" love me, love me not. " - Lulaw

02

Law's POV
•••
I woke up, ready for the horrible task that was Monday morning. Luffy and I had our first class together, and we had discussed the plan already. Though knowing Luffy, he probably wouldn't follow it very well. It was cold out today, so I dressed in a black turtleneck and my usual blue sweats along with my white air forces and my trademark hat.
"Morning," Luffy said as he sat in the desk next to me. At this point, everybody in the room had gone silent as it'd been years since we sat with each other.
"Morning," I said as I smiled at him. He smiled back and leaned over to kiss me on the cheek, causing me to blush. Everybody had now begun whispering, and I was content with this reaction. By lunch everyone would know.
"How'd you sleep?" Luffy asked, as he put his head on his desk.
"I didn't." I answered truthfully, and admitting it seemed to make me even more tired.
"Me neither," Luffy admitted with a small smile "it was family game night, and we played Monopoly." I smiled again. I loved partaking in the ASL brothers game nights. It was always fun, even if they had a tendency to last the entire night.
***
Class continued per usual, but all of a sudden I felt a weight on my shoulder. Luffy had fallen asleep. I feel a smile spread on my lips, and I'm suddenly aware of how much more I smiled around the smaller boy.
"Captain." I heard Bepo whisper from next to me, I smiled to myself. It was an inside joke.
"Yes?" I say, matching his tone.
"Are you and Straw Hat, you know, a thing now?" I nodded and watched as his eyes widened in suprise, but he seemed happy at this news. He said nothing else, and smiled to himself as he finished his work.
***
It was lunch now, and I sat alone with Bepo today. This marked the first time I'd sat away from Kidd and Killer, and I was happy to be away from them.
"WHAT??? YOU'RE DATING TRAFALGAR LAW???" I heard the Thief of Luffy's group yell from their lunch table. Everyone went quiet as all heads turned in the direction of one of the two boys. Luffy smiled bashfully and I continued to eat my rice balls in peace. Eventually, everybody went back to whatever they were doing before. But Nami was walking towards my table. She was wearing Luffy's straw hat, and I took this as a sign that she hadn't had a good start to her morning.
"Do you need something?" I asked without making eye contact with the orange-haired girl.
"Look, I don't know what you're getting at here. But if you even THINK about hurting Lu, Zoro'll kill you!" I couldn't help but chuckle slightly at her putting the task onto the police officer, and I reassured her that I wouldn't.
"I'm not going to hurt him. I seriously-" I paused. What I wanted to say wasn't a lie, but it felt wrong in the context of the relationship he had with the younger boy. "I care about him." I said finally. She seemed content with this response, and stormed off to her lunch table.
"Hey," I noticed the green-haired boy approaching my table, and sighed at how bothersome Luffy's friends were proving to be. "Lu and Chopper want you and Bepo to come join us at our lunch table. I can't promise Ussop will be very welcoming, but you can sit with us if you want." He didn't give me time to respond, and he just walked over to his table. I realized the 'seating chart' of their table had changed. Luffy and Nami sat next to eachother, but it seemed Nami had moved over to make room for somebody. Ussop sat across from Nami, and next to Chopper who sat across from the spot in the middle of Nami and Luffy, making yet another open spot. Zoro sat next to Sanji, and Sanji seemed to be supplying the entire group with lunch.
"Hey, Bepo," I said. Bepo was eating, so he just looked at me to see what I needed. "Want to go sit with the Straw Hats?" He seemed suprised, but he smiled and began to gather his stuff.
***
Flashback
•••
I was sitting between Luffy and his friend Vivi, as Luffy leaned over and began trying to feed me a rice ball with a pair of chopsticks.
"LUFFY!" I yelled finally
"JUST EAT THE DAMN RICE BALL!" both groups were laughing, and they were joined by their older friends too.
"If you miss his mouth and drop that rice ball, I'll shove those chopsticks up your ass." Sanji glared at Luffy as he said this, and Luffy stopped trying as he pouted.
"Fine," Luffy whined "it's your loss, they're delicious! Sanji's rice balls are the best." Ace was laughing, and he tried to use this as an excuse to steal the rice ball sitting on Luffy's chopsticks, but he missed causing the rice ball to land perfectly inside of Sabo's bento box.
"SCORE!" Sabo yelled excitedly, happily popping the rice ball into his mouth. At this point the entire group was laughing, but Luffy was crying.
"TRAFFY! HOW COULD YOU." Luffy cried. I laughed, until I realized he was quite serious. I used my hand to turn his head so he was facing me, and I fed him one of the rice balls that had been prepared by Kidd.
"There," I said. "Better?" Luffy wiped his tears and smiled.
"It's good, but nowhere near as good as Sanji's." I smiled and moved his hair behind his ear,
"Guess I'll never know." I said, and the group was once again laughing.
***
"Captain, you there?" I heard Bepo say, snapping me out of my thoughts.
"Yeah, what'd I miss?" I asked.
"I was asking you if you wanted to try one of my rice balls." Luffy said.

 I smiled, the more things change the more they stay the same.
"You know what? I think I do."
•••