Day 27
Monday, December 30th
Dear Journal,
Im so sad.. I only have today, tomorrow and the next day left of Christmas Break! I don't get why we go back on a stupid Thursday of all days.. psh. Oh well. Its only 2 days till Ace's birthday, I'm so excited! I hope he'll be happy..oh my stomach, its gonna kill me if I don't eat anything soon, so, here I goooo~
- M.D.L
Barreling down the stairs and into the dining room, Ace awaited his younger brother's presence and had prepared a little extra for breakfast. The poor older brother would've been run-through if he didn't know better of Luffy, and swiftly dodged out of the way, making sure to balance the plates on his arms carefully.
"OOOoooOO! Ace! You made breakfast today?!" Luffy squawked, attempting to grab every plate off of his brother.
"Yes.. and would you stop that?!"
Sitting down obediently at the table, Luffy sat as still as possible while Ace extravagantly waited on him, placing every plate around him. He couldn't help but drool at it all...
"It seems you like the look of it?" Ace asked with a smirk, holding up a hand to stop Luffy from eating while he waved around the last plate teasingly. Luffy nodded absent-mindedly, reaching a hand out to steal the plate from Ace's hand.
"Oh no, no, what do you say~?" Ace teased, holding the plate way above his head and out of reach. Luffy absorbed Ace's question and thought about it, sitting down, his face turning a little red.
"Please?" Luffy finally chirped, completely sure that he was right. Ace could've squealed.. he didn't, of course, but the thought was still there. He was almost upset that Luffy wasn't correct this time, for two reasons.
"Hmmm.. close," Ace responded, taking a seat next to Luffy, who had momentarily forgotten about the food.
"Hnnnn... thank you?"
"You're welcome, but not quite."
"What do you want from me, evil food-hiding fiend?!" Luffy grumbled, falling lifelessly against his brother as he continued his struggle fruitlessly. Ace listened to Luffy spout his nonsense in the hope of guessing the password right.
"How about an 'I love you', ne?"
Luffy sat back up and looked at Ace with an incredulous expression as it dawned on him that he hadn't even thought of that! How stupid was he, really?
"Hmpf.. Well, I do love you.." Luffy said, looking the complete opposite way as his arm wrapped around Ace's back and tried a different angle for the ever-agile plate.
"Oh? Do you now? Say it like you mean it."
"Ace.."
"Hmmm~?"
"...I love you.."
"Sorry, couldn't hear you..?"
"I love you, damnit!" Luffy yelped, and Ace was satisfied, pulling Luffy in with his free hand for a kiss, which Luffy enjoyed for more than one reason. Unfortunately, or maybe fortunately, Ace was too distracted to notice that..
"Ha! Got it!" Luffy exclaimed in triumph, taking the plate from Ace's hand while he was busy lusting away. Ace only smirked and let him take it, watching his brother lovingly as he gobbled everything up. Not every person could just sit there and watch.. it took a real man to brave an eating-Luffy.
"What can we possibly accomplish on a Monday?" Zoro mused to himself, spread across his floor in his thinking position. Bartolomeo snorted, sitting in Zoro's chair as he observed his brother in his natural habitat, as this was an uncommon occurrence to be able to see him this way.
"'What can't we do on a Monday?' is more like it," Bartolomeo replied, jabbing a heel into Zoro's side, who only scoffed.
"Luffy is always full of ideas.. wonder what he's doing," Zoro commented, more to himself than anything, and rolled over onto his back to retrieve the cell phone from his pocket. Bartolomeo raised an eyebrow at this assumption.
"I'm not sure you really want to know what he's doing," the older muttered, just loud enough for Zoro to hear who only kicked him in the shin while he texted Luffy for ideas. No reply..
Zoro suddenly thought for a second that he might agree with Bartolomeo about not wanting to know, but then he grew too curious and really did want to know what his friend was up to. So he tried calling Luffy instead.
"Burup-burup-burup... "
They waited...
"Burup-burup-burup..."
Bartolomeo yawned, getting a glare from his brother.
"Burup-buru-gotcha~"
"Zoro!" Luffy chirped into the phone, fending off everyone at the table who wanted a piece of his breakfast while holding the phone in between his face and neck. Zoro was not sure to react to the background noise.
"Hi... sounds like a battle field over there, Lu," Zoro commented, putting it on speaker for Bartolomeo to hear. It sure did sound like war..
"Shishishi! Really?"
Zoro looked to Bartolomeo who only facepalmed and they both sweatdropped as they turned back to the phone, almost forgetting the reason that they had called the boy in the first place. 'Oh yeah..'
"Hey Luffy, sorry to interrupt but, uh... what do you have planned today?" Zoro asked warily, afraid that he just asked Luffy out on a date. Ace heard this question and narrowed his eyes, managing to snatch a slice of bacon off one of Luffy's plates and munched on it idly while he crossed his arms, waiting for Luffy's response. It took the boy a while to really think about it..
Meanwhile, Rouge and Dragon did the same thing as Ace and almost laughed at themselves for having to steal food from their son while he wasn't looking.
"Ahh, I don't know, why?" Luffy finally responded, much to Ace's liking..
"Oh, you know, I was just bored and wondered if maybe you had any ideas.." Zoro replied, looking back at Bartolomeo who could only imagine the scowl on Ace's face at that moment. Well, actually they couldn't just imagine because they could feel it resonating its deadly aura over the space in between them.
"Don't think we were asking you out or anything!" Bartolomeo commented, just loud enough for the brother-boyfriend to catch. There; all was well in the world.
"Shishi! Well, now that I think about it, I'm kinda bored too, well, food is never boring, but once the food is gone then its boring."
..Spoken like a real man, a real man indeed...
"Hmm, you saying that makes sense...anyway, I- um, I'll see ya," Zoro said, wanting to get out of the war-zone as quick as possible.
"Aw, okay! See ya!"
Ending the call, Zoro turned to his companion with a scared face.
"Ace is going to kill us.."
"No, I think we're already dead."
Meanwhile, the D brothers helped clean up their breakfast mess and then hightailed back to Ace's room and sat there, thinking of things to do.
"'Things to do' not including Luffy..." Ace thought to himself..
"We could.. um...go to the movies?"
"Nah, I'm feeling anti-social towards people outside our household."
"We couldddd... we could have brunch?"
"We literally just ate!"
"Darn.. I thought that was the best idea yet.."
Ace sometimes wondered how much Luffy's brain and stomach were connected, to which concluded that maybe Luffy's brain was really just a second stomach acting as a black hole that took everything in as it whirled and whirled, thinking. Somewhat amused by his imagination, Ace smirked and then suddenly had a thought.
"Hey, how 'bout we go see Sabo?" Ace suggested, glancing towards his brother with an excited look. Luffy blinked for a moment and then nodded with a grin, popping up off the floor, ready to go already, well, almost.
Luffy ran downstairs and grabbed his hat off of te back of his chair at the dining room table, and the leapt back upstairs, saluting Ace like a soldier.
"Preparation complete, soldier!?" Ace barked, sounding too much like the brothers' grandfather.
"Yes, sir!" Luffy giggled, holding his hand to his forehead till Ace dropped his own, "Now let's go see Sabo!"
"Affirmative," Ace replied, patting Luffy's shoulder before steering him out of his room and down the stairs, getting their coats on before jumping into Ace's car, driving off into the dust-like snow that fell everlastingly.
"I'll knock~" Luffy sang out, jumping through the snow to Sabo's front door, Ace following behind with hands in his pockets. He whistled a happy tune while Luffy knocked his extravagant knock, and shut up when a shirtless, sweaty Sabo opened the door, wiping the sweat off his brow. The cold wind blew past them all and made Sabo shiver, his exposed nipples a bit too perky for Ace's liking at that point.
"Uh... um, hey... Sabo.." Ace mumbled, eyes going anywhere and everywhere while Luffy let himself in and snuck under Sabo's arm into his house.
"Hey Ace, sorry, I was working out. Here, come in," Sabo instructed, opening the door for Ace while he wandered back inside. Ace blinked and tried to rub the blush off his face as he entered, closing the door behind him.
Luffy took his coat off and sat himself down on Sabo's tan couch in his living room, looking around at all the bookcases and noticed that Sabo didn't have a T.V. anymore... the place on the wall where it had been was covered in another bookcase, turning the room more into a library then anything else. This wasn't a bad thing, it just made Sabo look like more of a genius than he really was. No offense, Sabo.
"Wow, I'd think that you were like a professor or something," Ace commented, walking into his old friend's living room as well, Sabo following close behind.
"Dad insisted on all of us reading more and filling our heads with 'real knowledge'. Though, I don't mind it, honestly. There are some cool books out there," Sabo replied, taking a seat in a comfortable lounging chair, still cooling off, while Ace sat down next to Luffy.
"So anyway, what brings you guys here of all places?" Sabo asked, running a hand through his hair casually, "it's been forever since you've been over here, ya know.."
"Got bored," Luffy answered honestly, laughing a little to himself. The blonde raised an eyebrow at Ace and sighed, smirking.
"I see how it is.. you wait until you have nothing else to do before you come and tend to the 3rd wheel," Sabo teased, putting a hand of fake-depression over his heart. Ace sweatdropped, but didn't say anything in return, mainly because he was unsure of how to respond without being rude or stupid. Luffy meanwhile blinked at a nearby open door leading down a flight of stairs and quickly bounded to it, running down the steps while Ace tried desperately to call him back. Sabo only laughed and let the boy go.
Looking around his old-friend's basement, Luffy stared in wonder at all the weights and machines in the room, and imagined the look on Zoro's face if he could see all this excercise equipment.
Meanwhile, Ace and Sabo came down as well, scaring Luffy from his observations.
"Yeah, I've added this since you two were last here," Sabo said, picking up a weight off the floor and swung it around in his hand while Luffy gaped at him.
Ace tried not to look, but.. Sabo was so.. muscular; more so than he had noticed before. His arms...
Sabo went up to his punching bag and threw a punch or two and a hard kick to finish it, turning back to Ace and Luffy who were either grinning or wide-eyed.
"Go ahead, try everything out if you want. Can't keep it all to myself," Sabo noted, whistling as he moved out of the way for Luffy to reek havoc upon the equipment.
Ace and Sabo sat on the couch in the living room while Luffy slept on Ace's lap after running out of gas.
"Maybe I shouldn't have have let him use all that stuff...?" Sabo asked hesitantly, looking down at Luffy with pity. Ace grinned and shook his head, fully aware that no matter what they said, Luffy still would've done the same thing anyway.
"You're fine, don't worry," Ace responded with a grin, running a loving hand over Luffy's back. Sabo smiled awkwardly in return, watching his friend's actions.
"So.. you two really are together...?" Sabo mumbled, not really sure why he had let it slip out of his mouth. Ace blinked at Sabo for a moment and then tilted his head in slight befuddlement.
"Yeah, so?" Ace asked, pulling Luffy up into a sitting position against his side where he still continued to sleep. Sabo sat there silently, not quite knowing how to respond or where to look or even how to feel; but he was going to have to do something.
"I guess I just never realized you wanted a relationship in the first place.." Sabo forced out, knowing that his statement was slightly off by a little.
Ace looked at Sabo intently, trying to read his eyes and expression to maybe, just maybe, if Sabo was hiding something.. and yeah, something was off.
"You mean you... don't approve?" Ace replied, sitting back while running a hand through Luffy's hair, preparing himself for a painful answer which took a while to fully come out.
"I don't know what to think. You two have always been close, but.. I don't know. It'll just take some getting used to, I suppose.."
Ace nodded slowly, resting his chin calmly on top of Luffy's head as he thought deep thoughts, intertwining his fingers with Luffy's. He wasn't going to let a little uncertainty from someone get him down in the dumps, no sir! Smiling as he made this decision in his mind, Ace rubbed the back of Luffy's hand with his thumb and planted a gentle kiss on his younger brother's soft-haired head lovingly.
"It's okay," Ace began happily, never taking his eyes off of Luffy."take your time adjusting, since we have the rest of our lives together to see."
Sabo watched Ace as he spoke and became a bit baffled. Did Ace honestly mean to say that he was set on marrying his step-brother? Making any sort of longer-term agreement at his age was risky and difficult to keep up, but, marrying his younger step-brother Luffy was a whole different level of weird and challenging. Though, there was no look of doubt or regret on Ace's face, and with a sigh, Sabo decided to try his best to accept his friends.
After all, he couldn't change their relationship...
~ + kill me. kill me now. *bows* ive been terribly busy- no, no, no excuses. I am truly sorry for this late update. forgive this pitiful author? Oh. on a different note, I want to thank all of you for reviewing and favoriting and of course, reading this story of mine. THANK YOU, and killll meeeee + ~
