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When Dazai looked at the moon he wondered, not for the first time, if it was looking back at him.
What would it say to him if it could speak?
Dazai had never thought to hide from the moon, but something about the way it looked tonight told him that the thought should have occurred to him earlier.
When sleep had failed to claim him for the fourth time this week, his body had brought him on a walk while his mind wandered a completely different plane. He strolled the river bank while he waded through his own thoughts. The choice of whether to drown in his mind or in the water weighed heavily on him.
He finally settled on the edge of a peer, letting the tips of his shoes dip into the water. The discomfort of wet socks would at least be an improvement on the swirling internal waters that had been plaguing his mind as of late. Like many other nights Dazai had been ruminating on a conversation he had with Odasaku one night at the bar. A very specific night - the first night. He was telling Odasaku the story of how he had met Chuuya. He had gotten to the part where he very cleverly tricked Chuuya into joining the mafia when-
"If you hated this kid so much, why make him join?" Odasaku interrupted.
"Well because he'd be a good asset, Mori wanted him." Dazai explained to his new friend in the matter of fact tone he was so used to using when people asked him questions that had an obvious answer.
"I thought you didn't really care about the mafia?"
Odasaku had a way of asking questions that made Dazai believe he was completely sincere, even if his words seemed to be digging for something more. The way he spoke told Dazai that he really was just curious to the answer to the question.
At the time Dazai had brushed him off with another one of his non-answers that he couldn't even care to recall now. Now, however the pervading thought that accompanied that memory was;
Why did he get Chuuya to join the mafia?
The answer he gave Odasaku was true. Chuuya was a powerful asset and well worth Dazai's annoyance from the Port Mafia's perspective. He just shouldn't have been worth it from Dazai's perspective, and yet he was.
A small breeze stirred the water around his feet. As Dazai watched the ripples, he thought about Chuuya - something he only allowed himself to do on nights like these, when his defences were weak from too many restless nights.
Those first few days with Chuuya had been different. Different in a way that Dazai hadn't experienced before. No matter what happened, nothing could excite him, but Chuuya did. He poked and prodded at every insecurity he could find just to see how Chuuya would react. Even after ten insults to his height, he still raged at Dazai with the same amount of energy as he had the first time. Where did it come from? Did it ever run out? Dazai had found himself wondering as he tried, in escalating fashion, to find Chuuya's limit. Chuuya's energy gave Dazai a new light. It gave him purpose, if only a minor on. It gave him more reason to think about the future, to see what Chuuya was like when his energy ran dry. That was why he kept him around.
That was where the thoughts usually stopped.
But tonight he thought about their first fight, and every one that followed. When Chuuya's eyes locked with his and he saw the spark, that pure light, that shone in his blue irises, Dazai felt a warm root planted in his chest that continued to grow until it felt like it enveloped everything from his heart, to his throat, to his fingertips. His heart beat faster, he struggled for breath - if only for a moment - and every nerve in his body tingled. He would have questioned if death had finally come for him, had it not been the foreign, warm glow, that emanated from the origin in his chest. For the first time he let himself wonder; was that what belonging felt like? No longer untethered and without root, Dazai became tied to Chuuya, a weight that somehow kept him from floating into the heavens or sinking into the depths.
Dazai looked from the water to the moon, and wondered again if it was looking back. If it was listening, could he trust the moon to keep his secrets?
Cool sand felt coarse under Chuuya's fingers as he gripped it for some kind of grounding force. Gravity had failed the gravity manipulator tonight.
He wasn't entirely sure what had brought him to the beach, especially not on a night like this. The waves crashed against the shore in an angry crescendo, almost loud enough to drown out his thoughts.
Almost.
Tonight he thought of Dazai, the living ghost who haunted his restless nights. It was nights like these - nights when the moon felt more like a cool reflection of the sun rather than a second-class imitation - when the gaps in his soul were illuminated, holes in his shadow highlighted in silver, when he thought about the missing pieces and the man that had taken them.
When Dazai left, Chuuya forgot how to be angry about anything else. There was a time when every enemy's face became wrapped in bandages, and every item in Chuuya's home smelled like antiseptic - he had to throw out every pillowcase he owned. Dazai had a way of worming his way into every aspect of Chuuya's life. So even after he was gone, there were remnants of him everywhere.
To this day Chuuya still found Dazai's socks in his drawers.
When the sun was up Chuuya could ignore these thoughts. He could pretend that bandages meant the same to him as everyone else, that he found the smell of whisky repugnant for reasons unrelated to any person, that he had never known an Osamu Dazai at all. Night was a different matter. Every panel of moonlight that shone through his window had once illuminated a sleeping form beside him, every whistle of wind was once heard with the comfort of another body's warmth in his arms, and every restless night reminded him that there was a time when he didn't spend those alone. At night, Dazai had been his, and he hated to think it. At the time he had simply accepted it when Dazai took to sleeping in his apartment, to sleeping in his bed. He had not questioned it when he woke to longer limbs clinging to him for warmth. Looking back on it, it all felt like a dream, Chuuya walked through these memories like one would wade through murky water, only when the moon shone just right would the picture sharpen and he would remember that it had been real. For a time.
That was before nights had been ruined for Chuuya. That was before when the moon had made moments magical, instead of making memories haunted.
Chuuya wished he could have placed what exactly Dazai had taken from him, but his mind failed to identify what was missing, it could only scream at him that something was missing.
Chuuya stared at the waves and wondered if the sea ever missed the water that became the rain. They seemed like they were angry about it as they violently crashed against the sand. Chuuya knew what that felt like.
When he heard the news he had smiled. Dazai was gone, he was free. He had opened a bottle of 1989 Petrus to celebrate the best day of his life and right as he was about to pour himself a glass his smile faltered and he hurled the bottle against the wall. He sunk to the floor from his position beside the counter, and he had cried. What a way to spend the worst night of your life.
Chuuya stared at the moon like it might give him the answer, but it did not speak, and the waves were still far too quiet to silence the storm in his head.