Addiction

N/M implications.

Dedicated to my addiction.

He called it love. Others called it obsession. But Mello seldom gave a damn about what others think or say about him. As long as Nia bothered to, once in a while, look up from his puzzles and games to grace Mello with a rare, brief smile, it could be good enough for him.

More than enough, as a matter of fact.

As long as Nia still smile at him, as long as Nia still acknowledge his presence, his existence, it would have been more than enough to keep Mello in the sunshine.

Mello never saw Nia cry before. Well, once in a while, perhaps. Or maybe a couple of times. It always made Mello a little happy to see Nia cry, because it means that Nia trusted him enough to cry in front of him. Because it means that Nia trusted him enough to break down and trust that Mello would be there to watch Nia pick up the pieces and put the puzzle back together again, sitting beside him to hand him the sticky tape when he needed it.

But when Mello broke down, who was there to catch him and help piece him back together again?

Nia did that, once, twice, and a couple more times. Until he couldn't take being the one holding the sticky tape any much longer. Until he could no longer understand why, of all the people Mello could have turned to, he insisted on Nia.

Nia never realize just how important he was to Mello. Nia didn't realize that he was the only one Mello trusted enough to cry in front of.

Nia didn't realize just how alone Mello was.

Of course, nobody realize that either. They thought they could help, they thought their kind words and actions would be enough to replace Nia's place in his life.

There's only one person who can catch me when I fall. Why don't any of you believe me?

They called it obsession. Mello called it love.

So, the thread snapped the day when Nia stopped helping, stopped being there, stopped lending the shoulder for Mello to weep on. And ran.

Mello never saw Nia smile at him again. No matter how much he clowned himself in front of him. Mello tried everything he could. He could have been talking to a rock.

When Mello left the orphanage to, in his own words, "find his sanity back in solid America', nobody realize that he meant it for real. That his sanity was already fraying from the night Nia looked at him with utter loathing, disgust and fear in his red, puffy eyes and screamed.

"GET AWAY FROM ME!"

Nia was an addiction. A drug he could not stop taking. When Mello first told him that, Nia jokingly told him that it's alright, because he'd never have to stop taking this drug anyway. They hooked their pinkies, like the children they were, promising each other that this friendship - this love - would last forever.

Nobody'd ever told him that the withdrawal symptons would hurt so much.

I should just let you soar with westbound wind.
I just can't and don't want to let you go.