If I owned DGM, Krory would look way different.
Bruise
Chapter 13: Mirror
"I hate mirrors," I mutter, pulling on my shirt.
"Did you say something, Moyashi?" Kanda asked, walking into the bathroom and leaning against the doorframe. Turning away from my reflection, I shake my head, "No."
When I try to walk past him, he held out his arm, blocking my path, and he says, "You said something. What was it?"
Ducking under the obstacle, I make my way to the door and after Kanda and I begin walking to the cafeteria for breakfast, I finally admit, "I said that I hate mirrors."
"And why is that?" he asked.
"Yu," I begin, "you can tell me I'm beautiful and stuff as much as you want, and believe me, I love it when you do, but I still don't see myself that way. Besides, the only opinion I'm getting is yours."
The cafeteria is nearly in sight when the bluenette asks out of the blue, "Do you have any plans today?"
"Um, not that I know of. I guess I just had planned that I would train or something with you. Lavi's on a mission in Brazil anyways, so he's not going to be back for several weeks depending on how long it takes to find the Innocence. Why?" I reply. I spot Lenalee sitting alone at our normal table towards the back of the cafeteria, and I wave, earning a smile from the pigtailed girl. Kanda stops walking and says, "Go get your food. I'll talk to you later."
Pouting, I protest, "But Yu―!"
The samurai was already walking toward Lenalee, who smiled widely and said something, and as I waited for my food, I kept looking back at them. The girl had gone from chipper and smiling to dead serious, nodding every now and then, and when I finally get my food, I'm more than happy to join the conversation that apparently stopped as soon as I showed up.
I set down my dozen plates, and with that, Kanda nodded to Lenalee and began to walk toward the hall, but I called, "Yu! Where are you going?"
The cafeteria goes silent, not even a murmur to be heard as I realize that Kanda had told me not to call him by his first name in public, and I, like everyone else, await a blood bath. It never happens.
"Just stay with Lenalee for awhile, Moyashi," he said over his shoulder, and then he proceeded to exit the cafeteria. Once he was gone, the noise increased tenfold, probably rumors and suspicions being passed around, and I nonchalantly sat down, shoveling food into the gaping pit I call my mouth.
"Allen, did Kanda just let you call him by his given name?" Lenalee asked, taking a bite of her salad.
"Yeah, why?" I ask, moving to my third plate. Shrugging, she says, "Just seemed weird."
"Okay," I say. "What was he talking to you about?"
Smiling innocently, she replies, "He told me that you're really flexible and that I needed to train with you."
"Oh," I mumble, my eating rate dropping slightly. I guess I expected it to be something else since they were acting so secret about it, but I'm not really sure what I thought that something else was.
oO_Oo_oO_Oo
As Karou waited for a finder girl finish writing, he glanced at the clock, finding it to be noon. The girl smiled, handing him the papers, "Here you go, Kanda."
The bluenette nodded his thanks to the blonde, beginning to make his way back to the cafeteria.
Karou was quite happy with the results of his little endeavor. For the past two hours after Lila had agreed to keep Ally busy until four, he'd been asking whoever he came across to write down words that came to mind when they thought of Ally Walker, and the next person was going to have to continue onto the fourth page. Granted, the samurai couldn't help but growl when girls would write down things like sexy, smoking hot, and delicious, but he guessed it would get the point across. Hailing the next person he saw, Karou waited for the person to finish writing down whatever it was, though it wasn't particularly helpful that the dude was also writing down adjectives like smexy.
Oo_oO_Oo_oO
"I am so tired!" I exclaim, flopping down on Lenalee's bed next to her. She giggles, "You've gotten better since the last time I trained with you!"
Glancing at her, I ask, "It's not been that long, has it?"
Whacking me playfully on the shoulder, she nods, "Allen, the last time we sparred together was your birthday, remember?"
"Right! Because all I wanted for my birthday was to have a sleepover with you, so we trained first and came back here later," I say. Laughing, she continues, "Yeah, and in the middle of the night, Brother found out and sent a Sir Komlin to destroy you, because he had one too many glasses of brandy."
Grimacing, I say, "Yes, and I was terrified that that machine was going to castrate me."
"You have to admit though, it was a fun birthday!" she laughed. "But really, you need to spend the night again. I never get to see you anymore!"
I smile, "Sounds good. Consider it a late birthday present Miss April Fools."
"Hey, it's not fun! Anytime I tell someone that it's my birthday, they think I'm trying to trick them!"
"I know how you feel. People think that I'm trying to get more presents when I say my birthday's on Christmas."
"Isn't Lavi's birthday coming up in the next few months? June?"
I tilt my head in confusion before I correct, "No, Lavi's birthday is in August. Kanda's is June sixth."
Blushing from embarrassment, Lenalee says, "I knew that! I was just testing you!"
"Right."
"Oh, shush, Moyashi!"
"Lenalee!"
"That's what you get."
Silence falls over us for about three seconds before we both break out laughing. Lenalee has been my best friend since I got to the Order, but ever since I started dating Lavi, he's been really possessive and he would easily get jealous. He wanted me to start spending a lot less time with her, not to mention how badly he went off on me when I suggested having a slumber party with her back in February.
"What time is it?" Lenalee asked through her laughter, and I glance at the clock before answering nearly four. With that being said, the pigtailed girl began pulling me out the door, not caring that I was resisting.
"Okay, here," she said, handing me a bar of soap once we get to my room. I was slightly tempted to sniff my armpits, but refrained, instead asking, "Do I really smell that bad?"
Shaking her head, she giggled, "No, silly! Read the label."
This I did, and then I smiled. All-natural, jasmine and lavender flavored soap, and I glance up at her, "Aren't I supposed to give you a gift?"
"No, you already got me that skirt in March, remember? Actually, Brother went overboard with presents this year, again, and he got this super expensive set of soaps. There were, like, a dozen of them, and when I saw this one, I thought of you. Besides, I can't rock lavender like you can," she explained.
"Thanks, I think," I say, opening my door. Smiling, Lenalee says, "Your welcome. By the way, you should probably put it in your bathroom as soon as you get it. Wouldn't want to lose it, right?"
"Right. See you at dinner, Lenalee!" I wave before closing the door. The soap's fragrance was already filling the room, even though it was still in a clear casing. Taking a deep breath, I savor the superfluous scent, walking toward the bathroom, and I purposely don't look at the mirror, setting the bar of soap on the edge of the tub.
Let's see, I still had a good two hours before dinner, so I could take a shower, but then I'd have to redo my makeup. Pathetic. My bruises on my face still hadn't completely faded a week and a half after the last time Lavi lost his temper. I finally settle on sleeping and move back toward my bedroom, but something bright red catches my attention. Turning my head, I stare at my bathroom mirror, eyes widening as tears of felicity pool at the edges of them.
All over the mirror in red and blue marker there were words. But not just any words. Ones that I would never describe myself as. At the very top of the mirror in alternating colors, ALLEN WALKER IS: was written across the glass, and in the middle, BEAUTIFUL was also written in switching colors, other adjectives surrounding it.
Pretty. Angelic. Sexy. Cute. Wish I was that hot. Smoking. Friendly. Always smiling. Never stops laughing. Irresistible. Edible and I would eat him. Sweet as can be. Drool-worthy. Bubbly. Radiant. Peace-maker. Should totally rock a leather jacket with his skinny jeans. I want to be his girlfriend. Delicious. Constantly diligent. And tons more.
"Are you convinced yet?"
I turn around, tears of happiness streaming down my cheeks, and in the doorway, Kanda stood, holding a pack of papers. Sniffling, I ask, "What is all this?"
Walking up directly in front of me, the bluenette spins me around to face the mirror again, arms secured around my chest, and he says, "Well, you said that you hated mirrors. I wanted to change that."
"So you wrote these things on it?"
"True, I wrote them, but I only came up with the words in blue. How many of those do you see?" he whispers, and I mentally count them. Relaxing in his arms, I reply, "Five."
"Right. The other fifty in red are the most popular words of choice from everyone else."
"Everyone else?"
Holding the papers in front of me, Kanda said, "Here. Seventeen pages of words that people described you as that I took the liberty of collecting."
"You didn't make this up?" I ask, shakily taking the pack and flipping through it.
"Look at the handwriting. Mine is on the mirror."
Kanda's writing was in cursive, flowing evenly before ending in a sharp point. Some of the words on the papers were like that, too, but some were choppy print, bubble letters, doodle-like, and even someone wrote elegant in Spanish. No one could pull off so many different styles with their own hand.
More tears fell from my eyes as I pull away from Kanda and walk into my room, wiping away the rivers so I could see what I was doing as I dug through my desk drawers. I finally find the box of push pins I had had for several years, and I begin pressing the paper to the wall before stabbing them.
After I had hung all the papers, I turn to see that Kanda had managed to pin up a poster above my bed somehow without me noticing, and I stared at it. It wasn't really a poster; it was a painting on rolled canvas. The painting starred a white Bengal tiger with blue-silver eyes walking through the snow, and the background had a mountain with a setting sun. My favorite though? The fact that in the fiery sky, there were ice-blue letters spelling YOU ARE BEAUTIFUL.
"Where did you get this?" I ask, staring in awe before I noticed the signature.
"Tiedoll had this painted for a while, but he never did anything with it, so when I asked him to write that on it, he didn't have any problem with it," Kanda said, sitting on the bed. "It's actually relatively old. He had already painted it when I became his apprentice, and I used to really like it. Whenever I would get angry, I would take this painting out of his studio and stare at it while meditating."
Not giving him any warning, I launch myself into his arms, knocking him down on his back on the bed, and I feel even more tears pour from my eyes. Holding me and stroking my hair softly, the bluenette asks, "What are you?"
"I'm beautiful," I whisper, crying so much that I think that I could flood the Order. It was going to take a while for me to integrate it into my mind, but for now, saying that it is enough. I wouldn't have been able to do that yesterday. Or fifteen minutes ago for that matter.
"Exactly," Kanda said. One of his hands moved to reach for his pocket, and I watched him pull out my mp3 player. How he got it? I may never know.
"And I took the liberty of also downloading this," he continued, flipping through my songs until he finally stopped it on a song I hadn't ever heard before.
My music device sang, "Do you ever feel like a plastic bag drifting through the wind, wanting to start again? Do ever feel, feel so paper thin like a house of cards one blow from caving in? Do you ever feel already buried deep? Six feet under screens where no one seems to hear a thing. Did you know that there's still a chance for you? Because there's a spark in you. You just gotta ignite the light, and let it shine. Just own the night like the Fourth of July.
"Because, baby, you're a firework! Come on, show them what your worth! Make them go 'aw, aw, aw' as you shoot across the sky-y-y. Baby, you're a firework! Come on, let your colors burst! Make them go 'aw, aw, aw'. You're gonna leave them all in awe, awe, awe!
"You don't have to feel like a wasted space. You're original, cannot be replaced. If you only knew what the future holds. After a hurricane, comes a rainbow. Maybe the reason why all the doors are closed is so you can open one that leads you to the perfect home. Like a lightning bolt, your heart will glow, and when it's time, you'll know. You just gotta ignite the light, and let it shine. Just own the night like the Fourth of July.
"Because, baby, you're a firework! Come on, show them what your worth! Make them go 'aw, aw, aw' as you shoot across the sky-y-y. Baby, you're a firework! Come on, let your colors burst! Make them go 'aw, aw, aw'. You're gonna leave them all in awe, awe, awe!"
oO_Oo_oO_Oo
Karou really hoped that Ally's tears were a good thing, because if they weren't, he was going to feel like a serious jerk for making her cry. The song, "Firework" by Katy Perry, finished shortly after, but the whitette continued to cry. For a while, the samurai wasn't even sure she was going to stop, but she did eventually, whispering, "Thank you so much, Yu."
"You're welcome, Allen," he replied. Looking up, Ally says, "You called me by my name."
"Sorry to disappoint, Moyashi," Karou chuckled, and the girl whacked him on the shoulder. Pouting, she asks, "Will you do it again?"
Shaking his head, the bluenette says, "Nope. You are forever Moyashi."
"Only your Moyashi," Ally muttered, and then she blushed furiously. "No! I didn't me―!"
"So you're my Moyashi now?" he teased as she buried her blazing face in his shoulder.
"BaKanda," she growled.
"My Baka Moyashi."
"Shut up!"
Author Note: Short chapter! Oh no! Hehe, it's making up for the last two longer ones. Actually, I came up with this chapter idea last night when I couldn't go to sleep, but when I turned on the light, imagine my surprise when I noticed a bat flying around! It was so cute! If you disagree and think bats are ugly, you are WRONG! And as always, please, Please, PLEASE R/R!