100 Fanfiction Challenge #14 - Smile
Fandom: Pandora Hearts
Ratings/Warnings: G, I suppose.
Summary: There's something funny in everything, really.
I started my life as a rather dire man. Everything was duty, duty, duty. There was no time for lollygagging or frippery, no sense in overindulging or hanging around and being unproductive. But that didn't end up getting me anywhere...and I suppose a part of me has always resented that, regardless of the fact that it got me a fair distance...albeit in a direction that I'd never hoped to go.
It was rather surprising when I was given a second chance. And even odder that it would turn out to be in such a...delicate time. I was given a literal crash course in dealing with things going as wrong as they possibly could, as quickly as they possibly could, but I hadn't expected to ever be a part of this whirlwind of chaos. Or to be laid up in bed as often as I've had reason to be lately.
There was no real merit in becoming a puddle of gloom again, though. A very certain someone who had been spending the last ten years steadily making himself a very vocal part of my life had that little niche quite comfortably cornered. But with my failing sight and worstening infirmity it did take a little more effort than usual to find something worth chuckling over. It required a bit of craftiness...and, more often than not, the cooperation of second parties.
One of which being that selfsame puddle~. The sound of hesitant footsteps and the soft shuffle of thick cloth gave him away as he sidled in through the door, undoubtedly having sent himself my way on some kind of flimsy pretense to check on my wellbeing. I pretended to wake, opening my eye a little and keeping straight faced as best as I could at the little sound of surprise, the slightly quicker footsteps that heralded his approach as I muttered obscurely in feigned delirium.
"B-Break...? A-are you alright...? Did...did you need something?"
It was a little harder to keep from cracking at the nervous stutter in the boy's voice. A little more mumbling and he got even closer, becoming a smudge of black in my peripheral vision.
"...Break?"
"...Please..."
That was what did it. He finally got closer, bending over the bed to better hear me as I apparantly pled for something. The warm, surprisingly comforting aroma of his usual cologne and cigarette smoke filled my nose and the lightest brush of his wild, flyaway hair tickled my cheek, and for a moment I just took the time to enjoy the the calm...
Before shattering it utterly by blowing a quick puff of air into his ear.
The sputtering and flailing that ensued was more than enough to have me laughing, for all that I couldn't see many details. I could just imagine the outraged blush on his face as he shouted at me, but even if I had been able to see, I wouldn't be able to appreciate it, rolling around on the bed as I was in my mirth -- however overdramatically.
The trick to staying sane really was to find a way to enjoy oneself however possible. Though it really did take a little dedication sometimes~.