Work Text:
This had been going on for a few days now. It was about time Dazai let his partner know.
“Kunikida,” Dazai called in a singsong voice.
Ignored.
“Kunikidaaaa!”
“What do you want, Dazai,” Kunikida replied without looking up from his paperwork.
Dazai took the seat in front of his desk, “I have something to tell you.”
“What.”
“I’m dying.”
“Finally.”
Dazai laughed. “I’m serious this time, Kunikida. You’re going to have to find a new detective as good as me.”
Kunikida looked at him, eyes narrowed, before looking back down at his work. “Atsushi has been shadowing you, he’ll be a fine replacement.”
“You don’t look that upset,” Dazai whined.
“Come back when you are visibly on death's door, then I will be visibly concerned.” Kunikida said.
Dazai sighed. “Okay,” he said finally, smiling and rising to leave.
He had other people to see after all, and did his best to stifle a painful cough until he was out of earshot of anyone in the building.
~
He told Atsushi the next day.
“You’re dying?” Atsushi was as shocked and concerned as he always was. “What’s wrong? Can I help?”
“No, no, little Atsushi, you can’t help.”
“Can anyone help?”
Dazai smirked. “Yes, but they’re not going to.”
“Why wouldn’t they?!” Atsushi had stood and begun pacing around the room. “You should ask them!”
Dazai could feel the worsening pain in his chest and did his best to ignore it. He didn’t care all that much, but Atsushi was already worried enough.
“They know.”
Atsushi rounded on him. “They know?” He sat heavily in the chair next to Dazai, sitting in silence for a moment.
“What’s wrong with you, Mr. Dazai?”
Dazai eyed him. “I’ve finally run into an ability I can’t nullify. Or, rather, it's caused by an ability, but the ability itself is not ongoing. I’m affected and that’s the end of it.”
“But what is it?”
“Do you know the old folktales about soulmates and flowers and confessions and the like?”
Atsushi fidgeted with his hands before replying. “Hanahaki?”
As if on cue, Dazai took one breath before he felt something get caught in his throat and he coughed. It still wasn’t so bad that he was coughing up flowers, or blood; though that would only be a day or so out.
“That’s the one,” he said carefully, when he was able to breathe freely (mostly freely) again.
“And you’re not going to tell them.”
Dazai shrugged. “They know.”
“Because you have already told them?”
“…no.”
“So how would they know?” Atsushi exclaimed. “We need you here, Mr. Dazai, you can’t just give up on life like that.”
Dazai gave him an amused look. “Have you met me?”
“Yeah, yeah. Double suicidal maniac, I’ve heard you a thousand times, so what. Do you not like what you do here? We help people!”
Atsushi paused for a moment, as though realizing something he should have thought of before.
“Double-suicide!”
Dazai nodded.
“No,” Atsushi said, “you want a painless double suicide with someone! This isn't painless or a double suicide. It’s just going to be you slowly, what, choking to death? Fix it!”
“Atsushi, this is the perfect double suicide.”
Atsushi threw up his hands. “How does that even make sense?”
“Think about it,” Dazai said, leaning forward excitedly, “I have a soulmate. I have hanahaki because I know who they are and I love them, which in hindsight is inconvenient at best. But it's a two way street. Whether they love me or not I'm still their soulmate; and their soulmate is going to die, so a part of them is going to die too.”
Atsushi narrowed his eyes. “I didn’t know you believed in that stuff.”
“Haven’t you read Plato?” Dazai asked, smiling. "Two heads, eight limbs, split apa-"
“Split apart, looking for your other half, I know. But,” Atsushi started, “does it count if it’s against their will? I thought double suicide was a mutual pact kind of thing.”
“Like I said,” Dazai shrugged, “they know. It’s their ch–choice.” Another coughing fit came over him, and when he recovered, Atsushi asked.
“Who is it?”
~
“Dazai.”
Dazai turned to look at Kunikida, Atsushi was hovering around the door behind him.
“Atsushi!” Dazai called, “you told him?”
“Of course he told me you imbecile. Now,” Atsushi sat down in front of him, “I order you to tell me who it is that you’re in love with.”
“Ugh, don’t say it like that, it sounds so sweet.”
“It is kind of sweet.”
“Atsushi!” Dazai and Kunikida both say, turning to him.
“Sorry,” Atsushi said.
“It’s not sweet,” Dazai said matter of factly, “it’s romantic.”
Now it was Atsushi’s and Kunikida’s turn to be incredulous. Kunikida rose without another word.
“Wait,” Atsushi said, as he walked past him, “aren’t you going to talk some sense into him?!”
“‘Sense’?” Kunikida said, waving back at Dazai, “what kind of sense could you talk into that?”
Dazai just smiled and waved at them.
~
The next day Dazai was coughing up real, actual flowers, and Atsushi was following him around with a stack of books.
“Okay,” Atsushi said, piling the books onto Kunikida’s desk (with a disapproving look from Kunikida himself), “there are a few different stories with hanahaki working in different ways. The most common includes the symbolism of the plants coinciding with something about the relationship.”
Dazai was peeking over Atsushi’s shoulder, both of them leaning over Kunikinda’s desk.
“If you puke flowers onto my desk you won’t have to worry about it being the plants that kill you,” Kunikida grumbled.
“You wouldn’t,” Dazai said, smiling at him.
“Try me.”
“What kinds of flowers have you seen, Dazai?” Atsushi asked.
Dazai sighed, “daisies.”
“Daisies,” Atsushi repeated quietly, flipping through the book. “Okay, daisies: gentleness, loyal love.”
“Clearly,” Kunikida said sarcastically, under his breath.
“Okay, that doesn’t help. What else?”
“Gardenias,” Dazai said.
Atsushi turned a few more pages, groaned, and picked up another book. “Here we go,” he said, after flipping through it, “gardenias are known to represent purity and sweetness.”
“Purity?” Kunikida asked doubtfully.
“Man,” Dazai said, narrowing his eyes, “gross.”
“I think this is referring to emotional innocence,” Atsushi said, reading further, “like childhood. A childhood friend?”
Dazai raised his eyebrows, smirking. Atsushi groaned. “Okay, what else?”
“Honeysuckle?”
Atsushi grimaced. “Like… the whole vine?”
Dazai nodded. “Hurt like hell.”
“Honeysuckle,” Atsuhsi murmured. “Love and passion? That’s still pretty general, are there any more specific flowers?”
Dazai thought for a moment. “Lilly of the valley.”
“Christ, Dazai,” Kunikida said. “I know that one. It’s used in Christianity often to symbolize tears. It generally represents sadness and pain.”
“Tainted sorrow,” Dazai said, thougthfully.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
~
The day after Atsushi had gone on his flower hunt, Dazai was coughing up roots, along with the flowers from the days before and a few new additions. He knew that meant he only had a day or so left. He couldn’t quite decide what to do with that day.
He hadn’t lied to Atsushi about not liking pain, but all things considered he thought he was taking this in stride. He wasn’t afraid of dying. Sure, there were things he was still curious about in life, but he wasn’t scared. He took out his phone when he made it back to the couch and typed out a text.
me: busy?
He hesitated with his thumb over the send button. One day left.
He pressed send. A response came about five minutes later:
slug: yes
Dazai rolled his eyes.
me: too busy?
He watched the little text bubble appear, then disappear, then appear again.
Finally:
slug: no
What was the harm?
~
“I hear there’s a folktale giving you some trouble.”
Dazai raised his head from where he was lounging on the couch. “I know that voice,” he murmured. He turned around carefully, “how did you know that?”
“Well, I wouldn’t have,” Chuuya said, tossing his coat and hat on the rack by the door, “except you and I aren’t the only two who make up ties between the Port Mafia and the Armed Detective Agency.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning,” Chuuya parrotted back. “Atsushi told Akutagawa and Akutagawa told me.”
“Ah,” Dazai said, laying carefully back down, “the wine is in the fridge.”
Chuuya’s mouth quirked up a bit, taking a detour around the breakfast bar into the kitchen. “So,” he said, “is this your perfect double suicide?”
“Did Atsushi tell him that too?”
Chuuya came back to the couch with a wine glass and the bottle before replying. “No,” he said, pouring himself a glass, “I’ve known you since we were what, fifteen? You’re not that hard to read.”
“Neither is Plato, but you still never read it.”
“I read it, I just didn’t tell you I read it.”
Dazai stood quickly from the couch then, swaying a little when his vision blurred. He only barely made it to the kitchen sink before he was coughing up flowers and roots and stems; and call him crazy but he thought for a second that Chuuya actually looked concerned.
He was breathing heavily, vaguely aware that Chuuya had followed him, wine in hand.
“Am I that entertaining?”
“Dazai, you’re insufferable.”
Dazai let out a laugh, he could feel blood dripping from his chin. That sealed his fate, he supposed.
“Azaleas, huh,” Chuuya said. He had the gall to sound amused. “Fragile passion. You’re so sweet, Dazai.”
“And every color of tulip possible, it’s disgusting.”
“Akutagawa thought it was sweet.”
“He only thought it was sweet because Atsushi thought it was sweet.”
Chuuya hummed. “What do tulips mean?”
Dazai coughed once more, trying to clear his throat. “It means a lot of things.”
“Like?”
“Hopeless, irresistible love,” Dazai said, “a perfect lover.”
“That’s a bit presumptuous.”
Chuuya was leaning over the sink with him now, fascinated by bloody flowers. Dazai had half a mind to tell him that was 'one step to the left' of sociopathic behavior; but he knew that Chuuya knew and didn’t care. Dazai found it endearing even though he would never say it outloud. His throat hurt too badly anyway.
“What’s that one,” Chuuya asked.
Dazai followed the nod of Chuuya’s head and groaned. He swallowed before saying, “mistletoe. Don’t ask me what it means.”
“I know what it means, I just wanted to hear you say it.”
“So mean, chibi,” Dazai whined.
Chuuya eyed him for a moment before putting his glass of wine down. When he turned back, Dazai had stood up straight, so Chuuya had to tilt his head back significantly to look up at him.
“Rude,” Chuuya said under his breath. Still, he buried one hand in the front of Dazai’s shirt, pulling him down slowly. Dazai realized belatedly that he wasn’t wearing gloves. The chibi really did trust him, didn't he?
Chuuya cupped his face with his other hand, using his thumb to smear blood over his bottom lip. Without a word, Chuuya pulled him down just a bit further, Dazai going willingly, and kissed him solidly on the mouth.
They stayed there a moment, Dazai leaning down further, wrapping his arms around Chuuya’s waist. When he pulled back again, red was visible on Chuuya’s mouth. He licked his lips.
"I know you love me, Osamu Dazai,” he whispered, in this little space between them that was just theirs. "I love you, too."
Almost immediately, the damn near excrutiating pain and tightness in Dazai’s chest dissipated, leaving only an aching soreness that was nowhere near as unbearable.
“How did you know?”
Chuuya smirked, pulling him closer slowly so when he spoke their mouths were touching. “Like I said,” Chuuya whispered, “I’ve known you a long time.”
Dazai kissed him again, just as slowly and just as solidly, swallowing the noise Chuuya made when he pulled him closer.
The second time Chuuya pulled back, he pulled back completely. Placing his glass in the sink, he retrieved his coat and hat, and the almost full bottle of wine.
“I’m taking this with me,” he called, walking towards the door lazily, “and, mackerel–”
Dazai looked at him from where he was still standing by the sink, fingers touching his bottom lip, trying to decide whether or not Chuuya had actually just kissed him.
“–don’t die on me just yet,” Chuuya said, and had the audacity to wink at him.
Dazai watched him wave the bottle, noticing he had put his gloves back on, and Chuuya disappeared out the door.