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Allen Walker wasn’t asleep.
He was instead huddled in the office of his home and cloaked in sheets of white paper from university, that melded in shade with his hair. Checking the time, he got up from his armchair, stretching his arms over his head as he wandered into his kitchen and finished off some spare takeaway food, from Jerry’s Diner, for dinner.
Patting down his loose shirt, and retying white hair, Allen rubbed at his eyes. He didn’t want to fall asleep. Because that’s when he returns. In dreams and nightmares of blades and blood. Long, navy hair and an obsidian gaze. Sharp features and a scowl. Hot breath and lost fingertips against skin.
It hurt to sleep, to remember, and yet Allen often found he never wanted to wake. Because this not-quite-stranger, from a time Allen remembers is a time long past, is called Yu Kanda. His past rival, surprising companion, and shockingly, his past lover. Yet now in this brighter, demon-less 20th century, Yu Kanda doesn’t exist.
Or at least that’s what Allen Walker believed. Because this time, instead of Kanda searching for Allen, the British man looked for Kanda.
But unlike the Japanese man had done, Allen hadn’t found the other.
Overall, it ached less to accept he didn’t exist, and that the man was simply, and just, a not-so-stranger in dreams.
Yet Lavi and Lenalee knew about his search, even thoroughly helped at a point, but gradually they laid the matter to rest, as they often stated that, “Maybe Kanda doesn’t want to be found.”
***
It wasn’t even Halloween, October having just begun, and Lavi had the great idea, with his college friend Daisya, to host a Halloween party. When they proposed the idea to Allen and Lenalee, they agreed, but why they couldn’t wait till Halloween was beyond them.
So, on a typical October night, with cloudy skies and a drizzle of rain, a trio walked up to the door.
Lavi grinned under a menacing pirate hat, adorned with his usual eyepatch and a sea captain’s coat, matted with fake blood. Beside him, Lenalee, dressed like the stars themselves, twirling a witch’s wand, her heels clicking against the cobalt path. Meanwhile Allen, keeping up a smile and holding back his yawns, dressed in, what Lenalee insisted he should wear, a dead butler’s costume.
As Lenalee tapped the door with her wand, and the oak door opened, the trio exclaimed, “Trick or Treat!”
The response at the door was cheer from Daisya Barry. “Hey guys! Happy Early Halloween!” Daisya flaunted his grim reaper costume and pulled the trio inside. Other people, who Allen didn’t recognise but Lavi seemed to, hung around orange pumpkin lanterns, and fake cobweb corners. Eerie and heavy music thumped through the speakers, while candy and sweet smelling alcohol was passed around. Lenalee’s eyes lit up and she smiled and waved to other witches, calling out to Miranda Lotto who nervously fiddled with a wand.
Allen became a wallflower but smiled and chatted politely to those who passed by him.
Daisya turned to the British dead butler and said over the music, “My foster brother is here! So, if you hear any grumpy comments, it’s not the party, it’s just him being him!”
Allen raised a brow. “Who’s your foster brother?”
“He’s called-…oh look! He’s here!” Daisya pointed and waved towards the other side of the room, where a Japanese man with long hair and a glowering gaze was stood. He had crossed his arms and wasn’t dressed for the early Halloween party. When he noticed his idiotic foster brother, he was prepared to stride out of the house altogether.
Yet, he saw the person beside Daisya, and his heart thudded heavily. The beansprout.
Allen tensed and paled. “K-Kanda…”
Daisya turned to the white haired man. “How do you…oh my god, you remember him. From the past, and all that stuff Lavi mentioned to me.”
Allen stilled and he didn’t know how to leave Kanda’s gaze, which was calculating, and glassy, but for once, unsure. “I-I’ve got to go.”
“No wait… Al!” Daisya beckoned back, but the British man was already through the door.
Looking back at where Kanda was stood, Daisya sagged when he saw even his foster brother was gone.
***
Outside, Allen shivered in the cold as he sped off down the stone path towards his apartment. His head was hung down and he let tears fall down his face along with the rain that soon got heavier, thundering down. It might as well have been Halloween today, with how it was a classic dark and stormy night. All he needed was a jump scare.
“Oi!”
Allen jolted. Lifting his head up and whipping around behind him, he met the Japanese man, whom Allen looked so long for. Yet, here Kanda was now, and he was running away?
“Why the hell are you getting soaked in the damn rain, idiot beansprout?”
“…” Allen held back a sob, and tried to smile, but it kept wavering. How long had he longed to hear that voice? Hell, it was still annoying when he was being called a beansprout, but it was Kanda’s. Inevitably, it riled him up.
Kanda then nodded to a car on the sidewalk. “Get your ass in here. The damn party is running low on drink.”
Hesitantly, Allen took a step back. But then taking in the stiff air, that chilled every nerve in his lungs, Allen strode up to the car, and got in with the Japanese man, who smoothly manoeuvred into the driver’s seat and drove off towards a store.
It was silent, and Allen laid his head back against the car seat, glimpsing at Kanda as he drove. Now that Allen could see him up close, he flicked over those dusky blue eyes, and Kanda’s leather jacket which fit perfectly over his lean, yet strong hands and arms. Up across Kanda’s neck, Allen almost missed it.
A scar. Yu Kanda can scar now.
Allen would probably ask about it later…
He immediantly removed his stare and berated himself. What ‘later’? This might as well be it. He and Kanda would just split paths…
“Does reincarnating make you quieter, beansprout?” Kanda asked, suavely changing the car’s gears.
“You know my name just fine, Bakanda.” Allen replied, and caught how Kanda seemed to falter, almost unnoticeably, in his movements at the sound of his voice. “Guess reincarnating twice made you twice as slow.” Allen said.
Kanda knew what the British man meant and scowled. “Want me to throw you out of the car, you idiot?”
“Dunno if you have any of that strength anymore, Kanda”
The Japanese man stopped at a red light. “Tch, don’t test me.”
Rain pattered, seeming louder, when the two in the car fell back in silence.
“Did…” Allen didn’t know if he should ask. Nevertheless, he decided he will. “…Did Alma come back?”
The car abruptly sped off down the road again, passing green and yellow lights. Kanda clenched the wheel, but with a sigh he shook his head. He was solemn but with a sense of resolve and peace. “No.”
Allen felt his eyes burn with tears again, but then Kanda asked, “You still have that old man hair. Same reason from the past?”
For a moment, Allen didn’t know what Kanda meant. But then it all came back. Being in Britain, telling everything to Kanda out of all people, being on the run. He wanted to laugh mirthlessly, but instead replied coolly, “No, I was born with it…you still have that long hair.”
“Well you said you didn’t want me to cut-,” Kanda instantly went quiet, because this was the first time they’ve ever talked in this lifetime. Whatever they said before, technically didn’t exist now.
“So, you remember all of it too Bakanda.” The British man smiled lightly.
“Che. You were too troublesome to forget, idiot.”
“Jerk. I even looked for you in this lifetime. You can at least be a bit kind, Kanda. Or is that out of your capability?”
Frowning, Kanda parked the car effortlessly on the side of the road near the store. He let go of the wheel while glowering at the bean. “I fucking searched for you once, idiot beansprout. And I fucking did it again in this lifetime too.”
Allen then despaired, which looked more amusing than sad. “You’re telling me that we both looked, and it still didn’t work out?”
Kanda, for once, actually made a joke. “Guess we needed that, hopeful as hell, science guy, Johnny.”
Allen laughed. “Yeah, guess so.”
“…”
Once again, the conversation fell, but Allen pulled it back up again. He might as well ask all that he’s been pondering and churning over in his head these past years.
“What will become of us?”
“What do you think stupid beansprout?” Kanda crossed his arms and laid back in his seat. “I sure as hell aren’t leaving you.”
“If you still feel like you owe me Bakanda-,” Allen began, just for the other to intercept.
“I’m not fucking staying to repay anything.” The Japanese man then pulled Allen’s collar to him, and stared into those grey eyes, and said, “Because instead of ‘helping’ you, or being there in the end to kill you, I’m staying because I want to, and the fucking Black Order, or whatever happened in the Second Exorcist’s project, doesn’t have any influence in my decision.”
Allen cracked a grin. “You want to be with me Bakanda?”
“I’m not saying it again.”
“Well it’s a change from wanting to slice me.”
Kanda smirked. “Just because I want to stick with you, beansprout, doesn’t mean I’m going to put up with everything.”
“Same with me, jerk.” Allen then, moving over his seat, Kanda’s hands at his hips, and straddled the Japanese man. Reading over each other’s expressions, everything between them became intensely fragile. Yet, after another moment, Allen leaned downed and roughly ground his lips to the other’s.
It strangely didn’t feel like a first kiss between them, because truly it wasn’t. With a natural ease, Kanda slid his hand under the torn and fake blood matted costume, feeling Allen’s smile against his mouth.
The British man ran light fingertips over the other’s jaw, while Kanda’s hand wandered and trailed over Allen’s torso and back. The skin on skin left hot and burning strokes that lingered and settled familiarly.
Everything came back wholly then. All the inns and all the fervent, rough touches against walls and thin sheets. The way Kanda’s heart always beat steadily, his movements strong and even, as he was pulled against Allen, who continually was racing, walking, running, in body and soul.
In the car, the windows slightly fogged, the two pulled away, panting softly, as they settled in the crook of each other’s neck and shoulders.
“Beansprout?”
“It’s Allen.” Allen sighed. “But what?”
“Why the fuck did you decide to wear a dead butler’s costume?”
Allen steadily sat upright and look down at what he forgot he was wearing in the first place. “Lenalee insisted. Said it suited my gentleman ways.”
“Che, but you’re not even a gentleman. More like an idiot.”
The British man stuck his tongue out. “What? You want me to dress up as a pumpkin or something Bakanda?!”
“Pumpkins aren’t beansprouts.” Kanda stated as if it were the simplest, most obvious answer. Meanwhile Allen just fumed.
“I’m not a beansprout.”
“Well you aren’t a gentleman either.”
“Then what am I, you jerk?!”
Yu Kanda smirked, “You are making me late. We got to get the drink.”
“Well, Happy Early Halloween Bakanda.” Allen Walker stated sarcastically, trying to move off the other’s lap, yet Kanda fiercely brought him against his lips again, just to make sure that the British man was truly there. That the illusions, of past lives, loves and lotuses, were no more.
And when they went out of the car, Allen stealing Kanda’s warm leather jacket, the Japanese man found that Allen Walker was surprisingly one of few constants in his life.
It surprised him more, that the thought sat well with him.