12.) Middles
Sanji nearly dropped his knife when the door to the galley burst open very suddenly that evening. He was just preparing some ingredients before he went to bed to create less work for himself in the morning - nobody ever came into his domain that late at night unless it was Luffy, and that little bastard would've tried to be much sneakier.
But it was Zoro standing there, closing the door quickly behind him and turning to face Sanji, his face serious. He had that weird intense aura about him, like everything else around him was totally muted.
Sanji subconsciously gripped his knife tighter.
"Um. What do you want?"
Zoro took a few slow steps towards Sanji, ignoring how the cook tensed just slightly. It was barely noticeable, but to Zoro, it was obvious.
"Does it bother you?"
"… Does what bother me," Sanji said flatly, looking at Zoro like he was an idiot.
"Do those two bother you," Zoro added, crossing his arms. Sanji looked like he wanted to slap the swordsman.
"Do those… who bothers me? What the fuck are you trying to say, you moron-"
"Nami and Usopp - do they bother you."
Sanji narrowed his eye and put down his knife, hands going to his pockets. Zoro could see the muscles in Sanji's forearms - visible with his sleeves rolled up - flex a little.
"I'm afraid I still don't quite understand, Marimo."
"The way they are. The way they've always been. Does it bother you?"
"They're friends, what about that is supposed to bother me?"
"But what if-"
"Then why would I care? I…"
Zoro glared at Sanji, and the chef could only match the swordsman's menacing expression. After spending so much time in the New World, Zoro had come to look even meaner by default. It had never phased Sanji.
"Alright." Zoro said finally, and abruptly turned on his heel and left.
Restraining the urge to throw his knife into the door, Sanji lit a cigarette and whispered to himself, "Stupid shitty fucking idiot. Of course it bothers me." Inhaling deeply, he looked back at the vegetables he'd been slicing. "It fucking kills me."
And, standing there alone again in the kitchen, he hated himself.
On the other side of the door, up against the railing of the uppermost deck, Zoro watched Nami and Usopp sitting together at the other side of the ship, in the front near the huge lion masthead. He'd watched them there from the crow's nest earlier during his evening workout regime.
He hadn't known why he couldn't stop staring at them while he lifted his gargantuan weights - he wasn't a damn spy.
But the way those two were… God, that thieving devil woman and that whining dumbass sniper, they were just… they'd always been like two peas in a crappy pod. And he loved them, as he had come to love the entire crew over all this time. But he could never be like them. He could never sit with someone at the edge of the deck, legs hanging off the sides, laughing and leaning on each other and smiling so openly and…
He knew it killed the cook. And he hated himself.