"K—Kyah! It's Natsu Dragneel—hurry, let's get out of here before he beats up us!"

"Can he look any scarier?!"

"Why does he always glare at us?"

"Did you hear? He got in a fight on the first day of school! There was blood everywhere!"

"I heard he beat up 3 seniors!"

Natsu clicked his tongue in disapproval as his classmates all whispered and moved away from him, the pink-haired male striding his way on over to his seat all the way in the back. He grabbed his seat and pulled it out, plopping himself down to put his feet on the desk in front of him.

It wasn't his fault he got into fights and people were scared of him. He only got into fights if he had to—he was trying to help but people thought it was the other way around.

But it didn't matter—if people thought he was scary and didn't want to get near him, that's their problem, not his.

Natsu sighed as he leaned back against his chair, closing his eyes to listen to the background noise around him. He could hear the girl's giggling, chair and desks moving, feet tapping against the floor, the bird chirping outside, and everyone talking about random things. It was sort of peaceful.

After a while, the teacher came inside the classroom making everyone stop talking and get in their respected seats.

The classroom became silent as the teacher took roll.

"Alright class, today we have a special assignment. It's a group project,"

The whole classroom started to whisper to one another as they wanted to pair up with each other, excitement filling the air.

The teacher sighed as he yelled at them to become silent again. "Settle down kids—no need to get excited because I picked your partners already!"

The whole classroom groaned except Natsu who raised a brow at the teacher, leaning against his palm. Maybe if the teacher gave him somebody who's scared of him, he won't have to do any work.

"Okay, here we have Michelle and Midnight, Haru and Mitsu, Gray and Levy, Dan and Angel, Natsu and Lucy..."

Natsu raised his head as he heard his name being called, looking around the classroom for some guy to come on over to him. He heard the name Luigi being called with his name and somehow, this guy sounded somewhat like a wuss.

After the teacher had named everyone in the class, everyone got up to go look for their respected partners, leaving Natsu to sit and wait for his parent to arrive.

As he waited, he watched as girls squealed and sat down with each other, some groaning and some blanching at the thought of being paired with another. His onyx eyes moved everywhere across the room till it landed on a blue mini skirt, his eyes trailing up the body to noticed it was a blonde female standing in front of him.

"What?" Natsu asked as she sighed a bit. "I'm Lucy—your partner?"

"I thought it was Luigi."

"Haven't you been listening?!"

"No."

Lucy sighed once more as she slumped in her spot, looking around for a desk to pull to sit right next to him. Once she found an empty desk, she dragged it across and pressed it against Natsu's, sitting down right next to him. "Well, I guess it's just going to be you and me for a week."

"No, it's going to be just you." Natsu pointed out making Lucy turn and quirk her brow at him. "Excuse me?"

"I'm not doing this shitty project. You can do it yourself."

"It's called a group project for a reason, you know."

"And I don't give two shits about it so have fun doing it yourself, partner." Natsu gave her a bittersweet smile making Lucy gawk at the male in front of her.

After that, the rest of the class period they barely spoke to one another.

"Natsu, let's go to the library and research some things for our project."

"I thought I told you yesterday that I'm not going to do it?"

"So you're just going to lie up in the roof all day?"

"Why not?"

Lucy groaned as she walked on over to the male lying on the concrete, crouching down to his size. "Come on, can't you just at least like, sit right beside me to make it look like we're working together?"

"No."

Lucy groaned as she started to whine, pissing Natsu off to the extent. The male tried ignoring her as he closed his eyes but the woman was so persistent Natsu actually wanted to jump off the roof of the school.

"My... what do we have here?"

"Oh, it's some hot chick with some gay pink-haired loser."

Natsu felt a vein pop out of his forehead as one of them called him gay, glaring at the four boys who have just entered the roof top which was his territory.

"No way—did you say pink hair? Is he the one who beat up the seniors?!"

"Tch, freshmen picking fights with upperclassmen?"

"What the hell do you want?" Natsu hissed at the four males as Lucy squeaked a protest, telling him to just let it be. "How dare you talk to Laxus like that?!"

"Is that pipsqueak talking to us?"

"Who else would I be talking to?" Natsu sneered making the three others stand in front of the big blonde-haired male who looked equally as disgusted as Natsu.

"Don't you dare talk to Laxus like that!"

"Laxus is the best!"

"Are these your little lapdogs, huh?" Natsu smirked as the three all looked a bit horrified, the male, Laxus, shooting him a glare. The two glared at each other until a shriek was heard, Natsu turning to see what that was. His eyes widen when he realized one of the males had grabbed Lucy, the blonde looking a bit terrified.

"Look what we have here, a pretty blondie!"

"Well, I wouldn't say she's that pretty. After all, I am the queen." The green-haired student smirked to herself as she flipped her hair to the side. Lucy scowled at them as she tried pulling away but winced when the grip tightened.

"Where do you think you're going?"

"L—let me go!" Lucy yelled as the male stuck his tongue out and grinned wickedly, Lucy squeezing her eyes shut. Before she knew it, the grip on her arm was gone and she was yanked towards something warm, the blonde making a sound of surprise. She re-opened her eyes and looked up to see Natsu glaring at the group murderously.

"Pick on someone you own size, you pricks." Natsu spat as he grabbed Lucy and turned around.

Lucy stumbled along behind him as she stared up at him worryingly, turning back to see the one grabbing her holding his cheek as the female in the group tried aiding him, the other two watching them exit the place.

She turned back and followed him back inside, words never being exchanged until they arrived at the library.

She wondered—why did he save her?

"Hey Natsu, let's have some lunch together! I brought some teriyaki today!"

"Ooh! Did you cook it yourself?!"

"Yeah I did! I also have some omelet today as well!"

"Wah—you're the best Luce!" The grinned widely making Lucy smile back. She took a seat next to him as they leaned against the rooftop door, Lucy opening her lunchbox to present Natsu her over-packed lunch. Natsu drooled over the food as Lucy handed him one of her forks, the two of them digging in the food together.

It's been at least 4 days since she and Natsu had been together working on the project and eating lunch. She would have been eating lunch and doing the project by herself but after that day where Natsu saved her from the juniors, Natsu started to warm up to her a bit and helped time to time.

Lucy noticed Natsu didn't have a lot of friends to socialize with and he usually spent most of his time up in the roof of the school. So once Lucy realized what he did, she decided to spend it with him.

A lot of people tell her to stay away from Natsu since he was a monster and total mess but Lucy thought otherwise.

If Natsu was a monster—she wouldn't be eating lunch and laughing with the guy.

Lucy sighed as she wrote a few things down in her notebook, looking at the computer screen to copy some information she needed for the project.

Natsu was late—like always—and she decided she would just work on it for now and yell at him later. She would give him a good piece of her mind because that idiot was making her do the whole project by herself and she was not that kind of person to do it but, she needed a good grade on this.

Lucy huffed once more as she heard the library door open and somebody stride in, sitting right next to her as she wrote something down. She knew it was Natsu just by the way he smelled and sat.

"Hey Luce..."

"You're 45 minutes late, Natsu."

"I know,"

"What was so important that you were so late?" Lucy growled as she turned to look at the male, her scowl immediately vanishing once she saw his appearance. "N—Natsu..! You're bleeding!"

"Yeah, I kind of got in a fight on my way here..." Natsu muttered as Lucy stood up to examine him closer. She frowned as she grabbed his wrist, pulling him up.

"Come on; let's get you to the nurse office!"

~X~

"O—ow! Careful, it hurts!"

"Sorry!"

Lucy frowned even more as she looked at the male wincing at every touch, the blonde trying hard to bandage and clean his wounds up. She finished banding his face and his lip but he still looked a bit in pain, the blonde wondering what in the world happened.

She grabbed his hand and looked at it to see if he hurt his palm too, gasping when she noticed the bruises on his knuckles.

"Natsu... you really need to stop fighting..."

"I can't help it,"

"But seriously..." Lucy sighed as she started to bandage his bruised knuckles. She placed his hands back down as she finished wrapping them, placing all the tools back into the rightful place it was in.

The blonde student went on over to the sink to wash her hands, peering over to see Natsu slumping in his spot by the counter as he stared at his freshly bandaged hands.

"Natsu are you okay—"

"Aren't you afraid of me?"

Lucy turned her whole head to look at him, her eyebrows knitting together in confusion. "What?"

"Aren't you scared of me? Like everyone else is? Why do you care for me so much... normally people wouldn't even get near me because I'm too scary..."

"Natsu..."

"I mean, if you're doing this because of the project I totally understand..."

"Natsu, I—"

"We don't need to talk or see each other anymore after we're done with this project—"

"Natsu, shut up!"

Natsu looked up from his lap as he stared at the blonde who was scowling at him. "I don't care if people say you're a monster, scary, a punk, or whatever they say because even if they think you're like that, I know you're not! The real you is all grins and laughs—don't you even dare say that I'm acting like this because we're partners for the project!"

"But Lucy—"

"No! I don't want to hear it! I know the real you! You wouldn't hurt anyone without a reason and you're a real sweetheart! I know you and I'm not afraid of you so don't think like that! Please... it hurts to think you only think that I only talk to you because of the project..."

Natsu stared at Lucy with wide onyx eyes as he watched her sniffle and wipe the corner of her eyes, keeping her head low. He watched her cry a bit more until he jumped off the counter and walked on over towards her, silently standing in front of her. He stared at her trembling figure and he frowned, gently grasping her arms to pull them away from her face, his hand tipping her chin up to make her look at him.

He looked down at her puffy red face, whipping the tears away with his thumb.

"Hey... don't cry... I don't like seeing you cry..."

"S—sorry..."

"I should be the one apologizing. Sorry for saying those things... it just kind of hurt that you might leave me once the project is over..." Natsu whispered quietly as Lucy stared at his hurt face. She reached over and placed his hand against his cheek, frowning at him. "I won't leave you Natsu... I'm not scared of you either so don't think that way..."

Natsu placed his palm on top of hers as he looked at her chocolate brown eyes, smiling slightly. He leaned forward and placed a gentle kiss on her forehead, making Lucy's face flush red.

"Thanks Lucy... you're the best."

After working for two weeks on the stupid project, Natsu and Lucy had finished and proudly made it perfect. The two had stumbled into the classroom and placed it on the teacher's desk, noticing they were first to finish.

They were proud and overjoyed that they managed to survive and finish the thing without any delay. After everything they went through—they were sure they never wanted to take that long for the project to be finished.

They were even happier when they got an A on it, the two of them screaming and cheering in the classroom full of quiet working students.

They got scolded but they could tell the teacher was happy for the both of them.

Natsu awarded Lucy with a surprise kiss on the lips as that shocked her overall.

It took a moment for her to register everything and when she did, she pounced on the male and kissed him senseless.

Even thought people call Natsu a monster, he will always be her little monster. Because Lucy gave other's a chance, it can brought her true happiness.

A/N: I think this will be the last chapter to this story because—I don't know. o 3 o
A lot of people requested me to make Lucy or Natsu a badass and stuff so the chapter came out as this!

I hope you guys enjoyed and liked this story, thank you so much for the support all the way through!

Thank you for reading! xx