Warnings: Adult language, shounen-ai, mentions of male nudity and a little bit of OOC for the sake of crack humor.
Pairing(s): MattxMello

A special thank you to hystericritic who agreed to beta-read this for me. You helped me out so much with this, you lovely person you. XD

Author's notes: Inspired by the Saturday Night Live sketch "Dick in a Box." If you haven't seen it yet, you might want to watch it on Youtube, or else this is going to look crazier than it already is.

I understand that it isn't anywhere near Christmastime, so why the hell am I coughing this up in October? Because I just had to do it, that's why. Let's call it an early holiday present from me to you. Originally this was going to be an FMA joke, because for some reason I can totally see Roy Mustang and Maes Hughes singing this. But then after the huge reaction to "Along Came a..." decided to make a DN version and use my other favorite explosive, blonde super genius. And out popped this deformed bastard baby between gag fiction and PWP without the porn. I don't believe that this tops my first work of DN crack, but for once I'm not trying to: I'll top it with my next gag fiction, featuring Near. I'm already in the process of writing that one, so start getting scared; it's coming your way. ;3

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note.

Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the apartment complex, entire floors were cleared out while their residents were out getting hammered at corporate Christmas parties or at home with their families, cuddling in front of a roaring fire, while remembering all the reasons why they left the domestic hellhole in the first place.

Fortunately Mello didn't work in an office building, or have a living family that he was aware of for that matter. He was definitely not going back to the Wammy's House after the way he left them. Not only would it feel like he was admitting defeat with his tail between his nut sack, but if he went back, he'd risk corrupting their image of him while he was still pure. He wouldn't even need to explain what he had been doing all this time; Roger would have a heart attack and die the moment he saw what happened to his face.

So Mello was sitting on his ass at home with the remote in his hand, flipping through the channels searching for the one program on television that wasn't decking the goddamn halls with holly. There were holiday specials spamming every network, even the porn on pay per view was festive, featuring titles such as 'Jingle Balls' and 'Santa's Coming Down Her Chimney Tonight.' That last one caused Mello to shudder with mental images and retreat to the cartoon station, where mice were singing in helium tones.

Christmas spirit was like the flu; a promiscuous virus for which there was no cure, just the sick, twisted motive to infect everybody on a large-scale basis, until they were hanging wreaths off of every perch and drizzling fake snow around while the impotent sky could not produce the real stuff. The population had deteriorated into a flock of carol-singing zombies, like something out of one of Matt's video games; except if Mello were to decapitate one of them with a shovel like he was tempted to, he'd get arrested. And he wouldn't even have a special somebody to dump the body with while Matt was contaminated with the swarm.

It was a sad day when a man couldn't even depend on his partner in crime, and even had to contemplate the probability of finding a chimpanzee that could be trained to do Matt's job. He could even buy a pair of mini goggles for it to wear--at least a monkey wouldn't have such a hard time growing up. Because in all honesty Matt was just a giant kid inside a scrawny grown-up shell: a big, chain-smoking kid who had his own patented victory dance for when he beat ten-year-olds at arcade games in the mall. As soon as November peeled off the calendar and became December, it was like a switch went off inside his head that caused him to give a shit about the world outside his Nintendo DS for the first time all year. He even used their money-money that they could've used to buy something important like equipment, or chocolate-to buy a plastic Christmas tree and stuck it in the corner of their apartment.

What the hell was the purpose of a plastic plant? It was such a cheap surrogate, a waste of space and it smelled a little bit like a condom, but it seemed to make Matt happy to decorate the stupid little tree, rocking his narrow hips to the holiday tunes playing inside his head and sometimes hummed under his breath. But who was Mello to judge? And when did he have the time to judge while he was busy digging his nails into his thighs trying hard not to throw Matt out the window? Not that he really hated Christmas or anything, but he was waiting on January the way a fat kid waits for the ice cream man to come down his street.

Mello finally gave up his pursuit and turned the television off completely, submersing the apartment in a gloomy silence, pining for the former sounds of life. Without anything else to look at, his eyes darted onto their sad little specimen of a Christmas tree, its fake branches sagging underneath the weight of candy canes, causing Mello to wonder if Matt had some kind of stripe fetish as he squeezed the wrapper of his last chocolate bar in his fist, irritated by the empty crackling sound.

If only there was some way to reverse time and eat it all over again; now wouldn't that be a useful power. Instead, he had to get up and drag himself into the kitchen, to the cupboard to dig around for another one.

A can of condensed soup toppled out as if it had been waiting for him this entire time, thirsting for his blood and leaped for it once Mello opened the cabinet door. And it would've succeeded in clobbering him too if Mello hadn't jerked out of the way in time, swearing as he watched it crash to the floor. He bent over to pick it up off the linoleum floor and check for dents, but the entire effort was wasted when he was beaten to the chase by another gloved hand that wasn't his own.

Matt seemed to materialize out of nowhere, emerging from the pocket of darkness that he had been hiding in all night with a bottle of rum in his hand and a Santa hat on his head, clashing freakishly with his red and black shirt. It was that ridiculous hat that distracted Mello from thanking Matt when he handed him the soup can; he just couldn't seem to talk and gape at the same time except to finally verbalize the disgust that had been running through his head:

"You'd look just like Waldo if he were gay and colorblind."

"I thought you'd like it," Matt shot back, reaching past Mello and grabbed two cups out of the cabinet with his free hand, while Mello snorted.

"Yeah, it's so tacky that it's a turn on."

Matt gave him a weird look, not the same kind of weird look that the Girl Scout gave him when he answered the door on Naked Friday, but an unreadable one. A face that couldn't be filed underneath some simple emotional caption: happy, depressed, pissed, longing.

And Mello wasn't in the mood to figure it out. He bounced up on the balls of his bare feet to shove the can back in its place on the highest shelf, his half-exposed stomach rubbing against the cool edge of the counter as he leaned into it, peering straight into the stale darkness of the cabinet, and swore again.

There was no chocolate. Fabulous. He shot a withering glare into the useless wooden cavity, contemplating horrible punishments for depriving him of his most precious vice before shaking his blonde head and gave up.

"I'm going to bed. Remember to get my chocolate in the morning," Mello muttered, spinning on his heel and started to leave the kitchen, but was caught by the shoulder.

"Hold on."

"Whatever it is, it can wait until tomorrow morning."

Matt's grip tightened. "No, it can't."

Mello glanced back at him, so taken aback by Matt's out of character aggression that he forgot all about resisting him; long enough to be tugged mindlessly back towards the couch. But he let go of being shocked in exchange for rage when Matt shoved him into a sitting position.

He finally slapped his hand off his body and backed the action up with a threatening growl. "What is this all about?"

Matt ignored him and Mello's temper flared: above all else Mello couldn't stand being ignored. So much so that he grabbed Matt's chin and yanked it mercilessly in his direction so he could glare straight into his eyes.

"What the fuck is so important that you had to drag me over here?"

Matt separated Mello's hand from his face, but wouldn't let go of it either. Instead he cupped it between his hands where their legs met on the couch, rubbing the glove's leather material offhandedly as he spoke. "Mello, I have something really important to give you, so just shut up, and listen."

Mello blinked a couple times in sequence, a part of him still grumbling about being bossed around, but still sat quietly while he watched Matt pour the rum into the cheap plastic cups they got on sale at Wal-Mart.

"Sorry there's no eggnog to go with it," he apologized offhandedly and Mello made a face.

"Don't worry about it." He took the cup that Matt offered him, stared into the amber liquor for two reflective seconds and then glanced back at him. "So…?"

Matt snorted. "So impatient. You're ruining the moment."

"What moment?"

"…Mello, you know we've been together for such a long time…"

Mello scrunched his forehead up. "Yeah, I suppose we have."

"It feels like we've been together forever," Matt continued. "And that's why…oh yeah. Cheers."

Matt clicked his cup against Mello's stationary one, toasting a secret that only he knew and took a sip, while Mello inched backwards away from him on the couch cushion.

"What the hell are you trying to say to me, Matt?"

"Stop being so neurotic, Mello. Not everything has some ulterior motive for you to decipher. And I need to be completely honest with you about my feelings right now."

Mello's eyebrows lifted up into his forehead, slowly cracking into an expression of dawning shock. "…Are you trying to propose to me?"

Matt stared at him for a moment; then squeezed the bridge of his nose with his thumb and pointer finger, muttering something under his breath about blondes, and that was all Mello needed to hear to piss him off again.

"What?"

"Nothing." Matt put his cup down and got up. "I'm just going to give you this thing so you know what's on my mind."

Matt disappeared into the other room again, leaving Mello alone to fester in his own anxiety. That was the problem with having such a powerful mind: it kept suggesting answers to the questions Matt left him with and it was making him paranoid. What if Matt really was asking him to get married? Drive to Vegas for that sequined ceremony that every little girl dreams about, performed by a fat Elvis impersonator before an audience of drunks, gamblers and flashing neon lights.

If he could unzip his emotions for two seconds and think about it based upon rationality alone, it made perfect sense. He couldn't stand to be around anybody else and had sabotaged a number of friendships for that very reason, but with Matt everything was different: he was the only one who bothered to understand him. So sure, Matt was the one that he'd ever consider spending the rest of his life with.

But horrible thoughts accompanied the word, 'commitment' for Mello; he just couldn't function in a situation where he was trapped by an invisible fence of responsibilities, like that pet goldfish he had when he was eight that he winded up killing within an afternoon. What if Matt wanted to adopt kids?

Mello suddenly remembered the rum that had been waiting in his hand, suddenly a brilliant solution to his troubles as he gulped it down like a parched alcoholic, then stopped to cringe, the straight-up liquor rushing from his stomach up to his head, much like a brain freeze, except warmer with an anesthetic aftertaste, just beginning to numb his tonsils and his brain cavity. Mello hesitated, allowing the rum to pass through him, for his mouth to salivate and water down the nasty biting taste dissolving slowly from his taste buds before grabbing Matt's cup off of the table and began to tip it back.

"Mello?"

Mello spluttered into his drink; dribbles of liquor leaking sloppily down his chin into the creases of his neck until he rubbed the paths dry with his wrist and looked over his shoulder at Matt, who had returned with a large box in his hands.

"Merry Christmas, Mello," Matt said and smiled shyly.

The box was at least twelve sizes too big to be for an engagement ring, dressed up in candy apple red paper and a gold bow on top. Thank God Matt selected a wrapping paper that didn't have anything corny or cliché imprinted on it, like rosy-cheeked snowmen or gingerbread men holding hands in an ambiguous way. It was simple, elegant and shiny, like the aluminum foil wrapped around a chocolate bar.

And for once, Mello was completely speechless; his mouth hanging open but the proper words to say never did come to mind.

"I didn't want to wait until tomorrow to give you this," Matt explained as he came closer, standing in front of Mello grinning like a child with a spectacular surprise hidden behind their back--or in this case, perpendicular to his waist.

If this were a movie or a romantic sitcom sugarcoating the realities of relationships for comedic purposes, there were a few things Mello would've done. Like gaze up into Matt's eyes, insist that he shouldn't have-whatever that meant-and maybe even manage to cry a little. And in that fleeting moment he'd recover from all the so-called trust issues stemming from an obnoxious childhood inferiority complex, but all that would melt into an undistinguishable puddle once they embraced each other passionately and the credits rolled…

Matt tilted his head to one side. "Well? Aren't you going to take off the top?"

Mello pulled the top off of Matt's Christmas box and peered inside, but had to take a moment to realize what he was looking at, and then another. He stared into the box for a full ten seconds; then his eyebrows knitted together.

"Is that…?" He paused to double check, in case he somehow made a mistake in his observation, and his voice cracked when he realized he didn't. "Is that a dildo?"

"No, Mello. It's my dick in a box," Matt corrected brightly and let go of the sides with his hands; proving that the cardboard was quite stationary, wedged around his-

Mello's mind buzzed to a sudden blank, enclosing tightly around Matt's words, which were still murmuring somewhere underneath the dense surface of his shock, over and over again until Mello had no choice but to digest it. And he was right in the middle of attempting to push it out of his head forever; then Matt's stupid voice overlapped his blankness, forcing him to come out of the safety of his head to properly hear to his stupid, stupid-ass question:

"So what do you think?"

Mello shot some sort of look at Matt, waiting for the chance in hell that he would break out laughing and admit that he was joking. Childish as Matt may be, he wasn't a practical joker. Which meant that he was dead serious about this.

As serious as somebody could be who stuck their own genitalia through a hole in a box and called it a Christmas present.

And what the hell was Matt trying to say with this display? If he wanted to show it off, why go through all the trouble of sticking it inside of a box? Or was it the box that was around his dick…?

"What do I think?" Mello repeated skeptically, ignoring the headache that promptly erupted inside his skull, and Matt's eyebrows furrowed behind his goggles.

"I put a lot of thought into this. The least you could do is say something…or stop looking at me like I'm crazy."

"Matt, you put your dick in a box. How the hell is that sane?"

"Somebody as special as you deserves a special gift," Matt countered. "I couldn't just get you something that's already been done to death…" His face pulled upwards into a wicked grin, as he found the perfect afterthought. "Let's just say I decided to think outside of the box."

Mello didn't say anything. At first he tried to think of the right way to respond, but the effort perished fruitlessly on the tip of his tongue and he got to his feet without saying a single word, somehow maneuvering his way between the edge of the couch and Matt's Christmas gift and stumbled into the clearing; where he kept marching in the opposite, dick-in-a-box-free direction.

"Mello?"

The sound of his name stopped Mello in his tracks in the bedroom doorway, hovering between remaining in the room to hear out what he had to say, and going to bed and avoid speaking or making eye contact with Matt for an undetermined amount of time. Finally Mello turned around towards Matt and pressed both his hands into either side of the wooden doorframe bordering him. He sucked a deep breath into his mouth, held it for a few seconds and then released it while he smiled in the sweetest way possible to go with his syrupy response:

"Matt, you kept the receipt for that thing, right? You know, just in case I want to take it back, or exchange it for another one…"