Allen didn't even know what he was thinking, running away like that. He really didn't.
He clearly wasn't and no matter how much he knew he had to go back, he couldn't force himself to do it…
His heart was still beating hard and his breath coming in shallow. He'd ran and ran until he couldn't anymore. Sweat had pooled on his brow and caused his hair to cling to his forehead. He was certain he'd been running for at least an hour, probably more. His whirling emotions were urging him to just keep running, but he was getting so tired and his muscles were aching. He ultimately collapsed under a tree on a hill, physically and emotionally exhausted.
He missed Kanda.
Allen clenched his hand tightly, the phantom feeling of the demon's hand in his own unbearable. The other man wasn't here with him and yet he could feel him all the same. He regretted it, he really did. He just left! He never got to explain to Kanda what had happened or how he was feeling. And it felt so...final. Was it final? Allen didn't want to think about it like that. Maybe his home wasn't great all the time, but that didn't mean he wanted to leave forever, especially since he was leaving Kanda there! It was just…
He didn't know. He scrubbed his hand roughly across his face, but it only increased his agitation.
Even just thinking about it...he couldn't look at his hand. His argument with Lavi wouldn't just...go away just because he went back and that was just if he could get back through the forest again without being eaten by something. He knew there was risk there with that. He just-!
He felt it first in rare drops and then more often, quickly becoming harder until it was truly raining. The water came down in sheets on him and his eyes stung as they tried to blink the water out of the way. The water was blurring his eyesight and he couldn't see clearly. Allen forced his weary body to move and stumbled unsurely onto his feet. The tree wasn't protecting him from the rain and he couldn't stay here.
From his hazy view atop the hill, Allen could see a town off in the distance. He saw the distinct starting line of the town and the silhouettes of homes and their roofs rising up from the ground. He couldn't see it well, but he could tell it was pretty far away, barely visible from where he was.
Allen shakily - at first because he was exhausted and then because the cold of the night started setting in - got to his feet. No matter how much it hurt, he needed to move and since he couldn't bring himself to go back to the mansion, he needed to find somewhere else to stay.
Would one of the inhabitants of the town let him stay with them?
Yet, as he slid down towards the bottom of the hill, he saw something he hadn't expected. It had been blocked from his sight from where he had stood previously, but now he could see a hut-like home and unlike the small town, it was close to where he was. A dull light shone through the bare windows of the small house and they drew Allen in, his weakened legs drew him towards it before he realized it. Not that he had any intention of stopping himself when he did notice it, but he did worry his lip a bit as he wondered if it would work out.
What kind of people would let in someone who wandered in front of their home in the middle of the night? Would they send him away? Would they be angry with him? Maybe they would hit him, but still he needed a place to stay and this one was as good as any other so he had to try! Allen got to the door of the hut after so long and yet altogether too soon and raised his hand shakily to knock at the door before quickly lowering it in a fuss after he'd done so.
He wasn't even shaking due to nerves this time, although he'd found himself with no shortage of those. He was just so cold! Whenever he wasn't too engrossed in his thoughts, he was shocked by the absolute chill that seemed to wrack his whole body.
Maybe he shouldn't be surprised...it was the middle of the night in winter in a place that snowed and now it was raining on top of everything! No wonder he was shaking with-wait.
Wait.
Forgetting the house for a moment, Allen whipped around where he stood to face back the way he had come. Yes, what he'd just realized was true!
Where was the snow?
The snow outside the mansion had been a near constant sight since he'd come back into this world. Sure, it had rained a few times as well and there was, of course, fog near the home but only in the short time period before the snow started falling more often. It definitely had been snowing last night and there had been snow in their front yard and in the forest when he'd ran.
He saw...or well, he thought he'd seen snow atop some of the roofs of the houses of the town he could see through the distance, rain, and tears.
So where was it now?
He truly hadn't noticed until now, but the hill he'd been sitting on, the path to the hut, and the entire area around it he could see...had no snow. Where was it? Did it just not snow in this area? Is that how snow worked? Allen had no way of knowing, he had very little general knowledge on a lot of things and very little on weather. Could the distance between he hut and the forest with the mansion really be so large as to explain-
A creaking sound came from behind him, startling Allen and making him whirl back around. The door! He'd forgotten all about his having knocked on it in his distraction. It was already open when he looked and standing in the doorway was an old lady. The night was dark but the lights coming from inside her home was brilliant, casting her face in shadow. She had short gray hair tied up in a bun and her back was slightly hunched. Despite that, to Allen's slight irritation, she looked to be about an inch and a half taller than him.
"Why are you here?" The old woman asked, not bothering to try and be polite. Although her voice sounded peevish, it didn't sound particularly mean. Just slightly irritated or bothered which, to be fair, he had bothered her late at night for an issue that wasn't hers to deal with.
That realization jolted Allen into movement and he lurched forward slightly as he bowed deeply to the old lady. Though he'd never done it before himself, he knew that in some situations bowing was a form of respect or apology and depending on the depth of the bow, the sentiment itself could be deeper. Still, Allen had made the gesture mostly out of a combination of nervousness and instinct.
"I-I'm so sorry!" Allen found himself stuttering out, giving free reign to his anxiousness while the elderly woman watched him silently. His youthful voice sounded even more so in the cold and desolate raining dampness of the night. "I'm so sorry to have bothered you! You see-! You see, I've recently lost my way home and I was hoping that you might know any place I could rest for the night!"
His heart sank heavily as the woman continued to say nothing. His body and head still bowed strictly downward, the silver haired boy kept his gaze firmly fixated on her feet. He jolted when she finally spoke in reply, almost not registering the words she actually spoke. Almost.
"I see." Her voice mostly sounded deadpan, but there seemed to be some hint of contemplation in her words.
The question was unexpected and Allen scrabbled for a reply for a moment. "Because…" Allen drew out, casting his mind around before finally forming his next words. "Because I asked?"
The boy winced slightly at the words. They weren't the best, but they were all he could think of and they could be taken two ways. Either the lady would ignore them or she would be outright offended by the statement and Allen wouldn't be able to blame her if she was. If not for his tone of voice when he said them, the words could have easily been taken as presumptive and demanding. Hopefully, he had been able to get it across in his voice that he didn't-
"Too right, I suppose." The old lady replied, more thoughtful this time and Allen looked up at her then, in time to see her nodding to herself in agreement. "As good a reason as any, I suppose. You might as well come in then, the night is cold and it's getting my floor wet." She stepped back enough to let the silver haired boy slip inside, which he did eagerly, before she closed the door.
The cabin was smaller on the inside than it looked on the outside and the room he'd found he'd stepped into was that of the kitchen. Unlike the one at the mansion, this one was warm and welcoming, containing furniture and countertops that were made out of a light brown wood instead of the heavy dark wood or rock that he was used to. And while the kitchen area he frequented with Lavi was cold and slightly damp (although far from wet), this one was dry and warm, owing to the fire that was roaring away beneath a simmering pot.
The whole place felt unbelievably inviting and was a stark contrast to what Allen was used to. Part of him was amazed at how much of a home it immediately felt like he'd entered, while another part of him…
...felt vaguely uncomfortable with it. For reasons he couldn't possibly understand.
The woman hobbled up behind him and then passed him, taking up what had probably been her previous position over by the fire. Allen hesitated at his spot, uncomfortable and unsure what to do with himself. The boy shuddered harshly as a nasty chill ran through his body. Maybe he should get a little closer to the fire.
Ignoring his own slight discomfort, Allen soldiered up behind and slightly to the side of the lady and stopped just a few feet away from the pot and the fire. He slowly held out his hands, side-eying the elderly woman as he did so to make sure he didn't get in her way and cause her even more trouble. She was very kind for taking him in like this.
They stood side-by-side quietly like that together for some time with the only sounds being the woman's quiet stirring of the pot. Then with a quick flourish that seemed to come out of nowhere and caused Allen to jump a little, she whipped the pot up and off the fire, whirling around and placing it on the dining table. She's more dexterous than she looks, Allen thought to himself as he watched.
"Don't just stand there watching with your jaw on the floor. Come and eat, you look like a drowned rat." The old woman admonished sternly and Allen hurried forward to take a seat at the table and the woman followed suit with two wooden bowls, each with a matching spoon resting inside of it. The lady ladled out from the pot two bowls worth of soup before and then she reached over to place one bowl in front of Allen.
Allen drew in a long breath as he hovered his face way closer to the bowl than was probably considered polite. The soup had a wonderfully inviting aroma that he didn't think he would get enough of but the smell was weak - at least, to his nose - and he had to get that close in order to get a good whiff of it. What was a lot stronger than the smell was the heat radiating off of the dish. Cooked in an iron pot and just off the fire, the steam coming off the bowl of soup practically felt like a fire itself. Again, much different from the home Allen had come from.
The dishes back home were never cold, but they were always made by Lavi earlier that day and set aside for Allen and Kanda to eat at their leisure when they awoke. That is, when Allen ate the prepared food in the dining room instead of going to the kitchen on his own to scrounge for snacks instead, which he had an unfortunate habit of doing. Allen felt his lips automatically twitching upwards at the memories, but the little smile dropped quickly with the influx of stress when Allen realized it was there.
He was still so confused, he didn't want to think about the happy or even the bittersweet memories right now. Instead, he forced himself to focus on something real and tangible; the soup in front of him.
Said soup had a dark brown and slightly thick broth with a few kinds of vegetables and a few small bits of meat resting in it. Shivering again, Allen spooned up a bit and blew on the hot soup lightly before downing it. It wasn't the expensive and rich flavors of the dishes he was used to getting at home, but that was to be expected. He might not know a lot, but it was always obvious that Kanda had more money and resources than this woman did.
Having said that, the soup was still delicious and what was better was that it was warm. Allen could feel the soup make its way down his throat and into his stomach and it was glorious. He hadn't realized how truly hungry he was until that moment and even though he'd warmed up considerably since being allowed into the home, that spoonful of soup was the closest he'd gotten to feeling truly warm.
At least his fingers were no longer feeling numb. Complete lack of medical knowledge aside, he had the distinct feeling that that hadn't been a good thing.
Spurred on by his newly discovered hunger and the desperate need to chase the warmth that the soup gave him, Allen went through the bowl with gusto. The woman completely slipped his mind as he ate and she didn't enter it again until he reached the bottom of his bowl and finally looked up, catching sight of his dining companion. The pale boy blushed in embarrassment at the sight of her, realizing he'd completely forgotten she was here in her own house. To top it off, he hadn't been paying attention to how he was eating in his haste to finish his meal and probably made quite a spectacle of himself.
His only point of solace was the fact that when he looked up, the elderly woman wasn't looking at him but had her eyes closed as she leisurely went through her own bowl. He tried not to be paranoid and think that the reason she had her eyes closed was because she didn't want to see him eat. He would only send himself into a spiral if he thought like that and probably die a second time from mortification…
Disappointingly, he was still hungry.
"You can have more." The woman said while looking up from her meal, as if she'd known Allen was staring at her. Allen jumped when she spoke suddenly, feeling more than a little skittish that night, but he lit up when he realized what she'd said.
"Really?" He cried, excited. It was a large pot, but she was an old lady who probably didn't have much and he did eat a lot.
"I wouldn't say it if I didn't mean it." The old woman replied dismissively and gestured (a little rudely) for Allen to hand over his bowl, which he did readily. He tried not to accept it back too greedily when it'd been filled.
"After you're done, I'll show you where you can sleep and then I'm done with you for the night." The woman stated, not unkindly.
"Okay." Allen mumbled through his food, still focusing his attention mostly on that instead of the woman. He still replied and nodded happily to what she said, though. He was grateful, after all, for what she was doing for him. It was nice.
And being with someone was helping him not think about another certain someone.
And how much he missed him…
...so very much.
