Zoro had no problems waiting for the cook - it'd give him the chance to take a nice, long nap. Again.

Leaning against the wall, he folded his arms, and closed his eyes; the city was just starting to wind down, and it seemed quiet and mellow in the alleyway. That was, until a sharp, sudden vibration reverberated through Zoro's jeans.

Zoro rolled his eyes, and fished around in his pocket for his phone.

Damn gadget...

He finally found it, and peered at the screen.

...Ace?

Slightly nervous, he answered.

"Uh, hey..."

"Zoro!" Ace's voice sounded both relieved, and somewhat strained. " Where the hell have you been!?"

Zoro frowned in confusion at his friend's tone.

"Ugh...what?"

He heard Ace heave a sigh on the other end of the line.

"Jeez...you're eloquent as always." He paused from a second. "You had me worried, man. You just disappear from my apartment, and no-one hears from you for, like, 3 days..."

Zoro felt the annoyance bubbling in his gut. There it was again. That lingering tone...those unspoken words of how people didn't think Zoro could take care of his own life anymore.

"Listen Ace, it's ONLY been 3 damn days. You expect me to inform all my acquaintances of every bloody move I make? I can take care of myself, you know - I don't need a babysitter." Zoro couldn't stop his voice from becoming a growl, even if this was Ace. In fact, the fact that it WAS Ace was pissing him off even more!

Another sigh crackled over the receiver, and Ace cleared his throat.

"Hey, I know, I know...I just - I was just - I mean, I didn't know you had somewhere else you could go, and I didn't want you to feel like...think that I didn't want - that you couldn't come over to mine. If you needed to, I mean..." Ace garbled out this half-apologetic, half-supportive line, trying to smooth over his earlier blunder.

Zoro let his back slide down the side of the wall, til he was sitting on the concrete. He didn't say anything - he just waited for Ace to continue on with this, so far very awkward, conversation.

On the other end of the line, Ace adjusted his sitting position on his couch, and took a deep breath.

Ok, c'mon Ace - time to change the topic.

"So, umm...did you get any luck? At the employment agency, I mean..."

Oh yeah - that's a real great change of topic right there. Idiot.

To Ace's surprise, Zoro's tone sounded a little brighter; like he was smiling quietly to himself.

"Not exactly. But I did get a job. Well, sort of."

Ace grinned.

"Yeah?! That's awesome, Zoro! What is it? When did you get it? What did they - "

Zoro cut him off with a deep, rumbling laugh, making Ace was smile so hard his jaw began to ache.

"Hey, you know I'm not gonna tell you about it over the phone, right? I hate even having a mobile phone, and I'm not using it more than I have to."

"Dude...this is the twenty-first century. You can't NOT have a phone! What the hell are people supposed to do if they need to talk to you?"

"Come and find me."

"...you sound like a serial killer, Zoro."

"Don't give me any ideas."

There was a brief silence then - both friends just happy for their own reasons. After a moment or two, Ace spoke again, his voice light and carefree.

"Ok, then, Mr. Cryptic, get your ass over here now and give me an update. If you were at work now, you wouldn't be on the phone, so no excuses."

Zoro pondered this for a moment.

Technically he WAS at work; every moment during this week, he was obliged to get Sanji to 'teach' him as many tricks of the trade as could be managed, without them actually being allowed into the restaurant (which, unfortunately, was greatly hindering any potential progress the cook and his protegee had been hoping to make). Nevertheless, Zoro still had the basics to learn - walking with a tray full of drinks was proving tricky, as was putting on a forthcoming demeanor for half the day. That, especially that, was hard for the notoriously stoic green-haired man.

Zoro sighed.

"Look, I don't know, Ace...I've sorta gotta be on call until Saturday, and that's when the real work begins, so..."

Just then, the door opened, and Sanji appeared, carrying a big cardboard box in his arms. He was about to speak, but then he saw Zoro down on the floor, registered the phone in his hand, he placed the box down on the floor, and began to walk away from the alley.
Zoro coughed.

"...uh, I'd better go Ace, there's -"

All of a sudden, Sanji leaped back in front of the green-haired man, waving his arms madly, and shaking his head just as vehemently. Zoro arched an eyebrow in surprise - even more so when the cook held up his hands, and then made a rolling motion with one of them. He backed away from Zoro, and went to stand a little way from him in the mouth of the alleyway, watching the the building rush of people commute for their end of day journey. He took out a cigarette packet and a lighter from his pocket, lit one, and stared ahead of him, seemingly absorbed in his own thoughts.

"Oi, Zoro - you still there?" Ace's voice brought Zoro back to the real world; at some point, he'd obviously drifted.

"Uh, yeah, I am. Look, I'll see what I can do, ok? I don't know if I can, but I'll message you later."

Ace huffed on the other end of the phone in mock irritation.

"Bah, Zoro...you're so fucking flaky. I'll catch you later then?"

"Yeah...see ya."

Zoro hung up the phone, and the silence that now hung in the air seemed deafening. For some reason, uneasiness had enveloped Zoro when he realized that Sanji was hearing their conversation; he'd been terrified that a tongue-in-cheek jibe from Ace would tell Sanji something about Zoro's previous difficulties...

Shit...I think I'm getting paranoid...

Rising to his feet, he cleared his throat, and walked over towards the silently smoking cook.

"Oi, cook. Sorry bout that; can't get that guy to shut up for anything."

Sanji turned his head slowly to face him, breathing out a stream of thin, nicotine-scented smoke. He regarded Zoro lazily with one eye for a second.

"A friend of yours?"

Zoro shoved his hands in his pockets, and looked ahead.

"I guess you could say that. Known the guy for forever; so yeah, a friend of mine."

Sanji smirked around the stick in his mouth.

"Good. I didn't think you had any, you know." Sanji paused for a second, giving Zoro ample time to take offence, but he spoke again before the other man could interject, " I mean, I've been with you since Friday; you haven't even called a single soul since you got this job."

Zoro fixed the cook with a fierce glare, and crossed his arms defiantly.

"Mind your own business, bastard. I'm not obliged to pander to other people's whims everyday of my fucking life." Zoro smirked then himself. "Besides...you haven't either, you know. Hypocrite."

"What!?" Sanji's eyes went wide with indignation. "That's totally different! I've been at work, idiot-marimo! I see a load of colleagues everyday, and I can't go out at night when I've got to be up at 5 a.m. on shift! You can't compare the two of us - our situations couldn't be more different!"

Zoro raised his eyebrows, and grinned. He drew forward into Sanji's personal space.

"I beg to differ, dartbrow. As of last Friday, I've been working too."

Sanji growled slightly, and met Zoro's challenge, rising up into the other man's face.

"You could've fooled me. You've done nothing but moan, all day, every day, like a five year old child! How's that meant to-"

Sanji stopped then, and the angry look drained away from his face. It was never real anger when arguing with Zoro anyway - just this really exaggerated, played up version of being pissed-off; a way to justify grappling with the man on the floor.

"Hey. Haven't you got to be somewhere?"

Zoro frowned. The cook was doing this mood swinging again.

"...I don't get you."

Sanji pointed at the phone in Zoro's hand.

"Your friend. It sounded like he'd asked you to meet up." Sanji turned around away from Zoro, and headed over to pick up the box he'd left by the door. "Go on. It's not like we can do anything more productive at this time of the evening. We'll start training again tomorrow."

Zoro watched Sanji suspiciously for a moment. He seemed...Zoro wasn't sure. Bored? Annoyed? Uninterested?

"...You sure? I mean, I haven't even learnt how to carry the damn trays yet."

Sanji chuckled, and held the box close to his chest as they left the alleyway, and walked out onto the street.

"I know that, idiot, but we have plenty of time. Anyway, it's better for you to see this guy, or your friends are gonna think I've murdered you or something. That, " he said with smirk, " and I can get some peace - and some sanity - back while you're gone."

That gave Zoro an excellent idea.

"Oi cook..." he said, trying to hide the twinkle in his eye, "You've gotta meet my friends."


It didn't take long for Zoro to realize that this may not have been one of his best ideas.
Ok, it was definitely one of his worst.

"Why did I let you talk me into this..." Sanji muttered, following Zoro up the stairs of an unfamiliar apartment complex. "And anyway, why can't we use the bloody elevator?"

Zoro silently cursed himself. He'd agonized so much recently about how to stop Sanji from getting any ideas about the rut he'd been in, only to realize he'd dug himself a hole bigger than the Grand Canyon by inviting the cook to go with him to Ace's place.

"I didn't fucking force you to come, you know. " the green-haired man growled, angry at himself, but deciding that the cook could more than take the cold-shoulder, "If you're that much of a hermit, feel free to crawl back into your shell, dartbrow."

Sanji sneered behind at Zoro's back.

"Me? The hermit? Ever-looked in the mirror, mossball?"

"Ever NOT looked in the mirror, eyebrows?"

Sanji answered with a sharp prod in Zoro's back, and he was rewarded with a, very satisfying, 'oomph'. The cook smirked when Zoro whirled around, hands up as if to lunge at him, and got ready to slip out of reach. Anticipating Zoro's grab, Sanji side-stepped (as much as he could in a crammed stairwell anyway), and gave Zoro another light kick to the back. This time, however, Zoro was too fast, he whirled around sharply, grabbed the cook's leg mid-air, and twisted to knock him off-balance.
It didn't occur to either man that fighting on the staircase of a ten-story apartment complex was going to end badly - until both men felt their shoes slipping, their balance toppling...and so began a very long - and very painful - descent.

Step after step, floor and floor, the two men rolled and toppled without stopping, fighting all the way - a tangle of limbs (one man kicking and pinching, the other grabbing and twisting), with cries of 'damn it!' and 'fuck you!' reverberating all the while throughout the building.

Finally, they fell in a crumpled heap at the bottom.

Bruised, panting, aching, and sore, neither man wanted to summon the energy, or spirit, to disentangle themselves from the other (the insults had already stopped after they passed the fifth floor).

After about a minute of trying to get the world to come back into focus, Sanji, whose body had managed to land more or less on top of Zoro's stomach, slowly pulled himself up. Zoro did the same under him, both men too absorbed in feeling their own pain to register the other's existence for a moment.

Then a little vein appeared on Sanji's forehead.

"You fucking IDIOT! Look what you've done!"

Zoro couldn't believe this...it was just too rich coming from the man who STARTED the whole stairwell-fighting idea!

"ME?! I'm not the one who starts prodding others in the back on a staircase!"

"Oh you poor thing, did I hurt you?" Sanji sneered sarcastically. "You're just a wimp!"

That got Sanji pinned to the floor in two seconds flat, his arms locked behind him by Zoro, who had twisted the cook onto his stomach with a quick, violent flick of the wrist.

" Take. That. Back." Zoro spat viciously.

"Over my dead-body, asshole!"

Suddenly, a loud, boisterous laugh erupted from behind the pair.

"Ahem...am I interrupting something?"

A.N/ Gah! I'm so sorry this update took so long! I got it out a.s.a.p, but I haven't had a chance to reply to all my lovely reviews and PM's...BUT I WILL! EVEN IF IT'S MONTHS OVERDUE, I WILL!

Hope the update was enjoyable :3