Standard disclaimer applies.

A/N: Set in Okinawa. Just because I can.

Ain't No Bed of Roses

A Beelzebub Fanfic

Oga x Hilda


Oga Tatsumi had never thought of himself as particularly romantic. In fact, he didn't think himself as a romantic at all. Whenever he said he believed in happy ever afters, they called him a child. When he said girls should be given flowers and chocolate they called him naive. In the end he gave up on the notion of him being anything close to romantic because apparently he just didn't cut it. He knew how to make a man shit in his pants but he didn't know the first thing to touching a girl's heart. Let people like Takayuki or Natsumi have that. He was Child-Rearing Badass Oga, and that was that.

"Where are you going?" Hilda's contralto lilt made him stop in his tracks. Shoving his hands in his pockets, he scowled. "Going for a walk. Why?"

"With the young master?" Her emerald eyes held both a challenge and a warning. Without me?

He sweat-dropped. These days Hilda was so touchy about him taking Baby Belze anywhere without her. "I thought you were going to the hot springs with the other girls," he said gruffly. "Baby Belze was feeling restless."

Hilda knew he was a man of few words. He liked to just state things, letting other people make their own conclusions. It may have gotten him into a boatload of trouble, but the habit was fine with her anyway. She didn't like blabbermouth humans. "Let us go then."

The sea at night was an undulating sheet sprinkled with stars. The rhythmic pulse of the waves lulled them into content silence, punctuated only by Baby Belze's occasional gurgles. Tatsumi went up to the water's edge and held Baby Belze above the tide, letting him kick the frothy sea in delight as Hilda stood next to him.

"The volcanic seas in Hell are much louder and hotter than this," she said after a while. "The sand burn your soles through and the waves can go higher than me. If you get caught you'll burn to ashes."

Tatsumi grimaced. "Doesn't sound like a tourist spot to me."

"Of course not," Hilda gave him her 'You-are-so-stupid' glare. "The seas of Hell are places to challenge one's endurance, unlike your placid waters."

Tatsumi cast his sights over the ever-moving current ebbing and attacking his feet. "Never actually liked the ocean," He blurted out suddenly. "When I was young that stupid sister of mine would dunk my head under the water to 'test' me."

He suddenly wished he didn't say it. What kind of idiot tells people that he was such a wimp?

Her tinkling laugh made him look up in mild irritation. "Glad you think it's funny."

"No..." Her eyes glittered in mirth, he realized; much like the stars. It struck him just how rare that expression was on her because it reminded him of Amnesia-Hilda, who blushed around him and was so... wifey. It was difficult to believe but under that abusive exterior was a fragile soul.

"It reminded me of something. You see, I share the same memory too." Her amusement in reminiscing the past made him turn away quickly, feeling uncomfortable. Hilda crouched down next to him as she stared out to the sea and he allowed himself just that - maybe he was a bit of a child and wasn't cut out to be a romantic.

But just for that one moment, he touched her heart.

FIN