the time and to generally just go to sleep. She let him go, raising her hands to first wrap around her chest then to cover her mouth as she looked to the far wall and cried.

He tried to reach for her, to comfort her. She slapped his hand away.

"Lucy, I'm sorry."

"I needed you!"

Those were the first words she said since he came through the window. Instantly, he stopped trying to solace her. Strands of hair were stuck to the wet spots on her face and her chest was expanding and contracting rapidly as she sobbed. It took her a while to calm herself down enough to talk.

"I needed you, Natsu. I didn't even have time to recover from the shock of the Tartarus then you were gone. I needed you there with me. I needed you to help me recover and you weren't there. I get word that Fairy Tail was breaking up and a fucking letter that YOU'RE LEAVING ME TOO. I go through Alegria alone and I lose Aquarius, the first friend I –"

"You lost Aquarius?" Natsu asked, his voice tinged with disbelief. Lucy gave him an incredulous look.
"Yes Natsu, I lost her. She's gone. You'd have known that if you stuck around but you left and then you come back and YOU DIDN'T EVEN KNOW THE GUILD HAD BROKEN UP."

Lucy Heartfilia had abandoned crying in favour of showing him exactly how angry she was. She began shaking him again.
"And I needed you, I needed you to be there as my best friend to comfort me and you left me. You left me and went out to train or whatever. You knew that I would have gone with you. You knew that. You knew and yet you left. You, the one person I trusted to not abandon me just up and fucking did that."

She quit throttling him. Her shoulders were slumped forward and began shaking again. Slowly, he lifted his palm to touch her cheek and she leaned into his touch, closing her eyes and letting herself just cry. He wrapped his other arm around her waist, pulling her into his chest. The hand on her cheek found itself buried in her hair and each sob she made caused his chest to tighten in grief.

It took a while for her sobbing to recede, him cooing and rubbing her back during the whole spell. Finally, it was just loud breathing in the room. His eyes felt heavy. The room felt stuffy. The street lacrima had shut off.

"I'm sorry, Lucy." he murmured against her forehead. His voice felt scratchy, like he hadn't used it in a million years. He began to wonder if she had fallen asleep but her breathing pattern said otherwise. He was about to succumb to the weight of sleep on his eyelids when she answered.

"I know Natsu, I'm sorry too."

He tightened his hold on her slightly, revelling in the weight of her body as it rose and fell with his breathing.

"Can you forgive me?"

"Ask me in the morning. I'm feeling too much now."

He made a noise of agreement before craning his neck to kiss her forehead. Her hair smelled like grapefruit. He faintly registered that she had changed her shampoo again. He wanted to keep his nose there, to continue smelling her hair but he felt so tired.

"I love you, Lucy." he said as he placed his head back on her pillows. His eyes felt so heavy and her breathing was lulling him to sleep. He saw a little less of the ceiling each time he opened his eyes from each slow, heavy blink. Just as he closed his eyes, resigning to the sleep and drifting away, he could've sworn that he heard her voice saying she loved him too.

A/N
I neeeeeeeeeeed them to address the whole situation in the manga.