By Any Other Name

C.12

"La mort d'un célibataire, oh oh oh
Laisse l'eau couler
La mort d'un célibataire, oh oh oh
Ça semble si cohérent
Heureux pour toujours, ooh
Comment pourrais-je en demander plus?
Un vie de rire au détriment
De la mort d'un célibataire."

I sang softly to myself as I made tea, alone in the kitchen, on this freezing ass morning.

"You know French?" L asked as he walked in, grabbing some candy from a shelf.

"Yep. So do you." I nodded.

"Of course, you knew that already." He hummed and I lifted my tea to my painted lips.

"Of course I did." I smiled, and took a drink. "What's on the agenda today?" I asked.

"Surveillance." He said and lead me to the main room, and we were the only ones in there for now.

"I want you to watch the footage of this man, see if you notice anything." He said and pointed out a certain man at what I think is a subway.

"Alright." I settled cross legged in the chair, tea in my hands, and watched the screens, taking in every detail.

After a few minutes, as he was climbing up the escalator, he had an envelope tucked under his arm.

"There! He has a..." I paused the video, and pointed, and completely forgot the Japanese word for envelope.

"A fucking... a..." I sighed and switched to English. "An envelope." I said, hoping he understood.

L looked at me with a small smirk. "An envelope." He said in English. "Yes, he does." He kept speaking in English.

"I couldn't remember what envelope was in Japanese, don't judge me." I said.

"What number is Japanese on your lamguage list?" He asked me, guess we were talking in English now.

"Third. English first, French second. Well, I guess English and French are tied for first. Learned them at the same time as I was learning to speak." I chuckled. "Anyway, shush, you're distracting me." I grinned and turned back to the screen.

I watched until an hour and a half later where he got off the train and died, and I paused and rewound a few seconds and saw the emvelope was missing.

"Where's the-" I started and felt L move even closer to me.

"Exactly. I knew you'd pick up on that. Now, what do you make of it?" He asked and I turned to look at him, finding his face mere inches from my own.

"Kira was there, Kira gave him the envelope, Kira gave him a sort of job to do with it, then Kira took it back after he killed him." I rambled, staring into his eyes and saw a little smile appear on his lips.

"Perfect." He whispered and went back to the screens, and I blinked and snapped out of my trance.

He should not have kissed me last night, it's been driving me crazy. Six years without seeing Lawliet or feeling him, and he fucking goes and teases me like that? I mean, I know it's not his fault, but shit, I need to get it together.

I drank more tea, then sat back in my chair, tea down in my lap as my hands fiddled with my mug.

"Are you alright?" L looked over his shoulder at me and my fumbling fingers.

"I'm good. You good?" I asked, drinking more tea.

"I'm fine, but you're fiddling." He looked back at my hands.

"I'm bored. I bore easily." I smiled and the others started coming in.

"Anything I can do?" He asked.

"You wish." I rolled my eyes.

"Wanna play a game? We have chess." He said and I perked up.

"Fuck yes!" I said and he chuckled a bit. He turned to the others and told them their jobs in Japanese, before turning back to me in English. "Anything you wanna say?"

"This is not my day for talking." I shook my head. "Forgot the fucking word for envelope... fuck me." I sighed and sipped my tea.

"Eh, maybe later, not now." L said offhandedly, and I choked on my tea, leaning over to cough, my eyes watering, and he looked shocked. "Was that not the right thing to say?"

I looked back up at him, still coughing a bit, and smiled. "No, it was- I just wasn't expecting it, is all." I smiled and looked away, then dried my face, careful to not mess up my paint.

"Go get the fucking chess set, I'm getting more tea..." I sighed, walking into the kitchen, shaking my head slightly with a huge smile on my face.

He was remembering.