Sayuuu ❀⋆.ೃ*₊ ⊹ 
Hi hi!!!  💞💞  Did u finish the math homework?? 😥🥺

Emiko ⸜(｡˃ ᵕ ˂ )⸝✮
Sayu-channn!  💖🌺  Almost, but I'm soooo confused on #9!!!! 😿

Sayuuu ❀⋆.ೃ*₊ ⊹
OMG me too!!!!!!!  My brother usually helps me but he's on a business trip or whatever with my dad 😭😭

Emiko ⸜(｡˃ ᵕ ˂ )⸝✮
Still??

Sayuuu ❀⋆.ೃ*₊ ⊹
YEAH 💔💔
I can't really be mad at him tho
It's honestly super cool that he gets to help out with a real NPA investigation

Emiko ⸜(｡˃ ᵕ ˂ )⸝✮
Yeah omg
It's kinda hot, www-

Sayuuu ❀⋆.ೃ*₊ ⊹
EW!!!!!!!  🤮  Shut up that's my brother u weirdo!!!!

Emiko ⸜(｡˃ ᵕ ˂ )⸝✮ 
😂😂  I'm js! www-

"Sayu!"  A motherly voice turned the schoolgirl's head from her computer.

"Yeah, mom??"

"Your father is on the phone.  Come say hello to him!"

"Coming!"  Sayu looked back to her computer screen and typed to her friend.

Sayuuu ❀⋆.ೃ*₊ ⊹
I gtg! Til tomorrow 💞💞

Emiko ⸜(｡˃ ᵕ ˂ )⸝✮
ok!! bye-bye ✌️ 🌺

Sayu logged out of the chat before standing up to hurry downstairs, making her purple computer chair spin a few times behind her.

"Have you been sleeping well?" Sachiko was asking as she wiped down a countertop with the phone in the crook of her neck.  "Please tell Light to make sure he eats properly. I'm sure he doesn't need the reminder, but still — mhm. Yes, do your best and work hard. Sayu and I love you. Alright, dear. Here she is. Call again soon."

Sayu reached for the phone, taking it as her mother straightened her neck to continue her kitchen cleanup. "Hi, Dad!" she greeted, moving to the refrigerator to take out a fruity drink.

"Hi, sweetheart."  The Chief tried to mask his tiredness with a smile in his tone.  "How was school today?"

"Oh, same old," she answered.  "I got a 94% on my book report."

"That's excellent, Sayu.  Well done.  Are you helping your mother around the house?"

"Yeah."  Sayu left the kitchen and moved to flop down onto the couch with a little bounce to her ponytail.  "I did all the dinner dishes and got all my homework done.  Except... I'm having some trouble in math.  When are you and Light coming home?"  She held the drink with her knees while she opened the cap and then took a sip before leaning back some more into the cushions and curling her legs up beside her.

"I can't say," he told her honestly.  "You know how these things are sometimes."

Sayu looked sideways, over towards the chair where her father usually sat after dinner.  Beside her on the couch was where Light sat once his homework was done while the family watched some television before bed.  She frowned, feeling their absence like a small tummy ache.  "...is Light there?" she asked.

"He's here.  Would you like to speak with him?"

"Yeah.  Please."  Sayu took another sip of her drink before setting it on an end table beside her.

"One moment, I'll get him."

There was a pause.  The pendulum of a hummingbird clock ticked several times before Soichiro's voice came back on the line.

"Sayu?  Here he is.  I've told him he can hang up when you're through.  I love you.  Work hard and respect your mother."

"I will."  Sayu shifted a little.  "Love you too, Dad."

She heard the phone being handed over, and then Light's voice.

"Hey, Sayu."

She smiled widely, sitting up a little straighter.  "Light, big bro!  So, are you an official detective yet?"  She giggled.

"Not yet."  Light's eyes slid over to where L was precariously trying to stack sugar cubes.  But the tower toppled, leaving him staring dumbly in his bullfrog pose, still hovering a pinched cube in the air.

"Aw, too bad," Sayu teased.  "Hey, can you help me with my math?"

"Uh, that's a little difficult to do over the phone," Light replied dryly.

"But you always explain it so I can understand it!" Sayu whined.  "Pleaseee??"

Light expelled a clipped breath.  "Okay, sure."

"Great!!  I'll go get my notebook.  We're factoring polynomials, and I'm completely lost!"

Light leaned forward, switching the phone with the encrypted line over to the other ear.  His eyes scanned the desk for some paper before he saw a stack near L. Standing up, he reached for a sheet, but the hem of his shirt came up a little and brushed the newly constructed sugar cube stack, knocking it over.  Light looked down through his extended arm, the phone still held to his ear.

L stared dead-eyed at the spilled cubes before lifting his moody, sunken gaze to Light with a disapproving frown.

Light just sighed and shook his head, plucking up a sheet of paper and sitting back down.

Some minutes passed with Light explaining the problems to his sister.  Soon, the paper was lined neatly with algebraic expressions.

"...okay, and now the rest should be easy," Light said conclusively.

The cuffs chain scraped against the floor as L leaned in uncomfortably closely, his wide eyes on the paper as a hooked index finger hung from his bottom teeth.

Light looked over only to lean slightly away.  He lifted his elbow in an attempt to shoo away the nosy detective.

Sayu was thinking.  "Ummmmm... I'm not really sure."

"Sayu, you know this," Light pressed.

L leaned in again.  "... four," he murmured.  "Plus or minus."

Light gave him an annoyed look.  

"Oh!!"  Sayu's memory finally clicked.  "It's a perfect square!"

"Right, good."

"So the last part is x plus or minus four!  Thanks, Light bro!  You're the best!"

"No problem."  Light sat back as L picked up the paper by its top corner, holding it up to inspect it.  He was still sitting awfully close.  Light rolled his chair away some.

"I wish you could tell me more about your work," Sayu sighed dramatically.  "You're so lucky!"

"...yeah, I guess so," Light responded, lazily swiveling his hips back and forth in the chair.  "I'm going to... get back to work now."  He glanced over to where L was graphing the polynomial using the sugar cubes on the desk.

"Okay.  Talk later, okay??  Love you!"

"Yeah.  You too.  Bye."

"Bye, Light!"

The call disconnected, and Light pulled the phone away from his ear, looking at it before closing it shut.  

The silence felt heavy in the absence of voices.

He swiveled back and forth a few more times and then sat up, plunking his elbows on the desk as both hands ran back through his hair.

"Come on, Ryuzaki.  There must be something we can be doing."  He gestured with both hands and then flopped back again, resuming the back and forth motion with the chair.

The sugar cubes now formed a lovely S-curve function.  

"Like what?" L asked dejectedly.  He was always so much more dull after Bean went to bed.

"Like..."  Light's eyes drifted before he scoffed.  "...chess?  We haven't done that in awhile."

"I don't feel like chess."  L wrapped his arms around his knees and buried his mouth in them.

"You don't feel like anything anymore," Light pointed out.

L made no reply.  He was just staring vacantly.

Light watched him a moment before looking over to where Soichiro sat leaning forward on the couch while scrolling through news headlines on a laptop atop the coffee table.

The rest of the Task Force had turned in for the night.

The hum of computer monitors hung like a fog in the dimly-lit room.

Light looked back to his hands, which rested together against his stomach.  He tapped his thumbs together a few times.

"Well," he sighed finally.  "You should do something besides mope around like this.  It's unhealthy."

"Hm," L mused dully.  "Showing concern for my health.  That's very sweet, Light."  The satire in his tone was thick.

"Okay-"  Light scoffed again.  "Don't make it weird."

"I'm sorry. I'm not good at being friends."  L's arms were still wrapped around his legs as he looked over, his cheek squished against his knee.  "Or were you not commenting as a friend?"

Light just looked bewildered.  He shrugged, having swiveled to face L more now as one ankle rested against his thigh.  "Just... saying," he mumbled.

"Hm."  L buried his mouth in his arms again, his gaze falling on the sugar cube graph again.

The silence hummed monotonously.

"...did you... want to be friends...?" Light asked slowly.

"I'm not sure a label matters," L snipped.

"Well..."  Light shrugged once more.  "I mean, we have been stuck with each other 24/7 for almost six weeks now-"

"That's not friendship, that's Stockholm syndrome."

"Good grief!"  Light shook his head, flustered.  He turned to face the desk again, sitting upright and reaching for a laptop off to the side. "Forget I asked.  You just seemed-"  He pursed his lips and shook his head again, staring to type into a search bar. 

L's head rotated so that the side of it now rested against his folded arms. "Seemed what?"

"Like you wanted to be friends," Light answered quickly, his hands briefly gesturing out before returning to the keyboard.  "And I was just trying to accommodate.  You know, get you out of this slump you're in. It's getting old."

L's gaze languidly wandered.  "...I've only ever had one other friend in my life," he mused quietly.  "Though it was quite brief."

"Yeah?"  Light eyes flicked down to the keys and then back to the screen.  "What happened to them?"

L didn't answer right away.  His head was tipped against his knees, his whole body wrapped in a self hug.   His shadowed eyes were downcast to one side.

"...she had my child," he murmured.

Light stopped typing, turning his head to L.  Soichiro looked over too.

L's thumb lifted from the hand flopped over his knee, finding his bottom lip and pushing it sideways.

"...and then she died," he added with quiet simplicity.

Light didn't know what to say.  Soichiro just turned respectfully back to his own business.

L drew in a breath, sitting up finally.  "I don't think I want to be friends with you, Light.  Because if you are in fact Kira, then it would mean losing a friend in the end."

A weighted sigh collapsed Light's chest.  "I thought labels didn't matter," he retorted.

"Mh, well."  L reached for a sugar cube.  "Perhaps I was wrong about that."

"You honestly still think I could be Kira??" Light asked with tired exasperation.

"The truth is, Light, I don't know what to think anymore," L answered pointedly, meeting the other young man's gaze.  "Except... maybe I would like to play some chess after all."

Light's own eyes held for a few more seconds before he nodded just once.  "Alright, Ryuzaki.  Let's play some chess."