Roommates Chapter 17: The Kids are NOT Alright, a fairy tail fanfic

"So…" Lucy cradled her best friend as they sat upright on the edge of her bed. "You are on birth control… right?"

"Yeah, of course!" Cana momentarily broke away from her friend's cuddle defensively. "It's just that… Loke gets soooo athletic in bed that birth control becomes like one of those plastic barbecue covers in the middle of a hurricane."

All Lucy could do was smile awkwardly.

"I… didn't… want to know that…"

The middle school teacher could hardly believe her morning so far. Cana had texted her the night before freaking out about something, and at about 9am that morning, the magazine print beauty came storming into the blonde's room to declare that her period was late.

"Okay, the pregnancy test doesn't work until after a few days, so just get through the weekend and don't tell Loke until you're sure," Lucy instructed, as the brunette rested her head on her friend's shoulder again.

"Yeah, no, of course not, of course," Cana agreed. "It's just... I can't stop thinking about what a… Loke baby would be like. I mean, I don't know… Would it just want to nurse 24 hours a day?"

Now Lucy was thoroughly roped into Cana's imaginary scene of baby Loke with all of the… charm of the adult counterpart. In Lucy's mind, she saw Loke's grown-man head on a baby's body, and that image was shudder-inducing.

"Probably," Lucy cringed. "We could make it, like… a douche baby jar."

She chuckled while Cana gasped in mortification.

"I'm so screwed…" The brunette groaned.

Just then, Loke, who had been wandering the loft in his work suit, heard the noises coming from Lucy's room, and seeing that her door was not all the way closed, invited himself in.

"Ladies, ladies," he said. "What is all the hubbub about?" He gasped in glee at the scene of the two women before him. "Oh, my... Luce, have you finally agreed to be our third?" He gave Cana a not-so-subtle wink. "Because, you know, we've discussed this."

Lucy's eyes popped out their sockets as she looked between her best friend and roommate.

"We have never discussed this," Cana assured her friend swiftly before turning to him. "Celeste, this is not the time!"

"We were just thinking about what you might have been like as a baby," Lucy interjected.

"Oh! Well why didn't you say so? I was the bomb diggity as a baby!" Loke beamed. He'd be hard pressed to miss an opportunity to talk about himself. "I mean, I was, like, break-dancing at eight months old. But they said that I needed a magnum size diaper, if you know what I mean."

The girls immediately started yelling.

"For the love of God!" Cana cried.

"Get out!" Lucy joined her. "Seriously?!"

"Estúpido…"

The Kids are NOT Alright

In the kitchen/living room area, Gajeel sat at the countertop tuned in anxiously to a man on the radio while he feverishly took notes.

"He's the worst quarterback in the league," the radio man said. "I mean, statistically, it would be better if he wasn't even playing at all, right?"

"You're listening to the radio and writing with a pen?" Natsu scoffed while chugging a beer.

"Yeah, what decade are we in?" Loke mocked, entering the kitchen and giving the pinkette a high five.

"Be quiet, idiots," Gajeel shushed before returning to furiously scribbling on his notepad with his pen.

Natsu shook his head as the radio host droned on. "I cannot listen to that guy."

"Come on Gajeel," Loke gave him a pity smile. "Jiemma Orland is the worst. Even the name is stupid."

"You uncultured…" Gajeel swiveled to glare at them in disgust. "Jiemma Orland is the king of sports radio commentary! He is legen - and read my lips when I say this - dary!" The former NFL player hesitated before speaking his next words. "...I've got an interview with him today, okay?"

The boys' eyes widened in surprise before Natsu and Loke shared secret glances with each other, holding an enthralling, nonverbal conversation.

"He's hiring a new research assistant," Gajeel continued before gesturing to his working area on the countertop. "Hence... the research. My old football coach set it up. The only other thing I'm concerned with now is how I'm gonna break the news to Miko."

"Oh, HELL yeah!" Loke perked up (with a little too much enthusiasm). "You've gotta cut ties with that kid man, she freaks me out."

His beef with Miko's mother (one of his bosses) aside, the little girl genuinely creeped Loke out.

"She never blinks," Natsu concurred, taking another sip of his beer.

"She's like a tiny little owl on a t-shirt."

"Or if a birdhouse ever became sentient."

"Alright, that's enough," Gajeel butt in defensively.

Thankfully for them, Lucy came skipping from the hallway.

"Hey you guuuuuuuuuuuuuyyyyyys!" she chirped in a sing-song voice. "Have I ever told you how handsome I think you are? Especially today? Loke, love the suit."

The honey blonde nodded his head expectantly. "Well of course you do."

"Gajeel… love the suit!" Lucy repeated the same compliment, but with surprise, noting the man's more formal attire.

"And of course Natsu…" She smiled with disgusting shamelessness at her bartender friend. "LOVING the five o'clock shadow… ooh, and is that the one eighth Cherokee I finally see kicking in?"

Now, while it was quite obvious to Natsu that this was manipulative flattery, he still smiled in gratification, stroking his non-existent beard.

"It's creepy and thin, just the way I like it," Natsu crooned. "Now spit it out, what do you want Heartfilia?!"

"I forgot to tell you guys… but Meredy is going to be here in a couple of minutes and I need you guys to be on your best behavior."

"Say WHAT?!"

"You've got to be kidding me…"

"Again, Lucy?"

Before Lucy could answer the boys, Gajeel spoke out again.

"Wait… By Meldy, you don't mean that demon child with the horrible mother who created the robot arm at your science fair do you…?"

"Meredy," Lucy corrected him, "and yes! She's also Purehito's daughter. It's gonna be great!"

There came a silence from the boys in the loft. Natsu and Loke were silent because they didn't know exactly what they could be in for, but Gajeel was silent because he knew exactly what they would be in for.

"Yeaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhh, I'm out," Gajeel said, not wasting a moment, getting off his stool and heading for the front door. He was ready for his interview anyway, dressed in an old suit, hair in a low braid, and finally equipped with a legitimate reason to leave the loft, and this conversation. "Don't wait up for me losers," he said as he closed the door behind him.

"So…" Natsu turned back to Lucy. "Why are you babysitting for Master Hades?"

"It's Purehito," she corrected defensively. "And I think that he's testing me. Our relationship might actually be at the stage where he wants to see if I can be a step-mom!"

"Are you nervous?" Loke questioned.

"It's nothing I can't handle," she answered smugly. "I'm already halfway there... I'm her teacher, so…"

In her pocket, Lucy's phone vibrated, and she anxiously yanked it out to check it. Loke raised an eyebrow. That didn't seem like the behavior of a person who was "handling" it.

"Okay, so that's Kyouka texting me that Meredy is downstairs…" Lucy muttered under her breath. "Alright boys, listen up!" She suddenly roared. "No dirty jokes, no alcohol, and no curse words! And yes you two, that includes the "B" through "S" bombs," she answered before they asked.

The boys jumped at the volume of her voice.

"Oh, and no bringing home college girls today, Berlusconi," she looked pointedly at Natsu.

The pinkette gasped, feigning offense. Over the past few weeks, the bartender had taken up an interesting new hobby of bringing home younger women to the loft for one night stands. Natsu couldn't lie to himself - without the emotional stakes of a relationship - it was quite fun. It reminded him of his college days when he was truly out of control. Since time and life's circumstances have both matured and humbled him, Natsu wouldn't exactly look back and say he was proud of the man he used to be in college.

"Well, that's not fair!" Natsu took another swig of his beer between protests. Lucy scowled at the bottle, disapproving of his blatant day drinking. "This girl that I've been hanging out with lately is toootally mature and interesting."

As good as he was at being a player, in his heart he knew he was a relationship kind of guy (sometimes to his detriment). So now, out of the college girls he'd been flirting with, he found one girl in particular that he figured was worth more than a one night stand, and he was bringing her over for dinner later.

Loke's eyes happened to land on Natsu's lower half, causing him to double take.

"Natsu!" He shouted mortified. "Wh-why aren't you wearing any pants?!"

Lucy leaned over the kitchen counter to see if Loke's claims were true, and lo and behold, Natsu was only in his boxers. She sighed.

"There are children coming to this loft, please put on some pants."

Natsu scowled at them both. "Why? You two are acting like my congas are out, I'm just in my shirt and undies."

"Everything you say sounds really creepy and weird when you're not wearing pants," Loke elaborated.

Natsu decided to test that theory.

"Your hair looks nice," he told Lucy.

"Ugh," the blondes groaned in unison.

"Mmm, that coffee smells delicious," he told Loke.

"So creepy," Loke muttered.

"Natsu, when I come back upstairs, you better have on some pants!" Lucy exclaimed as she started jogging towards the front door. "Or at least some really high socks!"

"High socks it is," Natsu smirked as the door closed behind the middle school teacher.

"You sure you don't want to swing too?"

In the lush, well-furnished and manicured backyard on a private swingset, a six-year-old red-headed girl mirthfully pushed a nearly thirty-year-old Gajeel on her swing, as the man chuckled with glee.

"Nah," Miko replied. "Pushing is where the action is."

Gajeel dragged his feet in the dirt to stop the swing and laughed wryly at her response. He grabbed the chain of the swing and turned around to look at her with a sigh.

"Miko, listen kid. I think we should talk."

The 1st grader was taken aback by his tone.

Gajeel's eyes aimlessly honed in on the dirt, then the pockets of her denim overalls, and then up at the sky before he sighed again.

"You know… I'm not going to be here forever, right?"

"I know about death, Gajeel," the girl said impudently. "I know that there's no farm where all my goldfish and grandparents go."

"Huh? What? No, no, no, no, no. It's just that I'm an adult. It's time for me to get an adult job with adult people. You can understand, right?"

"Maybe we should get to work on your resume first, because yours is terrible."

"My res… I'm… sorry?"

"I read your resume in my spare time," she clarified with a smile. "My mommy's been teaching me all about it when she's not working."

Gajeel raised an eyebrow. "Your mother… teaches you how to read resumes… in her spare time?"

Miko nodded proudly without deliberating further.

Gajeel was still dumbfounded at the revelation that Miko understood resumes at six years old. Is this what her mother considered fun?

"It's 2024, Gajeel," His charge interrupted his train of thought. "Typing is not a special skill."

"Hey Ms. Heartfilia," Hades' fair-skinned daughter stepped out the backseat of her mother's SUV. She wore a red, button-down, knee-length, dress and yellow sweater. Despite the gold, feathery headband on her pink mane, nothing, not even her bangs could hide the contempt in Meredy's emerald eyes.

But Lucy couldn't see that.

Instead the blonde was too busy focusing on the rich divorcee of her boyfriend getting out of the front seat of the jeep. She was wearing some sort of pantsuit from Chanel with shades from Celine that she took off with menacingly long nails, only to glare at Lucy and scowl at the apartment building. The last time she was this close to the buzz-cut woman, she and Gajeel destroyed her daughter's science fair project, lied about it, and then after Lucy fessed up, Kyouka tried to get her fired over it. Several times.

"Heyyyyyyyyy Meredy and Kyo-"

"I can be here in under five minutes if need be." Kyouka said tersely, cutting the small talk.

Lucy blanched. Kyouka's tongue was just as sharp and unwavering as she remembered it.

Lucy's attempted shield of congeniality crumbled slowly. "Okay…"

"Honestly, if it were up to me this wouldn't be happening at all," she said, grabbing Meredy by the shoulder and bringing her close. "Only because my husband is out of town, and he insisted that you were Meredy's favorite teacher and my daughter, for some reason, agreed with him."

Lucy's eyes widened as she smiled and clapped her hands together in delight. "Wow, really?"

Meredy closed her eyes and sighed. Then she took a deep breath and smiled widely at the woman before her. Lucy smiled back, none the wiser.

"Yeah," Kyouka continued. "She kept insisting on coming here, to your home, specifically."

"Ah, well you know," Lucy tucked a tendril of blonde behind her ear in an effort to fake modesty. "It is a pretty nice apartment," she chuckled. She was completely blinded by glee at the revelation that she was Meredy's favorite teacher.

So maybe she didn't secretly hate my guts afterall!

"Um, hey, um, I hope this doesn't sound rude," Lucy pressed Kyouka cautiously. "But, um… it's just that you keep saying my "husband" and I just wanted to make sure that you and Purehito aren't like, still married are you?"

Kyouka rolled her eyes and scoffed.

"No."

Lucy put her hands on her chest and started laughing despite the deafeningly awkward silence coming from Kyouka and her daughter.

"Thank the heavens, because I just, like, wanted to make sure that I wasn't missing some veeeery important piece of information, am I right guys?"

Back in the loft, (and against his better judgment) Natsu begrudgingly emerged from his bedroom squeezing into a pair of jeans, as Cana, who slovenly appeared from Lucy's room, rushed straight to the bathroom. Natsu thought her evasiveness was strange. Loke noticed too.

"Cana's been acting really weird," Loke whispered as Natsu zipped up his fly and buttoned his pants. "Do you think she's getting tired of me? I mean, it's been, like, months of non-stop sex. What am I gonna do if she doesn't let me hit the fifth chakra?" He whined.

Natsu groaned, because the last thing he wanted to do this morning was sit through Loke's sex metaphors.

"I'm just, I'm just saying," Loke continued, following a non-communicative Natsu to the kitchen. "Do you think she wants something more than sex?" His phone rang but after checking the caller-ID he quickly hung up.

"Do you think that she's finally becoming… a girl?"

Natsu sighed and plopped himself on the couch.

"'Cause I can't handle that, man," the honey blonde concluded.

"For God's sake…" Finally at the wit's end of his patience, Natsu turned to respond to him. "If you think she's starting to catch feelings then talk to her about it man. Cana's not the type to get all weird about being a booty call."

Natsu's eyebrows furrowed, and he subconsciously found himself putting his thumb and his index finger to his chin. As the words came out of his mouth, he started to second guess them.

"Although…" Natsu added. "She is still a girl, I guess. And we both know girls get way more clingy post-sex than guys do."

And with that bit of insight, Loke gasped, as if a proverbial atomic bomb had just been dropped on his mind.

Jiemma Orland was a living sports OG. He started off as a pretty impressive linebacker in the NFL, before his career was derailed by another monster rookie at the time. He went on to coach a successful team called the Sabertooth Tigers before copyrighting and trademarking the "Sabertooth" name. He then used it to start a sports talent management agency, and represented professional athletes from all sports, including Gajeel's favorite basketball player - Jura Neeks. He only recently sold the "Sabertooth" brand and talent agency to a mysterious billionaire and has decided to live out his twilight years doing sports radio commentary.

"And you're familiar with the show?" the interviewer questioned Gajeel.

"Yes, I am. I've been listening for years."

"What do you think of Mr. Orland?"

"He's actually like an idol of mine," Redfox said sincerely.

Behind a one-way glass panel, was Jiemma Orland himself in his radio studio, watching his manager interview his assistant-hopefuls, including Gajeel himself. Of course, Gajeel didn't know he was being watched until the guy pressed a glowing red button in his studio and shouted something into the mic.

"BE HONEST JACKASS!" Orland's voice rang through the intercom.

"Ow! Shit!" Gajeel yelled reactively. Both men in the interview jumped at the stark reminder (or inGajeel's case, realization) of Jiemma's presence.

The manager swallowed nervously and softly apologized for the radio host's rude interruption and Gajeel continued to finger the inner canal's of his ears in irritation. "I've got sensitive hearing you know," Gajeel offered to the interviewer for his profanity.

"Would you consider yourself an undercover cop?"

Gajeel stopped massaging his ears for one second.

"Huh?"

"Seriously," the man said with anxious eyes. "Are you a cop? You have to tell me!"

"Dude, no!"

"How far can you drag an unconscious man?"

"I don't know? I never really tried to...

"Hello, Mr. Orland," the manager said tersely as an absolutely shredded, six foot ten older man, with an insanely long, pale blonde mustache, silver pupils, and an even more insane 'X' shaped scar across his two eyes, in a suit, walked into the main studio of 87.4 FM.

"If you're as bad an assistant as you were a quarterback, I'll eat you."

Gajeel was absolutely starstruck as the behemoth of a man sat right in front of him. "You know, I know you, Gajeel Redfox?"

A small unknowingly started forming on Gajeel's pierced upper lip, but just as quickly started fading as Jiemma continued.

"Sub-par collegiate career, went to Hargeon, 9% from the European-slash-Women's league?"

"Okay, just wait a minute-" Gajeel tried to defend himself but was cut off.

"Now you wind up in my lap, and I'm supposed to be the luckiest girl in school."

Now Gajeel, was fully understanding why people said to never meet your heroes, because the wave of shame, shock, humiliation, anger and regret that washed over him in that single instant was almost impossible to describe. Frankly, humiliation be damned. He had half a mind to flip over this table they were both sitting to and break a steel chair over his head. Nobody made a punk out of Gajeel Redfox. Except, the only thing legitimately stopping him was… he was almost 100% sure this old man could whoop his ass. I mean come on! Even the guy's muscles had muscles.

As Gajeel was contemplating walking out, or running up on the football legend, he invited somebody else into the room,

"Come on in, big guy," Jiemma called out the door. "I want you to meet our new assistant, Gajeel."

"Hey, first of all, I have not agreed to-"

"Welcome to the team, Gajeel Redfox," said a voice much deeper than Jiemma's and Gajeel's put together. A voice that was so deep, it should have belonged to Satan himself. But it was also a voice that Gajeel recognized. "Hope Jiemma here, hasn't been too tough on you."

Gajeel instinctively stood up and slowly turned around to the man who was casting a shadow over both of them at the table. His eyes widened. His lips quivered. His heartbeat quickened. Gajeel Redfox was having a fangirl moment.

Ducking down so his bald head won't clean the paint on the ceiling was retired NBA legend and Hall of Famer, Jura Neeks. He was an asian monk living in the mountains before he pursued his love of basketball in the NBA. Despite his peaceful beginnings, his competitors always quivered at the very sight of him, and could you blame them? It was like having to match up against the jolly green giant.

Other than football of course, basketball was Gajeel's favorite sport. It was the one other thing he and Natsu had in common, and Natsu's father taught them both how to play the sport, and used to watch NBA games with them all the time. Gajeel got a particular kick out of watching Jura's games because other than being taller than Mount Sinai, he was as sturdy as a dump truck, making it hilariously impossible for any other team to block or try and dunk on him. It was so obviously and hilariously unfair… Gajeel would always eat a bag of popcorn and laugh at the opposing team.

"I'm in," Gajeel said not breaking eye contact with the Thai man. "I'll do it."

"Um…"

"So nice to meet you, Mr. J-Jura Neeks," Gajeel said, rapidly shaking his hand. He inwardly cursed himself for stuttering like Lucy, or worse Loke would've in that moment. "Can I sit on your shoulders?" The words just squeaked out as Gajeel looked up in awe, but Jura's response surprised him.

"Sure!"

"Really?"

"No."

"Oh."

As Jiemma and his manager started discussing something in the corner of the room in hushed voices, Jura eyed the boss carefully with a smile plastered on for Gajeel's sake.

"You've made a wonderful decision," he said, noticing Jiemma glance at him. Gajeel had yet to stop shaking his hand. "I'm sure you're going to learn a lot."

"Mr. Jura Neeks… the monk of the NBA…" Gajeel continued starstruck. Jura then switched hands with Gajeel, but he noticed something was in it.

"Well, welcome aboard," the former owner of Sabertooth said. "You can start today."

"I want to talk to Jura about a segment on his show," Jiemma said half heartedly to his newest assistant, as he ushered the basketball star away.

"But alas Orland, I wanted to talk to you about those jackets you promised?" Jura questioned as they both exited the studio.

"Right… buddy, of course!"

Perplexed, Gajeel finally unfolded the paper Jura passed him once he was alone, which read:

'Get out now! Run! You will die here!

Best,

Jura Neeks'

"Hey, Loke, you wanna stay for dinner?" Lucy chirped happily. She gleamed in pride at her student who was kneading the ball of dough that was soon to be tonight's meal. The blonde couldn't wait until Hades found out all the stepmom/stepdaughter activities she and Meredy had already been up to today.

"We're going to need to borrow your pasta maker though," Lucy added.

"Oh wonderful, are you gonna teach Meredy your recipe for overcooked mush?" Loke snided. He was in no mood to indulge Lucy further on her quest to impress this child's father when he was potentially about to lose Cana.

Well that, but also, Lucy just made really bad pasta.

"Oh ha, ha, ha," Lucy mocked dryly. "And no, I'm actually teaching her about Detroit."

She had been trying her best to pretend she wasn't eavesdropping, but even Meredy had to raise an eyebrow at that one. Meredy's plan to infiltrate her annoying teacher's house and find something to break her and her dad up had been going… rather slowly. When her dad told her that Ms. Heartfilia rented out a place with three other guys, Meredy was taken aback.

Sure, destroying her science fair project and ruining her perfect grades was annoying, but to Meredy, that was something she could get over. Her homeroom teacher being in a committed relationship with her dad however, was not something she could get over, and it was something she needed to end real soon. That… was the real reason Meredy was here.

And the only reason.

The young inventor did meet one of the roommates in passing, but he had turned out to be some self-obsessed, tie wearing moron, who acted like a perpetual white woman at a tea party and spoke in riddles.

"Ahh yes," Loke started slowly. "Detroit: The famous pasta capital of the world."

Meredy couldn't care less about the mindless babble between the two dumb blondes before her, but all of that changed when a six foot one stud came gallivanting from the bedroom hallway in slow motion.

"Well, I'm coming," the stud proclaimed proudly. He had on a tight gray shirt with bulging biceps under deep olive skin. His hair was spiky and pink, a shade or two darker than hers, which Meredy thought was strange for a boy but it added to his uniqueness. His eyes were golden, from what Meredy could tell, and they twinkled under the fluttering of his long eyelashes. His eyes were deep. Intense. If you looked in them too long you'd get lost.

The roommates could tell he had just come from the bathroom since his hands were wet and his fly was down. Lucy could only shake her head and sigh as the bartender continued.

"With a date…" Natsu punctuated. "Beth."

"Oh no you're not," Lucy objected sternly. "You are not bringing any of those college tramps around Meredy!"

"Oh hey, you must be Meldy."

When he turned to her, Meredy felt like Cupid had just shot an arrow through her chest. She felt light in the head, her body forgot how to perform its involuntary action to get her to breathe.

He was… EVERYTHING…

She didn't even care that he just called her the wrong name. She nervously waved hello even though he wasn't paying attention to her at all.

"And you guys are wrong about Beth, okay?" Natsu insisted to his loft mates. "Beth is… is smart… and she's mature and she knows about art…!"

He might as well have been talking to an empty room with the way Lucy and Loke were tuning him out. "And famous artists like Banksy a-and the guy who did the Obama poster and, you know, like… the Chalk Outline Guy!"

Loke did a double take.

"Are you talking about the outline they do to corpses at a crime scene?"

Natsu blinked.

"Uh… no?"

Meredy giggled dumbly. "That's stupid."

Natsu turned to the flush faced pinkette who was now twirling her hair. She was hyper aware of all eyes on her, but she was mostly concerned with Natsu's bewildered gaze with his smoldering golden eyes and bewitching eyelashes. His peepers might as well have been crafted in a Twilight factory.

"Your eyes… are so… yellow."

As the butterflies flapped ferociously in her stomach, she found herself sputtering nonsense and giggling aimlessly.

"They look like pee!" The words flew out of Meredy's mouth before she could stop them (although in her mind, she certainly wished she threw her hands over her mouth), followed by another nervous giggle. Lucy watched in shock as her most intelligent, and easily most witty and biting student was reduced to incoherent babbling. Loke stood next to Natsu curiously, as they both were piqued by what she was saying.

"Be honest with me," Natsu turned to Loke. "Do my eyes look like pee?"

"There's a bit of a… a piss-ish hue." Loke said with a shrug. "I mean if someone were to put a gun to my head and ask me that then, yeah. I guess I'd say so."

"Old pee eyes." Lucy added, and to the blonde's surprise, Meredy laughed again. Lucy was starting to feel like she was really getting the hang of this whole step-mom thing. She and Meredy were getting along great!

"I'm gonna kill him."

Gajeel seethed over a cup of coffee in Sue's diner as patrons trafficked in and out the eatery, the golden bell clanging incessantly as the glass doors swung open and closed. Blinding midday sun rays reflected through the glass, perimetering the booths and tables only being broken up by human bodies and shadows. His girlfriend, Sue, who was the manager of the diner was leaning over the counter, taking a liberty lunch break while her cashier, waiters and waitresses served the lunch rush crowd.

"I'm gonna punch him in his rich, old, white-bearded face!" Gajeel continued to vent. A poor, elderly, unsuspecting, white man sitting next to him at the bar counter, turned to the mixed race man in terror.

Gajeel rolled his eyes.

"Not you."

The poor old man took his deli sandwich and tea with trembling hands and walked away.

"Thanks for coming sir," Sue said with a smile of empathy.

"It's Jiemma Orland," Gajeel turned back to his girlfriend.

"So I guess you didn't get the job?"

"No, I got the job... and that's the problem."

Flashback

"Hey, hey, we're back here on the Jiemma Orland Show," Gajeel's new, slick talking boss said into a microphone. They were back on air after a quick commercial break in the recording studio. As the man spoke, only his manager and new assistant occupied the booth with him. "And let me introduce you to the newest member of our little family, and that is Gajeel Redfox, our new research assistant. I'll tell you what ... he's sharp as a tack. Ladies, there's no ring on his finger, and, Gajeel, why don't you tell us just a little bit about yourself?"

Gajeel jumped, flattered at the offer to sit by the empty microphone and seat. As he went forward to sit down the hairy-faced man rolled over to the other microphone in his rolling chair before Gajeel could open his mouth.

"Hey, thanks, a lot, J," the man said in a goofy voice mocking him. Gajeel's jaw straight dropped. And in the most Lucy-esque thing he's ever caught himself doing, he put his hand on his chest and gasped.

"Well, I never-"

"I really want to tell you about myself," he continued in a nasally voice. "You know, I've been on the job for two hours, and I still don't know how to order a damn milk shake. Even with a hand written note! My boss told me if I get his milkshake orders wrong one more time, he's going to racially segregate the office! Oh! And I played two years of mediocre Division I football."

"Oh... wow…" Gajeel was truly at a loss for words.

"And why was that?" Jiemma quickly rolled back over to his microphone in his regular voice.

"Well, because I really didn't know how to play football," The radio host answered himself as Gajeel again. "I got recruited for a girls' volleyball team."

"All right folks, there he is. That's Gajeel Redfox," Jiemma said, finally settling into his rightful seat. "And we'll see him again, probably never. All right, turning now to the NFL picture, it looks like the West-"

Standing on the outside of the radio booth was Jura Neeks who witnessed the whole thing, and scribbled something on a piece of paper in marker and plastered it against the one way glass where he knew Gajeel could see it.

'Don't let him see you cry!

Jura Neeks'

Gajeel shot Jura a dirty look while the bald-headed monk smiled and gave him a thumbs up.

"My boss is power-playing me. He thinks I'm some kind of pushover… a kissass, really." The man said with eyes narrowed onto nothing in particular. "I need to show him that nobody makes a mockery out of Gajeel Redfox and gets away with it. Remember when we were back in Phantom High Sue?"

"Yes…"

"Any kid who even looked at me funny got his ass shoved into the lockers. Brown Lightning ran that place! Hell, I was running that sorry football team in Hargeon too before I got injured. You wanna know how I did it?"

"How did you do it?" Sue asked with a knowing smirk. She didn't really want to know, but in typical guy-fashion he only prompted her to ask because he wanted to tell her anyway. So she played along.

Gajeel grew a wicked, toothy grin.

"You really wanna know the secret babe?"

She flickered an eyebrow in response as she politely sipped on her cup of tea.

"You dip your boys in their shake."

Sue then impolitely spit out her sip of tea.

"You what?!"

"That's all you gotta do. Your testicles, dip 'em in, wring' em out, dip it again when you give them their energy drinks, or gatorades or something like that. And find the perfect time to tell them later. It's like teabagging, but with extra steps. And that's how you assert dominance babe. It's like declaring in the wild, 'I'm the alpha'."

Disgusted, Sue put her mug of tea down. "Don't want that anymore…"

"Anyway, Gajeel that's a terrible idea."

He gave Sue a patronizing smile. "Babe, please. You wouldn't understand, it's like a guy thing."

"'It's like a guy thing?'" She questioned.

"It's a guy thing, hot stuff," he winked at her.

"Which gives me a great idea!" He jumped up from his seat and planted a quick kiss on her cheek before getting up and rushing out of the dinner.

"Thanks for lunch baby, you always give the best advice, BYE!"

Sue smiled and shook her head at the irony. He spoke for most of that conversation and only barely listened to the little that she said.

"Same ol' Gajeel," she chuckled softly.

"So the ancient Egyptians actually made pasta by flattening the dough with their feet." Lucy educated her young student as she slowly wheeled through a flattened dough ball (that she and Meredy made earlier) through Loke's pasta maker, causing thin, doughy, strings rolling out the other side. "Cool, huh?"

As Lucy continued to crank the lever on the pasta maker, she quickly realized how deafening the silence had become.

"Meredy?"

Lucy took her eyes off of her starchy creation for a moment and took in an absolutely desolate apartment. She rested her things down and quickly went looking for her boyfriend's daughter. In the living room? Nope. Bathroom? Nope? As Lucy advanced further down the hallway, she walked straight past her own open room door and quickly backtracked to discover who she was looking for.

"Hey." Lucy said awkwardly as she met the emerald eyed inventor digging through her drawers. "What are you doing in my room?"

Meredy took a pause from scrounging for a moment before she blinked. She then closed Lucy's underwear drawer that she had been scavenging through. The twelve-year-old did find some very interesting things in there.

"Why do you have so many bras?" Meredy asked in a monotonous, calculated tone. "I thought you were a teacher."

"Teachers need bras, too."

"I found way more than bras in there."

Lucy's heart did a backflip to her throat as she immediately thought of the many lingerie and lacy panties she had in there (that she prayed to God Meredy didn't see, but was pretty sure she did).

"W-w-well, I- um-" her face was turning a cherry red.

"Can I get a guarantee to get out of homework since you're sleeping with my dad?"

Lucy blinked.

Oh. My. Goodness.

"Um, hey, I know having your teacher dating your dad is weird, um, but I just want you to know that, um, you can ask me anything," Lucy said, sitting next to Meredy on the bed trying to regain control of the situation. She glanced over at her previously rummaged dresser drawers and saw that Meredy had taken out a bright red thong from her drawer and rested it on top of the bureau. Lucy just about wanted to die.

Meredy raised an eyebrow in interest. "Really?"

"Um, yeah, anything," Lucy said in uncertainty.

Meredy took a scoot away from her so they weren't shoulder to shoulder, and smirked as she looked Lucy in the eyes.

"Are you in love with my dad?"

Lucy blinked.

"Hmm... oh…"

"Do you and my dad ever dry-lump?"

"G... uh…"

"Is sexting cool?

"What? No, it's not cool."

"Have you done a 96?"

"I think that's a tax form… ?"

"Have you ever given anyone plow jobs?"

Lucy's air felt like it was choking her throat.

"How do you make love to a person animal-style?"

"Hey, do you wanna play a board game?!"

"So I've been doing some thinking," Loke entered the room with Cana with a huge grin on his face. "I think it's time that I take you out on a real date."

With a sigh she stopped doom scrolling on her phone and sat herself upright on Loke's bed.

"You're asking me out… on a date?"

"Yeah!" He chirped, waving two hard carbon copy tickets in his hand. From the time he had his conversation and epiphany with Natsu, he had been searching the internet furiously for the perfect activity for them to enjoy together, and when he EVENTUALLY settled for a figure skating show, he booked the tickets immediately. He even went out to get hardcopy tickets even though he had electronic tickets and a QR code sitting in his email. He figured she'd want to look back on the physical tickets one day as a souvenir of their first date. Maybe they could scrapbook them for their kids.

Or maybe he was getting ahead of himself.

"It'll be our first real date."

Cana scoffed.

"Now, Italy on Ice is a celebration of all things Italian featuring ice dancing's biggest and brightest Italian stars. Drea de Matteo is scheduled to appear, but, you know, they're not liable if she doesn't."

"Loke… I can't go right now… It's a really bad time, okay?"

Loke felt like the wind was knocked out of his sail.

"What…?"

"I'm sorry…" She let out a deep exaggerated breath, pinching the bridge of her nose. "Just take someone else."

"You mean, like another girl?"

"Yeah, Loke," Cana said with an eye roll. "Because this isn't what I signed up for. That was the deal." Frazzled, she felt her face turning red and her voice getting pitchy. "Just take someone else, okay?!"

For all she knew, she could be carrying his baby right now, and all of a sudden he wanted to take her out on a date?! She was already ashamed of the fact that she had feelings for him. This was just becoming a bit too much for her. She needed some space.

The more Cana spoke, the crappier and crappier Loke felt. He was disappointed, but he did his best to pretend to be indifferent. Sex was one thing, sure. Everyone had needs and urges, but surely he was a fool to think a woman like Cana would ever take him seriously.

"All right, yeah, sure, yeah, I'll just… I'll ask somebody else," he said, nodding fast and burying his hands in his pockets. "I'll just... yeah, totally, and with these VIP tickets I got... poppacorno."

Cana furrowed her eyebrows. "What?"

"Poppacorno."

"...what?"

"Poppacorno."

Cana blinked in confusion.

"It's just 'popcorn' in Italian!"

"Alright, alright, slow down," Gajeel said exasperatedly into his phone, pressed between the crook of his shoulder and his ear. "I could hardly understand a word that you said."

He was on the road driving furiously in traffic as he tried pacifying his roommate who was on the other end of the line.

"Gajeel, what the heck am I supposed to say?!" Lucy asked again frantically. "She's in my room asking me all these questions about sex and I just…" Lucy ran her hands through her hair as she paced the living room, her face now a splotchy red. "I mean… where is she learning all this from? She's supposed to be twelve years old; she's only in the fifth grade!"

Gajeel pushawed. "Please lady, have you ever heard of the internet? I was searching up way worse things when I was her age."

"When I was twelve years old, the only thing I was concerned about was my big birthday sleepover party, and going to the bowling alley with my friends, and having roller bags to put my books in because that's what all the girls were doing!" Lucy folded her arms and looked at her stressed out expression in the living room mirror. "I mean, we don't even have sex ed at our school, and some of those terms she was asking me were advanced!" She hissed.

"Well, let me answer those questions for you right now," Gajeel said, turning through to the entrance of a gated community, soon to his destination. "Since you can't seem to answer them, I will. Uh, am I in love with anyone's dad? No, unless they're Zoe Kravitz. Have I ever dry-lumped? Yes, and it hurts. Is sexting cool? Only if it's consensual. Have I ever done a 99? Still trying to figure out what that one is, and have I ever given 'plow jobs'," Gajeel stopped listing off answers to let off a naughty laugh at the memories of the last question. "Yes. Now, I've gotta go."

"Wait Gajeel! That's not helping me right now!" Lucy pleaded.

"Look, I'm sorry blondie, but I could've told you that babysitting that demon child was a bad idea from the jump if you had asked ME first," he added the last part with a note of petty, and flashed his ID to the security at the gate. "BUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUT… you didn't. And now I've gotta go. There's some business that desperately needs attending to."

"I can't believe this…"

"She's probably just testing you anyways," Gajeel offered, as he received his I.D back from gate security and drove into the neighborhood after being verified. "Have you thought of that?"

Lucy paused. She was taken aback, but as Gajeel said it out loud it seemed to make so much sense to her. She was so focused on the fact that Purehito and Kyouka might be testing her out as a potential parent, she didn't think Meredy could've been doing this to intentionally mess with her. Maybe.

"She still hates you for ruining her science fair project. Trust me, I know you may think she's probably let it go, but kids are petty as hell. Especially bullies. I would know… but look, I really gotta go, okay?" He said, getting out of the car to the house he's visited a hundred times before, and slamming the car door behind him. "But I'm sure you'll figure it out. Brown Lightning out fool!" He said before he hung up.

Lucy raised a brow in confusion at whether or not Gajeel really just called himself 'Brown Lighting' again unironically, before she went back to her bedroom, only to find Meredy nonchalantly reading her journal entries/letters she's written to her mother.

"MEREDY!"

The girl jumped before putting the paper down back on the formerly sealed envelope, but Lucy wasted no time snatching them both from her grasps. "You're not supposed to read that!" She shouted, holding them both close to her chest.

"Mommy issues…" Meredy commented curiously. "I thought for sure it would've been daddy issues…"

"What?" Lucy asked, too flustered to comprehend properly.

Meredy sighed, as if she was the adult in that situation and Lucy was the child she was quickly losing patience with. She shook her head.

"Let me be honest," she started. "I only agreed to come to this loft to sabotage you."

Lucy gasped and placed her hands on her chest, actually feeling hurt.

"Well, I never-!"

"But I've had a change of heart."

"What makes you think I'd be pleased to hear any of this, young lady?"

Meredy rolled her eyes. "Oh, get real. You didn't think for a second I actually liked you, did you?"

"I mean… I was sure we were at least having a little bit of fun right…?" Lucy was grasping for straws, looking down and drawing figures on the carpet beneath her with her feet.

Meredy scoffed. "This isn't my first rodeo. What, did you think that you were the only big-chested, doe-eyed floozy to date my dad? My dad's a millionaire, so of course randoms are always trying to be my new step-mommy. And do you want to know why none of them have made it out of the dating stage? Because of me!"

Lucy gasped.

"You made me sing that stupid song in front of my class and Stephanie and Sarah made me the laughing stock of homeroom for an entire week!" Meredy suddenly yelled, face inflamed in pink. This was the most emotion Lucy had seen Meredy's express... well, ever. "And that was humiliating!"

Lucy put her teacher hat back on, and again tried to comfort her student. "Well I'm sorry Meredy, that wasn't my intention. No kid deserves to be bullied… but do you at least understand now why I had to stick up for Nathaniel?"

Meredy stood up. "Forget that loser! This is about ME! You ruined my street cred by making me lose first place at the science fair, and singing with… you… and then YOU turned around and dated my dad! All your uncoolness is rubbing off on me!"

Lucy cocked her head to the side. She was beginning to lose sight on where Meredy's real grievances lay.

"So… this… isn't about me… dating your dad…? Or…?"

"Oh it is," Meredy assured her. "But I finally figured out the one thing that can make any girl in our class cool, that was when Tara Blue from 8th grade was telling the girls in homeroom that we haven't lived until we found a boyfriend and lost our virginity. She said losing hers was the greatest experience of her life!"

Lucy covered her mouth with both hands in mortification. She was pretty sure she was listening to a firsthand account of why they desperately needed to bring back sex-ed in middle schools.

"So look," Meredy continued. "I'm willing to put aside all of that horrible stuff you did to me before, and look away at your totally pathetic life…"

"Oh, that's great Meredy!" Lucy interjected.

"-If you could just put in a good word for me with that cute guy roommate of yours."

Lucy visibly trembled in cringe. Of the range of emotions this conversation was taking her on, disgust was very easily the most identifiable of the bunch.

"Who," she asked morbidly. "Not… Loke?"

"No, the other one!" Meredy said bashfully.

Now Lucy was even more disgusted.

"You don't mean… NATSU?!"

Meredy suddenly turned bashful again, confirming what Lucy hoped wouldn't be true.

Her middle school student… who also happened to be her boyfriend's daughter… had a crush on one of her roommates.

'And it wasn't even the one who knew how to clean up after himself…' Lucy snarked in her mind.

"Meredy," Lucy started gently. "I really don't think you should be rushing into these things…"

Lucy still wanted to find a way to break this to her student easily because Lucy herself could empathize. She was a girl in school once with a crush on an older guy. It happens sometimes. And when you're a girl Meredy's age, everything seems like a much bigger deal than it actually is, and feelings are going all over the place because your hormones are too.

"I just love Natsu so, so, so much!" Meredy closed her eyes and squealed, with a smile and a blush matching the pinkness of her hair. The young inventor took Lucy's pillow and buried her blushing face in it. "He's just SO hot!"

Natsu absentmindedly walked past Lucy's open bedroom, digging for earwax in his ear, as he made his way out the loft for his date.

"You really mean… that Natsu?"

"I want to rub my face on his face!" Came Meredy's muffled voice from Lucy's pillow.

Lucy sighed.

"Just to be clear, I am dialing another woman to go see Italy on Ice right now."

Whooshing past her bedroom door were Loke and Cana, who seemed to be in the middle of a swelling exchange. Lucy instructed Meredy to stay in her bedroom for a bit while she headed to the living room to see what was going on. Meredy of course, didn't listen and followed right after her.

"That's fine," Cana challenged with her hands in the air. "Do it!" She got in his face.

"Hey, guys, not right now?" Lucy pleaded, but her cries fell on deaf ears.

"Oh? It's ringing." Loke challenged, pulling out his phone with a wicked grin.

"I. Don't. Care." Cana hissed out through gritted teeth

"This loft cannot take any more hormones right now…" Lucy interjected lamely.

Meanwhile, Natsu was at a local art museum near downtown L.A, dressed in denim on denim, for his date with a UCLA student named Beth. He and Beth both liked dressing down, as the gorgeous ginger showed up to the date in denim overalls, with a black shirt and converse sneakers. Her hair was braided in two, showing off her small, cute face, and very noticeable freckles.

"I love the juxtaposition of high-brow literary with low-brow youth culture," she said, with a distractingly thick, country accent. Natsu didn't understand a word she was saying, nor how she managed to come to that conclusion from looking at a picture of a messy peace sign with a black backdrop, but hey, he supposed that's just art majors for you.

She looked expectantly to him for a response, and when he realized, he quickly stopped spacing out.

"Uh, yeah! It's almost too much juxtaposition for me, you know?"

Beth chuckled, assuming he was making a joke and not a serious response. They both looked at each other as he chuckled, joining her.

"It's, like, right up to the line of juxtaposition," he continued with a smile. "But I think I'm gonna let it slide."

Just then his phone rang, and he turned to Beth to politely excuse himself as he answered the call. She smiled and nodded as she began wandering to check out the other exhibits in the hallway.

"What's up Celeste?" The pinkette answered after reading the caller I.D.

Loke jumped back in the loft. Thankfully, he was turned away from Cana so she couldn't see his eyes bulge out of his sockets. Why the heck did he call Natsu?

"Hey, Nat… asha. Natasha." Loke cleared his throat. Cana's eyebrows furrowed down even harder. Meredy stealthily joined Lucy on the couch to witness the drama. With an audience, Loke continued speaking to 'Natasha'. "What it be, girl?"

Natsu raised an eyebrow at his friend's response. And then his expression fell shortly after.

"What's going on, Loke?"

"What you wearing, babe?" Loke asked, switching his phone from one ear to the next as an excuse to catch a glimpse of Cana's jealous expression over his shoulders. Cana's nose made the slightest scrunch of annoyance at his use of the word 'babe' but the brunette managed to hide her reaction incredibly well, considering Loke turned around to stare right in her face.

"It's the freakin' weekend," Natsu answered. "And why did you just call me "babe"?"

"You wearing something sexy?" Loke bit his bottom lip with a smile as he eyed Cana, who bit her own bottom lip to fight her fiery urges to snap at him.

Meanwhile, on the other side of town, Natsu was thoughtfully looking at his outfit, genuinely considering Loke's question.

"Well, you know, just a button-down and jeans like always," Natsu said innocently.

"Oh, you got jeans on, baby, are they tight?" At this point, Loke was intentionally lowering his voice to a smolder to really sell his dirty talk. His smile grew wider. He could tell his antics were getting to Cana.

"Uh, they're a little loose; I buy 'em big."

"Oh, them jeans sound sexy."

Natsu paused before answering. And blinked.

"Everything all right?" He asked, concerned. "You want to hang out more, man?"

"You taking care of that…" Loke had to gulp hard to finish his thought. "Taking care of that tushy for me?"

"Well I'm not doing, like, squats or anything."

Cana was beginning to feel deflated listening to this. Shaking her head to Loke's flagrance.

"I'm trying to eat less doughnuts…" Natsu continued to drone on from the other side of the phone.

"You still keeping it tight?" Loke asked.

"You're an idiot." Cana snapped and walked away.

Loke scoffed. Dropping the phone from his ears in disbelief, he reached his own boiling point.

"WHAT?!"

First, she blew him off, and now that he wants to talk to someone else, (like she suggested) she wants to walk around like it's her feelings that are hurt and that he's the bad guy?

"I thought this is what you wanted?!" He yelled, chasing after her.

"This is a really good example of the kind of people who should not be making love to each other." Lucy whispered to Meredy.

"Have fun," the brunette finished sternly, fleeing from him and storming into one of the rooms and slamming the door behind her.

"Cana, are you okay?" Lucy called out to her.

Pissed, Loke stormed out of the loft too, kicking the wall on his way out. "Damn it!"

"Ms. H you don't get it," Meredy replied. "They're just not Natsu! And I love Natsu so, so, so, so, so, so, so-"

"Oh my God…" Lucy trailed off in horror underneath her breath.

"He's so hot, I'm going to die."

"Meredy… Natsu is way too old for you," Lucy said seriously.

The prodigy student stopped her lovesick and incessant ramblings for a moment to listen to her teacher. Lucy placed her hand on her shoulder.

"I live with him," she continued. "And trust me, he's not the type of guy, you should be going for honey."

"God, you just don't get it!" Meredy shrieked in a fit of rage. "I hate you!"

Lucy was, again, taken aback by Meredy's verbal brutality, feeling like a pang just hit her heart. It didn't last long when she saw that Meredy was running down the hallway - this time to Natsu's room. Crap.

"Wait Meredy not in there!"

But it was too late, as the twelve-year-old had already slammed the door and locked it shut behind her. Lucy tried unsuccessfully to get to her before the door closed, slamming into Natsu's room door. She slid against it until she was slowly on the floor.

"It's not well ventilated in there…" Lucy trailed off.

"What are you doing here?" Miko asked, emerging from the house slide of her own personal swing set. Her big blue eyes were curious but hidden well beneath the bangs of her borderline orange hair. "Why aren't you at your new job?"

Gajeel, who had just hung up from his call with Lucy, boldly stepped forward. After his talk with Sue at the diner, he knew what needed to be done. Jiemma Orland was never going to have the chance to punk him again, and before Gajeel came here, he went somewhere to make sure of that.

"I'm quitting."

"You're quitting your dream job?" She asked curiously.

"Well, I mean, there's good news for you isn't it?" He asked crouching down in front of her. "It didn't work out at my new job and I want to keep being your nanny. That's what I've come to tell your mom."

"Why?" Gajeel grit his teeth. These questions were starting to work on his damn nerves. He realized that he loved this kid, but he definitely hated kids in general.

"Because kid," he started. "It just didn't work out."

Miko blinked innocently at him.

"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand I might've done something that will definitely cost me my job once my boss finds out… and probably my freedom as a law abiding citizen if he decides to press charges."

Miko shook her head, seemingly not satisfied with that answer.

"I can't let you do that."

"What do you mean you 'can't let me do that'?"

"I can't let you quit your job Gajeel. This is your first step towards greatness again, and you can't quit now."

She shifted hold of her teddy bear, from both arms to just one as she put her hand on his shoulder. He raised an eyebrow.

"You gotta go big or go home kid," she said, quoting him.

His eyes widened, immediately remembering the day that he decided to put Miko through some of the training drills he had to go through back in the NFL (because she asked), and even though she was sloppy, uncoordinated and could barely keep up, he didn't cut her any slack because of her tiny body.

"You gotta go big or go home kid," he said to her wheezing form that day. "That's the only way you'll be someone great."

Somehow, Miko's words seemed to have a sobering effect on him, cutting through the noise of the competing voices in his mind.

And suddenly, Gajeel also realized he was taking career and life advice from a six-year-old.

He hung his head down low at the realization.

"Oh for fuck's sake..."

"Mom?" She turned away from him and yelled. "Mom?!"

"Hey, what are you…?"

"GAJEEL JUST ASKED ME IF HE CAN SMOKE WEED!"

"WHAT?!" Gajeel's eyeballs popped out of their sockets as a redheaded woman stormed out of the backdoor of her house and looked alarmingly at her daughter and former babysitter. "What?! No, wait, see…"

"He said the next time we go to the park, he wanted to do it," Miko continued, running towards her angry mother. "And I get to hold it because I'm a minor!"

Gajeel's head about snapped off of his neck. "Where is your imagination taking you?!"

"You said that in front of my kid?" Loke's boss asked him.

"No! Mako let me explain…"

But Mako was having none of it.

"Are you serious?! Are you completely insane?!"

"Mako, Mako, you know me, okay? I'm wearing a tie and everything!"

"You are never, EVER gonna nanny my kid again!" She said picking up her daughter. "I will destroy you on the nanny boards. You can count on that. Come on, Miko."

As the little girl rested her head on her mom's shoulders, she sadly waved farewell to easily the coolest dude she ever met. Tears pricked her eyes.

"Goodbye, Gajeel," she said solemnly, trying to muster up a smile.

And with a bittersweet wave, realizing what she was doing, he softly smiled back at her. "Goodbye, kid."

"No, no, don't talk to him honey," Mako said over her shoulder. To Gajeel she had less kinder words to say. "It's 4:20 pm. Don't you have to be somewhere to be?" She spat.

Hearing the time, Gajeel quickly checked his phone and gasped. "Oh no."

"And by that," Mako turned around and continued, clearly not finished. "I meant smoking some damn weed!"

"Yeah, I get it!"

"Hey, Meredy," Lucy knocked on the door again. "Can you please come out of Natsu's room?"

"I'm going to roll around in his dirty clothes!"

The blonde cringed at the untold horrors probably awaiting that girl in there. Cana came storming out of Gajeel's room and slumped herself against Natsu's room door next to her best friend. "Lucy, I'm freaking out."

"Oh… okay…" The blonde was hardly in the headspace for Loke and Cana's shenanigans.

"Loke came over and asked me out, and I just… can't go on a date with him right now."

"Mmmhmm," Lucy answered half-heartedly, pressing her ear against the door, trying to figure out what Meredy was up to in there.

"Meredy!" Lucy knocked on the door once more. "You've got to get out of there now!" Lucy called again.

Looking between Lucy's worried expression and the door, she realized why she wasn't getting her usual advice from her bestie.

"Alright I've had enough of this little…"

"Ca-na!" Lucy whined. "Shh!"

The brunette banged on the door forcefully.

"Now you listen to me, all right, you little brat?! You just need to be quiet in there because I need my friend to focus on me right now!"

"What are you doing, Cana?!" Lucy whispered in a frenzy. "You know how much this means to me! Don't let your dysfunction rub off on her!"

Cana let out a wail of a moan and covered her eyes with her hands.

"Oh God," she moaned aloud. "I'm going to be a TERRIBLE mother!"

"No, no, no, ssshhhhh!" Lucy put her finger over her mouth looking around between Cana and Meredy through the door. It was like dealing with two separate tantrums at the same time.

"I am gonna be just like my mother. A terrible mom!"

"Hey... You're gonna be a great mom!" Lucy offered. "Your mom was great!"

"How the hell would you know? You never met her! Just like how I never met my dad because of her! And now she died and took that secret with her, and I've grown up to be worse than her!"

"Okay Cana stop it. You're gonna be a great mom! You're so fashionable…?"

"Look I can make this right, okay?" Cana offered.

Lucy wasn't so sure of that though.

"Meredy?" Cana addressed the girl, gently this time. "Hey, Meredy. Um, look, you should definitely not be having sex right now at this age, but when you do, just make sure you always use protection because, even if he says it's tantric and you're a Latina woman and you know better, you're just going to end up pregnant anyways!"

Cana banged on the door again for good measure, because that's what her Tia would do to her through the door when she wouldn't answer. Lucy and Cana were so focused on their dilemma with Meredy that neither of them noticed when Loke re-entered the loft.

"Ca... na..." he said slowly. "Are you... pregnant…?"

Lucy and Cana swiveled their heads to him simultaneously and gasped.

He continued to walk over to them slowly, eyes hollow and jaw slack.

"You're... pregnant...?"

"Wait, you're PREGNANT?!" Meredy suddenly yelled, cutting through the silence.

"Meredy, Natsu has one tie!" Lucy yelled to distract her. "See if you can find it!"

"No! I mean… I don't know." Cana promptly hastened to Loke's side with a growing pit in her stomach, meanwhile, Loke could hardly contain his growing smile. "We have to wait for the test results, but I'm late."

"Oh, my…" Loke placed his hands on his chest and spun around in glee. He was gearing up to do something. And Cana didn't know what, but she was certain it was either going to be stupid and/or racist. Probably both.

She tried to cut him off before he could finish but she was too late. "Loke don't-"

"We made a caramel miracle..." Loke said, looking at her with an expression as if he heard the angels singing an aria up above. He got down on his knees and put his ear to her very flat stomach.

Cana groaned and grumbled something in Spanish before she facepalmed.

The door to Natsu's room finally clicked and opened to a very revolted looking Meredy.

"So you ARE pregnant?! EWWWWWWW!"

"You got Cana pregnant?"

Needless to say, Natsu ended up cutting his date with Beth a little short that afternoon after his random phone call with Loke. Thankfully, Beth was super understanding about everything, and offered to come to the loft a little ahead dinner so she can meet the loft mates. What they found when they arrived was absolute chaos. Loke pulled him aside.

"We used protection!" Loke said wildly. "I don't know how this happened!"

"Think she did it on purpose?" Natsu folded his arms and raised an eyebrow.

"A Latina-Jewish baby... who wouldn't want that?" Loke answered as if he was stupid for asking. "I mean, think about the hair type! The bone structure."

"Okay, I'm not ready to be a godparent."

Loke did a double take.

"I didn't ask."

"Oh... okay. Good, good!" Natsu exclaimed, trying to shake his disappointment. "I wasn't into being an uncle again anyways!"

"You're not my brother!"

"Okay, Loke, look…" Natsu, brought his voice down and got serious with his friend. "Are you sure you're okay about this?"

"Yeah." Loke said nonchalantly. "I'm oddly calm about the whole thing."

"I'm freaking out by the fact that you're not freaking out!" Natsu stressed to him.

"Look, Natsu, maybe this isn't exactly in my five-year plan, but... maybe this is fate!"

"Five-year…?" Natsu muttered under his breath, still stuck on that part.

"Maybe I hit the jackpot!" Celeste continued. "Maybe this is the universe telling me that I'm never going to find a woman better than Cana Alberona."

After a moment between the two, Loke awkwardly turned to the red-head who was standing only six-inches away, quietly and respectfully witnessing their whole exchange. He smiled and held out his hand to her, fancying himself a gentleman.

"By the way, I'm Loke Celeste."

"Beth," she smiled and shook his hand. "Also, Mazel tov on your good news," she said in her thick country accent.

Loke froze, genuinely taken aback by Beth's respect for his culture. While it was just the bare minimum, it was more than Loke could say for anyone else that got cycled through their home.

"Oh my God, finally, Natsuvius!" Loke cried, shaking his friend's shoulders in delight. "You finally bring back a nice girl!"

Natsu could only half-smile awkwardly at Beth, feeling a mix of revolt for Loke calling him 'Natsuvius' again, and self-satisfaction from hearing someone finally validate his dating choices.

"Hey, so I made you a mocktail!"

As Lucy (and Meredy) began setting the dishes and utensils on the dining room table for dinner, Cana sat on the interior ledge of the bay window, looking down into a void as traffic congested on the busy Los Angeles roads before her. The blonde wanted to ask her something about the meal, but when she heard the soft sniffling of her friend, she realized Cana was having a moment and decided to let her be. Excitedly, after a stretch of calm, Loke burst forth from his bedroom with a drink he made for Cana in a wineglass with a comically large stem. He stopped short when he saw her watery eyes.

"Cana… are you crying?" He asked softly.

Cana shook her head as she continued to wipe away the tears rolling down her cheeks.

"No. I-I…" Sorrowfully, she shook her head and put her hands up in the air. "I just... I don't... I don't know."

Realization slowly dawned on the honey blonde, and he gingerly put the mocktails on the table and landed softly on the bay window by his paramour.

"Cana... I want you to know that I think you're amazing," he started earnestly. He scratched the back of his head, truly not knowing what to say to her. "And I don't really know what I'm supposed to be doing either. I told you before that I never knew my parents. I was adopted and raised with eight other kids, and none of us were related by blood, but blood couldn't make us any more family."

He settled right beside her, staring into his own void out the bay window. "As much as I loved them... I still always wondered what it would've been like to know my real dad..."

Cana's breath hitched. She turned towards him with wide eyes. He didn't seem to notice as he continued to open up to her.

"I think the point I'm trying to make here is... you're amazing. You truly are. And, you are going to do and be so many amazing things in this life. Maybe you'll be a mom, and maybe... maybe not. I'm just... excited at the possibility," he finally looked back up to meet her eyes, his vulnerable yet determined brown irises met her tear-stained ones. "But even if you don't, I want you to know that I'm here... and I want to support you... no matter what."

Cana felt tears welling up in her eyes once more, but this time from a different emotion. If only she could've heard something like this from her father.

"Thank you," she managed a frail smile.

"Also just want to give you a quick heads-up," he quickly returned to his previous ignorant excitement. "I might be doing a quick Google search before we have sex again, because I-I just... I don't want to impregnate the baby, you know?"

Cana rolled her eyes and groaned.

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand, moment over.

"I mean, we could have a Russian nesting doll situation on our hands!" Loke said in all earnestness, truly believing this was something he and Cana needed to be worried about.

At the dinner table, as two potential couples along with Lucy with her student began to eat, there was only the sounds of loud munching and forks scraping plates as the six of them chowed down on homemade spaghetti and meatballs with toss salad on the side. Natsu ate like a maniac, seemingly not caring about politeness or etiquette around Beth as he slurped down sauced up spaghetti strings, causing a ring of marinera to form around his lips. Meredy ate her toss salad, glaring pointedly at Beth, who smiled politely and ate carefully off of her plate, seemingly not bothered by Natsu's eating or Meredy.

"So, Meredy and I learned to use the pasta maker today, which was cool," Lucy started the conversation, after a stretch of silence between eating that she could no longer stand.

"Are you and Natsu having sex?" Meredy asked Beth directly.

Both Beth and Lucy reacted though, with both ladies sputtering at their food/drink and eventually coughing. An undigested, chewed up ball of spaghetti and meatball got lodged in Natsu's throat suddenly, and he needed to pound firmly on his chest not to choke violently over the dinner table.

"Hmm?" Natsu asked, turning his attention to the people around him for the first time since he started eating.

"Who wants seconds?!" Lucy asked quickly. "That's my question."

"I'm sorry darlin'," Beth began to clarify confused. "Did you just ask me if-"

"Oooh, ooh Luce!" Natsu licked as much marina sauce off of the plate as he could before he raised the empty saucer in the air. "I want seconds!" He added, pounding his fist on the table. "I want seconds!" He said again, ravenously.

Meanwhile, in Loke and Cana's corner of the table, the Jewish honey blonde had his hands rested firmly on Cana with a grin that reached up to his eyes that he couldn't shake. Cana was only able to take one or two bites of her meal before she had to slowly put the fork down and turn to Loke's creepy grin. He immediately just got up and hugged her from behind, mostly just cradling her stomach.

"If you're a boy, I'm gonna... I'm gonna name you Mordecai... or Abraham, Menachem Menandel, Schmerson," he finished proudly, with a smile.

Cana couldn't feel more nauseated.

"Hey!" Meredy said strongly, addressing Beth when Lucy disappeared to get Natsu's food. "I'm watching you."

"Well, time for dessert," Lucy said upon returning, noticing that everyone else was done with their main dish.

"No, no, please, y'all don't have to do that," Beth insisted to the blonde, rising from her seat. "I'll take care of it."

Though Lucy had been preparing to get the desert from the kitchen, Beth smiled politely at her, gathering everyone's empty dishes or uneaten food, and made a beeline for the kitchen, soon to return with their ice cream.

"Oh, thank you," Lucy said airily, taken aback by her southern hospitality. "That's so thoughtful of you."

When Beth was gone, Natsu leaned forward and whispered to Lucy with a smirk. "See? Thoughtful and mature," he bragged. He was more than glad to prove that Lucy wasn't the only one to date people of good quality around here. "In your face Heartfilia!"

"Congratulations," she leaned forward and whispered back. "You managed to date a girl with basic table manners!"

Meredy looked with narrowed eyebrows between the blonde and the pinkette. Why did he seem so excited to talk to his teacher?

"You win," Lucy continued to snark back. "Now why don't you get on her health care plan?"

"I am so excited to take this journey with you," Loke said softly, with his face in Cana's hair, still hugging her from behind. "What do fetuses even like to eat? Your boobs are going to be unbelievably ginormous," he remarked off-handedly, looking at her chest in a trance.

"Hey Meredy, do you want to go help Beth with the dessert?" Lucy asked, to get the child away from whatever Loke was doing.

"Can't," Meredy said casually with a shrug. "I hate her."

Lucy tilted her head to the side. "Oh, come on," she coaxed. "You don't hate her. You don't even know her."

"Uh, yes, I do! I do know her!" Meredy insisted. "She used to ride on my school bus."

Now that comment sparked red flags for everyone remaining at the table, it even made Loke stop being weird with Cana and returned to his seat to listen to the rest of this story with concern. Natsu shook his head in disbelief.

"No, no, no, that's..."

"What?" Lucy leaned to towards Meredy gently. "Wait what are you trying to say...?"

But Lucy, nor the others needed to probe the twelve-year-old any further for details as Beth herself had returned with the ice cream jar, a scooper and spoons and saucers for all. She happened to overhear Meredy's confession.

"Why- well I'll be a June bug on a hot summer's day... that's why you looked so familiar!"

Natsu felt his stomach sink.

"You were that crazy little kindergartner who had, like, the imaginary friends," Beth continued, smiling towards Meredy.

"And you were that skank with the skank face," Meredy scowled back.

"Meredy," Lucy said strongly, not liking the girl's language. "Please, I know you're trying to look cool in front of you-know-who but-"

"What?!" Meredy slammed her hands on the table freaking out. "You told him?!"

"N-no! I didn't tell him!"

"You just told him!" Meredy continued her outburst shocking the rest of the adults at the table before running off. "Oh my God, Lucy!"

Loke watched with an amused eyebrow raise as the little girl shot down the hallway and the next thing everyone heard was a door slamming. Lucy groaned loudly and put her face in her palms.

"So Beth, what are you saying to me?" Natsu asked, turning towards his date.

"When was the last time you were on a school bus?"

Her answer came with no hesitation.

"Last year."

Loke's jaw dropped.

"How old... are you?" Cana asked with a growing smile, enjoying Natsu's misery.

"18," she replied with a shrug.

Now it was Natsu's turn to groan loudly and put his face in the palms of his hands. Loke's jaw dropped ever farther. Cana did her best, but failed, to hide her snickering at Natsu's embarrassing mess-up. As Lucy expected the young ginger, her head cocked to the side.

"Hey, you know what, Beth? I actually think I subbed for your eighth grade English class before," Lucy said in realization.

Natsu groaned even louder.

"Oh that's right!" Beth's face lit up in a smile. "Hi, Ms. Heartfilia!" she waved at her.

Natsu scrunched up two fistfuls of hair in his palms, moaning in pain.

"Six... six... Where are you, number six?"

It was after 5pm that Gajeel quickly circled back to the radio station where his boss and everyone else had closed up shop for the day. The good thing about being your own boss of a radio show, is that you are free to set your own hours, so he was gone as soon as his segment was done on the radio. Gajeel wasn't too sure about this, but the milkshake he left for the cranky old man might've had one or two of his pubic hairs in it.

"Hey, Redfox, I thought you left early."

Gajeel jumped from where he was crouched on the ground, inspecting the drinks in Jiemma's mini fridge. The man with the prominent eyebrows seemed to have appeared out of nowhere.

"Assumed you weren't coming back," he said in his gruff voice.

"There was something wrong with the shakes," Gajeel stood up and cleared his throat. "So I went in and just threw them out because there's something wrong with 'em."

Gajeel noticed he had a brand-new milkshake in his right hand. It was possible, that could've been one of the drinks the former babysitter tampered with.

"Speaking of which, I should probably go ahead and throw that one out," he said quickly.

Jiemma eyed Gajeel with a mean expression then narrowed his eyes at the icy beverage in his hand.

"What the hell did you do to the shakes?"

Gajeel froze, he contemplated for a moment, lying, running away, or crumpling to the floor in tears, but for some strange reason, he instead chose to tell him the truth.

"They've been... compromised."

"What... did... you... do?"

"Look, I really, really want this job, Mr. Orland!" Gajeel began to pour his heart out. "And I know that I wasn't some superstar, hall-of-famer, quarterback. But damn it, I did get drafted into the NFL! And I do know how the play the game!"

Jiemma folded his arms while he was listening.

"I'd see kids playing touch football on the park, and then their plays would get 10x better after I gave them some advice. You wanna know why? Because of your commentary show."

Gajeel's mind flashed back to his training montage with Miko, and how even beginning to train her gave him so much joy.

"Look, I know... I can't play the sport anymore because of my back," he admitted, in a moment of vulnerability about his injury. "But I damn sure know my stuff about the game. Let me show you what I can do. And I can't show you what I'm made of if you've already written me off in your head and are resolved to treating me like garbage."

Jiemma stood there in silence for a moment while Gajeel stared at him bravely. He was no longer afraid. If Jiemma still couldn't change his ways and this really was the end of the road for him here, then so be it. This job wasn't worthy of him anyways. The radio personality shook the milkshake in his hand.

"You still didn't answer my question."

Gajeel sighed. "I put my beans in your shakes."

Jiemma raised his eyebrows in shock. "What?"

"You know, like, my balls?" Gajeel fisted the air in front of his crotch with two hands and started swinging it in a circle for a helpful demonstration. "Like this see? I shook it around a little bit like this."

Jiemma blinked twice in shock.

"In here?" He pointed at the milkshake in his hand.

"In all of them," Gajeel answered honestly.

Not being able to contain it, Jiemma burst out in a powerful fit of merry laughter. Gajeel was shocked silent, but as the laughing went on for a bit, he decided to join in by laughing weakly along.

"Oh, man!" Jiemma exclaimed, wiping a tear from his eye. "You know what we're gonna do?"

"What?"

"We're gonna do this to Jura."

"18 years old…" Natsu said in a trance. "She was only 18 years old."

With the dinner party being and over and ruined (and doomed before it even started depending on who you asked), the gang had cleared the kitchen and the living room, leaving only Natsu to contemplate over a clean kitchen counter, staring at a completely cleared dinner table, leaving only Loke to hang around to support him.

"She doesn't even know what Netscape is," the marketer chimed with his best friend. "Probably thinks of Ice Cube as... mainly an actor," he finished.

"Dude, I am TEN years older than her!" Natsu exclaimed into the distance. "How did this even happen?"

"This is a DISASTER!" Lucy came yelling down the hallway in a frenzy. "Kyouka is downstairs. She just called me. She wants to be let up. And Meredy's stuck in my room because she fell in love with you," Lucy pointed her phone at Natsu. "For some unknown reason!"

The boys shared a look with one another before she continued.

"I might as well call you, 'Bridge to Terabithia', because you make children cry," she shouted at Natsu, referring to Meredy, but also his unceremonious dumping of Beth when he found out her age at the dinner table.

"And you!" She shouted at Loke. "I might as well call you... 'Mexican in the Cupboard' because you put a... in Cana... never mind." Lucy stopped herself short.

"Hey... I will not apologize for my powerful sperm!"

"Why are young girls so fascinated with me? I feel and act like an old man!"

"SHUT UP, BOTH OF YOU!" Lucy yelled angrily again, silencing their simultaneous ramblings. "We are gonna fix this, because I am NOT losing Purehito because you two have to make and/or date BABIES!"

Lucy angry rantings truly silenced them. In all their time living together, they have never as afraid of the blonde as they were now. "Now you," she gestured to the neat freak. "Go stall Kyouka."

"And you... come with me and get Meredy out of my room. Now!"

At that command the boys scrambled from behind the island counter to their respective jobs, somehow bumping into each other before going their separate ways.

"And try not to get her pregnant!" Lucy yelled as Loke disappeared out the loft door and down the hall.

"Meredy, I know that you think you're in love with me right now, but I promise you, you're going to find someone better!" Natsu shouted from the outside of Lucy's locked door. The pair were on the ground outside of the blonde's room, attempting to coax the pre-teen out before her mother discovered what was going on. His empty platitudes did nothing for his young admirer though as Meredy made no attempts to exit the room.

"No! No, I never will!" came Meredy's muffled cry.

Natsu sighed and rolled his head lazily over to Lucy. "And why don't you have a spare key again?"

Lucy glared before mouthing something to him. 'Try harder!' He sighed.

"I can be a bit of an anchor!" He yelled off the top of his head. "And I've been known to drag women down."

"This is true," Lucy added softly.

Natsu turned to her slack jawed.

He didn't actually mean that.

"Hey!" he whispered.

Lucy's eyes widened innocently. "What?"

"Okay, Luce, seriously," he leveled with her. "What am I supposed to do?"

"I don't know, just tell her something depressing about your life... and do it quickly!"

Natsu turned away, closed his eyes and sighed. She needed a depressing story from him? He had plenty of those.

"Hey, Meredy? Meredy listen. I need you to know that I haven't loved somebody the way you think you love me... in a really, really long time. I don't think the feeling you have is bad. It's just misplaced. The last girl I was crazy in love with ended up leaving me after four years, took my cat, and told everyone we knew that I was a loser. I started drinking to numb the pain of that heartbreak. I'm basically an alcoholic now..."

Lucy shot him a look. He didn't notice.

"Even with all that pain, I still don't regret being in love with her. I mean, it's certainly better than being numb your whole life."

Lucy felt her heart being wrung out in her chest as Natsu spoke about not regretting loving Lisanna, even after all that pain. It was such a mature and lovely thing to say. Even with all of the faults that Natsu had - and she lived with the guy, she could list many - he truly had the biggest heart, and she hated that another girl nearly ruined it.

The two of them still lay on the floor in front of Lucy's room door in silence after his confession with Natsu's words about his ex still playing in repeat in her head.

It began to give her a sinking, foreboding feeling the more she pondered on it... and she couldn't quite put the words to why.

Just then, Lucy's train of thought was interrupted when the doorknob slowly clicked and turned and the twelve-year-old genius emerged from the other side. Natsu and Lucy both smiled.

"Meredy!"

"What changed your mind kid?"

"Ehhhhh, I'm over you now," Meredy said, matter-of-factly turning to Natsu. "You were right Ms. H, he did only have one tie in his room, and from what I understand, he'd only end up clinging to a powerful woman like me if we got together. And where I'm going in life, I don't need any clingers."

Before another word was said, Loke came scrambling behind a power-walking Kyouka into Apartment 4D.

"Hey, hey, guys, she's coming! Kyouka's coming. I failed..." he said lamely.

"Where's my daughter?" she bellowed.

Just then, Cana came sprinting out of the loft bathroom.

"There is a God," Cana came bursting into the room. "Guys, I've got my period!"

"That's so amazing! Thank God!" Lucy cheered with her friend.

Seeing Loke behind Kyouka, Cana ran over to him and gave him a big hug. "I got my period!"

Loke was despondent, not being able to hug her back. When she pulled back from their hug with her look of joy, Loke forced a dry laugh and smile.

"She got her period guys," he said half-heartedly.

The Puerto Rican turned to her best friend and gave her a big hug and they both jumped up and down and shouted with glee. "I'm so happy!" she cried before running out the loft.

"Welcome to our home," Lucy quickly turned to Kyouka, trying to regain her bearings. "Would you like a drink?"

"Bye, Meredy," Lucy saluted as her student and her mother had all of her belongings. "See you at school."

"Goodbye Ms. H! Hope your life eventually stops sucking!"

Lucy did a double take. Wait-

"Bye, Kyouka!" Lucy said, attempting friendliness with the mother again. "You're the most-a!"

"Bye, Luce," The woman said frivolously. "You've got a crew loose."

The blonde groaned and slumped against the door once the mother and daughter were on the other side.

"I am not having kids 'till I'm 80," she complained.

Loke walked with Cana downstairs of the apartment building and to her car.

"Now we can go back to the way things were," she said nonchalantly. "You can go on your date."

Loke stared at her in a confused daze, before he remembered their argument earlier that day. That already felt like a lifetime ago. It has been a long and emotionally intense day for him. "Right... Natasha."

"No more stupid mistakes, right?" She said with a small smile and her hand out for a handshake.

Loke's heart hurt as he truly processed how much Cana didn't want to be a parent with him, let alone by him.

"Right," he laughed wryly shaking her hand. And with that that had reached Cana's sleek black car.

"I'm gonna go," She said, whipping around to go on the driver's side of her car. As she turned around, Loke panicked.

"Hey Cana, watch your head!" He cried, taking the top of her head and helping it to duck down as she entered her car. Cana mumbled in confusion at Loke's sudden forcefulness as she was ushered into her car. Once inside, Loke smiled at her and waved as he closed the door behind her.

"You know, there's a marathon downtown, I just didn't want you to hit traffic."

"Okay?"

Cana still kept giving him concerned glances as she reversed out of the parking lot and dove headfirst into L.A traffic. Loke put his hands on hips and sighed. He looked up and read the smoke message he had paid to be written in the sky.

'Marry me?'

Loke looked around and exhaled heavily again, running a ring studded hand through his borderline orange hair.

Okay so A LOT going on in this chapter... also the longest chapter I've ever written, oh mama...

Have long have I been chipping away at this? A year maybe? I don't crank these out like a madwoman like I used to, but I do try to flow in the writing process when I can. Which parts did you guys like most? I kind of liked what everyone had going on today (review, review, REVIEW) lol.

I am actually SUPER excited for the next chapter, because we're FINALLY going to be introducing one of my FAVORITE characters in the Fairy Tail universe. (Any idea what for?)

Also, we are FINALLY getting closer and closer to the end of season one (and the end of PART I for this fanfiction) and I'm really excited! Season 1 of New Girl for me was a nearly perfect season of sitcom television. I hope Part I of this story will leave you with the same feelings. The warm fuzzies, but ultimately the desire for more!

Of course, a very special thank you, to the lovely and kind reviewers from the last chapter, Fluffy-Experiment, rao-hyuga 18, AJ, and me! You guys make my day, my year, everything lol. I think I've said this before, but your engagement and reviews make this feel like a community. A loft - even (lol), and it also keeps me engaged in this world we're creating.

Finally, I hope everyone can find some peace and happiness in your real lives, and if not, I hope this chapter can you bring you guys the funnies and some relief! :3

Until next time: Mirajane