End Games

Chapter 3: Strawberries & Wine

A week had gone by since the incident with Light. Not much had happened since. Light was again working with the K.I.T., and whenever he wasn't doing that, he was busy at school. Misa tried to give him some space the first couple of days because she didn't want to annoy him. She had decided to forgive him for the way he treated her the week before. Maybe she had been too clingy and suffocating. To her disappointment, Light didn't reward her for patiently keeping her distance by visiting her or acknowledging her presence. For days she waited in her penthouse for the door to open and Light to walk in, but that never happened. Most nights, she even dolled herself up in a sexy evening dress, hoping that he would show up. To her embarrassment the only one who saw her in one of her slamming outfits was L.
-flahsback-
That night she had worn a sleek, form-fitting red dress that went down to her mid-thigh. She was splayed out on her couch facing the entrance to her apartment, wine glasses and chocolate strawberries already set up on the living room table. The look on her face when the door opened and L walked in was absolutely priceless.
"Amane, I'm here to ask you some questions," he said, walking into the penthouse. When he took in the sight before him, his jaw fell slack and his eyes went slightly wide. The two stared at each other for what seemed a long moment.
Misa was mortified. Her cheeks flushed with embarrassment and she wished a thousand times over that this were just some twisted dream she was having. Seriously, Light's father himself could have walked in here and it wouldn't be as obnoxious as this, she thought.
"Why are YOU here?!" Misa demanded as she sat up cross-legged, with her arms crossed over her breasts.
L's expression went back to its usual openness. "I just told you why. Do you ever listen?" He said matter-of-factly.
"Whatever, I know what you said. I meant to ask why are you here and not Light? Is he coming right behind you?" she asked looking hopefully at the door.
"Light? No, he won't be joining us." L climbed onto the couch and perched himself next to Misa, who scooted away a bit. "But since you're curious, I actually asked him to come along but he refused. He said it wouldn't be necessary."
Misa tried to hide the disappointment she felt at this information. She wanted to see Light so badly. She looked at L and saw he was resting his forefinger against his bottom lip like he usually did when he was intrigued by something. She noticed he was staring very intently at her. She started to feel chills down her spine as a result of his scrutiny. He's looking at me again, but this time like in a pervy way. And I'm actually starting to like this....not good...I've definitely been cooped up in here too long. Misa snapped herself out of it. Neither said a word and she was starting to feel suffocated by the silence. Luckily at some point, L had switched his focal point from Misa to the bowl of chocolate covered strawberries. 'No surprise there' She thought.
You know you can have some if you want" She said, taking the opportunity to distract him.
"Don't mind if I do" Said the raven-haired man as he reached for the fruit bowl. L picked up a strawberry, then another, and finally he took the whole bowl onto his lap.
Misa gave a defeated sigh and smiled a bit at L's obsession with sweet things. Well my romantic evening is shot. If I'm going to be with the brainy weirdo, I might as well try to relax,she thought as she reached for the wine bottle on the table. She offered the bottle to L but he refused. "I'm fine thanks" He said.
"Suit yourself!" Said Misa as she proceeded to chug straight out of the bottle. She really didn't give a rat's ass about whatever L had to ask her so she might as well drink her disappointments away.
"Misa, do you love Light?" asked L as he chomped down on a strawberry.
"Of course I do! He's the love of my life!" She answered without hesitation.
"But you also admitted to deeply admiring Kira, is that correct?"
Misa hesitated for a bit, not wanting to say something that might incriminate her. "Yeah, so what?"
"You also know that Light is trying to catch Kira, which would likely lead to an execution. Light feels that Kira is a cold-blooded murderer who holds little regard for human lives. As we have witnessed before, he has killed innocents as well as criminals. Light feels, and I agree with him on this, that Kira must be brought to real justice. How do you feel about that?"
What is he getting at? She thought. Misa took a moment to carefully craft her answer. "It's true that I'm thankful to Kira for avenging my parents' deaths" She took a long sip of her wine and continued to speak. "Not many people know this, but my parents were murdered by a man who was supposed to be in prison. He was out on bail and even worse, he had a long list of offenses but there was never enough evidence to convict him. He'd gotten away time after time. You see, what you call "justice" just isn't enough to protect the innocent. It's not enough to change the world, the way Kira can. But you probably don't understand that Mr. Righteous Punisher"
"Actually, I do understand. I was orphaned at a very young age." L said looking into his bowl of strawberries. Misa was taken aback by this bit of personal information he'd just shared with her. Before she could ask him anything about it, L continued his questioning.
"So then how do you justify your support for Light? You're contradicting yourself."
Misa took another long sip of wine. "As I was saying, Kira killed the man who murdered my parents. For that I feel relief and gratitude. However, I want to be happy. I don't feel happiness because my parents' murderer is dead. I feel happiness at the thought of being with my Light forever. I feel happy at the thought of loving and being loved. Call me stupid or contradictive or whatever, it's how I feel." She drank some more wine.
L looked at her very carefully, analyzing, studying. He was sitting a mere couple of inches from the attractive blonde. Misa no longer cared about their proximity.
"So would it also make you happy to know that I'm enlisting you to help out with the investigation? I think you could be of some use for a change."
Misa nearly choked on her wine when L said this. "Whaaattt?! Seriously? Of course this makes me happy! So does this mean you trust me now?" She was kneeling on the couch, her face dangerously close to L's.
L almost fell off the couch at Misa's sudden outburst. "No. It just means that I think you'd be of more use actively participating in the investigation than being here wasting our space and money." He grabbed a strawberry, dropped into his mouth and waited for her to be all pissy about his "wasting our space and money" comment. Instead, he felt lips. Misa briefly kissed him on the cheek. Like the moment when he'd first gotten a look at her in that tight, short dress, his expression completely changed. He was taken by surprise...again.
Misa was giggling. "That's alright. I wasn't really expecting you to say yes to that. Also that look on your face after I kissed you was interesting. I kind of like it." She chugged some more wine and put the almost empty bottle aside.
L touched his cheek right where Misa had planted a kiss on him. "You're definitely drunk. Any chance you might want to confess to being the Second Kira and to Light being the First Kira now?" asked L.
Misa laughed and looked at him. "Oh Ryuzaki, you're so funny. I bet you just want me to kiss you again!"
L did not have a response to that. He was more interested in seeing where she was taking the conversation. He decided to tend to the last few of his chocolate covered strawberries. No matter the outcome of this conversation, he was determined to eat every single strawberry.
Misa was staring at L now with a wicked smile on her face. L wasn't sure what to make of it, so he said nothing. He simply went back to picking at the strawberries and watched Misa out of the corner of his eye.
Misa inched closer to L so that their sides were touching. He pretended to care very little about the proximity of their bodies as he picked at his strawberries. Misa felt a little adventurous. She had to admit that she was curious about what it would feel like to run her fingers through L's messy hair. So she did. First she took a tress of his hair in between her fingers and felt it. It was surprisingly soft and feathery, not matted at all. L chose to not react to this small gesture. He was still facing straight ahead and at the bowl of strawberries in his lap so that Misa could only see his profile. Had she been looking right at his face she would have seen that he was puzzled by her unusual actions. Then, she ran her entire hand through L's messy hair. At this he had no option but to turn his head toward her. He gave her a quizzical look.
"Sorry, do you like this?" She asked with a smile on her face. L had a look of puzzlement on his face that she'd never seen before.
"It's not bad" he finally answered. It was as though he didn't know what to do. This is kind of fun, I think he's actually lost! She thought triumphantly. She took L's brief response as an invitation to run her hands through his hair again. Truth was, she was enjoying herself as well. It's almost like petting a dog with really soft hair she told herself.
L reached for the last of the strawberries when a pair of warm, soft hands gently brushed against his cool ones. He stopped and then she grew bolder and took a firmer hold of his hand. L looked at Misa's face as she examined his hand in hers. The entire time he did not react, he simply allowed her to move into his personal space. He was allowing it for some reason, and this surprised both of them. Misa was now kneeling on the couch and she had finally managed to get L to face his entire body towards her.
Moving on the couch on all four, Misa continued to close in on L until their faces were a mere inch apart. L instinctively moved away but Misa followed, which ended up with him being propped up by his elbows on the couch and Misa hovering over him. Misa's bare thigh was brushing against L's.
Misa whispered over L's lips, "Ryuzaki...have you ever been kissed before?" L could smell the sweet scent of wine on her breath and he started to say in a warning tone, "Amane—" but he was caught off by Misa's forefinger on his lips, indicating that he should stop speaking.
In a barely audible whisper she told him, "Please, Ryuzaki, call me Misa now" and she closed the gap between their lips and kissed him gently. She brushed her lips against L's, who simply stayed still. She ran her tongue lightly over his bottom lip and entwined her fingers in his hair. When Misa felt that L wasn't reciprocating, she looked at him and saw that he seemed completely frozen in place. She moved off of him and he immediately backed away from her all the way to the other end of the couch.
Misa looked at L indignantly, as though he'd just openly rejected her and said "What's the deal?! This is a once in a lifetime opportunity for YOU, out of all people, to smooch with a super-hot chick and you do nothing?! You're highly ENCOURAGED to participate in your own make-out session you know..." she said sarcastically.
L remained quiet, not looking at her. Misa continued her ranting when he suddenly got up off the couch and said in a quiet, controlled tone "Amane...Misa...you are free to come to the main investigation room whenever you'd like. It is strongly suggested that you get caught up with all the investigation details."
"Oh...yeah. I forgot about that bit." She laughed a little. Without another word, L turned towards the door and began exiting.
"You're leaving me? I was just kidding you know..." She said. The door closed and L didn't so much as look back at her. "Meh, you don't have to be so serious! I was just kidding!" She yelled at the closed door. A few seconds later, she got off the couch, threw on some pajamas and collapsed back onto the couch without even bothering to clean anything up.
-End of flashback-
And that's what happened two nights ago when L and not Light showed up to her little romantic evening. Needless to say she's been avoiding going to the main investigation room. Not because L was there, but because Light might have seen her kissing L on the surveillance tape of her apartment. If that was the case then maybe he was angry and didn't want to see her. That kind of made her happy because it meant he cared, but kind of made her sad because it meant he didn't want to see her.
Whatever, HE CAN'T AVOID ME FOREVER, She thought as she made her way down to the main investigation room.