{Big Astronauts and Tiny Divers}

“Why can’t that! You need walls to make a house!”

Lots of people had green houses anyways right? That’s at least what Appa had told him. And besides, the green on Leia’s page wasn’t even the green Appa like!

“That’s not Appa’s green! Appa’s green looks better than that!”

“But this is the one green I got!” What was even Appa’s green?! If this green wasn’t Appa’s, then the house can’t be that color! “My house can’t be a color I don’t got!” 

“Yeah you can!” Erza insisted, coloring his grass bright pink. He had seen green grasses before so why not have a different color in the grass for once? “The sky can be lots of different colors, so why can’t houses?”

Putting the crayon back in the shared pile, he picked up the orange crayon for the sky. “Appa says if he could have his walls be any color, he’d pick green!”

“Walls are inside, not outside! That don’t help me!” 

Honestly, didn’t he understand that she was trying to get help for her house? It didn’t matter what his Appa says, what mattered was how the colors looked on the page!

“That’s a stupid question.” Erza huffed, scribbling on his own sheet of paper that Mr. Terran had given him. He had long forgotten about coloring in the lines because who does that for fun anyway? That’s boring, like Appa’s job.

“Everyone knows green is the best color!”

“Green?”

Adelaide scrunched her face at the mere notion of a green house. Of all the many colors in the crayon box, green was his first pick?!

“Ezra-” 

Adelaide looked up from her coloring, her tone quite serious when she stated his name. Matters like this were of the utmost importance, and thus, required the just treatment they deserved. 

She had a feeling Clay was a ‘newbie’ at this sort of thing. Poor guy, looks like he was pretty hungry too. She hoped he’d hang on till they made a decision.

“How soft? Um… let’s see.” The lawyer looked at the different shades of orange before her very carefully for a few moments before responding by pointing at one. “There! That one! It’s like my hair, isn’t it? Plus, pink is too… cliché. I’m sure Polly would agree!” she beamed at him and placed her hands on her hips.

“All right, I think we’re done here! Let’s go pay up, Clay!” With that, the duo made their way to the one behind the desk who smiled at them.

“Will that be all? That will be 45 dollars.” The man said.

“Yup! Here you are!” Athena took out her wallet and paid the amount.

“Thank you. Come again, and good luck with your baby!”

“Wh– we’re not married!! He’s not my husband…!” Oh God, she was flustered now.

"H-Hm! Oh, this one? Yeah, it looks like your hair!" He thinks. Best not argue with her about this sort of thing.

"Would he, now...? O-Oh..." 

Clay's voice caught in his throat, his stomach sinking. Though it wasn't the color now, since now Adelaide was getting older and she could make her own opinions, ("Blue walls, Daddy. Like the sky!") he quite distinctly remembered what her room was in their old apartment, since-

"Her room has to be pink, pumpkin. I refuse for it to be any other color!”

...Blinking, Clay brought himself back to reality, shaking the thoughts out of his head and following Athena to the checkout line. He was half listening to the conversation at hand, letting Athena handle the talking, when his ears caught what the cashier had said.

“Oh! So he’s your boyfriend, then!”

“Ggh- n-no, we aren’t anything!” Oh no. Be a man who shops with a pregnant woman and suddenly, you’re the father. “We’re just friends, is all!” 

“Oh, I-I see! I’m sorry for the mixup! Well, good luck, nonetheless!”

Managing to crack a smile at the cashier despite it all, Clay picked up the cans of paint from the checkout and exited the hardware store, receipt and gnarling starvation still in tow.

Athena, being a prideful pregnant woman now, had a lot of things to consider. Such as the baby’s name, maybe try learning how to knit from Junie and, of course, the new room. So, she called Clay in order to get some brushes as well as paint from the hardware store.

Soon enough, the astronaut was holding 10 swatches of paint in his hands. Meanwhile, she was keeping an eye on her stomach, the never fading smile on her face.

“Hmm… you know, Clay, I feel like it’s a girl. So… some soft orange and maybe blue would be nice for a calm baby-like room, don’t you think?”

“U-Uh... yeah! Blue and orange... alright, that’s a start.”

Truthfully, he had no idea how to correspond colors. When the three of them had bought the place, he just let Apollo, Athena & Adelaide choose what fit best, and he painted without questioning. So, Clay just nodded his head in agreement, putting back the extra colors. 

His stomach continued to complain, but Clay did his best to put on a smile. They’d be out of here soon, he hoped.

“A-Athena...”

Ooh boy, this was quite the predicament.

Standing in the hardware store, holding 10 different swatches of paint ranging from the sunniest of yellows to the coolest of blues in his hands, Clay had thought this was an in-and-out job. Get the brushes and the paint, and go back home to start painting. 

He’s not one to complain, but standing in the same aisle for 30 minutes and repeatedly selecting and putting back Athena’s choice of a room color while he was on an empty stomach was slowly but surely whittling him down. 

Tread carefully, dear Terran.

Clay snapped out of his trance, pausing in his ice stirring and blinking at the words. Truthfully, their words kept nagging at him, plaguing at his heart and feeding his insecurities. 

Perhaps he had been bad to her- missing Adelaide’s first years, fumbling in parenthood, delaying his proposal- and perhaps if he had done things differently, Faith would still be here. No… tonight he just felt like rambling, disclosing his problems, not-

“I-I couldn’t make you do that, Apollo!” he replied, shaking his head. “I-I wasn’t asking for help, I… w-we’ll make by.” Clay hoped so, anyway. By the stars, he hoped so. 

“I-It’s that… Adelaide is their family, t-their granddaughter, so… but maybe it’s selfish of me. They shouldn’t have to help someone they don’t like. And if their daughter isn’t here to benefit from it, then…” He rubbed his hand against his aching head, before he ran his fingers through his hair, and finally let out a long-winded sigh. 

“Can you believe it, Apollo?”

Clay let out a small, pitiful chuckle, stirring the ice in the cup that originally held the diet cola. Some ‘Welcome Back!’ dinner this had been, where after Apollo had told about all of his revolutionary work in Khura’in, the discussion of how Clay had been doing would leave a sour note to the night.

...But he couldn’t lie, not to Apollo, anyway. He’d be found out in an instant.

“They think... they think the reason why Faith disappeared was because of me. That my recovery in the hospital was her perfect oppourtunity to get away from it all. Why else hasn’t she shown back up after all this time?” 

Nodding excitedly in return, she sat next to Adelaide and made sure and her were set before he drove off. 

“I have! Though it’s been kind of a while since: magic shows and school would keep me pretty busy most of the time..” She stated before turning head towards Ade.

“Isn’t it?! I love riding the Ferris Wheel! ….Though Daddy swears he will never get on one again after I was lucky enough to persuade him to get on one with me once. Kept muttering ‘Objection, Objection, Objection…’ under his breath while shaking.”

“Haha, afraid of heights, is he?” Clay teased, continuing to tap his fingers to the music. “We’ve all got our fears.”

“Yeah, like how my daddy don’t like clowns,” Adelaide stated, nodding her head. “Especially if they supposed to be scary.” (Daughters, always telling their father’s deepest fears. What a shame.)

“...Mm. Thanks for the addition, Leia. Well... either way, we’ll be sure to go on the Ferris wheel.” Regaining his composure from being so rudely exposed by his own daughter, an idea soon came to his head. 

“Hey, let’s do something to pass the time! Let’s see how many license plates outside of California we can find before we get there!” Dad skills, at their finest. 

“Aww, don’t put it that way: I love hanging out with you two just as much. I’ll make sure this day is enjoyable for all three of us!”

She had no objections to the sudden change of plans with hanging out with Clay and Adelaide instead of Apollo and Athena; that, and it’d be nice to hang out with these two more. 

She then turned to Adelaide, nodding her head. “You bet we can!! We’ll definitely get them something.”

“Haha, well, it seems we have plans already,” Clay stated, chuckling as he straightened out the car mirror.

“Let’s get this show on the road.”

Both girls were already buckled in and ready, so he backed out of the WAA parking lot and started to head on the road, turning on the radio in the process. 

“You’ve ever been to the carnival on the boardwalk, Trucy?” He inquired, tapping his fingers on the steering wheel to the song that was currently playing. “Leia and I went last year.”

“Whoa! That’s really cool!” Mia said in response to Adelaide’s hobbies. So far, it seemed as though the two girls had a lot of similarities. This made Mia really happy.

“Let’s see…my favorite color is pink. But like, dark pink. Like my Papa’s suit! He says its ‘magenta’, but mama says its pink just to tease him.” She thought about the next question. “My favorite food is burgers. Mama says I’ve been eating them ever since I could chew.” 

“My favorite animal? Hmm…I really like dogs. They’re so fluffy and fun to pet! There’s a really cute doggy named Missle at the police station. He’s so smart!”

Mia looked at her side of the list and saw that the question was the same as Adelaide’s. She had to ask three of her buddy’s favorite things, but she didn’t want to ask the same things that she had just been asked.

“Okay…so what’s your favorite movie, your favorite place to go with your daddy, and…uh…your favorite part of school?”

“Ah... I see! A magenta suit, eh? Sounds like a bold fashion choice.” 

Now that she thought about it further, Adelaide swore that she’s heard about a lawyer who wore a magenta suit from her Uncle Apollo. Somebody important, and somebody who terrified him in court. But she couldn’t quite remember who...

Eh, it might not have been Mia’s Papa, anyhow. He seemed to be like a nice man, from what Adelaide could tell. 

“My favorite movie? Well... I really like Finding Dory! It’s one of my favorite Pixar movies. Plus, my dad has a whole bunch of Pixar DVDs, so every Saturday night we might watch a movie together while we eat dinner.” 

“My favorite thing to do in school is art and music class, of course!” She exclaimed. “I like making art and singing songs- but I also like to learn about science, like my dad! As for my favorite place, well...” Adelaide put a hand on her chin to think, before finally stating her choice.

“There’s this really nice place that’s outside of the city where you can see the stars,” Adelaide began, eyes glinting with wonder. “Once per month, my dad drives us out there to stargaze. I know a lot of constellations because of that.” The sign of an astronaut’s daughter, truly. 

“I hope you don’t mind being stuck with us, out of all people.”

Clay couldn’t help but feel a bit bad- this day had been planned weeks in advance, and he wasn’t even originally a part of it. Today a carnival was in town, and from what he knew, Athena had planned for Apollo and Trucy to join her. 

But... then complications happened in an important case that Apollo and Athena were working on, leaving the office in an overall state of panic in an effort to rush to sort things out, and, well-

He just wanted to make sure the girl still had a fun time today, just so it was one less thing to worry about. 

“He sounds really cool!” Mia gushed once Adelaide talked about her dad. “My mama raised me by herself for a while too, but then she got together with Papa! She’s so much happier with him.”

“…spare time?” Mia tilted her head. “Well…I don’t have a lot of spare time, because Mama and I are always training so that I can be the Master someday. But when I’m not doing that, I like to watch Steel Samurai with Mama and Papa! They both really like it. I prefer the Jammin’ Ninja though…his guitar is so cool!” 

Mia looked at the next question on her list. She hesitated a bit when first reading it, but quickly caught on. “Do you…have any hobbies? What do you do for fun?”  

“Mm... I see.” Adelaide nodded her head as she listened to Mia, piecing together the pieces in her head. So this... ‘Papa’ of hers wasn’t her biological father, then? That’s what she could piece together, anyways. 

...If her father ever found someone else, then she supposed she would be her new mom, much like how Mia’s Papa was her new dad. 

But... she decided not to think about that any longer for right now, and listened to the question being asked.

“I like to draw and sing,” Adelaide explained, showing a smile. “I sing in a Church choir on Sundays, and I have this set of watercolors that I use to paint my pictures.” 

“Let’s see here... ask your buddy about three of their favorite things. Alright, ah...” She put a chin on her hand in thought, before coming up with some questions.

Mia looked down the list and saw that her questions were easier to read than the ones that were meant for Adelaide. This was understandable, as Mia was only 6 and was still learning to read.

“My family? Okay!” Mia smiled and started counting them off on her fingers. “Let’s see…there’s my Papa and my Mama. They’re the best! My papa is the Chief Pros-prosa–uh he is a lawyer! And my mama is the Master of Kurain Village. I’m gonna be just like her one day!” Mia was always excited to talk about her parents. “And I also have a baby brother! His name is Marshall. He just turned 1 year old.”

“We don’t have any pets right now, but I really really really want a puppy.” Mia looked down at the paper and looked at the first question on her side of the list.

“What…is your…oh!” She started over from the beginning. “What is your family like?” In retrospect, she should have gotten it from context, but for a 6-year-old, it wasn’t as easy.

“A lawyer, eh? I’ve got an uncle who’s also a lawyer,” Adelaide commented, smiling at the thought of her Uncle Apollo. Perhaps it would’ve been possible for her uncle to have met Mia’s dad. She’d have to tuck away that question for future inquiry. 

Adelaide continued to listen to Mia’s description, noting her enthusiasm for her family and for the want of a dog. 

“My family? Mm, well-”

“I just live with my dad,” Adelaide began. “He’s pretty smart, and he knows how to make just about anybody smile. Ah, and there’s my Nana, my dad and I go to her house nearly every weekend for dinner. She’s very sweet, and makes the best cookies.” 

“Mm, no pets, the apartment that I live in doesn’t allow them,” she stated. “I’d like a pet someday, though.”