Title: A Mile in Mail's Shoes
Summary: "Matt, I'm not exaggerating or being a drama queen! I just… wish you understood that." "Yeah, Mello? Well… maybe I wish the same thing." MxM switch roles in a redundant yet modern version of the Prince and the Pauper.
Disclaimer: I don't own DN or the plot, but I stake claim to my clever wordplay.
Author's Note: Now… the interesting part. Mello discovers surprising things about Matt. And, yes, Matt has some pretty big secrets that are about to be revealed.
…
"Oh! Mr. Keehl! You must wake up! Your day has begun already! At the stroke of twelve, the spell will be broken! But for now, Mail Jeevas has your life… and you have his! He will have no recollection of being his usual self; he has all of your memories and none of his own. And you–you will also have all your own memories and none of his. Odd, yes, but it's how the spell works. You will live as him until the spell wears off, and during that time, you'll learn what it's like to be him."
Hearing this, Mello opened his eyes to glare at whoever was interrupting his sleep. Unfortunately, once his eyes opened, he could still only see a little. "What the fuck?!" His limited vision settled on a small female with gothic attire, purple hair, and wings.
"Uh, no. Nononono!" Her smile was crooked and jagged like a jack o' lantern, but she seemed so peppy... even with her hollowed-out eye sockets. "Watch what you say to me, Mr. Keehl. I'm what you call a Pixie. We travel all over the world, and at night, we grant the wishes of gamers we've been assigned to! I've been assigned to Mail Jeevas, but he's so selfless, he never wishes for anything… so, I've been keeping an eye on you, hoping the Pixie Council will allow me to grant your selfish wishes instead."
"I'm not selfish," Mello muttered before realization dawned on him. "Hey, you're existence is impossible. Wishes aren't real. And why the fuck can't I see right?!"
The 'Pixie' pouted (if one could call it a pout). "Hold your tongue, Mihael. –or I'll remove it; I can do that, y'know. Now, as I was saying…" She paused, thinking, before continuing. "Anyway, the Council agreed for me to grant your wish last night since it was something that Mail also wanted; he was just too kind to ask. So, to put it simply, he's out dealing with the Mafia, and you must learn to live his life until the spell is over."
"But, why…-?"
"Be careful with your questions, Mr. Keehl. I can only answer five questions throughout the duration of the spell."
"But I can't see!"
"So? You can hear, can't you? Call a doctor or something." She gave a giggle and kicked her feet; she was literally floating. "By the way, my name's Irony. Call for me if you need anything!" With that, the Pixie vanished.
Still, Mello tried to keep calm; he could barely make out shapes and shadows with one eye, and the other couldn't see at all. Miraculously, he felt his way around the bedside table and found the phone. He called up his own personal doc before describing vivid hallucinations and poor vision, hoping to God there was a fixable diagnosis.
The response frightened him. "Mello… why are you calling me? You know you've always been blind in one eye, and your vision in the other eye has been deteriorating for a while. As for the hallucinations, you're probably high-aren't you high most of the time anymore?" He didn't wait for a response before adding: "I'm surprised you're not calling about your leg. I mean –" before he finished, the phone went dead; the damn thing wasn't charged.
Mello cursed loudly and tried to process what this meant.
A) He was practically blind… which (he guessed) meant that Matt usually was too.
B) He was accused of drug use. (Did Matt do drugs? Yes, Mello had caught the redhead with coke once, but it was only that one time…)
C) There was (supposedly) something wrong with his leg. (Matt's legs were fine, right? Then again, he'd seen the redhead shirtless, but they've yet to get too intimate –never seen each other fully naked before. Maybe Matt had a scar? Or a birthmark? Or something…)
Heaving a sigh, he decided to check his legs. First, he noted the new attire –Matt's old attire. In place of leather was a striped shirt that was two sizes too big and a pair of jeans that were worn and full of holes. (Matt needed new clothes; that's for sure.) Ignoring this fact for now, he pulled up one pant leg to find… nothing. Just a pale leg with a surprisingly firm muscle-to-fat ratio for a lazy gamer with a lithe build. Seeing nothing wrong made him somewhat relieved, though he wasn't too sure why. Then, he pulled up the other pant leg and the little relief he felt was gone in an instant. His other leg –his left one –wasn't there. About six inches above where his knee should have been, there was a silicone-lined fiberglass stump pieced together around a socket where a bionic limb could be attached.
Suddenly, in that moment of realization, Mello understood: Matt wasn't lazy –he was handicapped.
…
/Short? Yes, but the purpose of this chapter was to expose Matt's secrets, and I did just that. Review./