I think I’ve written something about it before but I can’t find it so I’ll ramble about it again.
I adore the idea of Zoro sharing his earrings with the crew. Let me explain this a little bit…
Zoro is a lot of things and oddly possessive is one of them. He doesn’t feel the need to yell to the world that the crew is his but they are.
And the crew loves Zoro.
There’s a lot of well known people on their ship, all very good in their areas. They each have identifiable things about them, none so much as Luffy’s strawhat but some are very close.
So somehow, between all their adventures and the rolling ocean, a new tradition of sorts is born. And it starts with a hat and is joined by an earring.
The person or people going by themselves or on a potentially more dangerous part of their adventures, are occasionally given the responsibility of holding onto one of Zoro’s earrings for him.
It’s as sweet as it is terrifying. Because Zoro likes to make them sweat as he makes sure they know what he’ll do if they lose it, but they also know it’s his way of saying he’ll find them no matter what. It’s a promise that Zoro will tear his way down to hell in a twisted path of misdirection to find them, his earring and his crewmate. He will kill until the ocean around them is red and there isn’t enough salt in the sea to purify the earth from what he did to get them back.
It’s a unexpectedly heavy thing, the little gold earring that gets dropped in their palm. Heavy with promise and protection, with blood, sweat, and dreams
They’ve crossed paths with a lot of people who trust in a lot of different things while on their adventures. Lots of things people hold onto for good luck or faith or protection. They will say a strawhat and a gold earring aren’t necessarily the weirdest things to have complete and unwavering trust in but it’s up there.
They get use to how the earring chimes slightly when they move and the way it catches the eye. After all, it’s a pretty piece of jewelry and probably worth a decent amount of money. They feel important wearing it, just like they do when Luffy sets his hat on their head.
Look how much I’m loved. Can you see how we carry each other with us? There is gold in my skin and a crown on my head and neither are mine but I’ve never been more rich.
There’s something to it, more than the way the scent of Sanji’s cigarettes, Nami’s perfume, or the oil of Franky’s gears clings to their skin. More than how Robin’s devilfruit is always watching over them or how Chopper’s hair always sticks to their clothes. It’s more than Usopp’s voice telling stories in their ears or Brook’s music getting stuck in their head.
Zoro’s earrings are a claim as much as Luffy’s hat. A blessing from the first mate of the future pirate king that says minecrewfamilyyouaresoimportant all in a single golden gleam.
Sometimes Luffy comes back after a big fight, bloody and smiling, strawhat barely hanging on his head and gold waving from his ear.
Nami stands in a storm yelling directions and the earring whips against her skin in the wind, her eyes are as bright as the lightening as she guides her crew.
Usopp readies a shot, heartbeat as steady as his hand and the brush of metal against his cheek a reminder of the trust they have in him.
Chopper swings his head, slowly getting familiar with the odd way the swinging metal clinks against his antlers and how each movement makes the scent of metal flare up and the image of Zoro comes to mind.
Sanji burning and ready to spring forward to keep fighting, fire warmed gold almost too hot in his skin and a surge of affection that almost burns more.
Franky looming huge and loud in his fights, everything about him bright and loud and metal but the small gold in his ear still shines brightest.
Brook looking haunting with his sword and ice, bones clinking and an earring singing it’s own soft noise as it shifts against the place he’s pinned it to his clothes since he doesn’t have ears yohohoho and the metal gets cloudy in the cold air.
Robin tilting her head to consider her opponents, the demon in her cooing at the golden gift she’s been briefly given and demanding she finish up quick and go find her family.
Zoro always takes the earrings back once everything has been settled, the jewelry so very tiny in his hands. Something that special always looking strange in his scarred and calloused hands.
Sometimes he lets them keep the earrings for days. Somehow he knows that they need a reminder they’re safe and they made it out of whatever wild situation they’d found themselves in. He always comes asking for it but never before they’re ready to let it go.
He wears it better than all of them anyway, they couldn’t keep it even if they wanted to. The gold is most at home against the warm tones of Zoro’s skin and it adds an elegance to him just like his swords. The way the three earrings bump against each other when they’re all in and that chime is Zoro, so comforting in the same way the smell of salt and metal is.
Usopp decides Nami’s big hoops make him look more like a pirate and steals them regularly. She is not pleased.
Franky also gets his nipples done.
Chopper has little ones that looks like cherry blossoms.
Luffy gets a pair like Law, who absolutely refuses to acknowledge their existence and had just turned around and walked away the first time he saw Luffy wearing them.
Robin has an ever growing collection and they can’t figure out where she keeps getting them. Seriously none of them have ever seen her buy any where do they keep coming from.
Brook tells bad ear jokes daily.
Sanji only wears one small diamond earring, and will occasionally swap it out for a little silver hoop.
