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Dazai receives a text from an unknown number at 3:30 a.m. on a Friday night, which reads:
Need more nicotine patches. Better bring them soon or I’ll be chainsmoking again.
Of course, Dazai wasn’t asleep. He grins at the message and puts on his coat, swiping the box of nicotine patches he’d bought earlier that day off his kitchen counter.
+
The walk over to Chuuya’s isn’t long, but the biting cold of the late fall makes it seem like it is.
It’s been a few weeks since Dazai saw Chuuya last. He didn’t feel sad over those weeks, he didn’t even worry – he let himself go about his life as normal, because he knew that Chuuya was thinking about him. And that was enough.
Chuuya answers the door in his pajamas, just a white t-shirt and boxers, looking sleepy. Dazai hands him the box of nicotine patches and Chuuya accepts it with an appreciative hum. Nothing seems off to Dazai, until he steps over the threshold of Chuuya’s apartment and realizes, rather abruptly, that Chuuya is drunk.
“You’re drunk.” Dazai states, flatly. He hadn’t been expecting it from the coherency of the text he’d gotten.
“M’not drunk. Just had a little bit.”
Well, maybe so. Judging by his level of slurring, Chuuya either hasn’t had that much or it hasn’t kicked in yet. Dazai frowns, spots the bottle of wine on the counter and picks it up, gauges its weight. Almost empty. Dazai reads the label – it’s cheap stuff, not out of Chuuya’s stash.
“You need this to talk to me?”
Chuuya shrugs. “Eh. It helps.” He steps over to Dazai and snatches the bottle from his hand in one fluid motion. Dazai is about to take it back from him until he sees Chuuya corking the bottle, putting it back down on the counter. Part of him is relieved, the other part, well. Maybe he’d rather have a drunk Chuuya rambling about whatever topic is presented to him.
Chuuya makes his way over to his couch and flops down onto it, flicking on a lamp nearby. His apartment is decorated in a traditionally western fashion, with a sitting area and a coffee table. A television is mounted on the wall opposite the couch, and next to that a hallway leads to what Dazai guesses are the bedroom and bathroom. Several pieces of art hang on the walls, ranging from abstract to representational. Several potted plants are tucked into the corner of the room by the glass sliding doors leading out to the balcony. They look lush and well cared for, at which Dazai is surprised.
“Who takes care of your plants while you’re away?” He asks, settling down on the couch by Chuuya’s socked feet.
“Ah, usually Ryuu-kun.”
It takes Dazai a minute. “Akutagawa-kun?”
Chuuya nods. “He’s good with them.”
Dazai can feel Chuuya’s eyes boring into his cheek. “Chuuya?”
“Hm?”
“You didn’t call me here for the nicotine patches, did you?”
“No,” Chuuya says, “didn’t need ‘em.”
Dazai turns to look at him. His eyes are dark, hooded, and his cheeks are flushed from the wine. He looks soft, just in thin clothes with his hair mussed. Dazai looks away, frowns. It’s too intimate to see Chuuya like this. Too vulnerable.
There’s suddenly a weight in Dazai’s lap as Chuuya straddles him. The redhead brackets his hands around Dazai’s head. This close, Chuuya’s breath reeks of alcohol and his eyes are glazed, faraway.
Chuuya’s eyes flicker down to Dazai’s mouth, and he licks his own lips to wet them. “Dazai,” Chuuya murmurs, “this is what you want, isn’t it?”
God, does Dazai want this. His heart constricts in his chest. “No, it’s not.”
“It’s not?” Chuuya stands from Dazai’s lap, a little unsteady on his feet.
Dazai gets up, too. Looking down at Chuuya from his height suddenly feels all too real, as Chuuya looks smaller and smaller by the second. Chuuya looks up, his eyes lit up with renewed purpose.
Even in his drunken state, Chuuya is faster than Dazai by a longshot. He pushes at Dazai’s shoulders until Dazai’s back is pressed up against the nearest wall. Chuuya gives a lopsided, cocky sort of grin that does all sorts of things to Dazai’s head. “I don’t usually do it like this, but I’ll make an exception for you. Seems like you’d be into it.”
Dazai has a fraction of a second to be confused before Chuuya falls to his knees.
“Shit,” Dazai hisses, “Chuuya. Don’t. Get up.”
Chuuya tilts his head to the side, looks up at Dazai with gooey, doe-like eyes. Chuuya’s lips spread into a crooked, almost sinister grin. “You want this, don’t you?”
Dazai swallows. “Not like this.”
Chuuya furrows his brow and stands with some difficulty. “I don’t understand you.”
Dazai smiles sadly and cups Chuuya’s cheek in his palm, strokes his thumb over Chuuya’s cheekbone. Chuuya leans into the touch. Dazai doesn’t know if that action is conscious or not, but it makes his heart ache like hell.
Maybe he deserves this, Chuuya not understanding. Dazai has said a lot – done a lot – to Chuuya over the years. Maybe this is all in good time. Maybe Dazai should forget that Double Black ever existed. Dazai feels his heart sublime and bubble up his throat. He feels like gagging.
Dazai leads Chuuya over to the kitchen, where he rummages through the cabinets, searching for a glass. “Top right.” Chuuya says. When Dazai looks over to him, he’s pinching the bridge of his nose.
Dazai gets a glass, fills it to the brim with water, and hands it to Chuuya for him to drink. When he finishes, he puts the glass on the counter and looks up at Dazai. He knows there’s no way Chuuya could be sobering up – in fact, if anything, he should be feeling more drunk by the minute. But the light in Chuuya’s eyes is so present, so tangible; Dazai wonders if Chuuya knows, now, what Dazai means, and he hopes that Chuuya believes him.
Chuuya sighs, rubs his hands over his face. “I’m going to bed.”
Dazai relaxes, but can’t help but be disappointed. “Good idea.”
Chuuya turns, steps away in the direction of his bedroom, but pauses. “You, ah… don’t have to leave, if you don’t want. I know you didn’t drive here and… it’s late.”
“Aw does Chuuya want to snuggle?”
Chuuya bristles. “Shut up you piece of garbage. You know you’re sleeping on the couch.”
“I know,” Dazai chuckles, “goodnight, Chuuya.”
Chuuya swipes the box of nicotine patches off the counter, fumbles with it for a second before taking out a patch and sticking it to his left arm. “Goodnight, asshole.”
+
Dazai wakes up around noon to the sensation of pillows being thrown at his head.
“I can’t believe I’m awake before you, you shithead. Get up and make me some coffee.”
Dazai smiles in spite of himself. Chuuya stands at the foot of the couch, his arms crossed. He has heavy purple bags under his eyes and his hair is tied back into a bun.
Dazai sits up on the couch. “Whatever the princess wants.”
The line earns him a smack across the back of his head, but it’s worth it.
Chuuya settles into a chair at his kitchen table and grumbles directions at Dazai to find mugs and coffee and the machine. Dazai looks over every so often and watches as Chuuya levitates various objects into his reach, including the newspaper and his phone. It’s almost funny, seeing Chuuya activate his ability in such a domestic setting and casual manner, as Dazai is only used to seeing it in combat. Even before he left the Mafia, he and Chuuya hardly spent time together like this.
Dazai sets two mugs of coffee on the table and sits across from Chuuya, watches quietly as the redhead leans his head in his hand and reads the paper, and intermittently sips at his coffee. Dazai wrinkles his nose – the coffee is strong and black, which apparently Chuuya has no problem with.
“Stop staring at me, shitty Dazai.”
Dazai chuckles. “You didn’t give me much else to do.”
Chuuya pulls out a section of the paper and hands it to him.
“You read this?” Dazai shakes out the paper, opens it in front of him, “Every day?”
Chuuya shrugs. “When I can.”
Dazai skims the article but is mostly still staring at Chuuya over the page. It feels odd that Chuuya is letting Dazai see him like this, all sleepy and hungover and kind of – messy. Chuuya rolls his shoulders and yawns, his eyes flicking from the paper over to his phone, where he types in a message quickly then turns it over.
Chuuya finishes off the rest of his coffee and stands, stretching his arms over his head briefly before grabbing his mug and making his way to the sink. Dazai stands and goes next to him, waves his half-full mug at Chuuya, silently asking if he wants it, but Chuuya just shakes his head so Dazai pours it down the drain. Chuuya takes Dazai’s mug from his hand without saying anything and washes it.
“I’m surprised you haven’t kicked me out yet.” Dazai notes, leaning against the counter.
“Trust me, I am, too.” Chuuya sets both the mugs on a drying rack and leans on his hip against the counter, facing Dazai. Chuuya crosses his arms, but then uncrosses them and rubs the back of his neck. Dazai stares at the nicotine patch still on his arm.
“Listen,” Chuuya says, “I’m… sorry. About last night. That was…”
“Embarrassing?”
Chuuya’s eyes flicker up to Dazai, annoyed, but soften. “Yeah. And shut up about it, asshole.”
There’s no real bite to the insult. Dazai laughs softly.
“And…”
The tremor in Chuuya’s voice makes Dazai look at him, only to find that Chuuya has levitated himself just a bit, just enough to reach Dazai’s height. Chuuya’s cheeks are dusted pink and he won’t look Dazai in the eyes.
“And I believe you. Last night… I was thinking about some shit you’d said to me before you left, and it got all mixed up with what you said to me while you were on the truth serum and it just – fuck. Will you stop staring at me, you piece of shit?”
Dazai just smiles and touches Chuuya’s cheek, nullifying his ability and making him drop back to his normal height. Chuuya bristles.
“You asshole. Why do you always have to—”
Dazai leans forward and kisses him.
“You brushed your teeth.” Dazai notes when they part.
“I had a guest,” Chuuya grumbles, “I’m not a savage, like some people.”
Dazai laughs and pulls Chuuya a little closer to him by the waist. “So…”
“So I’m okay with this.” Chuuya says. “I just… Dazai, I don’t know exactly what I want from you. But I know that I don’t want you to leave again.”
Chuuya radiates heat under Dazai’s palm. “That’s all right.”