Tom Odell
Some lyrics have been changed
—-
Dazai POV
When I opened my eyes, I didn't automatically know where I was, but I knew that I felt warm. That for whatever reason, I felt safe. And I hadn't truly felt safe in years. I sent a furtive glance around the room that I was in, taking in any information that I could before sitting up and making it know to the body moving around in the adjoining room on the other side of the couch that I was awake. It didn't take me long at all to know where I was, even though the place had changed some since the last time that I had been here, I still recognized the art of the walls and the books lining the shelves. I still remembered everything that was left.
Sitting up, a blanket that I hadn't even realized was there in the first place fell off of my shoulders and pooled on my lap, the soft texture brushing against the bare skin on my hands and drawing attention to the missing coat, though one quick glance at the coat hanger by the door settled that mystery easily enough.
"I would've thought that you would have freaked out by now," a familiar voice says, the words almost drowned out by the smell that accompanied them as the owner of the voice walked up behind the couch and passed me one of the cups of coffee in their hands. "You always tend to do that when you wake up somewhere that you don't recognize."
I took the mug gratefully between my hands, hoping that it would burn away some of the lasting chill in my bones. "I had no reason to," I told the older man simply. "After all, this was once my home too."
I waited for Chuuya to get angry at my words or at the very least try to take back the mug that he had given me, but he doesn't and for some reason that hurts more than it would have if he just had. Chuuya and I, we didn't do this. We don't walk around on eggshells around one another as if the wrong word would break the other. We were loud and abrasive and said what was on our mind when we wanted the other to know it. But I wasn't really in the place to argue any of this. After all, I was the one to leave.
"Just stay out of the kitchen," the older man ordered while walking away, "I actually like it the way that it is and don't want you burning it down... again."
A small smirk curved on my lips as I immediately sprung to my feet and did the exact opposite of what the other ability user told me to, coming up on his side and following the shorter male in. "I will have you know that I am a great cook, Chibi," I insisted in a playful tone that neither of us believed but both let it stay because it was easier than the alternative silence.
"Huh?! Since when, you bandage wasting machine?" The man asked. He had his arms crossed angrily over his chest while looking up at me with a defiant gaze that seemed to be begging me to try and prove the other man wrong just so I would fail and he would be right.
I shrugged and pushed ahead of the man, going to the fridge and cupboards so that I could see exactly what he had that I could work with. When we were younger, I never did learn to cook for myself. Back then I typically just ate canned foods and things that didn't perish easily. You couldn't exactly make a full meal in a shipping container. After moving in with the slug, he let me try cooking only about once or twice. After those two disastrous attempts, the most that I was allowed to do was warm bread in the oven.
"I learned after leaving," I told the executive in lieu of a proper explanation. When I turned around to look at the small ginger, I could tell that he was still doubtful and disbelieving of my abilities. A healthy dose of skepticism would be the best explanation I suppose. "Just give it a try, won't you."
The other adult grumbled something under his breath that sounded vaguely like an interrupted string of curses, but I could see the tiredness dulling the blue of his eyes. I knew it as well as I knew the bags under my own eyes. "Fine," the slug decided at last. "But if I so much as smell something burning, I am dumping water on it and then on you and throwing you out," he declared before abandoning me and going into the living room. I knew that he was just saying that, but I would be lying if I said that I wasn't planning on taking extra care in the kitchen.
I watched for a moment as he stomped over to one of the bookshelves on the wall and stared at the books there. He didn't have his gloves on, he never did when we were here. He only wore them as a way to stay in control, but sometimes it was okay to give up that control somewhere that you felt that you could. He fingers glided over the spines of all of the books there before stopping on a well loved copy of the Sherlock Holmes stories. I tired not to read too much into the choice as I watched the other wrap the blanket that he had strewn across me before, around himself and sit down on his half of the couch with his back to me.
Tearing my eyes away from the lone figure, I busied myself with the task at hand. Cracking open eggs and whisking them together in a bowl, spraying the Pam that they would cook in and putting it on the burner to warm up before cooking the eggs. The older man had a small array of jams that I pulled out after putting a few slices of bread into the toaster oven. There was a small amount of fruit in the fridge, but it was enough for today. After cutting up an apple or two into small square, I put the bites into a bowl with a small assortment of berries that I found as well and got to work on the eggs.
The smell of food drew the mafioso off of the couch not much later as I started to set the small table at the edge of the kitchen area of the house. He didn't say anything as he walked over, taking the seat in front of mine with a curious gaze before serving himself a portion of each. I knew that it wasn't anything close to what he would normally eat as there wasn't a single grain of rice or piece of fish in sight, but sometimes it was nice to do things a little abnormally... like this whole morning has been thus far. I watched as he tentatively took an experimental bite before deciding that it was edible and starting in with earnest.
We ate in silence for a long time before it became too much for me. There was hardly a quiet moment at the Agency, with or without me being the one to initiate the chaos that ensues, and silence just didn't fit the pair of us. For the first time in close to two weeks, I was able to sleep without nightmares plaguing my dreams, but now that I truly wanted to speak the only other person in the room might as well have taken a vow of silence since I saw him last.
"Why did you bring me here?" I asked, purposefully catching the other man between bites so that he would have no excuse to not answer. "Why were you even in the cemetery at all?"
As soon as I asked the question, my brain supplied me with my own answers to them, but none of the rung as the truth even if they very well were. I needed to hear them from
The adult sent me a scathing look as he put his fork full of eggs back onto the plate with a natural grace that I've always adored. "I knew what day yesterday was," the other explained, his voice unnaturally soft. "I knew what it meant to you... what he meant to you. And I knew that you would be taking shit care of yourself if left to your own devices."
I sucked in a small gasp of air, but it was quite enough that the other ability user couldn't hear. In all of the theories that I had made up in my head, him doing this because of some lingering sense of needing to care for me was high on the list, but never did I expect for him to say it as bluntly as he just had.
"Aww, Chibi does care then!" I cooed, trying to lighten the tension that has been a physical weight sense the moment I opened my eyes.
"Shut up you bandage freak!" The other male exclaimed, pointing his fork at me in what I was sure was supposed to be a threatening manner, but the sentiment was dulled by the small clump of scrambled egg still on it. "I already told you that I would be the one to kill you, slimly bastard."
The other's checks were flushed and I couldn't stop the small laugh that escaped my lips, ringing through the air like a foreign melody that I had forgotten could be composed. It had been years since I laughed like this, something small but true, not the boisterous thing that I let out at the Agency so that the others don't catch on that I'm wrong , that I'm something other than them. Something that can't even be classified as human on the best of days.
"That Agency of yours has made you soft," Chuuya chided, but I could see the small smile that he was trying to force away even as he ducked his head to hide.
"That won't matter for much longer, I suppose," I muttered, but I could tell from the small jerk that the other male made that he heard it.
I stood up before the he could say anything and stacked the plates and bowls together, bringing them deeper into the kitchen and placing them down into the sink to be rinsed off before going into the dishwasher. Chuuya appeared at my side only moments later, opening the kitchen appliance and waiting expectantly for me to pass him the first dish so that he could put it where he liked. It was a familiar routine for us and for a moment I was able to forget when we were and pretend that it was four years ago before everything went to hell.
"Dazai," Chuuya started, his voice so I see and quite that I almost thought that I had just imagined it all together. I hummed lightly, letting the other know that he had my attention. "Stay here."
The dish in my hands slipped away into the small pool of dishwater that had formed in the sink. "What?" I breathed. "Why-?"
The mafioso huffed in an annoyed manner as if the reasoning was obvious and I was just being dense on purpose, something that might normally be true but wasn't this time. "It's obvious that your getting worse," the other explained, still not looking at me, "anyone with working eyes can tell that just by taking one look at you. So either those Agency brats just haven't noticed or they don't know how to deal with you and your... problems. Either way, if you continue on how you are now, you won't live long."
That was kinda the point.
I thought about just turning the other man's proposal down outright and leaving before the sting of my own actions had time to set in, but my feet felt glued to the ground and my mouth sown shut at the thought. The truth was, no matter how much I dint want to know it or ever speak it, I missed the small red head before me. The only reason that I was able to leave here that day was because he was out of the city on business, even then it was still one of the hardest things that he had to do. So in the end I agree, even if I don't think that it will make that much of a difference in the end.
When we were done packing the dishes away, Chuuya and I walked into the bedroom and it felt a bit like steeping back in time. The sheets were the same dark blue that we had chosen after arguing over weather to go with white or green and decided on a third color in the end so that neither one of us would necessarily 'win'. There was the same art on the walls, city scapes of Yokohama, Tokyo, and all of the other cities we had traveled to together. The only things that were different was that pictures of us were long gone and the other man's stuff had spread out to where mine had once been.
I watched from the doorway as Chuuya walked over to his dresser and pulled out one of the middle drawers, dumping the contents of it down onto the bed before putting it back in. The clothes that he'd dumped in a small pile were some old street clothes that still fit the older man, but didn't exactly match the style that he's been wearing for the past seven or so years. They were the throw away clothes that he had bought to wear no missions when we knew that using corruption was a more likely thing to happen than not. Whenever he used that facet of his powers, it was easier to wear clothes that he didn't care about since they would undoubtedly be destroyed before the end of the night.
Walking into the room, I was planning on planting myself in front of the book shelf as the other man folded and hung the clothes in his closet and other drawers, but something on the way caught my attention first.
"I always hated this thing, you know," I spoke out beofre I could think better of it. I was standing to the side of the dresser as Chuuya was putting away a pair of jeans inside of it. He shot me a dirty look as I picked up the hat that the man always wore wherever he went, holding it as if I was holding a ticking time bomb.
"It's not even that bad of a fashion choice, you asshole," he growled, standing up to try and take it from me, but I had already put the accessory back down where I'd found it, so he was just grasping at air.
"It's not because it's ugly," I tell the other, finishing my walk to the small bookshelf on the far wall, "which it still is," I added quickly before he begun to think that I thought that it somehow wasn't. "I've always hated it because it's the last requirement for corruption," I tell him honestly. I figured that the least that I could do was be honest with him, especially if everything still goes the way that I thought it might, even if it's only a little delayed.
Chuuya had his chant thing that he has to say to activate corruption, but it's all useless words without the ability embedded inside of the stupid hat of his. If the thing weren't I just burn, I wouldn't have to worry about the other being able to activate a part of his ability that will kill him if I can't reach him in time, because I know that one day Mori will send him out on a mission that will require it and I won't there to help. It's just the kind of person that he his and because of Chuuya's loyalty, he'll let him.
Chuuya accepts the answer, but chooses not to comment on it as if by doing so he could pretend that I never spoke at all, for all I know maybe he could.
—-
Chuuya POV
Once everything was away, I stole a glance at the curled up figure sitting down in front of the bookcase with three books stacked up next to his legs and a fourth in the younger adult's hands. In public it was rare to see the man with any book other than his suicide manual, something that he had left behind when he ran and I had hidden away under the floorboards so that I wouldn't have to see it. The book had plenty of pictures to keep it company down there.
Whenever we were at the office, the boss always had him reading books on strategy and such when he found that Dazai had carved out even a moment of free time through all of the endless bouts of paperwork shoved onto us both back then. The only time that he ever read something for anything close to pleasure was when we were here. I would find him just like that in the mornings when sleep didn't come easy to the other, which was to say most.
"Why don't you go get a shower," I suggested. "Leave the clothes outside of the door and I'll wash them while your in there."
The other man only nodded and closed his book swiftly after glancing down at what I assumed to be the page number. He walked away with a solemn expression that I felt mirrored on my own face.
For him, yesterday was the day that his best friend, the man that understood him and the darkness in his eyes in someway that I could never hope to without becoming like the two of them, had died. The day that he lost him. I don't know if they spoke before Oda died, if Dazai had been there, or if he had just run after he heard the news, but I know that he left because of that day.
For me, yesterday was nothing to me. It was today that hurt. This day four years ago I came back from a mission to an empty home without so much as a note left to fill the void that the other had created. The only farewell that I got was a bomb under my car and a bitterness that lingered for years that was only slightly dampened by the dead apple incident that had a happened not long before. And thirteen days from now will be the day that Mori officially marked Dazai as a traitor all those years ago.
The door clicked shut while memories twisted around in my mind, drawing me out of them. As I grabbed the pile of clothes left outside of the bathroom door and threw them in the wash, I couldn't help but wonder if the other ability user had even thought of me at all in the tears after he left. The hopeful part of me wanted to say yes, but the rational part of me said no. I wanted to be angrier with him than I was for that thought, but I couldn't. When I left the Sheep, though not of my free will as Dazai had, I'd forced any thought of them from my mind, it was the only way that I was able to survive the first few months in the Port Mafia.
I knew that I was setting myself up for another bitter goodbye, that I would never be enough to keep the other man, but that didn't stop me from doing what I have done.
—-
Dazai POV
When I step out of the shower sometime later, I wrap the towel around my waist and avoid looking at the mirror as if it was the plague. The time that it took me in there was enough for me to know that my clothes still weren't dry, so instead I went in search of some bandages, hoping that even one roll would be left. Chuuya must have heard me banging around in the bathroom because he knocked on the door not much later. After a slight moment of hesitation I pulled on the handle and cracked the door open, leaving it up to him to decide whether to come in or not.
The door opened the rest of the way only a second or two later as Chuuya slipped inside of the room. He didn't look at me as he crouched down in front of the sink and opened the cabinet there, reaching behind all of the things there for something in the very, very back. When he pulled back, there were three small rolls of bandages in his hand. It wasn't the amount that I usually used, but it was enough to cover what might been seen otherwise.
I grabbed the rolls as Chuuya made a turn to leave. Twisting my head, I forced out all of the thoughts saying that this was a bad idea and called out, "Chuuya." The man turned to look at me, keeping his eyes carefully trained on mine. "Could you...?" I held the bandages up in a silent question and watched as understanding flashed across the other's face. He nodded and stepped closer.
Sitting down on the edge of the bath, I let Chuuya sit down on the toilet lid and handed the bandages back to him, watching as he skillfully unrolled them with practiced hands. He was someone that knew the scars on my skin almost as well as I did. Closing my eyes, I let the other man get to work, firmly wrapping the bandages around my skin once more in a way that I could still move easily. I felt his fingers glide across the newly raised lines marring my skin with a touch as light as a spirit's. It felt caring in a curious way as I knew that he was taking in the new, angry red lines there, but he didn't say a thing and for that I was grateful.
With both arms covered, the mafioso moved onto my neck, swiftly covering it and taking care to not trap my hair inside of the folds. His eyes were soft with some emotion that I couldn't place when I opened my own to look at him, but the look was quickly dulled as the timer on the dyer sounded from the next room. Chuuya was up and out of the door before I could say a thing.
He came back with clothes in his arms and dissapeared just as fast as he'd come, letting me get dressed on my own. I slipped into the clothes, relishing in the warmth of them before picking up the small bolo tie from the counter, looking down at the blue stone that decorated it. The stone was the same color as Chuuya's eyes, not that the man in question seemed to have noticed this.
We carried on quietly with our day, staying in one another's orbit but never actually saying much. We both found our way to the couch thst I had woken up earlier as Chuuya took his side and the coffee table in front of it and i curled up on mine reading through the book that I had grabbed before.
The calm lasted well into the afternoon until the other man's stomach grumbled, but he knew as well as I did that there wasn't really anything here.
"Why don't you go get some groceries while I go back to the Agency apartments and grab some clothes?" I suggested. The other man nodded and we went about our errands.
It was dark by the time that we both got back to the house and the night was quite, but the kitchen was warm with food cooking on the stove and the whole day was enough that only darkness consumed my dreams.
—-
When I woke up mid morning the next day, Chuuya was still asleep in his room after staying up late doing the paperwork that he'd been assigned for recent missions and such. I didn't try to look at it or read any of the work and because of that he was able to stay in the living room and keep me company while doing all of it. I decided to make crepes in the kitchen, setting one or two sweet ones aside to give Kyoka later at lunch when I go to see her and Atsushi in the park, but making the rest savory for a morning meal.
The smell of food drew the sleeping mafia member like a moth to the flame, slapping the mafioso's hand light when he tired to grab one of the sweet ones.
"What the hell was that for?" Chuuya exclaimed, holding his hand against his chest as if the slap had burned though we both know that it had been little more than a tap and he had hit me much harder in the past for similar offenses.
"Those aren't for you, Chibi," I told the other man simply, handing over the plate that I had made that was for him which he took while still remaining to look grouchy.
"Then who are they for?"
"Kyoka," I told him simply, watching the surprise wash across the older man's face. "The girl loves sweets and I'm having lunch with her and Atsushi today, so I figured that I would save the boy some money."
Chuuya nodded while looking down at the crepe on his plate. "How is she, Kyoka?" He asked. "Kouyou... she worries sometimes."
"She's doing good," I told him truthfully. "The light suits her."
Chuuya looked up at me with that same soft gaze that I still didn't understand and nodded lightly.
The other ability user ate at the counter as I made sandwich's for me and the other detectives. Eventually we started talking and he asked me about my time France after assuming that I had gone there. I told him about my trip to the Louvre and all of the art that I had seen and the Egyptian exhibit that was on the lower floors. We talked quietly with one another until it was time for me to leave
—-
Atsushi POV
Kyoka and I walked to walked to the park after knocking on Dazai's door a few times and not getting an answer from the man.
"I'm sure he's already there," Kyoka reassured, already beyond tired of my nervous fidgeting that I've apparently been doing since we left the apartment building.
"But even if he is, what didn't he wait for us?" I asked, voicing the same question that has been bothering me since he didn't open his door after the third try.
The former assassin just shrugged. "He's a strange man."
When we arrived at the park, there were small children running around, some even old enough to be around Kyoka's age, not that she acted like any of them. It had been cold for weeks now, but today was a pleasant chill that only required a light jacket if you didn't naturally run a bit warm. On the far side of the park there was a small trail of trees that, while barren now, will have pretty cherry blossoms on them during the spring. Leaning against those trees was a tall man in a tan coat waving the pair of us over.
"Hey Dazai," I greeted, looking down at the array of European style sandwiches and sweets that the other had brought.
"Atsushi, Kyoka," he called back.
The former assassin's eyes fell on two French sweets that were presented prettily on a plate before looking up at Dazai with sparking eyes. The small nod from the older detective was all it took for her to sit down and sweep them up, thus starting lunch.
The picnic passed nicely with the three of talking amicably as I told Dazai about a mission that Kyoka and I had done the other day and the other man seemed more himself then he had in two weeks now.
It felt nice, like something set right.
—-
Ango, I'm not promising anything, but for now at least the plan of mine has been delayed. I'll call you before it comes back into like you and I both know that it will.
—-
3rd person/ switching POV
Dazai felt a sense of remorse as the weekend came to a close and Monday reared it's ugly head once more, but he knew that as soon as he was done with work, he could go back to the apartment and another lazy afternoon of reading and feeling warm.
Those that knew the situation from Friday watched as Dazai walked into the Agency with the old smile that they were all used to plastered onto his face, and while most of them took this as a sign that he was back to normal and they would now know how to better react this time next year when this happens once more, Ranpo wasn't so quick to jump to that conclusion.
He could still remember the lyrics ringing in his ears, both those that were said and sung by the other detective only a few days before at the cemetery, he knew that damage like that didn't just disappear with a couple days, but was only masked by the appearance of something lighter.
Ranpo watched while eating his way through a bag of chips as Atsushi bounded his way over to his mentor's desk and the two talked, but he could see the strain still present in the other man's smile and the distant look in his eyes, like he wasn't entirely here.
Lunch came soon enough and they all watched as he chose to stay behind once more.
Yosano chose to stay behind as the small four man group left to office, not saying a thing to the others and just waving them to go on. She had seen the look too after some time. She had seen just how different that it was from the haunted look that have been controlling the detective for weeks now and she wanted to know if this was an improvement of sorts or just Dazai taking the weekend to become better at masking everything than he already was.
"I wanna take you somewhere so you know I care
But it's so cold and I don't know where
And I'd bring you daffodils in a pretty string
But they won't flower like they did that spring"
Yosano listened to the voice singing out and thought that it had a sorrowful tone to it that was different than the desperation that she had almost grown used to over the past few songs that she had heard. To her, this sounded almost regretful more than anything else.
"And I wanna kiss you, make you feel alright
I'm just so tired to share my nights
I wanna cry and I wanna love
But all my tears have been used up"
Yosano felt her eyes go wide at the words coming out of the young detective's mouth. In the two years now that she had known the man, never has he seriously talked about being in a relationship before. It was always just him flirting with any pretty girl that he came across that he found mildly attractive and knew that he wouldn't have to spend to much time around after and then asking them to die with him. But he's never talked about anyone in a way that suggested that he might actually want to love them. Even more than just that, she had never seen the detective cry before. She privately had wondered if he was incapable of doing so altogether.
"On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up
On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up
On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up, up"
Dazai remembered running as fast as he could to an abandoned mansion already heavily ridden with bullets by the time that he got there, hearing the loud crack of gunfire dancing in the wind, the thumping of two bodies hitting the ground, one right after the other, as he tried not to trip over bullet shells and casings. He remembered how wrong the man on the ground's pale skin had looked, how foreign it had been. How he had wished for one more calm smile that he had grown to love, but all he got was a promise and the lingering scent of smoke. He didn't cry then, but he had known that he had just lost another that he loved, even if not in the same way that he felt for a certain red haired teen at the time.
"And if somebody hurts you, I wanna fight
But my hand's been broken one too many times
So I'll use my voice, I'll be so fucking rude
Words, they always win, but I know I'll lose"
Dazai did know that he would lose. He lost everything that he has ever loved the moment that he obtains it. He knew that it would be the same with Chuuya, one way or another he was bound to lose him in too, but he knew that this time, he wouldn't be getting the other back as even a shadow of what he had before.
"And I'd sing a song that'd be just ours
But I sang 'em all to another heart
And I wanna cry, I wanna learn to love
But all my tears have been used up"
Dazai did want to learn to love. He knew that he was strange, that he had never felt anything close to parental love until Odasaku and Ango. And he knew that what he had with Chuuya back then, while pure as it had been, was premature. It was the pair of them stubbornly stumbling through emotions and hoping that what they were doing was right. They each hurt one another in ways that they shouldn't have. But now that they were older...now that they were older Dazai wanted to see if they could learn to love in a way that they were supposed to.
"On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up
On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up
On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up, up
"Oh, need a love, now
My heart is thinking of
"I wanna sing a song that'd be just ours
But I sang 'em all to another heart
And I wanna cry, I wanna fall in love
But all my tears have been used up
"On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up
On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up
On another love, another love
All my tears have been used up, up"
Yosano left quietly, for the first time since she started this little escapade, feeling as if she had heard something that she didn't think she had a right to, but she was glad that she had. She knew then, even if Dazai himself truly didn't, that he was finally moving on and starting to heal from all of the damage done the way that he should've years before.
A/N: So I have already planned out the rest of this book, songs and all, and will no longer be taking suggestions. Sorry if you had any that you thought of but hadn't given yet.