Title: Bury Me under a Linden Tree
Pairing: Raito/Mikami, Raito/L
Rating: M
Warning: Contains swearing and sex between male characters.
Summary: Raito Yagami is a bestselling novelist, whose books have the strangest effect on people… they make them commit suicide, for example. Teru Mikami is his boyfriend who is starting to bore him to tears. And then there's L, a mysterious poet who catches Raito's interest.
Chapter I: The Light in the Leaves
Raito halted before the door, closing his eyes. His alert senses could catch a TV noise, possibly a baseball match and a smell of food, possibly macaroni and cheese.
He's watching TV, drinking a glass of wine – the first and the last of this evening - and has probably eaten dinner by now, so he is going to tell me that the rest is in the microwave.
Strangely enough, he felt as though all of this has flashed through his head before he was bestowed to the actual sensations and certainly before he set his foot into their apartment.
A dark-haired man sat in front of a TV set, holding a glass of white wine. He wore a pair of black jeans and a green T-shirt.
When he heard the door open, he turned his head to Raito with a warm smile.
"Hello. How was it? Did you win? I've already eaten, but if you're hungry there's still some macaroni left. I've put it in the microwave."
Raito gave him a wry smile. If anything, Teru Mikami was a truly predictable individual.
He went to the refrigerator without uttering a word.
"Oh. So you didn't win," Mikami said, watching with increasing worry Raito's disarrayed movements as he rummaged about in the fridge, occasionally tossing a food item on the floor.
"Then who did?" he asked.
Raito gave him a furious glance.
"Some poet, a complete naught nobody has ever heard of before the jury found his works in trash or something, because apparently they never went to regular print. Imagine that he didn't even bother to show up and receive the goddamn award. Fuck. I don't want to talk about it," Raito concluded and finally slammed the fridge door because he had found what he was looking for. A bottle of vodka.
"You shouldn't drink anymore, Raito, I think you've had enough," Mikami frowned.
"Why did I know that you were gonna say that?" Raito smirked and had a long gulp straight from the bottle.
Now you will stand up, try to take this bottle from me, I'll resist, we'll argue and then make up and end up in bed.
When Mikami rose from the sofa, Raito willingly put the bottle aside.
"Let's skip the arguing part. I want to take you right here and now," he said with a lopsided drunken smile.
A second later he regretted that he disrupted the scheme, because now his fury wouldn't leave him, even when the other man obediently lay down on the sofa, taking off his clothes. But there are other ways to overcome anger, aren't they.
The TV was turned off, as well as all the lights. Only the moonlight poured into the room and Raito took in the milky pallor of the other's skin, broken only by the dark pools of his nipples and the shade of his crotch.
He himself didn't bother with undressing; he just unclasped his belt and pushed his trousers and boxers down. He gave his lover a rough kiss on the mouth and one of his hands started to stroke his member, while the two fingers of the other dove deep inside Mikami's body, preparing him.
All happened in such haste that they didn't have the time to fetch the lube. Teru winced when Raito entered him. He's always like this when he's drunk, he thought, but soon all thoughts left him and he just lay there writhing on the sofa, moaning uncontrollably.
Raito was rocking his hips and his thrusts were increasing in speed and depth, until he was hitting the other man's sweet spot with a violent vehemence. Teru's eyes became blurred with pleasure that merged with pain, until he couldn't tell them apart anymore.
Finally Raito came and spent himself into his lover, collapsing onto him and falling asleep in the following instant.
Teru gently detangled Raito's limbs from his own, stood up, ignoring his soreness and went for a blanket. After he had made sure that Raito was covered for the night, he went to their bedroom and lay on the bed, staring at the ceiling until the darkness took him.
…
Raito arrived at the high iron gate. He pressed the doorbell, watching the white building rising across the perfectly cut green lawn.
So this is the famous Linden Hills sanatorium. It's said to be quite an expensive place. That kid must be rolling in money. That was Raito's first thought, but immediately after that he grew ashamed of himself. He was visiting an invalid, after all. He shouldn't be thinking about the state of his financial affairs. It was enough that he was speaking so ill about that person the other day, suspecting him of superiority and haughtiness, while in fact he couldn't receive his award due to a serious illness.
A voice asked him what his business was, and Raito explained the purpose of his visit. He was allowed entrance and before he reached the building he was greeted by two doctors, who escorted him to the patient.
The room agreed with Raito's image he had formed beforehand – it was a place quite different from standard sterile hospital settings. It showed that its occupant has been staying there for a long period of time, because now it resembled a place a person might inhabit at their home. There was a wardrobe, a stuffed bookcase, working desk with a computer and various personal items scattered on the floor, namely papers, books and sweets.
"You couldn't have someone clean this place?" one of the doctors whispered angrily.
"But I did, just two hours ago!" The other one opposed, before both of them left the room, leaving Raito alone with the patient.
The patient was a skinny, pale man of no more than twenty-five, with dark circles under his eyes and dark ruffled hair. He was half lying, half sitting in his bed, his hands grasping the hem of his blanket. He was staring at Raito with a completely blank face.
"Hello," Raito said, "I'm really glad that you agreed to meet me. I've read your poems and I thought that I absolutely have to see you."
"So now you see me," the pale man said, quite offhandedly.
"Erm, yes," Raito started to feel a little bit uneasy, but then reminded himself that this was a genius poet living in a sanatorium, so he should be prepared for pretty much of anything.
"Well, I'm Raito Yagami. Nice to meet you," he resumed smoothly.
L – that was a penname of a man named Lawliett Wammy, which was one of the few pieces of information about him that Raito had managed to find out – didn't respond to that. His eyes were roaming through the room and together with his strangely slouched posture reminded Raito of a trapped bird.
His next words only strengthened the impression:
"I don't like it here, it's suffocating. Wouldn't you mind going for a walk?" he asked.
Raito nodded, slightly bewildered and L pressed a button on the wall to summon a nurse.
"I wish to take a walk in the gardens with my guest," he said, after she came. In no time a wheelchair was delivered, and the nurse helped him into it.
They entered the gardens, Raito pushing the wheelchair.
"I apologize for making you do this," L spoke up, "they offered me an automatic one many times before, but I always refused. I would feel too mechanical if I used that, if you understand what I mean."
"I do," Raito replied and pushed the wheelchair without complaining.
They followed the paved road in a slow pace, taking in the scenery. There were many trees; oaks, beeches and mainly linden trees that had given the sanatorium its name, and also cultivated bushes and flower beds. Other patients enjoyed the fresh air as well; there was a solitary figure sitting on a bench in a shade of an aged oak, reading, and two women walking past the white brick wall, separating the garden from the rest of the world.
"I liked the time axis reverse idea," L said, "it's not an entirely new one, but I have never seen it carried out on such a large scale."
His habit of uttering unconnected statements at first served to confuse Raito, but he soon grew accustomed to it. It took him just a few seconds to realize that L was talking about his latest book.
"I don't remember how it came to me," Raito said. "I guess that it was in one of these moments you do something that you immediately regret afterwards and the only thing you can think of is: if only I could turn back time. I guess I just carried it a little bit further."
"I found it quite interesting. But I still like Dear Wilhelm the best. I only wonder," L made a short pause here and they entered a group of linden trees that grew close to each other, secluding this part of the road from the rest of the garden, "how you feel about all these suicides."
Raito took a deep breath. This wasn't the first time he heard this question; it was quite a favorite with the media. Well, that was understandable, because Dear Wilhelm, a modern-day adaptation of Goethe's Sorrows of Young Werther, was said to provoke a wave of suicides of more than eight hundreds of mostly young people who closely followed the method described in the book.
"I didn't expect that at all. At the time I wrote it I didn't even know that Goethe's original work caused such upheaval; I just got my hands on the book and was amazed by it. I thought that with some rendering it has something to say to a modern reader, something valuable. Of course, I couldn't help expressing some of my own ideas and opinions along with the original message, but I consider this minor."
"I heard you say that in one interview," L calmly replied. Raito gritted his teeth, mad at himself. Automatic responses were one thing, but next time he really should take the trouble to change the wording at least.
"It makes perfect sense. I just think it interesting when a week after the media made a fuss about Japan leading a world suicide chart the top-selling novelist publishes a book promoting suicide."
Raito gave the wheelchair a too strong push, so that L's head slightly hit the backrest.
"I'm sorry," he said, "it was an unfortunate coincidence. Besides, I was by no means promoting suicide. It's just that my hero was left with no other choice, just like Werther. People should cease to think that when a writer describes something without openly denouncing it, he automatically approves it. "
Busy justifying himself Raito overlooked a pothole and the wheelchair made a jump, L's head hitting the backrest harder this time.
"I'm really sorry," Raito said, automatically stretching out his hand to touch the sitting man's head.
Silky, he thought, his hair looks rough, but it's in fact more silky then Teru's-
"You've said that once, too," L proclaimed.
Shit, this wasn't even the same interview! And I did change the wording this time. That little prick has a disquietingly sharp memory. Or he has a special interest in me; I don't know which one is worse. What exactly is he trying to achieve by this conversation?
"Please let's stop here for a while, this is my favorite place."
Raito made a few steps and preceded the sitting man.
They reached the end of the linden road; the distance between the trees increased, letting in the streams of sunshine. There was a narrow strip of lawn and then there was already the white brick wall, which in this part of the garden was covered with ivy. In a shade close to the wall stood three grey boulders.
"Are these graves?" Raito asked incredulously, looking at L.
"Yes, some people who die here wish to be buried in this garden. Yagami-kun, have you ever thought about the power a writer holds? Someone said that the pen is mightier than the sword and they weren't far from truth. When a genius wishes to make an ordinary human do something, there's nothing to stop him. I can imagine an individual, a bored, spoilt young man, who detests actual physical violence but is fascinated with power. Everything always came easy to him and he knows he could excel in anything he chose, including writing. But that too is so easy that it bores him. Then one day he reads Sorrows of Young Werther and learns about the events its publishing caused, asking himself: 'Can my writing do that? ' And then he takes up the challenge."
No critic or journalist had ever dared to tell Raito that.
Raito laughed, but it sounded rather forced.
"You have an interesting way of thinking…Lawliett, may I call you that?"
"If you wish so, Yagami-kun."
"But enough about my works; I came here to discuss yours. They're…" Here he was forced to stop, because he couldn't find the right words. Not that there weren't hundreds of descriptions buzzing in his head – what the jury said before they proclaimed L a winner, and what all the critics said, for last week the collection was finally published and caused quite a sensation – for a poetry.
But Raito was sure that was he to repeat any of this, a collected, indifferent but strangely alluring voice would tell him that he had already heard that. Besides, anything of this didn't reflect his real opinion.
"Unique," he finished lamely, "I'm sorry, but I can't put it into words. I'm not a critic or scholar. It's just… when I read your poems, they strike a chord inside me I wasn't even aware that it existed before, and all I can think is, like, this is it. I don't even think that they are beautiful, because that's what you say when you see a sunrise or when you look from a viewing tower on a fine day, and your poetry is nothing like that. It is something more."
There was more on his mind; a comparison with his own work, for instance. Of course he knew that to compare poetry and prose was pointless, but Raito couldn't help it. Where he himself used cold calculation to achieve a certain effect on a reader, L used – Raito didn't know what it was, but it was as alien to calculation as a sunflower to a computer tomograph. And he was sure that he would never have it.
"I like you more for saying this," L said with a wan smile, intently gazing at Raito. "Will you be my friend?"
Raito was little taken aback by this, because the person asking for his friendship was insinuating that he made his readers commit suicide on purpose a moment ago. Nonetheless he nodded his agreement.
Soft breeze was playing with L's hair and the streaks of golden light gave his face an ethereal quality. He spoke up and talked about spring, birds crying in the distance, yellowish, fragile stalks of weed yielding under the sweeping wind and many other things.
Raito wasn't able to recognize the exact forms of the words; they went straight into his heart, leaving burning images there.
And that animated, glowing face! Its pallor disappeared, together with certain dullness in the eyes that had made them appear dead; now they were pools of inverse light shinning through the leaves and the wall, a light that couldn't be stop with material barrier but penetrated everything, spreading to the width and rising above. It flew and Raito flew with it.
It was the most wonderful thing he had ever seen or felt.
…
When he came home, a second before he entered a smell of a fried fish and potatoes filled his nostrils.
A fish, that means Friday, he's been in the gym and now he's back, waiting for me with the dinner. He's probably reading some materials…no, wait - he's watering his stupid flowers.
Teru Mikami put aside a small green plastic watering-can.
"Hello. Where have you been?"
"In a sanatorium," Raito replied, exhausted. This was like leaving wild moors offering hundreds of exciting adventures to visit an insurance agency. Everything was seen before, predicted, and repeated with a dulling monotony.
Teru looked at him with expectation. He obviously wanted to hear more about the sanatorium. But Raito was in no mood to tell him. How could that ever be told? And to him, of all people?
To maintain a communication is an important point in a relationship, an empty sentence he had probably read in some of those idiotic how-to-live-your-own-life advice books flashed through his mind. He grimaced.
"And how was your day?" he asked with no real interest, just to change the topic.
Teru froze. Act normally, just act normally, you can do it. He took a deep breath.
"Fine; there was just some quarreling in the office," he said, his velvety voice trembling ever so slightly.
…
Teru Mikami was sitting at his desk, eating a sandwich. He was having his everyday thirty-minute lunch break. His eyes were wandering out of the window, taking in the glass and steel structure of some other business building across the street, but they didn't really see it.
He will cook a fish tonight. He usually did that on Fridays, maybe he should alter it sometimes, he thought, but Raito liked fried fish. And then they will talk. He'll ask him what he was doing all day, for Raito didn't share his plans with him in the morning, and Raito will tell. It was bound to be something interesting; Raito lead such an exciting life. And then they can watch a movie together, it's been long since the last time they did that, maybe something romantic with lots of emotions and preferably with one or more of the main characters dying, Raito likes that kind of thing-
A hand on his shoulder snapped him out of his thoughts. It was Tarou Hamaguchi, a senior lawyer of about forty-years of age, and he was looking at him with his small, cunning eyes. Mikami didn't like this man.
"You heard about Tanaka's wedding?" Hamaguchi asked.
"Yes, sir," Mikami replied, slightly confused. Everyone in the office had heard of that; it wasn't the hottest gossip anymore. Why was Hamaguchi bringing that up now?
"We were wondering when you would tie the knot," Hamaguchi said with a sly smile.
"When I would do what?" Mikami asked with a blank expression.
"You know, walk down the aisle, get hitched… get married," Hamaguchi finally snapped, all of his patience having evaporated. He sometimes forgot that Teru Mikami wasn't a man to play with words. He disliked puns, periphrases and metaphors. If one has something to say, they should do it directly, because it saves time for the both sides concerned - that was his motto. People sometimes wondered why he chose to become a lawyer with this attitude – and how he could be so successful in the job.
"I have no plans considering this matter," Mikami responded, "I'm afraid that I have yet to meet the right person."
Then the "we" that made Teru worried before materialized itself in the form of Takeuchi and Ogata, another two of his colleagues and Hamaguchi's friends. They weren't Teru's friends.
"Then we can help you," Ogata said, baring his slightly tobacco-yellowed teeth in a smile.
"Let's go to a bar together tonight and we'll help you find someone."
"I'm sorry, but I'm engaged elsewhere," he said coolly.
"And what about tomorrow?" Ogata persisted.
"Thank you for inviting me, but I already have plans for the weekend," Teru said, wishing that the lunch break would be over soon.
Hamaguchi turned to the other two with a look that made them leave immediately.
"So, Teru-kun," he drawled when they were alone in the room, leaning menacingly across the desk, "you have no female friend and yet you have a meeting tonight, and your weekend is so busy scheduled. How could that be? Are you working yourself to death? Or you spend all of your spare time with your precious old mother?" Hamaguchi asked and his mocking eyes traveled to the photograph of Mrs. Mikami that her son kept on his desk.
Teru put aside the unfinished sandwich when he realized he had been grasping it tightly for the last five minutes, not taking a bite. His hatred for the man increased with every passing second, and his patience had reached its limits.
"What I do in my spare time is none of your business," he said icily, "Please allow me to end this conversation here, Hamaguchi-san."
"I won't allow anything of the sort," the older man snapped, hitting the desk with both of his hands, "there's something I want to tell you. The social paradigm has shifted, they say. First the Korean got their rights, then the Eta and at last the fags, but this is a good old place and it is exactly the same as when my grandfather used to work here, and no new order is required.
We need real men to execute the law, not weak limping fags who even dare to think they are something better than us and avoid our company."
Hamaguchi took a breath and gave the stunned young man a triumphant look.
"I hope you'll take the hint, or otherwise I'll have to talk with the boss, Teru-chan," he concluded and left the office.
This affected Mikami more than it should have. He bitterly regretted that he was taking himself too seriously, that he wasn't able to just laugh and let it pass, because it wasn't that bad – he only will have to be more careful about covering the consequences of Raito's rough nocturnal treatment, and have a glass of beer or two once in a week with the people he detested, making up some lies about the women he slept with, and they'd leave him alone, he was sure of that. But it badly wounded his dignity.
He worked hard for his career, which he didn't choose for easy money but for the chance to actually help people, to deliver justice, lame as it may sound. He didn't deserve to be mocked so cruelly just because he happened to love another man. And then there was his mother…
This was so easy for Raito, he thought. His position was a completely different one. He could date anyone he pleased, because writers were perceived as artists and therefore allowed to have their eccentricities. Lawyers didn't have that liberty, especially in a firm as old, respectable and rigid as was the one Mikami worked in.
He wouldn't tell Raito, he decided, because he would feel guilty for having caused him the trouble. That's what Teru said to himself, but an annoying small voice in his head was telling him that he was deluding himself and the only reason why he shouldn't tell his lover about what had happened was that Raito wouldn't care a fig.
…
"I'm glad to hear that," Raito said, having obviously switched off his attention just after 'fine'.
Mikami just nodded, forcing a smile on his lips.
With that their mini conversation was over. Raito produced a small book from his pocket, went to the living room, sat down in a large armchair and started to read it, or rather re-read it, for Teru noticed that it was the same volume that Raito often took into his hands these days. On its cover was a picture of a dark-haired young man dressed in a simple white shirt.
"What is it that you are reading?" Teru asked.
"It's Light in the Leaves. It's the book that won the Kuroda award this year."
"May I?" the lawyer asked and Raito handed him the book.
"That's the author? He looks young," Teru noted.
Raito shrugged his shoulders.
"We may be about the same age," he said.
Teru ran out of the things to say, for he never read poetry. He disliked everything that was not expressed clearly, after all.
"Well," he finally was able to come up with a comment of some kind, "They always use these black-and-white pictures on poetry covers these days, don't they. They probably think it's cool or something."
Raito smiled.
"It's not a black-and-white picture, Teru. He actually looks like that in color."
"You have met him? But it's written here that he is seriously ill and never leaves the Linden Hill --- sanatorium. Oh, I see. So, what is he like?"
Raito took back the book and his gaze left Mikami's face, fixing on something in the distance.
"Interesting," he said at length, "very, very different from you, Teru."
TBC