Chapter Seven – A Solid Conviction
Tsuna felt something similar to dread curl in his stomach when he woke up that morning, surprisingly peacefully, just to see Reborn perched on the end of his bed, tiny fingers rolling something metal and shiny back and forth.
A glance to the bedside locker showed the small box open, contents undisturbed aside from the fact where there had once been a bullet, there was now an empty space.
"I'm not sure how I should feel about you keeping secrets, dame-Tsuna," Reborn said, the words falling heavily on Tsuna's ears and Tsuna could do no more than swallow apprehensively, wondering if this was the morning that Reborn would confront him, would know.
But the tiny hitman flicked the bullet with inhuman precision, the metal clattering back into the small box it had come from and, by the time Tsuna had finished tracking its descent with his eyes, Reborn was sat on the edge of the mattress closer to his face, barely a foot away.
"R-Reborn," Tsuna began, forcing himself to lick his lips, voice catching in his throat and making the word pathetically weak.
"When were you going to tell me about Lambo?"
All of Tsuna's carefully thought out words, readied apologies, rising panic, were all washed away under the uttered question and there was nothing he could do to stop the wretched sob from ripping free of his chest, his hand rising to lift over his mouth as everything dissipated at once.
Reborn's considering expression turned thoughtful, nearly stern before his small little eyes glittered malevolently and the hum of energy that constituted a shift of little Leon sounded.
"Its seven thirty am, dame-Tsuna," Reborn purred, his little hands curling around the handle of the mallet Tsuna had witnessed appear. "Looks like you need some motivation."
Tsuna didn't know what to make of the fact that Reborn was very clearly giving him an out.
It didn't take him very much longer to find himself in the kitchen, nursing a tender ache on his back and dressed in his uniform, one hand curled in the pocket of his uniform trousers, fingers pressed to the bullet like the night before.
Easing himself into a seat, Tsuna bade his morning greetings to Yamamoto, Gokudera, Lambo and – warily – Hibari, wondering when his life had gotten so lively and finding himself enjoying it.
And, despite the fact he couldn't see him, he could feel Reborn's eyes tracing his every movement like a scratching sensation in his skull and, faintly, his fingertips burned.
Very, very rapidly, the action of rubbing the burnished metal in his pocket had become a nervous tick. So much, in fact, that they unlikely group of four – Hibari several metres ahead in order to seem aloof – had only been walking for around two minutes before Yamamoto was asking, "What you got in your pocket, Tsuna?"
Tsuna determined several answers he could give, ranging from the truth to carefully constructed lies. He glanced up to Gokudera, on his right, and watched as the teen's mouth pulled down, as if he knew what Tsuna was considering
"If I'm going to tell you," Tsuna began quietly, thumb pressing into the dent the metal had sustained upon being fired and meeting Tsuna's skull. Softly, Tsuna continued, "Then I'd rather we stopped walking."
Hibari, several steps ahead, came to a halt, turning on his heel with impressive accuracy and speed, eyes dark and unreadable as he considered Tsuna.
"Tsuna?" Yamamoto asked quietly.
Tsuna curled his fingers around the bullet and pulled his hand from his pocket. The projectile felt heavy in his palm and the knowledge of it weighted down his shoulders. He almost chickened out, breath catching in his throat.
"There was an incident yesterday." Tsuna glanced nervously to Gokudera, who reached to press his knuckles gently to Tsuna's shoulder blade in a show of companionship.
Neither Yamamoto nor Hibari missed this.
Tsuna took in a steadying breath and uncurled his fingers, hand opening like a slowly blooming flower.
"I was shot. And before you ask how, I don't know how to explain it. But this was the bullet." And, unable to help himself, Tsuna bent his thumb back in to roll the gleaming metal back and forth over the soft skin of his fingers.
"Tsuna." Yamamoto looked and sounded hurt, and Tsuna knew he had really overstepped his boundaries as a friend. No doubt Yamamoto was wondering why Gokudera seemed privy to more information when Yamamoto and Tsuna had known each other for far longer.
"I…It's complicated, Yamamoto," Tsuna whispered, hating the word even as he spoke it and he clenched his hand around the bullet, feeling the warmth of prolonged contact in it, even as it's uneven edges bit into his palm.
Gokudera looked as if he was sucking on a sour lemon and Hibari was staring at Tsuna's closed hand, his glare burning as though he could see the bullet hidden behind pale fingers.
"Perhaps," Gokudera said, voice barely audible. "If they became part of the Family."
"Gokudera-kun," Tsuna said, aghast, but then Yamamoto was nodding firmly, face set and serious.
Before Tsuna could say more, or before Gokudera could explain any further, Hibari was interrupting with cutting words and a harsh countenance, "I do not tolerate tardiness. If you're late to class, I will bite you to death."
"After school," Tsuna said quietly, resolutely. "After school, we'll talk to Reborn. And then, we might be able to tell you."
He reared back when Hibari leaned close into his space, staring down at him from his superior height.
"No. You will tell us," Hibari's tone of voice brokered no argument, his hand shooting down to enclose Tsuna's wrist, squeezing hard enough for Tsuna's fingers to slacken in pain, the bullet falling down into Hibari's free hand.
"This is poisonous. Keeping it will prolong the pain."
"H-Hibari – " Tsuna began, but then the senior was walking away rapidly, coat flaring almost dramatically behind him.
"It's not really that healthy to dwell on it," Yamamoto agreed quietly and, when Tsuna's fingers uselessly twitched in a mockery of wanting to close around the solid lump of metal that was no longer there, the other teen reached out to scoop up Tsuna's hand and squeeze gently.
"We're here, Tsuna." Yamamoto smiled then, but it still looked forced and made Tsuna's chest ache. "If you want to do something, talk to us, huh?"
"I don't mean to keep quiet about it I just…There's never been anyone there," Tsuna was mortified when his voice broke, and the look on Yamamoto's face turned from lost to resolute and then Yamamoto scooped Tsuna into a tight hug, nearly dragging Tsuna off of the floor.
"We are here, Tsuna," Yamamoto repeated fiercely. "And it will never be like that again, not so long as I can help it."
Tsuna had to bite his tongue to distract himself from the burning in his eyes and the sob crawling up his throat as he reached around to desperately clutch at the back of Yamamoto's shirt.
After a heartfelt moment in which he tried his best not to cry, Gokudera's hand pressed comfortingly to the back of his shoulder before his friend was saying, regret in his voice, "W-We have to go, tenth. Hibari seems pretty intense to people who are late."
"Y-Yeah," Tsuna stuttered, voice thick as he pulled away from an equally reluctant Yamamoto, the taller teen's eyes bright with unshed tears.
Then, surprising all three of them, Tsuna whirled around to hold just as desperately onto Gokudera, hiding his face briefly in a warm shoulder as he tried to regain his composure.
And, despite the ramifications of arriving late, the two of them just watched in companionable silence as the third member of their group began to tremble and cry.
By the time lunch had rolled around, Yamamoto was hurrying away with a quick apology and a stilted explanation of prior obligations with his club.
Along with his words he firmly said, "I'll be back soon, so you could wait here?"
Gokudera had left not moments before. With his abrupt transferral to the middle school, he needed to review with the teachers regarding his current stage of education and learning.
He said words of similar effect to Tsuna, and even made it a point to leave his bag by his desk to allude to the fact he'd be returning.
Tsuna shooed them away, a warm feeling blooming in his chest and settling like a balloon behind his sternum and making him feel light and happy.
He was just rummaging around for his lunch box when there was a clatter against the window next to him, and he glanced over just to see a scene reminiscent of the day earlier.
Being one of only a few in the classroom, and the closest to the window, nobody else noticed as Tsuna hurriedly opened the window and rescued Lambo from his precarious perch just outside of the room.
"Lambo," Tsuna hissed, placing his bag strategically on his desk and scooting his chair back in order to settle the small child on his lap. "What are you doing here?"
Lambo stared at him almost solemnly, wide eyes blinking slowly and almost lackadaisically before he reached tiny, slightly sticky fingers, to press his palm against Tsuna's forehead.
"It's gone," Lambo mumbled, hand pressed almost unerringly on the same spot Tsuna knew from Gokudera's quiet explanation the bullet hole had sat.
"Lambo," Tsuna whispered in return, horror creeping up his throat and almost closing his airways. "D-Did you see something yesterday?"
"Father once said that when a person dies, they're gone for good," Lambo said slowly, sounding out the words in a high pitched, childish tone at odds with his sentence. "That they've gone to heaven and we will celebrate their life even as we mourn their loss."
Tsuna didn't know what to say, heart thumping almost painfully in his chest as his mind chanted a litany of, no, no, no, not Lambo, please, not a child, don't let him care, don't let him know, I don't care about anything else but please, not Lambo.
"Idiot-Gokudera," and here Tsuna tried not to snort at the out of place name in such a serious moment, "Idiot-Gokudera, he was with you. And he didn't mourn. And you're not gone."
"I have a very special gift, Lambo," Tsuna said quietly, moving one trembling hand to rest in Lambo's curly hair and resisting the urge to call it a curse.
Mafia family, something in his brain whispered. He's five, but from a mafia family. What does he know of death? What should I tell him? What should he learn?
Lambo looked up at him, expression unguarded and filled with something Tsuna identified as wonder. The emotion made something twist uncomfortably in his gut.
"When I get very, very badly hurt, I sometimes go to sleep. And, when I wake up, the pain and sore bits are gone."
"Like a magic power," Lambo chirped, seeming cheerier than his earlier words as understanding lit up his eyes.
"Like a magic power," Tsuna confirmed in a choked off voice, reaching a hand to scrub at his throat. "But you need to keep it a secret for me. Can you do that?"
Lambo sniffed haughtily, head lifting higher and Tsuna felt his hand in Lambo's hair brush something firm, which he then identified as a small horn, an accessory of sorts.
"Of course I can," Lambo then declared, chest puffed out in pride at being given a secret to keep. "B-But why didn't you want me to see before?"
What does a five year old know of death, a voice filled with trepidation murmured at the back of his mind. What little does he know, and what will you show him? WIll it hurt him when he learns the truth?
Tsuna moved then, to wrap his arms around the confused boy, holding him in as gentle yet as firm a hug he could.
"Because you're now a very important person to me, Lambo. And I don't want you to see me at my worst."
Tiny hands curled in the collar of his shirt, one trailing away to grasp at his hair. Around them, the students had begun to whisper as they realised that there was, indeed, a five year old in the classroom with them.
Tsuna drowned out their words, felt Lambo's fast little heartbeat under the palm pressed to the young boy's back and wished, fervently, that Lambo never saw, for all that he was able.
So long as he could keep him innocent, he would.
The day I let a child know pain like that, is a day I never wish to see.
I think this may be the shortest chapter yet but oh well.
Hopefully it was to standards and not too many glaring mistakes.
I was thinking the next chapter might be a little interlude chapter. Well, we'll see!