A/N:Hola! I liiiiive! -runs around dorm pretending to be a zombie- So this has only taken me a month and a half to update. In that time I've written another chapter or four of my novel and started four new original stories, one of which is supposed to be a webcomic except that I lack any sort of artistic tallent. Two months have passed in the story. As such, Mello's English has improved, but he still makes mistakes. I'll bet you can see where I left off writing this more than a month ago. I read back over this section and was like, "Crap! What was Matt looking for again?" Yay! I have skills. Anyway, thank you sooooo much for your patience. On with the chapter!

Thank you to I Break for Bishounen Boys, C Elise, cratermaker, merichuel, Kaze Kimizu, and Anna Raffaella for reviewing! Also, thank you to Anna for the suggestion of types of butterflies for the chapter titles. I'll finish retitling them eventually. I may yet look up saints, though... We'll see.

Disclaimer: I would love to say that in my ridiculously long absence I have been off acquiring Death Note, but alas, that would be a lie.

Before it occurred to Mello to start keeping track, two months had passed. The days and nights had slipped by largely unnoticed. Most days he talked to Eira and some days he talked to Matt. Every day he went down to the music room with the sheet music Eira had given him and played the Tempest Sonata and whatever else it occurred to him to play. On two occasions he gathered the courage to eat in the dining hall with the other children, though he still refused to eat meat. His English had improved greatly, though he still reverted to Polish in times of great stress or frustration and Latin when he was afraid. He had finished Bez Dogmatu and read his Bible cover to cover three times. The scratches on his wrist had healed and the bite mark on his arm didn't look as bad, though he knew it would leave a permanent scar. The weather had begun to grow cold and the trees had turned brilliant shades of orange, yellow, and red. And slowly but surely he was beginning to feel comfortable here. Not quite safe, but not always scared anymore.

But it didn't occur to Mello just how much time had passed until he noticed his hair in the bathroom mirror one day as he was washing his hands. It had gotten ridiculously long and was now well past his shoulders. He looked like a girl. The boy scowled at that thought and resolved to fix the problem. It didn't take him long to find scissors and in no time he had his hair back to a manageable length.

The trouble with this, he soon found out, was that he had cut it without a mirror. He knew as soon as he reached the music room where Eira was waiting that all had not gone as planned. He scowled slightly as the councillor swallowed a laugh.

"Was your hair bothering you, Mello?" Eira asked in a teasing tone.

"Yes," the boy answered matter-of-factly. "What is wrong with it?"

This time Eira did laugh. "You didn't use a mirror, did you?"

"No," Mello said. "You know I do not like mirrors."

"Come on," Eira said, rising from her seat on the piano bench. "Let's go to my office and fix this."

Mello sighed softly and followed the woman through the maze of hallways and staircases back to her office. Once they reached it she sat Mello down in the wooden desk chair, as it would be the easiest to clean, and found a long strip of scrap fabric that she wound around the boy's shoulders. She then moved to her desk, taking out a pair of scissors and a compact. Without a word she held up the small mirror so that Mello could see his hair.

The boy cringed. Now he understood why the woman had laughed. His hair looked terrible. It wasn't even close to being even. The woman chattered pleasantly as she set to work. It wasn't until she was almost done that she asked a question Mello felt compelled to answer.

"You've never told me," Eira said, her tone making it clear to the boy that she was trying to sneak in a question better left out of light-hearted conversation. "Why don't you like mirrors?"

Mello tensed at the question. "I look like them."

Eira finished up with the last couple of snips and pulled the cloth from his shoulders. She would have to vacuum up all the hair clippings later, but she needed to vacuum anyway. "What do you mean?"

"The others," Mello said softly.

Eira frowned. This was clearly related to Rostov. The boy still hadn't told her much about his captivity, but she didn't press the matter. It was more important to gain his trust and show him he had someone he could turn to. Eventually he would open up. "The other boys Rostov kept?"

Mello nodded. An image of Number Twelve laughing shortly before his death surfaced in his mind and he fought down the rising wave of nausea.

"I can see how that would make it difficult," Eira said.

The boy studied her for a moment before nodding. She knew she had pushed him enough, so she didn't pursue the matter any farther. There were a few more moments of silence before Mello spoke again.

"I have to go," he said. "I told Matt I would have lunch with him. Thank you."

Eira smiled. She was glad to hear the boy had plans. The fact that he had bonded with Matt meant he was healing. "No problem."

Mello gave her a respectful nod before leaving the room. He knew that Matt wouldn't expect him to go down to the dining room for lunch the way the redhead did. The younger boy had picked up on his extreme antisocial tendencies. He had also picked up on the fact that Mello would not eat anything that might possibly contain meat, though he still didn't really understand it.

When Mello reached Matt's room the redhead was sitting cross-legged on the floor, gameboy in hand. It had been a birthday present, one of the few Matt had ever received. From what Mello understood, ever since he had gotten it he hardly put it down.

"Hey Mello," the boy said greeted, pausing his game.

There were two plates sitting on the floor. Both of them held nothing but fruits and vegetables. Mello gave a slight smile at the thought that Matt valued his company enough to alter his eating habits so that they could share a meal. There was also the fact that Matt had not questioned the older boy's objection to certain foods since that night a little more than two months prior.

"Hello. What game are you playing?" the blonde said. His tone was friendly even if his eyes seemed cold and his words sounded sharp with his accent.

"Mario," Matt said. "Your hair's short."

Mello nodded. "It was too long."

Matt chuckled. "It was getting kinda long. Oh! Hang on a sec. I've got something I want you to see."

Mello waited patiently while Matt rummaged through the disaster under his bed. It seemed to be taking him forever to find whatever it was he was looking for. With a sound of triumph he pulled a notebook from the mess.

"I thought since you're my best friend and all maybe I would show you this," Matt said. He seemed hesitant and it made Mello wonder just what was significant about the notebook. "I... haven't ever shown this to anyone else."

Mello nodded in acknowledgement and waited patiently as Matt opened it and flipped through pages. All of them were covered in writing, most much more childish than Mello could ever remember his being. The short phrases he could pick out read the same way he spoke. Short and broken and uncertain.

The blonde glanced up to study the gamer's expression and was mildly surprised to see the other boy studying him. Quietly he asked, "What is this?"

"It's... kind of a journal," Matt said shyly. "I mean, it isn't anything spectacular. I can't really read and write very well, but I try. But here." He indicated a page at the back of the note book. "This is what I wanted to show you."

Mello found himself looking at a list of some sort. It looked like names or maybe places or possibly both. But that didn't make it any clearer what it was. The puzzled look he gave the gamer apparently made that clear enough.

"It's a list of all the families I've lived with and all the orphanages I've been in," Matt explained quietly. "And the cities I've been to."

The Polish boy took all of this in with a slow, thorough, precision that ensured he fully understood what he was being told. He kept his expression carefully blank as he considered this. And then, after a few moments of silence, he spoke, his accent so thick and his voice so quiet that Matt almost couldn't understand him.

"Come. I show you something."