To the boy she loves, to the girl he adores

Chapter 7

"Juvia and Gajeel-kun?" earning a nod from Gray, the bluenette continues "He was Juvia's classmate during middle school."

"I know that, but how did you guys become friends?"

"About that..."

It was on a summer day when the teacher decided to have the class split into pairs to do a presentation for the class wall newspaper, which made it quite difficult for Juvia as she didn't have any friends and her classmate found her too weird to work with. Gajeel, on the other hand, was very scary back then. Always got into fights and disobeyed the teachers, he was known as the delinquent of the whole school and no one dared to talk to him, that included Juvia.

This was why Juvia was very surprised when Gajeel actively asked her if she wants to pair up with him for this project. The bluenette was scared at first, but because no one else wanted to pair up with her, she reluctantly accepted his offer. However, after spending a few days working with Gajeel on the project, she realized how different he was. Whenever she did something wrong, the boy would not scold her and instead, helped the bluenette fix it without any complaints. This soft side of him actually melted Juvia's heart as it was the first time someone treated her nicely, better than all of the people in her class.

"Juvia became his friend after that, our presentation actually got a pretty high score and was featured on the center of the wall newspaper."

Gajeel and Juvia stayed very close during middle school, they ate lunch together, did homework together, walked home together. It was thanks to Gajeel that she's no longer feeling lonely in class. Despite having a scary face and cocky attitude, he was very soft and caring towards her, tender to all her needs and fought back anyone who dared to make fun of her.

"Does Gray-sama know that Gajeel-kun has a cat?"

"No, I don't. I don't think a guy like him would own a pet." said Gray as he enjoys the story "Tell me more about it."

"He named the cat Pantherlily, but Juvia calls him Lily!" she smiles "Someone left it in the corner of the street and Gajeel-kun happened to pick him up, Lily stayed with him ever since."

"Hm, that explains why Levy always mentions the name Pantherlily. You know, Natsu has a pet, too. He named the blue cat Happy, which is a terrible name if you ask me."

She giggles at his comment then turns her attention to the cooking show. Gray has spared her life by closing his notebook and retreating his calculator, a cue for Juvia to put away her quiz paper and anything that relates to math.

Today's cooking show features Minerva Orland, a famous pâtissier. Juvia has been following her for quite a while, loving every single recipe that the baker posts on her social media page. Minerva is showing the audience the cheesecake recipe that she recently developed and the bluenette is very eager to learn it.

"Gray-sama, look at how amazing her sk-?! Eh...?"

She is startled at the sight of Gray, staring intensively at the screen. He seems to be mesmerized by Minerva's skills, murmuring a string of incoherent words that are hard to make out. She looks at him before turning her attention to the beautiful baker on the screen, steams come out of her head as she enviously grips her long, flowy skirt.

C-could it be that Gray-sama l-like Minerva-san?

She pouts, not enjoying the thought that is playing in her head. Minerva is indeed a beautiful woman, she's a great baker with millions of followers on social media, no wonder Gray likes her. That little thought keeps spinning in her head until she hears the soft murmuring from the person next to her.