Sometime later, Zoro, Nami, Sanji, Luffy and Usopp had reached their public mall area. At that point, it was already like…one o'clock. Okay? Is that all right if it was too long a period of time since the last time we told you the o'clock? Can you live with it?
"So, where should we go out to eat?!" Luffy said excitedly.
"I don't know." Everyone replied at the same time, EVEN LUFFY!! Sooner or later, they came to the un-mutual decision of going Friendly's, which they, of course, had in the mall.
They waited in line for a quite a while until a waitress finally came to them. "Thanks for waiting!" she said in a friendly fashion. "How many?"
"Five." They all replied at the exact same time.
"Follow me!" said the waitress as she started walking to find them a table. As they were sitting down and the waitress was frolicking off, Sanji grabbed her shirt.
"Excuse me, do you have a smoking section?" he asked.
"Oh, I'm sorry, no, we don't allow smoking in here." She said and looked authentically apologetic.
"That's okay, we wouldn't have sat in that section ANYWAY." Said Zoro as he barely restrained himself from smiting Sanji.
There was much dispute on who should sit where. Usopp and Luffy wanted to sit next to each other. That left the other three to sit on the OTHER side. Nami wouldn't sit next to Sanji, and Zoro refused to sit on the same side as or across from him. Sanji wanted to at least sit near his beloved Nami, but also wanted to have a lot of room so he would have liked to be on the side of the table that had only two people on it. Usopp required an isle seat just in case he had to go to the bathroom.
It's a puzzle, guys. How can we make EVERYONE happy?!
So Zoro sat by the wall on one side of the booth and Nami sat next to him. Next to her sat Luffy and next to Luffy was Usopp. Then, all by himself on the opposite side of the table, sat Sanji across from Nami.
There! Did you get that?! YOU BETTER HAVE!! If you didn't, you might as well just go home now because we don't want a brain dead person like you to read the rest of our story.
As Sanji sat on one side of the booth all by himself, he looked at Zoro, Nami, Luffy and Usopp who were all squished on the other side. "Uh…this seems kind of ludicrous." He commented.
"YOU'RE the one who refused to sit on the same side as Luffy and Usopp!" Zoro yelled. "Geez, Sanji! If you sat over here and Nami and I sat over there then it'll make so much more sense!"
"But I don't want to share the booth with two other people…" Sanji said.
"I know!" said Usopp as he stood up and then sat in the isle seat on the same side as Sanji. "There!"
"But I thought we were going to sit next to each other!" whined Luffy.
"Now we're sitting ACROSS from each other which is even better because we won't have to turn around to talk." Said Usopp.
"Yeah!" Luffy said, his eyes lighting up. "We just have to look forward!" They exchanged thoughts about how convenient their new set-up was, as Zoro, Sanji and Nami only stared at them with gaping expressions.
While they were all distracted so, they didn't notice two particular people enter Friendy's and take their seat in the booth right behind Sanji and Usopp. They had their menus up so it covered their faces, but any fool would be able to tell that it was Tashigi and Smoker. They had taken liking to the thought of stalking these horrible children and catching them when they were most off guard.
"I need a kid's menu…" said Usopp. "I want the macaroni and cheese and one of those colorful drinks."
"Which drink do you like the best?" asked Luffy. "I think the blue one is the best, then the green one, then the LIGHT blue one and then the red one."
"No way!" said Usopp passionately. "The green one is by far the best! Then the light blue one, then the regular blue one and then the red one."
"At least we both agree that the red one is the worst." Said Luffy.
"But you are so wrong." Said Usopp. "The blue one is so not the best."
"Yes it is!" said Luffy, sounding irritated beyond belief.
"The GREEN drink is the best!!" Usopp argued.
"The BLUE one!!" Luffy joined. Sanji, Zoro and Nami still couldn't help but continue to stare at the two with gaping expressions.
"That's got to be the stupidest thing I've ever heard someone argue about." Zoro said as he started looking at his menu.
"I don't know, you and Sanji have argued about some pretty stupid things." Said Nami somewhat quietly.
"Zoro starts them all." Sanji defended.
"I do not!" said Zoro.
"I rest my case." Said Nami.
"We weren't going to start arguing, Nami!" Sanji assured her.
"Yeah, and we SO do not argue about stupid things." Zoro added. "All the things we argue about are meaningful and NOT stupid."
"Let's think for a minute…" Nami said, rolling her eyes. "I have NO idea how many arguments you two have started about Sanji not knowing how to read, for starters."
"Nami!" gasped Sanji. "I have told you all MANY times that I DO know how to read, just not very well!"
"And besides, those aren't arguments." Zoro said. "That's just me making fun of him because he can't read. If it were an argument then he would say that he actually DOES know how to read and then I would tell him that he can't."
"But I CAN read!" Sanji said.
"Sure, sure." Said Zoro. "You can tell yourself that."
"I don't like you." Said Sanji.
"Then it's mutual." Zoro replied.
Just when things were about to get UN-friendly, a friendly waitress came over to make the atmosphere friendly.
So then they ordered. Both Sanji and Nami ended up getting salads, while Zoro got some kind of enormous hamburger with ALL the tidings! Both Luffy and Usopp ended up getting macaroni and cheese, but Usopp got the GREEN drink and Luffy got the BLUE drink.
Conversation pretty much ceased right then and there as they all mowed down. This was, of course, AFTER they received their food from the Friendly Waitress.
Then came the check.
"Fourty-two…" Sanji said, picking up the check. "That means that if we each pay ten dollars, it will cover both the check AND the tip. Nami…"
"Would you pay for me, Sanji?" asked Nami.
"I was just about to ask that!" Sanji laughed. "But you three still have to pay your ten dollars."
"I don't know about you guys, but I don't usually bring ten dollars with me to school." Said Zoro, leaning back.
"Yeah, I really don't either." Said Luffy.
"I don't even think I've ever even had that much money in my life!" Usopp added with a chuckle. Everyone chuckled with him for a few seconds until Sanji cleared his throat.
"You're all implying that you did not bring any money?" he said.
"Yeah." Said the other three men.
Sanji opened his wallet to see his wad of money.
"Wow!" said Usopp, leaning over to see all the money. "Where'd you get all that money?!"
"I just got my allowance!" said Sanji, inching away. "Plus, I have a job!"
"You have a job?" said Zoro. "Why? Don't tell me you baby-sit."
"I do." Said Sanji, looking slightly confused on why that was an issue. Zoro shook his head in disappointment as Sanji CONTINUED to fail to understand the issue that babysitting was SO a girl's thing.
So Sanji threw down a fifty as if it was nothing and they all got up and left Friendly's, the Friendliest place in the world. You see, everyone with older siblings has been to Friendly's PLENTY of times because whenever they got sad, their older sibling would nudge them and say, "Come on, let's go to Friendly's."
"What should we do now?" asked Nami. "I mean, since we're at the mall, we might as well hang out for a little while."
"No." said Zoro. "The mall is not one of those places that we 'might as well hang out' at."
"I bet there's a sale in American Eagle!" Sanji said as he pointed to the clothes store that was across from the Friendly's. "But we should check Banana Republic first. They're having a HUGE summer sale and I don't…"
"They have puppies at the pet store!!" yelled Luffy as he pointed to the pet store that was next to the American Eagle.
"I want to see if they have any Bulldogs!" said Usopp. "And I also want to check out the video game store!"
"They have some pretty stylish shirts in Aeropostale with bulldogs on them, Usopp." Said Sanji. "While it may not exactly be good to wear clothes with bulldogs on them, you could definitely use some new clothes."
"I like my clothes…" whined Usopp as he pulled on his suspenders and spun his spinny tie.
"It's been such a long time since I got new clothes." Sighed Nami.
"Me too!" exclaimed Luffy who was, obviously, still wearing the exact same thing he ALWAYS wears.
"Well, let's go to American Eagle then!" said Sanji since he wasn't about to miss out on the great sale they had.
"Yeah!" said Nami since she always jumped at the opportunity to be cool.
"Hurray!" said Luffy since he was happy if his friends were happy.
"Well…all right…" said Usopp since he didn't want to be left out of the loop.
"I'll wait for you guys here." Said Zoro since he couldn't think of anything that would possibly be less fun. Just as everyone was about to scold him and force him to come, he caught the sight of Smoker peeking at them from behind a plant with a murderous look in his eyes. "I guess I'll just go with you guys then."
Even though he wasn't afraid of Smoker, he didn't feel like having a confrontation at that moment because he had just eaten and he didn't want to have to deal with cramps.
So, with that, everyone jumped up and punched the air and then Sanji led the way to American Eagle!!