So uhhh holy shit guys over 100 follows? Even after I've kinda been quiet for a couple of weeks (I know, I'm very sorry, I've had to go to a couple appointments and make a couple appointments for mental health etc.. alongside uni deadlines.. lol not a good combination)

ANYWAYS! Thank you all so much for the reviews and faves/follows! They mean so much to me, and seeing them pop up in my emails really means a lot, especially when I'm slightly less active! So thank you lots! (Now hopefully this chapter is okay!)

Chapter 7 – Family Dinners: The Consequences

"You okay?" She tentatively asked, not sure whether or not she wanted to open that can of worms right after it occurred. He sighed and ran his fingers through his hair before looking her in the eye again.

"Honestly Luce? No." He said bluntly. His reply made her blood run cold, had she done something wrong? Was she the problem? Her heart sunk and her blood pressure increased tenfold when she heard his next question.

"Why didn't you tell me about the arranged marriage?"

"Natsu… I-" She cut herself off.

What was she supposed to say?

Never in a million years did she think Natsu would find out about this whole screwed up situation.. Hell, she herself had basically forgotten about it considering she only really sees her father once a year. And even then she had definitely been desensitised to the idea of marrying someone as a business deal over the years. Maybe that's why she didn't say anything; because she didn't really think anything of it anymore. Otherwise she supposed she would have said something to him earlier herself, rather than let someone else drop that bombshell on him.

Natsu sat on her bed, waiting for her to answer.

"Look I didn't even- it's not really- I'm not actually…" She felt her voice die down, thinking how to best to word the shit storm that was her family.

He didn't push her. Instead he was being eerily quiet. So much so that it started to freak Lucy out. Leading her to look up at him again, noticing that her gaze had dropped to the floor. He sat still hand still in his hair and an emotion she very rarely saw on his face.

One of hurt.

Though obviously trying to hide it, holding a neutral expression where he could, he was hurt he hadn't said anything. Lucy was his best friend. She could read him like a book sometimes.

The minute way in which his eyebrows pinched together, and the slight narrowing of his eyes brought about the smallest of creases on his forehead. A slight downwards curl at the corner of his lips where his usual carefree smile should be. But his biggest giveaway, the easiest way for her to tell was through looking into his eyes.

Despite not being able to find conscious words to describe it, somehow by looking into his obsidian green eyes she found the answer. God knows how he was able to convey so much emotion in a single glance, but he was.

"Luce?" He questioned his hand dropping from his head to land on the bed beside him. The softened tone of his voice was so much worse to listen to than she thought. Anything would be better than his gentle understanding, even hearing him annoyed or angry would have been better. She couldn't lie to him. Not like this, but she knew how protective he could be of his friends; she didn't want him getting angry on her behalf.

It wasn't worth it.

Lucy moved her hand to rest on top of his as she tried to express her regret, as if attempting to transfer her feelings through the power of touch. As she did so, his thumb gently caressed the side of her palm, a subtle way of letting her know he was listening.

"Nats.. I don't know.." The desperate way she breathed out those words, begging him to understand. "I didn't think you would ever find out. It's not-"

"You-" He interjected. "You kept it from me deliberately?" The soft tone retreating from his voice as his hand tensed slightly under hers. "Luce we're best friends why keep it from me?"

"No Natsu, that's not what I meant it's just," She took a moment to pause and think, not wanting to further confuse the situation. Explaining this wasn't her strong suit, and with her panic levels rising, her ability to reason coherently was slipping down the drain. "It's never really been set in stone, it's more likely some stupid threat my dad makes because I've never had a boyfriend." At least that's what Lucy had been telling herself for years. Her dad wouldn't really auction her off, would he?

Natsu pulled his hand sharply from hers, ignoring the anger he felt about the 'threat' comment and focused more on the sentence as a whole and backed away from her slightly. His dark eyes scanned her face as his eyebrows narrowed further. The particular intensity in his eyes rarely pointed towards her. But now it was. And Lucy, who could see this, opened her mouth to speak but Natsu beat her to it.

"Did you only ask me to come here, to be your 'pretend boyfriend', to stop the engagement?" His voice started to rise in volume.

"What? No! Natsu no. I-" Lucy took a step towards him as he took a step further from her as he continued.

"To make sure the engagement isn't set in stone." The words were laced with venom, and Lucy could see his face contort in anger.

Lucy felt her eyes prick with tears. This isn't how she wanted this to go.

"Natsu I would never!" She spoke carefully, her own voice rising in volume as if speaking louder would help him understand. "You know this."

"DO I?" He spoke loudly, his words hanging in the air for the next few seconds. "Because apparently you've been keeping some preTTY BIG SECRETS." The volume of his voice had been steadily rising, and this last sentence was practically shouted at her.

"Natsu." Her eyes widened at his tone and her voice dropped a couple decibels, cracking slightly as she spoke. "You don't mean that."

"DON'T I?" He shot back.

The force of his words, both in volume and in meaning, made her physically take a step backwards. The tears pricking in her eyes finally fell and she felt herself choke up slightly. After everything they'd shared, after everything they've been through together. How could he say that? She had shared more with him than she had anyone else before.

They didn't keep secrets, not deliberately.

Sure they shared everything, but there had to be something he was keeping from her. He had been acting a little strange a few weeks ago, and had tried to hide it more recently, but was still acting strange. She wasn't blind, she could see the weird looks he sometimes gave her or the way he avoided her at random times.

How could he be such a hypocrite?

And why did he care so much? It wasn't like they were actually going out and she hid this. It shouldn't be such a problem even if it were to happen. Why should he care?

Lucy let out a bitter laugh, filling the silent room with an uneasy tension. Natsu eyed her carefully, his narrowed eyes filled with hesitance after her laugh.

A flush of anger made itself apparent over her cheeks and she took a few shaky breaths before she finally exploded at him. Noticing this change in her demeanour, Natsu attempted to backtrack immediately regretting having shouted at her.

"You know what, Natsu." Lucy made her way over to the door.

"Luce, wait I'm sorry I just-" He reached his hand out and grabbed her shoulder to stop her leaving, but she quickly swatted his hand away. Her glare preventing any further words escaping his mouth.

"No. I'm sorry. I'm sorry that I never told you. I'm sorry that this affects you SO much. But either way, you're not the one being auctioned off to a bunch of 40 year old businessmen. And I don't think I'm the only one keeping secrets either so screw you."

The door slammed behind her, leaving a silenced and regretful Natsu in the room. Alone.

They both needed time to cool off.

LLLIINNEEBBBRRREEEAAAKKKK

When she returned to the room, about an hour later, she was cold and exhausted through and through.

After pacing around outside for a while, she ran out of steam. However being too stubborn to simply walk in and make up with Natsu, she waited it out by curling up on a bench round the back of the cabin and gazing at the stars wishing her mother was here to talk to her.

She had moved on from her mother's death.

Really, she had.

Writing her letters every now and again, keeping them tucked away in a box helped her process everything. But it was at times like these she regressed back to that day. Knowing that her mother wouldn't be there to help her through break ups, or fights with her friends, knowing that she would never be able to ask her mother advice about, well… anything, and knowing that she couldn't run to her mother for parental support when her father and her didn't get along. Those moments still got to her. And they probably always would.

After staring up at the stars and contemplating things for more than a while, Lucy decided it was probably time for her to go inside.

She was not only physically exhausted but emotionally drained as well. Having two arguments so close together, especially since one of them was with Natsu, really took its toll on her. Sure she was feisty but she hated confrontation.

Speaking of which, she had to go back to the room she shared with him now. Kicking her heels off and throwing aside the light jacket she grabbed on her way out, she made her way upstairs.

Gathering the little pride she had left and hoping to god that Natsu was already asleep; she quietly opened the door and made her way into the room.

The lights were off inside and once she had locked the door she made her way over to the chest of drawers. She pulled an oversized t-shirt over her head so she could shimmy out of her dress without having to go into the ensuite and risk waking up, what she assumed was, a sleeping Natsu.

Too tired to do anything else, she clumsily wiped off her makeup before cautiously climbing onto the bed. She did her best to avoid Natsu's sleeping form by edging herself as close to the wall as possible so she could settle in for the night. Though she was glad he was still in the room, and hadn't abandoned her to sleep on the couch downstairs, she couldn't help the pangs in her chest at how close he was in proximity, yet how far away she felt from him.

She hated when they fought. It always made her feel lonely, no matter how many people surrounded her.

Dwelling too long on the argument they had before, and the words they threw at each other, brought tears to her eyes again so she stubbornly tried to push those feelings aside, and willed herself to sleep. This meant, however, that she was so caught up in her own thoughts she didn't hear the small sigh that Natsu let out before shifting to face her.

"Luce?" His voice carried in the dark of the room, and Lucy froze at the sound of his voice, squeaking out a small reply. Though her back was to him, she could feel his eyes burning into her.

A warm arm snaked under her neck and another over her stomach, before she was pulled in towards him; holding her so close that she could feel his warm breath fan over her shoulder. She barely heard the whispered 'I'm sorry' over the sound of her own heart beat flooding her senses.

She breathed out a quiet 'what', a little spooked that he was in fact awake. A more audible sigh this time, sent shivers down her spine as his warm breath hit her shoulder again.

"I said I'm sorry Luce.." He spoke into the blonde hair gathered at her neck. "I didn't mean what I said," he continued quietly. "I'm more mad for you than at you, how can your dad decide something like that!?"

Whilst talking, he tightened his hold on her and pulled her in closer, his voice getting slightly louder as he spoke closer to her ear. Lucy shifted in his arms. Though she was used to him getting touchy feely whilst he was asleep or even half-asleep in bed sometimes, she did say she knew he liked to cuddle in bed, it felt different now that he was consciously choosing to.

"Nats.. it's fine.." She began.

"No Luce, it's not fine." He spun her around to face him. Not quite expecting their faces to be so close together, but continued on regardless of the heat rushing to his cheeks. "You shouldn't have to marry some gross old man."

Lucy cringed at his wording but tried protesting, arguing that middle aged wasn't really old but Natsu was having none of it. Angled just far away enough to look her dead in the eyes whilst still half-holding her, he asked her a question she didn't realise she needed to hear.

"How do you really feel about the whole thing? Because I know you're lying when you say its fine. It's very clearly not."

Staring into his eyes laced with concern, Lucy felt a small lump begin to form in her throat. Not trusting herself to talk right away she took a few deep breaths, but they came out a lot more shuddery than she expected. As if predicting what was about to happen, Natsu bundled Lucy up in his arms, pulling her close to his chest and next thing he knew a choked sob released itself from her throat and her previously clear eyes were swimming with tears.

Natsu cradled the back of her head with his hand, slowly using the same stroking motions to soothe her now as she had started to when he's motion sick.

The stress of the night had clearly caught up with her; she usually didn't full on sob in front of him. Sure a little appearance of tears was not uncommon, they were best friends and Lucy was very passionate about a lot of subjects; the events happening to the characters in her books were a relatively common cause of these teary episodes.

But almost never hysterical crying.

She was so out of it she hadn't clocked onto the fact that she wasn't getting tears and snot over Natsu's t-shirt, but in reality his bare chest. Not that he minded in this particular moment, he was still trying to calm her down.

Whispering comforting words and holding her tight until her breathing evened out. Which eventually it did. So much so that he pulled away to ask her again, when he saw her eyes were closed. Puffy and blotchy, but closed.

The girl had literally cried herself to sleep.

'What a weirdo.' Natsu thought to himself, unconsciously lifting a corner of his mouth whilst looking over her sleeping face. He brushed tear soaked strands of hair out of her face and wiped her damp cheeks. 'Why do I always end up here.. watching that peaceful face..'

After wiping his chest down with the covers, not particularly bothered about the mess like Lucy would be if she were conscious, he pressed a gentle kiss on her forehead and pulled her close resting her head in the crook of his neck.

"I won't let anything like that happen to you." He whispered, planting a slightly firmer kiss on top of her head and falling into a rather easy sleep himself.

Oh god guys I hope this chapter wasn't a huge disappointment after taking so long! I know the length is a lot shorter, but I wanted to ask you guys whether you would prefer chapters this kind of length more regularly, or if you wanted longer chapters more irregularly?

Please remember to review if you have any theories or even drop me a PM with any suggestions of any drama you think might be coming or should be coming up in this fic! I love you all time for replies?

CuteBubbles: Ah thank you! I agree with you, I think Natsu would face off with anyone for Lucy XD And I just hate when everyone had the 'Lisanna is evil, she's a threat to NaLu' kinda vibe? So I'm trying to include how I think her character really is!

Nina-Chan202: Sorry! Yeah I feel like she's a pretty strong person in that sense, but she probably puts on confidence more so than has it as well!

Michiamotippete: GOD IKR! And I sure hope so, you may see a seriously jealous Natsu coming up in the story soo… keep reading ;)

Joeclone: I totally agree! Jude is a sleazeball! and thanks, hopefully I'll get things under control soon.

Shadoweddark: THANK YOU ;O; I hope this chapter wasn't too disappointing after such a long wait. And yaass! We need more people to jump on the Love Lisanna bandwagon! She's just a character! (And we all know NaLu is endgame anyways XD)

Ushindeshi: Yo, so your comment kinda sparked a part in their argument, it was slightly different beforehand but what you said was so good that I had to use it!

CrazyZaika,heyitsmeduhnat, GRUgrace and to all the GUESTS! Thank you! I love that you review /o/