Title: Strings and Strings and Strings of Fate

Rating: K

Pairing: ZoroxLuffy

Genre: Humor/Romance

Time Period: Modern AU

Disclaimer: I do not own One Piece.

Warnings: Swearing, Alcohol, Pinky-holding.

A/N: Last one today.

Five days until Christmas. Festive lights drape over the streetlamps and every square inch of evergreen. The faint scent of cinnamon hangs in the frosty air.

And once again, Luffy and Zoro have invaded Sanji's apartment to "borrow" from his extensive collection of gift wrap.

("No, you're not touching my special gift wrap for Nami-san. Here, use the one with the creepy-ass reindeer heads.")

("WHY THE HELL WOULD YOU THINK THAT SCRATCH AND SNIFF STICKERS COULD TASTE GOOD.")

("I don't even know why I even bother tallying up what's been used. You knuckleheads never pay me back anyway.")

"Zooooooro." A pitiful whine.

Said person turns around and barely stifles down a laugh. Luffy's managed to wrap both himself and a box of stink bombs (probably for Usopp) together with thin, curly, red ribbons.

"Get it off me, Zoro!"

"Christ, I don't even know where to start." Zoro lets a chuckle escape and pats around the younger, searching for the spool. He finally finds it lying at their feet and tugs it up, only for Luffy's arm to rise with it. Somehow, the ribbon had started by knotting itself several times around Luffy's pinky, traveling between his arm and leg, and then winding itself in a haphazard path that Zoro wouldn't have been able to navigate, even if he wasn't directionally impaired.

Zoro turns the spool over in his hands, contemplative.

Grazes the ribbon against his outstretched fingers.

"Zoro?"

Impulsively twists his pinky once, twice, three times around the red strand with a slight smile.

Luffy blushes. He feels like tugging at the ribbon with his pinky, just to feel it tense against Zoro's.

Sanji pokes his head out of the kitchen. "If the two of you are planning on making out, you can wait until you get your asses home."

"Mind your own business, shitty cook!"

"Wait Zoro- WHOA!"

THUMP. Sanji comes out from the kitchen, still stirring his bowl of cookie dough. "You guys are idiots, you know that?"

The two are sprawled haphazardly on the floor, with Zoro covering his face with his free arm, and Luffy cackling into Zoro's turtleneck.

"Whatever. Anyway, the first batch is done."

"COOKIES!"

But instead of shooting up, Luffy hooks their tied-up pinkies together and yanks Zoro off the floor with only 60% of his usual exuberance. And between Luffy shoving cookies down his piehole, Sanji laughing about how Luffy managed to get more decorations on himself than his actual presents, and Zoro's attempt to raid the fridge for Sanji's shitty French wine, their pinky-holding goes unnoticed.