I looked out the window of our shitty, old apartment for the 14th time. It was dark out. Past midnight; early early morning. The moon was yellow and large and round. The dirty old street was empty and only once in a while did a car drive by. I watched the street lights flicker and I watched the windows of the building across from me, sometimes I'd see a person, but they never saw me back. I watched the sky too, and the stars... there weren't too many, the city lights were too strong to be able to see many clearly. And as I watched all these things only one question was visible in my mind; 'Where was he?'
I got up from the window ledge, where I had been sitting for the past forty-five minutes and made my way over to the kitchen. The only available light sources were the glows of my laptops on the floor, and the cool light coming in from the window. It was dark, and as I was shuffling myself to the kitchen I tripped over some wire and fell, not trying to stop myself, to the cold floor. I lay there almost helplessly for a bit, finding no reason to pull myself up. I was restless and I was worried and I was sleepless because of my worry, and not being able to call him only added to my unease. It was more than I could take. So I lay there, trying to forget, trying not to worry.
After awhile though, I got up, my worry was still there and worse yet I had a throbbing headache. A brilliant thought came to my mind then; cigarette.
In the kitchen I searched, through the drawers through the cupboards, but found nothing. I almost ran to the bedroom, I shuffled through my clothes on the floor, searching the pockets, still finding nothing. I looked under the bed, in the closet, I picked up all of the clothes off the floor and searched there, dumping them all on the bed as I did so. I searched the night tables, in the drawers, the cabinets, underneath every object in the room. Nothing.
Horribly distressed, I let myself fall onto the bed, onto the pile of clothes that I had left there, I turned over, lying on my stomach, only to be horribly greeted by one of Mello's vests. His vest. His scent still lingered vaguely on it; chocolate, laundry, gasoline and gun powder, it was lovely, it had almost a perfumery accent to it. I buried my face in it, not even embarrassed. 'Where was he? Where was he? Where was he?'. The question repeated in my mind, and I started dreading, fearing. I held the vest to my face and cuddled into the bed sheets. It had been almost a week now. My longing for him just kept growing. I missed him. I missed him so much. Everything about him, his face, his body, his mind, even his attitude. I missed it all.
Snuggling more comfortably in the bed, slowly, I fell asleep.
......
I stuck the old key into the lock, and opened the door with ease. To my surprise the apartment was incredibly dark, save for the light being emitted from several of Matt's laptops.
There was evidence that he had been working all over the apartment; the empty coffee mugs and soda cans left carelessly on the floor, the blanket and pillows on the couch, the thousands of sheets of paper lying all over the place.. So he had been working hard.
I walked into the kitchen, only to find all the drawers pulled out and the cabinets open, there were 11 empty cigarette cases on the table and the counter. I sighed. I opened the fridge. Absolutely nothing.
Tired, I yawned. I was too tired to even take a shower. Lazily, I stumbled into the bedroom. The first thing I noticed was the lack of dirty clothes on the floor, but as my eyes shifted around the room I realized they had just been moved to the bed. Sleeping on top of them, was Matt. My Matt. Curled up on the bed, still in his clothes, one of my vests clutched tightly in his arms. I tilted my head, watching him, his goggles were still on too. I smiled, walking a little closer to the bed.
As silently as I could, I peeled off my leather and draped one of his shirts over my chest, they were far too big for me, which made them perfect to sleep in. And as silently as I could, I tip-toed over to the bed and lay down beside him. I watched him sleep for awhile, watched his chest move up and down and listened to his breathing. Watched his lips quiver or his eyebrows twitch, or his head shift. Finally, gently, I reached my hand up to remove his goggles, I did so in such a careful way that he continued to sleep still, his breathing not even faltering once. And once they were off, I gently stroked the side of his face, admiring the softness of his skin. I stroked his red hair and reached my head upwards to gently kiss it.
"Mhhmm," he muttered in his sleep and I smiled. I waited for his eyes to open. But they didn't, so, once again, I reached up and kissed his forehead gently and stroked his cheek once more. Eagerly, I watched as his eyes fluttered open, and I watched them as they lit up and my sight then calmed down again. The smile I had missed so much over the past week appeared easily on his lips.
"Mello," he whispered reaching his own hand to touch my face.
"Sorry I'm late," I whispered. He didn't even reply, just snuggled warmly into my embrace, mumbling my name a couple times more until we both fell into a lovely,pleasant sleep.