A/N: This is my first DGM fic. I read the whole series in about a day (okay, more like a week), and I was listening to some of my more depressing songs and this thing just shouted 'WRITE ME~!'. (Besides, this gives me an excuse not to do Winter Break homework or to work on my other chapter fic X3)

Disclaimer: I do not own DGM. If I did, Lavi would be everywhere. He's so cute! Same with Road/ Rhode. Gotta love the psycho~ (though most of the Noah would fit that description).

Forty-Nine

It only hurts once, that's what everyone says. Everything you do is painful the first time 'round, but then you're prepared for it the next time, you can handle it. What's the word? Numbed.

They're delusional.

And they don't believe a thing of what they themselves say.

And I know it.

But they don't understand. They're talking about things everyone goes through. Things that everyone experiences: Humiliation, love, loss… The humiliation of overcoming your pride and needing help, the first love of your life, the loss of it all. It only hurts that once.

They don't understand things that they can't comprehend. And why should they? It doesn't make any sense.

I don't make any sense.

Did I ever?

What does it matter. I know it's not a question. What does it matter if I make sense to myself? If I makes sense to everyone else, I don't matter. That's what Gramps always said.

I am a Bookman, I don't matter. I stand on the side and I watch. I am not allowed to take sides. Bias could mean death; bias could be the destruction of a lifetime of achievement.

What do I mean?

Does it matter?

Do I care?

Am I allowed to care?

It only hurts just once, they say. What about the tenth time? The fifteenth? The fortieth?

The forty-ninth?

Forty-nine times I've felt the sensation of being utterly lost. Forty-nine times it's confused me (How am I supposed to feel?), forty-nine times I've felt like I didn't matter (Why do I feel so lost?).

And forty-nine times, it's hurt.

But it's never hurt so much as this. I wanted it to end; I wanted to just put it behind me. But I am a Bookman, everything must be recorded. Everything must me remembered.

If I died, would they care? Would my comrades feel for me? Would my friends cry for me? We care about you. We trust you. You're one of us. Come on…

Don't say it if you don't mean it. Please…

Gramps says that it's an illusion, and that these feelings I feel for them are brought on by my persona. Who am I again?

Right, I am Lavi.

That name, I hate that name. I despise that name. I didn't think there was a way for a human to hate something so much as I hate that two syllable, four lettered word.

If one called that a name, they would be lying straight through their teeth.

Ha, it's not like you don't do that already, eh Lavi? It doesn't matter what I tell myself, I am not Lavi.

I am not Lavi, I am whatever is convenient. I've done it forty-eight times before, why is it so painful now? Why does my chest suddenly get so heavy when I look at them?

This world I'm creating for myself, it's going to shatter; I don't know if I want to speed up the process or just let time take its toll. It's a role I'm tired of playing, a competition against myself that hurts every time I start a new game.

Lenalee… You're always trying to help, you're always worried about me… you cry tears for me… do you know that you're the only one I've ever cried for?

Allen… Smiling, you're always smiling and always the leader. I wish you wouldn't make me feel so guilty. Guilt… that's a word Gramps says doesn't exist for me. It's bias. But aren't all feelings biased? I suppose that's why I'm not allowed to have them.

Yuu… Or Kanda, I suppose. But you've never gotten angry at me for calling you by your given name. You yell at me, I know. But when we're alone… you training on those high bamboo sticks of yours and me just lying in the grass… you've never yelled at me. Is it a façade you project to the others? Or is it a façade you project just to me? You're very observant, Yuu, I know you know I'm lying. It's about time someone threw my game right back at me.

The only thing is, I don't know if this smile is still fake or not.

Lavi. Why do I respond when you call me that? It's just a name, just a word! I smile and turn, turn and respond. I take everything as though it was a giant game. But the thing is… even though I'm smiling, I'm completely serious.

Why can't you all see that?

Everyone else always does. Those past forty-eight times… they hate me, they all hate me.

Who? The personas, or the people I interact with? I don't know anymore. I'm beginning to think I don't know anything anymore. Maybe I never did.

Why can't you just say you hate me so I can move on with my life, so that maybe it'll hurt a little less? That phrase… 'Rub salt in the wound', is that why you're afraid to say you hate me? That you despise me? That you utterly loathe me?

Maybe I need to be numbed to reality. Make me realize, that even now, that although I believe myself to be protected by the most convincing, the most inviting, the warmest thing I've ever been, this thing that I am is actually something homely, unattractive, and downright disgusting? Please, shatter my confidence.

I don't want to be a coward anymore.

Lavi. Lavi, Lavi, Lavi!

Two syllables.

Four letters.

Something that Gramps just thought up. Trivial, unnecessary, insignificant, petty, useless.

Why does it mean so much to you?

Comrades.

Partners.

Friends.

"Lavi, welcome home."

Please, don't say it if you don't mean it.

It just hurts more.

Forty-nine times it's hurt.

But forty-nine times I've started over as a new person; started again as another fake figment of imagination that all of you can see.

When you say 'it only hurts once', does that count for every time I start over? If so, then I suppose the phrase it true. Every time I start over, it hurts again.

"Lavi, we love you."

Please, don't say those words. It just hurts, over and over again.

It only hurts once, but forty-nine times over.