Chapter Text
“Just where the hell is it?” the phone Allen had set on the music script case of the grand piano buzzed with Kanda’s voice, edgy and bordering on rage.
Allen chuckled low to himself and casually replied, “Told you it’s on the seventh floor. Can’t be that hard to find a room, BaKanda?”
A hiss immediately shot back at him through his device and Allen only smiled as he airily played his fingers above the keyboard, practicing.
“Come on, music school can’t be that complicated. Or are you just dumb?”
A snarl ripped through the phone this time. “One more word and I will kill you.”
Allen smirked despite everything. “Well, to kill me, you’d gotta find your way here first.”
“Tch. When I do, you are so dead.” The death threat was so prominent -
“Oho, I will be waiting.”
The line went off faster than lightning.
And Allen burst into laughter. His laugh resonated in the piano room 08-14 for a long while, before he whipped his head back to where his dear Lenalee – and Lavi, her official boyfriend now – were busy making last minute decorations to the late evening classroom.
“Thanks guys, really,” Allen said wholeheartedly, before he turned around fully in his piano seat to look at the final layout. “Although, I wonder if this is a bit too much…”
Lenalee shot him a disdainful look. “What do you mean too much? You are proposing, for goodness’ sake. What can be more important?”
A large grin came from Lavi, who winked at him with his emerald eyes and gave him a thumbs up.
“I will be your best man.”
The snowy haired boy sighed, scratching his head in wonder of whether it got too big, too complicated.
“Thanks, Lavi, but you know that’s not really it. Lena really did exaggerate it. He’s graduating, so I am just ehem – just wanted to show him I want to be with him for the rest of my life.”
A loud, humiliating coo came from his two friends who had taken leave from their now-thriving coffee shop (their total manpower increased to six staff now) to ‘support’ his occasion, and Allen only could smack his palm to his face and shake his head in resignation.
Well. It was not like he was not thankful for the immense support.
Then, with quick fingers, Allen picked up his phone and typed a fast message to Kanda who was probably still wandering on the wrong floor.
“So, all done now?” he asked one last time, silver eyes seeking his friends’ expressions after one last look at the decorations.
“Yup,” Lenalee answered with a firm nod.
“All ready,” Lavi echoed, before adding a lament. “What a pity we can’t stay since this place is too small.”
Not really. He could only imagine the commotion that would be stirred up if Lavi would stay.
“Right, okay.”
Allen took a deep breath, and pressed send.
Actually, it’s on the eighth floor. 08-14.
The message reply came not two seconds later.
Fuck you
And so Allen turned to the door, waiting with abated breath.
.
.
.
Kanda’s entry was impeccably loud.
He made sure of it.
A slam of the sliding ivory door against the hinges, with the poor wood left rattling from the impact.
He shot his best, damnedest, hardest, murderous glare at that darn moyashi, who dared to smile at him with the brightest, fakest smile Kanda had seen in forever.
“Hey Kanda.”
“You are dead.”
The beansprout merely cocked an eyebrow at him innocently.
“Why?”
Kanda’s left eye twitched.
“Don’t play dumb.” He snarled, straightening from his slightly bent-forward aggressive stance before the door. “What the fuck were you playing at, telling me a wrong floor number on purpose?”
He watched those ashen irises abruptly dart to the other side of the room for a moment, following the glance instinctively –
And his mind suddenly blanked out.
The fuck?
He heard the moyashi clearing his throat awkwardly from the piano seat, like there was an enormous embarrassment choking him, before the younger’s voice came timidly.
“Well… It was Lenalee’s idea to decorate… it…”
Kanda could feel a cold sheen of sweat on his palms.
It could not be. It better not be.
“I… I know it’s a bit too much, but erm, bear with it for today?”
Kanda could only look back at his lover with a horrified astonishment, every cell in his body shouting with vehement denial. His voice died somewhere in his throat.
Then, a pink tint flushed the bean sprout’s face minutely before Allen turned to his black and white keys, and started playing. Yes, playing the damn piano like it was not another blood chilling icing to the cake.
Kanda could only stand there, body frozen to the spot, listening like a statue, mind empty.
It had to be by the second verse, when Kanda realized with some acuteness that he had heard the song before. Some time ago. Somewhere.
As if reading his thoughts, Allen’s voice wandered through the music to murmur –
“Elgar’s Salut d’Amour. I played it during that first recital of mine you went to.”
Oh.
Allen chose that moment to peer sideways at him, silver eyes twinkling gold under the sheen of the slowly setting sun beyond the windows, fingers never stopping.
“It was an engagement present from Elgar to his wife.”
Kanda swallowed thickly as he felt the directions swerving dangerously.
It just could not be, right?
“Moyashi,” he finally managed to utter, tone solemn.
Their eyes met.
And surprisingly, Allen looked away first. Too quickly, in fact.
Kanda stared for a couple more seconds at his lover’s side profile, before he realized that it was futile to hope. It was too obvious already. His heart alternated between horrification and resignation.
“Let’s make it official,” Allen begun, just as the music notes slowly hummed towards the end. “You and me.”
And the music ended.
Steeling his guts, Kanda stepped into that ridiculously decorated classroom and walked until he was right beside his lover. He looked down; Allen continued to stare at his keys.
“I am twenty-four, and you are barely twenty-one.”
The moyashi finally looked up.
“There are people who get together when they are thirty, forty, fifty, sixty. Twenty won’t be any different. In fact, there are those who get together in their late teens too.”
The raven haired sighed, deciding to look to the distance despite the burn in his eyes from the sunlight.
“And you are rushing because?”
Allen was silent for a while, and Kanda dared not look.
“Because I am sure it has to be you.”
Kanda closed his eyes and reached a hand to hug his younger lover one-handedly against him. He tried not to feel anything, not the almost-hurt feelings emanating from Allen. He had to speak his piece.
“As I am you. But.” He paused, face scowling as he tried to gather his words. “Idiot. I am not ready.”
There was a pause of silence, followed by a soft chuckle from his arms before Allen pulled back.
Kanda was so very glad amusement was the only expression on his lover’s face.
“I am the younger one, and you are not ready?”
Kanda scowled darker.
“Tch. With that hair of white, you are the old one for all everyone knows.”
“Hey! That’s unfair!”
He only snorted at the moyashi’s genuinely irritated response, but was taken aback when one of his hand was suddenly grabbed.
“And let’s get back on track before both of us forget what is supposed to be really going on.”
Kanda had to smirk a bit at the words.
“Fine. I say, we can get engaged, but we leave all the ‘official’ business to the future.”
The bean sprout spent another five seconds looking at him seriously, before nodding.
“Alright. But we get the rings.”
Kanda cocked an eyebrow, watching Allen smirk back at him lopsidedly.
“It can be your graduation present.”
And somehow, Kanda suddenly felt he knew what had motivated the albeit, random, proposal-of-sorts.
“Tch. Rings or not, it will only be you.” He declared with a mild frown.
And then, Kanda watched Allen beam brighter than the setting sun with a warmth in his chest, sure that he really did mean his words.
Happily, he also ignored the awfully, colorfully decorated piano classroom full of silks and balloons. There was also absolutely no heart shape behind his name splattered across the noticeboards.
Really.
.
.
.
END