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Title: Less Than Three
Death Note - Complete
Rating: T
Genre: Romance/Humor
Summary: Despite his usual distrust for the holiday, Matt has decided to do something special for Mello on Valentine's Day. Oneshot, MelloxMatt, Mattcentric

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A/N: I wrote this for Valentine's Day despite my semi-hatred for the holiday. In my opinion, it's pointless. But it does allow for the random fluff oneshot. XD It took me a while to decide on which pairing to write about, but I've decided on MelloxMatt (M&M FTW!), so that's what you're stuck with. LxLight stuff is so much harder for me to write, for some reason. Horrible, I know, since I love that pairing to death as well.

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Less Than Three

by Kyrianne

Valentine's Day. The day for giving an assortment of chalky candy hearts, too-sweet chocolates, dye-injected roses, and sparkling lumps of rock to lovers and friends alike. Matt had never liked the holiday; the mere thought of it left him feeling slightly nauseous and the beginnings of a headache. The day, in his opinion, was fully commercial, just an excuse to jack up the prices of cheaply made stuffed animals and candy that would probably give you cancer.

He had always been cynical about Valentine's Day, even when he had been young at Wammy House. He had never seen the point of it all, and when he saw yet another mushy card pass hands to be received with joy and hugs, he could feel his mouth pushing into a smirk at the idiocy.

I hadn't helped that he never got any of those cards himself.

Come to think of it, that wasn't really true. There had been that one year that he had gotten a rumpled heart made of red construction paper from Linda, but he was sure she had only given it to him to be nice; the message written on it could testify to that. It had said nothing but, "Happy Valentine's Day!"

He doubted that could be constituted as a confession of undying love.

That same year, Mello had gotten more candy than he could carry (or eat) himself, but Matt had been happy to help him haul it back to their shared room. Mello had seemed to have the same beliefs as Matt did; every year the blonde would declare loudly that it was the dumbest holiday ever, even including President's Day, but Matt could still detect the exuberant glow radiating from his best friend's eyes as yet another valentine was dropped onto the top of his growing pile of pink and red.

Even though it stung a little to see proof that his friend was liked (or perhaps feared) more than him, Matt hadn't cared much. Mello had always shared the leftover candy with him, and that was fine with Matt.

As he got older, Matt only grew to be more distrustful of the holiday. Every time the month of February came around, he hated walking anywhere downtown with all the crazed decorations plastering everything. If he had to burn his retinas by looking at another grinning, tubby cupid, he would seriously go insane. Probably shoot something, too.

So now, Matt wondered why he was elbow-deep in egg goo, trying to complete a recipe that he had already told himself was too labor-intensive, all for the sake of giving Mello something on Valentine's Day. Why, oh why,hadn't he listened to himself?!

"One tsp vanilla extract..." he muttered to himself as he read the next ingredient on the list. His eyebrows knit together in confusion. What was a tsp?

After about 30 seconds of trying to remember the one cooking class Roger had subjected him to, he gave up and dumped about a tablespoon of the vanilla syrup into the bowl. Whatever a 'tsp' was, this was going to have to do.

Time for the next ingredient. "Two Tbsp milk?!" Matt groaned. "What the hell is a Tbsp?!"

This was going to be harder than he'd thought.

One hour and an egg-covered kitchen later, Matt had a plate of lopsided french toast hearts. Instead of the golden brown the recipe had assured him they would be, patches of black speckled the toasts. Matt scrunched his nose at them and tried to scratch off the charcoal to no avail. He shrugged and looked around the kitchen for something to disguise them with.

The counter was covered with the mixture of egg, vanilla, and milk he had used to dip the toast in. The puddle had drifted to the edge of the counter and was slowly but surely transporting itself to the floor, one drop at a time. A pile of discarded bread crusts sat forlornly on one of the few clear areas of counter top. The wrappers for the chocolate bars he had used to fill the french toasts lay crumpled in a ball, leaving the melted remains of chocolate to pool beneath them.

Matt suddenly had an idea. Mello liked chocolate, right? So why shouldn't he just cover the french toasts with chocolate syrup as well?

He padded over to the refrigerator to see if he had any syrup left over. As he opened the door, he was reminded of his need to go to the supermarket, and soon. His fridge was almost completely empty; a gallon of milk only a quarter full was the sole inhabitant of the top shelf, and the one below that was littered with random condiments such as ketchup and salsa, and some cheese dip that had to be at least 6 months old. Matt shoved these aside to find a half-eaten package of lunchmeat and then what he had been looking for: chocolate syrup!

He pulled it from the fridge hastily, shaking it to see if there was any left. An almost imperceptible sloshing of liquid could be felt as he slung it wildly back and forth. He stopped shaking the bottle like a madman and nodded once decisively. He would use it on the french toast, and they would be perfect.

Well... sort of, anyway.

Matt hoped Mello wouldn't notice the burned parts in the ginormous glob of chocolate that he was adding. He squeezed the majority of the bottle's contents over the toast before he realized that it now looked like soup. A very brown soup. He practically ran to the sink to syphon off most of the chocolatey goodness into the drain.

Now he was left with 6 soggy, dark brown lumps of fried bread that looked more like potatoes than hearts. Matt blinked slowly down at the "food" he had created, then shrugged.

What else could he add...?

~*~

"What the hell is that?" Mello demanded as Matt walked in the room carrying the plate of french toast balanced on his hand like a waiter. He had had to get Mello riled up enough to leave and do mafia stuff while he cooked, and now Matt had dragged Mello to a random diner, the closest he could find to their apartment. He was proud of himself for thinking of it, since he hadn't actually had time to clean up the kitchen enough for anything romantic; the eggs were still busy rotting away all over the place, but he didn't really care. Mello hardly ever set foot in the kitchen anyway, so Matt was pretty sure he'd be off the hook for leaving the mess to be cleaned up later.

He set the plate down on the table in front of the blonde with a plunk.

"I said, what the hell is this?" Mello demanded again, picking up a fork and poking at the toast that was closest to him. He glared at it suspiciously; it smelled like chocolate, but it looked disgusting, at least to him anyway. Red sprinkles normally reserved for Christmas cookies sat in the chocolate goo, seeping their dye into their surroundings as they were slowly melted away. Mello hated sprinkles, unfortunately.

"Chocolate shaped heart stuffed french toast, or something like that. I made it," Matt answered nonchalantly, but he eyed Mello uneasily as he waited for a response.

"Heart stuffed?" Mello repeated, sounding like he'd lost his appetite.

"Wait, no, I guess that's heart shaped..." Matt amended, then shrugged. "I have no idea what it's called." An awkward silence led him to add, "It has chocolate in it..."

Mello snorted. "No shit," he muttered, but he sawed off a piece and slid it into his mouth nonetheless.

Matt leaned forward in anticipation. "How is it?" he murmured almost breathlessly. Mello glared at him and he shut up, but the redhead continued to stare expectantly at the blonde.

Mello rolled his eyes, grimaced, and swallowed. "Well..." he started.

"Well?" Matt prompted, eyes shining with anticipation.

"It's not bad..." Mello allowed, pushing at the remaining toast with his fork. "...But it's not good, either. I think I just swallowed some egg shell."

Matt's hopeful expression crashed and disappointment took its place. "Sorry..." he murmured. He kept his head down and waited for the angry outburst that would be soon to follow.

Mello's lack of an answer compelled him to look up. The blonde was busy dismantling the toast to mine the chocolate from inside, as well as scrape the syrup from the top. He looked mildly amused as he slid a forkful of chocolate into his mouth every once in a while. Matt blinked with surprise but finally sat down across from Mello.

"You better have some real chocolate for me when we get home," Mello stated cooly as he took another forkful of chocolate. The brown syrup oozed from between his teeth as he added, "This stuff sucks."

With a sudden idea, Matt reached across the table for the fork. Mello surrendered it without fight, sending curious glances toward his lover, wondering what the hell he was planning to do with the utensil he had just pilfered. Matt simply trailed it through the chocolate lake himself and held it up to Mello's mouth with a lazy smile.

"I can feed myself, dammit," Mello snapped, but opened anyway and allowed Matt to slip the fork into his waiting mouth. He wouldn't let this change in conversation lead him astray, though. "So, do you have more chocolate for me?" he asked.

Matt was almost dismayed before he remembered the rest of the chocolate syrup left. It was the same low-quality stuff, true, but maybe if the conditions were right...

Matt let a sultry smile smooth across his face, and he leaned forward as he answered, "There's still more chocolate syrup..."

"What the hell are you talking about--" Mello started, but then stopped abruptly as he realized Matt's implications. His mouth pulled up into a knowing grin and he hooded his eyelids to peer at Matt from beneath them. "Matty, that's a perfect idea..." he purred, leaning forward to stroke a leisurely line down the bridge the redhead's nose with a leather-sheathed finger. Matt's face turned pink with a blush, but his smile only widened.

"I less than three you, Mewwo!" he exclaimed, drawing a few curious stares from the people surrounding them.

Mello's eyebrows pushed together with confusion and possibly surpise. "What?" he asked sharply.

Matt looked abashed for a moment and replied, "Um. Nothing." He watched Mello apprehensively for a moment before trying again. "I love you, Mello...?"

A bark of laughter flew from the blonde's lips. Matt flinched at the sudden noise, but he was suddenly being pulled into a strong embrace and could do nothing to avoid his lover. "Come 'ere, you!" Mello chuckled as he gave Matt a bear hug. He let go just as abruptly as he had latched on, and stood up dramatically.

"What say we get back to that chocolate syrup?" he suggested loudly, only it was more a statement of what they would be doing. The people who had been observing them before gave the blonde dirty looks before turning back to their own conversations, hearing a bit more than they might have wished.

Matt nodded slowly, turning pink again as Mello winked at him slyly.

He didn't think he hated Valentine's Day anymore.

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A/N: Chocolate stuffed heart shaped french toast is not as hard as I made it seem. XD I just made some recently in my Food Management class at school, since my teacher's all into the Valentine's Day thing. I'm not so much, as you've already been told. It just seems so silly to me. But that doesn't mean I won't use it as an excuse to write a random, fluff-filled oneshot of M&M goodness:D I hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it.

Happy Valentine's Day! Please review!

Kyrianne