Chapter Text
A night without nightmares. If that wasn’t already a good enough Christmas gift, B turned his head over to nestle his cheek in the mess of Lawliet’s hair. Lawliet was breathing easily, sleeping deeply, no doubt still exhausted from the night before.
I’d call that payback for sure, B thinks with a grin, studying the soft-and-sharpness of L’s cheekbones, the fading scars of the past few days under his eyes.B has a sudden yearning to grab his sketchbook and take an out on this Christmas, but that wouldn’t be fair to the kids, not really.
He still hasn’t seen Mello since the….incident yesterday. Well, time to face that shit, B thought with a grimace, rolling up in the bed.
L’s eyes flickered open slightly when B sat up. He mumbled something incoherent and B couldn’t help but smile and place a few kisses along his jawline, lacing their fingers together. God, it’s so nice to just see him like this.
B thought that was the best Christmas gift he’d had in years.
“Sleep, alright? We’ll all be here in a few hours.”
“How are you even moving after last night?” L mumbled into the pillow.
“I wasn’t up for four days before, stupid.”
“We slept yesterday,” L mumbled, his eyelashes already fluttering shut again.
“For only seven hours. Give yourself some time,” B rubbed a finger over L’s knuckle, leaning into his clean sugar-scent, “M’still gonna be here when you wanna get up.”
“Fine, fine,” L grumbled, clearly not liking the dependence on sleep as opposed to his usual choices. He still smiled a little, and squeezed B’s hand, “Happy Christmas, B.”
“Happy Christmas, Lawliet.”
Beyond shouldered his pack from the night before, which was weighted with presents picked up in New York. First order of the morning though, coffee. And possibly a cigarette. It wasn’t until the smell of roasted beans was filtering out into the kitchen that he noticed he was wearing L’s blue, star-covered sweater.
Mm, that’s particularly incriminating, B thought ruefully to himself, tapping on the coffee maker. He studied his reflection in the chrome on the stove only to also note an angry hickey L had left on his collarbone. Oh. Well it doesn’t get much worse than that, either. He tugged the sweater overtop of the spot, but doubted it would do much good.
It’s then he noticed he had company in the kitchen.
Mello was regarding him from the edge of the door, clenching and unclenching his fists. Looking distinctly paler than usual. B stared back at him. Mello’s eyes seem to go a little buggy zeroeing in on B’s collarbones. He walked forward like he was in some kind of bizarre trance.
It’s too early in the morning for this shit, B thought.
“You got something to say, say it,” B reached into his pocket for his Marlboros, setting them on the counter while he dug for the lighter.
Talking, apparently, wasn’t Mello’s M.O.
B didn’t see the punch coming until a second too late, when it lands with a crack on his ribs. The pain rippled through his solar plexus, making his eyes flicker red and white. A fuzz gathered in his ears as his hands turned to fists before he could think.
Mello started yelling, fists flailing while B shoved him aside and time started to slow down. The instincts started to kick in. The boy didn’t look familiar any more-- or was he a boy at all? He threw a punch with the finesse of someone much older. B dodged blow after blow until his opening made itself clear.
Sloppy stance. B took him out at the knees, wrenching his arms up where he can’t kick, and for a fleeting moment the flash of blonde reminded him of a childhood bogeyman-- someone I should have killed while I had the chance.
B was a breath away from breaking kneecaps when he remembered who he was fighting.
Fuck.
He kneed Mello in the gut and shoves him away, breathing hard. It took a minute for the boy to even start to look like Mello again.
There it is, even on fucking Christmas, B breathed out. Can’t escape what I am.
Mello was on the floor, breathing hard and winded from the knee to the stomach. He wasn’t getting up yet, which gave B a chance to clear his head. He picked up the Marlboro he was about to light, flicked it into flame. He took a drag and tried to say something that was mostly kid-friendly.
Or at least Mello-friendly. Mello opened his mouth like he was gonna yell something again.
“Shut up.” B was even a little surprised at how tired it came out. He took another drag while Mello lay splayed on the floor. Tried again.
“Listen, I’ve just done a deal with a crooked arms dealer, driven through a fucking snowstorm with bullets and an asshole cosplaying James Bond behind me, only to miss my goddamn flight, bribe my way through several security lineups to get on a plane to see the people I love, which L, might I add, is at the top of that fucking list,” B exhaled a cloud of smoke, watching it coalesce into something with feathers and a sharp beak.
“And it’s Christmas. In short, really not feeling your shit today, Mels.”
Mello winced, B was guessing he hit the ground hard, but the kid’s tough. He forced himself to stand, fists still clenched. Jesus, he never gives up, B thought, tapping the ash on the counter and trying to tamp down his anger, set his eyes back right.
“Talk. I might hurt you if you try that again,” B meant it. He doesn’t like talking that way to kids, but Mello’s not a normal kid. And it’s too early in the morning for another bout with the memories.
“I trusted you.”
B caught the swing of Mello’s arm without dropping his cigarette, prepared this time. He twisted it behind Mello’s back, just short of where he would hear the bone crack.
“I said, talk,” said B, “because your day is not today, and you don't wanna live as fucked up as I’ve left people.”
“I am talking,” hissed Mello, “I said, I trusted you.”
“Trusted me to what Mello?” B could feel himself shifting, feel the boy’s arm slip into any of the arms he had held like this, any of the bones he had snapped. B’s eyes peeled back Mello’s skin until he just saw just the skeleton, his grip on Mello’s arm tightening. “Trusted me to be like one of the little thugs you ran with? The baby Nazis that made you feel like a big man?”
He threw Mello forward, out of his grip and onto the floor just before the bone splintered.
“If I played by their rules, you’d be dead now, wouldn't you?”
Mello didn't answer.
“It's not like they would put up with your drama queen shit.”
Whatever Mello mumbled, B didn't hear it. He was concentrating on keeping his voice level, keeping the dead on the edges of his field of vision.
“You were a good boy for them, weren't you.”
He thought he heard Mello sob quietly against the floor. Tears on Christmas Day, how fucking typical. It could just as easily as been one of the ghosts.
“You had to be. But you’re a fucking little terrorist here. Because you can get away with it. But here's the deal, we put up with your shit, you put up with ours.”
“Them’s the rules. And if you fuck that up, you will be on a plane back to Odessa, because I’ve killed younger than you, and I sure as hell don't want to ever do that again.”
While he was talking Mello had scrabbled upright, sitting on the floor, holding his knees. He did look very pink around the eyes, although that could be from the fight. B let out a gust of breath, figuring he should let up on the kid a tiny bit.
“Look Mels, don't try that shit again. I dunno which version of my life they've given you at Wammy's, but I guess it was highly edited. I'm really not a good person to fuck with.”
“I know that dumbass,” spat Mello.
“So was your plan death by Beyond Birthday?”
Mello shrugged. B lit another cigarette, the dregs of his anger fading into the whispy smoke. A two cigarette morning. Just when he thought the day was starting off right.
“Mind if I take a seat?”
Mello was giving him the silent treatment. The smoke coiled to visions of a blond boy, hanging lifeless from a noose. Not a memory this time. And it's worse than that, thought B, worse cause I know whatever stupid he gets up to won't send him to join the ghosts. He’ll just become paralysed or comatose.
“Aside from not really being fair on me, is it really worth dying for?”
Mello scratched the floor with his thumbnail for a while. It was cold on the tile, his ass was sore, and his ribcage still smarted a little from Mello’s shitty punch. But something told him it wasn’t time to let up just yet. Not from this angle, anyways.
“How did you end up - you know, turning?” Mello asked the floor.
B took a long drag on his cigarette. There, he thought, knew you could do it, Mell. He searched for the right way to start, “I dunno, turned 13 and started noticing my roommate was really hot.”
“I thought someone had done something to you, on the streets or whatever.”
“That's not how you end up gay Mello,” B paused, bit the loose flesh on his knuckle, “did anyone do anything like that to you?”
“No,” said Mello, “the Bratva would have killed them.”
“So they kept you safe at least, even if they put some pretty stupid ideas in your head.”
Mello let that one drop. B was pretty sure there would be a sizeable dent in the flooring by now.
“Weren't you scared?”
“Of what?”
“Of being gay?”
“I was scared he’d find out. Because I was just a lanky thirteen year old jerk with acne.”
“You had acne?”
“Yeah, still got the scars, here.”
B pointed to his cheek where a few half-moon craters still dented his skin.
“Oh. I thought that was from something cool.”
B snorted.
“Sorry to disappoint.”
Even Mello smiled a little at that, although he didn't quite manage to look B in the face.
“Didn't it feel weird?”
B thought back to his own awkwardly emerging sexuality. It had felt a lot of things, uncomfortable, embarrassing and often - when left to his own devices, really really good.
“Not really, no.”
“Did he ever find out? Your friend.”
“Yeah, he did.”
“How did he take it?”
“It turned out he liked me too.”
“Oh.”
“I mean, that's the simplified version of events. We were idiots for a while first, of course.”
“Because he didn't want to be gay?”
“No, no.” B paused, wondering how he’d ever got into this conversation, “I think, look when you're friends with someone, it's important. Then if you decide to change that to getting into a relationship- well, it makes things different. You hurt each other more, I guess, although you also get -,”
“To have sex with them,” said Mello.
“Well yeah,” said B, “although I was going to say - love them more, in a different kind of way.”
“Sex,” said Mello.
“Remind me to have this conversation with you again when you are not thirteen.” B bit at his knuckle. “What I’m saying is that it's a tough call to decide whether or not to turn a friendship into a romance.”
“But you did have sex with him, didn't you?”
B smiled. “That's really for me to tell you another time Mels.”
“Who was on top?”
B rolled his eyes.
“Okay, new research project: ways people have sexual contact without anyone being ‘on top.’”
The pink on Mello’s face now had nothing to do with the fight, B was sure.
“You’re shitting me.”
“I’m deadly serious. I want three thousand words on Rogers desk by 7th January. Consider it punishment for fighting.”
“Roger’s desk?”
“In a sealed envelope. And don't try to get off with anyone until it is completed. I’m serious.”
Mello was really blushing by that point. Serves him right, thought B. It was rather - restful to get revenge in ways that didn't involve bloodshed. He could get used to it.
“You’ll find an extensive collection of reference material in the personal development section-,”
“Yes I get it okay,” said Mello.
They were quiet for a few moments, B exhaling trails of blissfully anonymous smoke, Mello now scratching at the frayed knee of his jeans.
“But I don't get why it never creeped you out.”
“I dunno. Maybe seeing the day people die above their heads used up my creeped out quota.”
“It creeps me out.”
“Yeah, I can see that. Look, you're kind of going through a shit time right now. You're going to get creeped out and you're going to get upset, but the thing is, those feelings are your shit and you're going to have to deal with them.”
Mello bit his lip, looking a little less red-eyed, “So you’re telling me to make it up with Matt?”
“You fell out with Matt?” B should have put two and two together, after what Near had said. But fuck, he really needed a coffee right now.
“You know I did, Sheep thing told you.”
“What about?”
“Sheep told you that too.”
“I want to know your version.”
“Sheep said you were gay and Matt stood up for him over me.”
“Well, Near was right,” said B, stretching his legs up and going for the coffee pot.
“Yeah, well he still sided with him. Then he got funny about me getting creeped by that.”
“So Matt thought my sex life was my business and you thought I needed a punch in the face for it,” B took a seat back down next to Mello, sipping the well-sugared coffee.
“Yeah well. I mighta called him a sheepshagger once or twice.”
Mello, to his credit, looked distinctly shamefaced now, B kept a stern face on, “Dick move, Mello.”
“I said I got it, alright. It’s like you said, all this shit is hard to handle right all the time.” Mello paused, and finally turned to look at B. “So how do you deal with your feelings?”
B took a draught of the coffee.
“Unhealthily,” he said blankly, before snapping out of it a bit. “Or we could bake cookies.”
Mello gave B a look that B translated as ‘Bitch, please.’
“It is Christmas morning.”
Right, so cookies then. B got out the requisite bowls and ingredients from the now-emptied kitchen (the staff traditionally took Christmas off, and most of the kids had brunch in Winchester after mass). He eased open the - slightly rusted - iron door to the old bread oven and removed two bags of chocolate chips, coaxing the creaking hinges back just as he heard stockinged feet brush against the tile.
“I dunno if I’m feeling cookies this morning, Near,” groused a sleepy sounding Matt.
“It might be - um -fun?” said Near.
Matt was looking at Near peculiarly, so intent on watching the pale child turn slightly pinkish that he didn't notice a third body in the door way until:
“You didn't tell me Nazi-Barbie was going to be joining us.”
Well, thought B, if you fall for a deception as bad as Near just pulled, life really is going to be full of surprises.
“I’m dealing with my issues,” hissed Mello.
“Bully for flipping you,” said Matt.
B decided that he needed further caffeination before he attempted to wade his way through the clusterfuck of pre-teen angst before him.
“We are making cookies,” said B, mainly to the coffee pot. “Near, Matt - do you want a coffee.”
“I want a coffee,” said Mello.
“You have already been up an hour,” said B, “you had your chance.”
B settled Matt in with a syrupy black coffee, because God knows the kid probably needed it, and poured a second mug for himself.
“Coffee, uh -Near?”
Near was unexpectedly near. At his elbow on the counter-top in fact.
“Could I have a glass of milk?”
At least with all that white he was probably hygienic. B poured out the drink and offered it to him.
“New skill set, N?”
“He can't get down,” said Mello, sullenly.
Near appeared pleased with his new vantage point and B clocked him taking in the kitchen and it's occupants like a pro.
He wondered if normal eleven-year olds did that.
He wondered if he had ever met a normal eleven-year old.
Anyway, cookies. There were three hundred and sixty four perfectly good days on which to mope about our fucked up lives, thought B. We can give give it a rest today.
“So um, do you have a recipe for these cookies, or do you just wing it?”
“Depends,” said B, “are we looking at experimental or edible.”
By now, Mello had clocked the chocolate chips on the counter, and was giving B a look that suggested his ribs would get another work-out if a single one of them was sacrificed.
“Okay,” said B, “edible it is. I think Jinny keeps a recipe- oh thanks, N.”
Near was quite getting into the climbing thing.
“So do we just watch, or what?” said Matt.
B surveyed the recipe, not quite sure how to convert the ingredients into peace on earth.
“No you get stuck in. Like they say on TV, cooperate,” B found the stereo, at least, and turned on the radio so he could listen to something other than the pregnant silence. Which yielded a chirpy version of ‘Sleigh Ride’. B deemed it acceptable, “So I think we need butter, eggs, sugar, chocolate.”
Mello perked up a little at the mention of chocolate.
“Mels, can you beat sugar like you beat my ribs?”
Matt slightly jumped at that revelation. Good, thought B, a little bit of curiosity might get him reaching out, poor doomed fool.
“Matt, you feed the sugar in as Mels beats it.”
Matt scowled at Mello and immediately dumped a white mountain in the butter bowl. Mello attacked it furiously with his fork.
“I’m trying to be nice to you, you twat,” hissed Mello.
Yeah, he's doomed. But no more doomed than the poor idiot sleeping upstairs, thought B. He took me on knowing the worst of me. And that works, keeps both of us out of trouble. Well, kind of.
“Yeah, well it's one faggot and two sheepshaggers late for that.”
Fair dos to Matt, he can give as good as he gets.
“What’s sheep doing? Sitting on his fluffy ass?”
“Near is in charge of the chocolate,” said B, turning up ‘Fairy tale of New York’ to drown out Mello's Russian cursing.
By the time Near had meticulously weighed out 12 ounces of chocolate chips, the butter was a smooth sugary mass, and -
“Matt, wash your hands after your fingers have been in your mouth.”
“Yes boss.”
Looked rather delicious. It looked like the coffee was kicking in a little too.
“Okay, now for the tricky bit. Take a bowl each, and put in half the flour, cocoa and salt. I'm going to give you half each the creamed butter, and you’re going to beat an egg into it, then beat it the dry stuff. Are you good with that?”
Mello was still mumbling under his breath about lack of access to chocolate, not helped by the radio suddenly switching to a quieter melody.
“Am I to work alone?” said Near.
“Nope, you're team B,” said B.
“That makes us the A team,” crowed Mello, but B noticed the little smile that had appeared on Near.
He liked Near. He couldn't help it. Near had been his case, and it had been more than rescuing a lost little child from the needles and the God-knows-what the doctors were playing with, it was the first case he took as team Wammy, the case that brought him home.
Near was meticulous in adding tiny quantities of powder to his mix. At this rate, Mello and Matt, who were now both liberally covered in cocoa and flour themselves, were going to have their batch in the oven way before Near. B guessed Mels was on a race to the chocolate chips.
B measured out half a teaspoon of salt and added it to Near’s flour-cocoa mix. Near smiled at B again, a real smile this time. In truth, Near had a rather creepy smile, but well, creepy kid. It suited him. B smiled back.
“Thought you’d have salt enough, Sheepy.”, hissed Mello. B was readying his death stare, when a melancholy tenor started to warble out of the radio.
‘The mistletoe hung in the old castle halls,
The holy branch stood on the old oak walls .’
“I had a metaphor last night,” said Near into his cookie mix. “I’ve never thought of one before.”
For a moment, there was nothing but the eerie whisper from the radio, and the sound of Mello’s furious beating.
“Mello has discovered geometry can be non-Euclidian.”
“Yeah, I learnt that two years ago, you stupid sheep.”
“It’s a metaphor,” said Matt. “It doesn't mean you really did it, it means it stands for something else, right Near?”
“Yeah, I know what a metaphor is too, Stripey,” said Mello.
“Go on,” said B softly, raising his hand to silence the bickering to his left.
“People believed in Euclid. They believed that geometry was everything, that it was the answer to every question, perfectly logical, perfectly ordered. They believed like it was a religion, which is very bad mathematics, but it kept things simple.”
“Then mathematics moved on. They proved that Euclid could not answer all questions, there were forms that existed outside of those rules. There was a lot of very productive mathematics in this time.”
“I guess they thought it was cool,” said Matt.
“Yes, but people didn't. People thought you could use Euclid to prove all sorts of things about humans, like right and wrong, which seems foolish now, of course.”
“What the fuck has this got to do with me?” said Mello, in imminent danger of beating his fork through his bowl.
“You had a set of rules that made the world safe. Then you were given a proof that the world did not follow those rules. Therefore you feel unsafe.”
Near looked up from his bowl. Mello looked as if his face were imploding from whatever fused wires were sparking in his head.
“Like I said to B, it’s a lot of shit to deal with.”
Near twirled a strand of his hair. Matt stole another glob of cookie mix into his mouth.
“But you don't have to deal with it alone,” said B, “if you knock of the asshole trip.”
“Alright, alright. I'm here aren't I?” said Mello, “I’m being nice.”
“Got anything you need to say?” said B.
“Oh fuck you, you know I don't apologise,” said Mello, “Never have, never will.”
Clearly, there was still a fairly sizeable chunk of mafiosa that still needed filing down.
“Near had never scaled nine foot walls until he was actually worried about your sorry ass,” said B, “if he can acquire a new skill set, so can you.”
Mello threw the fork dramatically into his bowl of gloop.
“Alright. I'm sorry, okay. Matt I was a dick. I said stuff I shouldn't have and it was shitty. I’ve acted like an idiot and expected you all to put up with my shit. And I’m sorry ‘bout serving fists for breakfast. Dick moves, Mello was a dick, can we move on.”
B raised his eyebrows and looked at Matt and Near.
“Did you really try to punch out B?” said Matt.
Mello kind of shrugged. B thought Mels eyes were looking a bit watery again, but he held it together well.
“Jesus,” said Matt. “You okay?”
“Should see the other guy,” said Mello. Matt looked at B. B shrugged.
“I guess that’s the most sense we are going to get. Now it looks like you’re about ready to get those in the oven.”
Near solemnly handed over the chocolate chips. Matt started giggling, maybe at Near, maybe at the situation, B wasn't really sure. He felt a change in the air pressure, but wasn't quite certain where it would take them.
B took a deep breath. It would take them wherever. Let's just ride the storm, same as ever.
Matt and Mello seemed okay right now, busily spooning out their weird production on a sheet of greaseproof paper. The dough they had produced was more of a splatter, B didn't hold out much hope for the end product.
Given Mello was conducting a thorough salvage operation on the chocolate chips, it seemed he had given up on the first batch too. Still, Matt gamely thrust them in the oven.
“What now?” said Mello, wiping a chocolate smear from his face.
“Eight minutes,” said B.
Mello made a noise like B had announced a death sentence. In the background, Near was just getting down to his last third of powder. B was about to offer to help, when the radio started up with the throaty purr of ‘Santa Baby’.
B guessed it was possibly still a sore spot. But hell, Mello had seen him in drag what five times before. He subtly changed his stance, his body falling into the familiar disguise, even without the costume:
‘...a 54 convertible too,
Light blue,’
B batted his lashes and hammed it right up, fluttering his fingers and pouting as he mimed along to the lyrics. Matt sniggered and then, joined in, flopping a tea-towel over his head to flick like locks.
Matt made a worse woman than L, but still he was cheerfully preening along, until even Mello's lips twitched. Dammit, thought B, Mels is not going to pass up a chance to out perform us.
Mello held out on his inner drama queen, until the last verse, when he was on his toes, sliding his hand over his jutting hipbone and crooning through an exaggerated pout.
Mello made a disconcertingly good girl, even as a joke. He had the mannerisms right with very little effort. B could see how he could make it work for real, at fourteen he would pass for twenty.
Don't go there, thought B. A was one ghost of Christmas past that could spare them a visitation. By the time he pulled himself out of his thoughts, Matt and Mels were cheerily air guitaring along to Slade.
Fuck it. B joined in. Here it is, Merry Christmas.
By the time Near was whispering “Africa receives moderate winter snowfall in elevations above 1,500 metres,” Mello and Matt had assembled a percussion section of saucepan lids and were tunelessly banging along to Band Aid, bellowing ‘Feed the Wooo - oorld’.
It was at that point the smoke alarms went off. B yelled at Matt or Mello to get the oven off, and made a mad dash for the basement, hoping he remembered the reset code.
When he has silenced the bleeping, B crept back to the kitchen, suddenly very aware of the silence. It was too late. B returned to the kitchen to find a familiar hunched figure, glaring at the world through sleep puffy eyes.
“Coffee?” said B.
At least Near’s cookie dough looked perfect.
Once L had coffee in him and B had directed something like a clean-up of the kitchen, they brought the single surviving batch of cookies into the drawing room to sit around the fire. B couldn’t help but smile a little fondly, imagining the scene Wammy had recalled to him the day before.
Playing cards like proper partners against crime. The Wammy house did kinda teach them how to do it right. Or at least how to deal with it all. B doesn’t let himself feel too guilty. If it kept Lawliet off the drugs, nothing else mattered.
“Alright, gather round, troublemakers. In a miracle that no one saw coming, we have cookies, no one has died or bled today, it’s Christmas, and here we all are,” he shucked his bag out from where he’d stashed it and dropped it on the rug.
“Is that supposed to be a motivational speech?” Mello snarked around a chocolate cookie, “Yay, Christmas?”
“Shut up, Mells. What I’m trying to say is I brought you all presents. For Christmas. Don’t tell the other kids.”
“This would be considered special preferences?” Near cocked his head slightly, nibbling at the edge of a cookie.
“Well, that and they’ll know I like you three best. Plus Linda, she gets some new charcoal that I like. Anyways--” he reached into his bag for the wrapped packages that he’d kept in his rucksack even through the ride in the storm. The white for Near, red for Mello, green for Matt. Lawliet had brought up the gifts from his desk too, and passed the gold-wrapped gift to B with a tiny smile.
B smiled wide back, hoping that he’d chosen right, for Lawliet. It was a little close on the heels of the mess they just left in New York-- but then, he was hoping that the memories ran a little deeper. Lawliet was handling the gift carefully, the same tense way he always did. Trying to guess what it was.
Matt tore through his paper the fastest, whereas Near and Mello both began delicately handling theirs in a similar way to L. They liked to play the game. Matt grinned ear-to-ear when he opened up the box to reveal the enterprise solid-state drive that B had spotted in a pawn shop.
“Wow, B-- uh, how much was this? There’s gotta be a million megs on here,” Matt adjusted his googles with a bit of a gasp.
“It’s definitely worth more than I paid for it, but that’s about the best my eyes can tell you on that front,” B winked, “Put it to good use.”
Matt nodded, “Thanks, I will.”
Mello was still shifting his gift back and forth with an air of concentration. B figured he had a pretty decent chance of guessing right. Near had ceased to manhandle his present and is curling a finger around his hair, “Story book, or notebook. More likely the latter.”
“Not quite. Give it a look,” B said gently, enjoying the way Near’s brow furrowed in confusion as he worked the paper open. Even Mello stopped for a moment to watch, although maybe just gloating over Near having incorrectly guessed the gift. Near let out a little gasp when the plain yellow book slid out.
“Oh. You got me a book. On non-Euclidean geometry,” Near was holding it with a peculiar reverence that B doesn’t quite know how to place.
He seems more confused than happy, so B felt like he should say something, “Sorry, I thought maybe it’d be something you’re into. Sorry you don’t like it, I mean. I can get you something else you like better?”
“No, I love it. But why would you encourage more of...this?” Near almost looks a little teary-eyed. Over math. Well, B thought, it’s not like I wasn’t a pretty weird kid too.
“I mean, you like it, Near. You should get gifts you like. Plus I thought it was pretty cool shit. Some of the manifolds, I mean.”
Near mumbled something that sounded incoherently like a thank you, but he seemed to be having trouble putting words together. Even Mello looked a little soft-eyed at that, though he turned his attentions back to his box, shifting it back and forth.
“Thoughts, Mell?”
“It’s pretty heavy, like, it’s got a weight to it that’s familiar,” Mello rattled the box once, trying to decide before his eyes widen all of a sudden.
“You didn’t,” Mello made a pistol with his hand, and B smirked. Mello whooped, “You serious?”
“I mean, it is Christmas. And lucky for you I decided this before you started giving me shit, so yeah. Don’t make me regret it,” B grinned a little more as Mello tore of the paper, lifted off the lid to reveal the slightly beat-up Beretta 92 that had been his right hand for more than a few cases, “I didn’t load it.”
“Shit. This has seen action, hasn’t it?” Mello handled it with the appropriate amount of awe, and respect. At least there, B could tell the kid was ready for it.
“Yeah, that one brought me luck with the Magic Lantern especially. It’s a steady shot,” B already puts out a hand as Mello goes to cock it, “Hey, you know the rules.”
“You said it wasn’t loaded!”
“Like I said, you know the rules,” he glared to let Mello know this was serious shit, “For use at the range only, Mels. I’ll let Roger know. I know you’re good with a lot of the weapons there. This one’s yours now.”
Mello lowered the weapon back into the box and slid it over to B. So definitely getting the message, “Thanks B.”
Mello’s gaze travels over to L, who is turning the midsize box over in his hands.
“Plane tickets,” L looked at B slowly, drawing the glance of all the kids as he set the blue box down in front of him, “Possibly a hotel booking.”
“Yeah,” he smiled a little bit. Lawliet had always been very good at the game, though B was often able to surprise him.
“But where, I can’t begin to think,” L pressed a finger to his lips carefully.
“I dunno if I wanna make you guess, cause I’m not sure I chose right,” B looked at the ground a bit, and Lawliet nudged him with his shoulder.
“You generally have very good instincts,” L worked the paper off slowly, lifted the lid to reveal the Heathrow to JFK tickets, dated for December 30th, and the brochure for the Casablanca Hotel, Times Square. Where they had their first new beginning together, or at least that’s how B thought of it.
He hoped Lawliet felt the same way.
“So. You think you can take New Year’s off?”
“You got the same room, didn’t you?” L’s voice was so perfectly soft for a moment, a smile spreading over his lips with all the weight of that old, yet so young memory. B let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding, “Of course I’ll come.”
“I thought it’d be nice to go back where we started, even if we’ve been around the block there a few times. Besides, I know you’re eyeing that case in Chicago, if you’re up for afters,” he winked to try and cut the tension between them, but L just nudged his shoulder gently again. Gratefully, almost.
“It’s perfect. Thank you. Now, open yours. Or guess,” Lawliet clasped a hand over his just briefly, eyeing the kids with an air of nervousness. Or maybe he was nervous about B’s reaction too. B squeezed his hand back before giving the box a rattle. It jingled.
“Well, I mean, they sound like keys, but that’s probably bullshit.”
“Did you get him a car?” Mello bounced up and down a bit, which B gave him a pointed ‘shut up’ look, before turning back to the paper. He worked the package open to find a familiar, if a little rusty set of keys. His keys.
“These are for my motorbike, yeah?” it was his turn to ask very softly. This isn’t the motorbike he drove through the storm in Queens, thought that was a slick piece of work. No, this was the motorbike he’d stashed in various garages in Europe, driven for years, with and without Lawliet behind him.
But what was spinning across B’s brain, already overwrought with living ghosts-- was that this was the motorbike that L had totaled. The same one B had arrested him for stealing, to force his hand.
“It’s in the garage, now. Ready for use.”
L’s hand wasn’t shaking when B took it now, feeling the distinct vertigo of wonderment, “How on earth….?”
“It wasn’t it good shape, but I found the right mechanic. A lot of the original parts are still there. The one’s that are new still drive well, or so Wedy tells me. I prefer to ride, not drive,”
“You fixed my bike. No. You fucking had it brought back from the dead,” B stared at L, and hoped his expression would convey the depth of what this meant to him.
“Yes. It was the least I could do,” L smiled just the tiniest bit, and B decided, yeah, meaningful stares weren’t gonna do it. This kind of present deserved a kiss, kids or no kids. And he’d been hungry for the softness of Lawliet’s thin lips since he rolled out of bed this morning.
It was Near, surprisingly, who cleared his throat to break them up a few beautiful seconds later, “I believe public displays of affection are considered uncomfortable?”
“Yeah, knock it off, you two, I’m gonna throw up,” but Matt was grinning at Mello, and Mello did not, in fact, look like he was going to throw up, so B supposed things were fine.
No, rather. Things were more than fine. It was Christmas and they were together and safe. Happy, even.
That was more than fine enough for the entire holiday.