Work Text:
“I’m sorry, is this seat taken?”
Following the voice, Dazai looks up.
He puts the pen down, his fingers barely peeking out from the cardigan’s sleeve. It takes him a second to realize he’s not hearing voices, and that someone talked to him. Nobody ever does.
Wow, he thinks. Today’s weird.
One would think that the park is big enough and has enough tables for everyone, without the need to bother strangers while they are obviously busy. Even in spring the place is not often crowded, being right next to a hospital structure.
(Some say it’s depressing.)
Annoyance begins to trickle down Dazai’s spine, only to be stopped when his eyes meet a black paperback hold by lean, clean hands — then he drinks in black distressed jeans, a worn-out leather jacket. Russet hair that would put wildfire to shame.
Eyes the color of the clear summer sky.
He hates those eyes already.
“I don’t know,” Dazai says. “Are all the other seats taken?”
The stranger runs a hand through his hair, fingers tripping into fire-like strands.
“Huh, yeah. Or I wouldn’t have asked.”
Dazai hums.
He looks at the back of the black iron chair the stranger is touching — as if to claim it already — and then down at the round table where he’s writing.
There is space for two, he guesses.
It’s his table, his spot under his favorite tree, but Dazai supposes he can share it for once.
Problem is, the stranger looks like a renaissance painting and it’s rubbing Dazai the wrong way.
Somehow, it’s a painful reminder of his own condition – of his oversized blue cardigan tossed above a simple hospital tracksuit, messy hair, the blue wristband that marks him like cattle.
Dazai Osamu is sick, and he is an empty page.
This man, though? He is an apologetic, annoying full page. Even his colors are loud.
And Dazai is drawn to it and repulsed at the same time.
(Why is this man talking to someone like him?)
“Here’s the deal, O’chibi,” Dazai volleys back. “You can sit if you tell me your name.”
“Hah?”
“You heard me.”
“Who are you calling a chibi?”
“You,” he drawls. “Not that I have any other name to call you by, unless o’Chibi answers my question?” He grins. “A name for a chair. It’s not that bad of an offer.”
It’s almost easy to insist on the pick-up line as he crosses his legs and tilts his chin to meet the stranger.
This man makes him feel bold.
Something in the way he hesitates and gnaws at his lips while his eyes roam across his face makes Dazai feel seen.
“…Chuuya.”
“Hm?”
“My name,” the stranger points at himself. “My name is Chuuya.”
It’s a nice name, Dazai finds himself thinking.
It sounds like a work of art, too.
In silence, he looks at Chuuya pulling back the chair, and taking his seat while resting the thin black paperback on the table.
'Milk and honey', Dazai reads in the white embossed lettering of the title.
How cliché.
“Dazai,” he offers in return. “Dazai Osamu.”
“Nice to meet you.”
“Likewise. Are you visiting someone at Yamashita hospital, Chuuya?”
“Nope, I’m just reading. I work nearby, and this is the closest park in the area, so I figured I'd stop by.” His eyebrows shoot up as he glances at Dazai’s black notebook. “You’re writing.”
It’s not a question.
“I’m starting something,” Dazai trundles out.
It’s not a lie, not entirely.
It’s a compromise.
Gone are the days when he'd have enough inspiration to write an entire chapter in a night, pouring his demons and wishes on a page that never remained blank for long. He used to put his anxiety and insomnia to work, and write the night away.
That, inevitably, changed after the hospital.
He topped out his creativity, he supposes, because he has been trying to write for a long time, yet the words escape him and the page remains white. He lacks stimuli, he tells himself. There's nothing to write about in a place where everybody is sick, especially when he’s too tired to even think.
It’s hard to write when you do nothing, and even more so when you experience nothing.
A blank page marks the beginning of a journey, some say.
Far fewer, braver people talk about the times the blank page becomes a prison.
“Writer’s block?”
“Something like that,” Dazai says, eyes narrowing as he tries to to avoid the conversation. He doesn’t need to dwell on his inability to write. “You’re new here.”
“Why do you say?”
“Well, I’ve never seen you around before.” A pause, and Dazai puckers. “I would definitely remember you.”
Chuuya shrugs the comment away. “As I said, I work nearby. Today I finished early, I’ve got nothing better to do and, frankly, this winter sucked ass, so I figured I’d come to the park and enjoy spring. Watch the cherry blossoms. Read a bit—"
“—Talk to a weirdo?” Dazai interrupts him, lips curling up.
The comment makes Chuuya snort.
“That, too.”
“Ah, so the poetry book is an excuse. I supposed that would be the case— you don’t look like the kind of person who reads poetry.”
Chuuya grimaces. “And who are you? A shitty detective?”
“I am—“
Ah. Right.
Who is he? Dazai Osamu, 29. Former novelist, all-time guest in his own body.
He was admitted into the Yamashita hospital rehabilitation structure after a suicide attempt gone wrong — or some would say right, considering he didn’t die and only fucked up his future.
It's funny how luck is just a matter of perspective.
His past is a foggy tangle of recent memories, his present is a hospital and his future—
Ah. That.
They say rehab , but the truth is that he’ll never get out.
Dazai’s gaze wanders to his assigned nurse, minding her own business on a nearby wooden bench. She always calls her son during the hours he spends writing in the park. Her son lives in Hokkaido.
Like many other things, Dazai doesn’t remember his name.
His memories mix, foggy and confused, his brain slowed down by painkillers.
Memories are fireflies.
Memories are delicate, short-lived fireflies and Dazai’s ones are flickering out of control because he ruined his own mind beyond repair.
Sometimes, his nurse will have to remind him of his name.
Yosano-sensei introduces herself to him every few days — even every day if he’s doing badly.
‘I’m Yosano Akiko, your neurologist,’ she introduces herself. ‘Your memory cycle is compromised. But you and I, Dazai-san, have known each other for the last four years. I know it must be confusing, but we’re going to take good care of you. Is that alright?’
She says it like he has a choice.
The truth is, he has to trust her – and it makes him feel powerless, out of control, but there’s nothing he can do.
Now, though, Dazai entertains the idea of lying to Chuuya.
He could pretend to be someone he’s not even though he wouldn’t have the clarity of mind to get his story straight and stick to it. Dazai doesn’t look like a sick man, but the nurse sitting at a discreet but safe distance and the blue rubber band around his wrist betray him.
Death is scribbled all over his body.
“I’m a patient at Yamashita hospital,” he admits, eventually. “As Chuuya probably guessed already.”
Chuuya smiles sheepishly, rubbing the back of his head.
“I did.” He tilts his chin to the blue bracelet. “Kinda hard to not notice, I guess.”
“Hm-m. Thanks for not making it a big deal.”
“It’s not a big deal, though?” Chuuya says, with a shrug. “It’s a public park. You’re getting fresh air. I’m doing the same. End of story.” Ah. He makes it sound so easy, Dazai could almost hug him. If he were a hugger, which he’s not. “It must be boring, though, to stick around in a hospital all day.”
“It’s alright. I’ve been in and out of hospitals for as long as I can remember.” Which is not very long, to be fair, because painkillers bite away his memory. “It’s not too bad anyway. Compared to most hospitals, this one is fancy.”
Only after a heartbeat — after noticing how pity flashes across Chuuya’s face — Dazai realizes he said it as if he needs to voice out why he’s around, why he’s playing the part of the ordinary person without being surrounded by doctors.
Normality makes him feel like an impostor.
“Sorry. That sounded lame.”
“It didn’t,” Chuuya replies. Then, his blue gaze falls again on the notebook of the table. He does not ask what’s wrong with Dazai and why he’s left to rot in a hospital, and the man is grateful for that small offer of mercy. “Why the park?”
“I’m a writer,” he says, quietly. At this point, that sounds like a lie too; he used to be a writer. Now he can't believe someone actually gave him money to put pen to paper. “Sometimes, I need inspiration.”
“As writers do. And what are you writing now?”
Dazai tilts his head to the side. “Well, Chuuya, that’s the catch. I’m trying to write.”
“Am I distracting you?” the other asks.
Despite the question, though, Chuuya flashes him a grin.
It means that, no matter Dazai's answer, the redhead won't get up and leave him alone.
“You’re not. What I meant is, I’m stuck.”
“Can I help?” For a moment, Chuuya himself seems taken aback by the casualty of the question — as if it’s not normal for him to offer to help a stranger. Instead of besetting himself, though, he clicks his tongue and adds: “I’m not a stalker, I swear. But a friend once told me that describing what they saw around them helped.”
“What do I see around?”
It’s hard to write what he knows, though, when he knows nothing.
“Hm-m.”
“I’d have to describe Chuuya,” Dazai ponders.
It’s not that he doesn’t like the idea.
It’s not a bad suggestion, either, and Dazai has never been shy about using strangers for his craft, but it’s hard to capture Chuuya with words.
There’s a specific word that describes how the light paints crowns of fire on his russet hair. Dazai searches for it, but it’s just out of his reach.
There’s a word for the shape of the tiny scar on the man’s forehead, just above his right eyebrow— white thick scarring tissue that moves with his expression. There’s a word for how he’s lean but muscular, and his traits betray the soul of a kind man who perhaps scowls a little too often.
Dazai can’t remember any of these words.
But Chuuya is smiling, and the sky trapped in his gaze is cloudless. His irises are limpid lakes of never-ending blue.
“Would that be so bad?” He asks, and Dazai finds himself smiling back with a light head and a heavy chest.
“No. No. But I don’t think there would be enough words in the world to describe you, and I don’t want to set myself up for failure.”
As his lips curl and he leans forward ever so slightly, mirth dancing in his eyes, Chuuya’s grin widens.
“Oi, are you hitting on me?”
“I could be. Am I allowed to hit on you?”
Chuuya’s smile withers, sheepish, and he shows his hand. He has beautiful hands, with long and elegant fingers. Hands Dazai is afraid to describe, but that he can't help but imagine holding his own fingers. He wonders how it would be to kiss those knuckles, slightly redder than the rest of the skin, one by one. Then he'd move to the translucent nails, pink and lucid. Then, the wrist.
He'd want to learn every inch of that hand, discovering how it feels under his lips. It's been so long since he kissed someone.
Only after a second of spacing out, though, he realizes that Chuuya is exposing a shiny silver band around his ring finger and his stomach dips.
“Sorry," the redhead says. "I have a fiancé.”
“Oh.”
At least to himself, under the polite nod he gives to the man, Dazai can admit that it’s a pity that Chuuya is taken.
Should have seen it coming, though.
However, even though Chuuya is beautiful enough for Dazai to envy the person who will marry him, he also lights up at the thought of the wedding.
And he’s never been a good man, Dazai. He’s never been an altruistic person. Some would say that he deserved to die.
So he finds himself hating the man who whisked someone like Chuuya off the market, simmering with a mix of annoyance and curiosity.
Because, if he can’t own a stranger, at least he can own his story.
“And who’s the lucky guy?”
“I never said he was a guy,” Chuuya counters, eyes narrowing. Dazai waves it away.
“You didn’t seem surprised when I tried to hit on you, so I took an educated guess.”
“Oh,” Chuuya says. “I mean, you’re not wrong. And, actually, I said he–” Chuuya stresses the word and looks at him, and Dazai doesn’t know if he should feel dumb or ashamed for the butterflies that explode in his stomach. “—He’s my fiancé, but that’s not completely true. We are technically married already. But we wanted to have a proper wedding, so we’re gonna go through all that shit again.” He shrugs, eyes wandering past Dazai; he’s looking at him, but his mind is somewhere else. To a better place. To a happier place, with someone else. “It’s going to be in Paris. Which is gonna be fucking hilarious because he doesn’t speak a word of French.”
Taking a moment to dissect the words, Dazai wrinkles his nose.
Confusion is a constant in his life: most things around him don’t make sense, and he learned to be okay with it. Sometimes, though, it’s scary. Most of the time, it’s lonely. However, in spite of everything Dazai knows, the man in front of him is just different.
This man just makes sense.
What doesn’t make sense, though, is the fact that Chuuya just said the words ‘proper wedding’ and Dazai is not quite sure how there can be a non-proper one.
“Care to explain why you and your fiancé are technically married?”
“Huh, it’s a long story.”
Dazai shrugs. “I have all day.”
“Well— we first got married drunk during a trip. Not our best day. So, when I say technically, I mean we were so shitfaced we don’t remember it.”
“You don’t remember?”
“Nah. Not a single thing.” Carelessly, Chuuya gestures at Dazai's notebook. "It could be a fun story, actually. Write that down. We were on holiday with friends and got wasted. I don't even remember for how long we drank, but when we woke up we had vomit in our hair, an official marriage certificate and a lot of shit to unpack."
Despite himself, Dazai chuckles.
For some reason, the sound squeezes his lungs like an old kitchen towel. “Right. Chuuya’s so short he had to be a lightweight.”
“Shut up! I’m not a lightweight, and my height has nothing to do with it?!”
“Hm-m, sure. What did you get drunk on? Red wine?”
“Well, yes...”
Subtly, he sticks his tongue out. “Disgusting.”
“Ha?!”
Dazai laughs louder at the surging outbursts — he laughs so loud his head starts spinning.
He inhales and exhales, then, forcing himself to slow down. Sometimes, he needs to breathe . He has to will himself to inhale a mouthful of oxygen if he doesn’t want to stress his body too much.
Normally, he doesn’t need to be reminded to take it easy. Emotions usually come to him in weak waves, and they are never overwhelming.
They never stray out of his control.
But, normally, Dazai doesn’t meet people who make him laugh like this.
“Your fiancé must be lucky," rolls out of his mouth.
The comment is honest, but entirely unplanned.
If Chuuya notices that Dazai sounds bitter about someone else’s happiness, he doesn’t call it out.
“He is.” The man balances his words, gnawing at his bottom lip. “He’s a lucky bastard, and so am I. He’s terribly smart, too. He acts tough, like he doesn’t care about shit, but that smile? God. That smile —“ Chuuya stops, realizing the little skip in his voice, and shrugs as if to dismiss those feelings. He shakes them off as if Dazai can forget he just witnessed love written all over a stranger’s face. “Well, you know how it is, he has a nice smile. Oi, I hope you’re writing that shit down. I won’t embarrass myself a second time.”
Almost in response, Dazai’s fingers find the pen he has abandoned with Chuuya’s arrival.
Smile is the first word he writes.
It sounds like a promising start.
“I am,” he assures.
He’s writing it in his mind, engraving every word.
People say they write the story they want to read; he’ll write the one he wants to live.
Because Chuuya utters out the words ‘he has a nice smile’ with a fluttering tone and a beam of his own, and Dazai can't help but think that, whatever smile this guy has, it’s nothing compared to what he’s seeing now.
Azure eyes, unguarded, pouring with affection.
Maybe, Chuuya is the story Dazai couldn’t find in his own head.
He can’t remember a single person who loved him like this weird short redhead loves his not-quite-proper husband.
“Tell me more about this proper wedding of yours,” he begs, because he’s a masochist.
Heavily, Chuuya swallows. “Why?”
Because I’ve never been in love, and I want you to explain it to me.
Dazai shrugs.
“I’m going to follow a smart man’s advice and write what I see,” he says. “What I hear, in this case. And because I am intrigued.”
“Intrigued,” Chuuya echoes.
“Well, I've never been in a serious relationship,” Dazai explains. “Also, Chuuya offered first.”
The redhead scoffs, a raspy little sound full of fondness that makes Dazai’s heart stutter, too.
“He’s a professor," he begins, slowly, as if he's carefully measuring his words. "A literature professor, the youngest of his generation. Not that anybody is ever fucking allowed to forget it. He also never fucking listens to me. And he’s so annoying, he cheats at every video game we play— especially Tekken.” He offers Dazai an apologetic smirk, resting both elbows on the table and leaning forward as if to share a secret. “I suck at Tekken, by the way.”
Dazai rolls his eyes. That was a cheap secret.
“Somehow I’m not surprised.”
“What?!”
“Chuuya seems impulsive,” Dazai offers, earning back a click of Chuuya’s tongue that tells him he’s right. “Tekken is, in fact, a turn-based game. You can’t just hope to beat the shit out of your opponent without a strategy, or you will never win. But that’s beside the point.”
“You insulting me is beyond the point?”
He waves the accusation away. “Truth is not an insult, Chuuya~”
“Ugh. I hate you.”
“I’m sure you do,” Dazai hums, unfazed. “Most people hate the truth. You were saying?”
“You tell me, weirdo. What do you need to write?”
“Anything,” he says. Then, he bites his bottom lip, realizing it’s not helpful. What he’s thirsty for is reality. Life, the life he can’t have. The life that feels foreign but that, out of Chuuya’s lips, seems familiar. “Well, small quirks. Memories. Details make a story believable.”
“Like the fact that he can’t cook for shit?” Chuuya volleys back, raising an eyebrow. He didn't lose a bit, and Dazai grins.
“Well, exactly.”
“He insults my fashion sense.”
“I don’t mean to take sides, but he is quite right.”
“Ugh. Shut up,” Chuuya growls. It doesn’t sound convincing, though. “Well, what else? We were fifteen when we met, he transferred to our school and we ended up in the same class. The asshole pestered the shit out of me ever since.
And now he’s always sticking his hands in my pockets because his fingers are always so damn cold, but he refuses to buy gloves because he’s a stubborn mule. He uses 5-in-1 shampoo and still has the softest hair I’ve ever touched. He’s so stupidly handsome. And I lov–” Chuuya’s voice breaks. He stops again, blinking rapidly, and his blue eyes suddenly remind Dazai of the sky after a summer drizzle — heavy and watery, clouded. “Ah, fuck, I’m sorry. He just annoys me a lot.”
“It does sound like it,” Dazai lies.
Because the truth is Chuuya sounds desperately, terribly, painfully in love with this man.
“Sorry.”
“It’s alright. What happened, then?”
“Then we grew up. Moved in together. I co-own a flower shop with my cousin, who is also the idiot’s best friend, so he thinks he can just loiter around scaring away clients.”
Flower shop, Dazai writes.
Best friend.
It sounds like a happy life, he thinks, a life he would love to steal for himself. Happy lives like this one make him hate the unlucky cards he drew.
“Chuuya’s lucky. He has a perfect life,” he says.
Chuuya smiles as if the words he’s swallowing taste bitter.
“I guess.”
“So are you picking the flowers for the wedding?” Dazai grinds out, quickly scribbling ‘happy life’ in the open notebook while making it sound as disinterested as possible.
Chuuya nods a little too fondly, a little too deeply, with still the ghost of tears in his worked-up breathing and glazed eyes .
How cute, Dazai thinks. Chuuya is moved.
He’s so happy he’s moved.
His boyfriend is definitely a lucky bastard, and Dazai definitely resents him.
“Yeah. We picked white lilacs.”
“Ah, that’s an interesting choice. Lilacs are… a statement and not dramatic or overused at all, I guess.”
The mean comment is enough to snap the other out of his almost-crying state, because Chuuya arches one eyebrow and pouts. Thank God, Dazai thinks — this pretty stranger should keep his watery smiles and happy tears for the aisle.
Dazai can't stand them, anyway. They annoy him for a reason he can't even explain.
(He hates to be so jealous of a man he doesn't know, wishing for a life he'll never live.)
“You’re a shitty liar, y’know. If you don’t like lilacs just say so.”
“No, I actually don’t,” Dazai admits, scrunching his nose. “They stink. If you want my opinion, Camellias would be better.”
“Too bad I didn’t ask for your opinion.”
“And yet you’re getting it anyway,” Dazai chirps. “When is the wedding again?” he asks, scribbling down notes. Banter. Lilacs. Camellias. Wedding. White.
All those words mean nothing to him, but they come alive through Chuuya’s feelings.
“August.”
“Ah. That’s going to be terribly hot, isn’t it?”
“I don’t think so, no. I’ve always pictured a warm, gentle day.” A pause. “I think we deserve one gentle day in our whole damn life.”
Idly, Dazai nods.
Gentle, he writes down.
He hopes so too – although he doesn’t say it out loud – because someone once told him that good people deserve good things. Not everybody has to be miserable, and he… well. Dazai might be the very depiction of lonely misery, a masterpiece of static anguish, but he wants to write this story.
It’s a physical need.
Some stories are good, and writers have a duty to snatch them from the cruel hands of time.
Besides, he wants to spend as much time as he can with Chuuya.
Basking in solitude and peace, Dazai has never felt alone before. However, this short stranger made him realize that he is bored. In this world that always looks pathetically average and grey and sheltered, Chuuya is an unexpected change he’d want to keep around.
“Why Paris?” he asks.
“Don’t you like it?” Despite the empty question, Chuuya crosses his arms as he leans over the table. His movements are elegant, in that nonchalant way that tells Dazai that Chuuya doesn't realize his own charm. “He said it’s a cliché, too. It’s a clichè, we should do something cool. He proposed the North Pole as if I’m ever going to get married with fucking penguins around. The idiot said that he might get eaten by a polar bear if he’s lucky. As if. ” Then he stops, pinching his nose. He looks exasperated. He also looks young as he mulls over the next words, but strained – as if that cheerfulness is not something Dazai should trust. “Anyway. My older brother lives in Paris, so we’re going to see family and stuff too.”
“That sounds nice.”
The North Pole sounds better, though.
“Paris is nice. Have you ever been there?” In response, Dazai shakes his head. “Well, you should go. If you ever get the chance.”
The thing is, Dazai can’t see Paris.
He will never see most of the world, and he can complain about it and feel sorry for himself or accept that he’s stuck in this universe that feels like a fishbowl.
Of course, he is allowed a certain amount of freedom and to do stuff; he’s not a prisoner.
He has a house of his own, a nice neighborhood, and this public garden he likes to visit.
He has an iron table with two chairs under a cherry tree where he likes to write.
The days might all feel the same but this is his world.
It’s all he ever needed.
Yes, he supposes it would feel normal for most people to hop on a plane and visit another country, maybe explore, and flood their social media feeds with unprompted pictures of their adventures. That's what most people would do.
His normality, instead, is made of doctor visits and a personal nurse and a veto on overworking himself.
“No offense, but I doubt I’ll ever get to see past Tokyo,” Dazai says, voice leveled.
“I’m sure you’ll get better.”
“A lovely thought. Unluckily, it seems like getting better is not in the cards for me.”
“Ah.” Chuuya licks his lips, weirded out, his eyes jumping from Dazai’s notebook to his poetry book. It could be easy to let the conversation die, now. But— “Do you want me to describe it, then?”
Dazai nods. “Tell me what you like about the city.”
Take me there.
“Well…there’s a lot of light, and broad streets and so many parks. Close to my brother’s house – his name is Paul, by the way – there’s this tiny pâtisserie with eclairs and madeleines that are mad good.”
Dazai blinks, and scribbles ‘eclairs and madeleines’ on the notebook.
Word by word, the page is not white anymore.
“I like madeleines.”
For a moment, a flash passes through Chuuya’s eyes.
I know, he seems to say.
“Yes, my fiancé does too. He has a stupid sweet tooth,” Chuuya compromises, then, although it sounds uncomfortable. “As I said, the ones close to Paul’s house are good. I can’t just describe them, though, you gotta try for yourself.”
“Chuuya will have to bring back some from his honeymoon, then.”
Here, right here. Idiot. How stupid can he be? Once again, Dazai Osamu waltzes into a situation only to prove that he is a master of hurting himself.
Because the afternoon taught him that he likes Chuuya.
He ancestrally, truly likes him – beyond reason and beyond all things that make sense.
Now, Dazai is not an idiot.
He realizes he only likes the surface Chuuya is allowing him to see and that they don’t know each other, but it feels like a good start.
It feels like a good thing even if Chuuya has a boyfriend and his eyes glisten when he talks about him. Still, he knows better than to hope that a handsome stranger will spare a single thought for him while in Europe.
Chuuya tches, crossing his legs and turning. Dazai notices the gesture conceals the vague hint of a blush. “You know what, maybe I will bring you something. Only if I remember.”
Dazai’s heart hiccups.
He will.
Future doesn’t mean much to him, but today feels different.
“Does this mean Chuuya will be back?”
“‘F course. If you are writing about me, I gotta make sure you do it right.”
“Sounds good. It’s not like I have much else to write anyway,” Dazai says. “Or any other visitors. Chuuya’s the only company I’ve got.”
Chuuya scowls. “Hah? You have no visitors at the hospital?”
“Not that I remember.”
“No room full of plushies and flowers and shit?”
He shakes his head, voice sharp. “I guess whoever cared for me got tired a long time ago. Can’t blame them.”
Chuuya’s shoulders quiver. “I'm sorry. That sucks.”
With a weak hmm, Dazai lapses into silence and doesn’t answer.
They say he is fragile.
They say his mental health is unstable, and his latest attempt compromised his physical health too. They say he might break if he stresses too much — falling to pieces like porcelain, like a vase someone handed carelessly.
Yet, he craves careless touches and violent kisses. He wants to be touched without fear, without hesitation.
He has a feeling someone like this handsome stranger would give him that kick he longs for, that sprinkle of danger.
But Chuuya is in love.
Chuuya is happy, he has a job and a husband and a perfect life, and Dazai longs for death.
“You know, Chuuya…” he murmurs, looking down at the page filled with bits of somebody else’s life. “You’re not as boring as I thought.”
“Thanks. You aren’t bad, either.”
“I wish I could have met you when I was feeling better. Maybe I could have stolen you from this fiance of yours.”
Maybe he would have stood a chance.
The words make Chuuya stop, lips twisting. “You’re still hitting on me?”
Dazai stares at him, blue eyes narrowed as his brows furrow, and only then he realizes he fucked up. He crossed a boundary.
He did it voluntarily, a gamble of some sort, and it backfired and slapped him back in the face.
“Does that bother you?” he asks, slowly. Chuuya’s gaze burrows in his.
“Maybe.”
“Well, too bad. Because I really wish we had met under different circumstances.”
It takes a moment for Chuuya to do anything – to answer or move or both.
“Me too,” he murmurs, then, almost drowsy. It’s a slip of the tongue, though. He stammers and backtracks immediately. “Shit, sorry. Sorry, I didn’t mean it that way. Of course, I’m flattered, but I—“
“I’m just joking,” Dazai interrupts him. He’s not. “Please forget it.”
He stops him before the handsome man he only just met can refuse him. Before a stranger can break his heart.
Damn, he thinks.
How lonely can he be, clinging so desperately to a person he doesn’t know?
“I didn’t mean to give the wrong impression,” Chuuya says.
Dazai shakes his head. “Trust me, you didn’t.”
“I’m really sorry,” he repeats, looking down at his hands.
When he notices that the man sounds sorry too, Dazai tells himself it’s a tiny consolation.
“Yeah,” he says. “Me too.”
—
Chuuya can’t breathe.
Every blink feels like sandpaper over his dry eyes, every step feels heavy as he moves out of the so-called public park. Nothing about it’s public.
The Yamashita hospital complex is more realistic than a movie set, but it’s worth the money and offers the best medical care.
His jaw hurts.
His throat burns.
He has to get out of this shitty park, out of this shitty hospital.
He has to—
“Nakahara-Dazai?”
Thank God.
The nurse’s voice echoing in the waiting room makes Chuuya jump, and his head snaps up.
He swallows, taking a deep, deep breath, forcing himself to bounce on his feet. He reaches the admission desk with knees slightly jittering, still, gripping at the pass inside his pocket until the plastic cuts into his palm.
“That’s me.”
The nurse behind the desk smiles, her peony-pink lipstick slightly smeared at the corners of her mouth, and quickly types up something on her laptop. Waiting for her to hand him the modules for visitors, Chuuya ponders that he’s never seen her before.
She’s definitely new.
God, he thinks, he’s been around enough to notice the new employees.
“Husband of Nakahara-Dazai Osamu?”
“That’s correct.”
Pity flickers in her face — ah, Chuuya thinks, she must have seen Dazai’s file. After all, he's been a guest of the high-risk ward for a long time. One-day memory loss.
Who would have guessed that one day is enough to hurt for a lifetime?
“Then I just need you to sign out and submit your visitor badge, and you’re all done.”
“‘K, thanks,” Chuuya mutters as if he doesn’t know the procedure by heart. As if he hasn’t been visiting Dazai every day for four years.
The wedding was supposed to be in August – August 2018.
The date on the module states an unmerciful March 2022.
“All done,” he mumbles, sliding the module back in her direction. His visitor badge — because he’s nothing but a visitor in his husband’s life, a shadow lurking in and out the corners of a burning painting – sits on top of the signed documents.
“Fab. Have a good rest of your day, sir.”
It takes everything in Chuuya not to thaw into sobs right in front of her. He’s just another admin task for the woman, and yet this is all his life.
Dazai is all he has.
He smiles politely instead, his fraying sanity hanging by the thread of his curled lips.
The moment he’s in his car, the scream climbs up Chuuya's throat.
It dies there, too.
Chuuya lays his forehead against the steering wheel, letting the tears prick his dry eyes.
Dazai thinks his memory is numbed and occasionally falters, and that his life always feels the same; the truth is, Dazai’s life is a never-ending cycle of the same twenty-four hours. Sometimes it's even less than that.
Dazai has lived the same day for four years.
Blinking, Chuuya sinks his nails into the black steering wheel. If he doesn't keep his hands occupied, he might carve his dried-out eyes out of their sockets.
“Fuck,” he whispers.
He wants to yell and kick and sink his shoe in the dashboard, and trash that stupid shrimp keychain Dazai got him for his birthday.
Instead, he parts his lips, and it’s a sob that comes out.
“Fuck you,” he murmurs. “Fucking hell. Meeting me when you were better? Seriously? What the fuck, ‘Samu. How the fuck dare you.” Dazai hitting on him so boldly was unexpected — but the idiot loves to stray out of his patterns. He’s a man who loves a dramatic one-liner, Dazai, always was. That’s one of the reasons why Chuuya loves him. “Shit. Who do you think you’re charming, after all this time? You stupid. Shitty. Crafty. Bastard.”
He was supposed to move on.
He was supposed to forget how Dazai felt under his fingertips, and file for divorce or get himself a new lover.
Instead, he’s gripping the wheel until his wedding band sinks in the flesh, and his palms hurt and his ears ring.
The sobs shake Chuuya until it hurts; until it burns.
God, he thinks.
He married the most stubborn man on earth.
—
“Things I remember about Chuuya:
- He’s short. Super short. Ridiculously short.
-Chuuya bites his lips when he’s worried. It’s annoying because then I have to kiss him and it tastes like blood. Ew.
- Chuuya’s lucky I like kissing him, by the way.
- Chuuya loves wine. And hats. And those pretentious poetry books I’m 90% sure he doesn’t understand.
- Chuuya likes karaoke. He also regularly gets drunk before 10 pm. Fuck my life.
- Chuuya smells good.
- That tiny scar on Chuuya’s forehead from that one time he didn’t see the glass door. We were arguing, and he walked right into it.
I told him he was right and I was wrong — now, of course, he was wrong. Obviously. But I had to do that so he’d shut up and let me drive him to the ER.
Things I want Chuuya to remember:
- Chuuya has to visit me once a year, and for thirty minutes tops. Not more, I can’t stand your Sluggy little brain for more than that. I’ll become stupid if you bore me for more than that.
- Chuuya’s hats are hideous.
- Chuuya is, indeed, short.
- Chuuya has to remember me wishing him ‘happy birthday’ and ‘happy anniversary’.
- I can’t stop it, Chibi, and this is not your fault. It’s going to get worse and I can’t fix this. I tried.- I love you.”
—
“I’m sorry, is this seat taken?”
Dazai is writing, today, like he always does.
He’s wearing yet another pastel blue cardigan and running a nervous hand through tousled hair.
He always does that when he doesn’t know what to write.
Yosano-sensei gave him a new notebook.
The man looks at the untouched page and scrunches his nose as Chuuya reaches for their usual spot, lifting his eyes as soon as he realizes his presence. He tilts his head to the side, soft brown curls framing his face.
Big, confused eyes of the same color of liquid gold rest on him, studying Chuuya's face for a moment.
And if Chuuya only could—
“I’m sorry,” Dazai says. “Do I know you?”