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How to Save a Life	By : saxonjesus Category: +. to F > D. Gray Man Views: 4511 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 2
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Chapter List
- 12
- 13
- 14
Chapter 13--Life is Beautiful

There are no facts, only interpretations.

---Friedrich Nietzsche

November 7

He didn't know how long he'd been sitting there, hand tightly clenching his
roommate's. It didn't really matter. The surgery had gone well, and Lavi was
expected to make a speedy recovery. The boy had a very sketchy medical history,
but thankfully that fact hadn't impeded the redhead's health as yet. Yuu
resisted the urge to knock on wood. It wouldn't help, and it wouldn't make him
any less nervous. He hadn't realized how integral a part of him Lavi had
become. It was almost frightening, how much his current existence depended on
the idiot rabbit. But he knew that living like he was now would be impossible
if the boy had died.

He'd be back in the closet, that was obvious. Of
course, that made him feel weaker, which wasn't
exactly a welcome emotion at the moment.

Two desperately dazed malachite eyes opened slowly, and Lavi let out a little
waking groan as he tried to take in the world. The boy blinked again, and then
once more. His expression was very confused, as if he wasn't really sure where
he was. That wasn't so surprising, though, Yuu thought, seeing as when Lavi had
last been coherent, he'd been in a forest.

Bookman had left his apprentice for dead, presumably after beating him to
within an inch of his life. There had been needles drilling minuscule holes
into the redhead's lungs, and he'd been bleeding from pretty much everywhere.
His leg and arm had both been off at awkward angles. In addition, Lavi had hit
his head pretty badly. On what, Yuu didn't know, but as long as the doctors
fixed the concussion that came with it, he didn't really care.

"Yuu... puu?" Lavi
asked with a confused gaze, then giggled incoherently.
"Yuu-puu-shan is 'ere wif me!"

"Er, yes, I'm... here with you," Yuu
repeated incredulously, patting the rabbit's hand absently.

"Un-HUH!" Lavi exclaimed, trying to sit up.
He let out a dastardly high-pitched screech as the pain outgrew even the help
of the morphine. "OH FUCK, OH FUCK, OH FUCK, ISSLIKE BEIN' HIT BY
LIGHTNIN'!!!"

The Japanese boy raised an eyebrow. "Excuse me?" He asked.

"Th' 'lectriticy,* isskillin' me, please save me, Yuu-pan!" Yuu couldn't
reflect on whatever the hell the redhead meant, as Lavi sat up partway, enough
to grasp the dark-haired boy's sleeves with white-fingered knuckles. He was
shaking with the effort, and tears piled up in his eyes--it was still weird
seeing him without the eye patch, which had not been found near the boy.

Yuu simply pushed his roommate down into the uncomfortable hospital bed, and
eventually Lavi's cries subsided. Rolling his eyes, Yuu reached over and
pressed the nurse call button. A moment later, a young man in peach scrubs
(poor fuck) bustled in, followed by a female in a white coat. She held a
clipboard in her hand and tutted when she saw her
patient struggling against Yuu's restraining arms.

"Lemme go, bassard!" The rabbit slurred annoyingly.

"No."

"Pweez, Yuu-tuu?" Yuu shook his
head again at the slurring, glancing at the doctor who was still examining her
clipboard.

"I'll be changing the medication as soon as you're finished cleaning him
up, Nurse Jerome." The nurse nodded and went to lift Lavi up.

The redhead wasn't having it.

"No, no, they're gonna fondle m'junk! Yuu-puu, they're gonna fondle m'junk,
help!" It was almost pathetic to see Lavi struggle against what was
obviously the inevitable. It was also really pathetic to see the look on the nurse's
face as he had to carry the squirming idiot into the bathroom, princess-style.

The sounds of resistance continued into the tiled bathroom, and Yuu followed a
minute later, wondering if there was a way he could keep Lavi calm, because it
was obvious the rabbit wasn't going to be giving up without a fight.

He walked in to find a very damp-looking nurse and a very agitated Lavi.
Somehow, they had both ended up in the tub, and neither looked particularly
pleased.

Knealing down next to the tub, he took Lavi's face in
his hands and turned the idiot's face toward his own, very sternly looking into
his dazed eyes.

"Lavi," he began, loud enough that it got the redhead's attention,
"Stop it, you are fine."

"B-buh Yuu-shan,
they're gonna ffffondle meh," Lavi slurred, his cheeks red and squished in
Yuu's hands.

"No, they aren't, just look at me." It was amazing what a little
force could accomplish, because the idiot stared at him like someone had set
his brain to the "off" mode for a good ten minutes when the nurse
finally finished his job.

And as soon as the dark-haired boy let go, it was back to the thrashing and
fighting against the exhausted-looking R.N.

When Lavi had been safely redressed and placed in his bed, the doctor hooked
him up to some different medication in hopes that the strange behavior was just
an allergic reaction and not due to some terminal injury of the brain.

After unsuccessfully trying to stuff food down the redhead's throat, the nurse
left, mumbling about how he definitely didn't get paid enough. The redhead
glared after him, mumbling something about "fondling" and
"junk." Yuu sincerely hoped it wasn't a brain injury. The boy had
hit his head pretty hard, after all, and Yuu didn't think he could deal with
this every day.

But he would, mushy as that thought was. He would stay with the boy he... very
much liked, no matter how hard things got. Even if Lavi was retarded, Yuu would
stand by him. Which he really hoped wouldn't be the case.

---

November 8

Everything around Lavi was swaddling him with warmth. There was a chilly hand in his own, but even that burned like lava when he thought
about it. The air in the room was dry, industrial, but it, too, was a
comfortable temperature. Even his feet, which were often cold when he didn't
wear socks, were tingling pleasantly at the same temperature as the rest of his
body.

The light abovehead reddened both his eyelids, so
obviously his eye patch was off. He struggled to remember why, but he decided
it wasn't worth it. Using his unoccupied hand--his left--he covered his right
eye and gently opened the other.

It was unerringly bright. All around him, light
refracted off of blindingly white walls. At first, it was nearly impossible to
see, but as he waited, eye watering a bit with the effort not to cringe, his
vision cleared. He was in a hospital--that much he could have told without the
sight to confirm it.

A dark waterfall of hair showered his face, and he realized his roommate was
above him, looking down at him with a worried look on his flawless, sexy face.
His eyes carried a bit of wariness, as if he was expecting Lavi to spout
something stupid. Which would be his first action, naturally.

But as soon as he opened his mouth, reality hit. He remembered the talk with
Yuu, the promise to stay with him forever, Bookman's appearance, and the
horrible pain.

"Yuu..." He said softly, a note of mourning making itself apparent in
his voice. Gently, the other boy removed his left hand from over his eye. For
the first time, Lavi saw his roommate without restraints.

"You okay, Baka?" Yuu asked quietly, squeezing the redhead's
hand gently. Lavi nodded, which hurt his head, causing his eyes to swim.

"Hurts," he mumbled.

"I know." The boy's right hand withdrew from Lavi's left and made its
way to his hair, where it began to weave through the fiery strands.

"How long was I out?"

"They had you in a medicine-induced coma for a day, and then you woke up
yesterday."

"I did?"

Yuu laughed, really laughed. It was a bad sign. Immediately, Lavi felt
suspicious.

"What did I do?"

"'Yuu-shan, they're gonna
fondle m'junk!'" Yuu imitated in a high-pitched
voice that even Lavi couldn't reach. The dark-haired boy rolled his eyes and
then continued in his normal register, "You wouldn't stop saying
that. You scared the nurse away."

"What was I on?" Lavi asked, dreading the answer he knew was coming.

"Morphine," was the simple reply.

"Ah, no!" Lavi moaned, bringing his free
hand up to his head again, this time to cover his growing blush. The other boy
snorted, but the hand in his squeezed again, comforting him. "So,
anyway," Lavi continued after he'd gained some semblance of composure
again, "today is what?"

"Sunday."

"So I only missed Friday's classes." He felt relieved.

"Che."

"What?"

"You don't really need to go to them, do you?" Yuu sounded a bit
disdainful.

"That's not the point, Yuu-chan."

"Of course it is, Baka."

Wanting to get out of this particular direction of the conversation, Lavi cast
his mind around for something else.

Ah, perfect.

"So, guess why Bookman came back?" He said, trying to sound playful.
He knew his expression didn't quite cover it.

"Why?" Yuu answered, playing along.

"Do you have your computer on you?" Lavi asked. He was sure Yuu
remembered by now, and he at least deserved to hate Lavi if he didn't, so he
may as well know. The boy nodded and pulled it out, poking the button to turn
it on. As it booted up, the room became rather silent.

Lavi quickly brought up the website he was searching for, clicked on the
featured video of them, and turned it around to Yuu. He tried to block out the
bass of the music--he really hated Poker Face--and the wanton moans that
seemed to carry over all the other noise.

He waited for Kanda's face to become horrorstruck, but it remained
contemplative throughout the entire video. He put his hand to his chin, and the
only sign that he was affected at all was the light blush on his face.

When it finished, he made a humming noise and looked over to his roommate.
"I'm sorry," he said, and he looked it.

Lavi had gone beyond the land of the confused and was currently dabbling in the
country of the utterly stunned. Eh?

"For what?" He asked, not really
understanding what was going on. But for some reason, Yuu didn't hate him, so
there was that plus at least.

"For taking advantage of you," Yuu replied, tone heavy with regret.
He let go of Lavi's hand and made to get up.

"What!?" Lavi exclaimed. He was no longer in
the country of the utterly stunned. He was now in the territory of the totally
stymied. "But you didn't--it was--wait, Yuu-chan, don't leave!" He
tried to sit up, but his stomach cramped up, protesting in the only way it
could at the moment: intense, blinding pain that made his vision go as white as
the walls. He may have shrieked, or maybe it was just a grunt, but the next
thing he knew, his roommate was back at his side, lowering him back down on the
bed.

"I'm really sorry, Lavi."

"I took advantage of you, you idiot," the redhead said through
gritted teeth. He would have waited for the pain to go away, but there was the
possibility that Yuu might leave the second he was settled back on his tiny
mattress. He had to get this out.

"Eh?" It was Yuu's turn to sound confused now. Dimly, Lavi felt a bit
triumphant, but that emotion was squashed by the overwhelming need to apologize.

"I was less drunk than you. I knew what we were doing. I could have
put a stop to it, but I didn't." If he had been sitting upright, Lavi
would have hung his head. Instead, he turned it so that the other boy wasn't in
his direct line of vision. He felt like he didn't deserve to see Yuu's face
right now. A lone finger reached out and turned his head back to face the
dark-haired boy.

"I looked like I was enjoying myself, so don't just blame it all on
yourself. Besides, I'm on top of you, so I'm assuming I started it."

Lavi blushed. That was kind of true, he supposed, but he really didn't want to
think about this. If he dwelled on it too long, problems started to
form, and with the thin sheets in the hospital bed, that was not something he
wanted to have, especially now.

"Yeah, but, well... you probably would have kissed anyone. And I'm the one
of us that's gay, so I really shouldn't have let that happened."

To his surprise, Yuu laughed. It was out of character, loud and booming, but maybe
a little sardonic.

"You seriously think I'm not too?" He asked, a strangely
genuine-looking smile on his face, as if he wasn't quite sure he was hearing
this absurdity properly. Lavi wanted to get offended, but he was a bit
surprised at this revelation.

"You are?"

The Japanese boy rolled his eyes and scoffed. "You're so dense!"

"This... this isn't gonna be weird, then, is
it?" Lavi asked. Because that was all he was really concerned with at the
moment. There was a small twitch at the edges of Yuu's eyes, but the redhead
ignored it.

"Che, why would you think that?"

"Well, 'cause we're both gay... and roommates... and stuff," he
finished lamely.

"You are such an idiot." With deliberate motions, the boy pushed Lavi
up and settled behind him so that Lavi could sit up as well. He leaned back
into Yuu's chest--so muscled, so firm, so
wonderful--and let himself relax. Yuu's hand found his own again, but it was
okay, because it wasn't weird between them.

And he had hope that maybe Yuu could possibly-maybe like him back.

If he was likable enough.

---

November 10

Despite having to have his leg wrapped in plaster,
having his arm in a bulky, hyperlink blue sling, and having to hobble along
whilst leaning heavily on a cane, Lavi thought getting out of the hospital was
a definite plus. Even if Tiedoll insisted on driving them
home. And even if the frizzy-haired Frenchman insisted on carrying him
into the room, princess-style, and dumping him rather unceremoniously (and
painfully, though Lavi had more tact than to mention that) onto his bed. As
soon as the man left, the redhead got up and used his can to totter over to
Yuu's bed.

It was more comfy.

Well, that was what he told himself. But he knew, not-so-deep down, that he
just wanted to be there because it smelled like Yuu and because the other boy
was bound to be there if he just waited long enough. Sure enough, moments
later, his roommate walked in. At some point between the trip from the car to
the room, he'd let his hair down, and it was now swishing about his hips as he
strode over to his bed.

"What are you doing here, you idiot?" He asked, but the long-haired
boy sat down anyway and laced his fingers through Lavi's like it was perfectly
natural. Inside, the redhead's heart did a little victory dance that consisted
of much fluttering and soaring.

"Being useless," Lavi replied nonchalantly, putting on his cutest
face and staring up at his best friend through his eyelashes. He squeezed Yuu's
hand a little bit and then pulled at the boy's wrist so that he could reach up
with his mouth and bite it.

"What the fuck are you doing, Rabbit?" Yuu asked, raising a dark
eyebrow questioningly.

"Eatin' ya," Lavi said, winking. For some
reason, his roommate's face turned bright red. "What is it?"

"Nothing, Rabbit, just... nothing." The boy
looked away, obviously trying to fight the blush off and losing quite
valiantly. Not knowing how to respond, Lavi once more affixed his teeth to
Yuu's wrist.

"You're mighty tasty, y'know. Like sandlewood and soap and Yuu-chan-y-ness,"
he mumbled conversationally. He really didn't understand why he was trying to
say what he was, but he figured that the other boy didn't really mind that
much.

"Get off, you weird... clingy thing!" Yuu shouted, wrenching
his arm away. Lavi's eyes teared up. He was still
unused to not having the eye patch. He was still a bit disconcerted by the
whole depth perception thing.

"It's still really weird," he muttered to himself, blinking his right
eye rapidly, as if doing so would make his vision evaporate back into nothing.

"Yeah, you're not a pirate anymore." His dark-haired roommate
responded. There was a tiny lift to the corners of his lips, and though the
redhead felt slightly insulted, he couldn't stop his heart from fluttering a
tiny bit at the memory of the other boy's real smile.

"Seriously?"

Pot-usagi calling kettle-san black.

"Yeah, with the... eye patch... and stuff," Yuu tried to explain,
waving his hands in strange approximations of gestures even as his voice faded
away.

"Arrr." Hooking his
pointer finger and pretending it was a hook, Lavi went about trying to scrape
the dark-haired boy's other arm, which was still in range. He managed to scrape
against Yuu's skin, but what little damage there was melted away within
moments, leaving in its wake nothing but pure, clear flesh.

"Oi, watch where you're flailing."

"You watch where you're flailing."

"Che. I don't flail. I'm not an
idiot like you."

Sadly enough, he had a point. Still, there was a tiny amount of tenderness in
Yuu's eyes as he looked down at Lavi with... kinship, maybe? Perhaps Yuu knew
he had found a soul just as broken and desolate as his own. Even if they both
coped with it in different ways, they both had haunted pasts and memories
they'd do anything to erase from their minds, and the redhead was willing to
bet that the dark-haired boy found solace in that fact. Deep, disfiguring cuts
only did so much, but someone to talk to was completely novel. Especially for a boy who had sealed off all of his emotions in
order to ghost through life, pretending to live.

Not that Lavi hadn't done the same. After all, wasn't
being a Bookman essentially shutting him out of harm's way so that nothing he
saw would be horrific enough to affect him? After all, didn't the scene about
the waterfall just keep coming back, no matter how hard he tried to block
it--even now?

Oliver was his name. He was thirteen. Around him, soldiers lay dying on the
rocky banks of the river. The battle had been bloody and fierce, and it was
Oliver's first introduction to the horrors of guerrilla warfare. He had seen
many skirmishes between tribes in Africa, he had seen countless sniper shots in
the Middle East, but he had never truly understood it until now. His master
couldn't really blame him for that; he was still very, very young, and his view
of the world had not yet been completely jaded. The way the two sides had just
appeared from the trees, from the ground, had blown him away.

The sounds of gunshots still rang true in his ears.

It had been a complete massacre, with one side barreling through the other
until only corpses and the mortally wounded were left behind. Without mercy,
the General on the victorious side shouted out something in a language Oliver
was only just beginning to learn. "Take..." He couldn't make out the
next three words, but then he heard "river." What few soldiers
remained uninjured lifted the bloodied bodies and tossed them into the rapidly
moving waters. Terrified, Oliver watched as each cadaver was washed away to the
nearby waterfall, limbs flailing--flailing, like Yuu had just told him he
was doing--like marionettes under an inexperienced puppeteer. With every
additional body, the water at the base of the cliff was slowly dyed red.

Red. The color of war. The color of death and the color of sorrow. Red. The color fear.

"Remember this always, Oliver," Bookman said. The redhead nodded
dutifully. He would never forget.

How could he?

"Lavi... Lavi? Oi, Baka. RABBIT!" Sharp words cut through the fog of his
memories.

"Eh?" He asked, blinking, once again discovering the wonders of depth
perception.

"Lost you for a moment there," his roommate explained.

"Yeah..." he replied thoughtfully. "Zoned out
for a minute. What did you say?"

"I said I'm not an idiot, unlike someone--" and at this point,
Yuu poked him hard in the chest. Lavi gasped, and the dark-haired boy looked
remorseful for the split-second between his words. For a moment, it seemed that
they'd both forgotten about his still smarting injuries, "--I know."

"You're so meeeaaan to meeee!"
Lavi wailed, right on cue. He put a hand to his slightly throbbing chest and
squeezed a couple fat, alligator tears from his eyes.

"Che, you deserve it," Yuu replied, rolling his eyes, all
concern forgotten. Lavi frowned. There was a pause where they both stared at
each other, but then Yuu's face sobered and he spoke again. "What were you
thinking about?"

"Oh." No, he didn't want to think about that. Make it go away.
"Just... stuff." He shook his head.

A hand brushed his cheek so lightly and briefly that it was almost like the
caress hadn't been there at all. "You're being vague, Lavi."

"I'm not allowed to be?" He asked. His voice had lost whatever
strength it had gained from the colossal pain Yuu had bestowed on him through
the violent means of the poke.

"No. Just... I want to..." It sounded like
the Japanese boy was having trouble figuring out what to say.

"Know?" Lavi asked helpfully. The other boy nodded, and it looked to
the redhead as if Yuu was actually giving him a hopeful, interested expression,
like he wanted to know about the horrors of the waterfall. He shuddered
unconsciously. The weight of Yuu's arm found his shoulder, supporting it. He
knew he had to say it, recount the horrors that were less awful than the ones
his roommate had lived through. So he took a deep breath and wished on whatever
star happened to be falling at the moment that Yuu wouldn't hate him for being
traumatized too. "I was thinking about the waterfall." That disgusting, stinking waterfall. Damn it to hell.

The dark-haired boy grunted. "You mentioned it in one of your nightmares.
I remembered it because it didn't seem to match the other things you were
yelling about."

With a pensive nod, Lavi continued. He explained how he and Bookman had come to
be at that wretched place, how each side had massacred the other, how the dead
had been so unceremoniously desposed of. Gradually,
the other boy had come closer to him, and that warm arm around him became a
cool, firm body pressed to his own.

"I just keep waiting for him to come back, you know? To
finish me off. I'm... really scared." There. He'd admitted it.

"I won't let him near you," Yuu said quietly, but his tone left
absolutely no room for debate. "I promise I'll protect you."

Silence fell, neither of them knowing what to say after such a bold statement,
but Lavi nodded. There was a glint in Yuu's eye that made it really easy to
believe that statement. Lavi wasn't really sure if Yuu would be strong enough
to take on his former master, but he did know that the other boy would probably
go down trying, if nothing else. So he left the situation alone--there would be
time to release him from this fool's promise later--and decided to change that
subject. The waterfalls were still there, superimposed over newly expanded
vision.

"Anyway, you're probably wondering why I had the eye patch in the first
place." Anything to get his mind off of the waterfalls
and the devastation and the blood-red river. Like the Red Sea. Only he
wasn't Moses and sure as hell couldn't part it.

"The thought had crossed my mind." Coaxed easily from the silence,
Yuu looked much more interested than he was trying to let on, but Lavi could
tell just from the set of his eyes and mouth that his roommate was now hanging
on his every word.

"When I was seven," he began, raising his arms melodramatically,
"I took a piece of shrapnel to the eye. My left one--if
you look, you can still kinda see the scar, but it's
not that apparent anymore, yeah? Anyway, I took the piece of shrapnel to
the eye, but it didn't do too much damage. I was blind for a little bit, but
after a couple of months, I started getting vision back. It was really fuzzy at
first, and it's still pretty bad, but Bookman decided to get me an eye patch to
try to 'train' it to see better, I guess. I mean, it's nowhere near perfect,
but it's been getting steadily better. My right eye's probably atrophied
anyway. I should probably get my vision checked." He scratched his head by
way of finishing.

"Ah."

It seemed Yuu didn't have a lot to say on the subject, so Lavi made a humming
noise and hoped another topic would come up soon.

"I had bad vision, too," the other boy said softly. Lavi looked back
at his roommate, surprised to note that they were still discussing eyes.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. I was in the dark for so long..." Yuu's voice was
anything but nostalgic, but it had a soft, remembering quality to it, like the
trauma of his youth was flashing before him. "When I was first in the
light, I just remember everything being really blinding." Lavi slipped his
hand back into his friend's, and the boy continued on with a tiny shudder
(whether good or bad, Lavi didn't know). "After a while, I got used to it.
I remember waking up briefly on the way to the hospital when I got really hurt
that one time, and everything was really, really... indistinct. Like I was seeing thing through a frosted glass or something.
But then when I woke up again, everything was clear. I think the Lotus is
helping me out."

The redhead nodded gravely. "That's possible," he muttered. "I
really don't know anything about it. If you know the doctor's name, maybe I
could look him up--you mentioned that he was the one who gave the Lotus to you,
right?" His roommate nodded. "Okay, well, if I can find him, maybe we
can find out exactly what it does?"

"It keeps me addicted," Yuu said quietly. Lavi looked up and met the
other boy's eyes. For the first time, he noticed just how long-lashed they
were. He also noticed how sorrowful the boy's eyes seemed to be. Like there was
no end to his suffering. "I don't know what all they gave to me, and the
worst of it has faded with time, but no matter how hard I try to quit, I can't
get off Vicodin. It's like it's trying to keep me in
one constant state. The first constant state it knew me in was addicted to
drugs. But always being constant and unchanging--I think that's why I went
through puberty so late."

"Oh yeah, you mentioned--or was it Lenalee?"**

"Doesn't matter," Yuu grunted. "It was painful as hell. One day,
all my muscles just seized up, and next thing I knew, I was growing. It was painful.
That's how I got on Vicodin in the first place. The
doctors kept me on it too long, and when they tried to get me off, I went into
ridiculous withdrawal."

"Sounds... well, I don't really know how that sounds." Lavi grimaced.

"Imagine growing half a foot in a month."

Suddenly his grimace was a nearly comical expression of horror. "Growth
pains?"

"Now imagine growing half a foot in less than a week."

The look of utter terror on Lavi's face became even more pronounced. "Is that
even possible?"

"Well, I'm this tall, aren't I? Che, you're such an idiot."

"I'm pretty sure that's not possible, Yuu."

"Well, it happened."

"But--"

"Just shut up. Idiots shouldn't speak."

Lavi pouted.

During the silence, a soft knock came at the door.

"'Scuse me..." a tiny voice said, muffled a
little by the wood. She stepped out from behind the door, and Lavi very nearly
choked. Lizzie had always been fairly pale, which she had often complained
about, as her brown hair was just a little too dark, but now she was covered in
deep purple bruises. Both of her eyes were swollen and black, and her nose
showed signs of recent trauma. It looked flattened, and blood still seemed to
be seeping from both nostrils. Tears pooled at her chin before falling to the
ground.

Immediately, Yuu was up from the bed--easily having relinquished Lavi from his
arm, not that the redhead would complain about that, given the new
circumstances--and across the room. He ushered the girl in, closing and locking
the door behind him. He led the unsteady girl over to Lavi's bed and set her
down gently before examining her to see what else was wrong. After a few
moments of poking and prodding, the dark-haired boy seemed content that nothing
else was injured.

During the investigation, the redhead had limped over to the other side of the
room and sat down next to the slightly shaking girl and patted her hand
reassuringly.

"What happened, Lizzie?" Lavi asked quietly, calmly, trying not to
startle her.

"He... he hurt me." The brunette sounded shocked, as if she had never
thought this would happen.

Lavi only nodded and pulled her head so that it rested on his shoulder.
Hopefully, it would make her feel better, though Lavi had never actually tried
to comfort anyone before, so he really had no idea if it helped at all.

The redhead noticed his roommate steal quietly from the room and return a few
minutes later with a washcloth. Lizzie hiccuped her
thanks and cleaned off her face.

"He was just... a little angry, that's all." The brunette reasoned,
though the rationalization fell on deaf ears; everyone in that room had heard
the rumors--the bruises had become more and more frequent over the past few
weeks, more difficult to hide, and they were all the more reason to
believe.

There was a distinctive scoff from across the room as Yuu searched for
something to reduce the swelling.

The room returned to silence after another minute. Lavi didn't want to be the
one to break it, seeing as whatever he said would probably be inappropriate for
the situation. He looked over to Yuu to find him with his phone out, texting.
Which didn't really seem useful, but then again, Yuu knew how to deal with this
sort of incident.

The dark-haired boy tucked his phone into his pants pocket and strode over to
the door, unlocking it, as if he was expecting someone. The echoing sounds of
footsteps running through the halls signaled the guest's arrival. The door
burst open, admitting a frantic-looking Jason, Lizzie's best friend and a
member of the sword team with Yuu.

"Lizzie! There you are. Jesus Christ, what'd he do to you this
time?!" He ran over to where the brunette was sitting, pushing Lavi out of
the way, and pulling the battered girl into his arms.

"It's not anything, really; he just got upset. I'm fine. Really, I
am," she said, trying not to sound like she was in pain, but the grimace
was all too obvious.

"That's bullshit, Lizzie, and you know it. You and I both know he's hit
you before and will keep doing it until it gets further out of control than it
already is!" The boy shouted, leaning back so that he could look the girl
in the face.

Lizzie's expression crumbled and tears started falling again.

"He isn't good for you; everyone knows what happened to his last
girlfriend. None of us want to see that happen to you, too." Jason
explained, and Lavi felt that that was his cue to nod in agreement. He noticed
Yuu follow suit.

"I just thought he'd changed," she mumbled miserably into Jason's
shirt.

"I know, I know, but sometimes people don't change; they just stay bad no
matter how many wonderful people try and help them," the tawny-haired boy
murmured softly, and he patted the back of her shirt.

"Yeah, I know that. I know that. I just can't believe that it happened.
I'll break it off, I just... want to go back to my
room and sleep. Help me back, Jay?"

The two left, Jason supporting her as she limped. Lavi wondered if Lizzie would
finally take her friend's advice. He fervently hoped
so.

---

November 14

The next few days passed without much ado, and Lavi quickly
fell back into the regular schedule. After apologizing to his professors and
handing in his late work (all impeccably done, the former apprentice Bookman
was proud to note), he'd promptly been assigned more, and after a small flurry
of short papers, Lavi felt like he was actually a college student for once. He
knew he was taking a crazy amount of classes, but due to his perfect memory, he
never had to study, and he was rarely assigned written work, as he was in
mostly language classes. What work he did have to do only took
a few hours a day, and that could usually be done during the other classes he
attended. It was a simple schedule: wake up, go to classes, do work for
previous class in the next one, and then come home and do the last bit. Then he
would fall asleep and do it all again.

The past few days had been different. He'd actually had to skip classes in
order to finish all his assignments, and he wasn't pleased with the current
(small) amount of sleep on which he was running.

In passing, Yuu had scoffed at him and told him he looked like a drug addict. Which was pretty rich, coming from someone who was addicted to Vicodin.

So after he had finally finished it all, sometime around
midnight or so, he'd collapsed into bed and promptly closed his eyes. He
proceeded to fall into a trance-like state, the one that usually precluded
sleep, but a soft, hesitant knock, not unlike the one Lizzie had given a few
days previously, crashed through it like cymbals.

He heard Yuu's quiet, long stride across the room, and the door squeaked loudly
when it was opened. A mumbled curse in that low, smooth voice made it apparent
that Yuu was trying to be as quiet as possible. That tiny fact pierced Lavi's
heart like no other gesture could. The dark-haired boy cared very much about
sleep, mostly because he got so little himself. It was a sign of great respect
and trust that he was trying not to interrupt Lavi's. The redhead found he kind
of liked it, just like he liked it when the boy called him an idiot while
ruffling his hair, just like he liked it when the boy gave him a large carrot
to munch on and called him an insufferable rabbit.

Apparently, for Yuu, insults were his way of showing his love. His actions
always belied his words, and the redhead had come to understand that very
keenly lately.

"Jay?" Yuu asked softly.

"Oh, were you asleep?" Came the whisper,
just as quiet as Yuu's voice had been.

"No, Lavi is."

"Oh. Do you want me to go?"

"No, come in. What is it?"

"She broke up with him today."

Lavi assumed they were talking about Lizzie, which made sense, since Jason was
here.

"Is she okay?"

"She's in the hospital. I knew I should have gone with her!"
Jason sounded a bit aggrieved, which was understandable. Lavi would have been
the same way if it had been Yuu who had been in that situation.

"Relax, Jay, there's nothing you could've done that could have stopped
that from happening."

"I know... it's just... it's kind of touch-and-go right now."

Lavi really wanted to open his eyes, but he knew he shouldn't interrupt this
scene. Obviously, the two boys were at least somewhat friendly with each other,
and he wouldn't ruin Yuu's chance at having another person close to him.

"You okay?" But he wasn't really sure if he liked how concerned Yuu
sounded.

"Yeah... I think. Yuu, I--I really don't know what I'll do if she--"
Jason's voice caught on the last word, and something that sounded suspiciously
like a sob hurled through whatever was left of Lavi's comfortable, warm little
bubble of sleepiness. He was definitely intrigued now.

"Relax. I'm sure she'll be fine. That's a big bruise on your head,
though." How could Yuu see in the dark? Was he a ninja? Oh, wait, his
eyelids were stained an orange-ish red. At some
point, someone had turned on the lamp. It must have been before he'd become
this aware, back when he'd been trying to fall asleep.

"Yeah, he tried to see her in the hospital, but he knocked me out when I
tried to keep him from her. The staff took him down." There was a small,
heartless laugh. "I think they got him with some kind of tranquilizer. I'm
pretty sure he's still out."

"Well, that's good."

There was a loud crash and a bit of loud swearing from both of the other boys.
Lavi took that as his cue to wake up.

"Eh... what the fuck...?" He asked, feigning exhaustion. Opening his
mouth wide, he waited for the yawn, which quickly took hold of him, causing his
eyes to wrinkle and tear up while his vision narrowed.

"Sorry!" Jason yelled, bowing like he would to someone older. Of
course, he was on the sword team with Yuu, so naturally he would treat the
dark-haired boy as someone above him. Yuu could take down anyone. Since the
first time he'd happened upon the practicing team, Lavi had come twice more.
Each time, the dark-haired boy had beaten everyone except the old Asian coach
when they sparred.

"It's fine--they were probably going bad
anyway." Yuu's voice brought Lavi back to the here-and-now. The room was
lit by only one lamp, and both the brunette boys were staring at a broken plate
of chocolate chip cookies, which Yuu had received from Tiedoll while Lavi was
in the hospital and had put, untouched, onto his desk so that "we won't be
poisoned by the old man's French cooking." Neither of them had
eaten any, though not for lack of trying on Lavi's part. He still had a bruise
from the last time Yuu had smacked his hand away.

"But still... the plate--"

"--Is cheap and plastic. Don't worry about it. My foster father is Froi Tiedoll. I think he can afford to replace it."

Jason nodded and reached over to pat Yuu on the shoulder. Lavi was surprised to
see his roommate didn't flinch away from the touch. "Thanks, man," he
said. "I'm a bit of a mess, sorry."

"It's no problem," Yuu said, briefly touching the hand on his
shoulder before removing it. It wasn't a brush-off, but it still showed that
the dark-haired boy had a long way to go. Still... progress was progress.
"Go to your room and get some sleep."

With that, Yuu ushered the other boy out.

And then Lavi realized something horribly disturbing: Yuu was polite to his
other friends.

Why did that make him feel jealous? Was it the politeness, or was it the other friends part? Either way, that weird, roaring feeling in his
heart wouldn't go away.

---

A/N: Wai~ another buffer chapter edited 'cause we've
been too busy/tired/lazy to write! We're sorry for the long wait, especially
when we promised a week, but the new semester is already really stressful. Em1
has three classes taught in German and Em2 has three literature classes. We've
also been writing Christmas fics for our friends. We
got stuck on the second one (but we know where it's going). Those will be up
soon, for those of you who are interested in Hetalia.
They are America/Japan and UK/US(both loyalist and
revolutionary). But we're sending them to our friends first, as... well...
these fics are their presents. As for the Lizzie bit,
if it seemed sudden, sorry. We tried to hint at it before, but this whole
barely-mentioned side-plot is a new thing we're trying out, so give us some
leeway, 'kay? Anyway, when we'll update again, no one knows, but we'll try to
keep it reasonably soon, okay? :)

By the way, to all our reviewers, thank you so much for
your input and your compliments. They are very much appreciated and it lets us
know that people are actually reading it.

*Typo on purpose. He's trying to say the electricity (from the lightning) is
hurting him.

**I don't think this was actually mentioned in previous chapters. Lavi is
referring to a conversation that happened off the page.
- 12
- 13
- 14
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How to Save a Life