Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Wado clashed with Kitetsu, the metal ringing out a single high note through the dojo, followed by a scrape as the blades separated again, then another rhythmic ring a few seconds later.

Swiftness met strength, but neither would budge, so they broke apart, both of them sliding back on the mats a few feet.

Then, she dropped low on a split decision, sticking Wado’s hilt in her mouth and bringing hands to the ground to balance as she swept at his legs with a fast rotating kick.

He dodged though, springing up over her leg, and she just managed to transfer Wado to her hand again and block, when he swung both his swords at her in a downward arc.

She let out a frustrated sound, but he merely smirked, pushing against her blade with precise control, enough to force her back into a quick recovery, twisting herself out of the way and pivoting on feet fluidly until she was standing opposite him again, Wado held in both hands.

She tried again, this time aiming a high kick for his chin as a distraction, keeping the momentum going enough to whip around once more and slice at his stomach.

But he avoided it somehow, almost effortlessly, ducking under her leg and then nearly knocking Wado from her grip with the force of his own swing.

It was no good. He was still always one step ahead of her, seemed to be able to anticipate or react to whatever she threw at him with less than a second’s notice.

Even after all these years, she’d only been able to land small nicks and scratches, the closest call being when she nearly took out his left eye. It wasn’t that she wanted to hurt him. But she certainly wished, on days like this, that her dad would fucking start to suck a little.

Time to try a cheap tactic, but one that was sure to catch him off-guard.

She swung out in a rather obvious attack, one he met easily with his swords. But immediately after that, she told him, “I got the scholarship,” and received the reaction she’d been hoping for.

“What?!” he screeched in surprise, and she took the opportunity to flick her wrist and make him lose Yubashiri, the sword clattering to the ground a few feet away.

“Ha!” Tana laughed triumphantly as Zoro gaped at her, grinning and twirling Wado back to her side confidently. “That’s one sword down. That should be worth a million points~”

“Wha—like hell!” Zoro stammered, and the match was indefinitely postponed seeing as he’d lowered Kitetsu and continued to stand there with his jaw dropped and a look of disbelief on his face.

She just smirked and backed up a few steps.

“Wanna go again?” she asked, raising her sword as he hastily picked up Yubashiri, but not for the purpose of sparring.

“Wait, wait, wait, back up—you’re serious?” he spluttered, returning both swords to the sheathes he’d belted to his hip.

Tana grinned, seeing as he was apparently giving up for now, and sheathed Wado as well, walking over to the wall where she’d tossed her jacket and pulling an envelope out of the pocket.

“I’m serious,” she said, crossing back to him to slap the paper to his chest.

The swordsman felt like his head was spinning as he slipped a finger under the flap of the already-opened envelope.

“H-How much did they give you?” was Zoro’s next question.

“Read it,” Tana insisted, coming up beside him and resting an elbow on his shoulder as he did just that.

It only took him a few seconds before he let out a shuddering breath and brought a hand up to drag through his hair in disbelief.

“Holy shi—a full ride—?”

She bit her lip and nodded excitedly.

Zoro stared at the paper for a minute more, reading and rereading to make sure he hadn’t missed a detail—make sure this was really happening.

Of course he’d known she could do it. He’d been there to watch her during her demo for the recruiters. His uncle had gone too, and to hear Mihawk agree that she’d done the best had been a huge moment of pride for him.

But part of him thought back some twenty-odd years, remembering how devastated Kuina had been when she hadn’t received the money she’d needed. When a dream of hers had died.

And yet, here he stood, holding an official document from Grand Line University, awarding Tana Roronoa a full-tuition scholarship for kendo.

Slowly, he lifted his head to look at her again, saw the way she met his eye with sheer joy.

“Holy shit,” he stammered again. Then, “Holy fuck! Tana!”

Hands reached out to grab her shoulders, giving her a shake, and he leaned in to kiss her forehead and smush her to his chest.

The swordsman bumped his nose against her hair, held it there for a minute and closed his eyes, a chuckle leaving him.

“I knew you could do it,” he murmured, a hand circling her head gently.

Then he pulled back, meeting her grin head-on, not having to look far as she was nearly his height now. A thumb stroked gently over her jaw.

“M’so fucking proud of you,” he said. “And your mom would be too.”

Tana’s smile softened, arms, still around her dad from the hug, giving a squeeze.

“Thanks, Dad,” she replied, then added, “I know I would’ve been in student loan debt hell for the rest of my life otherwise.”

“Yeah, you’re tellin’ me,” he muttered, rubbing a hand over her back, and he had to breathe a sigh of relief for that as well.

“Oh, your dad lets you practice without a uniform now?”

A smooth voice from the doorway, and the two of them turned to see Sanji standing there, still in his work clothes, one leg crossed over the other as he leaned casually against the doorframe, surveying the scene before him.

Tana looked down sheepishly at her flannel shirt and jeans that she hadn’t even changed out of to practice. But thankfully, the topic was soon forgotten when the cook noticed he’d actually interrupted something.

“Should I leave and come back?” he asked, straightening with a smirk. “Was this a bonding moment?”

Zoro and Tana exchanged a look, Zoro handing her back the letter and jerking his chin towards Sanji.

She grinned and hurried over to the curious cook, who took the letter from her with a quirked brow. Before he’d even opened it, though, he saw the university insignia stamped on the page, and sucked in a breath, looking up at Tana briefly with hope before he opened the letter to be sure.

And a manic grin spread across his face as well when he read the news, the blond laughing ecstatically before pulling the girl in for a tight hug and a kiss to her cheek.

“Fucking shit! I knew you could do it!” he exclaimed happily, and she laughed too, wrapping arms around his waist to return the hug.

“That’s what my dad said,” she snickered. “Thanks for proofreading my essay. Think that probably helped.”

Sanji snorted, pulling back from the hug.

“Better me than your father,” he said.

“Hey!”

Tana looked over at her dad following his outburst. Unsurprisingly, he was now glaring at the cook with the usual annoyance.

“Dad, can you even spell ‘scholarship’?” she teased, her look turning skeptical, especially when he struggled for words and finally burst out an indignant, “YES!” a second later.

“Don’t make him try,” Sanji added. Though, on second thought, it might be amusing, he considered with an evil chuckle. “Who else have you told?” he asked her instead.

“No one yet. Just you two,” Tana said, talking over her dad’s irritable grumbling in the background. “I wanted to tell Oliver, but he’s got a stupid date tonight. Figured I shouldn’t interrupt.”

“That girl you said he liked before?” Sanji asked.

“No, it’s a new one. I just heard about her this week. For two hours on Skype. He wouldn’t shut up about her,” Tana replied, clearly not enthused.

“Oh jeez,” the cook muttered. “Older woman?”

“Younger,” she corrected.

“Younger? What the hell—it’s his first year at college! Any younger and she’d still be in—”

“Exactly. She’s a year younger than me—a junior. I doubt it’ll last.”

Sanji glanced to Zoro then, who at least seemed to have simmered down a bit with the conversation change.

“Do Robin and Franky know about this?” Sanji asked, and Zoro gave a little scoff in reply.

“Uh, yeah. Robin texted me today. She basically did a whole fucking FBI search on the girl. Her name’s Meri. Her dad’s an art professor at Oliver’s school, and her mom works at the medical school,” Zoro muttered, recounting the long-ass investigative message that Robin had sent him. “Think she got Thomas to help her though ‘cause Franky was the only one relaxed about it.”

The poor kid...as if Thomas didn’t have enough shit to deal with, taking his SATs early.

Honestly, Zoro had skimmed the rest of the text when Robin began detailing what clubs the girl was in at school. He didn’t even want to know how she’d found all that out.

“And if your daughter had a date, you’d be just as bad,” Sanji scolded, glancing over at Tana to back him up.

“Yeah, and that’s why I’ll never tell him if I do,” she muttered under her breath to Sanji, who smirked.

“What was that?” Zoro squawked, but the two of them ignored him.

Thankfully, the sound of a phone vibrating interrupted them, and Tana instantly jumped.

“Oh shit! I bet that’s Uli!” Tana exclaimed, rushing to her phone still buried beneath her jacket on the floor. She tapped out her passkey at top speed, flipping through to her messages. “Fuck. Yeah, it is. Dad, can I take the car?”

“Uh. How ‘bout you tell me where you’re going? What are you doing. Who are you going with,” Zoro deadpanned in response, causing his daughter to roll her eyes as she hastily pulled her hair up into a short ponytail.

“Does it matter?” she asked, gathering her things and taking off the sword belt that held Wado, shoving it at her dad. “Put this away for me—Akashi’s meeting us and we’re gonna do drugs under the highway bridge. Car keys?”

Zoro took Wado hastily, then automatically dug in his back pocket and tossed them at her.

She caught the keys easily in one hand, and it was only then that he realized exactly what she’d said, temporarily distracted by her abrupt change in topic.

“OI! Yer not doin’ drugs!” he screeched, but she just laughed.

“Fine, then….I’m going to the courthouse to finally change my name,” Tana amended teasingly, shooting a smirk at Sanji, who nodded proudly. “I’ll tell Grandpa I’m leaving.” Then she leaned in to kiss Zoro’s cheek, the swordsman narrowing eyes at his daughter.

“Bye, Dad! I’ll be back by midnight!” she said, and hurried over to give Sanji a kiss on the cheek too and rush out the door before Zoro could enforce an earlier curfew.

Again, it was a beat too late that Zoro rushed forward to do just that, but Sanji stopped him, crossing over and pressing a hand to the other man’s chest.

Then he leaned in to capture the swordsman’s lips in a searing kiss to further distract him.

It lasted a long minute, the cook’s fingers migrating from his chest to his hair to drag him in closer. Maybe he had distracted him, but he could practically taste the over-protectiveness on his boyfriend’s lips.

“Relax,” the blond murmured when he pulled back an inch or two for air. “Uli’s there. You think his parents would let him get into drugs?”

Zoro made a soft noise of discontent, but he slid Wado into his belt as well so both hands could come around the cook’s waist.

“Vivi’s not the perfect princess you seem to think she is. And Kohza sure as hell isn’t a stranger to shit like that,” Zoro grumbled.

In any case, it was Akashi that worried him. His dad, Shanks, was one of the coolest guys they knew, certainly cooler than Luffy, and maybe even cooler than Ace. And the kid’s mom, Makino, was chill. But that was just it….they were too chill.

Sanji poked a finger to the deep furrow in Zoro’s brow.

“Wrinkles,” he warned, and decided to remedy that with a kiss to the same spot. “Honestly, mosshead, let her be. You never used to worry about this shit.”

“Yeah, well, I didn’t have a teenager…” Zoro grumbled.

“An adult,” Sanji reminded. “She’s eighteen now. And soon, she’ll graduate and go off to college in the fall, and you’ll be a lonely old man with an empty nest and no more control over her~”

“Urgh, shut up, don’t say that…” Zoro muttered, knocking his forehead into the cook’s and closing his eyes.

Sanji just snickered. As if Zoro ever had any control over his daughter anyway. She’d never gotten herself into any trouble (yet), and here the idiot was, acting like he’d had to constantly keep tabs on her.

Another annoyed sound from the swordsman, then he’d tilted his head to press lips to Sanji’s, kissing him slowly. He was tired after a long day of classes; he hadn’t seen Sanji all day, and the cook had done nothing but mess with him since appearing in the doorway. He needed to unwind. But what else was new.

Sanji kissed him back, and he felt the cook’s arms slide around his shoulders more comfortably, Zoro reciprocating by pulling him flush against him, hands working to untuck his white dress shirt so he could run them over smooth, milky skin.

Zoro’s lips shifted, after a minute, to press tender kisses along Sanji’s jaw, down to his neck where he knew the cook was sensitive, and also particularly delicious.

The blond made a soft noise in the back of his throat, tilting his head to give Zoro better access.

Calloused hands slid up Sanji’s back, sending pleasant shivers down his spine, and Sanji turned his head slightly to kiss Zoro’s face, just in front of his ear.

“She got the scholarship, Zoro,” he whispered somewhat breathlessly. “It’s all fucking happening.”

He felt Zoro’s lips turn up against the skin of his throat, then a teasing scrape of teeth before Zoro lifted his head to look Sanji in the eye.

“I know,” he replied with a grin. “You didn’t tell her about the restaurant.”

“I said before,” Sanji reminded, an excited grin coming to his face immediately after, raising a hand to brush the backs of knuckles over Zoro’s temple. The swordsman felt Sanji’s heartbeat pick up against his chest in excitement. “I don’t want to until I officially sign the papers. Pudding warned me I could still lose it before that. She almost lost her new place to a higher bidder last year.”

Zoro smirked and leaned in to give a reassuring peck to his lips.

“Right, well, okay, Mr. Paranoid. First, don’t listen to her, and second, you put a deposit down for it. You’re not gonna lose it,” he stated, and then the look on his face turned entirely mischievous, and maybe a little lecherous at that, before he asked, “What about getting married?”

Sanji dropped his head back, rolling his eyes dramatically to the ceiling, though he stayed right where he was with his arms around the dumb musclehead.

“I told you that too! Do you not listen to me ever? Not until after Tana’s graduation! Let her have her damn moment in the spotlight!” He scoffed loudly. “Can’t even get a decent proposal out of you, anyhow…”

Zoro looked pensive for a second before an idea seemed to strike him, and he quirked a brow handsomely.

“Well, you wanna go look at rings this weekend?”

Sanji stomped on his foot hard.

“Fuck no! Surprise me with one, dammit!” he complained, looking more than a little pleased with himself when Zoro let out a high-pitched cry of pain and doubled over his crushed foot.

“If you’re so concerned about making shit perfect, why don’t you ask me?” Zoro grunted out, trying to retaliate with a stomp of his own, but having no such luck as the cook danced away entirely.

“Because you wouldn’t appreciate any romantic lengths I’d go to!” Sanji exclaimed, avoiding Zoro’s hand when he tried to pull him back.

“Hmm…” Zoro thought. Then he gave an evil smirk. “Nah, probably not.”

He made another lunge for the cook, but this time, Sanji struck out with a leg, knocking Zoro’s arm away easily, much to the swordsman’s irritation.

“I swear,” Sanji huffed. “Why did I even bother falling for you. I put all that effort into figuring my shit out, all for you and your shitty feelings and for what?”

Zoro’s jaw dropped open, looking entirely offended by the asshole cook, and he acted fast. He shot out his hand again, grabbed the cook’s ankle while it was raised, and gave him a hard yank so he nearly lost his balance. Instead, Sanji could only hop forward on one foot awkwardly before Zoro snatched up his flailing wrist with his other hand and threw him down onto the mats.

The cook was still reeling from the impact, lying there flat on his back, head spinning a bit, when Zoro was suddenly atop him, crawling over to straddle his hips. A bruising kiss followed, one that Sanji was powerless to avoid. Not that he really wanted to anyway.

Sanji reciprocated, of course, despite his bitching from a minute ago, fisting a hand in Zoro’s hair and arching his back to press closer to the other man.

“Because I love you,” Zoro finally answered the cook’s question between kisses, voice low and rough in Sanji’s ear, and the blond grinned, nipping teeth at Zoro’s bottom lip, and pressing another kiss a second later to make up for it.

Zoro was right, but he wouldn’t be telling the mosshead that, not with words at least, though his kisses did turn a bit more tender, a bit more sentimental.

Zoro did love him, and that was incredible. It never ceased to make him feel incredible, that someone as strong as Zoro would hold him in such high regard, that he’d found the best friend and lover he’d ever had all wrapped up in a ball of moss. It was ridiculous, and amazing at the same time, and it made him feel more important and wanted than he ever could have imagined, certainly more than he had in his first thirty-one years of life until the brute had angrily stormed his apartment.

The swordsman lowered his body, sinking more of his weight slowly onto the cook, Sanji’s pulse racing when his lips again graced his neck.

Sanji had given him everything, restored everything in him, and he hadn’t cared how fucking long it had taken after that first impulsive kiss of his. He didn’t care that Sanji had been reluctant—understanding and desperate to make him happy, but reluctant nonetheless. He didn’t care that it had taken several months afterward for the cook to even kiss him back, close to a year before they agreed to, tentatively, be a couple.

Zoro didn’t give a fuck. He was just thankful that Sanji had reached back, that his own foolish spur-of-the-moment decision hadn’t ruined anything and had, in fact, changed his life for the better. He would have waited forever if he’d known that he was going to get this in the end.

Though he supposed that it had really started with his daughter. She’d found Sanji, after all.

“Look,” he panted over the cook’s lips eventually when they paused for air, hands having undone Sanji’s shirt buttons at some point, now massaging up and down his sides, coming low over his hips. “We can have whatever damn kind of wedding you want. Just….don’t invite your brothers. Your sister’s allowed, but not them. Come to think of it, maybe we should ban Luffy too.”

Sanji chuckled breathlessly, fingers playing gently with Zoro’s earrings as he caught his breath too.

“My brothers wouldn’t want to come. They haven’t said a damn word to me since they got out of Impel, and that’s how I’d like to keep it.”

“Cool,” Zoro replied. “Then you can tack ‘Roronoa’ onto the end of your name and separate yourself from them even more.”

Sanji made a face.

“Did Kuina take your last name?” he asked.

The swordsman opened his mouth to respond, then snapped it shut again and frowned.

“No…” he eventually admitted sulkily. “She didn’t wanna be Mrs. Roronoa….she thought it sounded weird.”

The cook laughed, shifting his hand to cup Zoro’s cheek, stretching a thumb to brush over that pout on Zoro’s lips.

“Well, duh. At the very least, ‘Vinsmoke’ is still a much cooler name. So why don’t you take mine?” he urged teasingly.

“Oh, come on, cook! You too?” Zoro screeched in protest, but it only made Sanji laugh harder.

“Fuck yeah!” Sanji insisted. “I’m with Kuina on this!”

Something about that statement had the swordsman’s heart flutter stupidly in his chest. It was one of the many things he loved about Sanji, that he actively brought up Kuina. She was never a topic to be avoided. The cook had never even met her, but he still gave her life, and for that alone, Zoro couldn’t help but dive in to kiss him again appreciatively.

He felt Sanji smile into the kiss, the cook’s fingers sliding back to thread in his hair again, more gently this time, though his lips were beginning to move with increasing need, hips jerking closer to Zoro automatically, eager to press against those hands still wandering over his exposed torso.

“There’s one good thing about Tana going out for the night to do drugs…” he breathed, and Zoro immediately got what he was implying. Hell, he’d actually had the same thought.

A slight groan as he nosed against Sanji’s cheek.

“I dunno if I can wait till we get home…” he said, then grinned impishly. “Storage closet? I won’t tell if you won’t.”

“Tell who?” the cook asked, hands moving down to stroke over Zoro’s back to distract himself from the heat coiling in his gut. “You literally own the place.”

A rumbling chuckle, and Zoro kissed his cheek.

“Good point,” he said, then sat up.

Sanji followed, expecting Zoro to quickly move off him, but he didn’t.

Instead, the swordsman took Sanji’s face in hands and looked into his eyes seriously, a lopsided smile tugging at his lips that came from pure affection.

“I love you, Sanji,” he murmured, and the cook’s smile was pure happiness in response.

He took one of Zoro’s hands in his and kissed his fingertips.

“I love you too, Zoro.”