Chapter Text
Chuuya Nakahara was just over twenty years old as of April. He was part of a pretty popular band known as 'Red Wine' consisting of Chuuya as the main singer, Kouyou doing bass, Akutagawa does guitar, Gin on drums, and lastly Kajii playing keyboard. They were a pretty popular band in many countries and cities especially Yokohama; of which the band originated from. The sound of their music was loud, heavy and punk. Rebellious. They were a group of individuals that had known each other in highschool, though, in highschool Chuuya was a member of a less popular band known as 'The flags' but due to fighting because of...various reasons they had disbanded years ago. 'Red wine' had one really popular song that almost everyone had heard it's one of the main reasons they grossed such a rabid and large fan base, the song was called 'Gravity'. A loud song full of riffs from Akutagawa, and loud, slightly raspy singing from Chuuya. Weeks after being released as a single, the song climbed the charts, quickly becoming number two in Japan and in other countries then eventually making it to the number one spot and lingering. Since then every new release from the band was almost always amongst the top twenty songs in Japan let alone Yokohama.
Chuuya was loud, outspoken and fiery. He had a bit of a temper but it wasn't anything the band wasn't already used to. He almost constantly existed in some form of metal punk, either with jackets, shirts, hair, makeup or pants. It was pretty rare to see the guy in a normal, casual outfit. He was pretty consistent on being out doing something either by himself or with his band mates, his favorite local bar hated to see him or his band mates coming because that meant loudness and a ginger passed off of two and maybe a half (on a good day) glasses of wine.
On the other side of the spectrum, Osamu Dazai was nineteen soon to be twenty. He was a genius at music. He could play basically any instrument under the sun, and lyrically? Close to perfect, every word seemed to be poetic and deep. He had a pretty strange vocal range, one line of words could be close to a strong tenor range and the next a almost feminine soprano octave. Dazai had been writing and making songs since he was about fifteen but there were a few from even back when he was fourteen, his songs always consisted of some type of piano and violin amongst other instruments but the intensity ranged, sometimes his vocals were soft, violin slow and piano gentle but other times he was practically yelling his verses, the violin was fast and intense and the piano was urgent and anticipatory, he would often speak Japanese, Chinese, English or sometimes even Russian while singing. He wasn't a very popular artist despite the genius of his songs, he had a few thousand quiet fans out there in the world, those who knew who he was liked his music and those who didn't know him simply did not know about it, he had very few haters but consistently their was one or two people leaving very aggressive and harsh comments and threats.
Dazai was a quiet person, he lived alone in a one bedroom apartment on the outskirts of Yokohama above a coffee shop where he worked (one of the places) because frankly there was no way three thousand consistent listeners were paying the bills. He was understated, he usually just wore either jeans or brown corduroy pants with either a big sweater or a loose long sleeve shirt. He kept to himself most of the time but would still get out there on a good occasion not loudly just a quiet fun.
Chuuya's eyes flutter open as the sun light from the window of his apartment starts to flicker through the cracks in his blinds. He sits up, his ginger hair a whole mess, he looks around until his eyes find his clock. 10:50 AM. WAY later then he had planned to get up due to rehearsals he had for a upcoming concert in Kyoto. He rubs his eyes groggily, a bit disoriented but when he realizes the time he sits up despite his tiredness.
"... Shit...!" He says as he stumbles out of the bed and sways side to side a little bit out of tiredness. Reaches into his drawer randomly, grabbing out a pair of slightly flared jeans and and a dark red button up tee-shirt. He walks into the shower, his phone starting to explode with texts asking where he was (mostly from Kouyou). Chuuya turns the water on and steps into the shower, shivering slightly at the change in temperature. He quickly washes off and changes, throwing his long-ish red hair into a loose ponytail, vaguely brushing his teeth then leaving the bathroom, Stepping over the many things on the floor and he power walks out of his apartment and grabs his keys. He runs down the flights of stairs to the lobby of the complex, dashes out into the parking lot, gets into his car quickly, not bothering to buckle the seatbelt as he simply plugs in the keys and backs out of the parking lot into the busy main road of downtown Yokohama.
The rehearsals were towards the east edge of Yokohama and it was a pretty big city so he drove for about 45 minutes north east (with the help of Google maps). He's still pretty tired due to the abrupt wake up, the lack of sleep from the previous night and the slight hangover from being out drinking with the band in Yokohama for the last night that they're home before they go to Kyoto. He sees a relatively tall building but with a complex system of exterior stairs made of metal grate and a run down look to it, vines growing on the edges and the stairs squeaking and swaying with the wind, something about it catches his attention maybe because he's always lived in a relatively modern area and this is a older looking type of structure, either way he isn't sure. He looks at it for a moment before catching a small slightly tilted, standard sign that reads "Toffee's Coffee". He usually wouldn't chose to the get food at a place that has the look this place does but he's tired and hasn't eaten breakfast so he parks the car in the costumer parking. He takes out his phone and opens his texts seeing all the messages from the band members, mostly Kouyou being worried and Kaiji being mad at Chuuya for delaying his 'lemon death metal sesh.' or something like that.
Ane-san: "Chuuya. Reply. It's been almost an hour since we should have started. This isn't funny."
LEMON HEAD: "CHUUYAAA!! I WANNAAA START ALREADYYYY!! HURRY UGH!!!"
Chuuya sighs and rolls his eyes but can't help the corners of his mouth from tugging up into a small smile at Kouyou's concern and Kaiji's antics. He replies saying that he's stopping to get food and he'll pick them up something as a apology.
Chuuya: "yeah, yeah, I'm fine just hungry, tired, and hungover. I'm picking up food and coffee, I'll get you guys something to repay the favor, dw."
Chuuya types out for a moment then sends, he shuts the phone off then slips it into his pocket. He takes a moment to breath before he opens the car door, gets out and starts walking to the coffee shop.
Dazai's eyes snap open and shoots up with a slight gasp as the alarm on the small side table goes off. 5:30 AM. He hits the alarm turn it off. The metal twin bedframe creaks loudly as he crawls out of bed. He has a massive headache. He sighs as he walks over to the small rack his clothes were hanging on, he looks at it for a second before grabbing a gray long sleeve and a baggy pair of dark blue jeans, he then reaches into the bedside table and grabs. out a roll of bandages.
His apartment was pretty small and baren. It had a small clothing rack, a twin bed with a wooden table next it it, a stove and sink with a cabinet above them and decor wise it had about two posters on the wall, a clock by the bed and in the corner was a small, well loved violin sitting up nicely on a stand.
After he grabbed his clothes, he puts on shower shoes and walks out of his apartment through the outside door, and his head starts to throb at the blinding sun. He grabs the towel that was drying out on the railing and walks down metal exterior stairs walking down a few flights before getting to the communal showers, he gets in one shower and cleans off, changing while in the shower because he wasn't one for getting butt ass naked in front of other people just for a shower especially without being bandaged. He wraps the bandages around his scared forearms then pulls the sleeves back down over them. He towel dries his hair the mirror before exiting the showers that remained mostly empty, say for a few people who also had early morning shifts. He walks back up the metal stairs then once at his door he placed his towel over the rail and his shower shoes in a sun spot to dry the walks back into his apartment. He grabs his round rimed glasses of the table along with a small necklace with a light blue pendent that had looked like it had been worn many, many, many times. He slid the glasses on his face and clasped the necklace around his neck, putting socks and shoes that were a pair of beater black converses on, then walking out the door one last time, grabbing the apron with his name on it. He walks back down the metal stairs to the ground level then enters the coffee shop he works at.
He greets his coworker, Yosano, before getting in the kitchen and making sure the stock is ready and full because their wasn't many customers at this time but still for some reason their boss, Fukazawa, still made them open this early, said it was for "good work ethics" or something like that, it wasn't important, Dazai didn't really care anyway. As orders start coming into the kitchen Dazai made each one and either wrote the person's name on the cup for it to be read aloud by Yosano if the person was picking it up but if they were eating here he bussed it out to their tables. As it got to around 9:00 it started to get really busy because it was the time most people were leaving for work. Dazai started to get a tired between carrying trays to tables, Bring them back, cleaning tables, making the food and drinks, bringing them up to the counter, and cleaning up the floor in the free time. His head was really starting to pound now but when he checked his pockets. He had left the painkillers up in his bedside table.
"Damnit, idiot..." He mutters to himself, referring to himself as he continues making a customers latte in the kitchen. As three new order came in.
'1. Americano - to go
2. Macha milk tea and mocha vanilla iced coffee with two scones and a biscuit - to go
3. Iced latte, chocolate chip cookie, two americanos, iced chai, lemon tea and a toast - eat here'
He reads the screen off and starts the make each order and bring them up to the proper place whether that be counter or table, by this time he was tired from running around so much and his head was pounding. He really couldn't wait to walk back into his apartment, take painkillers, sleep maybe make some music after. He finishes up the first two orders and starts working on the last one which he thought was really a lot of one person so he groans. assuming a large group would show up, be loud and make a mess for him to clean up because that's definitely the type of people who order a americano and a lemon tea in the same order, loud and obnoxious.
Chuuya walks into the 'Toffee's coffee' a bit cautiously. He walks in and and it smelled like fresh cookies and coffee. He comes up to the front were their was a woman, maybe early twenties with short black hair manning the counter. He's waiting in the line, the place wasn't the nicest looking but it was clean and smelled nice. He looks over the menu before deciding on what to get himself and the rest of the band, and after a few minutes, it was his turn to order.
"Hello, what can I get you today?" Yosano asks in the same polite and professional way she had with ever other customer.
"Hi, uh yeah, I'll have a iced latte with a chocolate chip cookie, a plain toast, two americanos, an lemon tea and a iced chai." Chuuya reads off the menu white board to the cashier relatively slowly.
"Will that be all?" Yosano asks with a polite smile that was 100 percent not real.
"Um, yeah, that's all." Chuuya nods, looking down from the white board to Yosano's face
"For here or to go?" She inquires with all the pleasantries that she could probably muster.
Suddenly Chuuya's eye catches on a guy speed walking out from the kitchen and dropping off Two orders the the counter, seemingly in a rush, Chuuya can't help but notice him, his brown hair is wild and all over the place, a little overgrown and fluffy but with a wet spot in the back from not being completely dry yet. But before Chuuya allows himself to stare for to long the boy is already back in the kitchen. So he turns his attention back to Yosano.
"Y-yeah, here, thanks" Chuuya mutters before walking to a table by the window. Hungry for the food but his mind is elsewhere. He briefly thinks back in the boy he saw. It's not that big of a deal, he just seemed quite different from what I'm used to, probably just the area... He thinks to himself as he waits patiently for his order, looking out the window in thought.
Dazai was working on making the long ass order in quiet and reluctance, he really didn't feel like getting bothered by a group of young teens that were probably skipping school right now. He starts to hums the violin melody he's currently working on to himself, working through the little kinks and rough spots as they come. Even if music was a part time activity he always tried to make it a full time job even during his actual full time job. After finishing the order he places everything on a tray, balancing it on one hand before he walks out to the main dinning area and carries it to the table and to his surprise it's not a group. It's just one out of place ginger.
As Dazai walks out the table Chuuya's eyes widen as his gaze catches on him again, now he's able to look at him in more detail, how the glasses on his nose are starting to slip down the slope of his nose, how there's bandages covering his wrists the are just visable beyond the edge of his long sleeves and the wild hair. Dazai's big eyes widen a touch with surprise at seeing that it's just one person, a pretty strange one to him, but still just one person. He's relieved that he doesn't have to deal with the mess later. Dazai leans over the table slightly and sets the tray down then once finished he takes a step back, he had been expecting the usual chaos of a group of teens. Instead, it’s just one guy — small, sharp-looking, and staring at him like he’s trying to figure out a puzzle.
Huh.
"Here ya go." He says leaning back a little after ridding himself of the tray.
Chuuya accepts the tray, and his fingers brush against Dazai's cold fingers just slightly in a brief accidental contact.
Dazai tilts his head slightly, studying him for a second longer than he probably should. His hand quickly retracting subconsciously at the touch in a way it usually wouldn't when a costumer brushes his hand by mistake, hell even on purpose. The ginger looks out of place here, like someone who belongs on a bright LED lit stage in front of a crowd, not in a dingy café that smells like burnt espresso, cheap vanilla syrup and minimum wage.
Weird. Fancy, Rockstar, city boy in a shitty run down coffee shop. Why?
“Yeah. Thanks.” Chuuya mutters back, but not rudely.
Dazai turns away before he can think too much about it, slipping back toward the kitchen. But the image sticks — the red hair, the blue eyes, the way he muttered his order like he wasn’t used to talking to strangers (while sober and in a unfamiliar area), for some odd reason something in his chest twinges and skips for a subtle moment as he thinks about it.
Not that it matters.
He starts humming again, trying to shake the thought and feeling off.
He watches Dazai walk away — not intentionally, it's just… his eyes don’t move fast enough. The guy’s humming something under his breath, something soft and melodic that doesn’t really match the chaos of his appearance.
Chuuya frowns at himself at his own train of thought.
Why am I paying attention to this? Get a grip. I don’t care. I really don’t. He grabs his drink, crossing his arms before forcing himself to uncross them. He takes a sip of his latte, it's pretty good, not anything crazy but still good though, but the taste barely registers in his mouth as he thinks about the the name tag he read on his apron. Osamu Dazai.
"... O-sa-mu Daz-ai...huh" Chuuya mutters quietly to himself, trying out the syllables. They feel foreign but not wrong on his tongue. What am I doing. It's just some guy.
Chuuya eats his toast and drinks his latte quietly. As the rest of the shop bustles with early morning noise. His eyes frequently flicker to Dazai when he runs out of the kitchen to wipe off tables or bring food out, he looks pretty tired, despite that he doesn't seem out of breath.
Dazai continues to make the orders and bring them out, his head pounding like crazy now from the all the running, it's pretty exhausting and painful but it's really nothing he hasn't done before. Still when he walks out to the dining area he glances over to the redhead by the window just out of curiosity. He really doesn't fit in here and he's vaguely familiar to him. Huh, he's kinda strange, I never got his name. Whatever, it's fine.
Chuuya finishes his portion of the food he bought relatively quickly, because as much as this place intrigues him, he's aware he really does have to get to rehearsals, or else he'll probably be god awful and unprepared at the Kyoto concert and that'd be a horrible look on the entire band. So he picks up the bag with the food in it and returns the tray to the counter before exiting the shop. He gets back into the car, and secures the food and drinks before pulling out if the parking lot, looking back on the building one last time before driving away to the rehearsal location.
Dazai makes the orders Back in the kitchen and by the next time he comes out into the main area again the small ginger had already left and he feels a twinge of disappointment? in his chest. Dazai sighs and grabs the rag, then walks over to the table and wipes it down, but he couldn't help but think about the guy while doing it for some odd reason. After he finishes wiping down the table he renters the kitchen area and continues to work. Now that the morning rush was over he was able to slow down by a little. Be looks over to the clock that barely still hanging on the door. 12:10 pm. A few more hours before his shift is over. So he looks back to his work and starts humming again.
Chuuya had arrived at the warehouse, and given out the lemon tea to Kajii, the iced chai to Kouyou (who lectured him on punctuality), and the americanos and cookies to Gin and Akutagawa who claimed 'cookies are for children, I could never eat such a childish thing.' then proceeded to eat the cookie in maybe 15 seconds, tops. They had long since started rehearsing, lines, lyrics and instruments. It was now 7:45 pm, they stopped for a few breaks here and there but played pretty much the whole time for the most part.
Chuuya sings the well known 'gravity' lyrics into the mic as Akutagawa gives the riffs, Kouyou plays the complex bass notes, gin does her drum solo and unfortunately for Kajii he plays the keyboard melody but he hates this song because he has the simplest, least metal instrument part by a long shot. They reach the chorus and everything becomes more intense as the most famous part of the song is being sung loudly by Chuuya.
"Twist my veins and shake the ground,
I’m tired of being silent while the world keeps spinning out.
If pressure makes a monster out of me,
Then let the whole damn city feel my gravity."
Chuuya yells the lyrics in the usual way he does and the group play the instrumentals around them in a synchrony that can only be obtained by years of practice, time together and trust all put together in a symphony of complex notes, and verses. The song starts to slow down, he words becoming quieter and quieter and the instrumentals turning calmer as the bridge leads to the last few verses then fades to silence. The warehouse is completely quiet for a few moments until all the band members start laughing loudly despite the seriousness of the song, even the famously usually stone cold Akutagawa creaks a smile and laughs. They all laugh with each other and talk even as they pack up their instruments to end the night.
"Chuuyyyaaa! Why'd you have to write my parts in such a lame way?!!" Kaiji says to chuuya loudly but despite that he's smiling.
"Oh come on you get a whole song of basically just keyboard!" Chuuya says back, smirking similarly to Kaiji.
Gin and Akutagawa both go to exit the warehouse with slightly rare smiles as they give their goodbyes for the night
"Bye! See you tomorrow." Gin calls out to the group.
"Correct, see you later." Akutagawa adds, like Gin but a touch more controlled.
"Heh! Right bye!" Kaiji says as he gives a big goodbye wave, as he also walks out the door with his keyboard slung over his shoulder in a fabric case.
"See ya in Kyoto, emos and lemon Head!" Chuuya yells back, as he drinks some water to refresh his vocal cords after all the laughing and singing.
"Bye, children and Kaiji. Get home safe" Kouyou waves them off, with a slight smile, calling Gin and Akutagawa children to refer to they way, they're a couple years younger then the rest of them.
Now that the three had left it just leaves Kouyou and Chuuya together in the warehouse. Still smiling slightly despite the laughter dying down. Chuuya's mind suddenly goes back to Dazai and the coffee shop earlier and his smile stays but becomes a bit smaller and different from before. seriously I have to stop thinking about that already.
"What's that face for, Chuuya?" Kouyou asks, teasingly as she walks towards him.
Chuuya blinks slightly at being caught, and he smiles slightly sheepishly at getting caught.
"I saw this guy, at the coffee shop earlier, he intrigued me." Chuuya explains half exasperated at the teasing.
"Hmm, sure." She replies teasingly with a knowing smile as she holds her bass guitar in her hand and walks towards the exit. "Well anyways see you tomorrow, break a leg, not literally this time." Kouyou adds jokingly, referring to the time Chuuya dislocated his ankle on stage, as she exited the warehouse.
Chuuya rolled his eyes at her teasing but couldn't help the smile and the small flustered feeling in his chest.
"Hey! I'm not lying, Ane-san!" He yells back, disgruntled, but still with smile. "Whatever, see ya, and haha, very funny" he goodbyes to here, and snaps back to the break a leg joke which he was not amused by.
The warehouse goes completely silent and Chuuya cleans up all of the remaining things left out, and exits the warehouse, holding his mic packed up into a bag. Once in the parking lot he gets in the car and drives home with peaceful expressions on his face.
He goes to bed right after packing for the trip to Kyoto. He sleeps peacefully that night.
(last part for this chapter, I swear)
Dazai finished his shift many hours ago, the time now being 12: 30 am. He was finally able to take painkillers and take a five hour nap after collapsing on the bed pretty much immediately after he got down with work, and is now sitting alone on his bed, cross legged, in his apartment with his violin in one hand and his bow in the other, He plays a fast paced but soft song on it and records it into the composing program on his junk computer. He places his violin gently back into it's stand then adjusts the volume of the audio clip and removes the background noises then picks up a specific one of the many papers scattered over the floor just by his bed. He reads through it to make sure it's right, and drinks water to prepare his voice. He clicks record with the stoke of a key. He begins to sing pretty heavy lyrics in a soft and quiet voice.
"There’s a long field, it's quiet but when I'm there I feel charity
Everything spiraling and rotten will disappeared from within me.
If I die tonight, let it be calm and lonely,
A silent fall through memories I'll leave behind, I'll be forgotten at last
To leave it all behind.
For my last wish is freefall, that's when I'll finally live.
I have not lived and I don't fear to die" Dazai sings softly slightly trembling to a degree.
Once he's done he stops the recording, reduced background noise and begins to replay the finished parts to himself. He doesn't like it. He let's put a frustrated and tired sigh like groan before shutting the computer out of frustration and flopping down onto the bed with a quiet 'hmph' of air being ejected from his lungs. He stares blankly at the ceiling for a few long moments. Before he can really think about it, his eyes drift shut, but behind his eyelids is a image of the redhead in the coffee shop. It's stupid to be thinking about it still. He felt weird every time he thought about him. He turned over and buried his face into the pillow with a quiet groan. He was really just a costumer I found interesting because he stood out.
"Stupid..." He muttered to himself quietly. As he shifted under his blankets repeatedly.
After a long thirty minutes he finally managed to slip off into sleep with the moonlight flooding in from the slightly cracked open window, the only sounds in the room being the sounds of cars and wind from outside.