Chapter Text
The evening air was warm as they left the Agency.
It was not fully summer yet, but the city had already started carrying that heavy June heat that stayed even after sunset.
The concrete held the day in its bones, the breeze from the harbor tasted faintly of salt, and Yokohama looked softer under the evening lights than it had any right to.
Dazai had expected to escape.
He hasn't yet , of course. Yosano had threatened him twice before they even reached the elevator, Kunikida had already taken his coat once when Dazai tried making a very reasonable argument about sudden appointments, and Ranpo had declared birthdays legally binding social events.
Fukuzawa had stayed quiet through all of it, which somehow made everything worse because arguing against silence was unfairly difficult.
Still, Dazai believed in trying.
“I suddenly remembered I have an appointment.”
“No, you don’t,” Kunikida said.
“I could.”
“You don’t.”
“I might.”
“You won’t.”
Dazai sighed with great suffering. “Nobody respects artists anymore.”
“You’re not an artist.”
“I’m artistic.”
“You’re unemployed in spirit.”
“That is unnecessarily cruel.”
“It wasn’t meant to be.”
Yosano laughed, and Ranpo chose that exact moment to reach into Dazai’s coat pocket and steal the candy he had been saving since afternoon.
Dazai gasped. “Ranpo-san.”
“You were distracted.”
“That does not make theft legal.”
“It does if I do it.”
“I hate this organization.”
“No, you don’t,” Ranpo said, already chewing.
Dazai opened his mouth, found no useful answer, and closed it again.
Deeply frustrating.
They had barely stepped onto the street when Dazai slowed a few paces behind the others and pulled out his phone.
The group continued ahead under the streetlights, Kunikida already arguing with Yosano over something that sounded like restaurant etiquette, while Ranpo walked between them with the complete confidence of someone who had never once suffered consequences for stealing food.
Dazai dialed quickly and kept his voice low.
“ Hello, Shizuko-san? I’ll be late. Don’t wait up okay.”
The answer came almost immediately. Shizuko sounded breathless, as if she had crossed the apartment in a hurry with at least one child attached to her skirt.
“Dazai-sama! I’m so sorry. I completely forgot the date. Between cleaning and chasing the twins around all day, it slipped my mind. Happy birthday.”
Dazai hummed, watching Ranpo’s back beneath the warm streetlights.
“It’s alright.”
“No, it isn’t,” Shizuko protested. “I even prepared your favorite dinner.”
“You say that every time.”
“Because your favorite is only one thing.”
“It is not.”
“It absolutely is.”
Dazai smiled faintly despite himself.
Shizuko seemed to remember something, because her tone shifted quickly. “Oh, Ango-sama stopped by earlier.”
That caught his attention.
“He left a gift on the table and said he was sorry he couldn’t visit properly. Apparently the government would collapse if he took one evening off.”
“Sounds like Ango.”
“He also told me to make sure you actually eat dinner.”
“Traitor.”
“He said you would say that.”
Dazai snorted softly and glanced ahead again. Yosano was waving for him to hurry up, Kunikida looked impatient, and Ranpo had turned halfway around, watching him with open curiosity. Dazai lifted one hand in lazy acknowledgment before looking away.
“I’ll be home later.”
“Walk safely.”
“That sounds much less impressive than drive safely.”
“You don’t drive.”
“A tragic flaw.”
Shizuko laughed quietly.
“Happy birthday, Dazai-sama.”
There was a small pause after that.
Long enough that Dazai could hear the apartment in the background. Hina talking loudly about something. Haru’s quieter voice answering her. The faint sound of wooden blocks knocking together.
For a moment, the street around him felt too far away.
“Thank you,” he said softly.
He ended the call before Shizuko could say anything else and slipped the phone back into his pocket. By the time he caught up with the others, his face had settled back into its usual careless shape.
The restaurant sat away from the main street.
There were no bright signs, no drunken salarymen leaning against the walls, no music spilling through the doorway. Just a narrow entrance tucked between two old buildings and a wooden sign hanging beside it.
It looked expensive.
Not loudly expensive. Worse than that. Quietly expensive. The kind of place where the staff probably judged a person’s bank account from their shoes.
Dazai stopped.
Yosano turned back. “What?”
He pointed at the building. “Why does it look like I need generational wealth just to read the menu?”
Kunikida adjusted his glasses. “You don’t.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I’ve been here.”
Dazai stared at him
“You’ve been here?” Dazai repeated.
“Yes.”
“Willingly?”
“Of course willingly.”
Dazai turned to Fukuzawa with genuine horror. “President, I think Kunikida-kun has been replaced.”
“He has not.”
“This man knows expensive restaurants.”
“I know reasonable restaurants,” Kunikida snapped.
“This is not reasonable.”
“You haven’t even stepped inside.”
“I don’t need to. I can smell the price markup.”
Yosano pushed him toward the entrance. “You’re not paying.”
Dazai blinked. “I’m not?”
“It’s your birthday.”
“What a beautiful tradition.”
Kunikida sighed. “Don’t get used to it.”
Too late.
Dazai had already glanced at the menu outside, confirmed his suspicions, and looked away for the sake of his health.
The inside was quieter than he expected.
It was not empty, but the voices behind the sliding doors stayed low. The scent of grilled fish moved through the hallway, and somewhere deeper inside, glasses clinked softly. The place did not feel crowded. It felt private.
A server bowed and guided them down a narrow hallway. Dazai kept his eyes moving as they walked, taking in the layout, the side doors, the back corridor near the kitchen. Old habits, mostly. Also curiosity. This place could not possibly be within the Agency’s budget.
He glanced at Yosano.
“Did you rob a hospital?”
“No.”
“Are you secretly rich?”
“No.”
“Secretly involved in organized crime?”
“Not currently.”
Dazai stopped walking.
Kunikida groaned. “Why would you say it like that?”
“Because his face is funny.”
“It isn’t.”
“It is.”
Dazai pointed at Fukuzawa. “President, are we criminals?”
“No.”
Dazai looked at Yosano, then back at Fukuzawa.
He did not believe either of them.
Their room was already prepared.
A low table sat beneath soft amber light, with cushions arranged neatly around it and a wide window facing the river. Yokohama stretched beyond the glass in broken pieces of gold, the city lights shaking gently across the dark water.
Dazai lingered by the window for half a second longer than he meant to.
Pretty.
The thought arrived before he could stop it.
He sat down quickly.
Kunikida took the seat across from him. Yosano settled beside Kunikida, Fukuzawa near the window. Ranpo dropped down beside Dazai without asking, close enough that their sleeves brushed when he reached for the menu.
Dazai shifted a little.
Ranpo ignored him , Or pretended to atleast
Dazai was not sure which was worse.
Ordering became a small disaster. Ranpo requested enough food for four people. Kunikida objected. Yosano added more out of spite. Fukuzawa asked for tea first, which somehow made the whole thing feel more official than necessary.
Dazai watched the prices and briefly considered a convincing fainting spell.
Unfortunately, Yosano would revive him, Kunikida would lecture him, and Ranpo would eat his dessert.
A tragic outcome.
The drinks arrived first.
Yosano had ordered without looking at the menu, and the server placed a pale pink cocktail in front of her, decorated with a slice of peach. Condensation slipped down the side of the glass.
For half a breath, something snagged at the back of Dazai’s mind.
He blinked, and the feeling slipped away.
Beside him, Ranpo frowned. “You ordered that?”
Yosano lifted the glass. “I like it.”
Ranpo looked personally offended. “It tastes awful.”
“You haven’t tasted it,” Kunikida said.
“I don’t need to. It tastes like someone melted candy into alcohol and hoped nobody would notice.”
Yosano rolled her eyes. “You said the exact same thing two years ago.”
“I was right then too.”
She pushed the glass toward him. “Try it.”
“No.”
“Scared?”
“I’m not.”
“You are.”
“I’m offended. That is different.”
Ranpo glared at the drink as if it had insulted him. After a moment, he took the glass with great reluctance.
“For evidence.”
“Of course,” Yosano said.
Ranpo took a sip.
He paused.
His face twisted into such open betrayal that Dazai almost laughed.
Almost.....
Because he had seen that expression before.
Rain against old windows. A bar near the harbor. A colorful drink in Ranpo’s hand. Green eyes narrowed in disgust.
The memory hit him hard enough to make him freeze.
Two years older, a little sharper, maybe a little harder to read now, but it was the same face. The same look of offended disbelief.
Oh.
Oh, no.
Dazai looked away, but his mouth had already moved ahead of him.
“Sweet drinks always been the same” he said quietly.
The world did not stop, but it felt close enough.
Kunikida was still arguing about sake. The river kept moving outside. Someone laughed softly in another room. Beside him, Ranpo went completely still.
Dazai realized his mistake three seconds too late.
Ranpo turned his head , He was not curious or amused.
He looked like someone had found a missing piece from a puzzle he had stopped admitting he cared about.
Ranpo said nothing.
His eyes stayed fixed on Dazai’s face , Too focused , Too sharp.
“How do you know that line.”
“What line?”
The room seemed to shrink. Yosano stopped mid-sentence and looked between them, but Ranpo was no longer paying attention to anyone else.
He was remembering.
Dazai could see it happening.
Rain. A bar. A stranger. A stupid drink and that laugh.
Ranpo straightened.
Dazai kept the smile where it was, even as something cold settled in his stomach.
Ranpo did not speak at first. He kept staring, not with the bright certainty he carried into solved cases, but with something slower and far more dangerous. The kind of attention that came when a memory refused to stay buried but had not yet returned whole.
Dazai hated it.
He hated it because he knew exactly what Ranpo was reaching for.
“Ranpo-san,” he said lightly, resting his cheek against his hand as if the whole thing amused him, “I say many things. Some of them are bound to sound familiar.”
“No.” Ranpo’s fingers tightened around the edge of Yosano’s glass before he seemed to remember he was still holding it. He set it down carefully, eyes never leaving Dazai’s face. “Not familiar like that.”
Yosano looked between them, interest sharpening. Kunikida had stopped arguing about sake and was frowning at the sudden change in the room, while Fukuzawa remained quiet near the window, one hand resting against his teacup.
Dazai smiled wider.
It did not help.
Ranpo’s gaze dropped to the pink drink, then shifted toward the window, where the river caught the city lights in broken strips of gold. For a second his face changed, frustration passing over it because the memory was clearly there, close enough to feel and too blurred to grab.
“A bar,” he said slowly.
Dazai hummed. “Yokohama has several.”
“Near the harbor.”
“Still several.”
“It was raining.”
“That happens often.”
Ranpo ignored every escape route Dazai offered him. His brows drew together as pieces began to arrange themselves without permission. “I was drinking something awful.”
“Also very common, apparently.”
“You were drinking whiskey.”
Dazai’s smile held.
Barely.
Ranpo saw that too.
“You said it tasted like regret,” Ranpo said, quieter now. “No. You said sadness would probably taste like whiskey if someone bottled it badly, you also said that alcohol is evil ”
Yosano lowered her glass.
Kunikida looked at Dazai with growing alarm. “What is this conversation about?”
“A very boring one,” Dazai said.
“It doesn’t sound boring.”
“That’s because Ranpo-san is very dramatic.”
Ranpo still did not look away. “I asked you if we had met before.”
Dazai went still.
Not enough for Kunikida to notice.
Enough for Ranpo.
The line had landed exactly where he intended.
Ranpo leaned back slightly, eyes narrowing as the memory shifted again. Not the bar this time. The Agency.
The first week after Dazai joined, when Ranpo had watched him from the couch longer than necessary, bothered by something he could not name. Not recognition. Not fully. More like déjà vu. A feeling of standing somewhere he had stood before, except the walls had changed and everyone insisted it was a new room.
“I asked you,” Ranpo said. “The first week you joined. I said you felt familiar.”
Yosano’s expression changed.
Dazai tilted his head. “I make a strong impression.”
“You said no.”
The room went very still around them.
Dazai kept the mask in place by force.
Ranpo’s voice was quiet now, and that was worse than any shout. “You said we’d never met.”
Kunikida frowned, looking between them. “but have you met before?”
Dazai opened his mouth.
Ranpo answered before he could.
“Yes.”
The word was not loud.
It did not need to be.
Yosano’s eyes widened, but she said nothing. For once, even she seemed to understand that interrupting too early would break something already cracking.
Ranpo looked back at the drink. His mouth twisted, not quite a grimace and not quite a smile. “I thought maybe I was wrong. I knew there was someone from that night. I knew I’d spent the night with someone, and I knew he left before morning, but most of the details were…” He stopped, clearly annoyed with himself for admitting even that much. “Messy.”
Dazai remembered.
Of course he remembered.
Ranpo in that cheap bar, tipsy and too observant for his own good. Ranpo complaining about Yosano’s drink recommendation while still drinking it. Also analysed every part of dazai
he giving his name like it meant nothing, as if Dazai would not carry it with him into every ruined version of the future.
Dazai also remembered the first week at the Agency.
Ranpo lying across the couch with a candy box balanced against his stomach, looking at Dazai for so long that Kunikida had complained about workplace staring. Then Ranpo had tilted his head and asked, almost casually, “Have we met before?”
Dazai had smiled.
“No, Ranpo-san. I think I would remember someone as memorable as you.”
Ranpo had stared a second longer, then shrugged and let it go.
Because Dazai had given him an answer and Ranpo had trusted those words.
That was the part Dazai had not expected to hurt.
Ranpo’s fingers curled against his sleeve. “You knew .”
Dazai looked toward the window.
“Dazai.”
“I knew.”
The words came out softer than he meant them to.
Kunikida inhaled sharply. Yosano sat back as though the conversation had finally taken the shape she had been waiting for. Fukuzawa, quiet until now, lowered his teacup without making a sound.
Ranpo stared at him.
For once, there was no triumph in being right.
“You knew,” he repeated, but not like before. Not as a question. Not even as an accusation. “When I asked you, you knew exactly why I asked.”
Dazai looked back at him.
He could feel it waiting behind his teeth ,A ridiculous comment about his memorable charm. A deflection about how Ranpo should be grateful for having such an interesting mystery in his life. Something sharp enough to make the room angry instead of careful.
None of it came out.
“I thought it would be easier,” Dazai said.
Ranpo’s face changed in a way Dazai did not like at all.
“For who?”
Dazai smiled then.
Ranpo laughed once under his breath, and there was no humor in it. “Right.”
Yosano finally spoke, but her voice was gentler than usual. “Ranpo.”
He shook his head, not looking at her. “No, I get it now. That feeling was there every time , When he joined. When he sat beside me. When he laughed at my snacks being terrible. I kept thinking it was because he was interesting.”
“I am interesting,” Dazai said weakly.
Ranpo ignored him.
“But it wasn’t that.” His eyes flicked back to Dazai, sharper now, hurt settling under the embarrassment. “Part of me knew you. I just didn’t remember enough to prove it.”
Kunikida looked utterly lost. “I need someone to explain this in a way that does not make me feel like I missed an entire case file.”
“You did,” Yosano said, eyes still on Ranpo and Dazai. “Apparently we all did.”
Ranpo’s mouth twitched. “You didn’t miss much.”
Yosano raised an eyebrow.
Ranpo’s ears went red.
Dazai noticed before he could stop himself.
Unfortunately, Ranpo noticed him noticing.
“This is awful,” Ranpo muttered.
“It truly is,” Dazai agreed.
“I wasn’t asking you.”
Ranpo looked down at the table, at the drink that had started all of this, and for one fragile moment Dazai thought the worst of it had passed. Then Ranpo’s hand tightened around his coat where it lay folded beside him, and his voice dropped lower.
“I know I wasn’t your first.”
The room froze.
Kunikida looked like his brain had attempted to exit through his ears.
Yosano’s hand flew to her mouth.
Dazai stared.
Ranpo’s face went red so quickly it was almost impressive.
“That came out wrong.”
Yosano made a strangled sound. “Did it?”
“Yes.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yosano.”
“I’m just asking.”
“Don’t.”
She pressed her lips together, clearly fighting for her life.
Ranpo looked like he wanted the floor to open beneath him. He refused to meet anyone’s eyes, and the embarrassment would have been funny if his voice had not gone quieter when he continued.
“I know it probably wasn’t important like that,” he said. “I’m not stupid. It was one night. You were drinking, I was drinking, everything after the bar is still half-blurry, and by morning you were gone.”
Dazai’s fingers went still against the table.
Ranpo laughed, small and awkward. “But I remembered enough to know it mattered to me.”
Nobody spoke.
Even Yosano stopped breathing too loudly.
Ranpo looked at him then, really looked at him, with all the pieces of the night still coming back unevenly. The drink. The whiskey. The motel room with terrible lighting. Dazai laughing like he had forgotten to pretend for half a second. Waking up alone with money left for breakfast and no explanation.
“I might not have been your first,” Ranpo said, cheeks still flushed but voice steady now, “but you were mine.”
The words landed without drama.
That made them worse.
Dazai felt them hit somewhere beneath the ribs, sharp and quiet and impossible to laugh off. His mouth opened, but nothing useful came. No joke , no apology and no neat little lie he could tie around the moment and make it easier to carry.
Ranpo looked away first.
“I didn’t mean to say that here.”
Yosano lowered her hand. Her expression had changed again, all the excitement fading into something more careful. Kunikida stared at the table as though he wished desperately to become part of it. Fukuzawa remained silent, but he was watching Dazai now.
Dazai hated that too.
He hated being watched when he had no performance left.
“It wasn’t nothing,” Dazai said.
Ranpo glanced at him.
Dazai immediately regretted speaking, because now everyone was looking at him.
He sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose. “This birthday is becoming very inconvenient.”
Yosano almost smiled.
Ranpo did not.
“That’s not an answer.”
“I know.”
“Stop saying that.”
Dazai’s hand lowered.
Ranpo looked more tired than angry now. “You keep saying you know, but you still let me think I was wrong.”
Dazai looked at him and thought of the Agency couch, the question, the easy lie. He had not meant for it to become anything. At the time, it had only been another door closed gently before anyone noticed it existed.
Now Ranpo was standing on the other side, holding the handle.
“I thought,” Dazai said slowly, choosing every word with care because none of them felt safe, “it would make things cleaner.”
Ranpo’s mouth twisted.
“Cleaner.”
“Yes.”
“For you.”
Dazai did not answer.
That was answer enough.
Ranpo let out a breath and stood.
Not suddenly or dramatically. He simply stood because staying seated beside Dazai had become too much. His coat hung from one hand, his fingers gripping the fabric tighter than necessary.
“Ranpo-san,” Yosano said softly.
“I need air.”
Nobody stopped him.
Maybe because nobody knew how.
Dazai watched him step toward the door, still half-expecting Ranpo to throw one last insult over his shoulder, something sharp and childish enough to let them all pretend the room had not shifted under their feet.
Ranpo did pause with one hand on the sliding door, but when he spoke, his voice had lost every trace of teasing.
“You laughed that night,” he said without turning around. “I couldn’t remember everything, but I remembered that.”
Dazai forgot how to breathe for one long second.
Ranpo slid the door open.
“And when I met you again, I thought maybe I’d imagined it.”
The door closed behind him.
The room stayed quiet.
Not the empty kind.
The heavy kind, where everyone understood enough to know nobody should speak first.
Kunikida looked pale. Yosano stared at the place Ranpo had disappeared, her earlier delight gone. Fukuzawa looked at Dazai with the calm, steady patience of a man who had seen people ruin themselves before and knew the first step back was always the hardest.
Dazai stared at the empty cushion beside him.
Ranpo had only gone outside.
That was all.
People left rooms all the time.
People walked away, came back, or did not. Dazai had built half his life around being the one who left first. It was easier that way. Cleaner.
Except the word sounded ugly now.
Cleaner.
For who?
His chest tightened.
Ridiculous.
Ranpo was outside.
Not gone , dead or across enemy lines.
Just outside.
And still Dazai’s body had already started moving before his mind caught up.
“Dazai.”
Fukuzawa’s voice stopped him at the edge of standing.
Dazai looked up.
The President did not ask. He did not scold. He did not say the things Dazai already knew badly enough without hearing them aloud.
He only said, “Go.”
Dazai stood.
For once, no joke came to save him.
Yosano watched him pass, and if she had anything to say, she kept it behind her teeth. Kunikida remained silent too, which was almost worrying. Dazai reached the door, slid it open, and stepped into the hallway before he could talk himself out of it.
The restaurant noise returned all at once.
Soft voices behind closed doors.
Footsteps.
Dishes.
Life continuing like nothing had happened.
Dazai hated that too.
Then he saw the end of Ranpo’s coat disappearing around the corner toward the exit.
And for the first time in a very long time, Dazai ran after someone instead of away.