A—A—B
So many of you are little cheaters! I can't have Smoker go upstairs and then leave, that's taking both options :B
Ah well. More people voted B anyways, so here we are!
-PD
Semantics
Smoker glared at his mother before he turned around and hurried back upstairs to Perona's room. The door was open, but no one was in there. He went back to his and Zoro's room and saw the two of them playing video games on the little TV that sat on Smoker's dresser.
The pair paused when Smoker came in. "So," Zoro scooted over on his bed to make room, "what happened?"
"You were right. I think I made it worse." He sighed, "Hand me a controller."
Zoro quirked an eyebrow, "Are you sure you're okay?" He asked as he handed Smoker a controller.
Smoker snorted a slight laugh as he took the controller and sat down next to Zoro. "I'm fine. I'm not a wimpy crybaby like you are." The insult would've held more sting if he hadn't been halfway towards laughing while he said it.
Zoro chuckled some. "Shut up, you bastard. That's total bullshit."
"I wasn't the one who cried almost every time I fell off my bike."
"I was 4!"
"So was I."
"And you pushed me off."
"Semantics."
Zoro punched Smoker in the arm and he was quickly rewarded with revenge two-fold.
"You guys~" Perona whined, "Quit fighting! I can't hear the game!"
"Hey, you started up again without me!" Zoro cried indignantly from where he was pinned under his brother's arm.
Perona dropped her voice low to mimic her brother's voice in the most stupid sounding way possible. "Well, duuuh. You guys wouldn't shut up."
"Hey, I wanna play! Smoker, let me up." Smoker gave one last noogie before letting Zoro up, watching as his brother quickly reclaimed his controller before picked up his own.
"You gonna play, Smoker?"
"Yeah I'm gonna play. It's my game, you morons." As the three of them played, they quickly became fully immersed in their battle. So much so, they almost didn't notice when Smoker's phone go off.
"Aren't you gonna get that?" Perona asked as the phone chirped away, slightly irritated by the distracting noise. It was pulling her out of her intense gaming zone.
"Naw, it's probably a robo-call. Been getting a lot of those cause of the elections coming up. Besides, I'd rather rot my brain with this nonsense than to talk to some obnoxious computer." Smoker seized the moment when Zoro got distracted by the phone, sending Zoro's character off the screen.
"Haha!" Perona cried triumphantly. "Now you have to go get snacks, Zoro!" She was more than thrilled to have lasted longer than her over competitive brothers for once, even if she did still have Smoker to beat.
"Hey, I was the one who defeated him. I should be the one to make the demands around here."
Zoro wasn't even paying attention as he looked for his brother's phone. He'd felt the vibrations when it went off, and he was curious about who it could be. Mostly because this was the third time they had tried to call. He already had a sneaking suspicion about who it was, but he just wanted to confirm.
"Zoro, just leave it."
"Ah, found it." Zoro picked up the phone just as the ringing stopped. "3 missed calls from Portgas Ace." He reported.
Smoker felt a tick form on his brow. "Then definitely leave it." The phone started buzzing again, but the battery died out on the second ring.
"Your battery died." Zoro sighed and looked over at Smoker who was now battling Perona alone. "You can't just ignore him like this."
"Yes I can."
"It's not fair to him."
"Hey, hey~ Are we gonna talk about Ace now?" All of Perona's interest transferred right over to her brothers, subsequently resulting in a win for Smoker. Not a very satisfying one, but a win nonetheless.
"No, we're not. There's nothing to talk about."
Perona cried in frustration as she flopped back onto the bed. "You're so boring I can hardly stand it!" She rolled onto her side and glared past Zoro at him. "You grumpy old man!"
"Shut up, I'm not grumpy!"
"You were born grumpy." Zoro teased.
"Shut up!"
"Grumpy geezer." Perona and Zoro smirked at each other as they pestered their brother. It was one of the few times they ever worked towards a common goal.
"I am not! Look, I don't see what would be so interesting about talking about Ace. Why not ask Zoro who he's interested in for a change." Smoker set up a new battle, this time with CPUs as well.
"Cause Zoro already told me about it. He's not an uptight old man like you."
"Che, whatever." Smoker frowned as they started playing again. Just as the battle was getting good, there was a knock at their door before Mihawk walked in.
"Smoker, Zoro, can I talk to you for a moment?" Mihawk beckoned his two sons before turning to leave when he spotted the stain on the carpet. He looked back up at his boys with a disapproving look before heading out the door.
"Shit, did we forget to clean that up?" Zoro whispered as he slid off the bed.
"Guess so." Smoker was right behind him, following Zoro out and down.
Mihawk sat down in his favorite armchair while the boys sat on the couch. Their mom was nowhere to be seen, so they could safely assume she'd gone to bed.
"So, er, Dad, What's going on?" Smoker asked, fingers fiddling with each other as he waited for what was to come.
"Boys, there's something that your Mother and I have decided to finally confess to."
Smoker and Zoro shared a confused look before turning back to their father.
"Before we knew your mother was pregnant with you two, we had a brief separation." This was news to both boys. Their eyes widened simultaneously, but they said nothing. "During that time, we entertained the idea of being with other people."
Smoker and Zoro looked at each other before looking back at their dad. They weren't sure about all this, and they didn't know whether or not they really wanted to hear about this.
"...To cut this story short and to quite possibly make it as awkward as possible, when your mother called me to tell me she was pregnant with you two, I was in someone else's bed."
The twin's mouths dropped open.
"...A man's."
Their chins smashed through the floor. This didn't sound like their father in the slightest.
"It greatly upset your mother, not to mention all the slander she got for my mistake. We even had to move to a new town. She's had her suspicions about you two for a little while now, but it's bringing up old memories and is really upsetting her. She just doesn't want our family to go through that mess again." He looked both of his sons in the eye in turn. "Smoker, Zoro, I want you two to know that we aren't against you. It's our issue, and we're the ones who have to resolve it. But we would still like for you two to avoid drawing unnecessary attention."
Smoker and Zoro were still trying to wrap their heads around their father's earlier confession. However, they didn't have time to properly process the information before Mihawk stood up again. "Now, go clean up that splotch on the rug before it becomes an unsightly stain." And with that, he disappeared as if he hadn't just dropped the biggest bomb he could manage on his sons.
The two sat in silence a moment more before Smoker spoke up. "Damn...I wasn't expecting that at all..."
"...Yeah...me neither..."
"I kinda didn't want to know that Dad shacked up with some guy."
"Yeah..." They turned to look at each other. "You know," Zoro continued, "we have one majorly fucked up family."
o()o()o
"Dammit!" Ace cried as he threw his phone down onto his bed. He'd tried calling Smoker at least 6-7 times, but not once did he pick up. The 4th time he tried to call, his call was disconnected almost instantly, which probably meant that Smoker had hung up on him. However, now none of his calls were even ringing, going straight to voicemail instead. Ace could only assume that Smoker had turned off his phone. He decided to call once more and simply listened to the sound of Smoker's voice as the voicemail message played. He must've seemed like a desperate stalker with how many times he'd called. He definitely felt like a desperate stalked, especially the desperate part. He couldn't get thoughts of Smoker out of his head and as his imagination spiraled, he felt himself get more and more desperate.
"Ace, seriously, it's late. He's not going to pick up any time soon. Just go to bed." Sabo complained from where he lay in bed across the room. Luffy was already asleep in the bunk above Ace, the beeping of Sabo's monitor the only other sound in the room besides Luffy's snoring.
"Sorry..." He mumbled before rolling over in bed with his phone clasped in his hands. He stared at it a moment before getting up and opening the window, climbing out onto the roof and closing the window back most of the way. He sat down and stared out over his tiny, mostly dirt back yard before calling Smoker one more time.
"Hey, you've reached my voicemail. Sorry I couldn't answer, but leave me a message and I'll call you back soon as I can...Uh, Bye." Ace always smiled when he heard Smoker's voicemail. Suddenly he realized that it had beeped and he was being recorded.
"Yeah, hey, Smoker..."
Ace climbed back in through the window as quietly as he could. Sabo and Luffy were both snoring away as he crawled into bed. He'd had to record his message many times over before he felt it was good enough to send. He just hoped Smoker would listen.
o()o()o
Smoker and Zoro were finally just climbing into bed when their father reappeared in their doorway. "Before you go to bed I want that popcorn and soda cleaned up. It's not sitting on the carpet all night."
"Dad, really?"
"Really, Zoro. Now."
Zoro and Smoker let out grunts of annoyance as they picked themselves up and went to the hallway closet to get the little dust buster and the carpet cleaning solution.
"Oh, hey, Smoker, is that your charger?"
"Huh, yeah. I was lookin for it. The hell's it doin in here?" Smoker grabbed his charger along with the mini handheld vacuum. The twins went back to their room and Smoker plugged in his phone as they cleaned. When they were finished and starting to settle for bed, there was the ding of a voicemail alert.
"Smoker—"
"I'm not answering."
"Just listen to the damn voicemail and quit being such a fuckin pussy about it." Zoro hit the lights and went to bed, careful to avoid the wet spot on the freshly cleaned carpet.
Smoker sat by the outlet where his phone was stationed and turned it on. Sure enough, Ace had called an additional 2 times since his phone had shut off. He unlocked it and opened the voicemail, listening to Ace's voice.
"Smoker, hey, it's me. I know you probably don't want to be bothered with me right now, but I just really wanted to talk to you. I'm pretty sure Zoro's already told you all about what really happened in that alley by Alubarna. I didn't mean to upset you so much, and if it's alright with you, I'd like to apologize in person. Maybe I could stop by after your shift tomorrow? So, uh, if you get this message just call me back. I really want to see you."
The line suddenly went dead, leaving Smoker sitting there frozen stiff. He looked at his phone then over at his brother's already snoring form. He looked back to his phone's screen before pressing the replay button, listening to it again and again into the night.
o()o()o
The next morning, Ace looked, and felt, like crap, if one were to be perfectly frank. He'd had another night filled with terrifying sleep paralysis, and hardly got a wink. His eyes were baggy and his skin was paler than usual. He went over to the freezer and pulled out 4 blueberry waffles and put them in the toaster before going to the fridge and grabbing a couple eggs to scramble.
Luffy was sitting at the table eating a bowl of cereal listlessly; he was used to a much bigger breakfast, and 3 bowls of cereal would hardly do. Ace was usually the one to do breakfast on Saturdays, but he just didn't feel at all up to it that day.
"Mornin Luffy. Sabo at the hospital?"
"Yeah. He left with Dadan a little while ago." Luffy looked up at his foster brother with a quirked eyebrow. "You didn't sleep well."
"Not really." Ace said as he beat the eggs.
Luffy didn't say another word about it as he scooped more cereal in to his mouth. "But...are you gonna make me eggs too?"
Ace chuckled a bit before going to grab more eggs. "Sure, Luf." His waffles popped up and Ace grabbed one of the steaming hot waffles right out of the toaster, hissing a bit at how hot they still were. He looked at the clock and saw that it was already almost 10; Smoker's shift started at 11. He hurried his ass up, practically throwing the hot eggs at his brother and sprinting upstairs to get dressed as he scarfed down 3 other waffles and a serving of scrambled eggs with ketchup. He popped a piece of gum in his mouth just in case his breath offended.
"Hey, Ace, can you give me a ride to Usopp's later?"
"Yeah, sure Luffy, if I'm back in time. I'll have my phone on me." He slammed the door as he hurried down the stairs and towards where he was sure he'd be able to intercept Smoker on his way to work. He eventually got to the intersection and looked around until he saw Smoker walking about a block and a half ahead, and he sprinted to catch up. "OI! SMOKER! WAIT!" He called.
Smoker had his earbuds in, so he couldn't hear Ace calling out to him. So it was only natural that he'd have a moment of panic when he felt a hand clamp down on his shoulder.
"Oh, sorry, I didn't know you couldn't hear me."
"...Ace..." Smoker frowned, "What, are you stalking me now?" Smoker tried not to let his glare falter when he saw the little bit of hurt on Ace's face.
"Well, no, but I...did you get my message?"
Of course he'd gotten Ace's message. He must've listened to it 10 times over at least. "...My phone died last night." Excluding the whole truth wasn't technically a lie, he supposed.
"...Oh. Well, I was wondering if you might wanna...well, if you wanted to hang out after you got off work."
"Ace, I'm really not up to it right now."
"Come on, please? If you're still mad—"
"I'm not mad." He was hurt.
"Smoker," Ace reached out and grabbed Smoker's arm, "look, I'm trying to—"
"Just leave me alone!" He didn't want to see Ace right now, especially after the conversation between Zoro and his mother last night. Ace was just about the first and last person he wanted to be with at that moment.
"Smoker!" Ace grabbed Smoker's other arm and turned him to face him, stopping the young man in his tracks. Smoker grabbed at the lapels of Ace's coat, trying to push him off, but he only succeeded in drawing him closer. The two refused to give an inch, and they were incredibly close. Their frustrated struggling slowed down and they locked eyes, silver with ebony. Ace leaned in to press his lips to Smoker's but Smoker turned away.
"Get off me." He mumbled, a blush spreading across his cheeks.
"Don't want to." Ace leaned in and pressed his nose to Smoker's cheek, nuzzling it a bit.
Smoker squeezed his eyes shut when he felt Ace press against him and his warm breath against his cold cheek. "You're so childish..."
"I know." He pressed his lips against Smoker's cheek, pecking it gently. He pulled away and leaned in to peck his cheek again, slowly trailing soft, fluttery kisses towards his mouth, trying to get Smoker to kiss him.
Smoker's face kept getting redder and redder until he felt Ace's lips at the corner of his mouth. "Stop!" He finally succeeded in pushing Ace away. "Just, just stop! I'm going to be late for work." He turned and stormed ahead, ignoring Ace as he called out his name.
A) Pursue after Smoker
B) Give him his space...for now. (Next Chapter)
Author's Note
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