A/N: This was on livejournal for like two years until now...might as well put it on here since I haven't updated anything in a while x.x -fail- I'm not dead though!

Disc: Don't own anything

If only she knew..

Whenever he was with her, he couldn't help but smile wider. Every time he was near her, he truly felt happy. He wanted to get to know her, ever since the first time he met her so many years ago. Back then, he didn't know what he felt, but now, he did.

How he wished he didn't.

A Bookman isn't supposed to have a heart. No feelings, no biased feelings, no friends. And in knowing that, knowing his duty as a future Bookman, and his feelings...it tore him apart.

Instead, he chose to act as if she were like any other person within the Black Order. He smiled at her like he would anyone else, he played and teased her like he would anyone else, all without trying to get too close to her. However, as the years went by, he noticed that she had broken through the walls that nobody knew he had erected around himself, without himself even knowing. He realized this, and at the same time, realized that he had been getting closer and closer to her as each day went by, just as he had gotten closer to the others.

Unintentionally.

And yet, he still got close. Close to the person he didn't want to, and yet at the same time wanted to be near. He wanted to protect that smile of hers, her very being. But if should give in to his feelings, then he really would be a failure as a Bookman. After all, in order to record history without any bias feelings, one must seal away their own feelings and simply record. To protect her would mean to break that code.

And so he decides to watch her from afar, trying so hard not to allow himself to get any closer to her than he already was. Why was it so hard? Why did it hurt? Every time she would get hurt in battle, or whenever an attack was aimed at her, he could feel his heart skip a beat. But she would always turn to him and smile that smile of hers, "Daijoubu." I'm all right. She would say that to him with a smile, no matter how hurt or injured she was.

It was only recently, this past year or so, that he realized something about her he hadn't noticed before. All of her smiles were forced, and although she never looked like it, she was probably lonely. How he came to that conclusion, he didn't know.

But he saw her, one day.

She was walking towards her room, from the cafeteria. She had that bright smile on her face, but as soon as her back was turned, that smile faded and disappeared. Her usually bright and shining eyes became dull, sadness radiating from her very form. She hid so many things, from all of them. Since she joined the Order, she never once has spoken of her past, her family, or how she learned about the Earl and Innocence. He could tell, she would never let anyone see this side of her, not intentionally.

Since then, he wanted her to open up to him, to talk to him whenever something was bothering her. Of course, he knew that she wouldn't do that. She didn't seem like the type to cry to someone, when something was bothering her. When those thoughts and wants came to him, he knew.

He knew he was in love with her.

If she knew...what would she say?

And so he doesn't say anything. He continues to spend time with her, like evreyone at the Order, and he does so knowing that he could never be with her.

When she left for that mission, alone, he almost begged Komui to let him go with her. It was a dangerous mission, why should she go alone? Bookman's words hit him, then.

"We are not their allies. We are only on the Order's side 'by chance'...A Bookman has no need for a heart."

Yes, he knew. But for some reason he didn't want to listen. He wanted to be with her, to protect her. However, when she turned to him and gave her that smile, the smile he loved so much, even if he knew it was forced, he had to give in. "Daijoubu." He couldn't argue with her, not like that.

For some reason...whenever she smiled at him that smile didn't feel like it was forced; it felt like a sincere smile, just for him. He wanted to believe that, he really did.

If only she knew...

would she love him too?

.o8.11.o7.