"You trust me, right?"

"Yeah."

Matt took a deep breath. He could feel the apple shaking on his head. His back was pressed against the wall, stiff as a board, and he felt like he was on the verge of cardiac arrest.

"This is really stupid!" Linda wailed from the sidelines. Sobs were getting caught in her throat. "Matt, he's going to shoot you right between the eyes! William Tell wasn't even real!"

Mello squinted his eyes, getting a good look at the apple sitting on his best friend's head. He tossed his slingshot back and forth between his hands. "This is going to be fun, Matt. And everyone's gonna think you're, like, this big hero or something."

"For letting himself get shot at?" Linda asked, scowling. "Matt, come on. Let's just go to lunch."

The other children shouted out their protests. No, Matt, we basically want to see you get shot at just because Mello's bored. We don't seem to care that this is probably some weird fantasy or fetish--

Matt took another deep breath. "Okay, okay. You ready Mello?"

"Yeah!"

Within thirty seconds, the remnants of the nice, red apple were all over the wall and Matt's head.

"That was great!" Mello cried, running over to Matt and giving him a fond embrace. "That was great!"

Matt gave an awkward chuckle.

"You trust me... right...?" Mello asked, only his voice was deeper than it was last time. Matt wasn't standing against the sun-bathed stones of Wammy's, and Linda wasn't there to act as the voice of reason. They were in a shitty-ass apartment and there was a bottle on his head this time.

There were several other bottles at his feet-- bottles that were empty because Matt and Mello had finished them off in quite a haste. They'd needed a buzz.

"I trust you..." Matt replied, putting all his weight against the wall. The bottle threatened to fall off but Matt somehow managed to keep it steady. "I trust you a lot, Mello"

"Good. This'll be fun."

It wasn't a slingshot this time; it was a gun. Matt slammed his eyes shut.

"You ready?"

"Yeah..."

Mello fired the gun without a second thought-- and the game changed from William Tell to William S. Burroughs.

notes and stuff: Uhm. Yeah. Inspired by You Won't Know by Brand New. And a documentary on beatniks that I watched earlier. Hope you all like it. Or at least get it.
I guess I could spare an explanation. William Tell shot that apple that was on his kid's head. William Burroughs played a drunken game of William Tell with his wife. I decided to add some blind-Matt-trust in the mix, and voila. A fic. You decide what happens.

This is dedicated to indigo's ocean because I probably wouldn't have thought enough about it to write it if I hadn't been talking to her. XD Loveee.