Mello walked with a sure and steady gait. He knew how to handle himself – he also knew that he was more intelligent than the people who surrounded either side of him. He didn't blend with the crowd – but then again, no one did. It was Los Angeles. Beside him there was a walking bird; it was a girl that had feather earrings, a very loose shirt, and looked like she was ready to take flight – that's how thin she was. A hopeful model, no doubt.

He looked up to the stormy sky. The wind whipped faster, promising a downpour. Mello hurried down the street, passing the model as she walked slowly in her own world. He felt the needed to get inside – inside his own hideout. He felt the remainder of the chocolate on his tongue. It was the reason he had taken an outing on a day with a forecast. He had heard that a candy store had the best chocolate of all of California. He needed to know if it was true.

It wasn't true; it didn't taste as good as the chocolate he had at Wammy's. He missed England, though he'd never say it out loud. Mello had the tendency of taking control and not showing any weak emotion. His conscience debated with him what the true meaning of 'weak' was. He told it to shut up.

He stopped when the man in hippie pants and a shirt that looked oddly like the model's – Mello wondered if this man was truly a man – stopped in front of him. He stretched his neck to see what the holdup was. He loathed waiting – he knew that the only way to do things was to do it now and not later, when the opportunity could have passed.

That way of thinking was Near's. Mello knew it was the pale's boy way of working – a way that Mello found idiotic. His conscience told him that sometimes patience could actually help. Mello idly speculated if a person could gag their conscience. He then thought that he might have been losing his mind.

He rejected that thought with the theory that he was already insane. The cars honked still, moving sluggishly. The light was still green and the hand was still red and there. He angrily questioned if anyone had pushed the button for the light to change. A girl bumped into him; he looked at her, irritated.

"Oh, excuse me, miss." She says, squeaking in her apology. She looks like one of the innocent girls that had no idea what they were doing in a big city. Her glasses were skewed and her clothes looked junky. She looked like she had just woke up and threw on what ever felt comfortable. Her blonde hair didn't look like it had been brushed since… well, since she had blonde hair. She runs a hand through it messily, waiting for Mello to accept her apology.

"I'm a guy." Mello said. Her mouth, which was quite full, popped open and she laughed nervously. Her eyes traveled away from him, searching for anything not to make this situation awkward.

"I'm sorry – you just look so pretty… I mean, you look more like a female from behind, not to say you have a cute butt. I mean, I'm sure you do – I mean, I wasn't looking at it!" Mello found it annoying how she kept running her mouth.

He looked back up to the sky – the clouds had become a darker color. They looked depressed and promised to spill their tears on everyone. He looked back at the girl, when he noticed she was clutching a few books. She's holding them with a death grip and it seems like she was tilted unintentionally.

"It's no problem – you should learn how to control your mouth however." Mello replied, just wanting to end the conversation. Her face flushed, and she blinked. Intelligence came into her eyes and she opened her mouth once and closed it, trying to think of how she should reply.

"Well, when you're certain a person is one gender and then they turn out the other, it kind of throws you off balance." She said.

"Well," Mello enunciated this word. "I wouldn't know since I know my gender differences."

"You do realize that sentence makes no sense, right? You just said you wouldn't know since you know…" Her voice trailed off, wondering if she was right in her correction.

Mello didn't care because he needed to get to his hideout – pronto. The sky grumbled and he knew that it was going to start raining soon. He saw the white walking symbol had finally popped up. He looked back at the girl as the crowd started moving. "Still, you understood what I said."

Mello turned and started to walk away, but before she left his eyesight, he saw her lean over and pick up a guitar case, that obviously had a guitar in it. His conscience told him that he should ask her why she is carrying so much stuff and help. He imagined his conscience had the face and body of Near. He then amused himself by strangling both of them in his mind.

His conscience was about to tell him something about that and he told his conscience to eat it. He thought for a moment that he had spoken out loud so he quickly looked around to see if anyone had heard him. He was suddenly shoved by a tall, lanky man with Egyptian eyeliner. He was in the middle of the crowd, being shoved every which way.

Once he got his footing, he managed to block the shoving. But as soon as he was able to do that, the rain started coming down. It didn't give a warning, it came in buckets. And Mello wasn't able to find a way out of the crowd. When he was trying to shove his way out, he saw the wannabe model on the edge of the crowd. She was dancing with the rain, not bothering to get out of the downpour. Mello really hated that girl with no name in that particular moment.

-/-

Matt watched as Mello walked stiffly into the hideout. Mello didn't have the confident walk as he did before. He seemed to have trouble moving – he spread his legs so far apart. Matt noticed the rain dripping off of Mello's long strands of hair. Mello shook his head angrily, sending droplets flying. He was also holding his arms in a strange position – very far away from his body.

Matt smirked, already knowing what had happened. Mello looked at him with a sour expression on his face. He asked, "What is that grin about?"

Matt looked down at the laptop he had on the table; it was open to a zombie game. He tried to control his face but it just had made it look more twisted. He felt his face from the inside out which just made him want to grin harder. He stood up and walked over to Mello.

He hit Mello on the shoulder, letting his hand rest there. "So did you like your shower in leather?" Matt asked Mello. Mello looked like he was going to turn and hit Matt but once raising his arm and swinging it towards Matt, it rocketed back towards him.

Matt grin turned wicked – the leather was too tight. He started to shove Mello back and forth, making sure to grab him before he fell. Matt could tell that Mello was going to walk away any second…if he could have walked away. More like hobble away.

"You know what's funny about leather and water?" Matt said while his grin became wider. "Leather tightens up pretty bad when it's with water. Say, Mello, you're still capable of movement, right?" Matt's voice held some dark humor to it. Mello could tell that Matt was going to do something…unpleasant.

"Yeah, I am. Just let me go so I can move." He enunciated can.

"You sure?" Matt asked. A concerned expression replaced his mischievous one but there was still a glint of humor in his eye. His shoves became quicker and he started to let Mello slip a little further before catching him each time. "I'm not…but if you say so…"

Matt shrugged his shoulder and let go of Mello's shoulder mid-fall forward. It was obvious that Mello was trying to catch himself, but the leather was just too tight. He fell straight on his face and Matt let out a loud laugh.

Mello muttered something along the lines of, "I'm going to kill you when I get off the ground." Matt walked over to the laptop and picked it up, going towards the door.

"What? I'm sorry I couldn't hear you – I think your leather may have also cut off your vocal chords." He said as he closed the door. He heard Mello huff angrily and then could hear the loud sounds as Mello tried to get off the floor.

Suddenly Matt heard a loud ripping sound and almost dropped the laptop when laughing. He could just imagine Mello's face. I'm so dead. He thought as tears rolled out of the corner of his eyes.

-/-

Later that day, Matt had passed out on the couch. He hadn't slept in two days because he was waiting for a new video game to come out and it had finally been released. Mello had shoved himself out of his leather and was standing, glaring, over Matt's sleeping figure.

All he had on was a pair of cotton boxers, which felt to Mello, extremely breezy in the circumstances. His fists were balled up and his conscience warned him what would happen if he killed Matt. He told his conscience he wished he could kill it.

Matt suddenly opened his eyes, and saw a furious Mello looming above him. He jumped off the couch quickly, going to the other side. Mello looked like he regretted something but Matt didn't know what. Mello regretted arguing with his conscience instead of punching Matt in the face.

"Hey, buddy – I see you got off the floor," Matt said nervously. His hands were extended like he was prepared to catch a flying Mello.

"Yeah, I recall you didn't hear what I said before. Would you like me to refresh your memory?" he basically snarled the last part. Matt began to think that he may really actually be killed.

"Nah, I think I'm good… Are you okay?" he asked nervously.

Mello narrowed his eyes suspiciously. Matt felt a laugh bubbling up in his throat as he said, "Would you like some calming tea?"

Mello screamed, coming at Matt, "I don't need any calming tea!" Matt put his hands up to shield his face and watched as Mello slipped on a full soda can Matt had dropped before taking a nap on the sofa.

His head hit the wood floor cluttered with things with a loud thunk. He didn't get up so Matt went over to see why he hadn't. Mello had knocked himself out – Matt laughed and then grabbed his laptop off the couch and took it to another room. But before he walked out, he threw a quilt on Mello. He also hoped that Mello wouldn't remember a thing when he woke up.