Fluffy one-shot inspired by candy-crackpot's entirely unneacessary Timothy & Allen post. Just happy fluff.
Sticky Fingers and Sticky Hugs
[Chut, je rêve] series
The cafeteria was a crowded mess as always, with Finders hiding their disgruntled faces when Exorcists skipped the lines and then their resigned sighs when Jerry took Allen's order. There was always such a long wait after Allen ordered.
Timothy stuck his tongue out when they also frowned at him, then glared when they began to laugh. Timothy ordered a lot, too, but not as much as Allen. Some said it was because Allen was in the middle of growth spurts, but most agreed that he was just a glutton.
He hopped onto the counter, scrambling to place his feet against the wall to hold him there as his elbows propped him up. "Jerry!" Timothy called, and the chef eagerly turned with a smile.
"Hello there darling. What can I get you today?"
Timothy wrinkled his nose at the endearment and rattled off a list. He made to hop off, stopped and considered, and then added, "And can I have a plate of dango? The kind Allen eats!"
Jerry laughed and nodded, waving off Timothy as he continued to laugh. Timothy pouted. Why was everyone laughing at him today? Sniffing, he hopped off and skated over to Allen's crowded table, skirting various people and even spinning wildly at some point, skittering unsteadily on his skates. People laughed.
With a grin he launched himself across Allen's lap, giggling when the teen choked and pounded on his chest. "Timothy!" He cried, finally breathing. "I could've died!"
"There's still food left," Timothy pointed out, gesturing towards the only slightly dented mountain in front of Allen. "You wouldn't die with food still left behind."
Allen regarded him with amusement, a smile curling and emphasizing a smudge of sauce on the corner of his lips. Without a thought, Timothy licked his fingers and swiped the smudge away, shocking Allen who stared at him with wide eyes. "What?"
"You had sauce," Timothy frowned, then wiped his finger off on Allen's black shirt. When he looked back up, he found Allen very still and quiet, and Timothy met his confused stare. "Did you get full?" Timothy asked incredulously.
Allen smiled, thin and wan. "No," he chuckled, and it was with trembling hands that he resumed eating. Timothy watched him for a moment, but when Allen's elbows began to dig into his side he wiggled off his lap to sit next to him. Tsukikami, who for the most part remained quiet when Timothy was with others - to not distract him, the Innocence had said, though occasionally he would sarcastically say something that more often than not flew over Timothy's head - shifted to stare at Allen with furrowed brows.
"What is it?" Timothy asked curiously, flashing Allen a grin when the teen looked at him and gesturing towards the Innocence. Allen followed the movement to where Tsukikami hovered, but it was clear he didn't seem him. Nonetheless Allen smiled politely and nodded. Tsukikami ignored it in favor of waving towards him.
"This Exorcist… Allen, right? He's odd."
Timothy frowned, turning completely away from Allen to focus on Tsukikami. "What do you mean by 'odd'?"
"Shh!" Tsukikami hissed, holding a finger up to his lips. "Don't repeat what I say all the time!" He glanced at Allen, who seemed content to continue eating. "I'm not quite sure," the Innocence admitted. "But he's different."
For as boisterous and obnoxious as Timothy acted, he was certainly sharper than others gave him credit for. He stared at Allen, connecting all those strange quirks Allen often displayed. Timothy grew up in an orphanage. He knew far more than his share's worth about the kinds of reasons kids ended up in institutions, and it wasn't only death in the family.
Timcanpy came fluttering into the cafeteria, took one look (?) at Allen, and immediately began to nudge his face, rubbing his embossed scar all over Allen's cheeks and forehead. Allen spluttered and started giggling. He carefully wiped his hands off and brought them up to cup Timcanpy, nuzzling the golem gently.
Timothy scowled at the sight, unhappy. They were both Tims! So why did Allen get all stiff and nervous when Timothy crawled in his lap, but all happy and giggly when Timcanpy cuddled him? That wasn't fair!
Before he could act on his first impulse, Jerry called his name from the window, and Timothy hopped up to go grab his plates of food. When he returned Allen had finished half his mountain and Marie had decided to join him, eating his food in a far daintier manner than Allen. Timothy set his plates to the side of Allen's mountain and resumed his earlier position, sitting flush against Allen's side.
Marie tilted his head and blinked towards Timothy. "Good afternoon, Timothy," Marie said politely, and Timothy resisted the urge to stick his tongue out at Marie when Allen shot him a sharp look. Instead he smiled politely back.
"Good afternoon," he said when Allen's elbow bit into his side again, and then he threw a scowl Allen's way. The teen continued to eat unapologetically. Huffing indignantly, Timothy dug into his own meal, determined to at least finish at the same time as Allen. Across from them, Marie sighed, and continued to eat his food at a more sedate pace.
With hands and mouth occupied, Timothy's mind wandered back to what Tsukikami had said, and what Allen reminded him of. Should he go the spoiled child route? The naive child route? The stubborn kid route?
When both he and Allen started on their dango, Timothy focused on carefully trying the sticky food. He prodded the dough with a finger, drawing back to test the sauce with a lick.
"Do you like it?" Allen asked, chewing through one of the dango. His gloves were covered in the sauce, too, and Timothy wandered how they all stayed so white over time when Allen was so messy with his food.
Carefully, Timothy slid one dango off the stick with his fingers, rolling the dough around and between the pads of his fingertips, grinning at the sticky sensation. "It's cool," he announced, then bit through part of it with the front of his teeth. Experimentally he chewed it and frowned. "Never had anythin' like this before," he added, and Allen chuckled lightly.
"It's an Eastern dish. I'd doubt they'd have much of it in France, though," he swallowed another dango. "I don't see why not. It ought to be everywhere!" Allen grinned when Marie chuckled.
Timothy couldn't fit the stick in his mouth to reach the next dango, so he slid that one off too and popped it in, puffing his cheeks and pulling his jaw to chew around it. Allen laughed and met Timothy's eyes as he easily tore the last dango off his stick. Timothy scowled around the food in his mouth, found it didn't really work out, then hurried to try and finish chewing lest he choked. He swallowed and swiveled a glare towards Allen.
He tilted his head up to focus on Timcanpy, however, when the golem decided to rest on Allen's head, wings folding back to tuck behind Allen's ears and tail coming to rest on Allen's shoulder, curling slightly around his clavicle. Allen glanced up with a smile even though he couldn't see the golem, and reached for his next stick of dango.
"Hey," Timothy said, all pretenses dropped and any strategy gone out the window. "How come you let that Tim all over you but not me?"
Allen choked on the dough, coughed viciously, then turned to stare incredulously at Timothy. "What?" He asked, as though he was not sure that Timothy had really said what he'd said.
Timothy gestured angrily towards the golem. "That Tim! You get all stiff when I try to hug you, but you let that one use you as his own personal couch! Is not fair," he added, throat closing slightly. He was jealous, he realized. Very jealous.
Allen's mouth opened, closed, opened again, and he hesitated, unsure. "I don't know what to say," Allen admitted, sticky fingers coming up to absently touch the golem's tail. "Timcanpy's always been this way, I never really did anything about it." At the touch Timcanpy swatted the fingers away and twisted to rest his tail on Allen's other shoulder. "He does what he wants," he groused, hand dropping.
"Does what he wants?" Timothy parroted, then grinned. "Well, if that Tim can do it, I don't see why I can't!"
"What-"
Timothy shifted to kneel on the table's bench, grabbed Allen's sticky cheeks with his sticky fingers, and furiously rubbed his own sticky cheek against his, smearing the dango sauce across their faces and even into their hair as Timothy dug his face against Allen's cheek.
Allen was shocked still, hands hanging uselessly in the air as he struggled between the first impulse of pushing Timothy's sticky hands and face away from his and not wanting to hurt the boy's feelings. He began to laugh and giggle, tickled by the absurd situation. "Stop!" He cried. "It tickles and it's sticky!" He yelped when Timothy blew a raspberry into his cheek, and then began to laugh harder. "Timothy!"
"Fwah!" Timothy said, settling back with a grin, feeling his skin stretch under the sauce on his face. He wiped his fingers off on Allen's shirt, earning him an indignant hey! "See? Not so bad."
"Not so bad?" Allen cried, fingers gingerly coming up to prod his messy cheeks. "We're an absolute mess now! And I just showered!" He mourned, taking off one glove to pull at a chunk of hair stuck together. "This is gross," he announced, and Timothy laughed, delighted.
"Is your fault for playing favoritism!" He said, nodding his head resolutely. Timothy was in no way at fault here. Satisfied with the result, he turned to grab another stick of dango and yelped when he was suddenly lifted by the middle. He scrambled uselessly in midair, feeling mildly sick when the arm holding him pressed in on his full stomach. Turning to face the perpetrator, he demanded, "Put me down! I'm not done yet!" He fiercely wagged his dangling arms and legs in the air, trying to dislodge himself from Allen's one-armed grip.
"No can do," Allen said, hoisting Timothy up against his side, partially resting him on his hip. "We've got to go bathe now."
"Bathe?" He parroted, appalled. "Nooo! I already bathed yesterday! Nooo!"
Allen blinked down at him, then grinned evilly. "'Yesterday'? Then you're definitely due a bath now! And, since you want to complain about favoritism," he added, and Timothy watched in horror as the grin grew to demonic proportions and Timcanpy came to rest on Timothy's back. "I'll be sure to wash your hair as hard as I scrub Tim!"
"Nuuuh! I dun wanna!" Timothy began to cry, wiggling fiercely in Allen's grip as the teen laughed and carried him off. This was not part of the plans! He resigned himself to his fate when he realized most of the cafeteria was either laughing with them or at them, and that no one was going to help him.
Still, he didn't deny the delighted flush that came across his cheeks as Allen continued to laugh. Tsukikami, too, looked satisfied, and Timothy decided this was one loss he could tolerate.
A/N: I love that children have no concept of personal space. I love when my five yr old cousin comes to visit and she plasters herself to my side, constantly intertwines our fingers and sits in my lap and gives me hugs. Its nice and warm and good, and Allen and Timothy both need that and not your bloody angst. (so I say, but I'm writing the damn angst...)