Chapter Text
“Can I—”
“No,” Near grits out, nails digging into Mello’s back. “Not yet.”
Mello winces. “Jesus,” he mutters into the younger boy’s neck, the skin there sweaty against his mouth. “How much time do you need? I didn’t pull out for that long.”
Near tightens his legs around Mello’s hips, weakly holding him in place.
“Be patient,” he says. “I’m— ah— n-not used to this.”
“Are you overwhelmed again?” Mello tips his head up to put his lips next to Near’s ear. “Is it too much for you?”
A short, shaky huff from Near. “D-don’t flatter yourself.”
“I’m not,” Mello purrs. “I’m making fun of you.”
Another huff, this one a shade more amused. “Charming.”
“It’s like I told you; you need more practice,” Mello says, a little sinister.
Under him, Near breathes in and out, unsteady. “Earlier— you t-told me earlier that I— I won’t see you again. So, I suppose I’ll have to find someone else for that.”
The provocation isn’t even close to subtle— Near is fishing for a reaction, and he isn’t trying to hide it— but knowing that doesn’t stop Mello’s stomach from turning at the thought of Near’s legs wrapped around someone else’s waist, his voice begging for someone else’s cock.
The wisest thing to do would be to ignore it. Mello’s ability to restrain himself is pretty fucking close to exhausted, though, and being inside Near without being able to move is draining the last of it. Against his better judgement, he gives Near what he’s looking for.
Snaking an arm between their torsos, Mello grabs the younger boy by the throat again. He doesn’t hesitate to squeeze; if Near wants to play with fire, he’ll give him fire.
“You aren’t going to find someone else.” Mello pulls back just enough to glare. “When I get you to LA, I’ll tie you to the bed and fuck you ‘til you cry.”
“O-oh,” Near rasps, “we’ve changed tense. You will. Not w-would.”
“You better fucking believe I will,” he menaces.
“What— what about my— my s-staff?” Near seems to struggle with the words, and Mello loosens his grip in response, allowing him to gulp in air freely. “They would— they will report me as missing.”
Mello laughs, then, tucking his face into Near’s neck as he does, lips brushing his own thumbnail.
“How many people even know you exist? How are they gonna report you as missing with no goddamn photos, no legal name, no record of you ever having been here?” He licks a drop of sweat from under Near’s jaw. “Maybe they’ll look for you themselves. Maybe. But I’m not gonna let them find you. And let’s face it— after a month or two everyone’ll think you’re dead. They’ll move on, and you’ll still be with me.”
“With you,” Near echoes quietly. A note of longing shines through his flat delivery.
Now there’s something interesting— it’s something which has been evident for a while, really, but which Mello hasn’t bothered to examine directly until now
“You’re getting off on this,” he accuses. The revelation isn’t that shocking; even if he was a lot gentler with Near last time, the whole thing did start out with Mello holding him at gunpoint and shoving him into a wall. “You almost want me to do it, don’t you? Drag your ass back to California and keep you in my apartment just to fuck.”
He receives no verbal confirmation, but the whine Near lets out is as good as— if not better than— a yes.
“You were right, earlier,” Mello says, electrified. “You do belong to me. These last few years, all alone, saving yourself for me. Did you think about me every time you touched yourself? Did you pretend it was my hand instead of yours?”
“Mello, I—”
“I bet you did,” Mello interrupts. He grinds meanly into Near, sinking his cock as deeply as it can go.
Near’s head tips back, exposing another inch of his bruise-covered throat. A sob falls from his lips.
This is how Mello likes him best: helpless, desperate, pathetic.
“In your head, you’ve been mine the whole time.”
“Mm— ah, p-please, I—”
“Mine. My toy. My weak little doll.”
“You s-said,” Near gasps, “that you— that you take g-good care of— of your things.”
“Aw,” Mello coos, condescending as can be. “You wanna get taken care of, Near?”
Near does not reply, seemingly absorbed in the task of drawing in enough air, like he can’t breathe properly without focusing on it. He’s shaking like a leaf.
“I’ll take care of you,” Mello says nastily. “You’ll be my little plaything, and when I’m not fucking you stupid or choking you with my cock, I’ll treat you real nice.”
“Oh God.” Near’s face is splotchy and flushed. He squirms in place uselessly, panting. “Can you— p-please, can you s-start moving?”
“I dunno,” Mello says. His facade of nonchalance is spoiled by the fact that his hands are trembling. “Do you really want it that bad?”
The cue does not go over Near’s head this time around.
“Yes. Yes, I— please, Mello, I w-want— need. I need it.”
“That’s right. You’re fucking helpless without me, aren’t you?”
Near looks up at him, eyes glazed over, dumb with desire. It’s sort of precious, the way his brilliant mind is dimmed-down from desperation.
Mello smiles, sincerely pleased by what he sees.
“Say it.”
Under his palm, Near’s throat moves as he swallows.
“I’m— I’m helpless,” he whispers, “without you.”
Mello lowers himself until their lips are just centimeters apart, eyes locked with Near’s.
“Your staff,” he says, “they can cook for you, do your laundry, but— they can’t take care of you. Not like I can.”
The younger boy whines and writhes again, and even the small amount of movement feels fucking sublime after so much waiting.
“You need someone to look after you,” Mello murmurs. “Keep you safe, put you in your fucking place. You need me. Nobody else is gonna fuck you like I can, or protect you like I could.”
He pauses, heart pounding, chest heaving.
“Even if they could, you wouldn’t let them,” he adds. “Wouldn’t even want them.”
Near pushes a trembling hand between them and presses his palm to Mello’s heart, wordless. He tilts his chin down in the smallest, weakest nod.
God. He shouldn’t say it. It should be left in the past, left to die with this catastrophe of a relationship, but Mello has already betrayed himself so many times, already fallen so far, that it is easy to let the words slip out.
“My Near,” he says softly, fingers around Near’s neck, Near’s legs around his waist. His throat goes a bit raw. This is the last time. “Îngerașul meu.”
The whimper Near lets out is broken-open, agonized. His eyes are suspiciously shiny.
“Say it for me,” Mello demands. “Nobody else. Nobody else.”
“Nobody else.” Near shuts his eyes and licks his lips. “Only you.”
“Good boy,” Mello says, moving his hand from Near’s throat to wind both arms underneath him instead. “Hold onto me. I’ll give you what you want.”
Something about fucking Near makes him sick in the head— sicker than usual, like he’s actually losing his mind. His arms wrapped around Near’s little body and Near’s little body wrapped around his cock, hot and tight and wet and perfect— it feels right.
Like this is how the world was meant to be.
Like the last two years and nine months were no more than a horrible mistake, an aberration, something that should be erased and forgotten.
It becomes increasingly difficult for Mello to distinguish the filthy threats he’s making from real plans, real promises. The stupidest part of him— the part that still wants Near more than anything— it starts to get louder and louder.
Near is quivering, barely able to form words: everrything he says comes out garbled and dreamy and stuttering, his sharp little nails raking down Mello’s back, sweat slicking both their chests. His cock is trapped between them, and Mello can feel it hot and twitching against his abdomen with every thrust, and fuck, time is just slipping through his fingers like water.
Each time he feels himself getting too close to coming, he slows down. Bites Near’s throat and licks his jaw and says something nasty just to feel him squirm and hear him beg.
Mello can’t hold off forever, though.
He’s just reaching the point of delirium to think that might be alright, that maybe this doesn’t actually need to be the last time, when Near pulls his hands away from Mello’s back to grip at the pillow under his head, whining in this hot, wounded way, and—
There’s blood under his fingernails.
It’s then that Mello realizes his back is bleeding.
It’s then that Mello is reminded of who and what this is.
Near may let him do all sorts of twisted things to him and plead for more. He may swear nobody else a thousand times. He may even still love Mello; God knows Mello still loves him.
(God knows he always will.)
But—
Love is not enough.
When push came to shove, Near didn’t stay with him. He sunk his claws into Mello and, instead of keeping them there where they belonged, instead of clinging close, he let go.
He left Mello to bleed on his own.
After this is over, Mello has to do the same. Once he comes, he has to leave, alone, and he isn’t coming back.
Not ever.
This is it.
This is the end.
Throat burning and eyes stinging, Mello halts his movements and shoves himself up onto his hands to stare down at Near.
There on the bed, Near lays, breathing heavy and pretty, lips parted and shiny with spit, his lovely little face flushed. He stares back.
Mello’s heart cracks clean in half, looking at him. It breaks along the fault line put there by the same goddamn boy almost three years ago. He crumbles to pieces.
He wasn’t supposed to kiss Near, but it hardly matters anymore. There is nothing he could have done to stop this from ruining him.
He lays back down on Near, gathers him in his arms again, memorizing the feeling of his damp, feverish skin, and kisses him on the mouth. He pours out every bit of pain and bitter, angry, tender love and swallows Near’s small sounds of ecstasy, sucking on the younger boy’s tongue as his hands find their way into Mello’s hair.
His hips begin to move again of their own accord, and he fucks Near into the mattress as he spirals, desperate and destroyed.
This is it, he keeps thinking. This is the end.
He has to let go. He has to.
But—
But he can’t.
He can’t let go.
It’s broken, so fucking broken, and still he wants this, wants to cradle the pieces in his hands forever, wants to curl his existence around these little shards even though they’re going to tear him to shreds.
And he’s talking again, he realizes, muttering nonsense into Near’s open, panting mouth— more threats, more promises he can’t keep, more vile, gorgeous dreams that will never come true. Under the sickness of what he’s saying is something horribly sweet, something he can’t allow Near to hear.
So he lapses into Romanian, lets himself speak freely, and imagines a world where Near is always like this, a pliant little pet instead of a painful memory.
I’m going to keep you safe, he vows, I’m going to make you happy. I’ll put you in a cage and take you out just to fuck you and then I’ll lock you back up again, I’ll keep all to myself and you won’t be able to leave me, not again, I won’t let you go, I’m never going to let you go, I’m going to keep you, I’ll keep you forever and I’ll teach you to be good and you’ll love me.
Near’s breath stutters, weak, wet sounds falling from his lips. He’s close— Mello knows he’s close, and Mello is close, too, and this can’t be over yet but it is, it’s almost over—
He clutches Near so hard it has to hurt, holds onto his thin shoulders and waist like he can stop time if he tries hard enough, like he really can keep Near if he wants it bad enough.
I love you, he rasps, I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, I hate you, you ruined me, fuck you, you’re everything to me, I love you, I hate you, I’ll never forget you for as long as I live, forgive me, I love you—
Near comes, crying out and violently grasping at Mello’s hair as he tightens around him and pushes him over the edge, too.
Mello falls apart with a broken, strangled sound, and the world ends.
Thirty seconds.
For thirty seconds, he lets himself stay still, breathing Near in, memorizing the exact shape of what he just lost.
After thirty seconds, he pulls out. Ties up the condom, throws it away. Wipes Near’s come off his stomach. Wishes he was dead.
He tries not to look at Near. If he looks at Near, he might not be strong enough to walk out. He searches the floor for his clothing, feeling numb and cold.
“Are we leaving?” Near asks, hoarse.
Because he’s a goddamn fool, Mello turns. Lets his eyes land on Near.
The younger boy has rolled over, onto his side. There are bruises all over his neck, his collarbone, his chest. The knowledge that they will fade— that eventually there will be no sign Near was ever his— is a knife in Mello’s chest.
“We,” he manages to scoff, albeit belatedly. Talons of panic claw at his throat. “Very funny, Near. But yes, I’m leaving— alone.”
Near frowns at him. His pitch-dark eyes are molten, pleading.
“You said— you told me it was dangerous for me to be by myself, but you’re going to leave me here? No one is coming back until morning.”
Mello forces himself to turn away. “Doesn’t sound like my problem.”
“You said,” Near protests, weak. “You promised. You promised you would keep me safe.”
“I wasn’t promising you anything,” Mello snaps. “Christ. I was threatening to abduct and imprison you.”
“I think,” Near says carefully, “we both know what that really meant.”
“Fuck off.” Mello spots his underwear next to his jeans and snatches the former from the ground, stepping into them and pulling them on.
Behind him, Near is oddly silent, but Mello is not about to make the mistake of looking again. He bites the side of his tongue, finishes dressing, and stalks to the door.
“Don’t,” Near blurts out the moment Mello’s hand touches the knob. “Mello— Mello. Please stay.”
Mello shuts his eyes. He draws a deep breath in, lets it out. Opens his eyes again.
“Goodbye, Near,” he says, stony, and turns the knob.
The door.
It. It doesn’t.
The door doesn’t open.
He tries again. Rattles the knob. Kicks it at the base, yanks on the handle.
A sigh from Near. Mello whips around, face and emotion in flames. Anger, embarrassment, and panic course through him, boiling his blood.
“This isn’t fucking funny,” he hisses.
Near blinks, grave expression incongruent with his just-fucked flush and the semen still smeared across his abdomen. “It isn’t supposed to be funny.”
“Open the goddamn door.”
“Do you remember the note you left?” Near asks, sitting up. “Upgrade your security, dipshit.”
“Unlock the door,” Mello snarls, “right the fuck now, Near.”
The younger boy scoots to the edge of the bed and cleans his stomach, unfazed by Mello’s rage.
“I can’t,” he says. “You’ll leave. You keep leaving before things are finished.”
“Things are finished,” Mello says. “I got what I came here for. We are done.”
“We’re not done,” he insists evenly, depositing the soiled tissues in the wastebasket, “and I don’t believe you’ve gotten what you came here for. Please sit down. We should talk.”
“I don’t want to fucking talk!” Mello shrieks. “We have— there is nothing to fucking talk about. You let me out or— or I’ll kill you, and then I’ll rip my way out of here through the goddamn drywall.”
Near pulls a pillow into his lap and curls around it.
“I don’t think you will.”
In the blink of an eye, before he can stop himself, Mello is in front of and then on top of Near again, pinning the younger boy to the bed with one hand on his wrists and the other wrapped around his throat.
“You wanna bet your life on it?” He gets in Near’s face. “It would be easy for me. I’ve done it before, to someone a lot stronger than you. You’ve got no idea what I’ve been doing all this time, what the hell I’m capable of.”
“You don’t know either,” Near says, fiercely determined. “You don’t have any idea what I’ve been doing.”
Mello can’t help but laugh at that. It is an ugly sound, harsh and short.
“Hang on. Let me take a guess: you’ve been sitting inside. Doing puzzles, building card towers, I bet. Between that and barely treading water on the Kira case, I’m sure you’ve been plenty busy, but you’ll forgive me if I’m not quaking in my fucking boots.”
“Busy,” Near agrees calmly, “but not too busy to learn Romanian.”
The blood in Mello’s veins runs cold.
“You’re bluffing,” he says, too-fast. “You’re full of shit. You don’t— what benefit would it have given you?”
“I’m going to keep you safe,” Near says in softly accented Romanian. “I’m going to make you happy.”
“No.” Mello’s eyes go wide, his grasp on Near’s wrists slackening as the dread washes through him in earnest.
“I’m never going to let you go.”
“Shut up, shut up, shut up—”
“I love you,” Near whispers.
He spits in Near’s face. “Fuck you.”
Near does not flinch, nor squirm to try and wipe it off. “Mello, please, listen to me. We could do this together, it could be— it doesn’t need to be like this, we—”
“No,” Mello cuts him off. “You listen to me. I’m not— okay, fine.” He swallows. “Fine. I’m not over you. But I was serious before. We are done. This is done. I never, ever want to see you again.”
The younger boy’s face crumples. Near’s pain is not satisfying or cathartic for Mello to witness. All it does is make him feel sicker.
“Okay.” His voice is rough with emotion. “You’ll have to kill me, then.”
“Don’t try me. I’m not playing around.”
“Neither am I.” A pause. “I can’t let you go, Mello. If— if you never want to see me again, then you’ll need to kill me and find your own way out of this building. If that’s really what you want… then go ahead.”
A long moment passes between them. Neither folds. Near’s pulse is steady and true under Mello’s middle finger.
“I will,” he swears.
His hand flexes, grip tightening, but it’s gentle. Too gentle to hurt Near, and certainly far too gentle to kill him.
He tries to squeeze harder, but all his hand does is shake uselessly.
“Fuck,” Mello says, voice wavering. “Fuck. I— God damn it.”
He can’t do it. Not to Near.
He clamors back, off of the younger boy, and collapses on the bed beside him, throwing his hands over his face.
Ten seconds of silence. Then, Near asks—
“You’ll stay?” He sounds small. Vulnerable. Mello hates him for it.
“I don’t have a fucking choice, do I?”
Mello moves his hands to rest on his chest and stares straight at the ceiling. There is a strange sort of calm that comes over him, a damp shroud of dread woven from the knowledge that he is utterly and completely fucked.
“I don’t,” Near starts, then stops. “My goal is not to keep you here against your will.”
That gets a laugh from Mello, longer than it should be, a little hysterical. “Could’ve fooled me.”
“You’ll forgive me the desperate measures,” Near says, “but I don’t know how else to get you to listen. You’re always running away, Mello.”
“Well, you’ve got a captive audience. Say whatever the hell it is you need to say so bad.”
Near shifts somewhere beside him on the bed, his small body a white blur in Mello’s peripheral vision.
“You still love me,” he says. “And I love you.”
A feeling of nausea creeps up on Mello, a twisting sense of illness that is accompanied by his heart aching sharply.
“And?” He asks. “It’s not like it matters.”
“How could it not matter?”
“It’s not enough, Near. It— love only goes so fucking far. We’re awful for each other.”
There is a sound of— disapproval, maybe, or annoyance, from Near. “I don’t think that’s true.” He slides closer to Mello on the bed, becoming a little clearer at the edge of Mello’s vision. “I’ll acknowledge that our relationship has had some… difficult moments. But we used to take care of each other. We were— I was happy.”
“Hell of a selective memory you’ve got there.” Mello picks at a callous on his left hand. “I treated you like shit for years.”
“Ah,” Near says. “I didn’t realize you still felt guilty for that.”
“I don’t,” Mello lies.
“I forgave you a long time ago,” Near tells him. “And I forgive you for leaving me behind.”
“The sentiment isn’t mutual.”
Silence stretches between them for a minute, then two, then ten. Near sits and tugs at his hair and fidgets with the sheets, still nude and evidently unembarrassed, and Mello makes half-moon marks in his own palms and wishes he were strong enough to strangle Near and free the both of them.
“Help me fix it,” Near murmurs. “Tell me what to do, Mello. Anything. Whatever you want.”
Jaw clenched, Mello keeps his eyes fixed on the shadow cast by the emergency sprinkler on Near’s ceiling. It’s shaped sort of like a flower.
“Go back in time,” he says, “and come with me to Los Angeles when I ask you to.”
Silence, again. Tugging of little white curls, again. Minutes sliding by, again.
“Okay.” Near finally says. “I— can’t undo anything, of course, but… I think we could arrange for me to come to Los Angeles with you, albeit only temporarily.”
“With a bunch of feds? I’ll pass, thanks.”
“No,” Near says. “You and I only.”
Mello glances sideways at him. It is the first time he’s looked at Near since he tried and failed to kill him. The time they lost seems palpable, like it’s there in the room with them. The years and months he spent missing Near like a severed limb; the hours and hours of unbearable phantom pains; the mere minutes it took to reverse the amputation.
“Yeah, right,” he finally scoffs.
“I’m being sincere,” Near insists, getting a little shrill. “Mello, you— you are very important to me, and— I want— I want to fix things.”
“Your idea of fixing things is keeping me captive?”
“It was yours, too, wasn’t it?”
“Fuck off.” Mello is none too thrilled by the idea of Near psychoanalyzing his fantasies. “That was— it was a sex thing. Dirty talk. Whatever. But you, you’ve— you actually have me locked in here.”
A small, warm hand touches Mello’s shoulder, retreating when he flinches.
“I won’t keep you here against your will,” Near says. “If… in the morning, if you still want to leave. I’ll let you go. But, just— I need you to think about it. Please.”
There isn’t really any point in continuing to argue. Mello sighs.
“Fine. Jesus.” He pauses. “Do you at least have something we can eat? Getting held hostage wasn’t in my plan for the evening.”
“Yes. Of course.”
As Mello sits up, Near crawls to the edge of the bed and steps off it, retrieving and pulling on a fresh pair of boxers from a small dresser by the door. His motions are made clumsy— moreso than usual— by the presence of a small controller in his left hand that he is apparently unwilling to set down for even a few seconds. Once barely-decent, he punches in a code, then turns to Mello.
“Stay here. I’ll be back.”
He doesn’t wait for a reply before stepping out of the room.
Once he’s alone, Mello tries to think. To strategize. He needs to force himself to come up with some kind of plan, some way to make sure that he still has the willpower to leave, come tomorrow morning.
But God.
He’s so tired.
He’s so tired, and being without Near for so long has hurt, and the hopeful naivety he thought he’d burned out of himself ages ago is evidently still alive, because part of him wonders if maybe—
Fuck. No. No, he can’t do this right now, he— if he starts to consider it, he’s going to fly apart.
Mercifully, it’s then that he hears the sound of soft footsteps in the hall, drawing him out of his mind and back into the bedroom.
The door swings open. Near hovers in the threshhold and attempts a small smile, one which doesn’t quite reach his eyes. “You can come out now.”
“Yippee,” Mello deadpans, sliding off the bed and approaching the younger boy. “What are we eating?”
Near fidgets. “I don’t have anything that could be considered a meal prepared. There are— snacks.”
“Your staff is useless.”
Mello walks through the door, then the hall, then into the kitchen. His gun is no longer on the counter, he notes.
“Do you have pasta or something?” He asks. “I’m not eating crisps for dinner.”
Near appears at his side. “I believe I have a number of dried grains and noodles.”
He lets Mello rifle through his pantry a bit, picking out various items— spaghetti, canned tomatoes, an onion, some garlic— until he’s collected enough for a passable meal.
“Alright,” Mello says. “Now show me where the pots and pans are.”
It should feel stranger than it does, standing in Near’s kitchen and making dinner for the two of them twenty minutes after making a very poor effort to kill him.
There is something surreal about it, Mello thinks. It’s a nicer setup than the one he has in LA, one with a lot of space and a gas stove that he’d put money on Near never having touched before. Near sits on the counter a few feet away, still in no more than boxers and socks, very pretty and very quiet as he watches Mello work.
The intensity of his gaze is eventually a bit much, so Mello gives him a task.
“Go get some oregano.”
“I don’t know if I have that.” Near bounces his heels off the cabinet beneath him, kicking his feet a little.
Mello rolls his eyes. “Go check. I’ll wait.”
“Help me get down.”
“Fine,” Mello says, abandoning his tomato sauce briefly to lift Near down from the counter. “High-fucking-maintenance.”
Near wordlessly wanders off, and Mello returns to stirring.
“I can’t find it,” Near says about thirty seconds later.
Christ alive.
He switches off the burner and marches over, crouching next to Near on the floor. There’s a small box of spices and dried herbs in front of him, but before Mello can rifle through them, a familiar label catches his eye on the bottom shelf of the pantry.
“Hey,” he says, snatching one of the chocolate bars up. “This is… why the hell do you have this?”
“They’re your favorite,” Near says, like this clears anything up. “Or, they were. Maybe you prefer something else now.”
Mello shakes his head. “This is still the kind I like best.” He peels back the wrapper and turns the candy over in his hands. The finish on the chocolate is glossy, smooth. “When did you get them?”
Near’s gaze weighs heavy on him again. When Mello glances over, there’s an electricity to the air between them.
“They’ve always been here,” Near says, solemn. “I brought them with me from Winchester.”
The breath in Mello’s throat catches there, lungs freezing.
“But you don’t like chocolate,” he says, stupid.
“Right,” says Near. “But I love you.”
“So,” Mello says, “so you were—”
“I was waiting,” Near says. “I knew you might not come back, but I— I hoped.”
The refrigerator hums. A clock ticks softly from another room. Air from the furnace whispers in the vents. They stare at one another. Mello feels paralyzed. His mind is, for once, blank.
Finally, stirring to life, he swallows and says: “Right.”
He rises to his feet, the search for oregano all but forgotten, and helps Near up, head spinning and chest aching.
Near brought his favorite chocolate from Winchester and learned Romanian and thought of him, still, all this time.
He waited.
He hoped.
Standing there next to the pantry, body bare and goosebumped and bruised, Near looks fragile, but Mello is the one to shatter.
He drops the bar of chocolate on the ground and grabs Near’s face, crushing their mouths together. Near parts his lips readily when Mello bites at them, winds his arms around Mello’s neck, sighs soft and high-pitched into the kiss, and—
“Fuck,” Mello mutters. “God— God damn it, Near, you—”
“Don’t,” Near pleads. “Just kiss me.”
Mello does. He kisses Near like it’s the first time, the last time, like they’ll be together forever, like they’ll never see each other again. Fumbling and heartbroken but without breaking the kiss, he guides Near away from the pantry, moves him in short, jerky steps until they’re at the edge of the kitchen and Mello can lift him back onto the counter.
Near winds his limbs around Mello, arms encircling his neck, heel pressing into the back of his thigh, and pulls him closer.
“I love you,” he whispers against Mello’s lips. “You love me.”
“Stop,” Mello says. “Stop it, I don’t know— I don’t know if I can, I haven’t decided—“
“Then pretend.” Near leans back and looks at him with so much longing in his big, horrible, beautiful eyes that Mello could just about die. “You don’t have to answer me yet, but can’t you— can’t you say it back?”
Mello’s lips part. His heart is in his throat. His hands shake. He is ridiculously, inexplicably terrified. It’s stupid. He’s already said it, just not in English. Not on purpose.
“I love you,” he manages.
Near sighs. Clings to him. Lowers his face to Mello’s collarbone and kisses it. And says—
“We should eat.”
Near doesn’t let Mello stray far from his reach for the rest of the night. He lingers beside the stove, on the counter, nearby enough that Mello is worried about the sauce splattering onto him. He sits precariously close to Mello as they eat, elbows bumping together. He rushes to help Mello tidy up— they don’t bother with washing dishes, but when Mello rises to put his plate in the sink, Near follows. He even stands there as Mello uses his toothbrush, leaning against the counter and gazing into Mello’s eyes in the mirror.
It was like this when they were younger. They hardly ever parted.
In bed, the trend continues. Near holds onto him, face hidden in Mello’s chest, one of his legs hooked over Mello’s, who goes stiff and keeps his hands to himself. They used to sleep this close at Wammy’s, two bodies crammed into a creaky little twin bed. The nostalgia presses into his mind like fingers into a bruise, sweetly painful.
After a few minutes, Mello hears a sniffle. He ignores it. He hears another. Ignores that, too.
By the third time, the dull weight of guilt is dragging him down enough that he gives in, gathering Near in his arms and putting his lips to the top of his head.
He’s not going to ask if Near is okay. It would be unforgivably stupid. Neither of them are.
For a long time, he has considered the damage irreparable. Maybe it is.
It was convenient to believe that.
There was a comfort in denying himself even the thought of a future with Near, the sick satisfaction of asceticism a reward of its own kind, and there was another in imagining only a future where Near existed completely under his control. Trying to conceive of a world in which Mello works with him again— in which they grind through evidence and risk their lives and probably get at each other’s throats— it’s harder. It’s terrifying.
This is no safely-impossible fantasy. It is something Near is asking for, and something Near is willing to give. The question is whether Mello can offer the same.
He loses consciousness without reaching a conclusion.
Mello wakes with a start, jerking violently out of a grim dream that he can, for once, recall with perfect clarity: Near’s body, slumped over and crumpled, lifeless—
His arms are empty. He rolls over, frantic, and lays eyes on Near, whole and unharmed and living and safe, his rounded shoulders rising and falling, fine-boned ribcage expanding and contracting with gentle breaths.
He remembers, then, what he told Near yesterday— that no one else would protect him like Mello could— and wonders if there’s any truth to it or if he’s just looking for an excuse, now, looking to give himself permission for what he may end up doing no matter what.
The morning light hits Near’s face, stripes of pale yellow setting his white hair aglow, illuminating his skin. Something frightening and ugly but whole quietly takes root in Mello’s heart.
He knows.
His hand reaches out and cups Near’s cheek. The younger boy’s eyes flutter, and he draws in a sleepy, snuffling breath before lifting his lashes to gaze blearily at Mello. Near must see something in his expression, because he blinks a few times, eyes focusing.
“Hi,” he says, voice quiet and delicate and coarse with sleep.
Mello swallows around the lump in his throat.
“Okay,” he says. “We’ll go to Los Angeles together.”