Author's Notes: I wrote this as a Valentine's gift for my L back in 2009, but never got around to posting it here. I found it going through my writing folder looking for some other stuff and thought someone out there might enjoy it.
Obsessions & Vices
"Have you always hummed in the shower, Light-kun?"
Light stops immediately, his eyes flicking quickly to the slight gap in the curtain where the open handcuff sits on the edge of the tub. It's the only time he's ever allowed to take it off and L – he can't stand to think of him as Ryuzaki, because he's certain that's not his real name either – insists on remaining within sight so as not to corrupt his observation.
But nothing can ruin Light's good mood today, despite the predicament he's found himself in these days – he knows he's not Kira, damnit – and he raises an eyebrow in return. L is perched precariously on the lid of the toilet in a hunch, but in an all-too-frequent display of his peculiar brand of flexibility, he has one foot drawn up towards his mouth. He is nibbling along the edge of his big toenail, as if he's run out of fingernails and needs a way to compensate. Or maybe L's just compulsive like that… takes one to know one.
"Will the answer somehow affect the percentage chance that I'm actually Kira? Such small things as oddities and vices?"
L's hand extends through the gap with an offering of a towel just a split second before Light reaches to turn the water off, and it unnerves him, how well this boy observes him, studies him – knows his habits, but not him, not really… knows the patterns, but never the reasons – and he purposefully pauses a extra thirty seconds before actually turning the handle. Maybe it'll screw up his percentages.
"The answer itself wouldn't have, but the fact that you avoided said question will be figured in. And a vice? Why would you consider such a thing to be a vice? It doesn't fit the definition of an act that is immoral, evil or depraved."
"And the dictionary entry continues to define it as a fault – a defect or imperfection."
"Do you regularly take to memorizing dictionary entries?"
Light hesitates a moment, but honesty wins. "As a child, I was often bored in school. And yes, an imperfection – and since no one can qualify the definition of human perfection, personality being subjective - you can't negate my own personal qualifiers."
"That was never my intention. I was merely curious. Had you simply answered the question, I would have gained far less insight than you've now given me."
As Light steps out of the shower with the towel wrapped around his waist, he dutifully holds out his wrist to L, who has hopped up and off the toilet seat and in the same motion lifted the handcuff to snap it around Light's wrist. Their eyes meet for a moment as Light contemplates a response, but then he decides it's less trouble to say nothing at all, percentages be damned. L's eyes on his barely clothed body unnerve him far less than the constant reminders that someone he considers a - maybe, possibly, just a little bit - friend thinks he's a murderer.
Light turns to leave the bathroom and L follows him, standing beside the dresser to remove-and-replace the handcuff while Light pulls a soft nightshirt over his head. L retreats to sit on the end of the bed as Light finishes dressing, but he can't help but fill the silence before very long.
"Are you going to tell me what we had to stop by your house to pick up today?"
"No." Light turns down the covers and climbs into the bed, rolling onto his side to put his back to L, the chain draping loosely over his hip.
"What purpose is served by concealing something from me when we are always in the same space?"
"I don't plan on showing it to you." Light closes his eyes as he reaches to turn off the light, but L keeps talking to him, unaffected. It's a defect they both share, this insomnia – but at least he tries, while L… L never seems to sleep – but it's a topic they've never actually touched.
"Then why did you retrieve it?"
"In case I decide I do want it. If I do, then you'll know – if I don't, then you'll just have to wonder."
L falls silent and Light feels slightly smug, awarding himself a victory point, but he also feels suffocated. The knowledge that it's just inside his backpack nags irritably at the edges of his mind now that L has brought it up, but he's not ready to break yet. Behind him, he can hear the detective shifting positions, but only so that he can lean back against the headboard and rest his chin on his knees. L's long, thin fingers tap against his leg with a rhythm not unlike his computer typing and even his breathing is too loud. Tappity tappity tap…
Everything sounds too loud to Light because he hasn't slept properly in days. He can say it's because he's trying to do his own observing in return, find out if and when L sleeps, but it's not the truth, and he prides himself on the truth – how can he be Kira when he can't remember being Kira? His mind won't shut down, it's hit one of those frenzied points that he sometimes gets, and salvation is only an arm's length away.
L reaches for his computer on the bedside table and Light suddenly snaps, sitting up in bed and flipping the light back on. "I… I don't care if you see it. If you laugh – no, you never laugh at things anyway – or how it affects my percentages - " Light cuts off abruptly and turns to L, reaching out to touch the back of the hand at the other end of the chain. "I'll show you what's in my backpack if you can promise me just one thing."
"Promise? I can't acquiesce unless I know what I'm being asked, Light-kun." L turns his wide eyes to meet Light's gaze, flicking down momentarily to Light's hand against his own.
"I don't want to hear another word for the rest of the night about or pertaining to me being Kira." Light pauses as he realizes L is about to interject and lifts his hand, breaking the connection to stop him. "I didn't say you couldn't conjecture – I just don't want to hear about it."
There's a glint of curiosity in L's eyes - more knowledge to be gained by giving up only a little, and only temporarily? "Agreed."
"Promise." Light holds out his hand.
"Promise." L echoes and they shake and Light is surprised when L squeezes his hand for just a heartbeat or two longer than necessary. His hand is far warmer than Light would have guessed.
Sliding off the bed, Light sifts through his backpack until he finds his treasured prize, carrying it over to the television before pausing to consider the connections.
"I didn't know you played videogames, Light-kun. I must admit that it's not what I would have speculated based on the rest of your profile."
Light turns to give him half a warning glare and L stops talking. "I don't, really…"
"But you're hooking up a console."
Light ignores L's propensity for stating the obvious and shrugs as he unravels the controller, deciding that there's no harm in sharing the background if he was going to give away the contents. "This is the only game I play, not that anyone else knows. It's… unusual. My sister was watching a neighbor's children overnight - the reason why is extraneous - and the music was turned up while I was trying to study. I enjoy jazz. I couldn't help but pause to watch them play while on my way to the kitchen for a drink and… I was fascinated."
L has shifted from the end of the bed to the small couch in front of the television, curling his legs up underneath him, and he reaches for a heart-shaped box on the coffee table as Light sits down beside him. The menus whiz by in a colorful blur as L gently lifts the lid off the box, the tiniest flicker of a smile ghosting across his face at his eyes skim the note taped to the lid.
"Chocolate, Light-kun?"
Light glances at the open box as he debates about which level to play. For some strange reason he can't quite label, he wants L to see what he sees, to actually understand the reason before the behavior itself... Maybe the cure to his own insomnia will be the cure to L's? If Light ignores the cool weight of the metal against his wrist, he can almost pretend this is normal. "If there are any caramels."
L delicately plucks a square between his thumb and forefinger and reaches smoothly to press it against Light's lips, a unusually mischievous sparkle in his eyes. "Your hands are busy."
Light can't help the flush in his cheeks as he reacts almost automatically, letting L push the chocolate into his mouth - and is it his imagination that L makes sure his finger brushes against Light's lip before pulling away? "Thanks…"
L's expression stretches into a grin as he watches Light chew and swallow the chocolate, but the other boy never looks away from the screen. "You are… rolling a ball?"
Light licks the chocolate off of his bottom lip and shakes his head. "Not exactly – it's a katamari and things stick to it, but only if they are small enough."
"I fail to see the point…" L plucks another chocolate from the box, strawberry, and pops it into his own mouth as he watches the rolling ball pick up tacks and buttons from the floor.
"Give me a moment…" Light mutters under his breath as he steers the ball over some legos and jacks. "There, you see? The katamari gets bigger and the world changes size accordingly."
"This is the song you were humming in the shower earlier."
It takes Light a moment to answer because L is giving him another chocolate and he's also vaguely embarrassed about the humming, but by now the katamari is large enough to roll out of the house and into the yard, a perfect chance to avoid answering yet again. "Now this is where it really gets insane…"
The two boys continue on this way, eating the chocolates from the heart-shaped box until the katamari is picking up flowers and fruit, rocks and cats and dogs and people.
"The phones ring, the animals make noise, the people scream… every single object, no matter how large or small, is counted, in the tiniest of percentages towards the whole." There's a trace of curious wonder in L's voice and Light thinks he's beginning to understand the obsession.
"Yes! It's genius, really." Light's head is buzzing and he suddenly realizes that the room is starting to spin a little and he laughs. He can't remember the last time he laughed, but he's actually… having fun… and L is now hunched over a much larger box, also red. "It's the only thing that's ever helped my insomnia."
L does not miss a beat even as he is carefully unwrapping something and Light notices that the card on the table bears Watari's familiar handwriting. "How large does it get? A town, a city?"
Light feels warm. "A… a planet…" And then, "L… is there something… in that chocolate… something I…" He's being ridiculous, L would never…
L feels suddenly compelled, but even as he analyzes the feeling, he somehow knows where this is going to end up. Is he pushing it there or is Light? Is it both of them? "It's a true vice, Light-kun…" L pauses to sigh, also unusual. "I am allergic to chocolate-"
The katamari is picking up trees now, it's nearly the size of a house.
"But you eat it constantly!"
Light turns to look at L and the katamari crashes into a freighter in the harbor and several telephone poles fall off because L is holding an elaborate blown glass object and it can't possibly be what Light thinks it is.
"Maybe then, an obsession more than a vice – the domination of my thoughts by a persistent idea, thought or image."
"And a mind obsessed with obsession?" A mind that can't ever seem to shut down…
"Needs a mental break… is that the Eiffel Tower?" L looks up from where he is tearing Watari's precious gift into bits, placing the scraps carefully into the glass.
"And the Great Wall of China – yes, I admit to needing a mental break. And this obsession… it's the mental break from other obsessions."
"Which in and of itself, could be considered a vice – a bad habit – unless…"
"Unless said mental break was the cure for the greater ailment."
The katamari is rolling up the clouds in the sky and Light is headed for the rainbow, knowing it will be the last thing he needs to put it over the top – he will have engulfed the entire world in his ball. His eyes catch the flicker of a lighter in L's hands.
"My cure for yours." L sets the glass down, reaching with two fingers to Light's chin to turn the other boy's face towards his. Light drops the controller onto the floor with a loud thunk of surprise.
And at first, it's just L passing him what he is now entirely certain is not a legal substance, but once that connection is made, it morphs. It's a tongue running along his lip and suddenly their mouths are crashing together, hot and insistent in their mutual exploration. Light fists a hand in L's thick, dark hair as the other boy swings one leg over him.
This too, is an obsession – an idea, an image he can't turn off – maybe it's a vice, an act of immorality, but he doesn't fucking care right now because they must be linked by this obsession, linked like their insomnia, like this case, like the chain from wrist to wrist.
The celebration music repeats into the background and Light closes his eyes against the spinning. L's teeth are against the pulse in his neck and Light slides his hands up underneath the white shirt.
Light can't help the moan that escapes from his mouth as L shifts in his lap to bring their hips together – it's happening too fast, all at once - and it's complete instinct as they grind against each other. Their kisses all taste like chocolate and even though Light has been thinking about this for longer than he cares to admit, he is calmed by the knowledge that he can't possibly be alone in that obsession or this wouldn't be happening. But it is happening – he's thrusting his hips up to meet L's as they kiss again and again and then the whole world is exploding into fireworks of color behind his eyelids. He can hear his own breathing - he's gasping for air.
L breaks the kiss and his head drops to Light's shoulder, his eyelids dip a little. Light's hands are still fisted in the cloth of the shirt, but as he slowly releases them, the two boys slide sideways onto the couch in a tangle of limbs.
"I feel… sleepy…"
L chuckles softly in response to those words and Light thinks it might be the first time he's heard the other boy make such a sound. "As I said earlier, Light-kun… a mental break is sometimes desired. I eat chocolate when it makes me ill because… sometimes it's necessary to feed the obsession before it devours you completely."
L pauses in his explanation, but Light's breathing has already evened out and there's a hint of chocolate at the corner of his mouth. L leans up to lick it off before letting his head drop back onto Light's shoulder.
He hasn't thought about whether or not Light is Kira in almost an hour.
He is not the least bit sorry at all.