"X-ray! When are you planning on-!" Mello's impatient outburst was cut off upon opening the door to the situation in X-ray's room. There she stood, clad in her usual outfit of a knee-length sweater and tights. But something was clearly upsetting her. No, upset was an understatement. The girl stood on tiptoe on her bed, her arms full of the jars that housed her precious, live butterflies. More jars sat at her feet and crowded the bed behind her, instead of being scattered in various points around the room as usual. X-ray's pet hedgehog, Mr. Robinson, was stuffed into the pocket on the girl's sweater, chittering in happy ignorance. Mello stood there, wide-eyed at the situation.
"X-ray? What on earth-?"
"SSSHHHHHHHH!" The girl hissed, her green and brown-mismatched eyes wide with horror as she stared at something on the floor between Mello and herself. Mello frowned.
"Did you just shush me?" He asked incredulously. X-ray shushed him again violently. Mello's frown deepened.
"X-ray what on earth is the matter?!" He demanded, taking a step forward, but freezing as X-ray shrieked and took a step backward on her bed.
"It's going to eat my butterflies!" She screeched, eyes as round as saucers. Mello followed her gaze to the floorboards, where e he identified the disturber of the peace. There, sitting smack-dab in the middle of the floor, as happy as a clam, sat the largest spider both X-ray and Mello had ever seen. It was easily the size of Mello's hand, with all of his fingers spread out. X-ray gathered her jars closer, absolutely terrified. It was not that she didn't like spiders, after all, it's not their fault they're so ugly, but that didn't make them less spooky, or less of a threat to her butterflies. Mello sighed.
"I'll take care of it." He muttered.
"But don't hurt it!" X-ray begged. "It can't help being ugly!"
Mello glanced at the younger girl and smirked. Reaching over to X-ray's desk, Mello retrieved a large book and approached the spider; he held it over the clue-less arachnid, letting X-ray see his full intent.
"No! Mello please do-!" X-ray's plea was cut off as Mello let the book fall and squash the spider nicely with a violent smack. X-ray gasped and Mello looked at her, his triumphant feeling draining quickly as he saw the horror and despair on his friends face.
"You, you k-killed it." X-ray murmured, her knees knocking together violently. When she realized Mello was staring at her she hastily began placing the jars back on the shelves next to her bed, setting Mr. Robinson on her pillow where he curled up and promptly went to sleep, like a good little hedgehog. Grimacing at his mistake, Mello sidestepped the mangled spider remains to climb up on X-ray's bed.
"Here." He said gruffly, taking hold of a jar, only to have X-ray yank it back. He looked down at her, slightly offended. They locked eyes for a moment before X-ray bit her lip nervously, turning away.
"Come on X-ray, it was just a spider. There are plenty of them around here." Mello attempted reasoning her, but her only response was the slight tremor of her body at the 'spider'. Mello growled, he was becoming more and more agitated with each passing second of silence.
"So you're just going to ignore me? Fine then! See if I care!" Mello burst out. Turning on his heel, he jumped off of the bed, slamming his feet into the floor with as much force as possible. When X-ray didn't even turn it made him even angrier, and he kicked one X-ray's handmade sock dolls across the room before slamming the door behind him with enough force to rattle X-ray's jars on the shelf. Only when Mello had gone, did X-ray let a singled, tiny tear slide down her cheek.
"Okay, 'fess up. What happened?" Matt prompted, snatching the mangled chocolate bar wrapper that had been chewed and scrunched into submission out of Mello's fist. Mello huffed, rolled so he was left staring out the window. Matt raised one eyebrow mischievously. Sticking one finger in his mouth, he deposited the biggest glob of spit he could manage directly into Mello's ear canal.
"DAMNIT MATT! What do you WANT?!" Mello roared, sitting up so fast that Matt feared his friend would suffer whiplash. Mello grimaced as he shook his head, trying to get Matt's saliva out of his ear.
"What on earth has been going on between you and X lately? Beyond threatened to knock both of your heads together if one of you didn't fix it." The joking grin vanished from Matt's face. "So what happened?"
Mello grimaced.
"X-ray was freaked out by a huge spider in the middle of her floor so I squashed it with a book. She didn't want me to though, she actually begged me not to. Then she just started ignoring me! I swear I don't know what is with that girl sometimes!" Mello flopped onto his back with an exasperated sigh groan, his hair spreading round his head like halo. Matt nodded and glanced out the window. Something appeared to have caught his attention and he frowned, pushing his goggles up on his forehead to see better. Curious, Mello pushed himself up his elbow to look, and what he saw captured his attention as well X-ray was slowly her way along a flower bed, a jar in one and a butterfly net in the other. Just as the girl closed in on her subject, the small, winged creature fluttered up into the branches of a nearby tree. X-ray stopped, disappointment etched into each feature of her face as she followed the butterfly with her eyes. The two boys watched as X-ray sighed, hanging her head ever so slightly as she turned and walked over to where Beyond Birthday waited for her. The young man smiled and took X-rays jar in one hand, and her small fingers in the other, leading the girl back to the house. X-ray allowed herself to be led back inside, studying her long shadow that stretched out in front of her, letting her butterfly net tang loosely from her fist. Mello stared at the girl's hair, noticing for the first time how it seemed to glow in the light of the setting sun as she and Beyond neared the back door. Seconds later, the two boys heard the back door shut, signaling the return of the un-victorious butterfly hunter. A sharp poke in Mello's side brought his attention to Matt, who widened his eyes and tilted his head toward the door. A second later Mello heard a tiny sigh, followed by x-ray's door shutting softly. Matt raised one eyebrow and pointed at Mello, then jerked his thumb toward the hallway. Mello understood the message. Do something about it, Matt's eyes told him before the brunette crawled into his own bed and turned off the light.
X-ray looked up at the gentle tapping on her door once before returning her attention to the sock doll she was so meticulously repairing.
"Come in." She called. Whoever was on the other side of the door hesitated a moment before opening the entering. Once they had closed the door behind them, X-ray looked up. It was Mello. X-ray stared at him a moment before looking back down to her sock doll. Mello walked forward, holding something behind his back as he approached.
"Look, X-ray. I'm sorry about the spider thing. I shouldn't have squashed it, especially since you asked me not to. But look, I brought you this." Mello then revealed what he had been hiding behind his back. Resting on a branch inside the glass jar was the shimmering, green butterfly that X-ray had been trying to capture the night before. Her face must have lit up at the sight of the creature, because Mello's eyes began to twinkle.
"Are we friends again?" He asked hopefully. X-ray tilted her head at him.
"We never stopped." She said simply, rewarding Mello's heart with a smile as she reached up and took the jar form his hands. Mello grinned and sat down next to X-ray. Everything was back to normal.