commute
Someone had built a wall of bricks on her head. Or a whole fortress.
Of that Lucy was sure as she awoke only reluctantly. Her eyelids weighed down heavy, refusing to open.
If the thing on top of her was a fortress, then it seemed to be forged by fire. Lucy was sweating, and everything was dry and hot. So hot. She couldn't breathe.
What the hell had happened?
Was this life after death? Was this hell? Whatever had she done to get to hell?!
If you asked her, she had led a kind and righteous life. She'd have to complain about this.
Someone groaned close to her ear. Another poor soul, about to be thrown into purgatory?
Her eyes still wouldn't open.
"Lu…cy?" the voice croaked.
Speak of the devil.
Slowly, as the memories began to trickle back into her aching head, Lucy realized that the weight aswell as the heat belonged to her own personal evildoer.
And in this scenario, she would be punishing him.
As soon as she didn't feel like dying.
"Grmmh?" she answered.
Now this was not how she had pictured their first time waking up together would go. At all.
Natsu shifted, allowing her to finally take a deep breath as his upper body slid to the side. HIs hands, however, didn't move from her waist, but rather pulled her close into his side again.
With all the force she could muster, Lucy slowly opened her eyes. Red orbs stared back at her. That was all she could take in, because the light infiltrating her sensitive retina made her eyes water painfully, and she pressed them shut again with a wince.
Natsu cleared his throat to let out a long wail, wiggling against her.
"I wanna die," he declared. Lucy simply nodded. "So bad?"
Lucy nodded again. His voice had turned to a slightly concerned murmur. He was apparently much more awa ke than her, judging from his movements and ability to speak. Her own throat felt like someone had padded its sides with carpet.
His face pushed against her cheek, and he nuzzled it gently.
"You should…" she finally managed, ignoring the scratchy sound of her voice, "…brush your teeth."
He snorted, obediently pulling away and untangling himself from her. Now, finally, she opened her eyes for good, leting them accustom to the light flooding in from the windows. It looked like a promising day. For people who had been clever enough not to get drunk the previous night.
She blinked up at Natsu. Somehow she even managed to push any concerns regarding her appearance to the back of her mind.
"Morning," she said and tried a smile. With a grin, that Lucy almost found mischievous, he leaned down and pressed a sloppy kiss to her mouth.
"Ew!" she called - but only after kissing him back. With a strong push against his chest, she shoved him off the couch. "We both have to brush our teeth. I think I have a spare toothbrush."
After an excrutiating struggle off the couch, Lucy straightened herself. She watched Natsu stretch and give a hearty yawn, and suddenly she thought waking up like this was not so bad after all, no matter the circumstances.
Better than waking up alone, certainly.
This was the first time she had woken up with Natsu, and she would treasure it no matter how much her head was trying to explode.
She hoped there would be many more times.
The thought brought a slight redness to her cheeks. Lucy almost jumped when his voice reached her, shattering at least a million braincells in the process.
"Lucy? So what about that toothbrush?"
He stood with his head cocked and a curious look on his face, yesterday's clothes a little disheveled from sleep. She blinked rapidly, trying to process his words.
"Ah, yes!"
The act of toothbrushing proved to be a silent undertaking, with them standing side by side and flinching every time they accidentally looked in the mirror.
Then Natsu was banished from the bathroom, leaving Lucy to try and save what was to save of her face and hair. The latter was forced into hiding by means of a bun, but not even her make up could cover up the dark circles under her eyes. With a defeated sigh, Lucy deemed herself done.
She stepped out to find Natsu rummaginf through her fridge, and her stomach turned at the mre thought of food, even as she started screeching at him.
"Leave my fridge alone! Last time I had to rebuy my whole suppplies for the week!"
The screaming only worsened her headache though, and she groaned as she rubbed her temples in exasperation. She began to realize how stressed mothers must feel all the time.
"But I'm hungry!"
"How can you even think of food right now?"
"I need at least five pepperoni pizzas."
They didn't buy five pepperoni pizzas.
They bought four - and one that wouldn't make people breathe fire, on Lucy's insistence.
The train rattled steadily, and everytime Lucy accidentally caught her reflection in the glass, she flinched. How had Natsu convinced her to leave her place when she looked like this?
It really had to be true love.
Convincing her to come along to his place, however, had not been such a hard task. Lucy had almost regained something like actual life force when he had insisted on her tagging along and sharing the pizzas with the others. The sole idea of finally seeing where he lived - and meeting Happy again - had been more than enough for Lucy to squeal and agree excitedly.
They hung low in their seats, speaking little, exchanging agonized glances every few minutes. An old woman, who was sitting opposite of them, assessed them scrutinizingly for the whole of their shared journey, occasionally muttering something under her breath that Lucy feared might not have been a compliment on her hairdo.
When the unpleasant granny finally left the train after what felt like a million stops, Lucy exhaled deeply.
"Wow, she was a bundle of joy, huh Natsu?"
Natsu didn't answer. Natsu had turned green.
"Ohgod! Why is the hangover resurfacing now?"
"Motion…sickness…" he whined lowly as he clutched his stomach, a picture of misery.
"Motion sickness?! Oh dear. But- but you drive!"
"Driving is good. I love my car. I hate… public transport."
He spat the words with such disdain that Lucy almost couldn't surpress a burst of laughter. Her own stomach still grumbled displeasantly, but seeing him in such a state made her forget all about her own struggles. It could always be worse.
In an attempt to comfort him, Lucy set her stack of pizzas on the empty seat beside her and reached for his hands. His painfilled eyes fixed themselves on her hands on his, and then moved to her face. His lips were pressed closely together, cheeks puffing out.
"If you vomit onto me, I will kill you."
He nodded in quick succession, and his lips became even thinner.
Choosing to leave his sweaty hands to their occupation of clutching his stomach, her own hands moved upwards, gently turning his face towards her and threading her fingers in his hair.
Natsu sat attentively, moving little - whether asking for her touch or surpressing the contents of his stomach, she did not know. And frankly, she didn't want to find out either.
But when she continued to carefully rake her fingers through his curls, nails gently scraping his scalp from time to time, his forehead dropped against her shoulder, and he gave a low hum.
Pride surged through her, and she smiled to herself as she leaned her cheek against his head, dropping her right hand onto his lap as her left continued the Stop-Natsu procedure. His hand found hers to squeeze it weakly.
"Gosh, you really live at the end of the world, huh?"
"Told ya it's the outskirts."
"Which stop is ours again? The pizza will cool off soon!"
"Nah, it'll be just the right temperature - I've tested it out. And uh…" He unwillingly brought his head up to look at the schedule that was painted on the high end of the wall, apparently regaining some life now that the train was momentarily halting. "Uh, oh shit! This one!"
They escaped the train just in time, with Lucy huffing and puffing as she supported both the pizzas and a struggling, sick Natsu.
She gasped for breath as they slomped down onto the nearest bench, enjoying the sun's gentle caress and the light breeze. After her breathing had calmed down a little, she took in her surroundings.
It was a small station, an open building that allowed her to peek past the tracks. It was greener here than in the city, and she watched a few children march over the level-crossing. Fields stretched out until they reached the beginning of a small forest. There was no more city in this direction. Outskirts indeed. This was the very edge of Crocus.
"Ah, this is so nice!" she called. Natsu slipped off the bench.
His house wasn't just small. It was tiny. Possibly the smallest house Lucy had ever seen. But it was a whole house nonetheless, even though it stood a little crooked. The brickwalls exuded a homely charm, but Lucy worried that the tree looming over it might come crashing down any second.
"This is your place?"
"Yup!" he exclaimed proudly, throwing a hand in the air for emphasis. The other was busy holding on to the pizzas he had tugged under his arm. "Awesome, right!"
Lucy giggled at his enthusiasm. "Do you think we'll wake the others up?"
"Maybe. They'd deserve it though."
"Natsu!"
"Well - Gray would." he conceded. "And Lis wasn't drinking anyways, so I guess she'll be up. Oh and there was this girl…"
"Oh god, right! The one that clung to Gray like… an octopus, haha."
"And now I have to ring my own doorbell," Natsu grumbled as they arrived at the front door.
Lucy searched for said doorbell, but gave up after a second. Natsu looked rather forlorn himself. She watched as, after a moment's hesitation, he reached behind a bush and continued to fumbe a little, and soon a sharp sound echoed behind the closed door.
"Are you for real."
"Well," he grinned sheepishly. "Didn't have so many visitors yet. At least now I know I have a doorbell."
"I can't belive you someti-"
The door was ripped open, and they blinked as they stood faxe to face with a panting Gray.
"Good. You're here. Now you can-" he maneuvred Juvia in front of him. "-give her directions on how to get back to the city."
An evil grin stretched across Natsu's face.
"Oh, but we brought pizza for everyone! Pepperoni."
"Juvia likes it hot!" the young woman squealed.
Lucy but her lip as Gray turned red from head to toe.
The rest of their forenoon was spent as lazy as possible, with little moving or activity whatsoever. Lisanna seemed the only one dying to get them out of their phase of selfpity and pain. But they seemed content with staying right where they were.
Behind his house, Natsu had a little patio with a small table and two chairs, that the whole gang had chosen to occupy, absorbing the stray rays of sunshine that fell through the leaves of the massive tree.
Lucy herself was lying on a makeshift 'mattress' consisting of three blankets. The empty pizza containers lay strewn around the place.
The wind rustled through the treetops. Lisanna was whistling a melody inside the house. Her headache was finally dying down, and the food even though she had tried her very best to refuse it - actually had helped.
A small smile played around her features as she lay there, eyes closed.
And then, just like that, the peaceful atmosphere was forcefully destroyed.
"Alright!"
Natsu had jumped out of his chair without warning, fistbumping the air. Lucy could have sworn she had heard him snore loudly not one minute ago.
"Gray, where did you park? I'm all fired up!"
Gray groaned, seemingly just as disturbed from his slumber as Lucy, and pointed to his right. Juvia shifted on his lap, sighing happily.
"Lucy! Come on!"
"W-what! Me?! But why, and what, and, uh…"
He practically pulled her to her feet, bristling with zest for action. Happy eyed the critically, glaring at Natsu for being shoved off Lucy's tummy. Then he rolled himself into a solid ball again, facing away.
"You'll see in a sec! Gray! Keys!"
He received them - to the head.
"Ouch, you bastard! I'll teach you-"
"Natsu," Lucy deadpanned, and he shrunk back immediately. You didn't want to disturb Lucy in her sleep, pull her up and then igniore her. He seemed to understand that much from one look alone.
"Okay," he grinned, and took her hand into his, prancing with excitement.
"Geez, Natsu, what is so exciting? And where are we driving?"
"Oh, I don't know," he informed her as they rounded the corner and stepped onto the street.
"Eh?"
Natsu was occupied with craning his head left and right, ntil he apparently spied the object of his desire.
"It doesn't matter where we go," he laughed as he pulled her along. "It will be fun because we're together. And because of this."
He halted in front of a big, black motorcycle. Lucy's heart dropped into her stomach as she eyed the shiny, gleaming metal.
This thing looked fast, to say the least.
"Can you drive this thing?"
"Yup!"
"…do you have a license?"
"Nope!"
His grin didn't waver.
"Are you ready for a little adventure?"