Title: He Knew Things in French
Fandom: D.Gray-man
Author: su-dama/tempusfugit3
Pairing: Lavi/Kanda
Rating: R overall
Words: 2600
Disclaimer: DGM belongs to Hoshino Katsura et al.
A/N: Not such an original concept, but as Lavi is so fluid with the world, he also has a French vocabulary he uses to spare Kanda the predictability and boredom of many missions, to Kanda's bemusement, of course.
--
A is for Amoureux
When Lavi and Kanda set foot in France, he is immediately run over by a madwoman in love. More specifically, she is wearing heels made of spikes—they must be made of spikes. She is also very bent on crushing his feet for being such a stranger. Lavi hops away and against Kanda's chest, and they almost fall in love with the force of it.
The madwoman goes screeching around a corner; she must be drunk.
Kanda puts Lavi upright. "Watch it, you rabbit. Why couldn't you hop away while you're at it?"
Lavi winks and says, "Too late, boss."
B is for Bonsoir
They get a room at the desk; but then Kanda says, "What the hell."
And Lavi knows better. So he gets another room, just for Kanda, and Kanda says, "What the hell."
And Lavi wants to smile knowingly and say We'll have a good night.
So they look at each other in the way they usually don't and this makes Kanda scratch the bridge of his nose and look away as if there is something mighty interesting about the potted plant. His hair shines in the dust of the hotel. Lavi swallows at this and checks into two rooms.
C is for Coiffer
While in Paris, Kanda has a purpose. Lavi, on the other hand, does not, ignoring the whole Exorcist-on-a-mission thing. He likes the idea of leisure with his best mate, and he thinks that now, leisure is explicitly important. It is vital to his very existence.
If he may touch Kanda's hair. If he may play with it. Vital, right.
"Hey, boss," Lavi starts as he enters Kanda's hotel room.
"No."
"But."
"I just washed my hair."
"I just washed my hands. It's perfect."
Kanda sighs and looks at the ceiling, then at his pillow where there are a few hairs.
D is for Deux
After investigating the late activity of the Noah, they leave their Order liaison for the brightness of Paris. Lavi moves one foot in front of the other and feels like walking home, wherever that may be. He stalls for Kanda, who is lagging with a chip on his shoulder.
"What's wrong," Lavi mumbles out of the corner of his mouth. Kanda stops walking.
"I just realized something," he says, too seriously, with his eyes downcast.
"That you got two feet?"
"That there are only two of us."
Lavi wonders, thrilled, why this would evidently scare the fuck out of Kanda.
E is for Échec
They have a report to make. Many people of the Order are already on the road for now, but Lavi or Kanda must call in. Lavi, naturally, must write this all down. Kanda takes it from him as they sit on a bench outside in the park. He disappears into the paper.
"Calling Yuu."
Kanda does not respond. When he does, he is brutal with the paper, whacking it against the iron armrest.
"I took time writing that, ya know."
"I don't know. It's a bad report."
"'Cause it's not the truth."
They think about the truth of the mission.
F is for Foi
They pass a church on a street corner, newspapers billowing, swept under boots. Lavi watches as the passing sun glints off the metal of his uniform and onto an imaginary plane of debris and nothingness. He assents.
"All right, I give."
Kanda doesn't answer.
"I'll stop pestering you."
Kanda purses his lips and frowns deeply at the pavement.
"I'll only do what I need to do," Lavi says, leveling with him.
A Man of Faith steps out of the church, looks around, and seems to come upon them. Kanda turns and smiles a very inarguable smile. At nothing. At Lavi.
G is for Gabriel
In the same moment, Lavi feels everything is moving much faster than he is. That the wind is moving faster and faster and that it'll never stop even if it is only Kanda.
But it's not Kanda. It's an angel touching down to Earth for him, on him, touching his forehead and brushing his eyebrow with a finger of light. All it says is something ancient; Lavi comes to himself. He opens his eyes to the skies, and the sun is shining brightly again.
Kanda is looking over him and asking if he's alive. Lavi has a message for himself.
H is for Hors service
Nursing a head wound, although it's nothing, Lavi gladly accepts Kanda's help through the city and back to the hotel room. Once Lavi warns Kanda to handle him with care, Kanda drops him unceremoniously onto the bed and starts to climb in as well.
"Whaaat," Lavi groans.
"Not my fault you got ran over."
"It was a carriage."
"It was two horses."
"And I survived that? Am I still workin'?"
Kanda snorts darkly and starts to shove more pillows beneath Lavi's head. He then starts to quietly pile himself on top of Lavi, of which Lavi is not much aggrieved.
I is for Imbu de soi-même
Lavi wants to leave for the night, to get out for fresh air and city lights, but Kanda is a fucking mother figure and won't let him budge from the bed. They give each other scant looks for a while before they say anything else apart from the earlier sighing.
Kanda seems to be thinking about all the sighing, so he's blushing. Lavi smirks on the bed.
He thinks about Kanda blushing when he closes his eyes to a black veil and lit shadows. He thinks about Kanda going down on his body, sleepily, and Kanda's nipples through that shirt.
J is for Jour
They look at some paperwork later; or rather, Kanda looks, Lavi reads, and they are both again silent as the day they met. Which means Lavi is chuckling in between reading and reaching over to pinch Kanda's nipples. Which also means Kanda is emitting sounds that remind Lavi of a kitten not getting enough milk. He feels better.
He marks down the day onto an empty paper, and before he knows it he is knee deep in intra-analysis. Suddenly he loses track through the infrastructure of numbers and can almost feel the embarrassment at the tips of his fingers. Great.
K is for Klaxonner
This should be about sex. This should be about more than sex, and Lavi should just be getting some. However, he is not. He is being pushed beyond his limit, as he can't just jerk off to anything. Kanda wants him to. With head injury and all. Kanda's hand rests on his knee as Lavi rests back against the baseboard.
"More."
Kanda watches, looks down, looks away. Watches. Lavi's never been so turned on by another male before, and as he touches himself in front of Kanda, he listens to the whistle blowing and carriages and hubbub from the window.
L is for Laid
Kanda is a spiritual sort of guy. Not the religious kind, the spiritual kind, and yes there is a difference, as Lavi's come to learn. He only needed to learn it once, but it seems he keeps seeing the many diamond sides of Kanda that never wear thin.
They are at a tower, looking down upon the city and into the other villages. Kanda is telling Lavi to stop distorting himself.
"What's that?"
"You're making yourself this . . ."
"Am I a monster, Yuu?" Lavi asks evenly, catching Kanda's hair in the wind.
"We're all monsters here," he says.
M is for Mauvais
Lavi feels ugly now. Not that he hadn't felt this before in his days of contradicting others with multiple personas. He is winded from the wind and sick from the sickness of wanting to know things from Kanda's mouth.
They hurry to shelter, and though they are far from the hotel, they are not far from each other. Lavi wonders how much longer.
"Till what?"
"I dunno. I was wonderin', and then I just stopped."
Kanda shakes his head and averts his eyes elsewhere. Lavi does the same and catches the shaking in the clouds. He then kisses Kanda ruthlessly.
N is for Noël
They both have never been much up for the holidays. They have never been homebodies for special occasions (except the one time Lavi got drunk and took Kanda down with him).
This is not the holidays. It's just a normal week with a drawn out mission intended for many missionaries. Lavi is a little missionary with a sharper love for out-of-season ornaments. That's all that catches his eye. Sparkly things. Things indigenous to this population. French things.
Good God the way French women ruffle their skirts.
Not the ordinary women.
The women in red on stage.
"Tch, whatever," Kanda says.
O is for On
Together they are impregnable. They are, like they've always been, a testament unto themselves. Like a gospel, Lavi may spell it out at his own full-of-it podium. Preach it. Kanda is his witness. Kanda is his accomplice. Kanda is somehow everything that Lavi wishes.
Kanda will even hold Lavi's hand while he ducks down to press his palm into his head. The wound is opening; he sees Gabriel again. He sees Komui, and then Gramps telling him what to do. He sees Gramps' shoulder, walking away. He drops his hand to his knee and balances against Kanda's hip.
He feels.
P is for Pourquoi
"Why do you keep walking into me?" Kanda hisses once Lavi's done it for the fifth time along the road. It's the next day, before lunch, and Lavi's stomach is speaking above Kanda's hiss. "Will you feed that?"
"Yuu, it's a stomach."
"Eat then."
"I feel like—" Lavi breaks off to listen to his stomach cursing.
Kanda grabs his chin as if it's the last thing on earth and moves Lavi's face up toward the light. Lavi feels inspected. He is being examined for infections, risks. He is sweating now and thinking he's diseased.
"I'm gonna throw up now."
Q is for Quasiment
Kanda tells him he's probably poisoned; it happens, even to the smart ones.
Lavi wonders if Kanda is calling him smart, although he already knows the answer.
They walk for air and exercise. Lavi can't possibly stomach the room, nor is it possible that he eat any time soon. He can barely keep down his breaths. He thinks everything is about him. He thinks aloud if Gramps will meet them today, and Kanda tells him it's tomorrow.
Just as Lavi is about to take another step, Kanda yells out something and Lavi halts, gulping. He looks down into the Seine.
R is for Râler
Lavi fights Kanda about seeing a physician. He doesn't want the Order to pay for it, and it's pointless if he can just puke it all up anyway. He starts to feel a bit better by Kanda's taking him out of the city, how Kanda is watching him (yesss) in the closed carriage with a hand on the door handle, like he's about to scram if Lavi does toss his—
"Boss, I'd like it if you weren't so paranoid."
"You're one to talk," Kanda spits, placing a mint on Lavi's thigh. Lavi blinks at it. He can smell berries, though.
S is for Selle
No one needs it more than Lavi. No one else needs to be dragged to empty fields that are slightly wet from inclement weather. No one needs this more than Lavi, right now, right when he has taken that mint-tasting-of-berries into his mouth and around his teeth. The insides of his mouth burn, and he tilts his head at Kanda.
They stand in a field, the kind of vision that leaves one emptier in the end, but there is still that feeling of absolution. Of a heavy meal that keeps on giving. Of Kanda pushing him down into the grass.
T is for Tordre
Being sat on.
It's a slice of life that Lavi must eat more often.
He likes the feeling of Kanda inching down past his navel, stopping there, licking the center of Lavi's chest, down the arrow that points south, and then Kanda sinks down deeper into the grass while there is no one else alive and yes, yes, Lavi is inside of him. Lavi opens his eyes sluggishly.
"Are ya cryin'?"
"It's—somewhat—dry."
Lavi wonders if he wants to say it's gross, it's sick to have his cock up Kanda's ass.
He feels himself welling up and he might—
U is for Ultime
Kanda had given him a mint, but he won't let Lavi kiss him. Not when Lavi comes, either.
So Lavi has to lie there in the dirt and grass, thinking up ways to kiss Kanda without getting cock-blocked for the next time. He's come early and Kanda is not happy. Kanda is lifting himself away from him. He is going away, and then coming back.
"Where'dja go?" Lavi hums apologetically. The stomach virus has gone away as well for the time being.
"Wipe my fucking ass, thanks a lot."
"I didn't mean to."
Kanda reconsiders. Lavi gets him off now.
V is for Vingt
When they return to the city in time for a pre-midnight meal, Lavi counts his fingers and toes in his head. He does this to prevent himself from jumping Kanda's ass again. Also, to prevent unwanted upchuck. He wants to kiss, he does.
Because he grows bored with this, he asks Kanda if he feels okay.
"What. Are you planning on getting me sick?"
"Fear not, dear brooding companion."
"I don't have time to be sick. We part in two days."
This makes Lavi comment on the fact Kanda is so paranoid, and that he'll probably die before . . . He clenches.
W is for Wagon
Two days later, they have already seen Bookman and are now on their way toward the Alps. This was not the original plan; Kanda is also not puking, to his liking.
They sit in their wagon and let the driver's reins drown out the wheels and dips in the road. It's surprising that Lavi does not get motion sickness especially after feeling like shit.
It's almost as if this trip has become some symbol of their sex life, if they should call it that. Lavi makes Kanda feel better about the motion sickness with a very steady hand under cover.
X is for Xénophobe
They touch ground for the first time in a long day, and Lavi seems to have developed mermaid legs; he can't stand on two feet. He warms up to the idea of Kanda as a crutch, but after coming more than once today, Kanda is too tired to deal with him.
Lavi gestures. They are only a few miles out of another town, and the driver is busy pissing behind the wagon. Lavi puts a hand to a horse's rump, petting it. Kanda uses sign language: he's not saying anything in front of the driver. Or horses.
They are wary.
Y is for Yves
"This place is such a riddle," Kanda sighs, looking at the stars.
Lavi doesn't look. "Can you see St. Ives from here?" he asks, just barely enough for Kanda to hear. Kanda moves closer by the railing. They are on a balcony. It's a fucking balcony and it could be romantic. Lavi's read it somewhere.
Okay, it's romantic, and Kanda enjoys the stars. "No."
Lavi gathers his strength to point at the unseen horizon. "It's there. Somewhere. There."
"Are you happy?"
Lavi is talking about a mountain, and Kanda is worrying about him. There should be a riddle for this.
Z is for Zéro
They have made it this far. Lavi has to check Kanda's chest to see if it's grown any more.
It has. Just the tiniest bit. But it has, and Lavi can tell, and this is bad.
"It doesn't mean anything," Kanda lies.
Lavi starts breathing in Japanese, speaking, just saying words he knows that will fluster Kanda. He breathes Yuu. Kanda breathes Yuu in. Lavi is very direct when he speaks another language. He is careful not to be sarcastic, because it comes out stronger in this tongue, which flusters Kanda even more.
He counts down in sarcastic French (worriedly).
