CH5

phantomdeluxor: Hello and welcome to the latest installment of fictionally impared!

SynonymousBrian : Haha finally! Though it was mostly my fault seeing as I kept procrastinating the editing, then some shit came up, but yeah, its here now!

phantomdeluxor : yeah we weathered school, drama, and raining octopi to bring this fic to you!

SynonymousBrian : and parents! XD

phantomdeluxor : yes, those too

SynonymousBrian : so yeah, its finally here, and you better enjoy it!

phantomdeluxor : Please read, enjoy and comment! Here it is

SynonymousBrian:And we dont own! if we did, Takada would've died in the first episode!

phantomdeluxor: ...before she appeared

SynonymousBrian : Exactly!!!

The next few days weren't very comfortable ones for Raito. Wherever he went around the small apartment or even out on the streets of Boston, Claire and L (especially the otaku) acted very cold and distant. The caramel tressed mass murderer would walk into a room when the two of them were talking and they would suddenly go quiet, looking away as if they had a bad secret. The only one that paid him any mind was Neko, who continued to rub against Raito's leg happily and purr against his ear, oblivious to the thick tension. Being Mr. Popular throughout his schooling, the boy had never experienced the feeling of loneliness and cliques. It was strange, he often tended to exclude himself, but it was completely different from being excluded. It was a new feeling, a strange one that made him feel rather distressed, and that in itself was distressing. Thinking back to the other day, he supposed he felt a little bit bad about what he did to L, but every time he began to feel guilty about almost sending the raven haired detective to his death he stopped himself and said while it may have been stupid, it was nothing to feel bad about. He'd killed him once before gladly, and he could do it again. L stood in his way in both worlds, and most likely the only way to set things back to the way they were supposed to be was to kill him.

Still, there was a lingering feeling in Raito's heart that wasn't anger, and he refused to call it remorse. It was strange, in a way as sad and hollow as loneliness but at the same time it made him feel heavy and rather nauseous. So what was it? He decided not to linger on the thought too much instead tried to go back to sleep, a thing that was becoming more elusive than Claire's conversations. Outside of the door he could hear the distinct, muffled voices of L and Claire, just barely he heard his name spoken and his ears instinctively perked up.

"-But why? That's what I don't understand, I mean the guy tried throwing you off a roof that I'm not even sure how many stories high up it is, and your not the least bit mad!?"

"No, I never said I wasn't angry. I expected Kira-kun to try to kill me, but I think Raito-kun feels badly about it."

"What do you mean? You keep talking about Raito and Kira as if they were two different people."

"That's because they are Claire-san, well not exactly different people, but different personalities."

Raito heard a pause in the conversation.

"So you're saying he's crazy, in a way. That he's a good person but Kira is his evil side?"

There was a slight laugh in her voice at the cliché of it.

"Yes that only emerged when he touched that book. Before that, there was only one personality, Raito's. However, after he found the Death Note, his Kira personality which was buried deep inside him, surfaced. He was at that point what I shall call, Kira-Raito-kun. However, when he forgot all his memories, he became simply Raito-kun again, only to revert back into Kira-Raito-kun afterwards. I also know from what I've seen of the anime and what Claire-san has told me, towards the end of his life, his Raito personality had been completely engulfed into his Kira personality, making him nothing but Kira-kun. And now… From what I've observed, in this new world, the old Raito personality is showing itself again at certain points and separating him from the Kira personality. Therefore, he now has two separate personalities."

"Uhh… ok… But if that's true, then how can he revert back to his Raito personality? Kira completely dominated his soul back at the warehouse."

"His good side is strong Claire-san, and I don't think the real Raito-kun likes being Kira's prisoner."

There was another pause, longer this time.

"I hope your right, for your sake."

"…Me too."

Raito rolled over in the bed and looked at the wall. L was freaking crazy, talking about something he didn't understand. He was always Kira, and always will be. But then there was that feeling again, stronger now than ever, making his stomach churn and his heart heavy yet empty. One thing Raito could give it was that it was persistent at eating him alive. He kept his eyes closed and evened out his breathing as he heard the detective walk into the room and sit down on the edge of the bed before laying down. Raito turned around under the blankets to face L, eyes opened just the tiniest sliver, unable to see most of the detective save a faint outlining of his pale face and wild hair. But he could hear L's inhales and exhales, every breath, every tiny sound that escaped his lips as he squirmed into the sheets. He could practically feel the rising and falling of L's chest, his steady, ongoing heartbeat resonating across the tiny mattress, constantly reminding the mass murderer that his enemy was still alive as the older man seemed to fall asleep. Raito took a deep breath, feeling heat suddenly rush to his face and his stomach overtaken by massive bird sized butterflies, why was his heart suddenly beating so fast? Was he nervous, or guilty even? Or did he just have a hard time restraining himself from choking L with a pillow right now? While Raito liked to think the latter, it didn't help him get to sleep any faster.

Surprisingly, the next morning when Raito blinked the sleep from his cinnamon eyes, L was still snoozing soundly. A rare occurrence seeing as L hardly ever went to bed let alone got up late. He was obviously curled up in a fetal position under a mass of blankets, having stole most of them from Raito the night before, tufts of wild black hair poking out at the top. Claire however, was awake and chatting away on the phone when Raito walked into the kitchen. She paused to give him a slight glare out of the corner of her hazel eye, her now usual morning greeting to him, then continued talking on the phone.

"-So are you going to come home for Christmas or not? ...Oh really? That's great! Oh I'm so happy I miss you so much …aww thanks Davy, I love you too, good night." She made a kissing noise into the phone and hung up, a rather silly, dazed smile still stretched across her face.

"Who was that?" Raito asked

"Hrm? Oh that was my boyfriend David. He's doing an exchange program in Australia right now and I haven't seen him in months," she suddenly let out a shriek of laughter, "Get it?! Cuz it takes months to get to Australia?" she asked, somewhat uncertainly.

"No, your jokes are terrible, you'd do a world a favor by stopping your attempt to be humorous," Raito said and sat down at the table across from Claire, who was frowning, but whose eyes suddenly lit up and she leaned forward.

"Speaking of boyfriends, L's Birthday is in a week."

Raito raised an eyebrow. "Well, what do you want me to do about it? And what does that have to do with boyfriends, get those yaoi fantasies out of your head."

"Get him a gift silly!" Claire said hitting Raito lightly on the back of the head, completely ignoring his second question.

He continued to glare at her from under his auburn hair. "Why would I do that?"

Claire sighed "Because I know you're not the best of friends right now," Raito crossed his arms and gave her an, 'I told you so' look.

"BUT!" The Otaku continued "He's nice enough to forgive you for almost killing him the other day, and doesn't hold it against you so you should at least get him a birthday present."

Raito thought for a moment. He guessed that it wouldn't hurt… after all, it wasn't like as if he was going to pledge his undying love to the detective… and they could've after all, had been friends, of course, had it not been for the whole killing thing, "Ok but that still doesn't change the fact that I hate him and won't enjoy spending the last bit of my money on him."

Claire sighed and let her shoulders drop, it really wasn't going to be easy to get those two to be friends, let alone fall in love, then an idea struck her.

"Ok I'll make you a deal, you wont have to spend a single penny on him. You can pick out the present and I'll buy, on one condition!"

Raito rolled his eyes and looked at the wall "And what might that be?"

"You two have to go on a date-"

"-No." he said flatly still looking at the wall.

"Aw come on! All you'd have to do is go to dinner, and you can even pick the place! I don't care! Take as long as you want and if you don't even talk to each other fine, but that's my condition for getting him a present for you," the yaoi fan said excitedly.

Raito glared back into Claire's eyes for a long time. He wasn't even sure why he was considering doing this, he could just as easily go buy L some cheap gift himself and it would be done with. Maybe it was the lack of a decent intelligent conversation, or maybe Raito was just growing tired of Claire's cooking and bad Chinese take out, maybe the word just slipped from his lips but somehow he heard himself saying, "Ok."

Claire's eyes widened 3 times their normal size. "Really?"

"Yes really!" he screamed at her "Now shut up!"

"Ok but first what do you want me to get him?"

Raito paused for a moment to think then said with a smirk "Two movie tickets and a girlfriend."

Claire lived up to her promise, and in a week it was L's birthday: Halloween. Outside on the street, kids (and many adults too) were dressed up in costumes, screaming wildly, running from house to house collecting candy and egging cars and windows. Inside her apartment, Claire had brought a big cake with orange and black frosting from work, and had strewn the kitchen table with candy.

"You really didn't have to go to all this trouble Claire-san." L said staring fixedly at the cake

"Of course I did it's your birthday!" The otaku said bouncing around the kitchen "Plus it's Halloween, and I would want to celebrate it anyway." She placed some candles on the cake and lit them. "Ok now make a wish!!"

L stared at the candles for a while, "I wish-"

"Don't say it out loud!" Claire screamed.

"Why?" the detective said puzzled.

"It won't come true if you say it out loud. Haven't you done this before?"

L made a frustrated sigh, angry that this pointless ceremony was taking away from his cake eating time and shoving his thumb into his mouth, "When I was young I had a few parties, but I made Watari stop giving me them because it proved to be nothing but a constant reminder that I was left unwanted by my parents."

There was an awkward silence in the room broken only when Raito, who was standing by the window and didn't turn back to the table as he said, "Do you want us to stop?"

"Hrm?" L looked up at the younger man.

"If it's as painful a thing as you say, do you not want us to acknowledge it at all?" he asked, amber eyes bright and imploring.

"No, no it's fine, and this cake looks delicious!" L paused again, "Thank you though Raito-kun."

Raito glanced back over his shoulder before turning back to the window. "Yeah whatever."

"Ok now make a wish!" Claire said, trying to lighten the mood.

L thought for a moment before leaning forward and blowing out the candles.

"Ok now open your presents!" Claire squealed, shoving them next to the cake. L seemed somewhat peeved at not being able to eat his cake but tore open the wrapping anyway. Claire's present was a chess set with sparkling back and white pieces and a matching board.

"Thank you very much Claire-san, I love chess," the raven haired detective said, giving her one of his endearing, if slightly creepy smiles.

"Really?! I was hoping you'd like it, I wanted to get something intelligent for you!" Claire gushed and Raito couldn't help but roll his eyes slightly.

L was already moving on to Raito's present; it was small and weighed hardly anything. The caramel haired boy had turned around and watched as L pulled back the paper to find two tickets to a movie.

"What is this?" The raven-haired man asked

Raito's lip curled up slightly as he tried to hide a smirk. "Two tickets and the hope you'll find yourself a girlfriend so Curaire will stop trying to pair us together."

L glanced up at Raito, then back down at the tickets. "But I have no one to go with…Claire-san would you ask a friend of yours for me?"

Both Claire and Raito gave a slight jump of surprise, neither expected L to actually accept the gift.

"O-ok, I have a friend who could… uh… now?"

"Sure," L replied.

Claire was frowning slightly as she walked over to the phone and began to dial. "Hey Sandy, happy Halloween…I'm fine thanks, listen you know how you wanted to go on a date with some…yeah I found a guy…" She glanced over at L who was beginning to shovel cake into his mouth at an alarming rate. "Yeah he's… cute…ok how's tomorrow, good? Ok he'll see you there… oh his name is… L-Louis Ryuuzaki… yeah ok see ya bye," the girl finished, pressing the end button, "Well, Mr. Ryuuzaki, it looks like you're going on a date tomorrow!" she suddenly exclaimed, somehow going from slightly worried to extremely ecstatic, "This is gonna be so much fun!" she shrieked, bouncing over to L and attempting to make him dance with her.

Raito watched in mild shock, the fact that L… who rarely showed his face to anyone would actually go on a date… with some girl he'd never met too! It was… strange, hard to imagine the horribly awkward detective with anyone. 'Well, if it goes well, at least Curaire will stop fangirling.'