Staring at yourself in the mirror running your fingers over the scars left from your top surgery should bring you euphoria- happiness something like that.
But you didn't.
Some nagging little voice in the back of your head made you doubt all of the progress you've made with your transition, made you feel like you still looked like a women. That anyone who didn't know you would only see a girl dressing as a man.
sighing you press the heals of your hands into your eyes in frustration. You should be feeling good your not ment to be having bad days like this anymore you go to were you wanted you got to a point we're you weren't uncomfortable going shirtless. But your brain is fucking you over.
"Babe? You in there?" Ace calls from the hallway knocking on your bedroom door making you jump having not expected the noise.
"Yeah, you can come in it unlocked" you call back after a few beats of hesitation. You didn't feel like being seen by anyone right now but Ace would always be the exception. Even if you did tell him to go away right now he would know something was up since your voice is shaky from holding back tear and come in anyway. Never would he let you be alone when upset.
Surprisingly he doesn't fling the door open like usual instead he opens it like a normal person. You can feel his firey eyes burning into your back as he comes in, quickly closing the door with his foot.
"Got you some candy I thought you would like from the island" he says softly, placing the candies down on your dresser.
He comes up behind you and carefully raps his arms around you waist and resting his chin on your shoulder. Ace is looking into your glassy eyes though the mirror with a frown. His strong arms tighten around you as he gives a gentle squeeze pressing a small kiss under your ear. Slow hands move up your abdomen tracing shapes and following the invisible patterns of your skin that only he seems to see like he does when you're laying in bed together about to go to sleep.
"What's wrong handsome?" he asks softly continuing his movements and placing more small kisses to your neck.
Handsome it sends a spike of warmth though you but it doesn't last the nice feeling being enveloped by the bad within a few short moments.
"Nothing… my eyes are just hurting" you knew it was a bullshit lie that only the most oblivious people would believe. It made you cringe at yourself.
"You're staring at yourself in the mirror with no shirt on cause your eyes hurt?" Ace doesn't even pretend to believe you. Tracing his fingers slowly up you stomach up to your new twin scars.
Ace has shown with his words, hands, and mouth how much he loves your new scars. Both because he's happy you're becoming more yourself and because you look insanely attractive with them. The first time he ever saw them after Marco permitted you to take off the bandages he looked like he was ready to pounce on you, the only reason you didn't is cause Tate was there helping you. After she left though? He went wild.
You tried forcing yourself to think about all the things Ace tells you every day, tried to make your brain realize that you did look like a man that you didn't do all of this for nothing.
"Please tell me the truth" he whispers against your ear making me shiver both from the feeling and his words.
Bothering him with gender issues was never something you liked to do preferring to keep it all to yourself as to not burden anyone with your problems everyone has enough on their plate already they don't need to listen to your whining. Keeping this to yourself now wasn't an option though. Ace wouldn't leave till you told him, he would hold you till you finally break and spill everything out to him. It'd be better if you skipped that step and go right to telling him.
Sighing you flick your eyes down to the ground not wanting to have to look at him or yourself any longer. Voicing your thought was already hard having to see the reason you feel the way you do and the man trying to fix that at the same time would make you incapable of getting anything past your lips.
"I dono, I just… I feel like shit." you mumble curling your hands into fists at your sides. All the feelings your having right now are all out of wack and that's the only thing you feel like you can do to express that. "And I shouldn't be feeling like shit! I finally got the stupid surgery I've been wanting since… since forever! I still feel like I look like a girl, I still feel like I am just playing dress up, and I still fucking feel like everyone is just humoring me by calling me a man" your voice beaks at the end and you have to shut your eyes as tight as possible to prevent the stream of tears that welled up in your eyes from cascading from your eyes down your cheeks.
Ace's arms drop and for a moment with your spiraling thoughts you thought that some way you had said something wrong. Made him upset enough with your words that he's going to leave you here to handle it on your own. Leave you to your thoughts and doubts just like he should have from the start.
But you know he's not like that. You know he would rather die before he left you alone like this. Your brain was just blaring at you the same way it was about your body right now so you just couldn't think right.
When he gently grabbed your shoulder turning you around to face him and moved both hands up to hold your face it snapped you out of it making you open your eyes to look at him still blinking rapidly to try and keep them at bay.
"I know me just saying it wont do much but you are the most handsome man I have laid my eyes on. You don't look feminine in the slightest" Ace moves his left hand down to your hip pulling you closer so your bodies are touching. "No one would know you were trans if they looked at you. I didn't know till you told me"
"That's cause your stupid" you mumble leaning into his hand and putting more of your weight on him.
"Do you know what I thought when I saw you for the first time after I finished getting my shit rocked by the old man?" he asks softly ignoring your comment as he presses a kiss to your cheek wetting his lips with your tears in the process. His lips were softer then usual having actually listened to you and started using lip balm. It was yours that he was stealing to use but you don't care.
"No?" you reply back quietly as you sniffle trying to slow the tears as you rap your arms around Aces middle. That's not something that you ever thought about before, why would you? All you thought when you first met him was that he was an annoying little prick who just needs to give up on his one sided fight with Pops. Logically you came to the conclusion that he had a similar thought to you since you were a dick to him at the start.
"I thought 'wow this dude is such a asshole, I wish I could kiss his stupidly handsome face till he shuts up'" you can't help the small burst of laughter that ripped out of you at his words.
"There's no way that's what you thought" the small smile that tugged at the corners of your lips made Ace give an even bigger one back.
"It is though! It was love at first sight" he says with a dramatic sigh and a flurry of kisses to your face.
You let out small quiet laughter at his dramaticness unable to hold them in as your tears slow. Ace keeps kissing you moving down from your face to your shoulder then he slowly slid farther till his lips were on the scar under your right pec retracing were his fingers moved earlier with his lips.
"My charming man…" he mumbles against your skin, his hands move to hold your hips in place so you couldn't move away from his assault of kisses. "These make you look so fucking handsome I can barely handle it" he moves over to the other scar doing the same round of kisses as he did to the other.
You can't stop the flush that travels up your neck to your face. Tears have stopped flowing and Ace's words and kisses distracted you from your thoughts making you feel better so quickly and flawlessly that it made you a little dizzy. It made you think that his devil fruit gave him fire powers and the power to make you feel better without even really trying.
Watching him go all over your scars with kisses and mumbled praises made you feel like the world around you was spinning and he was the only solid thing left for you to hold to as it all disappears. One of the hands that was sitting useless at your side since he slid down to his knees to hold onto his hair instead. Not tightly just resting there to ground you to him and him alone, your thoughts doing nothing to distract you from him now no matter how hard they seem to be trying.
Eventually once he deems it enough he moves onto your stomach covering the left in kisses slowly making his way over to the right.
"Ace…" you mumble out his name for a reason that you don't even know making him look up at you with his big beautiful black eyes.
"Hm?" he hums pausing his movement.
"I love you" you say after a moment of silents.
"Love you to babe" he says with a crooked grin.