#Zoro has a bit of a dilemma after Sanji's passing

[swirlymarimo]

Baby Blues

"Your eyes are beautiful."

The statement comes from nowhere, completely unprompted it seems to the cook who's leaning against the wooden banister of the Thousand Sunny's upper deck with a half-forgotten cigarette burning close to his fingertips. It's only that he's unable to see how the golden sunset and the deep blue of the ocean reflect in his irises.

Zoro can. He's been willingly sucked straight into the stunning pools of blues and the dark blackness of his dilated pupils for the better part of the past half hour. They were chatting about simple things, like the little details of their day. As bad as it may sound Zoro wasn't really paying much attention to Sanji's latest dilemma of boredom with his dishes. He was craving to make something new, something that excites the tongue whatever that means. Instead, he was discovering completely new hues of blue that pooled along the inner edges of his pupil and how there was a dark ring of navy surrounding the outer rim. They were stunning. He's always thought so, ever since first eye contact.

"My eyes?"

Sanji chuckles, the randomness of the compliment taking him by surprise. He has no idea what prompted his partner to say such a thing. After all, he had just been venting about his recent and very displeasurable creative block. He thinks Zoro must have been halfway listening like he sometimes does. It's not like he was being rude or disinterested, Sanji knows what's happening. Zoro is staring at him again, and his brain is simply turning to mush.

"Yeah, they're blue just like the sea."

An obvious observation. The sea was blue yes, and so were Sanji's eyes. It was a common bit of knowledge. Still, he understands what his lover means by this. He's attempting to offer sweet nothings. Despite that though Sanji has the desire to play around with the swordsman and play coy.

"So you like the color of the sea?"

If Zoro had two eyes to roll he would have. Instead, he spares a side-eye toward the man that loves to irritate him even in moments when he's trying his best to be romantic.

"No. What I like is your eyes, the sea reminds me of them."

Certainly, Sanji can't twist that. He'll have no choice but to acknowledge his sweetness. Or so he thinks. A favorite pass time of Sanji's is to make things more difficult for him to get some kind of entertainment. Moments like these are not always exempt from that.

"But you knew the sea before you knew me."

Zoro raises an eyebrow but he has the perfect retort right on the tip of his tongue.

"And I never thought it looked particularly beautiful until then."

"Take that," he thinks to himself. It almost serves as a second compliment, his beauty being the reason Zoro can find beauty in the water. Typically romantic praises aren't his strongest quality but that one felt like a champion to him.

Sanji cradles his chin into his hand putting his body weight fully against the sturdy wooden banister. That was quite sweet hearing the last confession. No one has ever said anything like that to him before and he would be a liar if he claimed not to have butterflies in his chest. He passes a soft smile to the man beside him.

"What did you think was beautiful before the sea?"

It's an honest curiosity. If his eye's had become the reason Zoro could think of the sea as a beautiful thing, something that almost everyone would think then he wants to know what beauty meant to him before that.

Zoro seems surprised by the question as if he hadn't ever thought about it before. He looks out across the calm waters and searches his memory for an answer. Pretty things never held much value to him in his youth so he never bothered with any of them. Appearances had little to do with the truth of it all.

"I never cared about things like beauty. I knew what kinds of things usually look nice but I never paid attention to the beauty in other people." He supposes that's a good shortened way to explain how he'd learned to look past appearances.

"Why?"

Sanji didn't understand his lack of interest in beauty. From a young age, appearance was always something important whether it was how one was supposed to dress or simply the world around you.

"Because it didn't matter to me," Zoro answers truthfully. For a very long time, he chose to believe that beauty meant nothing in the grand scheme of things but as he grew older he learned to appreciate the value of lovely things. Not shiny jewels or flashy appearances but the beauty of people's smiles, and how important it is to see a little bit of good in the world.

"And it matters now?"

Zoro reaches a hand out and gently caresses Sanji's cheek with his thumb. Stroking gently along the sharp jawline as those pretty blue eyes find his again. He smiles widely as he answers.

"Of course it does. Beautiful things like the blue sky and the crystal sea, the warm glow of sunsets, and the sound of smooth singing. It all seems beautiful to me now because it all reminds me of you and you are beautiful."

Sanji can't help the small chuckle that escapes him or the blinding smile that stretches across his face.

"You've gotten so soft."

Now it's Zoro's turn to chuckle. Thinking about how he once was in comparison to how he is now and it's like night and day.

"Is that a bad thing?"

He's gotten so far in life and he believes that if he'd never let his guard down and allowed his softer side to grow that he never could have become who he is right now. He wonders what that would have been like.

"Of course not."

Of all people, Sanji understands perfectly that softness is not a weakness but a strength. He may be the one mostly responsible for encouraging Zoro to drop the steely facade and learn to enjoy himself.

"Can I kiss you?"

All of his gratitude goes to the man in his arms and all he wants to do is thank him for persuading him to become this big softie that's head over heels in love instead of the bitter, angry, lonely man he could have been.

"Do you want to kiss all beautiful things?"

Sanji smiles through the cheeky question, enjoying the small laugh he draws from Zoro. He wonders if Zoro knows that he's beautiful too when he lets that wide smile that wrinkles the corners of his eyes show.

"No. Only you."

Afterall Zoro only finds a few things in life pretty enough to kiss but only one of them is capable of kissing him back.

"Then please do."

Sanji grins as his nose bumps against Zoro's, their faces having gotten closer as they talked without knowing it. In seconds their lips are pressed together in one of the softest, sweetest kisses Sanji has ever been given, all of this because Zoro thought his eyes looked nice in the sunset.

#zosan #zoro x sanji #zoro and sanji #zosan ficlet #zosan fic #my post #ficlet #this whole thing started as a script but I just couldn't settle for that #it needed to be written #zoro is a sap #smitten zoro #smitten zoro is best zoro #sanji is pretty #sanji is smitten #so much fluff you could drown in it #tooth rotting fluff #fluffy zosan