Archive of Our Own ^beta

Zoro had never seen Sanji cry. It just didn't happen. He didn't even cry when he fell off the swing and broke his collar bone last year. So finding his best friend and self-proclaimed rival crying quietly on the one of the playground's picnic benches that sat in the corner of the play yard was certainly a surprise. In fact, Zoro would go as far to say that he was shocked. "Curly? Are okay?" the boy asked, approaching the sniffling blond cautiously.

"Go away." Sanji grumbled, viciously rubbing at his teary eyes with the sleeve of his jacket and bringing his knees up to his chest.

"What're you crying for?" Zoro asked, becoming slightly annoyed by Sanji's odd behavior. He sat down next to the blond, punching his arm lightly.

"I said go away dammit!" Sanji snapped, burying his red face into his knees.

"Not until you tell me what's wrong!" Zoro snapped back, giving the other boy a strained look. He didn't like seeing the person he considered his rival acting so pathetic nor did he like him looking so damn sad.

Sanji sniffed quietly into his knees before lifting his head to give the other boy a tear filled gaze. "Well you know its valentine's day today, right?" the boy asked, giving his watery eyes one last swipe.

"Yeah, so? What's that got to do with anything?" Zoro asked, beginning to pick his nose.

"What do you mean 'so what'?" This is a big deal! It's the day of love and romance!" Sanji proclaimed, throwing his arms in the air with a small flourish.

"I like the day after valentines better. That's when my dad and I go to the store to get all the cheap leftover chocolates," Zoro mused, pulling his finger out of his nose and flicking a rather large booger from his finger.

Sanji gave the other boy a disgusted look before continuing his small rant. "You're such an undignified Neanderthal. I wouldn't expect someone like /you/ to understand something like romance and love."

"Would you get to the point already lover boy?" Zoro snorted, rolling his eyes at the over dramatic child.

Sanji glared at nickname, giving the smirking boy a rough kick in the knee. "Well I was thinking that maybe I could ask Nami to be my valentine this year..." Sanji muttered, a light blush breaking across his cheeks.

"Pfft. You asked /Nami/? She's so snooty and she's a whole grade younger than you."

"She's not snooty! She's just passionate about certain things." Sanji shouted, immediately springing to the red haired girl's defense. "And age is but a number... Love knows no bounds... It's like-"

"You're such a weirdo," Zoro interrupted, snickering at the other child.

"Speak for yourself moss ball." Sanji snapped, shooting the green haired boy a glare before continuing with his tale of woe. "So I picked some dandelions for her and I was even going to give her the other half of my pack of gum! I went right up to her after we were dismissed for recess but before I could even ask her to be my valentine she and all of her friends just started laughing at me. I... I didn't know why she was laughing. I thought I did everything right! I did everything the movies said but she still laughed. I didn't know what to do so I- I just ran away."

Zoro watched as Sanji's face seemed to crumble, tears building up in his eyes yet again. The blond hiccupped quietly, trying, and failing, to hold back a sob.

"Hey... Hey it's okay Sanji. She's just a dumb girl; you still have time to get another valentine, right?" Zoro questioned, feeling the need to comfort the weepy blond.

"But I don't want another valentine!" Sanji wailed, not bothering to wipe away the snot dribbling out of his nose.

"What do you need a valentine for anyway? It's not like you wanted to kiss her or anything."

"N-no. Kissing is gross!" Sanji agreed quietly, continuing to let fat tears slide down his cheeks. "But I was thinking that if she had agreed we could have... Never mind. It's not important anyway."

Zoro raised his brow, giving the other boy a curious look. "You could have what?"

"I don't know. I guess we could have held hands or something." Sanji muttered, blushing hotly at the idea of being able to hold hands with the cute third grader that had just turned him down.

Zoro thought for a moment, looking as though he was deep in thought. The boy blinked a final time before grinning as an idea blossomed in his mind. "Hey curly, you can hold hands with me if you want!" Zoro proclaimed loudly, looking immensely proud of himself for thinking up the idea.

"What? No way! That'd be weird!" Sanji shrieked, looking rather horrified at the mosshead's 'brilliant' idea.

Zoro cocked his head to the side, confused by the other boy's outburst. "Why would that be weird?"

"Well because... I don't know! It just is!" he squawked, becoming more and more flustered as the conversation continued. "You're a boy! I can't hold hands with you!"

"Who cares if I'm a boy? You said you wanted to hold hands so we should just hold hands!"

"It's not that simple though." Sanji mumbled, still red faced with embarrassment.

"Why do you gotta make everything so difficult?" Zoro groused, reaching over to grab Sanji's hand and clasping his fingers together with the other boy's before the blond could even think about pulling his hand away.

"See curly? This ain't so bad. I bet holding hands with me is just like holding hands with some girl!" Zoro smiled, running his thumb across the top of Sanji's smaller, paler hand.

"You're an idiot," Sanji mumbled, turning away from the other child's gaze.

"Speak for yourself Curlybrow," Zoro grinned, happy that his friend seemed to be back to his old self. "Hey Sanji, this holding hands thing was actually pretty nice. Can we do it again tomorrow?" he asked, scooting closer to the blond.

"Of course we can't. It's not valentine's day tomorrow," Sanji answered, unconsciously tightening his grip around the other boy's hand.

"Well that's dumb. We'll just have to make it Valentine's Day everyday then!"

Sanji let out a loud sigh, obviously exasperated by Zoro's logic. "You really do have moss for brains," Sanji murmured, leaning over and placing his head on Zoro's bony solider.

Neither boy seemed to notice the blush that spread across one another's cheeks. Or perhaps they simply didn't care.