Author's Note: Okay so I can't believe it, this is the last chapter of Beautiful Disaster! I hope this was as interesting and thrilling for you as it was for me. I have to thank you guys so much, I was beyond nervous to enter this fandom, since there are others who know this archive so much more than I do and I was sure I was diving into disaster. This was also another one of those things I've never tried before (abuse, rape, self-harm, sex scenes in general ...) so I'm really glad you guys liked it! If you guys haven't noticed, I've started to write a story called Speechless. For those of you who wanted other stories, I plan on writing them all, but it was really just a matter of which would be written first. If you want to read more about what I've written, then I guess check out my profile or my new story. If you're sick of me and I've made you hate the fandom, I apologize. I don't own One Piece. I will be asking you one last question at the end of this chapter. I can't believe this is really happening ... I hope this ending doesn't suck!
Beautiful Disaster
By: Setkia
Full Summary
Sanji is the assistant cook of the world-renowned restaurant, the Baratie, the only restaurant like it in the world. He's a successful chef and flirts with the customers every chance he can get but there's a problem. It's all a facade. The cooks give a new meaning to the word "abusive", both mental and physical. The only thing keeping Sanji alive is his love for cooking and a good ol' pack of cigarettes.
Zoro Roronoa is a swordsman who suddenly has more change in his pocket than he expected and enters the Baratie by recommendation. His waiter happens to be a curly browed man with an adoration for cigarettes. An attempt speak to the head chef goes horribly wrong and he gets sucked into the crumbling world of the chef's, wondering how he can possibly save him and better yet, why does he want to save him in the first place?
WARNINGS FOR THIS CHAPTER, the following things are present in this chapter of Beautiful Disaster:
Mentions of rape, past self-abuse, abuse
Chapter 42: Little Wonders
Our lives are made
In these small hours
These little wonders,
These twists & turns of fate
Time falls away,
But these small hours,
These small hours still remain
-Rob Thomas, Little Wonders
"What do you want to do?"
Sanji gave Zoro a strange look. A typical Wednesday afternoon lying in bed, staring at the ceiling while tracing patterns across the others chest and now they were asking about what Sanji wanted to do? "What do you mean?"
"What's your dream in life? I realize you've never told me," Zoro said. He laced their fingers together, grinning. Six months later and the nut was replaced with a ring, along with a matching ring. Yes, Zoro had decided to stop being cheap and they had settled for a simple, silver band with a single bronze jewel in the centre.
"My dream?" Sanji repeated, frowning slightly. "I never really thought about it."
"You're going to be twenty-five in March and you've never considered what your dream is?" Zoro shook his head and laughed. "Come on, I've known since I was eight, you can't seriously tell me you have no true aspirations in life, can you?"
Sanji shrugged. "I mean I guess I have one, but it's kind of stupid."
"Tell me."
The cook took a deep breath and sighed. "I … I don't know …"
"If you have a dream, you have to tell me. You already know all of my idiotic friends' dreams."
"Our idiotic friends," Sanji corrected.
Zoro laughed. "Right. Our idiotic friends." He pulled their hands lower towards their stomachs and grinned. "Are you scared? You know you can tell me anything."
"It's not really a dream that you'd have any interest in," Sanji said. "I mean I want to do it, but still … And haven't we kept your friends in the dark for long enough?"
"About what? They know we're in a relationship."
"I meant about my past."
Zoro blinked. He looked Sanji in the eyes and gulped. "Are you sure?"
"I'm ready for them to know," Sanji said. "I don't want to live a lie anymore."
"You're not living a lie," Zoro said, rolling his eyes. "You just haven't told them everything."
"It still feels the same as lying."
Zoro nodded and brought their joined hands up to his mouth, kissing Sanji's knuckles gently. "Then we'll do it when you're ready. Now about that dream of yours?"
Sanji bit his bottom lip.
He and Zeff had created a restaurant out of nothing, built it up and had it ruined before their very eyes. Even without Patty and Carne there, having been fired four months previously much to Sanji's great joy, the rumours about what had happened on those days would still remain. The restaurant's reputation was ruined, at least to the few who had witnessed the abuse and Zoro's fight with the cooks. Sanji wanted to build something concrete, something without taint, something that would stand forever, start a legacy. But surely Zoro would have no interest in something like that?
"You're over-thinking things again," Zoro told him softly.
"You under-think things too often," Sanji shot back with no real venom in his words.
"So …?" Zoro pressed.
Sanji sighed. "A restaurant." He looked at Zoro briefly before turning away and taking a deep breath. "When Zeff took me in, we had one thing in common. Food. We both loved cooking and we had both either seen or experienced someone going hungry and we didn't want that to ever happen again. We created a restaurant with the hopes of feeding every hungry person who came by. I know the prices were high, but we didn't intend to let anyone who wanted to eat leave without having at least one meal. But the more the staff grew, the less those priorities became … well, priorities. In the end it kinda went to hell. I want to create something that holds its purpose, a restaurant that accomplishes what it set out to do." Sanji shook his head. "Sounds stupid, right?"
Zoro was silent for a moment.
Sanji took it as confirmation.
"Stop that."
Sanji gave Zoro a strange look. "What do you mean?"
"You were just imagining the worst case scenario, weren't you?" he accused.
"What? No I wasn't!"
"You so were," Zoro said, frowning. "When are you going to realize I'm not them? I'm not going to judge you like you think I will." His brow creased. "I don't want you to worry about anything, okay?"
"Yeah well, I can't just get over it that quickly," Sanji said. He sighed. "I wish I could write a letter to myself from the past, tell him all the screw-ups he made and teach him to avoid them. It'd be wonderful."
"I wouldn't want that," Zoro said softly. "I mean if you could avoid what you went through that would be amazing and wonderful, but then if that happened, you might not have met me. And I don't want to imagine my life without you," Zoro blushed, turning his head away. "If I wrote a letter to a younger me, then I guess Kuina would still be alive She wouldn't have killed herself, maybe I'd have been more social, maybe I would've joined some support group for feminists or something, I don't know. Maybe I wouldn't have taken up kendo, therefore wouldn't have eventually had enough money to go the Baratie. Never regret anything in your life, you might hate it now, but if it hadn't happened, you wouldn't be where you are now. You like where you are now in life, right?"
"Yeah," Sanji said softly.
"So don't regret anything."
Sanji nodded but he knew it would take longer to get there than Zoro implied.
"So you want to start a restaurant of your own," Zoro said. "I think that's great. I could help you with it, I don't know, figure out colour schemes or something?"
"Colour schemes?" Sanji snorted.
"What?"
"Can't imagine you as an interior designer," Sanji said, laughing.
"I think I could make it sexy," Zoro said with a grin.
"Oh yeah? I'd like to see you try."
"Was that a challenge?"
"Maybe."
The two of them burst into laughter, unable to hold it in anymore.
Sanji bit his bottom lip and grinned. This, he decided, this was how he wanted to spend the rest of his life.
"Is this actually happening?" asked Nami in a voice of fake disbelief. "Are Zoro and Sanji actually hosting a party at their own house for once?"
Luffy rubbed his hands together and grinned. "I can't wait to have some of Sanji's steak!" he said, laughing. "You make your own sauce, don't you?"
"Of course," Sanji said, trying not to look too nervous.
He told himself over and over again he was ready and Zoro told him not to rush it, but he wanted to get it off his chest. He wanted there to be no murky water between him and his friends. He was starting live over again, a fresh start. As much as he wanted to forget his past, they deserved to know. They had accepted Sanji despite knowing nothing about his background and it was about time they knew.
Sanji laid the last plate down on the table and cleared his throat.
Luffy, Usopp, Nami, Vivi, Kaya and Ace all sat before him and suddenly he felt as though his throat was clamming up. Oh dear God, was he going to have another attack? He had been fine for the past few months, but what if that was the calm before the storm?
He felt Zoro's hand on his shoulder, pulling him out of his rapidly running thoughts. "I uh, decided something," Sanji said in a voice he hoped wasn't shaking from his nerves. "Over a year ago, I pushed my way into your lives and I'm sure you have questions about where I'm from. Zoro didn't tell you anything because I wasn't ready for you to know. But," Sanji sucked in a deep breath, "I'm ready now."
The table was silent, obviously waiting for him to continue. There was no judgement in their eyes, only worry and it helped relax him a little bit.
"I guess the first thing you should know is where I came from. When I first met Zoro, it was at a restaurant. The Baratie."
Luffy's eyes seemed to widen in recognition at the name.
"You might've heard about it, there was a law-suit filed against it a few months ago by a man by the name of Fullbody. It's a very high-class restaurant, five stars, so I'm told." He bit his bottom lip. "If you've read the newspapers, then you'd know that the law-suit was filed because a man was attacked. By Zoro."
No one seemed surprised that Zoro had lost his temper at someone, but they didn't know why of course. Sanji could see the non-comprehension in their eyes, asking questions, but not daring to word them quite yet.
"If you haven't heard of that case then a less recent case would be the one in which another man was attacked, verbally and physically, by two cooks who had previously worked there." Here, Sanji had to close his eyes and remember to breathe properly. "Those men's names were Patty and Carne. The one they were attacking … was me."
Nami closed her eyes and began shaking her head, Vivi had a look of pure horror on her face and Kaya was mumbling to herself, something about how it was impossible. Ace had a grim look on his face that matched Luffy's. Usopp looked at Zoro as though to ask why he hadn't said anything before now.
"If you remember, a few months ago I donated Zoro some of my blood because the idiot got himself into a stupid fight," Sanji said. "And Nami, I'm sure you saw I had a few markings on myself. If Luffy would remember, I had a few scars on myself when we first met." Sanji closed his eyes and slowly rolled up his right sleeve. He didn't want to cry, he wouldn't cry, but dear God was it hard not to. "I … was abused during the time I worked at the Baratie." The tears were trying to slip out past his shut eyelids, but he bit his lip and tried to hold them back. "For a little over fourteen years, I was physically abused as well as mentally." He drew in a long, deep breath, knowing he was shaking. "Shortly before Zoro took me out of there, they had begun to … sexually violate me,"
Here, Vivi and Nami gasped while Kaya had turned her head away and seemed to be sobbing.
Sanji drew in a shaky breath. "I … also used to be depressed and had an inferiority complex, as well as a few other problems …" Sanji didn't want to name them all right then, saying he used to be suicidal and cut was not something he wanted to broadcast. He wasn't ready just yet to let that part of him be known. He didn't know just how to word it, how to finish his shaky speech and he was sure his knees were close to buckling and he was on the verge of tears, if he wasn't crying already.
Sanji drew in a shaky breath. "I just … thought you deserved to know."
Wincing, he opened his eyes, ready for the wave of sympathy, disgust, or whatever other emotion the others saw fit to associate with his situation.
He saw none of it.
He saw admiration. He saw respect. He saw pride.
"S-Sanji," said Kaya, pushing aside Usopp's hand that was offering her a handkerchief. "You … you're very brave."
Vivi and Nami nodded in unison, as though to confirm Kaya's words.
Luffy's eyes were shining with respect. He didn't seem to be able to form words, but it was obvious he had a new respect for Sanji that went farther than his fighting ability and his cooking skills.
Sanji didn't understand it, he just couldn't comprehend why this was something that caused the group to be so admiring of him. Wasn't he soiled? Tainted? Why were they looking at him like he was some sort of hero? It didn't make any sense!
Sanji didn't trust his throat to work and instead took a seat at the table, the entire room falling into silence.
He was tense throughout the entire dinner and yet when it was over and everyone was getting ready to leave, it was as though nothing had changed. As though nothing Sanji had said had changed their opinion of him for anything more than the better.
When they said good-bye to the last guest, Zoro wrapped his arms around Sanji tightly.
"You're amazing, Sanji," he said softly whispering into his hair.
"W-why were they …" Sanji couldn't stop the tears now, they were coming out and his grip on Zoro tightened. He closed his eyes tightly and gripped Zoro's shirt. "I don't understand," he said. "Why … aren't they disgusted?"
"There's nothing to be disgusted of," Zoro said gently. "How many times will I have to tell you this? You're strong Sanji. You're so strong."
"But …"
"They admire you because you made it out alive, they respect you because you weren't beaten when others would've fallen, they are proud of you because you defied odds," Zoro said softly. "They're amazed by what you've managed to conquer. Remember what I told you? Don't ever be ashamed of your scars, they're signs that you're stronger than what tried to kill you."
Zoro tilted Sanji's head up and kissed him gently. "You're strong and beautiful Sanji."
"I'm a disaster," Sanji said, shaking his head. He thought he had come far, but here he was, crying while being held by his boyfriend for saying the very thing he should've said in the first place. He hadn't made any progress, sure, the cutting had stopped, the nightmares had receded, but in the end he was still terrified, he was still worried, he was still paranoid.
"You're a beautiful disaster then," Zoro said with a grin. "And you're mine. Remember these?" Zoro gestured towards the ring on his finger. "The second they legalize this, I'm asking you."
"Is that a threat?" Sanji teased, Zoro already lightening up his mood.
"Perhaps."
Sanji grinned. "I look forward to it then."
"Why am I blindfolded? Is this some sort of weird kink you've discovered?"
"I wasn't thinking about it like that before, but now I am, thanks for that," Zoro said with a grin. "Can't you just trust me? We're almost there."
"This isn't going to be one of those things where you take off the blind fold and you're asking me to prom or some shit like that, are you?"
Zoro laughed and whispered in Sanji's ear. "No, it's better."
"Anything's better than that, who would want to go to a shitty prom?" asked Sanji to no one in particular.
"You're ruining the moment," Zoro told him. He spun Sanji around slowly, much to Sanji's discomfort. He trusted Zoro, but he still preferred to see things with his own eyes rather than someone else's. "Okay, you can take it off now."
"So we're not having kinky blindfolded sex?" Sanji said.
"Bastard, just take it off!"
"You just get right to the point, don't you Marimo? I can't preform under pressure—"
"Stop turning this into an innuendo!" Zoro said with a frustrated sigh. "I'll just do it!" Zoro pulled at the piece of cloth over Sanji's eyes and the blond had to blink several times to adjust to the new light.
When he was finally able to see properly again, he was confused.
He was standing in an empty room, very big, very broad. It almost reminded him of an empty ballroom. There were swinging doors on one side of the room and a twirling staircase leading to an upper floor. It kind of reminded Sanji of a vacant Baratie.
"Zoro, what's going on?"
"I uh, I've been kind of saving up," Zoro said, rubbing his neck sheepishly. "And I thought abbot what you told me, about the Baratie and how much you wanted it to be a place that served everyone could be like a home for you and the ones you loved and so I rented out this building and I was wondering if we could maybe, possibly, potentially start a restaurant here?"
Sanji's mouth dropped open. "What?"
"It was just an idea," Zoro said quickly. "I mean you don't have to, I just thought since you can't really go back to the Baratie then you would need somewhere else you could feed people and make them happy," he reasoned. "I could just tell the guy in charge we don't want the space—"
"Don't you fucking dare," Sanji said, grinning widely.
"So I take it that we're going to take it?" Zoro asked, giving him a cheeky grin.
"I'm killing you if we don't take it," Sanji promised.
"Would now be a good time to mention that I've decided I'm going to let you pay rent?"
Sanji stared at him. "Are you serious?"
To be able to pay rent, it made everything more real, paying rent meant that now Sanji was contributing towards the taxes, he was finally being allowed to pay his own electricity bills, his own water fees. It might add up to a lot, but that meant that if Zoro was depending on him to pay half the rent, that would mean he needed him there, there would be no reason to kick him out, no way to get rid of him.
It made everything seem even more permanent than the rings, the declarations of love, the nights sharing the same bed and all the fabulous dinners combined together.
This was real.
"Yeah," Zoro said, rubbing the back of his head sheepishly. "If you still want to—"
"Of course I fucking want to, Marimo!" Sanji said, rolling his eyes. He would get to pay rent, they were going to buy this building, they were going to legally own something together, both their names would go on the lease, it would truly be theirs.
"We need need a name for this joint," Zoro pointed out. "Unless you want the Baratie two-point-o."
Sanji shook his head. "I've got the perfect idea."
"It's not going to be something stupid like Basket or something, is it?"
"Chez Marimo," Sanji said with a grin that split open his whole face. "Got any complaints?"
"Does this mean we'll have to be associated with that weird-ass book store?"
Sanji shook his head and laughed. "Got a problem with my naming skills, Marimo?"
"I'd say you've come a long way," said Zoro, wrapping an arm around the frame of the thin cook.
"We both have," Sanji said.
"We're getting too mushy, aren't we?" Zoro asked, turning to Sanji with a grin.
"It's humanizing," Sanji said.
"More like humiliating," Zoro said, rolling is eyes.
Sanji hit him gently in the chest, giving him a quick kiss.
"You missed," Zoro said.
"What do you mean I—murph!"
At that moment the door opened and in walked Luffy, Nami and Ace.
Ace snickered. "Should we leave them alone?"
"Oh my God, was that his tongue?" Nami squealed.
"I think your girlfriend has a gay fetish," said Ace, turning to his brother with a frown. "Should we have her checked?"
Zoro pulled away from Sanji and rolled his eyes at the trio in front of him. "Get out!" he yelled.
Sanji grinned and gave Nami an apologetic look. "Sorry Nami but me and the Marimo need to break in the room, get a feel of the place, you know," he said.
"You guys are going to have hot kinky restaurant sex, aren't you?" Nami said with a pout.
"Go," Zoro said, pushing at Nami to get her to leave.
When she finally did leave along with the D Brothers, Zoro turned to Sanji and grinned. "Now what were we doing?"
"I believe Nami called it hot, kinky restaurant sex?" Sanji said, twirling the fabric of Zoro's shirt and pulling him closer.
"Long title, isn't it?" Zoro said with a grin, kissing Sanji gently. "They really should, shorten it—"
"Shut up and fuck me Marimo."
Zoro obeyed.
Author's Note #2: The thank yous! (The last ones for Beautiful Disaster ... I'm still in shock.)
Guest: I am beyond glad you enjoyed it and hopefully, you liked this chapter too!
bronze andromeda shun: And I realize that you've reviewed to Speechless before I saw your review here ... Well, I hope this wasn't a dreadful ending for you and that you enjoyed your wild ride with me.
Shizuka Taiyou: And I know about two of those people you said were perves. The other one, not so much. Don't even ask me why, but I love the idea of innocent guys and Zoro started off that way and then he just kinda got ... messed up. Such is life.
Vicky: Tada, I hope you haven't loved the story only to hate the ending ...
Random Person: ALWAYS LOVE THE AWKWARD!
KleinXDgirl: Ten Count, what do I say about it? It's killing me, that there hasn't been a new english translation for new chapters, I'm dying inside. I don't know why I enjoy making Zoro a therapist, but so yeah. I will be writing each story I've mentioned, but it's just a matter of order of publishing really. I can't start them all at once or else all the plot points will get confused in my head and yeah, I'd cry of over-writing (I'm lying, I love writing too much ...)
Guest #2: I hope you like Speechless, if you've checked it out.
Raigon: Actually, this is the end.
X. summergrey .X: Because Japan is mean, no they aren't engaged but if Sanji had just listened to Zoro, they could've been on their honeymoon. I prefer them in Japan though.
NaruHinaLuvr: I'm really, really glad you like it and consider it that good!
lilcutieprincess: I hope this ending wasn't horrible.
fangal4life: The other two stories will be written, at some point. You'd be surprised how much angst I can get in. I like to balance things, happy chapter, depressing chapter, happy chapter, you see the pattern?
Okay now my last question to you guys: This has been a seriously wild ride. I want to know any last thoughts you have about this. Have you enjoyed the journey? Am I being ridiculous, starting another story for this archive without even being in the 200s of the show? What was your favorite part? Was it worth your while or do you feel like you just wasted hours of your life? Please let me know! If you leave your username, I will PM you (if you have PM on) and give you my reply to your review.
And now to edit.
Oh Dear God, why did I write so much?!
