The Ability to Fall (Death Note)

04 ♚ Shyness

♚ : 04

— Shyness —

I found it very difficult to drift off to sleep, even in the comfortable hotel room that Lawliet provided for me.  I hadn't quite let the previous events sink in yet, although I was certain about one thing: that I was extremely overjoyed that I was finally able to see him once again.  A few years seemed like an eternity without my best friend.

My smile faded as I remembered one little thing. I grabbed my phone in a panic (which was given back to me under restrictive circumstances), having the urgency to contact my mother.  I’d forgotten to tell her that I made it to Japan in one piece.  I dialed the number hastily, and the phone didn’t even bother to ring before another voice had picked up.

“Wait a minute,” Lawliet cut in.

“Gah!” I shouted, throwing the phone onto my bed.

Why the heck is he picking up the phone? 

Before I knew it, he'd opened my door. He was standing right there, lowering a cell phone from his ear. He held his phone in a strange way, I might add, with his thumb and his index finger.

The corner of my mouth tugged up, and I felt my face heat up just slightly. I found the peculiarity of his actions pretty amusing. I missed them.

“Kyou?” Lawliet asked, waving his hand in front of my face.

“Hey!  How did you...” I started, taking a peek at my cell phone.

“It doesn’t matter,” he said, taking a seat beside me, “I’ve already contacted your mother. I told her that we were rooming together for university.”

“It isn’t normal for a guy and a girl to be rooming together, if you haven’t noticed. Is that even legal?" I sighed. "What did she tell you?”

“Well, she sort of giggled, and she told me to take care of you.”

I smacked my hand onto my face. “Sheesh, Ryuzaki.”

“Well, we are staying in the same building.”

“But Ryuzaki!” I sighed, peering over at my phone once more as if my mother had been listening through it.

He yawned.  “Sorry, I’ll try to clear things up with her. By the way, I stopped you from calling her because I can’t give out much information about where I'm located; I needed to contact her through another number.  And, by that, I meean no information.”

“Why is that?” I wondered. 

“You’re still under suspicion of being either Kira or the second Kira,” he said, not bothering to answer me.

“Who’s this Kira person you keep talking about?” I asked, a little agitated that he wouldn’t give me a straight answer.

He pressed his thumb to his lips. “You mean you don’t know?”

“Not a clue,”

“I assumed that they aired some sort of information about it on a news station back at home. I’m sure you’re tired, so I’ll explain everything in the morning.”

He then pulled an item from his pocket that looked horribly wrong; a pair of hand cuffs with a rather long chain connecting them. He took my wrist and tried to put one of the cuffs around it, but I snatched it away.

“What on earth are you doing?” I gulped, blushing madly. My heart rate increased rapidly.

“Relax,” he yawned as if what he just tried to do was nothing, “We need to spend twenty-four hours together every day until you are cleared of suspicion. That’s the only way you'll be cleared. Believe me, I don’t want to suspect you anymore.  That’s why I’m doing this.”

I shot Lawliet a weird look, but I trusted him.  I guess it would be alright as long as I’d gotten my name cleared.  I reluctantly let him put one cuff around my wrist, and he put the other around his own wrist. 

“Well, goodnight,” he said, and lied down beside me. 

“Er, you too.”

He closed his eyes as I did mine. I turned a shade of crimson. I wondered why on earth I was blushing so much... we grew up together. I should have felt perfectly normal about a situation like this.