Two Sides of a Gesture
Title: Two Sides of a Gesture
Medium: Fic
Word Count: 310
Rating: PG
Prompt: Wave
Character: Chopper
Note: Kind of set very early during the timeskip.
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Human gestures have always been one of his fascinations. Ever since he has started to adapt human behavior, he’s interested in the meaning of gestures. It’s just so strange, how one simple move of your hand can break a friendly bonding apart, yet that same move can fix another. Sometimes the differences are great and easy, sometimes they are too complex for him to understand. There’re those few gestures he’s somehow familiar with but their different meanings always confuse him.
Very early in his life he learned the meaning behind the wave of one’s hand; it’s a gesture to greet someone, to welcome them. And for a long while, that has been the only meaning of waving for him.
With the limited possibilities of social contact, he had always known that some gestures would remain unknown for him. And how he now wishes that he had never learned some of them.
Now living the pirate life, he’s more accustomed to the gesture of waving one goodbye then to welcome them, one side to the gesture he wishes he had never learned. At some point, he started to hate the gesture, he didn’t want to wave goodbye for the torturous pains of leaving someone. This gesture has two sides; one he likes, the other he dreads.
But then Merry died, and he had felt weird about not waving her goodbye for real. As if to emphasize it, they had parted on Saboady without a goodbye, simply been torn apart without a warning. These haunting scenarios keep him awake at night, as well as the pressuring feeling of regret. He wishes he could’ve waved them goodbye, put proof of his love into a gesture for them to carry to the end of the world.
Since, despite all the sadness it brings, the wave of your hand is a gesture of friendship nonetheless.