Two: Bias
The drive back home to Wammy House was quiet… well, most of the way.
"Lawliet, how was-" Quillsh began when Lawliet interrupted, as if he had been waiting for him to speak just so that he could interrupt.
"I've decided to take on the case of George Altair's murder," He told him, fingers gripping more tightly to his knees.
"Oh, really now?" Quillsh asked. "It doesn't seem like a case you'd bother with. As far as the police are concerned, it's just about open and shut. They've got all of his friends and enemies in custody and are questioning them."
"Things aren't always what they seem, and besides… this… this is personal."
"Oh, is it?"
"Yes… Miss Cosette… well, we are not friends but…" He paused, mulling over his words. "She has suffered much tragedy in her life, and I do not wish to leave her in the belief that life is so unfortunate. I'd rather her believe this as a lie than become disenchanted. Mr. Altair also cared much about his son, and his kindness towards me despite my… awkwardness… deserves to be rewarded somehow. It isn't a big deal. If it's as simple as I think it is, then it'll just give me something to do in my spare time."
"It'll also give you a reason to go see Miss Cosette again."
"I do not think she is very fond of me. It isn't surprising. Most people aren't," He replied, though he didn't sound too downtrodden. In his years of being Lawliet's assistant/partner, Wammy had discovered this to be fact. Lawliet was… strange (and that was understatement), and he often rubbed people the wrong way.
"So," Wammy said, "does that mean you don't want to see her anymore?"
"Au contraire," Lawliet said, voice flat. "I wouldn't mind seeing her again at all."
Wammy sighed. Teenagers, he thought.
-
Morning came, and Wammy found that Lawliet had up and left the orphanage without so much as a goodbye. His young apprentice, A, and the backup apprentice known as B were the only ones in his office. It appeared they had tried to sneak in to see the magnificent L (at least somebody thought he was cool), only to find he was gone. "I told you he wouldn't be here," B said.
"Well, yes, logically, it was unlikely," A replied, pouting slightly, "but you're the one always telling me to take risks if I want to be like L, B."
"Yeah, well, you're Mr. First-in-Line!" B spat unhappily. "I shouldn't have to tell you anything."
It was hard to believe they were only nine-years-old.
"Boys, please leave this office," Wammy instructed calmly. "Your lessons will be beginning soon."
"Yes, Mr. Wammy," They said, disappointed that they had been caught. They of course had no idea that Wammy was L's assistant, Watari, or if they did, they had yet to claim they had deduced this fact. Wammy saw a lot of potential in young A, if not a bit of weakness when it came to making a decision. B, however… there was something that just wasn't right about that boy. The air was colder around him, it seemed, and his attraction to all things L dwindled on obsession. He feared that he may bring about some problems later in life.
But that didn't matter now. The problem at hand was Lawliet… not that he didn't know where he was, but still.
-
"Why, hello, Mr. Christopher," Mr. Altair greeted Lawliet at the door.
"Hello, sir," Lawliet replied. "I woke up this morning and realized it was Saturday, so I thought I might drop by and see if Miss Cosette could use some company in this difficult time." Truthfully, he'd just wanted to get into the house. He'd investigated a few rooms the day before, but now he wanted more information on George, his life, and his habits. Some of these things would probably come just from searching the boy's room.
However, he didn't get three feet in the door before he heard, "What are you doing back here?"
Cosette was standing on the steps, dainty hand on the railing, eyes sharp and accusing, despite the fact that he had done nothing to be accused of.
"I'll leave you two alone," Mr. Altair, an expert at diving out of sticky situations because of his job, made his exit before he got involved in whatever hormone-driven argument may come soon. He apparently failed to see that Lawliet ran almost completely off of cold logic.
Lawliet waited for him to go, then turned back to Cosette. "I came to investigate your brother's room," He explained, as if invading the privacy of a dead man was not at all offensive. To him it wasn't. After all, he wasn't using it anymore.
Cosette took one more step though did not reach the floor at the end of the staircase. "Why?" She asked, furrowing her brow. "What interest is it to you?"
Lawliet then did something that was most likely foolish, and he was sure he would kick himself for it later. "I am L," He told her simply. That kind of trust with a person he hardly knew was probably the stupidest thing he could possibly do. He honestly didn't know why he said it. In fact, it had just slipped out, without his brain processing the words beforehand.
Is this what girls did to men? Well, he certainly didn't like it.
"No, seriously," She said flatly.
Well, he'd already blurted it out. Might as well keep it up.
"Yes, seriously," He responded.
"That is a ridiculous statement! L has been around solving crimes for years! To be L, you would have had to have been a child!"
"Actually, I started out around the same time I met you," Lawliet replied. "Yes, I was a child. Seven years old to be exact."
She stared at him, mouth open as if she were to make a statement, but no words would come out. After a moment, she scoffed, rubbing her sinuses. "I don't have time for this nonsense. You can do whatever you want, but please leave me alone. I have a music lesson." She brushed passed him, not giving him another look.
Lawliet rubbed the back of his neck and stared at his feet before deciding to investigate. Anything to get his mind off of her for a moment. He might as well be thinking about something mentally stimulating instead of… well, hormonally.
-
George's room was neat and organized like Cosette's but it was far less practical. He saw game stations under the boy's television set and stacks of video tapes and magazines on his bookshelf. The gap between his mattress and the floor revealed video tapes and magazines of a bit more risqué quality. The room smelled of incense, despite the fact that the stuff he kept on his desk hadn't been burned since he'd been gone. Lawliet liked the smell (it smelled of peppermints) and stashed one of his incense sticks in his pocket. The papers on his desk were homework assignments, both completed and in progress. George was obviously a fairly smart boy, a B+ student or so. There were pictures in the desk of him and a group of other boys at parties, drinking their parents' alcohol and listening to their music too loud, as teens often did. He certainly hoped Cosette wasn't the type to follow in her brother's footsteps…
He jeered himself for thinking of such a thing. She was quite obviously not the follower of her brother. She was so stiff and standoffish, it was hard to think that they even lived in the same house, that they were raised by the same parents.
His dresser and closet revealed nothing of interest other than a bunch of name-brand clothes and a marijuana plant that seemed to be dying with lack of care. Maybe pot wasn't entertaining anymore.
Perhaps, George moved onto bigger drugs, he mused, storing it in the files in his head.
Coming down the steps into the lobby once again, he was about to slip off into other rooms to investigate when he was distracted by a haunting sound.
Porgi Amor
qualche ristoro
Lawliet peeked in through the partially opened door to see Cosette standing by the piano with an older man accompanying her. She was singing opera? He'd had no idea she was trained in the field.
Al mio duolo
A'miei sospir!
That was Mozart's "Porgi Amor." He listened to it on occasion, but he'd never heard it sung live before, and certainly not by her. He feared deeply in his head that perhaps his inexplicable affections towards her may have rewarded him with a sense of bias towards her… but he enjoyed it regardless.
O mi rendi
Il mio tesoro,
O mi lascia almen morir!
The song ended, and Lawliet remembered to breathe again. He could hear the voice teacher critiquing her performance, but he was too busy counting her freckles to pay attention to whatever he was saying. After all, it was probably nonsense, since it was obvious that the performance was perfect.
That damned bias.
He knew he needed to get a lid on his emotions before they wiped out his logic, but it was something he was incredibly new at, and he didn't really know what to do.
Before he figured out the answer, he was grabbed sharply by the ear, catching him off guard and causing him to howl out, arms flailing. He was caught by the wrist and pulled away from the door a ways, kicking and screaming, until he realized that it was Quillsh who had taken hold of him and not some insane stalker killer (not that he had one of those… yet).
"Watari…" Lawliet stammered, blinking his raccoon-like eyes at him.
Well, Quillsh had to admit that he was a little stunned that the boy was… well, stunned. Lawliet was so very seldom caught by surprise, but just now he'd been scrambling around like a lunatic, yelling out like some kind of banshee. It was very un-Lawliet-like.
But it wasn't as if the boy hadn't been full of unexpected things. Up until recently, he'd assumed the boy to be almost completely asexual.
"What did I tell you about going off on your own without telling me first?" Wammy asked sternly.
Lawliet wasn't listening to him, and to be honest, Quillsh couldn't blame him, since after all, Cosette was standing in the doorway and if looks could kill, the boy would be dead.
Lawliet swallowed hard, loud enough for all of them to hear it.
"Please," She said, dangerously quiet. "I am in the middle of a lesson. Do come back another time when my family is not so unavailable." Her glare was full of ice.
"Y-yes," They both said, unable to come up with anything else.
"Have a nice day," She said. Both of them found it hard to believe that she meant it.
-
Lawliet had spent the next few hours in his office, whittling away his time on the computer (he kept it on the floor rather than use the desk- in fact, he didn't really have any furniture, preferring everything to be on the floor).
"How's the research coming?" Quillsh asked when he entered with the boy's snack for the day.
"It isn't," He said darkly, obviously displeased from the events from earlier that day. "It's true that he was participating in some more than questionable activities, but I don't see any potential suspects for killing him."
"Well, that's why they arrested his friends-"
"No, Watari. That's the thing. As far as I'm concerned, all of his friends are innocent. I have found absolutely no suspects whatsoever. I'm thinking that the killer may not have been in direct relation to him, or perhaps the killer is more interested in someone else in the family. I'm guessing that it's his father that they're really after. Perhaps a shady business dealer… however, as far as I know, anyone the man has made business with has an alibi for that night. It's very frustrating."
"And to think I thought you were in here distressed over what happened between you and Miss Cosette earlier."
"I understand she is not fond of me, but she certainly has a lot of nerve to look at me in such a way, considering I'm trying to solve this murder case," He grumbled, dropping his sugar into his coffee. "I doubt that she and I will ever make a connection…" His voice had taken on a subtle sound of disappointment, one that someone who did not know Lawliet as intimately as Wammy did would not notice. "It's not that surprising…" He mumbled. "I don't really make a connection with anyone." He slammed the cup down a bit too hard, and the hot, sugary liquid spilled over the top, splashing his hand. "OW!" He shouted.
Wammy knelt down, drying it off with a handkerchief from his pocket. "It's not so bad," He said.
"It's just a small burn."
"That's not what I was-"
"I know…"
The room was silent for a moment before Lawliet spoke again. "Watari… It… seems that my vast knowledge has a flaw in it. I am having trouble understanding the female brain. I… am also having trouble understanding my own functioning."
To describe emotions as functioning. That was so typical of him. "Well, you know that I'm here to help you if you need it, Lawliet."
"Yes, I know…" He took a long slurp on that disgusting sugary coffee, eyes staring at the screen.
Quillsh sighed, wiping up the mess on the floor. Something told him that the next few weeks were going to be very difficult.
(A/N: Just so you know, the song Cosette is singing is "Porgi Amor" by Mozart, and I don't own it. Also, BB and A will not be big parts to this story. I merely brought them in for an appearance because I like them, but pulling them in will not work with the plotline I have planned. Thank you for reading.)
