B: I actually counted them; it's 38 pages... ;^; I really, really went overboard with him. And it's so out of the flow, and agh. Set alone it's a nice short story. Not a nice flashback. Blarg. But I won't be omitting anything...too many people don't want anything to be cut out. I think I've figured out a pattern for it, too. I'll be explaining that at the end of the chapter anyway, though, so... Yeah. Thank you for telling me your opinionnnn...
Grell Sutcliff: You're a tiny bit behind but I'm replying anyway. Hi! You want more fluff... Rather, you want fluffier fluff. Ahaha...I am terrible at writing fluff, bu...but I can try! ^^; Maybe this chapter will feed your need for fluff. .-.
Zakuro Nakano: Well the good news is I won't be editing parts out. .u.
Serialkiller567: Ahhh, thank you for your input... A majority wanted it split into chapters, so I'm sorry... Though I agree it would be a rather nice short story rather than an overly-long flashback or whatever. Agh. It won't be shortened, either, so...I'm sorry. Wahhh...
Guest: Admittedly, the age differences in some of the pairings are rather odd, particularly with Sam and L, though it's pretty weird with Anna and Near, too. Aha. But I'm glad you like the pairings anyway~~ ^^
TheBlackArtist: Wow, I got this review right when I was waking up this morning...and then I felt bad because I usually don't update until after school. xD So here's your chapter after waiting, dear reviewer~~
Wow, a lot of you gave me input for what I should do with L's past...so...thank you so much! I love you all! I'll explain what I've decided to do at the end of the chapter...
...Speaking of this chapter... This-I hate it. I'm sure a few of you will get overly excited and whatnot, but god, I am just too awkward for this stuff. Looking back... howww did I write thaaat.
In any case, if you like LxSam you may very well like this. Or not.
But um. I hope you like it.
WARNING, I guess: for sexual themes.
Enjoy?
L eventually stood and turned away from his computers. He was done for now. At this point he could only try to prove it was suicide, therefore proving that charred body was the killer. Besides, Sam had said the two of them would go to Sam's house tonight, and so he supposed it was about time to do that. He was coming to be able to admit to himself that yes, Beyond had beaten him. B had beaten him. He would have to accept that eventually….
Sam swung her feet off the side of the bed and got to her feet. She slipped into her sneakers as L contacted Roger to say that he was ready to go. This was accepted, and soon both of them had shoes on their feet and they were heading down to the front of the hotel to find the black car awaiting them, Roger standing with the back car door open, gesturing for them to get in. Sam entered first, L following, and they sat beside one another as Roger closed the door behind them and eventually the car began to move. There was silence. Things came up in the silence, but nothing was said aloud. Little things. Thoughts. Memories. Emotions. Perhaps mostly memories.
Sam was the one who pushed the quiet away and drowned the muted hum of the engine. Awkwardly, she placed her hand on his and spoke. "You know," she said, and L listened even though he knew what was to be said, "I… I love you, L." Her voice was quiet. Higher-pitched than normal. Hesitant.
He didn't look at her, but his hand closed around hers. "I love you too, Samantha."
It didn't take all that long to get to Sam's house, to my house, to Anna's house, perhaps to Sierra's house. Our house. They got out of the car, Roger drove away, and they walked up to the door. Sam considered knocking, but instead decided that she would just walk in. This was still technically her house, right? Right. So why should she have to knock?
She opened the door and they walked in. L immediately slipped out of his shoes, and Sam followed suit.
"Sam!" I greeted, grinning as I stood. "L! Welcome to our humble abode!"
Anna giggled. "You're so weird, Aunt Natalie," she said, and I laughed while Light smiled.
"You," I said to Sam seriously. "You are going to give me a hug."
She grunted unhappily as I hugged her, and Anna bounced up to join us. Light got to his feet and started walking over. "You need to be home more often, Sam," Anna told her as the poor girl was released. "And sorry for hugging you."
"It's fine," she responded, crossing her arms uncomfortably. "I actually feel pretty cuddly right now, so…."
"Oh, you cuddle with your L," I smiled, waving her off as I turned and began walking away. Sam and L made their way further into the house, Sam muttering something under her breath, and Sam spotted the Uno cards on the coffee table.
She pushed her fists into her cheeks, excited. "Is that Uno?"
"Yep!" Anna chirped.
"We were just finishing a game before you came," Light explained.
"Can I play?" she asked hopefully.
"Yeah!" Anna grinned as I beamed an, "Of course!"
"Would you like anything to drink?" I added, and Sam nodded.
"Dr. Pepper?" she asked. "And tea for L…."
"On it!" I sang, and practically danced to the kitchen to get their drinks. Anna led Sam and L further in, encouraging them to get comfortable. They all made conversation as the night began. Anna and Sam talked and Light and L talked, which went relatively well all things considered. Even though it seemed like L was glaring at Light the whole time. I brought the drinks back at one point, and refilled Anna's cup of grape juice, and then there was a moment of utter silence as the conversations died. In this silence, there was an echo of music from the city just outside. A song every one of us recognized.
I laughed.
Anna and Sam smiled. "Aunt Natalie, Aunt Natalie, can we play this song on our speakers?" Anna asked happily.
I stood and cleared my throat, looking around at the others. "Might I add some music to this fine establishment?" I asked sophisticatedly, and Anna giggled.
"Sure," said Sam. L didn't need to speak. "Can I use my iPod? It has that song on it." Yeah, she had actually gotten some of this world's songs on her iPod. She'd bought a chord that connected the musical player to the computer so she could make her downloads back when she was in America. You know, while L was Leonard DeNero.
"Go ahead," I responded to her, and she pulled it out of her pocket. I pointed her to the speakers in the back of the room on the bookshelf. The house was soon filled with music.
Anna let out a cheer, happy to know the song, and stood. "C'mon, guys, we can dance!" she exclaimed enthusiastically, spinning around.
"No thanks," I said sheepishly. I was not a dancer.
Sam pressed her lips into a thin line as Anna yanked me up and to my feet. Light was laughing lightly as Anna spun me around. Sam giggled slightly, then stared as Anna went into a split.
"I can't do that," she said flatly.
"Me neither," I agreed, laughing. "Poo you, Anna!"
Anna only grinned as she stood and bent over backwards into a bridge, then kicked up and flipped, only to go down into a split again.
"Still can't do it," I said, raising my eyebrows.
"L can," Sam said just as L said, "Samantha can."
Sam stiffened. "No I can't!" she cried.
"Oh, poo you guys!" I huffed, crossing my arms. "Fine. Sam, you get up here!" I grabbed her wrists and pulled her up. She let out a yelp of pain, and my heart skipped a beat. It was irrational, but suddenly it wasn't years later and I was fifteen, and Sam… surely she wasn't self-harming again…. That would be….
"You nearly yanked my arms out of their sockets," she muttered, and I was here again. It was over. That was over.
I beamed. "Sorry," I said, and pulled her up. I swung her over to Anna, and they danced. I grabbed Light's wrist, then L's, and pulled. Light obliged, but L wouldn't budge, only frowning at me. The song changed, and it became a nice, happy, upbeat song that all of us knew. Anna began clapping along to the beat, and Sam and I danced while Light joined Anna in keeping a beat, even going so far as to start singing along. Sam managed to sweep L up into the group of dancing people. Anna rejoined eventually, leaving Light to sing.
"What the hell, Light?!" Sam snapped. "How come you have such an amazing singing voice?!"
He only laughed, and eventually he was pulled in by Anna. No more singing, but hey, we were all having a wonderful time. It was like a school dance, but without all the other people I didn't talk to anyway. Song after joyful song came on and we danced and danced…. Time passed, but none of us really noticed. At one point, Anna and L faced off to see who had better moves. It mostly served as entertainment, and at the song's finish, we really only kept enjoying ourselves afterwards without picking a winner. But eventually the stream of upbeat songs ended, and a slow song came up. Things paused. Everyone but Anna had a partner, but she saw what was to come and grinned, only sitting back on the couch to watch with an impish grin on her face.
The two pairs danced. Me with Light, and Sam with L. Light, typically, actually knew how to dance to this sort of thing, but you know, he was Light after all. I could feel my face heating but I only smiled and danced with him. And what do I do? I asked teasingly. We can't both dance to the men's half.
I didn't learn the woman's part, you know, he responded with a soft chuckle.
Sam and L danced just as we did. It was funny. L knew how to dance, too, though it wasn't really as expected. He'd learned it from his father as a child, because 'All real men have to know how to dance with a woman.' There was a sense of sadness there in that memory, but it did also lead to happiness in being able to dance together.
There was a point when the song ended, and each pair would break apart. Anna was clapping, and then there was utter silence save for her resounding claps. Then the next song came on. A Linkin Park song. Bleed It Out, to be precise. Sam immediately broke further away from L and grinned, throwing her hands into the air.
"Yes," she said. "Linkin Park. Yes." Linkin Park would, of course, be her favorite band of all time.
We did hang around for awhile longer, but soon Rester came knocking on the door, and Light had to leave us. Things began to wind down, and at one point Sam and L would leave too. Anna decided to go up to bed soon after, leaving me alone downstairs. In this time, I grabbed the computer and began to write again.
Bliss.
It was dark again. At first there was the glow of the computers and the moonlight illuminating the room though the wall of windows, but now the light had been obscured by a cloud and L had just turned off the computers. Darkness… but still there was a dim light coming from the window. The golden city lights below along with the muted glow of the moon served as the half-light that was their limited illumination.
It was also quiet. With the dull hum of the computers gone, it left it silent enough to make Sam hear ringing in her ears. Neither of them said a word. Too many things were coming up in the silence.
'Tell me you'll beat them for me, Son.'
Too many thoughts, too many emotions, and too many memories.
'You'll never be as good as you think you are, Sam.'
There was nothing to say. Every thought was one they shared, every feeling was felt together.
'It may be childish, but I won't ever want to lose. And because of that, I just won't lose. I'll always win.'
There was the sound of shifting material as L got to his feet. The cloud grew thicker, and the room grew darker.
'I'll always want to be better.'
"Stop it," Sam frowned to herself, curled up at the head of the bed with her arms wrapped around her legs. No, Sam, she thought to herself, you don't need to think about your idiot mother anymore. How she never understood. And when she tried, she'd only start yelling…. A stinging feeling crept into her throat and eyes, and suddenly it hurt to breathe as there was a crushing sensation in her chest. "Damn it," she muttered, and wiped at her eyes in an attempt to rid them of the tears building and spilling out to run down her cheeks. It didn't help that it wasn't just her own memories pressing down on her, but also L's. And to be honest, he had some pretty depressing memories. No, no, that didn't help at all.
"Samantha."
She knew he was there. Standing next to the bed in his long-sleeved white shirt and his baggy blue jeans, his amazing black hair seeming to cover his eyes in the dark. He was, of course, slouching in that way that pronounced that he was just L. Sam pressed her palms into her eye sockets to try to stop the tears. Even though he knew. Even though she knew it wouldn't matter anyway.
"I shouldn't be crying," she said, her voice quiet. She didn't need to say it, because L knew exactly what she thought, but she said it anyway. "My past is stupid compared to yours."
L looked at her. Reached out, and gripped her hand. "Samantha. 'Even though there are others who have gone through worse than you, it doesn't make the pain any less real,' remember?" But his voice cracked. He leaned in, then, pulling her arm up towards him. He brought her wrist to his lips and kissed the scars from times past. A tear ran down his own cheek, and the cloud left the moon, allowing its light to shine and illuminate the room and reflect off of the trail the salty droplet had left behind. His lips left her arm, and he slid onto the bed and lifted the other arm to kiss its respective scars. The markings of pain.
Sam looked at the tear running down his cheek; felt it drip off of his chin in his perception. Her mouth twitched into a smile. "And even if it's still in the past, it doesn't mean the pain is gone," she said to him, and he smiled ever so slightly.
"Yes," L agreed. He didn't have to. "And even though I am a liar, Samantha…" – Sam closed her eyes and frowned slightly – "…I was speaking the truth earlier." His voice was soft. Husky, even. Low-pitched and somehow hoarse. Perhaps because of the tears. "I really do love you, Samantha…." His hands found hers, and their fingers intertwined. But she knew he'd spoken the truth, and she would always know these things. Sam may have had her problems with liars, but she understood him, so she supposed it was okay.
Her eyes looked off to the side for a moment, and then back to L. The moon shone almost blue-like light at his side, just as it shone at hers in L's eyes. She leaned in slightly, and L did the same as their eyes closed and their lips made contact. L was still sweet, so sweet, yet somehow bitter in the moment…. And L's mouth was filled with the taste of vanilla, with a hint of salt. Salt from the tears that still wet their cheeks. The tears that were still there, but now had seemed to lose some of their bitterness in these sweet kiss. Sugary vanilla.
The kiss deepened, and they pulled one another closer. Their arms wrapped around the other with hesitation. Sam's fingers gripped at his shirt and tugged lightly. The shirt was slipped off and lost….
They were heading towards the place that Sam once believed was the ultimate bond. The ultimate one-ness with someone that had been beaten only by the Bond. But now; now they were heading to what would truly be the highest form of unity one could possibly reach. The ultimate bond; and she and L would truly be one.
The tears were drying now, but even now, when it came to the final moment of decision and they were only staring at one another in the moonlight, L hesitated for but a moment. Only a moment. A moment to decide whether they would actually do this, if they would really reach the ultimate bond…. A moment of hesitation as memories surfaced….
But then the decision was made, and the two melted away into the night, drowning in the moonlight.
...Yep. Yeppers.
And next week L's past will be up; well the beginning of it; yeah. What do you think? Good thing, bad thing? How'd I do, considering my problematic awkwardness?
Fun Fact: That scene is named the Moonlight Scene. When I first started thinking it up (something to do with Real-Life Sam hinting at it and me turning it into a real thing so I could taunt her with it), the first thing I knew about it was that there would be moonlight. So...yeah.
Now, for L's past, what I'm going to do is split into normal-sized chapters, but do a double update every other week. Next week is only a single update, but the next week is a double, and so on. With the size of L's past, I'm gonna say it'll take about four weeks, maybe? So...that's what I've decided. If it's unsatisfactory...sorry. ^^; Hey, tell me your idea, maybe I'll change it, but right now that's how it is.
Soo...review? For...uh...moonlight?... .-.