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If he’s being honest, Zoro’s always hated the galley. There are too many sharp smells, too much steam, too many breakable things. He walks through it the way he walks through enemy territory: hands where Sanji can see them, shoulders broad enough to knock over nothing, expression carefully blank.
The only reason he ever steps foot inside is the cook. Which, frankly, is worse.
Tonight the galley’s warm and close, lights turned low and the ship humming its soft night noises around them. The windows are fogged with the ghosts of earlier steam, copper pots glowing on hooks. A knife block sits like a small altar and Sanji’s leaning against the bench, sleeves rolled, shirt open just enough to hint without bragging. Zoro sees the bowl of fruit first, the slick wedges of colour piled high: mango, orange, pineapple, something star–shaped and sticky. Glazed in a light syrup that catches the light.
Then he sees Sanji’s hands, sees the way his fingers splay lazily over the rim of the bowl. The way his thumb idly smears a bead of juice against the back of his knuckles. Long, clever fingers, scarred where they should be, soft where they have no right being. Knuckles he’s seen crack a jaw, fingertips he’s watched coax dough into clouds.
Zoro’s mouth goes dry for no good reason.
He’s never admitted (out loud, to anyone, even himself) that he has a problem with Sanji’s hands. That sometimes, when the day goes quiet, he catches himself staring at them more than at his swords. Watching them flip a knife. Watching them pinch salt, roll cigarettes, smooth a wrinkle in Nami’s map, press against Luffy’s forehead.
Watching them. Imagining.
He shoves that thought down, hard, and opens his mouth to make some cheap crack about the cook finally needing alone time with his mirror, but doesn’t quite manage to get there because Sanji pushes off the bench and the golden light slides down his arms and over his hands and Zoro’s focus tunnels. Hard.
Sanji dips his fingers into the bowl and he doesn’t just grab, he sinks them into the syrup, letting it slick between his knuckles, then curls them gently to lift out a wedge of mango. The fruit is soft and golden and dangerous–looking, clinging to his skin like it doesn’t want to be anywhere else.
Zoro swallows.
“Hungry?” Sanji asks, like they’re having a normal conversation.
“Busy,” Zoro lies.
“That’s not what I asked.” Sanji turns the mango slice between his thumb and finger, examining it like he’s checking a precious stone. A bead of syrup slides along the side of his hand, down to his wrist and he licks it off, fast and practical, and Zoro barely keeps from swearing. “C’mere.”
Zoro stays where he is. “Why?”
Sanji laughs, soft and disbelieving and takes a step forward, then another, closing the space with the kind of easy grace that always makes Zoro’s muscles tighten. The galley seems to shrink with every centimetre and by the time Sanji stops close enough that Zoro can almost count individual eyelashes. “You’re my test subject. New dessert menu, for the ladies.”
“I didn’t agree to that.”
“You never agree to anything sensible. Luckily, I don’t care.”
Zoro almost says something cruel just to be contrary but Sanji pinches off a segment and holds it up and Zoro’s fucking traitorous attention tracks the movement like there’s a string between his eyes and those fingers. The mango wedge glows almost translucent, catching the light as Sanji’s fingers cradle it, his thumbnail pressed into its back, juice slick.
Zoro’s mouth floods and he refuses to examine whether it’s for the fruit or the fingers. “Fine. One.”
Sanji hums but he doesn’t hand the piece over; he lifts it instead, right up in front of Zoro’s mouth. The scent hits first, ripe and bright and sugared, followed closely by the heat of Sanji’s fingers, so close he can feel it radiating against his mouth. Zoro suddenly has nowhere to put his hands, nowhere to – they flex at his sides, empty, stupid. “Open.”
Zoro stares at him. “The fuck? Just give it to me.”
“And miss this view? Open.” It’s the tone that does it, not sharp, not mocking, just… cool. Sure, like he’s seeing whether Zoro will listen.
Zoro’s spine goes rigid. He could step back. Could shove Sanji’s hand away, make a joke, ruin the moment. But Sanji’s eyes are on him, focused and intent and those fingers are right there, waiting, and Zoro’s willpower – seasoned in blood and training and a thousand brutal choices – hits a patch of quicksand. His jaw unlocks. His mouth opens and he gets to see, in real time, how Sanji’s expression changes; a soft flare of something darkly pleased glints in his gaze, like he’s run an experiment and just gotten exactly the result he wanted.
“Good,” he murmurs softly and the word digs in under Zoro’s ribs like a hook even as Sanji slides the mango into his mouth with a slow, unhurried push. Fingers brush his lower lip, dragging and the pad of his thumb catches the inside corner, a barely–there pressure that makes Zoro’s breath hitch. The fruit hits his tongue, sweet and sharp and his jaw works on instinct. Chew. Swallow. The taste of the mango is secondary to the faint brush of a fingertip along his lip.
“Well?” Sanji asks and his voice has a new weight at the bottom.
Zoro forces himself to shrug, forces himself to shove his heartbeat down from where it’s suddenly hammering in his throat. Tries to play this casual, because what the fuck else can he do? “S’fine.”
Sanji’s smile sharpens and he dips back into the bowl, this time never taking his eyes off Zoro while his fingers disappear into syrup and fruit. Zoro’s attention locks onto the tendons in his wrist, the way they shift under skin, the sinew of his hand moving, working until Sanji brings up a slice of orange, bright and dripping.
The citrus hits his tongue with a sour burst that makes his mouth water and Sanji’s fingers slip in a fraction further this time, knuckles ghosting his teeth. Zoro’s hands curl into fists and, hell, he can feel his pulse in his mouth, in his fingers, in stupid places that have no business being involved right now. This time Zoro feels Sanji’s fingers drag against the inside of his lip as the wedge passes and he can’t – his own tongue betrays him and flicks over the tip of one of them on the way to the fruit, helpless.
They both freeze, Sanji’s pupils blown wide. Zoro realises, in exquisite horror, that his body’s just signed him up for a whole different kind of trouble.
Fuck. He swallows. The wedge goes down like stone.
Sanji’s lashes flutter as he blinks, slow, and for once his voice comes out a little thinner. “Did you just…”
“No,” Zoro says instantly.
Sanji stares at him. Then at his own hand. Then back again. “Oh,” he says in a tone that is going to ruin Zoro’s life. “Oh. Oh, that’s interesting.”
Zoro grits his teeth. “Don’t –”
“What?” Sanji’s smile goes lazy, feral. “Tease you? Experiment? See how red I can get your ears?”
He goes to deny it, to tell him to knock it the hell off but Sanji whispers open and Zoro – Zoro opens. The wedge of mango presses in slowly this time, Sanji’s fingers with it, rubbing across his tongue, smearing juice along the tastebuds. Zoro could bite, maybe, but he doesn’t. His knuckles turn white from how badly he’s clenching his fists.
Sanji watches his mouth the way Zoro watches an opponent’s stance. “Didn’t know you like fruit so much.”
“I don’t,” Zoro mutters around syrup and fingers, betraying himself in every fucking way.
“Liar.” Sanji’s thumb strokes the inside of his cheek. The pressure is barely there, but Zoro’s whole nervous system stands up and pays attention. “You’re practically purring.”
Zoro swallows too fast, letting it burn his throat. “Shut up.”
“Oh, we’re way past me shutting up,” Sanji smirks, eyes bright. “You had your chance when you licked me.”
“That was an accident.”
Sanji lets his fingers slide free with a drag, his tongue flicking out to catch a bead of juice at the side of his knuckle and Zoro hears himself make a sound that’s never come out of his own mouth before. Sanji’s gaze snaps up, triumphant. “Oh, that’s it,” he breathes. “We’re doing this properly.”
“Doing what properly?” Zoro repeats, which is a mistake because it invites an answer.
Sanji wipes his fingers once, half–heartedly and this close he smells like the syrup, like smoke and the subtle, savoury warmth of the galley. There are faint shadows under his eyes from late nights and bad sleep, sticky syrup smeared across one wrist. Zoro wants, with sudden violence, to put his mouth there. The galley feels too small, the lantern light too warm, the air too thick. Zoro can hear his own pulse in his ears, a hard rush and he knows he could end this right now. He could shove him away, mutter something about smoke, go collapse in the crow’s nest and pretend none of this ever happened.
He doesn’t. He watches as Sanji hums and says: “Sit,” and Zoro puts himself down before his brain can argue, dropping until his knees hit warm wood. He’s knelt in worse places, sure: dirt, stone, blood but god knows he has never, ever knelt for someone whose hands are shaking very slightly.
Sanji’s breath hitches. “Oh, fuck,” he says quietly. “I meant – that’s okay.”
From down here, Sanji’s a line of long legs and steadying hands. Zoro stares straight ahead at the seam of his ridiculous pants for a second, getting his bearings, before he lets himself look up only to find Sanji’s gaze already locked onto him. His face’s flushed and his lips are parted and both hands curl and uncurl, fingers flexing like they’re holding back.
Zoro swallows, his own mouth suddenly too empty. He needs to speak, to say something, but he can’t – nothing will come out. He can’t think like this, not with the way Sanji’s hand curls around his jaw, not with the way he whispers: “Open.”
Heat slams through Zoro so hard he has to dig his fingers into his own thighs but he opens his mouth. Sanji doesn’t go straight for fruit this time: his thumb comes first, pressing gently to the centre of Zoro’s tongue and Zoro’s whole spine sings. He holds perfectly still, jaw held wide, breathing slowly through his nose. The taste of soap and skin and syrup hits his tastebuds, bright and intimate.
“God,” Sanji whispers. “Look at you.”
Zoro can’t, not really: his vision’s narrowed to that thumb, on the way the joint flexes. On how easy it would be to close his teeth, on how hard he’s choosing not to.
Sanji strokes his tongue once with the pad of his thumb, like he’s testing texture. The simple, slow movement flips all Zoro’s switches at once and he feels heat pool everywhere, anywhere, his skin prickling. He breathes in through his nose, long and careful, before he closes his lips around the thumb and sucks, hard enough that Sanji’s breath catches and Zoro feels the hitch travel down Sanji’s arm.
“Fuck,” Sanji hisses so Zoro does it again, deeper, tongue pushing up, wrapping around the pad, tracing the whorls of fingerprint. He lets himself taste, really taste, finding skin and overly sweet syrup and a hint of salt from the sweat that’s starting to bead at Sanji’s wrist. Sanji’s other hand snaps out and grabs the bench edge like he needs the anchor and Zoro hums around his thumb, smug and wrecked all at once. Vibration shudders up Sanji’s fingers and Zoro’d smirk if his mouth wasn’t currently occupied.
“Good boy,” Sanji breathes and Zoro honestly might black out, has to dig his nails into himself to bleed off some of the pressure that wants to go into his teeth. He takes what he’s given, mouth following, greedier each pass and he only realises he’s leaning into it when his knees creep forward, thighs brushing Sanji’s shins, when Sanji eases his thumb back out and replaces it with two fingers. They rest on Zoro’s tongue, heavy and sure, pressing down just enough to remind him of dimensions.
“Breathe,” Sanji says quietly.
Zoro obeys, letting the exhale ghost over Sanji’s knuckles as he pushes in a fraction further and Zoro hums around him, eyes half–closing. Obedience is its own buzz under his skin now, as heady as sake. He can feel where Sanji’s bones are under the skin, the little bump of callous at the base of a finger from knife work.
Sanji makes a choked sound, a little desperate. “Again.”
Zoro repeats the motion, finding a rhythm. Draw in, release. Drag tongue, swirl. He’s not thinking anymore, not the way he usually does in a fight or when he’s tracking the crew: his world has narrowed to the way his mouth sinks down, deeper, until Sanji’s fingers hit the wet heat of his throat and the muscles there flutter.
“Fuck,” Sanji says, wrecked. “Okay. Okay, stop, stop –” His face is flushed, chest rising and falling too fast. He swallows, several times, and Zoro imagines his mouth there, his teeth scraping over the other man’s windpipe. “Quit looking at me like – like you want to keep going.”
Zoro checks himself, and, yeah. He’s staring. He can feel the cling of spit on his lips, the faint pulse of his own heartbeat in them, the phantom weight of fingers on his tongue. He wants more: he wants to drag Sanji’s hand back until he forgets his own name. It’s probably written all over his face. “Can’t help it.”
Sanji makes a bitten–off sound. “Say that again.”
Zoro blinks. “Can’t. Help. It.”
Sanji closes his eyes for a second, like the words hit too hard and when he opens them, there’s something raw and soft under the feral gleam. “You realise I’m unhinged enough to take that seriously, right?”
“Good,” Zoro says, surprising himself with the speed of it.
Sanji’s shoulders jolt. A laugh, shaky and disbelieving, escapes him. “Oh, fuck, you’re gonna kill me.” He brings his wet hand to Zoro’s face, thumb brushing the corner of his mouth, smearing the last stickiness away and the touch is reverent in a way that makes Zoro want to look away and lean in at the same time.
“Open,” Sanji says again, but softer now. “Last one. For tonight.”
This time it’s just Sanji’s hand, palm first, fingers curling in, pressing over his tongue in a shape that makes Zoro’s head spin. It’s too much to take all the way and so Sanji doesn’t make him. He just lets Zoro close his mouth as far as comfort allows, lips around the base of his fingers, tongue spread against his palm. Sanji’s palm is broader than he’d thought, his lifeline cuts deeper. The skin’s thicker along the outer edge where the pan handles sit and Zoro maps it, memorises it, burns it into the part of himself that keeps a catalogue of his favourite things: good swords, good sake, good places to nap. He files Sanji’s hands there, permanently.
“I’ve been wondering,” Sanji breathes. “You think you’re subtle, but you – I’d be slicing garlic and there you’d be, eye on the knife for five seconds and my fingers for ten. I thought, there’s no way, no way he’s that into this. Not when he barely looks at my legs unless I’m kicking something.”
It hits something primal, the last thin strip of self–control between his back teeth frays. Zoro makes the call and bites, hard enough to make Sanji’s breath catch, a sharp inhale that punches out of him like a hit. His free hand slams on the bench behind, palm smacking. Zoro bites down a shade harder until Sanji swears, low and obscene, and Zoro has never heard anything better in his life. It’s a crime, actually, when Sanji pulls his hand back, dragging the pads of his fingers against Zoro’s tongue on the way. Zoro has the humiliating, uncontrollable urge to chase after them, to the point where his jaw actually shifts like he’s going to lean forward and Sanji catches it, thumb pressing under his chin.
“Stay,” Sanji says, an order and a joke and Zoro fucking stays. Sanji lifts his hand, palm up. Zoro’s spit gleams across his knuckles in the lamplight, thin and shining, stringing faintly between two fingers and Zoro feels something in his stomach do a slow, alarming roll. He’s never been conscious of his own tells before, but he knows them now: the way his eye keeps dropping to Sanji’s hand, the way his shoulders loosen only when Sanji touches him, the way his mouth still tingles where he bit down and the way he wants that ache again.
Sanji takes him by the jaw and pulls him to his feet, horrifically close, before he sidesteps around him in that tight galley space to palm his shoulder, steering him forward until Zoro’s hips bump the bench, until Sanji’s hand’s found the back of his head to guide him down.
“Hands,” Sanji manages and Zoro grabs onto the edge of the bench, fingers curling over the wood. He can’t see Sanji now and it’s somehow both the worst and best part. He can only feel, the warmth of his chest brushing Zoro’s back as he steps in close, the faint drag of fabric, the ghost of breath near his ear, but his eyes are full of wood and what he can see of the sink and his own white–knuckled grip.
Something hot curls low in his gut as Sanji’s hand settles on his right wrist, thumb stroking over the pulse point like he’s checking the quality of a cut of meat. The other traces up his forearm, up his bicep, over the span of his shoulder, then down the line of his spine in a slow, careless glide that leaves fire in its wake.
“Too much?”
“You’d have to work harder,” Zoro grits out, his voice rougher than he expects. “If you wanted too much.”
Sanji laughs, delighted, right by his ear. “Don’t tempt me. You don’t know my definition of too much.”
“I’m starting to,” Zoro mutters.
“Yeah?” Sanji’s hands slide around to his front, palms flattening briefly over his ribs, his sternum, just feeling the rise and fall of his breathing, the way his chest strains under his shirt. “And what’s your definition?”
“Where I am,” Zoro says. “Right now.”
Sanji goes very quiet, even as his fingers linger at Zoro’s collarbone, thumbs brushing the hollow at the base of his throat. Zoro’s swallow stutters against them, his own hands gripping the bench tight, right until Sanji”s mouth finds his neck and Zoro’s hands spasm and the bench – cracks. It’s a soft sound, almost nothing under the rasp of Zoro’s breath and the wet drag of Sanji’s mouth on his skin, just the creak of wood fibres giving up, but it vibrates straight through Zoro’s palms and into his bones.
Sanji’s teeth graze that spot just below his ear, the one he hadn’t known was wired directly to his spine until today. “Poor little bench, couldn’t handle one swordsman having a crisis.”
“I’m not –” Zoro grits his teeth as Sanji’s hand tightens on his stomach, thumb pressing just under his ribs. “Having a crisis.”
There’s a beat of silence where he can feel Sanji’s smirk forming against his neck before he takes Zoro’s wrist in his hand, peeling his fingers one by one off the edge to pry his grip loose. Zoro could fight it but he doesn’t, just lets his hand come away to hover stupidly in the air until Sanij presses it flat against the bench and covers it with his own, tangling their fingers messily, Sanji’s longer hand pinning Zoro’s like a brand, like a man fixing a weapon in place. “There. Now if you break anything, I’ll feel it.”
Zoro swallows. “You’re insane.”
“You say that like it’s new information.”
Sanji shifts and Zoro feels the change all the way through him: the subtle adjustment of hips, the way Sanji’s chest fits more firmly against his back, the hot press of his mouth returning to the hinge of Zoro’s jaw. A kiss. Another. A bite, just shy of too much. Zoro’s fingers twitch under Sanji’s and the real break happens on the second bite. Zoro feels it before he hears it, pressure building in his fingers, tendons drawn bow–tight, the grain of the bench digging into his palms. Sanji’s mouth is at his throat again, hot and reckless, teeth scraping just shy of real damage, and Zoro’s grip just… goes.
The wood gives with a sharp, wounded snap.
He flinches, more in embarrassment than pain. His knuckles are white, shoulders strung out, breath punching in short, startled bursts against the thick air of the galley.
“Gonna keep breaking my kitchen?” Sanji murmurs, lips moving against the corner of his jaw. His hands are already on Zoro’s hips again, thumbs digging in, keeping him exactly where he is, chest pressed to cool wood, cheek turned to the side, nowhere to look but down.
Zoro swallows. “Shouldn’t make it that flimsy, then.”
“Oh,” Sanji purrs. “It’s not the bench that’s flimsy.” He lets go of Zoro’s hip with one hand just long enough to touch the splintered edge beside Zoro’s fingers, like he’s checking, like he’s admiring his own work. Then that hand slides back, slow, up over Zoro’s spine. He traces each knob of vertebrae like he’s counting them, palm warm through the material of Zoro’s shirt. Zoro hates how his back arches into it. Hates how easy it is. Hates that his body keeps answering yes before his mind has even finished thinking don’t you dare.
“Sanji,” he grits out.
“Last chance,” Sanji says softly, voice rough. “You want to joke this off, call me a pervert, shove me away, this is where you do it.”
Zoro’s mouth is dry. His heart is a drum in his throat. “You want me to shove you away?”
There’s a beat before Sanji answers, before he says, quiet: “I want you to do what you actually want.”
It’s a filthy thing to say, in its own way and it lands too heavy to laugh off. What Zoro wants is blurry and huge, bigger than the galley right now, bigger than the Sunny, bigger than every vow he’s made. He wants to keep Sanji’s hands on him, keep that soft crack between the cook’s ribs and his armour wide open and safe. He wants to taste that fucking fruit again.
He wants, and wants, and wants.
“I’m not pushing you away,” Zoro breathes, which is its own problem, really. Sanji makes an indecipherable sound and swipes his hand back up, over Zoro’s jaw, catching the corner of his mouth before he drags his fingers through the bowl of fruit, catching syrup. Zoro’s lips part on reflex now, letting Sanji thumb slide in, just barely, smearing the thick syrup against his tongue. He can feel Sanji staring at the side of his face now, like this is the line they’ve stepped over and there’s no going back so he meets the pressure. Opens more. Takes more. Sanji’s whole body flares hot against his back.
“That’s it,” Sanji breathes, voice gone rough. “That’s it, keep –”
Zoro’s fingers gouge the bench until something inside the wood finally gives up. Another sharp crack splits the air, louder this time and Sanji starts laughing, high, delighted, disbelieving. His thumb is still in Zoro’s mouth and Zoro can feel the laughter through the bone of his wrist.
“You’re actually going to break my fucking kitchen. Over my fingers.” He drags his nails down Zoro’s torso again, slow, and laughs into his shoulder, low and smug and a little breathless. “Tell me, Moss, how long’ve you wanted my hands on you like this?” and Zoro answers by moving.
The motion is pure reflex: hips driving back, shoulder rolling, grabbing for what’s behind him. He catches Sanji’s wrist with one hand and Sanji’s hip with the other and uses the leverage the way he uses the weight of an opponent’s sword: turning it, redirecting it, folding it around a new axis. Sanji makes a startled sound as the world spins, as his back hits the bench with a dull thud, his palms skidding to catch himself, his breath leaving him in a rough little sound that Zoro feels all the way down his spine.
Zoro steps in, crowding him up against the wood nice and proper, shoulder–to–shoulder, hip–to–hip, until there’s nowhere for the cook to go that isn’t into him. The cracked bench complains about the new distribution of weight and Sanji stares, eyes wide, pupils blown, one of his hands still caught in Zoro’s grip and the other with nowhere to rest that isn’t Zoro’s chest.
“Huh,” Sanji says, breathless. “You do remember your legs exist.”
“Mm.” He pins Sanji’s captured hand back to the bench, fingers wrapping tight around that narrow wrist. The other hand comes up of its own accord, bracing beside Sanji’s head, close enough to cage, close enough that Sanji can feel the heat of his skin.
Sanji bares his teeth. “You finally gonna do something about this?” he snipes, the last edges of bratty confidence clinging on for dear life. “Or are you gonna go back to –”
Zoro kisses him and Sanji makes a noise like he’s been punched, his fingers grabbing a fistful of Zoro’s shirt, pulling him closer instead of pushing him away. His body arches, instinct seeking contact; he tastes like the syrup, sweet and sharp, like every stupid thing Zoro has never let himself linger on after meals. He pulls back just enough to breathe, not enough to give Sanji space, to rasp against his mouth: “You wanna know how long?”
Sanji blinks, stunned. “What?”
Zoro’s fingers tighten around Sanji’s wrist where it’s caught against the bench, tendons standing out, knuckles white. The air between them feels thin, used up. “You asked how long I’ve wanted this.”
Sanji swallows. Zoro can feel it under his palm where his other hand rests flat over Sanji’s chest, right over his heartbeat. The muscle jumps, betraying him. “Yeah, but I was… I didn’t think you’d actually –”
“Since we met,” Zoro cuts in, plain as a sword laid on a table.
Sanji chokes on air like the word’s a fist in his gut. Zoro watches his face change, watches the disbelief hit first, then the reflexive denial, like he’s reaching for an excuse and then, worst of all, that raw flicker of hope, bright and terrified, like something that’s spent years in the dark and doesn’t trust the sun.
“You didn’t even like me then,” Sanji blurts. “You called my cooking crap.”
“Still wanted you,” Zoro says. “Wanted to shut you up, mostly.” His mouth crooks, knife–sharp. “Turns out that part hasn’t changed.”
Sanji glares at him, automatic, but the edges are wet and frayed. His lashes shine. “You’re an idiot.”
“Yeah.” Zoro leans in until their noses almost brush, until there’s nowhere for Sanji to look but him. “An idiot who’s been trying not to do exactly this every time you talk with your hands.”
Red climbs up Sanji’s throat, over the sharp slash of his cheekbones, right up into the tips of his ears. Zoro’s hand twitches with the urge to touch all of it and for once he doesn’t stop himself: he lets go of Sanji’s wrist long enough to cup his jaw, thumb sweeping the ridge of bone, fingers tucking into the vulnerable groove behind his ear.
Sanji’s eyes flutter half–closed like something overloaded. He still manages to get the words out, hoarse. “You say that now, with my hand on your throat and yours on my fucking heart like this, but what about tomorrow? Next week? When I piss you off so badly you wanna jump overboard just to get away from my voice? When I’m too much?”
Zoro snorts, mouth brushing Sanji’s as the sound leaves him. “You’re never going to be less. You’re always gonna be loud and sharp and dramatic and better than anyone I’ve ever met at tearing yourself to pieces before anyone else gets a chance.”
Sanji’s fingers fist in Zoro’s shirt, bunching coarse fabric like he’s trying to hold himself up on it. “And?” he grits out. It sounds like it hurts.
“And I’m not afraid of that. I’m afraid of not having you at all.” The words hang there, heavy as a blade between them and Zoro dips his head and bites, soft but unmistakable, at the corner of Sanji’s mouth. The tiny sound it drags out of him is half–shock, half–want.
“So here’s the deal,” Zoro continues, leaning in until his body pins Sanji fully to the bench, thighs bracketing Sanji’s hips, no space, no retreat. His palm flattens over Sanji’s chest to find the heart under it wild. “True is: I wanted you when you were a loudmouth asshole in a shitty suit kicking paying customers for fun. I wanted you when you walked away and I hated you for it. I wanted you when you stomped back onto the Sunny smiling like your ribs weren’t cracked. I wanted you when you nearly died for another man’s family and thought that meant you didn’t deserve this one.”
His thumb rests against Sanji’s lower lip, feeling the give there. “True is: I’ve been holding the line for years so I didn’t grab you wrong. So you had time to run if you needed to. You want to put your fingers in my mouth, put me on my knees, bite me and tell me to stay, fine. I’m in. I’ve been in this whole fucking time.” His hand tightens in Sanji’s shirt, pulling him forward until their noses bump. “But we do this for real. You don’t get to pretend it’s nothing afterwards, you don’t walk away and call it a joke to make yourself feel safer. What do you want?.”
Sanji’s eyes flicker and for a heartbeat every mask he owns tries to land at once: the lazy smirk, the bored scoff, the tilt of his chin that says this is nothing, the roll of his shoulders that says he could walk away right now and not feel a thing. Zoro watches him reach for the lie like muscle memory and slam into something solid he can’t dodge.
“What, you need me to draw you a map?” Sanji scoffs, voice too thin to carry the swagger properly. “My hand’s been in your mouth –”
“Sanji.”
Just his name, low and steady but hits like a hand to the chest and Sanji stops. Zoro can see how fast he’s breathing now, the way the wildness in his eyes isn’t just heat but fear threaded through it in tight, familiar lines. The run–before–they–push–you kind. The kind Zoro’s watched him live with for a long time without ever calling it by name.
“I need to know,” Zoro says, quieter, letting the words land between them like a drawn line. “If this is you actually wanting me. Or you starting something you’re planning to laugh off later.”
Sanji’s mouth twists. “You think I’d –”
“Yeah,” Zoro answers, no hesitation. His thumb digs a little harder into the meat of Sanji’s thigh, not quite gentle, not quite rough. “I think you’d throw yourself in front of a cannon and call it a joke. I think you’d put yourself on the menu and tell everyone it’s just good customer service.” His eye doesn’t move from Sanji’s face. “So. What is this?”
Sanji looks like someone’s shoved him right up to the cliff’s edge and told him to pick a direction. “What do you want to hear?”
Zoro leans in until their noses almost bump, close enough that Sanji would have to close his eyes to look away. “I’m not doing this if you’re not here with me. All the way.”
Sanji hisses, like he’s swearing an oath he never wanted to say aloud. “Yeah. Of course — yes.”
Zoro’s heart does something stupid and painful and right. He closes the last inch, resting his forehead against Sanji’s, letting their breaths tangle and he can feel Sanji’s breath shaking against his mouth, feel the storm that usually lives behind Sanji’s eyes turned outward now, wild and scared and trying so hard not to show it. Sanji laughs weakly, fractured. “This’s insane.”
“Yeah,” Zoro says with a half–shrug, like they’re discussing the weather. “So is sailing into a world government base because Luffy pointed at it. We’re not big on sane here.”
Both his hands slide down now, palms flattening over Sanji’s waist, thumbs smoothing along the dip of his back. He draws Sanji in, fitting himself along the line of Sanji’s spine like it’s a stance he’s been training for. His mouth finds the curve where jaw meets ear; he breathes there for a second, steadying them both until Sanji’s fingers curl into the back of Zoro’s neck, like he’d climb into his skin if the bones would just get out of the way.
His eyes are bright, wet at the edges without quite tipping over. Hope and terror and want all crammed into too little space. “Say it again.”
Zoro leans their foreheads together because he knows what Sanji means, knows which part has caught, has lodged in that warped ledger he carries around in his chest. So he says it clean. “I’m not doing this once. I’m not pretending it didn’t happen. I’m going to be in your mouth and your kitchen and your bed until you say no.”
Sanji’s breath punches out of him like Zoro just stabbed the air out of his lungs. “My bed, huh,” he manages, something like a smile ghosting around the words.
“You think I’m letting you sleep alone after this?” Zoro mutters.
Sanji’s mouth trembles just once, a tiny tell, and then he grabs Zoro by the jaw and kisses him like he’s saying yes with every nerve he has. It’s desperate and messy, noses bumping, teeth clicking, all the careful coaxing they tried earlier burned away into something raw and sure.
They list sideways, balance shot. The bench complains and then gives and they slide off in an undignified tangle, ending up on the galley floor with a dull thump. Sanji lands half sideways across Zoro’s lap; Zoro ends up slumped against the cupboard, legs splayed like he’s been dropped there by a careless god. The lantern throws gold over everything: damp lips, mussed hair, the faint red bloom of a mark on Sanji’s throat where Zoro’s teeth have already been.
There’s a minute of shuffling, a muttered: “Move your damn arm! ” and a half–hearted: “You move your bony ass,” and then they settle. Sanji ends up straddling one of Zoro’s thighs, facing him, knees bracketing his hips while one hand sinks onto Zoro’s shoulder like it was always meant to sit there. The other hovers, uncertain, as if he’s suddenly realised he has no idea what to do with himself now that he’s allowed to touch.
Zoro solves the dilemma by catching the floating hand and guiding it to his own jaw, and leaves it there. Sanji’s fingers spread, thumb brushing the corner of Zoro’s mouth, tracing the curve like now that he’s been given permission he can’t quite stop.
The ship rocks them on her slow, familiar heartbeat. Above, footsteps go by: someone crossing the deck, laughing about something that has nothing to do with the two idiots hiding in the galley. The sounds fade, mercifully heading away until there’s just the soft hush of the waves outside and the quiet hiss of Zoro’s breath every time Sanji’s thumb moves.
Sanji looks wrecked, but in a new way. Not like he’s been dragged under and left there but like he dove on purpose and came up with something in his hands. The tightness is still there at the edges, the old habit of bracing for the bill to come due, but underneath it something bright and feral is cutting through and it makes Zoro’s heart do something structurally unsound in his chest. For once he doesn’t think about the horizon, or the next island, or the next blade he’ll throw himself at. He thinks about this kitchen, about this warmth, about this man whose hand is memorising his mouth like a favourite recipe.
“Tomorrow,” Zoro says, voice low, like he’s stating a plan for battle, “We’re doing this in a proper bed.”
Sanji snorts, breath fanning across his lips. “Dream big, Mosshead.”
“Shut up,” Zoro says into the hollow of his throat, more fondness than heat.
“Make me.”
Sanji nips him, fast and sharp, right where his neck meets the shoulder and Zoro yelps, more from surprise than pain, and fights back a grin. “Okay, don’t make me.”
Sanji’s laugh vibrates against his skin, settles low in Zoro’s chest like something that finally found where it belongs. They stay like that until their breathing evens out and the wildfire heat eases into a slow burn, until the light dips lower, until ship rocks them in small arcs, a cradle more than a battlefield.
Eventually Sanji sighs, the sound reluctant. “We should… probably stand up before poor Chopper walks in and has a heart attack. Or Usopp, fuck.”
“Mm,” Zoro answers, making no move whatsoever.
“And I have to fix that bench before Nami notices and charges you for structural damages.”
“She’d charge you too,” Zoro points out, because he knows his navigator.
“Yes, but she’d start with you,” Sanji says, his wicked little grin flashing as he leans back enough to see Zoro’s face. “Up.”
Zoro groans like he’s being asked to do actual work but when Sanji hauls on his shirt he comes, unfolding in stages, dragging Sanji with him. They wobble, crash lightly into the cupboard, then the other way into the bench and it’d be embarrassing if it weren’t so them. Hands clutch at elbows, hips, shoulders, meant to steady, absolutely not ready to let go. By the time they’re both upright Sanji’s hair looks like he’s been in a small storm and Zoro’s shirt is skewed half off one shoulder. Sanji smirks at the sight and reaches up to tug the collar straight, fingers lingering there like a man testing the edge of a blade he already knows is sharp.
“Yeah?” he asks, softer now, the word heavy with promise instead of threat.
Zoro catches his wrist and kisses the inside of it once, brief and sure. “Yeah,” he echoes.