WARNING: The chapter deals with un-spelled out struggles of Eating Disorder and body image issued for Law. Law has vitiligo and allergies which makes him sick, and the mental stress Doflamingo puts on him made him worse physically. The 55-year-old La is still in the process of accepting himself still, so be kind to our meow-meow. There is mild homophobia, and occasionally thoughts of characters slide into the zone of "I should just die." And these topics will get explored in details in chapter 3.
So if these things in the story send you to bad places, please don't read the story.
Chapter Two: A Long Separation
In nibbles, I had lived most of my life until the day I met him.
A bite of soft bread created the first painful rumbles in my belly, and after that, my life was never the same. With eyes, I fed my starving heart: "A greedy tongue was a curse," my adopted step-father had hammered into me, "but a greedier hand was worse," he had threatened when I wanted to eat the last slice of pizza one afternoon after eight hours of studying since the morning.
Despite his warnings, my eyes wandered, and my mind wondered about the taste and texture of food that others could gobble down without any fear.
"How was the taste of the sandwich?" I often asked about the taste and smell of the foods that my friends ate during lunch hours. It was my way of feeling part of a group. It was my way of filling this hunger that plagued me. When I saw Penguin wolf down the fourth piece of the pathetic-looking excuse of a ham sandwich, my lips automatically moved to shoot the question like an arrow.
"Doesn't matter, as long as it feeds you, Law. Don't worry, you are not missing out on anything scrumptious!" Penguin had no time to relish or feel disgusted about his lunch. Bepo and Sachi nodded in unison. "We really don't have the luxury to complain about quality or taste at this point. If it's paid by someone else, we just have to eat it." I respected Penguin's no-nonsense attitude towards everything in life, it was a sign of a good doctor.
"How was your fried rice?" Bepo always asked me out of care. "You didn't finish it. Was it too oily? Or was the rice too rubbery?"
I wish I could say that it fed me and the taste didn't matter. But it did, I had been eating the same dish for a month straight, not out of love but out of compulsion. I wanted variety, and the stupid sandwich sitting between Penguin's fingers looked appetising. "Wanna taste?" He offered. The very thought of biting into that oily, greasy ham-sandwich made my belly crawl out of my mouth. I wanted it, but my stomach warned me about the consequences.
On a surface level, the answer for the situation was simple, "gluten allergy." The allergy got aggravated as I grew up because my adopted family didn't take food allergies seriously and when I wanted to eat more they monitored my food consumption. Internally, it was fear and revulsion. I guess my expression said my answer.
"Come on, be happy your condition will not kill you!" Sachi laughed, we were doctors in our master's final year, so we knew very well that celiac disease couldn't kill me easily, but it could harm me in other ways if I was not careful and eventually kill me.
Yet who would explain to him that this hunger was chipping me away mentally day by day? This constant hunger bothered me. Ever since I could remember, hunger has been a constant companion that I have chosen to ignore and suppress.
It began with the slice of plain bread that I greedily took from the fresh loaf that my birth-father had bought from the local bakery. As I grew up and made to shift homes, I was constantly reminded that weak people complained about their blessings. The very fact that I could eat such a luxurious spread of the finest cuisine from around the world was a blessing! For me, the fact that after eating the food, my body couldn't metabolise and not die was a blessing. Every meal became a test of endurance and resistance. My suppressed greed taught me the hard lesson that I had to stop desiring food that made me sick and if I did eat it, I should not complain about it by falling sick. My mind was always chanting: Say no to cookies, say no to fried chicken, say no to bread, say no to pizza! Anything that you wanted was tarnished with the flavour of pain. Keep saying no, toy with your fork, keep saying no, play with your knife, and keep saying no until and unless they begin to label you as a picky eater.
Amidst this stomach-churning chaos of watching Sachi laugh, Penguin chewing on the stinking sandwich and Bepo giving me a sympathetic look, he had arrived in my life, with a plate full of half-burnt cookies made of almond flour.
That confidence he carried always blew my mind away, anyone within nine inches of the cookies could smell the burnt underside of his creation. Still, he dared to encroach on my bubble of self-consciousness and enrich my life for a whole decade. "Do you want a cookie?" Luffy had stood there happily with the piling of ugly cookies. With a lab coat on, he looked so much younger than he already was, that I was tempted to ask why a high school student was talking to us. Instead of doing the lame mean thing that Sachi was infamous for, I quietly read what was stitched on the pocket of his lab coat. His name and department: Monkey D Luffy, Department of Food Science, First Year. Then I observed him properly from top to bottom, a little butter-yellow round face that had tanned unevenly, an old knife scar under his eye, unruly jet-black hair and the most beautiful pair of deep brown eyes I had ever seen. And he was definitely a foot shorter than me, which made me want to put him in my pocket.
Everything about his presence screamed: fresher!
"I am Luffy! I saw you and thought you might like my cookies. They are a bit burned." He placed the pink plate in front of me, and then he smiled at me again. For the first time in my life, I felt struck by a lightning bolt in my heart. He flopped onto the empty seat beside me, and I forgot that I was capable of words. He spoke again, and I heard him like a lovesick man. And I immediately was seized by another hunger for something beyond food. I wanted to see this smile for the rest of my life. "I am not that good at cooking yet, but my grandpa said if I was not going to join the Marines, then I better get a degree in the only thing I am good at. But you know, you can't get a degree in eating, so I applied for culinary school. But my grandpa just didn't understand and then, with my father's backing, he said I would be a terrible cook as I would eat everything from the restaurant kitchen and ruin the business. To be fair, I can't refute their reasoning! So they said food science would be better suited for me. So here I am!"
"Wow, you can talk!" Sachi was the first one to talk to him.
Luffy offered a glance to Sachi, and pointed at his own lips, which were plump and too beautiful my horny eyes registered, "Yeah I have a mouth? See?"
Sachi was not one to back down, he continued, "So why is there a shiny berry on this side of the university?"
Luffy looked at the floor, "Where is the berry?" Then he patted his thighs. "Did I drop a berry?"
"He meant you." I finally spoke. "First-year students are all shiny like a berry coin. It's a metaphorical thing."
"Ah." He blushed and scratched the back of his head. "Thank you. And you have a beautiful voice too. Like ocean waves to my ears." Luffy grinned again, and I felt a blush creep up my skin too, sadly Luffy couldn't notice it thanks to the melanin cocktail that my face was. It was hard to believe that this pocket-sized sunshine was talking to me. "You are handsome too!" Not many people approached me, let alone looked at me and complimented my voice. It was Luffy's openness and honesty that took my breath away every time that we spent together for the next ten years.
Until that point in my life, everything was just a never-ending cycle of repetition and chores I had to do to live from one to another. I had been living in survival mode for so long, and used to people's frowns and knotted eyes that I had to reconfirm what he thought about me, "You think I am handsome? Despite the vitiligo?" My hand pointed at the little white patches on my chin and skin.
Luffy nodded, "I know a handsome man when I see one! Shishishishi!"
"Am I handsome?" Sachi asked.
Without a blink, Luffy replied, "No."
"The boy is spirited."
How could I not love him, every expression on his face was honest and open, he didn't have to pay by the rules, or follow social customs, "I am 18! An adult!"
Bepo decided to join and cut out Sachi before he could anger Luffy, "So what are you doing here? Shouldn't you be in your building in the west wing?"
"The food science department is here, we got shifted last week. In this building, we have been given the seventh floor above the nutrition and health science department. We will have overlapping coursework." Luffy pushed the tray of cookies towards me. "Cookie?"
"He can't eat," Sachi spoke before I could refuse.
"Because you stole his mouth?" With not-so-innocent eyes, Luffy tilted his head cutely and asked, "How would you feel if your future patient was not allowed to answer the questions, but their guardians or companions did?" Then he read my name stitched on my apron's pocket. "Tra? Trafalafal?" I couldn't help but chuckle, my name was not easy to pronounce. "Well, we will have time for you to teach me how to pronounce your name properly in future, okay? Anyway…" Luffy turned to Sachi again and read his name. "Well Sachi, Traffy here can answer for himself, right?" Luffy asked with a deadly glare directed at my friend. Who immediately stopped whatever nonsense he wanted to do.
"Wow, Law, this one is pocket-sized dynamite!" Penguin finally joined the talk with a laugh. "Tell him why you can't eat the cookies, Law!"
With a deep sadness in my heart, I said, "I have celiac disease."
"You mean you suffer from gluten allergies and may have other dietary issues?" Luffy's face didn't lose its seriousness. "Do you carry your allergy card?" I nodded. "May I see? I am still learning how to read it properly, but I am better than regular people. You see, my second elder brother has allergies so, I plan to focus on creating food that is available to people who have allergic conditions." He gave me his hand, he wanted to read my card.
Who was I to refuse? I pulled out my wallet and fished out my card. The next few minutes he spent cross-checking the ingredients he had written down in his notebook with my allergy card. My friends and I observed him. My heart reminded me that there was at least a difference of 7 years between us, but my heart was warming up to him, as he diligently continued studying my card.
After he was done, he slapped my thigh, "My cookies are safe for you Traffy." He picked up a cookie and offered it to me. "It is made with almond flour and almond milk and almond butter shishishi!"
"Thanks." Instead of taking it from his fingers, I decided to give into my greed and bite a chunk. The cookies tasted terrible, but I didn't feel the rumble in my belly or itchiness in my throat! So shamelessly I finished it all while Bepo, Sachi and Penguin looked at me with horror.
"Can I have one?" Sachi asked. And his hands came for one cookie. But I treated his hand like a fly that needed a good swatting.
I spoke in my mother tongue, "Mine!"
"What language was this?" Luffy asked.
I was not allowed to speak in my language in public, thanks to my stupid adopted family's rules. Yet I never stopped thinking in the language that my biological parents so lovingly taught me, "Sorry, I said Mine in my mother tongue, Flevian."
"Why are you apologising for knowing more languages? My brother Sabo is super-intelligent, he speaks seven languages! He knows Flevian too, he picked it up when my brother was little. You can always converse with him, but you have to wait to meet him. He got dragged by our father to learn the ways of a Marine!" Luffy laughed, "My whole family is Marines or serving the World Government!" Luffy was the first person in my life who didn't care about the things that made me feel bad or inferior. Just when the buds of affection began to bloom in my heart, Sachi's greedy hand tried to steal a cookie.
Again in Flevian, I spoke and whacked his hand, "Mine!"
A not-so-gentle hand patted my arm, "Easy there, Tiger! I will bake you more" Luffy grinned. "Cooking is 70% of my coursework!"
After this little gesture, Bepo had finally found Luffy interesting enough to jump into the conversation, "Why a tiger? He is more like a starving meerkat! Law can't even bite!"
"Because he is beautiful like a tiger. He even has golden eyes too! You are cute too Bepo, want to meet my friend Wanda? She is single and training to be a lieutenant!" Luffy grinned again, his personality with Bepo was that of a morning sunshine, comforting and kind.
"No time for a relationship." Bepo huffed. "This guy could use some romance, though!" My best-friend betrayed me by pointing his cute chubby thumb at me. "The last date he went on was a blind date for an arranged marriage! Wasn't it? I think she was the eldest daughter of the Germa family, doing research in poison, wasn't it Law?"
Luffy was not bothered by the information that I went on a blind date, but rather it was my health that he chose to care about. "Ain't you too young for marriage? Especially with your workload?" For the first time, someone was so genuinely concerned about me in a long time. Even Bepo, Sachi and Penguin had no idea what was going on in my personal life, but Luffy smelled foul-play. Because, deep down I knew it, he didn't need to approach me with the cookies at all, yet he did, he actively chose to meddle in my life.
The cookies were so bad that he was on his way to dumping them somewhere discreet, but he used them as a portal key to enter my life and change the trajectory of my life.
"Tell that to my adopted step-father. Maybe the fatherfucker will listen to you!" I smirked.
"Adopted step-father?" Luffy squinted his eyes. "Interesting choice of words."
"It's a complicated story." I sighed. "You might find it boring or too troublesome. And never ever approach me with cookies again, if I tell you…" I let the words swirl around us for the fact to sit in Luffy's heart that I was not easy. He needed to understand that I was not easy by choice but by circumstances. Actually, I wanted to nip these budding feelings in my heart that very afternoon. Yet he kept surprising me.
"I will make you more cookies, I promise, Traffy! And I am not afraid of complicated. We can do the romance thing too on the side while you tell me your life story." He offered his brightest smile. That smile was the reason I could continue with a long separation of two decades. He may have taken all our shared memories and deleted everything that belonged to us online, but he could never take my memories of him. Because he conveniently forgot, I was cursed with a photogenic memory, if I saw it once, I could never forget it, and he was the album I cherished the most.
Like a cannonball, Luffy had rolled into my life that day, "You will?"
Luffy gave his full attention to me, "Do you have a list of dishes that you want to eat but weren't able to until now because of your allergies? I will recreate them for you. The one that will not give you any allergic reactions!"
"Pizza?" My greedy mouth asked. "Can you make me pizza?"
"I will be able to," The best thing about my lover was, he never lied and when he tried, he failed at it gorgeously. "I am still in the basic stages of cooking." Luffy slammed the table with excitement! "BUT I WILL MASTER IT ALL FOR YOU!" With apologetic puppy eyes, he tried to pull away the plate of the cookies.
I Flevian I again said, "Mine." Luffy blushed, maybe he understood that day that the word was directed at him and not the awful cookies. Whatever the reason for his blush, he couldn't take them away from me as I held on to the plate like my life depended on it. "So we start with cookies?" I smirked. "Am I a poison tester?"
"Yes! I know those cookies are bad. But I need someone to give me feedback, and you have allergies, so be my Guinea pig!"
"What if I die?" I joked. "What will you do?"
"I will kill myself if I kill you with my food!" The seriousness in Luffy's voice sent shivers up my spine. In the course of our ten-year-long love life, I learned the hard way, that when matters came to hard situations, Luffy would always choose me over a thousand times!
"Damn Law, shiny berry matches your emo with equal enthusiasm." Bepo grinned and patted Luffy. "Hey kid, please make your experimental food for my best-friend! He has been eating the same horrible fried rice from the cafeteria for the last month!"
"I will." Luffy nodded.
"Seriously?"
"Seriously-seriously" Luffy nodded. "Do you want to be my food tester this summer break? I will cook new things for you every day."
"Law, say yes to him!" Penguin smiled. "Luffy seems sincere."
"I am sincere. I don't mess around with food."
"You better not kill me!" I laughed. "If you do, my ghost will sit on your shoulder and pull your lovely hair."
"Aww, you think my hair is lovely?" Luffy cupped his face to offer me the maximum dose of cuteness. "Shishishishi!"
"You are lovely."
With a blushing face, he inched closer to me, "I am Monkey D Luffy." Then he again raised his hand and offered his pinkie to me. And I took it into mine and coiled our fingers. "I promise to always feed you want and make sure you are not hungry." My heart was hit by Cupid's arrow, and then I intertwined all our fingers and he giggled. His hand was small in comparison to mine. When his not-so-soft hands relaxed in mine, they felt even smaller.
"Dr Trafalgar D Water Law."
"Nice to meet you, Traffy!"
That was the day I fell in love with him, and for the next decade I kept falling in love with him, and then on our tenth anniversary, Monkey D Luffy vanished from my life; he took everything that would remind me of him, our albums, our shared trinkets and our shared clothes. He left me behind a note full of gibberish and a notebook full of recipes he created for me.
And for the next twenty years, I spent chasing any clue of tracking him down.
The first year was spent looking desperately for him, even though his family had no clue where he went. By the time they found out, he had made them swear to keep his information a secret.
The second year was spent in anger. Every waking hour, I was reminded of his absence. The little flat we bought together grew larger. The sofa felt bigger. My once-always-busy kitchen became lonelier. And the bed which was the greatest source of warmth became cold. With dark thoughts beginning to simmer, I was consumed with rage and I constantly found myself asking: how could you break up with me?
Were the ten years we spent together worthless?
Did the promises of being together through thick and thin were made on lies?
Did I mean so little to him?
In anger, I ate store-bought bread and other items I was forbidden to taste. I gorged on them until I was found wriggling in vomit and whimpering for him on the side of the road. Against my wishes, I was dragged to the hospital and put under observation. My adopted step-father didn't want me to be in pain, so overnight he sent his family to me. Almost every member who visited me, except him, was kinder and caring for me. Love didn't bind this family, so I knew it was all a facade to lure me back into their grand scheme of plans. When I had declared a decade back that I fell in love with Luffy none of them opposed us openly, but I knew they had done everything they could to break us apart under his command. From harassing me with my family's loans to my educational debt. Cutting funding for Luffy's research to harassing his brothers, they had done everything to make us miserable.
In Doflamingo's eyes, I was the lamb that had strayed from the path and taken a detour called Luffy, and now I had returned home. Carefully I observed them do their theatrics, all I had was now anger and grief. They never badmouthed Luffy, and they never said anything negative about our relationship, but they constantly reminded me how Dressrosa was not as progressive as my former country of Flevance—and insisted that what Luffy did was for the greater good.
The one month of forced stay in the hospital re-established one truth: this break-up was a stupid act of love.
Bepo nursed me back to health after my release and told me to tame my anger and act rationally. Penguin and Sachi told me to move on, they tried to set me up on blind dates. But never Bepo, because my lover had told him of this horrible plan in advance. My best-friend didn't oppose him, as he cared for me too much. Bepo knew well that I was not the only one who believed in one soul in one lifetime, Luffy believed it too.
Eventually, I was called back to Doflamingo Manor for a visit. My adopted step-father tried to do everything in his power to convince me that Luffy left me because he was a coward. Deep down, he knew that I was not buying it. Before meeting Luffy, the Doflamingo I knew was this larger-than-life-sized man dressed in pink and feathers; who had ripped apart my biological family. He had put my biological parents in debt, he had forcefully adopted me to further his agenda and had raised me to be a pawn in the game of chess. Somehow, under his mocking gaze, I always felt my inferiority was the reason why everything fell apart.
After Luffy bombarded the doors of fear down in my life, I began to realise how much I was the victim and that I shouldn't be ashamed of it. Everything I ever liked, wanted, desired, wanted or loved; had been either monitored, controlled, offered to me in scrapes, or outright denied. Meeting him again after years in his room brought back the fear, but now I was much older and calmer thanks to Luffy. As Doflamingo continued talking with me, he proved that he was the reason my lover had taken such drastic measures. Someone who had spent years loving me like I was the most precious flower in the world wouldn't vanish overnight. No matter how much I prodded and asked my adopted step-siblings, they kept their lips zipped, I knew that by now. That day, despite my belly churning in fear and disgust, I continued hearing Dolfamingo's lies and fake sympathy. I convinced him that I believed him, and I even shed tears. He wanted to see and relish These tears of anger and powerlessness, and I put on a show.
But I was persistent, I never stopped looking for answers.
With every visit to my adopted step-family, and phone calls made to my biological family, I was certain Luffy didn't run off. My fiancé evaluated all the options and chose the one that would hurt me the least and hurt him the most. In the grand scheme of things, my dreams and life were above him. Heartbreak didn't understand the logical reasoning. I knew he was selfish when he wanted to be, but what kind of selfishness was this? To run away from me, all because he loved me so much! The pain he caused wasn't any less because his actions were born of love.
The pain of heartbreak was pain at the end of the day.
If I wanted to get out of this spiderweb of my adopted family, I had to play by their rules. Despite the hurt and pain, I decided to behave better, so that I could figure out a permanent solution. My adopted stepfather didn't stop trying to get me married, instead of fighting him, I decided to meet people on blind dates; I left my dates with a pleasant time but made sure it was enough for the girls put into the same situation to understand that I had not consented to this.
And then from the third year began my years of longing and searching.
I searched for him everywhere. Monkey D Luffy had vanished. Not only had he left this country, he had left North Blue! So I went to the other oceans, but I could never track him. Which also established that his family had helped him vanish from the face of the planet. They were not as powerful as my adopted family, yet, they had connections, which they put to good use.
Still, neither his father, grandparents nor brothers told me of his location.
Maybe my hope for a reunion would've died, but then the untraceable cheques began arriving in the fourth year of our long separation.
During the decade we spent together as lovers, Luffy had proven multiple times how good he was at his job, maybe whimsical, but he was a genius. So every time his research funding got cut down, my lover pulled through. He always managed to overcome the obstacles with unique solutions. The food items he created, and experimented with, helped many people like me. Hence, when he vanished, I refused to believe that he stopped loving me like the rubbish excuse he had written down on the note for me.
Monkey D Luffy gave up on a thriving career just to protect me.
These cheques were proof of how much he loved me. They kept coming from companies where my lover had worked as a researcher and consulted. And I was registered as his only beneficiary, so he deposited every royalty he deserved into my bank account. Then cheques began to arrive from all over the globe, from companies whose names I couldn't utter or knew existed. From whatever corner of the world he was hiding in, he was trying to help me. That's when my anger of having been left behind ended and my cry for his embrace began. Then one day, the entire mortgage of our little flat was paid in one full sweep!
Again the anger was reborn, and before I could spiral down further, Bepo made me sit down and confessed that he knew Luffy was planning to break-up with me for a while. He reminded me again that Luffy did it to protect me. That night I left Bepo with a bleeding nose and Sachi and Penguin finally learned what the Doflamingo family had been doing to me since I was little.
After that, the three of them decided to help me in whatever capacity they could to reunite me with Luffy.
When the anger left, I finally grasped the whole picture and understood what my adopted father had done! Everything became crystal clear, the reason why he vanished, and why I was forced to accept the money from this so-called anonymous beneficiary.
Tracking Luffy was made next to impossible, but tracking his brothers was easy. I found both of them again three years after our ugly verbal fight, which eventually turned into a physical brawl. The fight had happened immediately after Luffy vanished, we had parted with bloody noses, injured mouths and battered knuckles. I had hoped these injuries on the three of us would bring that rascal lover of mine back. Nope, he was a stubborn mule who refused to return.
Hence, when I found Sabo and Ace on the island of Syrup, I made them sit down by the collar and cut to the chase. I was still older than them, even though they were in their mid-30s, I was a senior who was almost 40.
In Flevian I spoke so that it was obvious I was talking to the two, "Was it my adopted step-family?"
Sabo turned first and Ace after, and then both glared at me like I was a pathetic idiot for not realising it any sooner. "Took you a sweet four years, I see!" Ace spat the words in fluent Flevian. I was surprised Ace learned the language too. So we continued our conversation in my mother tongue.
"Where is he?"
"We can't tell you. He made us swear on his life. It's an oath!" Both brothers replied in unison.
I slammed the bunch of cheques that had arrived in my private mailbox, "He still loves me. He was the only person who knew of my other bank account and the secret mailbox. These can't come from old parents, as you know, they are still paying the price for saving a nation. All these bits of papers are from the companies he worked with." My voice broke. "Then why did he have to vanish like this? He loves you guys so much, how can he bear to be away from you two? He loves his family, so why would he let my family bully him?"
"You moron." Sabo spat too, "He did it to protect you!" I understood yet, I didn't want to. "Your step-father threatened your entire career, you were getting crushed under the debts of your biological parents, and your sibling is still in college, and you still have your educational loans too. That adopted family was going to milk you like a breeding heifer one way or the other, Luffy couldn't let all your hard work come to nought."
"I would've figured a way out."
Sabo slapped the table, "Yes, you would have. But Luffy didn't want to risk it. You were being targeted by the homophobes, weren't you?" It was true, I was losing patients at the hospital because I was outed as a gay man. "Did they not break your chamber?" People spread misinformation that my vitiligo was caused by unnatural sex that I had with men. Luffy didn't like the way I was being targeted daily at work and online, and the breaking down of my chamber was the last straw for him.
Luffy's parents, grandparents and brothers had helped me during those hard days, but my adopted family was just better at making my life hell. Money gave them unchecked power which even the most respected civil-servant family of Dressrosa couldn't counter.
My hands hid my eyes as I cried out loud, "He is the only person who loved me without any conditions…"
Ace took the crumpled cheques from the other hand and neatly arranged them with restrained anger, "He should've asked help from us to Law. But you know Luffy, he will prioritise everyone over himself." Sabo patted Ace's palm, "Our greatest regret is that he couldn't trust his family enough. So Luffy made his own conclusion; he was the anomaly in your adopted step-father's grand plans for you. Even if we kill him now, his loyal people will make your life hell. Luffy has allowed you to get out of his grip. Without Luffy as the bargaining chip and your weakness, you are invincible Law, so embrace it."
I wanted to scream that my Luffy was my only source of strength, but what proof did I have to back these bold words?
Because of me, a lovely man had run away from his own family. Luffy hated being alone, yet he chose the loneliest path for himself. Ace tried to act as the mature elder one. Who was he fooling? We knew he was angry, he was so angry. Luffy was the little brother he brought to his home, no elder sibling wanted their baby sibling to go through this. Would I be able to sleep if one day I found out Lamy had gone into hiding and was being harassed by her lover's family? I wouldn't. Hence, how could I ask Ace and Sabo to speak about Luffy's location? Their reluctance was an act of kindness. Ace took a deep breath, then said, "Do everything you can, clear your family's debt, clear your education loans, and put Lamy in a safe space, we will help you with Lamy in anyway possible. Use the cheques wired to you. They should help a bit, wouldn't they?"
I nodded, I could clear the principal sum of my educational loan; loans which I was forced to take despite being eligible for the scholarship. Likewise, I could cut the first strings that were strangling me and my biological family. In the eyes of the Doflamingo family, I was nothing but a puppet. Luffy was giving me a chance to cut my strings. I didn't like this at all! "Even when he runs away, he chooses to protect me? When I find him, I will punch your brother." I didn't realise I was crying for a while now, I wiped the tears and snot from my face with the sleeves of my shirt, but the tears didn't stop flowing down.
"He could've been honest. Why did he write a long note saying he didn't love me any more? That he was bored? Why tell me his heart wanted excitement? When he wrote those words, did he think I couldn't understand he was lying just because he wrote it on paper? Did the ten years we spent loving each other mean nothing? Why lie to me, I would've done my best to fix this mess. Why is he behaving like this!"
"You wouldn't have agreed any other way, would you, Law?" Sabo patted my shoulder.
"No." I nodded. "How can a single man have so much power to tear away my family twice!"
I was forced to become part of the Doflamingo Family as collateral at the age of seven, my family's clinic was taken over, and my biological parents were forced to work in their hospitals to pay off the debt. I was raised to become one of the faces of their pharmaceutical empire and marry one of the daughters from either The Big Mums conglomerate or The Kadios or the Germas. The plan failed because I was queer as a 3 berry bill!
"All I wanted was to be happy with Luffy."
On the brink of our fourth year of long separation, I had finally broken down completely and cried in the arms of my lover's brothers.
After I found Luffy's potential location after twenty years, I immediately went to my little sister. If there was someone more eager to take revenge than me in this entire world, it was her. In no time Lamy was ready, she was biding her time for my sake. Now that she was certain I found where Luffy was, she decided to go ahead with the plan we both set out to accomplish ten years back. Everything now depended on her and lay at the mercy of her fingers.
"Are you sure, brother?" Lamy kissed my cheek as I stood on the ramp to the ship. "Once I press the button, it is all over, and you cannot return to Dressrosa ever!" She dangled her unhackable phone; every scam, every crime, every corruption and every act of fraud committed by the Doflamingo family were collected in that phone. "Okay, I am being dramatic, you can return in a few years. Because I will miss you so much." With a deep breath, I nodded. Scared would be an understatement for me, I was terrified of what if! What would she do if everything we did yielded no results?
Lamy on the other hand was as brave and confident as the 18-year-old Luffy I met, unbothered and unmarked by fear.
I pulled her into a bear hug and kissed her forehead. "I will miss you so much." Everything Luffy did twenty years back was to protect me and my biological family, and I think I earned this. This is all my luck spent on one final gamble. I don't care if my career tanked, my reputation got ruined, or I became unemployable. "Absolutely."
"Then let's do it." My sister pulled my hand to her phone and used my finger to press the button. "We are taking down the entire Doflamingo family. Together."
"Thank you." I squeezed her hard. "I am so sorry, I am leaving you to fight alone." I took a deep breath and kissed her cheeks.
My sister shook her head admonishingly, "You have done enough, it is time your abusers pay the price."
"Lamy, I love you, remember this, okay?"
"But you love Luffy more than me, teehee!" Lamy pinched my cheeks. "So now go. And don't call me until you have put your names in the family register as a couple, okay!"
"I am nervous!" I was plagued by thoughts of how he would react. I had changed so much. My hair looked like a bookshelf duster that was unevenly grey, white and black. I gave up on the goatee and let it cover my jawline, and my vitiligo had spread further on my face and body. "I don't look the same, I have wrinkles and I wear glasses now!"
"And you think Luffy of all the people will care?" Lamy always loved Luffy a little more than me, and I could feel how much she missed him too in her voice. "Because your fiancé is the champion of skincare and worshipper of ideal male beauty, is it? Last I remembered, he used five-in-one-shampoo-body wash-face-cleanser!"
"Once he shampooed his hair with fabric softener too!"
I almost cried in laughter recalling that memory. That evening was hilarious, I had returned after god knows how many hours of working. He came running into my arms at the door, and I patted his head like usual. My fingers felt like I was embracing a dog who was feeling fluffy after a great bath. So when he announced how much he loved the new shampoo because his hair was soft, I asked him what he meant by the new shampoo. As I had not changed anything in our usual supplies. Like a duck guiding its duckling, Luffy had led me to the bathroom to show the pink bottle, which my birth-mother had sent in the care package. My lover couldn't read my native language of Flevian and assumed it was a new shampoo.
"I miss him so much, Lamy, I can't wait to meet him," I spoke the words in Flevian so that only Lamy could understand, not the other passengers climbing up the ship. How easily I could recall my mother tongue, I lamented. The Doflamingo family had done everything to make me learn their language and make me forget my mother tongue, but when I wanted to convey my deepest thoughts, my first-grade Flevian overpowered the fifty years of mainland language speaking skills.
In much fluent Flevian, my sister replied, "You will meet him in fourteen days. And in fourteen days, I will burn the whole Doflamingo empire for you." Lamy smiled. "Then I will roast a marshmallow on that fire for you!"
"I look forward to it. I think I should climb in now." I could see the sailors and other passengers walking in. "I am so worried."
"One last thing!" Lamy hugged me tighter. We both heard the whistle for the final boarding call. "Tell me, what will you say to Luffy when you meet him again?"
"First I will punch him, then I will hug him, then I will cry, and then I will tell him: I thought I'd lost you." Because I did think so. If I couldn't find him, I would have walked into the ocean with broken pieces of my heart in my bleeding hands.
"It is time to go…" Lamy nuzzled her nose in my chest. "I hope you can finally eat well and sleep well and love well."
I gave her one last squeeze and pushed her out of the ramp with the parting words. "I love you, little bug..." My sister smiled at me softly and then raised her hands to scream proudly in our mother tongue.
"BYE BROTHER! I LOVE YOU VERY MUCH!"
Once I settled into my room, I found my flip-phone blowing up with noises. Every person who knew me well and cared for me was texting me. They all knew I was not going to pick up any call no matter what. So they resorted to old-school SMS!
I paid no attention to any of those notifications and decided to concentrate on reading up on the place where the love of my life lived; Shandoria. With every new flip of a page I felt like screaming, I felt like hitting myself with a hammer. Luffy was many things; smart but occasionally an idiot, brave but reckless when it came to love, hated working hard but would never take a shortcut. Luffy was everything but complicated.
Why didn't I realise that he was hiding in the most obvious place? Because it was complicated in my head, simple answers never appealed to me. I couldn't fathom that he would be hiding for two decades at the end of the world; the place where we planned to have our honeymoon!
It was an island of my choice because I read in some peer-reviewed food science of Luffy's that the seafood and local produce didn't have allergens. So someone like me could eat anything their heart desired. We wanted to take that gamble after our marriage.
Instead, the idiot ran away the day after the engagement.
And he did exactly what he always told me, had his grandfather not forced him to study Food Science, he would've opened a café in a quiet place and fed people what he created in his kitchen. In the early days of our dating life, I vividly remember him saying he had worked on many ship kitchens before he was dragged to join the university because he deliberately fudged his marine physical and aptitude exams. He had two former-marine friends, named Sanji who was a seasoned ship-cook and Zoro who was a marine-guard. When both of them quit to marry and start their inn on the island of Goa in East Blue, Luffy joined them. When asked by his grandfather what his excuse was: that this was an internship requirement for his Master's thesis. I knew it was a lie. Luffy wanted to see how a small-time service business worked.
After he vanished, I went to meet Sanji and Zoro, in hopes of finding him. Not only they had no idea of Luffy's drastic decision, but they were actually in the middle of writing an apology letter to us for not making it to the engagement ceremony as they were in a pickle because of adoption agencies fucking up paperwork. And how they would make it up by helping us with the wedding preparations.
After hearing everything from me, the blonde had taken a long drag off his cigarette and told me to go to Shandoria. In my bold stupidity, I had scoffed. "You think he will hide on a barren abandoned island where we were planning to have our honeymoon?"
With an irritated voice, Sanji had snapped back at me, "The simplest answer is most often correct*" If he could, he would've hit me with the glass ashtray that Zoro was holding for him.
"Cook is right here Doc, Luffy is not a complicated soul who gets twisted by their own thoughts like you and cook here." Zoro had reminded me. "He does what he thinks is right by instinct."
"HEY!" Sanji had hissed like a cat, the adoption debacle had stressed him a lot and Zoro's little mocking didn't help. "Luffy is someone who thinks in simple terms, opposite means opposite to him and not a convoluted path to self-doom."
Of course, I knew, I knew it too well. Hurt and pride had clouded my judgement. Hence, by the time I was in another part of the world, the name of Shandoira slid down my list of priorities.
Again I went back to the pages, realising that I was so blind to the obvious truth, that it injured my pride that I behaved like a fool for two decades. I could have found him fifteen years before. I could've found him the very day he left.
Unable to do anything about the two decades wasted, I laughed internally while my eyes cried to the point of itching. The first time I had ever cried openly was in front of Luffy, and it was because of him.
An old memory resurfaced, it was just after we had started hanging out during our summer break.
I didn't dare to confess, as I didn't know what was in his heart. I knew he found me attractive, yet my stupid heart couldn't believe it. Inferiority complex and overthinking were my curses. The seven-year-age gap didn't help my situation either, thanks to Sachi's constant teasing and Bepo and Penguin's constant reminder that I should be the mature one.
Hence, every time I visited his flat that he shared with five other people, I carried my books and papers and sat on the couch like a good-mannered guest. That afternoon was different, all his roommates were gone for work or remedial classes, and we were the only people in that messy place. Most of the days, Luffy talked non-stop from the kitchen counter while I gave him my input to his experiments.
So when he stopped talking, I had to look up from my workbook and ask, "Luffy you alright."
He was not. He didn't say it out loud, but his shoulders were defeated for the day. Furthermore, he raised his hand to gesture that he was fine. I didn't believe him.
"If you need help, call me!"
After multiple failed attempts at making bread with rice flour, Luffy had returned to me defeated. With an adorable pout and an adorable yellow apron on, he stood in front of me. On instinct, I moved my books and offered him the space. Luffy had flopped beside me on the couch and tucked his feet under the blanket I was using to warm my legs.
In the spur of the moment, I wrapped my arm around him. Luffy hugged me back harder, slid his cold feet inside my socks and laughed, "Shishishi!" Instead of feeling annoyed, I pulled him into a tight embrace. We cuddled wordlessly until we ended up falling asleep.
When I woke up, my head was on Luffy's lap. In his one hand was a tattered detective book, and his other hand was gently combing my hair. I had never been this comfortable in my life until that point. Then he read out loudly, " The world is full of obvious things which nobody by any chance ever observes. "* Luffy had smiled.
I sat up, "Why did you read that?" My voice was raspy. "What is the obvious thing I failed to notice?"
Instead of a reply, Luffy placed his right hand on my heart and my right hand on his heart. Then he gently dropped the book on the floor and used his unoccupied hand to push my head towards him. After a long soft first kiss, he smiled against my lips while I sat there with his warm hand on my chest. Then rivulets of tears ran down my cheeks; I felt shy, I felt happy and for the first time I was not lonely.
"I love you Trafalgar D Water Law." Luffy kissed me again. "This is the most obvious thing in this wide-world, you dummy." Luffy grinned and then cupped my face to wipe my tears, "We just swapped our hearts. Now you are mine. And I am yours."
"I am yours, Luffy."
When I woke up, my flip-phone was ringing. Being a cafe-owner meant I got calls from suppliers at any moment in life; mostly mornings. The desire to grip my phone and fling it gripped me. But I was reminded that if I lost this phone, I would have to buy the latest smartphones, and then I would be gripped in my mind by curiosity and I would look up information about my lover. Worst case the worst scenario, end up contacting him!
So, I didn't throw the phone but decided to check who was calling me. Once I saw who was calling, I had to answer it. "Good morning Ace."
Instead of greeting me, he bombarded me with a question, "Lu, have you seen the news?" That was a strange question, I didn't own a television. In this exile of mine, I had cut out anything that would spark the desire in me to go back to him. "Don't tell me you don't use the television Sabo and I bought you last visit."
**"I gave it away…" I mumbled.
"You did what?"
"I gave it away."**
My brother laughed, he didn't scold me like he usually did, "To whom?"
"Carrot."
"Does she not live downstairs?"
"Yup."
"Go to her and check the news. Please tell me you have some cable services or a streaming service." I replied in silence. "Lu go to Carrot, at least borrow her smartphone to see the news."
"It is 4 am, ACE! I can't wake up the girl after she spends ten hours working in the café. Let her sleep. Tell me what is the news?"
"It is Sabo…"
"Is he alright?"
"He is dragging the whole Doflamingo Family to court."
Hearing the name of the Doflamingo Family ignited my hate and anger. They hurt my lover. Finding out that my brother was finally able to bring their crimes to the eyes of the public made me happy. Then fear returned, the fear that made me run away. They were powerful, they were extremely powerful, and if money didn't work, they resorted to violence.
"Is he okay?"
"Yes, Sabo is fine."
"No…" I heard my voice break like an old bamboo flute. "I meant…" Forcing down the emotions was harder than I thought. Why was it so hard, still? Two decades of separation didn't make it any easier for me, "Him."
"Are you still trying to avoid saying his name? What is he? A hungry ghost haunting you? Seriously Lu!" Ace sighed from the other-side of the world. "If you love him so much that saying his name hurts, you shouldn't have left him in the first place, no? All you both have done is pine for each other like two turtles, while that fatherfucker Doflamingo rolled in money and power! At least you should've let me kill him, what was the point of getting trained as a sniper since the age of three?"
My brother meant well, but we had this conversation so many times that I didn't have the energy. "Please don't start! The past is the past."
"Yeah. It is." Ace mimicked my tone. "You are almost 50 and are still unable to lie."
I warned, "I am disconnecting the call if you are going to treat me like a toddler. If you do not tell me about him!"
"Fine! Fine." I could picture Ace pushing his hair backwards. "He quit his job and left Dressrosa four days back."
"He quit?"
"Yes."
"And his…" Debts, debts, debts and more debts, my mind screamed. Debts his family was paying, all because they wanted to save people; all because they wanted to save Law and little Lamy and all the population of Flevance. Why was the world so unfair to good people like the Trafalgars?
"I don't know the details, but when I met Bepo and the other two, they said Law was planning on going on holiday to Shabody for months. But they never heard of any plan of quitting. They were surprised too, but now they can't get hold of him. He still has the bad habit of ignoring phone calls."
"A holiday? Are you sure it is him? He is smart."
"How smart can he be, if he hasn't been able to locate you still?" My brother mocked me.
"Don't insult him." I hissed. No one has the right to insult that magnificent man. "He didn't try hard enough."
"He didn't? Lu I saw him travel all the seas in hopes of finding you, he is a dumbass. Anyway, Sabo's people saw him climb on a cruise ship to Shabody. So be assured he went on a holiday. Don't worry."
"Are you sure he didn't find my location?"
"I am certain."
"Okay."
"Well, do whatever you want but try to catch up on the news. If Sabo wins, you can reunite with him. Isn't tha—" I didn't reply and disconnected the call.
My heart told me not to be over-excited, I looked at my hand, my engagement ring had lost its shine like me. The thought of a reunion after all this time made me scared. I was no longer the cute-youthful-looking man he loved. I had wrinkles, I had grey hair on my sideburns, and I was much buff and broader. All the years of physical labour done in this café had reshaped me. Even the scar under my eye was fainter now.
Could he ever accept this old and withered me in his life?
TBC
NOTE:
The simplest answer is most often correct: From Occam's Razor by William of Ockham.
The world is full of obvious things which nobody by any chance ever observes: Sherlock Holmes.
"I gave it away…": I copied this from Good Omens S2, well spoilers: When Aziraphale blew up his Halo, he mumbles to Crowley, "I gave it away." I wanted to replicate that dialouge.
P.S: I got laid off thanks to AI and my manager throwing my teammates and me under the bus to save her position. Anyway, I am still in a state of anger and irritation, as I have to relook for a job. At least I got a severance which will float me for the next two months if I stop spending any money on little luxuries like books!
So if you have a mean comment zip it, you are not helping! And if you are LawLu Anti, please learn to mute and block accounts and people, I am begging you!
And the One Shot written properly for LawLu Month Day 2 will go up in the evening :)