#the linked work’s a bit of a style study and a bit of angsting sanji for fun because i just can’t help it

[inoreuct]

thinking about zoro noticing sanji being more restless at dinner one night. he’s imperceptibly frazzled, perfect suit a little less put together, tie looser around his neck and carrying a barely-noticeable tremble in his fingertips that isn’t usually there. zoro’s noticed him eyeing the bottle of sherry on the countertop whether he himself realises it or not, and the realisation dawns on zoro that the damn cook needs a break.

he of all people knows how sanji pushes himself too far— maybe not physically, but he will blatantly ignore burnout and mental fatigue until it eats away at him enough that he’s forced to stop, whether by the crew’s efforts or his own oft-disregarded limitations. it’s a form of undeserved self-flagellation that makes zoro want to punch a wall but sanji can’t know he cares, no, because 1. the cook won’t take well to being “mothered” (cue zoro’s eye roll) and 2. they’re supposed to be rivals. hello.

so after dinner he tidies the galley to sanji’s exact specifications (which he just,,, happens to have memorised, alright, stop making a big deal out of it. he knows all his nakama’s routines. shut up.) and finds the cook on the deck, liquor in hand, telling him that luffy had asked him to. he snags the sherry from sanji’s slender fingers so that the cook doesn’t drink too much too fast. he feels sanji struggle with words and leaves the space around them empty so that the cook can fill it as and when he sees fit.

it’s the least that zoro can do, he thinks. holding space for someone he cares about because he’s never been good enough with words to fill it himself, but sanji’s never seemed bothered.

zoro lets slip something that he doesn’t think about, the words natural as breathing, tries not to freak out about it, and takes his spot in the crow’s nest so that his cook can rest.

i wrote this properly in sanji’s pov and it’s here, by the way. if you even care.