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“How long can a human hold their breath underwater?”
Luffy’s question came completely out of the blue, but the straw hats were used to that. Sanji barely took notice of it as he came walking out of the kitchen, but he didn’t feel like he was the one most suited to answer Luffy’s question, anyway. Jimbei looked up, considering their captain’s inquiry.
It was an unusually quiet day out at sea, the waters surprisingly calm. They hadn’t spotted a single pirate ship all morning and had evaded the marines without trouble. The crew was enjoying the sun out on the main deck, most of them sharing the space for once, except for Franky, who was busy working on some new weapon in his development room. Usopp had started sketching something in his sketchbook, bent over his work, but his hand now sat frozen as he tuned into Luffy and Jimbei's conversation. Chopper was helping Zoro keep track of his reps as he circled through his workout. The number of his current one, weighted squats, was already too high to be reasonable. Nami and Robin were lying on deck chairs, a little closer towards the aquarium bar, far enough to keep away from the shenanigans happening further towards the stern. They had placed themselves quite expertly, their heads just underneath the shade of the trees, keeping them cool enough.
Luffy was clearly bored. Which could mean two things: they were either about to have the best time together, or something would go terribly wrong.
“Hm, I'm not certain,” Jimbei answered their captain, indulging him. “Probably for a few minutes, at least.”
“How about fishmen?” Luffy continued, as Sanji collected an empty glass bowl from him. He had served the entire crew some ice cream earlier and now started collecting them again to wash up, not getting involved in the conversation just yet. Better to stay back.
“We don’t need to hold our breath.” Jimbei chuckled, and as he handed over his own glass bowl to Sanji, he thanked him. “We can breathe underwater.”
Sanji watched as Brook’s attempts of creeping up to the ladies without getting caught flopped. Immediately, Sanji started walking over to them, hoping to come to rescue.
“Oh, yeah, that’s right! I forgot about that. So, it wouldn't really make sense to have a competition about it." Luffy sighed, his plans apparently wrecked.
"Did you plan to have us all hold our breaths, captain?"
"Yeah, thought it would be fun. Maybe we could do something else?” There was a small thump as Luffy’s back hit the deck and he stared up to the sky. “Like, hm, see who can stand on one leg, the longest?"
Neither Nami nor Robin seem to be very impressed by Sanji's rescue attempts, as he tried to engage them both in a conversation, just so that they would be left alone by Brook. They handed him their glass bowls but had little else to offer.
"Oh, come on, that’s not fair. Sanji would win that one, easily," Usopp replied to Luffy, and at the sound of his own name, Sanji started listening more carefully.
"Huh?" Sanji said, smartly, because he had been too busy trying not to stare at the two beautiful women in front of him, a lot of their beautiful skin revealed for the sun to kiss.
"I guess you're right," Luffy said, pensively. "What if we did like a couple of rounds with different challenges? So that everybody got a chance?"
"Maybe it should be something that's not as skill-based," Usopp suggested, straightening himself up further, now completely involved. "Like, maybe something random?"
"Oh, yeah! Like... Who has the longest toe?"
"I'm not letting you touch my feet," Nami chimed in, completely unimpressed by the suggestion.
"Who has the longest hair, but not growing from their head?" Usopp tried.
"I don't think that's appropriate," Chopper reckoned.
"Who has the most freckles on their face?" Zoro suggested, surprising them with his input.
“Sanji, you have freckles!” Luffy ascertained. "Do you think we could count them?”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Sanji scoffed, “there are so many, it would be–”
“Forty-three," Zoro answered, and as Sanji whipped his head around to stare at him, he looked about as shocked by his own answer as Sanji felt.
“Wow,” Luffy said, nodding, as if Zoro’s words clearly held nothing but the truth, not doubting it for one second. “Impressive.”
"What the hell are you on about?" Sanji snarled, still glaring at Zoro, his heart beating faster in an instant.
"There are forty-three freckles on your face," Zoro replied, now meeting his eye. Something inside of Sanji was short-circuiting. Perhaps his brain. Perhaps his heart. "Well, I guess, give or take a couple, depending on the day. Some are more visible when it's sunny."
"You’ve gotta be shitting me.” Sanji still stared at Zoro, who maintained eye-contact, crossing his arms.
"Go. Count them."
Zoro’s suggestion was completely moronic. Sanji took the two remaining glass bowls that were sitting next to Chopper and Zoro and left for the kitchen, mumbling to himself while he went there.
The swordsman was fucking with him. There was no way in hell that he knew the number of freckles on Sanji's face. Sanji didn't even know, and it was his own damn face for God's sake. He put the dishes in the sink and was just about to start washing them, when his hands ghosted over his cheeks, trying to remember the freckles that he knew were there. He remembered a bunch on both of his cheeks, a couple on his chin, a few near his temple. There was no way Zoro had counted them. When? How?
Sanji left the kitchen and the glass bowls unwashed in the sink.
He tried to make his way to the men's quarters mostly unobserved, or at least appearing calm and collected, but failed quite miserably at that task. Most of the crew was busy doing something that only Luffy or Usopp could have suggested: scribbling on some of Usopp's sketch paper in what Sanji could only assume was an attempt at drawing the funniest self-portrait. Even Brook and Jimbei had joined in, but Zoro, bloody Zoro, sat back, not participating, instead watching Sanji as he made his way over the deck. At least he kept his fucking mouth shut.
Finally, Sanji found himself in front of the mirror. Part of him fought the urge to start cleaning it, as it was clearly long overdue, but that wasn't the point of him standing in front of it right now.
Working systematically, Sanji began counting, starting with the freckles on his forehead, closest to his hairline. He brushed his hair away, tucking it behind his ear, revealing some hidden ones there. His nose was next, then his left cheek, followed by his right, until, finally, he got to his chin.
He got his result, but then counted again, just to make sure, trying not to miss any of the fainter ones, trying not to count any twice.
Fucking hell. Zoro had been right.
Sanji returned to the deck and found the others, now joined by Nami, each trying to balance a spoon on their nose. Brook and Chopper had apparently already lost, both encouraging those still left in the game. Sanji had half a mind to berate them about using kitchen utensils, but the urge to keep walking and avoid interaction was stronger.
“I’d be crying my eyes out over this miserable defeat right now… Good thing that I don’t have any!” Brook called out, laughing wildly, as Sanji walked past them. Sanji’s mind was too preoccupied to react with a smile. Reaching the kitchen in no time, he washed the bowls on autopilot, his thoughts circling around the fact that Zoro had been right about the most absurd fact. And nobody else seemed to care, not even a little.
Sanji wanted to confront him about it, wanted to tease him about the fact that he knew Sanji’s face better than Sanji did himself. But the thought of talking to Zoro about it seemed about as appealing as driving a knife right into his stomach and giving it a twist. There was an underlying fear in the potential implications of it all, too grand and frightening to think about it too much. Sanji thought about it anyway. He spent the entire afternoon doing so. He prepared their dinner as a sideline, spending much more energy on trying to figure out what it meant. Perhaps he was overthinking it. The longer Sanji occupied himself with the thought, the less it felt like a thing he had to fear and more like something that filled him with a pleasant feeling, warm and bright. He couldn’t allow it to overwhelm him, so he kept it at bay and cursed the swordsman.
After they had finished dinner, when the sun was starting to set, Sanji set out and found Zoro at the stern of the ship. Sanji viewed him for a moment before he approached. Took in his stature, the way he was leaning over the railing, watching the sun as it started to get swallowed up by the horizon.
“How the fuck did you know that?” Sanji asked, starting the conversation without any greeting as he lit a cigarette. The first plume of smoke got picked up by the wind and was gone in an instant. The breeze ruffled their clothes, elicited a soft tinkling from Zoro’s earrings, messed up Sanji’s hair.
“What?” Zoro bit back, glancing at Sanji only briefly. His guard was up. Sanji wasn’t surprised.
“The freckles. Like, that’s insane.”
“No, it’s not. You get all up in my face every time we fight. It was easy.”
“That’s – Zoro. Come on, be for real, that’s not how you counted them.”
Zoro glanced at him once again, and Sanji inched a little closer, perhaps unintentionally. Perhaps not unintentionally at all.
“So, what, you want me to be honest here?” The swordsman grumbled.
“Yeah! For fuck’s sake, that’s why I’m asking!”
Zoro sighed, and then seemed to come to a simple conclusion.
“I’ve been counting them for a while. Got lucky that you changed your hair, or it might still be a mystery to me.”
“Zoro, what the fuck are you–”
“I like your stupid face,” Zoro said, shrugging, not looking at Sanji as he spoke. “I like looking at it.”
“Then look at me now,” Sanji demanded, still unsure whether Zoro was just messing with him, trying to find new ways to rile him up. Zoro turned towards him, his face unreadable. Sanji froze as Zoro lifted his left hand, and his index finger touched Sanji’s chin, softly.
“One,” Zoro started, his finger gliding to a new spot, barely any movement at all. “Two.”
Zoro counted them all, even the ones that were hidden by his fringe. He had to tuck Sanji’s hair behind his ears to get those ones. Sanji thought that he could probably win that breath holding contest that Luffy had suggested, after all. He might even beat Jimbei.
“Forty-three,” Zoro concluded, but his hand lingered, his fingers resting at Sanji’s jaw.
“You only have like, four,” Sanji stated, matter-of-factly. He felt a little scared to count them himself, too scared of what it would reveal to Zoro if he did so. He did it, anyway, moving his hand over Zoro’s face slowly. Two on his left cheek. One above his right brow. And one, barely noticeable, almost underneath his chin. Sanji had never done that before. Touched him, so carefully.
“What, is this, like, a competition?” Zoro’s thumb, still resting on Sanji’s cheek, brushed over his skin in what Sanji wasn’t sure was accidental.
“Isn’t it always?” Sanji’s voice was a quiet thing now, fearing that any wrong words would stop Zoro from touching him, so awfully soft. He let his own hand move to the side of Zoro’s neck. There was another freckle he hadn’t seen before, a couple of centimetres under Zoro’s ear. But it probably didn’t count.
Zoro shrugged, lifting Sanji’s jaw carefully, forcing him to look into his eyes. He hadn’t quite finished it, but Sanji dropped his cigarette anyway, stamping it out with the ball of his foot.
“Not right now, no. Not for me,” Zoro said, and then closed the little distance that was left between them by kissing Sanji.
Sanji should have been completely startled by that, should have stepped back in disgust, or at least in displeasure. He should have delivered a kick that would send Zoro flying right over the railing.
Instead, Sanji did the next best thing, and pulled Zoro in, breathing into their kiss, letting his own guard down completely. He allowed himself to get lost in it. The feelings he had tried to stomp out, only for them to burn hotter than before, flared up and he let them guide him, his hand finding Zoro’s hair, and his arms, and his back. He needed to feel as much of him as he could, all at once, suddenly desperate for it.
Whereas something had short-circuited inside of him before, it seemed like something entirely new awakened inside him now, pulsing through him like the current of a river, engulfing him, fearing to take him under. He was about to lose his mind.
“I do wonder,” Zoro mumbled, bringing Sanji back to his senses, at least a little. It didn’t suit Sanji, that he was interrupting their moment with words, but then he noticed that Zoro’s cheeks were flushed and found at least a little satisfaction in the intermission. “How many others there are. Freckles, I mean. On your body.”
The cigarette was burnt to the filter by time Sanji dropped it to the ground to stamp it out.
“Hm.” Sanji leaned back enough to tap his finger against his own lips, a cheshire grin plastered on his face, and pretended to think about it. “Guess you’ll have to count those, too.”