Disclaimer: I duz nawt own teh Deth Nowtez, beeches.

A/N: Well, here's your next chapter. Enjoy.

Song of Choice: Delicate - Damien Rice


Los Angelus, California. 7:03 P.M. PDT. Monday.

"That Linda girl is nuts. Crazy," Matt mumbled, more to himself than anything, as he poured milk into the glass in front of him.

Across the table, Mello scoffed, brushing blonde hair behind his ear. "Tch. All artists are crazy, that's what I say."Matt nodded agreeably, as he always did, though he was certain that the stereotype couldn't be completely true since he knew that quite a few artists were brilliant. But then, most things Mello said had at least some accuracy to them, so maybe not.

Not particularly caring to think on the matter Matt slid Mello's milk over to him and started sipping at his, watching Mello carefully as he lounged in his chair, never quite meeting his eyes as he looked around the room. Watched the way occasionally the blonde would smile a bit as his eyes landed on something with special meaning, or something with special memories attached to it. Mello really wasn't home enough.

Matt's gaze turned downcast, staring into the milk sloshing about in his glass. "Linda said you were dead. That you'd been dead for… a while."

Once again Mello scoffed, almost rudely this time, and when Matt glanced up the blonde was on his feet, pacing across the room to inspect the calendar as he sniggered, "Me? Dead? Hah!" The way Mello said it, it made it seem like the most ridiculous thing in the world. Matt still gave him a strange look, his mind still not wrapping around the fact that Linda would lie to him, but the befuddled expression vanished into a small smile as Mello gave him a blunt look.

"I'm not dead, Matt," Mello repeated, stomping across the room and laying a kiss on his forehead. Against his skin, Mello whispered in a rare tender tone, "I'll always be here with you."

Matt felt a blush taint his face, though no happiness came with it, and he whispered a pleading, "Promise?"

"I promise," Mello said.

And oh how Matt wanted to believe him as he watched him turn around and hurry out the door, just as he had mentioned he would; he had to leave to go to work again. Illegal work.

Slowly, Matt turned around to look at the empty chair across from him where Mello had sat. Staring at the full to the brim glass of chocolate milk across the table, for everything in him Matt could not remember weather he had seen Mello take a sip.


Outside Los Angelus, California. 3:16 P.M. PTD. Tuesday.

Matt didn't want to be here.

"What do you mean doesn't… remember it?"

Everything in him wanted to leap out of his chair and dash out of the house. Or, better yet, to close his eyes and pretend like none of this was happening. It was hard, though, when their whispers about him came through the walls.

"I don't know… maybe he has post traumatic stress disorder? PTSD?"

"I guess… I'm not a therapist though."

Matt squeezed his eyes shut, pressing himself further against the chair. Linda had situated him here, telling him to relax until Halle and Linda had finished discussing in the other room. They were in there, he could hear them - they were discussing about him, his life, his future. What they would do about him.

"…What about the funeral? Mello would want him to be there."

"Is that smart?"

Matt wanted to scream. He wanted to cry. Maybe even die. Anything to end the mind-numbing confusion, the pounding of his temples as he tried to decipher just what was happening. He knew only a few things. Where he was, the date, and that Mello loved him.

That, and that he wanted them to stop talking through the walls.

Halle clearly had no intention of listening to him. "I don't know… I'm telling you, he doesn't believe me. He wouldn't pick up my calls, and when I came to his apartment, he just stared at me like I was some sort of alien and said 'oh, Halle. Mello just left.'"

"Seriously?"

He had. He had just left. Matt wasn't crazy.

He was there.

There with him. Drinking chocolate milk.

"Yeah… isn't it sad?"

Matt wanted them to be quiet. Yet even pressing his palms against his ears did not silence their words, only muffling their passage into his mind, scrambling everything he thought and wanted to know.

"How are we going to get it through to him? Prove it?"

"Maybe if he went to the funeral…?"

Funeral? No. Mello didn't need a funeral? Whose funeral?

"Maybe… but you know there's no body or anything… they can't even use his real name…"

"Jesus…"Suddenly the redheads hands jerk from his ears, smashing onto his lap to instead grip the fabric of his shirt. Biting into his lip and tasting the blood there when he did this far too hard, but not minding the pain at all until he released it to whisper a plead into the air. "Shut up… please…"They couldn't hear him. Nobody could. "I know. Man… do you think he'd see a therapist?"

Shut up.

"I don't know, man. Matt's stubborn."

Shut up.

"We had a thing at Wammys, you know. We'd always say that, if one of them died, the other wouldn't be too far behind. Guess it was more accurate than I thought…"

"Don't talk that way. Matt will be fine."

Shut up.

Shut up.

Shut up.

"Halle, I don't think he's fine now."


Outside Los Angelus, California. 6:03 P.M. PDT. Tuesday.

Matt woke up in an unfamiliar bed.

The lighting in the room was dim, and only when he squinted could he see that it was because the dark purple curtains had been pulled over the only window, and the lamp beside his bed, the only light source he could see, had been flipped off. It took him a moment in his grogginess, but he realized that he must be in Linda's house by the expanse of art on the wall.

"This sucks," Matt muttered exasperatedly to himself, looking up at the ceiling. He couldn't remember it completely, but he was fairly sure he had fallen asleep on the couch. He had to wonder what the girls had decided about his future. After all, it had pretty much been deemed he was a complete nut-job.

Matt smiled as he pictured Linda's shocked expression if he were to call up Mello right now and have her talk some sense into her.

Rolling his eyes Matt slid out of bed, strolling aimlessly around the room as movement tended to help him think, despite his irritation with the overly-plush red carpet as it smothered his toes. Nothing was making sense as of right then, and like hell he was going to let them drag him off to a crazy home when he was clearly perfectly sane. Well, as sane as a normal Wammys child at least, which in retrospect wasn't all that sane at all.

But still. Matt still saw himself as a sane individual, one that had a boyfriend to come home to, and that will have blown a gasket in irritation by now if he realizes that Matt left home for this long without telling him. Matt smiled. Ah well. At least he'll pay attention to me while he's angry with me.

It was about 30 minutes before there was rapping knock on the door, one that was so light that he almost didn't hear it. He didn't have the chance to say 'fuck off' or 'come on in' (really, at that point, the first would have been more likely) the door swung in and a certain familiar fluff ball shuffled in uninvited.

Matt's eyes narrowed slightly at the boy as he plopped down on the chair without a word, grey eyes never even once landing directly on Matt, though the redhead knew he was being watched in his peripheral vision.

Slowly, Matt sank into a sitting position on the bed. Once he had made himself comfortable, Matt turned to the albino and spoke. "Sup, cotton ball?"

Near looked up at him with a rather empty look in his eyes, one that caught Matt off guard. Near gave most people the 'I-have-no-soul-fear-me' look, but never Mello and certainly not him. What surprised him more, though, was what Near said. "Matt, I have to ask you to take off your shirt."

Matt would have choked on his ramen noodles had he been eating any. Instead, he simply choked for air for a moment, coughing for a few seconds to hold back surprised laughter, thinking for sure that Near had just made his very first joke.

He hadn't. In fact, he continued to simply stare at Matt with a dead serious look, straight in the eye, until the laughing nervously subsided. After a second it fully dawned on Matt that Near wasn't kidding in the slightest and he paled, giving Near a quizzical look. "Near… dude… why?"

Near stared at him bluntly. "Take it off. And look in the mirror."


Outside Los Angelus, California. 6:39 P.M. PDT. Tuesday.

Matt's mind was numb as he stared at himself and his bare chest, disbelieving of the marks there. They were mostly healed now, but the charred black marks were still there, the red, flawed skin around the wounds still visible. There they were, those unfamiliar marks on his body, among the many firm liar bruises and scars from years and years of abuse that were still visible there.

Choking down a cry of disbelief Matt reached up to carefully prod at one of them with his fingertips. They stung the tiniest bit, but they were clearly not new and had been there at least a month.

Matt wasn't stupid. He had experience with being shot as well as shooting others, and even if he didn't, he'd watched enough crime shows to know that these were gunshot wounds. Gunshot wounds he shouldn't have survived, but did. Gunshots he definitely should have remembered, but didn't.

He had felt the eyes on him for a long time now, burning two extra holes into his back, as if he didn't have enough in his chest. Not bothering to turn to look at him, eyes still locked on his own reflection, Matt said, "What're you looking at, Near?"

"You," Near replied flatly. "Still not realizing your own mistake."

Matt couldn't reply even if he had a good retort, too fascinated by the wounds on his chest. He supposed they had always been there, but he hadn't ever really questioned them, never really paid enough attention to actually notice them. Perhaps he really did get drunk too often, really was too busy now a days when he wasn't…

"Matt," Near said a bit impatiently, "You got shot. Eight times. It was in effort to distract Takada's guards from chasing Mello, part of the mission to kidnap the Kira-supporting newscaster against my knowledge. You only barely survived." He paused for a second, letting this sink in. Then he continued, "Mello wasn't so lucky."

Matt opened his mouth to argue, but the only thing that actually emitted was, "Oh?"

"She had a piece of death note and a pencil in her undergarments, and she hid them in the blanket he gave her to cover herself. He respected her modesty, and it was the death of him," Near explained monotonously. "Mello died of a heart attack, and his remains burned in the church due to other Death Note related circumstances."

He was wrong. He had to be wrong.

"You're going to have to face the facts some time or another, Matt. I understand t he trauma you're going through, but this isn't what Mello would have wanted…"Finally Matt seemed to find his strength, turning around jerkily and meeting Near's eyes, making the little albino jump and almost fall in surprise. "You don't know what he wants!" he shouted immediately storming forward as if to attack the white haired boy, but instead simply dodging around him into the bedroom again. Where were his shoes… his shirt… he had to get out of here.

Near made a noise as if to speak again, but Matt made sure to cut him off in a fury. "You don't know anything! Did you even check the church for remains, huh? Did you even look for bones to make sure he was actually dead and not that bitch, Takada?"

"Matt, the death note-"

"She could have written the name wrong! That's a rule! If you write it enough times…" Matt paused to pull his shirt on over his head, still fuming as he dashed across the room for his shoes. "It doesn't matter. I don't have to explain to you - you're all freakin' crazy. I talked to him, Near, we had breakfast together this morning! He's just been busy, okay? Doesn't mean he's dead!"

"Matt-""He's alive," Matt snapped, grabbing the small bag he had brought and throwing it over his shoulder as he whipped the door open, fully prepared to storm out of the apartment immediately. Near didn't try to stop him - as if he could - instead just letting Matt run to the door and practically burst through it.

Near made no attempt to even stall him until the last minute when the pale hand inexplicitly grabbed Matt's shirt sleeve, making him stop in his tracks for a second to glare at the white haired boy.

To his surprise, there was emotion in Near's eyes. It was sadness, hurt, and pain, all mixed together where apathy once was. The emotion did not manage to reach his ever monotonous voice, however, as he whispered, "He's not. The funeral is on Friday."

Matt watched, slowly, as Near released him and shuffled back to Linda's apartment, somehow unable to run away until the albino had reached the door and finished with a final statement: "Don't forget - I loved him too."

With this, Matt turned and ran, praying that when he got home…


Los Angelus, California. 8:41 P.M. PDT. Tuesday.

…Mello wasn't home when he returned. On the table, the chocolate bar still rotted.


A/N: Um, I never actually planned for there to be that little tidbit of one-sided Near/Mello in there considering I loathe that couple with a passion… but it just kind of came out by itself. Oh, the drama…