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He's never seen L, he never will. He's never heard his real voice, he never will. But he's studied his cases, he's trained his mind to be in synchrony with his. L is his ultimate goal, is intelligence, brilliance, power, all the things he wants to... To be? To have? He's only sure about the want. L is omnipresent in the free and oppressive place that is their orphanage, but far away, unattainable, godlike.
But Near, Near is right here.
Near's lips on his, concentrated and repetitive and a bit thrown off by his savage ravaging of his mouth, like someone who's learned kissing from a book, Near beneath him, sweating, grinding up against him, yet oddly calm, Near's hands down his pants, stroking him hastily in a corridor between two classes, breathing heavily and quietly as he does the same to him, and sometimes Mello tells himself this is the last time, but he's not good at denying himself what he wants; and Near appearing in the doorway to his and Matt's room one day he's avoided him completely, timid and confident, patiently looking at him, ...
And Near and the way he solves assignments, steady writing, not too fast but without pausing, so that Mello, silently solving with him, overtakes him easily, until he reaches the first difficulty and Near calmly catches up and passes him, never slowing down. And the similarity in the thinking Mello finds in the way his solves cases, imaginary or real, to the thinking on these other cases he knows by heart, naturally being somewhere the most dedicated studying never seems to get him, and he wants to be this have this destroy this internalise this completely.
But what he has is Near drawing patterns on his chest with a finger, looking bizarrely concentrated, Near trying, with application, to give him a blowjob, except that he comes to soon for it to get very far, Near obediently abandoning his stupid toys when he tells him to, with his infuriating false pliability, and of course that's not what he wants, only it's much more satisfying than it should be. And Near, because he's Near, must know all this, so he tries not to think too much about what his rival is thinking, and he certainly doesn't ask.
When Roger tells them that L has died (and he explodes in grief, in shock, in disbelief, L can't die, can't lose), Near doesn't look up from his puzzle. When Roger suggests they work together to catch Kira, Near agrees, voice calm and unassuming, and under the layers and layers of indifference Mello can feel the joy, and for the first time he understands Near and himself and (but he doesn't dare use the word until much later) their love a little, and God, he wants to strangle him, and if it wasn't for Roger's presence maybe he would.
He's gone four hours later, without having seen Near again, without leaving any hint as to his destination, and even Near couldn't find him; but he's not worried about that: Kira will throw them together again in the end.