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With the stakes rising to intense levels between the SPK and Taskforce, getting a night this quiet was practically a miracle.
January 27th. One day before Lights designated meeting with Near. Despite how thick the tension was, Light was utterly calm. Coming home calmer than Shizuku had ever seen him since Sayu’s kidnapping.
But the calmness felt eerie. The calm before a storm, the pause before a predator pounces, like the world was holding its breath and wouldn’t exhale until the truth came out tomorrow.
The meeting had been lingering on her mind ever since Light agreed to it. It felt far too much like a trap, and with lights unwavering self-assurance, he seemed blind-sighted to the warning signs that seemed to blare at her.
She wondered if it was a case of Lights unmistakable need for victory.
She was in her head again, recycling the same thoughts that had been floating around her head for the last week. Why did this meeting make her stomach churn? Why didn’t light seem to see the warning signs? Why was he so calm? Why did it feel so final?
These thoughts hovered over her heavy like fog and suffocated her like smoke. Sitting in the darkness of their shared room only seemed to make her spiraling worse. And she knew better than bringing up this burden with light, she knew him well enough to gauge how hed react. Dismissive, as always.
Despite her doubts, she couldn’t take the hurricane of what ifs in her mind any longer.
With a deep lingering sigh, she stood up and left their room, wandering around their apartment to find where light had decided to tuck himself before the meeting. It was less than 12 hours away, and if Shizuku tried hard enough she was sure she could hear the gentle woosh of sand falling through the hourglass. Slow, deliberate and deafening.
She hated how the air seemed to carry an impending sense of finality. She felt almost desperate to find Light, and her desperation was driven by this seemingly irrational sense of doom. Light wasn’t Kira. She should trust him, he was calm, she should be calm; so why did it feel so hard to believe in his innocence?
She had noticed Aizawa’s growing suspicion, and she couldn’t deny the fact the thought had started to creep forward from the deepest confines of her mind. No matter how hard she tried to drag it back into the shadows, it always came back around into the light. A crimson, hauntingly alarming light that made her shake her thoughts away and walk faster towards Lights office.
Gently she knocked on the wooden door before cracking it open and peeking her head around it. the room was illuminated gently by his desk lamp, it painted the planes of his face in a soft warmth, and suddenly her worried disappeared. Her thoughts and suspicions of her fiancés possible involvement as the worlds biggest murderer melted to the back of her mind.
Despite the way he looked up from his files with that same lopsided grin she had fallen for all those years ago, it felt off. And she had to clench her jaw as the thoughts rushed in once more.
She quickly made her way to his side wordlessly, resting her hands on the back of his leather desk chair and letting her finger tips ghost the soft tufts of hair against the back of his neck.
She watched as he placed down his pen, the one she had gotten him for his birthday last year, and she felt the hint of a smile ghost her lips.
Light spun around, head tilted in a way that made his bangs shadow his eyes. She had always loved his eyes, honey hued and bright. She couldn’t deny herself the urge to reach out and cradle his cheek with the softness of rain on a flower.
She felt her body sigh and his gaze hardened almost imperceptibly, his brows furrowing slightly.
Shizuku pulled her hand back, letting her fingers brush the soft strands of his fringe from his skin as she let herself crumble against him. Crawling to sit on his lap.
Her head against his chest, the steady beat of his heart, which usually relaxed her, felt more like the ticking of a clock, counting down her remaining moments with Light. She screwed her eyes shut, willing the thought away best she could.
She felt his hands find the bottom of her thighs and ride her up to a more comfortable position.
She felt his silky voice through his chest before it hit her ears, his hands coming to cradle her waist, his fingers toying with the apex of her hip.
She sighed against him, the warmth of his touch was grounding, but her head was still swimming. She needed a distraction from this.
As she tilted her head to look at him, from this angle his expression was soft, eyes mellower than usual.
“What’s on your mind?” he asks quietly, voice synonymous with the fondness of a lullaby, she felt herself frown as her arms tightened around his waist.
She gave a noncommittal hum, “same as always” she mumbled, keeping her eyes downcast, she wasn’t able to stomach the possibility of looking up and meeting the eyes of someone she didn’t recognize. That fear was becoming too much of a habit for her liking. She could barely look her lover in his eyes anymore. It felt ridiculous to her.
“Shi, I’ve already told you not to worry. Everything will go fine; we will be fine. I promise.” He reassured, the hint of a chuckle lingered beneath his words, his tone was too lighthearted for the heaviness she was feeling in her chest at that moment.
As his hand started to trace shapes into her back she willed herself to relax her tense muscles in his touch, the flutter of comfortable chills up her spine as he brushed his fingers up and down the small of her back relaxed her enough to let her mind wander.
Her mind strayed, far away from the date and slowly approaching designated doomsday she had created in her burdened mind.
Her brows relaxed and she thought about Light, younger Light. The way he was when they first started getting to know each other, she let her lips quirk into the hint of a smile as she recalled meeting Sayu and Sachiko for the first time. Life felt easier back then, Sayu was happy, innocent, and sunny, Sachiko was happily married and nosey.
Shizuku thought about the nights she spent at the dinner table with the Yagamis, tapping lights foot under the table and watching him bite back a cheeky grin as he returned the gesture.
Those days felt so far away now.
Glancing up at Light, he looked far away in thought too. She took the opportunity to admire him, the way his face had matured, the soft doe-like look to him had disappeared with age.
It had been almost 6 years since she first met him. She could barely remember life without Light.
She remembered the night they first agreed to start going out. The softness in his gaze was unlike anything she had witnessed before. He looked at her like an equal. Something she had noticed, ran with, and never looked back.
Her Light… something about him had shifted.
Grown up, obviously. But age wasn’t the only thing that had changed. At times, she met his gaze and almost didn’t recognize the eyes that stared back.
And every time it happened it disappeared just as quickly. Almost unnoticeable. A flash of something hungry, something bigger than she could anticipate sat beneath the life they had built together. It frightened her.
When Light had begun to blossom, she felt like she was lagging behind, her petals were not as elegant as his. They were dark, rotting with doubts and unspoken burdens, weighing her down until she felt like wilting.
Light had always made her feel like an equal to him, building her up to she was on the same level of his despite the gradual growing pedestal she had mentally placed him on.
Light and Shizuku had grown together, intertwined like branches.
Of course, Light had offered to share this burden best he could, but even he wasn’t able to comprehend the sheer magnitude of the thoughts that had begun to eat her up. and she refused to drag him down due to her mental incompetence. Instead, she buried it down, deep beneath her ribs and inside the valves of her heart, pushing it down further with every heart beat and ignoring the shadow of her burdens when it leaked, when it dripped through her veins and seemed to taint her hands.
He shifted beneath her as she snapped out of her thought, she had tensed up again, her fingertips digging into the fabric of his shirt.
She could feel it in the way his breathing hitched, not in annoyance, but something different she couldn’t quite place, perhaps inconvenience. As if she was knocking the matchsticks he had so carefully placed around her.
She hated feeling like a liability to Light.
Screwing her eyes shut she finally sat up from his chest, his hands cradling her waist, snaking around to hold her thighs once more, his thumb stroking the soft skin of her leg.
Wordlessly he prompted her, his eyes asking the question. She avoided his gaze, shaking her head as she got off of his lap, the cool wooden floorboards grounding her further.
“Come to bed, It's late.” She spoke quietly, her hand lingering on his wrist that had returned to hold the pen and linger over the page. For a moment she thought he was going to deny her.
But he obliged, placing the pen down and filing away the papers on his desk in a drawer to his left.
Shizuku let her hand fall to her side as she began to make her way back to their room.
Letting out another sigh as she took a seat on the edge of the mattress. her side was undone, quilt pulled back and bedsheets wrinkled from where she had been laying earlier.
Light followed behind her shortly after, hands coming to undo the first few buttons on his casual black button up, she watched him as he turned his attention back to her. His hands paused at the third button from the top.
They locked eyes for a moment, something unspoken crossing them as Light let his hands fall back to his side. She couldn’t hold his gaze. Her eyes falling down to her lap as she fidgeted with her intertwined hands, she felt like a child being scolded despite the lack of words shared between them.
She watched as Light paused in front of her, his body slotting between her thighs as one of his hands came to cradle her chin and tilt her head up, forcing her eyes to meet his.
In the moonlight bleeding in from the sheer curtained windows, she thought she was looking into the same velvety brown eyes she had fallen for all those years ago.
But with another blink the vision melted away to reveal the same cynical almost blood hued eyes she had always dreaded finding. She swallowed thickly as she felt his index finger trace the line of her jaw, his thumb brushing her throat.
She was correct, Light had grown; changed into something.
Into what? She couldn’t say, and with their gaze locked together in silent devotion she understood she’d get her answer tomorrow.
But tonight was hers to pretend, pretend the man before her was the same Light she had as a teenager.
Light's thumb traced her bottom lip and the shallow trance fizzled away enough for her to speak.
“I need a distraction.” She said bluntly, quietly. Hushed voice in the early night.
“What kind of distraction?” Light asks, tilting his head as her hands come to finish unbuttoning his shirt.
He watches as she avoids his gaze, far too focused on the task at hand he thinks to himself. Silent but knowing, he copies her action, pulling up her shirt and letting his warm hands ghost her stomach, thumbs running up the side of her abdomen and tracing the curve of her waist.
Her brows furrow as she finishes unbuttoning his shirt, letting her hands rise above her head for him to pull her shirt over, leaving her bare for his eyes once more.
Deep in her mind, she knew this was the last time they’d do this. Something would go wrong tomorrow, and Light would be pried from her hands. And she was helpless to prevent it.
She wondered if this was how Ryuzaki felt the hours leading up to his death.
What had he told Light? Something about a bell? She understood his seemingly meaningless babble about premonitions for the future. She understood far better than she had ever wanted to.
Light lips trail down her neck, placing open mouthed kisses to her collarbones; she eased herself back to lay against the mattress. But even with the way his hands toyed with the waistband of her underwear, his knee prying her thighs apart as he fumbled with his own belt, her mind was still clouded.
She needed more. She needed more of his touch burning her skin, more of his mouth against her flesh. She needed him to peel her skin open and devour her from the inside.
She needed to be entirely consumed by his being, and maybe then she’d be blessed by escape from this mental hell she’d been subjected to for far too long.
As Light finally draped himself over her, the pressure of his hips pressed against hers. The trail of kisses down her sternum cool against the heated air between them. Her hands found his hair, fingers tangling in the foxy red strands. She felt her hands tense, pulling at them as he bit and marked her skin until his nose was against her lower stomach.
She glanced down at him, his sharp gaze shielded by his feathered fringe, she drew in breath, sucking air through her teeth as she shifted her hips where they laid pinned beneath his chest, she watched as his eyes trailed up her bare body, eyes calculating. Like he was deciding where to latch on next.
She breathed out his name, and his eyes snapped back to meet her own. He paused as he noticed the glassy look to her eyes.
Her bottom lip quivered as he returned to hold himself above her, gently he rested his body weight on his elbows, letting his head find the crook of her neck. His breath tickled her throat.
“What’s the matter, angel? Why are you crying?” he questioned gently, voice low and sincere. His hands rubbed circles into her hipbone. One of her legs coming to wrap around his hips and draw him in closer.
His tone caught her off guard as she drew in a shaky breath, the exhale coming out just as trembling. She felt the sting of tears catch in her throat, a lump she could barely swallow as she tried to bite back a wracking whimper.
His lips placed kiss after kiss along her jaw and up to the shell of her ear where he moved down to meet her lips.
A quick loving peck to her flushed lips and she swallowed down the painful sob that threatened to escape from her chest.
His actions were giving her whiplash. Light hadn’t used that pet name in years, she couldn’t recall the last time he had called her angel with no prompting.
It made her heart squeeze painfully inside her chest.
She screwed her eyes shut, willing herself to remember the feeling of his skin against hers, the way his weight felt on top of her.
Deep in Shizuku’s heart, she knew this would be the last time they’d intertwine and connect like this. The last of their intimate embraces.
The least she could do was enjoy it and commit it to memory. But even the thought of admitting this to be the final time he’d touch her this way hurt her heart, a painful lingering ache in her chest that she imagined grief to feel like.
She felt cruel grieving him when it wasn’t guaranteed everything would fall apart a day later. It was cruel to not only herself but him as well.
Slowly she guided his hand down her body until his fingers brushed her inner thigh. He gave her a questioning look. Brows slightly drawn upwards as he waited for confirmation. Did she really want this?
Yes. More than anything.
If this were to be their last night together, she wanted to feel him in every way possible. She wanted their souls to touch one final time.
As a stray tear finally breached her eyes and trailed down her cheek, Light was quick to kiss it away, frowning at her melancholic expression.
“Are you sure?” he questions gently, fingers slightly squeezing the inside of her thigh, to which she only spread them further apart.
Without a second's hesitation she nodded, wrapping her arms around his shoulders and drawing him in for a kiss. A suffocating, breathless kiss that made her lips sting.
She pulled back after a long moment, their noses still touching as she tilted her head to rest her forehead against his.
Her tear-soaked lashes brushing against his skin as her eyes fluttered shut.
When she finally spoke, Shizuku didn’t recognize the voice coming from her lips. Her tone was saccharine sweet and yet a defeated sadness lingered.
“I have never needed you more than right now, Light.” She murmured, letting her words hang between them like the stars in the sky.
And when she opened her eyes once more to meet his, the only way he could describe her look was as if he had hung the moon.
A woeful shine lingered in her brown eyes, illuminated by the moonlight.
Light couldn’t help but wonder to himself if she knew just how much she truly meant to him.
She had been his exception. The perfect girl, carved from stardust and neighboring atoms, designed specifically for him and him alone.
He couldn't ignore the potential. The equality between them. Light was a man of many things, but true genuine affection wasn't one of them. He wondered if she knew how many nights he considered admitting everything to her, revealing his biggest secret to her. The countless nights of going back and forth with himself in the early morning hours.
He also felt a sort of finality as he connected with her, the warmth pooling in his gut was almost nauseating as he leant down to place another kiss to her forehead. A gesture he would have thought to be far too affectionate.
But tonight was a special night,
Tomorrow he’d finally give her the world he promised himself to give to her all those years ago.
What better way to celebrate becoming God of the new world than to devote himself to his goddess the same way she had done countless times before?
This was a treat for him as much as it was a final goodbye for her.
The warmth she felt when he finally connected with her entirely was different. It seemed to encase her entire being. He ran his fingertips over her tense limbs until she relaxed into the mattress beneath her.
Their fingers linking as his name fell from her lips like a broken prayer.
He drunk up the sighs from her lips like he was parched. Swallowing his name on her tongue as if it was the only sustenance he knew of.
She wondered if he had made the same connection that she had in her mind.
The red strings were all leading to the same spot. Perhaps his uncharacteristic lovingness was because he knew it was the end too.
Light could never leave Shizuku behind, but she knew he would. Regardless of if it was intentional or not.
Shizuku would be left with the memory of his hands over her body and his eyes locked with hers. For a moment, they were teenagers again, still learning each other through kisses and intimate touches.
For a moment, she was back to when life wasn’t so suffocating, to when her mind was her friend and not an enemy of the darkness that lingered above her and Light.
For a moment, everything was perfect, tangled limbs and roseate lips.
Everything would change tomorrow, but for now? she would allow herself this indulgence.