Author's Note: Wholly crap! I almost did it AGAIN! D: I almost lost another whole chapter! When will I pay attention! I was able to save this one though before it was completely lost. See, I have this bad habit of accidentally writing/saving over old chapters (usually chapters I haven't posted yet, otherwise it wouldn't be a problem,) and yeah! It's not even deleting them, 'cause I could go into my recycle bin right away and get them, but nooo, I have to save over them. My gosh!

Anyway...

Disclaimer: I do not own Death Note, or anything remotely associated with it.

December 5, 2007

The rain was pouring outside and my breath was fogging up the window. My eyes were burning trying to hold back my tears, and it wouldn't work for much longer. I hadn't cried since before I could remember. I'd never needed to; there had been nothing in my life worth crying over. Not even pain. I'd always had a high tolerance for pain. But this wasn't like physical pain, this was emotional pain, and it cut much more deeply than any physical pain I'd ever known. I hugged my knees closer to my chest and looked out at the street from my window.

I'd been delivered back to Wammy's shortly after L's death. I'd spent the last month locked in my room; not eating, not sleeping, not talking to anyone. Linda had tried to get me to talk for the first two weeks and then had given up. Matt came in regularly and tried to engage me, but it just wasn't happening. I hadn't seen Mello, and Near had become something closer to a ghost story than a real being. It seemed as though he was as much of a shut in as I was.

I was left with a terrible emptiness. It felt like I was just a shell, and had nothing left inside of me, no soul, so heart, no lungs, no blood, no air. Just nothing. L's death had taken much more from me than I ever thought it could. Maybe it was because I hadn't ever believed L could die. Maybe it was my fight with Mello in August or maybe it was that everything since moving to Wammy's in the first place over a year ago had just finally caught up with me. But whatever it was, I was a mess. A lonely, empty, mess. And whatever it was, L's death had pushed me here.

I tried telling myself over and over again that L wasn't dead. I tried telling myself that this was some kind of cruel joke, or a bad dream. I tried telling myself that at any moment, I'd see L walking down the street, or driving in a car, and turn up the driveway to Wammy's. But I knew I'd never see that. I knew that this wasn't a cruel joke or a bad dream; I knew that L was dead, I'd seen it myself. I could see him there before me, mid-sentence he just stopped. His body falling towards the floor, the abrasive light from the computer monitors throwing shadows in twisted directions and the ghostly glow of the emergency light's playing across L's already pale features. And then there was the other Light. The vile demon that had caught and held L while he died... L had died.

Apparently Mr. Yagami convinced his people to keep the investigation open, apparently Light had taken over for L and there was no 'apparently' about how that information made me sick to my stomach.

I pulled the teddy bear off the chair beside me, the teddy bear L had given me; I buried my face in it.

I wouldn't cry, I wouldn't cry. I just needed something else to think about. I slowed my laboured breathing for a moment, and listened. Through the floor below me was Roger's office and I could hear a voice, a raised voice. Someone was shouting, it sounded like Mello.

Suddenly a door slammed, and I heard footsteps pounding up the stairs, and down the hall where another door slammed. I went back to gazing out the window, but was pulled out of my trance when the door down the hallway slammed again, followed by the footsteps. Down the stairs this time. I took little interest in them, until I realised their significance. Out the window I watched Mello, suitcase in hand, start heading down the street.

What!

No!

Mello!

I didn't think, I just reacted. I launched myself off the window seat and through my door, and all but breaking my neck as I raced down the stairs and out the front door.

No shoes, no coat. It was early December, but it was raining instead of snowing. The cold bit and stung at me but I paid no attention to it. The rain pelted me and soaked me to my bones but I paid no attention to it.

I had other things to worry about.

"Mello!" I cried as I raced down the walkway of Wammy's House. "Mello!" I cried again as I made it to the street. He couldn't leave too! No! I'd just lost L, and now Mello was leaving too! "Mello!" I cried, and I was no longer able to hold back my tears. Like a dam being breached it seemed like my tears flowed down my face in a flood. I scanned up the street and down, but between my glasses fogging up and my tears I could barely tell the time of day. "Mello! Please wait! Don't leave!" Did he go left? Or right? I ran to my right, teddy bear still in hand, "Mello!" The world got more obscure as my tears got thicker. "Mello," I sobbed. I was running harder now, paying no attention to where I was going, I was completely unaware of where I was, until I heard it, the blood curdling screech of car breaks as the four ton machine skidded towards me.

I spent a week in the hospital and over a month in a cast. I spent three months in physiotherapy and over six months trying to learn to walk again.

It probably didn't help that I wasn't walking, I all but never left my room. It probably didn't help that I wasn't eating either. Matt did his best to make sure I ate something, but you can't live off tea and dry toast. Then again, I wasn't really alive; not by any one's standards... except maybe a mortician's.

"Jewel," I didn't answer, "Jewel!"

I turned my head away from the door and towards the window.

"I'm leaving Jewel. I'm sorry. It's time for me to move on too."

L had died, Mello had run away, Near had started his own investigation, Linda didn't talk to me anymore (I didn't blame her, I wouldn't want to talk to me either, and of course there was the fact that i wasnt talking.) And now Matt was leaving too.

The story of my life.

I'm surprised Roger hadn't kicked me out all these months I was sulking in the window. He probably would have if I hadn't kept my grades up. Linda may've not been talking to me, but she always made sure to bring me my work from my classes. Now that Near, Mello and Matt were leaving, Linda and I would be next in line. That was a scary thought. I'd pity the world if anything happened the Near... No, I pitied the world already because of what had happened to L.

"Take care of yourself Jewel. Please."

I didn't say anything back to him. I didn't tell him that I didn't want him to leave me. I didn't tell him that I didn't want to be left alone. I didn't tell him that he was the only one I had left.

"Don't hesitate to call if you need anything or whatever."

I didn't say anything back to him. I didn't tell him that I needed something right now. I didn't tell him that I needed him to stay.

"Goodbye Gem."

I heard the wooden door close softly behind me, and quiet footsteps echo down the halls.

"Goodbye Matt."

Author's Note: Yeah, the last couple chapters have been a little shorter than usual. The next one will be too, but I figured it was better to organize them like this rather than try and cram two or more chapters together.

So...

Today is the Tri-Chapter Reader Review Poll :D ...I wanted to do 21 chapters just so I could get one more of these in, LOL. So my friend Kait and I were talking about this before she left (she went to South America,) and on account of this was such a sad chapter, I would like to know...

What was the happiest moment of your life?

I have a couple myself I think, but if I had to pick one it would be the time I got to see my older brother after seven years. It had been forever since we'd seen each other because he lives so far away, but one day he came back to town and he, my little brother and I spent the day together. It was so wonderful because I missed him so much and we barely ever got to even talk to each other, let alone see each other you know :)