Note: Weekly update, and profile page updated for those interested, with links to the wonderful fanart my bride Miharu Is Haruka's Love Child made for one of my other fics Lithium ^^
I also updated Feed My Frankenstein.

So... will Matt and Mello ever stop hating each other? Dun dun dun!

Matt
I hadn't gotten in Layla's pants in a decent amount of time, not that she wasn't willing, but circumstances had made it impossible until now. Therefore, I had lost any interest I had in her. I wasn't one for sticking to one girl for too long, whether I got her or not. Well, to be honest, I always got them. But this time I just didn't care, there were plenty of other girls here and my mind wasn't focused on that lately, which was a premiere to me since the end of junior high school.
No, the object of my... attention... horror should I say... was the blonde fag. Mihael. Blonde fag.
I didn't exactly know why he had shut up in the security booth, but I felt enough relief at the thought that I wouldn't disappoint my parents by being kicked out of university for such a motive as homophobia that, although I blamed it, my mind was playing me the bad trick to want to thank him for that.

Layla, in a perfect timing, came my way. Great. I discovered, to my surprise, that feeling her boobs squished against me as she reminded me of how she would gladly open her legs for me in the minute made nothing to me. I was finding her quite annoying, to the least. Her friend waiting for her a few feet away, on the contrary... well, I'd probably take a chance with her later.

Getting away from the girls, I walked to where the fag was sat. I was feeling incredibly nauseated, but since I saw him there, I had made the decision to talk to him, and I knew that the sick feeling in my stomach would subside as long as I wouldn't have talked to him, so I'd better do it now.
I stopped when my feet were a few inches from him, but he wouldn't look up.
"I know you saw me." I told him, trying to catch his attention, but he purposely ignored me. It couldn't be the earphones preventing him to hear me, I could tell his phone laid in his lap wasn't playing any music at the moment.
"Ok." I sighed, sitting beside him. I couldn't believe I was doing that. Sitting beside him, I mean. Me, with so few distance between a fag and me...

"Listen..." I began, not exactly knowing how to bring the topic up.
His arm shifted a bit to put the music on, and I heard it blasting from his earphones. More than the fact that he was: one, soon going deaf; two: listening to my favourite band and therefore making me realise that I had the same tastes in music as a gay guy; and three, humiliating me, as if the situation wasn't already enough, I felt his naked arm against my own arm's skin, and my hairs stood straight in protest. Ack!
I instinctively rubbed my arm. Wrong move.

I had come to thank him, and I, I knew it, had just despised him with such a move.
The music stopped immediately, and although I thought he would punch me again, he just turned his head oh-so-slowly, and glared at me. He pulled the earphones out of his ears, letting them fall in his lap.
"If you came to insult me, don't bother, I don't care." he said, blankly, before going back to ignoring me, closing his eyes and resting against the trunk of the tree again.
"You didn't look like you didn't care, a little earlier." I replied. I don't know why, I was here to say something positive, but he had a gift to set me off, and I couldn't help but snap at him.
I saw him stiffen, and once again I readied myself for the blow, but nothing came.

"It had nothing to do with the fact I took what you said to heart, because it wasn't the case, you're not the first one, and probably not the last one that will insult my sexuality. I just meant to close this little mouth of yours because you're way too self assured and narrow minded." he spat, still keeping his eyes closed.

I didn't really expect that, although I knew I had gone too far this morning. But it made sense, since he had never seemed to be the kind of guy to take shit from anyone, from what I knew of him. But something snapped in me at his words. I was beginning to feel something different, something like guilt but not exactly. Ok, I was feeling guilty, because it suddenly occurred to me that it was as right to insult him as to insult black people or fat people or... red haired people.

When I was a kid, I've been mocked for my red hair more than once. Kids can be cruel, and I got all the clichés about redheads thrown at my face from kindergarten to junior high: redheads stink, redheads are angels of Satan, redheads bring bad luck...
So I could relate to that, to what I did this morning. I wasn't proud of that, all of a sudden, not that I was before, but now, I could somehow understand I didn't have to bash him for being gay. It wasn't a matter of being a homophobe, which I was... it was that I didn't have to state it so blatantly and despise him in words. Even if he said I hadn't hurt him, maybe I had, of would have with another person, and anyway, yeah, I was as narrow minded as the people that insulted me for having red hair. Although I was born with it, and I couldn't change it expect if I dyed my hair, unlike him who could at least try to change.

But it wasn't only guilt, it was shame. It's scary how I had put myself on the other side, the side of people that think it's normal to insult others about a particularity they have, when I had been on the side of insulted people before. It was scary because if the victim becomes the attacker, then something is not right. The victim should learn the lesson and not change side.
"Sorry..." I whispered. I didn't know what to tell him. I was still disliking him, but still, I couldn't get away without apologizing and thanking him, that was the least I could do. I kinda deserved what he had done to me.

His eyes, that he had closed once again, opened, and he stared at me, like waiting for me to go on, so I did.
"I'm sorry, I know I shouldn't have told you that. I can't help the way I feel toward gays, but it wasn't a reason to insult you, so I apologize. And thank you for not telling the security chief anything. I would've been kicked out and I owe you a big one for that." I said, fast, because I needed to get it out, and I didn't want him to interrupt me.
His reply took me aback.
"What do you expect from me?"
I was the one to stare this time.
"N... nothing, why this question?" I stuttered. Shit, he was making me nervous with his piercing eyes on me.
"Apologizing won't make you less a dick to me, no pun intended this time." he looked away, his back relaxing against the trunk once again. BASTARD!
"I apologize and that's all you have to say?" my voice raised, and really, if I hadn't known I didn't stand a chance against him, I would have hit him straight in the face.
"Do you like me, I mean, the fact I am gay?" he asked out of the blue. I didn't know where he was going.

"Of course not, and you know it." I replied, trying to understand.
"Just like I hate you and all the cocky attitude you wrap around yourself. You feel sorry, but you still hate me, and I accept your apologies, but I still think you're a dick. Understand now?"
"Uhm... " was all I could mutter. I didn't get it at all. And I hated feeling that dense more than I hated him at the moment, which was saying something. That guy had the ability to make me feel bad with myself.

Mello
God was he stupid. I would have loved to think that it was my sexy presence that was turning his mind upside down to the point he wasn't getting what I was trying to make him understand, but unfortunately, he was just a dork, it seemed.
"What I mean, since I have to explain the obvious, is that maybe, although we hate each other, we can act like adults from now on, since we have to spend thirty hours together. We'll have to cope with each other no matter if we want it or not."

He seemed to agree, and we stayed silent for a while. It was weird. I glanced at him, wondering why he was staying here.
He looked at me, then at his hands, then at me again, and he flashed me a grin that would have made me melt if it hadn't irritated me to no end.
"What?" I snapped, as I saw him refrain a laughter.
"Sorry man, I was just thinking that if you were a chick... well... you'd make others chick jealous, you know, perfect skin, long lashes, blue eyes and all..."
Ok, now I was melting. Not for the compliment, but for the fact he had looked at me enough to see my perfect skin, lashes and blue eyes.
"For your information, know that chicks are already jealous, even if I'm a guy."
And I insisted on guy.
"I guess you could easily be taken for a chick..." he chuckled. Arg. How I wished I could slap him right now!
"Being gay doesn't make me any less of a man." I replied, shifting so my left hand rested on the grass and my face was mere inches from his, "I wasn't the one to end up sprawled on my back. Twice." I added, reminding him how weak he had been against me, before resting back against the tree. It had the merit to shut him up, because he looked down again. Not so cocky anymore, hm?

"Why are you gay? I mean... how... how did it happen?" he asked all of a sudden. That was the stupidest question I had ever heard about homosexuality.
I didn't reply, ignoring him. Maybe he would go away and leave me alone. I didn't want to talk to him. He had apologised, I had accepted his apologies, that didn't mean we actually had to take the conversation further.
I put the music on once again, declaring the talk over. He seemed to get the message and stood up.
I felt a bit bad as he spared me a sad puppy look before leaving.
As he walked away, I stated, loud enough for him to hear me: "It happened when my mother got pregnant."
He turned around, looked at me questioningly for a few seconds, and I could tell he was trying to understand. Then he turned around again and left for good.
Did he get it? I couldn't tell, but he couldn't be so dense, could he?

Matt
Lying on my bed, listening to the latest album of the band the fag and me seemed to both like, I was thinking about our conversation. I stood up and walked to my desk, lighting my old computer on. I had had a hard time installing a DSL line on it, it wasn't even able to handle an internet connexion at first, old as it was, but after a few knocks up I had been able to link it to an old modem and surf the web, stealing some neighbour's wifi since there was no way my family would afford a provider subscription.
"It happened when my mother got pregnant."
The words kept on looping in my mind. I typed a few words in Google and soon plenty of pages related to my search appeared.
I read one, then two, then made some other researches, and I realised two hours later something that set a new light on things that had been bothering me since this afternoon.

He was born like this. Gay, I mean. He hadn't chosen to be, it was genetic. That's what he had meant when he said it happened when his mother got pregnant. Just like my red hair happened when my father's spermatozoide met my mother's ovule. I didn't know that. I was stunned because I suddenly got all the horror of his situation slapping me in the face. It wasn't his fault, according to serious medical researches, there was nothing he could do against it, he had to live with it. I felt pity for him.
I also felt my homophobia slightly lessen. I couldn't hold against him, or any other homosexual person, something they had no control over. I was still feeling a bit disgusted because it didn't seem normal to me to be that way, but the part of me that wanted to bash them for being so openly abnormal was gone.

Mello
I was heading for the security chief's office the next morning, five minutes before the time we had to be there when the redhead lightly touched my shoulder to catch my attention, as he arrived behind me. I was surprised by the fact he had touched me. By his own free will. Were we making progress?

"Hi." he said, smiling sheepishly. He looked like he had something to say, so I spun on my heels to face him, ready to listen. Oh God, I should have kept on walking. No progress at all, but the stupidest rant of all times.
"I... made some researches yesterday, because of what you said and... I'm sorry... I didn't know man..." he stopped, and even if I wasn't angry yet, I was kinda annoyed by his insistence on calling me 'man' like if we were pals or something, "I mean, I didn't know that it was genetic and all, that you didn't chose to be that way... must be hard..."

I began to boil. Ok, he had understood what I meant, but despite that, we hadn't made the tiniest progress. He was feeling sorry for me. Like if I had a cancer or something.
"It's not hard, except when some stupid shithead tells me stuff like being sorry for me, because there's nothing to be sorry about, man." I seethed. He must have seen my fists turn to balls because he took a step backward, "I'm totally fine with being gay, I'm even happy with it, something you don't seem to get is that yes, it's genetic, but no, it's not a disease or something I should be pitied for. Or should I pity you for being heterosexual? When I see Layla, I really feel sorry for you, man."

His eyes left the spot they were staring on the ground to look at me. I could tell his mind was thinking at lightning speed, by the way his eyes scrutinized me. I didn't exactly get what or how he concluded from what I said, but he suddenly asked me:
"Well then, can you stop acting like her around me and trying to get into my pants?"

He had the point. I had to admit that I didn't have anything to envy the brunette, I had been acting around him exactly like she did, trying to get him. That didn't mean I liked him being right.
"I guess we can work from that." I replied, before closing the distance between the security chief's office and me. But I didn't miss his self satisfied smirk when he followed beside me. Oh God, I hated him. Probably.