Author's note: A few original characters here, mainly because they can't be avoided. Also, Ms. Jun Tanaka is shamelessly based on the woman who taught me portraiture and how to work with colors. Also, if you like psychology, you should look up flow states. It's really interesting stuff.

January 10th, 2004

Light shifted his bag a little and checked his watch. It was 5:00 now, so Sayu's friend should be...

"Hey! You're Light, right?"

Light turned. This girl, Shiori, couldn't be much older than Sayu—15, at most. She was sort of pretty in a modest, unassuming way, and her hair was very dark and untidy. Light's eyes lingered on it for a few moments before he shook himself out of it.

He hasn't been in contact in ten days, so stop thinking about him.

"Yes, I'm Light. Shiori?"

"Yup!" She smiled brightly, and Light plastered on his 'kind and patient big brother' smile as she started leading him to the art studio, chattering on about how glad the teacher would be to have him and how much she didn't like drawing her teacher and just about everything else she could think of. Light, for his part, tuned her out and focused on memorizing the route so he would never have to walk with her again.

Not that he would be coming back, of course. He was just doing this as a courtesy to Sayu's friend, and because it would help him get a small jump-start on paying for Sherlock's training. It wasn't going to be a thing.

Certainly not.

"We're here!" Shiori declared finally, opening the door to an older-looking building and guiding him through a few hallways on the ground floor to reach a large art room.

Light, despite himself, liked the room immediately. It was quiet, well-lit, and smelled of fresh paper, pencil shavings, and paint. He inhaled the scent discretely, eyes roving over the space. It was a little bit dusty, but the dust came from charcoal and paint rather than lack of upkeep. There were the occasional random smears of paint on various surfaces, and he could almost taste the art supplies in the air. In the center of the room was a large table, and the desks were arranged in a sort of U around it. There were only a few other students in the room and they were either drawing, sharpening pencils, or critiquing each other's drawings.

"You must be Light Yagami."

Light stopped admiring the room to face the speaker. She was shorter than him by about five inches, plump and middle-aged, with deep lines in her face, as if she had seen a lot in her time. Her hair was pulled back, and it matched her eyes, both a rather unremarkable brown, but her gaze was strange and made Light feel as if she could see right through his masks and to his soul. It was a feeling he had only ever experienced with Sayu, and with...

...that bastard, Ryuzaki.

"Oh! Light, this is our teacher, Ms. Jun Tanaka."

"Call me Ms. Jun," she said, still maintaining that odd, piercing gaze. It made Light highly uncomfortable, and the feeling didn't go away when she declared, "You are an old soul, Light Yagami."

Light wasn't sure how to take that. "...Thank you?"

"Have you ever modeled before?" She asked, acting as if she had never made any odd declarations at all. Shiori, meanwhile, pranced away to begin setting up her things at another table and chatting happily with an older woman who looked like she could be someone's grandmother.

"No. I'm really only here..."

"That's all right. I'll be instructing for the first thirty to forty-five minutes, then we'll begin with a few minute-long poses. There will be a short break after that, then we'll do a few five-minute poses, and after that a few twenty minute poses. You'll be able to move around and get water between poses. Okay?"

Light sighed. "Yes... I wanted to ask-"

"You'll get sixty dollars for today's session," she said, "and Shiori told me you wanted me to look at your drawings. I'll do that after, or in one of the breaks. Any questions?" She hardly paused. "You can watch the lesson at the beginning or do your own thing, it doesn't really matter."

And with that, she drifted away to flip through the sketch books of each of her students and give small pointers and evaluations.

Light couldn't decide whether or not he liked Ms. Jun, even as he watched her instructing the class with enthusiasm. He didn't like that she could see through him, and he didn't like being interrupted, but there was something almost charmingly irritating about her. The quality almost reminded him of

that bastard, Ryuzaki.

Light huffed lightly and gave up on not thinking about him. L had promised to keep in touch, and so far it didn't look like he was going to keep his promise. It wouldn't have been such a big blow if L hadn't made it so that Light couldn't easily forget him. He had given him Sherlock, a daily reminder. And he had called on New Year's. Why would he call on New Year's and then not call again? If he was going to just cut ties with Light, wouldn't it be better that he just didn't call him in the first place?

"That's good, Light, you can switch positions, now."

Light jerked out of his thoughts, surprised. Students were looking at him expectantly, and Ms. Jun smiled knowingly.

"You didn't know we were drawing, did you?"

Light did not dignify this with an answer, as whatever he said was likely to make him look like an idiot. He instead leaned back on his elbows and fixed his eyes on a cup of paint brushes in the corner, letting his mind wander.

He found, to his surprise, that he didn't mind posing like this. It was harder than it seemed, certainly—the longer he tried to stay still, the more gravity tried to alter his position. Still, the odd sort of concentration it required brought Light to a sort of flow state of semi-meditation. He was at once thinking and not thinking, his mind both dormant and operative. He barely noted the passing of time, and before he knew it, the three hours had disappeared and Ms. Jun had fished his sketch book out of his bag and begun rifling through it without permission.

She looked vaguely impressed, looking at Light with new respect. "These are pretty good, technically. You've never taken a class?" Light shook his head. "They seem pretty accurate, and you're not falling into the same trap I've seen with a lot of people like you, trying to make everything exact."

Light frowned. "People like me? And that's the problem I wanted you to help me fix—no matter what I do, I can't seem to make the drawing reflect the model."

"No, that's not your problem. I'm talking about geniuses," she said dismissively, ignoring his mild surprise. "People like you, who are so good at everything... do you have a photographic memory?"

"Sometimes," Light admitted.

"Exactly," she said. "People like that are often very technically good. They can draw so well that it comes out like a photograph. But that's not art, you see? If I wanted to take a picture, I'd get a camera, not a pencil and paper. When you're drawing someone, you're not just drawing them, you're drawing yourself at the same time."

Light thought this sounded an awful lot like something from a sappy shoujo manga that Sayu would read, but did not tell Ms. Jun this. She seemed like the type of woman who was firm in her beliefs and firm in her defense of those beliefs.

She flipped through his drawings, tutting occasionally. "You're developing a pretty good style. I like the shading in circles, I've never seen anything quite like that before." She stopped on a page and tapped it with a gray smudged finger. "Where's your source material for this?"

Light peeked at the drawing. L. "Memory."

"You should get a photo, or get him to sit for you."

Light frowned. "I can't."

Ms. Jun gave him a funny look, but didn't question the declaration. "You need practice. That's all I can tell you right now. You need to develop your style and find the feeling of each drawing, or else you'll just turn into a photo robot. Don't become a photo robot."

And, with those parting words, Light was given sixty dollars and shoved out into the night.

Even then, Light found that he could not quite figure out whether he liked Jun Tanaka.

January 11th, 2004

Jun Tanaka called my house earlier today. I now have employment from 5:30 to 8:30 every Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday as a live model. At sixty dollars a session and five days a week, I'll get $300 a week. Sherlock's training is $4500. That means I'll have earned enough money in 15 weeks. By that time, Sherlock himself will also be ready for the training.

I would thank Sayu for getting me the job, but I can't tell whether or not I'm thankful yet.

January 12th, 2004

Second art class today went without consequence.

Ryuuzaki has not been in touch in twelve days. He'd better have a fucking good reason for this.