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“You’re fucking stupid.”
“Tell me something I don’t know.”
You huff, eyes skimming over the man before you. His shirt is torn on the side, bleeding black from the blood that leaks from his body. A foot long gash decorates his side, ripping through flesh and muscle and dripping itself down his skin. It’s almost sickening to look at, his exposed muscles contracting in the exposed light. You might throw up.
“Okay… okay,” you mutter to yourself, dragging a hand through your hair before your eyes flick up to his face. Zoro’s gaze is already on your face, a soft, brown eye peering down at you beneath furrowed brows. “You’re lucky I can patch wounds.”
He hums, watching as you flit about the infirmary. “Speaking of, where even is Chopper?”
You shrug as you approach him once more, hands falling on his knees and prying them apart, his thighs spreading. Zoro swallows, his fingers curling tightly over the lip of the bench, knuckles whitening. You slot yourself in the open space before your fingers fall upon the hem of his shirt, the pad of your fingertip grazing the bottom of his belly. He twitches, his thighs closing around your waist.
“Arms up.”
Zoro raises his arms above his head and you tug his shirt up his torso. Your thumb catches on his torso, lightly dragging up his skin, and before he can control it he lurches from your touch and chokes back a giggle.
You pause, his shirt bunched around his chest and slowly meet his eyes, yours narrowing. “Did you just giggle?”
His eyes search the room behind your head, the infographic on different antibiotics suddenly incredibly interesting. His cheeks are boiling, and the gash in his side is throbbing from his sudden movements. “No. Get on with it.”
From the corner of his eye he sees you grin menacingly. Your hands are now pressed against his chest, his heart beating erratically against your palm as it cavs into the softness of his skin. He might die, he thinks, with you between his legs and your hands on his chest as you discover the thing he tries so terribly to hide. As he’s bleeding out. Of course.
“Oh, my god. You’re ticklish.”
Zoro’s eye twitches, redness bleeding down his neck. “I’m bleeding out, you know. I could die and you’re making fun of a dying man.”
Your eyes roll and you finally tug his shirt the rest of the way over his head and drop it onto the floor beside you. “I can’t believe you’re ticklish,” you mutter as you disinfect the gash, deaf ears falling on the way he hisses. “This is the best thing to happen to me since that girl kicked Sanji in the nuts.”
He grits his teeth. “Ha. Funny.”
You grin, threading the needle. “No, I’m serious. Big, bad, mean Roronoa Zoro is ticklish and giggles like a little girl. You’ve made my day, really. I should put this moment in my autobiography before I die.”
Zoro opens his mouth to answer but is silenced as a groan as you dip the needle into his skin. His hand falls to your waist, fingers digging into the soft skin. “Hilarious. Is there any way you can make this quicker? Like, are you hiding super speed from me?” The embarrassment might kill him, if you so close to him doesn’t first.
You raise your brows as you bring yourself closer to him, pressing your side against his soft tummy. He swallows and exhales a groan, the sore pain of the skin sealing itself together ripping through the left side of his body. His eyes finally fall on your face, something he can’t identify ripping through his body. The furrow of your brow, your lip trapped between your teeth, the deftness of your finger, the swell of your hips trapped between the dough of his thigh. He wants to swallow you up with his body, wrap himself around you and worship you until he’s tired.
“Yeah, like how you hid that you’re ticklish.”
He blinks, deadpanning down at you. All sentiment is gone. He couldn’t want you to be done any quicker.
Though, by the looks of it, you’re halfway done. You’re weaving the needle throughout his skin quite quickly, the bleeding slowing to a light trickle that seeps into the hem of his pants. Somewhere, in the midst of it, you’ve tied your hair up, the glistening skin of your neck inviting.
God, he wants to kiss you.
That would be inappropriate. You’re sewing up his side like a torn doll, and besides, he’s harboring fresh resentment from the jokes about him being ticklish. Also, he’s painfully nervous .
Another time.
Silence falls between you. The muted squelch of the needle passing through skin repeats like a broken record, accompanied with Zoro’s occasional groans and hisses of discomfort. You’re focused, your head almost pressed against his ribs as you carefully close up the gash. A piece of hair falls from its tucked-away style and brushes his skin.
Zoro giggles. You freeze.
He slaps a hand over his mouth as your eyes dart to his face, bewildered eyes staring down at you. Your lips curl in, trying to suppress your laughter out of respect for your wounded friend. He slowly lowers his hand and clears his throat before nodding to your unmoving hand, his face beet red.
“Are you going to leave me at seventy-five percent?” he croaks out.
As you sew him up the rest of the way, tiny giggles and laughs escape your lips, and he doesn’t miss the way you’ll slightly exaggerate a movement of your head or your free hand in hopes of enticing a reaction from him, though the most you get is the tightening of his legs or his fingers digging into your skin.
Finally, after what seems like eons, you tie off the knot and snip the thread. With a sigh, you place the needle on the tray beside you and peer up at your crewmate, to once again find him staring back.
“Well, that wasn’t so bad, was it?”
Zoro’s eyes narrow at you, his expression unamused. You wince. Is he actually upset?
You sigh, your hands falling to his thighs. “You know, I actually find it kind of cute.”
His brows practically shoot into his hairline as he gapes down at you. Your eyes are averted, staring at a speck of dust on the floor, the jowl of your jew flexing as you clench your teeth.
His hands grasp your face and turn your head, and his lips are on yours.
God, you’re soft. Your hands steady on his thighs as you lean in closer, his calloused palms falling on your cheeks. He can taste the coffee you had with your breakfast, and the strawberries you ate while reading your book. Your tongue skims his lower lip and pushes inside, a groan rumbling from his throat. You’re addicting, and he’d withstand all the teasing if it meant he got to kiss you like this every breathing moment.
You pull from him to breathe, lips swollen and skin heated. Zoro’s thumb skims over your cheek, memorizing the smoothness of your skin under his fingertips. You grin, and your mouth opens as you go to speak, a small grin mirroring your own on Zoro’s lips. Your finger skims the skin on the inside of his thigh. Zoro jerks, a muffled yelp sealed behind his lips, and your grin grows.
“Ticklish.”