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“Are you really gonna make me do this?” Dazai asked with a sigh, frowning as he glanced at the stage on the left side of the bar through his peripheral vision.
“That was the deal,” Odasaku said, staring at him with his usual unwavering expression before taking a sip of his whiskey.
“But it’s packed tonight!” Dazai whined. “I didn’t know when we made the bet that if I lost you’d have me make a fool of myself in front of fifty people! I thought it was just going to be at our usual haunt, where it’s never busy…”
Odasaku fell silent for a moment to consider Dazai’s complaints.
He, Dazai, and Ango had made a bet with each other a week ago in which Dazai claimed that he could get an A on his university math final without Odasaku and Ango’s help studying. If he could do it, the two of them would do whatever he wanted them to do for a month. If he couldn’t, they would make him tell those bad jokes that he was so fond of just like a comedian would during open-mic night at their usual hangout place, the Bar Lupin, the weekend after the test.
Well, it was the weekend after the test, and Dazai had gotten a B, but the Bar Lupin was closed for renovations. Dazai had suggested that they put off his little show until the Bar Lupin reopened, but Ango wouldn’t have it. He insisted on finding another place where Dazai could perform.
The Butterfly Lounge had looked like your run of the mill hole-in-the-wall kind of place on the outside, but the inside was a lot more packed than the Bar Lupin had ever been. Dazai had regretted making the bet the second that he had seen the first question on the test and he was regretting it even more right now. Luckily for him, Odasaku was a softy and he might let Dazai out of this if Dazai acted distressed enough about it. Unluckily, though, Ango was a hardass and would override any sympathy that Odasaku might try to show him.
“Well, maybe if you--”
“No,” Ango cut him off harshly, glaring first at Odasaku and then at Dazai, “you are not getting out of this. Now stop being such a child and just get it done with already. The longer you wait, the more agony you’ll put yourself through.”
Dazai sighed again. “You’re so mean, Ango…” he said, but he knew that there was nothing that he could say or do to change Ango’s mind, so he downed the last of his beer and then hopped down from the barstool that he had been sitting at so that he could walk to the stage.
There was currently no one in line waiting for the mic. A guitarist had just stepped down after singing a few mediocre originals. A few people were standing beside the stage, seemingly contemplating whether they should go up or not, but not actually moving. Dazai walked past them and they stopped their conversations to watch him as he walked up to the mic that was on the stage.
He took a second to observe the audience. Only a few people other than Odasaku, Ango, and the people who were standing by the stage had noticed that he was up there. Everyone else was having lively chats with each other and drinking to their hearts’ contents. For a moment, Dazai’s anxieties ceased. Perhaps the people who were already occupied would stay occupied and wouldn’t focus on him and his stupid comedy.
He cleared his throat into the microphone.
“Good evening, ladies and gentlemen!”
His anxieties came back immediately after, as a majority of the bar’s patrons paused their conversation and their drinking to give him their attention. They didn’t even know who he was or what he was about to do, but they were clearly curious. How lovely.
“Wow, you all sure perked up quick!” Dazai exclaimed, forcing a grin. “You weren’t even graceful about it, either. The Butterfly Lounge is seeming more like the Caterpillar Lounge tonight, huh?”
His first joke was met with silence and blank stares.
He rubbed the back of his neck, his smile faltering just a little.
“Aaaanyways, uh, my name is Dazai and I’m going to be performing some standup comedy for you guys tonight!”
Once again, he was met with silence, and it was clear that some of the patrons were skeptical of him. A few took their eyes off of him and went back to their quiet conversations with one another. Dazai gripped the microphone with both hands.
“Right! Well! What better place for a comedian to start than with stories of his childhood, right? Maybe we’ll find out why I use comedy as a coping mechanism!”
Another patron went back to his drink.
“Believe it or not, I wasn’t always the tall string bean you see before you! When I was a kid I was actually very short and round! I mean, you know how in cartoons, babies are always delivered to their parents by a stork? That wouldn’t have cut it for me. I would’ve needed a fucking crane. And… ah…
“Well, I was always getting up to trouble as a kid, you know? I mean when I was about ten, I swallowed some of the coins that were in my dad’s wallet. He had to take me to the hospital, and my mom was at work but she kept calling my dad while we were there to ask how I was doing, and for a good two hours all he would say is ‘there hasn’t been any change yet.’”
He chuckled at his own joke, but stopped quickly when he saw that, once again, no one else was laughing, and no one else looked amused.
“A-and when I was a kid, I was real interested in sci-fi stuff, you know? I loved all of those shows about space and aliens and whatever. It was my dream to become an astronaut. My parents never seemed to like the idea, though. Oh, sure, they’d smile and nod at me when I’d tell them about my dreams to go to space, but they’d always just tell me ‘the sky's the limit!’ So, uh… I figured if being an airplane pilot was the closest they’d ever want me to be to space, I’d rather just find another job.”
Dazai expected to be met with silence once again, so it surprised him when he heard a soft chortling coming from the back of the bar. He glanced over to see a tipsy redhead covering his mouth with his hand and laughing into it. The dark-haired man with frosted tips who was sitting beside him looked confused and mildly annoyed. Dazai couldn’t help smiling.
“My parents would always give me a hard time on my birthday, too. Every year they would have some joke to make about my age. I was really glad when I turned eighteen and I was finally able to move out. So I didn’t have to deal with them anymore. Like, come on, guys, the aging jokes are just getting reaaaaaaaaaaally old.”
The chortling became louder, turning into a cackle.
Dazai’s smile widened. “So anyways, flash forward a couple years and here I am, living on campus, working towards a degree in philosophy. Prerequisites are a bitch, though. I was never any good at math in high school, how the hell am I supposed to be good at it in college? Seriously, I really can’t count how many times I’ve failed math tests before.
“That’s actually why I’m here tonight. I failed another math test and in the process, I lost a bet to my friends. They made me come up here and tell shitty jokes to you guys. They’re real hardasses sometimes. They’re not exactly the best at comforting words, either. Last time I was stressed out, my buddy Odasaku told me ‘It could be worse. At least you’re not stuck in a hole in the ground filled with water.’” He ran a hand through his hair and laughed right along with the redhead in the back. “But at least, I think he--I think he meant well!”
“College isn’t all bad, though! I get to go to some sweet parties. Although, there was this pretty wild one that I went to a few weeks ago where I got pretty drunk and lost my watch, and while I was looking for it, I saw this guy who was harassing some girl, and he was stepping on my watch at the same time! Naturally, I gave him a good ole knuckle sandwich and scared him off. Nobody gets to do that to a lady, not on my watch!”
With every bad joke that came out of Dazai’s mouth, the redhead in the back laughed louder and louder. By the end of Dazai’s bit, he was laughing so hard that it looked like he was struggling to breathe, and he was slamming his fist against the tabletop. The rest of the bar remained silent, but Dazai didn’t care. Maybe it was the alcohol talking, but that man’s laugh was the most beautiful that he’d ever heard, and doing this was worth it just to hear that.
“Thank you very much everyone, you’ve all been a terrible audience, except for the redheaded cutie in the back!”
He gave a rather grandiose bow before leaping off of the stage and making his way to the table where the redhead was sitting.
“Nakahara, would you please calm down. You’re drawing so much attention to us, he wasn’t even funny, he was just--”
“I think he meant well--!” the redhead echoed, then continued to laugh so hard that tears started streaming down his cheeks. His laughter was infectious. Dazai couldn’t help laughing as well.
“So, I see you like bad puns,” he said, taking a seat right beside the redhead, much to the dark-haired man’s chagrin.
“I fucking--fucking love them,” the redhead choked out, trying to calm down and catch his breath.
Dazai chuckled softly. “Well, cutie, do you have a name, or would it be okay if I just called you mine?” he asked.
The dark-haired man rolled his eyes and gave a grunt of disgust. The redhead’s eyes widened and a blush grew on his face. Dazai guessed that it didn’t have anything to do with the alcohol.
“I--ah, it’s Nakahara,” the redhead stuttered.
“A pleasure to meet you, Nakahara. I’m Dazai,” Dazai introduced, then glanced over at the dark-haired man. “Who’s your friend?”
“Akutagawa,” the dark-haired man grumbled.
“Nice to meet you, too, Akutagawa!”
Akutagawa huffed and folded his arms over his chest, causing Dazai to frown.
Nakahara waved his hand dismissively. “Don’t mind him, he’s a party pooper.”
“No, you’re drunk, and he’s not funny,” Akutagawa said.
“He’s fucking hilarious!” Nakahara protested.
Akutagawa merely sighed.
“Yes, well--” Dazai began as he started to feel around his pockets, then stopped to let out a quiet gasp, “--oh my! I seem to have misplaced my cell phone number… Would you be willing to give me yours?”
Nakahara snorted with laughter. “Sure thing, Mister Smooth,” he said.
He and Dazai both pulled their phones out of their pockets and Nakahara prattled his number off to Dazai. After putting the number into his phone, Dazai sent Nakahara a quick greeting text. Chuuya laughed again and held his phone out for Dazai to see.
“I found your number!” he trilled.
“So you have,” Dazai said, giving him a nod and a smile. “Now, can I ask you one more question?”
“Sure,” Nakahara replied.
“Well, I’m researching important dates in history for a school project of mine. I was wondering, if you aren’t busy, would you want to get together with me next Saturday so that we can create one together?”
Nakahara let out one more hearty laugh, then put his phone away and nodded. “Yeah, you know, I’d like that a lot.”