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This is what love looks like to Dazai:
It’s blue eyes squinting up at him, dangerously narrowed, annoyed and almost angry because Dazai is physically unable to stop himself from making awful jokes and teasing everyone that steps within a five-foot radius. But the corners also soften ever so slightly, even crinkles in delighted laughter, and in an equally fond voice, love says: “Eat shit and go fucking die, Dazai.”
It’s a black coat hanging carelessly over their couch in their apartment after a long day at work. It’s dirty and more often than not decorated with specks of blood and ash, but it means love is back, safe, alive, home.
It’s orange hair spilling like waterfall on silk-spun sheets. It’s red lips bitten raw and purple bruises on their neck, in their thighs. It’s their hands tangled in each other’s hair and nails dragging across each other’s backs, passionate and real.
And it’s a gold band around Dazai’s finger, a promise of trust and a never ending always. It’s their wedding vows whispered under Yokohama’s sky that Dazai still has memorized, even after all these years. It’s their dried wedding flowers preserved in a pretty white frame that hangs in their living room. There’s another ring hidden beneath leather gloves, but it’s there, love is there.
Love is also waking up to two cups of coffee on the table. One cup is unsweetened and plain while the other has two sugar cubes, a drizzle of milk - made just for Dazai, and how intimate, for someone to know you so well they can make you a perfect cup of your drink without having to ask. And even if Dazai is not a morning person, his husband still waits so they can start their day together.
“Took you long enough,” his husband greets and he puts his book down. “Did you sleep well?”
Dazai warms his hands with heat coming from the cup. “I did! All thanks to you.”—and it’s true because there is always love in his husband’s tender embrace, in his featherlight kisses; in the way they curl into each other, seeking each other’s warmth even in their sleep.
“Do you have work today?”
Dazai takes a spoonful of soup. And this too, is love: eating a warm meal on slow mornings, their legs tangled together under the table. “Sadly. Crimes to solve, evil to conquer. You know how it is.”
“The unsung hero of this city,” says his husband with a lazy grin. “I have the day off. I bet you’re jealous.”
“And I bet you’re going to miss me while I’m gone~”
A kick to his shin. “Haaah? You’re the big baby here. I’m sure you’re going to text me as soon as you arrive at the office. No, wait - you’re going to call me as soon as you cross the street!”
And Dazai smiles because this is what love looks like: stupid bets, silly arguments, cheesy longings, having someone to miss, and how lucky is he to have someone to want to go home to?
“You always pick up the call though?”
Love comes in random afternoon messages to help speed up the day. Photos of food, photos of the city, photo of a random candy wrapper Dazai on a sidewalk, this reminded me of you, photos of the sky, photos of more food.
Sometimes Dazai cannot believe that he is allowed to have this for himself. Once, someone had asked him what he thought about marriages and soulmates. He had laughed at their face, cruel and bitter, because monsters like him are incapable of such things. Undeserving and unworthy, and yet, and yet —
“I’m back!”
Love looks like a sleep-warm husband on the bed, blinking away the tail ends of his nap while a thin blanket hangs over his shoulders. “Finally,” and with outstretched hands he demands for an embrace.
“You’re so clingy. Like a cute little koala,” says Dazai and he tucks his husband’s hair behind his ears. A kiss or two here and there.
“Okay, go away now. I can’t tolerate slander.”
Dazai tightens his hold. “Really dramatic, too.”
“Fuck you.” A contented sigh before he throws his whole weight on Dazai. “Come on, help me make dinner.”
Love is in the kitchen where it’s orange and warm. There’s French music playing in the background and the air smells like garlic and rosemary. They’re wearing stupidly ugly aprons that they got from a gag store in Berlin. Dazai peels all the potatoes completely wrong and his husband laughs and laughs and laughs about his tears when he gets to chopping the onions.
“Why are you crying? It’s not like you’re the one being cut in small pieces to be cooked and eaten!” his husband says as if it’s the funniest thing in the world. It really isn’t.
It makes Dazai laugh all the same. “Well, what if I’m just mourning them?
There are cakes in the fridge to celebrate their wedding anniversary. Two of the same kind, because after spending so many years together meant they developed the same food preference, and ha, would you look at that? They surprised each other with the same exact dessert.
Then the lights go off just before dinner and they open the windows to let the cool air in.
Dazai lights a candle and it’s their most romantic date yet. Spoon feeding each other, drinking from each other’s wine glasses until the whole bottle is empty and there’s a pretty pink flush high on their cheeks.
It’s midnight and they’re drunk, and being in love means slow dancing in the dark, singing to each other whispered notes of a tune only they know. It’s Dazai wrapping his arms around his husband’s waist, pressing closer, placing soft kisses on his face. They don’t know how long they’ve been holding each other. A second? A minute? An hour or more?
It feels like forever.
And—Dazai wants that.
Once upon a time he used to think about how foolish it is to want something to last that long. It used to bring him a sense of misery because if good things can last, then certainly the horrible ones can too, right? But thinking about it now, holding his husband close, their bodies flushed so close together that they can hear each other breathing—eternity doesn’t seem so bad anymore, not when his eternity begins and ends with the man in his arms.
“Mon amour,” his husband stops swaying and presses his hand on Dazai’s cheek. It feels like warm embers on his skin. Dazai tilts his cheeks, seeking the familiar heat. “What’s wrong?”
Dazai takes his husband’s hand, presses kisses on his fingers until he reaches the gold ring. It glows with the light of the flame. “Let me love you for a long time, okay?”
A smile. “As long as you’ll have me, Osamu.”
This is what his soulmate looks like: ocean blue eyes, fire red hair, a constellation of freckles on his shoulders that only Dazai gets to see. He smells like coffee in the mornings, like wine in the evenings, and he’s the only person allowed to call Dazai my love and little shit in one sentence. “Chuuya,” he breathes in the little space between them, “I’d marry you a thousand times over if I could.”
Dazai tilts his head and leans in for a kiss.
This is his home, this is his soulmate, this is his safe place; this is love—and he’s happy to have found it in Chuuya. In his smile, in his embrace, in his poorly delivered jokes. This love is his. Theirs. And it is more than enough.