Taste

You don't have time to regret when you know it's what you're meant for. When you see it in loopy letters dangling over their heads, when your fingers itch with antipation and your tongue twitches with hunger. You don't have time to regret when your hands are deep in a man's gut, and you can feel the squish of organs against your fingers. When the blood tastes so sweet, and that sharp pleasure rolls down your spine when you lick the bones clean. There's no time for regret.

When I was a child, All my time was spent in his shadow. We were told what to do to be like him, and how. There was never any why, except for a rushed, "You're smart enough," After a while, it wasn't even a compliment. The enough stuck on the end was a taunt, a way to get us to claw our way to the top. To be smarter.

All of my life, I never saw him. Yes, I saw L, but never Lawliet. I saw a letter on a computer screen and heard a fake voice coming from computer speakers. All the time I had thought, this is the man I want to become? Not even a man, an idea.

When I saw someone was meant to die, I liked to watch.

My favorites were murder. To see the looks on their faces and hear the screams trapped in their throats. I would watch behind a wall, or a door, never afraid.

Eventually, watching wasn't enough. I wanted someone to scream like that for me, to plead, to cry. Because I had grown up, watching it happen, it didn't seem so bad.

It was just something people did when they didn't like other people, right? I could do that, surely.

The first time I killed, I didn't eat her, her face was far to beautiful, her eyes wide with terror and mouth agape in a scream that never sounded. I couldn't destroy her any further.

I took a piece of rib, to keep for myself. A trophy, a memory of my beloved. Because I loved her, I loved the way she screamed and struggled, trying to break free. I knew she couldn't, so I let her.

I fell inlove with each of my kills, more than I could love anyone alive. But, I never knew that was strange, because I had never known love as a child. I was just a test subject. His successor. There were never any dumb love stories that told us how to be.

When I met L, it was in the back of a dark bar, after I had killed someone. The boy was around my age, with the most perfect pair of blue eyes I had ever seen, I would've kept them If I hadn't been so hungry.

When L sat next to me, his eyes sparkled, and a lilt decorated his voice. His skin was so thin and pale, I could see each vein, feel each bone, and I had never wanted to taste someone so badly. He told me he was L, and I told him I was Beyond.

"Ah, Backup," He had smiled, those perfectly white teeth shining, his thin face twisting, darkness falling across his features. His shirt crumpled around the arms, far to big for his practically skeletal frame. He looked tired and hungry and unhealthy, like a starved child.

When the glass hit the table, I stared. There sat a beautifully pink jar of strawberry jam.

"Your favorite, correct?" He had tilted his head so long, scraggly black hair fell over his shoulder, and I could see his eyes more clearly. They were dark, something hidden behind his pupils. And for the first time, I fell in love with someone living.

He had been far too perfect, so delicate in appearance, while being strong enough to be, well, to be L.

When I pinned him to my bed, he had been strong enough to kick me away and snatch away the jam he had given me, "None of this for you, now." When he left, drool dripped down my chin. He would be the most fun to kill.

Unfortunately, he got me first.

When we met again, it was with my hands hooked to eachother, behind a glass window, with a phone to both of our ears.

At this point, I was completely gone. Insane, crazed with the idea of L's dead body underneath my bloody hands. I dressed like him, stood like him, I was him. Atleast, I wanted to be.

His voice was staticy through the phone, but still held the same taunting quality, partially having to due with his handpicked vocabulary.

He looked the same, mostly. The circles under his eyes were darker, his eyes wider and if possible, he was even skinnier. Obviously, solving my killings had gotten to him. That made my heart race.

My fingers shook when I held the phone. Well, at that point, they were always shaking, moving, I couldn't stay still.

I smiled at him, and felt my eyes bulge and saliva roll down my chin, laughter bubbled in my throat, I had been so happy to see my beloved once more.

"H-h-ellooo, L," My words trembled inbetween spouts of laughter. I tried not to blink, scared of forgeting his face.

L chewed on his thumbnail, tilting his head to the side as he inspected me. Light shone on his eyes, making them look larger than usual. His cheeks were sunken, like an old man's.

When I met him in the bar, I hadn't gotten the chance to actually look at him. Each inch of skin made my mouth water.

"Yes, Hello, Beyond." He said, sounding unamused.

I looked down, chin poking into my chest as I laughed, long and loud. Of course he remebered me. Of course. Of course

He asked me, "How are you?"

I slammed my face against the glass, mouth open, toungue out, insistent of tasting him The sweat on my palms smeared against the window, and my eyelashes poked my eyes. My breath clouded the glass.

He did not jolt back or scream for a guard, he simply scoffed and raised an eyebrow. His words came out muffled, around his thumb from the phone I had dropped on the floor.

"Quite sorry but you cannot eat me, Beyond."

I smiled, teeth clicking against the glass. My love knew exactly what I was thinking.

I dragged my fingers across the foggy glass, writing, You look yummy, Lawliet.

He furrowed what wouldn've been his eyebrows (seeing as they they were either non existent or hidden underneath his mop of hair.)

"How do you know my name, Beyond?"

"I can see it...above your head." I pointed with a shaky finger. He probably couldn't hear me, but must've understood due to the fact he mutterd an "Oh" under his breath.

I spent the rest of my days locked up, behind a tall steel door. My fingers bled from trying to claw my out, so I wrote on the walls woth red. I wrote of L, and the other letters. About my childhood, about the taste of flesh.

I have an excellent memory, you see. I can remeber anything and everything. Something someone says will implant its way in my mind, and I will never forget.

I will never forget my loves. My kills. I still rememeber buried in the ground.

Whoever set the instution on fire? I thank them.