I could so easily write a follow-up story to this... One featuring my favourite dorks, of course... Alas I will not for the time being... Not unless anyone wants it...

Anyway. This one was the last of the prompts sitting in my inbox for the last nearly 4 months, so I'm glad to be getting it finished - although now I have a whole bunch of Bickslow/Cobra/Lucy/Laxus + their various shipping combinations (including all four of them together) to write for the 100 Kink challenge on tumblr (please feel free to request a prompt + pairing for it!).

Prompt: An apple, a sweater, a tube of lipstick that is not what it seems'? for Gratsu - itsajoshyboy

Cleaning Day

"Oi, Luce! What happened to your sweater?"

Lucy's first reaction was to just roll her eyes at Natsu's random question - because honestly, what kind of question was that? She wasn't even in the damn room! But then she remembered what had been sitting at the top of her clean laundry pile, ready to be ironed and put away: the sweater (not that Lucy was sure how such little material could be called such a thing) that her oh so wonderful boyfriend had bought from some shop Lucy really didn't want to know the name of when on his last mission with his team.

And realising just what it was that Natsu was no doubt probably holding up in front of him, Lucy quickly pulled her hands out of the sink full of soapy dishes and rushed out to go yank the halter-top sweater from the Dragon Slayer's hands. "Give me that back!" Lucy squawked as she came to a stop on her hardwood floors right in front of him.

Natsu collapsed back down on Lucy's bad with a huff once she'd taken her sweater back from him. "Jeez, it's just a jumper…" he muttered. "No need to get like that over some old, ratty piece of fabric…" Really, he didn't get it. He went through her laundry all the time! And it wasn't like her sweater had actually been wearable anyway. It was completely backless! And it didn't even have sleeves!

Lucy's cheeks quickly became a dark shade of crimson as she bundled up the sweater that was, in fact, very much wearable. "That's not… It's not–"

"It's a virgin killer sweater, Flame-Brain," Gray chuckled from behind the blonde as he returned from the bathroom.

"A virgin killer? How does a sweater kill virgins?" Natsu wondered.

Gray was grinning at his partner now next to him on the bed as he took a bite of the crisp, green apple he'd snagged from Lucy's kitchen. Lucy's face was still beet red as she just gaped at the two mages without knowing just what it was she was supposed to say. But oh, how Gray loved how dense Natsu could be sometimes… It was annoying most of the time, but recently, Gray had found it adorable - although perhaps that was due to the fact that Gray had had the chance to let Natsu experience some new exciting things for once… "Because it's sexy as hell, that's why," the Ice Make mage chuckled again. "Why do you think Bix bought it for her?" Because Lucy certainly wouldn't have bought it for herself… Gray knew that.

"Wait, Bickslow gave it to you?" Natsu's confusion only grew as he turned back to his best friend, who was no wishing she could jump out the window that was just behind him. "And he was a virgin too?!"

"No!" Lucy quickly squeaked. No, no, no… Definitely not…

Gray sighed as he gently patted Natsu's shoulder. "You have much to learn, my friend." And oh, was Gray going to teach him. Most definitely.

Shaking his head, Natsu only sighed to himself and pulled his legs up to cross them under himself on the edge of Lucy's bed. Lucy herself took the cue to retreat back into her kitchen - along with the incriminating piece of clothing that she was going to have to remember to store in a locked drawer from then on - to finish doing the dishes. It was cleaning day, however, so while Lucy went about making her small apartment spotless and shiny, Natsu had been confined to the bed along with Gray, unless they needed to visit the bathroom, just so he didn't get out of her way. Even Happy had gotten bored and left.

After a moment of just listening to Gray crunch on his apple, Natsu began to just looking around the still messy apartment of his friend - honestly, he didn't think he'd ever seen it so messy in his entire life.

He spied a tube of bright red lipstick on the nightstand just next to him, and his brow furrowed as he reached for it slowly, only shouting out to the female mage in curiosity again, "Since when do you wear lipstick Luce?"

And once again, Lucy could only screech before rushing out of the kitchen yet again, because it was most definitely not a tube of lipstick she'd left next to her bed from the previous night.