Chapter Text
L's Christmas List, [do not edit or repost]
December 18-19, 1989
The backpack he can afford is bright pink with polka dots, cheap polyester blend, and the last of its kind. The coins feel heavy, clutched in his sweaty palm. Beyond Birthday hands them over, ignoring the way the clerk raises an eyebrow.
“S’for my sister.” he lies, trying not to look at the way red and blue flicker and flash at the man’s skin. Just keep it together.
It’s not a good date. Too close to a very bad date. The groceries are heavy on Beyond’s back, the oversized bomber jacket from a boy at least six years older than him, god knows how many years dead, clinging to him with London’s December rain. His boots are letting in a little too much water, but at least his fingers are warm in the new pair of red-knitted mittens.
He knocks on the door, just as he has for the past month or so, and waits a few minutes under the awning for the same scene to play itself out. A frail, wizened old woman opens the door slowly, her eyes squinting for a moment, before some memory fills in the gaps of what she sees.
“Robert,” Marla embraces him as if she hasn’t seen him in years, rather than hours, “You’ve been so long out to play, love? Why didn’t you come home for dinner last night?”
She always asks the same thing, even though Beyond has sat at her table yesterday, the day before, eating rice pudding in the seat of a ghost. Sometimes, he swears he sees him, peering out from the corners. The boy whose photographs are on the mantle, age 10, age 16, military dress. They look a little alike. A little.
Marla tears up again when he produces the carnation from his bag, and he plays the part well over dinner. It’s not so bad. Even the ghost at the door smiles a little, though Marla’s dinners always consist of creamed corn, ham, toast. It’s warm though, it’s a place to stay. I’ve got to find another one soon, or the cold will get me. Gotta find shelter.
But I can’t stay here. Not when she’s gonna die. Not when I might– He coughs slightly on the rice pudding.
“Go down alright, dear?”
“Yeah. I’m fine.” Beyond makes up stories about school friends, stories about learning about ships based on what he’s seen and knows. It’s nice. It’s nice to pretend, though he can see the date above her name with every bite he swallows.
Marla Porter. December 20, 1989.
The next day, he packs his pink polyester backpack, with what’s left of what was underneath the old woman’s mattress, and whatever else might help his chances out there.
“Where are you going, Robert?”
“School.”
“It’s Saturday, though!” It was, in fact, a Wednesday.
“Look I’m just going out for a bit, okay?”
She tuts to herself, “Well, if you must go out to play. Won’t you give your mother a kiss?”
Beyond swallows, “Alright.” and kisses the paper-thin wrinkles on her cheek for the last time. Sorry I’m not him. Sorry you had to–
“You’ll be home for dinner, won’t you?” she says, and the memory of a murder he doesn’t quite remember flashes through his eyes. He flinches, hard, but she doesn’t seem to notice.
“Yeah.” B shoulders the pink backpack, now loaded down with jam, bit of bread, bit of fruit, and whatever was in the cupboard that could keep, “Bye.”
“Stay safe, honey!”
The air has dropped several degrees from yesterday, and though clouds are gathered in a grey soup above him, it hasn’t started raining yet. Small fucking mercies. Beyond Birthday exhales, and steps out on to the pavement.
Beyond's Shopping list [do not edit or repost]
December 19, 1989
Given that there’s a growing layer of mushy sleet on the streets of London, L is satisfied that he chose to wear his wellies on this third trip into the city for Christmas shopping. He doesn’t like how they squeak when he walks, making it impossible to mask his presence, but they do a bang-up job of keeping his feet warm and dry.
Even as small as L is, it had been a challenge to squeeze past the crowd that had gathered to take in Harrod’s Christmas display windows. The nearest display – which he managed to stare at for a few minutes before being out-sized by the adults around him – was a magical forest glittering with white lights, nimble sprites bedecking the trees with ribbons and colorful sweets.
Lollipops tied to the branches with white ribbon, L thinks just as he’s swept away from the view. That’s just what the tree in the saloon ought to have.
“Would you like me to take your coat, Lars?” Wammy asks when they’re fully enveloped in the toasty air of the department store. Every room and aisle is bustling with shoppers and tourists, and L lets Wammy take his coat for the time being, knowing he’ll soon grow too warm in such an atmosphere.
“Can we go to the top and work our way down?” L asks, already making his way toward the escalators. Wammy allows him to lead the way, holding both of their coats with that sort of fussy precision that occasionally gets him mistaken for L’s manservant – or would, if L looked at all like a posh child and not a slightly rumpled one in need of a haircut.
During the ride up to the fifth floor, L consults his Christmas list again. He takes gift-shopping seriously, and prides himself on giving each kid at Wammy’s the gift most suited to them, based on careful observation and calculation. Sasha hadn’t even asked for a tea set, but L had seen her re-read The Secret Garden enough times to know that she was fascinated with Victorian propriety and rituals. And Roger heavily favored navy polo necks in winter, but perhaps didn’t realize that his cold-weather dandruff left behind a startling, snowy landscape on the dark fabric.
“Fifth floor is casual menswear,” L observes to Wammy as he hops off the final escalator. “We can get Roger’s gift, then go down to the third floor for Toy Kingdom.“
“And where will we finish?” Wammy’s lips quirk a little behind his mustache. “The Chocolate Cafe or the Ice Cream Parlour?“
He knows all too well that L wouldn’t dream of leaving Harrod’s without visiting or or the other. Or both.
The sky opens up in early afternoon, by the time Beyond has trekked to the heart of London. The pack is already feeling too heavy, and his boots are soaked through with sleet. He rounds the edge of Brompton road, invisible amongst the bustling tourists. Guess I can get out of the cold for a bit, s’long as people don’t notice me.
Beyond isn’t stupid. He knows people like Marla, people like me, he corrects, are few and far between. There’s no fucking way I’m going to an orphanage. They’d start asking questions. They’d want to know where he was from. They’d find out who he was, what he was, and what he did.
Beyond bites his lip to that thought, jumping away from the grotesque mask-faces of the crowd. He lets the current carry him into Harrod’s. While he’s still presentable he makes his way up to the third floor, the flickering lights calming him with the fact that these, in fact, are not something his eyes invent. While keeping his eyes on a glittering blue and white tree, he bumps straight into a well-dressed, middle-aged man, carrying several bags of purchase.
“Sorry, young sir,” the man has greying temples and a mustache that grows underneath his smile. He smiles like Marla. Beyond sees her face flicker once over his, and perhaps stares a bit too long, “Are you lost?”
“Yeah,” he says it with a touch of unsureness, then gathers the lie in his mind, “I was supposed to go with my parents for lunch, but I don’t know where they went, so I just came here. I don’t know if they’ll be able to find me!”
He lets breathy panic into his voice, and the urgency hits the old man,Quillsh Wammy, in the way his eyes soften. Good. If I’m lucky I can get a meal out of this, maybe even a warm night’s sleep. One day at a time.Before Beyond opens his mouth. There’s a boy behind the old man, mop of messy, dark hair, whose just coming off of talking to the shop girl.
“This one with the flower pattern will do, Wammy.” the boy, obviously some kind of rich kid, hands the gift slip to the old man. L Lawliet. Beyond reads the red letters with a slight smile on his lips, the hell kind of name is L Lawliet?
At first, L assumes that the boy talking to Wammy is lost. It happens often enough in a store as large as Harrod’s, especially when it’s as crowded as it is today. Wammy must assume that he’s lost, too, if the helpful, expectant expression on his face is any indication.
L’s eyes quickly take in the boy’s appearance and puts together an altogether different story. His jacket is far too large, definitely second-hand, and the pink backpack he wears looks heavy. L is surprised that the shop security actually let him wander around wearing it. His gaze travels sharp from the top of the boy’s curly head down to his worn shoes, and only when he glances back up does he see that the boy is looking at him just as sharply. Their eyes meet and L instantly slumps a little, lets his features go slack.
“Hullo,” L says quietly.
“Hello,” the boy says back, the accent strained and nasal in the back of his throat. It sounds like something from the movies. New York?
“Good, Lars, you’re back.” Wammy shifts his packages and looks down at L. “I’ve just bumped into this young man who’s been separated from his parents.”
“What terrible luck.” L looks at the boy without blinking.
“Indeed. Now that we’ve finished shopping, perhaps we ought to take tea at one of the other restaurants.” Wammy gives the boy a generous smile. “Would you care to join us while you wait for your parents?”
“Oh, yes sir!” the boy says, his smile big enough to make the corners of his eyes crinkle.
L’s fingers twitch a little at his sides. The smile looks real, not faked.
“I’m Lars, and he’s Mr Wammy,” L says, shuffling from foot to foot. “We’re up from Winchester for the day. You must be on holiday with your parents?”
“Mmhm.” The boy gives a vigorous nod, but his smile stiffens.
A liar, then. L knows how to spot his own kind.
Beyond shifts uncomfortably in his seat at the Georgian tea house. The whole thing feels like a big mistake, under Lars Lawliet’s wide and watchful slump, Mr. Wammy with his straight backed smile, taking tea from bone china and pastries off of silver platters. He smiles and asks Beyond questions about America, but Beyond didn’t miss the cash he slipped the maitre ‘d when they were let in. I don’t belong with these people.
Which is a shame really, considering both Mr. Wammy and L Lawliet would live a hell of a lot longer than anyone he’d stayed with before. And isn’t that just how it is? Beyond tries to be civil when reaching for the scones and jam, but gets a quizzical look from L Lawliet when he spoons a jar’s worth of jam onto his pastry.
Look, we can’t all stuff our faces with eclairs every day of the week.
He takes a nibble of the scone and is unable to stop the slight moan that comes out of his lips, “I didn’t know they could make jam this good!”
Wammy chuckles, “It is world famous.”
Lawliet laughs too, and it’s a nice sound. Not as unkind as Beyond was expecting. Beyond doesn’t particularly like the way he stares, like he’s trying to unravel his thoughts from the outside in. He’s suspicious of me. Probably thinks he knows everything.
Beyond leans in, knowing his usual way for dealing with rich bullies. Freak ‘em out a bit. It’s not like I can stay with fancy-pants here. “So is Lars some kind of fancy nickname for L? I’m guessing he’s your butler or something, considering he’s not Mr. Lawliet.”
Halfway through tea L decides that the boy – who has the absurd name Beyond Birthday, no less – might not be a thief even if he’s definitely a runaway. Wammy knows it too, even if his warm, smiling eyes give nothing away. That’s fine; if the kid truly has no home to go to then there will be room for him at the school. He can share a room with Harold, or maybe Barrett. Barrett was a runaway when he came to Wammy’s House, too.
But Barrett, at least, knows enough of the world to know that you don’t take all of the strawberry jam for yourself. L hides a frown and makes do with the lemon curd.
“So is Lars some kind of fancy nickname for L?”
The words burn in L’s ear and he abruptly stops squeaking his wellies together beneath the table. His eyes flick to Wammy to see if he’s overheard, but he’s distracted by an old friend who’s come to the table for small talk.
“I’m guessing he’s your butler or something, considering he’s not Mr Lawliet.” The boy named Beyond smirks, his eyes glittering with something that could be malice or humor, and L’s brain swims with possibilities, each one less pleasant than the one that came before it.
How could he know? Maybe one of those knobs at Scotland Yard that’s been fired sent him? He quickly evaluates Beyond’s features. He can’t be much older than I am, if he is at all. Maybe revenge for the Chapman case?
L’s pale fingers dance over his plate, picking up his butter knife first, then his fork. Yes, fork. He slips it beneath the crisp white linen tablecloth and presses it hard against the bony length of Beyond’s thigh, his face blank as he leans in to whisper “Who sent you? And who do you work for?”
Beyond’s eyes widen to saucers. Whatever reaction he expected from L, it wasn’t this, that much L can plainly see. He jerks the fork away at once and stares openly, suddenly far more intrigued than suspicious.
“Almost no one knows my real name,” he says softly. “How’d you sort it out?”
Lawliet’s slump goes from harmless to lethal in less than a second, the hard whisper matching the way the fork digs into Beyond’s thigh. His heart kicks up to a mile-a-minute, and the room takes on an ugly hue. And then it’s gone, and Lawliet is appraising him with something that looks like curiosity.
“Almost no one knows my real name. How’d you sort it out?”
“I don’t work for anyone, okay? It’s just me. I see people’s names– like above their faces,” Beyond’s heart is beating too fast to lie, and besides, no one believes him about this anyways.
Who is this kid? He’d stab me with a fork over his name?
Lawliet stares at him, long and hard, but doesn’t say anything. His eyes are unfathomable, and he’s got a thumb jammed under his lip, crouching like a peculiar frog. He seems to come to a decision, “Wammy, Beyond and I are going to pop out to get iced cream. You like iced cream, don’t you?”
The question is so serious for a moment that Beyond can’t help the grin the crawls over his lips, “Yeah.”
Lawliet hops out from his seat on the plush cushions, and Beyond follows. While they walk out towards the purple neon sign, Beyond jumps at the flickering image of a yawning mouth of teeth superimposed on the reindeer display. Rats crawl at the base of it, but he’s sure those are memories too. Pretty sure.
“Stop it.” he mumbles at the way Lawliet stares, “Sometimes I see other things too. But the names and numbers are the only ones that mean anything. That’s a reindeer, right?”
L’s eyes pass between the display and Beyond’s uncertain expression, trying to make sense of the question for a few seconds before simply deciding to answer it at face value.
“Well, it isn’t a real reindeer.” The reindeer has comically long eyelashes, in fact. “It isn’t very realistic, more of a fantastical rendition. Like you might see in a storybook.” He looks back at Beyond to see how he’s processing this answer. With relief, it seems.
L wants to ask what the reindeer looks like to Beyond, but decides to put in his order at the counter, first, requesting a hot fudge sundae made with strawberry iced cream. Beyond quietly asks for a regular hot fudge sundae, and L tells the server to top both their orders with extra whipped cream and sprinkles.
They watch the server put together their sundaes, then sit at high stools and dig their dessert out of parfait glasses with long spoons, Beyond spinning back and forth just slightly, his eyes closed with evident pleasure.
Iced Cream for two [do not edit or repost]
“I don’t understand how you can see names and numbers,” L finally says, gazing at Beyond over the rim of his sundae glass. “I’ve never heard of anyone who can do such a thing. But there’s no other way you could know my real name….” he trails off and sucks at the end of his spoon, both frustrated and fascinated.
“How do you do it? And what kind of numbers? What do they mean?”
The sweetness of the sundae goes colder on Beyond’s tongue as he turns back to Lawliet’s intent gaze, “You really want to know, huh?”
I’ve never told it to anyone who’d actually believe me.
He exhales, looking over his shoulder at the men wearing his father’s face. “They’re… death dates. I can see when people die, and their names. I don’t know why, I don’t know how, I don’t know that I want to. All I know is that everyone I’ve met–” the words die in his throat. I don’t know people for long, really.
“They’ve never been wrong before,” Beyond forces himself to look back at Lawliet, who has his brow pinched in something between skepticism, awe, and slight fear, “Look, you don’t have to worry about yours though, you won’t die till–”
“Don’t.”
“Sorry, sorry.” The date above Lawliet’s head is long, longer than even most of the kids he’s met. They both turn back to the remains of their iced cream sundaes, the air suddenly grim and uncomfortable. Lawliet is licking his spoon back and forth in an almost fervent manner. “So what’s so important about your name, anyways?”
The laughter from people roaming the food halls, the cheery blast of Christmas music on the sound system – all of it shrinks away as L sucks on the end of his spoon and turns the peculiar boy’s words over in his head. He’s familiar with all of the mental disorders that might induce hallucinations, but being able to see the date of someone’s death is such a specific type of vision that it gives him pause.
L has never had anything remotely supernatural happen to him before, and even entertaining the possibility of Beyond’s claimed abilities is enough to make his entire skin squirm with a skeptic’s discomfort. If he were an ordinary boy he would probably decide then and there that Beyond was either a nutter or a pathological liar and leave it at that, if only to keep the safe, sane walls of his world intact. But in the end he’s L – not very ordinary after all – and certainly drawn to the extraordinary no matter what threat to his world-view it might pose.
“Everyone calls me Lars,” he mutters around his spoon. “L is the title of a detective who solves cases that Scotland Yard and CLP have given up on.” He scoops up the last of his sundae and swallows it with a slurp. “I’ve solved over forty cold cases in England alone. I guess you could say it’s a hobby.” Though the word hobby seems like a dreadful understatement.
L pushes his parfait glass aside and regards Beyond with a tilt of his head. “I want to see how your eyes work.” He gestures with a shrug at the crowd filtering in and out of the aisles behind the ice cream parlor. “There’s a lot of people here. Are any of them going to die today?”
Beyond freezes up when the word detective falls out of Lawliet’s mouth, loud, angry voices from many nights before starting to fill his ears. Lawliet’s entire attention is directed at him, dark eyes shaded under the wild mop of messy black hair. If I lie to him, he’ll know.
Beyond turns his head, scans the crowd, squinting over the sea of faces that morph and meld into memory to the red letters that float above, “No one here. Not soon, anyways.”
Lawliet looks away for a moment, tapping the spoon against his lower lip, then staring at B intently.He’s going to find out, he’ll know what you did– Beyond forces those thoughts closed, I don’t even know what I did.
But maybe if he knows. Maybe if he believes me, what I see…maybe we can find out.
“There’s someone else, though,” Beyond knots his fingers together, unable to meet Lawliet’s gaze, “I’m not… I don’t have parents.”
“I know.” there’s such a gentle seriousness to Lawliet’s voice, that Beyond knows, knows he understands. It surprises him for a moment, presses his words on with more honesty.
“I was staying with an old granny– her name’s Marla Porter,” Beyond swallows, hard, thinking of the lonely woman in her empty house, chasing at shadow-memories.
“She’s gonna die. It’s gonna be tomorrow.”
Beyond licks his lips anxiously at his own words, his eyes cast down into the remnants of his sundae. It’s a sight that both perplexes L and makes something twist low in his side, right below his ribs. He looks away, and it’s a few beats before he can look back again.
“That means you don’t have anywhere to stay tonight, yeah?”
Beyond gives a reluctant nod, and it’s enough to make L jump off his stool and hold up a hand to keep Beyond from following. “Wait here. I’m going to get Wammy and see about putting you up.”
L finds Wammy finishing up at the gift wrap centre, giving polite instructions to a shop clerk who’s loaded up a trolley with their purchases. “There you are,” he says when he sees L approaching. “And where’s your new friend?”
“Finishing his sundae.” L gestures for Wammy to lean in so that he can speak low in his ear. “He’s a runaway, but he says he doesn’t have parents. I think he could fit in at Wammy’s, but it might be good to get his whole story first. Can we put him up at Marylebone tonight?”
Wammy straightens up a little, adjusting his glasses. “He’s from America, Lars. Even if he is an orphan, installing him at the school will be a unique challenge.”
“But not impossible, right?”
To that Wammy only purses his lips together and looks thoughtful. “In any case, he’s certainly welcome at Marylebone for now. I’ll bring the car around front and you two can meet me in fifteen minutes,” he says, passing L his coat.
Later, when the Bentley is gliding through traffic and turning toward the West End, L asks Beyond how he ended up in London. The answer involves much animated description about hopping a freighter ship as a stowaway, a story almost too fanciful to believe – except the kid must have come ashore somehow, and L doesn’t have a terribly hard time imagining him scuttling around the decks, squinting into the sunlight and hiding, mouse-like, between the cargo containers.
“Oh, where are we?” Beyond asks when Wammy turns the Bentley into a small underground parking lot.
“Marylebone. It’s the Wammy family’s flat in the city.” A penthouse, in fact, though L doesn’t regard this detail as important. “The Wammy family manor is outside Winchester. That’s South of here. But it’s been turned into an orphanage and school now.”
And with that, the Bentley comes to a smooth halt and L unlatches his door, rounding the car to let Beyond out.
The apartment is grand– far too grand for Beyond to feel comfortable in. The floors are oak, the tables are teak wood with inlaiden carvings, the couches a vivid crimson. Lawliet shucks off his shoes like they’ve personally wronged him, puts his bare feet on the couch, drawing his knees up to his chest.
Beyond, figuring that’s the proper way to sit on these damn thing, follows suit.
“You can sit any way you like, you know.” Lawliet has an amused smile playing on his lips.
“Well that suits me just fine.” Beyond stretches his legs out so that his bare feet dangle over the couch next to Lawliet, who smirks, but doesn’t comment.
Beyond takes a a deck of cards that the sailors gave him before he’d left and fumbles them between his hands nervously, forcing himself to keep still when images flash out of the corner of his vision. He shuffles the deck, trying to distract himself. Is this a mistake? Lawliet doesn’t look like he’s going to arrest him– in fact, he’s hopped off the couch to grab a rather large notebook and textbook.
“Are you working on…detective stuff right now?” Beyond crawls over to Lawliet’s end of the couch, peering over at a language he doesn’t recognize.
“No, I’m studying – It’s Italian.” L tilts the book toward Beyond, noticing that he’s stopped playing with that deck of cards he brought out a bit ago. L doesn’t bother mentioning that Italian will be his ninth language, once he’s reached conversational fluency. In his earliest years Saskia had spoken to him in English, Russian, Mandarin, and Dutch, and by the time she died, multi-lingualism was as natural to him as breathing and walking.
Even so, L doesn’t like studying languages so much as he strongly dislikes the idea of eavesdropping on someone and not being able to comprehend what they’re saying.
Beyond’s face falls a little as he squints at L’s Italian book, clearly disappointed that it isn’t full of detective stuff. L hesitates a few seconds before quietly shutting the book and setting it aside. “I suppose I can show you what I’ve been browsing through.”
He scoots off the sofa and fetches a heavy file folder from his book bag, then crouches on the floor in front of Beyond and flips it open. “The FBI hasn’t acknowledged me yet, so I’ve been looking through some of their cold cases,” he says, laying out a sheath of papers next to Beyond’s knees. “Don’t ask me how I got these, by the way,” he adds, widening his eye a little, “but I’m looking for ones that are interesting. Also challenging. It’s not fun if it’s easy.”
Beyond tenses when the FBI is mentioned, trying not to show too much nervousness as he flips through. Looking for his name. There’s a lot of New York in the case files, but nothing as recent as July 1989. So maybe they’re not looking for me after all. Or at least it’s not a challenge to him.
He chews at the skin of his knuckles while he flips through the grotesque unfinished stories. Murders where the corpses are years dead, a mob boss who used only hand-to-hand combat, a strangled six-year-old ransomed in a wine cellar. One of the boys, from Louisiana, has been missing since age thirteen. Beyond squints at his name, floating in red over the image. Death date’s still a while yet.
“Nine years…long fucking time to be missing, and still alive,” Beyond says to no one in particular. I wonder if I could end up on these case files. He scans the story, a simple disappearance from a basketball game, never seen since. The parents look pleasant in a family photograph, but one of the neighbours providing testimony has a curled lip that makes Beyond’s skin crawl.
Their dates are close. Beyond doesn’t linger on what that means, if anything. It’s odd, though.
L nibbles on the edges of his finger as he watches Beyond study the case files. He can hear Wammy rattling around in the kitchen behind them, probably putting together a light supper.
L has never spoken to someone his own age about the work he does; he doesn’t often, in fact, speak to people his own age very often at all. The other kids at Wammy’s were at one time intrigued by L and his particular type of reclusiveness, but now they’ve mostly got used to him skipping lessons and disappearing from the school for long periods at a time. He’s quite sure that most of them believe that he’s sickly.
And so L nearly holds his breath as he continues to watch Beyond, bracing himself for a particularly daft question or – worse yet – a silly bout of childish crying. But Beyond only reads the files with curious eyes, rattling off a single observation: “Nine years…long fucking time to be missing, and still alive.”
Fucking. L thinks about how he said the curse word so casually. As if he’s not trying to be impressive or bombastic, but just speaks that way on a regular basis, which L supposes he must.
“Mm, that’s the Shaun Simmons case?” L crawls up on the sofa to look over Beyond’s shoulder. Shaun’s school photo shows off his large, crooked teeth and freckled cheeks. “Why’d you think he’s still alive?”
Beyond tilts away to look at L, his hazel eyes wide and searching. A split-second before he opens his mouth to explain, L catches on.
“Wait. You can see names and death dates on photographs, too?”
Beyond gives him a small nod, and L sucks in a breath and looks at the photograph of Shaun again. “Oh, that’s really useful,” he admits. “For this type of work, anyway. If the FBI knew he was alive, they probably wouldn’t have let the case go cold.”
It’s useful if it’s true, L reminds himself, glancing at the clock. It’s only just past seven, several hours yet until the date of Marla Porter’s death.
The word ‘useful’ whirls around Beyond’s mind with every case he flips through, spreading them out on the fine Persian carpet in little piles. I’d never thought of it as anything other than knowing when you could kill someone, if you wanted. He bites a little harder at his knuckles, wondering how Lawliet got into his ‘hobby’. Just as he’s about to say something, Mr. Wammy comes over.
“There’s tomato soup and cheese biscuits for dinner if you boys would care to join me,” he looks momentarily surprised when he sees Beyond poring over the thick file of cases, but doesn’t comment. Over dinner, Beyond asks Lawliet more about Shaun Simmons, and he rhymes off a few stories that could be theories, which the two of them almost get into an argument about—if Lawliet weren’t so damn good at showing that he was right. He’s not showy about it though, so it’s the first time Beyond has lost an argument that doesn’t end in a fistfight. For a moment, he almost forgets about what date tomorrow is, his eyes staying in the glow of the room, with the savory scent of tomato soup.
“I think I’m going to retire, boys. Beyond can take the third bedroom for whenever you decide to go to bed.”
“I think we’ll be up a little later. Perhaps we ought to watch a movie.” Lawliet glances meaningfully at Beyond from across the table.
“That’s an excellent idea, Lars. I’ll make some popcorn before I retire. Beyond, do you have anything you’d like?”
“Do you have Batman?” Beyond asks, suddenly animated. The film was so interesting that Beyond had snuck in to see it in the theatre twice. The story was easy to fall in to, easy to forget about the world outside while watching.Could use that right now.
“Yeah, Batman sounds great.” Lawliet nods, and Beyond takes a seat next to him on the couch, still studying him out of the corner of his eyes. Beyond has never met a kid detective before, never met anyone quite like the sharp-eyed boy in front of him. He’s a detective like Batman. Are his parents gone too? But the movie titles are starting to flicker on the screen, and Beyond focuses his attention there, to blot out the whispers and skitter of images that are just as false.
At Wammy’s House they have movie nights one or two times a month, and L usually skips them unless it’s a movie he’s really been itching to see. The other kids are too chatty and restless, making him want to order them all out of the room, but Beyond proves to be decent movie-watching company. He sits quietly, a sofa cushion hugged to his chest, and takes the film in with rapt eyes. After a moment, L forgets that he’s there and falls into the spell of the film, too.
“It’s good, isn’t it?” L announces when the ending credits have finished parading down the screen. He walks over to the VCR and pushes the ‘rewind’ button. “The Joker isn’t a very good criminal mastermind, though. Too showy, almost like he wants to be caught.”
“Maybe he just wanted people to know what he was,” Beyond suggests in a faltering way, so that L turns to catch an odd expression on his face. L isn’t usually mindful of other people’s emotions, even if he can pick up on them exceedingly well, but a ripple of intuition tells him to take care with this conversation.
“You mean a monster? He blames Batman for that. And Batman blames the Joker for creating him when he killed his parents.” L climbs back onto the sofa and perches over the popcorn bowl, idly picking out a few kernels. “I think they both want their epic showdown, really,” he says, cracking a small grin. “Batman seems just as mad as the Joker sometimes, don’t you think?”
“Yeah, I thought that too!” Beyond drops the pillow, gesturing animatedly with his hands, “Man, and wasn’t it risky that Alfred told Vicky that he was Batman? I mean she’s a reporter! Not that there’s anything wrong with people knowing…secrets. Secret identities, that is. I’ll keep yours, y’know?”
Lawliet nods at him very seriously, “You have to. No one else knows except Wammy.”
“I will. I will.” Beyond eyes the numbers above Lawliet’s forehead, and guesses by the look of it that Lawliet’s detective work isn’t much like Batman’s. His stories are good though. And he doesn’t seem…scared of Beyond, which is surprisingly nice for a change.
“So is Mr. Wammy your Alfred, if you’re a detective?” Beyond reaches for a handful of the popcorn kernels at the bottom of the bowl, crunching them thoughtfully, “And do you really live in a mansion?”
The barrage of questions from Beyond, paired with his insistence that he will keep L’s secrets, sends a flutter of unease through L’s belly. The possible consequences of opening up himself to a stranger hasn’t been lost of L, exactly, but the novelty of this whole experience has kept him from fully contemplating them until now.
L watches Beyond scoop popcorn into his mouth and decides that he should be easy enough to discredit, if it comes to that. But for now it feels interesting – good, almost – to actually talk to someone about his ‘real’ life other than Wammy.
“Not a butler at all,” L says, picking up some popcorn between his thumb and forefinger. “He’s a lord, actually, and my legal guardian, as well as the founder of Wammy’s House. I suppose its a mansion, as its massive and really old, but a lot of people live there other than us. Orphans, but Wammy’s House is more of a school than an orphanage.”
He plays with the popcorn kernels instead of eating them, not particularly hungry. “My parents are dead, too. I never even met my father, though.”
He raises his eyebrows at Beyond a little. “What about you?”
“I…knew my dad, yeah. Didn’t see him much, but he was a good guy,” Beyond thinks of his rare visits, the sheepish grin and the screaming from his mother than his dad would just shrug off.Always drove him away eventually, though. “I knew when he was going to die, too."
He turns away, biting his tongue hard. Had to find out how, didn’t I? The word devil rings out in his ears, and he tastes blood, tries to unclench his jaw. Forces himself to look at Lawliet. Don’t act suspicious. Don’t.
"Pretty sure my mum wanted me dead.” “She was always all fucked up, so I’m not surprised that her day was soon after I got to London.”
You’re the devil. How did you know? HOW DID YOU KNOW? Her screams echo in Beyond’s ears, the image of her cracked fingernails reaching to claw at him flickering in front of his eyes.
It’s alright. She’s dead now. She has to be. He keeps his eyes on Lawliet, who seems calm, slightly skeptical, but not altogether disbelieving, either. Just assessing. Beyond glances at the clock, just passing eleven. Guess it’s getting close to time. His heartbeat picks up, realizing what it would mean for someone like Lawliet to know. To believe him. He’s not even sure his mother did, even after everything that happened. But someone has to. That’s enough to believe in for now.
He takes a deep breath, “Are we going to go, or what?”