"Natsu!" Igneel cursed under his breath as he stumbled over another toy. Couldn't the kid put his toys away every once in a while? Or at least not leave them in the middle of the hall where anyone could trip over them?

Letting go of his anger, the redhead walked into his son's room quietly. Last night Natsu was feeling a little sick, he even went to bed early, and Igneel had a bad feeling about that.

Women might have 'mothers' intuition', but he was a single dad, and he was sure he could teach those mothers a thing or two about intuition.

Silently, he walked towards the bed in the opposite corner from the door, careful not to wake the slumbering kid. Natsu's face was a bit flushed, and his sleep seemed to be restless as he shivered under his blanket. Igneel pressed a hand to his son's forehead and a few seconds later his hopes were crushed – the skin was way too hot for Natsu to be healthy.

The single father rushed down the stairs to the kitchen and quickly filled a bowl with water and a cloth, then rushed back up the stairs to gently put the wet cloth against the kid's forehead.

Igneel pondered what to do next as he ran his fingers through Natsu's soft hair. "Dad?"

The redhead glanced at Natsu's face to see that the kid awakened, and he was looking up at him confused. "Hey there, how do you feel?"

The pink haired boy blinked groggily, "It's really hot."

Igneel kept his expression neutral, but on the inside worry started to rage within. "You have a fever," he told the nine year old, "you definitely won't be getting out of bed today."

Natsu's dark orbs stayed as dazed as before, even the thought of missing school didn't pull him out of his sick mood. "I'll be back in a minute; I just need to sort a few things, okay?"

Too weak to answer, the little boy's eyes closed, and his father escaped the room, snatching the first phone his eyes laid upon. It wasn't his cellphone which meant Igneel had to strain his memory to recall the correct order of digits as fast as he could. He tapped his foot impatiently, waiting for his call to be answered.

"Hello?"

Igneel's lips curled upwards slightly, happy to hear the woman's voice at that moment more than ever before. "Good morning Sunshine."

"Uch, Igneel, please tell me you didn't call me at 7 in the morning on Tuesday just to flirt." Lucy's irritated voice sounded from the other side of the line.

"Have some faith in me Beautiful, I apologize if I interrupted your beauty sleep, but you don't need it anyways."

He heard her sigh over the phone, and his previous tilt of the lips turned into a tiny smirk. "Igneel, get to the point."

"I need your help with Natsu today." He started.

"I figured as much. Do you want me to pick him up from school?"

The redhead bit his lip. "Actually… Natsu won't be going to school today, he has a fever."

"… Igneel, what are you asking me to do?"

"You see, the thing is, I have a meeting today, a very important meeting I can't miss or cancel, so I can't stay here with Natsu, so I thought-"

"You thought 'hey, my neighbor doesn't have to go to work, maybe she could take care of my kid for me?"

"Exactly!" he grinned into the phone.

"And what makes you think I'll do it? Maybe I have plans."

"Uh… I haven't thought that far ahead yet." He admitted.

She sighed again, "You are so lucky it's unbelievable. Fine, I'll do it. Just let me get dressed, I'll be at your place in thirty minutes or so."

LuneelLuneelLuneelLuneelLuneelLuneel

Twenty five minutes later Igneel heard a knock on the door and hurried to the front door, swinging the door open and not caring in what state of dress he was.

Lucy, however, did care. "Igneel, where is your shirt?!"

Igneel took in the sight of her flushed cheeks and embarrassed expression as the blonde tried to look anywhere but at him; a hard task to do since he was right in front of her, only one foot away.

"You angel!" he hugged her tightly to his chest, and then suddenly released her and jogged upstairs to bring his oxford shirt, vest and tie before he started talking.

Lucy would never admit it, but the entire speech he gave her about why he didn't have a shirt on when he opened the door went in through one ear and left through the other just as quickly – who knew men could be this fit at 39?

"… If he asks for Pop Tarts say no, unless he eats his lunch, and then only one. You should-"

Lucy cut him off, having memorized the speech after a year and a half of babysitting Natsu at many odd times, "Aren't you late for some very important meeting?"

Igneel paused, stared at her, then grabbed his keys quickly on his way to the door. Halfway out of the house he turned around and went back to Lucy. What he did next surprised probably more than it should have – he kissed her cheek and whispered "thank you," and dashed out the open front door.

Lucy was frozen in her place, too shocked to move. She finally shook it off with only one single thought in her mind: 'Igneel is so weird sometimes.'

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(O.O)

Word count: 919

Hi people of this fandom! I updated too! I admit I sorta guilt tripped Maiokoe into updating (which worked), but I didn't mean to! It was honestly an accident!

This chapter happened because I feel like shit for the past week, I need to submit two works for tomorrow, which I haven't started yet, and it's currently 11:40 pm, so it won't happen either. Oops?

Also, I'm considering writing a second part to this, but I have a lot of other stories waiting to be written, and I'm working really hard on my Lalu story Renegade Star.

To the lovely arsenicgrace, I can't PM you because you're a guest so I will answer right here: thank you so much, I don't think my writing is that great (especially considering that this story is usually written when I'm about to drop late at night), but - again – thank you~!

I won't be writing Luneel's wedding here for two reasons: first, weddings are Maiokoe's thing, I don't really like wedding (go bother her and make her update!). Second, this fic is meant for the things Maiokoe won't write in her fic, this is basically a fanfic to a fanfic. She lets me write my own plotlines, headcanons, and ideas here using the AU world she thought of. We already planned their wedding (sort of) so you'll just have to wait until she posts it (in the very far future)