Chapter VII - Surprise!
"We should adopt Kibou."
Lucy stopped in her tracks, staring out into space. Did... did he really just say that? she thought to herself, her cheeks aflame. Did he really suggest that we... adopt a child together? She didn't know how to respond to such a proposal. She didn't think her heart could beat that hard, or that her thoughts could kick into overdrive in a millionth of a second. All because of four little words that just came out of her boyfriend's mouth, her boyfriend of a meager eleven days. Not eleven weeks, not eleven months, not eleven years. Eleven days.
Was he serious? she pondered, unconsciously clenching the handle of the stroller in her hands so hard it made her knuckles turn white. There's no way he could have been serious. It took him years to make a move on me. There's no way he was seriously suggesting we adopt a child. No way. Right? Swallowing the lump in her throat, she slowly turned her gaze to Natsu, who stood beside her as he watched her face, waiting patiently for a response. There was no hint of a joke on his face, which was unsettling for Lucy. She knew him so well that she could always tell if he was pretending to be serious as a joke, or if he was actually serious. And the expression he had right now, his unblinking eyes that remained focused on hers, his mouth set into a straight line that wasn't twitching with the need to smile and laugh and say "I'm just playing, Luce!"
Natsu was serious.
Unable to conjure up any words at the moment, Lucy turned to face forward and continued to walk back to the house, staying completely silent. Natsu, startled and confused by her response, watched her walk away for a moment before moving to catch up with her.
"Lucy?" he called out, hoping he hadn't freaked her out with the suggestion. He felt an anxious bead of sweat run down the back of his neck when she didn't respond to him, with neither words nor a glance in his direction. Now he was certain she was freaking out. He could see it in her eyes when she looked at him a moment before, but he ignored it, hoping - praying - that it was just his imagination. But now he was sure it wasn't just his imagination. He'd scared her. He cleared his throat. "U-um... Luce?"
"We'll talk when we get back to the house," she said softly, her voice still caught in her throat. "I need to think for a moment."
Natsu gulped as he felt the most nervous he had been in a very long time. The fact that she didn't want to talk until they were at the house, in private, and safe from making a scene, could either be really good or really bad with Lucy. He knew that she could either go one of two ways: either she'll be appalled that he would have even suggested such a thing and scold him for trying to move too fast with her, or she would be the complete opposite and actually be happy that he made the suggestion. Usually, he was pretty good at determining which reaction he was going to get. He could read her like an open book, after all. But right now, he didn't have a single clue what was going on in her mind. He didn't have the slightest inkling as to what she was thinking, and how she was going to react when they got back to the house.
A part of Natsu just really wanted to get to the house as soon as possible so that he could get an answer to all his questions, but another part of him wanted to make the trip back to the house as long as possible, because he was afraid of the answers to his questions. He couldn't recall if he'd ever felt this conflicted about confrontation, with Lucy of all people. He was usually pretty solid in mind about confronting Lucy about things. But now, he was terrified and uncertain. What if he'd fucked up the chance to be with her? What if she broke up with him because of this stupid proposition.
The instant that thought entered his mind, he shook his head to force it back out. He knew Lucy wouldn't break up with him over something like that. Even if she was surprised and scared about him moving too fast with her, some part of her has to know that he's trying to do what's in Kibou's best interest. Some part of her knows that he just wants to protect the little guy from getting hurt. Doesn't she?
After what seemed like mere seconds as well as an eternity - the mix of the two sensations was very perplexing for Natsu - they arrived at the house. Lucy continued not to say a word as she opened the door and pushed Kibou's stroller inside, kneeling down to unstrap him and lift him up into her arms. The dragon slayer swallowed hard as he closed the door behind him, waiting apprehensively for her to speak. The silence was close to unbearable; the only noise going on in the living room being Kibou's cute little grunts and gurgles.
When she finally did speak, it made Natsu jump. "I don't know if we can adopt him, Natsu," she said solemnly, placing a tender kiss to Kibou's temple before setting him down in his bouncer.
"Why not?" he replied, swallowing again. His throat had run dry.
"Because we can't, Natsu. We've only been dating for eleven days. Eleven. And we've only known Kibou for the same amount of time. It would be... insane and irresponsible of us to take Kibou into our care, permanently."
The fire mage's eyes widened a fraction, surprised by her answer. "Irresponsible? How would taking a child that needs our help into our custody be irresponsible?" he inquired incredulously. "I'm not saying we should kidnap him or something. We should adopt him. He likes us, and we like him. What's the harm in making him happy for the rest of his life? Think about it. He will have a much better chance with us than he would ever have in an orphanage."
Lucy sighed as she sat down on the couch, watching Kibou bounce up and down, giggling with content. Natsu had a point. Kibou would be in such good hands if they decided to adopt him and take him home to Fairy Tail. There would be a one hundred percent chance that he would find happiness, as well as a family that'll always love him unconditionally. But...
"We're so young, Natsu," she reminded him, turning her attention onto the dragon slayer himself. "We're inexperienced. What if something were to happen to him because we didn't know what to do?"
"Luce," he began softly, sitting beside her and smiling warmly as he took her hand into his. "Every single first time parent in the world is inexperienced. The best way to become experienced, is to gain experience." He placed a soft kiss to her cheek. "I know we can do this. This is what is best for Kibou."
"But, Natsu, we don't have anything at the house for a baby."
"That's what money's for. We'll buy everything we need, especially if we're still getting paid those five million Jewels."
"What will the guild say?"
"You've been in Fairy Tail for a couple of years now, and you're concerned about them disapproving of us adopting a baby? You saw how happy they were when we told them that we had gotten together. They're gonna go fucking ballistic when they realize we came home with a baby."
Lucy huffed and sent him a glare, harshly smacking his arm. "Natsu, you baka, Kibou's right there!" she chastised, gesturing to the jubilant little baby. "Watch your language."
Natsu chuckled and rubbed his arm. "Sorry," he said, smiling despite the pain. "But Lucy, you know as well as I do that this is what's best for him. There's no guarantee he's gonna go to a happy, loving family if he gets put into an orphanage. Heck, there's not even a guarantee he'll get adopted in the first place. If he comes home with us, he'll always be happy. He'll have a home, and a family that'll always be there for him. He deserves that much, doesn't he?"
Lucy sighed and rubbed her arm, watching Kibou play. "I don't know, Natsu," she muttered truthfully.
Natsu smiled and kissed her cheek. "Fine. How about this?" He slid off the couch and crawled over to Kibou's bouncer, gently lifting him up into his arms and holding him against his chest. He looked at Lucy with his best puppy-dog eyes, which was accompanied by Kibou's innocent, sweet, chubby face. "How can you say no to this face?" he asked cutely, rounding his eyes to make them look bigger.
Lucy pouted at being double-teamed. "That's cheating, Natsu," she whined, trying to keep herself from smiling. Natsu didn't falter though, continuing to hold his face, batting his eyes at her, which finally pushed her over the edge. She sighed, but smiled, crawling over to them as well. "Fine. You've convinced me." She cupped Natsu's cheek and kissed him lovingly. "Let's do it."
"I knew you'd come around," Natsu smirked triumphantly, returning the kiss with vigor. Kibou smiled radiantly and giggled, as if understanding the circumstances and realizing that he was going to have two new, awesome parents. But, in a split second, he also realized that Natsu was hogging Lucy, which didn't sit right with him. With the cutest pout known to Earthland and a hearty shove, he pushed on Natsu's cheek.
"Ah!" he shouted.
"Oh, dear," Lucy giggled, pulling away and taking Kibou into her arms. "You've made the poor thing jealous again, Natsu."
"Is this gonna become a regular thing with you, kiddo?" Natsu asked with amusement, tickling Kibou's tummy. "Am I never gonna be able to kiss Lucy from this point on?"
"Ah!" Kibou responded with a silly giggle, loving being tickled.
"Lucy, I think we've got enough stuff."
"I think we need more."
"But, Lu-"
"I just want to be prepared, Natsu."
"Lucy-"
"What do you think, Kibou? Do you think we need more stuff?"
"Ah!"
"See? Kibou agrees with me."
"He'll agree with anything you say if you say it like that!" Natsu whined, pushing the heavy cart full of baby stuff. They had finished their job in Clover Town, and were officially Kibou's parents. But they were now back in Magnolia, and their house didn't have anything for a baby. So they were currently at the nicest, most renowned baby store - according to Sorcerer Weekly, anyway - to pick up a few things. Or, the entire store, Natsu was coming to realize.
They had been shopping for hours, and Lucy just had to look at every single thing and buy ten of everything. He eyed everything in cart with a wary stare, praying to Mavis that it was all going to fit into his and Lucy's tiny house. She suggested to him the night before that they should consider looking into getting a new place, but he said he didn't think it was necessary, because he knew for a fact that his house in the middle of the woods was big enough. But now, as he's staring at all the baby supplies, it's got him wondering that maybe, just maybe, that little house in the middle of the woods wasn't going to be big enough. And it made him worry. Where were they going to put everything? Was Kibou going to have to share a room with Happy if there wasn't any room in his and Lucy's room for a crib? How would Happy react to that?
Come to think of it, how was Happy going to react to this entire situation?
Natsu didn't think about clearing this with Happy at all. The thought never even crossed his mind.
"Ooh, Natsu, what do you think about this?" Lucy's voice woke him up from his thoughts, allowing him to turn his attention to her. She was holding up a little onesie with a Fairy Tail insignia on it.
"Babe, we've gotten him fifty different things to wear," he deadpanned. "Several of which already have our emblem on it. We don't need ano-"
"But we didn't get him this one," she sang, putting the onesie in the cart and continuing to look around, pushing Kibou along in his stroller. Natsu sighed but didn't protest, knowing that it would all be for naught. Trying to talk Lucy out of buying something was like trying to talk Erza into thinking that cake was disgusting. For all the time that he's known her, Natsu has avoided going shopping with Lucy every chance he got. And up until now, he's been rather successful. There was one incident a little while after they met, where her punishment for him sneaking into her apartment while she was bathing was that he had to go shopping with her. For the whole day. It could have been worse that it was, but it was still miserable for him.
He never had to wonder why Lucy had to constantly go on jobs to get money for her rent, because she never had any money, because of her crazy shopping problem.
Of course, he would never tell her that she had a problem. He wasn't that stupid.
Not to do it a second time, anyway.
"Maybe we should have brought Erza's luggage wagon," he suggested, idly fiddling with his wristband.
"Why do you say that?" Lucy inquired as she looked through the teething rings.
"Well, we might need something bigger than this cart if you're planning on purchasing the entire store."
Lucy sent him a light glare, huffing as she put her hands on her hips. "I told you, Natsu. I want to be prepared for anything."
"I understand that," he said, looking at her with a bored gaze. "But seriously, Luce. Are you trying to spend the entire five million Jewels we made in one trip to the store?"
The blonde only huffed indignantly and turning back to the teething rings, muttering to herself. "Boys. You can't take them anywhere."
Natsu narrowed his eyes slightly, but instead of retorting, he just rolled his eyes to himself, leaning against the cart with a long, heavy sigh. He watched her through hooded eyes as she picked out a chain of teething rings and turned to Kibou, holding them out to him.
"What do you think of these, baby boy?" she asked sweetly, smiling down at him. Kibou examined the rings curiously for a brief moment before grinning widely and giving his typical squeal of approval. Natsu, despite himself and his boredom, smiled softly at the exchange. Jeez, she's spoiling him already, he mused. She doesn't even need to buy him teething rings yet. I wouldn't be surprised if she bought him his first bicycle or magical item today too.
He chuckled softly to himself. They've been Kibou's adoptive parents for less than a day, and she's already becoming his mother. He sighed dreamily as he stared subconsciously at her.
Natsu snapped out of his daze when a familiar scent hit him. Furrowing his brows in confusion, he turned to follow the scent. His eyes widened at seeing a familiar face a few aisles down, completely baffled by the person he saw.
"Gray?!" he exclaimed. The sudden call of his name caused Gray to jump in surprise and spin around toward the source of the voice. He blinked when his eyes landed on Natsu, the color draining from his face.
"Shit," he muttered to himself, looking around for an escape route. But it was too late. Natsu was already making his way over to him.
"What in the hell are you doing here, snowflake?" he shouted in disbelief.
Gray huffed. "I could ask you the same thing, pyro!" he said defensively, crossing his arms over his chest.
"I'm shopping for my son, as a matter of fact!"
"Since when do you have a son?"
"Since four hours ago! Lucy and I adopted the child from the mission!"
Gray fell silent, not expecting an answer like that. His eyebrows raised to the point of being hidden by his bangs, his eyes so wide it seemed like they could just pop out of their sockets at any second. Once the dragon slayer's words processed in his head, he took a step back and made a rewind gesture with his hands.
"Whoa, back up for a sec," he said. "Did you just tell me that you and Lucy adopted a child together?"
Natsu cooled off, clearing his throat and sheepishly rubbing his neck. He didn't mean to just blurt that out to him. Damn him and his stupid, uncontrollable impulses. "Y-yeah, we did," he stammered, his voice lowered. "His parents abandoned him, and we didn't know what else to do. So we adopted him." Before Gray could say anything else on the matter, Lucy approached them, pushing Kibou's stroller in front of her with one hand, while she dragged the heavy cart behind her with the other.
"Jeez, Natsu," she griped. "Thanks for ditching us back there." She turned to Gray when she noticed him, blinking a few times in surprise and confusion. "Gray? What're you doing here?"
Ignoring the question, Gray kneeled down in front of the stroller to get a better look at Kibou. He smiled at the young child, reaching his hand out to him. "Hello, there," he greeted him, arousing curiosity from not only Kibou, but Natsu and Lucy too. Kibou stared at his hand for a moment before grabbing it with his own tiny hand, holding onto one of his fingers. Gray chuckled lightly and gently shook his hand, practically beaming with a kind of energy that neither Lucy nor Natsu had ever seen in the ice alchemist before. "It's nice to meet you, little dude." Kibou stared at him, but giggled after a brief pause, smiling up at him.
"Ah," he uttered.
Gray chuckled and stood up. "He's a little cutie." He turned to Lucy. "What's his name?"
"Kibou," Lucy told him slowly, surprised by seeing a different side of Gray she'd never seen before. The ice mage didn't seem to notice her confusion, only smiling wider and nodding his head, looking down at the child in the stroller.
"Cute name."
"Whoa. Who knew you turned into a different guy around kids," Natsu stated, perplexed as well. Gray spun around to look at him, sneering at him.
"What? Am I not allowed to be sensitive?" he snapped, his eye twitching in annoyance.
"That ain't what I said, frostbite," Natsu snapped back, snarling. "Stop putting words in my mo-" He blinked when Lucy suddenly grabbed hold of his hair, also grabbing Gray's, pulling them both down so they were eye level with her.
"There will be no fighting in front of the baby," she warned, sending them both a glare that was almost as scary as Erza's. "Do you understand?"
"H-Hai," the boys squeaked in unison.
The celestial wizard nodded curtly and released them. "Good. Now, Gray, try and answer my question this time." She looked up at him. "Why are you shopping at a baby supply store?"
Gray suddenly got a little uncomfortable, gulping noticeably as he reached a hand up to scratch the back of his head. He avoided their eyes. "Uh..." Before he could give them an actual response, Juvia came running up to them, holding two little onesies in her hands.
"Gray-sama," she sang merrily, practically sparkling with joy. "What do you think of these?" She held the onesies up for him to see. They were both pastel blue with cute white snowflakes on them. "Aren't they just adorable?" She jumped when she realized Natsu and Lucy were there, her eyes widening instantly as he face flushed to a deep red. "O-oh... hello, Natsu-san. Lucy-san. What brings you here?"
"What brings you here?" Natsu asked back, staring at them with wide eyes. Juvia swallowed thickly and exchanged glances with Gray, who looked just as anxious as she did. After a long silence, the ice wizard cleared his throat and nodded to her, folding his arms over his chest and adverting his stare from the group, a light but distinguishable blush on his cheeks. Juvia swallowed once more and faced Natsu and Lucy, who were watching them expectantly.
"J-Juvia's pregnant," she stuttered, shyly playing with the ends of her hair. Natsu and Lucy's eyes widened simultaneously, and the group fell into silence once again.
Once Lucy had found her voice, she cleared her throat and said, "You're pregnant?" A single, nervous nod from the water mage was all the blonde needed to start bouncing up and down and squealing like a school girl. She hugged Juvia. "Oh, my god, congratulations!" Juvia blinked several times before smiling brightly and hugging her back, bouncing with her.
"Thank you!" she giggled.
The celestial mage smiled at her as she pulled away. "How far along are you?"
"Juvia's about fourteen weeks," she answered, smiling radiantly as she subconsciously put her hand on her abdomen.
Lucy smiled brightly and looked at Gray. "And you're the father?"
Gray cleared his throat and nodded, a soft shade of pink dusting over his cheeks. He was visibly trying to keep himself from smiling, but he just couldn't keep it contained. "Yeah. I am," he said with an affirmative nod. Lucy's grin suddenly fell into a scowl as she started to pound on his arm with her fists.
"What the hell, Gray?! Why didn't you tell me you and Juvia had gotten together?! I thought we told each other everything!" The devil slayer blinked at the sudden onslaught of fists against his arm, trying to step away and out of the line of fire.
"Ouch, Lucy!" he yelped, rubbing his arm once he'd gotten a safe distance away from her. "Damn. I'm sorry, okay? I woulda told you, but Juvia wanted to keep it a secret. And then she got pregnant, and so she really wanted to keep it a secret."
"Gray-sama's right," Juvia concurred. "When Juvia got pregnant, she didn't want to tell anybody until it was... safe to start telling people."
"Well, that's understandable," Lucy admitted, folding her arms. "But still. How did it happen? When did it happen?"
"Well, we started going out after the guild disbanded last year," Gray explained. "Considering we were living together, it was too difficult for me to hide my feelings for her. So... I stopped hiding them." He blushed brightly and looked away to avoid eye contact, embarrassed by how cheesy that story was.
"Aww," Lucy cooed, giggling. "How sweet. It took you long enough to accept your feelings. Do you have to be so stubborn about everything, Gray?"
"Oh, leave me alone."
"I have a question," Natsu interjected, eyeing the two, identical onesies in Juvia's hands. "Why did you get two of the same onesie, Juvia?" The water mage tilted her head at the question, looking down at them in her hands. She blushed slightly and giggled.
"Oh, because Juvia is pregnant with twins."
"Well, that's the last of it," Natsu announced as he plopped onto the couch beside Lucy, leaning his head against her shoulder with a soft, exhausted sigh. "Crib's all set up, too." After they had finished talking to Juvia and Gray at the store - which took what felt like an eternity to both Natsu and Gray, who just had to tag along silently behind the girls as they shopped for baby stuff together - they had gone home to set up all of the stuff they bought.
Which meant Natsu was the one that set everything up, while Lucy used the excuse that she needed to "keep an eye on Kibou to make sure he didn't get lonely."
"You sound tired," Lucy pointed out as she fed Kibou, never looking away from the child's adorable face as he drank from the bottle, making cute, soft suckling noises as he did.
Natsu huffed. "I am, as a matter of fact. It would've been nice to have some help setting up the crib. And the changing table. And the highchair. And the-"
"I told you before, Natsu. I had to stay with Kibou."
Natsu rolled his eyes, but smiled nonetheless. "Yeah, yeah, I know you did. God forbid you leave him alone for two minutes." He sat up and placed a soft kiss to her cheek. "You're already becoming overprotective of him."
"So what?" she countered, smiling warmly as she tenderly stroked Kibou's cheek. "I'm his mother now, aren't I? I'm supposed to be overprotective of my baby boy, right?"
He chuckled softly, leaning his chin on top of her shoulder to watch Kibou eat. "Yeah, I guess that's true." He glanced up at her face through the corner of his eyes, grinning at the expression she had. She may had put up a fight when he first suggested that they adopt him, but she was more down with the proposition that he was. The instant they signed the adoption papers and Kibou was put into their permanent custody, she instantly went into full-on mother mode. She had no problem transitioning to being his "mommy," and he could tell that she was looking forward to spending every day with him from that point on.
He couldn't blame her, though, for being so excited. Because he was just as excited as she was. And he could tell that Kibou was excited about the arrangement as well. He was nothing but a pure bundle of joy the entire time they'd been in Magnolia. He was totally eager to see everything that Magnolia had to offer, and as far as Natsu could tell, Kibou was totally digging his new home. His favorite part about the new house that he was living in was definitely Happy.
Happy came by the house earlier to welcome them back from their mission, and he and Kibou were instantly best friends, which had felt like a gigantic weight had been lifted off Natsu's shoulders. Ever since the thought about how he and Lucy didn't clear the situation with Happy beforehand, he had been concerned that maybe the Exceed wouldn't be pleased with it at all. Which now, he realized, was a stupid thing to be concerned about. He should have known that Happy wouldn't have been anything other than, well, happy about having a new member of the family. In fact, the only reason the little feline hadn't stuck around was to get out of helping them unpack the heaps of baby stuff they had brought home.
"Can you believe it about Gray and Juvia?" Lucy asked, snapping Natsu out of his thoughts. He looked up at her and tilted his head.
"What about Gray and Juvia?" he inquired.
"That they're having a baby, duh. That they've having two babies! I think that's incredible. I can't believe it." She grinned and looked down at the sweet child in her arms. "Kibou's going to have two little friends in just five months."
Natsu smiled and nodded. "Yeah, he is. It's crazy to think about though. I didn't even have a clue that they were together in the first place."
"Neither did I! Juvia was surprisingly really good at keeping something like that a secret. I would have expected her to announce it to the entire guild the instant the guild got back together."
"I would have expected her to announce it to the entire world."
She laughed. "Yeah, that seems more like her. It's actually quite impressive that she was able to keep her relationship with Gray a secret for so long. Before they were dating, she couldn't go two minutes without expressing her love for him, let alone close to a year." She turned to face him, smiling. "And wasn't it weird to see Gray like that? Like he had... baby fever."
"Yeah, it was weird," he concurred. "It was kinda weirding me out a bit. I never woulda thought that Gray would be one of those guys that swooned at every baby he saw. It was like he was high as a cloud as he walked through that store."
"I guess he's more excited about Juvia's pregnancy than he's leading on," the stellar mage suggested. "Are you happy for him?"
"Pfft," he scoffed. "As if. Like I could ever be happy for that perverted stripper."
"Oh, please, Natsu. You know just as well as I do that, even though you hate to admit it, Gray is your friend. A close friend, at that."
"Frostbite is not my friend! I hate that ice princess's guts!"
Lucy giggled and rolled her eyes, standing up with Kibou once he finished eating, taking him into the kitchen so she would remember to clean his bottle. "Whatever helps you sleep at night, Natsu."
The dragon slayer scoffed, folding his arms. Yeah, right. Like the stripper could be my friend. Bah. I can't even stand being his guildmate. Despite his claims, as Natsu started to actually think about it, he was happy for Gray. Especially considering the life he's had, it's actually... rather nice to see him like that, to see him genuinely happy about something.
But of course, he would never admit that to any living soul. Ever.
Author's Note: what's this? An update so soon? I gotta say, I really love the days where I can just write without having to stare at my laptop for hours on end and only get a sentence or two down. There's nothing else like it.
Thank you guys so much for the reviews. I'm loving all the love you guys are giving me and this story. Just keep it coming! Love you guys!
