Chapter 7: answers that are not yet given

I was so surprised that I was speechless. Should I say thanks or…? So instead I left without another word. It might have been rude of me, but I couldn't make sense of it. Why was he glad I was okay? Didn't he hate me? I could see no possible inconvenience for him if I hadn't survived the poison. My death scythe turned back into a bracelet and I walked out into the rain. It was a nice light rain. Most of it had already stopped, so I wasn't too wet by the time I got home. When my hair was completely straight, as it was when it was wet, it was roughly about knee length. I combed it out and then dried it. I had a very big, picturesque window in my room, from which I could see the library and the pier.

I stared out my window into the rain, watching as it spattered the windowpane. I didn't understand it any more than I understood him. Why would he even care? Sure, it wouldn't look too good from his point of view if the grim reaper he was training suddenly died, but I saw no reason for him to tell me that. He had never called me 'Leah'. It was always 'Miss Hayes'. Why the sudden change? He hadn't even said a word about me not wearing my uniform.

Another reason why William annoyed me was because I couldn't tell what he was thinking, figuratively. I was always very good at perception. I could tell what people were thinking based on their facial expressions, and I could tell what they were most likely going to do next. Though William followed his schedule 24/7, his face was always completely emotionless. At first, when I had seen his expression, I was so surprised I couldn't tell what the emotion was. That was the huge difference I had seen today. He was actually showing some sort of emotion besides the usual disdain, indifference and whatever.

Now that I thought about it, the expression on his face had resembled Grell's when we had gone to our family grave for the first time. Our parents had been best friends, as had our grandparents. So it was natural to bury them in one huge family cemetery. I had cried my eyes out. Grell didn't cry. He looked more like he didn't know what to feel. His expression had been somewhere in between sadness and wistfulness. Not completely sad… yet not really any other emotion either.

Speaking of family graves, that was a good idea. I would go visit them later, once the rain cleared. Fortunately, the rain wasn't long, and I managed to go outside closer to the evening with a large bouquet of red roses. I took Grell's Harley up to the hillside, as it was pretty far from here. Yes, I did know how to ride a motorcycle. It wasn't that hard. I took the bouquet of roses and several name plates. I had memorized who was where and had made little tablets for them. It didn't seem fair not to have a namesake.

I walked up to the top of the hillside and laid a single flower on each grave, laying three on my parents' graves, and three on the graves of Grell's parents. I then hammered the tablets into place onto the ground. The sky cleared slowly, and beams of sunlight shot in between the clouds. It was very nice. I stood there, looking down onto the ruined houses. I could still tell which one had been my family's house, and Grell's family had lived right across from us.

A light breeze made the trees sway from side to side. I heard a faint rustling noise and looked over my shoulder. Far on the other side of the graves, I could see an outline of a figure standing in front of a smaller group of graves. I strained to see the person, but I could only make out their outline. I grabbed my red thin rimmed glasses from the inside of my pocket, put them on and glanced inconspicuously at the person.

This time I saw the outline of his hair and familiar square glasses. It was William. I hadn't expected him to be here. Then again, it wasn't so surprising considering the fact that almost everyone in our district had died. I didn't know William had lived here as well. Then again, there was barely anything I knew about William.

Maybe he wasn't really as uptight as he acted. William smiling, let alone laughing was unheard of and never thought of. Could I change that? I might be willing to try. If he didn't hate me like I thought… maybe he wasn't really so bad? He could be an entirely different person and I wouldn't know.

From that point, I decided to be a little different. I would no longer get mad at him with anything he said. I would get him to trust me. Who knew? Maybe we would end up being friends?

*** William's POV, third person perspective***

He watched as Leah got on the red motorcycle and drove away. He picked up his death scythe from the ground and walked out of the cemetery. He hadn't really paid much attention to anyone before, except to tell them off when they did something wrong and in Grell's case, hit him over the head.

He had no idea why he cared specifically about Leah, and only about Leah. She had grown up with that piece of garbage, and they were as close as family. Her personality wasn't as bad as Grell's was, but she was still like him. She loved red, which was his least favourite color. She was almost never on time and had distaste for rules and schedules. She would talk back to superiors and hated taking orders. She wouldn't wear glasses though it was a necessary part to being a shinigami. Every shinigami had to wear glasses. She had refused point blank. She was stupidly emotional about everything and one could read her expression like an open book. One should not take their emotions into their job. It was a waste of time.

Everyone else in his life had seemed to be cast in a dark shadow. However, since the first time he'd met her, it felt like she had a spotlight trailing on her, forcing him to look at her. He'd known someone was out to kill her since the training incident where she had fought her partner, and it was his duty to protect her. He should be disgusted with her, like he was with Grell and Ronald and most of the other shinigami who didn't know their places. For some reason, he wasn't.

I couldn't care less about that woman. He told himself firmly. The only reason I am happy she is alive is that it would affect my job position if the one person I was training suddenly died. She matters no more to me than anyone else.

He walked into his house and snapped the door shut.