"The human whose name is written in this note shall die."
The beginning of a story, the end of a life.
He sat in his room, behind his desk, reading. This was the third time he was reading the whole Death Note story. He liked it, often thought of it. Or, did it obsess him? It appeared to him that he started acting different since a few weeks, when he started reading this manga. This was not the first manga he read. Naruto, Full Metal Alchemist, Shaman King, Letter Bee, Hikaru no Go, and that's just the tip of the iceberg. But this one… This one had a strange effect on him. He was not easily scared, but, he was very cautious now.
He was one of the smartest kids in class, though he'd never call himself that. Light seemed so just to him, and so did L. He understood that killing people was a bad thing to do. But a new, better world needed some sacrifices. And L… he was very smart, of course, but he couldn't think of a way to create a new and better world. This was his one big disappointment in L.
If he had to choose who to be in Death Note, he didn't know who to be. Probably Ryuk. All others ended up death, unhappy or he simply didn't like them. Ryuk was also pretty miserable… Just bored to death and addicted to apples from the human world. How would he react if he knew that nowadays an apple is not always a piece of fruit, but also can be a cell phone?
The thought of that made him smile.
Outside his house he heard a big "bang". Immediately he stood up to see what it was. Was it… could it be… A shinigami? No, of course not… But still he hoped, to meet a shinigami, someday, and talk to him. Without even looking out of the window he went to bed. It had been a long day at school, so he was very tired. He closed his eyes and fell asleep.
In the middle of the night he woke up. He looked into his room. It was all dark. He could see the silhouette of the chair near his desk. As he kept looking at it, it seemed to move… His eyes tried to see through the darkness. The chair, or what looked like a chair at first, moved towards him. It grew taller and it's shape changed. He couldn't believe his eyes…
"Today we're going to start with something new." Began his math teacher. This was the only thing he could hear. He was totally distracted by something, by last night… It took hours for the teacher had finished his story.
Finally math class was over. Time to go home.
While he sat behind his desk, he finished reading Death Note for the third time in a row. Tomorrow he'd start reading it a fourth time.
As he lay in his bed, he was thinking about this wonderful world. Birds could sing, the sun could shine, people could be happy…
As he lay in his bed, he was thinking about this rotten world. Birds died of the oil people threw in the oceans, storms could tear houses to pieces and people were capable of murdering each other.
A new and better world… How to create one? Murder all criminals and in the end yourself, because you became a criminal yourself? Or do nothing, hoping that the world would change itself? Could it? Probably not. But, who says the world is bad the way it is right now? Maybe it is not perfect, but neither are people. Why should we expect something (or someone) to be perfect, while we can't even be perfect ourselves? He thought it was impossible for a human to be perfect. But, humans didn't had to be. That's just the problem: people want to be able to choose, but find it hard to make decisions. They want to be free, but don't always know how to handle freedom. They want to be perfect, but they can never be so.
People want to live, but are afraid to die. Rather not live at all, in order to never die? People could die… He could die! What if he died? He couldn't just die right now… He had to make something of his life. Maybe he had plenty of time to make something of his life, but, what if this was his last chance? Once you get a chance, you can either grab it or let it go. This chance had to be grabbed, no matter what!
At school he was always very shy, didn't spoke a word, nobody knew him. This had to change, as soon as possible. He didn't want to die… He didn't want to stay unknown, at school, or, just everywhere… He didn't want to continue his life the way it was going right now. He was sure of it.
Weeks passed, and he didn't feel happy. He was scared. Scared to waste his life, scared to die, to get a heart attack… Of course he knew this way he wouldn't change anything. He really wanted to change, but…
Another month had to pass before he saw it couldn't go on like this. But, what to do? He was already shy, and even more now he was scared all the time, or at least very cautious. What to do, what to do…? He thought of that night two months ago. Then he walked through his room, got something from under his bed. Gently he held it in his hands, as if it was very special, vulnerable maybe. Without a sound he opened it.
Next day he woke up too late, and hurried to school. It was full of people, everyone walked in every direction. They were walking to their classes, this meant he was just in time. He didn't like big crowds that much, but there was something strange. As he knew still most of the people didn't knew his name, he was still kind of nobody at school, he disappeared between the people, became part of the crowd. And for the first time in months, he smiled again.