Disclaimer- I do not own D. Gray-Man or any of the characters from the series and with never claim them as my own.
"That's a stupid answer." I huffed.
I went back to picking my bread apart. It was a stupid reason, too. Wars were stupid, people were stupid. Everything was stupid! Why was everything so stupid?
"Are you going to stop pouting?" Lavi asked.
"I wasn't pouting." I said, though it really wasn't helping my case any. "I was just thinking about how stupid the world was. Stupid, stupid, stupid!"
I was pouting and I knew it. I just couldn't believe that I lost. I actually lost to him. That only further proved that I was weak, and stupid too. Ugh, stupid, stupid, stupid!
I stopped my inner hate fest and looked down at Lavi for the first time this entire "conversation". Much to my surprise, he was grinning from ear to ear. He was laughing at me, that jerk! He was the pushing buttons this time. I tried to kick him in the side, but he grabbed my leg and pulled me off the bed.
This only resulted in me dropping my tray and making a mess of fruit and bread. Now the question was what was he trying to prove. That he could hurt me without even trying? No, he wouldn't do something like that, would he? He said he didn't want to hurt me earlier.
I stared at him for who knows how long and he grabbed my right arm. I'd forgotten I put that bracelet on when he left earlier. I didn't even hear it ringing before. I guess I really hadn't been paying attention to much anything before. I guess I really had shut myself off to everything for a while.
"The bell on this sounds really weird." He said, turning his attention to me. "What's it made of?"
"Silver, I think." I asked, shaking my hand a bit. "It's a little loud for being so small, isn't it? I never noticed that before."
"That's not what I…" Lavi paused and frowned. "Nevermind. It's not important."
I had no idea what he was trying to say. I didn't think there was more than one answer about what I bell was made of, but I guess I was wrong. I stared at it very hard to try and figure out what he actually meant, but there was nothing. It was just a tiny silver bell attached to a bracelet. That was all it was.
I looked up to see that he was still looking at me. I didn't know what was so interesting that he had to stare, but maybe I was making another strange expression without realizing it. Unless it was something else that I hadn't realized before. I reached up to pat my hair to make sure nothing had happened to it, but it was fine. I looked at Lavi yet again.
"What are you looking at?" I asked
"Are you comfortable?" He answered.
"What does that have to-!" I paused and looked down.
I was sitting in his lap, which was something I probably should have noticed before. Maybe it was about time I started paying attention today. I wasn't normally this scatter-brained unless someone told me to do something while I was really hungry. I didn't think I was that hungry. Lavi laughed again and the sudden urge to hit him came back.
Oh, this guy! He was so annoying. I couldn't believe nobody had killed him before now with how he acted. I would have if I could have, but he already proved to me two times that I wouldn't be able to even if I tried. I frowned and settled for pinching his nose, which quickly shut him up. He just yanked my hand off his face and frowned at me.
"Was that really necessary?" He asked.
"Yes, it was." I replied. "Stop laughing at me!"
"If it's not me, then who will?"
I slapped my hand into his chest and huffed. He was still making fun of me. He was such a jerk. How did he even have friends, anyway? With an attitude like he had, no one would anyone even want to hang around him for very long.
I needed to change the topic before I got any more annoyed than I was. There wasn't really much to talk about, though. Except for everything I've been out of the loop about, but I had a feeling no one would really tell me even if I asked. The most Allen told me about was the Akuma things and then he briefly mentioned something about innocence or something. Most of what he said didn't even make any sense at all, anyway.
"You said Monica told you to give this to me?" I asked, holding up my arm to show him the bracelet again. "How was she doing when you saw her?"
He didn't answer me immediately and I really didn't take that as a good sign. I mean, she was obviously well enough to order someone to do something for her. But she couldn't do so herself, which meant that the doctors were making her stay put. Which probably meant that she wasn't really wasn't well enough to get up and walk or anything. So she must not have been in very good shape to begin with. This, honestly, worried me very much because she didn't usually let anything stop her from doing anything even when she was hurt.
"Allen said she was alive!" I shouted. "He only said she was hurt. Lavi, how badly is she hurt?! You said you saw her!"
He still didn't answer and, instead, looked away from me completely. Why wasn't anyone telling me what was wrong with my sister? Was it really that bad that they all wanted to hide it from me? I was a big girl. I could take whatever news they threw at me, so why weren't they letting me know?
I grabbed the collar of his shirt and tried to shake him. I knew he was hiding things from me and this was what it was. I wanted to know. I had a right to know. Monica was my sister, so nobody had any right to keep anything from me.
"Why won't you tell me?!" I demanded. "Damn it, Lavi! I have a right to know. Tell me!"
I found myself crying for the third time today. I was really emotionally unstable right now, wasn't I? I really couldn't help it, though. People were keeping secrets from me and none of them wanted to tell me about what happened to Monica. The grip I'd had on Lavi's shirt slowly loosened up as I dropped my head against his chest.
I still wanted someone else here even after all this time, but I was forced to settle with this guy again. He didn't hesitate pulling me to him like he did answering me, though. He rested his chin on top of my head and sighed.
"She was…" He paused. "… in bad shape, but your sister's tough, right? She'll be fine. Don't cry."
"Don't tell me not to cry!" I snapped. "I ca-!"
I squeezed Lavi's shirt again, knowing exactly what I was about to see. I was cut off from the real world, then, and sent into the black and white world that was my own mind. It was here, in this room. There was glass shattering and flying everywhere. It was really hard to figure out what was going on.
Everything was moving so fast and there was something that sounded like a gun shot. There was a sharp pain in my stomach and I slowly looked down to see blood quickly staining my shirt. I started losing focus and someone called me name. I was falling back and there was nothing between me and the floor. I'd been shot and I was going to die.
Someone called my name again. I couldn't even make out who it was. There voice just echoed and echoed. It just repeated over and over and over again.
"Snap out of it, damn it!"
Everything melted away until there was color again. Lavi was staring at me like I'd gone off the deep end. And this was the second time he'd pulled me out of a vision like that. But it was very unsettling seeing him sitting there. I looked at the window and my eyes grew wide.
I grabbed his shirt again and kicked my feet against the floor to try and pull him backward and onto the ground. I hadn't expected to actually get him to budge at all, but I was lucky enough to catch him off guard. I landed on my back with him on his hands and knees over me. This probably would have been even more embarrassing if the situation were any different.
"No, you idiot." I shouted, tugging his shirt again. "Get closer! Closer! Get down!"
He tried to object, but the window broke as he opened his mouth. In that split second he dropped completely to the floor and made things far more awkward than they had been moments ago. I shouldn't have even been worried about that, though. There was nothing but a bed between the wall and us and it wasn't going to do anything to stop what was about to happen. We were as helpless as mice trapped in a maze.
He could have run when he had the chance, but I stupidly grabbed him and pulled him to the ground with me. What was I thinking doing that? We were both going to die because of me. Something, there had to be something I could do, but there wasn't. I didn't want to die at all.
"No!" I shrieked, squeezing my eyes shut as tightly as I could.
And what I expected to happen next, didn't. I opened my eyes to see some strange shield-like dome thing covering us. I could see things hitting it, but they just turned into showers of sparks on impact. I turned my head toward the bed, forgetting Lavi's was right there and ended up resting my cheek on his for a second. I quickly looked the other way, at the door.
It and the wall were covered in holes and I heard people screaming out in the hall. I shuddered a bit as Lavi breathed on my neck. I know he didn't mean to, but it still felt really weird. The shield started to fade a bit and I looked back at him. Was he the one who made it or was I?
"Pay attention to what you're doing." He said. "You'll get us killed if you don't."
"I did this?" I asked, my eyes growing wide again.
"Focus, Julia!" He replied. "Don't let it fall."
I nodded slowly and looked forward before squeezing my eyes shut again. I was actually doing something useful, even if I didn't know how. I didn't want to end up undoing what I'd just done. I felt Lavi move over a bit so that he wasn't completely on top of me anymore. I honestly couldn't believe he was relying on me, though.
You're losing focus. Stay focused Julia.
I wasn't sure how long we'd stayed there like that, but it was long enough that I was starting to get tired. I heard something start cracking and I opened my eyes again. It was the shield this time. There were a bunch of cracks forming and they were starting to get bigger and bigger. Panicked, I looked at Lavi again.
He was looking at me, but it didn't seem like he actually saw me. He was thinking really hard about something and I hoped it was a plan b. It didn't look like I'd be able to keep this up much longer even if I pushed myself really hard. The blows to the shield began to lessen and lessen for a minute and Lavi gritted his teeth.
"Let it go." He said, as he moved to pick me up. "We're gonna run while we have a chance."
I was slightly horrified by this suggestion, but he was already ready to go. Now he was the one who was going to get us killed. Either way, it didn't look like I had much of a say in the matter. I took a deep breath.
"Ready?" I asked.
"As I'll ever be." He replied.
A/N- More WTFery from this chapter, guys. Also, Julia and Lavi don't think of each other like that. But it totally looks like they do, doesn't it? I think I'm slowly starting to lean toward that a bit early, which is bad, but whatever. This chapter was interesting anyway, hopefully.
