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"She was beautiful, but she was beautiful in the way a forest fire was beautiful: something to be admired from a distance, not up close." ― Terry Pratchett, Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch

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Ignite

Chapter #6: Flame

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He watched, entranced, as she ran water over her legs, her arms, her chest. It rolled over her skin in beads and shone like clustered jewels under the sun. His mouth was dry (also her fault) and all he could think about was how nice it would be to lick that tantalizing liquid off her skin. A bead of sweat escaped his scarf covered forehead and rolled down his neck before settling on his bare shoulders.

She was killing him.

Natsu Dragneel, Son of Igneel, and over all bad ass fire mage was going to die right there on that little piece of sandy beach all because some genius (seriously he didn't know whether to worship or punch the dude) thought that women's swimwear should be made up of nothing but triangular pieces of cloth and string.

She leaned back in the lounge chair, and Natsu watched from the corner of his eye as her hands disappeared behind her neck. A moment later the taut string securing her top loosened and she pushed them to the side. He swallowed thickly. Damn it, the only thing keeping those little triangular pieces from falling away and exposing her was gravity itself. Did she even realize that she was sacrificing his sanity for the sake of a few less tan lines? He was pretty sure she didn't. Even in all her vanity, Nastu didn't think she knew how alluring her body really was.

He'd never really noticed it before, but Lucy's body was different from the other girls. Her hips were fuller and her chest was (obviously) bigger, but it was more than that. Maybe it was because her magic wasn't as physical as the rest of their guild mates, but there was a softness to Lucy's body that Erza and the other girls seemed to lack. There was just a little bit more substance to her thighs, and a bit more flesh over her hips and ass. She was just so ...

Inviting.

Why did she have to look so damn good? It would be so much easier if she wasn't so irrefutably gorgeous. The past month had been hell for him because of it. Ever since that stupid dream he couldn't help but notice how tempting her body really was. During the day he was tortured by little fragmented images of what it might be like to kiss her lips, what kind of sound she would make if he licked her neck, and hey, wonder if her tits would taste different than the rest of her sun kissed skin?

Nights were even worse.

With nothing to distract him, his imagination was free to run rampant. Most nights he dreamed of her. Sometimes they were more innocent - the holding of her hand, the tangle of their lips. Unfortunately those seemed to be the minority. Most mornings he woke up sweating and with phantom moans bouncing in his ears. He'd been reduced to taking morning showers because of it. If Happy noticed his sudden change in routine (and his sudden tendency for long, drawn out showers) he wisely remained silent.

The weekend was suppose to be an opportunity for the entire guild to get out and relax for once but Natsu realized the moment Lucy stepped out in her bikini that the "relaxing weekend" was going to do more harm than good to his already frazzled nerves. He suspected that seeing her half naked and wet was going to come back and haunt his dreams that night. Even though, Mavis knows, he really didn't need any more of that kind of inspiration.

Sometimes he was convinced that he was the biggest fucking pervert and felt more than a little disgusted with himself. Of course, then Macao or Wakaba would open their mouths and the relief be immediate. He definitely wasn't on their level. Or Master's for that matter ... now that he understood the happenings behind those leers he got why Lucy made a point to be extra careful with her skirt around the old geezer. Still, he couldn't help but wonder if the amount of time he spent (unwillingly) fantasizing about his partner could be considered normal.

More than once he'd been tempted to ask, but every time he shot it down immediately after. Most of the guys in the guild couldn't be trusted to keep their yap shut about it (for men they sure loved their fucking gossip). Gray could probably be trusted to keep it a secret if just to avoid it getting back to Lucy and imploding their whole team dynamic, but the amount of shit the ice mage would give him for it made the idea less than appealing. Same could probably be said for the iron dragon slayer.

All in all, Natsu figured it was best to just keep his dirty thoughts to himself.

He watched as Levy jogged up to Lucy's lounger, talking animately and gesturing to the volleyball net behind her. A moment later and the blonde was retying her bathing suit strings behind her neck and smiling as she followed her blue haired friend down the beach.

Natsu nearly groaned under his breath. "Why the hell did it have to be volleyball?" he grumbled. Why couldn't she play horseshoes or bean bag toss, or anything else that wouldn't show off the delectable bounce of her breasts. He tore his eyes away, determined not to prolong his suffering any further, and nearly jumped out of his skin when he took notice of the brunette smirking down at him.

Fuck. Cana. Not good.

"Well, well, well. What do you know?" There was a sharp gleam to her mahogany eyes that set his brain into a scrambled frenzy. "You know, if you kept staring at her any longer I think you might have actually managed to catch that little bikini of hers on fire."

He sputtered uselessly. This was bad. Really, really bad. He needed to say something - anything - to get him the hell out and away from this conversation. "I - uh ..." Unfortunately his brain was completely stalling out and his tongue seemed more interested in tying itself in knots instead of helping him.

She chuckled, cocking an eyebrow while her smile turned downright sly. Natsu wondered if there was a demon hiding behind the face of Gildhart's daughter. "So, were you aiming for the top or the bottoms? Lucy's got one hell of a rack but her ass is pretty bangin' too, don't you think?"

Heat was spreading across his cheeks and beginning to travel down his neck. "I don't know what you're talking about!" he said shrilly, the words rushed and tumbling over themselves. Maybe if he just kept denying everything she would go away.

Unfortunately it seemed to have the opposite effect because the perpetual drunk took the opportunity to sit next to him, her legs crossed under her and one hand nursing a bottle of her precious beer. "Really? Let me fill you in. You," she gestured to him with the neck of her bottle, "have been staring at her," she moved the bottle so it that it pointed towards Lucy, "for the past half hour. At least."

Shit. Had he really been staring that long?

"I was, uh ..." Now would be a really good time to think of a good excuse. "Thinking." Yeah, ok, he could work with that. Nice and vague. And hey, it was technically true. "I guess I didn't realize I was staring." Ok, that was a lie. He had known he was ogling her. He just hadn't realized he had been so painfully obvious about it.

Cana hummed, not sounding all that convinced. "Oh, you were thinking all right." She took a swig from her beer and sent him a wicked grin. "With your dick."

He choked, and Cana (that bitch) merely laughed and slapped his back hard enough that he almost found himself kissing the sand. He wheezed, trying to regain precious oxygen to his brain. "Wha-No! I wasn't-"

She gave her hand a flippant wave. "Please, don't even bother denying it." There was a level of understanding in her gaze that scared the dragon slayer senseless. "You looked like you were ready to march over there and plow her into the sand."

Actually, he had been busy being plagued with a fantasy about taking her up against that palm tree over there. But the idea of taking her from behind with her knees buried deep and anchored in the sand was another mouth watering image that was sure to haunt him until the end of for-fucking-ever.

Without thinking his eyes slid over to the blonde mage. She had her legs parted and her knees slightly bent as she braced herself for the ball to come over to her side of the net. When he heard Cana's knowing chuckle he reddened and hid his face between his knees. Damn it - just – fuck! "Did anyone else notice?" His voice was muffled by his mortification.

She shrugged, tilting her beer back and finishing off the bottle in one last gulp. Natsu was surprised she hadn't just brought the whole damn keg with her. "Nah, they're too busy causing chaos like usual." She gave him a pointed look. "You're lucky Mira and Lisanna went to the spa though. They would have thrown you to the wolves for sure."

That ... was probably true actually. Mira would have probably thrown him some kind of twisted coming of age party the moment they stepped back into the guild. And Lisanna, as good of a friend as she was, would have probably been right on board. Worse, she'd probably go congratulate Lucy for being the one responsible...

Damn, that was a horrifying thought.

He lifted his face from his knees, ill placed hope fluttering in his chest as he gave the perpetual drunk his most pleading look. "So you won't say anything?"

She hummed thoughtfully, giving him an appraising look. "Tell you what. You listen to some advice from your big sis and I won't breathe a single word to anyone. How's that sound?"

Honestly? It sounded a little too good to be true. Especially seeing as it was coming from Cana. He loved the girl like a sister, but the perpetual drunk could be down right sadistic. That she would offer to give up this kind of blackmail material was more than suspicious. "What kind of advice?" he asked, skeptical.

She smiled conspiratorially. "Why, how to please your woman of course! You wanna make sure Lucy has a good time too right?"

His face flamed (seriously, he was surprised his head wasn't on fire). "What?! I don't - no!"

She shrugged, leaning her cheek on her knuckles and looking entirely too nonchalant. "You're either going to hear it from me or from the rest of the guild. Pick your poison."

He growled, his fists clenching. "Why do you even care!?" Seriously, he didn't need help with this - didn't want help with this. Not the kind that Cana was suggesting anyway. He wanted to get rid of the fantasies, not encourage them. This 'advice' she was talking about was going to make his problem a million times worse.

For the first time in the entire conversation, Cana's expression turned serious. Whatever traces of teasing completely wiped from her face. "Because Lucy deserves the best experience possible." She gave him a pointed look, as if daring him to disagree. "And, face it Natsu, you're so clueless you need all the help you can get.

After a moment, his shoulders slumped. In some ways the brunette was right - Lucy did deserve the best experience. She deserved the best of everything. The only part Cana didn't seem to get was that he had no control over it. She wasn't his. "It doesn't matter anyway," he muttered, looking out across the water. "I - we're not -" he growled, frustrated that he couldn't seem to put anything into words today. "We aren't like that."

"Yet."

"Ever," he said, with an accompanying glare that left no room for argument.

For a moment she stared back at him, unflinching, but then rolled her eyes with a sigh. "I swear, you Fairy Tail men are so melodramatic!" Her eyes flicked towards the far end of the beach where most of the group was gathered at a tiki themed bar. "I need another beer..."

Natsu didn't know what the hell 'melodramatic' meant but he figured it sounded like an insult. "I am not!"

She waved a hand flippantly. "Yeah, whatever. Look, I'll pretend to buy your bullshit, ok? Not going to happen with you and Lucy. Got it." She raised an eyebrow in challenge. "Doesn't mean you're not going to with some girl eventually, right?"

Natsu didn't answer because, really, there wasn't anything he could say to that. Sure, he liked to think that someday he'd get to experience sex - he'd been fantasizing about it so much he'd be crazy not to be curious.

Cana's grin screamed of victory. Natsu kinda wanted to punch her in the face just to get rid of it. "So are you going to listen to your big sis, or what?"

She wasn't going to leave him alone about it until he agreed. And, as much as he wanted to tell her to fuck off, giving her an excuse to gossip to the rest of the guild - to Lucy - wasn't an option. He'd bury his own head in the sand before he let his partner find out about this. Still, forcing himself to say that one word that he just knew was going to trigger a downward spiral of dirty thoughts was damn near the hardest thing he'd had to do.

"Fine."

Seriously, he would have willingly jumped on a freaking train if it meant being spared from the torture the drunk was sure to subject him to.

She draped an arm over his shoulders, grinning madly. "All right, first things first. Don't do that slow romantic crap, got it? You don't want to bore the poor girl."

Natsu wasn't really sure what the 'slow romantic crap' was, but he figured he wasn't really slow or romantic in general so he'd be safe. "Uh, sure."

She gave a nod of approval, her smirk turning devious. "Good. Now listen and learn ..."

The next fifteen minutes were officially the most mortifying, most awkward, in his entire life.

As he expected, Cana's 'advice' was making his problem a million times worse. How the hell was he suppose to ever look at Lucy again without wondering if teasing that one little spot between her legs would make her beg? Or if throwing her legs over his shoulders would turn her moans into screams? Or if using his mouth would really-

Wait.

He recoiled away from her, stuttering. "M-my mouth?!"

Cana winked. "You heard me."

Natsu kinda had mixed feelings about that. On one hand, the idea of kissing Lucy - tasting Lucy - there made any remaining blood in his brain shoot south. On the other, he couldn't help but think of how his partner would throw fits whenever he so much as caught a glimpse into her underwear drawer. Wouldn't she feel too ... exposed doing that?

"Do girls ... really like that?" he asked, curiosity burning through his embarrassment.

"Ooh, yeah," she assured confidently. "Trust me."

He frowned thoughtfully, looking at his feet. "I don't think she'd let me ..."

"How do you know?" Her smile turned sly. "Being that we're talking about a hypothetical girl an all."

His ears burned. Truth was he couldn't imagine doing anything like that with anyone but his blonde partner. Even when he consciously made an effort to replace her in his thoughts with some generic stranger, she always made her way back without his permission. He just couldn't get her out of his head.

When he didn't respond right away, her smile turned sly. "You know, a girl like Lucy? She'd probably be so turned on, she'd return the favor without you even asking."

Return the - she didn't mean... Cana smirked. Shit. She did mean - fuck. Lucy's mouth, soft and hot, wrapped around his -

He growled, shaking the image away before it could fully form. Not allowed. Notallowednotallowednotallowed. "Are we done?" he snapped. Please just be fucking done already. Mavis knew she'd already condemned him enough for the rest of his stupid life. Any more and he was pretty sure he might be better off letting Erza beat him bloody until he suffered from memory loss.

She rolled her eyes, removing her arm from his shoulders. "Geeze, who knew you'd be such a prude?"

His denial was immediate. "Am n-"

She slapped her hand over his mouth, none too gently. "Will you just shut up and listen?" she snapped. He retaliated by licking her palm but her nose only crinkled in disgust instead of pulling away. "Uhg, you're such a child. Listen, I only got one more thing to say and then I'll leave you alone. Believe it or not, I got better things to do with my time then spending all day schooling you in how to satisfy your not-lover."

He snorted. No doubt those 'better things' were going back to her keg and getting piss drunk on the beach. Still, he didn't really care what the hell she did as long as it didn't involve him, so (with an annoyed glare) he nodded.

She removed her hand, wiping the saliva on her palm onto his bicep with a sneer. "I don't even know why I bother. I should just let you make a fool out of yourself."

He growled warningly. "Cana ..."

The irritated eye roll she gave him was immediate. "Yeah, yeah. Last piece of advice. You know, in case you completely screw everything else up." Her frown softened, less annoyed and more thoughtful as she stood up and brushed the sand off the back of her thighs. Her chin tilted up until she was looking at nothing but sky. "Just ... pay attention. She'll show you what feels good and what doesn't."

Natsu paused, the tension in his shoulders loosening as he looked up to the woman he considered family, and mulled over her words with thoughtful consideration. It was the first an only piece of advice she had given that wasn't accompanied by a lewd smirk. Maybe that was why he almost felt like it was actually genuine and not just a jab to see how red his face could get. "Yeah," he mumbled, "Ok."

Raising her arms over her head, Cana stretched with a sigh. "Well, I'll leave you to it then." She gave him a meaningful look from the corner of her eye. "If you got any questions you know where to find me."

He nodded, even though he had no intention of taking her up on her offer. As she turned to leave he felt the sudden need to say something. "Hey Cana?" She paused, sparing him a glance. His cheeks flushed and he looked down at his crossed ankles. "Not that I'll ever, you know, use it. But, uh, thanks. I guess." Even if she had only done it to embarrass him, she had still took the time to actually give him some descent advice.

She smiled. For a moment it was soft, almost sincere, until the corners of her mouth tilted into something devious and all too familiar. "Yeah, yeah. Just make sure you do your sensei proud!"

The pink tinge to his cheeks deepened until he was sure his face was as red as his swim trunks. Why had he felt the need to thank her again? "Don't you have a keg to babysit?" he grumbled irritably.

She chuckled, her hand raised in farewell as she headed towards the unsuspecting bar. Just as he breathed a sigh of relief, her steps paused and called out to him over her shoulder. "Oh! And Natsu?" Her voice carried over their little section of beach and several heads turned their way to stare between the two of them curiously. "Don't forget - ladies first!"

Natsu frowned in confusion, well aware of the amount of all the eyes watching him. Ladies - oh. The heat that had only just faded from his cheeks came back with a vengeance. "Do you ever shut up?!" he snapped loudly. "Go drown in your beer already!

Her laughter rang clearly in the space between them and Natsu felt himself begin to shrink under the scrutiny of his fellow guild mates. A quick glance confirmed that Lucy's eyes was one of the many trained on him. Her head tilted curiously as she held the volleyball between her hands.

He was just about ready to bury himself a hole and crawl into it, when the loud screech of "Gray! Your trunks!" saved him. Almost immediately, everyone's gaze turned to the naked ice mage (who looked more annoyed than embarrassed at the development) and the red faced Juvia who looked ready to melt into a puddle of fan girl bliss.

For once, Natsu found himself grateful for his team mates stripping habit.

AN: Because, lets face it, guys don't just know these kinds of things on their own.

Well, this was suppose to be out last week but last Monday I lost nearly all my writing for this story - this chapter included. As such, part of me is satisfied with how this came out, but another (admittedly larger) part doesn't even want to look at it because I can't help but feel like the first version was so much better. I suspect rewriting the other chapters is going to have a similar result, so please, please be patient with me when it comes to updates since I'm not ahead of the game like I was (I literally had 6 chapters written and nearly all the rest at least started).

If there is a silver lining to this tragic event, it's that the all the angst (I am ashamed to say I cried ... like, shoulder-shaking-please-let-me-just-drown-myself-in-chocolate-and-ice cream crying) has given birth to another NaLu chapter fic. If you want to read the product of my tears it is titled "To the Flame" (title subject to change because I'm just not in love with it) and is going to be, er, different from what I usually do. Last week (you know, during my pity fest) I've written over 7k words for it, so needless to say that I'm a bit excited about it. Turns out a psychotic Lucy is pretty fun to write. Go take a look see if you're into that angst/fluff combo.

ALSO! I had a lovely conversation with Dark Shining Light (she writes some lovely NaLu fics - go check her out!) and we have both realized something rather tragic that I'd like to bring to everyone's attention.

(If you read my other story The Good Dog please ignore this since you've already heard my rant about it)

Go look at some of your favorite fics. Look at the amount of reviews and then look at the amount of favs and follows. Is it just me, or are there a whole lot of wonderful stories that have double (sometimes even more) favs/follows than actual reviews? Don't get me wrong - I appreciate the favs and follows myself, but at the end of the day most of us authors are posting our stories so we can get feed back. Those favs and follows? They just read as numbers. In a review I see a person. I LOVE seeing your guys' reactions to my chapters. If there was no review system ... well, I wouldn't be writing fanfiction at all. I'd be writing something original that I could at least have the chance of making some money for my efforts.

Reviews are a fanfic author's payment

I am guilty of not always reviewing, I know. It is something that I have been working at remedying. Especially with one shots. It is so easy to enjoy a one shot and just move on because, hey, it's not like it's ever going to update. Sometimes, as readers, even us authors forget the time and effort it takes even for a short drabble. And they do take effort. I know I probably spent a good five hours (at least) agonizing over Love Bleeds The Color Red even though it's less than a thousand words.

Writers are taking time out of their lives and taking little pieces of themselves (because lets face it, writing is a personal thing) and putting it out there in the form of a story. If other authors are anything like me then they are probably waiting eagerly for those little emails to come through with responses.

So lets start a movement - authors and readers alike. If you like a story enough to fav/follow then you should like it enough to take a few extra minutes to review at least once. Lets all try to be people instead of just a number.

End o' rant.

Note: please don't take this as me being a review whore (I mean, I am. But that's not why I'm posting this). If you can't manage to fully adopt this idea then I hope you'll at least make an effort in reviewing another author's works. We have so many wonderful budding writers out there that just need the encouragement to keep on writing. Please, please give them that encouragement.

To the people who do review: Thank you. I want you to realize that if it were not your words of encouragement throughout the years that I wouldn't even be half the writer I am today - I mean that. I wouldn't be able to call myself a writer at all, if you all hadn't been there every step of the way to keep pushing me forward and I certainly wouldn't have been able to get through rewriting this chapter in two weeks if it weren't for being able to reread all of your wonderful encouragement to remind me that you guys are there patiently waiting. This chapter is for you guys!