I have no desire to write, but I have to anyway, because, to everyone's surprise, L is here again. I feel obliged to update you, since you are my pen pal.

I never wanted to find myself in the situation of having to talk about him again, but reality is not always as we imagine it. I should have got used to it by now, but sometimes, it seems that, despite my logical and rational mind, I like to delude myself that one day everything will be the way I want it to be.

Until then, I will have to live with L, because I can no longer try to get rid of him. If I did, I would find myself further away from my goal than I am now.

Being at Wammy's House and having two friends is just a step in that direction, but there are many things I lack, which are not material and which, therefore, I cannot easily obtain. If you were a real person like me, you would realise that, but you are not. You don't need feelings or connections, to be rational and a task. You don't have to come to terms with your past actions and wonder if what you did was of any use, because you exist in time, but you don't feel it.

You do not feel the passing of days. You are not consumed by the fact that everything around you is changing, while you are stuck in memories of the past, because it is the only thing you know for sure.

I want to be able to live with my mind towards the future, that's why I got the idea of becoming a journalist in my head, to have something to hold on to and to be able to tell myself that once I'm actually writing articles in my office, everything will be fine and I'll have already stopped seeing that Friday every time I go to sleep, but it's not true.

It is only a hope, as it had been that I would never have to see L.

He has returned. That day will never leave me.

And the more I think about this future I have imagined, the more uncertain it becomes.

But this short update is not about that aspect of my life.

This page is about L.

I was the first person, after Watari or Roger, to see him. I have already written that I intended to enter his room and I did. However, I fell asleep and woke up five hours later with him by my side. Not the best way to start the morning.

He told me that his temporary departure from the orphanage had been caused by me telling him he shouldn't be here. He thought that proving me wrong would erase any negative feelings I had towards him. Obviously, it didn't. I hate him, anyway, and I will never stop doing that.

Actually, I don't even know if he conducted that research. He just told me that he did something to demonstrate to me that it wasn't so, but I haven't read anything about it, because accepting information from him is like getting punched in the eye: it makes your eyesight damaged for a certain period of time, and I have to see his lies clearly.

I haven't been out of my room since he came back, except to have lunch with Rae and Ayla. Waiting for them was less pleasant than usual, since I was forced to share the same space with L, who stood at a table at the end of the room alone, which is the only good thing, because he looked like a loser.

He really is, by the way.

It's true that he was the one who turned away the people who tried to sit down, but that doesn't change anything, quite the contrary.

What bothered me most, though, was something else entirely. Ayla suggested that we join him, and I objected firmly, being backed up by Rae adding that, perhaps, L wanted to concentrate on his work, as he was not only eating, but also had some papers spread out on the wooden top. So far so good, nothing strange. I was glad that Rae was on my side, but I would have preferred it if that position would have remained even after she finished eating.

They joined him when I was about to leave the canteen and return to my bedroom. I turned around and they were talking to L. They could have at least waited for me to leave the room, but that didn't happen, and L didn't even dismiss them.

They seem closer than I imagined, and I can't even intervene because if they decide to be on my side, L will surely throw them out of the project, which won't happen, since being on his side allows them to make their dreams come true.

I have to keep my distance and remain calm. Being in my room satisfies both requirements. I've never found myself inside these four walls alone for so long, but if I have no other way to momentarily ensure the continuation of that futile and unrealisable plan, I have to put up with it.

I can approach L, by the way, just to make sure that the project doesn't work and that he decides to abandon it once and for all, after having fulfilled their demands, of course. I don't know how long it will take, but I want to be there when it fails. Until then, I try not to interact with him and ignore him as much as I can because, if he happens to decide to irritate me, I am not sure I will be able to restrain myself.

I hate him so much.

And, in the grand scheme of things, I don't particularly care to talk to him; therefore, his 'blackmailing' me gives me an incentive to do something I already intended to do.

Someone knocked on the door. I didn't mind being interrupted by my conversation with Mazzaroth and being sought out by someone other than Rae and Ayla to get my opinion or whatever, but it took me a while to answer, because I didn't know if I actually had the strength to entertain any discussion, even the shortest and most insignificant.

"It is open." I said finally, but no one entered the room.

On the one hand, I was relieved, because I could continue to wallow in the idea that I could eventually be replaced by L. On the other hand, I wanted someone to worry that I was no longer so present in a place frequented by more people. However, less than forty-eight hours had passed and, according to a popular misconception, that was not enough time to consider a person missing.

It was only an exaggeration of the situation that allowed me to consider ridiculous the idea that no one cared about me except Rae and Ayla, who had seen me that very morning, because I wasn't really missing and I wasn't even in any immediate danger, but it didn't completely remove the feeling of being in my old house.

'Old' because I really wanted to consider Wammy's House the new and extremely different one.

There was a specific reason why I didn't stay in my room alone much and it was because, for a long time, it was the only place where I could consider myself safe, but, after the accident, it had become a constant reminder of how I had preferred myself, how I had been selfish and how someone else had paid the price while trying to get me out of there.

I didn't want to seem weird and for anyone to question my behaviour, so sometimes, at the expense of my will and the lingering feeling of panic I had about not being aware of what was going on outside and especially to Rae and Ayla, I would stay cooped up in my room reading, which made it worse.

Reading was supposed to distract me, but all it did was point at me and blame me for everything that had happened. I had no way to make the book stop beating myself up, because I was not reading for someone else, but for myself; therefore, it fed the noun that defined my past actions. Yet, not reading and thus not being able to get my mind away from it in some way and having to deal with my thoughts directly was worse.

However, at that moment, L was at Wammy's House and seemed to be replacing me in the role I was to take on that day, despite the fact that I did not trust him. In addition, that rational part of my mind was constantly trying to convince me that there was no threat lurking. Furthermore, I had Mazzaroth, instead of any other volume, which didn't completely disintegrate whatever negative feelings I had, but it mitigated the burden I carried on my shoulders, because I could say I was in the presence of someone else, if I personified it, and that deterred me from exhibiting behaviour I would consider strange.

I heard a knock at the door again. I wondered who could do it a second time, even though I had already said they could come in, and the answer I gave myself was not pleasant, because it had never happened before L had shown up there and it was in his character to behave like that.

I put Mazzaroth under my pillow with the temporary pen I had procured hanging on the cover, because I hadn't had a chance to retrieve mine, and approached the door.

I was surprised to see Lex once I opened it, though he partially explained why he hadn't entered the room initially.

"Receiving guests?"

"That they self-invite?" I asked.

"Well… You should always expect me, because you are my assistant and what if I need you?"

"Do you?"

"Yes! You need to pick up your things from the floor. I might slip and fall and break my other ankle!" He chuckled, looking to the ground in front of his feet, on which rested a pen to which a slip of paper was attached. "'For Ethelinda'… Is it a gift?... Oh! A secret admirer!"

I ignored his comment completely, because my mind was entirely absorbed in the realisation that the first knock on the door had been from L. I should have been happy to have it back, since it was also my intention to get it back, but the fact that it was him who had returned it completely changed the narrative and my opinion of it, so much so that I hated it and considered it useless, despite the fact that it was a perfectly good biro.

I picked it up from the ground and, without paying too much attention to Lex's presence, tore the card into four parts, pulled out the ink reservoir and split the transparent barrel in two. I just wanted L to know how useless any generous action he did for me was, which he surely defined as 'help' and was designed to inflate his outsized ego.

Being careful not to trip over Lex's crutches, I walked to the front of L's room and dropped everything in front of it. I knocked, but didn't wait for him to reply, as he had done. I did not mean that I wished he had crossed the threshold of my room, after my invitation, because he was not allowed to do so in any situation, but I would have preferred him to make his presence known on the other side of the door. In the first days of his stay at Wammy's House, he had become accustomed to appearing behind me without warning and I could not tolerate him continuing in that way.

Only when I turned towards Lex was I aware of his confused and amused expression, which also hid a hint of concern. However, he did not move and seemed unwilling to leave.

"I guess… Not a secret admirer?" He asked me, as I returned to my room. "It must not have been good to see him again, huh?"

At the same moment that I was entirely inside it, I heard a door to my right open. Lex turned to look at the fraudulent paladin of justice, and I didn't even need to check whether it was him or not, because I was sure, and he confirmed it himself.

"Hello, Lennox."

Just hearing his voice was unbearable, let alone when he was using an outdated version of Lex's alias. No one had called him that since the second month of his presence at Wammy's House. I could only think of two reasons why he might know that, and in that instant, I imagined it was just the option that gave me one more reason to hate him.

"Hey there, L. Glad to have you back." Lex reciprocated.

I walked out of the room, aiming my gaze at L, crouched on the floor picking up the pieces of pen.

"Have you read our personal folders?" I asked.

"No, that would be an unthinkable breach of privacy and, unlike you, I'm not so foolish as to make others aware of it."

"I didn't go back to your room." I lied pointlessly, as it was obvious that I had made a little late-night foray while he was in the bathroom.

"Yes, you did. I put salt in a sheet protector, the opening of which was downwards and slightly curved, so that it wouldn't fall out unless it was raised, Ethelinda. Didn't you wonder why there was a little white paper at the bottom of the backpack?"

He was making fun of me. Telling me the way he had found out about my invasion was to direct my actions in a certain way, in case I decided to make another visit and get my hands on any other object.

It was to make me waste my time making unnecessary checks on the presence or absence of salt and any other means of verification that I could think of, which probably hadn't even been conceived by him. In short, he wouldn't even have to make the effort to create an ingenious method to ascertain my passage, because I would have considered it myself and spent most of my time making sure it didn't work.

Letting him know that I had figured out his little game would have been to my disadvantage, because he would have told me that the salt one was one of many systems he had put into practice and that he had many others to use. He would not have given me any concrete proof of their existence; therefore, I decided to postpone the matter to another time and find out for myself.

"You did well in being able to put it back in the exact position, I must admit. If it hadn't been for that little detail, I wouldn't have noticed." He added.

"The pages were blank." I spoke.

"And you wonder why?" He cast me a look and then pulled himself up. "We made a compromise. I never said I would no longer consider you a threat. It's a completely different negotiation, one I'm willing to have if you want to come down to my terms."

To his terms? Did he mean that I would have no active part in the bargaining?

He only confirmed that the best way to define him was my own: anti-justice, because he administered his personal idea of fairness, equity, and morality, without anyone being able to criticise the way he operated.

"The salt could get in your eyes if you're not careful where you step."

"Creative way of refusing."

We remained a few seconds in silence looking at each other, for it was clear he expected a rebuttal from me, and I had a lot to say to him. However, Lex's presence, which I had decided to consider, distracted me from voicing these things.

"I would never sabotage something that Rae and Ayla are a part of."

I opted for something that would restore my reputation in Lex's eyes, in case it had deteriorated, and that would remind L of the commitment he had made, but that was true, so that there was no need for me to lie and for L to believe himself the defender of truth and reprimand me.

"Not everything I do is for the project per se, Ethelinda. I told you: completely different negotiation."

He was basically telling me that there was something I could ruin without it affecting Rae and Ayla negatively.

"How do you know about Lennox?" I asked and L gave a nod towards Lex.

"I told him." The latter replied and I turned to him, confused. "I'm talkative. I'm sorry."

I shook my head. I didn't want him to apologise to me for a defining characteristic that I honestly liked, because I was sure whatever he had to say was either interesting or funny and I didn't want my hatred for L to alter that about him.

"And he's very good at listening." He added.

"I bet, since he often gets into other people's business and meddles in conversations that don't concern him." I signalled to him with my hand to enter the room, to which he obeyed.

"Actually—" L began to counter, but I had no intention of listening to him.

I followed Lex and closed the door behind me, without even giving a last glance of attention to the anti-justice.