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The summer heat is heavy outside of the security of his apartment. It’s dark inside, cool and moist. The air conditioner hums a comforting tune, a smooth buzzing in empty air as he rolls himself down the hall from his bedroom to his office. He remembers only briefly the long stairs in his Shinjuku apartment, the way he might have danced down them in glee, the sound of his socked feet padding against glossy hard wood as he’d reached toward his bookshelf and pulled Celty’s head into his arms.
Life in those days had been as simple as is was complicated. Wake up, watch the world from behind the safety of his own boundaries, plot the end of the monster who roved through the streets, and laugh. The bitterness that he’d felt back then tastes sweet in comparison to this. To waking up and dragging himself numbly from his sheets. Checking in with Kine—I’m still breathing, I’m still moving, barely—and forcing sore limbs to carry him into his chair.
He feels like a prisoner, maybe, trapped within a body of a cage. Arms that won’t work the way that he wants them to. Legs that won’t walk forward at all.
But he doesn’t want to think about that right now.
He eats breakfast from his lap—a plate of rice, some vegetables, some tea on the desk—he talks with clients, answers emails, and he flinches at the sight of a familiar name in his inbox.
Kishitani Shinra [15/06/16]: Long time no see (unread message)
He almost deletes it.
But instead, he allows it to sit there, bolded against everything else, staring up at him with judgmental eyes among client messages and ads for things that he doesn’t have the urge to buy.
He goes about his business, but against his eyelids, the image of those words has been branded. Even when he changes tabs, wastes time browsing random chatrooms and social media sites, he can’t shake the feeling of that text staring at him through the screen, as though Shinra himself is peeling back his skin and pressing nosy fingers around in his insides.
Finally, with a deep sigh, lungs quivering only slightly at the force of it, after so many months have passed and his pulse doesn’t hurt as it pounds in his veins anymore, he opens the email. He rolls his eyes. It’s the same Shinra, even after so much time has passed. Never shutting up about Celty, never knowing which words he really shouldn’t say.
Hey there, scumbag!
It’s been a long time, hasn’t it? Celty and I are doing very well, no thanks to you, you know. Despite your villainous plots, we’re stronger than ever! Ikebukuro is quite peaceful without you around. Any time there’s trouble, no one has to worry about some lowlife pulling the strings anymore.
Speaking of the many people who dislike you, Shizuo asked about you the other day. It’s weird, isn’t it?
Do you think maybe he wants to finish the job?
Wishing you the best,
Shinra
Izaya stares at the screen for a long time. His fingers shake against the keys, everything around him—the darkness of his apartment, the air conditioner buzzing, the plate in his lap and the tea on his desk—blurs around him. His eyes focus only on Shizuo’s name on the monitor. Bile rises in his throat.
There are fists against his arms, knocking him back. His bones ache, his side stings. He’s stumbling backward, falling down, looking up with blurry eyes as a dark figure looms overhead—closer, closer—
The plate clatters to the floor. He’s pushing the wheels of his wheelchair toward the bathroom. His arms pulse in pain, his legs are wracked with electrical pulsations—pain, pain, fear and pain—
He’s falling down, groping cold tile in the dark. There’s a wetness on his cheeks, vomit pushing up from his throat into the bowl of the toilet. One retch, then two, and by the third, he’s a mess of breathing, of a heart pounding with such a force in his chest that he fears it might tear through the skin.
He’s making ugly little noises, gripping so tightly at the toilet seat that his knuckles turn white.
And Kine finds him like that, legs splayed uselessly out onto the floor. There’s vomit staining his shirt, tears hot against his cheeks, and he shakes and shakes, won’t let himself be touched for many, many minutes.
Kine cleans him up, carries him to bed.
And he sleeps.
The day passes gradually into night, and Kine stays over. Izaya is not aware of this until the morning, as he’s pulling himself out of bed and a figure appears in the doorway.
“I got breakfast.”
He doesn’t move forward to help, even as Izaya’s arms struggle to grip the chair. They’re hurting more than usual. He notices the bottle of pills on the nightstand, even in the dark.
Kine knows better than to help him. Useless and weak, even at his lowest, he will not allow himself to be taken care of. He’ll carry the weight of his sins alone. He’ll live with this condition until he dies.
“Did you use the card?” he’s asking questions like everything is normal between them, as though he’s back in Shinjuku, bossing around a snobby Namie, as though he isn’t a lowlife dragging himself into a wheelchair or a cripple refusing treatment out of pure self-hatred, “Or do I need to compensate you?”
Kine is quiet for a moment, a shadow in the threshold of the room. As Izaya uncaps the pill bottle, he finally speaks. Everything is calculated, Izaya knows. He wants to pretend that Izaya isn’t taking painkillers. He wants to distract him from his own weaknesses.
“Don’t worry about it.”
As though Izaya can’t afford to feed both of them. As though he’s such a charity case that he needs anyone to feed him. Will Kine try to hold his fork for him too? Will he make little cooing noises as he pushes it toward Izaya’s face?
“Don’t be like that. It’s just sushi.”
He stops himself from grumbling about it too much, cuts his losses, even allows Kine to step forward into the room and take the handles of his chair.
They eat in silence. Kine isn’t much of a talker, and he knows how Izaya gets after an episode. Despite sleeping for so long, there are dark bags lining the underside of his eyes. His hair is messy, his skin is dry. Kine mentions none of it, allows him to eat. Izaya doesn’t understand it at all, why he stops by so often, why he helps him up after he’s fallen.
Something stirs within his chest.
And as quickly as it surfaces, he squashes it.
He’s shuddering, dry-mouthed, heart racing in his throat as strong arms pull him from his chair. His legs skitter against the floor, hands groping blindly at the body against him, trying to fight it, trying to get away—
Dark eyes leering down at him. A mouth opens, fangs glinting in the night. A monster, a monster, a monster—
He’s leaning back, he’s choking on the blood rising in his throat. The monster raises something heavy over its head—a vending machine, maybe, something too heavy for a human to hold. It’s staring at him with those black eyes, oozing blood from many cuts.
“Do it, monster.”
But he’s scared. He doesn’t want to die.
Someone will help him, someone will come to save him.
But no one comes. No one cares. No one—
He’s snapping awake, sprawled out on the floor. There’s water splashing against his face, a placid frown looking down at him as Kine dumps the rest of the water bottle over his head.
For a moment, he doesn’t understand where he is, why he’s here, why his limbs won’t pull him upward and why everything hurts. He was in Ikebukuro, looking into the eyes of a monster wearing human skin. He was—
No, he was being pushed around in his new city, enjoying the warmth of the summer. He was chatting idly with Kine about a new client when he’d spotted it, blond hair, glasses, that tell-tale bartender’s uniform.
Heiwajima Shizuo was there. They’d locked eyes.
And everything had went black.
He’s in the kitchen, locked away again in his apartment. He doesn’t know if he’d been hallucinating or not. He doesn’t know how Shizuo would have found his way all the way here, or why.
“It was him,” Kine confirms, capping the bottle and setting it to the side, “I know. I saw him too.”
There’s a towel working its way through his hair. There are hands touching him gently, as though he’s fragile, as though he might actually break.
Kine is an idiot. Can’t he see?
Izaya is already broken. He’s so mangled that he can’t even recognize himself anymore.
“Why?”
The question hangs in the air for a long time. Kine looks away, smears the towel in the water on the floor. He isn’t sure exactly what he’s asking. Why is Kine taking care of him? Why is Shizuo here? Why is everything turning on its head, the world spinning at such a speed that he can’t keep up with it anymore?
Why is he alive?
“He’s looking for you,” Kine sighs, lifting him with hands under his arms and pulling him toward his chair.
There are no words between them. There’s a silence, not quite as uncomfortable as Izaya thinks that it should be.
“He’s been asking around about you. He came to see me yesterday, but I turned him away. I guess your doctor friend sent him.”
Izaya takes it in, nodding numbly, shuffling in the chair and finding a comfortable spot. Kine is silent for a moment, taking the towel into the bathroom. Izaya sits quietly, tips his head back and stares at the ceiling.
His fingers grip the edges of the arm rests. He thinks of Shizuo as much as he can muster, before the blackness begins to hint at his vision and the tell-tale trembling begins to inch through his bones. Heiwajima Shizuo is a human, he reminds himself. A dangerous human, nothing more, nothing less.
A human, who has put him in this chair. A human who has punished him for his own foolishness, his own cowardice, his own selfish inability to see an enemy as anything but a monster, to look beyond the red blood flowing through those veins, the pain and the loneliness and the constant hardships.
Shizuo, the human. Shizuo, always so much better, always so much stronger, always so much more deserving of love.
“You have a doctor’s appointment today.”
He shakes his head, chasing away the images of a blond man with a crooked frown, stepping forward, brandishing his weapon—
It’s nothing but a bad dream. Nothing but a memory that someday, he will shake.
His fingers rest centimeters above the keyboard, shoulders stiff and shaking. His eyes watch the text lining the screen, drinking in each word. He doesn’t know what he wants to say. His inability to formulate a reply is startling, his fear in the face of harmless text is troubling at best.
This isn’t Orihara Izaya.
Orihara Izaya isn’t afraid to speak, afraid to type, afraid to unleash his razor sharp wit on anyone when prodded, and right now, oh, does he feel a little prodded.
Stabbed, even. He bites back a laugh, tastes the bitterness of bile on his tongue.
Heiwajima Shizuo [15/06/16]: No Title (unread)
I’ve been trying to see you.
You have my number.
He has the audacity to write such a curt email. He has the gall to contact Izaya at all. After everything, after the fighting, the pain, ten entire years of hatred and hardship, this monster, this complete and utter moron thinks that Izaya will do anything that he asks of him?!
He’s insane. Izaya moves to delete the message, to forget about him forever.
But he stops.
The arrow hovers above the trashcan icon. He lets out the breath that he didn’t even realize he’d been holding. His side stings. His arms shudder in pain.
[Re: No Title]
The message stays open for what feels like hours. He stares at the blank, white space, thinks of what he might say.
‘Go die.’
‘Rot in Hell.’
‘I never want to see you again.’
‘Monster.’
Kine opens the front door, and when he looks up, he realizes that it’s gotten dark. Time has slipped through his fingers. His arms feel numb, sitting over the keys for far too long.
“I brought dinner.”
He knows better than to say anything about that.
Months ease on. It’s September, warm and muggy, wind passing through the trees and rustling dying leaves from their branches. He’s sitting in a park, Kine not too far away, smoking a cigarette with enough distance between them that the smell of the smoke won’t scare him.
It wouldn’t matter anyway, he tells himself. He’s meeting up with a monster, facing those old ghosts, racing toward his fears head-on.
His legs feel tired. Physical therapy today, early again tomorrow. He refuses to feel defeated in this, refuses to admit that there was any reason for his change of heart aside from his own need to run through the city again.
It definitely has nothing to do with the figure pressing through the crowd, causing a thundering in his chest, a blurring in his vision.
He closes his eyes, takes in a few deep breaths. He ignores the way that his breathing rattles in his lungs, tugs at the scars on his side. He pretends that his arms aren't numb with pain.
“Hey.”
And he’s shaking despite himself.
He’s shaking, and Shizuo is a blurry figure of black and white and yellow, a cloud of smoke, a shadow looming over him, ready to strike the final blow.
There are hands pulling him back into his chair, there’s a faraway voice, calling out to him.
There is Shizuo stepping back, eyes widened, pained, even, and Izaya tries to laugh.
He isn’t allowed to be hurt by this, by what he’s done.
It’s too human of him, it’s too real. And it hurts, it hurts like nothing he’s even felt before.
He’s going home, and Shizuo watches as he’s wheeled away.
A speck in the distance, a nightmare that he’s still not strong enough to face.
October arrives before he knows it. He pulls himself from bed, taking two small steps toward his wheelchair before falling gracelessly into the seat.
“Just two steps a day,” the physical therapist had told him, bright and optimistic despite his many jeers during each of their appointments, “Once you get stronger, we’ll start taking three, then four, then—“
He considers getting worse just to spite her, but he’s beyond foiling his own plans. Someday, he will face Shizuo on his own two feet. Someday, he will be able to look him in the eye.
As an equal, maybe, someday.
But not quite yet.
He’d received an email the day after their botched meetup.
A simple, “I’m sorry” and nothing else.
He’d felt tainted then, more damaged than ever before. He’d slept an entire day away, chasing Kine out with a voice raspier than he would have preferred, and he’d reveled in his self-hatred. In his weakness. In his cowardice.
In the comfort of his own pain, he’d cocooned himself. Alone, he didn’t want to see anyone at all.
Miraculously, the next day, he’d sent a reply.
“Meet with me again.”
And that was that.
For minutes at a time, he’d found himself able to look into Shizuo’s eyes. Dark and hooded, mournful and quiet. Shizuo had stuffed nervous hands in his pockets, stayed a safe distance away. He’d waited until Izaya’s breathing had calmed to look him in the face, hadn’t even attempted to speak.
They’d stood there in silence for a long time—in Kine’s apartment, away from the curious eyes of onlookers, away from Izaya’s safe haven and any place that these encounters might taint.
He’d reached forward at some point, searching for skin. Shizuo had hesitated before offering a hand. They’d touched, for a mere second, and Izaya had burned.
His hand still tingles when he thinks about it. Kine had bought him burn gel, and somehow, that had helped.
Time passed, minute-long meetings stretched on for hours. Sometimes they ate lunch. Sometimes Izaya talked to Kine about business, sometimes Shizuo stared into his bowl for a long time, as though maybe he wished that he could drown in it.
And Izaya had grown accustomed to his guilt, to the way he looked at Izaya when he thought that no one was paying attention.
‘I almost killed you’ he might say, he might clench his fists and shake in his rage at no one but himself.
And maybe he would apologize again, endlessly, and Izaya would find himself breathless, strangled by those words.
But Shizuo stays silent, every time. He thanks Kine quietly before he leaves. He sends Izaya a final look. There’s something swimming in his eyes that Izaya is never quite willing to name.
They meet up, and eventually Izaya touches him without getting burned. Eventually he hobbles across the room and greets him at the door.
Shizuo steps back, surprised. He watches as Izaya takes careful steps back into the apartment, clinging to Kine's arm. He stills in the hall, doesn’t make a move to come in for so long that Kine urges him inside.
They eat, they drink tea.
Izaya’s arms feel fine. His legs are tired, his muscles, light. Even his side feels looser, and maybe, he even catches himself smiling as he talks about a client.
And the days drag on.
Time passes.
He begins to feel like himself again.
And one day, he recognizes the face staring back at him in the mirror.
[01/12/16: It hasn’t been long enough.]
Shinra, my old friend, I hope you and your headless monster are doing well.
I have found myself quite enjoying the hustle and bustle in a city so free of inhuman entities. You see, humans are much more of my thing, and the idea of something so monstrous roving through the streets of Ikebukuro honestly makes me feel a little sick to my stomach.
That’s not to say that I don’t miss the two of you, always flaunting that disgusting, forbidden love as though you were the protagonists of some depraved romance novel. I’m sure you’ve only continued to push that love off on anyone who will listen. I’m sure the entire city is sick of you by now.
Thank you, so very much, for directing that monster Shizu-chan to my home. I have to say, I was a little surprised that he found me, given his tiny, protozoan brain and his inability to perform even the most minute of tasks without failing miserably.
Should I return the favor? Maybe you’ll find a box of rattlesnakes on your doorstep one of these days, Shinra. You’d better be careful when opening your mail for a while.
Wouldn’t that be hilarious? Quite the adventure for you and Celty, wouldn’t you say? I’m sure it would cement your love, as she watched the life fade from your eyes!
Please pass my regards on to your beloved.
Orihara Izaya
It’s October 14th when his physical therapist suggests using a cane. She produces one from a storage room near the back, a blocky, tacky thing—medical white, padded handle. The type of thing that he grew familiar seeing elderly people using during his stay in the hospital. And he laughs.
Kine is helping him back into his chair at the end of his session when she suggests it. She’s cheery and bright, but he can’t ignore the shadows of annoyance behind her smile. She’s tired of working with him. These months have worn her down, and she’s eager to rid herself of him any way that she can.
She must be happy that he’s been making progress.
“Why did you decide to become a physical therapist?” he questions, grinning like a child, batting Kine’s hands away, “Did you want to help people?”
She falters, isn’t sure what to say. She’s been warned about him.
“Could it be that you wished to fill that lonely void in your heart? The children that you could never bear—oh, I’ve noticed, don’t think that you’re that sneaky, miss. And the tan lines of a wedding ring on your finger fade away more every day, don’t they? Did he leave you because you couldn’t have children? Did he find himself someone younger, someone less damaged? Did he—“
Kine is wheeling him away as he rambles on—laughter rolling through the empty halls as they go. He’s laughing all the way out into the parking lot, as he’s hoisted into the car.
“A cane!” He cackles, throwing his head back, clenching his fists in his lap and training mad eyes on the street ahead, “Does that moronic woman really expect for me to walk with a cane?!”
Kine doesn’t look at him, doesn’t say a word. He concentrates on driving until they’ve reached Izaya’s apartment.
He’s pushing Izaya inside, closing the door behind him, adjusting the air conditioning when Izaya complains about the heat.
And he says, finally, a single sound in the vast emptiness of Izaya’s apartment, “I think a cane would be a good idea.”
Like an old person, like some sort of cripple. Izaya laughs again, grits his teeth through the pain. He’s not weak enough to struggle to walk. He’s not strong enough to try at all.
Kine doesn’t press the issue. He doesn’t harass him. He drops it, orders lunch.
And Izaya wonders how much time will pass before Shizuo decides to visit again.
Izaya walks with careful precision, toeing the concrete with shaking feet as he rests his weight on the cane. It’s sleek, black, expensive glossy wood, and an early Christmas present from his staff had been unexpected enough—let alone something like this.
He feels a little bit like an evil villain now, even more so than he did in the wheelchair. He wonders if Shizuo thinks so too, as he matches his pace, hands stuffed in his pockets, and takes slow drags off of his cigarette.
It’s snowing gradually, chilly even bundled up in so many furry layers. Shizuo wears only a single scarf—The Awakusu girl has taken up knitting, he explains, albeit a little bashfully.
They find a coffee shop on the corner, tuck themselves away inside by the window. Izaya draws a finger along the lip of his cup, watches the people outside. He can see himself smiling in his reflection in the glass, and for only a moment, he decides not to hide it.
“Shizu-chan,” he speaks, turning his gaze to the other man, taking in the way that his shoulders still stiffen at the sound of that old nickname, “Why did you come here?”
Shizuo looks at him long and hard. His brows furrow, and he looks away.
“It’s Christmas,” he breathes, red-cheeked, rubbing idly at his nose, “I didn’t have anything else to do.”
They both know that he’s not answering the right question. There’s a pressure building between the two of them, so many questions left unanswered, so many emotions that might take them years to properly address.
Izaya still flinches when Shizuo draws too close. Shizuo still looks at Izaya as though he were the biggest regret of his life.
But they live on, brokenly, tiredly. They pull the tattered pieces of this relationship that has never quite been healthy back together. They rebuild. They learn to be happy again.
Shizuo will carry his regrets on him like a second skin. Izaya will never be able to walk without a limp.
They’re scarred, they’re damaged, but Izaya feels okay.
Maybe for the first time since he’d left Ikebukuro so long ago.
“There are these kids,” Shizuo continues, the vibrato of his voice humming over the noise of the café, “They’re high school kids. Kind of a pain in the ass. One of them has a smartass mouth, just like you.”
Izaya chuckles, asks if he’s been replaced.
Shizuo tells him, “No one can be as twisted as you.”
It’s neither a compliment nor an insult, but Izaya’s chest still swells with something unnameable, something so light that he thinks he might float away.
“They remind me of us,” he sighs, dragging a hand through his hair, “If we’d gotten along.”
They both click their tongues at the mere thought of it. They both look in opposite directions.
“I wondered if I could get along with you.”
He watches as the baristas make drinks. He watches as patrons take their seats and shuffle in and out of the door. The sound of the bell ringing is crisp as a cold breeze rolls in. He notices only after so many months that his vision doesn’t blur at the sight of Shizuo anymore.
“Did you come all this way to confess your love to me, Shizu-chan? On Christmas? How romantic.”
Shizuo huffs, maybe he laughs. He drums his fingers against the table.
“You wish, you bastard.”
The snow continues to fall, and they sit for a long time. They talk of the past, of the current Ikebukuro, of all of their friends who they’ve left behind in the city.
And time passes.
Winter melts into the fresh warmth of Spring.
The rain brings in Summer.
And someday, after months and months, after years have gone by.
Izaya walks again.