Chapter Text
“Hey, Atsushi!”
Atsushi whipped around at the sound of his name. Down the hallway, Junichirou Tanizaki called his name while jogging to catch up with him. Atsushi stopped walking to wait for the ginger to catch up.
“What's your next class?” Junichirou asked.
“I don't know. Honestly, I just got here. I woke up late. I have to get my schedule from the office… And I don't know where it is!” Atsushi whined. “Do you know where it is?!” He waved his arms around in a panic.
“Hey! Calm down! I'll show you.”
“Just tell me where it is, you'll be late on the first day!”
Junichirou started walking towards the office. “No, it'll be fine. Come on!”
Atsushi followed Junichirou to get his schedule. The two chatted as they made they're way to the office, walking side by side.
“Thank you, Tanizaki- Oof!” Atsushi yelped as he felt himself collide with another student. Junichirou caught his friend before he could go down with him.
When Atsushi opened his eyes, they darted to the man on the ground. He was picking up his bag and the books that fell out of it.
“Crap! I'm sorry!” Atsushi bent down to help the man. As he went to grab a fallen book he felt a quick sting on his hand. The guy had slapped Atsushi’s hand away.
“I'm fine, I've got it.” The boy said as he snatched the books up and left.
Atsushi watched as the black and white haired boy ran away.
“Do… you know him?” Atsushi turned to Junichirou. Junichirou shook his head ‘No’. The white haired boy turned back to the other side of the hall where the guy he had bumped into previously had disappeared. “Hmm…”
They finally were on their way to the office again.
~{♡♡♡}~
Atsushi Nakajima, a 1st year college student, stood in front of a door. A door of The class B 1-3.
He nervously slides the door open. Everyone in the room goes quiet and looks towards the door.
“Are you Mr. Nakajima?” The teacher asks. The boy standing in the doorway nodded. “Thank you for joining us, take a seat anywhere with an empty spot.” And the teacher went back to teaching.
Atsushi’s Purple-Yellow eyes scanned over the rows of seats. There were a few empty seats, most were in the back of the classroom. They were really far from the front. Then, there were 2 seats on either side of…
‘That's the boy from earlier!'
In the middle of the two empty seats sat the guy that Atsushi had bumped into in the hall earlier. Sitting by him seemed to be his only option. His eyesight wasn't good enough to see anything from the back rows.
He took a breath before he approached the black haired guy.
“Do you mind if I sit here?”
The already seated guy looked up at Atsushi. “Sure.” Then he went back to his notes.
Atsushi sat down and quickly got out his notebook and began catching up.
~{♡♡♡}~
DING DING DING
Atsushi packed his stuff back up before he left the class. His seat neighbor had already darted off before he had the chance to apologize again for earlier
Oh well…
He pulled out his phone. He had a few messages from Tanizaki. The messages were letting Atsushi know that he was going to spend lunch with his sister.
“Lunch alone it is… I guess…” Atsushi looked around at the empty room before sighing. “I could visit Dazai…”
Dazai had attempted to take his life once again. This time it landed him in the hospital. This was the first time it had been so bad that he was sent to an inpatient psychiatric hospital for more than a few days. Usually his attempts were never outed as ‘attempts’ and just accidents, then he was sent on his merry way. It had already been a week since he was admitted to the psychiatric hospital.
Atsushi put on his bag and began his way out of school.
~{♡♡♡}~
“Atsushi!” The brown haired man yelped when he saw his little brother. He immediately smothered Atsushi with hugs.
“Osa’- Ow! You’re hugging to- tight!” Atsushi struggled against Dazai’s grasp. “Let go!”
Dazai lets go and begins laughing. “You left me forever~ I thought you were abandoning me!” Dazai whined and feigned loneliness. “I guess I’ll find a better brother~”
“What?! I-I visited you yesterday! And what do you mean ‘find another brother’?!” Atsushi was clearly annoyed with his older brother’s antics. “Kunikida’s right! You are a pain in the ass!” Dazai tried to playfully hug Atsushi to annoy him but Atsushi wasn’t having it and slapped his hands away.
“Yikes! The tiger is mad! He’s using big boy words!”
“Stop comparing me to a cat! I’m a grown man!” Atsushi puffed out his chest.
The two were silent for a few seconds before falling into laughter. Kunikida, who worked as a tech for the hospital, gestured for them to quiet down, as there were other families visiting their loved ones. The two quieted as told.
Dazai, still coming down from the laughter, wheezed. He sat down at one of the visiting tables, and Atsushi did as well. “B-but seriously Atsu, how's your first day in college? Meet any cute girls?” He teased Atsushi.
Atsushi sighed, catching his breath before speaking “Nope! No girls for me! You already know that I'm going to focus on my work more. I don't need a girlfriend to distract me from it. Plus, you know that I'll never like anyone like that.”
“Fine, fine. So? Any friends?”
“Just Tanizaki- Oh! I didn't tell you what happened this morning!”
“Ooo~ Do tell!” Dazai rested his head in his palms like a girl at a slumber party.
“I was late, and I needed to grab my schedule from the office, but I didn't know where the office was. Tanizaki offered to show me. So, we were walking and talking-” Atsushi ranted a lot to Dazai, it had become normal to the two.”-Then, boom! I knocked into another guy by accident. I was going to help him pick up his things but he slapped my hand!”
“Woah! Overreacting much? What'd he look like? I might know him!”
“I didn't get a good look at him, but then I found out he was in the same class as me! He has short, black hair with white tipped pieces of hair. I think he was mostly just wearing casual clo-”
“That's Akutagawa.” Dazai said very casually.
“W-Wait… You know him?”
Dazai had gone to the same college that Atsushi was going to. He attended the school for 2 years but got expelled in his 3rd year. It made sense that he knew the kids there but Atsushi was confused because he thought the boy he had met was a 1st year student.
“Yeah, of course. I went to that college longer than you have.”
“I know, but isn't he a first year student?! How would you know?”
“First year?” Dazai laughed a bit at the statement. “He's a third year student.”
Atsushi was confused, Akutagawa looked a lot younger. “Th-Then he's like 20! Wait- he was in a first year class”
“Which class was it?”
“Mathematics. Why?” Atsushi tilted his head in clear confusion.
Dazai giggled for a moment. “So, it's that bad?” Atsushi was still clearly confused so Dazai immediately explained to him. “He's never been good with math. I didn't think that he would fail again, though.”
“Huh?! W-Wait… He failed twice?! Shouldn't he be expelled”
“Apparently, and the dean was paid off.” Dazai shrugged. “But you're good at math, maybe you should help him?”
“But, I- heh?!”
Another person had entered the visitation room. It was Akutagawa. Akutagawa was visiting someone?
Akutagawa clearly heard Atsushi's surprised yelp because his eyes darted Atsushi’s way. His eyes widened before he immediately exited the room. Just for a few seconds, though. He came back in, acting like he hadn't seen Atsushi and walked towards them.
Atsushi thought he was coming over to them but, instead, he passed them. He sat with a short, ginger two tables away from Atsushi and Dazai.
“Woah, I didn't know he knew Chuuya,” Dazai said in a low whisper.
“His name is Chuuya? The ginger one, I mean.” Atsushi said in the same low whisper.
Dazai nodded. ”Maybe you should offer that help now?”
“No way. Plus, he's in the middle of a conversation!” Atsushi glanced over to Akutagawa and Chuuya. He swore Akutagawa was staring at him, but he did have a habit of being paranoid for no reason. “Look, I’m not going to try to make friends with him! It seems he’s made his opinion on me.”
“But what if you get lucky? You’ll have another friend!” Dazai would never shut up about Atsushi making friends. “It’s 50/50 and you’ll only gain!”
“Yeah, I’ll either gain a friend or an enemy” Atsushi rolls his eyes and looks at his phone, checking the time. He turns back to Dazai. ”And it's more like 70/20!”
Dazai rolls his eyes too. “So pessimistic.”
“Dazai. Look at where you are.”
“Shush.”
~{♡♡♡}~
It was now after lunch break. Atsushi was back in class. Taking notes next to the one and only Akutagawa. Well, he was more so dozing off than taking notes.
As he almost dozes off for the third time that hour, he loses grip on his pen. He fails to catch it before it falls under his desk somewhere. ‘Crap…’ Atsushi looked under his desk, nothing, his pen was nowhere in sight. No, he found it. It was under Akutagawa’s desk.
‘Double crap…’ Atsushi wanted to avoid talking to him but, clearly that wasn’t going to be possible. He procrastinated for a few moments before he spoke up.
“Uh… Hey-” Atsushi muttered, barely loud enough for his neighbor to hear him.
“You're pen?” Akutagawa immediately replied with a question.
“Yeah-” Akutagawa leaned over to grab Atsushi’s pen. He handed the pen to Atsushi after he was able to grab it. “If you knew that I was going to ask, why didn't you just give me my pen when I dropped it?” Atsushi whisper-shouted, a bit frustrated with the raven haired boy.
He gave a small chuckle at the question like the reply was an obvious answer. “I just wanted to see how long it'd take you to speak up. I'd say that 2 minutes and 23 seconds is a pretty long time to speak up.”
“You counted?!” Atsushi seemed a bit creeped out by that.
Akutagawa rested his head on his hand. He looked at Atsushi. “Mhm” He hummed in acknowledgement. “Were you scared of talking to me?” He sniggered.
Atsushi felt his face grow hot. “Why w-would I?!” He raised his voice, a bit too loud.
Their professor turned around from the whiteboard, where he was writing. “Ahem… Are you two going to pay attention or keep disrupting the class?”
“Ah! I'm sorry!” Atsushi apologized. He could feel eyes on him. He began blushing, he was so embarrassed. “I didn't mean to interrupt!”
The professor dismissed the problem and began to write again.
Atsushi, frustrated, writes a note with a sticky note and slaps it onto Akutagawa’s notebook. ‘I’m not scared of talking to you!’ It read.
Akutagawa looked over to Atsushi after he read the heartfelt note. The gray haired boy was angrily writing his class notes. “Heh…” He let out another small chuckle. Atsushi ignored it.
~{♡♡♡}~
Soon, class was over and it was time for after-school activities, to go home, or to your dorm. Unfortunately for Atsushi, he stayed in a dorm.
He was told by the staff that his original roommate withdrew last minute from the school for personal reasons. For the past night, he had a dorm to himself. He was supposed to get a roommate tonight. He waited in his room patiently. Having a roommate meant having a friend and/or a study buddy. He just wouldn’t be lonely.
He was tired. He wanted to sleep but his excitement for a roommate kept him up.
As he began to doze off, he heard the door squeak open and Sigma, the student dorm supervisor, welcoming someone to the dorm. “This will be your dorm for the year. And this is Atsushi, your roommate.”
Atsushi had to rub the sleep out of his eyes before he greeted his roommate. “I’m Nakajima Atsu- Hah?!” Atsushi finally saw his roommate. It was Akutagawa. “This has to be a mistake! He’s not actually my roommate, right?”
“I’m not happy about it either.” Akutagawa groaned.
“You two know each other?” Sigma quietly asked.
“Yeah. It’s fine, he’ll get over it.” Akutagawa placed his bag down on the vacant bed. He turned to Sigma. “I think I’ve got it from here. I don’t want to waste your time."
Atsushi quietly begged Sigma to get the other to leave. Sadly, Sigma wasn't not able to read his expression. “I’ll be going then. And, like I said, I’m Sigma and you can come to me if you’re having trouble with your residence here.” And with that, he exited and shut the door behind him.
Atsushi just laid back down and turned away from his roommate, towards the wall. “Don’t be loud.” He said before he covered his head with his pillow, an his body with a blanket.
Akutagawa sighed as he began unpacking. “This will be a long year.”