Author's Note: It's always weird, seventy-five pages later, to look back and be like, "Where the hell did this start, and what was I smoking then…?"

Transvestitism is a time-honored family tradition. As are egregiously awful puns. 8D

XXV. More Mascara

Mello ran the brush through his bangs for the umpteenth time, batting his eyelashes absently at the mirror.

"Yes, sir," he answered in a whisper so demure it might well pass for female. "Thank you, sir. I'm afraid, sir, that my party would notice my absence if we got busy upstairs, sir, and it'd be very awkward, sir, if you noticed certain anomalies in my anatomy."

It was uncomfortably plausible. He was pretty damn sexy. Maybe too damn sexy. "Girl" was a disturbingly good look for him.

He tossed his hair expertly over his shoulder, flashed himself a lipstick-lined smile, smoothed his dress, and sat on the countertop to fight his way into the heels.

Heels were a bitch, but there wasn't much to be done for that. Skanky girls like the one he'd been preening in the bathroom mirror didn't wear flats. It was stilettos or bust in this business.

Bust an Achilles tendon, that was.

And he did have to admit that they did a nice number on his calves.

Not that he was too keen on the idea of making a habit of all this, however unsettlingly well it worked.

He sighed, not too unhappily, and sashayed a few laps around the bathroom. Fake cleavage or no fake cleavage, real women didn't trip on their own heels and eat the nice hardwood when they went to parties.

Well, not often.

He posed, pursing his lips, and admired the shameless gold-digger in the mirror.

Needed more mascara.

Everything could do with more mascara.

—

Matt stared at his dresser until he thought that his sleep-deprived eyes would bleed.

Light lugged his suitcase in and heaved it onto the bed, the springs of which protested vociferously.

Matt would have protested vociferously, too, if he'd had that much concentrated clothing slammed in his face.

Light didn't dig through his clothes; he sorted through them carefully. Everything was neatly folded, to the point that Matt was beginning to suspect that Light kept Folding Gnomes in the zipper pocket, and they came out at night to make his things more orderly.

"Formal clothes I can do," Light was saying to himself. "Sketchy club? That's a challenge. Semi-formal? You got your man."

"Are you sure you have it under control?" Matt asked.

Light glanced up from the brushes-and-chisels suitcase excavation. "I think so," he answered. "Why?"

Matt pointed to the door, around the frame of which Kat, Fiona, and a few of the latter's posse were peeking somewhat less than surreptitiously.

"Need help?" Fiona chirped, looking at Light as though he'd fallen from heaven and landed in her backyard.

Perhaps the sandbox had cushioned his landing.

Man, if all you had to do to get the royal treatment around here was to make out with another guy, Matt was just going to—

Um. Nothing.

—

Light had to admit that Fiona, for all her conspicuous displays of ditziness, really knew her stuff.

Though he had thought it within his rights to refuse the rhinestone-studded necklace she'd pushed at him.

A man had to draw the line somewhere.

Satisfied, he smoothed the front of his black vest, pulled at the cuffs of his white dress shirt, flicked an imaginary crease out of his black slacks, and straightened his silver tie.

Yeah. He looked damn good.

He glanced over at Fiona's other mannequin, who she'd dolled up in a snappy navy blue suit. The two of them were struggling with his tie, which was, predictably, black-and-white-striped.

"Here," Light interjected, approaching. He snatched the article, twirled it around his own neck, and tugged it into a neat Half-Windsor.

"Whoa-ho," Matt said, grinning. "Two ties? Boy's asking for trouble."

"Or asking to be hanged," Light replied, sliding the knot down, slipping it off, and transferring it to Matt's neck where it belonged.

Matt adjusted it appropriately, stood up taller, made a supercilious face, and then tugged at his lapels. "Do you think it suits me?" he inquired, breaking into a grin.

Light smirked, folding his arms. "I think it's suitable," he responded.

Matt considered the mirror Fiona was holding up for him and fixed his goggles atop his head.

"It might be illegal to be this sexy," he noted. "I hope nobody files a suit."

Light grinned. "Don't thank me," he said. "Thank my suitcase."

Matt waggled a reprimanding finger. "Can't use that," he censured airily. "It was the same sense of the word. Breaks the rules."

Light blinked. "There are rules?" he asked.

"Volumes full," Matt confirmed, not seeming to notice the way that Fiona was bouncing like a yo-yo behind him, trying to steal the goggles off of his head.

He noticed when she succeeded, however, but grabbed for them too late—she'd already shoved them down her shirt for safekeeping.

Matt scowled. "Did you learn that from Mello?" he inquired archly.

Fiona affected innocence. "Maybe," she replied.

Matt held a hand out, palm up. "Well, fork 'em over. I'm driving, and I need 'em to see."

Stoutly, Fiona shook her head, crossing her arms protectively over her chest.

"Damn it, woman!" Matt sighed, but he went over to the desk anyway, scrabbled along the backboard for a key, and used said key to unlock the top left-hand drawer, from which he retrieved a red case.

It yielded, from its plush lining, a pair of slick frameless glasses that drastically magnified and emphasized Matt's royal blue eyes.

There was a pause.

"Smokin'," Fiona decided, eagerly.

Matt blushed. "Not allowed to inside," he responded.

"Holy hell," Light agreed. "You look like a lawyer, Matts Domino."

"Objection," Matt retorted, grinning. He closed the case.

Light died a little bit inside.

But in a good way.

x

When Fiona presented them dramatically at the foot of the stairs, Light encountered one of the greatest conflicts of his life as she moved out of the way.

Before he had time to fortify his retinas and/or blind himself with a sharp utensil, Mello's blood-red dress, black stockings, and stiletto heels were scarring him for all eternity.

Then Light saw the fake boobs and the sultry makeup, and he considered himself lucky he didn't pass out on the spot—which probably would have proved disastrous, given that he was still on the stairs behind Matt.

Mello smirked, touched the beads of the crucifix that disappeared among his cleavage, and curled the other hand about one hip. "Undressing me with your eyes?" he inquired. His fingernails matched his dress; they flashed as he flicked his hair over one shoulder. "Don't worry; I was doing it in the mirror. I'd tap me."

"Mello-kun would also have us rest assured that we do not want to know where he acquired the pieces of his costume," a familiar voice remarked dryly.

Slightly alarmed, Light glanced over at the slender, delicate woman—or not—perched on the edge of the nearest armchair. L had disappeared beneath a shimmering black dress that draped—mercifully and quite unlike Mello's—to his ankles and further still, the fabric of a train pooling around his silk-slippered feet. Black silk gloves climbed past L's elbows (damn Matt to a thousand goggle-less hells), and he drew a lacy shawl close about his shoulders. The clincher was the gauzy veil, ornamented with ribbons and black pearls, that somewhat eerily concealed his vast gray eyes. The black silk rose settled over his right ear, emerging gracefully from among smooth dark hair (tamed again, but loose now about his pale neck and shawl-swathed shoulders), was just icing on the cake.

So to speak.

Light was very, very, very confused. What the hell were you supposed to do when hot boys made just as gorgeous girls?

There was some small encouragement to be found in the fact that Matt seemed to be facing a similar dilemma.

Light doubted that there was much of a precedent for this sort of thing.

He was suddenly and wildly tempted to snap a cell phone picture of Mello and send it to Misa with the explanation, "my nu gf."

…or to Matsuda.

Fortunately, he retained some crucial part of his sanity, shook his head, and collected himself.

"Shall we go?" he inquired.

"Wait!" Kat wailed, her flip-flops sounding like twin machineguns as she careened heedlessly down the stairs. Before Light could articulate a caveat, she had vaulted off of the bottom step, leapt half her height, and jammed a black fedora onto Light's head.

As she bent double, panting, he tipped it, smiling in spite of himself.

"Thank you," he told her.

Kat waved a weary hand. "You bet," she managed.

"Light delights in Kat's hat," Matt noticed innocently.

"Quite right, that Matt," Light commented to Kat.

She grinned, eyes sparking again, apparently revived. "Goofs," she decided. "Get out of here already."

—

"This is probably much safer," Matt explained, holding the back door open for them.

L had to agree. The less people saw him this way, the better. Kinky Chains aside, cross-dressing wasn't exactly his forte.

It came as no surprise when Quillish appeared from around the corner of the House just as they were sneaking towards the convertible, because the world was a terrible and sadistic place at the best of times.

Quillish appeared to be trying not to laugh.

"It's for a case, Wammy!" Mello shouted, less-than-daintily.

"I said nothing," Quillish declared.

Mello eyed him suspiciously. "Your nothings speak volumes," he retorted.

Quillish smiled equably. "So does your dress," he replied.

x

"Don't you think we're a little conspicuous?" Mello asked absently from where he sat next to L.

Light in the passenger seat literally turned around to stare at him incredulously.

"Mello," he said. "As much as I have come to respect you, you cannot talk about being conspicuous."

Mello smirked prettily. "It is pretty difficult to hide how sexy I am, isn't it?"

Light made a strangled noise and retreated to his seat.

Mello gave a particularly low evil laugh that was very much at odds with his appearance.

Through the hazily dark figment of the veil, L gazed out the window, smiling faintly, and watched the road signs draw them closer and closer to the creature's den.