A/N: So much crap going on. You know, I'm almost done with my paper on the obese. I hate doing work cited pages... shit.
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Escort to Happiness.
Six.
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After going out for a real lunch, L and Raito made their way back to the office with Raito complaining all the way about how they shouldn't have taken so long. L reminded him that the company would not go under because Raito took a ninety-minute lunch break.
When they arrived on the third floor, the first thing either of them saw was Near walking past with two cups of coffee in his hands. He turned in their direction and his gray eyes widened upon finding L walking along the hallway.
"Mr. Lawliet," he called.
"Hello, Near," he hummed, walking away. "How've you been?" He didn't seem too interested in the answer.
Near followed him, shuffling as quickly as he could without spilling his drinks. "No, Mr. Lawliet, I've been looking for you all morning. The fifth floor needs that manila folder; are the numbers corrected yet?"
"Oh, that. Yes, it's in my office. Follow me," he said and craned his neck to find Near doing just that. He walked beside Raito and the brunet seemed dead-set on going back to his own office but L angled him a certain way and they all ended up at the door to L's office.
The door was opened and the two eldest walked in first. L went to search around his desk and found the folder Near was after, holding it out to the younger man as he sat. Near stepped forward, ready to take it, but frowned at the predicament that the two cups of coffee were creating. They all stared at the drinks in silence.
"… Here, I'll help you," Raito said, sighing and taking one of the cups for himself. He blew at it and finally sipped.
Near frowned and took the folder with his free hand.
Raito swallowed and looked at him again. "Why do you always carry random cups of coffee around with you, Near? It's very nice but…"
"They are not random. That was for Mr. Hibiki on the fifth floor," he said bluntly.
"… Oh," he hummed and sipped again, slightly embarrassed.
"Near," L called, garnering his attention from frowning at Raito. "Do you remember that conversation we had the other day? About happiness?"
"Vaguely," he responded.
"Well, I'd like to give you a scenario."
"Is it business-related?" Near asked with some abstract hope of being treated like a professional equal. His hopes were dashed when L shook his head, no. Near sighed, thinking about the other coffee, the one for Ms. Weatherly on the second floor, wondering if the chilly AC would get to it first or greedy Raito.
L cleared his throat, sitting back in the chair. "Let's say you run someone over with your car-"
Raito spit out his mouthful of hot coffee. Near gasped, now wet.
L ignored them both, continuing, "-and you find that someone very close to your victim is hurting. You can't get this person out of your mind, no matter what you do and all you want is to make them happy. But your efforts don't seem to bring much more than confusion and paranoia. What would you do?"
Near looked up from wiping off his blazer, giving L a sort of confused, disbelieving look. He was beginning to suspect that two of the company's most capable workers were engaged in nighttime role-plays. Before he could try to summon an answer, Raito had set down his cup of coffee and was pulling L into a miniature huddle, scolding him under his breath.
In a moment, Raito turned around and made a shooing motion with his hand. "Near, that'll be all. Thank you."
Near sighed, shaking his head, and left quietly, the door closing with a soft click behind him.
Raito grunted. "Honestly, L."
-
The next three days were almost normal. Raito had gotten L to get back to work after an almost calamitous miscalculation on his part through the Oak Group's quarterly earnings. He had absentmindedly written the percentages out as 13, 5, 12, 12 and 15, which happened to be a certain someone's name alphabetically. Raito didn't find this at all funny and some of the men on the fifth floor wondered if L needed a vacation - after all, he had never taken one in the six years he'd been at IDM.
L sat at his desk and ordered lunch in, trying to get through all the things he'd neglected and had a hard time thinking of things that had nothing to do with Mello. He hadn't even seen him in a few days and wondered if he was any better off without any of L's meddling in his daily life. Raito sometimes comforted him in saying that humans were very adaptable creatures and Mello seemed very human. L didn't think that made much sense but didn't bother to question it.
He would lay in his bed at night, staring up at the ceiling and, for some reason, see Mello lounging around in those leather pants. He had looked very nice and L thought that Mello seemed to be the person that would do very good if placed in a well-to-do family - if only he had been raised differently, perhaps, he could wear leather like that all the time. He would shut his eyes and beg for sleep. Sleep seldom came.
It was Monday morning when L came out of his office and headed for the kitchen on the second floor. There was a refrigerator there, one which most people used to store sandwiches and slices of cake made by their loving spouses. L never put anything in there after hearing the horror story about a birthday-surprise gone wrong. Some coworkers chipped in for a cake for a just-turned thirty-year-old and when lunchtime rolled around, they went to get the cake from the fridge - as it turned out, one slice was missing out of the box and they spent the rest of the day searching for an employee with blue frosting on their fingertips.
When L walked in, he was greeted with the sight of the young intern, Near, fiddling with the coffee maker on the counter. L headed over to the cooler and grabbed a paper cup. He heard Near's tiny grunts of impatience and asked, "What's wrong?"
Near looked back over his shoulder, surprised to have L sneak up like that. "Oh, Mr. Lawliet… nothing, but I've got five orders of coffee and this machine is broken."
"I can put in a work-order, if you like."
Near sighed. The printer wasn't even fixed yet.
L noticed Near's slight pout and gestured to the water-cooler. "Perhaps you can get them water instead."
"It is not the same..."
"You know, Near, your job as an intern should not constitute getting greedy people caffeine. You should be doing paper-filing, like a proper young man."
"I'm aware but there's never any to be done."
L thought for a moment, tapping his lower lip with a thumb. "Actually," he said, "I believe Mr. Yagami has some data-entry that might need to be done… most certainly, he does not have a taste for such things. I will arrange that for you."
An emotion flashed in Near's eyes, something akin to gratitude, and he nodded his head. "Thank you, Mr. Lawliet. I would like that very much."
"I know," he said, and took his water and turned for the doorway.
"Um, Mr. Lawliet," Near called, stopping the man in the threshold. "I just wanted to tell you, I gave your scenario some thought. While running for coffee, one doesn't have to think so much and so I had some time… I think that if I was in such a predicament, I would want to make peace. I would go and talk to this person and see if I could offer any assistance."
L perked up at hearing this. "You would go talk to them?"
"Yes. If I could help, I'm sure they would tell me."
There was a pause. "I see." He looked down to the linoleum tiled floor, considering, and then nodded, a small smile appearing. "Yes, I see. Thank you for your input, Near, you are helpful as always."
"Mr. Lawliet?"
"Yes?"
"That scenario. It's real, isn't it?" He tilted his head.
"… Yes, it is. But keep that to yourself, we don't want the men upstairs to know my dirty secrets, right?" He disappeared behind the wall and faintly, his footsteps could be heard, mingling with the sound of typing and mild chit-chat.
Near sighed. Yes, sir.
-
"Oh my, oh my, oh my…"
Mello recognized the worried murmurs even from around the corner and sped his walking to see what was going on with Rosie. He found her right in front of the shop doors, key ring in hand and apparently hadn't opened the store up even though it was after nine. Mello walked up beside her and she gasped, crying out, "Oh, Mello, you're here! I'm so glad!"
"What's going on?" he asked and found he didn't need an answer as a man, huddled up in a few layers of tattered jackets, was snoozing in front of the doors, blocking the way. Mello grunted, having found the homeless on the stoop of his own apartment building many mornings before.
"I just don't know what to do," Rosie moaned, getting herself into a tizzy. "I tried to wake him, but I didn't want to touch him - Mello!"
She called after the blond but it was too late and Mello had already given the bum a swift kick in the side, effectively waking him and he snorted and growled, scrambling to his feet. He hurried away when he saw Mello's unhappy face and skulked around the side of the building.
Mello sighed. "You just gotta make 'em understand they can't sleep anywhere-" he was interrupted, suddenly, with one of Rosie's tight hugs as she commended him on saving the entire store. He growled at the embrace and soon enough she toddled off to open up the doors.
She bounced in, turning the front lights on and Mello followed suit, walking over to the coat rack by the counter and taking his apron from it. He began to tie the strings behind his back and settled into his normal lean on the counter. He heard Rosie in the back, fiddling with the watering can and she called out to him, "It's going to be a great day today, Mello! Didn't you see the sun outside?"
"Yeah, s'damn hot outside is what it is…" Mello grumbled.
Rosie came into the front room, watering can in hand. "What'd you say?" she asked.
"Nothing."
"You know what I was thinking, Mello? I had a thought last night and I told my husband and he thought it was great."
"What's that?" he mumbled, mouth half covered by a palm.
"We should have music in the store. Like the department stores in the mall! It's just too quiet around here. I also heard that flowers react positively to gentle music, so maybe…"
Mello shook his head. "Rosie, this isn't a department store. And flowers can't hear."
"Oh, fiddlesticks! Mello, don't you like music?"
"The kind of music I like would kill all the flowers."
She looked over at him, blinking.
The bell above the door jingled and both employees perked up, ready to make a sale and Mello immediately held back a face at seeing a slightly hunched-over figure standing in the threshold. The man's hair was wild but seemed to have been smoothed down in the front, his bangs blowing in front of deeply ringed eyes.
Rosie didn't seem fazed at all and she beamed at him. "Hello, there! How are you, sir?"
He nodded at her. "I'm fine, thank you." He directed his gaze towards the counter and Mello, walking up to him.
Mello sighed. Just another day in the funhouse, he supposed. "Can I help you?" he asked.
The man gave a sort of crooked smile. "Yes, actually. I'm here for an application."
"… An application? You mean like a job application?"
"Indeed."
Mello gaped and gave Rosie a look of dread as she gasped happily, running over to the two of them. She began to speak about how they needed help so badly and all Mello could think was, No way!
"-it's really very difficult when Mello has a day off and it's just me, or when I have a day off and it's just poor Mello," she was saying, ticking her woes off on her fingers. She looked up at L and smiled. "Do you have any references?"
"I do."
Mello turned to Rosie. "Can I talk to you in private?"
She blinked up at him, nodding, and followed him into the back room, calling out to the potential employee, "One moment, sir!"
Once in the room, Mello snuck a peek out at the man once again before turning his full attention to Rosie.
"What's wrong, Mello?"
"Hey, come on, I know you want some help but we can't say yes to any Tom, Dick and Harry that walks in off the street," Mello reasoned, frowning heavily.
"Oh, but he's darling!"
"There's nothing darling about him, he looks like he's a step away from that hobo this morning."
"He'd look much better in one of our aprons, I think," she said, contemplating the image.
Mello contemplated the image, too, and didn't like what he was seeing. "Rosie," he moaned, "are you serious?"
"Like a heart attack! Come on, let's go tell him the great news!"
She marched right in there, leaving Mello to wallow in his sorrow and he heard her shout, "Congratulations!" at the man outside. He shook his head to himself and thought that this was clearly all Matt's fault. If he wasn't such a stubborn fool, he'd be alive and in this shop and they'd snip flowers together and Rosie would call them cute all day long. But now he had to work with some creepy-looking hobo. Jesus, Matt.
Mello gave himself a minute before walking back out into the main room and Rosie already had the tape-measurer out, getting the strange man's waist size for his impending uniform. She looked up from him and smiled at Mello. "Mello, come introduce yourself to your new coworker!"
Mello huffed and walked forward. "I'm Mello," he said bluntly.
He smiled back, uninterested in Rosie's bustling about him and extended a hand to the blond. "I'm L. Pleased to meet you, Mello," he said and looked into Mello's eyes as if he could find some color other than blue. Mello took his hand, ready to throw a tantrum if it was greasy or sticky, but it was soft and the skin there was smooth. He took his hand away quickly and stuck it in his jean pocket, turning away to do some sweeping.
-
"I have something to tell you and I don't think you will be happy to hear it. This is why I've chosen to tell you over the phone."
Raito sat down on his bed immediately, feeling his stomach sink down into his feet somewhere. "Oh, God, L," he moaned, horrible scenarios running through his mind, "what have you done? Tell me you didn't peep again, oh please, just tell me that!"
"I have done no peeping."
A sigh of relief. Then, apprehension. "What was it then?"
"I met Mello today."
"… What? How?"
"I went to his place of business, obtained employment there, and called IDM to take a vacation."
"…"
"Raito, if you have fainted, I will call the paramedics in five minutes, but I am fixing a piece of pie and-"
"You're an idiot, you know that? Absolutely… L… I just don't know what to say! You've caused me to be speechless!"
"Quite a feat," L said, mouth full of some sort of pie.
"Why would you take it so far? You don't even know this guy-"
"Ah, ah. That's not the case anymore. We've shaken hands."
Raito growled, "That's not the point I'm trying to make! What about your job? The one that pays for your electricity and rent for that nice apartment, your car note… what about all that stuff? A flower shop is not going to maintain-"
"I'm on paid vacation. It won't be for long. I have been enlightened… a little albino told me if I wanted to make this young man happy, I have to just go up and ask. It was so simple and brilliant, I have no idea why I didn't see it before."
"… Little albino? You mean Near?"
"Names are not important."
"Listen, I know why you didn't do this before and it's because you mowed his friend over with a car!"
"Well, I won't be telling him it was me," L said like it was so obvious.
Raito frowned. He looked around his room for a bottle of aspirin. "L," he sighed, "you're a grown man, you do what you want. But if you get into trouble, don't come crawling to me!"
"You know I'll walk."
"Ugh."
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To be continued.
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A/N: -stabs self- Send good vibes - I've got a test in Bio and a French paper to turn in today. Anyway, please comment and tell me your thoughts.