Title: Feeling
Author: Snow Tigra
Fandom: Death Note
Pairings: Mello/Matt, L/Light, Matt/Near, Mello/Near, Ryuk/Matsuda, Sayu/Naomi and possibly more
Warnings: YAOI, that should be obvious. But this is also an AU story that doesn't follow the events of Death Note.
Summary: It's the house at the end of the block that's been there forever. It's the house they say teenagers around town disappear into and never come back from. It's the house Matt has been living in for as long as he can remember. It's normal to him. So then why is this annoying blond making him question all he was so sure he believed?
Chapter 5
"Where do you want the cereal? Oh and... damn! You get the good chocolate kind!"
The unfamiliar voice roused Matt out of his deep thoughts a few hours later. True to what he'd told Matsuda, it was indeed grocery day. Still, he had pretty much intended to leave it and let Matsuda take care of the whole thing, while he worried about other people - namely Ryuk. He didn't really feel like carrying bags and chatting with the bubbly blond who dropped everything off┘ but those thoughts were quickly discarded when he heard that unfamiliar voice in the kitchen. Then again, it could just be someone filling in for Misa, it did happen on occasion.
"Umm, up there in that cupboard. That's where they go, right Matsuda?" Misa's voice responding definitely told Matt that this was someone new. He stood up from his place in the living room and crossed the hall toward the kitchen. He was protective by nature, so of course he wanted to know who this extra person was...
He should have known.
Standing in the kitchen, helping Matsuda and Misa put away the various bags of items, was a very familiar blond haired boy. Today he wore the same black leather pants, with the same lace up army boots that had to be too big for his feet. Instead of the vest like last time, he wore a long sleeved, deep red shirt that almost looked black, with a design on it of some strange creature that looked like a mummified bug.
"Mello? What are you doing?"
"Helping." The blond tucked away the box of cereal and shot Matt a wink. That expression definitely meant he wasn't helping. "Hey, I have something for you."
"I didn't ask for anything."
Mello shrugged and wove his way around Misa and Matsuda - who gave Matt a helpless shrug about the boy as he passed - then stepped into the hallway facing Matt. He pulled from his pocket a rectangular piece of plastic that looked beaten and well loved. Matt took the piece as it was handed to him and turned it in his hands.
"Isn't this a... game system?" Matt pressed the button on the edge and flipped the piece open, looking at the old dusty screen. He couldn't imagine this being a gift of any sort, it really looked too old to be functional. Besides, Ryuk had always been the one to play the video games. Matt turned the handheld system over and frowned lightly as he saw a name scratched into the paint on the back. It was jagged writing from the effort, but he was pretty sure it said MailJ.
Was that even a name?
Matt opened his mouth to ask Mello, but stopped when he realized that the whole time, the blond boy had been watching him. The expression in his eyes was almost hopeful, watching his face intently for some secret to jump out between them. Matt frowned and quickly closed the system, handing it back to him. "Umm, it's not mine. And besides, I don't even play these things. I'm not a video game person."
"Really? Huh, I was really sure."
"Sure about what? What in the world made you think I play video games?" What in the world was up with this blond kid?
Mello responded with a shrug, tucking the game system back into his back pocket. "It was just a hunch, usually I'm right about this type of stuff."
"Sorry to disappoint you."
Mello just shrugged once again, not seeming bothered at all. "Well, have fun with your groceries, I guess I'll see you later." Without letting Matt say another word, Mello turned and left the hallway at a fast walk. Matt was actually stunned a bit and followed after him, only to find Mello half way out of the yard when he reached the door. Matt frowned, watching him leave the yard and walk down the street┘
He wanted to know what was up with this strange boy who kept stopping by, but there was no point in chasing after him now.
"All done Matt! Did you want to sign today?"
"Huh? Oh, right. Thanks." Matt took the clipboard from Misa and tried to banish the whole situation with Mello from his mind as he signed the paper.
"You don't need to fill out the other part, if you want us to bring the same things."
"That'll be fine." Matt handed back the clipboard, watching her climb into the van.
"Misa?"
"Hm?"
"About that boy... do you know him?"
"No, I thought he was with you guys."
"No..." Matt trailed off, looking back over toward where Mello disappeared down the road. A moment later he shook his head and shrugged it all off. Turning back to Misa, he gave her an embarrassed smile.
"Sorry about that. I'm usually not this bad, it's just been a long morning."
"No problem. See you guys next week, don't eat all that chocolate by yourself!" Misa giggled and leaned out the truck window. "Bye Matsuda!!" Then she was driving away, disappearing down the street.
Matt smirked and walked back over to the door where Matsuda was now standing, watching Misa drive away.
"So I guess you weren't too depressed about this morning then."
"Matt!" Matsuda's protest came out in a whine and Matt couldn't help but laugh at how cute it sounded.
"Relax. I talked to him. He just needs some time alone for right now and it'll get sorted out. Can you give him a little space until then?"
"I guess..."
Matt smiled. "Thank you Matsuda, I promise I'll help you get it all resolved. Either he's got a good explanation he's giving me tonight, or he'll have a black eye in the morning, I promise."
That seemed to be enough to make Matsuda smile.
Matt spent the rest of his day doing normal, boring things. He helped Matsuda put away what little was left of the groceries, chatted with Sayu while she cooked lunch for everyone, and even frowned in disapproval at Ryuk when he walked by. Later, after lunch, he watched a movie with Sayu and Naomi, watching them curl up against each other while Matsuda sat on the floor, sniffling into a Kleenex over the poor village outcast who was possessed by some animal demon, but still managed to beat everything and get together with the equally lonely and hot outcast from a neighboring village. It all ended like most of Sayu and Naomi's movies, the two lovers finally staying together, no matter what the world had to say about it. Ryuk only wandered by to grab food, then disappeared back up the stairs without a word, so he didn't break the mood at all, not even for Matsuda.
Personally, Matt liked the movies with happy endings.
As night drew closer and freezer pizza boxes were picked clean and tossed into the garbage, the group split on their separate ways. Matt found himself wandering out from tossing away the garbage, only to stop in the hallway and stare. Sitting in front of him, on the hallway table under a tastefully hung mirror, was the tattered and beaten up handheld game system that Mello had asked him about.
How had-
Matt shook his head and actually laughed softly. Of course! When they'd been talking he hadn't put the little machine in his back pocket, he'd slipped it onto the table, leaving it for Matt to find later.
Matt should have known he would pull something like that. It just seemed like something a boy like that would do, though he had no idea why.
Matt picked up the game system and turned it in his hands. Flipping it open, he found the 'on' button which stuck with a soft click as the machine struggled to turn on. When the screen came to life, he could see there were little bits of dirt stuck on the side and a corner where the colors faded into pink and green, showing the screen probably needed to be replaced or repaired. The game on the inside came up with a lively screen, showing a silhouette of a kid holding some sort of large sword shaped like a key, with tarot cards on the bottom of the screen. Matt watched the images for a moment, then hit the power button again and shut it off.
Was there supposed to be something important about this game? Was there something he was supposed to think of or remember? If there was, it wasn't coming to him, and instead he was left wondering what a boy like Mello would even be doing with this type of game or system. He didn't seem like a person to play video games either. He seemed more the┘ hands on type. Not exactly sports, but not staying inside and playing games either. It just didn't fit him. It really didn't fit either of them.
With a small shrug of his shoulders and a soft sound, Matt tucked the game away in his back pocket and grabbed a jacket. It wouldn't be too long before he was supposed to meet Ryuk outside, and he figured he should probably head out to meet him early, so none of the others followed.
"Going somewhere?"
Matt stopped as he heard the familiar soft voice, coming from the stairwell, a shudder and wave of fear passing over him. He didn't need to turn to see the short boy dressed in the white pajamas, he could picture him perfectly in his mind, the way he always leaned against things and grinned just enough to make one nervous.
"I'm taking a walk in the backyard."
Matt did turn after speaking, but he found the stairs empty, without even a creek filling the air from the boy who must have just been there. Matt pushed his hands deeper in his pockets and quickly stepped outside, shutting the door tightly behind him and not looking back.
The backyard was already cloaked in darkness as he made his way across the tall grass, hearing crickets chirping loudly, bidding goodbye to the sun. A quick wind brushed through the trees and a couple birds flew off, heading for midnight rousts before the owls and other predators came out to stop them.
He passed by all of it silently, not really paying much attention or thought to anything. Still, Matt wasn't surprised to find Ryuk already sitting in the farthest corner of the back yard on a well worn tree trunk, left over from a tree that looked like it'd been blown over in a storm, but the roots somehow managed to stay put enough to let it keep growing, even if it was now lying horizontally across the lawn. No wonder Ryuk had made the lawn service promise to never remove it.
"I guess that explains why you fought for this tree so much." Matt pulled his hands from his pockets and sat down next to him on the tree, shifting around a bit until he found a spot that was comfortable.
"I'm surprised you remember that. I just like being away from the house." Ryuk was wearing one of his normal long sleeved shirts and black jeans that made him nearly melt into the darkness. If he hadn't of moved and it was a bit darker, Matt would have easily missed him. Luckily he'd been flipping through pages of his sketchbook, the white pages nearly glowing in the darkness.
"Do you remember Light?"
Matt blinked and shook his head. "You mean, wait... that's a name, isn't it?"
"I think so." Pages turned and Ryuk settled on a sketched page of a boy who dressed flawlessly for his age in a suit jacket and tie, complete with some sort of school crest on the side. "I don't remember him, but I sketched it, a while ago, I think. It's been smudged and repaired a lot."
"You sketched all of these? What are they?"
Ryuk gripped the book a bit tighter, then passed it over to Matt. "My memories."
Matt looked down at the worn sketchbook before him and suddenly began to realize why Ryuk had been looking for the book so frantically. If it contained something like that┘ well, he would have been worried too. He closed the book and slowly started flipping from the beginning, looking at each picture.
The house, sketched out in perfect detail, without the small garden and fountain in the front. The gate was still there, closed tightly, and this was actually sketched from the outside, as if Ryuk had been standing on the street when he did it. But the house wasn't new, it was ill kept, with shutters hanging crocked and a torn up lawn. It looked like a ghost house from a movie, the one that everyone always told you not to go in, but you ventured in that one day anyway...
"I don't remember these pictures, at all. But it's my drawing style, because I know where to fill in the smudged lines. And those little scribbles on the side, it's my handwriting, just in quick words and phrases, it's actually really creepy when you think about it."
Sketches of people, two girls laughing in the kitchen, which used to have large thick curtains that covered the windows and blocked out the view. One girl had shoulder length hair in thick dreadlocks and a couple piercing in her nose. She wore clothes like Ryuk, torn and belted, held together with safety pins that almost make it look like she was clothed more in a fabric skeleton then actual cloth.
"Don't you find it strange that you don't remember things? And I'm not talking about what we ate two hours ago or what movie we watched last night. I mean like when you came here, when Sayu and Naomi came here, or hell, even when Matsuda showed up."
"I remember Sayu and Naomi showed up together," Matt murmured, flipping through more of the pictures.
"But when? You can't answer that can you? Hell, I can't even answer how long ago it was we got that monstrous fountain outside. I remember them putting it in, but it's like there's no time in my head. Doesn't that drive you nuts?"
Matt shrugged and kept turning. He'd never really thought about it.
A sketch of a strange boy, sitting in the living room, on the coffee table. He held a sucker from two fingers, close to dropping it, as he pointed an accusing finger at the other boy sitting on the couch across from him. The other boy was the one Ryuk had called 'Light' and both were smiling like good amused friends in the middle of a joke.
"Who were your parents? Did you have a brother and sister? Did you go to school? Did you ever have a birthday? When did you get here? Here! At this house!"
"I've never left the house."
"That can't be right, you weren't born here! I know you weren't!" Ryuk reached forward and pushed away Matt's hands, quickly flipping ahead in the book to a page back toward the beginning of the book, one Matt had passed. It was of a child, peeking around a corner with a curious look on his face. Behind him was a second boy with shoulder length straight hair and mischievous grin. The first boy was wearing goggles over his eyes and holding a flashlight like it was his lifeline, ready to explore.
"Two kids, so?"
Ryuk stabbed his finger at the corner of the page, smudging a couple of the background lines. "That's you!"
"Ryuk, stop being silly, I haven't been here that long."
"Oh? Then when did you get here, smart ass? When did you get here?!"
Matt opened his mouth but didn't have an answer for that. He couldn't think of it.
"I know when you got here. You got here after Light and that girl with the braids, but before Sayu and Naomi. See? Here's them... this can't be more then a couple years ago, they don't look any different."
"Ryuk..."
"Don't you get it Matt?! We can't remember! None of us can remember things outside this house! We can walk, we can talk, we can be the best fucking friends in the world, but if anyone ever asks us how we met, how we got here or where we even plan on going, we won't ever remember!"
Ryuk grabbed the book completely from Matt and frantically flipped to the end so fast it looked like the pages would rip out. He stopped on the newest sketch, of him and Matsuda in how own bed, naked and kissing, their bodies twisted together.
"I can't fucking remember him! I did this with him and I can't remember a thing about it! I'm not a heartless scumbag like you and him think, I just honestly don't remember a thing!"
"Ryuk stop-"
"You're not listening!!" Ryuk actually tosses the sketchbook, the binding cracking as it hits the grass, a couple of the pages in the middle finally coming loose and sliding just a bit away. "I'm afraid to sleep at night! I don't sleep at night! I sit up and I sketch in the other books and papers all around my room. That's probably the last time I've ever touched my bed, and no matter how tired I am, I can't sleep! Instead I sit in front of the tv, all day long, dozing off quietly and waking up whenever I hear one of you walk by. I'm scared out of my mind, Matt and I don't fucking remember why!!"
"Ryuk! Calm down."
"No, no, I'm lying. I do remember why. You want to know why? I'll fucking show you why!"
In a near rage, Ryuk kicked open the back cover of the book, revealing the last two pages side by side.
Stretched across the back two pages, drawn in angry, hurried lines, in a face. It's a child's face with large wide eyes and curling hair that brushes against his ears and just below his neck. Thin lips, teeth showing in a grin that you would only think to find on an animal's face. The eyes looked hungry, nearly alive, as if he could come off the paper and draw you in.
The worst part wasn't how real or frightening the sketch was, and it certainly was. The worst part was that Matt knew the face. And he knew that grin.
"Near."
"He scares the living shit out of me! I want to run and hide whenever I think about him, but do you know how hard it was for me to step out of that door today? I didn't want to leave. Damnit Matt, he lives in the fucking basement, and I still can't make myself walk past the front door, even if the thought of him makes me want to run and hide. What the hell is wrong with us?! All of us?"
Matt didn't have an answer.
He vividly remembered the fear at the stairs before he'd stepped out, the voice and the person he was sure was watching him. He vividly remembered the door in the kitchen and walking down those stairs... even if he was so scared about the very thought of doing it, he could hardly breathe.
"That kid is keeping us here."
Matt heard the words and his own thoughts confirmed it. In fact, he realized he'd been thinking the same thing for the longest time┘
He'd just never done anything about it.
And he didn't know why.
"I don't want to go back in that house." Ryuk whispered, finally done with his rant, or speech or whatever that had been. The two of them seemed to slip into a silent agreement, because both knelt down on the grass to retrieve the pages, stacking them together and locking them back inside the sketchbook where they were safe. Neither looked up at the house in front of them, nor did they even consider it.
Still, oddly enough, it was only a couple minutes later that both of them were rushing for the house without a second thought. But to be fair, a scream from a second story window will cause people to do crazy, and maybe even stupid things.