KTKG Says: Well… Here we are. This is it! I hope you guys enjoy!

Chapter Twenty-Five (Epilogue)

Six months later…

"Uh… I'm so tired and in so much pain!"

"Oh, shove it Natsu. You're not getting a sponge bath and that's final!"

Natsu stuck his lip out in a pout as he threw himself onto the bed. "But Luuuuuuce! My birthday –" Lucy cut off whatever else was about to come out of his mouth with a pillow to his face. "Your birthday was two weeks ago Natsu!"

Letting out a hefty sigh of defeat, Natsu settled for focusing on getting comfortable in bed. "Well, you can't blame a guy for trying. Besides, it would have been a nice way to celebrate." He turned a glaring eye in the blonde's direction, but in return received a smirk as she climbed into the bed as well.

"Well… if you really want one I could always call your favorite nurse to do it. What was his name again? Ichiya? I'm sure he'll be more than happy to do it."

Natsu shuddered visibly as the person Lucy was referring to suddenly appeared in his mind's eye. Unfortunately for him, his active imagination had the man in question appear in the nurse's outfit he often fantasized Lucy wearing, causing him to promptly gag and his bedmate to burst out into a fit of laughter. "Not funny Lucy." He frowned as he realized his comment only made her laugh harder.

He settled for pouting some more as he massaged his leg while he waited for his woman to calm herself down. After a few moments, she managed to reduce her howls of laughter down to light chuckles as she snuggled into his side. Never one to turn down her cuddling, Natsu threw an arm around her but gave a huff of irritation nonetheless. She slid her hands under the covers, knocking Natsu's out of the way before she began rubbing his thigh in his place. At the contact, Natsu practically melted. He didn't know what it was, but Lucy seemed to have the magic touch when it came to easing aches in his body.

"I'm sorry honey-buns; I didn't mean to make you sick." She snickered once more but let out a yelp when Natsu started pinching her side. "Okay! Okay! I'll stop!" They both settled back down and Lucy resumed her ministrations. "Seriously though, in all honesty, how are you really feeling? Are you excited that today was your last day of physical therapy?"

"Yeah… and, great. I feel great."

He really meant it, and not just in the physical sense, but just as an overall feeling of greatness.

The past six months had brought about some events and changes that he would have never seen coming in a million years. While some weren't his favorite (car accidents are never fun), he could honestly say that he was thankful for them all.

After he had been released from the hospital, Lucy had pretty much been the main one to help with his aftercare. The two of them had come to a mutual agreement to let Wendy decide if she wanted to continue on with the program, and much to his surprise, Wendy had declined to do so. Her reasoning? She finally found her real-life big sister, so she was good and felt that she had got what she wanted out of the program. At the memory, Natsu couldn't help but smirk. His sister really was turning into quite the little lady.

So, with Wendy out of the program, Lucy was back to just focusing on running the organization (of course with a lot of help from Levy) and periodically worked from home. Home, of course, being his apartment.

The woman was an absolute godsend, especially considering that Natsu for the most part had been confined to either the bed or the couch. She helped his sister with the cooking and cleaning around the house, and thankfully she was the main one to help him with his um… hygiene.

Luckily for him, instead of taking a leave of absence from work, Erza had arranged for him to just work from home. This of course involved both her and Gray making a stop once or twice a week to deliver and pick up anything that couldn't be sent electronically. Honestly, Natsu was convinced the two only came by for Lucy's food, which she would graciously send them home with since she was used to cooking large portions anyway.

The biggest change for Natsu had been having Lucy drive him around.

His car had been totaled in the accident, so immediately after he was discharged, he and Lucy had been depending on his cousin and his best friend to get them to his appointments and the grocery store. Since Gajeel and Levy seemed to practically be inseparable these days, Levy had loaned Lucy her car for the time being until he received his insurance money. Speaking of which…

"Hey Luce, do you want to go car shopping with me tomorrow?"

She stopped her hands and craned her head around from its position on his chest to look at him with wide eyes. "You already want to go tomorrow? Didn't you just get your check in the mail today?" He smoothed some of her bangs back, careful not to hit the large black frames of her glasses. "Well yeah, why not?"

She huffed and straightened herself so that she was leaning against the headboard like him. She crossed her arms, shooting a glare in his direction as she pouted out "You just don't want my help anymore, do you? Are you trying to get rid of me?"

He caught the slight smirk on her face and made a lunge for her. She let out a shriek of laughter as he wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her flush against him. "Now now my dear Juicy Luce, you know I would never try to get rid of you! I just figured that you were tired of doing all of the driving and thought that since I was cleared to do it myself today, it would be nice if we could go looking at least. You know, so we can give Levy back her car and then we'd have our own."

Lucy stilled as his last sentence finished echoing off of the walls of the medium-sized bedroom, and as if in slow motion, her head once again craned up so she could look at him. Her eyes were wide behind her frames, and in response his eyebrows rose in confusion. "You… you mean you'd have your own car right?" At her statement, it finally hit Natsu what exactly it was that he had said, and in turn why she was currently blushing besides him. Never one to pass up and opportunity to see her imitate and tomato, Natsu leaned in close and smirked as he answered, "You're a part of the Dragneel family Luce. It's only right that it would be considered your car too."

She let out a nervous chuckle as she placed two fingers to his forehead and gave a light shove to move his head back a bit. The small distance didn't do anything for her blush, as it seemed to begin travelling down her neck as she replied "No, it wouldn't apply me because technically I'm not really a Dragneel, I'm just dating one."

At her comment, something in Natsu clicked, and wordlessly he detached himself from her to turn and dig in his nightstand. After a couple of seconds and curses to himself that he needed to clean the piece of furniture out, he found the object he was looking for. Turning back to Lucy, he casually tossed the small box in her direction, which she deftly caught, and mumbled out a "You're one now." A second or two passed before her eyes widened in realization as to what it was that she was currently holding in her hands. Wide questioning brown eyes swung in his direction and even though his heart was racing a mile a minute, he attempted a casual shrug.

"Natsu… is this…"

He took the small box back from her and opened it slowly, revealing the princess-cut solitaire diamond that sat on a simple white-gold band, then turned it in her direction. He smiled lightly at the small gasp that escaped her lips and mentally pat himself on the back. Looks like he did a good job with his pick. "Natsu… when did you-"

"Last Christmas, actually, but that's not the point right now."

She sucked in another surprised breath and Natsu took the opportunity to surge forward with his plans. He hadn't really meant to cut off her question, but he was actually starting to get pretty nervous and wanted to get this all out before he lost his nerve. He hadn't really planned on asking her tonight, however her comment about not technically being a Dragneel sparked something in him.

He took one of his suddenly shaking hands and grabbed her left one for support. He wasn't quite sure why he was suddenly nervous but then again, wasn't everyone this way when asking someone to spend the rest of their life with them?

"Lucy, listen. I didn't really plan this out, so I'm just going to wing it. Bare with me." He glanced at her surprised face, only to find that her eyes were still fixed at the piece of jewelry that was almost resting in her lap. Taking a deep breath, he soldiered on, encouraged further when he felt Lucy give a reassuring squeeze of his hand.

"Lucy… you are the best thing that has ever happened to me. Seriously. We've been through a lot in the year that we have been together, and you have no idea how much it means to me that you have stuck by my side through it all. You've been there for not only me while I was recovering, but for my baby sister as well, and the impact that you've had on her is something I could only dream about. Over the past six months, I've had the pleasure of getting to experience what married life with you is like, and honestly Luce, I don't think I can go back to us just dating."

He dropped her hand and pulled the ring out, holding it up between his fingers as he locked eyes with her. Her brown eyes were starting to water a bit, but he trained his gaze instead on the small smile that was blossoming on through her tears. A nervous smile began to make its way to his own mouth as he grabbed her hand once again for support before continuing on.

"What I'm trying to say is, I really want to officially make you a member of the Dragneel family, and I'm hoping that you want to be one too. So, Lucille Francis Heartfilia, will you marry me?"

There was a moment of silence as Lucy looked back and forth between him and the ring he was currently holding between them. She hesitantly plucked the piece of jewelry out of his hand and looked at it, a meek "Are you serious" escaping her. He silently nodded, then voiced his response she he noticed that she hadn't looked up to see.

Natsu held his breath as Lucy took a couple of seconds to think. It didn't take long before her head snapped back up, her face scrunching into an expression he wasn't sure of before she flung her arms around his midsection and literally squeezed the breath he had been holding out of him. "Yes you idiot! Of course I want to marry you!"

He chuckled lightly as he wrapped his arms around her in return, relief washing over him as he felt her tears start to soak through his shirt. Once the last of his nervousness left his system, he was suddenly consumed with giddiness at her answer and started outright laughing as he rocked them back and forth.

The punch to his gut from his bedmate did little to stop his laughter but he released her all the same, lightly wiping away her tears as she pulled away from him. She frowned a bit as she slipped the ring on her finger, allowing them to both marvel at how it looked. "I can't believe you made me ugly cry." He chuckled once more at her comment, earning himself a small shove as she started giggling along with him.

She calmed down as she brought her hand up to inspect the ring once more, then turned her attention back to him before leaning in to place her lips against his. "I love you." She kissed him again, a slight giggle escaping her. "You're cheesy as ever, but I love you, and I have a confession to make. After practically living with you these past six months, I don't think I would have been able to go back to normal either."

A bark of laughter escaped him as he kissed her a third time before maneuvering them into a horizontal position. "I'm glad I'm not the only one that felt that way then." She snuggled closer to him as he reached to turn off the lamp on his nightstand.

"You know this means we're going to start officially moving the rest of your stuff in, right?" He felt her nod in the darkness. It wouldn't be much that they had to move. At the most it would just be a matter of finding a place for her bookcases and desk since she had pretty much slowly moved her entire wardrobe in over the past few months. He supposed the rest would go into storage.

"So… about car shopping…"

Lucy sighed as threw an arm and leg over Natsu, burrowing down into his side as she placed her head on his shoulder. "I suppose we can go after Wendy and I finish shopping for her outfit for Saturday."

"What's Saturday?"

"The girls in the program wanted to have a summer dance, and Wendy wanted to participate."

Natsu was silent for a moment as he searched his memory for the information he had just heard. When he vaguely remembered, he casually threw out the question if this dance required a date.

"Yes Natsu, it does, and yes Wendy has one already."

Natsu was about to jump out of bed and head down the hall to where the youngest Dragneel was, however his newly minted fiancée's voice stopped him cold in his tracks.

"If you ruin this for her I will become a widow before a wife seeing as I will murder you."

Wisely, he settled back down and replaced his bedmate's appendages to their former positions as he mumbled, "you're lucky I love you." He felt her puffs of laughter against his neck as she responded, "You're lucky I love you. Now, go to sleep. Tomorrow's my day off with you and I plan to celebrate so I need all the sleep I can get."

Relaxing his body, the excitement from the day's events suddenly hit him and he felt exhausted, but in a good way. As he was drifting off to sleep, he heard his fiancée's voice reach him once more.

"Don't worry about the dance, I volunteered us as chaperones so you can keep an eye on little Romeo. Just don't scare him so bad this time, okay?" Seconds later, her light snoring signaled that she had left him for dreamland. A smile pulled at his face as he followed her into unconsciousness.

He knew there was a reason he wanted to marry this woman, and he was glad that she agreed.

He chuckled once more to himself. After all, Lucy Dragneel had a nice ring to it, and it would be a shame if she didn't make it official.

"Natsuuuuuuuuu… go to sleeeeeeep."

"Sorry Mrs. Dragneel."

A snort from the blonde was heard as he finally closed his eyes.

"Dork."

"I love you too."

THE END

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KTKG Says: AAAnnnnnddddddd that's it! I started to end it with Lucy saying she was pregnant, but that's for another story lol. I just want to take this opportunity to thank each and every one of you that have liked, followed, read, and reviewed this story! It means a lot of me that you've all stuck with this thing for the past three years and encouraged me to keep writing this when I was ready to give up on it. I hope you guys love my next work just as much, and keep a look out for it as it's coming soon! I love you guys dearly and will be seeing you all again soon. Until then, you know what to do… REVIEW!