[Fic - Yullen Week - Day 2] Days Passing By
First of all, I'M SORRY FOR THE LATENESS-of sort. I know it's still the 20th at some part of the world. Anyway I had posted this like, nearly 10 hours ago but due to some mistakes I had to take it down for a bit because I had no laptop then and couldn't fix. My dad just came back with the laptop now, so.
Anyway, to the fic.
Title: Days Passing By
Author: a1y-puff
Fandom: D. Gray-Man
Pairing: DUH. Yullen Week anyone? :/
Genre: Umm. Daily-life-ish/humor?
Summary: Rooming with Kanda, Allen decided, was not as easy as he had thought it would be at first.
Word Count: ~4700
Warning: AU. Possible OOC-ness, dorky alert, randomness-and did I say dorky?
Disclaimer: I do not own the characters and the verse that is Allen's assignment down there. It's from Cradle Song by Brahms.
Beta: lafuego and hakasha (You lovely ladies are awesome, seriously.)
A/N: First of all, you need to read Ephemeral Summer first because that’s the prologue to this.
Anyway. The theme is bittersweet. I don’t know how it turned out THIS long but-yeah. The general idea is “The bittersweet-ness of a life with Kanda”. Yeah, sue me :/. Also, let’s have a different style so you won’t get bored? :D
Special thanks to pinkxpiano, harmony283 and isumi_ilde for their random ideas and help =).
- Days Passing By -
Yullen Week, Day 2
Theme: Bittersweet
/ Territory /
Rooming with Kanda, Allen decided, was not as easy as he had thought it would be at first.
The guy had been ridiculous at first, actually drawing a line in the middle of the room using a 50 centimeters ruler and a 2B pencil. Then he made it clear that Allen was never to cross that line, or else.
Allen had snorted at that the first time, inwardly calling Kanda a freak, but the one time he accidentally stepped over that line, an eraser was thrown right to his head.
"What the bloody-"
"You crossed the line," Kanda simply answered before returning to sketching in bed, his legs pulled up to balance the sketchbook. A few seconds of Allen cursing inwardly and Kanda turned to face him again.
"What?" the boy asked irately.
"My eraser, bean sprout. Give it back."
Allen scowled, at first, but slowly it melted into an annoyingly bright smile-as Kanda would put it, and he replied sweetly, "Here you go, sweetheart."
Allen didn't miss that chance to throw the stupid eraser back squarely at Kanda's forehead.
Needless to say, things were thrown, from books to pillows, followed by a mock fistfight that by the time they were done, the room was a mess, their things scattered across each other's part of the room, while the both of them laid there, side-by-side in the middle of the room, chests heaving and faces bruised and the line forgotten.
* * *
/ Routine /
Every morning, Kanda would wake up ridiculously early. This, Allen found out the hard way. At 5:00 every morning, Kanda's phone would shrill out a heart-attack-inducing rock guitar sound as an alarm, and it always jolted Allen out of his sleep while it took Kanda at least one minute before he finally woke up and turned the bloody alarm off.
During that time, Allen would turn to the wall, cover his head with his pillow and groan at the sorry excuse for music blaring from Kanda's phone.
Once Kanda was awake and the horrible music was off, Allen usually listened to the rustling sounds of Kanda changing into his sweatpants and sweatshirt. Give or take five minutes later, his roommate would be gone out of the room to god knew where at this ungodly hour, but at least Allen was now free to doze off.
Kanda generally came back at 6.30, and by then Allen would usually be awake already, or at least, on the verge of waking first thing he saw was, of course, one sweating Kanda Yuu who had no modesty and just took off his shirt there, right in front of him-or well, right by Kanda's own bed, which happened to be across of Allen' some reason, Allen was always facing that way when Kanda just came back from his morning workout.
By the third week, Allen thought he'd be able to remember the shape of Kanda's bare back without difficulties.
* * *
/ Struggle /
Having one adjoining bathroom was more of a problem than what Allen thought it would be. It wasn't a problem when one of them didn't have a morning class, but when both of them did, well.
"Move. My class is in a building farther away than yours so I need to leave sooner," Allen hissed, his hand not budging from the bathroom's door knob and half on top of Kanda's own hand.
"No, you move," Kanda retorted, his hand gripping the knob under Allen's hand even tighter. "You fucking take forever in the shower. What the hell do you do in there anyway?"
At that, though, Allen couldn't help but color a little. "Wh-taking a shower, of course. What else is there to do?"
Kanda raised an eyebrow. "How would I know? You're the one who takes goddamn 45 minutes in the shower. What the heck, are you a girl?"
"Wh-" at that, Allen's eyebrow twitched and he pushed Kanda aside with
his shoulder in annoyance. He got even more annoyed when Kanda barely budged. Damn that strong, toned body.
And Kanda pushed back, their shoulders and arms and hips pressed against each other, shaking lightly in their effort to push each other away. But still, Kanda was bigger, taller and stronger, so it was less than thirty seconds that Allen got tackled away quite hard from a bony hip digging to his side and he groaned in pain as he was forced to let go of the knob.
He could only swear at the slammed bathroom door the next second as he caressed his abused side.
At night, though, when they were tired and sleepy, sometimes, both of them tried to tolerate each other. At least, there were times when they would brush their teeth together, despite the glaring contest via the mirror, unnecessary comments on Allen's strawberry toothpaste-which Allen had bought because it had been ridiculously cheap, by the way-or Kanda not using enough toothpaste and their elbows kept jabbing each other as they moved-Kanda's to Allen's head and Allen's to Kanda's side.
The pain from those jabs was only slightly better than their morning struggle.
* * *
/ Homework /
If there was a time where the two roommates would leave each other alone and in peace without previously arguing like a pair of fishwives, it was when the both of them were too busy with their respective homework.
Right then, Allen was sitting on his bed, his keyboard laid in front of him, as he stared at his homework there was a verse that he needed to create a rhythm to, and Allen had no idea how to start.
"As I bid thee Good Night / The Angels of Light / Draw close around thy nest / To guard thee in Rest," Allen murmured the words, lightly snapping his finger in contemplation and trying to come up with an appropriate rhythm.
He fiddled with the keyboard a few times, and since no chord was given, Allen pressed the keys in different intervals while mumbling the verse over and over and adjust his fingers on the key to create some decent-listening rhythm and-
The constant clicking of Kanda's mouse caught his attention, and he turned his head to see his roommate sitting at his desk and completely absorbed by whatever he was seeing on his laptop, right hand moving about with grace as his index finger went about clicking the mouse.
"What are you working on?" Allen asked curiously, crawling out of his bed and walking over to peer at Kanda's monitor.
"Homework," the older male answered absently, dark eyes still focused on the laptop screen.
Allen rolled his eyes. "Yes, what kind of homework?"
Kanda sighed, before letting go of the mouse and leaning back against his chair. "Making logos," he answered, cracking his neck and stretching his arms a little.
"Oh," Allen then stood behind Kanda and bent forward a little to see the few logos Kanda had made and-well. He wasn't an expert in art, but he'd still know when something was good. "These are cool," he murmured.
"Hnn," Kanda grunted in acknowledgment, before leaning forward in his seat again, going back to work.
Not wanting to bother the Japanese, Allen went back to his bed and sat before his keyboard again, murmuring the verse while pressing a few keys and-
"The last one sounds better than the rest," Kanda suddenly commented without looking away from his laptop, and Allen blinked.
He tried that rhythm again while saying the verse a little louder and-well. That sounded quite fine.
"Thanks," he smiled up at his roommate but Kanda didn't even spare him a glance. Well, Allen jotted down the rhythm on his worksheet anyway.
* * *
/ Decoration /
A month and a half into their living arrangement, Allen realized something-their room was bare.
The walls were painted some beige color with plain dark blue curtains, completed with some basic furniture but that was all. Kanda's side of the room was even plainer, because he preferred boring white sheet with a black bedcover. And damn was he neat. Kanda always left the room with all his stuff back in their place. No books on the bed or pencils out of the case or other useless knick-knacks lying around.
Allen's, though…
Yes, Allen wasn't the neatest person in existence, but he wasn't all that messy, really. So it irked him that whenever Kanda was done making his bed and tidying up his stuff before leaving the room, he would glance to Allen's side of the room and-snort.
Now though, right after entering the room, smelling so strongly of paint that Allen was tempted to tell him to take a shower right about now, Kanda was-staring. He was staring at the wall by Allen's bed incredulously.
"What. The fuck."
"It's called decoration," Allen raised an eyebrow. "This room needs more color so I pasted a poster on the wall. I can do that on my part of the wall, right?" he frowned then, ready to argue if Kanda was going to prohibit him for decorating at least his wall.
Kanda stared some more and-"That's one creepy poster. Weirdo."
On the wall, there was a picture of a deranged-looking clown carrying a coffin upside-down on his back. "What? It looks cool," Allen shrugged.
Kanda gave him a weird look, before walking over to his desk and put his bag there, then disappearing into the bathroom.
The next day, when Allen came back quite late because he had just finished practicing piano in campus-since he had none back at the dorm-it was Allen's turned to gape when he caught sight of what was now hanging on the wall by Kanda's bed.
"What on earth-"
"Decoration," Kanda deadpanned. Then the older male reached out a hand to said 'decoration', pulling the katana out of its sheath. "Now this," Kanda said, smirking as the blade of the katana gleamed menacingly, "is what I call 'cool'."
Allen gulped. Putting aside the thought of why they even allowed something like that in the dorm-if Kanda didn't just smuggle it in-Allen decided that Kanda definitely wasn't about to be outdone, even regarding decorations.
It was much later that night that Allen found out that: one, the katana had a name-Mugen; and two, it had always been there, in the room. Allen just had never known of its existence because Kanda had hidden it under his bed.
Allen didn't know what to make of his roommate who slept with a sharp object within reach.
* * *
/ Pets /
Not really satisfied with their rather creepy-scary decorations in the room, Allen bought yet another thing to add some color to their shared room.
He hummed lightly as he carried the objects into the room, lips forming a persistent smile despite the stuff he carried was a little heavy. He maneuvered the box in one hand in favor of turning the door knob and entering his room-but it was locked. Maybe Kanda had gone somewhere.
Oh well.
Allen fished his key from his jeans pocket and unlocked the door, carefully making his way inside and gently pushing the door closed with his foot.
He couldn't wait to get this particular decoration ready.
Later in the evening, when Kanda was back from wherever it was he had been and his eyes caught the new occupants of their room, Allen really nearly giggled at his expression.
"The hell?" he asked eloquently.
Allen was openly chuckling now. "Your left eye is twitching," he commented lightly, before climbing down his bed and walked over to his desk. There sat a medium-sized fish bowl with starfish-shaped ornaments and a few small stones at the bottom. Two small fish were swimming happily inside, one was yellow and the other mostly black. "Aren't they cute?"
"…goldfish, bean sprout?"
"The name's Allen, Bakanda. And I've always wanted a pet but they don't allow cats in here so I bought fish," he elaborated. "They give more life and color to our room."
Kanda stared at the fish like he was trying to decide whether to disagree or to let Allen and the fish be, but then Allen spoke again, and-
"The yellow one is Timcanpy. I already named him. Now would you please give this cute little black fish a name?" Allen asked with a sweet, sweet smile that he dearly hoped would somehow work on Kanda.
After all, if Kanda named the black one, it would give him a sense of-ownership. Or something. So at least he would let Allen keep them-
"Golem."
Allen blinked. "I'm sorry?"
"The name," Kanda turned to face Allen, raising a hand to the fish bowl's direction. "Golem."
The younger boy frowned. "Why? What an un-cute name."
Kanda snorted. "Like yours is any better. Timcanpy is such a weird name.
"It's not-" wait. Kanda had named the fish. And he'd just referred to Timcanpy as Allen's, so that would make 'Golem' Kanda's right? "On the second thought, Golem is such a charming name. It sounds strong," he smiled widely, because. Hey. His objective had been achieved.
"Yeah whatever," Kanda shrugged and went to his desk and placed his bag there, before proceeding to the bathroom without even a second glance to the fish bowl.
Allen's smile dimmed at that, but-hey, at least Kanda had given it a name. That should be enough…right?
* * *
/ Sharing is Caring /
It turned out that Kanda did feed the fish. Allen started noticing it one morning when Kanda had just come back from his morning workout. Before flinging off his shirt after he arrived as per usual, Kanda walked over to Allen's desk and took the small plastic bag of the fish food Allen kept near the bowl and threw some in.
Instantly, Timcanpy and Golem swam to the surface and started eating. This, Allen watched with bleary eyes still clouded with sleep, but even that didn't lessen his urge to smile.
So he did.
"What?" Kanda growled at him once the older boy noticed that Allen was awake and staring.
Allen just shook his head then, before yawning and stretching on his bed. "You feed them," he stated simply. Kanda was sharing the responsibility of owning the pet goldfishes. He cared enough for them to actually feed them. Wasn't that just wonderful?
"I don't need fucking dead fish in my room," Kanda grumbled before walking to his bed and taking off his shirt.
Now that one? It was still Allen's favorite sight, for whatever reason.
* * *
/ Wake-up Call /
As time went by, Allen's assignments were getting increasingly difficult. It wasn't a rare sight these days to see Allen running late for class after having stayed up until late at night, fiddling with his keyboard to practice a piece or creating melodies for certain verses and Allen was just thankful Kanda didn't say much about him being noisy with all the sounds that he created during the night.
It was a bit rare, but it happened these days, that Kanda's noisy alarm didn't jolt Allen awake in the morning, because he only had so little sleep. Kanda rarely bothered to wake him up that sometimes Allen had to dash to his classes, running late. Kanda had seen this change with a raised eyebrow, but he didn't do or say anything otherwise.
That Thursday-oh wait, it was past midnight, it was already Friday-Allen had pulled an all-nighter, so by the time Kanda's alarm went off at 5 a.m., he was still awake, finishing up some simple composition. His eyes were bleary and he could barely keep them open.
He didn't even look up as Kanda finally woke up and turned off the alarm.
Too absorbed as he was in his homework, it surprised him when Kanda suddenly spoke to him.
"You haven't slept?"
Allen looked up from his worksheet and keyboard and he gave Kanda an almost frustrated look. "What does it look like?" he replied sharply, because-yes, lack of sleep was never good for him. Why was inspiration so hard to get? But Allen realized that he didn't have to snap at Kanda so he shook his head lightly. "Sorry, I just-I need to submit this at 8 today."
"It's five."
"I know," Allen snorted and went back to writing down some notes on his worksheet, "I heard your stupid alarm."
"You won't be able to wake up."
"Please don't jinx it," pleading, almost. Allen knew how hard it was to wake up when he got only, say, 2 hours of sleep. He needed to wake up at least by 7 so he would have enough time to prepare before going to classes and if he didn't get this finished soon…
Allen shook his head. He had to do this.
From the corner of his eye, he could see Kanda lingered, but before he could ask what the older boy wanted, Kanda was already moving away, fiddling with his cellphone before finally leaving the room.
It was about half an hour later that Allen finally collapsed back to bed, papers strewn on the foot of his bed and keyboard stacked messily on his desk.
He didn't know how long he was out, but he woke up to the horrible, horrible indefinable noises, because-it sounded like there was a rock concert with a sucky sound system going wrong happening right by his ears. And then there was a shrilling, ringing noises too, and it kept going on and on and the guitar rock kept shrilling and the sounds were too annoying for Allen to not wake up, and-
"Oh dear Lord, what is-"
He forced his eyes open, and the first thing he saw was Kanda's impassive face as said roommate just stood there by his bed with crossed arms and dripping wet hair, a towel was slung around his neck. Allen noticed that it meant Kanda was freshly out of the shower and-
Wait, that wasn't the problem now.
"What on earth are these noises?" he groaned then, placing one hand on his throbbing temple. "Make them stop, please. God, my head…"
Kanda, however just stood there and stared. "You're awake yet?"
A groan was his answer. "What-yes, of course I am!" with these kind of noise, how couldn't he be?
And then the noises died down one by one, so Allen opened his eyes-when did he squeeze them close?-to find Kanda holding Allen's phone and an alarm clock, pushing the off button.
Wait.
"…what did you-" Was Kanda turning on three horrible-sounding alarms to wake him up? That was-
"What? You're awake so don't fucking complain," the Japanese said as he fiddled with the phone before putting it back down on Allen's desk.
Allen groaned into his hands. "You could have just shaken me awake or something," because three alarms was a little overdoing it... right? So why was Kanda the one giving him an incredulous look now?
"You think I haven't tried?"
"…You have?"
"A few times before today," Kanda shrugged, "Tch, you fucking sleep like you're dead whenever you pulled an all-nighter. Stupid. Now get up, you're wasting time sitting there like an idiot," and now Kanda was tugging him up, roughly pulling on his arm to jerk him up, and Allen yelped.
Kanda was practically dragging him out of bed, what the-"H-hey!"
"No more sleep for you, moron. It's 7:10. Get. Up," and with that he jerked Allen further away and pushed him to the direction of the bathroom.
Well. Allen grumbled along the way but he didn't fight anymore.
It was 30 minutes later, after he finished his shower and was getting ready for classes that he realized that-Kanda had meant well. He was only making sure Allen wouldn't be late to submit the assignment he had been working on so hard all night long, and that-
It was nice to know that Kanda actually cared.
* * *
/ Peace Offering /
Allen was smiling to himself. Lenalee had come to visit that weekend, although she hadn't been able to stay too long, but he'd given Allen homemade cookies, and god knew how much Allen adored Lenalee's cookies.
When he arrived at the dorm that afternoon, no one was there. Michael-their flatmate who was occupying the other bedroom-was absent as per usual. He'd only ever seen Michael maybe five times in all this time he had been living there. Kanda had told Allen that he was a weirdo, though. Then again, everyone was a weirdo to Kanda, so.
Allen shrugged, before walking to the bedroom he shared with Kanda, finding that his roommate wasn't back yet.
Well. Allen put the jar of cookies on the table. It was half-eaten already, because Allen hadn't been able to keep his hands off of the jar along the way. He took a few more bites, before deciding that maybe he should get a shower first. So he placed the jar on his desk, slipping out of his jacket and going into the adjoining bathroom.
Give or take 30 minutes later, Allen came out of the room to find Kanda sitting on his bed, sketching.
"Oh, you're back," he greeted, and Kanda lowered his sketchbook to peer at him and grunted his response, but-was it him or Kanda looked just a little uneasy? Allen walked to his desk then, noticing that oh, Kanda had fed Tim and Golem again, and that-"What the bloody…"
There, on his desk, sat an empty cookie jar.
Allen was pretty sure there had been almost half the jar when he left it, so-wait. Did Kanda…
"Did you eat my cookies?" Allen asked in a low voice. He wouldn't have thought Kanda would, but-there was no one else around.
Kanda though, didn't even glance up. "No. Why the fuck would I?"
Allen didn't believe him. Why? Because-Kanda wasn't looking at him. Allen stepped closer to Kanda's bed then and slowly repeated his question, "Kanda. Did you. Eat. My cookies?"
At the back of his mind, Allen vaguely felt like it was such a ridiculous question to ask Kanda but-
"I said no," Kanda denied even harder now, "Why the fuck would I want to eat something like that-"
"They were homemade," Allen gritted out. "I love homemade cookies. My best friend baked them for me and you wouldn't be able to find anything like that on the store. Do you know how long it's been since I got a taste of any homemade cookies?"
"Like I said, I didn't-"
"You have crumbs around your lips, Kanda," it was said in a dangerously low tone, and-"You know what? I would have shared it with you if you had just asked, and-"
Allen faltered, because-well. This was ridiculous. Yes, he was angry, but more to the fact that Kanda wouldn't admit it. If Kanda had-yes, he might still be pissed, but it would be easier to forgive him. Now though…
He needed to get out. Cool his head. Something. Getting worked up about just cookies were stupid, yes, he knew that at the back of his head but-Allen just shook his head. "Whatever," he muttered and grabbed his jacket, stepped into his sneakers and went out of the room, leaving with a silent click of the door.
If Allen had turned around to see Kanda's face, he might have seen the-guilt? Regret?-maybe a little bit of both in those dark eyes.
Allen didn't know how long he'd been out, just wandering in the neighborhood around the campus, sitting down somewhere in a park and just basically wasting his time. Although the cold breeze had cooled his head down and now he was feeling stupid about having gotten so angry at Kanda. Though he'd still need to at least make the jerk admit that he'd stolen his cookies.
Yuu Kanda. Stealing his cookies.
Now that he thought about it, that notion alone was quite ridiculous that his lips trembled in his attempt to not randomly burst out laughing.
Shaking his head, Allen finally walked back to the dorm with a cooler head. He'd just talk to that stupid dork of a roommate. Maybe Kanda had just wanted to try them, but then Lenalee's cookies were just that good-Allen had never tasted any cookies like hers, really-so without realizing it, he'd eaten them all up? That was… possible.
It was probably why the jerk hadn't wanted to admit it. He'd probably die out of embarrassment.
When he set his foot back at their dorm, however, his nostrils immediately caught the smell of something burning, and it alarmed him. He rushed inside then, yelling for Kanda and-"What happened?"
He didn't expect, however, to see Kanda in the kitchen, bending over the oven-was that smoke?-and once he heard Allen, the older man jolted and turned around, and that was when Allen realized that Kanda was-
Kanda was… wearing an apron.
"…What the-"
At the sight of Allen staring at him, however, Kanda growled. Then he shout a "Fuck this!" before proceeding to wrenching the black apron over his head and throwing it aside, before immediately stalking out of their dorm with a slam of the front door.
Well.
"What the hell was that about…" Allen muttered confusedly. Then he went over to take Kanda's apron from the floor and he noticed the apron had some stains-paint? He brought the apron closer to his nose and vaguely smelled paint from said apron.
Oh. This was probably the apron Kanda used when he was painting, then… So what was he doing in the kitchen?
Allen's eyes caught the opened oven and the strong smell of something burning, so he walked over to said contraption. Inside the oven were…cookies.
Black, burnt, shapeless cookies, yes, but cookies nonetheless and-now that he took a good look, the kitchen was a mess. There was flour all over the floor and some used utensils messily stacked on the sink, and-
Had Kanda been trying to…bake cookies?
Allen went silent and proceeded to clean up the kitchen, pulling out the burnt cookies and putting them aside, washing the dishes and wiping the oven clean and mopping the floor, and all the while he really, really couldn't help that small smile etched on his lips.
When everything was clean, Allen contemplated on what to do with the burnt cookies. They certainly didn't look edible, and Kanda did look like he was going to throw them away anyway. And even though Allen really wasn't one to throw away food, there was nothing he could do at this point.
So he brought the cookies to the trash can, but before he threw them, Allen took one piece and took a bite and-he nearly gagged. It was-too bitter from being burnt, and just basically wasn't edible at all. With a whispered apology, the cookies finally found their rest in the trash bag.
Twenty minutes later, Kanda came back with a plastic bag in hand. And Allen was about to greet him, to-maybe try to talk to him or just-let the older man know that he wasn't angry anymore.
But before he could even open his mouth, something rather hard and big hit him straight on the forehead. "Oww! What the bloody-"
"Was in the supermarket," Kanda replied curtly, kicking his shoes and going straight to his bed.
Allen scowled at that and he really was about to-throw at the jerk whatever it was that he had thrown to Allen. But as soon as he grabbed the object from his lap, he faltered.
In his hand was a huge bar of chocolate that Allen had often seen in stores but never bought due to the price, and-"…you're forgiven."
Kanda was silent for a few seconds, but then Allen heard a snort. "I'm not fucking apologizing."
The snarky reply, however, just made Allen laugh. "Of course not," he snickered, as he peeled the wrappers, "You're forgiven anyway."
Kanda clucked his tongue, and Allen took the first bite of his chocolate. It was-not overly sweet, but it melted on his tongue, and just overall tasted wonderful. He chanced a glance at Kanda who was now busying himself with his laptop and-Allen smiled.
It turned out that rooming with Kanda really wasn't all that bad.
~NeverEnding~
A/N: Reviews would still be appreciated greatly. I’m still trying to finish Day 3 fic here and reviews would certainly motivate me to write faster :)
Also due to me not having my own laptop it's going to be hard to write the fics on time, I'm sorry but Day 3 will be a little late, but I will write all 7 themes because at least I know what I'm going to write for them. Please forgive me if the other fics will be a little late as well, I'll try not to but I can only use PC at work and when mom's laptop is home, and well. At the office I have work to do so I can't write that much. I hope you understand, thank you.
Anyway, to the fic.
Title: Days Passing By
Author: a1y-puff
Fandom: D. Gray-Man
Pairing: DUH. Yullen Week anyone? :/
Genre: Umm. Daily-life-ish/humor?
Summary: Rooming with Kanda, Allen decided, was not as easy as he had thought it would be at first.
Word Count: ~4700
Warning: AU. Possible OOC-ness, dorky alert, randomness-and did I say dorky?
Disclaimer: I do not own the characters and the verse that is Allen's assignment down there. It's from Cradle Song by Brahms.
Beta: lafuego and hakasha (You lovely ladies are awesome, seriously.)
A/N: First of all, you need to read Ephemeral Summer first because that’s the prologue to this.
Anyway. The theme is bittersweet. I don’t know how it turned out THIS long but-yeah. The general idea is “The bittersweet-ness of a life with Kanda”. Yeah, sue me :/. Also, let’s have a different style so you won’t get bored? :D
Special thanks to pinkxpiano, harmony283 and isumi_ilde for their random ideas and help =).
- Days Passing By -
Yullen Week, Day 2
Theme: Bittersweet
/ Territory /
Rooming with Kanda, Allen decided, was not as easy as he had thought it would be at first.
The guy had been ridiculous at first, actually drawing a line in the middle of the room using a 50 centimeters ruler and a 2B pencil. Then he made it clear that Allen was never to cross that line, or else.
Allen had snorted at that the first time, inwardly calling Kanda a freak, but the one time he accidentally stepped over that line, an eraser was thrown right to his head.
"What the bloody-"
"You crossed the line," Kanda simply answered before returning to sketching in bed, his legs pulled up to balance the sketchbook. A few seconds of Allen cursing inwardly and Kanda turned to face him again.
"What?" the boy asked irately.
"My eraser, bean sprout. Give it back."
Allen scowled, at first, but slowly it melted into an annoyingly bright smile-as Kanda would put it, and he replied sweetly, "Here you go, sweetheart."
Allen didn't miss that chance to throw the stupid eraser back squarely at Kanda's forehead.
Needless to say, things were thrown, from books to pillows, followed by a mock fistfight that by the time they were done, the room was a mess, their things scattered across each other's part of the room, while the both of them laid there, side-by-side in the middle of the room, chests heaving and faces bruised and the line forgotten.
* * *
/ Routine /
Every morning, Kanda would wake up ridiculously early. This, Allen found out the hard way. At 5:00 every morning, Kanda's phone would shrill out a heart-attack-inducing rock guitar sound as an alarm, and it always jolted Allen out of his sleep while it took Kanda at least one minute before he finally woke up and turned the bloody alarm off.
During that time, Allen would turn to the wall, cover his head with his pillow and groan at the sorry excuse for music blaring from Kanda's phone.
Once Kanda was awake and the horrible music was off, Allen usually listened to the rustling sounds of Kanda changing into his sweatpants and sweatshirt. Give or take five minutes later, his roommate would be gone out of the room to god knew where at this ungodly hour, but at least Allen was now free to doze off.
Kanda generally came back at 6.30, and by then Allen would usually be awake already, or at least, on the verge of waking first thing he saw was, of course, one sweating Kanda Yuu who had no modesty and just took off his shirt there, right in front of him-or well, right by Kanda's own bed, which happened to be across of Allen' some reason, Allen was always facing that way when Kanda just came back from his morning workout.
By the third week, Allen thought he'd be able to remember the shape of Kanda's bare back without difficulties.
* * *
/ Struggle /
Having one adjoining bathroom was more of a problem than what Allen thought it would be. It wasn't a problem when one of them didn't have a morning class, but when both of them did, well.
"Move. My class is in a building farther away than yours so I need to leave sooner," Allen hissed, his hand not budging from the bathroom's door knob and half on top of Kanda's own hand.
"No, you move," Kanda retorted, his hand gripping the knob under Allen's hand even tighter. "You fucking take forever in the shower. What the hell do you do in there anyway?"
At that, though, Allen couldn't help but color a little. "Wh-taking a shower, of course. What else is there to do?"
Kanda raised an eyebrow. "How would I know? You're the one who takes goddamn 45 minutes in the shower. What the heck, are you a girl?"
"Wh-" at that, Allen's eyebrow twitched and he pushed Kanda aside with
his shoulder in annoyance. He got even more annoyed when Kanda barely budged. Damn that strong, toned body.
And Kanda pushed back, their shoulders and arms and hips pressed against each other, shaking lightly in their effort to push each other away. But still, Kanda was bigger, taller and stronger, so it was less than thirty seconds that Allen got tackled away quite hard from a bony hip digging to his side and he groaned in pain as he was forced to let go of the knob.
He could only swear at the slammed bathroom door the next second as he caressed his abused side.
At night, though, when they were tired and sleepy, sometimes, both of them tried to tolerate each other. At least, there were times when they would brush their teeth together, despite the glaring contest via the mirror, unnecessary comments on Allen's strawberry toothpaste-which Allen had bought because it had been ridiculously cheap, by the way-or Kanda not using enough toothpaste and their elbows kept jabbing each other as they moved-Kanda's to Allen's head and Allen's to Kanda's side.
The pain from those jabs was only slightly better than their morning struggle.
* * *
/ Homework /
If there was a time where the two roommates would leave each other alone and in peace without previously arguing like a pair of fishwives, it was when the both of them were too busy with their respective homework.
Right then, Allen was sitting on his bed, his keyboard laid in front of him, as he stared at his homework there was a verse that he needed to create a rhythm to, and Allen had no idea how to start.
"As I bid thee Good Night / The Angels of Light / Draw close around thy nest / To guard thee in Rest," Allen murmured the words, lightly snapping his finger in contemplation and trying to come up with an appropriate rhythm.
He fiddled with the keyboard a few times, and since no chord was given, Allen pressed the keys in different intervals while mumbling the verse over and over and adjust his fingers on the key to create some decent-listening rhythm and-
The constant clicking of Kanda's mouse caught his attention, and he turned his head to see his roommate sitting at his desk and completely absorbed by whatever he was seeing on his laptop, right hand moving about with grace as his index finger went about clicking the mouse.
"What are you working on?" Allen asked curiously, crawling out of his bed and walking over to peer at Kanda's monitor.
"Homework," the older male answered absently, dark eyes still focused on the laptop screen.
Allen rolled his eyes. "Yes, what kind of homework?"
Kanda sighed, before letting go of the mouse and leaning back against his chair. "Making logos," he answered, cracking his neck and stretching his arms a little.
"Oh," Allen then stood behind Kanda and bent forward a little to see the few logos Kanda had made and-well. He wasn't an expert in art, but he'd still know when something was good. "These are cool," he murmured.
"Hnn," Kanda grunted in acknowledgment, before leaning forward in his seat again, going back to work.
Not wanting to bother the Japanese, Allen went back to his bed and sat before his keyboard again, murmuring the verse while pressing a few keys and-
"The last one sounds better than the rest," Kanda suddenly commented without looking away from his laptop, and Allen blinked.
He tried that rhythm again while saying the verse a little louder and-well. That sounded quite fine.
"Thanks," he smiled up at his roommate but Kanda didn't even spare him a glance. Well, Allen jotted down the rhythm on his worksheet anyway.
* * *
/ Decoration /
A month and a half into their living arrangement, Allen realized something-their room was bare.
The walls were painted some beige color with plain dark blue curtains, completed with some basic furniture but that was all. Kanda's side of the room was even plainer, because he preferred boring white sheet with a black bedcover. And damn was he neat. Kanda always left the room with all his stuff back in their place. No books on the bed or pencils out of the case or other useless knick-knacks lying around.
Allen's, though…
Yes, Allen wasn't the neatest person in existence, but he wasn't all that messy, really. So it irked him that whenever Kanda was done making his bed and tidying up his stuff before leaving the room, he would glance to Allen's side of the room and-snort.
Now though, right after entering the room, smelling so strongly of paint that Allen was tempted to tell him to take a shower right about now, Kanda was-staring. He was staring at the wall by Allen's bed incredulously.
"What. The fuck."
"It's called decoration," Allen raised an eyebrow. "This room needs more color so I pasted a poster on the wall. I can do that on my part of the wall, right?" he frowned then, ready to argue if Kanda was going to prohibit him for decorating at least his wall.
Kanda stared some more and-"That's one creepy poster. Weirdo."
On the wall, there was a picture of a deranged-looking clown carrying a coffin upside-down on his back. "What? It looks cool," Allen shrugged.
Kanda gave him a weird look, before walking over to his desk and put his bag there, then disappearing into the bathroom.
The next day, when Allen came back quite late because he had just finished practicing piano in campus-since he had none back at the dorm-it was Allen's turned to gape when he caught sight of what was now hanging on the wall by Kanda's bed.
"What on earth-"
"Decoration," Kanda deadpanned. Then the older male reached out a hand to said 'decoration', pulling the katana out of its sheath. "Now this," Kanda said, smirking as the blade of the katana gleamed menacingly, "is what I call 'cool'."
Allen gulped. Putting aside the thought of why they even allowed something like that in the dorm-if Kanda didn't just smuggle it in-Allen decided that Kanda definitely wasn't about to be outdone, even regarding decorations.
It was much later that night that Allen found out that: one, the katana had a name-Mugen; and two, it had always been there, in the room. Allen just had never known of its existence because Kanda had hidden it under his bed.
Allen didn't know what to make of his roommate who slept with a sharp object within reach.
* * *
/ Pets /
Not really satisfied with their rather creepy-scary decorations in the room, Allen bought yet another thing to add some color to their shared room.
He hummed lightly as he carried the objects into the room, lips forming a persistent smile despite the stuff he carried was a little heavy. He maneuvered the box in one hand in favor of turning the door knob and entering his room-but it was locked. Maybe Kanda had gone somewhere.
Oh well.
Allen fished his key from his jeans pocket and unlocked the door, carefully making his way inside and gently pushing the door closed with his foot.
He couldn't wait to get this particular decoration ready.
Later in the evening, when Kanda was back from wherever it was he had been and his eyes caught the new occupants of their room, Allen really nearly giggled at his expression.
"The hell?" he asked eloquently.
Allen was openly chuckling now. "Your left eye is twitching," he commented lightly, before climbing down his bed and walked over to his desk. There sat a medium-sized fish bowl with starfish-shaped ornaments and a few small stones at the bottom. Two small fish were swimming happily inside, one was yellow and the other mostly black. "Aren't they cute?"
"…goldfish, bean sprout?"
"The name's Allen, Bakanda. And I've always wanted a pet but they don't allow cats in here so I bought fish," he elaborated. "They give more life and color to our room."
Kanda stared at the fish like he was trying to decide whether to disagree or to let Allen and the fish be, but then Allen spoke again, and-
"The yellow one is Timcanpy. I already named him. Now would you please give this cute little black fish a name?" Allen asked with a sweet, sweet smile that he dearly hoped would somehow work on Kanda.
After all, if Kanda named the black one, it would give him a sense of-ownership. Or something. So at least he would let Allen keep them-
"Golem."
Allen blinked. "I'm sorry?"
"The name," Kanda turned to face Allen, raising a hand to the fish bowl's direction. "Golem."
The younger boy frowned. "Why? What an un-cute name."
Kanda snorted. "Like yours is any better. Timcanpy is such a weird name.
"It's not-" wait. Kanda had named the fish. And he'd just referred to Timcanpy as Allen's, so that would make 'Golem' Kanda's right? "On the second thought, Golem is such a charming name. It sounds strong," he smiled widely, because. Hey. His objective had been achieved.
"Yeah whatever," Kanda shrugged and went to his desk and placed his bag there, before proceeding to the bathroom without even a second glance to the fish bowl.
Allen's smile dimmed at that, but-hey, at least Kanda had given it a name. That should be enough…right?
* * *
/ Sharing is Caring /
It turned out that Kanda did feed the fish. Allen started noticing it one morning when Kanda had just come back from his morning workout. Before flinging off his shirt after he arrived as per usual, Kanda walked over to Allen's desk and took the small plastic bag of the fish food Allen kept near the bowl and threw some in.
Instantly, Timcanpy and Golem swam to the surface and started eating. This, Allen watched with bleary eyes still clouded with sleep, but even that didn't lessen his urge to smile.
So he did.
"What?" Kanda growled at him once the older boy noticed that Allen was awake and staring.
Allen just shook his head then, before yawning and stretching on his bed. "You feed them," he stated simply. Kanda was sharing the responsibility of owning the pet goldfishes. He cared enough for them to actually feed them. Wasn't that just wonderful?
"I don't need fucking dead fish in my room," Kanda grumbled before walking to his bed and taking off his shirt.
Now that one? It was still Allen's favorite sight, for whatever reason.
* * *
/ Wake-up Call /
As time went by, Allen's assignments were getting increasingly difficult. It wasn't a rare sight these days to see Allen running late for class after having stayed up until late at night, fiddling with his keyboard to practice a piece or creating melodies for certain verses and Allen was just thankful Kanda didn't say much about him being noisy with all the sounds that he created during the night.
It was a bit rare, but it happened these days, that Kanda's noisy alarm didn't jolt Allen awake in the morning, because he only had so little sleep. Kanda rarely bothered to wake him up that sometimes Allen had to dash to his classes, running late. Kanda had seen this change with a raised eyebrow, but he didn't do or say anything otherwise.
That Thursday-oh wait, it was past midnight, it was already Friday-Allen had pulled an all-nighter, so by the time Kanda's alarm went off at 5 a.m., he was still awake, finishing up some simple composition. His eyes were bleary and he could barely keep them open.
He didn't even look up as Kanda finally woke up and turned off the alarm.
Too absorbed as he was in his homework, it surprised him when Kanda suddenly spoke to him.
"You haven't slept?"
Allen looked up from his worksheet and keyboard and he gave Kanda an almost frustrated look. "What does it look like?" he replied sharply, because-yes, lack of sleep was never good for him. Why was inspiration so hard to get? But Allen realized that he didn't have to snap at Kanda so he shook his head lightly. "Sorry, I just-I need to submit this at 8 today."
"It's five."
"I know," Allen snorted and went back to writing down some notes on his worksheet, "I heard your stupid alarm."
"You won't be able to wake up."
"Please don't jinx it," pleading, almost. Allen knew how hard it was to wake up when he got only, say, 2 hours of sleep. He needed to wake up at least by 7 so he would have enough time to prepare before going to classes and if he didn't get this finished soon…
Allen shook his head. He had to do this.
From the corner of his eye, he could see Kanda lingered, but before he could ask what the older boy wanted, Kanda was already moving away, fiddling with his cellphone before finally leaving the room.
It was about half an hour later that Allen finally collapsed back to bed, papers strewn on the foot of his bed and keyboard stacked messily on his desk.
He didn't know how long he was out, but he woke up to the horrible, horrible indefinable noises, because-it sounded like there was a rock concert with a sucky sound system going wrong happening right by his ears. And then there was a shrilling, ringing noises too, and it kept going on and on and the guitar rock kept shrilling and the sounds were too annoying for Allen to not wake up, and-
"Oh dear Lord, what is-"
He forced his eyes open, and the first thing he saw was Kanda's impassive face as said roommate just stood there by his bed with crossed arms and dripping wet hair, a towel was slung around his neck. Allen noticed that it meant Kanda was freshly out of the shower and-
Wait, that wasn't the problem now.
"What on earth are these noises?" he groaned then, placing one hand on his throbbing temple. "Make them stop, please. God, my head…"
Kanda, however just stood there and stared. "You're awake yet?"
A groan was his answer. "What-yes, of course I am!" with these kind of noise, how couldn't he be?
And then the noises died down one by one, so Allen opened his eyes-when did he squeeze them close?-to find Kanda holding Allen's phone and an alarm clock, pushing the off button.
Wait.
"…what did you-" Was Kanda turning on three horrible-sounding alarms to wake him up? That was-
"What? You're awake so don't fucking complain," the Japanese said as he fiddled with the phone before putting it back down on Allen's desk.
Allen groaned into his hands. "You could have just shaken me awake or something," because three alarms was a little overdoing it... right? So why was Kanda the one giving him an incredulous look now?
"You think I haven't tried?"
"…You have?"
"A few times before today," Kanda shrugged, "Tch, you fucking sleep like you're dead whenever you pulled an all-nighter. Stupid. Now get up, you're wasting time sitting there like an idiot," and now Kanda was tugging him up, roughly pulling on his arm to jerk him up, and Allen yelped.
Kanda was practically dragging him out of bed, what the-"H-hey!"
"No more sleep for you, moron. It's 7:10. Get. Up," and with that he jerked Allen further away and pushed him to the direction of the bathroom.
Well. Allen grumbled along the way but he didn't fight anymore.
It was 30 minutes later, after he finished his shower and was getting ready for classes that he realized that-Kanda had meant well. He was only making sure Allen wouldn't be late to submit the assignment he had been working on so hard all night long, and that-
It was nice to know that Kanda actually cared.
* * *
/ Peace Offering /
Allen was smiling to himself. Lenalee had come to visit that weekend, although she hadn't been able to stay too long, but he'd given Allen homemade cookies, and god knew how much Allen adored Lenalee's cookies.
When he arrived at the dorm that afternoon, no one was there. Michael-their flatmate who was occupying the other bedroom-was absent as per usual. He'd only ever seen Michael maybe five times in all this time he had been living there. Kanda had told Allen that he was a weirdo, though. Then again, everyone was a weirdo to Kanda, so.
Allen shrugged, before walking to the bedroom he shared with Kanda, finding that his roommate wasn't back yet.
Well. Allen put the jar of cookies on the table. It was half-eaten already, because Allen hadn't been able to keep his hands off of the jar along the way. He took a few more bites, before deciding that maybe he should get a shower first. So he placed the jar on his desk, slipping out of his jacket and going into the adjoining bathroom.
Give or take 30 minutes later, Allen came out of the room to find Kanda sitting on his bed, sketching.
"Oh, you're back," he greeted, and Kanda lowered his sketchbook to peer at him and grunted his response, but-was it him or Kanda looked just a little uneasy? Allen walked to his desk then, noticing that oh, Kanda had fed Tim and Golem again, and that-"What the bloody…"
There, on his desk, sat an empty cookie jar.
Allen was pretty sure there had been almost half the jar when he left it, so-wait. Did Kanda…
"Did you eat my cookies?" Allen asked in a low voice. He wouldn't have thought Kanda would, but-there was no one else around.
Kanda though, didn't even glance up. "No. Why the fuck would I?"
Allen didn't believe him. Why? Because-Kanda wasn't looking at him. Allen stepped closer to Kanda's bed then and slowly repeated his question, "Kanda. Did you. Eat. My cookies?"
At the back of his mind, Allen vaguely felt like it was such a ridiculous question to ask Kanda but-
"I said no," Kanda denied even harder now, "Why the fuck would I want to eat something like that-"
"They were homemade," Allen gritted out. "I love homemade cookies. My best friend baked them for me and you wouldn't be able to find anything like that on the store. Do you know how long it's been since I got a taste of any homemade cookies?"
"Like I said, I didn't-"
"You have crumbs around your lips, Kanda," it was said in a dangerously low tone, and-"You know what? I would have shared it with you if you had just asked, and-"
Allen faltered, because-well. This was ridiculous. Yes, he was angry, but more to the fact that Kanda wouldn't admit it. If Kanda had-yes, he might still be pissed, but it would be easier to forgive him. Now though…
He needed to get out. Cool his head. Something. Getting worked up about just cookies were stupid, yes, he knew that at the back of his head but-Allen just shook his head. "Whatever," he muttered and grabbed his jacket, stepped into his sneakers and went out of the room, leaving with a silent click of the door.
If Allen had turned around to see Kanda's face, he might have seen the-guilt? Regret?-maybe a little bit of both in those dark eyes.
Allen didn't know how long he'd been out, just wandering in the neighborhood around the campus, sitting down somewhere in a park and just basically wasting his time. Although the cold breeze had cooled his head down and now he was feeling stupid about having gotten so angry at Kanda. Though he'd still need to at least make the jerk admit that he'd stolen his cookies.
Yuu Kanda. Stealing his cookies.
Now that he thought about it, that notion alone was quite ridiculous that his lips trembled in his attempt to not randomly burst out laughing.
Shaking his head, Allen finally walked back to the dorm with a cooler head. He'd just talk to that stupid dork of a roommate. Maybe Kanda had just wanted to try them, but then Lenalee's cookies were just that good-Allen had never tasted any cookies like hers, really-so without realizing it, he'd eaten them all up? That was… possible.
It was probably why the jerk hadn't wanted to admit it. He'd probably die out of embarrassment.
When he set his foot back at their dorm, however, his nostrils immediately caught the smell of something burning, and it alarmed him. He rushed inside then, yelling for Kanda and-"What happened?"
He didn't expect, however, to see Kanda in the kitchen, bending over the oven-was that smoke?-and once he heard Allen, the older man jolted and turned around, and that was when Allen realized that Kanda was-
Kanda was… wearing an apron.
"…What the-"
At the sight of Allen staring at him, however, Kanda growled. Then he shout a "Fuck this!" before proceeding to wrenching the black apron over his head and throwing it aside, before immediately stalking out of their dorm with a slam of the front door.
Well.
"What the hell was that about…" Allen muttered confusedly. Then he went over to take Kanda's apron from the floor and he noticed the apron had some stains-paint? He brought the apron closer to his nose and vaguely smelled paint from said apron.
Oh. This was probably the apron Kanda used when he was painting, then… So what was he doing in the kitchen?
Allen's eyes caught the opened oven and the strong smell of something burning, so he walked over to said contraption. Inside the oven were…cookies.
Black, burnt, shapeless cookies, yes, but cookies nonetheless and-now that he took a good look, the kitchen was a mess. There was flour all over the floor and some used utensils messily stacked on the sink, and-
Had Kanda been trying to…bake cookies?
Allen went silent and proceeded to clean up the kitchen, pulling out the burnt cookies and putting them aside, washing the dishes and wiping the oven clean and mopping the floor, and all the while he really, really couldn't help that small smile etched on his lips.
When everything was clean, Allen contemplated on what to do with the burnt cookies. They certainly didn't look edible, and Kanda did look like he was going to throw them away anyway. And even though Allen really wasn't one to throw away food, there was nothing he could do at this point.
So he brought the cookies to the trash can, but before he threw them, Allen took one piece and took a bite and-he nearly gagged. It was-too bitter from being burnt, and just basically wasn't edible at all. With a whispered apology, the cookies finally found their rest in the trash bag.
Twenty minutes later, Kanda came back with a plastic bag in hand. And Allen was about to greet him, to-maybe try to talk to him or just-let the older man know that he wasn't angry anymore.
But before he could even open his mouth, something rather hard and big hit him straight on the forehead. "Oww! What the bloody-"
"Was in the supermarket," Kanda replied curtly, kicking his shoes and going straight to his bed.
Allen scowled at that and he really was about to-throw at the jerk whatever it was that he had thrown to Allen. But as soon as he grabbed the object from his lap, he faltered.
In his hand was a huge bar of chocolate that Allen had often seen in stores but never bought due to the price, and-"…you're forgiven."
Kanda was silent for a few seconds, but then Allen heard a snort. "I'm not fucking apologizing."
The snarky reply, however, just made Allen laugh. "Of course not," he snickered, as he peeled the wrappers, "You're forgiven anyway."
Kanda clucked his tongue, and Allen took the first bite of his chocolate. It was-not overly sweet, but it melted on his tongue, and just overall tasted wonderful. He chanced a glance at Kanda who was now busying himself with his laptop and-Allen smiled.
It turned out that rooming with Kanda really wasn't all that bad.
~NeverEnding~
A/N: Reviews would still be appreciated greatly. I’m still trying to finish Day 3 fic here and reviews would certainly motivate me to write faster :)
Also due to me not having my own laptop it's going to be hard to write the fics on time, I'm sorry but Day 3 will be a little late, but I will write all 7 themes because at least I know what I'm going to write for them. Please forgive me if the other fics will be a little late as well, I'll try not to but I can only use PC at work and when mom's laptop is home, and well. At the office I have work to do so I can't write that much. I hope you understand, thank you.