Chapter Text
After the judge ordered him to YRS, Chuuya had three last nights at home.
On the last of those three nights, his whole family sat around the rickety kitchen table, each with a sullen expression etched onto their faces.
His older half-brother, Paul, simmered with a rage that wrapped around his body to cloak his anxiety. His breaths were deep and slow in a shallow attempt to stay calm and mentally present, but the way his gloved hands clenched into shaking fists on the table gave him away.
Paul’s boyfriend, Arthur, who had gently tip-toed into the family over the past two years, shivered more violently than usual with pale cheeks and blue lips, bundled up in a tasseled, dark red scarf. He sat next to Chuuya and across from Paul, naturally gravitating to whoever was the most heated.
And of course, Chuuya, like his big brother, glowed with a royally pissed-off aura to hide how panic swirled in his chest. His heart thumped violently, and his mind was a ransacked garden of everything and absolutely nothing.
Lastly, their parents stood deathly still, smiling softly in their poplar picture frame.
If it weren’t for the picture, Chuuya would’ve forgotten what his maman and papa looked like years ago. He was grateful for the picture, grateful that he could see maman’s quiet smile and papa’s knitted eyebrows (he wasn’t wearing his glasses and the flash of the camera caught him off guard) before being sent off to some delinquent kid prison.
Chuuya was… scared. And angry, too. Really fucking angry.
In the silence of their post-dinner family “meeting”, Arthur put his arm around Chuuya’s shoulder while the lightbulb hanging from the ceiling hummed with old age. Arthur was touchier overall than Paul, which nobody minded, and let his head rest on Chuuya’s, acting like an ice pack for the pissed-off little firecracker.
Arthur was a nice addition to their little family, Chuuya thought. He was glad that his brother wouldn’t be alone when he left.
And Paul knew Chuuya had a weird habit of thinking like that. He presented himself as a tough guy – which, admittedly, he learned from Paul, and look where that got them – but at his core, he did nothing but fuss over other people. Paul was almost 25 for fuck’s sake, and Chuuya was over here worried about loneliness when he was about to get shipped off hours away to a shady-ass reform school! Quesquecette merde?! Occupe toi de tes oignons!
Paul took a deep breath – Chuuya watched him from across the table as Arthur shivered and sniffled – and tried to calm himself. He tended to shift toward outbreaks when he didn’t really get his emotions, and he’s learned the hard way what kind of consequences it brings. He should’ve done better raising Chuuya to avoid that sort of behavior.
That was how Paul was supposed to care. Arthur gave hugs and Chuuya would talk your ear off – Paul was supposed to teach and lead by example. He was supposed to keep his little brother (who he just learned existed only two years ago!) safe and out of trouble. The kid spent enough time on the streets dealing with shit. Paul was supposed to give him better.
“Don’t beat yourself up over it,” Chuuya cut in, eyes pointed like a dagger in Paul’s direction. “You weren’t the one who choke-slammed a kid into a table.”
Paul couldn’t help but smirk. “I’ve seen the security footage, kid. It was hardly a choke-slam.”
“That’s not the point,” Chuuya spat out, semi-embarrassed. “It was my choice to step in, so don’t you dare take away from it. My actions, my pissy fucking mood. End of story.”
“Watch your damn mouth, you little fucker.” There was a wisp of laughter in Paul’s voice that split a smile across the two brothers’ faces.
“You two are impossible,” Arthur added with a small grin of his own.
The picture frame remained still in its spot beside Paul, staring at Chuuya as he found something else to laugh at. There was a softness about the whole situation that wasn’t there before, a small trace of it’s okay, little one. We’re here. You aren’t doomed. You’re far from it.
Chuuya tried his best to hold onto that.
The government car arrived at seven o’clock the next morning.
The officer driving was a chain-smoking old man with gray, swept-back hair, a mustache, and a short beard ending in a spike. His eyes were violet, with a monocle over the right one, secured by a gold chain, and Chuuya already wanted to kill him. He had a mean and sour stick-up-the-ass aura that Chuuya sure as hell didn’t want to deal with on the way to his new prison – that, or Chuuya was just really bad at reading vibes. Maybe he was just pissy about the whole reform school thing in general.
Well, whatever. He was fifteen. With all the good he’d done, beating up bullies and whatnot, he should be allowed to take his anger out on the wrong people every once in a while.
The officer plucked out his cigarette when he talked, which was not often. He said two or three things to Paul and Arthur before he handcuffed Chuuya to a metal bar that ran behind the front seat and didn’t speak for two hundred and seventy-five miles.
Chuuya was itching for conversation the whole way, but he was smart enough to keep his mouth shut. He had to be – he was in the backseat of a cop car for fuck’s sake.
About five hours into the drive, the officer pulled over and let Chuuya out to pee. They stopped at a shitty gas station in the middle of nowhere, and the old fart nodded to the doors. “This is your bathroom break, kiddo. Be quick,” the officer said, blowing out a thick cloud of smoke. It wafted over Chuuya’s head and into the sky; it was almost dark out, the kid noticed.
When Chuuya was finished, he trekked back to the cop car. He considered running – considered it a lot more than a normal person would – but decided against it. He spent a good amount of time surviving on the streets, but he was as good as dead in the woods up on the mountain. And with the feds on his tail? Yeah, fuck that.
So Chuuya was obedient and climbed into the back of the car, cussing himself out in his mind. The officer filled their tank and situated himself behind the wheel, sighing big and loud the way all old men seem to.
“Glad to know you aren’t planning on running,” the officer said, flicking the ashes of his cig into an ashtray on the dashboard. Chuuya furrowed his eyebrows in the backseat. “Here, eat up.” The old man pushed a plastic bag through the iron bars separating the back and the front. “It’s the last good food you’re gonna have before YRS gets to you,” the officer warned. “But you seem like a good kid. You’ll be out soon enough. Consider this a ‘good luck’ gift.”
In the bag was a pre-made ham sandwich and a bag of sour gummy worms. Chuuya beamed.
“Thank you,” Chuuya blurted, fighting the urge to tear into the food like a rabid animal.
“No problem,” the officer answered. “My name is Hirotsu, by the way. Ryūrō Hirotsu. Just in case you need a voucher sometime down the line.”
Chuuya had no fucking clue what that meant, but he thanked the crazy old man once again before digging into his gas station meal.
Officer Hirotsu didn’t bother refastening the cuffs.
Chuuya had imagined Yokohama Reform School with imposing stone walls and menacing coils of barbed wire, so what greeted him instead felt like a slap across the face. Instead of walls, the campus sprawled openly, meticulously maintained on healthy green grass. Two- and three-story buildings of red brick punctuated the landscape, nestled among towering cedar trees and ancient beeches that cast swathes of comforting shade. It was, without a doubt, the most inviting property Chuuya had ever laid eyes upon—a genuine school, a beacon of excellence, fucking over the nightmares of the slaughterhouse he’d been preparing himself for.
They drove up the long road to the main administration building and Chuuya caught sight of a baseball field where some boys scrimmaged and yelped. In his head, he’d seen kids attached to balls and chains, something out of cartoons, but these guys were having a great time out there, thundering around on the grass. He thought about jumping from the car with a wicked smile and joining them.
“Careful now,” Officer Hirotsu murmured, turning up into the main building’s driveway. “The warden doesn’t like smiles.”
Chuuya scoffed. What kind of cliché shit was that? Though to be fair, it’s not unrealistic for a reform school and “frown town” to have quite a bit in common.
Inside the building, the officer waved down a secretary who took them into a yellow room lined with wooden filing cabinets. There were desks and chairs lined up in classroom-style rows, but Officer Hirotsu nudged him to stand up in front of the blackboard with his hands behind his back. The dread was setting in by this time; Chuuya fought to keep his face indifferent.
It was silent, and the silence stretched on for ages. The secretary left a couple of minutes later, half bored and half busy, while Hirotsu sucked the life out of his last cigarette, stubbing the bud on one of his metal bracelets and tossing it into the trash. Chuuya’s foot started tapping against the linoleum-tiled floor halfway through the five-minute mark, but a sharp look from the officer had him still as a statue.
When the warden entered, the silence came to a screeching halt. Not because the man was loud – no, not that at all. It was his presence that spoke, drenching the room with ear-splitting screams. Chuuya stood at attention fully against his will.
The man was fairly tall and had a slender physique, cloaked in a sharp suit: a white button-up, a black pinstriped suit jacket, black shoes, and black trousers. He had straight, chin-length black hair slicked back, leaving bangs on each side of his face, and eyes that slipped pills into unprotected drinks at the local bar (at least, that was Chuuya’s interpretation of the unnaturally passionate and predatory gaze).
“Thank you so much for delivering our new student safe and sound, officer,” the warden began.
Officer Hirotsu bowed, awaiting further instruction, which Chuuya found curious because Officer Hirotsu didn’t work under the warden at all – he was an officer of the Japanese government. What the fuck was he following orders from this guy for?
“Now, if you’ll excuse us,” the warden continued, “I’d like to interview the young man privately before I send him off. Would you mind calling one of the boys from Dormitory B down here? I’ll have one of them show the new student the ropes when we’re finished here.”
The officer hesitated, dark eyes flitting over to Chuuya’s direction. It didn’t last long, though, because Chuuya was shaking in his boots like a wet noodle, and the warden was staring with that awful smile, thin and bitter like ginger licorice.
“No time to dilly-dally, officer,” the warden chuckled. “I know you have places to be.” He waved the officer off as if he were a little kid and not a man with a handgun and taser secured to his belt. Chuuya found a morbid sense of admiration in that sort of power-induced confidence, especially after Officer Hirotsu gave a final swift nod and left the room.
The admiration vanished when the officer closed the door on the way out.
Chuuya stood like a blade of grass in the front of the class-like room. The warden took a seat at the frontmost desk, eyes grazing over the boy as if he’d have to draw him from memory a week from now.
When the warden finished his odd visual scan, he folded his hands on the desk and let out a satisfied hum. “Tell me about yourself, boy.” He caught the way Chuuya’s brows knit together and waved away the obvious confusion. “Don’t overthink it. Imagine you’re introducing yourself to a room full of your peers. What would you say?”
“Uh, well… my name is Chuuya Nakahara, I’m fifteen years old, my favorite color is red, and… I like dogs and playing video games.”
“Lovely,” the warden beamed. “I’ll go next: My name is Ougai Mori, but you will only ever refer to me as ‘Mr. Mori,’ ‘Warden,’ or ‘sir.’ I’ve been in charge of Yokohama Reform School for four years, my favorite color is blue, and I like caring for children who behave–” The warden’s tone dropped to something sinister. “–and guiding those who don’t.”
Chuuya felt his stomach drop.
“It’s my understanding that you’re a fighter,” Mr. Mori said, tilting his head almost innocently. “Is that true, Nakahara?”
“Uh, just Chuuya is fine.”
“I asked you a question, boy.”
“Oh. Right. Sorry,” was Chuuya’s awkward answer. “I just like standing up for what’s right, sir.”
“Right.” The warden laughed. “You’re an interesting character, little one. I’m excited to see how far you make it at this school.”
A gentle knock at the door brought their conversation to an end. A boy with long, braided white hair and a scar over his eye peaked his head in the room, curious and cautious and borderline mischievous. “Hello, Warden. I’m here to show the new guy around.”
“I know what you’re here for,” the warden laughed. “I called you here.”
“Ah, hehe, right. Sorry.”
“Don’t apologize.” Mr. Mori turned his attention back to Chuuya who felt so awkward he might pass out. Like those goats that faint when they’re frightened, which Chuuya hated to admit. “Chuuya, this is Nikolai Gogol. Nikolai, this is Chuuya Nakahara. I expect you to clue him in on all YRS customs, expectations, and routines. If he’s caught stepping out of line in the next two weeks, you’ll receive double the regular punishment for his actions.”
“I understand, sir.”
“Good. Take him to tour the dormitories first, then the mess hall. Return here before dinner so we can get little Chuuya his altered uniform.”
Chuuya imagined socking the guy right across the face for that comment. He overheard the secretary mumbling about needing to contact some tailor to make adjustments to his uniform, so of course the warden knew about it, too. Damn it, Chuuya knew he was small, but he was only fifteen! Paul said he didn’t get his growth spurt until seventeen. That’s two full years! Two!
Snapping Chuuya away from his mental fussiness, the warden stood, brushed the wrinkles from his suit coat, and left with a subtle nod. The two students felt themselves physically relax. Why that conversation was so tense, Chuuya wasn’t sure, but he was more than happy to follow the goofy kid out of this place. Hell, he was willing to follow him into Mariana’s Trench if it meant putting space between them and the freaky warden.
“Well, you heard the man,” Nikolai exclaimed, skipping over to link arms with the new kid. “Let’s start your tour, shall we?”
Chuuya cringed but obliged as the white-haired boy tugged him out of the building and into the grassy field. A little ways away, past the baseball field, were three two-story brick buildings that Nikolai labeled the dormitories.
“You’ll be in Dormitory C,” Nikolai explained, “because you’re new. Get enough points and you’ll move up to B with me and Fedya. Dormitory A is for the most well-behaved kids – the ones who’ll finish their sentence or turn 18 soon.”
Chuuya nodded. “So how do I get points?”
Nikolai laughed like a goddamn psychopath from an episode of The Twilight Zone. “Of all the secrets slipped and kept in the cracks and crevices of YRS, that has to be the most coveted.” He unlocks their arms and twirls around, skipping backward so Chuuya can see the wild look in his eyes. “Welcome, Chuuya,” Nikolai cackled, “to Yokohama Reform School, your own personal hell.”
Chuuya stood in the doorway to Dorm C’s laundry room with his arms folded over his chest. He wore his new YRS uniform: a gray work shirt, denim pants, and brown brogues boots and watched as a kid with cinnamon-red hair put Chuuya’s old clothes in the wash. Their house staff, Mr. Ango, was there, too, talking Chuuya through the schedule.
Every kid had to attend school, he said, that was a rule. “Other reformatory schools might not strike that balance between reform and education, but YRS made sure that their charges did not fall behind, with classroom instruction every other day, alternating with work details, Sundays off.”
Later, Nikolai would re-explain the schedule: Monday, Wednesday, and Friday were school days, which meant sleep, heal, and fuck around and find out since a lot of the boys couldn’t read. What did work days look like? Well, that depended on what dormitory you were in. Dormitory C – the new kids and the bad kids – worked out on the fields under the hot sun; decently behaved kids (like Nikolai, supposedly?) in Dormitory B worked as indoor cleaners; and the good and/or soon-to-graduate kids were assistants to on-campus staff like secretaries, nurses, and teachers.
“You’ll have the next two days off to get adjusted,” Mr. Ango continued, pushing his big circle glasses up on the bridge of his nose. If Chuuya was asked to describe the man, he’d say something along the lines of a cross between a twiggy baby deer and a wise old owl – which, considering his neatly combed hair and pale brown double-breasted coat, wasn’t too far off the mark.
“He gets two days off, but I have to babysit him for two weeks?” Nikolai groaned. Even while complaining, a pointy smile etched into his pale face.
“Yes, that seems to be the case,” Mr. Ango hummed. “I’m not sure why he’d give that task to a Dorm B student, though…”
“Probably ‘cause he’s gonna get bumped down soon,” the cinnamon-haired kid snickered. Chuuya noticed a white adhesive bandage on the bridge of his nose and wondered what it was for. “That kid is tied to Dorm C like teenage girls are to abortion clinics.”
“Tachihara, watch your damn mouth,” Ango snapped. “There’s a reason you haven’t moved onto Dorm B in the eight months you’ve been here.”
“Eight months?!” Chuuya blurted, eyes nearly popping out of his skull. “Putain! You carrying this sentence to term or what?”
“Dude, shut it,” Tachihara snorted, rubbing his nose with the back of his hand in a weak attempt to hide his growing smile. “We already got a sarcastic witty ginger and you’re looking at him.”
“Uh-huh, whatever you say, Juno.”
“Aw man,” Nikolai cried. “Tachihara already stole my new friend!”
Tachihara rolled his eyes. “You’re not even in this dorm, dude. Why don’t you go play with your Russian boyfriend or something?”
“Oooh, sounds fun! Our favorite game is string the asshole ginger up by his unraveled large intestine!”
“Alright, that’s enough,” Mr. Ango cut in, his voice heavy with annoyance. “Gogol, report back to your dorm and tell Mr. Hawthorne I’m reassigning the new student to Tachihara. It seems you need some time to calm down and re-center.”
“Damn it!” Nikolai groaned. “But the warden gave this task to me, not fuckboy cinna-ginger!”
“For the love of god,” Ango muttered under his breath. “It’s either you head back to your dorm, or you spend the night in solitary.”
“Solitary?” Chuuya squeaked.
“Solitary?” Nikolai echoed with a flat, bored tone (contrasting comically to Chuuya’s horrified shock.) “Are you too scared to beat me like the other staff, Mr. Ango?”
Mr. Ango scowled. “I’d prefer not to, but if you deem it necessary, I have Mr. Fukuchi on speed dial.”
Nikolai sighed, dragging himself toward the door and weaving past a still shocked Chuuya on his way out. “Fine, fine, whatever. Bye-bye, Tachi. See ya, Chuuya.”
“Later, weirdo.”
“Bye, Nikolai.”
A little while after Nikolai left, Mr. Ango excused himself to take a phone call, and Tachihara took it upon himself to explain Dorm C’s layout to the new student. The first floor of the dorm was taken up by a small kitchen, an administration office, and a large assembly room. (It’d be called a family room in another lifetime, but here, the couches were replaced by creaky wooden benches, and there wasn’t a singule electronic device – let alone a TV – in sight.)
On the second floor were the dorm rooms, two of them for the highschool-age students and one reserved for the younger kids. Each room had 12 bunk beds in it, storing 36 students total, but right now only 30 were being used.
The top floor was where Mr. Ango and the other Dorm C staff member, Mr. Fukuchi, lived, plus some utility rooms. “We’re not allowed up there, obviously,” Tachihara said. “I couldn’t care less about the rules, but even I avoid it. Ango is pretty chill when it comes to discipline, but if you’re ever caught by Mr. Fukuchi…” He left the rest unsaid, which Chuuya silently appreciated.
As the sun creeped down below the treeline, the students trickled back from the mess hall and into their respective dormitory houses. Chuuya declined the offer of grabbing a quick bite and instead hung with Tachihara in the East assembly room. The rule was that none of the boys were allowed up to their rooms for the night until one of the dorm staff took attendance, just to make sure nobody made a break for it.
“Honestly, YRS isn’t too bad if you know what you’re doing,” Tachihara said, playfully bumping shoulders with Chuuya as they sat side by side on the bench. “If you got any questions, I’m your guy. I don’t doubt you can hold your own in a fight, but it’s better to be safe than sorry. The best advice I got is to mind your business and try to stay goal oriented. This place isn’t forever for us, y’know?”
Chuuya nodded. He hadn’t even finished his first day yet, and his throat was already sore with homesickness.
Tachihara noticed, and after an awkward second of courage building, he wrapped an arm around Chuuya’s shoulders. It wasn’t as soft and comforting as Arthur’s, and Tachihara’s gaze wasn’t as protective and understanding as Paul’s, but it was something, and for that, Chuuya was grateful.
“Ayo! Ryuunosuke!” Tachihara called, unlatching himself from Chuuya as a couple more students shuffled into the assembly room. “C’mere! Come meet the new guy!”
Begrudgingly, a thin kid with dark hair, choppy bangs, and the palest skin Chuuya had ever seen dragged himself over. His uniform was a bit more tattered than Tachihara’s, confirming Chuuya’s theory that today had been a work day. Upon closer inspection, the vampiric kid’s eyes were the color of charcoal, and the tips of his hair were dyed a gray-ish white color. There was a hint of a snarl in his gravelly voice when he talked.
“What do you want this time, Tachihara?”
“Aw, don’t be like that, Aku. Say hi to Chuuya Nakahara, the new kid! Chuuya, this is Ryuunosuke Akutagawa, Dorm C’s whiny goth guy. I mainly started hanging out with him because I’m into his sister, but turns out he’s a pretty cool kid,” Tachihara said.
“Don’t call me kid,” Akutagawa mumbled. “I’m older than you.”
“Yeah, by like four months,” Tachi snapped, waving the pettiness away. “And either way, it doesn’t matter. I’ve been here longer and therefore I’m cooler and smarter and tougher and – most importantly – in charge.”
“Uh-huh,” Akutagawa yawned, dripping with sarcasm. “How interesting. You’re truly mind-blowing.”
“Funny. Your sister said the same thing when I–”
“I will kill you, Tachihara.”
“Not if you don’t want solitary, you won’t!”
Chuuya furrowed his brows, shifting his weight on the bench. He did his best to look less disturbed than he was. “What the hell is this ‘solitary’ thing, anyway? Is it actually, like…”
“I don’t know,” Tachihara admitted, stretching his arms over his head. A tag on the back of his uniform’s collar stuck out awkwardly, poking a tuft of hair that also went against the norm. “I’ve never been. Aku, what was it like when you went?”
Akutagawa shrugged. He took his time stepping around the bench to sit on Tachihara’s left. The assembly room was almost full with about twenty-five kids littered around the space, and the smell of outside dirt and grime was stinking up the place. Yeah, it had definitely been a work day.
“Actually, nevermind,” Tachihara said, clapping Akutagawa a little too roughly on the back. The dark haired boy sputtered out a cough and glared at him. “Sorry. You don’t gotta talk about it if you don’t wanna.”
“It wasn’t that bad,” Akutagawa scoffed. “They just put you in the empty work shed for the night. The worst part about it is the cold.”
“That sounds…” Chuuya frowned. “Really illegal.”
Tachihara nodded. “You’re gonna see a lot of that here. Just… remember my advice, ‘kay?”
“What? To mind my business? They’re abusing kids here!” Chuuya hissed, balling his hands into fists. He’d never been great at controlling his emotions, but at least he remembered to drop his voice to a pained whisper, channeling his urge to strangle someone into his sharp scowl.
“Well, it is a reform school,” Tachihara muttered back. “If you expected them to pamper us in designer clothes and fancy chocolate, you should transfer to the asylum down the road. The best thing we can do is keep our heads down and keep making progress. It’s every man for himself in YRS, Chuuya.”
Chuuya rolled his eyes, leaning forward and turning his attention to the dark-haired boy. “Akutagawa, right? If you don’t mind sharing, what did you do to get solitary?”
“Chuuya–” Tachihara started, picking up a panicked tone.
Akutagawa’s answer was served with a side of cold, dead eye-contact. “I made the mistake of speaking to Dazai.”
“Akutagawa, seriously,” Tachihara snapped. “Stop.”
Chuuya ignored him. “Who’s Dazai?”
“He’s–”
“Attention, boys!” came the house staff’s booming voice. By process of elimination, Chuuya knew it was Mr. Fukuchi; he was a tall older man with light, spiky hair, two strands falling in front of his face, and an upward mustache. Unlike Mr. Ango, Mr. Fukuchi wore a more military-like outfit instead of a suit with the sleeves rolled up and white half-palm gloves. The man carried himself with a bitchy, authoritative aura, and if Chuuya hadn’t already met the warden, he’d assume this guy was head of the whole damn school.
Every student in the assembly room shot to their feet as soon as Mr. Fukuchi spoke; Tachihara dragged Chuuya up by his upper arm, stabilizing him when he wobbled in his too-big boots.
“Tachihara, who is that you’re clinging to?” Mr. Fukuchi practically yelled.
“I’m Chuuya Nakahara,” the boy in question answered.
“Was I asking you, Chuuya Nakahara?”
“Uh, no, but–”
“This is Nakahara, sir,” Tachihara blurted. “It’s his first day. Mr. Ango assigned me to show him the ropes.”
Mr. Fukuchi nodded. He seemed pissed and pleased at the same time, which made Chuuya tick. What an asshole. “Alright. I trust that you know what you’re doing and the consequences if any more mistakes are made.”
Tachihara stood a little straighter, and Chuuya followed suit on instinct. “Yes, sir.”
“Moving on,” Mr. Fukuchi said. “You all know the deal. If you hear your name called, respond with ‘here’ and head to your dorm.”
30 names later, it was just Mr. Fukuchi and Chuuya alone in the assembly room.
“Before I send you off to bed,” the staff began, “I want to make one thing very clear: in this Dorm, you do not speak unless spoken to. You’re not here to have fun or make friends. You’re not here to make a difference or change the world. You’re here because you’re a delinquent who needs to be reformed. Do not make this behavior a habit. Understood?”
The urge to spit in his face was crushing Chuuya like a boulder thirty times his size, but using his incredible power of self-restraint and self-preservation, he managed with a quick nod and a mumbled, “Yes, sir.”
“Good. Now head up to bed, young man. You have a long day ahead of you.”
Chuuya had never been much of a crier, but he’d taken it up since the arrest. The tears came at night, when he imagined what YRS held in store for him. When he imagined his big brother in their shitty apartment, fussing around, opening and closing things because he didn’t know what to do with his hands. Arthur was probably sitting on the edge of the bed, or the couch, or standing idly in the doorway with a lost expression. And all of it was Chuuya’s fault – because had to jump into some random unfair fight and knock some bully’s lights out. Because Chuuya couldn’t mind his own damn business for once in his life.
He knew he couldn’t let the other boys see him cry, so he turned over in the bunk and put his pillow over his head and listened to their voices: the jokes and taunts, the stories of home and distant cronies, the juvenile beliefs about how the world worked and their ridiculous plans to outwit it.
Chuuya was almost asleep when he heard the chuckles and snickers die out completely, replaced by a scream that belonged in a horror movie. A rush and a whoop, and more screams, followed by everlasting, nightmare-inducing sobs.
“That’s the worst part about being in Dorm C,” one of the kids muttered to Chuuya in the dark. He couldn’t see the kid, couldn’t even make out the silhouette. “You can hear loud and clear when the warden takes his kid out for ice cream.”
Mr. Ango knocked on the door of room 2 and yelled, “Time to get up!” His voice was a little awkward – it was comically clear he wasn’t a guy who liked to yell – and the students saluted another morning at YRS with groans and cussing. They lined up two by two for attendance and then marched to the bathroom in their single-file lines.
Next came the two-minute shower where the boys furiously lathered with the chalky soap before their time ran out. Chuuya put on a good show of acting unsurprised by the communal showers but had less success hiding his horror at the frigid water, which was absolutely fucking merciless. What came from the pipes smelled like rotten eggs, as did anyone who bathed in it until their skin dried.
“Now it’s breakfast,” said the kid beside Chuuya as soon as they finished dressing themselves. Chuuya recognized the voice as the kid in the bunk beside him who muttered something about ice cream last night. Chuuya had originally deemed him a lunatic like Nikolai, but upon closer inspection, the guy seemed relatively normal… Well, as normal as a girl dressed up like a guy can be.
She had straight dark hair that reached just above her shoulders and perfectly trimmed bangs. Her eyes were a deep magenta, and peaking out from her gray work shirt was a golden chain necklace with a matching butterfly charm.
Chuuya was absolutely baffled, opening and closing his mouth like a fish out of water. What the hell was a girl doing in an all-boys reform school? What kind of lunatic would sneak into a fucking reform school?! Before he could blurt out any of his racing thoughts, the girl slapped her hand over his mouth.
“Shut it. I have my reasons for being here. If you tell anyone, I’ll break your nose. Hit on me and I’ll stab you.” She let her hand drop from Chuuya’s mouth and offered it out for a handshake. “Akiko Yosano.”
Chuuya’s head was still spinning on his shoulders, but he took Yosano’s hand and shook it. “I’m Chuuya Nakahara,” he said, dumbfounded.
“I’m only talking to you because you were talking with Tachihara,” Yosano explained, “and I owe him one. Also, it’s nice to finally have someone around that’s shorter than me.” She delivered the last line with a wicked grin.
Chuuya scoffed, but his face was painted with a smile of its own.
“You can ask three questions,” Yosano said as they made their way downstairs and through Dorm C’s main door. It was a quarter mile walk to the dining hall, and while Chuuya was originally planning on walking with Tachihara and Akutagawa, he couldn’t pass up this odd situation.
Yosano had ruffled her bangs and tied her hair back on her way out, and she used a broken mirror shard to apply dirt-like contour as they walked. Chuuya had way more than three questions.
“Are you trans?” Chuuya blurted.
Yosano shook her head. “I’m a cis girl, just here on business.”
Chuuya’s nod was slow and clearly not understanding. “How come you haven’t gotten caught?” he asked as Yosano blended her not-makeup with the hem of her shirt. “No offense, but a matching outfit and a hair change isn’t really enough to pass as a guy, especially in an all-boys reform school.”
“Well, makeup helps,” Yosano said, completely unbothered. “And I don’t really need to pass as a guy. I just need to fool some of the staff.”
“But why?”
“That’s not a question I can answer right now, carrot top. Try something else.”
Chuuya scoffed. “Okay… How many people know about your… identity?”
“All the dorm C boys know, but most of them don’t give a shit. And even if they did, Ango works with my boss and hands out solitary to every asshole that makes it a big deal.”
Chuuya ignored the way his stomach knotted and the word boss. Tachihara’s advice was playing on loop in his mind, but his stupid mouth was going a mile a minute. “So Ango knows you’re…?”
“Yes, dipshit, Ango knows I’m a girl.”
“Okay, damn,” Chuuya murmured. “You don’t need to be a bitch about it. I’m guessing Mr. Fukuchi doesn’t?”
Yosano laughed. “He sure as fuck does not.” She tucked the mirror shard into the empty space in her boot and messed up her short ponytail a little more. “I think you and I will get along pretty well,” she said. “Don’t be a stranger, Chuuya. I might need your help soon.”
Before he could ask, the quarter mile walk to the dining hall was up, and the two students got separated in the line. When Chuuya looked for a place to sit, Yosano was nowhere in sight.
The mess hall was loud and rowdy, full of all the boys serving up their morning round of nonsense. It reminded Chuuya of his junior high years when he was still a kid on the street, making a mess of things just because he could. He didn’t hate the scene as much as his migraine instructed him to.
Tachihara caught him off guard, slapping him on the back while holding his own tray up with one hand. “Chuuya!” he cheered. “Man, I’m so glad to see you survived Mr. Fukuchi last night. I thought your ass was grass. He didn’t give you any lashes, right?”
Chuuya blinked back his confusion, trying to zone in on the conversation. “Huh? Oh. Nah, no lashes.”
Tachihara grinned. “Good. C’mon, let’s go sit before the Dorm B psychos get here.”
Chuuya followed Tachihara to a long wooden table near the back half of the cavernous room, and they sat down in rickety chairs around the center. It wasn’t too long before Akutagawa joined them, taking a seat next to Chuuya.
“Here, Ryuu,” Tachihara said, reaching over to grab Akutagawa’s bowl of cinnamon-oatmeal slop. He took his spoon and scraped a little over half of his own food into Akutagawa’s bowl before pushing it back in front of the dark-haired kid. Before Chuuya could ask, Tachihara said, “Aku’s got a medical problem that fucks with his lungs and muscles, so everyday I give him a little bit of my food so he can stay healthy.”
“That’s nice,” Chuuya said. He decided not to point out that three quarters of a bowl didn’t qualify as a little bit. Instead, he took his spoon and dug out a heap of oatmeal to plop into Akutagawa’s bowl.
The pale kid’s blush was comically obvious. “You didn’t need to do that,” he murmured. “It’s not like I’ll die.”
Chuuya shrugged. “If you’re sick then you can’t work, right? And if you can’t work, that means there’s more work for me and Tachihara to do. So think of it as me looking out for myself.”
Tachihara beamed as Akutagawa gave in, getting to work on his nearly overflowing breakfast.
“So,” Chuuya started. “Uh… I was talking to Yosano this morning.”
Tachihara choked on his bite of oatmeal slop. “You what?”
“She came up to me and told me to ask her questions and–”
“Slow down, Chuuya,” Tachihara cut in. “First, Yosano is undercover, so use he/him before you get yourself killed.”
Chuuya nodded.
“Okay. Second, do not get involved with him. Chances are he came up to you because he wants to use you for some crazy next step in his plan. Yosano’s working with outside forces, and that’s the sort of stuff that gets people killed.”
Chuuya let the conversation die out. He had a feeling Yosano was working toward exposing some bullshit at YRS, and Chuuya already made up his mind about working with her. He had every intention of burning this place to the ground.
The YRS schoolhouse was older than the dormitories, one of the few structures that dated back to the opening of the school. There were two classrooms upstairs for the younger kids and two on the main floor for the older kids. Tachihara steered Chuuya into their homeroom, which had fifty desks or so crammed inside, and the two of them squeezed into the second row. Chuuya was swiftly appalled – The posters on the walls had owls hooting out the alphabet next to bright drawings of elementary nouns: house, cat, barn. Little-kid stuff.
“I thought you were kidding about most kids not knowing how to read,” Chuuya whispered.
Tachihara laughed. “Wish I was. This whole place is a fucking joke.” He scooted his chair forward a little, folding his arms on the desk and laying his head on top. The other kids were either doing the same or picking out board games to play from the cabinets in the back. “At least the teacher is cool. You’ll like him, Chuuya.”
The teacher’s name was Mr. Sakunosuke Oda. He was a tall man with dark brown eyes and short hair with a reddish tinge. He wore a loose, black-and-white pinstripe shirt under a beige-brown coat with brown buttons on the cuffs. To Chuuya, Mr. Oda looked like somebody’s aunt’s boyfriend that showed up once at a cookout and blended in a little too well.
Mr. Oda took attendance silently; he knew all the boys’ names and checked them off with a stubby No. 2 pencil.
“Looks like they haven’t put you on the roster yet,” Mr. Oda said, glancing in Chuuya’s direction. Had the boy not been watching the teacher’s every move, Chuuya wouldn’t have heard him at all.
The teacher stepped forward and pulled out a chair in front of Chuuya's desk with an unbothered, uninterested expression. His voice was the opposite, though. Slow, melodic, and kind – a real contrast to Mr. Fukuchi last night.
“My name is Mr. Oda,” the teacher said. “Mind telling me yours?”
“It’s Chuuya Nakahara, sir,” the student answered. “But just Chuuya is fine.”
Mr. Oda jotted the name down on his notepad. “Nice to meet you, Chuuya. Can you read or write?”
“I’m fifteen, of course I can,” Chuuya snorted. “I don’t know how people get this far without it.”
Mr. Oda cracked a smile at that. “You and me both, kid. Anyway, welcome to YRS. Most kids take this time to rest or socialize, but if you’re interested in doing anything academic, just let me know. I’d be happy too–”
Mr. Oda was cut off by a twiggy brunette kid wrapped in bandages and drenched like a dishrag. Instead of denim paints and a gray shirt, the kid wore a white button up, black tie, black slacks, and a heavy black coat over his shoulders – all of which were dripping water onto the school’s old wooden floorboards. The dozen other kids in the class paid him no mind, but Chuuya couldn’t pry his eyes away from the oddity standing in the doorway. If Mr. Oda was a bodyguard, this kid was without a doubt the spoiled brat in question.
To confirm the theory even farther, Mr. Oda excused himself and ushered the boy out into the hallway.
“Before you ask,” Tachihara groaned, turning his head to look at Chuuya. “Yes, that’s Dazai.”