For Luffy, love was food and loud laughter.
Love was food served warm despite the hustle and bustle in Partys Bar. Love was raucous jeers and good-natured jokes shared amongst barrels of booze. Love was a cup if steaming hot tea and cries of how he should become a Marine. Love was meat fought over and hunted with two others. Love was each painstakingly made food to suit each crewmembers' palette. Love was crocodile roasted over a fire, clear soup stirred in a pot, and sandwhiches cut in half to be shared.
For Luffy, love was feeding and being fed, teasing remarks and tall tales.
For Luffy, love was around a table and surrounded by family and nakama.
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(For Dragon, love was books upon books of buried history and truth told however begrudingly.
Love was a Marine father telling him stories about pirates who were kind and Marines who were greedy and selfish. Love was lullabies singing about forgotten kingdoms and missing islands burned off the map. Love was heavy hearts and hunched shoulders as his father warns him about chains and slavery and Dragons undeserving of their name. Love was silent understanding despite being on opposite sides of the sand, of exchanged letters written in code, and of fists that cradle as much as they fight.
For Dragon, love was the blank truth and white lies, falling countries and crying people.
For Dragon, love was uncovering what was right with people he trusts by his side.)
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For Sabo, love was acts of services quiet and loud.
Love was a pipe thrown at him to defend himself and his life. Love was sewn clothes made to fit him better and clean goggles clumsily wiped. Love was sharing blankets and huddling together for warmth and contact. Love was toasting three red cups and grimacing over the acrid taste of sake stolen from a bandit who loved them through harsh words and actions. Love was pleading for another one's life. Love was sailing on the sea with the knowledge that they'll meet once again, someday in the future. Love was a coat over his sleeping form, a cup of hot coffee on his desk, and a folder of wanted posters of his dearest brothers compiled without asking.
For Sabo, love was showing you care without words spoken.
For Sabo, love was gentle hands and bright eyes.
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(For Garp, love was battles between enemies and spars between friends.
Love was knowing when to hold back and trusting the other to do the same. Love was hearty laughter after a fight fought well and drinks passed around. Love was exasperated admonishments and cheeky grins. Love was sneaking out in the middle of the night and stealing swords to practice their forms. Love was hitting a bullseye and crowing in success. Love was a silent sentinel by his side, wearing a fedora and a veiled threat. Love was rice crackers over mountains of paperwork. Love was newspaper clippings of his grandsons endeavors.
For Garp, love was skin to skin and blood on blood.
For Garp, love was having your back guarded by someone you'd lay your life on.)
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For Ace, love was... not his.
Love was for children without the Devil's blood in their veins. Love was for children who had parents and smiles and happy lives. Love was for those who didn't kill their mothers and angered the Fates. Love was for those who could laugh freely and and be loved.
For Ace, love was unreachable.
And then Luffy came along.
Love became stubborn will and sunny grins underneath a golden strawhat. Love became a scar curved underneath an eye that shone bright with glee. Love became clingy arms that wound thrice around his body. Love became a battered child with red all over him and a promise still sealed in his lips.
For Ace, love became Luffy, just as friendship was Sabo.
Love turned into a hundred spars every day with a blackboard of their progress. Love turned into building a treehouse that was theirs and a flag flying in the sky. Love turned into bandaging wounds and putting ointment on scars. Love turned into finding things in the scrapyard and dining-and-dashing in High Town. Love turned into facing flames higher than he was tall. Love turned into crying over a letter and making promises that couldn't be kept, turned into fury that fueled his flames, turned into a hug that saved just as it killed.
For Ace, love was Luffy and all the people that said they were happy he was alive.
For Ace, love was his life.
(Love was peach hair and a red hibiscus ever-blooming still in the South Blue. Love was baby clothes kept away in an attic and names written in faded parchment.
Love was dying and living for Portgas D. Rouge and Gol D. Roger.)