The Mello Code

Matt awoke at the sound of movement in the bedroom. There was daylight at the top of his quilt and an imprint of a PSP in his arm. He couldn't remember Mello having come to bed. The blond had been still staring at the documentation for his case at four am, when Matt had wandered in to say that he was going to crash. He vaguely wondered if Mello had slept at all. He tended not to when in the grip of an assignment, his workaholicism as fixed in adulthood as it had been in childhood. He'd often pulled all-nighters then, trying to cram enough to finally pip Near to the academic post. "You slept?"



The movement paused momentarily, then there was the clicking of coathangers, as Mello evidently searched through the wardrobe. "Morning, baby."



"Tea?"



"Good idea. Get yourself some breakfast while you're making it." Mello didn't sound tired. His tone was brusque, as if he was in a hurry to get on.



Matt sighed. He was warm and comfortable. There was an unspoken agreement between them that, upon waking, Mello didn't attempt a conversation before first providing caffeine. Matt rummaged inside his cocoon of quilt and found the offending PSP. It was switched on, which meant that the battery was probably nearly drained. Unless this was ridiculously early in the morning, like nine o'clock and Mello had woken him up maliciously. "Mell."



"What?"



"Do you know what the etymology of the word 'slave' is?" Matt blinked under his covers, sure that the quilt would protect him from direct harm.



"Yes." There was a zipping sound. Matt guessed that Mello had chosen a black, leather vest top, like he did most mornings.



"Then you don't need me to tell you that it's from Slav." He paused, but there was no response, except a small clicking sound. It was too soft to be a gun being cocked, so it was probably Mello putting his cross bracelet on. "Only don't you think you're failing as a Slavic man, if you don't make me a cup of tea?"



There was a pronounced slurping sound. Matt reached up and pulled down the quilt to see. Mello was too far away to be anything more than a collection of blurred colours, but he was definitely holding a mug. "You've got coffee!"



"Yes." Mello put the mug down and peered into the mirror. "Pisser, innit?" He lifted his mug again and strode across the room. "I'll be in my study."



Matt deflated. He reached out to his bedside cabinet for cigarettes and yelped. His fingers had touched hot ceramic. There was a cup of tea already there. "Oh." Outside, on the landing, there was a short chuckle. "Mihael!"



It took a few seconds before the response came from down by Mello's study. "What?"



"Come here." Matt called, lighting a cigarette. Mello hestitated, before retracing his steps. Matt quickly put his goggles on, so he could see the blond reappear at the doorway. "Thank you for my tea. Mell, listen, before you get into your case, we need a chat."



Mello smirked. "You're on your first gasp of nicotine and you've only just discovered your tea, yet you want to attempt coherent conversation. Ambitious, but go on."



"What do you want to do for your 21st?"



Mello shrugged. "Surprise me."



"No!" Matt raised his arm. "I'm not surprising you. You like the concept of a surprise better than you like the reality. If you won't tell me what you want or what you want to do, then I'll be forced to really sort out surprises. Then you'll be miserable on your birthday, because you haven't micromanaged your world."



"I really don't care what we do. It's not that big a deal."



"Objection!" Matt pointed. "It's not that big a deal right up until the 13th, then it's suddenly a very big deal. I bet it would be a huge deal if I went and started putting Christmas decorations up around the house. Then it would be, 'why are you doing Christmas now? It's not Christmas until my birthday is over.' I know you, Mihael Keehl, better than you know yourself. Tell me!"



Mello was just smiling at him from the door. "Maybe." He leaned up the doorway and started licking chocolate. "I'll have a new jacket."



"You'll have to pick it out then. You laughed at me the last time I said something would look great on you. You said it was tacky and I had no style at all."



"I'm not arranging my own birthday!" Mello frowned suddenly. "Why do I have to take all the initiatives?"



Matt peered down at his tea. He was sure that they had just had this conversation. He sipped some more, feeling a little disorientated. Sooner or later, that wonderful rush, that signalled the caffeine and nicotine hitting, would come and he could follow Mello's personality change whims a little better. "You have to take all of the initiatives because you're very critical if you don't. If I arranged something, you'd hate it on general principle."



"Yeah." Mello started to slip away. "I'll be in my study if you need me."



"Mihael!" Matt called. "I challenge you to tell me what you want for your birthday and if I'm going to this class later and if you want to go away for Christmas. I dare you to tell me. In fact, if you don't tell me, you're the biggest loser ever to crawl out of Wammy's. I'll..." He noticed Mello peering back around the doorjamb. "Stop being evasive and come and tell me things." Matt patted the bed beside him. "Come on, I'm a bear of very little brain and I need your awesome mind to come up with these answers."



"Matt, you don't half fucking whinge sometimes." He paced outside the door. "Just keep it simple. I enjoyed my 20th, we'll do that again."



Matt nodded, he had had his rush. He could think more clearly again. "So you want me to book a flight to Japan, arrange for a meglomaniac to terrorise the world, then sort out a warehouse to cower in fear of our lives?"



"It had a lot of sex and chocolate in it. That's what I liked about my 20th."



Matt bit his lip. "You want to go to a club, don't you? Or a party? Have you ever had a party? It's your 21st, Mello. Come on. In some countries you're now legally an adult. A couple of decades ago, this would be the birthday where you'd legally be able to have gay sex."



"You're starting to do my head in now." Mello raised a hand in finality. "We'll stay in. Me and you. Perfect birthday."



"You wouldn't let me stay in when it was my birthday."



Mello mouth opened and closed again. Guilt became etched on his features. Matt's last birthday had been a disaster, not least because in the post-Kira exhaustion, they had nearly slept through it. Mello hadn't so much forgotten it, as not been awake long enough to remember it. "Yes. So it would serve me right if you did fuck all for my birthday."



"That's not what I was saying." Matt sighed. "Stop with the complex before it starts."



" Baby, I'm making a decision, ok? I want to stay home and relax and spend the day with you."



"Ok." Matt bit his lip, but Mello was already walking away again. Matt called after him, "So you want a jacket for your 21st birthday. A jacket? That's not very..."



Mello snapped, "I don't even need the fucking jacket!" There was an exasperated sigh and he reappeared at the door. "Get me some cake and lock the door, shut off my phone, disconnect us from the Wammy's network and make sure I don't do anything. Want something I haven't had in 21 years? A bit of fucking peace. That would be absolutely bloody perfect! Think you can arrange that?"



Matt flinched. "Yes." He knew not to push it anymore. Mello didn't say anything else, but the look that he cast into the bedroom spoke volumes. Matt's knees rose under the quilt and he averted his eyes, carefully smoking his cigarette. He heard Mello marching away down the landing and bit his lip. Sometimes the Slav could be a pain in the arse to live with. Just recently it felt like he was regressing back to the more tetchy days following their reunion post-Wammy's House. Matt knew why. Mello had finally run out of excuses to justify not jump-starting his own career again. The drive that had sent him after Kira was now fuelling the making of his name. By the time that L had been Mello's age, he had had thousands of cases to his name, which was why he had been the hope of leaders across the world when Kira had thwarted them all. Mello just had one case. One huge case, but nontheless it was just the one. He was about to reach another birthday without becoming king of the world, or whatever he was actually aiming for. Conversely, Near was taking everything that would have ordinarily have gone to Lawliet. They thought he was Lawliet. His portfolio must already be bulging, while Mello could practically see the tumbleweed blowing through his own. Matt sighed. He felt like a war widower.



A door slammed back along the landing. Matt glanced up, as Mello flew into the bedroom, swooping down upon him and ripping the quilt back. A moment later, Matt was being yanked by the arm and collar out out of the bed and propelled against the connecting wall. Mello yelled inches from his face, "What is your fucking problem?"



"What?" Matt was genuinely shocked. This did not feel like sex.



"I've been watching you on my monitor since I went back into my study! You've got a face on you like a wet weekend!" The blue eyes flashed with angry frustration. "What do you want from me? Eh? You want me to make every decision about everything in this bloody relationship, so you can just whinge from your bed?" Mello swung him around again and threw him towards the wardrobe. "Get dressed and fucking do something! You're not stupid, Matt. Do something!"



Mello turned on his heel and walked out again. Matt could hear him running back to his study and the door slammed shut again behind him. The redhead released the breath that he'd been holding, his hand trembling to his mouth. A kaleidoscope of thoughts collided in his stunned mind and the goosebumps on his flesh had nothing to do with the cold. He felt sick. The pressure did not get to Mello. It notably did not. Matt glanced at the camera and stumbled backwards towards his underwear drawer. There he took several deep breaths and drew the calmness down onto his veneer. Yes, pressure did get to Mello. His childhood was marked with minor eruptions like that, but they had tended towards the verbal, ranting and pacing. The pressure had got to him several times during the Kira case. There had been moments of violence then. This was not Mello cracking up. This was Mello feeling pressure.



Matt dressed, quickly, conscious of the camera following his every movement. He had no idea what he was going to do once he was dressed, except to have a wash. He should have done that before dressing. He held his hand up and inspected it. He was shaking. He moved across to the bedside cabinet and gulped down the remainder of his tea, grateful that he'd had the presense of mind to put it down as Mello had entered the room. He lit another cigarette and took it with him towards the bathroom.



Mello was already on the landing again. Matt hadn't heard the study door open this time. "I'm getting washed."



"Mail." Mello's lips were pursed together. He hadn't calmed down, it was just that the guilt had penetrated too. "I'm sorry, ok?"



"Ok." Matt took another couple of steps towards the bathroom, but Mello was approaching again at speed and he flinched. "It's ok, I said!"



Mello's arms wrapped around him and held him. It was rough and domineering, more entrapment than an embrace. It bore the stamp of a man who didn't have time to turn this into sex, but had to for his own peace of mind. "I shouldn't have kicked off at you like that, but yes, it would be nice if you weren't beseiging me with fucking banal questions every thirty seconds." He leaned in for a kiss, but Matt turned his head away. Mello growled, "Matty."



"Mello, it's ok. Right?" Matt tried to wriggle out to make it into the bathroom. "I'm sorry I nagged."



"Alright, but give me a kiss."



"I haven't had a shave or brushed my teeth yet."



Mello hand rose behind him to grab a clump of hair. He pulled Matt's head back enough to claim his kiss. "It's incredibly sweet that you are worrying about my birthday. Really sweet." There was a manic edge to his stare that was freezing Matt to the core. "But I don't want to hear any more about it until the 13th, ok? You know that I want to stay in. As for tonight, you decide. If you're going to St Mary's, then go, if you're not, then stay." His eyes narrowed. "It is not my decision."



"Let go of me." Matt spoke as icily as he could. "Mello, this is domestic violence."



"You fucking what?" Mello sneered. "Oh! They really gave you a weapon to wield over me, didn't they? Oh! Good luck with it, Matty." He let him go and started to walk away. "Go on then, phone Hal. Grass me up. Let her put you somewhere safe, where I can't find you. Tell her what a bad, bad boy I am."



Matt took the final paces into the bathroom doorway, half expecting Mello to pounce on him again, but the blond really was returning to his study. Matt closed and bolted the door, then stood there trying to assimilate what had just happened. His mind raced in circles, but did not reach any conclusions. All he could think of was that Mello must be feeling really scared inside to be acting like this. He gave no show of it outwardly. A certain tenseness in his posture maybe, but nothing else. Yet the signs had all been there, if Matt had only thought to look for them. Evasiveness when questioned about anything from his work to what he wanted for his tea; and the big one, the unwillingness to allow Matt free rein out of the house. That had happened twice in the past too. Matt didn't want to even consider the second time, because that encapsulated his biggest fear, which was that Mello was going insane again. He sat down on the toilet and exhaled, trying to ward away hyperventilation. "Oh fuck."