Category: Family Fluff
Characters: Monkey D. Luffy, Nami, Child OC
This is a present for my lovely friend, deliathedork~ She dutifully comments on a vast majority of my work and I thought it was high time I repay her kindness personally. Plus, she drew a hella cute fanart of a LuNa child and inspiration struck me like lightning, so, here's the little drabble I put together! Enjoy~ :3
Nami's long tangerine hair ruffled lightly as the light breeze poured onto the porch where she was seated in the porch swing, pushing herself slowly back and forth with the tips of her toes as she watched the wind play with the crisp green leaves of her flourishing tangerine grove. The fruits were plump and fat on the skinny branches and Nami knew it was high time she harvest them, but it was such a nice day that she had decided to take a few minutes to enjoy it. The empty basket lay beside her on the chair, waiting patiently to be filled with her succulent, well-tended tangerines. The swinging chair creaked and groaned with each of Nami's movements. It was a sturdy construction, one of Usopp's making- a wedding present, in fact, to celebrate the union of Nami and one King of the Pirates.
Nami's mouth twitched into a small smile at the thought of her husband. It had been eight years since he had achieved his dream, but his sense of adventure was far from dead. Upon that crowning achievement the Straw Hat crew had continued to sail the seas together, but following their engagement, Nami had expressed her wish to retire to Cocoyashi Village and take over her mother's tangerine farm. He had graciously abided her wish to ensure her happiness. The crew finally disbanded with Luffy's official retirement, and home they came. Nojiko had done well to watch after Bellemere's estate, and actually hadn't wanted to relinquish it at first; however, Nami knew that Nojiko hadn't sought after any dreams of her own for managing the tangerine farm. There had been tears and smiles as Nami convinced her sister that it was high time she chase after her own desires, while Nami paid time long due. Besides, she didn't mind; it was what she wanted. Her map of the world framed on the wall while the couple busied themselves with both expanding the household and planning their wedding.
They were married there, in the tangerine grove with the entire village and all their friends in attendance (which made for a massive gathering, given Luffy's propensity for friendship). It had seemed to Nami that the entire Grand Line had been invited, and the rest of them turned up anyway. Where Straw Hats went there was a magnificent party to follow, and Nami awoke to find pirates and Marines and royalty alike all passed out in her front yard in various degrees of inebriation. Usopp had actually made the porch swing completely plastered on ale, but somehow it was still immaculately constructed.
It took all of a week after that for the boredom to take hold of him. With the house completed and the wedding over, there was nothing to satiate his endless drive. Though he didn't openly complain, Nami would always find that he wandered down to the docks to sit upon its edge, the bottoms of his sandals skimming the small waves as he stared longingly at the horizon. Nami would never deprive Luffy of his freedom, so she had given him her leave to travel as he pleased with the only stipulation that he come home once in a while. To her great surprise, he had vehemently refused. "If your place is here in Cocoyashi, then my place is with you," he had told her with that serious blank stare of his. She had started to cry, and he fell off the cliff into the water reeling, thinking he had upset her somehow. She had jumped in after him, hauling him to the beach and crying and laughing and calling him and idiot and saying she loved him so, so much.
Very soon after that, Nami was in no condition to travel at sea anyway.
Nami turned as she heard the familiar slapping of flip-flops against wood just in time to see a small form burst through the screen front door. Nami smiled warmly as her five-year-old daughter scampered breathlessly up to her, holding something behind her back as she giddily beamed up at her.
"Momma, look!" she sniggered before plopping an old, worn, red-banded straw hat to her head. "I'm Daddy!"
"That's lovely, dear," Nami chuckled. Besides her wild orange hair, Islamere was the spitting image of her father, down to that stupidly big grin of hers. She even bore a curved scar like her father's, though under the opposite eye, which was clear evidence of the child's uncanny ability to attract trouble. She had earned the mark at three years old getting into a fist fight with a raccoon out in the yard (which she had won, of course). Luffy had laughed his head off while Nami was running around screaming for a rabies vaccine. Nami couldn't help but grow a little strained thinking about the fact that she now had two headaches to deal with.
Soon to be three, she thought with a small sigh as she glanced down at her belly, swollen with her second child. Islamere tottered over to put her little hands on her round stomach. "Mommy, when is little brother Ace going to be born?"
"Soon, dear," she answered as she lovingly ran her hands over her stomach. Nami had been the one to name Islamere. Nami had wanted to honor her mother in some way but wanted it to be unique. Robin was actually the one who had suggested "Isla" as the root, and Nami had combined it with the latter half of her mother's name to produce one that was a perpetual reminder of the two people she loved most in the world. Luffy had been fine with it, because his greatest suggestion for his daughter's name had been "Steak" and there was no way in hell Nami was naming her firstborn child after a cut of meat. She had been dreading what ridiculousness he would concoct learning she was pregnant with a boy, but he had immediately jumped in to naming him after his beloved brother.
Monkey D. Islamere and Monkey D. Ace. Nami didn't doubt that they would go on to do great, great things. She would be lying if a teeny-tiny part of her wished that they wouldn't take up piracy like their parents, even though there was a snowball's chance in hell of that.
"Momma!" It was clear to Nami that her daughter had been pestering her for a moment while she had been lost in thought, as she was shaking her arm insistently and pouting. "Momma, can we go pick tangerines so we can make tangerine sauce for Daddy?"
"Of course. He'd like that very much," she agreed with a nod. It took her a minute to ease herself up from the swinging chair. She groaned as pain flared in her lower back. Yes, there were many wonderful things about the joy of pregnancy, but the constant aches and pains were not one of them. Islamere grabbed the empty wicker basket and hopped down the porch steps to dash into the grove to begin squeezing the fruits, testing their ripeness before plucking them one by one from the trees. Nami followed more slowly, watching from her distance as her daughter methodically worked through the fruits. She had been taught by the best, after all, so even at five she was proficient at knowing which tangerines were ready for harvesting. She held her hands on her large belly, envision a little black-haired boy tugging at her shorts begging to be included. The vision made tears of joy prickle at the corners of her eyes.
Nami was blessed, that was for sure.
"Heyyyyyyyy!" Nami glanced over her shoulder as a cheerful voice floated up the path. The happy smile that graced her lips was almost instinctual as he spotted him striding up the dirt road, one hand waving wildly while the other had a sack hefted over his shoulder. It was incredible how much he had changed, growing taller and more muscular, but yet remained the exact same, jean shorts and flip-flops and red vest, toothy grin and sparkling eyes and a curved scar adorning his face.
"Daddy!" Islamere squealed, dropping the wicker basket to run over and launch herself at him. Luffy crouched down to catch her, then spun around whisking her high in the air before dropping her down into his arms. "Didja catch any big Sea Kings today? Huh? Huh?"
"Sure did! I got lots of good meet!" he cackled amiably. Luffy was no longer a pirate, but the sea still called him, so he had taken up a profession of hunting Sea Kings that prowled the nearby islands. Sometimes he hunted locally and sometimes he was gone for a week, but he was happy, and that's all that mattered to Nami. She watched warmly as he placed a hand on the straw hat that was still sitting atop her head. "Hey, it's my hat! It looks great on you, Islamere."
"Thanks! I'm gonna be King of the Pirates one day, too!"
Luffy started guffawing in ridiculous bliss while Nami paled, imagining all the terrible situations her daughter could get in trawling the Grand Line.
"That's awesome!"
"Don't encourage her!" Nami screeched, trying to wrench off her sandal to launch it his head. She of course threw off her equilibrium swinging her pregnant belly around, and she cried out as she wobbled precariously.
"Nami! Be careful!" Luffy scolded her as he stretched an arm across the yard to steady her. He quickly closed the distance between them to stand over her, frowning in concern while keeping an insistent hold on her waist. "You okay?"
"Yeah," she smiled sweetly, then thumped him in the forehead. Before he could ask why, she glowered at him with a hand on her hip. "Seriously! Our daughter is not going to be a pirate! Neither is our son!"
"But why? We were pirates."
"We should want our children to be better!"
"Right! Islamere can be a better King of the Pirates than me! Although, it's gonna be hard, 'cuz I'm awesome," he snickered while rubbing the underside of his nose with a smug snicker. Nami rolled her eyes but couldn't help but smile. She was fighting a losing battle. Of course they were going to be pirates; it was in their blood, after all. Nami could only hope that they amassed trustworthy crews to see them through thick and thin on their journeys. Luffy sensed what Nami was thinking and chuckled, pulling her forward to kiss her forehead sweetly. "Don't worry. They'll be strong."
"I know." He stepped back, setting Islamere down to crouch down and grab her belly with big hands.
"Ya hear that, little buddy? You're gonna be a great pirate too! Shishishishishi!" As he chattered blissfully to their unborn son, Nami watched with all the love in the world and more. I truly am blessed to have such a loving husband who dotes on his children and wants them to live fulfilling lives. After a second, Luffy jumped up, swinging the sack of fish meat around. He spied the basket of tangerines as Islamere carried it over.
"Guess what, Daddy! We're making your favorite!"
"Tangerine sauce?!"
"Yup! I picked these all by myself!"
"Whooooooa! That's so awesome, Islamere! I bet this tangerine sauce is gonna be extra yummy then!" he grinned. Delighted, the girl ran into the house carrying the basket on her head, screaming at Nami to hurry inside so they could begin preparing dinner. As she chuckled, she felt Luffy's hand sneak into her own to hold it tightly.
"What?" she asked when she found him staring at her with a big smile.
"Nuthin'. I just love you."
After five years of marriage, she really ought to be used to his spontaneous proclamations and such, but she still flushed like a teenage girl and brought a hand to her cheek in obvious fluster. He chuckled proudly and leaned in to press another light kiss to her cheek before striding forward towards the house, tugging her along. Nami smiled as she stared at his strong back, the one that had borne the weight of a nightmare for her long ago and that she had followed dutifully ever since. Her days since then had been blessed…
And there were many, many more blessed days to come.