Chapter Text
Dazai’s phone rung.
He hesitated, but answered quickly upon seeing whom his caller was. Chuuya Nakahara.
“Chuuya?” He mutters. He can hear soft breathing from the other side of the phone. “Hello?”
“Dazai.”
Dazai’s stomach twists at how serious Chuuya sounds, even more hesitant than before to continue the conversation. But he does. “Yeah? What now?” He asks, trying not to show the fact he’s genuinely a little worried for his,, acquaintance.
“I can’t die.”
“What? What the fuck are you talking about? Chuuya, what the hell?”
“I should have died when that fucker shot me. I didn’t. Dazai, I’m immortal.
. . .
Like you.”
Dazai freezes up. “What?” He stutters out. How did Chuuya figure out he was immortal? Dazai didn’t tell a soul. Hell, how is Chuuya even immortal himself? Dazai guessed it was only him that would be stuck with this curse.
“I watched you throw yourself from a building, fuckwit.”
“Right.”
“Just your luck, huh? You’re so hooked on trying to kill yourself and you can’t even die.”
Dazai grits his teeth. “Is that all you wanted to tell me, Chuuya?”
Chuuya’s breath is a little shaky on his end of the call. Dazai listens, though his finger lingers over the “end call” button.
“Can we meet up? I think we should. Talk.”
Dazai nods, though realises Chuuya can’t see that and stops, agreeing verbally. “Outside of the arcade?” Dazai knows he doesn’t have to specify for Chuuya to understand which arcade he’s talking about.
“Yeah. Six PM. Be there, Mackerel.”
Dazai somewhat forces a chuckle. “Yeah yeah. See ya, Snail.”
And that was their call, over.
The agreed meetup time came faster than Dazai thought it was going to. (The only day that he feels goes fast, and it’s the day he’s meeting up with the crush he’s clinged to since he was fifteen.)
The brunette walked, slowly, his head down and headphones at full volume. (It’s not like paying attention to anything is going to stop him from getting hurt. He can’t leave regardless.) He did get shoved out of the way a few times on the walk, after accidentally stepping infront of cars, but didn’t care.
He also got slapped, albeit a lot lighter than usual, by Chuuya when he arrived twenty minutes late to the arcade.
“The fuck took you so long?”
“Wasn’t paying attention.”
Chuuya groaned. “Just because you can’t die doesn’t mean you should stop trying, asshole.”
Dazai shrugged. It’s up to him what he does, and he doesn’t plan to try any harder than he needs to. “It won’t make a difference.” He replies nonchalantly.
Chuuya grits his teeth, before hitting Dazai on the back of the head. “Idiot.”
They had fun that night. Dazai will admit that he hasn’t laughed like that in a long while. When he got back to the Agency, he told everyone how much fun he had. He told the story over and over again. However the only detail of his exciting evening with Chuuya that he didn’t say, not even once, was that the pair finally admitted their feelings for eachother and began dating. They even kissed, too.
Arcade dates like those happened often after that. They met every few days. Arguing sometimes, arguments are their love language at this point, occasionally reminiscing on their meetup before or their meetups when they were teens. Sometimes they drink their hearts out together. Sometimes they don’t even say a word, they just play games.
Years go past of dates like those.
Years go past of Dazai being happy, atleast happy enough, with his cursed life.
Chuuya promised Dazai years, and yet despite Chuuya having told Dazai he was immortal too, their time was limited. Limited as Dazai should have expected.
Everyone else had long died when Chuuya’s ‘curse’ wore off. He told Dazai he had lied the day before he died. He told Dazai it was an ability that allowed him to live so long, and when the ability user died, he had little time left too.
Dazai was convinced the whole city had the capability of hearing his heart shatter into a million pieces, piercing his insides, tearing him apart from the inside out.
Dazai sobbed. He begged Chuuya to stop messing with him. “Hat-Rack, this isn’t funny.” He cried. “Are you being serious? You can’t be being serious. Please stop.”
Chuuya’s expression stayed blank, solid. “Sorry, Mackerel.”
Dazai couldn’t help the way he stormed out of the apartment the pair lived in after that. Dazai couldn’t help the way he drunk so much that he didn’t return until Chuuya was already gone. Dazai couldn’t help the way he was so angry he had been lied to yet so upset at the same time.
Dazai couldn’t help the way he didn’t even get to tell Chuuya goodbye.
Dazai wished he had said goodbye properly. He wished he hadn’t gotten so upset. He wished Chuuya hadn’t lied.
He wished he wasn’t cursed the way he is now.
He misses his lover, and he misses his friends. He misses having people to care for, and people who care for him in return.
He would give anything to go back.
Especially now that he’s left with nothing.