Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/18537.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Underage
  Category:
      M/M
  Fandom:
      Death_Note
  Relationship:
      Matt/Mello
  Character:
      Matt, Mello, Roger_Ruvie, Near, Halle_Lidner, L
  Additional Tags:
      Wammy's_Era, Romance, Hurt/Comfort, Community:_Sweet_Charity
  Stats:
      Published: 2009-11-21 Completed: 2010-01-14 Chapters: 11/11 Words: 17542
****** And Other Addictions ******
by Jenwryn
Summary
     And maybe Matt was wrong, maybe there is no such thing as can't get
     better.
Notes
     A long, long time ago, Misura won me at Sweet Charity, with the idea
     that I'd be writing her something around 2500 words long (with the
     prompt "death by chocolate"). I took forever to get it finished and,
     somehow, this was the end result. ^^
     Anyways, this hugs close to canon, but only for so long as it suits
     me. It's also nothing more than a blazing dose of fanservice. Really.
     Fanservice is what we do. ;)
***** Prologue/Epilogue *****
I'll be the phonograph that plays your favourite
Albums back as you're lying there drifting off to sleep.
~ The Postal Service, 'Brand New Colony'.
►
11:23 PM and the rain sets in, clattering on the shutters and bang-rattling
against the front door. Matt pulls his sleeves further down his wrists, his
collar higher up around his neck, and presses his back in closer to the muddle
of scruffy blankets, and clean laundry, which one of them must have tossed
across the sofa at some point. It's supposed to be spring soon, but you
wouldn't know it, not when the weather is curling in, cooler and harder,
against the flimsy walls of their cheap apartment. Santa Rosa, the girl at the
supermarket had named the storm, when Matt had made his way down there earlier
in the evening, his hands clothed in gloves and buried deep in his pockets. Now
he wonders whether the front door will actually survive it, as the storm beats
rougher.
11:42 PM and Mello steps through that same doorway, the wind tearing it from
his grasp and making him wrangle with the handle, cussing like a dockworker.
Matt doesn't even look up, simply starts shutting down the programme he's been
working on for the last few hours. Shopping bags slump onto the floor behind
him. He can hear Mello's jacket shedding water, drip-drip-splatch, onto the
scuffed linoleum. No doubt it's running down the hairline cracks that lace the
floor, and probably pooling against Matt's Italian racing boots, just because
that's how the world tends to work. There's a familiar grunting noise, as Mello
unlaces his own boots and shimmies free of them, then another soft cuss, and
the rattle of his heavy leather coat being flung over the weak-willed umbrella
stand, left behind by the previous tenant. The whole process is nothing more
than an interlude, though, and then Mello is hanging over Matt's shoulder, his
skin warm and his hair cold, dripping rainwater onto Matt's neck. The water
slides down beneath Matt's collar and onto his chest.
"Oi," says Matt protestingly. "That's friggin' cold, Mels."
"Funny, I think I already knew that," Mello purrs against Matt's earlobe and,
if the water hadn't already had Matt shivering, then the vibrations of Mello's
storm-chilled voice would have done the trick quite nicely. The blond nips at
Matt's ear, just enough pressure to make Matt squirm, but not enough to
actually hurt. He adds, "You know, somebody refused to go out on a chocolate
run, despite me having asked nicely. I had to take a detour in this cat-piss
weather, because of that."
Matt leans his head backwards, rolling his eyes in the general direction of his
best friend's God. "There's something a little bit wrong with your definition
of asking nicely, Mello," he says. "I really don't think that ringing me up in
the middle of me trying to get a shitload of complicated work done –
complicated work done for you, I might add – and whinging like a naggy old
woman actually constitutes as nicely."
The word work temporarily distracts the blond and he leans over a little
further, to better study the screen of Matt's laptop. Matt also casts his own
gaze in that direction, but only to check that the programme has completely
shut itself down safely. It has, so he closes the laptop with a decisive click
of the cover locking into place, and puts it securely, out of the way of Mello
and his compulsive need to touch things, onto the cluttered coffee table.
"I was looking at that," Mello complains.
Matt latches onto a fistful of the blond's dripping hair and says smoothly,
"Sure you were, but you and I both know that you reading most of my work is
akin to me reading your Latin Bible, man – pretty much pointless. Now, do you
want to get your pretty little arse around here and have me dry you off, or
would you rather stand there bellyaching about my alleged lack of niceness?"
For a second Mello actually hesitates, to Matt's great amusement. After a red
blink or two of the clock on the microwave, though, the blond grins slowly and
disentangles his hair from Matt's grasp. He makes his way around the sofa like
that, then, all rain-heavy black jeans and drenched hair, his hips doing that
thing that they do when Mello is in a particularly predatory mood, and moves to
sit himself down on Matt's lap.
Matt, who's been letting his eyes wander appreciatively, bursts out laughing.
"Whoa there, not soaked through you don't." He pushes Mello back a little way
and then, before the blond can start his drama, tosses him a towel pulled from
amongst the tumbled stack of laundry. Mello catches it easily, though his eyes
are warning lights. Matt pulls another towel free and holds it up with one hand
and a meaningful expression. He reels the blond back in towards him with a
thumb hooked at a silver belt buckle.
A cranky pout turns into an expectant smirk, as Mello begins to dry his hair,
and Matt begins to unloop the belt free from Mello's jeans.
***** Chapter 2 *****
It's Matt, who begins it all. Not on purpose, either. It's just... well, it's
just been a long week, pop quizzes to answer and essays to write, and the
weather outside is still miserable, not that Matt cares about that exactly,
except that the greyness seems to creep inside too, somehow, as though the very
walls at Wammy's can soak up the cold and spit it out into the bedroom that the
two of them share. Yes, it's been a long week, and Mello, who is loud-mouthed
and whiny, is refusing to shut up about Lent and the doom that is him having
already been so long without chocolate. Matt is used to Mello's moods but,
really, there's a limit to everything. And so Matt is simply cranky, when he
pulls the block of Lindt from amongst the electrical wires, dead batteries and
old socks in the top drawer of his desk – a very small block of chocolate, for
the record, which he had nicked from Mello the last time the blond pissed had
Matt off beyond his breaking point.
If Matt could somehow glance into the future and see where it would lead, well,
maybe he wouldn't do it; maybe he would put the chocolate back, or throw it at
Mello's head, or storm out of the room and give it to the first person he comes
across, out of spite. Matt can't see into the future, though, and so he doesn't
do any of those things at all. Instead, he pulls delicately, tauntingly, at the
wrapper; breaks a corner of chocolate off with his front teeth, and slides it
onto his tongue, to let it melt there. Matt doesn't even really like chocolate,
at least not to obsessive levels – he'd rather chips and gravy, thanks – but
the expression on Mello's face is worth the effort.
The blond bunches his fists at his sides and looks ready to pounce. He goes a
funny shade, when Matt curls his tongue to break more of the fine, thin
chocolate free from the bar, and swirls it behind his teeth.
"Mmm," says Matt with deliberate exaggeration, just because he can; just
because he knows it will drive Mello up the wall to think that someone else is
enjoying that which he, himself, cannot have. Matt's trying hard not to laugh
his arse off (death by chocolate is not up there on his lists of Preferred Ways
To Go), and maybe that's his downfall, actually, because he's no longer paying
full attention to Mello, and that is always an extremely unwise move when in
the midst of pushing Mello's buttons.
"I can't eat it," says Mello in a growly, pissed off voice. Matt's about to
shoot back something smart-arse, when the boy adds, "but there's no rule says I
can't kiss it."
Matt's eyes have barely had time to widen, and he's choking on the chocolate in
his need to work out whether Mello is joking – Mello had better be bloody
joking – when the blond is right there, way too close for comfort. Mello's eyes
are bright and blue and, yeah, definitely more than a little bit furious, and
then Mello is kissing him. It's crooked and it's clumsy, and Mello pushes his
tongue between Matt's dumbfounded lips and licks at Matt's mouth. Matt powers
backwards, with a scrabbling jerk of stripy-socked feet against the debris of
books and disembowelled gadgets that litter the carpet of his side of the room,
and finds his lower back trapped against the desk. Mello just takes Matt's
retreat as an invitation to shove him harder against the furniture. The desk
rattles against the wall. Mello has his mouth on Matt's again, and he does
something with his tongue that ought to feel really gross but somehow doesn't;
Matt really hopes he didn't actually make the embarrassing noise that he thinks
he just made. He can feel his knees giving out as Mello's hair brushes against
his face. And Mello simply pushes closer, as though he knows Matt kind of wants
to slide to the floor in a messy heap, but doesn't want to let him.
Matt's body is doing things it shouldn't, and it's hard to think through the
panic. He finally remembers that he has hands of his own, and puts them on
Mello's shoulders to shove him the hell away – but it's too late, oh man, it's
too late, too bloody late, and he can tell from the way Mello gasps into his
mouth, all warm breath and chocolate, that Mello knows. That Mello has felt it.
That Mello has felt it, through the material of both of their trousers. Matt's
face goes as red as a postbox, the problem wilting away from the sheer horror
of it having been detected. Mello lurches backwards, wide-eyed and startled, a
rare expression on his face professing genuine shock at something happening
that he hadn't expected; something that he hadn't calculated into the on-the-
spot contingency plans that follow him around like his own shadow.
Matt wraps an arm around himself and hugs tightly, his other hand holding onto
the desk because his legs are still shaky. Every square inch of his not-
inconsiderable brain is rushing to try and find some way to explain it all
away, some way to prove that he's not queer or whatever – some way to make
Mello not hate him now.
Matt hasn't even worked out how to make his jaw function, though, when Mello's
expression changes. The blond's mouth forms a small oh and then he lurches
forwards again, maybe even faster than he had moved away, his teeth clicking
against Matt's teeth and his tongue back in Matt's mouth, as if there were
still chocolate to taste, except that Matt knows there isn't. Matt clutches
helplessly at the desk, but his lips are moving against Mello's, as if Matt
weren't telling them not to, and Mello has both of his hands scrunched up
against the front of Matt's shirt, and it's nice, it's... it's really damn
nice, so long as Matt doesn't think, and thinking isn't exactly working very
well at the moment anyway, and maybe Matt's hands are even moving to take hold
of Mello's waist and pull him closer. But then Mello makes this kind of hushed
moaning noise, a noise that shoots like lightning down Matt's body, and
suddenly it is there between them again. Matt kind of wants to hide from
embarrassment, and maybe Mello can simply ignore it, except that Mello never
ignores anything, and he gasps into Matt's mouth again, and one of his hands
streaks down the front of Matt's body, as though he's going to—
Matt yelps and struggles free, sheer panic lending him the strength to send
Mello tumbling onto his arse on the floor, and he's out of the door and half
way down the hall before he can even begin to process the sheer mortification
of what just happened.
***** Chapter 3 *****
Matt doesn't meet Mello's eyes for almost a week.
On the thirty-first of March, Lent ends, and Mello swaggers into their room
holding a block of Cadbury's high and triumphant. He waves the purple-wrapped
prize under Matt's nose as he swans past, then settles himself down at the desk
on his side of the room. He unwraps the block on the top of his chemistry
textbook, licking at his thumb and dabbing up the chocolatey shards that fall
onto the crisp pages.
Matt tries not to watch him, but it's a pretty futile goal. He has actually
realized, this past week, in the course of attempting to not think about Mello,
just how much time he generally does spend with his mind or his eyes fixed upon
the blond. And not... not always in a best friend kind of way, either. Matt is
aware of that now, and it's kind of weird, and it's kind of obvious, and he
doesn't know what he's supposed to do with the knowledge since he's obtained
it. Apart from lock it away in some distant part of his brain, of course, and
just hope that it sort of... dies off.
The small fact that Mello clearly loves it, when Matt is playing the part of
his willing and attentive audience, doesn't exactly help matters, either.
"You can have some, you know, if you want," Mello says casually now, holding
out a square of chocolate between his thumb and his index finger, as though it
were perfectly normal for him to be giving his chocolate away.
Matt stares, and asks if he's running a fever. Which may not have been the best
response, really, because, the next thing he knows, Mello is looking pissed off
again and is throwing scrunched up Russian notes at Matt's head. Matt laughs
and dodges, holding his pillow like a shield and reaching for the nearest
throwable item to pelt back in return.
...on second thoughts, it had been the perfect response.
Still. Matt has to be cautious now, and he knows it. He can't risk being
cornered, not now he knows that the wrong kind of glance is going to make him
blush like a dumb girl or, worse, spring a boner against Mello's body. In fact,
he's pretty sure he can't so much as think the words 'boner' and 'Mello' in the
same sentence ever again.
At least, not until the lights have gone out and, after a while, Mello's bed
begins to rustle and squeak. Matt knows his friend gave that up over Lent too,
not that Mello told him, exactly; they do share a room, after all. Somehow it
affects Matt more than it used to, though, and somehow he doesn't seem able to
tune out or fall asleep, and somehow he doesn't seem capable of denying that it
makes his insides heat up and bubble.
And if Matt waits until Mello's breathing has smoothed into sleep, and then
turns his face to the wall and slides his hand into his own pyjamas, well, Matt
doesn't want to discuss it. Not even with himself.
►
On the ninth of April, Matt lets Mello lean against him when they're sitting on
the floor, working on a combined project for the geography class they share.
Matt pretends not to notice when Mello's fingers stray off-course, from the
pages they're supposed to be turning, and draw invisible continents against
Matt's jeans-covered knee instead.
On the fourteenth, Matt leans over Mello's desk to reach for some papers, and
finds himself standing there like an imbecile, sniffing curiously at the scent
of Mello's hair. He darts back as if he's been burnt, the second he realizes
what he's doing; even as he's pulling back, though, he sees the way that Mello
shivers to himself, as if he knows exactly what Matt had been doing. As if he
doesn't find it weird.
On the nineteenth, Mello slinks up behind Matt, stands there for a good long
moment, then puts his arms around Matt's waist and his face against Matt's
back. Matt can hear Mello breathe, can feel the light press of Mello's chin.
Matt counts to ten before he wriggles free.
Two hours, seven minutes, and a handful of seconds later, he turns over on his
bed and demands, "Doesn't it even bother you?"
Mello puts down Faust, and plays dumb.
Matt glares. "Me. Being a guy. Like this."
Mello scrunches up his eyebrows and heaves a dramatic belly-sigh. "Oh,
obviously I think it's terrible."
Matt rolls his eyes, then covers them with his goggles.
Mello makes as if he's going to sit up, and Matt can't help but twitch. Maybe
the blond notices, because he sighs again, a little less drama-queen and a
little more genuinely this time, and decides against moving. "I don't see that
it really matters either way," he mutters.
Matt pushes his face against his pillow, so that his goggles almost hurt around
his eyes. Then he lifts his head, just high enough to see Mello, and asks,
against his better judgement, "You... don't?"
Mello is looking distinctly peeved. "Do we really have to talk about it?" he
snaps, suddenly sitting up after all, swinging his legs from his bed, and
stalking over to Matt's side of the room. Matt sits up in a hurry too, and
watches Mello warily from behind his goggles' lenses. Matt doesn't say
anything, though, when Mello sits down beside him. Mello's slender weight makes
the mattress shift slightly, and tilts their shoulders close together.
"What about... him?" Matt asks, gesturing vaguely upwards.
Mello puffs out a breath of air. "You're Matt."
As if that were in any shape or form an actual answer.
Maybe Mello senses Matt's doubt, because he looks away and rubs at his face.
It's silent and it's awkward, and Matt kind of wishes he could make sense of it
but apparently this – whatever this is – doesn't come equipt with diagrams or a
user's manual. He hadn't even seen it coming. It simply... is. And that's why
he gives in, in the end, flopping backwards across his bed and putting one of
his hands over his eyes. Mello is worryingly still. Matt can practically hear
the cogs whirring in his friend's head. Then Mello wriggles around a little,
and Matt can feel the pressure against the bed, when the blond pushes one of
his palms down near Matt's shoulder. Matt can feel it, too, when Mello leans
in.
Mello's hair brushes against Matt's face and kind of makes him want to sneeze.
Matt says, embarrassed by the waver in his voice, "We'll still be best
friends?"
He shifts his hand away from his goggles, to better study Mello's continued
silence.
Mello is giving him his best are you stupid? look. "Of course. I like you,
don't I?" he mutters, as though that's supposed to explain everything, and
perhaps it does, on some level. Mello's cheeks are going a little bit pink.
"I've always liked you," he adds.
Matt frowns. Matt smiles. Matt wrinkles up his nose, as Mello's hair brushes
against it again, like a blond curtain dusting at Matt's freckles; he suspects
he really would sneeze, except that his entire body is frozen in anticipation
of whatever it is that Mello's about to do.
"Hey," the blond says softly, then leans in so close that Matt gives up trying
to focus. And Mello's lips are warm, and Mello has both his hands somewhere
around Matt's shoulders, and Matt... Matt is kissing him back. In a weird way
it's actually more awkward than it was the first time, perhaps because they're
both fully aware of what they're doing; perhaps because they've chosen it
consciously. After a moment, Matt lets his hands move, ever so tentatively, and
takes hold of Mello's waist. His touch is only feather-light, but Mello moves
into it instantly, as if he can't help but gravitate towards Matt's grasp. Matt
is so surprised that he sucks on Mello's lip by mistake; Mello lets out a funny
little moaning gasp, and so Matt does it again, on purpose now. He's a bit
worried that Mello will find it lame if he does stuff twice over like that, but
Mello doesn't seem to mind in the least.
Mello's cheeks are undeniably pink, and his eyes are wide and bright, when he
pulls back to breathe.
Matt makes a vague wanting motion with one of his fingers, and Mello leans back
in for another kiss.
When Matt's lips starts to relax to what they're doing, and Matt's hands shift
a little more firmly against Mello's waist, Mello rocks in against him and
makes Matt exhale in surprise. When Mello moves even closer, sliding one of his
legs over Matt, so that he's practically sitting on top of the redhead, Matt
grasps even tighter, grins, and shrugs them both sideways until he's the one
lying half on top of the blond. Mello's hair is flung across the bed-cover like
a crooked halo, and Matt can hardly breathe, because he can actually feel
Mello's dick against him. Matt's eyes grow almost painfully wide as he
processes that realization. It's difficult to keep his thoughts straight –
except that straight is apparently right off the menu now – and he steadies
himself by reaching out and brushing the boy's hair slowly away from his face.
Mello closes his eyes beneath Matt's touch, and that makes Matt bolder; he runs
his thumb along one of Mello's eyebrows, then leans in jerkily, embarrassed to
be doing it, and places butterfly kisses against each of Mello's eyelids, first
the one, then the other. Unsure as to whether it will get him kicked onto the
floor, but somehow incapable of stopping himself regardless, he whispers,
haltingly, "You're really kinda pretty, Mels."
Mello growls lowly, as if he's cranky, but his eyes are bright when he opens
them again. Either way, Matt thinks the blond is kinda pretty when he pouts,
too, and he's rather getting the hang of this whole thing, so he simply kisses
Mello again, to shut him up. Matt likes this new angle better. He likes the way
that Mello's hands are trying to pull him down closer, and the way that Mello's
hips are trying to push up against his own, too. It's a little bit
overwhelming, though, when Mello slides his hands beneath the back of Matt's
shirt, because those are Mello's fingers touching his bare skin, and it's not
like ever before, oh God. Matt can't – it's hard to think – too much texture
and sound and feeling and the beat of blood and he doesn't—
"I don't know, don't know what to do," Matt confesses, an awkward rush of
tumbling words.
Mello blushes, rolls his eyes to pretend otherwise, and snap-mumbles something
about Matt being a genius and surely you're clever enough to work it out. For
half a second Matt is rather of the opinion that, well, if Mello's going to
take that bitchy tone, then he can go and wank in the bathroom all on his own
perfectly well, thank you very much. Except that then Mello gives him this
unexpected smile and wriggles beneath him, angling his hips so that his rubs
against Matt just like that, and suddenly the bathroom is much, much too far
away. Matt scrunches his hands into the bed-cover, and somehow the two of them
are pressed together, and Mello is gripping at Matt's back and mouthing at
Matt's neck, and Matt has his hands on Mello's face, his hands on Mello's
belly, his hands down the back of Mello's jeans, Mello's arse soft against his
fingers. And then Mello makes this keening noise in the depths of his throat,
rougher and deeper than Matt's ever heard it on the nights, when Mello thinks
Matt is asleep and jerks off; Mello's whole body trembles in Matt's embrace as
the sound bursts from between his lips, and his fingers clutch at Matt,
bruising, needing.
Matt groans, and comes in his pants.
***** Chapter 4 *****
Perhaps the most startling thing is that nothing changes. Not... not in any
tangible way, anyway. Mello still gets cranky and acts like a bitch, and Mello
still laughs and blows bubbles in his chocolate milk at breakfast, and Mello
still spends a gazillion or so hours with his back bent over his textbooks.
They still sit next to each other, too, in the classes they happen to share,
just like they've always done, and Mello still grumbles when Matt happens to
gets an answer right before he does.
And yet, it's completely different.
When Mello's hand brushes against Matt's, it feels deliberate. When Mello
smirks and teases him about dumb shit, it feels like the words have bewildered
themselves in Matt's brain, so that even negatives are somehow a positive
thing. When Mello flops all over Matt in the free-reading corner of the
library, his feet up on a beanbag and his head in Matt's lap, it feels as
though everyone ought to be watching them. And, when they leave their bedroom
in the mornings, it feels as though everyone ought to be able to tell, with the
ease of a single glance, that the reason why Matt's hair is even messier than
usual is because Mello has had his hands tangled up amongst it, and the reason
why Mello's lips are pink is because Matt has been kissing them.
It takes Matt what half an eternity to work out that nobody actually can tell.
Well.
Near can tell, Matt theorizes, but that's to be expected. Near has always
watched the pair of them, from behind his block-towers, from within the
security of his train-track circles. Near's grey eyes follow them into corners
and down long hallways. Hell, Near has probably been watching Mello since
forever; he's certainly watched Matt since the day Matt first arrived. Matt
remembers how it was, small and rugged up in a coat that wasn't his, his too-
cold hand safe in Mr. Wammy's, and dried tear-smudges still on his cheeks as
they stood there, on the gravel drive, giving Matt breathing space and a chance
to crane his neck and stare up at the huge house that was going to grow into
being his home. Near had been watching him out of a window even then, so tiny
that nothing but his eyes and fingertips, and a shock of white hair, had been
visible. Still. Near might have been watching him, but it was Mello who'd
powered down the stairs like a bright-eyed rocket, pausing only a second, to
obtain Mr. Wammy's good-natured permission, before peering beneath Matt's
beanie, tugging at Matt's scarf, commenting on Matt's girly eyelashes, and
generally claiming Matt, within the space of ten minutes, as his New Own
Friend.
All of which is besides the point, the point being -- if anyone knows, then
it's Near.
Near, and maybe Roger. Roger stands in doorways, sometimes, pausing mid-walk
with his eyebrows disapproving and his lips pursed, as though he really wants
to say something but doesn't quite know how. He never actually does say
anything, but Matt's ears heat up whenever he sees him. Roger is the only one,
so far as Matt knows, who's ever come close to actually catching them together
– early May, and they'd somehow ended up in the shrubbery near Roger's office.
In the shrubbery, and Mello had been toying with Matt's hair, their faces so
close, and Roger had leant out of his window and demanded to know what on earth
do you boys think you're doing? Mello had beamed up at him angelically and
claimed to be counting Matt's freckles for a probability study. Roger had done
nothing but stare down at them for a very, very long moment, before nodding
curtly, as though he'd actually accepted that, then had snapped at them to get
out of the garden either way.
But nobody really knows. Not in a truly-knowing kind of way. Not in the kind of
way where they could say anything directly.
Still, Matt knows. Matt knows, and it's like a pool of warmth at the back of
his stomach, at the base of his spine. Whenever Mello puts his hand up in
class, to answer some complicated question with the ease of one plus one, and
the other kids look at him with that disgruntled appreciation that they always
employ, somehow that's reflected onto Matt too, now. Matt's always been super
proud of Mello but now, now Mello is kind of like his. So it's Matt's pride
too. Even if only he knows it.
Perhaps because only he knows it.
To be honest, Matt isn't sure that he really wants anyone else to know. They
might try and take it away from him, might put them in different classes, would
definitely put them in different bedrooms. Which is why Matt puts his foot down
and refuses to let Mello actually snog him in public.
As much as he would sometimes like to.
►
There are weeks of kissing, mussed up amongst dog-eared books and Mello's
pillows. Matt learns how to make Mello mewl against his mouth, and how to make
Mello come so hard that his hands leave purple shadows on Matt's arms.
Sometimes they rock against each other, frantic or slow. Sometimes Matt has to
escape to the bathroom on his own, because someone has knocked on the door and
asked for permission to come in and yammer on about something. Sometimes it's
late at night, and the room is dark, and then they touch themselves on Matt's
bed, their knees pressed together, their eyes watching each other in the
absence of light, and when Matt's hand is jerking against his dick he imagines
that it's Mello's hand, and he hears nothing but Mello's breath changing speed
next to him, and he likes to come when Mello does, so he can pretend that he
directly caused that hacking little gasp of flurried completion. It's quiet,
and it makes Matt blush, and it makes Matt want more, and he can't understand
why Mello doesn't just ask, except maybe Mello doesn't want what Matt wants.
Because there's no way that Mello could be nervous of... anything. Because he's
Mello. Mello doesn't get nervous.
Matt gets so nervous that his tongue sticks to the top of his mouth, but it
doesn't stop him thinking about it.
The sun is tilting in low through the curtains on a Saturday afternoon when
Matt rolls over on the bed, shuts off his Game Boy, takes Mello's book away
from him, brushes his hair out of his eyes, and begins to kiss him. Mello
studies him curiously for a second, and Matt can feel the unasked question in
the way that Mello is holding himself, but then the blond just leans up a
little, so as to better answer the kiss. Matt waits until Mello's cheeks have
gotten a little flushed, until Mello's hands are smoothing up and down Matt's
back that way they do, until Mello's hips are moving slightly. Then Matt
strokes his hand down Mello's belly, slowly, slowly, as if the very universe
hangs on the angle of its journey. He puts his index finger on the button of
Mello's jeans and asks, "M-may I?"
Mello falls uncharacteristically still.
Mello bites at his lip, soft skin tugged by quiet teeth.
Then Mello nods, and tilts himself a little way up, snug against Matt's hand.
It... it's not as though Matt hasn't had plenty of experience with his own
anatomy. It's not as though he hasn't seen Mello's naked dick before, either.
After all, they share a bedroom, they both use the boys' lav, and they both
piss standing up. But this is different. Seeing Mello slip on a pair of
pyjamas, or lose hold of one corner of his towel, is nothing at all like seeing
Mello spread beneath him, Mello's breath hot and his blue eyes wide, Mello's
face flushed and heated all at once, as he stares up at Matt in a fixed sort of
way way, and Mello's dick, Mello's dick standing increasingly to attention, as
Matt finishes pulling Mello's jeans and boxers all the way off. Mello's feet
push at his jeans to help, bare toes catching at Matt's wrists. Matt just
gazes, and blushes, and breathes, and tries to count to ten. When he reaches
seven and a half he reaches his right hand out, ever so tentatively, and Mello
lets loose a growl, very low and caught up in itself, as Matt brushes the back
of his hand along the length of Mello's dick. Matt turns his hand and presses
his fingers a little closer, feather light still, feeling the soft skin growing
ever smoother; he circles his thumb around the head. Some part of his brain
shivers in surprise, as he finds himself wondering what it would taste like,
but Mello interrupts Matt's thoughts with another growl, and Matt's thumb
presses a little firmer in automatic response. Mello's own hand shoots down,
then, with a kind of begging impatience, grabbing hold, entrapping Matt's hand
against him. Matt gasps jaggedly at the sensation of Mello's skin pressing
tight on both sides of his hand; different, demanding.
"Please," says Mello.
Matt's world goes up in smoke, in a better way than he could have ever have
imagined, when Mello lets go again, and it's Matt's own hand, Matt's own hand
that strokes and jerks at Mello until the blond is gasping and moaning beneath
him, and it's Matt's own name on Mello's lips when the boy comes, stuttered out
like a prophecy or a promise.
When Matt wipes his hand clean and wriggles his jeans downwards to finish
himself off – he frigging aches from not having come in his pants at the sight
of Mello's hips bucking against his wrist, of Mello's dick pulsing within his
grasp – he doesn't expect Mello to move. He certainly doesn't expect Mello to
wriggle around on the bed, push Matt's hands away and glare up at him, as if
Matt were about to do something entirely unfair and completely unreasonable. He
doesn't expect Mello to wrap those pale, slender fingers around his dick,
either, but that's exactly what Mello does. Mello is gazing up at Matt
intently, the tip of his tongue peeking out the corner of his mouth, the
motions of his hand slow and concentrated. Matt bites his lip hard and decides
that nothing could be better than this, nothing, nothing, god, the feel of
Mello touching him, oh, and then Mello shimmies a little closer, gets a little
rougher and whispers, "Come for me, Matt."
Matt doesn't need to be asked twice.
Mello crows with victorious delight, flops back against the bed, and grins like
a lunatic. Matt wriggles around and flops down beside him, not caring for the
moment that it's a tiny bit gross and that maybe they should do something about
that; he just grins like a fool when Mello shifts a second time, and puts his
face against Matt's shirt sleeve. Then there's nothing but the sound of Matt's
pulse behind his ears, and the shape Mello's mouth against Matt's shirt, until
Mello observes, a little breathlessly, "We need to do that more often."
Matt can't even answer, just grins an impossible bit more, puts his arm around
Mello's side, and pulls the half-naked boy a fraction closer. He can feel two
points of Mello's crucifix sharp against him. The fine, invisible fuzz-hair on
Mello's hip is soft beneath Matt's fingers. Mello bites at the cloth of Matt's
shirt, but shifts in against him obligingly regardless.
And maybe Matt was wrong, maybe there is no such thing as can't get better.
***** Chapter 5 *****
Time moves on, in its usual winsome way, and L arrives home from a case in
Bangladesh. Matt and Mello and Near gravitate together in the eastern wing,
gathered in one of the hallways that the other students rarely use. Portraits
of stern-expressioned old ladies look down at them from sweetly-gilded frames
along the wall. Mello is sucking on chocolate eclairs with faux bravado, and
Near is staring at Matt from over the top of Optimus Prime's blue plastic head.
There's the usual hush-hush fussing from Roger, as though the three of them
aren't clever enough to know full well that their privileged position brings
certain expectations in its wake. Mello makes a snide remark, and Roger's
eyebrows bristle. Matt aims a kick at his best friend's ankle because,
seriously, Roger's eyebrows are correct about one thing, and that's that the
right to visit L isn't a business to be messed with. Of course, Mello knows
that, perhaps more so than the rest of them even, and Matt is also fully aware
that the blond never actually pushes the boundaries an iota more than he get
away with, but... sometimes even Matt gets twitchy. And Near standing there, in
that way that he has, with his head tilted against the wallpaper and his eyes
on Matt, doesn't exactly help things. Not that Matt cares if Near watches them.
It's just a little creepy, that's all. Really.
The grandfather clock in the conservatory strikes six, and the steady fall of
footsteps emerges beneath the final chime. Mr. Wammy is carrying a black
umbrella beneath one arm and there are splotched raindrops darkening his
jacket; he's not been home for long. He and Roger share a comprehending smile
above the boys' heads, and Roger shrugs his shoulders slightly, as he passes
the three of them into the older gentleman's care. A certain quiet, the variety
of which Roger would have loved a moment earlier, descends over Matt, Mello and
Near as they follow their protector down the portrait-adorned hall, then into
another, slightly darker and slightly older, lined with oak panels and the
scent of old books and damp kindling. Shush, shush, and the sound of feet
moving. Not even Mello would dream of messing with Mr. Wammy. They know even
less about him than they know about L, but it doesn't matter. Wammy's children
are accustomed to obfuscated personal histories. Besides, Mr. Wammy is the
reason they're here, after all; here, and not in the places that lurk at the
corners of their memories like malingering bruises (it's scents, for Matt, more
than images; dry dust, and rain on the salt plains). Mr. Wammy is like Father
Christmas, too, except that he only visits irregularly and can always be
trusted to bring with him the one thing they want more than all else: L.
Sure, there are other presents, too. There's always something for each of them,
carefully placed on the mahogany table in L's study – gifts socializing with a
generous plate of cake, and a cheery row of teacups. It's a blueberry tart, the
evening after the Bangladesh case, and a plate laden with iced vanilla
cupcakes. Matt makes note of them in a trained-to-observe kind of way but,
truth be told, he's significantly more interested in the game console that's
sitting proudly between a stout hard-cover, all about international military
codes, and a net bag holding a muddle of polished wooden blocks. The blocks are
presumably some kind of mind-teaser for Near; after all, the book is obviously
intended for Mello. It's proof of how well L knows them, actually. Anyone else,
Matt rather thinks, would be inclined to bring Mello expensive chocolate, and
would miss out on the glow that the book conjures up. Matt doesn't always get
games, either, and, even when he does, they tend to require some kind of
construction or mastering – even this console is a prototype, he can tell with
a glance, and his fingers twitch at the prospect of coaxing it into proper
working order.
It goes without saying that all of their games are lesson, and all of their
lessons are rewards.
They know a little bit more about L than they know about Mr. Wammy. After all,
L was one of them once. Matt remembers, back when he was small enough to still
speak with the broad vowels of his original English, long winter evenings spent
sitting on cushions in the library whilst L read to them. Sometimes L picked
the books, and sometimes he would delegate the choice, but no two evenings
would see the same text, nor even the same genre. One night they might hear
from On the Origin of Species, the next, Fingerprint Mechanics, the night after
that Through The Looking Glass. Even back then, L was special, and only six of
them would be there with him – Near, impossibly tiny, curled up on the lap of
the black-haired boy with the strange eyes, who nowadays is only mentioned in
cautioning undertones; Linda, with her expression dreamy and her eyes lighting
up when fiction was chosen; Mello, leaning between Matt and the brown-haired
girl, A, that nobody speaks of at all, not undertones nor otherwise, as though
they've all forgotten her. Matt remembers her, because it was A who taught him
how to pull a radio apart and put it back together again, and because it was A
used to play with Mello's hair, when they listened to L read, as though the
paleness of it against her soft fingers was calming in a way that even L's
presence was not. Matt remembers her, because she let Matt put his ear against
her bare belly, even though she was both a girl and practically an adult, to
hear a second heartbeat snuggled in her stomach. One morning Roger told them
that A had died, and Beyond scowled into his porridge, and the whispers said
she'd hung herself, but Matt knew better, because she'd shown him her suitcase
the night before and had hugged him till she cried.
It's funny, the way that seeing L always makes Matt wonder whether she really
did leave, but he's never been brave enough to ask, just in case Roger had
actually been telling the truth.
Anyway. L doesn't stop being a mystery, just because he was originally part of
their childhood. Sometimes they see him individually, and he speaks about
reports and classwork, but the detective's heart is never really in it.
Sometimes, he sees them together, and offers them cake, only to steal back the
trimmings for himself. Always, he tells stories about cases he's concluded. He
picks their brains as he talks, courting them into finding a solution before he
can present it to them, as if they were living in a crime show on the BBC,
except that L's cases make those ones look simplistic. Whenever L is in the
room, with his jeans rolled up, and his hair falling into his eyes above his
teacup, Mello and Near are blind to everything else. Matt knows, because he
spends most of his time in the same condition, and the left-over percentage
gazing at them. When they were younger, even a year ago, L would grin at Matt
around a bite of cake, as though he knew, and Matt would feel his face go hot.
After the Bangladesh case, Matt finds himself simply grinning back.
L tip-taps the end of his teaspoon against the desk and looks more knowing than
ever.
After the Bangladesh case, though, L doesn't tell them a story. Instead, he
eats his blueberry tart and brings them up to date with a certain Japanese case
that has been creeping onto the news even in Winchester. When he's licking his
fingers he breaks off abruptly, meets Matt's gaze directly, and declares, "It's
good."
Matt can't help but believe that his idol isn't actually talking about the
food, but there's no way to ever prove it.
►
Mello can never sleep after L's visits. He lays awake, staring at the ceiling.
Sometimes he gets up and wanders around the room restlessly, peering through
the curtains, stacking and un-stacking his textbooks, mumbling, muttering,
driving Matt absolutely crazy.
"I want to be like him," Mello hums tonight, his eyes bright in the light,
which is gleaming from one of the ornate lamps in the gardens outside.
The first time Matt had seen the garden, he'd stared wide-eyed and had
concluded, in the privacy of his own mind, that Wammy's belonged to Narnia, at
night-time. Now he's used to the old iron lamp-posts and just wishes that Mello
would shut the bloody curtains. "I know," he grumbles. "You can, you will, but
could you please sleep now?"
In the past Mello might have sulked, or stalked some more, or crawled back into
bed. The night after the visit from Bangladesh, he clambers into Matt's bed
instead.
"I want to write down all the things he's ever told us," he confides. His
breath is hot in Matt's ear and it might have been a turn-on, if Matt weren't
so freaking tired from the emotional stress that L's visits always cause. Mello
hasn't closed the curtains properly, either, they're caught on a pile of books,
and there's still too much light in the room.
Matt rolls over, and stares at his friend. "What, you want to write L's
biography?"
"Sure, why not? He's just... I mean, don't you ever think about it? After all
the things you've heard?"
Matt isn't entirely sure. He isn't entirely sure that the big wide world,
beyond the stone walls of Wammy's House, would see L as the shining knight that
Mello – and, okay, Matt himself – perceives him to be. He isn't entirely sure
that L would even appreciate the gesture. Besides. Well. The honest truth is
that, most of the time, Matt really does want Mello to reach the top, to be the
next L, to be amazing... but there are also moments, like right now, when
Matt's tired, and his emotions ache, and he just wants to sleep, when he would
really prefer it if there were no L at all, and Mello were simply Mello.
Which is quite amazing enough, anyway, so far as Matt is concerned.
Mello prods him in the arm. "You still awake?"
Matt sighs, decides that offence is the best defence, and curls up against
Mello. The boy's taking up most of Matt's bed as it is, anyway. Matt likes the
feel of Mello's legs near his, and he strokes vague at Mello's cloth-covered
stomach for a second or two, then closes his eyes and stumbles out, "'m asleep.
You too."
He's pretty sure he can actually hear Mello pout, but the blond lets it be, and
doesn't speak any more.
Matt thinks it was worth it, the next morning, when he wakes up with Mello's
hair all tangled in his face and making his nose itch. True, he's also pretty
sure that it's the final proof that he's really, really, incurably weird. But
he's also beginning to realize that too much time has passed, too much time
since the moment when he could have said no to these feelings lurching and
spinning inside of his ribs.
Mello grumbles, when Matt shifts closer against him, but he doesn't pull away,
just moves his whole body upwards, to use Matt's arm as a pillow, and falls
promptly back asleep. Matt plays with Mello's crucifix, counts Mello's
breathing, and waits for the alarm clock to go off.
He's starting to suspect that he doesn't actually care about anything any more,
so long as Mello feels the same way.
►
And then L dies in a distant country.
And then Matt makes a promise, which he doesn't really intend to keep.
And, when Mello shoulders a bag, and walks out that gate, the blond doesn't
look back, not even once.
***** Chapter 6 *****
The week after Mello leaves isn't worth talking about, so Matt doesn't. He goes
to class, he eats his meals, he interacts when his teachers ask him to. He
adheres to the letter of the law, not a skerrick more and not a skerrick less.
When he can, he stays in his room. He keeps out of trouble, keeps out of the
way of all the ones who know better – all the ones who are distracted by L's
death, all the ones who wouldn't be able to understand that, right now, right
now, Matt wants nothing more than to bury his face in Mello's pillow, and pick
at stray blond hairs.
He wishes that he'd at least told Mello his name, his real name, the name he
hasn't heard since he was brought to this place. This place, which has given
him so much and taken even more away.
He wishes Near would stop watching him with those dark-ringed eyes.
He wishes so very many things.
The day they remember him, long enough to have someone come and take Mello's
things away, Matt climbs the wall on his own for the first time. He walks the
road into Winchester proper. He looks at the people without really wanting to.
He buys a pack of cigarettes from a too-skinny girl in the suburbs; she's all
hipbones and collarbones and mercifully dark hair. Matt barely speaks to her,
but she takes his money anyway.
He finds the busted motorcycle on his way home, tucked up amongst bushes and
sticky grass. It takes him half a week to bring it back to Wammy's, piece by
piece, day by day. And it's Roger who discovers him behind the science rooms,
grease on his face, and tools, stolen from the caretaker, scattered around his
knees. Perhaps it's a symptom of the chasm that L has left them all in, when
Roger simply gazes at him for a long, silent moment, then turns and walks away.
Or maybe he just can't be bothered asking the usual what do you think you're
doing, young man?, because he already knows the answer.
Preparing to break a promise, Matt would have answered.
There's even a tiny chance that Roger isn't quite as big an idiot as Mello had
always said he was.
That, or he's just too busy preparing things for the new L, to be worried about
something as pointless as Matt.
►
Matt doesn't find Mello's secret stash until he's finished wiring the bike's
tail-light. The space behind the bedroom's skirting-board is practically empty,
but for two Yorkie Bars, the stubborn scent of milk chocolate, and an oddly
shaped envelope with his name written upon it in painfully familiar
handwriting; dear Matt. Matt sits on the floor for eighteen minutes, his mind
wandering to places he doesn't want it to go, and his thumb tracing the shape
of Mello's crucifix beneath the envelope's crisp paper. He wants to know if
Mello has written him a letter, but he can't bring himself to open it to see,
can't bring himself to touch the crucifix directly. He pushes the envelope
gently into his pocket, furious and distraught, and punches the wall until he
finally, finally, finally has an excuse to let the tears fall.
►
And weeks turn into months, and months turn into years.
►
Near is L, and Roger is Watari, and Linda lands a place at Camberwell College
of Arts. Matt rides all the way to Aberdeen, just because he can, and then all
the way back again. His bedroom at Wammy's is almost empty now, but there are
three postcards waiting for him on his bedside table, covered in Near's
meticulous handwriting. Matt doubts they were posted in the places their
postmarks are declaring, and they tell him a lot of nothing, except for the
repeated idea that Matt ought to come and work for him. Matt has better things
to be doing. He rides all the way to Tintagel, just because he can, and then
all the way back again. An old woman with pink-washed hair, at a bus-stop near
Winchester Castle, teaches him how to pack a pipe and blow smoke rings, and
tells him a story about King Arthur's Round Table, which he's heard a thousand
times before. Matt breaks into the office at Wammy's House and burns all their
documents, the whole lot of them, in a steel drum behind the science rooms, and
nobody comes to stop him. He smokes as he watches the ashes spiral in the night
air. The flames devour the paper, and the photographs crumple and burn in the
gleam of the ashes; Linda with her cheerful pigtails, Beyond with his
unsettling sadness. Matt only saves two of them, unpinning them carefully from
the staples holding them to their files, and slides them into a slip of paper
and down the side of one of his boots, for safekeeping. Their faces follow him
even when he can't see them; Mello, trying to look so serious for the
photographer, and A, with her quiet smile.
By the light of the fire he opens an envelope that he's been carrying around
for years, its corners bent and its white dirtied to a shade of grey. The
letter isn't what he had expected, the letter leaves out all the things Matt
had believed it would say. It's not even worthy of the name letter, it's just
an A4 page torn from one of Mello's old school books; it's eight words in a
still-not-forgotten handwriting, eight words that make Matt's stomach twist
with almost pain. He reads it, once, twice, three times, then tears it into
tiny pieces and watches each one burn.
One day, you'll have to come find me.
The crucifix is smaller than he remembers, the chain more fragile, and it curls
like a broken creature in the palm of his hand.
This time, when Matt leaves, it's his turn not to look back.
►
Something tells Matt that he would probably really like the States, if only he
were here under different circumstances. As it is, it's dark and seedy, and
there's too much poverty on the streets, and he wishes someone would fucking do
something about it, and how is it that he seems to be living out every bad
Hollywood flick he's ever seen – except that he isn't a spy, and he isn't a
hero, he's just a kid with a motorbike, ginger stubble on his chin, and a gift
for hacking into things. He has a little cash in his pocket, too, and a
passport that Near had organized for him, strangely enough, despite the fact
that Near's new babysitter, that American with the military look, obviously
didn't approve; Matt had sworn he'd pay it back, somehow, just to escape being
in the grey-eyed boy's debt. No, Matt's not a hero, and he isn't even looking
for the girl he loves, some hypothetical Hollywood heroine who would be
eternally grateful to him for finding her; no, of course, not, because that
scenario would belong to some charmed life that Matt isn't living. Matt's just
a kid, looking for a boy with a track record of not appreciating it when people
try to help him out.
Which is why Matt does what he does. He doesn't actually hunt Mello down at
all. He lets Mello find him, instead. It's just luck, really. Oh, luck aided by
weeks of careful research, sure, but, so long as Mello never directly asks,
Matt won't be telling.
The bar is also seedy, and dark, and pretty bad, and Matt thinks that maybe
it's a good thing that he already has enough back story on Mello, to know all
the things that the blond hasn't done to work his way to his current position,
else the whorish clothes he has on, when he swaggers through the front door,
might have made Matt's brain leap to the wrong conclusion. As it is, Matt has
to suck at his bottom lip, and tilt his head a little to the side.
It takes Mello, ever-observant Mello, a full five minutes to even notice the
red-headed young man in the corner, that's how nondescript Matt is.
The funny thing is, Matt's spent so long working out how, exactly, to best get
himself back into Mello's life, that he hasn't really considered what will
happen when he's managed it. Matt isn't prepared for the horrified way that
Mello's eyes widen, when they meet his gaze; Matt isn't prepared for the manner
in which Mello stands up, slowly, sinuously, dangerously – Matt isn't prepared
for the way Mello snatches his coat back up, and walks back out into the night
without so much as a word.
Matt gets all the way to his stupid rented room before he gives himself
permission to fall apart, and by then his pain has derailed into fury anyway.
He breaks a few things, only to spend the next two days putting them back
together again.
He finds himself back at the bar on Monday.
Mello is already there, waiting in the corner that Matt had inhabited on
Friday. He buys Matt a beer – there's a smile for the waitress, who apparently
knows better than to card either of them – waits for it to arrive, then lets
his eyes storm up and glower. He snaps, "Where the fuck were you on the
weekend, I sat here for-fucking-ever."
By closing time there's a row of origami birds, made from paper napkins and
chocolate wrappers, lined up in front of them. There are two empty beers, as
well, and a muddle of soda cans, and Mello has not only told all but one of his
Mafia goons to piss the hell off, but he also has his hand on Matt's knee. When
Mello lowers his lashes and grins at Matt, Matt knows full well that neither of
them are actually drunk enough to pretend that they aren't aware of what
they're doing, but he goes along with it anyway, flicking a thumb out to tuck a
strand of hair behind Mello's left ear. Mello tightens his hold on Matt's knee,
and tilts his face sideways, to rest his cheek against Matt's hand. He moves
his own hand up Matt's body, coming to rest at Matt's chest. Matt can't move,
can't breathe, can't even bring himself to care about who might be seeing this,
them, here, like this. He wants to kiss the blond, wants to touch him, wants to
haul him onto his lap, wants to shout at him, too, and rage at the fact that he
left him all those years ago—
—and then Mello's fingers close around the crucifix at Matt's throat, and then
Mello is on his feet, so abruptly that the barstool rattles in his wake, and is
gesturing to his remaining bodyguard that it's time for them to leave. Matt
doesn't even have time to so much as stand himself, before they're out the
door.
Even the origami birds look a shade duller, without Mello in their orbit.
***** Chapter 7 *****
It's another week gone, another week of talking in the bar, before Mello agrees
to come home with him.
Matt's one room is the proverbial shit, of course, but, seeing as Matt
generally gives a proverbial rat's arse about things like that, he hasn't paid
it all that much attention. He realizes he's waiting, though, when Mello steps
through the front door and sort of sniffs at his surroundings. Matt might have
thought that he was over needing Mello's approval but the relief, which burns
through him when Mello simply shrugs, chalks one up against the theory.
Matt locks the door behind them, and slips the chain in place.
This place of his, it really isn't much, though. A sofa with the stuffing
coming out, something vaguely resembling a kitchen, a bathtub and a toilet
tucked away behind a cracked glass divider. A double mattress, on the floor,
with sheets and a blanket folded neatly at the end. Greying carpet covered with
the snaking tendrils of electrical cords, centred around a mess of technology
on the laminated table. The walls are layered with scraps of paper, with notes,
with newspaper cuttings. They flutter to themselves as Mello walks across the
room to look through the window, to look down at the alley below with its
rubbish growing ghostly in the falling light. Someone has painted a dark crowd
of faces onto the bricks, seeping from the pavement up onto the wall; the
higher reaches are coloured by the less disturbing lines of taggers.
"I've seen worse," says Mello, casually, as though to re-enforce the
implications of his shrug.
Matt wants to ask him when, or where, but he's too busy watching Mello's
profile in the half-light to be bothered with hearing the sound of his own
voice. He wants to run his thumb along Mello's chin.
Mello touches at his own face, as though he's felt Matt's thought, and turns
aside to study the wall instead.
Matt watches him, as he reads the clippings. They've been talking about the
Kira case, these last few days, coming at it from tangents, from the shadows of
unmentioned implications. They both know what Mello is trying to do here. Right
now, Matt doesn't give a shit about any of it, but he still watches intently,
as Mello's mind takes in the contents of his walls.
The blond raises his eyebrows; lowers them again. "I thought you said you
weren't following the case."
Matt wets his lips with his tongue. He can feel the warmth from Mello's body as
he walks up behind him, can feel the tension they've been filling the room
with. Mello is even more volatile than he used to be, Mello is a match waiting
to be lit, a lighter with a too-easy spark. Matt feels it beneath his skin, and
it buzzes. He wishes Mello would allow himself to be touched. He wishes Mello
would do some touching himself, but he hasn't, not since Monday night when he'd
put his hand on Matt's chest and then run away.
Matt shakes his head. "I never said that. I said I wasn't obsessed with it, not
like you." He's off-handed, as though it doesn't matter either way.
Mello just looks at him, that wide-eyed innocent look that means he's at his
most deadly.
Matt slides a pack of Marlboros from his back pocket, and taps a cigarette out
between his fingers. "I also had a debt to deal with. And I was looking for
you, wasn't I."
They've been dancing around this for days. Mello hasn't asked him how he came
to be here, hasn't asked him what he's living off, hasn't asked him what he did
in all the years between.
Matt puts the pack back in his pocket, and lights up. He steadies himself with
warm smoke.
Mello leans back against the wall, paper rustling all around him. The sun has
almost set, now, and the light in the room is dispersing into a dull gleam.
Mello's eyes seem dark in his face. "You've been working for him," the blond
says, tone left hanging three inches from being an actual accusation.
Matt studies his cigarette; studies the way Mello's hands are pressed against
the newspaper cuttings on the wall, long and slender fingers spread over
apathetic headlines. Mello is refusing to look at him. There are a thousand
things Matt could say. Instead, he shrugs. "Yeah. I needed the money, and I
needed a way here. Work is work. And he doesn't exactly ask much, anyway. Well,
he asks, but he knows I'm not going to tell him. Not the one thing he wants to
know."
"He asks about me."
"Of course."
Quiet. Hushed sounds rising up from the alley. A girl shouting with her friends
in Spanish. The tap of the blind against the window, sway, sway, in the evening
breeze.
Mello meets Matt's gaze. His expression twists. His hands press closer to the
newspapers. He glances around the room and says, "Don't get any ideas, Matt.
I'll be sleeping on the couch."
Matt snuffs out his cigarette on an empty pizza box, and crosses his arms
against his chest; self-preservation and a point-to-prove combined. "Really?"
he inquires calmly, and maybe Mello doesn't expect that, maybe Mello has grown
used to people simply following his statements as if they were orders, because
something in Mello's stance alters slightly. "Really?" says Matt again,
stepping closer now, his voice smooth as if he weren't trembling inside. The
expression on Mello's face – Mello's face, which hasn't changed at all, really,
because it still broadcasts every nuance of his thoughts in the most ridiculous
way – snags at Matt's insides and makes him bolder. Maybe Mello has been
expecting him to just pretend that all those things hadn't happened between
them, all that time ago. Maybe Mello has been expecting him to have forgotten;
yes, that would be typical of the blond. For a guy with such an ego, he's
always been amazingly good at believing he means nothing to anyone around him.
Matt hasn't forgotten a thing. He hasn't even tried.
There haven't been any blondes passing through his arms, in some empty bid for
replacement. He's had enough time to think about exactly what it is that he
wants, and what he wants is Mello and, for any more direct and pressing needs,
well, Matt has two perfectly good hands and no qualms about making use of them.
Matt hasn't forgotten a thing, and Mello put his hand on Matt's knee on Monday
night, and that has to mean something.
And now Mello is standing less than two feet away, tarted up in those clothes
that are clinging to every inch of him, the feathers from his stupid coat
looking so soft against his jaw, and his hands pressed against Matt's wall so
hard that his knuckles are going white. And all Matt knows is that he wants to
reach out and touch, touch, touch, take hold of Mello's face, press Mello
against the wall, hold him, hold him, long and hard and hard and long. And
maybe Matt has just had enough, or maybe it's the shot in his veins from the
bar, or maybe it's just inevitable, but that's exactly what Matt does do.
Mello is warm and malleable beneath Matt's grasp, as he lets Matt push him
closer to the wall, as he lets Matt tangle a hand in pale hair, as he lets Matt
press in against him. Paper tears at Mello's shoulders.
"Really?" Matt asks, one last time, and he feels like he's chewing on his own
heart.
Mello's eyes blaze. His hands lurch away from the wall and grab for skin and
clothes; he hisses between his teeth and pulls hard at Matt's hair, yanking
Matt's head backwards to study him intently, as though those blue eyes of his
could crawl around inside Matt's head and down to the pit of his stomach. Matt
bares his teeth in a knowing way, because suddenly he does, suddenly he does
know exactly what this is, and what this is is Mello, Mello like when was a
kid, Mello faced with the only thing in the universe that he isn't game to
demand as his birthright. This one thing.
"Tell me you don't want this," Matt urges. He can taste Mello's breath against
his mouth, even as the blond stands there against the wall, his hands gripping
Matt's clothes, his eyes wild. "Tell me this isn't what you've always wanted,
and I'll walk right out." Doesn't matter that this is his place, doesn't matter
that Mello is the one who should do the walking, because Mello already has
walked, and it's Matt's turn now, Matt's turn to call the shots for once.
Mello stares holes into Matt's soul, blinks slowly, then re-finds his old,
familiar smirk from somewhere beneath the grime and polish of this city, and
this life that he's been living. He doesn't loosen his grasp on Matt's hair,
but he does tilt his head forwards and down, and licks a line along Matt's
throat.
Matt lungs catch and shiver, and he buries his hand deeper amongst Mello's
hair.
Mello curls a hand around Matt's back, smoothing downwards and finding it a
home in the empty back pocket of Matt's jeans. Mello's touch is a time machine
and the years roll back, back, until nothing has existed but the two of them
and their own little universe. Matt slides his own hand lower, fingers against
Mello's neck and behind his ear, tickled by feathers and the throb of Mello's
pulse in his veins. "Would it kill you to say it?" Matt whispers, tongue thick
with emotion, forehead against Mello's forehead and their bodies hot against
each other.
"It might," Mello chuckles, low and bitter and crooked, and tilts his face to
be kissed; all teeth and tongue and wet and warmth and Christ but how can a
kiss be so intimate. Matt is fighting to breathe and Mello is curling his
knuckles in Matt's back pocket. His lips are damp at Matt's ear, his tongue
traces lines against it, hot puffs of air and longing. "There's something you
can know, though," Mello whispers, hot puffs of air and longing, voice shaking
as his hands ride back up Matt's body, pushing up Matt's shirt, scraping down
again, fingers deft and rough all at once as they tug at Matt's belt buckle and
shove at his jeans. "My name, my name's Mihael Keehl."
And Matt lets out a half-lost moan, a moan that has nothing to do with the fact
that Mello has just spun them around and pushed Matt's back against the wall so
hard that he sees stars. Matt clings to Mello's shoulders, as the blond takes
hold of his dick, as the blond's fingers re-find their old familiar ways
against Matt's body, as the blond fingers the differences that time has
wrought, then slides down to kneel before him and take him into his mouth. Matt
moans again, head back, hair catching at cuttings, tearing them. Mihael,
Mihael, Mihael Keehl.
"Mail," Matt answers; Mello killing him with his tongue, Mello's hand gripping
so hard at Matt's hip that Matt thinks there will be bruises already. "Mail
Jeevas, I'm Mail Jeevas."
If somebody had ever told him that coming with the sound of his own name on his
lips would be such a rush, he'd never have believed them but it is, oh God, but
it is.
***** Chapter 8 *****
And now they're grown-ups, and things have changed, but nothing is actually
different. When they sit together on the mattress – Matt red-faced and half
undressed; Mello still with his feathery coat on, and his lips shiny – their
bodies fit against each other just as well as they always had. Matt takes
Mello's coat off, and trails his fingers along the bare strip of Mello's
stomach.
When Matt manages to blush a little more, and answer Mello's belated question
honestly – yeah I'm clean, there was only ever you – Mello sucks at his bottom
lip for a moment, paused in the act of shrugging his vest off, then finally
admits the same.
"Fuck," says Matt. Because it's the only word he can find right now. Because
the victory swirling in his guts might get him punched, if he confesses it
aloud. Because Mello just had his mouth on Matt's dick, and words can't express
what it means to know that that mouth has only ever been there and there alone.
Because.
"Fuck," says Mello right back at him, sombrely, then falls apart into sudden
laughter; falls back onto Matt's mattress, with his chest naked and breathing,
and his hair tossed every which way, like the very first time they were
together like this, all those years ago, on an April afternoon. Mello laughs
until he descends into giggles – his knees up, his face bright – then hiccups
in Matt's direction and puts his arm around Matt's neck, pulling him down to
kiss him slowly. "Why are you still wearing your shirt?" he asks, amused, hands
lazy on Matt's skin.
Matt grins into Mello's kiss. "I think the better question is, why are you
still wearing your pants?"
And it's funny, because they've never done it like this before, not all that
time ago, not ever, and Matt's hands are trembling as he unlaces Mello's pants,
and he can't help but think he's going to screw it up, pun not entirely
intended; can't help but think he's going to do something wrong, but, somehow,
it doesn't seem to matter. Because Mello is laughing, as he wriggles free from
his pants, and Mello is smiling, as he pulls Matt down against him on the
mattress. Matt doesn't even have time to confess that he isn't entirely sure
what he's doing, before Mello puts his finger over Matt's mouth and murmur-hums
something about Matt being a genius, and surely you're clever enough to work it
out; also, by the way, there's lube in my coat pocket.
Mello touches the crucifix, which is hanging at Matt's chest, with his mouth.
He kisses Matt's skin around it; consumes Matt's insides with those blue eyes
of his. He wraps his legs around Matt and pulls him closer. Their fingers/
mouths/everything work together, as if this were the sole purpose Mello's God
had made them for.
And Mello is so, so beautiful, when Matt finally gets it right.
►
Somehow, Mello just doesn't leave. Oh, physically he does; he comes and he
goes, because he has his games to play and his places to be – but it's as
though Matt's one stupid room has become his place to touch base.
Matt asks about everything, though part of him doesn't even want to know,
because the rest of him needs to. He helps whenever he can, fact-checking,
fact-proofing, creeping around the mental corners in Mello's mind. The more
Matt does, the more they talk, the more the full extent of Mello's plans unroll
before him. Mello hasn't changed one bit, but he's changed completely. He's
driven and he's crazy; he's cool and he's calm.
He's simply more Mello than ought to be allowed.
Matt's life condenses down until there's nothing but caffeine and cigarettes
and loving-Mello and beating-Near. His nights blur into the gleam of computer
screens. Numbers, names, names, numbers. Awake and asleep sound like synonyms.
He doesn't approve of Ross, hell, he doesn't approve of any of the men Mello
works with. Mello tells him to keep away from them, tells him that he doesn't
want Matt getting involved. Matt finds it stupid, since he's involved anyway,
but Mello plays his cards close to his chest even now. He calls Matt his Ace of
Spades. Matt wants to hit him in the face, because he knows, he knows that all
it really means is that Mello, who holds the whole world in his hands, just
doesn't want that world to know that there's something he gives a shit about.
Or maybe he doesn't. Maybe he's been eating, drinking, breathing Kira for too
long. Maybe, after all this time of playing badass, it's what he's really
become.
Sometimes, just sometimes, Matt thinks that the only time Mello is even truly
aware of him as Matt, rather than just as a cog in his vendetta, is when Matt
has one of his hands on the headboard of the bed and is fucking Mello into the
mattress, driving Mello so hard and so deep, pushing him off the edge, fucking
him down to earth just for the purpose of fucking him back into oblivion again;
the tumble of sheets, the grunt of breath; it's not – it's only – it's but a
fraction of what Matt actually wants.
People think Matt is harmless. They don't notice him. They smile, and nod, and
forget him three seconds later. Only now is Matt realizing that they're wrong,
that he's been wrong. That he's just as insane as Mello is, only that his
insanity is different; only that he wants something different, something a
thousand times more selfish.
Matt hadn't known that love could feel so vampiric.
Matt learns to smile when he doesn't mean it, to stare at the world serenely
through his goggles and his haze of nicotine. Matt learns to think, eat, sleep,
breathe Kira just like Mello does. He counts Mello's breathing when he stays
for the night, hair spread against the pillow; deep in his entrails Matt feels
it, knows it: it's the only way.
►
It's the only way, but it isn't enough.
Matt isn't there, when the building goes up, but he sees it from the gas
station where he's been waiting, at Mello's order, just in case. The girl
behind the counter – slight film of dust on the back of her hands as she does
the books, scratch-scratch of her pen intervened by the comments she tosses at
him now and then, where he stands, leaning by the door – says something about
phoning 9-1-1, but Matt is already outside the office by then, already inside
Mello's car. Matt swears the whole way, driving with clammy palms clenched
tight, and white knuckles; cursing Kira, cursing the Mafia, cursing Mello and
his fucking plans and, even worse, cursing the fucking suspicion that Mello had
known exactly what might happen – and had kept Matt and his precious car away
for this very reason.
Matt's never seen anything like it. The stink of burnt plastic, burnt timber,
asbestos dust and charred pig-iron; everything shattered and melted and moulded
and twisted beyond recognition. There are people amongst it. Not the Japanese
task force, because they've already gone, but people Matt knows by sight;
people Matt can now barely recognize. Fear tears at his insides, but he's cold
now, cold and calm, cold and calm as if it were his own death he were going to,
not Mello's; Matt doesn't think, he can't afford to. He knows he's going to
find Mello alive. He knows he's going to find Mello dead. Moments like this the
universe is all things at once, all things combined and beaten with the spoon
of fate, all things mixed and muddled and terrifying and, even if the Cheshire
cat were to appear, over there, perhaps, grinning on that slip of iron which
once must have held the traitorous roof up, it wouldn't add to the nightmare,
to the dis-reality.
Mello is on the ground, holding the hand of a man almost covered in rubble.
There are tears and blood and skin and filth all over Mello face, or all over
what's left of it. Matt throws up in the mess, the burger he'd eaten half an
hour ago revolting against his throat and his stomach, spattering his boots
with ash and vomit. His hand tastes of iron when he wipes his mouth with it,
hurries, hurries now, squats at Mello's side and speaks his name, over and over
and over and over again, a mantra, a prayer, a beggar's psalm on a street
corner, please please please please please please please. There's a pulse, and
the motion of eyeballs behind eyelids, and Matt retches again with the sheer
relief.
Alive.
He's already gathered Mello up, and begun to leave, when it occurs to him to
check the pulse of the dark hand Mello had been clinging to so tightly. Matt
doesn't want to go back to do it, but he knows Mello will ask once he's better,
must get better.
He checks, but it's cold and silent.
Mello weighs too much, as Matt carries him back to the car. Matt stumbles and
trips on stone and wire and, once, somebody's leg, fractured bone white in the
mocking daylight.
Mello can't move, can't open his eyes, can't barely breathe; he still parts his
lips, though, when Matt lays him out on the bench-seat of the car, and mumbles,
"No blood on the upholstery."
►
Everything changes. The trip across the country is like a journey in a bottle,
the radio never turning away from the news, Mello listening, with his one good
eye staring out at the countryside as it passes. The hotels are cheap and they
only stop when they have to. Matt simply drives, and drives, and drives, for as
long and as well as he can, only pulling over to rest when the seconds, with
his eyes closed, turns into moments; no point driving them into a fourteen-
wheeler.
It's a journey in a bottle, yes. It's changing bandages. It's baths with a
plastic bucket in motel showers, lukewarm water, and the scent of baby soap.
It's Mello in loose track-pants and a flannelette shirt. It's blisters that
can't be popped, nerves that are numb, and nerves that would be better if they
were. It's skin, fragile and returning in sickening shades of brown and purple.
It's Matt with his eyes fixed on the highway before them because he can't cope;
it's Matt with his eyes fixed on the sky because he doesn't want to think about
it. It's Mello, finally falling asleep as the sun rises before them, milky glow
across the tarmac, using Matt's coat as a pillow against the window. It's
silence, until even the news on the radio peters out into nothingness.
The night they enter New Jersey, though, Mello leans forwards suddenly, pushes
at the old cassette deck, and lets The Cure tell them all about you, soft and
only, you, lost and lonely.
"You know," the blond says, as he rummages around in the glove-box for a half-
empty pack of Maltesers, "we had it all wrong, Near and I. Somehow, I don't
know... the harder we tried to be him, the further away we ended up. It's like
chasing a mirage."
Matt knows Mello's speaking about L. Matt shifts into a higher gear, and
glances sideways at his friend, who winds down the window a little, and passes
him a cigarette. "How's it going?" Matt asks, though he isn't even sure what it
is, exactly, that he's enquiring about.
"I think I've figured it out now," Mello answers, and counts out Maltesers onto
his healing palm, prodding gently at the skin beneath them. "It wasn't that I
had it wrong, more that I had it a little crooked. Near has never wanted more
than to succeed L, and that's why he is where he is. As for myself..."
Matt returns his attention to the slip of world being continually re-born in
the headlights' glow. "You wanted to beat L."
Mello gives Matt a look, pops Maltesers in his mouth like a hamster, and shifts
his seat backwards a notch or two. "Don't be going all past tense on me now,
Matty-boy. We're not dead yet."
When Matt glances back at him, Mello is smiling the first smile that that
altered face of his has ever attempted. It isn't his old smile, no, but
sometimes, just sometimes, new isn't necessarily a bad thing.
***** Chapter 9 *****
New York isn't Los Angeles, and that's a fact. Freelancing isn't like working
for the Mafia, either, and it's a strange game they're playing here, the two of
them; with Near, and against him. The money's almost gone. Mello calls in
favours with people-who-know-people. Kira is a bastard, and Matt is beginning
to take it personally.
Mello and Near toy with each other, on the telephone, until Matt's skin itches.
And then there's Halle.
►
Matt's never been with a woman, of course. He's never been with anyone apart
from Mello, so it's stating the obvious but, still. It's not for lack of
offers, from Linda onwards (blonde hair in the tapered sunlight, eyes dark from
the lack of sleep that had haunted them all, after L's death). But he's never
been with a woman. And Halle; Halle is a woman unlike any he's ever met.
It's actually Mello, Matt knows, whom she wants to fuck, but Mello ignores her
in that way he does; leaves her hanging, with just enough tease in his face to
have her coming back despite it. She's older than them, but it doesn't seem to
bother her. Mello leers and says that it's Near she really wants, and Matt
splutters into his beer at the thought. They've been in contact for a while
now, the three of them; since before the boys came to this side of the country,
actually. Halle doesn't say a word when she first sees Mello's scarred face,
and Matt likes her the better, for that one small fact, than for anything else
she's ever done. She takes Mello to Near, though, which cancels out the
benefits she'd earnt herself. In Matt's eyes, anyway.
They're sitting in some dump of a motel, beside a too-loud road, when she turns
up with a bottle of vodka and a pack of cigarettes. The cigarettes are for
Matt, though she takes one for herself before she hands them over. Mello offers
her a light, and she sits herself down at their table, her long legs enticing
their eyes up to the shadows of her skirt. She studies Matt through the haze of
her smoke, and it's the first time he can remember her actually looking at him
properly. Her eyes are piercing, as she gazes from his goggles to his boots and
back up again.
"So this is how it is, then," she says.
Mello smiles at her sideways, his thumb flicking lazy flames from the lighter,
then grins at Matt; the kind of grin that is probably illegal in countries
where they don't believe in public lewdness. Halle uncrosses her legs, then
crosses them again, and gazes knowingly at the ceiling.
The bottle of vodka doesn't take very long to be opened, and Halle's bare toes
– her shoes dropped to the floor – take even less time to find their way into
Matt's lap. Matt twists at the contact, stomach knotting, and stares at Mello
rather than at the woman. It takes him a second to realise what he's done, and
he checks her face for offence taken, but Halle is smiling; smiling the smile
of someone who knows what she wants and, more importantly, knows perfectly well
that she cannot have it. "I can see why they're both after you," she says.
Matt raises his eyebrows at her.
Mello simply sprawls back, elbows against his chair. His gaze is curious and
indolent, and he purrs, "You don't need my permission, you know."
Matt does need it, of course, and so does she, and the ex-mafioso knows it full
well, but his statement is permission in itself. There's a politics here,
buzzing away beneath the pulse of physical tension, and a part of Matt's vodka-
washed brain says that he hasn't fully comprehended it yet. Halle hip-swings
her way around the table and slides herself onto Matt's lap. Mello shifts
imperceptibly in his chair; Matt can hear him move, Matt can feel Mello's eyes
watching everything, even as Matt balances his cigarette on the edge of a bowl,
and Halle undoes Matt's belt, no-nonsense, leaning her face in towards his,
even as she unbuckles and unzippers.
"No kissing," says Mello, suddenly cool.
Halle smiles, dark and darker, shifts her shoulders to show her indifference,
and places her mouth at Matt's collarbone instead, pressing her teeth against
him – hard, but not hard enough to leave a mark. Her hands are cool against
Matt's skin as she frees him from his boxers. His dick presses up against her
lap as she strokes it. "Have you ever," she says, curious, her full attention
on him now and her eyes ignoring Mello in a way that all three of them know is
obviously calculated to gain Mello's fixed notice, "been inside...?" Then adds,
with an amused little laugh, "Inside a woman?"
Matt could answer whatever he fancies, and he doubts she'd be able to call him
on it, but better to be honest and clumsy with reason, he rationalizes, than
dishonest and judged a lousy lay. Besides, she's only Halle. His hands are on
her now, though, not that he can remember having put them there; running up her
sides and down her sides, catching his fingers as best he can beneath her bra,
back around to work the clasp with clever hands, then forwards once more. Her
breasts are strange and heavy and almost fluid-feeling in his hands. He tweaks
at her nipple as if it were Mello's, and her breath catches behind her teeth.
"No," he says, and twists it again.
Halle nods. Her hands are cool on his dick, slow and steady; she's done this
before; how many times, he wonders, with whom. With whom would she rather be
doing it this time, he asks himself. With Mello, watching them with hooded
eyes, from the other side of the table? Mello's crude innuendos about the
white-haired kid rise up in Matt's mind. Still, Halle looks pleased as she
touches Matt, as she pulls a condom from her blouse pocket and rolls it over
him. She shifts, dragging her skirt over her hips and bunching it at her waist.
She's not wearing any underwear – does she always do that or can she read them
that well – and the soft-rough of her pubic hair presses against him and makes
him twitch. Her right hand is tight on Matt's shoulder, and her left hand
guides him inside of her as she rises up to take him in; her body moves closer
as she does so, her breasts warm and soft against his chest. Matt bites his lip
at the sensation of her; she's hot like Mello but so fucking moist, sucking at
him as she sinks down the length of him. Both her hands are on his shoulders
now and she uses them for leverage, angling herself as she moves, as though
she's pulling him against some place within her. Matt remembers vague notions
about g-spots, stumbled upon when he'd first researched the prostate; Halle
mumbles against him. She takes his hand, places it between her legs, says, move
like this, move like that, God please, and Matt finds her irritating, except
that Matt also finds her bloody good around him and, over her shoulder, he can
see Mello watching, watching, watching; Mello's eyes sharp on everything and
Mello's arm moving steadily, doing something between his legs beneath the
table. Matt bucks into Halle hard at the sight, makes her moan, and suddenly
Matt doesn't care any more what the underlying politics of this is; doesn't
care any more, which of them it is that she'd rather be screwing – him or Mello
or even the damn albino child – because suddenly he knows that Mello's name
hangs upon this. If Matt is Mello's fuck, then Matt has to be fucking good at
it.
Matt shifts, takes her hips in his hands, and pushes himself up until Halle is
seated on the table. Her eyes go a little wide at her sudden loss of control,
and Matt undoes her shirt and trails his mouth against her breasts, touches at
her nipples, teasing, sucking, beginning to learn her tells, the way she
breathes in rather than gasping out, how she pushes her back on the table, a
glass rolling to the carpet, vodka splashing. She might be a woman, but Matt
finds what makes her moan just like he'd found what makes Mello moan, and maybe
the feel is different, and maybe the angle is different, but soon she has her
legs clenched around him and he can feel it in her knees against him, as he
pushes her closer to the edge with every thrust. She lets out a hoarse groan
and tightens around him, shaking; Mello stands up and draws Matt into a messy,
wet kiss. Mello's hand on Matt's face tastes of orgasm, and Matt comes at the
stroke of Mello's tongue in his mouth.
Halle doesn't speak, as she smokes a cigarette, sitting naked on the table with
her feet on Matt's chair. When she's finished, though, she considers the butt
for a contemplative moment, takes another shot of vodka, smiles slowly, and
tells them everything she knows.
►
New York isn't Los Angeles, but time passes at the same rate in the one place
as it had in the other. The motel begins to feel like home, Matt plays the role
of a spy after all, and Mello calls in more favours from people-who-know-people
but, ultimately, they're on their own now. The other people don't matter.
Japan is Japan. The world is condensing into L's heirs and Kira, and Matt
doesn't even try to argue, when Mello hands him the keys to his Camaro, touches
the crucifix beneath Matt's shirt, and says this is it now; it's been fun,
hasn't it, amongst the crap, don't you think, Matt? Matt just says Mello's
name, Mello's real name, and maybe that's enough.
►
Apparently it's Halle who saves him, in the end; a swift call at the right
moment to the right person, guns halted, and Matt trussed up in a cell like a
bird waiting to be plucked, with no idea what's happening in the outside world
and no idea if he's going to want to be alive in it by the time the day is
over. She comes to bail him out, eyes dark and no make-up on her face, and
doesn't take no for answer, just drives him to her boss in a haze of fatigue
and cigarette smoke.
Near is sitting in the corner of a lounge-chair and has the eyes of an eighty-
year-old. Matt can't work out what to say to him, so he says nothing at all.
Apparently it's Mello who has saved the day, though, so Matt figures that
they're finally even, anyway. Not that he even really cares anymore, to be
honest.
Near gives him this look, when Mello finally walks into the room, as though
there's something he's been meaning to say for the last ten years or so. And,
for a second, Matt thinks he's really going to – but then Mello has his arms
around Matt and everything else vanishes.
"We did it," says Mello, his mouth on Matt's mouth, on Matt's face, on Matt's
neck; his hands gripping so tightly that Matt aches and stings where the guards
had beaten him.
Matt winces and grins, because Mello is right. They've done it. "You did it,"
he answers, bubbles of relief in his throat and catching at his vowels.
"What next?" Mello asks. His clothes are singed, and he smells of death and
petrol, but it doesn't matter.
Halle hands the blond some chocolate, and he gives her a cheerful thumbs up.
Matt laughs. "Anything."
"Anything?" Mello repeats, sucking on the milky gift. "Anything." And this time
it's as though he's marvelling at it, not questioning it. Then he leers,
exhausted but delighted, and makes a very descriptive promise about exactly
what they're going to be doing the moment Matt's ribs have healed enough.
"Matt..." begins Near, and they both look at him, then; questioning, curious,
and less aversion on Mello's face than Matt can remember having seen in a long
time. "Matt," Near says again, then shrugs to himself, and sits there, in his
toys and his silence, and with Halle kneeling beside him without him even
noticing her. Whatever Near had wanted to say, he doesn't. Instead, he lets
them limp out the front door and out into the Japanese night.
He's still L, Matt considers with a whisper of pity; he must have more
important things to do.
***** Chapter 10 *****
"Anything at all," says Mello, for the umpteenth time. He's sitting in the
middle of the motel bed, wearing nothing but a towel; the bedspread is rolled
down and the sheets are a strange sea-green. He wraps his arms around himself,
all scars and elbows and jutting ribs; wraps his arms around himself, and his
eyes glee, as though he's a little kid again and can't quite contain his joy.
Matt laughs into the shower-steamed bathroom mirror, and rinses the toothpaste
from his mouth. It's as though it's suddenly hit them that they're only young
still. That it doesn't matter what the world has thrown at them, they're only
young still.
Matt keeps waiting for the bubble to burst, to dint, to pop into effervescent
nothingness, but it hasn't. It hasn't. They're back in America, they're in the
middle of nowhere, and it hasn't. They have passports in their pockets, money
in their wallets, and a job lined up in Mexico. Mello wants to travel south,
far south, wants to brush up on his Spanish, and maybe catch up with some old
contacts on the way. Matt doesn't really care, he just wants Mello to keep
looking like he's looking right now; smiling at him in the reflection of a
mirror with that look in his eyes.
And, preferably, to stop trying to get himself burnt to death, of course.
Outside the window, the motel's office sign is winking at them, light glinting
off the lines of Matt's bike, which is parked in front of the low verandah.
Mello had thrown a tantrum when he'd realized that Near hadn't managed to get
him his Camaro back, from where ever it was that it had ended up, but the bike
is easier to move around the place anyways, and it's not like they own much at
the moment. Matt just shrugs, whenever Mello threatens to buy a car; frankly he
likes the feel of the blond behind him, the press of Mello's thighs against him
as they purr down the highway.
Mello's hair is wet against Matt's skin, when Matt sits down on the bed with
him. He smells faintly of soap and shaving foam. Mello runs his hands along
Matt's chest, counting the tiny scars that Japan has left upon him. There's an
opened bottle of beer on the beside table, just emptied enough for Mello to
kiss at Matt's collarbone and whisper nonsense against his jaw. Mello's hair is
cool and damp, leaving trails on Matt's shoulder. Matt strokes Mello's back
absently, pulls him around until he's almost sitting in Matt's lap, and circles
his thumb around Mello's bellybutton.
"It wouldn't kill you to say it, you know, Mels," Matt murmurs. He'd reach for
the bottle, but he doesn't think beer would go so well with toothpaste.
Mello grins against Matt's chest. "It might," he teases. "And you shouldn't
need me to state the blindingly obvious."
Matt holds Mello's wrists loosely with one hand above his head, and says
hummingly, "Oh, really? Well, you know, I love you too, dumbarse."
Mello grins, all bared teeth and rising knees, and crows victoriously. "That's
more like it."
►
The detective business isn't exactly jonesing for new competition but, the
thing is, Near had conceded more than Matt had imagined. It's the detective
Deneuve who crosses the Mexican border, and he does so – oh the irony – with
the blessing of the officials on both sides. Matt works his way through half a
pack of cigarettes just to stop himself from laughing at the sight of FBI
agents shaking his boyfriend's hand.
The ex-Mafioso Mihael Keehl, and his unidentified accomplice from Japan are,
after all, officially dead. Burnt to death and shot in the head, respectively,
and, if nobody can find the autopsy reports, or their photographs, that's to be
expected. The Kira case was, after all, a bit of a mess. The conspiracy buffs
are already whispering things about government set-ups and organized
assassinations. And L, well, he's already begun to merge so far into the
shadows that there are those who say he doesn't exist at all.
Though, that's probably because they can't see the postcards he sends,
postcards that never seem to say much of anything at all, but which always
appear, kind of creepily, at motels just in time for Mello and Matt to pick
them up. Matt is still pretty sure that the postmarks are all lying, but it's
interesting to note the slight change in the tone of the kid's handwriting the
night they arrive in Cuauhtémoc, and how he's signed for an H. as well as an N.
Mello finds it outrageously amusing, of course, but still slides it into the
back of one of the notebooks he's begun to carry around with him, before
sitting himself down and opening it to a clean page. The hotel is dingy and the
lights keep flickering, but Mello sits beneath its fluttering glow with the
moths and a bowl of chocolate flavoured cereal, and writes, in all honesty,
     ...I am the old world's runner-up, the best dresser that died like a
     dog, Mihael Keehl. I once called myself Mello and was addressed by
     that name, but that was a long time ago.

"Not so long ago," says Matt, rummaging in his pocket for his last pack of
cigarettes, his gaze heavy for the first time since the whole business had come
to an end. He puts his finger at the nape of Mello's neck and just rests it
there. "And what am I to call you now?"
Mello keeps writing, four more words, draws a line across half the page, then
puts his pen down and turns on the half-broken desk chair. He pulls Matt into
his lap, despite the warning creak the furniture gives up, and whispers,
"Whatever you want, Mail. Whatever you want."
***** prologue/epilogue *****
11:42 PM and rain falls hard on Buenos Aires, but the inclement weather banging
on their door is being ignored, and the water dripping from the kitchen ceiling
falls, with unattended splashes, into an old ice-cream container with a steady
rhythm.
"I did go out and buy you your ridiculous chocolate, you know, just like you
asked me to," Matt says, with a grunt and a grin. Mello is straddling his lap,
wet towel draped around his now naked neck. Mello's hands are flat and firm
against Matt's shoulders. Matt's wearing nothing but socks. He likes the feel
of the muscles in Mello's lower back, moving beneath his palms. He likes the
shift of Mello's thighs against him. He likes the feel of himself inside Mello,
of Mello surrounding him. He noses Mello's damp hair away from his neck, to nip
at the pale skin there. "Bloody addict."
"H'h," responds the blond in a distracted voice. Mello's just finding his
rhythm and he's making Matt's breath catch, now, as he grips a little tighter,
takes him a little deeper, and begins to really move, move-dance-fly-create,
hips and thighs singing with a devastatingly slow beat. Then there's his tongue
licking at the corner of his mouth, a darting tip of wetness, and his arms
pushing for better leverage against Matt's sunburnt skin, and he enlarges upon
his mutter with a, "What? You said no, on the phone." He tips his face
downwards towards Matt as he speaks, slow, slow, slow to the backdrop of the
rush of storm beyond their thin walls, unsettling Matt's nerves in all the
right places.
Matt takes the opportunity to suck at Mello's lip. He chuckles, low, tone like
a shade of purple velvet, even as the pleasure trawls at his insides, building
with every shift and sway. "Dickhead," he breathes against Mello's chin.
"Y'know I never mean it." He slides one hand between their bodies, wraps it
around Mello's dick and begins to stroke, slow, slow harmony to the music
Mello's playing with his body.
The blond groans, lets his head tip right forwards, shoulders bunched with
motion, digs his nails deeper into Matt's skin, and ups the tempo.
►
Hour unknown, because the storm has shorted out the clock on the microwave, and
Matt lies with his with his spine curled against the scruffy blankets on the
sofa. Mello's body is tucked in warmly against his, their legs a comfortable
muddle. The wet towels lie forgotten on the floor. Matt's shirt covers Mello's
back, tossed crookedly over skin and scars to stop him from getting cool,
though Matt thinks his hands, stroking the blond's arse, are probably having
more effect.
Mello breathes, and smiles, and brushes Matt's hair from his face. He traces
his finger over Matt's crucifix, and the nicotine patch on his arm to the left
of it. He whispers, "You know, I'm not sure where you get off, calling me an
addict, Mail Jeevas. You're as big an addict as me."
Matt opens his eyes, tightening his hold on Mello's body, and studies him for a
while. Then he closes his eyes again, and drags the blond in even closer,
anchoring himself against Mello's hip bones.
And if Matt says anything at all – if Matt says anything at all, which might
sound an awful lot like, oh, but I've always known it – Mello lets him pretend
that he hasn't, just drags the blankets down, from the top of the couch, to
cover the both of them; curls closer, and dozes off to the sound of Matt's
heart beating.
Addictions are what it's always been about, after all.
 
►
We'll cut our bodies free from the tethers of this scene,
Start a brand new colony,
Where everything will change,
We'll give ourselves new names (identities erased)
The sun will heat the grounds
Under our bare feet in this brand new colony
Everything will change.
– The Postal Service, 'Brand New Colony'.
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