Disclaimer: No, don't own One Piece.

Ace had set out shortly after his birthday and Luffy couldn't be happier for his brother. Truly, he couldn't! It was a dream come true, and Ace was the first of the brothers to properly realise it! (Sabo didn't count, his had been extraneous circumstances and besides, he'd been cheating anyways)

Yet, then February came, and Luffy did not know what to do. Should he celebrate Ace's and Sabo's birthday even though they weren't present to do so? The decision was taken out of his hands when Makino simply suggested he do something nice, like sending out a wish to the waves for Ace and collect new flowers for Sabo's grave.

After that, however, came Luffy's birthday. For almost all of the past ten years, he'd never once had to celebrate it without at least one of his brothers by his side (he couldn't remember how he'd celebrated it before meeting them, truth be told). Waking up that day felt weird (There was no one there to wake him up), training against the trees and monkeys and alligators felt lonely (the 100 daily matches were nowhere near challenging enough for him any more, not without his brothers there) and venturing down to Foosha on his own was making him oddly antsy (no one to tell him that root there was tricky or that stone there wasn't as steady as it seemed).

He'd be 14 today, but strangely, he felt older. A frown graced his features more often than not that day and he couldn't bring himself to fully enjoy the party that mayor Woop Slap and Makino had put together for him. (There was no one to steal food or cake from)

Setting out up to Sabo's grave in the morning did little to alleviate his mood, and when he arrived, he sat down cross-legged in front of it.

"I wonder where Ace is by now." Luffy told the breeze that played with his hair.

"I'm fourteen, Sabo! I'm older than you by now!" A mantra that he'd repeated for the last three years when Ace and he had paid visit to their brother's gravesite.

"Ace has gone off to become a pirate! Just like we promised!" a brief bout of silence, then, "He set out on the first. I guess it did make sense he was telling the truth back then." The teenager looked down at his lap, "I don't mind you two having more than one birthday, you know? It's more food and celebration for me, too." His eyes came back up watery.

"I'm by myself now. Dadan's happy Ace left – and she's worried, yanno? 'He'll get into all sorts of trouble', she said just yesterday, 'hope he won't mention us!" Snickering, Luffy relaxed his face from the stern facial imitation of Dadan's he'd tried. "I'm curious when he'll get a bounty – and what it'll be. I'll definitely surpass it, I promise you!" his hand was held to his heart in an expression of earnestness.

Luffy's expression turned into one of sad remembrance. "You'd have started out by now, as well. Though Ace would say you did already – that's cheating, though! We promised we'd do so at seventeen, not earlier!"

Leaves wavered in the light, warm wind that softly caressed Luffy's hair and face.

"I brought you some flowers, again. I hope you're having the bestest adventures that there are! Write them all down wherever you are right now, will you? So that you can read them to me and Ace once we're there, too!" Tears streaming down his face, Luffy deposited the flowers, got up, turned around and quietly ambled towards their treehouse, shoulders and head hanging down – but only for that day. For that day, it was okay to be sad and happy and everything in-between.