Entry to Twinstar's Fabulous Fanfic Contest in aarinfantasy, under the category 'twinstar' and with the pairing Mello/Matt.

TANGO

by Beautiful Taboo

There was a ball at Wammy's House.

According to Roger, it was a party, but everything seemed to have been patterned on a badly-written princess's fairytale. The usually solemn air surrounding the house was put away for a while, and was replaced with little, bright, twinkling lights wrapped around the bushes, and continuously-playing classical music in the background. The rarely-used event hall had been opened, dusted and decorated in the same manner as the House's exterior: tables covered with pristine, white table cloths and food, an elegant wine bowl with a sculpted cherubim, and a small stage where a violin player, accompanied by piano, was stationed. The guests blended right in; they were dressed in expensive-looking branded outfits, with half of their faces covered with masks that the House had prepared for them in advance.

Mello hated every minute of it.

It wasn't because he hated the decorations and the theme (although he was rather sure that he could've done a better job because good God, really, who in his right mind would use those horrid pink doilies?). It was because of the nature of the event. It was a going-away party. For L.

Though there wasn't much difference since L had been out of the House more than he was in, Mello felt somehow that this party would make things official. L had reached the legal age, and he was now officially independent. And he wouldn't come back to stay anymore.

"L needs this party to gather his connections," Roger had explained to all of them prior to the celebration. "You are not to talk to any of these people. They are from high positions in the society, and you are only to observe. Of course, I'd have to give you an assignment, wherein you'd have to profile most of our guests, to at least make sure that you get something out of this event. You may include..." After that, Mello had blocked out his other words as he continued talking about who else was and wasn't going to the party. He didn't feel like doing this assignment anymore. Why would he try to learn about the people who'd take L away?

So now, as the music lapsed into Bach and the couples began to gather, he quietly slipped out of the event hall and out into the garden.

He made a beeline towards the unused gazebo, and he carefully removed his makeshift poison ivy from the seat. Looking around one last time, he sighed in relief before he plopped down. Bending a little, he took out a Calculus book and a pen from under one of the stone seats. He needed a distraction and Calculus seemed challenging enough to take his mind off things.

He was on his third problem, when an unfamiliar voice stopped him.

"Hullo," it began, its English accent sounding acquired rather than natural. "Mind if I sit next to you?"

Mello looked up and found a boy his age, give or take a year younger, with a mop of thick, red hair. He wore evening wear, although he had on a tie with Mario on it and some odd-colored goggles. In his hand, a console was beeping, begging for his attention. Mello narrowed his eyes.

"Yes," he replied curtly.

"C'mon, it won't be that horrible. 'Scuse me." Without waiting for an invitation, he climbed up next to Mello. "I'll just finish this level and I'll bugger off. Ignore me." As soon as he said the words, he bent down, as if curling himself into a ball, and began pressing buttons with gusto.

Mello snarled. No, this boy did not just defy Mello in this particular night when he was having something that resembled female PMS. The last thing he wanted to find out was that he wasn't as scary as he thought himself to be.

"Get. Off. My. Gazebo."

The boy ignored him, and instead, bent down further, as if wanting to hear the music above Mello's voice.

Mello was not patient.

On that second time of ignoring his command, Mello put down his book and pushed the boy by the shoulder. "I said get off!" he barked. "Are you deaf?" With his push, the boy remained intact, but his console jumped out of his hold and onto the floor. The batteries spilled out.

"Aw, man. And I've advanced quite a bit, too." He looked at Mello, more like annoyed rather than mad. "I wasn't able to save that." He jumped out of the seat and began gathering the pieces that tore off from the body. Quickly, he began reassembling the whole thing.

"Good," Mello huffed.

"I don't normally hit girls, you know, but that wasn't really nice," the boy told Mello, though his attention seemed more focused on his game. He pushed up his goggles to his head. "And I thought you were real pretty, too."

"Do I look like a girl to you?"

"Well, yeah, 'cause-" He looked up and as soon as he saw Mello, he ended his sentence with an understanding "oh". He looked down and flushed. "Sorry. You were wearing a tuxedo. Didn't see it the first time."

"And what exactly were you looking at?"

"Your eyes?" His voice rang with honesty.

Mello groaned.

The boy straightened up and placed his console carefully into the back pocket of his pants, in case it was thrown out again. Grinning a bit, he held out his hand. "Nice to meet you. I'm Matt."

Mello considered various responses, but he decided that he didn't feel like doing his problems anymore. He took the hand gingerly and shook it. "Mello. So who are you?"

"I said I'm Matt-"

"No, not that, you twit," Mello snapped. "I mean, who are you to be here? Roger told us that it'll just be older people."

"Ah, Mr. Roger. He's the old guy with the balding head, isn't he? Uptight old man. I was brought here by Mr. O'Connor, from the Wammy's House in Ireland. He told me that I was going to live here from now on. Mr. Wammy wanted me to."

Mello's eyes widened. "You're kidding." Mello knew about the other Houses, but as far as information went, the House only took in genii. Not... street boys who played games and who couldn't make a distinction between males and females. "We weren't told anything about it." He remembered Roger's speech. He could faintly remember something, but he shook his head and decided to let it go. At least this boy didn't seem like as much of a threat as Near was.

"So what are you good at, Matt? Playing games?"

"Yeah. And right, I'm pretty good with my hands, too. Computers and stuff. Mr. O'Connor said that they had to give me away since I was always taking apart our computers and hacking into their emails. Not that moving could prevent me from doing that, though." He nodded towards Mello's book, completely oblivious to Mello's dripping sarcasm. "I guess I'm good at Math, too. And impersonations."

"Which must explain your stupid accent."

"Exac- wait. What stupid accent?" When Mello bent over, snickering at Matt's bewildered face, the redhead took this as a chance to stand closer. "I'm also pretty good at other languages. Um." He counted it off his hands. "A bit of Irish, German, Chinese, and Japanese. Since, you know, they have the best games. And I want them in original."

"Wonderful." Mello rolled his eyes as he jumped out off the seat.

"How about you, Mello? What are you in Wammy's for?"

"Logic. Psychology. Pretty much everything." Mello dusted his shirt smugly, on his face a Whatever you could do, I could probably do ten times better kind of expression. "I'm in line to succeed L, you know." He was twisting the facts a bit, but who was he kidding? He'd beat Near sooner or later, anyway.

"That's so cool!" he gushed. "So that means you've met him, right? L? I think I saw him back there, although he had a mask on. I s'pose you gotta be secure when you're L."

"Obviously," Mello replied, his voice taking on a stiffer tone. "Anyway, we should go back in now. Roger would think that I brought you here. I should at least leave you to Linda. You two would prolly suit each other well." And I should try talking to L, before he leaves at midnight, he said to himself, glancing at his wristwatch. It was half past eleven.

"But it's boring," Matt whined. "All old people. And I have to wear a stupid mask that's making my nose itch." He scratched his nose, and Mello noticed for the first time the sea of light-brown freckles on it. For some reason, the blonde wanted to count them, but he pulled himself back. For a while there, he had forgotten L.

A Piazzolla piece began playing in the background.

"If we go in now, no one would notice," Mello said, suddenly desperate to go in and turn over this new boy to someone else. "They'll be dancing."

"Do you really want to go in?"

"Of course not," Mello snapped again. "But we have to, unless we want get to caught. If I were by myself, I could well enough hide, but I can't help you do the same. I don't need any more red marks on my character card. And I want my gazebo."

"Then you can leave me here, if you want."

Mello was annoyed. "Do you want me to leave you here?"

"No," Matt admitted.

"So let's go. If you think it's so boring inside, then let me tell you now how much you're boring me right now." He took his ivy from where he last put them, and placed them on his seat. Finally, he went down the gazebo and nodded towards Matt.

"If you're bored, then we can do something else," Matt offered.

Mello sighed and put his Calculus book on the foot of the gazebo stairs. "Fine, I'll humour you. Tempt me." He crossed his arms over his chest, looking at Matt challengingly. There was, of course, no way that this childish boy could do something that could at least be more interesting than going inside, which was already boredom at its peak.

Matt began to think. Finally, he looked up shyly, and with a flushed face, he said, "We could dance."

Mello's jaw dropped. "What?"

Matt cleared his throat. "Well, Etude No. 3 is about to finish. And Etude No.4 is nicer."

"Etude what?"

"Etude No. 4. Piazzolla. Music class. Third grade."

"I know," Mello replied, flaming. "I was just testing you."

"Okay," Matt replied. "So, did I pass?"

Mello's mind was a jumble of thoughts. He tripped over his words as he felt his face burn at Matt's smile. "P-Pass, what? Well, yeah, I suppose you pass, I mean, it's not like you were wrong or anything-"

"Perfect. So now we can hang out here. And dance."

"If you're thinking that I'll be the girl, then you're dreaming."

"We can be both boys. They taught us how in the orphanage, since we didn't have any girls." He pulled his goggles down to his neck and looked up shyly. "And I'll take that as a yes?"

"You're still thinking that I'm a girl, aren't you."

"No."

Mello tried to see if he was lying, but he looked sincere enough. In fact, honesty was written all over the boy's face. Sighing, and taking a look around in caution, he walked over to Matt. It would last him about six minutes at most. A lot of time left to talk. "Okay, but just Etude No. 3."

"No. 4," Matt corrected.

"I know, I was just-"

"- testing me," Matt finished. He smiled happily as he offered Mello his hand. "You know how to dance?"

"Are you looking down on me?"

"No, no," Matt said, suddenly panicking. "I'm not. I think you're very capable. I'm worried about me. I have two left feet." He blushed, and his freckles turned red. Almost as red as his hair.

"I've got enough skills for both of us."

"That's what I'm hoping," Matt said, sincerely relieved.

Mello took his hand and he felt Matt's on the lower side of his back. There was a nagging thought at the back of his head that yes, he was playing the woman's part. There always must be a woman's part. He rolled his eyes again, and decided to let it pass. Matt seemed too shaken to realize what he's doing, after all.

As he watched Matt's red-brown pupils follow the movement of his feet, Mello couldn't help but smile. Matt smelled like peanut butter and jam and tea, and it made Mello feel okay. Like everything was going to be alright. It was kind of sad, still, since no one could ever replace L.

Perhaps, he thought, as a small laughed escaped his lips, as Matt's feet clumsily wove themselves together and having him trip all over himself, having this guy over would make things a whole lot better.

The next morning, Roger found two children sleeping on the gazebo's floor, their faces flushed pink from the early rays of the sunrise, and their hands entwined.

As he bent down to bring one of them up in his arms, he somehow had the feeling that this scene was something that he'd see more of in the future.

Despite the growing uneasiness at the pit of his stomach, he smiled.

Fin.