okay so i usually see zosan written as gay zoro and bi/pan sanji (which is totally cool and im not trying to hate on that w/ this post and if u prefer that ur interpretation is totally just as valid as mine!!) but I actually see it as the other way around.
So i first got the idea when i was doing some deep dive research into bisexual culture in the 19th century for my 21 page gay vampires history final paper (don’t ask lol). And it turns out that dual wielding blades is slang in Japan for bisexual. There are two different words for it but one of them, nitoryu (which admittedly from what i could glean is the less common one in terms of bi slang, but still!) is the one zoro uses to refer to his two-sword style. So then i was like “what sort of elevated plane must a triple wielding bisexual have reached?” And my pansexual sister went “may i suggest pansexuality?” And now i can’t stop thinking about it. Little kid zoro asks kuina about some couple he sees and she’s like “well they are romantic partners which means they care about each other the most and can trust each other to have each other’s backs in a fight. And also there’s kissing i guess. I don’t know.” And little zoro is like hmm okay ig. And then he does not think about it again, like, at all, until forever later when he’s a bounty hunter. He sees two people kissing or something and he’s like “oh yeah. Romance. Forgot that existed.” And then he basically decides that romance is someone who can always match you in a fight, but because zoro’s gonna be the best and also can’t yet conceptualize fighting that doesn’t involve swords he’s like ig I won’t have romance since no one will be able to match me sword fighting. And then he stops thinking about it again. Until he meets sanji. And sanji can match him in a fight, no problem, but also isn’t someone zoro has to get better than to become the greatesf swordsman. Sanji has his back in a fight. He cares a lot about sanji. Sounds awesome. Perfect romanic partner for him. But sanji also, kinda…pisses him off to no end. Because the guy has somehow got the idea in his head that only women and men can be romantic together, and zoro has literally never heard of this idea before and it makes no sense, and he can’t understand why the cook thinks it or why no one else finds it weird. He seriously cannot conceptualize what the hell mental gymnastics sanji is doing in his head to perceive the world so strangely and so differently from how it actually is. Where the heck does the cook get the idea that women are the complete opposite of men and are weak and in need of protection?? Instead how they really are: human, ultimately, just one way to be and capable of everything that men are. But zoro is kinda bad at articulating his thoughts so all this comes out more like “oi shit-cook, why are you acting so stupid?” And then sanji gets mad and they fight. But yeah pansexual zoro who does not give a shit what a person looks like as long as they can match him in a fight. I feel like it fits really well with his backstory/character.
Okay so then i got thinking about sanji, and here’s the thing. The way he treats women in canon really bothers me, and it comes off as so performative and definitely gives Learned Behavior. So i was thinking where he might have learned it. And here’s my theory. Sanji loves to feel helpful and wanted. So when he starts working on the Baratie he acts so gentlemanly and polite and doting to everyone. And a lot of fragile little man egos on the staff and among the guests can’t handle it and he gets hit a lot, and zeff of course kicks everyone who does that off the boat, but still it’s gonna stick with such a traumatized kid. And so he gradually focuses his attention on the women who will coo over this cute little kid trying so hard to be all suave and mature. And it feels nice to him to be told positive things like he never got before in germa. After feeling useless his whole life, being complimented feels so nice that he starts getting a little desperate for it. And I can’t imagine that every single cook and guest on the baratie would have fantastic views on gender, or that zeff would have the time and vocabulary to sit him down and explain how he was slowly drifting into the realm of misogyny and why that was bad. So he probably picked up a lot of stupid ideas about how men should act around women and what women wanted, and there were no women working on the baratie to explain things to him or provide a counter example. And he starts fearing being perceived as weak as well so being vulnerable around men becomes something he avoids, because he is exposed to all this macho, toxic masculinity bs, and no one is explaining that it’s wrong to him. And then puberty hits and suddenly he’s getting teased by all the cooks who perceive his doting on women as trying to get in their pants. And he internalizes that as “this is how im supposed to act” and so he starts being performative about it, and it’s encouraged so it only gets worse. Especially because he’s so terrified of being vulnerable, that when he begins to experience his gay awakening he shoves it down as far as it can go and starts putting more emphasis onto how “obviously heterosexual” he is. And then he meets zoro, who is every thing he wants to be without even trying. He’s masculine and strong and respected and doesn’t need to perform like sanji does to be perceived as any of those things. And sanji also finds him really, really attractive, as terrified as he is to admit it, so he constantly gets angry at the guy and picks fights on purpose to avoid confronting his own feelings. So yeah gay sanji, cause i really just can’t read his wierd heart eyes routine around women as anything but a performance for heteronormativity. Someone put that man in therapy.
but yeah that’s my argument for pan zoro x gay sanji.
Hc that Sanji still talks to his mom. His last cigarette of the night after all the dishes have been done and the kitchen is sparkling is when he does it. It's usually just a quick recap of the day, things he did or saw that he thinks she would like, said in the safety of his mind or if he's feeling particularly brave (or oh so lonely and small like he did in that cell on that rock on his side curled up in a courtyard surrounded by his brothers wanting nothing more than his mama and her hugs) whispered out loud to the stars in hopes she might actually hear it that way where ever she is. "Hey mama I saw the prettiest shell today. it was the exact same shade of blue as your eyes I think" and "Hello mama, I tried a new recipe today! It was a little on the salty side but I think I can get it perfect next time. I think you would have liked it." and "I met someone new today mama. He's really weird and won't take no for an answer but he seems nice. He listened to me talk about the All Blue for what felt like forever! I'm still gonna find it one day mama I promise.... I wish you could find it with me. Maybe if you were here I wouldn't be so afraid to go looking."
i saw a thing that was about a kiss cam landing on a couple but one is straight so the guy kissed his neighbor but the original guy gets jealous and kisses him instead. it might be cute for sanzo?
this took me a second to parse thru, but we got there in the end
x
Sanji has a rule about large crowds. Actually, Sanji has several rules about large crowds, most of them involving exits and sightlines and not letting Luffy wander into anything, ever. His main rule is to never let himself relax too much because god knows the moment he does the universe will find him, tap him on the shoulder and say surprise, idiot!
Unfortunately for him, the stadium is the fucking definition of a big crowd.
They’re wedged into overheated, overused seats with plastic cups of beer and a tray of chips that Luffy is inhaling like it’s some kind of personal mission, and Sanji is trying desperately to pretend he isn’t enjoying himself. The air has that bright electric buzz of a day where everyone’s collectively invested in something meaningless and fun, the the field a dazzlingly clean green. The crowd rolls in waves, all chants and groans and laughter, like some kind of living ocean.
Nami keeps heckling the umpire and Usopp has somehow gotten into a rivalry with a guy three rows down wearing the opposing team’s colours and keeps turning around to yell things like: “You wanna say that again?!”
Zoro’s sitting to his left like he’s been poured there, hunched with one arm stretched along the back of the seats like he owns the whole fucking row. His forearms look carved when he lifts his beer and keeps exposing the line of his neck, which in turn makes Sanji’s brain do something stupid and un-platonic like stare.
Sanji tries really, really hard not to stare but the problem is Sanji’s been doing this little dance for months now where he insists to himself that the tightness under his ribs is just rivalry and irritation and the urge to kick Zoro into the sea.
(Sometimes it even is! Most of the time it is absolutely not.)
“Hey,” Nami says suddenly, voice bright with danger. “Sanji.”
Sanji doesn’t look away from the field. “If you’re about to ask me to buy you a souvenir, the answer is no.”
She points at the big screen without even turning her head. “Look.”
Sanji glances up to where the camera feed’s sweeping the crowd, picking out faces and couples and people who look like they’ve been drinking. Everytime the screen lands on two people sitting close a little graphic pops up of two cartoon lips, a heart, the words KISS CAM in aggressive glitter font. A teen couple kisses too eagerly and the crowd roars, two middle aged women kiss and throw up double peace signs and the crowd roars louder. A guy tries to kiss his friend; the friend shoves him away and flips off the camera and the crowd goes downright feral.
Usopp is vibrating like he’s about to pass out. “If it gets us… if it gets us!”
“It won’t,” Sanji says firmly.
It does.
The stadium is huge, sure, but the universe is petty as fuck and fate is nosy. Worse, Sanji has the kind of luck that ensures anything humiliating will happen to him in high bloody definition. When he looks up the big screen is suddenly, horrifyingly, the slice of the row where Sanji and Zoro sit shoulder-to-shoulder. The KISS CAM graphic pops up like a death sentence, cartoon lips bouncing. A little heart pulses and Sanji feels every cell in his body light up with panic.
Nami shrieks with laughter while Usopp howls. “Oh, this is classic!”
Luffy stands up on his seat and is immediately, violently, yoinked back down by every pair of hands around him.
Sanji’s face goes hot. “No fucking way.” He turns automatically toward Zoro, ready to hiss something threatening, but Zoro’s already looking at the screen, calm as death. He lifts two fingers to his mouth and makes a lazy little motion, like he’s telling the camera to stop and then he mouths, clearly and unmistakably: he’s straight.
Sanji’s blood turns to ice, apparently. His brain stutters, trying to decide which part of that statement to be furious about first because it’s not wrong, it’s also just… not right. Maybe. He’s still figuring it out.
The crowd boos playfully, the sound hitting Sanji like a wave, but Zoro keeps his expression perfectly neutral, like he’s not actively detonating Sanji’s entire life in front of approximately twenty-two thousand people.
Sanji stares at him, mouth opening uselessly but Zoro doesn’t look at him. He keeps looking at the camera before he points at Sanji with a little dismissive wave, like: not him. And then, because the universe has a cruel sense of comedic timing, the guy sitting on Zoro’s other side leans in. He’s maybe mid-thirties, hat pulled low, smelling faintly of beer and cheap cologne, with the kind of face that says he’s here for a good time, not a long time.
He looks at Zoro, at the big screen and grins like he’s just been handed a dare. “Well,” he says, loud enough for the nearby seats to hear. “If he’s straight…”
He leans in to kiss Zoro and Sanji’s entire body goes cold and hot at the same time. Zoro doesn’t jerk away or shove or look startled or – he turns his head just enough, barely, to meet it halfway like kissing some stranger on a fucking jumbatron is no big deal, and Sanji’s stomach drops through the floor.
Jealousy is an ugly word that Sanji’s never, ever liked. Jealousy feels like ownership or insecurity, like a thing weak people do because they can’t handle themselves. Sanji doesn’t get jealous. He’s above –
His hand shoots out, grabs a fistful of Zoro’s jersey at the collar and yanks, hard, until the guy’s kiss lands on air, lips smacking uselessly as Zoro gets pulled out of orbit.
The stranger blinks, startled. “Hey!”
Sanji doesn’t even look at him; he pulls Zoro in and kisses him.
The crowd loses its mind. Sanji loses his own mind in a quieter way because Zoro’s mouth is warm in the way it shouldn’t be, because Zoro is usually all sharp edges and stubbornness but here, right now, Zoro’s lips are soft enough to make Sanji’s chest ache. For one single second, Zoro goes still with surprise before he kisses back, his hand coming up to lock his fingers at Sanji’s waist, pulling him closer with the kind of blunt certainty Zoro does everything. Sanji’s heart slams against his ribs like it wants out. The kiss is messy, too fast and too public, fueled by pure spite and something else Sanji’s been denying for so damn so long it’s practically a second religion at this point. He hears the stadium roaring around them and Luffy screaming like he just saw fireworks against Usopp’s incoherent shrieks.
He also hears, distantly, the tiny sound Zoro makes against his mouth – a little choked-off noise – and it’s the hottest thing Sanji has ever experienced in his life. He pulls back just enough to breathe, keeping his forehead locked to Zoro’s because he’s pretty sure that iif he puts any distance between them he’s going to die of embarrassment.
Zoro looks at him with his eyes half lidded and mouth open, expression utterly unreadable in the way that always makes Sanji want to punch something or kiss him again or take him home and never leave his bedroom, ever.
The Kiss Cam is still on them, the graphic is now throwing cartoon confetti like it’s celebrating a national holiday. The guy on Zoro’s other side is staring at Sanji like he just witnessed a crime. “What the hell, man?”
Sanji finally turns his head toward him, smiling nice and sharp. “Get your own,” he manages and, hey, if his voice is shaking a little, well. Seems fair, all things considered.
The guy holds up both hands in surrender, laughing. “Okay! Okay! Fuck me!”
Zoro, expression still, murmurs into Sanji’s ear, too low for anyone else to hear: “Jealous.”
Sanji’s entire body lights on fire, even as he jerks back to glare at the other man. “Shut up.”
Nami leans across Luffy with the grin of a shark. “So, are you two done pretending you’re not insane about each other or d’you need it to come back for a second round?”
Usopp looks like he’s about to faint. “I’m going to be sick. In a good way.”
Sanji covers his face like he’s trying to erase himself from reality but Zoro’s hand, warm and unbothered, settles on Sanji’s knee. The crowd’s attention is elsewhere now, chasing the next spectacle but Zoro’s hand stays put, heavy and solid.
“You okay?” He asks and his tone is normal which seems worse, somehow.
Sanji’s mouth opens, several things dying to come out, starting with a denial or a cuss or a joke. Hell, he'd settle for a furious lecture about consent and public humiliation and Zoro being the worst. What comes out instead is thin and honest and horrifying. “Why didn’t you stop him?”
Zoro blinks. “Why would I?”
Sanji’s throat tightens. “Because… because you don’t just… let some random guy kiss you!”
Zoro’s eyebrow lifts. “But I should let you kiss me?”
Sanji freezes, the part he’s been trying not to name sitting between them like some kind of landmine. He stares at Zoro, helplessly furious with him for being right.
Zoro leans closer, voice low enough that it becomes private. “You don’t have to figure it out right now, Curls.”
He swallows hard and does the only thing that won’t make him combust and stands. “I’m getting a drink,” he mutters, too fast.
Nami looks at him with plain surprise. “We’re in the middle of an inning.”
“I don’t even know what that is,” Sanji snaps, and spins off toward the aisle.
Zoro catches his wrist, just enough to give him pause. His gaze is steady. “Don’t run too far,” he warns and Sanji’s chest tightens, knowing damn well he should pull away and pretend none of this happened and go back to being that guy who flirts with women and never has to look too closely at his own feelings for one of his best friends. Instead he glowers, the only safe expression he has left, and stalks up the steps toward the snack stand like his dignity depends on it. Tragically, though, his dignity’s already dead on some camera feed somewhere, getting replayed in someone’s roll with heart emojis, probably.
His mouth still feels like Zoro, skin still remembering Zoro’s hand. His brain keeps replaying Zoro mouthing he’s straight with that stupid calm like it wasn’t a knife to the gut and a gift at the same time.
When he returns with a drink Zoro is still there, leaning back in his seat like nothing happened. He barely looks up when Sanji drops into his seat and shoves the drink into Zoro’s chest out of pure aggression. “Here.”
Zoro takes it, blinking. “Uh, cheers?”
Sanji watches his throat move with each swallow and hates his life. He takes a long sip of his own drink and tries to swallow down the panic and the want and the humiliating hope that is starting, against his will, to grow. Then he mutters, barely audible: “Just. We can talk about it later.”
Zoro’s hand settles back on his knee, his mouth folding into something soft and crooked, sipping at his beer like the tips of his ears aren’t going pink. “Yeah. Yeah, okay.”
x
it's important that you know they're watching cricket, not baseball, bc its the only sport i know the rules of beyond volleyball. btw if anyone knows where this is ?? from ?? lemme know like do i credit someone or ??
I love that four different people on my feed scheduled this joyous person to reblog by 8am on June 1. I look forward to seeing this a dozen more times today.
I love that four different people on my feed scheduled this joyous person to reblog by 8am on June 1. I look forward to seeing this a dozen more times today.
I keep seeing all the art of flexible Sanji and hope you may have some thoughts (˶>⩊<˶)
unfortunately for y'all i'm back on my zosan bullshit. we love hypermobile sanji in this house !
x
Zoro’s always kept his thoughts about other people’s bodies in the same mental category as anything else about a fight. To him, the way someone moves only matters in the way a shoulder rolls before a punch, or the way there's a jerk right before someone tries to bolt, or the shallow little pants that scream exhausted even when his opponent’s mouth is still running bullshit. Strength, weakness, speed, balance, reach… those are the only metrics that matter to him, really. A body is either an obstacle, an ally or a weapon he learns to read in half a heartbeat. Anything else is the kind of distraction that gets civilians killed and swordsmen soft.
He can look at someone and think strong. He can look at someone and think dangerous. He can look at someone and think weird as hell but probably won’t stab me in the kidney, so. That’s the whole damn list, end of story, which is which is why the new cook joining their crew should be nothing. Instead, Sanji moves in and suddenly the Merry feels smaller than it has any right to.
There’s three square meals a day plus snacks now, sure, fine. Great, even! But the cost of a well-stocked pantry is that the guy is everywhere all of a sudden. He orbits Zoro’s space like it’s his personal mission, boots pacing the deck with those stupid curly eyebrows and the god-awful smoke and the way he drawls mosshead like it’s a love song and an insult all at the same time.
At first, Zoro just thinks the other man’s annoying. Loud, smarmy, rude. Whatever. Then the close quarters nonsense starts piling up and his brain starts glitching on a loop he can’t seem to turn off. The first time it happens is after a fight with some no name pirates, just enough of a brawl to get everyone sweaty and pissed. They get back to the ship with the sun glaring overhead and Sanji starts stripping off his soaked shirt to rinse all the blood and grime off him. Water sluices over his shoulders and down the long line of his back, catching on the dip of his spine before sliding lower and he’s — he’s built solid, fine, Zoro can admit that much. He’s got muscles shifting under skin like they know exactly what they’re meant for, and Zoro’s eyes catch on the way his abs tighten when he twists to wring out the shirt afterwards.
His stomach does a funny little flip; he looks away so fast his neck cracks, image burned behind his eyelids anyway.
strong, his brain supplies automatically, a little too defensive. good core. good… kicks.
He thinks nothing of it, until one night he’s stuck in the crow’s nest on watch, trying to sneak a nap in when he hears the shower running below. The ship’s beautiful, but she’s got thin walls (thin everything, really) and Zoro can hear Sanji singing in another language, off-key and terrible. Zoro’s brain supplies the picture without asking: water on bare skin, steam, that stupid blonde hair plastered dark to his neck. Then the water cuts off and the guy walks past the base of the mast in nothing but a towel slung low, skin flushed pink, hair damp and curling and Zoro’s mouth goes dry. He watches the way droplets slide down the cook’s body, catching at the hollow between his collarbones and a nipple and — and Zoro's pulse kicks, hard, like he just finished a set of lifts. Heat crawls up behind the back of his neck. He rolls over, buries his burning face in his arm, and growls a string of curses into his own skin until his teeth ache. It doesn’t kill the feeling, but the distraction of being so pissed off with himself helps, on some level.
He’s nineteen. He’s lived lifetimes. He’s way too fucking old to pretend he doesn’t know what’s happening to him, but he refuses to acknowledge it, out of pure spite and sheer embarrassment because no way is the first actual crush of his life on one of the most annoying people he’s ever met.
One evening, a few weeks into Sanji joining them, Zoro’s just finished his own workout brain when the cook drops to the deck like gravity’s a mere suggestion. The movement is so controlled and so effortless that Zoro’s eyes betray him instantly. They trace every knob of spine as his brain supplies the usual combat notes, fast and furious: flexible, quick, excellent striking range, hips open like —
And then the wall in his head cracks and a brand new, completely unauthorised thought struts in because how far could Sanji bend if Zoro put his hands on those hips and pressed?
He nearly trips over his own feet, stomach doing something complicated and treacherous. His skin suddenly feels two sizes too small — he can feel his pulse in his throat, in his wrists and lower still, body reacting like Sanji just drew a fucking sword instead of just. Stretching.
Sanji doesn’t look up. He keeps his head bowed, hair slipping forward to curtain one eye with one palm flat on the warm deck. His breath leaves him in a measured exhale that Zoro has no business noticing. The cook always treats his own body like some finely tuned instrument he actually respects, and something about that precision is making Zoro’s brain fold in on itself in all kinds of brand new, humiliating ways. He shifts deeper into the stretch, hips tilting and ribs compressing, spine staying impossibly straight — and Zoro’s body lights up like a signal flare, heat punching low in his gut, sharp and sudden and definitely not from the workout. His palms itch with the phantom urge to grab.
Sanji’s voice drifts up, muffled against his own knee, lazy and amused. “You still alive over there, Moss? Or did I finally break that thick skull of yours?”
Zoro makes a noise. It's a tiny, pathetic little cough that sounds suspiciously like his own body selling him out. He forces his voice flat. “S’fine.”
Sanji’s laugh is low and way too happy about it. He finally lifts his head, eyes glittering with so much mirth that it makes Zoro want to chuck him straight into the ocean. “Looks like your thoughts are doing squats.”
Zoro glares at him. “Shut the hell up.”
Sanji’s grin widens as he changes position, swinging one leg up until his heel’s gliding past his own shoulder like it’s the most natural thing in the world, toes pointed. The shirt rides higher, fabric pulling taut across his torso, outlining every shifting ridge of muscle in his abdomen as it tightens to hold the pose. Sanji’s breathing stays calm and steady, like he’s not currently defying human anatomy for kicks and Zoro’s brain flatlines again.
He thinks if you hooked a hand behind that raised knee and pulled him in, he’d fold right against you like — Zoro slams a door on that so hard the hinges scream. His face is on fire. His ears are on fire. He’s, like, three seconds from walking to the railing and hurling himself overboard just to cool the fuck down.
Sanji holds the stretch like he knows exactly what he’s doing. “Cat got your tongue?”
Zoro’s jaw works but absolutely zero safe words come out.
“Oh my god.” He lowers the leg with deliberately agonising slowness, clearly savouring every inch of Zoro’s suffering. When his foot touches the deck he leans back on his hands, loose and relaxed, looking at Zoro like he’s a fascinating new species of idiot. “You’re staring.”
“No, I’m not.”
Sanji’s smile turns wicked. “Mouth open and everything.”
Zoro’s hands curl into fists. “I was… assessing.”
“Assessing,” Sanji repeats, deadpan. “That what the pirate hunters are calling it these days?”
Zoro can feel the heat crawling down his neck, pooling lower. Sanji’s gaze flicks over his face and for half a second the teasing flickers, something sharper flashing underneath. Interest? Curiosity? Like Sanji’s testing the water and finding it a lot hotter than expected. “You’re welcome, by the way.”
“For what?”
Sanji’s grin goes positively demonic as he twists into a new stretch, torso spiraling slow and deep, one arm reaching across his body while the other anchors him. “Expanding your worldview. Try not to pass out on my deck, Mosshead. Usopp just mopped.”
Zoro drags a hand down his face like he can physically scrub the heat away. “Rack off.”
“Mm.” Sanji hums, already flowing into the next impossible position, casual as breathing. “You wish.”
x
Arguably, the only good thing about Sanji being on board — aside from the constant stream of food perfectly tailored to their every mood, need and want — is that he’s great to spar with. Zoro never tells him this out loud and, frankly, wouldn’t know how without making it sound like a threat, but the fact is there all the same, as quiet and insistent as any other weapon he keeps strapped to himself. Luffy is fun to fight, sure, because Luffy’s all chaos and rubber and endless energy, but Luffy doesn’t match him, exactly. Luffy… overwhelms.
Sanji, though… Sanji reads the shift of Zoro’s shoulders the way Zoro reads the twitch of Sanji’s thigh before a kick. Their spars have become something sharper than training and softer than a real fight: a private language made of steel and sweat and the shared understanding that they both know what it means to stand between the crew and whatever the sea throws at them. It’s the only place they meet like this, outside of the dogpile crew naps where Sanji’s head ends up on Zoro’s shoulder sometimes. On the deck, blades and legs flashing, they speak the same tongue: protect the crew, push each other harder, stay alive together.
So when Sanji kicks off his shoes one humid afternoon and says: “Oi, Mosshead. You got time to lose again?” Zoro feels that familiar low spark in his chest and calls it a normal reaction.
It’s a good session at first. Normal and familiar, planks warm under their feet. Zoro’s blades hiss through the air while Sanji’s kicks are sharp and pointed, spinning like wind and spite, each one landing with the kind of strength that makes Zoro’s blood hum. They’re both breathing hard and grinning through the sweat, trading insults the way other people trade handshakes.
And then Sanji feints low, boots skidding on the deck, before exploding upwards in one of those ridiculous twists that shouldn’t be possible for anyone who isn’t made of rubber. Zoro reads the motion and twists to block, but Sanji’s already flipping the other way, body cutting through the air like smoke. One second he’s in front of Zoro and the next he’s on him, legs hooking over Zoro’s shoulders like they belong there, thighs clamping down hard and sudden around his neck. Sanji’s full weight settles forward, hips sliding in close, until suddenly the soft insistent heat of him is pressed right against Zoro’s face.
Zoro freezes, both their weights balanced on his own two feet, two swords still gripped tight. Sanji’s got one hand fisted in Zoro’s green hair for balance and the other braced casually on his own thigh like this is nothing, like he does this every day and Zoro’s brain goes white. The reaction is immediate and overwhelming: the pressure of Sanji’s thighs against his cheeks makes every breath come short and shallow, his lungs working harder just to pull in air that tastes like salt and smoke and skin. He can feel the faint, living pulse of Sanji’s body through the thin fabric, the way his muscles shift and tighten when Sanji adjusts his balance. His mouth is right there, lips still parted with surprise, brushing damp cloth, and something hot and restless starts crawling up his spine like a slow fuse.
He knows his face is burning. He knows his ears are burning. His grip on his swords has gone white-knuckled, tight enough to ache, unsteady in a way he never is during a fight.
Sanji laughs above him, bright and cocky, the sound vibrating straight through his thighs into Zoro’s skull. “You giving up yet, Mossy?”
Zoro doesn’t answer. Can’t. He can feel sweat sliding down his temple, can feel the way his chest is rising and falling too fast and too shallow. His entire body gives a confused, heavy throb he doesn’t want to think about right now. Sanji shifts his weight a little, hips rolling forward a fraction, and Zoro makes a small, involuntary sound against him, choked off at the last breath.
His hands are shaking.
Sanji goes quiet for a second, before his free fingers slide under Zoro’s chin, tilting his head back so he can see Zoro’s face. His thumb brushes once, lightly, along the edge of Zoro’s jaw. “This position suits you, you know.”
The words land like a spark in dry grass; Zoro can feel how they make the restless heat in his gut twist harder, sharper, still frozen with the terrifying knowledge that his body’s doing something he has no control over. Sanji watches him for another beat, something unreadable flickering behind his eyes and Zoro’s balance, already shaky, finally gives out. They go down together, Sanji riding the fall gracefully before twisting at the last second to land on his feet while Zoro hits the deck on his back with a heavy thud, eating wood. Sanji stands over him, one boot planted lightly on Zoro’s chest, looking down with a smirk. “Guess you can’t handle me on top of you, huh?”
Zoro stays on the deck for a long time after the other man saunters off, frozen with the mortifying realisation that he wants Sanji to come back and sit on his face again. The thought is bright and filthy and warm and it settles under his ribs like a new vow he never meant to make.
It gets infinitely worse, after that. Everytime Sanji drops into a stretch Zoro’s eyes find him like magnets, like his gaze has a mind of its own and it’s decided Sanji’s spine is the most interesting thing on the entire fucking ocean. In his defense, he tries to fight it at first. He swims faster and lifts heavier and runs extra laps around the ship just to sweat the thoughts out, but the second he sits down to catch his breath there’s Sanji again, folding himself in half like it’s nothing.
Zoro’s brain supplies the same unhelpful commentary on loop.
look at that hip look at the way his back stays long bet he could bend backwards over the railing
He dreams about it now, awful vivid dreams where Sanji’s on the deck with Zoro’s hands guiding the stretch, pressing until Sanji exhales right against Zoro’s throat. In the dreams Sanji laughs and says harder and Zoro wakes up with his sheets damp and tangled around his hips like he’s fifteen all over again. He jerks off in the crow’s nest and in the shower at all stupid hours of the night like an idiot, one hand clamped over his mouth and the other working fast and mean because if he goes any slower he’ll think about it too much. He thinks about it anyway, about Sanji’s heel near his own shoulder and how easy it would be to fold those long legs up and open and the way Sanji’s abs would tighten under his tongue, and comes so hard he sees stars.
“Idiot,” he hisses into the dark, wiping his hand on his shirt like that erases the evidence, not knowing if he means himself or Sanji or whatever bullshit’s put him in this situation.
The days blur together into one long haze of trying and failing. He trains harder than he has in months, getting up before dawn while the deck’s still damp. He goes through kata after kata until the movements start feeling like punishment, three swords flashing in the first pale wash of morning. He pushes until sweat blinds him and his wrists ache and the old familiar pleasure of effort turns into something meaner, figuring that if he can just… empty himself through muscle and repetition and pain then there won’t be anything left over for this stupid crush.
The problem with that logic, though, is that everytime he stops to breathe there's a flash of blonde at the edge of the deck or a drag of smoke near the rail or the sound of his voice carrying from the galley with that clipped arrogance, like every word has to elbow its way out first.
In the mornings, Sanji still comes out and stretches like the whole world belongs to him, body bending in ways Zoro wants to physically bite. Trying not to watch is like a whole-ass private discipline: Zoro rotates between keeping his eyes on the horizon and then his eyes on his swords and even his eyes closed, even though that’s embarrassing as hell to resort to. Each time, he lasts maybe ten seconds before his gaze drags back like it’s hooked there, finding Sanji’s thighs or the long line of his arms under thin fabric.
He dreams of Sanji above him and under him and around him, laughing at him and gasping for him, all of it wrong and impossibly, horrifically vivid, until he wakes breathless in the dark with the shame already rising before he’s even fully conscious. He tells himself over and over that this is just a stupid phase but his brain doesn’t get the memo, his dick sure as hell doesn’t get the memo, and he resolves to stomping around after breakfast each morning like he can scowl it out through spite alone.
It doesn’t work, so eventually he resorts to other methods.
They make port at a sleepy little island with too many bars. The crew scatters almost at once, ducking off to find supplies or cards or drinks or just wandering about. Zoro picks a bar at random, plants himself at the back like he’s trying to melt into it, and orders two sake and then another, just for kicks. Around him, sailors laugh too loudly in one corner while some poor soul tunes a fiddle (badly) near the back. He drinks like he’s trying to drown the god-awful itch under his skin in shitty alcohol and bad air and it almost works, right up until a man slides onto the stool next to him. He’s got a smile that belongs in sketchy bars and knows how to ask for trouble without sounding too impolite about it, and he buys Zoro another round before Zoro can think of how to refuse.
The man’s knee is close enough to his under the table to count as intention, voice low and suggestive when he says: “You look like you could use somebody who knows how to keep up with all that muscle.”
Zoro stares into his cup and thinks, sure, okay. He can do this, probably. Fuck knows he never has before, but Usopp’s always banging on about there being a first time for everything. He can go with this guy and let himself get handled and get this stupidity out of his system. He can prove that wanting is just plain old wanting after all, that a body is just a body and that Sanji isn’t some… awful, persistent, completely singular catastrophe.
The stranger touches his wrist lightly. “C’mon,” he says, amused now, clearly reading Zoro’s silence as shyness or reluctance. “Ain’t asking you for marriage.”
Zoro takes a deep breath and lets himself be led out the back door, where the alley’s narrow and rank, crates stacked against one wall. The stranger turns easily, stepping into Zoro’s space with the confidence of a man who has done this countless times before and Zoro thinks fine. do it. get it over with.
The man kisses him and Zoro —
He tries, really. He grabs the man’s waist, if only because that seems like the right place to be grabbing, and even lets the guy mouth at him a little, lets him smile into it, lets him press closer like they’re going somewhere obvious before his asshole traitorous brain calls it quits. The second the stranger’s hand slides from his chest towards his belt, Zoro’s brain pictures Sanji’s hands at a cutting board, fingers sure and quick and infuriating or Sanji’s foot braced on deck, right before a kick. Sanji’s voice going spiked and dangerous when he’s angry. Sanji’s shirt riding up to reveal that perfect trail of dusky hair.
Sanji’s laugh.
Zoro jerks back like he’s touched a stove and the stranger blinks at him. “Whoa. You alright?”
Zoro steps away hard enough his shoulder hits the wall behind him. “S’nothing.”
“Didn’t look like nothing.” The stranger rolls his eyes a little, but the corner of his mouth quirks in understanding. “Ah. Wrong guy, then.”
Zoro’s ears burn with anger so sudden and stupid it feels adolescent. He mutters something that might be sorry if heard from a great distance and walks out of the alleyway without looking back. He buys a bottle of whisky on his way past the bar and drinks it in the street until the lights blur and the whole island tilts a whole dirty degree off level. By the time he gets back to the Merry, the sake’s done nothing but loosen the misery enough to make it louder. He climbs to the crow’s nest because if he sees Sanji right then he might actually throw a punch from sheer humiliation or kiss him, and, honestly, he can’t tell which would be worse.
All that effort of trying to get Sanji out of his system, and all it teachies him is that this isn’t some generic problem or some stupid teenage lust from being trapped in the same tiny space as another guy his age. It’s just… Sanji. Just irritating, brave, reckless, heart-endingly kind Sanji.
After that, there’s not much point in fighting it anymore.
He finds himself in the galley at all kinds of werid hours with no real reason to be there, leaning in the doorway while Sanji cooks or preps. Half the time he hears himself blurt out some useless thing just to have a line into the room. “Those knives… look sharp.”
Sanji glances up with one eyebrow raised, like he’s worried Zoro has some kind of lethal head injury. “Wow. I sharpened the knives and now the knives are sharp. Imagine.”
Zoro grunts and rolls his eyes and stays anyway. He’ll talk about nothing or anything: the shitty weather, the last island, Luffy eating, Usopp’s inventions. At one truly tragic point he starts telling Sanji about a broken hinge on the deck hatch. Anything, apparently. Any stupid scrap of subject matter that’ll let him stand there another five minutes in the warmth so he can watch Sanji’s hands move. He stares at the easy precision of each motion, before catching onto Sanji’s mouth whenever he talks, the curl of it when he’s smug or the way his tongue flicks out when he tastes a sauce off his thumb.
One afternoon Zoro’s meant to be sleeping off a headache from getting decked in the temple with a sword hilt during a brawl, and instead he’s in the galley again with one shoulder pressed into the doorframe, watching Sanji section oranges at the bench. Sanji hums without turning. “Something you need, Moss?”
Zoro should leave right then but he hears himself say: “No,” like a bloody idiot, too fast, and knows he’s fucked up because Sanji makes that pleased sound in his throat that usually means he’s scented someone’s blood.
“No?” Sanji turns slowly, the knife loose in his fingers like he’s deciding whether to peel the next orange or try to slit Zoro’s throat with it. Both options are equally likely. “My mistake. Must’ve been imagining all the staring, then.”
Zoro’s arms fold tighter across his chest. “I’m not staring.”
Sanji makes this low, smoky hum that vibrates straight down Zoro’s spine, unconvinced and amused and downright mean. He reaches for another orange with excruciating laziness, tendons flexing under freckled skin, and the scent of the orange bursts with the cut. He peels it in one long spiral. “Starting to lose count of how many times you’ve been in here today. Yesterday. The day before. It’s becoming a pattern, you know.”
Zoro says nothing, because his tongue feels too thick and his brain is a screaming mess of shut up shut up he knows he knows. They can both count. They can both infer. At this point it’d be a fucking miracle if Sanji hasn’t figured out that Zoro’s been dragging himself through this fresh circle of hell every day.
Sanji sets the orange aside with maddening care before he turns properly, leaning one sharp hip against the bench. His smile is all teeth. “Should I be concerned? Is our little Mossy nesting?”
“Shut the fuck up.” Zoro’s scowl feels carved into his face, but his pulse is hammering so hard he can feel it in his throat, in his wrists, in the sudden heavy throb between his legs. He’s spent nineteen goddamn years not thinking about other bodies — especially not this one — and now it’s all he can focus on, from the wet shine on Sanji’s lower lip to the faint scar near his collarbone that Zoro wants to lick at until Sanji gasps.
“Riveting conversation, as always.” Sanji flicks the tea towel over his shoulder and steps closer, crossing the distance between them like it’s nothing, until the toe of his shoe nudges Zoro’s boot. His voice drops into that rough register that never fails to make the swordsman’s knees feel a little funny. “D'you trail every man around the ship like a starved alley cat, or am I just lucky?”
Zoro can almost taste the want on his own tongue and for, one reckless heartbeat, he doesn’t care that he’s probably going to be shit at this. Doesn’t care that he has no smoothe lines and no practiced hands, that he has no idea where to put his mouth except everywhere. He can figure it out. He’ll bite and suck and grind and learn because it’s Sanji and the thought of Sanji’s tongue in his mouth and Sanji’s hips pinning him and Sanji’s teeth against his throat — it’d be worth learning for.
He swallows, hearing how hoarse his voice comes out. “Pretty smug for someone who isn't telling me to get out.”
There’s the tiniest hitch in Sanji’s perfect mouth and Zoro clocks it like a victory, satisfaction blooming hot in his chest because good. Let him feel it, too.
“And if I did tell you to stop?” Sanji murmurs, fingers brushing the front of Zoro’s shirt, right over the sternum. It’s light and teasing, before his hand tightens in the fabric hard enough that Zoro’s breath kind of catches, whole body going rigid with that sick, awful hope. Sanji’s close enough now that Zoro can count the eyelashes framing those blue eyes, can feel the warmth of his exhale against his own mouth, can smell the orange on his fingers and the tobacco on his tongue and the raw, living heat of him. And then the asshole presses the small bowl with the peeled orange into Zoro’s hands, instead. “There. You came all this way, wouldn’t want to send you off empty handed.”
The silence that crashes down is deafening. Zoro stares at the bowl like it’s betrayed him, before glowering back up at Sanji’s face, heart jackhammering with rage and humiliation and the sheer whiplash of the last five minutes. His fingers clamp around the bowl so hard the ceramic cracks; he can still feel the ghost of Sanji’s knuckles against his chest.
“Seriously?” he grits out through clenched teeth.
Sanji lights a fresh cigarette with a flick of his lighter, exhaling deep to loosen a plume of smoke that curls between them. He moves back to the bench, hips rolling just enough to make Zoro’s mouth water. “You seem a little high strung lately. The vitamin C should help.”
“I hate you,” Zoro snaps but it comes out raspy and cracked and way too damn honest for his liking.
Sanji glances over his shoulder and there it is, that little crinkle at the corner of his mouth, the nearest thing to a real smile Zoro’s seen all day. Soft and knowing and almost fond. “Oh, you really, really don’t.”
x
They hit a small port town with some misshapen tavern that smells like spilled beer and very old sweat and very, very cheap perfume. It’s kind of place where the piano is missing at least six keys and the bartender looks like he’s either regularly gutted or gutting. The crew’s loud and hungry and grateful for ground that isn’t trying to kill them, so Zoro loses track of them pretty quickly as they move through the building like they’re trying to ransack it. He’s seen Sanji in enough of these places to know that he’s usually halfway to a table of women by now but is surprised to find that the cook’s still next to Zoro at the bar, ordering something for himself that’s way too fancy for this joint. He doesn’t even sip it, just turns the glass slowly between his fingers and watches Zoro like he’s waiting for the exact moment Zoro forgets how to breathe.
Which happens roughly every single time Sanji looks too directly at him, so. It’s not exactly a lengthy wait.
“Well?” Zoro scowls, knowing if he doesn’t say something he’s going to start grinding his teeth into dust. “Not going to bother some poor girl?”
Sanji’s eyebrow rises. “Do you want me to?”
“No,” Zoro snaps. “It’s just a…” He can’t say question because he doesn’t want Sanji answering it. He grinds his teeth, just a little. “It’s weird. For you.”
Sanji’s smile sharpens. “Oh, you’ve got opinions about my behaviour?”
A woman a few seats down smiles at Sanji with the kind of expression people share when they’re used to being smiled at in return. She tosses her hair, touches her cleavage, the whole routine but Sanji doesn’t even look. He just… keeps watching Zoro, and Zoro’s stomach does something mean and hot. It’s not that Sanji ignored her, exactly, because he’s not stupid enough to think he owns the blonde. He doesn’t want to own anyone. He just… likes it when Sanji’s attention finds him and stays.
He leans in a fraction and murmurs, barely loud enough to be heard over the piano massacre: “What’s wrong, Moss? Don’t like watching me flirt?”
Zoro’s fingers tighten around his cup. “You know I don’t.”
Sanji just laughs and tips his head back, stealing the cup right from Zoro’s hand and finishing it off.
The same damn night the world does it what it always does, and explodes into violence. Bounty hunters swarm the dock with steel flashing under moonlight because that’s how life for the Straw Hats rolls, apparently. Zoro carves through the first wave like paper, Wado singing, blood hot on his face and, somehwere, Sanji does some stupid spinning kick that’s completely unnecessary, landing on the balls of his feet and flicking his hair out of his eyes like he knows Zoro’s watching.
Wado almost kisses the deck, Zoro recovering just in time but pissed about it. He wants to murder Sanji for it and also wants to kiss him for it and —
It doesn’t stop. Days blur into a fever and sparring turns into torture and then naps become a different kind of torture. Meals are almost the worst of it, Sanji leaning over the table with veins standing out on his arms while he serves extra rice. Their knuckles graze sometimes and Zoro’s mouth goes dry with how badly he wants to suck those fingers clean. Evenings are almost unbearable because Sanji moves through the ship like he’s doing it on purpose, stretching his hamstrings on the rail or smoking in the crows’ nest or just. Watching Zoro from across the way like someone would hunt prey across the fields.
One golden afternoon Zoro plants himself against the mast with his arms folded, tired and sore from this morning’s skirmish, more than happy to pretend he’s just part of the ship for a few hours. The sun’s playing nice and the wind’s tugging nicely at his hair and he’s very nearly asleep when Sanji drifts into his shadow, looking him up and down with that infuriating, slow concentration that always feels like he’s sizing Zoro up for a coffin or, worse, a bed.
“Help me stretch.”
Zoro’s eyebrow twitches. “No.”
Sanji hooks one ankle overhead, the whole line of him tightening. “It’s important to keep limber, you know. Some of us use our bodies for more than, what, getting lost? Lifting weights?”
“Funny,” Zoro mutters. “You’re the one who keeps putting your body in my space.”
Sanji’s grin sharpens. “Aw, is it bothering you?”
Zoro could pick any of a thousand insults; he could talk about Sanji’s shitty attitude or his even shittier dress sense, or the way his jokes are borderline unbearable. He inhales slowly, physically wrangling the upcoming flinch back, choking the aversion to putting words to whatever this is. Says the truth like it’s a blade, because it’s not like Sanji doesn’t know. “Yeah.”
Sanji’s face kind of stutters and there’s a glorious half second where that cocky mask slips and something naked flashes underneath, all surprise and heat and the tiniest crack of oh, flashing so bright Zoro feels it like a punch. “Well. You’ve got a funny way of showing it.”
Zoro holds it there, jaw set, refusing to move an inch because it’s suddenly vitally important that Sanji sees he’s not joking. “And you’ve got a funny way of trying to get my attention.”
Sanji scoffs, but it falters halfway. “Please. You’re not that interesting.”
Zoro looks up at him, fighting every urge to drag this into an argument because that’d be easier, somehow. Instead, he rests his wrists on his drawn knees and says: “Fine. Show me, then.”
Sanji visibly hesitates, like he’s deciding whether Zoro’s carting around bravado or obedience and probably clocking that it’s both, packaged in the same stupid stubborn shell. “Bossy,” he says, but his mouth curls around it like he likes the taste. He folds forward again, fluid, palms flattening to the deck beside his boots with insulting ease as his spine finds a perfect arch. His shirt rides with the movement, exposing the dip of his lower back and the twin dimples Zoro’s been wanting to sink his teeth into for weeks.
Zoro’s watched him do this a hundred times and has never once felt normal about it.
“Go on,” Sanji says, voice muffled by the angle. “Let’s see if the mighty swordsman can touch his ankles without crying.”
Zoro exhales through his nose. He rolls his shoulders, buying time and pretending it’s about loosening up and not about the fact Sanji is right there and Zoro can feel his eyes like heat.
Then he bends, almost relishing in the fact that this is something Sanji's clearly underestimated: the fact that years of sword mastery aren’t just strength. It’s also hips and ankles and core and breath and the discipline of mobility so he doesn’t tear something mid fight and die stupid. He goes down steady and unhurried, refusing to rush, getting his fingertips down first and following with his knuckles. Then the pads of his fingers sink to wood and, with a small shift of weight, he gets down even more, his forearms lengthening and hamstrings biting, the stretch clean and satisfying.
He doesn’t need to look up to feel the way Sanji’s gaze has snapped to him, or the way the air changes. Zoro feels the attention land in his own body like a perfect hit, blood rushing everywhere all at once with the thrill of genuinely surprising Sanji. Of stealing the upper hand in a game Sanji usually runs like he invented it.
“Problem?” he smirks, still folded over because standing up right now would feel a little too close to giving ground.
Sanji’s scowl snaps back into place but it’s a flimsy thing now, all edges and absolutely zero weight. “Fine, you can bend. Congrats.”
Zoro’s mouth twitches. He stays down another beat just to be annoying about it before he straightens slowly, vertebra by vertebra, like he’s got all the time in the world. He watches Sanji’s track the movement and feels something trill deep, deep inside of him. “You sound disappointed.”
Sanji’s eyes narrow. “Touching the floor doesn’t make you special, seaweed-brain.”
“Special enough you’re staring.”
That one hits: Sanji folds his arms like he’s barricading himself. “Fuck, you’re unbearable. Fine, try this.”
He drops into a deep twist that Zoro’s seen in flashes, maybe, but never this close. One leg goes long and the other bends, torso folding over the extended thigh with an arm braced and the other reaching overhead in a clean arc. His throat stretches taut, looking like something carved to demonstrate the concept of agility but cursed with a smartass mouth that ruins it on purpose.
Sanji’s eyes cut sideways, smug even mid stretch. “What, you afraid you’ll pull something?”
Zoro feels the way his smile turns slow and almost mean. “Afraid I’ll embarrass you.”
He drops into it and, sure, it’s not perfect because he’s not a freak of nature like Sanji, but it’s damn close enough that his body lines up with the shape. Close enough that the stretch sings through his side and his balance holds firm and that he can feel — almost viscerally — how much Sanji expected him to fuck it up. His skin buzzes with the satisfaction of it, bright and almost cruel.
Sanji stares at him like he’s personally offended by Zoro’s body. “You practice this,” he says, accusing, like Zoro gone and committed fraud which is ridiculous: it’s not Zoro’s fault Sanji’s always underestimating him.
“I train.”
Sanji looks like he wants to insult him and also maybe like he wants to touch him, which is a delicious contradiction to see on the other man’s face because he’s usually so sure of his own lines. There’s a flush crawling up his neck so vibrantly that Zoro could bottle how badly he wants to lick it off. “Get up.”
Zoro snorts, knowing he’s grinning just enough to be insufferable. “You want a rematch already?”
“Get. Up.” Sanji says again and for a beat Zoro pauses at the tone, thinking maybe he’s pushed too far — and then Sanji’s fingers close hot and rough around the back of his neck, thumb pressing neatly into the pulse hammering at his jaw. “Get up so I can shut that mouth of yours.”
The second Zoro straightens, Sanji fists his shirt and slams him back into the mast with enough force to rattle the ropes overhead. Zoro’s spine hits wood, jolt going straight through him to spark behind his eyes, but Sanji doesn’t give him time to recalibrate. The kiss is all teeth and tongue from the first second, Sanji’s hands still tangled in Zoro’s shirt like he’s afraid Zoro will disappear if he lets go. Zoro groans, raw and starved, and then he’s kissing back, hands finding Sanji’s hips until fingers snarl through the fabric. Sanji’s knee slots between his legs, pinning him there, and Zoro’s whole body lights up with the realisation that this is exactly how the blonde fights, too: close and relentless, all pressure and control. He bites Zoro’s lip just enough to make Zoro gasp, then uses the opening immediately. Zoro’s head knocks back against the mast but he doesn’t even care because Sanji’s mouth is on his and the world’s shrunk down to exactly this. His fingers slide up Sanji’s spine, hips jerking forwards instinctively to ride the other man’s thigh like he can’t help it, pulling him in harder and Sanji makes a sound into the kiss that Zoro’s going to remember for the rest of his life.
Sanji breaks the kiss just long enough to drag his mouth down the side of Zoro’s throat, teeth scraping skin like a threat, like a promise. Zoro’s whole body jerks. “Sanji —”
Sanji hums against his neck, voice vibrating into bone. “Mm?”
Zoro just kind of chokes on nothing; he doesn’t even know what he meant to say. His hands tighten bruisingly on Sanji’s hips, dragging him back up because he wants that mouth back, he wants —
“Wow!” Nami’s voice rings down from the upper deck like a gunshot and Sanji freezes. Zoro makes a noise that might be a growl, but god knows he’ll deny it until his dying day.
Usopp’s voice follows, delighted and scandalised in equal measure. “The deck? Really? You couldn’t wait five minutes to get below?”
Sanji jerks back like he’s been dunked in cold water, blue eyes blown wide and cheeks going violently, violently red. He stares up at where Nami’s leaning over the rail, her grin awfully sharp. “Don’t mind us, carry on! We’ll just… keep charting the wind direction.”
Usopp cackles and high-fives her. “For science!”
Sanji makes a strangled, wrecked little sound and finally drops Zoro’s shirt, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. Zoro doesn’t move. Can’t. He’s still pressed to the mast by nothing but the sheer overwhelming weight of what just happened, mouth swollen and tingling and still tasting like pure Sanji. Even with the others watching, he can’t stop looking at the way Sanji’s throat is flushed dark, pulse jumping visibly under the skin, eyes blown wide and glassy. He’s so tempted to just lean in and crowd into Sanji to kiss him again, Usopp and Nami be damned.
He grinds the back of his head back against the mast, embarrassment veering sharply into frustration as he snaps, furious and mortified: “Go away!”
Usopp cups his hands around his mouth, already backing up. “Oh, we’re already gone! Emotionally! We’re scarred for life!”
Nami’s laughing so hard she’s wheezing, one arm slung around Usopp’s shoulders as she drags him back, shouting something about using protection and exhibitionist tickets. Their giggling dades down the deck like a pair of evil seagulls and then it’s quiet again. Just the hush of the ship and the waves and the relentless thunder of Zoro’s heart.
Sanji just stands there, hands flexing uselessly at his sides like he doesn’t know what to do with them now that they’re not touching Zoro. His cheeks are scarlet, that pretty colour smearing all the way to his jaw. He opens his mouth, probably to fire off some cutting insult because everybody knows that’s his emergency exit at any given time, but Zoro beats him to it. He touches his own split lip with his tongue like he’s checking it’s real, reaching out slowly and carefully to close his fingers around Sanji’s wrist. The skin there is fever hot.
“Rematch,” he says, low and edged with something raw and hopeful that feels terrifyingly close to begging. His eyes stay locked on Sanji’s, steady despite the flush still burning his own fact. “Just you and me.”
Sanji stares at him, visibly thrown. For one gorgeous moment his eyes go wider, almost wondrous, like he can’t believe they’re getting another shot at this. Then his mouth curves, slow and shaky at the edges but real, so fucking real, and it lights something huge and warm and in Zoro’s chest. “In private,” he agrees, thumb brushing the corner of Zoro’s mouth. “Unless you want Nami auctioning off front row seats to watch me ruin you.”
Zoro’s grin cracks wide, following the other man down towards the galley like he was always meant to.
x
zoro is 10000% the kid that writes 'get out of my school' notes
First image, in a post from January 2020, consists of text and three screenshots from The Witcher. The text reads:
When it’s finally 2020 but you realize that both 1820 and 1920 had massive plague outbreaks
The three screenshots show Geralt of Rivia saying: “Hmm. Fuck.” The post is startling because January 2020 was just before the full force of the COVID-19 pandemic was unleashed.
Second image, also from January 2020, shows the Side-Eye Monkey meme. This captures the anxiety that is compounded with the knowledge in early 2020 that the world was overdue for a pandemic during a climate of anti-vaccination beliefs.
Third image is a Tumblr tag that reads:
#well it is the year of the rat
Fourth image shows Kronk from The Emperor’s New Groove, subtitled as saying “Oh no.. It’s all coming together.”
Fifth image from March 2020 (when the COVID outbreak started to go international) is another Tumblr tag that reads:
#this was funny until it wasn’t and then it was again
Sixth image from April 2021 shows the character D.W. Read from Arthur, with dark circles under her eyes indicating a state of exhaustion, capturing the mood of the world thick in the throes of the COVID pandemic.
Seventh image is a GIF from April 2026, showing Commander Rourke from the film Atlantis. The subtitles have him saying:
