Guns and Cigarettes [Levi/Rivaille x OC]

Chapter 10: Nobody Move, Nobody Gets Hurt

Lungs refusing to adopt air, my breathing hitched. A stone was lodged in my gorge. The drawn curtains surrendered to sunlight, which now became an interrogation lamp, sterilising the little counter with predetermined disapproval.

Inhale. Exhale.

I stared at the egg wedged in my clammy palm. It seemed to beckon to me with its figurative expression of dread, begging me to make it quick, to stop the torture of anticipation. A bead of sweat tracked along my temple.

Finally, judgement day has arrived. Shadows mimicked my course of action as I raised my arm, angling the egg to align with the edge of a cracked bowl. The sun spectated in expectancy.

Hazel's first cracking of an egg. A milestone!

I witnessed a dynamic parkour as the hard-shelled ovum descended fiercely. Its round calcium carbonate belly was exposed, awaiting a merciless finale. The rays of celestial beams refracted off the bowl's edge, illuminating this moment in history in which I was to extract this egg successfully out of its shell.

Crack!

A beaming yolk was drained of all delight, its face now a melted, contorted mess as it smashed against the side of the bowl. The white briefly followed suit, spineless like sheep.

I regarded the bowl with horror, watching the egg drain itself off the side of the dish and proceed across the surface of the pine. It was a scene of murder. I was practically a walking corpse if this was discovered and I was made to clean this up.

My palm itched forward in attempt to sweep the egg under the glazed ceramic saucer before a grave voice bellowed over my shoulder.

"How the hell do you manage to fuck that up?"

His eyes stung me with disapproval as he drifted towards the freshly populated cupboard that I dreaded the most, but also happened to probably be his favourite place in the entire apartment. A cloth was thrown at my way, followed by a mop, then a shelf of cleaning solutions.

Just a little excessive, don't you think?

"Clean that shit up."

I opened my mouth to protest, but catching the narrowing of his eyes hurtled down my words, shutting me up for good. I was reminded that this was no longer my territory, but every speck of dust graced under this roof is Levi's.

Fine.

__________________________

The sun had already retreated and succumbed to the moon's appearance by the time Levi finished his 'brief' clean of his entire apartment. I frowned at the tiptoeing short stack in the main room connected to the front door, who was trying to reach an upper corner. 

I snickered to myself, noting the number of phonebooks needed for him to reach the upper corner. 

Splinters of his raven undercut were exposed on his nape under the pieces of hair that waved dramatically to him dusting. There was no other way of putting this; cleaning is Levi's religion.

I leaned against his stocked pantry, finishing off the last of that fluffy egg omelette he made. Just when I was sneaking over to his fridge to get more food, I found a little cheap printout stuck to the fridge door of a familiar wine-coloured gown and my milky white teeth exposed in a lop-sided smile. My thumb brushed across a blurry photo of a slim figure with familiar hair highlights crucified to the fridge door by an old magnet. If only was I a hopeless romantic would I start swooning to all the attention. 

"Hey, couldn't you find a better-" I began mockingly before a forceful fist rapped against the wood of the front door.

Immediately, the boy froze in his tracks, staring at the source of the racket.