Nami felt an intense sensation of heat, on the verge of what burning flesh would be like, across all of her exposed skin. It was just a little past noon and the sun was at its peaking point. She lazily opened her eyes as she felt trickles of sweat forming on the bridge of her nose. She lifted her hands and swept them away, taking a glance around the deck. Not much of the crew decided to stick their noses out of their rooms today – the weather was exceptional, in an (mostly) unbearable way. Nami was positive it was going to remain so until the sunset – the perfectly clear sky with not a cloud in sight would be an obvious forecast for anyone, even without Nami's keen sense of climate. As someone who fully embraced weather with all its' quirks and nuisances, she didn't find today's scorching temperature a very big deal – it was just a perfect opportunity to sunbathe for a little while.
Luffy and Usopp were the only ones largely unfazed by the heat aside from herself. They were both sitting on the main deck, browsing excitedly through Usopp's marksman equipment that was sprawled across the floor. Luffy pointed at something, urging Usopp to look and laughed heartily, wiping his forehead from the sweat that stuck his raven bangs to it. He proceeded to pull his vest over his head, apparently not bothering to unbutton it at all. With his young and lanky yet toned body now in full view, Nami watched him through her sunglasses. The faint tingle of excitement in her lower stomach didn't surprise her at all – it was something to be expected whenever a remotely attractive representant of the male species decided to dispose of his upper garments. It had almost always waned after a longer while of being exposed to the sight, but the initial reaction was strong enough to never escape Nami's attention.
She had a passing thought of „Did you just think of Luffy in a somewhat sexual way?", but her mind quickly disregarded that question as too uncomfortable to answer for the time period and supplied her with a different subject to ponder upon.
How exactly did Luffy manage to remain so pure-minded his entire seventeen-year-old life? He'd spent a good chunk of his childhood in the company of an undoubtedly filthy lot of pirates, both in hygiene and mind. Had they really never mentioned any of this stuff around him? Was he never curious as to what those foreign words meant? It was probably foolish to expect parental responsibility from a bunch of pirates, no matter how good-hearted they might have been, so it was a possibility that they simply never took the time to explain it in a way that he would understand...
Or was he just uninterested? Nami had only been sailing aboard this ship for no more than two months, but it was pretty obvious that whenever sexuality was addressed in conversations, he didn't look awkward or uncomfortable, but rather... clueless, confused. There was no questioning the captain's sincerity, so there was no way he'd only been putting up an act. Luffy always spoke and behaved his mind - he could be read as easily as an open book with letters that take up half a page.
It was unusual, to say the least, to encounter a seventeen-year-old boy unaware of things such as sexual arousal when he should be bursting with hormones. That was defnitely one of the perks Luffy had that remained a mystery and it toyed with Nami's curiosity to no end.
The idea of asking him about it briefly crossed her mind, but she quickly discarded it. How should he know the answer? And she would probably have to explain it to him herself if she brought the topic up in the first place (which she, understandably, had no interest in doing)...
The navigator's eyes followed the key of seagulls that had been circling the sky above the ship in unison for a while now. Thoughtlessly, she returned her gaze to the pair of airheads playing underneath the quarter deck. Luffy's hat fell to his back, supported by the string around his neck, as he threw his head back with a wide smile on his lips and closed eyes, facing the sun and obviously enjoying the warmth it gave.
Uh-oh. That tingle wasn't going anywhere.