Exception

By: Aviantei

6. "Just because you won't…"

In the scheduling mess that was Kanda's life, he was at least grateful that he had managed to score a free period as well as a study hall. Sure, the study hall was shared with Lavi, but the free period gave him space to go wherever he saw fit and actually gain some personal space. It was also luck that Ivy had her own free period at the same time, during which they usually met up to work together and occasionally chatted in one of the free study rooms at the school.

Kanda settled into the room, laying out his textbooks and trying to get his homework assignments together. The only real complaint he had was his free period was two classes after lunch, meaning he couldn't just get all of his homework for the day out of the way—a pretty fucking stupid setup if you asked him. Within minutes, Ivy entered the room as well, giving a greeting and a small wave. After a few bits of small talk—how their days had been, had any permanent damage been caused to people or objects—Kanda decided that he should just get it over with and ask Ivy about the whole debacle with a certain redhead.

"So," Kanda said, sounding a lot more awkward than he would usually let anyone else hear, "was the Rabbit acting strange today?"

Ivy paused in setting her own work out before she realized that just screamed suspicious. She hadn't really been planning on mentioning the date, mainly because Kanda didn't exactly need to know. "Isn't he always?" she smoothly retorted, hoping that would be enough.

Kanda pressed on. "I mean stranger than usual." The Rabbit had probably just been running his mouth, but that was a pretty risky way to try and run it. Because, even if Kanda didn't like to admit it, he knew Lavi could read him. For acting like such a dumbass, Lavi got people, and there was a zero to none chance that he hadn't picked up on Kanda's…affections. Because it wasn't a crush. Kanda Yu did not get crushes.

"Lavi was Lavi." Normally, that could settle matters. Ivy went to find an old assignment sheet for reference, only to find her folder a complete mess. Ugh, when had that even happened? She started to organize the papers, not looking up. Lavi must have done something stupid to get Kanda this worked up.

"Okay," Kanda said, his voice coming out more agitated than either of them had expected. Disgruntled, the boy found the chapter he was supposed to be reviewing for his history class and flipped open the corresponding notebook.

Ivy finally looked up, trying to read Kanda's expression. Sure, his default was a frown, but there was a crease between his eyebrows that were furrowed farther than usual. His irritation was getting pretty high. Ivy couldn't just let that go. "Why?" she asked, keeping her voice gentle. "You seem worried." Finding a piece of old test review points that had been memorized long ago, Ivy crumbled it into a ball, it was soon joining the contents of a nearby trashcan.

"Two points," Kanda scored, and Ivy smiled. Knowing that it was best to work and talk at the same time, Kanda began taking down notes, trying to figure out how to pursue the topic without sounding completely obviously. "If I had to say, he was acting distinctly extra Lavi-ish earlier."

Ivy quietly snorted. "'Lavi-ish'?" she questioned. "Do you realize how close that is to 'lavish'?" Come to think of it, maybe she shouldn't put those two words together. The connotations were just plain out weird.

"And three points for vocabulary," Kanda allowed. "You're just racking the points today."

Ivy could feel herself relax a bit. These were the sort of moments she preferred to have with Kanda over anything else—the tiny calm and quiet that couldn't happen with anyone else. "Well then, two points for saying 'vocabulary' instead of 'vocab'."

"But you say 'vocab'."

Ivy's smile widened a bit. "So?" Kanda smiled a bit, too, ready to provide a follow up, only to be cut off by Ivy's phone vibrating in her pocket. She usually left the thing on in case of an emergency, especially since the most of her contacts were in classes at same time. Kanda understood, and Ivy tried to give him an apologetic look as she answered it. "Hello?"

"Hey there, Ivy-chan!" The voice on the other end was loud enough to be heard without speakerphone. Ivy glanced to Kanda, who was grimacing. Sure, Lavi had the same free period as them, but he wasn't one for studying, so the rabbit usually hung out elsewhere. "I was wondering what time I should pick you up tomorrow?"

Jesus fucking Christ. Ivy scrambled to turn the volume on her phone down, but the damage was already done. Kanda's expression had contorted, right on the border between annoyance and absolute death sentence for whoever had pissed him off. "Lavi, we can talk about this later," she said, sounding more panicked than she would have liked. Without giving the redhead a chance to reply, she hung up and placed her phone on silent. "Kanda-san—"

"So…" Kanda drawled, just barely controlling his voice. The result was something emotionless, which only made Ivy feel worse. "You're the Rabbit's girlfriend then." Part of Kanda couldn't actually believe it. Sure, he knew Lavi would go through with asking Ivy out to mess with him, but he had never thought she would say yes. In fact, he always thought that the person she had liked…

"It's only one date," Ivy protested. God, why couldn't she just breathe like a normal person?

Kanda could tell he was on the verge of snapping, and he seriously wished that tables weren't so breakable. Tiedoll had to be tired of getting bills from the school by now. And, of course, when hitting things wasn't an option, the next obvious step was to yell about it.

"I thought you said he wasn't acting weird!" Kanda accused. His voice roared, but Ivy didn't flinch.

"He wasn't!" she shouted back. "He was just being Lavi!" She knew better than to be afraid. Yes, Kanda was angry, but he wouldn't do anything to hurt her. And even putting that aside, it was a simple fact that standing up to him was necessary at times.

"Well, that sure as hell doesn't mean you had to say 'yes'!" Seriously, had he been wrong this whole time?

Ivy resisted the urge to scoff, but it didn't make her feel any less indignant. "Just because you won't ask me out doesn't mean other guys can't!" she retorted. Because, really, just how much of this was she supposed to take? They had been waffling around the issue, and it hadn't gotten any better. What did Kanda expect? That she was just supposed to sit around and wait for him to stop being so stubborn.

The two stared at each other, all silent save for attempts to catch breath.

"I have to go," Ivy said. She quickly gathered up her books, not caring for the state of her papers. Those could be fixed, replaced. This moment…she needed to get out. Once she was out the door, Kanda slumped back into his chair.

Fuck.

Ivy managed to find another empty study room and locked the door behind her, almost falling backwards to lean against the wall. Had… Had she really said all this stuff? Was she trying to make this situation Kanda's fault?

It really isn't, she tried to reason, but part of her wanted to be. This whole time, she had mostly said yes to Lavi, hoping that Kanda would make a big deal out of it. Because if he reacted, then that meant he had to care at least some for her, didn't it?

But even if it did, that didn't excuse what she did. Because in the end, she was just manipulating him, and it was beyond unfair to do that to someone that cared enough to get that angry over it.

Ivy let out a shaky breath.

"I'm seriously the worst…"

This is one of those chapter that definitely wanted to add a bit more to. The early versions were just missing some of the emotional connections, so I tried to expand on that this time around. The extra scene with Ivy at the end is part of that expansion. It adds a bit more to the rest of the rewrites that are coming up (and actually made me expand my rewrites up to the ninth chapter so I could incorporate it.

There's one more rewrite coming out today, and then we'll be back on schedule! Pretty soon we'll be done with the rewrites, too...

Be sure to check it out later this afternoon!

[POST] 092615