Just Hair - carriecmoney - One Piece (Anime & Manga) [Archive of Our Own] (2024)

“Sanji, you’ve got a walk-in!”

Sanji finished throwing a load of towels in the dryer. “Give it to Tiffany and leave me the f*ck alone,” he growled. “I’m not in the mood to listen to Sheila’s problems today.”

“It’s a Heila, not a Sheila,” Iva said, propping up on the door frame to the back, arms crossed over her flowery button-up. “It’ll take you, like, five minutes. Get a smile on your face and take the man’s money for me.”

Sanji kicked the dryer closed and pressed the buttons to get the cycle started, crossing himself that it would. It did. One less thing to fix today, thank God. “Why me?”

“Because you’ve been a little pissant all day,” she drawled at him. “And because I said so.” He sneered at her, but she had known him since he was an even angrier teenager. She just shrugged, her bouffant updo unmoved by Sanji’s boiling irritation. “Or don’t, and don’t get paid today,” she said. “Your choice.”

The dryer squeaked. Sanji slammed the side with the sole of his shoe. “Fine.” He stomped past her – tried to. She grabbed his arm before he could be visible to the public. “What?” he snapped.

She looked at him, her blue eyeshadow harsh behind her falsies. “Breathe, baby.” He huffed. She raised a tattooed eyebrow. Sanji took a deep breath in, out. Another. “Need some water?” she asked. “I can stall the Heila.” Her mouth twitched. She needed to reapply her lipstick. “Probably shouldn’t have let him in at all,” she admitted. “He’s not in uniform, but that’s a cop if I’ve ever seen one.”

A cop came in here for a haircut? Sanji’s illogical curiosity calmed him more than any guided meditation. He shook his hair back and dredged up a customer service smile from under the shipwreck of his terrible day. “I’ll be fine.”

She smiled, patting his cheek. “Of course you will, babydoll.” She let him go, twisting past him to do her own thing in the back. He made sure his shirt was tucked in right, then went around the lip of the wall protecting the back from the shop proper.

It was pretty busy for a Wednesday. Every chair but Sanji’s had a client in it, mostly housewives getting their highlights done and their gray touched up. Iva had painted the beauty shop city-trendy a year or so ago, all black walls and houseplant accents, with a spray-painted gold chandelier overhead that a metalworking friend had made for cheap.

Sticking out from all the jangling chicness was Sanji’s assigned Heila, hovering at the front desk, white shirt and black jeans and regulation haircut. A cop indeed, but to Sanji’s impeccable eye, he didn’t seem to feel as out of place as he looked. Sanji checked his shoulders and feet for the typical straight man discomfort at being in a space not made for him, but he just stood on the linoleum like a rock. Admirable, but he was making the poor girl at the front desk nervous.

Sanji winked at her as he approached his walk-in. He resisted the urge to pull his own V-neck higher up his collarbones. “You must be my new client,” he said as brightly as he could force, drawing the walk-in’s attention away from the black wall. “Welcome to Salon Peach, I’m Sanji, and I’ll be taking care of you today.”

The walk-in’s eyes sharpened in the way people’s did when they recognized his name’s origin. He was Asian, but was he actually Japanese, or did he just watch a lot of anime? “Zoro,” the walk-in said, shaking Sanji’s outstretched hand with a tight grip. Assertive, but not actively challenging, unlike most of the men Sanji ran across in this town in response to his not-straight presentation. Wasn’t he just full of surprises?

Sanji nodded toward his station. “Well, let’s go sit down and talk about what you want to do with your hair,” he said, already thinking about what clipper guard the walk-in used on his nape. Probably a three – he was pretty overgrown.

Zoro obeyed without comment, dead eyes sliding past everything as he trudged through the curious clients and stylists to Sanji’s chair. He looked just as fed up with the world as Sanji. Maybe if they made this quick, they could get through this without Sanji biting his head off or Zoro pulling out a slur as a tip, and Sanji could go back to taking out his bad morning on shop maintenance.

Zoro sat down. Sanji propped up behind him, hands braced on the chair, and made eye contact in the mirror. “So, tell me what you’re thinking, officer.”

That got a reaction, a twitch of a lip curl. “Don’t call me that.” Sanji raised an eyebrow. “I quit the force today.”

“Oh?” Sanji’s mouth smiled in the mirror. “I’m sure that’s a story.” Zoro grunted. Oh, Sanji would crack him like a raw egg. Sanji shook his hand through Zoro’s black hair so it laid down his forehead, not quite hitting his eyebrows. Coarse, but he expected that, he was Asian. Greasy. Men. “So, what am I doing to you today?”

Zoro met his mirror eyes, dark irises as hard as the glass. “The weirdest f*cking thing you can think of.”

Sanji’s breath caught. His smile grew. “How much time do you have?” he asked. “And what’s your budget?”

Zoro shrugged. “Nothing to do, anymore.” He almost-blinked when Sanji tugged the hair in front of his ears to see how far it fell. “And whatever you want to charge me.”

A little thrill went up Sanji’s spine. Don’t get ahead of yourself, girl. “Color okay?” he ventured. Another sharp shrug. Sanji couldn’t help but laugh. “You’re really up for anything, huh?”

“It’s just hair,” Zoro lied. It was never just hair. “If it sucks, I’ll just shave it off.”

“No, you won’t.” Sanji pictured the color wall in the back, the little-used column of vivids they kept on hand just in case lighting up in his head. “What’s your favorite color?”

A spark finally flared in the ex-cop’s eyes. “Can you dye my hair green?” he asked.

Sanji bared his teeth. “Sweetheart, I can do anything you want.”

The spark caught the kindling. “Bet you can’t.”

Sanji burned. “I’m going to mix up your bleach,” he said. “Don’t chicken out on me now.”

“Like hell.” Sanji put a cape on him, ruffling the shaggy back of his head, from nape to whorl. Zoro’s eyes closed. “We don’t got all day, Blondie.”

Sanji couldn’t stop grinning. “Oh, we’ll see who’s the blondie in an hour, hotshot.” He tugged a lock. Zoro’s lip curled. “Get comfortable,” he said. “This’ll take a while.”

Sanji was pretty well versed in the types of clients they got in this corner of northeast Tennessee and who they wanted him to be. The staple of every Southern beauty shop, the rich-ish housewives terrified of the passage of time, wanted him to be just sassy enough that they could pretend they had a gay best friend for an afternoon. Their husbands wanted to talk about football to power past their discomfort at being in a women’s space, gritting their way through caring about their appearance with a fifteen minute argument about LSU and the Vols. Their children wanted a pink streak they could hide during church, to dump about their social lives, to ask probing questions about bisexuality that Sanji always, always answered. It was okay that he wasn’t straight, as long as there was the divide of scissors and a cape keeping him at a cardboard distance in their lives. He could touch – he had to – but they couldn’t touch him. He was safe.

He had never been so safe that someone fell asleep on him, though.

Zoro’s head nodded forward, bleach swiping across Sanji’s gloves instead of Zoro’s hair. f*cker. Sanji scowled and stomped on the chair pedal to drop Zoro all the way down, jolting him out of his nap. Zoro grunted, eyes fluttering.

“Oi,” Sanji snapped. “Wait until you’re processing to fall asleep, asshole.”

Zoro groaned. Sanji pumped him back up to easy working height. “Sorry,” Zoro mumbled, lips barely parting. “S’just – been a long week.”

Sanji hummed, faking more sympathy than he felt. “I bet.” He painted bleach on Zoro’s virgin hair. At least him being a gross man who hadn’t washed his hair in three days was a good thing in this one instance. He was still absolutely upselling the Neanderthal on shampoo at checkout, though. “Did you actually quit today, or was it your last day of your two weeks?”

“They didn’t deserve two weeks.” Sanji grinned. Zoro closed his eyes, nostrils flaring with his horse-level huff. “My scalp itches.”

“That’s how you know it’s working,” Sanji teased. “Where?”

Zoro gestured over his left eye, barely not touching his bleach-soaked hair. Sanji used the end of his rat tail comb to scratch it for him, enjoying the full body shudder he got. Touch-starved clients were the cutest. Did a guy this built really not have a girl? Maybe they stayed away because of the cop thing, or because he radiated ‘don’t f*ck with me’ energy. Too bad Sanji was never good at not poking a sleeping bear.

He went back to bleach application. “Well, whatever your reason is for leaving, I’m sure it’s a good one,” he said, giving Zoro the out this time. “So, I take it you don’t have another police job lined up?”

Zoro snorted. “No, I’m done trying to make eight-year-old me happy.” Sanji bit his tongue, letting his hair drift over his eye. He should have tied it back before he started bleaching. “Not entirely sure what to do instead, though,” Zoro said, looking down at his lap.

Sanji poked his forehead with the comb to tilt him back. “Well, we don’t have any positions open right now,” he said. “Are you from around here?” Zoro shook his head. Sanji rapped him on the crown. “Stop moving.”

Zoro wrinkled his nose at him in the mirror. “Whatever.” Zoro shrugged. “Guess I could go back to Atlanta,” he said. “Don’t really want to, though.”

Sanji smirked. “You’d be the only one I know who’d rather be here than there,” he said. Her face popped up – he kicked it back down. He refused to think about her more than that while he was straining to stay in customer service mode, or else he would break a mirror.

“Dunno about here, exactly,” Zoro said, zoning out as he watched Sanji’s reflected hands strip his hair. “But, moving’s expensive, and I guess I don’t have anywhere else to be.”

Sanji sighed, tilting Zoro’s head a little to the side to get at his sideburns. “Well, have you explored around here yet?” he asked. “I’ve been told the hiking’s good.”

That spark glittered again. “Not an outdoorsy guy, Blondie?”

“Only when forced.” He pumped the chair up a little. “Tilt forward a bit, there’s a dear.” sh*t, he didn’t usually talk to male clients like that, he was going to get beat up. But Zoro just obeyed, tucking his chin to his chest. Sanji bit his tongue and focused on bleaching Zoro’s nape. “Most people who move here do it for the mountains,” he went on. “What else is quitting your job for except doing whatever you want with your body and your time?”

Zoro made a little noise. “That’s a good point.” He cut only his eyes up in time to catch the reflection of Sanji’s. “Where’d you get your piercings?”

Sanji blinked. Laughed, full belly, like he hadn’t in days. Zoro smiled.

“Babydoll, why is your walk-in still here?”

Sanji flicked his hair over his shoulder to smile at Iva’s question. “We’re going green,” he said, hands still mixing up color. Iva raised their eyebrows. Sanji scowled. “What?”

“You’re spending more than five minutes with a man, on purpose,” she drawled. “Are you sick?”

Sanji rolled his eyes, turning his back on her skepticism. Hmm… what if they did a few accent streaks in the front? He hadn’t done the cut yet… He should do that after the bleach wash and dry.

Iva shoved her hip into his periphery. “Why’re you giving a cop green hair?”

“He asked for it,” Sanji stretched the truth. “And he’s not a cop anymore, he quit today.” He pulled down two more bowls. Lime and teal, maybe. “You know I’ve always wanted to do green on someone.”

Iva hummed, close to a tune. “Interesting.” Sanji didn’t look up at whatever she was trying to imply. “If you go long, you’re closing,” she told him, pushing off the counter. “Don’t forget about your girl, boy.”

Sanji grit his teeth. “I’ve been trying to, actually, f*ck you for that.”

“Trouble in paradise?” she quipped. Sanji threw an empty product box at her. She caught it. “I could fire you for that,” she pointed out.

“But then who would you torture?” He mixed up a tiny bit of his accents, then arranged the handles over his fingers to carry them back to the front. “I’ll close,” he grumbled. “Now leave me and the cop alone.”

“Feisty.” She slapped his ass. “I like that in a man.”

“I could sue you for sexual harassment,” he snarked.

“But then who would torture you?” Iva cackled and followed him to the front, splitting to clean up her own station. Sanji huffed and strode across the salon to where he had parked Zoro while he was processing.

Sanji sat down on the arm of the couch, startling Zoro out of his nap with a snort. Sanji crossed his legs and showed Zoro the bowls. “So, here’s what I’m thinking,” he pitched. “This one is for the bulk of your hair,” he said, pointing to the mid-green. “Then, we pull out streaks in the front with the other two.” He looked up at the bleach under the plastic cap he had put on Zoro. “We’ll do the cut first, though,” he said to himself. “It won’t be fully stripped, but we’ll work on that in future sessions.”

“So I’m coming back, huh, Blondie?”

Sanji jumped out of his work reverie and looked his subject in the eye. Zoro had that spark again - multiple of them. Sanji grinned. “Only if you can afford it, leech.” sh*t, was that too soon?

Zoro smirked. He sat up, battling the black hole of the too-soft couch to be able to see the colors. “Looks weird.”

“Oh, we can get weirder,” Sanji promised. “But we need to get your hair used to it first. Hold these.” He shoved the bowls into Zoro’s lap so he could peel back the plastic of the cap to check Zoro’s roots. “Looking good, looking good.”

“So we can take it off?” Zoro asked.

Sanji scratched the itchy spot on Zoro’s scalp, plastic squelching in the sea of bleach. “Not quite yet,” he said. “We can only lift so much from hair as dark as yours in one go, but we’ll do our best today.” He slid to his feet, taking the color back. “Go back to sleep,” he told the cop. “I’ll get you when you’re ready.”

“Don’t tell me what to do,” Zoro said, eyes already closing. What would it be like, to be able to fall asleep on command? Maybe Sanji wouldn’t be as grumpy if he could do that. He shook his head as he drifted back to his station, getting himself set up for the next round.

Caroline poked her nose into Sanji’s mirror. “What’re you doing, child?” she asked.

“Finally using the Absinthe we’ve had rotting in the back for too long,” he told her. He wrapped a foil around the tail of his comb and held it to Zoro’s roots, painting lime green over his eyes. “And the Lemon, and the Aquatic.”

“Oh, you’re going all out!” She swept hair into a dustpan. “You’re lucky,” she told Zoro. “Sanji’s the best, you’re in good hands.”

Zoro quirked a brow. “If you say so,” he said. “Right now I just feel like I’m about to win a ribbon at the county fair.”

Caroline tittered. “Oh, but it’s always worth it in the end!” She went back to cleaning her station for the night. Sanji still had at least an hour to go.

Zoro yawned. Sanji frowned. “Did you work nights or something, or am I just that boring?”

“Yeah. The first one.” Well, sh*t. “It’s whatever.”

Sanji held in a sigh. “Well, here’s to daytime hours with your next gig.” He did a foil of teal. He had shaved the rest of it too short for foils to be necessary, but he wanted these accents to be sharp.

“If you’re the best, why were you free?” Sanji blinked. “Everyone else here has been back-to-back with actual appointments,” Zoro said, eyes flicking around the salon. Maybe he hadn’t been as dead to the world as his napping would suggest. Well, he had been a cop, after all, and if he quit, he must have been a good one. “My sister complains all the damn time about how hard it is to reschedule her hair stuff,” he went on. “She’s gonna be so mad I was able to show up and go green without being put on a waiting list.”

Sanji’s smile felt wafer-thin. “I am the best,” he asserted. “I just… I had a bad morning, so I rescheduled my afternoon,” he said, the truth coming out against his will. “I haven’t been in the best mood, so I felt it was best to give the women of the world a break rather than make them deal with me.”

Zoro raised an eyebrow. “This is you in a bad mood?”

“Well - technically,” Sanji stumbled. sh*t, he had been having a good time with this. He was supposed to be feeling like sh*t, not joking with a gym bro about hair care. “I guess it’s hard to keep it up when I get to turn a cop into a mossball,” he teased.

Zoro’s eyebrows shot up. They were very expressive for being 2009-thin. “A marimo, you mean.”

Sanji folded the foil over. “Right, those.”

Zoro considered his reflection. “You cut me too short, if that’s what you were going for.” The cape bumped as he gestured under it. “They’re - fuzzier.”

Sanji laughed. “Next time,” he promised. He finished the last foil and folded them all together. “Ready to be a lunchlady again?” he asked. Zoro groaned. Sanji grinned. “Just for half an hour,” he promised. “Then we’ll wash you out, and you can see how good I am at my job.”

“I never should have let you talk me into this,” Zoro grumbled, submitting to the cap once more. All of this unflinching obedience was giving Sanji ideas he should never be having about a client – about a male client, no less. Don’t think about her. “I should have eaten first, at least.”

“Oh, are you hungry?” Sanji pulled out his phone to set a timer. “I can get y’all takeout while we wait,” he said. “There’s a few places nearby that aren’t a complete embarrassment to the industry.” Zoro grunted. Sanji rolled his eyes and plopped down in Caroline’s empty chair, spinning to face Zoro, legs crossed as he caught up on his phone.

“There’s a few taco options, or Greek, or Italian,” he rattled off, clearing his Instagram notifications. sh*t, he had forgotten to get before-state pictures. He always did that. He got up, turning Zoro’s back to him with a foot on the chair, opening his camera. “My fiancée likes the tiramisu there,” he added. The chandelier reflected off the cap in the most annoying ways. He always had to become a gymnast just to get a good picture through the plastic. “I can put you on my Instagram, right?” he asked after he already had a few decent shots.

“Whatever,” Zoro said. “Fiancée?”

Sanji froze. Right. “Ah - yes,” he said, back stiff. “We’re getting married in November.”

“You sound so excited,” Zoro deadpanned.

Sanji held in a huff. Clients didn’t care about his problems. They only wanted to talk about their own. He didn’t have problems, not to them. The cardboard cutout of a gay stereotype didn’t fight with their female partner over breakfast because of-

Doesn’t matter. It didn’t matter. “Just the typical ordeal of wedding planning,” he deferred. “I’m sure it’ll be worth it in the end.”

“Like green hair?”

Sanji smiled. “Like green hair.”

Zoro’s penetrating look through the mirror was undercut by his wet grass cafeteria styling. “Did you have dinner plans with them already,” he asked, “or do you need to eat, too?”

Hmm. Was it worth it to fish? Sanji didn’t actually want to hook this man - even if he just quit, he was still a cop, and Sanji didn’t hit on clients, and he had Pudding at home. Probably. But, he couldn’t deny that it was fun to throw a straight man off their game.

Sanji braced on the back of Zoro’s chair, very carefully not touching him as he let a little bit of bedroom come into his eyes. “Are you asking out a taken man?” he asked. “So forward, sir.”

Zoro didn’t even blink. “Just don’t want to eat in front of you if you don’t have food at home,” he said, face a f*cking stone sculpture. “Or let you pay for it without getting something for yourself.”

Sanji’s mouth twisted. “No wonder you washed out,” he mumbled. “You’re not a terrible person, after all.”

Zoro bristled - deflated. “Okay,” he acquiesced. “Guess I can’t argue about that.” He bumped back into Sanji’s fingers. “And you’re avoiding the question.”

Sanji’s heart clenched. “I’m… not actually sure what my evening plans are,” he admitted. Lord, it had gotten quiet in here. “We didn’t leave for work on the pleasantest of terms,” he muttered, trying to keep his coworkers from snooping like they loved to do.

“No sh*t.” Zoro crossed his arms under the cape. Sanji cried that the black drape hid the strain of his white shirt over his chest. “Is it, like… a today thing, or a real thing?” he asked.

Sanji snorted. “Darling, I am not drunk enough to tell a stranger about my romantic problems.”

Zoro blinked. “Oh. Right.” He cleared his throat. “Sorry.”

Sanji shook his head. “It’s sweet of you to ask,” he compromised. “Tacos?”

It was official. They were the last ones left in the salon.

“Oh, this looks so good,” Sanji told himself, watching frothy green water drain away in the black sink. “This will be incredible.”

Zoro’s face contorted, eyes clenched closed. “I think this might be the first time someone’s called my hair ‘incredible’,” he said, kimchi on his breath.

“And it won’t be the last, if I have anything to say about it,” Sanji swore. “How do you feel about that?” he asked this masculine paragon of a man.

Zoro took the question seriously. Sanji would go to war for the person in his shampoo bowl. “Good?” Zoro tested. Sanji scratched his scalp. “Yeah. Good.”

Sanji smiled, massaging the base of Zoro’s skull. “Excellent. It would be a waste to give some of my best work to someone who didn’t appreciate it.”

Zoro thought as Sanji rinsed his bangs, turning Zoro’s head sideways so it didn’t run over the rest. Oh, this was a delicious color pairing, he was so good at this. “I like that,” Zoro muttered into the cavernous void of the vacated salon. “Being your best work.”

Sanji smiled while Zoro’s eyes were closed. “Who wouldn’t?”

Sanji kept Zoro turned around for the five minutes it took to dry his hair. Not like it really mattered, since there were mirrors on the other side of the salon, too, but it was the thought that counted, right?

“You’re a bit of a drama queen, aren’t you?” Zoro commented, eyes closed against the finishing spray.

“I just like sticking the landing,” Sanji replied. “Keep your eyes closed.”

Sanji fluffed up Zoro’s bangs. This was his magnum opus. Zoro wasn’t allowed to move back to Atlanta ever in his life. “Ready?”

“Been ready,” Zoro grumbled. “Let me pay for this sh*t and go the f*ck home.”

Sanji laughed. “Oh, you won’t be thinking that when you see this.” He twisted a lime bit out of the teal. “Okay,” he said as he turned the chair around to face the mirror. “Open your eyes.”

Zoro did as commanded. Sanji watched undistilled joy bloom across his rock-hard face. Sanji never wanted to do a different job in his life.

“I love it,” Zoro whispered.

Sanji gripped his shoulders. “You can get in closer,” Sanji told him, unsnapping the cape and whipping it off. It always felt more real when the new hair was seen with their actual clothes. Damn, he looked good. “It’s your hair, don’t be scared.”

Zoro ignored the taunt and tugged on his two-toned bangs, turned his head to see the shorn green around his entire skull. The green brightened his skin tone like his natural hair color never could, bringing out the undertones and highlighting the empty hole in Zoro’s left earlobe. He had an excellent head shape for all the things Sanji wanted to do to him.

Zoro rounded on him, body tense. They were the only people in the building.

“Do you do hugs?” Zoro asked, and Sanji knew he was about to see this boy every month for the next ten years.

Sanji opened his arms. Zoro stepped in and gave him a full-body embrace for more than ten seconds. If this man still thought he was straight, the unemployment self-reflection was going to slam into him like a freight train. “Thank you,” Zoro buried in his shoulder.

Sanji swallowed. “It’s my job,” he deflected.

Zoro let him go, holding him at arm's length by the shoulders for a silent second. The green really made the flecks of gray in his eyes pop. Sanji was so good at this.

His hands dropped. “It looks great,” Zoro said. He looked around the empty salon, a line wrinkling between his thin eyebrows. “Are we really the last ones here?”

Sanji chuckled. “That’s what you get for being a difficult client,” he told Zoro.

Zoro frowned. “Difficult?” he asked.

“Oh, not in the traditional sense,” Sanji told him, drifting to the front desk, tossing their empty takeout containers in the trash that he would have to take out later. “But we’ll be better when I can block out three hours for you on purpose.”

“You had f*ck all to do all afternoon.” Zoro got distracted by his own reflection in a different mirror, ruffling his streaked bangs. Oh, those turned out exactly how Sanji imagined. “Damn, this looks good.”

“Told you.” Sanji dropped into the chair at the front desk, shaking the computer awake. “Weird enough for you?”

Zoro showed teeth. “It’s a start.”

They made Zoro’s next appointment for six weeks out. Everyone else in the salon who had been there that day teased him about having a regular that wasn’t a woman that actually made it to his Instagram story for approximately thirty minutes, right until the next beauty shop drama hit the towers and they all forgot about it. Sanji posted Zoro’s after-dinner photoshoot against the brick wall to mild acclaim, then set it aside except for idle planning when he looked too long at the color wall. He couldn’t wait to see how it had faded, what undertones he could bring out for the evolution of Zoro’s hair.

And then Zoro sat down at his station, roots brutal, brass shining through, wheatgrass and weeds for his bangs, and Sanji almost dropped the chandelier on his head.

“What the goddamn sh*t did you do?” Sanji did not yell. f*ck off, Tiffany.

Zoro blinked at him. Sanji was going to commit murder. “I took your advice,” he said. “I took a hike.”

Sanji hit him on the head with his comb. “f*ck off with that bullsh*t.”

“I did!” Zoro protested. “I met a weird guy in the woods, and he offered me a job!”

“A job doing what, sticking your head in a tanning bed every day?” Sanji screened. “I told you to take care of it!”

“I did!” Zoro yelled back. “I put the weird sh*t you told me to in it after every damn wash!”

Sanji breathed in. Breathed out. “Okay,” he said, not okay at all. “Whatever. What in God’s name am I doing with you today?”

“What’s your new job, anyway?” Sanji asked as he conditioned Zoro between root bleach and color.

“Luffy is a raft guide,” Zoro said. “So I guess I am now, too.”

“Huh.” Sanji doused him with the hose. “You do have the shoulders for it.”

“That’s what people keep telling me.”

Sanji lifted Zoro’s head to get underneath. “Do you like it?” he asked.

Zoro shrugged. “I got to cancel my gym membership,” he said. “And they’re good people.”

Sanji hummed. “I guess the weather has been good lately,” he said. May was a good time to be in these mountains, he was told. “Good business?”

Zoro snorted. “Like hell that witch lets me look at the books – ow!”

Sanji rubbed the spot he had just flicked with a wet fingernail. “No woman is a witch,” he chastised. “Behave, boy.”

Zoro tried to punch his leg and missed wide. “f*ck off.” Sanji grinned in the safety of the empty shampoo room and Zoro’s closed eyes. “You’d agree if you knew her,” he grumbled.

Sanji huffed. “Doubtful.” His rings caught on one of Zoro’s earrings for the twelfth time. He growled. Zoro’s lips parted. “Can we take these out?” Sanji asked. “I should’ve mentioned it when we started,” he said. “They’re lovely, but they’re just going to keep getting-”

“Do it,” Zoro muttered. He turned his head so his left ear was on top, but didn’t free his hands from under his cape. Did he expect…?

The part of Sanji that lived in his boots surged up. Sanji kept it in his socks for the next time he was left alone – Pudding didn’t appreciate it all that much. It was fine.

He wiped his hands on the towel around Zoro’s neck to f*ck with him. He unclipped Zoro’s earrings, each identical long gold drop, three in a line. He stuck them in his pocket. “I’ll give them back when we go back to my station,” Sanji promised. Zoro was very, very still. Sanji’s toes curled.

“Why three?” he asked, going back to his conditioning. “And why all the same?”

Zoro shrugged. Sanji adjusted the clip on his towel. “Felt right,” he said. “Also, it pissed Law off.”

Sanji snorted. “Not like that’s hard to do,” he said. He hadn’t been to Law’s parlor in ages. Maybe he should get a new tattoo soon. Something that he could hide for the wedding, though - Pudding was already irritated enough about his finger ones they couldn’t cover with a suit or makeup.

Zoro grinned. He had very sharp canines. “Luffy came with me,” he added, “because he was bored.” He cracked an eye at Sanji. “Don’t think he’s bored anymore.”

Sanji grinned back. He started a final rinse. “Let’s get you dry and start on the color while you tell me about it.”

This second round of color was even more stunning than the first. Sanji was a genius.

Zoro tilted the hand mirror so he could see the back of his head, scanning the gradient from royal blue at his nape up to cerulean at his crown. “Nice.”

“Nice?” Sanji snapped. “That’s all you got to say, marimo?”

Zoro looked past the hand mirror at him. “I’m not green anymore,” he pointed out. “You sure you still wanna call me that?”

Sanji rolled his eyes, hands on his hips. “Well, that’s a great way to guarantee I’ll call you that until we die.”

Tiffany crept forward, the little snake. She had been spying on Sanji’s process the entire appointment. “It looks incredible,” she swooned. “Oh, I want to help next time!”

Zoro pulled a face. Sanji held back a laugh. “I think I can handle a little mossball like this by myself, Tiff,” he told her, stepping between her grabby hands and Zoro - to take the mirror back, of course. “I’ll go over what I did later, if you want the chemical rundown.”

“Oh, yes!” She would always get distracted by colorful lab work. She retreated, casting longing looks at Zoro’s head as she went to retrieve her client from the dryer chairs.

When she was gone, Sanji turned Zoro to face the wall mirror, hands on his shoulders as he bent over. “Don’t worry,” he murmured, maintaining eye contact in the mirror. “I won’t let anyone else touch your head,” he promised. “This is my best work, not anyone else’s.”

Zoro visibly swallowed. Maybe Sanji should let Pudding’s terrible friends talk her into an open relationship after all. “Good,” he muttered, just for them. “When my hair falls out, I’ll know who to sue.”

Sanji grinned and pinched his cheek as hard as he could. “As if.” He took off Zoro’s cape and grabbed his phone. “Outside,” he ordered. “It’s picture time.”

“Here,” Sanji said, tossing a foil-wrapped bagel sandwich in Zoro’s lap before he had even caped up for his third appointment. “Eat something before I murder you.”

The shaggy, overgrown, sea-blue urchin grunted. He turned over the sandwich until he found the edge of the wrapping to peel it back. “You bought me breakfast?” he asked, voice raspy and soft in the empty, sleepy start to the salon’s Tuesday.

“No, I made you breakfast,” Sanji answered. “I refuse to believe the useless jocks you work with would know a balanced meal if it bit them in the ass.” Sanji took a long drag of his iced coffee. The back of his shirt was still sticky from the fifteen minutes he had been outside coming in to work today. Bad signs for the outdoor venue visits Pudding had scheduled for their afternoon, but that was her damn fault for being so damned picky. The wedding was in six months. In theory.

Zoro raised his eyebrows, then bit in. His shoulders relaxed. “No’ bad,” he said, cheeks full. Sanji rolled his eyes instead of smiling like he should. Not bad. Whatever.

Sanji let him eat while he marshaled his supply forces. He loved the peace of being the only stylist in the salon - just him, his client, and the lingering hairspray smell. It almost tricked him into thinking life was going okay.

“Your girl’s lucky,” Zoro said when he was done eating, balling up the foil and wiping his mouth on his shirt. Brute. “You can cook and do her hair for free. My sister’s gonna be even more jealous.”

“One day I want to meet this mythical sister of yours,” Sanji commented. He took the foil ball to throw away for Zoro, their callouses brushing. “You should tell my fiancée that for me,” he said, shooting for sardonic. “You’re wrong about part of that, though.” He whipped a cape around Zoro’s shoulders, snapping it tight with a thumb to Zoro’s neck just to hear him hiss. “I don’t do her hair.” The rusty knife of that never got duller. Sanji ran his hands through Zoro’s hair. God, he had so much work to do. “She prefers the salon she grew up going to,” he explained. “Family ties and all that.” Maybe they should go back to green, since Zoro loved it so much? There were strong brassy undertones coming through - probably all that helmet sweat. Sanji should go easy on it until summer was over, give it a break until cooler weather. But where was the fun in that?

“That’s cruel.”

Sanji blinked. Zoro watched him in the mirror, something tight around his eyes. “You’re as good as everyone says, and she doesn’t even want to show you off?” Zoro didn’t look away. “I would.”

Okay, this was getting a little too close. “Just because I’m good at my job doesn’t mean I want to do it to everyone in my life,” Sanji lied. “Now take out your earrings. How do you feel about orange?”

Sanji clutched his rolling tray, gasping for breath. “What-” He wheezed, choking on his laughter. “What goes on in that boy’s head?” he squeezed out.

Zoro smirked, arms crossed under his cape, dye-wet hair a green glop on his forehead. “Nobody knows,” he said. “But yeah, somehow we’ve got a deer that lives under the main cabin, and Luffy swears it can do first aid.”

Sanji whooped, clutching his chest and ignoring Iva’s shush-up glare. “Oh - oh, I’m gonna have a heart attack.” He wiped his eyes on his shoulder - sh*t, now he had Tennessee orange slashed across his navy button-up. “I cannot believe your work is real,” he chuckled, rushing to wipe the dye off his clothes.

Zoro’s smirk deepened at the corners. “You could always come check it out for yourself,” Zoro said. “Get in the water, get an arm workout in for once in your life, meet everyone.” He glinted at Sanji. “Prove to them that you’re real, too.”

Sanji chuckled, picking up his dye brush again to finish up the orange on the back of Zoro’s head. “Oh, am I an illusionary figure in your life now, too?” he asked.

“Uh, the straight guy with long hair who dyes me rainbow and told me to take a hike?” Zoro snorted. “Yeah, you’re just as fake as them.”

Straight? Aw hell no. “Bi, actually,” he said to Zoro’s canary roots. Really? After all the flirting? he wanted to ask, but - he wouldn’t. He couldn’t start that conversation and then go tour event space barns after lunch. “Marrying a woman won’t change that.”

Zoro went quiet. Sanji checked his face in the mirror and found that deep stare on him again. “Good,” he said. “I wouldn’t think it did.”

Sanji looked away. “What about me besides the gender of my partner would make you think that, anyway?” he asked, scraping the bottom of the orange bowl with the brush. He really didn’t want to have to mix up more. “I would’ve thought it was obvious.”

Zoro shrugged. “People never think I’m gay, either,” he said, and Sanji kept a tight grip on his brush. “I hate it when people assume sh*t about me, so I try not to do that about others.”

Sanji raised his eyebrows. “You just told me you assumed I was straight.”

Zoro’s jaw worked, ear twitching in Sanji’s eyeline as he painted on the last of his dye. “Yeah. But… you know.” He shrugged, muscles tense. “Safer.”

sh*t. He needed more orange after all. “I need to mix up just a little more color,” Sanji said, eyeballing what was left for the weight. “For the record, no one who works here is straight,” he level-set for Zoro. “Or, at least, not for long.”

Zoro nodded. “Okay. Good to know.”

Sanji frowned. “Well,” he drew out the word as he watched the dye rinse out of Zoro’s hair. “It doesn’t look bad…”

“That’s encouraging,” Zoro grumbled, eyes clenched. “What’s wrong?”

“It’s just not as vibrant as I hoped,” Sanji sighed. He pressed the hose into the base of Zoro’s head, watching the Tennessee orange go Texas Longhorn. “Guess the color wheel strikes again.”

“Well, last time I stopped traffic at night,” Zoro complained, shifting in his seat. The shampoo chairs were not designed for his rower shoulders. “Muted is okay.”

Sanji swished that around. “Do you want to be less bright?” he asked. “We can work back to subtler colors-”

Zoro opened his eyes to glare at him. “Don’t you dare chicken out on me now,” he growled.

Sanji blinked. Grinned. “Sweetheart,” he purred, “if you’re in, then I’m in.”

Zoro nodded, then fell asleep.

“So, six weeks?” Sanji asked as he sat at the front desk computer. He smiled and waved the new front desk girl, Jordan, off. “I’ve got this, dear, don’t worry.”

Jordan flicked nervous eyes at Zoro’s looming two-toned hulk and skedaddled without fighting him about doing her job for her. Sanji shook his head. “Not sure why anyone would be scared of you,” he said as he navigated to his appointment calendar.

“Because I used to carry,” Zoro deadpanned. Sanji snorted. Zoro shrugged. “Came with the territory.”

Sanji glanced over Zoro’s board shorts and faded, side-cut tank top. “You’ve done a decent job purging the cop from your system,” Sanji observed. “Guess all that river water’s good for something besides ruining all my hard work.”

Zoro shoved his hands in his shorts pockets. “Hard to care about authority with Luffy around.” He bent in to peer at the monitor. “What’s six weeks from now, anyway?”

Sanji hummed, counting in his head as he clicked through the- damn. He sighed. “The week I have to go to my fiancée’s family reunion.” He flipped his hair over his shoulder. “It’s a giant family, they basically have to rent out all of Gatlinburg for it.” He grimaced. “It won’t be fun… but it’s necessary.”

Zoro’s eyes narrowed. “Man, why are you even getting married?” Sanji glared at him. Zoro’s lip curled. “Just sayin’, you’ve never seemed excited about anything to do with it,” he pushed on past Sanji’s f*ck-off vibes. “There’s no shame in backing out of something that makes you miserable.”

“Oh, what would you know about it?” Sanji snapped. Zoro’s face flattened. Sanji’s heated. “Shut up.”

“Uh-huh.” Zoro kicked the desk. “Take it from me, dude, you’ll feel a lot better when you stop trying to make other people happy, even if ‘other people’ is just who you were five years ago.”

Sanji sneered. “I’m going to carve out your spleen and serve it to your pet deer on a platter.”

“Okay, Hannibal,” Zoro snorted. “You do that.”

Sanji was going to throw this man off a mountain. After he cut off his head to put it in a hair show. “July ninth at nine,” he snapped, blocking out three hours on the Tuesday after the week with the family that hated him. “Don’t be late.”

“I won’t if you bring breakfast again,” Zoro said. “sh*t was good.”

Sanji should have rescheduled. It had been a rough weekend after an even worse week, and he was feeling every moment in his ankle bones. Iva knew the grisly details, she would have let him take the day off. But if he didn’t do something normal with his life he was going to lose his mind, so in to work he went.

He unlocked the front door at a quarter to nine for his pre-opening smoke to find Zoro standing on the sidewalk. They stared at each other.

“You’re early,” Sanji said, numb and stupid.

“I, uh.” Zoro shuffled his Chacos on the asphalt. “I gave myself time to get lost, and then I didn’t.”

Sanji raised his eyebrows. “You’ve lived here how long and you still get lost?” Zoro didn’t answer. Sanji shook his head and opened the door wider, giving up on his third cigarette of the day. “Well, come on in, you’re scaring the squirrels.”

“Pretty sure an active military occupation wouldn’t do that,” Zoro argued even as he obeyed, his passing body heat as humid as the July day ahead.

Sanji scratched under his messy bun, considering the options as Zoro stood awkwardly in the middle of the half-lit salon. “Well, go sit at my station, I guess,” he shrugged. “I’ll get breakfast ready.”

Zoro sat and watched Sanji scurry around. He hadn’t planned on them eating together, but f*ck it, they had the time now, and he was hungry, too. Sanji unpacked all of the little dishes from his traveling basket onto his rolling supply cart, wheeling it between his and Caroline’s chair. It was a little high for a real table, but it would have to do.

Zoro stared at the spread, the miso and natto and rolled omelet, at the metal chopsticks Sanji laid out on a plate borrowed from Zeff’s kitchen. His forehead furrowed under his tragic roots. “Is this because I’m Japanese?”

Sanji snorted as he plated himself some natto. “Well, it’s not not that,” he admitted. “It’s more… I’ve never really delved much into making Asian food, but all the research I’ve been doing for your hair inspired me to try it out.” He looked longingly at the wine fridge. “Do you drink?”

“For breakfast?” f*ck. Before Sanji could backpedal, though, Zoro grinned, cheeks chipmunked with rice. “Now you’re speakin’ my language.”

Sanji got up and poured them both a white wine, heavier on the orange juice in his plastic cup than Zoro’s. Zoro plowed through the meal, at least tasting everything from the two-person arrangement. Sanji would have to get lunch out. “Any notes?” Sanji asked as he dropped Zoro’s drink at his elbow. “I haven’t had anyone to taste test in a while.”

“S’good.” Zoro eyed the poor man’s mimosa. “Didn’t know white people up here knew how to make natto.” He sipped. “Definitely the best I’ve had around here, to be sure.”

Sanji flipped his hair to hide the pleasant twist of his stomach. “Not exactly a high bar, marimo.”

Zoro grunted. “You have to research for me?” he changed the subject.

“Oh - well.” Sanji picked up his chopsticks to snatch his share before Zoro ate it all. “I’ve done a little bit with Asian hair types in the past, but not with a lot of color, like I do with you,” he said. “I wanted to make sure I was doing it right.”

Zoro chugged his drink. Animal. “And?”

Sanji stuck a rolled omelet in his mouth. “I’m the best.” Zoro chuckled.

“So, what’re we thinking?” Sanji asked fifteen minutes later, breakfast eaten and shop open. His hands still shook a bit - he would have to sneak in a smoke while Zoro processed - but he was feeling… better. Food always helped.

Zoro shrugged with Sanji’s hands buried in his overgrown hair. “What’re you thinking?”

Hmm. Sanji pulled it apart to look at the roots. “Do you want to keep growing it out?” Zoro’s face twitched. “Or not.”

“S’hot,” Zoro grumbled. “And it just gets all gross at work.”

“That it does.” Sanji scratched Zoro’s scalp hard. Zoro shuddered. “We could give it a bit of a break,” he suggested. “Shave it down, do your roots, leave it blonde until next time.”

“Yeah, if you’re a f*cking puss*.”

Sanji laughed. “Okay, Mr. Demanding.” He pulled Zoro’s bangs off his eyebrows. Zoro’s head moved more than the pull was worth. “Green in the front, blonde in the back?”

“Whatever you want,” Zoro said with just a hint of a scratch.

“I could leave you enough on top to pull on,” Sanji teased, snarling it up. “Bet the boys would like that.”

Zoro huffed, yanked out of his trance. “You ever try to date gay here?” he asked. “As a not white guy? It’s miserable.”

Sanji bit his lip. “Can’t say I have,” he said. “Let’s do the cut first so I don’t waste our time bleaching stuff that’s going anyway, and you can complain about it then.”

“How did last week go, anyway?” Zoro asked. “With the family reunion or whatever.”

Sanji lifted the clippers off Zoro’s nape. “It didn’t.” Zoro raised an eyebrow in the mirror. Sanji pushed his head down so he didn’t have to deal with those eyes on him. “I finally realized she would never stop wanting a yes-dear doormat she could boss around,” he quipped, powering through the memories of the screaming, the tears, the empty bed he couldn’t fall asleep in. “So I let her go find him. Without me.”

“She wanted you to be a doormat?” Zoro looked Sanji over in the mirror. “You’re the most contrary person in Appalachia.”

Sanji huffed. “Clearly you’ve never met my old man. Head down.” Zoro tucked his chin back to his chest. Sanji started buzzing again, satisfactory lines up from the nape to crown. Multicolored, greasy hair waterfalled to the floor. “Anyway, that was before the trip,” Sanji said, leaving out the buildup, her birthday, the business lease in Memphis she had gotten without telling him, how she assumed he would just pick up and move across the state with her without any kind of consultation. Zoro didn’t need to know. “Luckily, I was excused from attending.” He wasn’t, actually - she had tried to beg and guilt him into pretending through it, to put on an act so she wouldn’t have to own up about the failure of her relationship to her whole family. He hated the part of himself that had almost done it.

But he hadn’t. He used the week she was gone to move out instead. His furniture was in Zeff’s garage now. He was staying in his old bedroom. He had made their breakfast in the kitchen where he had learned to cook in middle school. He was miserable.

“Good for you.” Sanji kept his attention on Zoro’s hair. “Figured out what you’re gonna do next?” Zoro asked.

“Find a new place to live before I murder the old man.” Zoro snorted. “It’s a pain in the ass with all the goddamn Florida people moving up here, though,” Sanji complained.

“Yeah, good luck with that.” sh*t, Zoro was a transplant himself. Would he be offended by Sanji’s local opinion? Zoro just coughed, head jumping under Sanji’s clippers. “Well, if you need, uh, any help or anything?”

Sanji bit his tongue. “It’s sweet of you to offer,” Sanji said with all the Sweet’n’Low stored by the bleach in the back. Zoro flipped him off in the mirror. Sanji cackled. “But I think I can handle it.”

In the end, Sanji’s mental exhaustion beat out his professional pride. He posed Zoro’s green and icy head against the backdrop of the back wall of the salon, where the distress of the brick was artistic instead of just old. “Tilt your head - there you go.” Sanji snapped a few more options, angling Zoro so the line between the colors was the focal point. “Are you this docile with everyone?” Sanji teased. “Big scary guy who rolls over when someone tells him what to do?” Zoro made to glare at him. Sanji clicked his tongue. “Eyes back on the stop sign.”

Zoro’s jaw worked. “I don’t do everything you tell me to do,” he said as he did what Sanji told him to do.

Sanji smirked. “Turn to face me.” Zoro did. “Chin down.” Down. “Now hop three times.” Zoro almost did it, heels leaving the ground before he growled and lunged for Sanji. Sanji laughed and danced away, twisting out of Zoro’s attacks. “If you hit me you’ll have to go back to your old ass hair!” Sanji told him. Zoro snarled-

Stumbled over Sanji’s outstretched boot, falling face-first towards the curb. sh*t. Sanji’s reflexes caught Zoro by the shirt and elbow. “Careful!” Sanji hauled him back upright, Lord he was heavy, heart in his throat. “Don’t do sh*t like that!” Sanji snapped. “About scared the daylights outta me!”

Zoro stared at him, still in Sanji’s hold, very close, wearing his normal clothes, oh no. Sanji dropped his arms and stepped back, rubbing the ghost of Zoro’s width out of his palms on his pants. “Anyway - I proved my point.” He picked up his phone that he had dropped in the scuffle, checking to make sure it hadn’t chipped. “Next time you want to wrestle, watch your footwork.”

“Next time I won’t miss,” Zoro grumbled, sticking his hands in his pockets and slouching against the wall. “You’ll be the one going down, and I won’t catch you.”

“Oh, as if,” Sanji replied. “I could take you any day, marimo.”

Zoro’s eyes sparked. “Name the time and place.”

Sanji grinned, jerking his head back inside. “How’s six weeks sound?”

“You’re not allowed to take this the wrong way,” Zoro growled as he clunked a glass co*ke bottle down on the dresser by Sanji’s mirror, choked with wildflowers and still dripping from the rain outside. “This was not my f*cking idea.”

Sanji stared at the flowers. Thunder rumbled. “Then who do I have to thank?”

“The goddamn witch gave me a lift and tricked me into taking them when she dropped me off,” he grumbled, glaring out the front window in the direction of the soaked main street. “Bitch.”

Sanji kicked his ankle. “Don’t call a woman that,” he warned. “I would never refuse a gift from a beautiful lady, even when the messenger is you.”

Zoro rolled his eyes as he took his seat. “You’ve never even seen her.”

“All women are queens,” Sanji said. He crept up to the flowers, picking up the bottle to inspect them closer. They hadn’t been trimmed properly, and they were dripping rainwater all over his table, and one of the black-eyed Susans was missing half of its petals, and he adored them. “What’s the occasion?”

“She said something about making you feel better after the breakup,” Zoro huffed, sitting back in Sanji’s chair and crossing his arms under his chest. The one button done on his Henley strained. Sanji watched it in the mirror to see if it would pop. “I think she’s just trying to offload them, the cabin’s covered in these little sh*ts. She’s started selling them to customers and sh*t.”

“Well, she’s got a lovely eye,” he said, tugging out an aster to strip the leaves off that were under the water line. “Tell her thank you from me - politely.”

“Whatever.” Zoro’s chest heaved. Sanji set the flowers back down, spinning the bottle so the prettiest angle faced out. “Let’s just get this over with.”

Sanji snagged a towel as he came around behind Zoro, dropping it on his head and ruffling his rain-damp hair. “What’s gotten under your tail today?” Sanji asked. He needed a smoke. “Does the marimo not like the rain?”

“Marimo are aquatic invertebrates.”

“Wow, a four-syllable word!” Sanji twisted the towel with a wrist-flick and set it around Zoro’s neck, smirking at Zoro’s nasty mirror glare. “Guess I haven’t bleached your brain out yet, after all.” Zoro sneered. Sanji pushed his hand into Zoro’s hair. “Are you hungry now, or should I wait to deliver lunch when you’re processing?”

“I could eat,” Zoro admitted, “but I could wait.” He watched Sanji play with his hair. “What’re you thinking?”

Sanji’s hands itched for the clippers. “What do you think about a pattern?”

Sanji felt Iva approach more than he saw it. “What in the name of the baby Jesus are you doing, boy?” she asked.

“Whatever the hell I want,” he answered, lasered in on the curve of the line behind Zoro’s ear. The tendon bunched. “You try and talk right now I will end you and your bloodline,” he hissed at Zoro. Zoro growled deep in his chest, but stayed hunched over like a good boy. Sanji made another shave, the bare clippers slicing another eighth-of-an-inch line in the two-guard field he had buzzed earlier.

“This is a grown-ass man, not a kid who wants to look cool for prom,” Iva argued. “Unless you want to charge for a kids’ cut?”

“I’d rather eat glass - stay still!” Sanji spread his free hand on the top of Zoro’s head. Zoro froze. “There it is,” Sanji breathed, moving along the curve mapped out in his head. “It’s just an experiment,” he told Iva.

“Well, that experiment better turn out beautiful,” she said. “We’ve got a reputation to maintain.”

“Leave me alone and you’ll find out.”

Sanji could feel the eyeroll. “I’ll heat up some towels in case you decide to go whole hog and shave him,” she drawled as she drifted away. “Godspeed with your ‘experiment’.”

Hmm. Sanji finished the rest of the curve in silence, then blew off the babies with a quick hair dryer burst. “What is your shaving situation, anyway?” he asked Zoro. “If you say a dry knife I’m firing you as a client.” Silence. “Oh, you can talk again,” Sanji allowed. “For now.”

Zoro lifted his head, rolling his shoulders before settling back into position. “S’not much,” Zoro said, scratching his chin as he looked at himself in the mirror. “It grows slow and patchy, so I just do a whole razor shave every three days or so with whatever’s in our bathroom.” His eyes flicked up to Sanji’s beard in the mirror. “I’m not as persnickety as you.”

Sanji ignored that to preserve the structural integrity of the building, running his fingers down Zoro’s jawline. There was only the barest scrape of stubble apparent in spots, more of a sign of a spotty shave than new growth. “When was the last time you did that?” he asked.

“This morning.” Sanji’s mouth quirked. Zoro grumped. “Don’t want you on my ass for another f*cking thing.”

Sanji hummed. “Let it go a bit next time,” he requested. “I’m curious, and I’ll show you what it feels like to get treated right as a reward.”

Zoro snorted. “Pretty sure you already do that, but whatever.” Sanji traced the line of Zoro’s cheekbone. He could do something fun with that, if Zoro was wrong and it grew just fine when he didn’t overmow it like a zealous landscaper.

Zoro’s eyes fluttered. Sanji kicked the part of him that hadn’t gotten laid in over two months into a cave.

“Next time,” Sanji swore. “Today we’re doing purple.”

“Usopp’s gonna be over the moon you’re doing weird sh*t to me again,” Zoro commented as he watched Sanji paint the top of his head cerulean. “He pouted about the blonde.”

Sanji tilted his head. “Who’s Usopp?” Please don’t say boyfriend.

“Other coworker,” Zoro said, and Sanji’s spine eased. He shouldn’t even - whatever, he’d own up in confession later. “Me, Luff, the witch-” he didn’t even flinch when Sanji flicked his ear- “and Usopp, that’s the crew.”

“Seems kind of small,” Sanji said as he kept painting. “I thought y’all would have at least a dozen, with what operations sounded like.”

Zoro shrugged. “Luffy’s picky,” he said, “He likes most people just fine, but it’s different with him recruiting someone new to the crew.”

Sanji shot him a mirror look. “Didn’t he find you wandering around the woods?”

“Well - there’s more to it-” Sanji strengthened the Look. Zoro pouted. “Yeah,” he admitted. “But he met Nami when she worked at the Food Lion, and Usopp came from a goddamn gas station, so-” Zoro threw up his hands, black cape fluttering. “He’s just like that.”

Sanji worked dye into Zoro’s roots. “He sounds fascinating,” Sanji said, not even lying. The stacked-up stories Zoro dropped through the months had painted a bizarre portrait. “I’m not sure if I’d like to meet him or let him remain a fantastical unknown forever.”

“Oh, we can’t let him near you.” Sanji co*cked his head, stomach twisting. “As soon as he finds out you can cook, you’ll never have a moment’s peace again.” Sanji grinned, letting his loose hair drift over his face to hide it. “I’m serious,” Zoro said, sounding like it. “I’ve never seen someone be like that about food. He would kidnap you and hold you hostage like Snow f*cking White if I ever mentioned you fed me good when I come here.”

“Snow White wasn’t a captive,” Sanji argued as the twist in his stomach curled up like a cat in the sunshine.

“Well, she did the chores, didn’t she?”

“Cooking isn’t a chore.” Sanji sectioned off another lock of hair. “It’s why we’re alive.”

“If you say so, man.” He adjusted his seat between brushstrokes. “Either way, Luffy isn’t allowed to know that you know what a rice cooker is.”

Sanji chuckled. “I’ll take your word for it,” he relented. “Now sit still.”

Sanji knew the interrogation was coming. It had been a few appointments since anyone else was in the building while he worked on Zoro, and they had a rapport that was observably abnormal for Sanji with a client. Someone was going to notice, and send someone to grill him about it.

Predictably, Iva caught him in the back while Zoro’s color processed, her hard stare as much of a headlock as any physical contact. “What in the hell is going on?”

Sanji had two painful, visceral seconds where he yearned for the masculine no-questions-asked atmosphere of Zeff’s kitchen. Too bad he was banned from trying to work at Baratie. “Most people wouldn’t care about what their employees did with their lives, y’know,” he stalled, rinsing out the color bowls.

“Most people ain’t me.” Iva propped her hands on her hips. “Spill. You like the cop?”

“If I didn’t, I’d charge him a lot more.”

“You’re not undercharging him, are you?”

“Of course not!” Sanji’s wild gesture with the wet bowl flung water all over Iva’s blouse. He winced. “Sorry.” Iva just brushed the drops off and kept f*cking looking at him. “I’m just not overcharging him, that’s all,” he qualified. “And he tips okay.”

Iva sighed. “I just worry for you, sweetie. After the whole Pudding affair-”

“Don’t.” Iva shut up. Sanji scrubbed at nothing. “He is actually gay, he told me, but either way, no. Not happening.”

Iva hummed, taking the clean bowls from him to dry with a towel waiting for the wash. “You sure?” she asked like he knew she would. “If he’s truly not a cop anymore, he’s cute, and he obviously likes you, honey. You could do worse in this town.”

“I don’t think anyone has ever described that boy as ‘cute’ before,” Sanji drawled. “And no. I don’t date clients.”

“You’ve never had a chance, baby,” she pointed out. “You’ve been attached to that hussy as long as I’ve known you-” She bent out of the way of his assault. “You dumped her, I’m allowed to be honest at last!” she cried.

“We broke up!” he argued. “Mutually!”

“Whatever helps you sleep at night.” She snapped his hip with the damp towel. “You always deserved better,” she told him. “And if ‘better’ is an ex-cop with a better bosom than me who lets you do whatever the hell you want with his hair - well.” She put the dry bowl back on the stack. “You could do worse, sugar.” She patted his shoulder, leaving a wet spot on his shirt. “Do you need the towels warmed?” she asked.

“Not today,” he muttered. “We’re going to try next time.”

She nodded. “Alright, dear heart. Take care.”

“Tell your lovely friend thanks for the flowers,” Sanji said as he handed Zoro out the door, making eye contact with his waiting client on the couch. “See you in six weeks, marimo.”

“Whatever.” Zoro ran his hand over the buzz in the back, tracing the curve bisecting the cerulean and the purple with his fingers. “See ya.” He ducked out into the drizzle, making for the orange Subaru parked in the fire lane with its flashers on. Sanji watched as he got in the passenger seat, already mouthing off to whoever was driving. The Nami coworker, maybe?

“If you’re worried about dating a client, I’ll take him off your hands,” Tiffany whispered in his ear. Sanji jumped, nearly clipping her chin with his shoulder. She winked, hand on his lower back. “Just sayin’! I’d do a good job and you know it.”

“Oh, f*ck off,” he hissed, rolling out of her reach. He approached his next client on the couch with a clean smile. “Audrey, good to see you!” he greeted her. “Come on back to my station. How did the play go?”

Okay, maybe Zoro wasn’t completely full of sh*t.

“Told you,” he mumbled as Sanji combed over his beard - or, what passed for it. “Slow and patchy.”

“And how long was this growing for?” Sanji asked, thumbing a bald spot on Zoro’s cheek. Mihawk would be in knots if he saw this. No fancy beard trims today, then.

“A week? Maybe longer.” Zoro shifted in Sanji’s chair. “It’s itchy, and I’ve had to deal with everyone’s bitch-ass opinions the whole time,” he complained. “This better be worth it.”

“Don’t worry,” Sanji assured him. “I’ll take good care of you.” He pushed Zoro’s head down to inspect how his curved divide looked. “How did this go?” he asked, tracing it for emphasis.

Zoro shrugged. “It was cool, until it grew out too much.” Sanji could see that. “Usopp offered to help keep it clean, but like hell I’m letting those idiots near my head with anything sharp.”

“Aw, but you’ll let me?” Sanji teased. “I’m flattered.”

“You’re a professional,” Zoro grumbled, skin blotchy to match his beard. “It’s different.”

“Well, either way, I appreciate it.” Sanji combed it all down, hiding a wince when it refused to lay in the same direction. “So, no more patterns?”

“Not unless you’re going to shave it down more than every six weeks,” Zoro replied. “I can’t afford that sh*t.”

Sanji chuckled. “It wouldn’t be a full charge for a trim like that, but I get your point.” He dug his fingers into sky blue and soft violet. “I think I’ll try a gradient today,” he decided. “Do the shave first, then work with the colors you’ve got, leave off the trim so we have enough to work with. Sound good?”

“God, get this thing off me,” Zoro moaned, pulling at his scruff with both hands. Sanji laughed.

They didn’t have a proper barber chair in the salon, so Sanji did the shave in a shampoo bowl. It had been ages since he had done one - the men in town typically went elsewhere for this service, and even though the salon was queer-friendly, the kind of queers who needed a shave didn’t tend to stick in the Smokies for very long. Sanji shaved himself every morning, of course, but it wasn’t the same. Even if it hadn’t been a client he actually liked, it would have been a nice change of pace. As it was, he got lost in the process, the dim shampoo room and its relative quiet lulling both of them into a different kind of fugue state. Sanji wasn’t even upset that Zoro fell asleep the second the first hot towel went on.

Sanji blinked out of his work trance as he lifted the last towel off. “Still asleep?” he asked quietly, rubbing the edge of the air-chilled towel down the fresh shave along Zoro’s jaw. Zoro grunted, or maybe snored. Sanji flicked him on the nose. “Wake up, asshole.”

Zoro started. “‘Asn’t ‘sleep,” he yawned. Yeah, sure. Zoro wiggled around, stretching chair-stiff muscles. “You done?”

“Just about.” Sanji pumped some of his own aftershave he had brought from home for this into his hands. “How’re you feeling?”

Zoro considered it as seriously as he always did. “Soft.” Sanji grinned. “Not sure if it was worth all the buildup, though.” Sanji frowned and flicked Zoro’s ear with a fingernail. “Hey!”

“Be grateful I didn’t do worse.” Sanji rubbed his aftershave into Zoro’s skin. Bastard probably wouldn’t even care if he dried out. “Say ‘thank you, Sanji’.”

“Like hell.” Sanji squished up Zoro’s cheeks. Zoro batted him away, cape crinkling like his forehead. “Quit it.”

Sanji cackled, echoing in the shampoo room. “Baby.” Sanji did a final look-over for any missed spots. “Okay, wake up while I clean up, then put on your bleach,” he said, packing up his shaving supplies. Zoro rubbed at his eyes - paused. He dragged his hands down his face, pore by pore. Sanji smiled. “Like it?”

“If I say yes, will you shut up?” Zoro cracked an eye, peering towards the salon proper. “What’s going on out there?”

Sanji paused to listen to the world outside their bubble. There was indeed yelling going on out there - masculine yelling. Sanji sighed. “I bet someone’s jealous husband is here again.” He wiped off his hands. “Stay here, I’ll take care of it.”

Sanji left him to his confusion and sauntered to the noise. Some redneck loomed over a cowering client in Caroline’s chair. Caroline and Iva were doing an admirable job keeping him off without actually touching him, but Sanji wasn’t afraid of assault charges or getting fired for them.

He walked up to the guy and gripped his shoulder, leveling his nicest glare at him. “Now, we don’t need to be causing a scene here, now, do we?” he asked in his sweetest voice.

The redneck glanced him over and came to the obvious conclusion. “And what the hell are you gonna do about it, fa*ggot?”

Sanji glanced at Iva for permission. Iva spread a hand. Sanji smiled at the redneck. “Let’s speak outside, shall we? Like men.”

Sanji came back in from his manly chat five minutes later, only a little breathless, to a buzzing salon and a frantic staff. Everyone swiveled when the door opened. Sanji smiled. “All taken care of, ladies. And guests.” He nodded at Zoro, who was crouched by the target client’s chair, cape still on, bless his heart.

Sanji locked the door behind his back, just in case - the redneck had gone running with his tail between his legs when Sanji proved that he could, in fact, do something about it, but a little temporary insurance never hurt anyone. Fire codes were stupid, anyway. The chatter kicked back up with a vengeance. He carried himself to Caroline’s station like eyes were still on him, because they were.

The target client, a realtor if he had ever seen one, was clutching Zoro’s hand, her knuckles white. She blinked red eyes at Sanji. “I’m so sorry,” she hiccuped. Her hair was still half-foiled.

“Nothing to be sorry for, my dear,” he told her, propping against his own chair next to Caroline’s. “Happens to the best of us.”

“Do you have a safe place to go?” Zoro asked, still kneeling in front of her. There was a fleck of shaving cream Sanji had missed high on his temple. “I know the people at the women’s shelter, they’re good people. They’ll help you out if you need it.” Of course a good cop like him had been friendly with the local shelters.

She hiccuped again. “No - no, the kids are at my sister’s,” she said. “She - she knows. I just…” She wiped her face on a mascara-streaked tissue. “I wanted one normal thing to happen, and he…”

Zoro squeezed her hand. “You’re alright,” he told her. He reached for his chest, where a shirt pocket would have been. Sanji smiled. Zoro cursed. “Uh - Blondie, you got a pen?”

Sanji went and got one and a salon business card from the front desk, only speaking to the other employees with his eyes as he came and went. He gave them to Zoro, who wrote down a phone number on the back and handed it to the client. “He gives you any more trouble, you call me, okay?” he told her. “No matter what time it is.”

She looked at the card. “Who are you?”

He smiled at her. “I’m bigger than that guy, that’s for sure.”

Someone gripped Sanji’s arm - oh, just Iva. “If you charge that boy for anything today-”

“Oh, don’t worry,” he muttered as Zoro joked around with the sobbing client. “This one’s on me.”

“You didn’t have to do that,” Sanji said after the target client had left and the salon was almost back to normal. “You shouldn’t have had to do that.”

“You’re right,” Zoro said, technically looking at himself in the mirror, but Sanji knew he was looking beyond. “It shouldn’t have gotten that far to begin with.” Sanji focused on his careful gradient on the back of Zoro’s head. “You didn’t do anything I used to have to care about, did you?” Zoro asked.

Sanji bit his cheek. “You know those kind will never admit they got beat up by a fa*ggot.” He ignored Zoro’s judgment. “Only the state of Georgia would think what I did was assault.”

“The fact that you know the details about Georgia’s assault laws tells me way more about you than you know.” Sanji rolled his eyes. “Good.” Sanji glanced up to catch Zoro watching him in the mirror. “He deserved it.”

“Most men do.” He painted purple up. “Did she tell you anything she didn’t tell Caroline?” he asked out of professional curiosity.

“I have no f*cking idea what she told your coworker,” Zoro said, “but if my experience taught me anything, it’s to assume that any situation a woman actually tells me about is at least six times worse behind closed doors.”

Sanji paused in his painting. “Iva!”

“What?” Iva called from her station.

“Get over here,” Sanji ordered her. When she huffed and complied, Sanji told Zoro, “Repeat what you just said.”

Zoro’s eyes flicked between the two of them in the mirror. “Uh, domestic situations are always worse than the woman will say?”

Sanji and Iva stared at each other. “Lifetime hundred percent discount,” Iva decided. “Seems appropriate.”

“Hah?” Zoro grimaced. “For what? Having common sense?”

Sanji patted his neck. “You’re a cop who admitted your methods aren’t perfect,” he said. “Do you know how rare that is?”

“Not a cop.” Zoro pouted. “Point taken, I guess.” He glared at Iva in the mirror. “I won’t do more than a fifty percent discount,” he said.

Iva grinned. “Marry him,” she told Sanji, “before he can think too hard about it.”

Zoro laughed before Sanji could protest, loud and happy. Sanji shook his head and waited for a sting at the implied rejection that never came. “Bit of a jump, ain’t it?” Zoro said, sparkling at Iva. “At least make him buy me dinner first.”

Iva opened her mouth - nope, absolutely not. Sanji spun on his pivot leg to roundhouse the back of her knee, pulling his punch at the last second so it just bent a little under her. “Don’t you dare,” he hissed.

Iva moved out of range with a squawk. “Assault! In my salon!”

Everyone turned to look at her, a room of unamused stares. She winced. “Ah. Not like that?”

Zoro snickered. The salon’s bubble burst, a cacophony of cathartic laughter. Sanji braced himself on Zoro’s chair, arms shaking, stomach hurting. What a day.

Iva pulled the reins back in, using the mood to refill the drinks of everyone with a cup and leaving Sanji alone again, for now. Sanji wiped his face on his shoulder and shook himself back to work. This kind of color was time-sensitive, and he really wanted it to look good, today of all days.

“Y’all are hysterical,” Zoro sighed, smile lingering in the dips of his face. “Are y’all like this when I’m not around?”

“Worse,” Sanji assured him. Zoro chuckled. Sanji held his tongue in his teeth as he finished another swipe of the gradient. “Don’t take her too seriously,” he told Zoro. “She’s worse than a grandma for trying to set up her young people with anyone with a pulse.”

“And now that you’re single again, you’re getting years of pent-up matchmaking?” Sanji shot him a blind fingergun in the mirror, clicking his tongue. “Good luck dodging those bullets,” Zoro said. “Maybe you should just lie and say you’re on Hinge or whatever the straight people in this town use to get her off your back.”

“Not straight,” Sanji reminded him. Zoro waved it off. Sanji huffed. “And how the hell should I know? Pudding and I have - had - been dating since high school, like good little Southerners,” he grumbled. “I’ve never had to date online.”

“It’s overrated,” Zoro told him. “Just find a dude in a bar with a back alley like God intended.”

Sanji grinned. “Maybe I will.”

Iva came over to the front desk as Sanji was checking Zoro out, because of course she did. “Alright, move, boy,” she said, dumping him out of the office chair so she could take it. “I’m ringing this one up.”

Sanji squawked from the floor, kicking one of the wheels so it rolled her belly into the desk. “Hey!”

She ignored him and smiled at an amused Zoro with his wildberry hair. “Let’s make a deal,” she began in her haggling voice. “Thirty percent off for services rendered?”

Zoro raised an eyebrow. “You promised me a full lifetime discount an hour ago.”

She flapped a hand, nails clacking against each other. “That was an hour ago me,” she said. “Never trust your past self, darling.” Zoro rolled his eyes and came around the side of the desk, holding out a hand to - oh. Sanji grasped it in an extremely manly way and let Zoro haul him to his feet, getting a first class seat to the bulge of his bicep. “Sanji-boy did a lot of work today,” she crooned, watching the action with a dangerous look. “Hard work, mind you.”

Zoro shot a look at Sanji. Sanji dropped his hand. “No more than usual,” he said to f*ck with Iva’s negotiations.

Zoro stared at the ceiling with a frown. “Hmm…” He nodded. “Okay.” He gestured a thumb at Sanji. “How much of whatever y’all change actually goes to the guy?” he asked. “I’ll pay that.”

Iva barked. “Oh, clever!” Sanji tried to argue, but Iva held him off with a hand as she manually typed the number into their POS system. Of course she knew that off the top of her head. “You strike a fair deal, officer.”

Zoro blinked a few times. “Been a while since anyone called me that,” he said. “Kind of forgot about it.”

Iva grinned, lipstick on her teeth. “Good for you, kid.” She gave Sanji a final shove. “Get out of here,” she ordered him. “You’ve got other clients today, and I’ve got this handled.”

Sanji narrowed his eyes at her, at Zoro, who wasn’t any help at all, the lout. “Fine. I can tell when I’m not needed.” He marched back to his station, cleaning it up with maybe a little more force than necessary as the conspirators conspired without him. Assholes.

Iva’s laugh boomed out. Sanji did not turn to see what Zoro had said or done to make her do that. He was a professional.

After a few minutes of just-below-hearing chatter, the door opened and closed. Iva’s boots clacked towards Sanji. “Okay, I officially approve,” she told him, sitting in his chair with her water bottle. “You picked a good one.”

“I didn’t pick sh*t. Now get up and f*ck off.” She sucked at her water bottle like it was her husband’s neck. He slammed the drawer with his hair dryers shut hard enough to rattle the whole dresser and the mirror next to it. “I’m not going to date a client!”

She shrugged. “He and his friends like Wild Wing,” she told him. “Go there almost every Wednesday for trivia, he said.” He glared at her. She blinked her heavy falsies at him. “You’re good at retaining useless information like that, right?”

“I hate you,” he said. “Down to the very core of your being.”

“If you don’t go, I’ll tell Zeff.” A chill ran down his spine. She smiled around the spout, a devious curl. “Don’t think I won’t, boy.”

Sanji shoved his face in a damp towel and screamed.

“Hey, isn’t that your hairstylist?”

Zoro paused in pouring Usopp’s beer from the pitcher. “Huh?” Nami pointed at the bar across the bar, eyebrows waggling. Zoro twisted around to follow her finger. Usopp recovered his beer with a squeak, hands catching it before it could spill all over the table. Zoro ignored him and glanced over the barflys, the seasoned white guys in trucker hats, the overpolished white women - oh, there he was, leaning against a free spot between two groups, hair down, wearing a patterned short-sleeved button up Zoro had never seen before. Why was Zoro surprised he was dressed differently than usual? Of course he didn’t wear his work clothes to a bar, even if his work clothes would’ve fit in here just fine. He was a priss like that.

“Huh. Guess it is.” Zoro turned his back on Sanji’s flirting with the bartender. “Anyway-”

“Luffy, fetch.”

Zoro’s brain froze. “Huh?”

Luffy perked up and jumped off his stool - frowned. “Wait, what am I fetching?”

Nami rolled her eyes. “Lord, I hope he’s smart.” She pointed at Sanji’s lean, which was now pulling his tucked-in shirt in a long line across his body, down to his hip. At least the jeans were the same. “That’s the guy who dyes Zoro’s hair,” she explained in her annoying-ass preschool teacher voice. “You know, that guy-”

“Oh!” Luffy grinned. “Got it! I’ll get him!”

Zoro groaned as Luffy ran over, draining his first beer so he could pour himself a second. “Great.”

“I’m sorry, did you not want to see the guy outside of his workplace?” she asked, rounding on him from across their hightop. “It’s not like you bring him up every day or anything.”

Zoro rolled his eyes. “He’s a professional,” he pointed out for the billionth time. “Just because he’s friendly and sh*t when I’m paying him to do his job doesn’t mean he wants to be friends.”

“Yeah, you should tell Luffy that,” Usopp drawled, watching the bar interaction from behind his beer. “I don’t think he gets that idea.”

Zoro watched Luffy get up in Sanji’s grill, the flirty face falling into the naked shock most people met Luffy with. Ugh. Zoro was so f*cked.

“Hey, we’re supposed to share that,” Nami bitched as he poured a third beer.

“Tough sh*t, get your own.” Sanji smiled at Luffy, flipping his loose hair over his shoulder, like he always did. Zoro looked away. “This is gonna suck.”

“No, this is gonna get you laid so you stop being such a bear all the time,” Nami said. “You can thank me later, bitch.”

“Like hell!”

“Hey, Luff!” Usopp called over him, raising his beer at Luffy’s return. “You got us a new teammate?”

“Yeah!” Luffy announced as he dragged Sanji to him. “He says he knows the old people stuff!”

Sanji stumbled on a tug, his drink spilling on his hand. He grimaced at them, eyes snagging on Zoro. “Sorry, marimo,” he said, and f*ck, now the crew knew they had nicknames. “I didn’t mean to crash your night out, but-” He tried and failed to pull his arm out of Luffy’s grip. Luffy grinned at the world.

Zoro shook his head. “S’fine.” He lifted his cup in greeting. “Hey.”

“What Zoro means to say is that of course you’re welcome to join us!” Nami chirped. She fluttered her eyelashes at Sanji. “You’re Sanji, right? We’ve heard so much about you.”

Sanji smiled, the slick one he used on women. “I must say, it’s a delight to finally put faces to names,” he crooned at her. Blech. Zoro hid in his beer.

Luffy pushed Sanji into the stool next to Zoro because everyone was out to f*cking get him tonight. Sanji eyed Zoro’s head, then set down his bougie drink and grabbed a napkin from the pile on the table. He wiped his hands down, then stuck them straight into Zoro’s hair. “Is this what you do when I’m not looking?” he moaned, pushing Zoro’s bangs back and yanking him around like a gearshift. “No wonder you’re always so blown out!”

Zoro pushed him away. “It’s my hair, not yours.”

“Like hell it isn’t!” He poked Zoro in the chest. Had they ever been on an even level like this? “If you’re gonna be my best work, you better act like it! I swear to Christ-”

“Aright, y’all, it’s about time to start tonight’s team trivia!” the host announced over the bar’s sound system, cutting off Sanji’s tirade at the ankles. “The way the game is gonna work…”

Zoro scooted away from Sanji as Blondie swiveled to listen to the rules, glowering ahead. The other three lined up on the other side of the table like the f*cking Muppet hecklers, observing the last fifteen seconds with different mixes of shock, delight, and spiteful glee. Zoro scowled.

Screw the crew getting on his ass for being whipped for his hairstylist. Zoro should have been worried about losing his spot on their trivia team to the prissy asshole.

“Figs aren’t vegan?” Usopp asked, watching Sanji write the answer down on its slip. “Really?”

“A special kind of wasp crawls inside the flower and dies, then gets liquified into the fruit,” Sanji rattled off, betting the highest points left in the round and sliding off his stool. “Excuse me, my dear,” he said with a f*cking bow to Nami before flouncing off to the stage where the trivia host was set up.

Nami’s hand shot across the table to grip Zoro’s wrist, her honey-brown eyes staring him down. “Sleep with him,” she ordered, claws sharp against his tendons. “Tonight.”

Zoro yanked his arm away. “Don’t tell me what to do.”

“I mean…” Usopp shrugged. “I would, if I was you. Which I’m not! But - you get it, right?”

“I like him!” Luffy announced. Well, there went the neighborhood. “He should join the crew!”

“He has a job - that he likes - and he hates getting his hands-”

“So, where does the team name come from?” Sanji asked as he came back to the table, climbing back onto his stool. He waved the next slip at them, basic information already filled out by Nami before Sanji had sauntered in and ruined Zoro’s night.

“We’re the Strawhat Crew!” Luffy answered, answering nothing. He lifted his hat from its string around his neck onto his head. “See?”

“It’s the company name,” Nami explained, taking the slip back. “And it’s my turn to write the answer.”

“Whatever you say, lovely.” Sanji glanced at Zoro - double-took. He clicked his tongue. “I swear to high heaven,” he muttered, “if I knew you’d be like this I’d have brought my texture spray.” He wiped some condensation off his glass of half-melted ice to dampen his fingers before pushing Zoro’s bangs back. “I swear, I’m making you get some styling gel next time I see you, and teaching you how to use it properly.”

“You’re making him spend more on product than I do,” Nami teased. “He’s not made of money, y’know!”

“Hair care is self-care,” Sanji shot back, still fiddling with Zoro’s hair. Zoro turned to face him better, keeping his eyes downcast. There was a flash of silver peeking out through the half-done buttons of his shirt - a necklace? Zoro could get him jewelry.

“Okay, the answer for round two question two, what fruit isn’t considered vegan, is - figs!” the host announced. The bar booed and groaned. She grinned behind her mic, fake red hair drifting over her bright blue eyes. “Shoutout to the one team that got it right!” she said, flicking a salute their way. Sanji blew her a kiss back. “Moving on to round two question three, my geography question…”

“Everyone shut the f*ck up,” Nami hissed, laser-focused on her area of expertise. Zoro tuned it out and let Sanji futz over him. It felt nice.

“Sanji, do you want to sleep with Zoro?”

Usopp spat out his drink. Sanji jerked out of Zoro’s hair, laughing nervously at Luffy’s - Luffy question. “Haha, what?” He played with a rip in his jeans. Zoro hunched over his beer. “Do I - what?”

Luffy blinked at him, chomping on the bones of his wings. “You’re cool, and I like you,” he said. “If you want to, you should.”

“I’m finding a new team of all women where at least they’re not all morons who make me miss the stupid question!” Nami yelled. She snatched up the slip and marched up to the host’s table. Usopp was still choking on beer, pounding his chest with his fist. Zoro wanted to die and take them all down with him.

“Um…” Sanji glanced around at anyone but Zoro for an out. “Are you serious right now?”

“Here are your nachos!” their server said, dropping a loaded plate in the middle of the table. Luffy lit up and dove in, forgetting how weird he was being in the face of burnt chips and chicken. The server smiled at them. “Anything else I can get y’all?”

“I need a shot,” Sanji groaned, dragging his hand down his face. There was a strand of blue hair caught in a ring. f*ck it. f*ck it.

Zoro nudged Sanji with his knee under the table. Sanji jumped, whipping to him. “What do you like?” he asked, forcing himself not to look away from Sanji’s Windex-blue eyes.

Sanji’s smile twitched. “Gonna shoot tequila with me, marimo?”

Zoro glanced at the server. “Two of those,” he said. “House is fine.”

“Make that three - four,” Usopp tacked on. “Nami’ll be pissed if we don’t get her one. And some limes!”

The server nodded. “Got y’all.” She glanced at Luffy’s Sprite levels. “Need another, baby?”

“Yersh, pwease!” Luffy said through nachos.

They got second place. Nami decided that was worthy of celebratory white tea shots. Apparently, it was a tequila night for everyone. Zoro couldn’t say he minded. Tequila made Sanji stand instead of sit, tie his hair up and let it back down at least three times in twenty minutes, lean on Zoro when Usopp’s long-winded stories made him breathless with laughter, throw outlandish compliments at Nami, critique the sh*tty bar food like he was a damned Michelin judge. It was a different side of him than Zoro saw when he was on the job, but not that different. He still wanted those hands in his hair.

Sanji braced on Zoro’s leg, leaning across his lap. “So, who does your hair around here?” he asked Usopp, who had moved around the table to sit on Zoro’s other side at some point. “I didn’t think there were any good Black hair places for a country mile around here.”

Usopp laughed. “Oh, I go down to my cousins in Pigeon Forge for it,” he said, tugging on a twist. “Good excuse to visit.”

Sanji nodded, his loose hair drifting over Zoro’s bare arm. “Would they be willing to let me shadow sometimes?” he asked. “I’ve always wanted to learn, but-” He gestured around and almost hit Zoro in the face. “Oh, sweetheart, I’m sorry!” he said, patting Zoro’s chest in apology. He stared at his own hand. “Oh, wow.”

“I’ll ask, and I’m out,” Usopp declared, taking his drink to hide behind Nami and Luffy’s loud argument about nothing. “Y’all have fun!”

Sanji didn’t hear him, watching his hand curl on Zoro’s pec. He breathed. “Oh, my.”

Zoro took a chance and Sanji’s belt loop, tugging him so the bit of stomach just above his belt pressed against Zoro’s leg. Sanji shook himself a little.

“You know,” Zoro shot his shot, “this bar has a back alley.”

Sanji blinked - got it. He laughed, falling forward to drop his forehead on Zoro’s shoulder. “Sounds gross,” he groaned.

Zoro’s fingers crawled up to tug Sanji’s shirt out of his pants, just enough to touch skin. Sanji shuddered. “Well, do you still live with your old man?” he asked as he thumbed circles into Sanji’s hip. “I’m stuck in the middle of the woods with these harpies now, we wouldn’t get a moment’s peace if we went there.”

“But then I could make breakfast for everyone,” Sanji said. Zoro swallowed. Sanji’s mouth was extremely close to his neck.

“Another time.”

Sanji pushed off him to look him in the eye. “Yeah?”

Zoro nodded. “Yeah.” Sanji bloomed.

Zoro left Nami to close out. Whatever, she’d just deduct it from his paycheck. More important than his financial situation was finding a place without straight people around, where Zoro could finally see if Sanji’s bark matched his bite. Sanji’s new place was in sort-of-not-really walking distance from their trivia bar, but Zoro didn’t mind a walk through badly lit, car-oriented neighborhoods to sober Sanji up a little. He wasn’t blackout, but he was a little silly-tipsy, all hands and giggles, getting lost telling Zoro random anecdotes while not missing a single turn down streets not designed with pedestrians in mind. Zoro kept him from getting hit by a car and touched back. He could finally touch back.

Sanji paused at the dark corner of a red light, sweaty arm against Zoro’s. “Almost there,” he promised. “God, I can’t wait to take my shoes off.”

Zoro glanced down at Sanji’s feet. He was in dress shoes instead of his usual Docs. “They’re nice,” he tried.

“Of course they are,” Sanji snapped. “But I didn’t think I’d be walking home when I put them on!”

“Oh yeah?” The light changed in their favor. Zoro put his hand on Sanji’s lower back to urge him across. “What did you think would happen, anyway?”

“That I’d watch you have fun with your friends from across the bar and go home alone,” he said. So his boss had asked that for a reason, huh? “They weren’t supposed to recognize me from freakin’ Instagram and recruit me to y’all’s trivia team.”

“They all follow you,” Zoro told him, hopping onto the grassy median. “They’re obsessed with you.”

Sanji psshed, bumping into him hard enough to almost send Zoro sprawling into the weeds. “What’s there to be obsessed with?” he complained. “I’m a not-even-divorced dead end bisexual with too many piercings and tattoos and a record, who won’t move out of this useless town because I actually like it here.”

Zoro considered that laundry list. “Those all sound good to me.”

“Of course they do, you have no standards.” He turned into an apartment complex, thank God. “But normal people think I’m lame, or weird.”

Man, that Pudding chick had really done a number on him. Zoro caught his wrist and pulled him in, right in the middle of the late-night parking lot. “Hey.” Sanji blinked at him. “It’s okay if you’re weird.” He reached up and tucked Sanji’s long hair behind his ear. It was soft. “Most people are.”

Sanji’s mouth parted. Zoro thought about-

Sanji grabbed his face and kissed him, hard. Zoro wrapped his arm around that skinny waist and kissed back, all slippery tongues and gross night sweat. Finally.

Sanji yanked back with a gasp, panting in Zoro’s face. “Inside,” he said, “before I f*ck you on the sidewalk.”

Zoro swallowed. “Yessir.”

Sanji probably had a nice apartment. He seemed like the type. But Zoro couldn’t really tell, since Sanji shoved him through the door as soon as it was unlocked and pushed Zoro down on his couch, sitting in his lap and attacking his face. Zoro opened his mouth and let his hands go wild, all over that broad back, tight ass, soft hair. He pulled Sanji’s legs as wide as his jeans would go, thrusting their clothed hips together. Sanji bit his tongue. Zoro groaned.

Sanji ripped away, breath hot on Zoro’s face. “Hey,” he said, backlit by the parking lot floodlights outside. Zoro panted. “You want me to be mean to you, right?”

“Oh, hell yeah-” Sanji gripped Zoro’s hair at the roots and yanked. Zoro whimpered. “f*ck, f*ck.”

“That’s it,” Sanji breathed, wide eyes fixed on Zoro’s face. Zoro struggled to keep his own open. “f*ck, I love your noises.” Sanji dove down to bite his neck. Zoro hissed, writhing. He was pinned. He loved it. “Gonna make you make ‘em all,” Sanji planted in his tendons.

Zoro shoved his hand down Sanji’s jeans. Sanji reached down with his free hand to unbutton them, loosening them enough for Zoro to go deeper, not letting off from gnawing at Zoro’s neck. Zoro squeezed. Sanji yelped. Zoro grinned and did it again. Sanji slapped his chest. “Quit it!”

“Oh, so you’re the only one allowed to like noises?” Zoro asked. He weaseled his other hand in for the other cheek. Sanji had more ass than it looked. f*cking leg day ass motherf*cker. Sanji sucked his entire earlobe in his mouth, earrings and all. Zoro knocked his head back, hitting the wall behind the couch, Sanji’s teeth catching on the earrings and pulling them tight. “sh*t.”

Sanji’s hand on top of his head slid to the back, cradling the sore spot. “Baby.” Zoro felt around with his mouth until Sanji got the picture and kissed him again. Sanji rolled into Zoro’s hands, setting a rhythm, kind of almost bumping into Zoro’s dick on every other pass.

Sanji tugged up Zoro’s shirt one-handed. He had to let go of Zoro’s mouth and hair to get it off. Zoro’s shoulders lifted from the couch, which wasn’t really deep enough for two grown men to sit on like this. “Do you like your bed?” he asked.

“It’s new,” Sanji said. “I f*cking love it.”

“Damn,” Zoro cursed. “Guess we won’t break it, then.” Sanji giggled - still a little tipsy, then. Zoro slid down the couch - slipped sideways. Sanji laughed as he landed on Zoro’s hips, which would’ve been great except for the f*cking angle, Jesus Christ that hurt. Zoro extracted his hands from warm denim and hot ass to shove him off. Sanji took it one roll farther and flipped to his feet, kicking off his shoes and chunking them at the door before stripping off his jeans. He sat back down on Zoro in just his shirt and underwear. Zoro could finally see the thigh piece that had teased him through the rips in Sanji’s jeans for months. It was some elaborate Mother Mary Catholic bullsh*t, screened over by dark leg hair. Would Sanji make him convert so they could raise kids together?

Sanji splayed his hands over Zoro’s ribs, drinking him in. Zoro laid there and let him look. “You’re sinful,” Sanji whispered, hair shading his face.

“If you start going in on that Christian nonsense, I’m out.” Sanji’s teeth flashed. Zoro shifted so the cut of Sanji’s pelvis dug into a less awkward spot on his leg, their body hair catching like Velcro. “You’re hairy.”

“Yes, darling,” Sanji crooned, stroking over the dust of Zoro’s chest hair with the flat of his palm. “And you’re not.”

“No sh*t.” Sanji bit his lip, just looking, and Zoro had a brain blast. “Do you even know what to do with a guy?” Sanji glared. Zoro winced. “I mean - not like you need to have both experiences to be bi, I know that, I just-”

“Oh my God.” Sanji reached down to Zoro’s crotch and grabbed his dick through his shorts. Zoro jerked. “Please shut the f*ck up.”

“f*cked the shut up,” Zoro replied through gritted teeth. Sanji showed his.

“I know enough to treat you right,” Sanji promised, feeling out Zoro’s bulge with his long fingers. “The rest, we’ll figure out as we go.”

“A’ight.” Zoro tucked a hand into the fold of Sanji’s leg, reaching up with the other until he felt hair - head hair. “Get down here.”

Sanji smiled at him, indulgent, heavy. Zoro’s belly squirmed. “For what?” he teased, feeling up Zoro with no real purpose.

“So I can buy you a pony,” Zoro bit out. “Why the hell do you think, asshole?”

Sanji draped over him, limb by limb. He used the new angle to worm his hand under Zoro’s waistband, most of his body squeezed between Zoro and the couch back. “Aw, you want to take me for a ride, marimo?” Sanji adjusted Zoro’s dick to point up, tugging it as he mouthed over Zoro’s face, dragging his beard everywhere. “I wouldn’t mind.”

Zoro snarled his hand in Sanji’s hair, hauling him down for a biting kiss. Sanji melted, hand still working, button on his shirt scraping over Zoro’s nipple. Ow. Zoro rutted into it. Sanji’s support arm curled around the top of Zoro’s head, hand cupping his ear, fingers playing with his earrings. The kiss slowed to idle working, languid, tight tugs on Zoro’s dick. Sanji’s own was sandwiched against Zoro’s thigh.

Zoro f*cked up Sanji’s hair, pulling on tangles, scratching over the buzzed sidecut by his left ear. Sanji hummed. “I can tie it back,” he said into Zoro’s mouth. “I know it’s annoying, it’ll just be in the way.”

“Nuh-uh.” Zoro gathered it up, wrapped it around his hand. “Don’t you f*ckin’ dare.”

Zoro watched Sanji’s lashes flutter, biting on Zoro’s lip instead of his own, wiggling around. Zoro was going to fall off this couch.

He pulled Sanji’s hand out of his pants so he could get up. Sanji blinked at him, still in his scrunched-up lay - yelped when Zoro grabbed his feet. “Hey!”

Zoro spun him around so he sat on the couch properly, then yanked off his underwear and made Sanji slide forward so his hips were near the edge. “What the hell-” Zoro went to his knees. “Oh f*ck.” Sanji fumbled at his shirt buttons. “Oh, f*ck.”

Zoro left him to the last of his clothes and got to work, one arm around Sanji’s waist, the other stroking through the hair on Sanji’s calf as he swallowed his dick down. Zoro’s eyes closed - God, he had missed this, of all things. His brain and mouth hollowed out, hair in his nose and smell in his eyes. Sanji’s dick was extremely suckable. He bet that bitch never did it.

Hands went to his head. His roots were more abused tonight than after an hour of being soaked in bleach. “Oh, Jesus, Mary, and Joseph,” Sanji gasped, rutting up into Zoro’s mouth. “Yeah, just like that.” Zoro looked up at him to meet hazy eyes, framed in the square of white window light, hair f*cked up, beard swished around, shirt open to a chest even hairier than his limbs. Zoro bobbed, having a great time. Sanji could use him like this for hours and not even get him off, and Zoro would say thank you.

“Oh, you enjoy this, don’t you?” Sanji muttered. He stroked fingers over the suck of Zoro’s cheek, poking himself through Zoro’s face. They both shivered. “Oh, darling, you’re wasted on being in public,” he sighed. “I should lock you up in here for a month and just keep you on my dick-” He cut himself off, lip deep enough in his teeth that his incisors scratched beard hair. Zoro moaned, clutching Sanji tighter, gripping his ankle, other leg trapped between Zoro’s thighs. “Oh,” Sanji breathed. “f*ck, you actually like that?”

Yeah, Zoro f*ckin’ liked that. He swallowed Sanji into his throat to prove it, vision blurring as the tears finally hit. Sanji hissed and gripped Zoro by the nape, keeping him down. “f*ck - stay right there, gorgeous.” Zoro breathed through his nose as best he could. Sanji kicked his leg free of Zoro’s light ankle hold to drape it over Zoro’s shoulder, heel digging into his midback. Zoro palmed at his own dick, just enough to take the edge off - oh, even better. He pulled Sanji’s trapped calf closer, a warm object that wasn’t himself to rut against.

“You’re good - you’re so good,” Sanji muttered, head back, necklace banging as he thrust up into Zoro’s mouth. It was some kind of silver plate charm. Zoro would investigate it when Sanji was sick of not letting him breathe.

Zoro dug the fingers of the arm around Sanji’s waist into his hip in a tempo, encouraging a pace that Zoro could actually maintain. Sanji found it and kept it, shallow dips, breathy babbly imagery pouring out of his mouth. If he could do half of the things he promised, Zoro wouldn’t mind being locked away.

Sanji’s dick twitched hard. Zoro sniffed and braced himself, not letting Sanji back off. “Oh- oh-”

Sanji came with a sigh, brine in the back of Zoro’s mouth. Zoro swallowed it down, head swimming from the light oxygen, heavy dick on his tongue. Man, he had missed this sh*t way too much.

Sanji stroked Zoro’s face as he came down, all of his fingertips exploring. “Lovely,” he gasped. The space between Zoro’s shoulders where a socked heel dug was hot, the bottoms of his feet folded under him itchy. “Oh, that was perfect, thank you, marimo.”

Zoro pulled off slowly, lowering the leg on his shoulder back to the floor, kissing down it with swollen lips. “Don’t be weird,” he said - f*ck, his voice was f*cked up.

Sanji chuckled. “Of course not.” He cupped Zoro’s face in both hands. “Hello, darling,” Sanji said, dopey grin on his flushed face, hair even worse than before the blowj*b, somehow. “How’re you feeling?”

Zoro took stock. Sanji’s face softened even more, the weirdo. “A little stiff,” he admitted, still dick-raspy. “Your carpet sucks.”

Sanji laughed, pulling him up to a high kneel to kiss him, a long smack. “We can find you a more comfortable spot,” he promised. Kissed him again. Zoro braced on Sanji’s knees, surging into it, again, again. Sanji’s grin wasn’t going away. “That was good,” he muttered into Zoro’s mouth.

Zoro huffed, scraping his front teeth over Sanji’s mustache, noses bumping. “That compliment sh*t doesn’t do anything for me,” he growled.

“Oh?” Sanji dragged a hand down Zoro’s chest, rubbing the heel of his hand into Zoro’s pec, palm cupped over his nipple. Zoro pushed into it, Sanji’s knee just barely making contact with his clothed dick. “Funny,” Sanji drawled. “Seemed to do a lot for you when you were on your knees for me.”

“Still am,” Zoro pointed out. “On my knees, I mean.”

Sanji hummed, kissing him again. “So you are.” Another kiss. “Would you like to not be?”

“It’s been a long ass day,” Zoro said. “And we’ve got a seven-thirty tour in the morning.”

Sanji laughed, right in Zoro’s ear. Zoro bit his cheek and stayed strong. “Let me take you to bed, sweetheart,” he said. “Treat you as good as you’ve treated me.”

Zoro snorted. “If you’ve sucked a dick in your life, then I’ll eat Luffy’s hat.”

Sanji grinned and nipped Zoro’s nose. “First time for everything. Now get up.”

Later, after Sanji had failed spectacularly at sucking dick, but had been pretty damn good with his hands instead, Zoro collapsed face-down on Sanji’s overstuffed pillows, groaning, ass sore, sheets sticking to his sweaty skin. He had forgotten how gross sex made him. Them. f*ck, why did he have to work in the morning?

The balcony door slid open. Zoro turned his head to watch a robed Sanji trudge back inside, cigarette smell wafting in from the balcony until the door closed. “You didn’t hafta smoke outside,” Zoro yawned. “It’s your house.”

“Yeah, and it’s my security deposit,” Sanji shot back as he shucked off the robe. “Do you know what a pain in the ass it is to find a place that lets you smoke in the building anymore?” he bitched. He tossed the robe to the floor and flipped back the f*cked-up covers, baring Zoro’s back to the open air as he crawled in. “Quitting’s easier than that.”

Zoro almost asked why he didn’t, but. He didn’t. Another night, maybe. Tonight, he watched Sanji’s profile as he fussed around on his side of the bed, refusing to settle down and conk out like Zoro wanted to do. “Did y’wanna - talk, before we went to sleep?” he asked. Sanji would probably work himself into a wordless lather forever if Zoro didn’t push him.

Sanji paused while plugging in his phone and tilted back, staring at his popcorn ceiling. Zoro waited. The pillowcase was bunched under his cheek, and his arms were falling asleep under it, but if he moved, Sanji might stop thinking, and then he’d never get a proper answer.

Sanji sighed with his whole body and looked over at him - got distracted by his back. Zoro smirked. Sanji gulped. “Uh.” Zoro’s smirk grew. “Can…” Zoro flexed. Sanji buried his face in his hands. “f*ck, this is embarrassing.”

“I just had basically your whole hand up my ass, so-”

“Can I give you a massage?” Sanji blurted out. Zoro snorted, twitching in Sanji’s bed. “You said you wouldn’t laugh!” Sanji snapped.

“No I f*ckin’ didn’t.” Sanji sneered at him. Zoro shrugged. “Sure,” he said. “Not sure why you’re so worked up about it, but if you wanna, I ain’t got no problems with it. Not sure what you get out of it, but whatever.”

Sanji grumped, huffing out of his bed to the bathroom. “f*ck off.” Zoro kicked at the sheets with his feet to push them down more as Sanji snatched up some lotion or whatever. He banged it on the stand on Zoro’s side of the bed and mounted Zoro on the back of his thighs. “Oh, now I get it,” Zoro drawled, pushing his ass back onto Sanji’s soft dick. He bet that was a view, after what Sanji had done to his hole.

“Shut up and stay still,” Sanji ordered. Zoro liked that. He liked how casually bossy Sanji was. He liked even more how it didn’t disappear in bed, like with some of his previous hookups who had been mouthy in the streets but mousy in the sheets. Sanji rubbed lotion in his hands, then pushed both hands up the sides of Zoro’s spine, strong pressure and slick skin. Zoro moaned and melted into it. Nice.

“Don’t fall asleep,” Sanji warned him. Zoro made no promises. This guy knew what the f*ck he was doing. Zoro could fall in love with those hands.

“P- my ex didn’t really like - any of this,” Sanji admitted in a quiet voice. “She liked being pampered, sure, but - the aftercare was overwhelming, for her, most of the time.” Oh, now Zoro was awake. “She didn’t like me talking that much during sex, or telling her what to do, which I get, but-”

“No, I don’t get.” Zoro looked over his shoulder at Sanji, who was only wearing his saint’s medallion and a startled look, hands still on Zoro’s lower back. “It’s fine for her not to like things,” he said, “but all that - that’s you,” he said. “If she didn’t like half the sh*t you did and that you like doing, then what was the f*cking point of her dating you? Just because you were supposed to?” He snorted. “That’s bullsh*t.”

Sanji stared at him. “I could snap your neck right now,” he breathed. “Dump your body in a river and make it look like an accident.”

Zoro groaned and did the whole rigamarole of turning over and sitting up. Sanji bucked along for the ride, hands full of lotion as he tried to stay upright without ruining his comforter. Zoro sat cross-legged facing Sanji, sheets bunched up around them.

“Look,” he said. “I know that your relationship with that chick was a big part of your life, and now it’s gone, and that f*cking sucks.” He didn’t think about the uniform Luffy had hosted a bonfire party for, the trunk or treat kids, the smell of the station and the weight of the belt. “But, fixating on it won’t mean it didn’t happen at all, or make it magically better.”

He took one of Sanji’s hands and rubbed the lotion in his palm up the inside of Sanji’s arm, circling it in until there wasn’t white caught on any hair. He swallowed. “I can’t fix it, either,” he said to the inside of Sanji’s elbow. “But I can let you do my hair, and boss me around, and make breakfast.” He repeated the lotioning with Sanji’s other forearm. Huh, it was kind of nice to pay attention to someone else like this. “I don’t want you to be a lapdog, or gay or straight, or anyone else but you, because I think you’re funny and smart and one hell of a cook, and what kind of asshole would I be if I tried to change that?”

He lifted Sanji’s hands to his mouth, kissing one palm, then the other, watching Sanji’s face. He looked like Zoro had just dropped a mountain on him. It was awesome.

Zoro smiled against Sanji’s fingers, licking the ring on his right index. “Deal?”

Sanji’s breath rattled in his chest. “I’ve never hated someone so much in my life,” he swore. Zoro nipped his thumb. “How dare you?”

Zoro shrugged. “Guess I’m tired of dancing around it.” Sanji’s mouth trembled. Zoro turned Sanji’s hands so they could touch Zoro properly. Sanji’s nails dug into the hollows behind his ears. “If you’re in, then I’m in, Blondie.”

Sanji sniffed. “I’m going to do the weirdest things to your hair,” he choked out. “And you’re not allowed to say sh*t.”

Zoro smiled. “Looking forward to it.”

“Did I really have to come in for this?” Zoro whined as he sat down at Sanji’s station. “Why can’t we do this in the kitchen like usual?”

“Because my kitchen doesn’t have the entire Pulp Riot catalog or stain-resistant sinks,” Sanji retorted, whipping a cape around Zoro’s shoulders and snapping it shut. “Kitchen cuts work for maintenance and straight men, but your roots are atrocious. If I have to see them one more day, I’m ripping them out and planting them in Usopp’s garden.”

“Like you even could,” Zoro shot back.

Sanji rolled his eyes and flipped him off in the mirror. Zoro made jerk-*ff motions under the cape. Sanji gasped. “There are ladies present!” he hissed, slapping Zoro upside the head. Zoro grimaced, rubbing the spot.

“Sanji-boy, be nice,” Iva called from across the salon. “We worked hard on getting you that boyfriend, I’m not paying for a replacement!”

“Oh, can it, you old hag!” he yelled back. Caroline chuckled, exchanging weighted eye contact with her own client in the mirror. Sanji pulled a face. “Can’t take y’all anywhere,” he grumbled, pulling Zoro’s hair apart to look at the roots.

“Hey.” Sanji hummed. What about stars? Stars would be a cool pattern, especially now that his subject was a captive in his bedroom at least three times a week. “Hey.”

“What?” he snapped, glaring at Zoro in the mirror. Zoro shook a hand free of the cape, holding it up, open and empty. Sanji stuck his tongue out, but gave him his own, cheeks heating up even before Zoro put his mouth to the inside of Sanji’s wrist. Maybe he should get a tattoo there, so Zoro always knew his spot.

“Oh, f*ck off,” Sanji grumbled.

“Nope.” Zoro dropped his hand. “So, what’re we thinking?”

Sanji hummed. “Well…”