The Game (luNa)

9

Luffy woke up. That fact alone startled him. He almost never slept well. And he very rarely woke up without being a screaming, sweating wreck. That's how most nights went. Either no sleep, or troubled sleep resulting in being woken by the same nightmare at about one in the morning and not sleeping again after that. But he was awake.

Then he became more aware of his sensors. The familiar scent of tangerines. The familiar pain in the gut. The familiar warmth in his arms. Wait … he opened his eyes, squinting in the light. When he could see clearly, his gaze settled on the familiar head of ginger hair.

He smiled to himself. Nami. He closed hiseyes again and listened to her breathing. Eventually, she began to stir. Luffy sighed, enjoying the last of the peaceful moment. He opened his eyes and watched his navigator slowly look up, meeting his gaze. He expected to see her face go red, and for her to squirm away, but she just looked up at him.

Then she did something completely unexpected. She pulled herself forwards and kissed him softly. He closed his eyes, in shock. He felt his cheeks heat up and knew Nami was the same as she pulled away and buried her face in his chest, embarrassed. He chuckled and began to trace circles on her back. She shuddered in his arms.

After a few more minutes, she finally sat up, looking down at him. Her face still held a reddish hue. ‘You hungry?’ she asked, knowing it was a pointless question. He grinned and nodded, shooting an arm up to grab a beam on the room.

He sat up, gently wrapping an arm around her waist and pulling her close. Then he slipped off the bed, pulling her with him, and lowered the two of them to the floor. He set her down and let go of the beam, flipping back to absorb the impact of his arm. Nami waited for him to go before falling in behind him as he exited the room, not sure what awaited them in the kitchen. 

The night before, Zoro, sanji, usopp and chopper had all packed up and headed to bed straight after dinner. Chopper and usopp were first out the door, still chatting away and giggling about whatever stupid thing usopp had said.

They opened the door to the bunk room and froze, both of them staring into the room with their jaws on the floor. Zoro and Sanji came up behind them, curious as to what the two of them were gawping at. 

‘Hey, what's up?’ Zoro had said. The two didn’t reply. They were in shock. Sanji and Zoro turned to follow their gaze and noticed their captain sound asleep. 

‘Well would you look at that.’ Sanji muttered. ‘The captains finally getting some res - HANG ON IS THAT NAMI WITH HIM!’ he promptly feigned, even before Zoro could smack him in the head for being so loud. He chuckled to himself. 

‘Well, well, well.’ he muttered. ‘Didn’t see that one coming.’ 

They were now sitting around the table in the same awkward silence as they waited for their captain to enter, likely with the navigator. None of them knew what the hell to say. It was definitely going to be bloody awkward. And sure enough, the duo entered the room.

Luffy was grinning like the clueless idiot he was, and ran straight over to the plate of food Sanji had left on the bench and carried it over to the table where he began scarfing it down. Nami looked slightly pink in the face and carefully kept her gaze averted.

Even so, the crew watched her hurry through the kitchen and grab her food before taking her seat next Luffy. No words were spoken for a long time. When they did, they came from Zoro. 

‘well.’ he said. ‘You two sure made this awkward for everyone.’ chopper nodded. Luffy looked up at him confused. 

‘What do you mean awkward?’ he asked with his mouth full of food. His eyes widened as he swallowed, a look of realisation on his face. ‘Ohhhhhh, I get it.’ he said. A grin stretched over his face and he began to laugh. ‘It's because I -’ nami cut him off with an angry smack over the head.