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Even though Aya had been in the Devildom for quite some time now, sometimes she still caught snatches of demons whispering things behind her back as she passed them in the hallways. They leaned in close to one another and snickered just loud enough for her to hear, but never loud enough for her to understand. It reminded her of the cliques from highschool, and even though she was in college now (and in another realm on top of that), her mind was tugged back to those locker-lined hallways where gaggles and clusters of mean-spirited children drew their heads together and laughed at the strange outcast girl while she walked by.
The girl whose parents were too wrapped up in themselves to want her. The girl who liked reading fantasy or horror books as she walked to her next class or on her way to the bus stop. The girl who liked to play white witch with her incense and her candles and her little book of spells she always kept in her backpack. Her crystals, her doodles, her hair, even her music.
"Fucking weirdo," they sneered at her passing back. "Freak."
Aya didn't know what they were saying about her now, but she knew that it was the same aggressive whispery tone, the hurtful, snide giggling that she recognized from experience and held hurtful words in its undertones. She was dragged so far back into her memories that she was instinctively hugging her books tightly to her chest, just as she used to walk with them near the end, when she finally started letting all of it get to her.
Someone reached out to touch her shoulder and she instinctively jerked away from the clawed fingers that she sensed hovering there and their malicious intent. She became aware of her current surroundings then for just a moment before she felt her center of balance begin to sway out over the winding stairs below her, which she had been descending without her own notice. She caught a glimpse of the demon that had reached out to grab at her before she plummeted down the remainder of the staircase, her books spilling from her arms as she brought them up to protect her face.
Aya's crossed forearms struck the marble staircase and she heard a dull snap. A jolt of pain shot up her right arm from elbow to wrist and she yelped, tucking her head further into her arms, not wanting her glasses to fly off too, that would really be some final twist of cruelty on top of all of this. She hit her shoulder, her lower back, her left hip and thigh, and suddenly everything stopped. She had stopped (falling that is) and she lay at the bottom of the curved staircase that ran down from the second floor classrooms to the first floor lobby, her books and papers scattered around her, her right arm throbbing with pain. She still had her glasses on at least.
And then, the demons began to laugh at her. They burst out laughing all at once, the sound echoing and swelling in the high-ceilinged domed roof of the academy. Some of them jeered things at her which she couldn't hear over the roar of their cruel laughter, and between that and the pain starting to flare up everywhere on her, Aya began to feel tears stinging at her eyes.
"Aya?" one voice cut through the raucous laughter and her surprise stopped the oncoming wave of tears. It was Belphegor; she'd recognize his voice anywhere. She looked up from the floor and sure enough he was kneeling in front of her, and some of the demons (some of the closer ones that had noticed and recognized him) had stopped laughing and were now watching, wary looks starting to creep over their faces.
"Did you fall?" he asked her, frowning. Of course he'd known she'd fallen, but what he was asking was implied more in the low-burning anger that was glowing in his usually half-closed sleepy eyes. She recognized it at once and laughed nervously, the sound coming out more fragile than she had wanted it to.
"Yep!" she smiled at him, trying to ignore the ache all over. "Clumsy me..." She went to push herself up into a sitting position and her right arm gave a sharp knife of pain again. She yelped a bit and then grinned sheepishly at him, holding the arm lightly against her chest with her left as she shifted her legs under her so she could sit up. Luckily her skirts didn't go flying up over her head during her not-so graceful descent, that would have been leagues more embarrassing. She again tried to force herself to smile at Belphie, but stopped when she saw his usually calm face marred by anger. She smiled more genuinely, softer, and murmured: "I.. think I may have hurt myself."
Now, all the laughter had ceased, and almost a hundred pairs of eyes were watching as the Avatar of Sloth helped the exchange student to her feet. He looked up at the crowds of demons clustered up along the staircase with an intense contempt. He was marking them, they knew, gaining recognition of them. And each demon he made eye contact with knew that some time later on, they would be meeting one of the seven princes of Hell in an alley somewhere late at night, and there would be no one around to help them. Then his attention was on the exchange girl, the human that was a bit weird and a bit ditzy but was somehow cherished by all of the demon brothers just the same. They'd made a mistake. And like all demons, they weren't sorry for it, they were just bitter that they'd been caught.
Belphie helped her stand up and Aya brushed herself off with her left hand, fixing her uniform and then her hair as he knelt again and gathered up her books for her. He shifted the weight of them to his right arm and wrapped his left arm around her waist, tugging her close. With the amount of times they'd been this close together, Aya thought it shouldn't fluster her the way it did, but she always got flustered the minute their fingers touched. Her heart was racing too, and that could have been from adrenaline after her fall but, her deeper heart knew it was more.
"Can you walk?" he asked her, his low voice so soothing to her nerves. She nodded and smiled at him more easily this time.
"Thank you, Belphie."
"Come on, we're going to the nurse's office," he said and immediately began to guide her in that direction. She went without protest but worried about one small thing.
"..Will you stay with me?" she asked quietly, timid in her need for him. She knew the Avatar of Sloth didn't like being tied down by burden. But he nodded and she let out a relieved little sigh under her breath. Her pain already seemed much better. Tolerable, at least. With him, the whole world seemed much more tolerable, and Aya let herself lean against him as she limped alongside him toward the infirmary.
---
Belphie sat with her as the nurse checked over her, the succubus noting aloud that Aya would definitely have much deeper aches and pains later on in the day and especially when she woke up tomorrow, after her shock wore off. She gave Aya a balm for her bruises which had a familiar, comforting scent that reminded her of a medicine she used to use back up in the human world.
As for her arm: "The break isn't severe, but it is broken, and you'll need a cast on it, at least for a little while. Right now, this splint will have to do; I've put magic around it so it doesn't slip out of place, but you need to get to a healers straight away. Understood?" Aya nodded, feeling a bit numb. She'd never broken a bone before, so she was a little scared. Would her body take well to supernatural healing magic? She knew that bones took months to heal fully, and she looked down in dismay at the split that was tucked protectively against her side and waist with a sling.
"I'll take her," Belphie spoke up. "Don't worry, Aya. Think of it kind of like.. a family doctor. You know?" She didn't but the thought soothed her. In fact, his voice and his assurance that all would be well calmed her even more. And of course, his hand in hers, their fingers linked gently made her heart lighter still. They got up and he carried her books once more. She reached out to take them from him, not wanting to burden him further, but he either didn't notice or pretended he didn't see and carted her out of the nurse's room and back toward the dorms instead of the main hall.
"What about class-?" she glanced back over her shoulder as they walked out the doors instead of up the stairs. He scoffed, not looking anywhere but forward, the House of Lamentation springing up immediately on their left as they descended the steps and cut through the well-manicured gardens toward it.
"The nurse said you needed rest," he said firmly, but his voice was his usual quiet tone so she didn't feel like she was being scolded. "And I know the perfect place for that."
She wondered briefly if he meant his room, the one he shared with Beel. That could be pretty restful, but she wouldn't press her welcome of course. He probably just meant taking her back to her room. However, it was neither of those things. Belphegor passed both her room on the second floor and his and Beelzebub's room on the third and continued to climb until they had reached a familiar staircase. Aya knew that sometimes Belphie hid away here in his old upstairs prison whenever he felt like he needed to be extra alone, but she hadn't been expecting for him to guide her there. Now that they were here, with the low ceiling and the soft yellow-orange lighting and the huge soft bed that took up almost half the room, she found she was pleased. She liked cuddling with him up here, it felt like their own special, secret place (even though all of his brothers knew it was here).
Belphie tossed both his bag and her books onto one of the overstuffed chairs, knocking the pillow off it and onto the floor. Aya bent and scooped it up with her good arm as she shed the weight of her bag from her shoulder and let it clunk softly to the floor. She brought the pillow over to the large bed as Belphie finished kicking off his shoes and throwing himself back onto it. She giggled as she watched him roll about on it like a sleepy cat attempting to get more comfortable, and when he looked up at her with his one arm that wasn't beneath his own weight extended out to her, she happily crawled onto it, careful to turn and lay so that her right arm was up on her side and her back was snugged up against his chest. His arm flopped down over her hip and she felt his face nuzzle the nape of her neck between her loosely braided hair. It tickled and she curled up a little at the feeling, another pleased giggle slipping out of her.
"Mm..." Belphie mumbled on her skin, pressing the smallest, slightest of kisses there. Aya shivered delightedly. "How'd you fall?"
Her shiver turned into a halting jolt and her eyes opened up, her brain replaying the accident in her mind again. They'd been laughing at her, she'd not been paying attention, and when someone had reached out to touch her she'd...
"I was clumsy," she answered him, which wasn't entirely untrue, but she also didn't want to unload the entire thought process onto Belphie. "Someone tried to grab me and I slipped-"
"They tried to grab you or push you?" he asked, and she heard the expression on his face: the raised eyebrow, the slight downturn of his lips as he stared at the back of her head in mild doubt. She turned her head toward him a little bit.
"They wanted to grab me I'm pretty sure but I-" Got scared, she didn't want to say that last part out loud. It felt foolish to say.
"You lost your balance?" She nodded. He sighed a little and she sat up with a bit of effort to look at him. He stared back up at her curiously.
"If I told you what I'd been thinking about before I slipped, will you promise you won't get mad at me? Or laugh?" Her cheeks were a bit pink and she felt silly for even saying this much, but Belphie just sat up and put his hands on her arms and guided her to lie down at the foot of the bed this time, opposite to the way they'd originally been cuddling. Then he plopped himself down beside her so they were looking into each other's faces. Aya thought, not for the first time, that she loved his eyes. And his hair. And the way the latter spilled over the former.
"Tell me," he nodded, his expression serious. Aya was still embarrassed, and she cuddled up closer to him, her forehead almost pressed to his chest. His chin settled atop her head and his arm went around her carefully and squeezed.
"...Back when I was younger, in highschool- do you have that here?" He shook his head. "Well, it's kinda like.. pre-college. Anyway, up in the human world, we go to school for the first dozen years of our lives or so. And human kids can be.. mean. Not as mean as demons, of course!" she hurriedly added, sensing his slight skepticism at her words, "but still, pretty cruel. I've always wondered how they got like that, you know?"
He grunted, having a comment but letting her continue talking instead of interrupting her. She was thankful for and of him.
"I used to get made fun of in school," she continued. "It's a pretty common thing among humans though, so I tried not to let it get to me. I know that sounds silly but.. I don't know, maybe it's because I'm just a human? It hurt, even though they were just words." She thought she felt his arm get a bit tighter around her, but maybe that was just her imagination. "All I wanted was friends, to fit in with a group of people, but instead, I didn't fit in with anyone. My hobbies, my interests, they were all so weird to everyone."
"You are a bit weird," he spoke up gently, but once more she sensed no meanness in his voice so she grinned against him, taking comfort in his light teasing.
"Anyway, when I felt that hand coming to grab me I just.. panicked. Usually, when someone did try and interact with me, it wasn't really a friendly gesture, you get me?"
"I get you," he nodded again, and then, in a voice she thought sounded grimmer than his normal one: "You know you're not alone anymore, right?"
The question surprised her and she pulled her head back a bit to look up into his face. His look wasn't exactly irritated, or pitying, but it was something other than his usual relaxed expression that she couldn't quite place. Maybe because she'd never seen it on a demon's face before? It was sympathy, she thought, and suddenly, she felt a tear tracking from the corner of her eye and she knuckled it away quickly with her unbound hand, hoping he hadn't noticed it (but he probably had). She nodded and then smiled with more confidence. "I know," she said, feeling happy because she knew he was right- she wasn't alone anymore. "I have you, Belphie~ And I have the others too."
His eyes rolled exaggeratedly when she mentioned his brothers and it made her laugh aloud. Then she scooted close again and lifted her face to his so their noses were touching.
"I know I'm not alone, and believe me, I'm very happy that you're with me now."
His eyes avoided hers for a moment (his own charming display of slight embarrassment) and then he pressed a quick kiss to her lips, which both surprised and delighted her.
"So sappy..." he mumbled, but his hand was on the small of her back, rubbing there in slow, light up-and-down strokes that she felt she could happily have him do all the rest of the day.
"You make me happy, Belphegor," she almost-whispered, pressing their faces close together and closing her eyes, her cheeks burning. "You make all the bad things go away."
"Hmph," he grunted at her words, as enigmatic as ever. But he didn't stop holding her, and they fell asleep together that way, foreheads touching, breaths mingling warmly between each pair of their lips, legs comfortably twining together near the knees and ankles as they slept, and dreamed of each other.