I recently realised I forgot to do this in the beginning:
This story is the result of a collection of so-called "incorrect quotes" gathered from tumblr, mainly the user incorrectone-piece. The story itself is mainly cobbled together from the inspiration these quotes gives me. Since I have no idea where most of the quotes are from, any help with identifying them is more than welcome so I can give proper credit in the corresponding chapters!
Reviews are more than welcome – they give me life and joy and actually help in giving this story a direction. Something you want to see? Something you don't understand? Let me know!
Bepo's ears pricked up and then he was gone, leaving a flattened Usopp and a flummoxed Nami in his wake.
The mink had been uneasy since their tea session had bled into the evening hours and he had been coerced into joining the girls at Sanji's farewell party; he had almost refused to join them when he couldn't find his boss who, unusually for him, didn't answer his phone and consequently sent Bepo into the preliminary stages of a slight tizzy. Nami would never forgive Law for this thoughtlessness. Bepo finally calmed down and agreed to join the revelry when Nami got Luffy's confirmation that yes, Law was with him and Kid and yes, he had eaten his lunch and no, he hadn't had too much coffee and yes, he'd bring him to the Sunny later so yes, Bepo could join the girls with peace in mind and alcohol in body.
And once Kid's booming laugh echoed down both the street and the house, overpowering the mellow jazz filtering out form the living room, Bepo was gone, leaving a startled Nami and vaguely squashed Usopp in the middle of a conversation about the benefits and challenges of growing your own hops.
Out of purely idle curiosity and a slight sense of doom, Nami followed in Bepo's wake, righting the picture frames knocked askew by his haste and dropping a trampled bouquet of flowers in the sink on her way. She hadn't even time to register the cool night air before a beaming Luffy wrapped her in a quick hug before running inside, dragging a choking Sanji and chortling Kid and Killer with him.
Bepo, on the other hand, was somehow held a couple of feet off the ground, supported only by a lanky pair of legs wrapped in black denim.
Nami knew Bepo was a very healthy mink for his species and size that included several hundred weight units of your preferred measurement system. She stared for a moment before shaking her head and deciding not to think too hard about the physics involved.
The decision to ignore the situation was made easier by her utter confusion: it sounded like Law was apologising and that just couldn't be right, but simply a figment of her imagination. She knew Law doted on Bepo at the office, but she had never either heard a simple 'sorry', not even when they both knew he was in the wrong, nor seen the slightest tremor of remorse flit over his stupidly handsome face.
Her musings about the nature of man were cut short by a fluffy elbow clipping the side of her head as Bepo ushered Law inside, trying to explain where to securely leave his coat if he didn't want it exchanged with something pink and fluffy as the house was wont to do at whim and will. The sudden assault sent her tumbling into the darkening evening but before she could brace for impact with the ground, a warm hand wrapped around her elbow, keeping her upright.
She really had to stop getting saved by him, although this occasion wouldn't have had quite the consequences of the game–
She cut the though short, focusing on the pressure and warmth radiating from his hand.
"Trafalgar Law."
"Nami."
If Nami would have been one of those persons of a romantic persuasion, or, indeed, would have had a single romantically atuned bone in her body, she'd swear that the evening stilled around them, that the sounds from the party dimmed and that the porchlight highlighted the flecks of gold in his eyes. That somehow, a nightingale started singing in the nearby square while small chubby babies flitted about sprinkling confetti, and thus ruining the environment a little more, all in the name of love.
But she wasn't very romantic and so she sent off the weird feelings and images into the dark night to fend for themselves, merely raising an eyebrow as the hand around her arm didn't seem to let go by itself.
"You can let go now. I'm fine," she said, wiggling her arm slightly for emphasis.
"So you are. My apologies."
He let go of her and just… stood there, his face cast in shadows and the slight rosy tinge of the setting sun.
There was some sort of moment going on here, and Nami would be damned if she lost the nameless and undefined battle to a sleep-deprived doctor who had a frustrating habit of getting under her skin.
Especially when he was being annoying and a general nuisance.
So she squared her shoulders and met his gaze, arms folded in defiance.
After an exceptionally uncomfortable moment, Law suddenly seemed to realise something, twitching slightly and disappearing after Bepo into the murky interior of the Sunny.
Nami wrapped her folded arms around herself as she watched him go, the evening suddenly a bit colder.
She had no idea what was wrong with the man. And whether she liked it or not, his behaviour had started getting at her.
He never talked to her anymore, merely acknowledged their coffee routine with monosyllabic remarks. There were no more weirdly tangential discussions that jumped from the departmental filing system to the official document keeping systems of ancient Mesopotamia to the development of the written language. He physically turned the other way when they happened to meet in the doorway and had started going home at an almost reasonable hour – although the number of complaints from Bepo regarding the amount of work he brought home had grown exponentially instead.
It was good that she only saw him for a couple of days at the office and almost never at lectures. Any more of the cold shoulder and she'd resort to words.
And here she had thought they had started getting along.
Oh well, his loss.
And with that, she pushed the brooding man out of her mind, focusing instead on having fun.
A coatrack offered her momentary refuge as Luffy rushed past, Chopper's hat held high and laughter trailing in his wake, before a lively game of beer pong (it seemed Sanji hadn't learned his lesson from the Halloween masquerade, judging by the number of empty cans next to him) drew her attention.
She'd miss Sanji, horrible beer pong skills and incessant flirting aside. He had promised to get back after his study abroad was over and done with, but she knew how much he missed his old man and furthermore, no matter how optimistic Luffy was, harboured some glum premonitions about Sanji meeting a pretty French lady and leaving the crew for good.
Luckily she couldn't get the hamster of pessimism spinning its gloomy wheel of doomed prophecies fast enough as the stream of guests arriving and exiting the house was kept constant, and all needing some sort of assistance; from finding the guest of honour to making a clandestine exit or simply finding the punch bowl. A short interlude in the form of helping a confused Koby (one of Luffy's multitude of friends who all happily showed up to their parties, no matter if they, like Koby who was on track to become the next chief of police, really shouldn't be engaging in the sort of behaviour exhibited at the Sunny), was broken up by a commotion in the living room that sounded suspiciously much like the prelude to chaos that quickly drew them over.
"We need to talk about your maturity," Nami sighed, regarding the scene in front of her.
Usopp and Chopper were crammed on the sofa, while Luffy was balancing on the armrest, feet lazily dangling. Sanji was perched on the back of an armchair like some weird bird of prey, Killer seated below with his long legs drawn up to his chin, while Zoro, apparently having attempted a mighty jump from the sofa to a vacant chair, lay sprawled on the floor. Usopp's girlfriend, in town for one of their infrequent weekends together, watched the scene unfold with an amused smile on her face from a safe spot near the wall.
On closer inspection, her feet didn't touch the floor either.
"Bold words for someone standing in lava," Luffy said. "Could you get me some popcorn? I don't want to die, like Zoro."
"Oi! Who was it that pushed me off the sofa?"
"If Zoro's dead, he can do it," Nami said, shaking her head and leaving the living room to its fate.
Or tried to, as her progress was suddenly halted by a mass of white fur.
"Bepo! Everything good?"
"I can't find the kitchen and my beer is in the fridge. Could you show me the way?"
"We were just there," she laughed, gesticulating down the hall. The look of sorrow consuming Bepo's face made her heart clench.
"Sorry…"
"What are you apologising for, you silly furball? Just follow me!"
"Sorry…"
With a smile, she gestured for the mink to head down the hallway. It wasn't until he moved that she noticed the brooding man hovering behind him. "Trafalgar."
His non-response came as a non-surprise.
The man really had to work on his manners.
In the kitchen, Vivi and Kid were locked in an argument about something that sounded suspiciously much like the pros and cons of international weapons trade, Koza glowering at Kid with his arms crossed from behind Vivi in some sort of display of partner-support and intimidation.
He really didn't need to do that. Vivi was plenty scary all on her own.
It would also have worked a bit better if he wasn't half a head shorter than Kid and about a third as broad.
Sometimes Nami was really, really sad about her utter lack of attraction with regards to one Eustass Kid; the man was fit as a fiddle and a true delight for weary eyes. It really was a pity his personality made such an excellent work of killing all prospective feelings leading to mutual pleasure.
Kid's hair was even more lively than usual, a sure sign he had been dragging his hands through it in frustration and Vivi had that self-assured tilt to her head Nami knew so well. She gave them a further five minutes before Kid either stormed off, refusing to admit defeat, or broke something.
She hoped he'd choose the hideous souvenir plates Usopp collected, if it went that far.
They were also, very impolitely in Nami's view, blocking the fridge. Her efforts to move them in vain, Kid being a muscular hunk of human being and Vivi totally ignoring her calls to 'move it!', the hopes for a refreshing beverage were quickly approaching zero.
"My turn to apologise," she said, giving Bepo a rueful smile. "Seems the dunderheads won't listen to neither reason nor need."
Bepo looked crestfallen and Nami felt her heart clench in her chest once more at the sad sight. "Oh no! I'll make sure you get your stuff, just let me–"
"Room."
A blue glow filled the room and a beer appeared in Nami's hand and Bepo made a happy noise at the chilly beverage suddenly filling his paw.
She had to admit that Law's powers did have their occasional uses.
"Thank you," she said grudgingly while a more honest and heartfelt expression of gratitude was heard from Bepo before he disappeared towards the commotion in the living room, cold beer in hand.
"Are your gatherings always this lively?"
Nami couldn't help the twitch of her mouth betraying a tinge of amusement. "Firstly, why do you sound like you're straight from the Regency? 'Gathering' and 'lively' aren't expressions I'm used to outside an Austen novel. Secondly, yes. Yes, they are."
They both winced as a wail suddenly tore through the air.
Either a stray cat had once again wandered into the living room and gotten caught in the sofa, or Usopp had, for some inexplicable reason that probably went against the Geneva convention, brought out his electric guitar.
"Sometimes they might get a bit too 'lively'," Nami allowed, letting the inverted commas fall into place with an almost audible click as a frazzled Zoro stumbled into the kitchen, making a beeline for the popcorn machine.
The popcorn machine had appeared in the kitchen a few months ago; no-one admitted to any responsibility regarding its existence or appearance in their lives. After a short conference regarding its fate, combined with the ominous hum from the oven when they tried to move it, a unanimous decision was reached to leave it alone.
You never asked about the things that appeared in the Sunny. You just accepted them.
Like the octopus that had one day made quite the dramatic entrance into their lives in the middle of Sanji's shower.
It now lived a in a small pond Chopper and Usopp had dug for it next to the shed.
The judgmental tilt to Law's whole countenance as Zoro attempted to balance a bucket of the popped corn on one bandaged arm raised Nami's hackles. "What, you don't think he can do that by himself, just because he's injured?"
But the tiresome man simply shook his head in clear disapprobation. "I just think he really should be more careful if he wants to continue using that arm after it's healed. It isn't too good to flop around all over the place with a broken wrist." An eyebrow rose at Nami's questioning expression. "Doctor, remember? I do know something about injuries."
Before she could retort, the voices over by the fridge were rising in both volume and colour of language chosen. In order to preserve some peace of mind and piece of Kid, Nami flicked the light switch, flooding the kitchen with the full power of Usopp's latest upgrade to the kitchen lamps (they could now be legally classified as floodlights), causing both Kid and Koza to yelp in surprise. Vivi, more used to the peculiarities of both the house and the crew who inhabited it, didn't bat an eye and kept on making her point of the paradox of both promoting peace and non-proliferation and being responsible for almost a third of the world's arms trade at the same time and how Kid really should get some better hobbies.
A moment of silence descended as they watched a passing Zoro declare Vivi the winner of the debate before he grabbed the back of Kid's shirt, dragging him out to join in the living room revelry.
"And also, Chopper told me."
Nami just sighed in resignation and shook her head as she leaned back against the kitchen counter. "Of course he did. He won't tell any of us what happened, but a total stranger? Why not." She narrowed her eyes, a movement behind Law catching her attention. "Oi! Go upstairs if you're going to lose any more clothing. You know the kitchen is not the place for that!"
An unconvincingly embarrassed laugh could be heard accompanied by scurrying noises, followed by a moment of silence.
"Where did Bepo go?" Law looked around at the empty kitchen, suddenly noticing the void left by his friend.
"You only noticed now? He joined the lava lot."
"Every now and then I forget how old you people are," said Law, materialising another beer for himself.
"Because you're so much older?" Nami scoffed.
"A lady never tells," he said with a smirk.
"So about a hundred and twenty."
A loud burst of laughter echoed through the house, followed by the unmistakeable noises of Usopp starting up his karaoke corner.
"Eh, at least they are having fun," she said with a shrug.
"You were playing 'the floor is lava'."
"I resent that. The others were, I wasn't. Thus, the plural usage of 'you' is inappropriate."
"Fine, they were playing. I thought that was a children's game."
"Who says that 'the floor is lava' can only be played by children? You're only as old as you feel, after all. A hundred and twenty in your case, while the average age in this house is about… nine and three quarters."
"What about the median?"
"Around five."
A thunderous crash echoed from the living room.
"Around three and a half," Nami said, not missing a beat. "They could probably be a bit more mature, but, then again, so could we all."
Law merely shook his head, a small smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. "That's true, I'm positive I just heard Bepo's influence in that crash. And here I thought all parties in this town were as exciting as the football party or as glamorous as the Halloween thing."
Nami's face fell at both thinly-veiled allusions. "Well, the Halloween Masquerade is one of the few occasions the staff gets to let loose, while the post-game party was organised both by and for students."
"Speaking of, how come you were playing the student side at the football game? I thought you were the assistant of the department?"
"The university can be a bit confusing for someone not from around here," said Nami, wondering how to best explain the inner workings of an age-old institution to an outsider. Although that he'd been with them for several months by now, some things were still confusing. Like the route to the copier. Or the way the coffee machine worked on Thursdays. "I'm a full-time student. But, since I'm also a poor full-time student, I have to work at least part-time to make ends meet. Luckily enough, I got the position as office admin when the previous one left for a sabbatical."
"Your position isn't permanent?"
Nami shrugged. "Mona will be back soon, I just planned my exchange to start when my work here ends."
"You're going abroad."
The noises from the living room rose in volume once more, making Nami peer over Law's shoulder to see if they required assistance. Or an ambulance. But when Chopper's high-pitched laugh cut through the din, accompanied by Luffy's holler of 'Let's play twister!' she concluded that they at least weren't dying, and turned her attention back to Law.
Maybe he had once made a grumpy face and the wind changed, making him stuck in a permanent glower, she mused, looking at the obvious effort he made to smooth his brow.
"Work, studies and time abroad," he summarised, raising his beer in a mock salute. "You're quite the industrious person."
"I get things done." A deceptively sweet smile spread over her face. "Not judge a book by its cover, and all that."
"I wouldn't dream of forming my opinion before all the facts were known," said Law. "So this isn't a party just for your friend? Sanji, right?"
"I don't like having parties thrown in my honour." A satisfied grin spread over her face. "However, Sanji's even worse than me at accepting them, so Luffy takes every opportunity he can to throw one at him."
A peculiar look flitted over Law's face before he nodded sharply. "Well, have a nice evening," he said, grabbed his beer and disappeared once more into the party din, leaving a bewildered Nami in his wake.
What was the matter with that man?
After a while, the game session in the living room dispersed and the party filled most of the house. Nami was happy to see Bepo the Victorious, who had won the twister tournament with a surprising show of agility and the contortion skills of a professional acrobat. And, not to forget, also by virtue of crushing both Usopp and Luffy who had tried their best to tickle him in a show of unsportsmanlike behaviour.
They should have known better than to try and tickle a mink. They knew how thick their fur was.
Vivi and Koza had disappeared and Nami would not want to be in Sanji's shoes when he found out what they had been up to in his room. Luckily enough, he was currently occupied with setting up an intricate game of cards, declaring crushing defeat or jubilant victory depending on the tricks while Luffy and Bepo were slowly but surely losing all their lose change to his swift fingers.
As the evening wore on and people became more loose-limbed, Chopper found his familiar role as a travelling ambulance, rushing from room to room helping people with small scrapes while going 'WEEE OOO WEEE OOO WEEE OOO", while Usopp was sickeningly cute serenading a laughing Kaya by the power of karaoke. Zoro and Kid had been engaged in a drinking competition since the lava adventure, gathering empty bottles around them like shipwrecks around a malfunctioning lighthouse.
And Nami was having fun.
There was something special about being surrounded by the people you loved, even though the constant tinkle of empty bottles hitting the mantlepiece got repetitive after a while and Usopp's karaoke corner was a bit loud at times. He had even managed to set up a snack corner with both popped corn and spun sugar, enticing Chopper for regular pitstops during his first aid voyages.
"What do you call cotton candy?" Chopper asked during one of his pauses, munching on a large wad of the sugary goodness.
"Candy floss," said Nami, Luffy and Zoro.
"Ghost's breath," from Usopp.
"Papa's beard," answered Sanji, as a passing Bepo chimed in with "Grandma's hair!"
"Why would you call it anything to do with hair?" Chopper asked, aghast, the sugary confection forgotten in his hoof.
"I call it beard, not hair."
"Still a type of hair!"
"Potato, tomato."
"French is such a weird language."
"Says the guy who has twenty words for moose. And who speaks French."
"That's why I can say it's a weird language. I have the expertise," Chopper said, nose in the air.
Luffy gleefully stole the remainder of Chopper's candy floss, tired of waiting for Usopp to make a new one. "Wouldn't it be cool if French people were real and not just invented for 'Ratatouille'?"
Sanji rubbed his temples, probably praying to some higher power for patience as he was wont to do when Luffy opened his mouth. "Sometimes I'm not sure if you're serious or if you just live to be a pain in the arse."
Luffy shrugged while fighting off an irate Chopper, holding the stick of spun sugar high overhead. "Both. I seriously sometimes forget that nationalities exist. And sometimes it's fun to see you squirm."
"I'll never make you French toast again."
Sanji looked pleased at Luffy's horrified expression. "Come on, admit that the French have given you good things. Like crêpes."
Luffy looked pensive. "There's also French fries."
"Not French, but I'll allow it."
"Cheese soufflé," said Usopp.
"Mayonnaise," proclaimed Luffy.
"French mustard," answered Sanji.
"The guillotine," from Zoro, causing a passing Koza to look slightly alarmed as he adjusted his dishevelled shirt.
"The metric system," Nami mused, grinning at the furiously blushing Vivi following Koza.
"The stethoscope!" Chopper chimed in.
"The pencil-sharpener."
"Hot air balloons."
"The hairdryer."
"The oboe."
"And that's why we hate them and will never allow the French inside our borders again," said Luffy with a serious expression.
Nami scoffed. "Luffy, the only military incident Brazil and France have been involved in centred around a lobster fisherman. You had an actual Lobster War. I'm not sure where to rank that in the grand scale of international military disputes; under or above the Emu War of Australia and the Sheep Wars of Texas."
"They invaded."
"In the sixteenth century. And no, I'm not going to debate this. Again."
"Spoilsport. Soon you'll claim that my newly improved system of measurement won't work either."
"Luffy, you can't start declaring time in jiffies or your height in crisps."
"You are boring, and it's not measured in crisps. That'd be silly."
"I'm sure I saw you count out a pile of crisps the other day."
"Crisps are not uniform enough. I use Cheetos. I'm exactly 41 Cheetos tall."
"Why did you think you needed to measure yourself in Cheetos?" Usopp asked.
"Because we were out of Doritos."
Nami sighed, giving up all hope for the future of mankind.
Usopp regarded Luffy with the air of a long-suffering person who sees no end to his torment.
"Want a Cheeto?"
Usopp regarded the proffered snack for a moment, before shrugging and accepting the offering. "Why not. My body, unlike many, is not a temple. It's a storage unit for my regrets, after all. What harm can a floor-cheeto do that I haven't already done to it myself?"
"The harm of a ton of additives and preservatives?"
"Part of a normal, healthy diet."
"Nothing about your diet is normal. Or healthy."
"Well, part of my normal diet, then."
"Fair enough."
Usopp scoffed. "Fair has nothing to do with it. It takes dedication to live as unhealthily as I do."
"Did you know the most unhealthy thing isn't whatever Usopp had for lunch today, but rather how much we sit?" Sanji mused, leaning back in his chair.
"The most unhealthy thing about you is how much you smoke," said Nami.
"I disagree! It is how much I admire you, lovely lady," said Sanji, throwing her a blinding smile.
"Or the amount of empty prattle coming out of your mouth," said Zoro.
"Did you know Kid has this amazing chair?" said Luffy, his brain aligning with the thread of conversation. "It's shaped like a scorpion and is so comfy! I could live in that chair."
"Even though sitting too much shortens your life, as we just learned?"
"Who cares? It'd be worth it in that chair."
"Oi, half-pint! That's my chair you're talking about," said Kid.
"And it's so comfy!" said Luffy, raising his voice.
"And it deserves respect!" said Kid, raising his already impressively thunderous voice in tandem.
"But it's so pretty and cool and wicked," said Luffy, speaking even louder.
"It's my chair!"
"AND A PRETTY CHAIR IT IS!"
"WELL, IF SOMEONE–"
By now, Luffy stood on the coffee table, screaming in Kid's face. Kid, however, wasn't fazed by this and screamed louder in retaliation, prompting Luffy to raise the volume of his scream in turn.
"Should we stop them?" Killer wondered, making a half-hearted attempt to rise from his seat.
Law, on the sofa next to a sleepy Bepo held up a lazy hand to stop him. "No, I want to see who wins."
Sadly enough for his scientific experiment, peer-reviewed and ethically approved, Nami instead threw a sofa cushion at Luffy, knocking him down from the table and demanded that the pair take their insufferable strutting and measuring contest outside, thank you very much.
Not that it made much of a difference, the men opting to start throwing Luffy's juggling balls at each other instead.
"Are they always like this?" Bepo asked her, wonder in his voice as he sank down on the sofa beside Nami, the frame creaking slightly under his weight.
"Usually," Nami hummed, taking a sip of her beer as the men in question transitioned to throwing darts at the dartboard Zoro had gifted Sanji for his birthday last year. "But you should know, menace of the office and all," she said, elbowing him playfully.
"Sorry…" the bear yawned, leaning against her.
"You can't be tired now, the party's just starting," Nami said fondly, ruffling Bepo's fur.
It was so soft. Almost superior to Chopper's.
Not that she'd ever reveal that to her fuzzy little friend.
"What time is it?" Luffy suddenly exclaimed, looking alarmed, darts momentarily forgotten.
"Eleven minutes over eleven, why?" Nami said.
"Quick! Make a wish!" Luffy exclaimed, screwing his eyes shut and looking almost constipated with concentration.
"I wish you'd stop shouting," Nami said, burying her head in Bepo's shoulder to muffle the noise.
He really was soft. And warm.
Zoro scoffed, opening another beer with his un-bandaged hand where he lounged in the threadbare armchair. "You know it doesn't work if you wish for the impossible."
Luffy glared at her. "Yeah Nami! You should really know better."
"Well, then I wish for better entertainment."
"I have the perfect solution!" Usopp proclaimed, eyes sparkling. A moment of frantic activity was followed by a man taking a proud stance, arms akimbo, in front of his trusty whiteboard. "Pictionary!"
The game was divided into the Sofa (Nami, Bepo and Law – all the people who didn't bother to move), Team Potato (Zoro, Usopp and Killer, the team named by Zoro) and THE WINNERS!11! (Sanji, Luffy and Kid; a last-minute addition of Chopper and Koby caused protests from the other two teams which were silenced by Sanji's reasonable and logical argument of 'It's my very unasked-for and unfortunate surprise party, so we do as I want').
When the game commenced, the five-man team didn't seem to have any advantage of being almost double the size as the combined artistic talent of the group amounted to one (1) teaspoon and so their artworks were somewhat hard to guess for anyone. The worst (or best, depending on your point of view) example being something that looked like an ice-skating caterpillar that Luffy vehemently insisted was a bus.
Once Kid presented something that looked like either a very contemporary take on the death of Marat but turned out to be an interpretation of Santa Claus, the game had to be suspended, as the philosophical debate on the nature of art devolved into a squabble if Father Christmas lived on the North Pole or in Lapland.
Kid and Luffy argued for the North Pole, a very silly notion in the opinion of both Nami and Sanji since there are no reindeer there, a key component of Santa's transportation choices. He therefore had to live somewhere with some sort of reindeer, either in North America (caribou) or Scandinavian Lapland and/or Siberia (reindeer). Chopper, resident expert, declined to judge and disappeared under the pretence of getting a refill.
But, as Killer pointed out, "It doesn't really matter, does it? Santa is kind of an asshole, when you think about it. He works one day a year and then spends the rest of it judging people. So who cares where he lives?"
Law hummed in contemplation. "You mean him and Kid gets along quite well?"
"Shut up, bumfaced doctoral failure."
"Got the papers and thus I'm officially no failure, you burnt piece of toast."
"I don't like you."
"I'll get over it."
"Beer?"
"Sure."
But the beer-fetching process was cut tragically short by a call that apparently demanded Kid and Killer's presence in another part of town.
Nami got a bit concerned at the, frankly, scary look of exhilaration that graced Kid's face at the opportunity of what sounded like the precursors to a fight and his boisterous exclamation of "Tonight is a good night to die!"
"I'll make sure you don't do that, then," Killer said, a weary note to his voice.
"Not me, the other guy," Kid scoffed, shrugging on his leather jacket.
Law smirked from his laid-back position against a gently snoring Bepo. "Has anyone told you you've got anger issues, sparky boy?"
"I prefer to call it 'leadership skills'," Kid gave a two-finger salute as they waved goodbye and departed for what sounded like more violent pastures.
The clock struck twelve, Usopp declared the hour of the wicked witch of the East AKA Nami-I'm-talking-about-you which in turn led to the aforementioned Witch attempting to smother him with a pillow, and the evening turned into night. The topics of conversation became more obscure and the bottles of alcohol approached took on colourful shapes and funny names and the less experienced partygoers trickled away, one by one and Chopper had to be carried to bed once he fell asleep in the middle of a monologue about the medical uses of the agave plants he and Usopp were cultivating.
Then it was suddenly a lot later, both in terms of time and drinks ingested.
And Nami was once more stuck with Law.
And they was almost back to normal and she really shouldn't be so happy about that, should she?
Their conversation twisted back and forth like a ship tacking against the wind, jumping from one tangent to the next, from speculations about the professorial candidates to the justification of universities in general to the problem with institutionalisation and what theory is not.
How did this keep happening? First in the kitchen, then they'd been a surprisingly good team in Pictionary (which was lethal the way Luffy and Kid played it) and now Bepo had disappeared somewhere and everything was fluffy and warm and it was kind of nice to lean back in the sofa and sink into ruminations about life, the universe and everything.
With him of all the available people.
If she wasn't careful, she'd start thinking this was kind of… nice.
"– and what's really the point of changing?" Law concluded his latest thought. "Who are you afterwards? The same person, or someone completely new?"
"It's too early to discuss the nature of reality," Nami groaned. "Can we get back to questions about 'who you really are, I mean really, when you think about it?' at around four in the morning?"
"As if I'm awake at that ungodly hour."
"Judging from the shopping bags under your eyes, you're awake most of the time."
"Touché."
"But if we think of time as 'jiffies'–"
Although the groove was in the air, people started to drop off and drop dead as the hours grew darker and Luffy's karaoke choices started to approach disco. At four in the morning, the last weakly flickering embers in the fireplace illuminated the pensive face of a dark-haired man, idly twirling his cocoa mug in his hands, while his green-haired companion lay sprawled on the sofa, contemplating both life in general as well as the benefits of sleeping on the sofa contra the effort of getting to his own bedroom.
"Going to bed?" said Luffy, gaze fixed on the dying flames.
"Thinking about it. The sofa will kill my back but it's too much work to go upstairs."
"Traffy and Bepo are crashing in our room."
Zoro raised an eyebrow. "I thought they'd have left. Or that he'd sleep in Nami's room, judging by the looks they were giving each other."
Luffy merely shrugged. "I think they're just friends."
Zoro shrugged in response. "Throw me that blanket, then."
Sanji, passing by with a toothbrush in his mouth, threw the blanket on top of Zoro's head before disappearing up the dark stairs, not bothering to wait for his muffled curses.
Silence descended upon the living room, only broken by the occasional creak as Zoro tried to find a comfortable position on the sofa.
"Zoro?"
"Wtfs?"
"Aren't you supposed to be asleep?"
"I'm supposed to be a lot of things, but I live to disappoint." Zoro turned again, hoping that lying on his other side would be more comfortable. This proved to be in vain and he sighed, flopping down on his back once more, trying to stretch out his legs. He only succeeded in knocking down a hideous vase gifted to them by Chopper's mum when they moved.
Sadly enough, it didn't break as it tumbled down from the side table.
A hard lump had formed in the sofa, somewhere in the vicinity of Zoro's kidneys and kept digging into his side. He turned once more, hoping against all hope that this would make things better.
It did not.
"If sleep is for the weak, but sleep make us weak, what makes us strong?"
Luffy's philosophical tendencies were at their greatest in the middle of the night. Usopp had once suggested that the phases of the moon might influence the strength and weirdness of his insights. The pale moonlight glinting of forgotten bottles and abandoned glasses could be interpreted as suggesting a certain correlation (causation still to be determined) of this theory.
"Booze," Zoro grunted, kicking off a cushion in his attempt to find a comfortable sleeping position.
The blessed moment of silence was broken once more.
"What do you think of Nami's crustacean menstruation station in the top floor loo?"
"The what?"
"Haven't you noticed? There's this huge lobster, holding a tray where she keeps her pads and stuff. I think Vivi found it online."
"Why is it in our bathroom then, not Vivi's?"
Luffy merely shrugged, happily gazing into the dying embers.
The stilness of the night wrapped itself around Zoro, blanketing him in a transcendent state of stilness and repose. The sofa became one with him, a singular point of immovable support in the silence, punctuated by the last crackling pops from the smoldering fire…
"Are lobsters scorpions to mermaids?"
Usually Zoro quite enjoyed Luffy's ramblings, but not at four in the morning when he tried to sleep.
"It's four in the fucking morning. Let me sleep on this awful excuse for a sofa."
He finally found the mysterious lump, which turned out to be a delicate porcelain ballerina.
He let the decorative figurine join the vase.
It did not break either to his great dismay.
"Sorry for trying to inject a shot of philosophical pondering into our humdrum everyday life."
"It's still four in the morning, it's our humdrum everyday night. And I don't bloody know, I'm not a mermaid. Or a merman for that matter. Ask Camie. And how do you even know the word 'crustacean'?"
"…you do realise that I'm writing my thesis on…bugs, right?"
"Are they crusty? No."
"Zoro, sea bugs are also bugs."
"Good. Night."
References:
Drever, R. (2015): Holiday Treat: What's the Difference Between Reindeer and Caribou? Accessed 1.6.2021.
McFadden, C. (2020): 45+ of the Greatest French Inventions of All Time. Accessed 13.4.2021.
Wikipedia: Lobster War. Accessed 1.4.2021.
(since ff net doesn't really like links, you have to do some internet searching yourself)