AN: Hello, readers and fanatics alike, Jazbez here once again with a new LuCa story. Now then this is important, I'm thinking about making this a series of one shots focusing on Cana, Lucy and their family and I'm curious as to what you may think about the prospect.

This story is inspired by the song 'Summer of '69' by Bryan Adams and its feelings of nostalgia.

Disclaimer: I don't own any copyrighted materials or items. Instead, they belong to their respective owners.

:Note: Ailbhe is an old Gaelic name for both genders, and is pronounced as AL-va:

Jade eyes stared up at the object in front of them, young and curious that were glued to the gilded binder of the book. The owner of the jade eyes knew the basics of reading and writing, as they were taught by their mother the alphabet and sounding out words, but the letters in front of them didn't make any sense to the owner.

Natural curiosity overtaking them, the owner tried to grab onto the book, stretching their arms and feet to reach. Unfortunately for the owner, their hands didn't come close to the book as their young arms simply didn't have the reach needed. Slightly discouraged, but still relatively determined in getting the book taunting them, the owner saw a small stool by the toy chest on the opposite side of the room.

Determined, the owner stumbled their way to the stool and picked it up, their eyes gleaming in anticipation of reaching the strange object. What they didn't expect, however, was for an amused voice to call out after them, "Ailbhe Alberona, what are you doing?"

Quickly trying to hide what he had been doing, a young redheaded toddler dropped the stool he had been holding a few inches above the ground and spun around to meet his mother. Even at such an early age, he knew his mother was pretty; clad in a sundress, the woman had her blonde hair in a ponytail and a smile on her face, very slight smile lines enhancing the effect even more, the mid twenty year old was an epitome of kindness and the toddler knew it, "Well? Are you going to tell me what you were doing?"

Flushing red from embarrassment, Ailbhe quickly tried shaking his head rapidly in an attempt to act innocent. This, however, had the opposite effect.

Smiling, the boy's mother gained a small glint in her eyes at seeing the action and crossed her arms over her chest, "Oh, is that so? You weren't doing anything, anything at all, huh?", seeing her son nod his head, the woman let out a smile that many who knew her would consider slightly dangerous, "Even if your Auntie Mira came over here?"

Hearing that, the boy's face lost all color as he quickly paled remembering the woman his mother had mentioned. Running through the boy's mind were flashes of memories, each a desperate struggle to escape and run away from the series of suffocating hugs, kisses, and cooing of the white haired woman who couldn't help but call him 'Avvy'. Realizing the dangers his mother was threatening, but not fully grasping the teasing nature behind the words, the boy quickly changed his previous shaking of his head to nodding and pointing to the object that had caught his full attention earlier, to the point of not realizing his mother was watching the spectacle from the doorway near the end.

Giving her son a playful smirk, the woman walked over to one of the many bookcases on the side of the wall in her family room and grabbed the book with the intricate design, slightly surprised to see it as she had thought it was in another room of the house, her bedroom, at the time. Grabbing the book and tucking it between her arm, she pointed to it with a smile on her face and faced her son, "This?" Seeing the way his head rapidly moved up and down along with the smile on his face, she couldn't help but laugh.

Happy to finally have a chance figure out what it is, the toddler quickly walked forward to his mother and was scooped up in her arms and taken to the couch in the front of the room. Quickly, upon reaching the couch, the boy squirmed out of his mothers arms and gazed at the book that was taunting him for so long.

Propping open the book in her lap, the woman looked at her son staring at the contents within, "This, Ailbhe, is a photo album."

Scrunching his face in confusion of the words, the boy could only stumble over the words his mother had said which slightly frustrated him, "F-foto allbem?"

This, of course, only caused his mother to laugh louder at the pout she was getting from him, "C-close honey, it's called a photo album. See all of the pictures inside, that's why it's called that."

It was at that point that the boy seriously looked at the pictures inside the book, seeing faces that looked somewhat familiar to the ones of people that came to visit his parents on occasion, or at that big building he went to sometimes in the middle of town. What surprised him the most was the figure in the center of the image. Pointing at it, the boy looked up at his mother, "Momma?"

Curious at what it was, the woman was even more surprised when she realized the boy wasn't asking her specifically what the picture was, rather, who it was in it. Quieting down, the woman could only answer absentmindedly, "Yeah, it is. That was a few days after I had joined the guild."

Her eyes were focussing on the bottom right hand side of one of the pages, glued to the image of the mess hall filled with the old members. She could see where her son was pointing to, at the image of her old self was sitting at the bar absentmindedly stirring a strawberry milkshake. Looking back at how she was back then, the woman could see just how insecure she must have been, questioning her place and if she was safe where she was. It wasn't often that she felt that way nowadays, but those thoughts seemed to have plagued her life daily all of those years ago. Besides that, though, there was an even greater sense of sadness at the picture, so many of those in the picture had left the guild during the years she had disappeared. It wasn't so much as them leaving that hurt her, but more of the fact that she never got to say goodbye to them, to her family, that still hurts her. Granted a good few of them visited the guild over the years she had been back, but there were still a large group of them that she had never seen after the fact.

Looking away from the photo and at his mother, Ailbhe could see the sad look in her eyes as she stared at the picture, "Pretty."

At that, the woman's train of thought was broken away from her thoughts and rather to her son, "What was that?"

Giving a big smile, the toddler pointed towards the picture once again, "Momma pretty."

Letting out a small chuckle at that, the woman pulled her son closer to her in a small embrace, "Well aren't you sweet."

Glancing through the album, the woman pointed out certain pictures out to her son and gave small descriptions to some of them. Stopping at one picture, the toddler recognized the pair of people in a large photo, "Oji?"

Glancing at the picture in question, the woman let out a small smile at what she saw, "Yeah, that's Uncle Natsu and Aunt Lisanna alright. That was taken at their wedding."

The pair of them were dressed in wedding attire, both holding the other while the rest of the guild watched them from the sidelines. It was taken a number of years ago, with Natsu having a small scar now over the bridge of his nose and slight stubble on his chin while Lisanna had seemingly grown her hair longer over the years. The pair had always been rather fond of Ailbhe, always babysitting the boy when his parents were away. Lisanna had always claimed that it was good experience for her whenever they would want a child of their own, despite her and the other's concerns of the father's traits possibly carrying over to the child.

It was the next photo, however, that shocked the woman when she saw it, "How in the world did they get a picture of this?"

At this, a new amused voice sounded out through the room, "Get a picture of what?"

Hearing that, the pair of mother and child turned and looked over the couch, or, in Ailbhe's case, tried to look over the top of the couch. Seeing who it was after finally looking over the side of the armrest, the child quickly sounded out at the person they saw, "Hi Mommy!"

From her position in the doorway to the room, a new woman with brown hair and dressed in a flannel shirt and jeans walked over to the couch and ruffled the boy's hair, earning a laugh from the seated woman and a grumble from the boy as he tried to fix him ruffled hair.

When the woman approached her wife seated on the couch, she gave her a quick kiss on the cheek before sitting down as well. Wondering what she was doing here, the blonde woman rose an eyebrow at the woman next to her, "You're home early, Cana."

Shrugging off the comment with a wave of her hand, Cana went on to clarify why she was home so early from the guild. Doing so, the blonde haired woman caught a whiff of smoke coming from the woman's clothes, "Natsu and Gray started a fight at the guild. I was just about to leave anyway, them destroying the table I was sitting at just seemed to help speed me up."

Shaking her head at what she had just heard, the woman couldn't stop the sigh escaping through her smile at the image, "Nine years later and they're still fighting as hard as the day I first came here."

Deciding to play along with the good humor her wife was displaying, Cana added on to what she had just heard, "Sixteen years." This of course only got her a nudge on her shoulder from her pouting wife. Seeing the look on her son's face at that, Cana gave the boy a wink and told him, "Long story. Anyway, what are you guys doing?"

Shaking her head at her wife, the blonde woman turned back to the item in her lap, "We've been going through our photo album, somehow it got out of our room."

Confused at this, Cana rose one eyebrow at that, "We have a photo album?" This, in turn, had her raising her arms in surrender at the glare she got in return for that comment, "I was kidding, somewhat. Anyways, what did they get a picture of?"

Not believing what her wife had told her, the woman nonetheless dropped the subject, at least until it was to be brought back up by her later between the two of them. Pointing at the picture in question, the woman's wife peered over at it before giving off a small smile, "Well I'll be damned, I didn't even think he'd do it."

The picture showed a scene taking place in what seemed to have been a park during the night. In it, Cana was kneeling on the ground in front of her, then girlfriend at the time, showing a ring to the woman and had her mouth open as though talking. Said woman seemed to be in shock at that moment, her figure slightly bending over and a hand was placed over the mouth of the woman in shock, apparent by the widened eyes she had.

Seeing the questioning look in her wife's eyes, Cana thought it'd be best to explain what she meant by that, all the while pulling her wife closer to herself, "I asked Happy if it was okay for him to take a picture from the treetops in the park before I had even asked you out that night, I had always thought he had forgotten to actually take it. That, or he had lost it afterwards; I guess he pulled through with it after all…"

Hearing that, the woman gave her wife a kiss on the cheek, as well as amusedly ignoring the look her son was giving them at the display of affection, "I didn't know you had it planned that far ahead." The memory of that night still brought joy to the woman, as the two of them had been dating for about a year beforehand and they were already talking about moving in with one another at the time. The proposal just made everything seem so surreal and real at the same time for her that it stuck with her to this day.

Seeing the memories seemingly playing around in her wife's head, Cana took the album from her hands and decided to flip through them, despite her son's indignant cries of not being able to see them as well. It wasn't until a few minutes after the fact that her wife seemed to snap out of her thoughts, as well as feeling her son sitting on her lap in an attempt of his to see the photos once again.

Pausing, Cana looked up from the album to look at her wife, a mixture of both surprise and amusement in her eyes, "I just realized how many of us have kids now. It's a little weird isn't it."

Looking over her son's head, the woman couldn't help but agree with her wife. There were, indeed, several baby pictures with parents and their children. A slightly disgruntled Gajeel stood next to a laughing Levy as a small black haired girl was climbing onto his head from his shoulder An older Erza was cooing over the form of her adopted son and twirling his brown hair, while a laughing Mira was seen at the background of the photo. A smiling Gray bouncing his young son on his knee while Juvia watched from the sidelines, the photos of similar occurrences and even more couples seemed to just continue into the album, surprising the woman as she had never fully realized the fact.

Seeing as his parent's seemed lost in thought, the young toddler in his mother's lap decided to turn even more pages, stopping at one in particular that took him by surprise, "Mommy?"

Both women now knocked out of their thoughts, the two looked at the picture in question, each having a different reaction. It wasn't very surprising once the women thought about it, even among their own feelings at the picture, that their son was confused, this Cana looked different than the one that their son knew. Not helping herself, the blonde woman laughed at the picture of the of a younger looking Cana in her late teens, "I forgot you used to have long hair, honey."

Scowling a little at the flood of memories she was getting of burnt hair, brawl fights, and laughter after the fact surrounding her whenever she walked back into the guild for weeks afterwards, Cana took the photo album and closed it, "It's not funny, Lucy!"

Ailbhe couldn't help but be confused as Lucy was laughing loudly calling for her wife to come back while her other mother walked away towards their bedroom running her free hand through her pixie cut, all the while mumbling under her breath, "Dumb Flamehead, lighting my hair on fire, 'But it was an accident!', yeah right."

Words (2556)

I hope you have enjoyed, and I may or may not be uploading soon. I am currently in college for Liberal arts and History and as such I have more papers due than what some others may have. Example, I currently have four papers to write, three of which concerning history and a fourth about economics, not surprisingly I'm writing about the history of certain economic policies.

And, as always, have a nice day.