IMPORTANT:
All credit for the original conception and first scene of this fiction go to the original author; Konoha's Kage. I have made minimal changes to the first scene and am in no way claiming it to be my original work. If you believe you've read part of this before, you have, it is chapter five in Konoha's Kage's compilation of one-shots titled 'Rays', and if you enjoy this, you'll love her work even more. Please contribute feedback, it is appreciated in any form.
"LIGHT!"
Light heard his sister's shrieks before he heard the sound of her rapid footsteps pound the stairs.
He was already looking at the door when she slammed it open, looking absolutely livid. "What happened?"
Sayu snarled. "You'd better throw that notebook away," she said, referring to the notebook he was currently filling. "Because I quit!"
Light's eyes widened. "What? Why?"
"I can't take it anymore!" she declared. "I'm not lying anymore. I absolutely refuse to talk to your –"
"Shh-!" he interrupted, walking past her and slamming the door closed. "Do you want Mom to hear you?"
"I don't care. The whole world can hear!" she exclaimed, but her voice lowered nonetheless.
He rolled his eyes, but looked at her expectantly. "What happened?" repeated Light.
Sayu threw herself on Light's bed and pressed his pillow up against her face. "'Eiinsthmm."
"Sayu, I may be a genius, but I'm not fluent in that particular language."
She threw the pillow at him, missing completely, and pulled herself up, her face no longer full of rage but guilt. "He said he doesn't think Lucy Night is real, and that I'm just pretending that someone else wrote those poems because I'm modest." She paused, then repeated the sentence that was distorted by pillow. "He kissed me."
Light froze for a few seconds. "…Oh."
Lucy Night was a foreign exchange student from America attending Sayu's middle school. She was an aspiring poetess, and had caramel eyes and soft brown hair. She was Sayu's best friend starting a couple of months ago, when she saw Lawliet while walking past his school on the way to hers. Instantly she fell in love and started writing poems dedicated to him. Sayu had found them. She didn't tell Lucy, but decided to copy them down and give them to Lawliet. For the last few weeks, Sayu had been meeting up with Lawliet and delivering poems. The high-school student was absolutely infatuated by the poems, and he never failed to miss a meeting.
Sayu didn't blame him. She wasn't a fan of poetry, but even she could see how incredible the pieces were – well, the pieces that she could read. In addition to English and Japanese, Lucy knew about eight languages and liked to write in them as well. That didn't seem to hinder the quality of the poems however, and seemed to be even more enhanced by the foreign dialect.
Unfortunately, Lawliet was right. Lucy Night wasn't a real person. Sayu had made it up.
But Yagami Light was.
Sayu had given him hell about it when she first discovered the notebook full of verse. After reading the poems inspired by Lawliet, it was Sayu who came up with the plan to pass them on to the British teen. She had promised her brother that the Lawliet wouldn't figure it out and was right.
"Light, I'm sorry. This seemed so fun at first, but I didn't really expect it to go this far."
"I did," he replied quietly. "It's the power of association. He has never seen Lucy Night, but he's seen you, and associates you with the poems. No matter how much you talk about her, eventually, if he never meets her, he won't think of her as real."
Light wasn't modest, as Lawliet believed Sayu to be. He knew his poems were good – better than good. But he also knew who would appreciate them, and see them for what they were.
So far, many of the poems Lawliet has read are old ones, written before Light met him. The rest were all inspired by Lawliet, all in Japanese or English, and of those Light only offered the dark ones. They were written in frustration, confusion, sometimes disgust, and sometimes worry. The subject of the poems was usually a beautiful night creature with silent steps and long fingers that destroyed, manipulated and examined. Other times it was day monster that had reflective, deep eyes, and it hid in shadows or used tricks of light as distraction.
Light had yet to show Lawliet the poems that were written in sadness of unrealized love, or in awe of beauty, or in desperation of another equal, or in fear of rejection and self-destruction.
"This sucks!" Sayu complained. "Why couldn't you fall in love Ryuga Hideki? I wouldn't mind if HE cheated on you with your little sister!"
"He didn't cheat on me," Light corrected. "And it's not your fault, Sayu." He knew that despite her whining, she still felt guilty for what Lawliet had done. "I guess it's over now."
"What?" demanded the girl. "Why don't you tell him the truth?"
Light laughed. "What would I say? 'Hey Lawliet, I think you're super hot. You have pretty eyes and every time I look at you I want to push your hair out of your face and kiss you. Yeah, I'm that tennis jock that you think has an IQ of fifty. Don't worry, you're not alone, I've manipulated everyone else to think I'm an idiot so I can stay popular, and not a weird nerd like… well, you. Actually, I'm a genius and I wrote you all those love poems. Even the one in fluent French. In case you haven't noticed, I'm gay. I'd really appreciate it if you didn't tell anyone that. Also, last week I stuffed your friend Nate in a locker.'"
Sayu frowned. "Why do you hate his friends so much anyway? I talked to the one in stripes and goggles a couple days ago and he wasn't so bad."
"You haven't seen the leather one," Light snapped. "And River is just irritating. He fits way too well in our school lockers."
"Light! You won't get anywhere with Lawliet if you keep bullying like that. You don't need to be mean to be popular."
"Not usually, but I do now, ever since Kanami Hisao caught me coming out of the school library a month ago. I only barely convinced him that I was looking for the comic book section."
Sayu didn't know whether to be impressed that Light was able to convince someone that a six-hundred page hardback book on the patterns of the Freudian thought process was a comic book (it didn't even have a picture on the cover!) or to be exasperated by the lack of intelligence within his circle of friends. She chose the latter.
"Light, how can you hang out with people like that? You don't even remember their names!"
"What do you mean?"
"Light, do you remember why Takada broke up with you last year?"
"She broke up with me? I thought we drifted apart."
"You called her Misa! While making out with her!"
"Oh, you're talking about Takada. Wait, was Misa the one with the belly button ring?"
"No, Misa's the one with the tattoo on her – The point is, at least with L's friends, you remember why you hate them. In fact, you even have emotions towards them! And you can tell them apart."
"I hardly think that calling them 'hermaphrodite', 'bytes-for-brains', and 'albino freak' counts as telling them apart. Besides, what do you mean emotions? I hate them."
"News flash, genius, hate's an emotion. Usually you treat everyone else one of two ways depending on the convenience: You ignore or charm-to-the-point-where-they-become-zombie-like-enough-to-ignore."
"So I prioritize the people in my life."
"No, you really just don't!" Sayu groaned. "Light, you'd rather Kanami Hisao think you're stupid than Lawliet think you're smart. You can't do this anymore! If you don't tell him the truth, then I will," she warned.
"Kanami's a very influential person, Sayu!" Light protested.
"No he's – Light, stop trying to change the subject with me. I'm calling Lawliet."
"Sayu, wait."
She had her hand's thumb poised over the keys of her phone, and the other hand on her hip, and she tapped her foot impatiently.
Light glanced down at the notebook in his hands, at the line he hadn't finished writing. The graphite was as gray as those eyes, staring expectantly up at him, waiting for him to reveal the words he still had.
"Just… give me some time to think about it, okay?"
His sister sighed, reluctantly putting her cell phone away. "You don't have much time, Light. Lucy Night isn't here to protect you anymore, but you've never needed her."
"Yeah," He muttered, "Goodnight, Sayu."
She sent him one last withering look before she left him to finish his poetry in peace.