Sanji

A couple of weeks pass by like a dull powerpoint presentation of my life. Wake up, go to work, cook, get home, cook, sleep, wake up, repeat. I don't know if it's convenient coincidence or things just haven't changed since that spar, but I haven't seen hide nor mossy-hair of that marimo since. Nothing but passing glances as he leaves for work, or just as he heads to bed when I get in. All too quick to decipher what exactly he's thinking.

What was I expecting to change anyway? That he and I would suddenly become the bestest buds in the world? Go out drinking and stuff? After one crummy sparing match that started because my frustration just built up that much? Retrospectively, the idiot moss-head did well to react so quickly and put up a fight himself. I haven't been able to cut loose like that in a while. And maybe, that's why I thought I'd finally got through to the guy. But no, nothing. He still denies my existence.

And it wouldn't be so bad if I didn't see how he's like with Luffy. The soft glances behind irritated scowls whenever Luffy knocks something over. The small smiles that could easily be missed whenever Luffy spouts some incomprehensible shit. The soft touches to his arm, shoulder, lower back, ruffling through his hair. He's like a completely different person! And it really shouldn't irritate me as much as it does, but I don't even get anything. Nothing.

"Sanji… feed me…"

And there's the man in question himself, still in his work clothes and leaning over the dining table like a deflated balloon. He looks up at me with bleary eyes as I come in to the flat.

I shrug off my coat, slip off my shoes. "How long have you been sitting there just waiting for me to feed you?"

Luffy shrugs. "Hungry…"

Despite my tiredness, I manage a chuckle. His incessant gluttony is becoming more endearing than annoying these past few days, and that's worrying.

"Alright, alright. What do you want?"

"Anything. Everything! Meat!" He thrashes about on the table, gaining renewed energy at the mere mention of food.

I look around the flat as I start pulling a cut of steak from the fridge. "No marimo tonight?"

Luffy tilts his head. His expression looks pained as he strains to think. "It's… Wednesday. So he goes straight from kendo class to night guard."

"Hard worker," I mutter. Or pulling out all the stops to avoid me. Again. I sigh, shake my head and start filling up a pan with water. The room suddenly feels stuffy and I look over my shoulder to see Luffy stood directly behind me, on his tiptoes and trying to peer over my shoulder. He meets my puzzled glare and breaks into a grin.

"Can I help?"

I narrow my eyes at him. There's a little voice yelling in the depths of my mind, telling me that letting Luffy help would be the worst idea in the world. So goodness knows what I was thinking when I hand him the veg knife.

"Can you cut onions?"

"Pft, onions? No problem!" He takes the onion I hand him and places it on the counter, raising the knife.

"Use a chopping board."

"Oh, right."

There's cluttering to my left, and I look up to see Luffy peering behind the microwave.

"Boards are in the cupboard next to the fridge."

He grins. "Right!"

He returns with a chopping board as I drop some noodles into the pot of boiling water. I watch him place the onion on the chopping board this time.

"Peel it first," I say.

"Right."

Luffy's brows knot and he pouts a little in concentration of peeling the brown layer of skin off the onion. I can't help but chuckle at him. With all the shit that happens in the world, here is a man who has somehow managed to retain some form of pure innocence. That, or he's just completely moronic. Yeah, probably moronic.

I start putting other vegetables beside him. "Slice these up too. Nice and thin."

"Okay…"

I watch him out of the corner of my eye, focusing really hard on the onion, tip of his tongue sticking out of the corner of his mouth. I turn back to the boiling pot of noodles and give it a stir. When I return to Luffy's side, I watch him hack away at the onion, creating chunks of various shapes and sizes.

"What the hell are you doing?" I ask with more of an exasperated sigh that an annoyed one.

Luffy chuckles. "Sorry. It's harder than it looks."

I take another knife and the other half of the onion he hadn't started to slice yet. "Hold your knife at an angle like this. It'll make slicing easier. Tuck your fingers on your other hand inwards too, so you don't cut yourself." I pause to slice up the onion, going at it maybe a little too quickly for him. "Did you get that?"

I look up to see Luffy watching my hands with wide eyes sparkling with wonder. He catches my glance and smiles. "It's fun watching you cook."

I pause and stare at him for what feels like too long. The rapid heating of my cheeks snap me out of my lull and I shove a wooden spoon into his hands.

"Here, go give the noodles a stir."

It's a good thing he's easily distracted. As he bounces over to the stove I turn away and concentrate on chopping up the vegetables, fighting with the flustered feeling bubbling in my gut. You'd think I'd never received a compliment about my cooking before with the way I must be glowing crimson. Well… Everyone's alsways complimented me after they've shoved my down their shitty gullets. Luffy's no different. But it's not often I get the compliments because someone's actually seen me cook.

"How do you know when it's done?" Luffy asks.

I take a deep breath, feeling my heart return to a normal rhythm. "Try a piece and see if it's soft enough."

As I finish up the vegetables, I hear him blow on the noodles and slurp.

"Mm!"

I smile and place a wok on the stove, whacking up the fire to full. More slurping to my right distracts me.

"I said try a piece, not eat the whole pot!"

Luffy turns around, looking sheepish with strands of noodles dangling over his chin.

He swallows the lot and grins. "Sorry! I'm just hungry."

I sigh and run a hand through my hair. "When are you not hungry? Here… Why don't you just sit down."

Fortunately, I only decided to do a quick stir-fry. There wasn't much time for Luffy to complain and tell me to hurry up before I'm serving up heaps of noodles and beef before him.

"Thanks!" He manages to get out before stuffing his face and depleting almost a quarter of his portion and I haven't even sat down yet.

I shake my head and take my place opposite him. "You'd think I don't feed you enough."

"Well," Luffy mumbles around a mouthful of noodles.

"Chew and swallow first," I remind him, before reminding myself that I'm berating a grown man about table manners. If people could only see us now.

Luffy swallows his mouthful. "You could always feed us more. Double our meals!"

"They're already double! And most of it goes to feeding you. I'm pretty sure that mossy gorilla barely eats anything I dish up."

At the mention of Zoro, I feel my face snap into that automatic snarl I must have whenever thoughts of the marimo enter my mind.

Luffy seems to miss it and carries on tucking into his dinner. I watch him for a moment, considering that night's conversation- if you could call it that- with the swordsman on the rooftop.

"Luffy, can I ask you something?" I start, a little uncertain at first. If I couldn't get a straight answer out of the moss-head, then maybe I will from Luffy. I know I already have my speculations and I'm pretty sure on them, but it doesn't hurt to confirm.

Luffy's eyes lift from his bowl to meet mine, but he doesn't stop slurping up food. I wonder if his attention is even on me at this point.

"You and Zoro… You're… Together, right?"

Luffy hums and swallows a chunk of beef. "Well, not right now. He's at work."

It takes a minute for me to process his answer. "No, no, not like that. I mean, you know. Together together?"

His brows furrow as he chews in thought. "What, like, living together? I thought you knew that already because you live with us too."

He chuckles. I lean my head on my hand to stop myself from face-planting the table. Trust Luffy to not be able to give me a straight answer because he can't even catch my drift. Does that mean it's alright to be blunt with the guy?

I straighten in my seat and try a different approach. "What… er… What do you think of Zoro?"

Luffy looks up at me again and breaks out in wide grin. "I like Zoro."

Great! Now we're getting somewhere. I lean forward on the table a little. "As in like a friend? Or more than that?"

Luffy frowns. "More like what?"

I breathe in slow to try and counteract the sigh I can feel building up in my chest. I slump back in my chair, staring down at my bowl of noodles.

"Nevermind," I mutter.

We eat in silence for a little while. Luffy finishes his bowl and sets it to the side a little.

"Is something wrong?" He asks.

I glance at him again, reading the raised brow, straight lipped expression he's giving me. Well, it's now or never I suppose.

"Luffy, you and Zoro are lovers, right?"

Luffy's eyes widen a fraction before he smiles at me, cheeks reddening a little.

"Yeah," he says. "Sorry, were we being too obvious?"

"N-no, it's not that. I just… Well, that'll probably explain why he's been really edgy to me since I moved in."

Luffy tilts his head a little. "Huh? Edgy?"

I shrug. "I don't want to jump to conclusions or anything, but if you haven't noticed, the marimo and me haven't been in the best of terms since I moved in. I mean, did you even give him enough warning that I was moving in? Did you guys even talk it through properly? He probably thinks I might get in the way or something…"

Luffy's chuckling distracts me. "He's probably just not used to you yet."

"Used to me? He hates me! And all because he's stupid enough to think we might elope or something."

I slip my pack of cigarettes from my pocket as Luffy's chucking increases. I narrow my eyes at him.

"What's so funny?"

He grins at me. "So you'd hate eloping with me?"

I give him the most deadpan expression I can muster. "I'm being serious here. I wouldn't want to be murdered with jealousy as the main motive. I've done too much shit to go out of this world like that."

Luffy shrugs, the wide smile never leaving his face. "I'm being serious too."

I give him a level stare, lighting up the cigarette bit between my lips. I try not to let my mind get carried away. There's every possiblitiy that Luffy really is still taking everything like one big joke, or has completely misunderstood the situation.

"Luffy," I start slow. "We're talking about you and Zoro here…"

"I know, and I'm talking about you too. Hey, is there more of this?" He holds up his empty bowl.

I nod to the wok on the stove, ignoring the topic changer.

"I hope you're not suggesting what I think you're suggesting, or at least I hope you're not suggesting it seriously."

He grins as he sits back down again and tucks into seconds.

"You know Zoro would murder me in a heartbeat if there's even any hint of anything going on between us," I say flatly.

Luffy shakes his head as he chews down his mouthful. "Nah. He already knows about it."

"Knows about what? Wait…" A thought strikes me and my eyes widen as I stare at Luffy. "You're… You're not breaking up with him, are you?"

Luffy chokes. He struggles to swallow the last bite of his dinner before frowning at me.

"No! I love Zoro."

"Then what the hell were we just talking about?"

Luffy pushes aside his empty bowl and hums in thought, glancing off to the left. When he turns back to look at me, his cheeks have tinted a dark shade of red.

"I love Zoro, and… You too."

He grins, rosy cheeked and chuckling lightly. I stare at him, cigarette dangling at the edge of my lips with ash crumbling on the end falling on the table. My heart beats slow and loud in my chest, before speeding up and boiling my blood. I frown.

"Idiot. You can't love two people at the same time. Not in the same way, anyway."

Luffy returns my frown. "Yeah, you can. I love a lot of people."

I shake my head. "No, well, maybe. But not all the same, right?"

"What's the difference?"

I sigh and run a hand through my hair. "Alright, how about… Parents. You love you're parents, right?"

Luffy nods.

"And you love Zoro."

Luffy nods feverently.

"But you don't love him in the same way you love your parents. Am I right?"

"Hmmm…"

"So you don't love me in the same way either, right?"

He meets my eyes. "No. It's the same."

We sit in silence for a good minute, staring each other down. Luffy's features have softened, but he's lost his grin. I'm the first to look away, crushing the butt of my spent cigarette in the ashtray on the table before lighting up another.

"No. You're confused," I say, shaking my head. "There's no way you mean it the same way."

"I'm never confused," he replies, getting up and moving the empty dishes to the sink. "At least not about what I like. I mean every word of it."

He pauses to yawn and stretch his scrawny limbs above his head. I hear the dull pop of his joints as he does so.

"Well, time for bed," he says, the smile returning to his face. "I have work early tomorrow again. Night!"

I watch him head into his room, shutting the door gently behind him. I can't even get my brain to react fast enough. There's too much in the conversation to process and not enough answers to the hundreds of questions I already had to begin with.

I slump forward in my seat and light another cigarette. What the hell did Luffy mean by all that? He loved Zoro and me too? Is he being serious? And he said that Zoro knows. Zoro already knows. What kind of fucked up thing have they got going on?

The click of the front door snaps me from my thoughts. I blink a few times and notice my ashtray is full. My muscles feel stiff and ache as I turn a little in my chair to watch the marimo himself come in.

He spots me, brows furrowing slightly before snapping back into his usual stoic expression. He glances around the flat and I take that quick moment to check the time. Three in the morning. I was sat in the kitchen this whole time?

"Up already?" He asks as he slips of his jacket. I don't sense anything other than a hint of surprise in his voice, and I don't read anything in his face either. I wonder if I look as tired as he does.

"Couldn't sleep."

I glare at my ashtray. I can't bring myself to look him in the eyes right now. Regardless of whatever fuckery is going on between him and Luffy, a sick feeling settles in the pit of my stomach, churned by ounces of guilt and the feeling of knowing too much of something that I really shouldn't know.

"Oh."

Oh? That's all he can fucking say? I bite down at my cigarette, curl my toes under the table. He shuffles past me, towards his room bedroom. I glare daggers into his back, wishing that it would hail ice the size of footballs all around his vicinity tomorrow.

He stops as he reaches his door. I falter over my hateful thoughts as he turns back to face me.

"Uh," he starts, then stops and glances down on the floor, brows knotted in thought. I can feel the etched lines of anger dissolve from my face.

When he looks up again, the stoic expression is back on his face. But this time, his dark eyes glisten with determination.

"I'm, uh…" He pauses again but quickly recovers. "I'm training again tomorrow."

I stare at him as the silence stretches between us. "…And?"

He frowns. "So be there after. Because we're having a re-match, and this time, I'll kick your ass, curly."

He splurs out his last sentence in one breath and disappears into his room before I can reply. I watch the closed door too intently for a moment. What the hell was that? Was that… Was that the marimo trying to be… social?

I slam my head on the table and try not to groan too loudly. Tonight has been a rollercoaster of questions and suggestions and right now all I want to do is sleep the world away. I pull myself from my seat and shuffle to my room. Tomorrow. After kicking the marimo's ass for a second time tomorrow, I'll get the complete and straight answer from him.

Zoro

I pause from training and glance up at sky, blazing orange from the setting sun. With it's heat gone, a cool wind picks up and sticks to the sweat on my skin. I take a breath and stretch out a little, pushing past the dull ache of my muscles.

Luffy got called in to work the night shift at the offices tonight and it won't be long until the cook gets home. I cringe a little when I think about what I said to him. There was definitely a better way to challenge him to a rematch, but I'd already spent the last two weeks bumbling around awkwardly for the right words to say, and for the right time to bring it up. Who knew it would be this hard? And for some reason, my mind decided that last night was the best time, when the cook looked haggard and half-dead. What the hell was he doing up all night in the kitchen anyway?

I shake out my loose muscles and head towards a few rusty buckets filled to the brim with rocks and chunks of concrete. I move to a more central position on the roof, balance one bucket neatly on a thick wod of cloth atop my head before picking up the other two buckets and hanging them from my wrists. Easing myself into a horse-squat I close my eyes and focus my mind on the slow pace of my breathing.

My meditations last for what feel like mere minutes, when the silence is snapped by the clicking of the rooftop door. There's a clacking of leather shoes on concrete and flick of a lighter.

"You know, training like that, you look like someone who just dropped in from the 12th century," says the shitty cook in his usual cocky tone.

I grit me teeth and crack my eyes open a little in time to see him blow smoke off in the direction of the wind.

"Why don't you buy actual gym equipment?" He pauses to wrap his coat tighter around himself. "And train indoors for once."

"Can't afford it," I mutter, shutting my eyes and forcing myself back into meditation.

I hear him suck in smoke and breathe it out with a sigh. "What the hell are you supposed to be exercising, doing that anyway?"

"It builds up stamina and helps my balance. And right now, it's testing my patience too."

He's quiet after that. My skin tingles at the thought of him staring me down.

"Hey, why don't you try something new," he says.

I have a split second to react between the sound of his footsteps approaching and the sudden rush of wind building up towards me. My eyes flicker open, and I dodge his kick just in time. The bucket balanced on my head flies off and lands on the ground with a loud clang and a scatter of rocks.

I glare at him. He smirks. Playful, but I know it's an invitation for a challenge at the same time.

"One down," he says, slipping his hands into the pockets of his trousers. "Try and dodge me while keeping those buckets balanced this time. You've got two chances left."

I move into a defensive position, holding out my arms to better balance the buckets. He barely gives me the chance, launching full force at me. I manage to dodge his volley of kicks, but it's harder under the weight of metal and rock.

It doesn't take long for me to get comfortable with his rhythm. I change stances, launch a rock-filled bucket-weighted punch right for him. He dodges like he has all the time in the world and hooks the bucket right from my wrist with crook of his ankle. I watch it clatter to the ground, not far from the other one.

He tutts and takes another drag. "You're not as quick as the other night, mossy. Sure this training is paying off?"

I shift the last bucket from my arm to my head. The move seems to surprise the cook. He watches me as I tilt around for a second, finding the right balance, then raise my fists in an offensive stance. His frown disappears, as he understands, then lunges forward again.

I let my reflexes react to dodge his attacks, keeping my focus on balancing the bucket on my head. I hate to admit it, but the cook might've just come up with a more advanced way to train my balance and my focus at the same time. After a few near misses, my reflexes sharpen, and I start dodging his attacks as though we were in sync.

I don't hold it for long. His rhythm becomes irregular, his pace picking up, then dropping, then suddenly shooting up. His attacks become relentless and the bucket starts swaying dangerously on my head.

I grab his leg as he kicks, locking it and flinging a punch. He blocks, locking my free arm. Our glares meet. Even in the dim light of dusk I can see just how brightly blue his eyes are. The air is silent for a beat, filled with nothing but strained grunting. Then the clang of the third bucket slipping from my head breaks the silence. I let him go, turn to see the mess of buckets and spilt rubble we made.

He laughs. "I win again, marimo."

I take a moment to catch my breath. The sight of my shinai against the fence of the roof reminds me of why the cook came up here in the first place.

"That was a warm up," I say, picking up two of the training swords. "Fight me for real this time."

His cigarette twitches as he bites down on it. The smile disappears, replaced by a straight, solemn look. The air shifts around him, grows quieter and still. I can see the slight shift of tension in muscles of his legs, like a snake, coiling and preparing to strike.

He runs forward and I snap my thoughts into focus. I raise my swords to block, but he feints and catches me on my left. Grunting, I double back and dodge a quick succession of kicks. He leaps to the left, feints, and circles me again.

He's faster, more intense. I can feel the force of each kick reverberating through the hilt of my swords. I up my game. No way am I loosing to him again. I counter a mistimed kick and use the break to start going on the offence.

I thrust and slash, whirling my blades around my like a windmill. Impossible to block. He flips backwards a good distance, flexible as ever, but it gives him enough space to recover. By the time I get within range, he's already defending every strike.

I've fought this guy twice, yet already he seems to know my every rhythm and pattern in a fight. The thought doesn't shake me. Because it means I also know his, and I know the only way to stop a coiling snake is to trap it.

He arcs a leg to strike my knee and I let him, going down with the force. At the same time, I crouch, snagging his leg and spring upwards, toppling him to the ground. He falls with a grunt and a hard thud. Before he can slip out and regain his footing, I trap his legs with the weight of my own and lay the blade of my shinai across his neck.

He struggles but doesn't escape. I'm about to claim victory when he tilts his head upwards and spits out the cigarette still bit between his lips. It hits me like a hot flick on my cheek just below my eye. I back off him with a grunt, rubbing the spot with the back of my hand.

"You fuck," I mutter.

He looks at me for a second. A look I can easily mistake for concern, but it's probably not that. The cook chuckles before picking himself up from the floor.

"Sorry, mossy," his voice comes out low and quiet. He takes out another cigarette and lights up. "But when I fight for real, it's win or die. There are no rules in my book."

He dusts off his coat and starts making his way back towards the door.

"You better come down for dinner," He calls back as he opens the door, then pauses at the doorway. "There's… There's something I need to talk to you about."

I frown but before I can reply, the door snaps shut behind him. I glare down at the rocks scattered around on the rooftop as if everything was their fault. The cook, talk to me? About what? What's so important that he had to warn me before?

Worry starts to settle in my gut and it irritates me more that I don't know what exactly I'm worrying about. I decided to put away the feeling for now and start clearing up the mess we made in our fight. I pause half way through filling up a bucket.

"Shit," I mutter under my breath as I realize the cook wins again.