Rylie

Louie's layout is an interesting one- during the day; it is a very family-friendly facility, if you're going to ignore the bad neighborhood and dirty exterior. The large windows let in lots of light; the alcoholic beverages are hidden under the bar and only brought out upon request. The laughter of young children echoes throughout the building, and the bar is empty.

But I don't work those shifts.

I work the nighttime shifts, when even the booths, whose previous tenants were toddlers and overworked parents, house lousy drunks and people trying to escape from it all. The lighting changes to a dimmer, eerier feel and the smell of smoke clouds the air. The taste of liquor is practically tangible and reaches those who aren't even drinking (those people generally being limited to the staff). I'm a waitress here, so when the bar is full and the people move over to the booths, I take care of them. William doesn't like me being by the bar. He says the cops hang out around there most, and he doesn't want them to see me working here. So, I do the same thing as the bartenders. I just have to move around a little bit more.

Currently, I've been pulled onto the lap of someone probably more than twenty years older than myself. It doesn't seem to bother him that, legally, I am not even old enough to be serving alcohol, and yet I do anyways. I wonder if he has a daughter, if he'll ever have a daughter.

"Hey beautiful," he says, and I almost flinch, but I can't because that would make us lose money. Instead, I fill my thoughts with the other boy who has referred to me as such.

"Yes, sir?" I question him, as politely as I can. I don't know why I'm required to be polite, they don't care what I say to them as long as I'm serving them beer and wearing my short skirt.

"How bout you just stay here for a little while," he slurs, dropping his head into the crook between my shoulder and neck and wrapping his hands around my waist.

I'm feeling more than just a little bit uncomfortable with this, and I try to shake him off. "I'm sorry, sir, but I really have to get back to work. Would you like me to get you something to eat or drink?" I ask, shifting in his lap in my attempts to get free. He only seems to like this.

"Nah, I just like you sitting here," he tells me, his voice barely understandable. I feel lips graze the back of my neck, and I stiffen as I try to meet William's gaze from across the room. He is behind the bar, soothing a pair of bikers who are just itching for a fight. He shakes his head slightly. I'm busy here; just hold on for a couple of minutes.

I sigh and close my eyes, pretend to be anywhere else. Just three more hours.

Matt

Matt sighed. He was running out of places to walk, and it was already dark. He scanned the row of buildings before him. Tall and dirty, they reeked of bad judgment and even worse character. The middle one, though, caught his eye as the dirtiest, grungiest of the bunch. Louie's Bar and Diner.

He laughed, as he'd never heard of a worse combination. All the same, he'd also never had a better time to get drunk. Matt had already been out for four hours, and while he was sure that Mello had cooled down in this amount of time, he did not feel any need to get back to the safe house. He felt gloriously free here, out in the open, where nobody knew him, and it wasn't a feeling he was used to having, at least not since he had taken up his current residence. He spit out his cigarette, throwing it onto the floor and grinding it under his foot before heading inside.

The atmosphere was manic, the hysteria of alcohol and something a little bit darker filling the air. Smoke also penetrated the room, smoke heavier than what he was used to, causing Matt to be thankful for the goggles he wore that were currently protecting his eyes. He moved towards the bar- this may have also been a diner, but something told him that that wasn't its purpose at night.

"Hey, dude," a guy in his mid-twenties told him, black hair with blue streaks shining in the strange light, "the bar's full, catch a booth."

Matt did as he was told, grabbing the first empty booth he could find and sliding into it. He groaned; he had not been drunk for a long time, and he wasn't sure whether he was going to back out on his decision or not. What child prodigy, he questioned himself, purposefully gets himself drunk? And then he remembered. Oh, yeah, that's right, he's no child prodigy- that would be Near or Mello or perhaps even Number Four- and he had nothing to lose at the moment, getting drunk this one time wouldn't cost him anything except a few not-so-precious hours of the perfect awareness he had been born with. The total absence of clear thought was something that normally alarmed him, but right now it was something he was craving. (Semi-absence of thought was something he could deal with, a position he purposefully put himself in whenever he picked up a game console.) Lord knew what Mello was going to do when he got back to the safe house and smelled beer on him, so Matt figured he might as well enjoy it while he could.

"Excuse me, sir, can I get you something?" The voice startled Matt right out of his thoughts, it was so unrightfully familiar. He looked up, and could feel his face split into a wide grin at the sight in front of him.

It was Rylie, in all her red haired, luminously innocent glory. Her eyes widened when she saw him. "Hey!" she said, moving a bit closer to the table, eyes widened and reflecting something that Matt couldn't exactly place. "You're the guy from that Game Stop, aren't you?" she asked him.

She remembered him. "Indeed I am, Rylie," he chuckled, mind in a complete state of shock. She works here…? "You work here?"

She frowned, as if the thought of her surroundings dirtied her mood. "Unfortunately," she murmured.

"Why, you don't like it?" he asked, teasing, eyes surveying her face and taking in her lovely features once again. I am lucky, I am lucky, I am so, so very lucky, to stumble into this bar and not anywhere else…

She stuck her tongue out at him. "Well, I'm sure you would enjoy getting your ass pinched by dirty old men more than I would."

His face straightened. Matt was, all in all, a pretty mellow guy. Easy come, easy go, just let me have PSP, thank you ma'am, I'm all set. But he'd done a lot of growing up since he'd tracked Mello down- he'd witnessed a lot of things, and while he still maintained his easy demeanor, he was no longer naïve. "Does that happen to you often?" he questioned her.

Rylie seemed mildly surprised by his intensity. "It's kind of the in the job description," she said lightly, smiling at him again, and effectively scattering his thoughts. If only he could piece together one coherent thought when she was around… that would be very nice indeed, and then maybe Matt could figure out what to do with this inexplicably draw towards her. She glanced around the crowded building, and blew some of her red hair out of her eyes. "Mind if I sit down for a second?"

Matt smiled warmly at her. "I'd love it, beautiful, but I don't want you to get in trouble."

"Eh," she responded, shrugging, tugging down her skirt (it was, Matt had noticed, very, very short for a skirt, more like a mere piece of black fabric wrapped around her hips than an actual piece of clothing.) and sliding into the booth across from him. "They won't mind, they're all drunk."

Matt laughed. "Geeze, you think?" he commented. Nope, he decided at that moment. I am not getting drunk, I'll have no need if she sticks around a little longer. This was the girl who had inexplicably, frustratingly haunted his thoughts since she had first come up and recommended that game to him, and he was perfectly aware of the fact that he had no right to obsess over her. He'd had, what, one conversation with her? Matt was not one to believe in love at first sight, that was not the way he was raised, that had not been something that he'd believed he'd ever encounter (truth be told, from the moment Mello left the orphanage and Matt decided to go after him- and probably quite a while before then, too- Matt had not been anticipating a life long enough to come across such a thing.) All the same he know that, realistically speaking, out of the top three geniuses of Wammy's House, he was the most likely to get lovesick. Naturally.

"Do you like the game?" she asked him, leaning forward across the bar to make herself heard.

He nodded. "It was great."

"Was?" Rylie questioned, her tone betraying her surprise. "Are you already done?"

"Yep," he replied cheerfully, enjoying her stunned expression. "Finished about six hours into it."

Her eyes widened. "Didn't you die?"

"Nope," he replied nonchalantly, "I don't die."

She shook her head disbelievingly, hair whipping past her face. "I'm impressed."

Matt chuckled. "I have a lot of spare time on my hands."

"You can say that again," Rylie mumbled under her breath, and Matt mock-glared at her.

"What?" he taunted, "you just jealous you can't do better?"

Rylie sniffed. "You wish," she scoffed. Then she paused and looked at him, considering him seriously. "I never did get your name, you know," she said, and looked at him expectantly.

Matt grinned at her. "You trying to hit on me, babe?" he asked her, and watched her face turn bright red. It was a sight he found most appealing. He laughed at her embarrassment. "Relax love, I'm kidding. My name's Matt."

"Matt," she repeated, like she was testing the word out on her tongue. He, for one, knew he liked the way it sounded. "Fits you. It's very nice."

"You think so?" he mused, wondering what she would think of his real name. Not that he would probably ever tell her, considering this meeting was a one in a billion shot, but… He could still wonder. With a brain as large as his, and so little proactive thought occupying it, he had room to dream.

"Rylie!" a sharp voice wafted over to them, and Rylie started quickly, standing up before hitting her leg on the side of the table and wincing in pain. Matt looked over after sending a concerned look her direction, to see the young man who had directed him earlier waving her over.

She sent him an apologetic look. "Sorry, Matt, I'll be back in a second." She walked away before immediately returning. "Oh," she laughed nervously, "I almost forgot. Can I get you anything?"

He smiled lazily at her, the grin unfurling slowly across his face as if he was in no rush. And truly, right now, he wasn't. "Just come back," he told her, trying to bring himself to regret the cheesy words the second they left his mouth. And yet, he found couldn't.

He watched her sashay off into the smoky haze, to serve some other man, probably way more drunken than Matt, and someone who definitely cared about her way less (and really, Matt had to remind himself, he didn't care about her at all. He only thought that she was extremely, extremely hot. Right?), and put his mental war- to leave or not to leave?- to rest. He would stay, and that was final.

But as he watched her bend over to catch the order of the man she was currently waiting on, he couldn't help but think that it was a physical impossibility for him to be sane while her skirt was that short.

Insanity is very nice.

So sorry for the late update- just got a lot on my plate lately. Um… so, there's gonna be some Rylie x Matt fluff in the next scene! I'm super stoked to write it actually… I know this one's pretty short, and it's pretty much a bridge to get it to where it needs to be for the next chapter. The next chapter is a semi-bridge, but it paves the road for their relationship…

AND, I finally finished watching the Death Note series, as of a couple days ago, and while I am now fully informed as to all the plot detail, this story will be changing several of them, while still sticking to the original plot somewhat.

But right now, I need your guy's take on something: Rylie will soon also be introduced to Mello. Should he be a side love-interest, or should I leave Rylie solely to Matt? Also, if Mello is not a potential love interest for Rylie, should I just leave Mello all by his lonesome, or should I create another character for him to go off with as a side pairing? I just feel bad leaving him all by himself….

So, please review!

-Alice