hi!! i love your writing and i would like to suggest something.
Can you please write about sevika x reader buf sevika shuts down during arguments. During a bad argument, sevika walks out and goes to the last drop. When she comes home, she is drunk and all soft for reader, expressing how sorry she is and how she loves reader.
thank you!! 🤍🤍
Hi!! Thank you so much!! I looove writing super soft Sevika! 🩷🫶🏻🌷✨
Wife!Sevika x Reader - Drunk On Love
Summary: After a bad argument, Sevika comes home drunk and determined to remind you just how much she loves you.
Arguments with Sevika were rare.
Not because the two of you never disagreed.
You were both stubborn enough that disagreements happened all the time.
The difference was that most of them never turned into real fights.
Most of the time, one of you would crack a joke. Or Sevika would pull you into her lap until neither of you could remember what you were annoyed about in the first place.
Tonight was different.
The argument had started small.
Something insignificant.
Something that should have stayed insignificant.
Instead, frustration piled onto frustration until the two of you were standing in the middle of the living room, voices raised and tempers frayed.
You couldn’t even remember who had started it.
Only that neither of you seemed willing to back down.
“You always do this!” you snapped.
Sevika’s jaw clenched.
“I do what?”
“You shut down.”
Her shoulders immediately went rigid.
The look on her face made your stomach sink.
Because you’d hit the exact thing she hated talking about.
“When things get difficult, you just stop talking to me.”
Sevika looked away.
“You think I don’t notice?”
“I don’t know what you want me to say.”
“Anything.”
The silence that followed felt deafening.
You watched her retreat into herself right in front of you.
Her expression closed off.
Walls snapping into place.
The same walls she’d spent years building before she’d ever met you.
“Sevika-“
“No.”
She grabbed her jacket.
Your heart dropped.
“Baby, don’t. Please.”
“I’m going out.”
“Seriously?”
“I need space.”
The words landed like a punch.
Before you could say anything else, she was already heading for the door.
The apartment rattled from how hard it shut behind her.
And then she was gone.
-
The silence afterward was awful.
You tried reading.
You couldn’t focus.
You tried watching television.
You couldn’t follow the plot.
Eventually you ended up curled on the couch, staring at absolutely nothing while your thoughts ran in circles.
The anger had disappeared hours ago.
Now all that remained was the ache.
The empty space beside you.
The memory of the look on Sevika’s face before she’d left.
You knew she didn’t walk away because she didn’t care.
If anything, it was the opposite.
Sevika cared so much that sometimes emotions overwhelmed her completely.
She never knew what to do with them.
So she ran.
Not from you.
From the feeling itself.
Still.
It hurt.
The clock ticked past midnight.
Then one.
Then nearly two.
You were half asleep when you finally heard the front door unlock.
Your head immediately lifted.
The door opened.
And there stood Sevika.
One look at her and your eyebrows shot up.
“Oh.”
Sevika blinked.
Then smiled.
A slow, slightly crooked smile.
“Hi, sweetheart.”
She was drunk.
Clearly so, in the way her usual control had softened at the edges and her movements carried a looser, unfocused ease.
The kind of drunk that made her usually guarded expression melt into something gentle and affectionate.
The kind that made her look at you like you personally hung every star in the sky.
You stared.
She stared back.
Then her face crumpled slightly.
“Oh no.”
“What?”
Her eyes immediately turned guilty.
“You look sad.”
Your irritation returned for approximately three seconds.
“You disappeared for hours.”
“Oh.”
She looked genuinely devastated by this information.
“Right.”
You folded your arms.
Sevika kicked off her boots.
Then walked directly toward you.
Not with her usual confidence.
A little unsteady.
A little sleepy.
But very determined.
Before you could stop her, she dropped onto her knees in front of the couch.
“Sevika.”
She wrapped both arms around your waist.
Immediately.
Like she physically needed to.
“Hi.”
Your expression cracked despite yourself.
“Hi.”
Her cheek pressed against your stomach.
Warm.
Comforting.
Familiar.
For several seconds she didn’t say anything.
Just held you.
Then she mumbled,
“I missed you.”
Your chest tightened.
“Sevika…”
“I’m sorry.”
The words came out instantly.
She didn’t hesitate or pull away. Nothing guarded her words or her expression. Just raw honesty, unfiltered and open.
She squeezed you tighter.
“So sorry, baby.”
You looked down at her.
Her eyes were glassy.
From the alcohol or tears, you couldn’t tell.
But the emotion underneath was completely real and unmistakable.
“I shouldn’t have left like that.”
You softened.
Sevika buried her face against you.
“I hate fighting with you.”
Her voice came out muffled.
“You know that?”
You threaded your fingers through her hair.
Immediately, she leaned into the touch.
Like a cat finding sunlight.
“I know.”
“No, babe.”
She looked up.
“I really hate it.”
Something vulnerable flickered across her face.
“I spend the whole time feeling sick.”
Her gaze dropped.
“Because you’re the person I love most, darling… I hate knowing I’ve hurt you.”
Your heart squeezed.
Sevika rarely admitted things like this.
Rarely let anyone see beneath the armour.
But right now there wasn’t a single wall left standing.
Just your wife.
Looking at you with complete adoration.
“I don’t like when you’re upset with me.”
You smiled sadly, pushing her unkempt hair back from her face.
“I wasn’t exactly thrilled with you either.”
“Fair.”
The word came out immediately.
Then she frowned.
“You were right, though.”
You blinked.
“What?”
“I shut down.”
The confession sounded difficult even now.
“I know I do.”
Her thumb brushed absent-mindedly against your side.
“When I get overwhelmed, I don’t know what to say.”
She looked down.
“I always think if I talk I’ll make it worse.”
The guilt in her voice made your chest ache.
“So I stop talking.”
A pause.
“Which somehow also makes it worse.”
You huffed out a laugh.
“Yeah. It does.”
“Thought so.”
You ran your fingers through her hair again.
Slowly.
Watching her eyes practically close from the affection.
The sight was ridiculous.
The terrifying woman everyone feared in Zaun completely melting because her wife was playing with her hair.
“You know,” you said softly, “you can tell me when you’re overwhelmed.”
Sevika nodded immediately.
“I know.”
“Instead of disappearing.”
“Yeah.”
“Instead of making me worry.”
She nodded.
A pause followed.
Then:
“Can you keep doing that?”
She instinctively leaned into your touch, her eyes drifting half-shut as your fingers threaded gently through her hair.
“Even while I’m being scolded?”
You laughed.
Actually laughed.
And the relief on Sevika’s face was immediate.
Like she’d been waiting all night to hear it.
“That’s my baby girl.”
“Yeah I am,” Sevika mumbles confidently.
You laughed harder, unable to hide how adorable she looked right now.
Sevika tiled her head in confusion.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
She narrowed her eyes suspiciously.
Then climbed onto the couch beside you.
The second she sat down, she pulled you directly into her lap.
No discussion.
No warning.
Just scooped you up like you belonged there.
Which, admittedly, you did.
Her arms wrapped around your waist.
Her chin settled on your shoulder.
“You know I love you, right?”
The question came quietly.
Almost hesitant.
You turned your head slightly.
“Of course I do.”
Sevika shook her head.
“No.”
She pressed a kiss against your cheek.
“Like.”
Kiss.
“Really.”
Kiss.
“Really.”
Kiss.
“Love you.”
You couldn’t stop smiling.
“You’re drunk.”
“I’m correct.”
Her arms tightened.
“You are my favourite person.”
A kiss against your temple.
“My favourite place.”
Another against your jaw.
“My favourite everything.”
Your face grew warm.
“Everything?”
“Everything.”
She sounded deeply offended you’d even question it.
“I’d pick you every time.”
Your chest felt impossibly full.
Sevika tucked her face into your neck.
Holding you so carefully.
Like you were something precious.
Irreplaceable.
“I don’t say it enough.”
You felt her breathe out against your skin.
“But I love being married to you.”
The confession settled softly between you.
“I love waking up next to you.”
A kiss.
“I love hearing you talk.”
Another.
“I love when you steal my shirts.”
Another.
“I love when you fall asleep on me.”
You laughed.
“I do that constantly.”
“I know.”
She sounded delighted.
“It’s great.”
You turned in her arms enough to cup her cheek.
Her eyes immediately softened.
The look she gave you made it obvious.
Sevika adored you.
Completely.
With every stubborn, protective, devoted piece of her heart.
“I’m sorry too,” you whispered.
Her expression melted.
“Oh, sweetheart.”
The pet name sounded so gentle it almost hurt.
She leaned forward until your foreheads touched.
“You don’t have to apologise for being upset.”
Her hand found yours.
Intertwining your fingers.
“I just wish I’d handled it better.”
You brushed your thumb across her cheek.
“We both could’ve.”
“Maybe.”
She smiled.
Then pressed a lingering kiss to your lips.
Slow.
Warm.
Unhurried.
When she pulled back, she immediately rested her forehead against yours again.
Like she couldn’t bear putting even an inch of distance between you.
The apartment was quiet now.
No anger.
No tension.
Just the weight of Sevika’s arms around you.
The steady rhythm of her breathing.
The occasional sleepy kiss she kept pressing against your face every few minutes because apparently she couldn’t help herself.
Eventually, you felt her beginning to drift.
Her grip never loosened.
Even half asleep, she held you close.
Murmuring another soft, drowsy,
“I love you, my sweet girl.”
Into your hair.
The words were slurred slightly.
Sincere nonetheless.
And as you settled more comfortably against her chest, listening to her heartbeat beneath your ear, you couldn’t help smiling.
Because no matter how ugly the argument had been, no matter how badly it had hurt in the moment, one thing had never changed.
synopsis🧺: going through the emotions of a breakup and healing, reader is in the process of packing their memories in box. eventually anticipating telling them come pick it up and its their choice to figure out if he good enough or they’ve had enough.
Katsuki is the type of man who would burn bridges for you.
Right now he's acting like he doesn't want to be around you. You sick and tried of feeling like a second option while he gives other bitches the time of day when he swears he loves and misses you. But all he does every time is fall up inside you and kisses you until you forgave him.
Love is a bitch. a fucking trifling bitch. You hold on to the pain of being left on read. the dread of spewing your whole heart to him, while breaking down in disruptive tears as you pack his clothes in a bag. Blocking your vision you drag your body down against the wall, eyes talking because the mouth can't bear to scream another word for a man who left her without a trace. The rain stabs the window panes and the lightening strikes a familiarly shake in your soul.
A man who swore to love you up and down, to the end, no matter what flaw or insecurity you had left you heartbroken as you stare at past messages of a breakup messages. A coward you think to yourself. "The mighty fucking Bakugou couldn't even do it in person. Am I not even worth that?" You sob with your knees pressed to your chest. Before you know it you were sleeping on the floor, so much emotions made you tired. When you woke up the storm passed. The sun was bright and the birds chirped. You gave off a half smile before you came to realize you were lifting your self off the floor with Katsuki things scattered across the floor. You sighed at the sight of broken glass, wrinkled clothing and a half drunken liquor bottle. You look back outside, clouds started to form again and the room got heavy. You made your way down the steps, with every step dragging behind the other, the apartment was silent and the wall knew too much to not talk. You sit at the stool near the kitchen island and toss your phone. Not wanting to see the avalanche of text notifications from all your friends asking questions that they should already know the answer to.
"Are you okay?" No.
"Do need us to come comfort you?" No.
"Do you think he still cares and is just scared?"
This was one you didn't know how to answer, because you guess three years meant nothing but a mistake he can erase and overwrite. If he cared he wouldn't have thrown this all away, you've been fighting for him, for you, for the relationship as a whole. You scoff at the messages, pushing your phone away. Watching it guide across the counter, you sit in silence, in pain this smothering you like smoke. His smoke.
Hours later, from walking all over the house, picking up items that belong to him and placing them in a box for him to shuffle to his next girlfriend home. Hopefully he takes his emotional baggage with him too. The doorbell rings. Staring at the window you see the clouds releasing a heavy down pour while you're soaking in your own emotions. Another ringing hum flows with a brass knock, you glance at the clock while snuggled up on the couch with a brown fuzzy blanket. You didn't feel like explaining to anyone what feelings you think you should convey at the moment, you get up anyway. The anxiety fueling your steps, the shades and shadows of your slippers hitting the floor. Unlocking the door you frustratedly scan the boxes near the wooden frame. Creaks of the hinges repeat a tune as you open the door wider. Stuck in time with the time keeper in front of your presence, Katsuki Bakugou stands in the doorway.
Subconsciously you take a step back, scanning his drenched tall hunched figure. He looks like he ran a mile to prove a point, a statement you don't even want to hear.
"What the fuck are you doing here?"
"Why the fuck aren't you answering m' calls." he pants.
Jerking your head back and scanning him up and down like he has any right to ask you anything.
"Who the fuck do you think you're talking to! I don't have to answer shit from you."
"I-shit. Y'know I dont do this shit." You roll your eyes at the graveling process of him trying to balance the scale of him not being able to be emotionally present for you to hear him out.
On the verge of breaking down you grab the rest of your strength of putting words together without crying.
"YOU LEFT ME! KATSUKI!" The world stood still as you tried to fight a battle with your body but lost as tears flowed down your face and voice screamed of heart.
"YOU HURT ME! I LOVED YOU AND IVE BEEN HOLDING ON TO US- to.. us. For the past couple months, I've carried your love on my shoulders along with fixing the relationship we had!" You sniffle to get air back into your lungs before screaming back at him. You step closer to him.
"Every damn day, I hope we can makeup and we can get over this hurdle and go back to leaving each other kisses and leaving the bed soaking wet. But I realized Katsuki, I don't fucking know what obstacle I'm facing..." " How can I FIX something I don't know what's broken." You shrug with the last bit of air you had left. Katsuki failing to steady his breath as he begins to cry from the targeted pain he's caused you without even realizing he meant so much to you. His frame staggering as he wants to stand confidently but deep down he knows he needs to be vulnerable.
"I..I was scared. Fuck. I didn't want to fucking hurt you, not like this not at all."
"Then what the fuck was this about Kat? WHAT SCARES YO-"
"I DIDN'T WANT TO FUCKING DIE AND LEAVE YOU HERE."
The world stopped rotating and the space you two held stood silent. You tuned out the rain's patters hitting the window and ground. You grew still to the cold wind and look fixedly into Katsuki sobbing scarlet orbs. Two frightened individuals, who didn't know what the world had in store for them stared immensely at each other with eyes of sorrow. The situation he put you in made you feel worthless as if everything you two had was easy as a summer fling. On the other hand, he made your stomach spin, the love you had for each other was otherworldly. You observe his face - the bags tell you he hasn't gotten any sleep. Scanning you he can read your expression of distrust. You watch his breathing get faster - he's anxious. He noticed the movement of your unsteady hands every time you replayed the sentence in your head.
“So… _Katsuki whats it gonna be?” leaning against the door, not taking your eyes of him.
He stares powerfully into your soul before choosing an answer to your ultimate question. Taking a step to the side, he bounces his leg.
"You."
Soaked from the rain storm, he collapses around you and smothers you in kisses. You promised it wouldn't go like this but his pleasant touch, his soft lips, he's intoxicating. His tongue swallows yours as he lures you closer to his dampened figure.
synopsis: after what you thought was going to be your happily ever after amongst the stars, you were dropped back down to this universe with your heart shattered beside you and confusion riddling your disheveled mind. an enigma, a mysteriously charming young man, had swept you off to galaxies you never believed to have existed, just to ship you back where he found you. "star-crossed lovers" has an entirely new meaning to you, and maybe even he is wondering why he had left you in the field.
introduction: they'll say i'm nuts if i talk about the existence of you.
this was requested as a mini fic, but it would be an injustice to the song to make this entirely short. so, i decided to elongate the pain you and dazai are suffering from his decision to break up with you.
contents: ~11.6k words; sfw light angst, hurt/comfort; fem!reader; dazai-typical womanizing behaviors; brief reader x kunikida; jealous and possessive!dazai
a/n: i've missed writing songfics like this. ttpd you will always be my ultimate inspiration for dramatic melancholy and figuring out how to make it work out in the end.
"How dare you think it's romantic leaving me safe and stranded."
. ۫ ·
They're everywhere. Every set of eyes you encounter suddenly has brown irises, a flickering of embers that never seem to die out, all-consuming and life-ruining. The guy from the night before, he was so kind and so sweet, attentive, engaging, and you'll never see him again. The other guy last week you went to dinner with paid for everything, opened the door for you, walked you to your complex's front porch, and you'll never call him back. The guy a month ago, who handed out compliments left and right, told you how stunning you looked when you felt like you were still bleeding out, sheepishly held your hand, and you haven't thought of him since.
Every new man you meet is nothing compared to him. Walks home from work are hard, remembering he'd pick you up after to make sure you got back safely, kissing you goodbye and not leaving until you were inside. Your gaze can't help but travel along the sea of people on the subway, standing there with your knuckles white from the intense grip you have on the handle, hoping one of these fakes conjured from heartbreak is the real one. They all look like him, everywhere, no matter who is before you, and the wounds reopen on their own. You count the times you've cried, logging it in a journal you bought specifically to write down all the inexplicable emotions you have been experiencing. Right now, in the span of three months, you have sobbed, wept, cried, gotten misty-eyed, a total of three hundred and forty-two times whenever you dare to think of him.
There hasn't been a calamity quite like this, startling you to near death, how inconsolable you were when out of nowhere, the day you two were supposed to go on a date, your makeup done - looking at its most perfect it has ever been — and you waited. You sat in your living room and waited, only to receive a text message from him, three hours later: "I don't think this is going to work." The entire world, universe, and all its galaxies had spiraled into a black hole of pain and agony, leaving you sitting there with your jaw dropped, hands shaking, and filled with desperation that had never once existed inside of you.
You frantically tried calling him, to speak to him instead of sending messages through space, and while you were initially grateful he picked up, your heart sank further into the stratosphere when you heard the loud chatter of the bar with its music blaring in the background. "Hello?" He answered, as if he had already deleted your number, and tears had already sprung their way to your eyes.
"It took you three hours to let me know you didn't want to be with me anymore, but you're at the bar?" You scoffed, voice breaking, and he winced. Grimaced. His head hung, a third glass of whiskey beside his arm, half empty, and swallowed. It took three hours because he was struggling internally about even telling you — usually, he runs without another word. In his mind, that was a sign of respect and his... whatever those feelings were for you. "Dammit, Osamu, answer me!" You shuddered, pissed with yourself for letting him hear how devastated you were. "What did I do wrong?" Dazai's jaw flexed, nails digging into his bandaged palms, and tried to ignore that he was still wearing the outfit he picked for your date that he was so excited for it sent him spiraling down to Lupin's Bar to make up his mind on if he could do "forever".
"I can't handle it," he told you, whispered, drowned out by the misplaced lively spirits behind him on the other end. "I'm not good enough, and I can't give you what you want. End of story." You were silent, letting that sink in, not understanding where it all had been coming from, under the impression everything between you two was perfect.
"Don't you think I should be the one making that decision?" You attempted, but his own silence helped you understand it's—
"You would have made the wrong choice."
You wanted to argue, to tell him he was the one making wrong, rash decisions, but the click before the line went dead was the final blow as your body hit concrete when the rope was yanked out from under you. You pulled the device from your ear, staring down at the blinding screen, a photo of the two of you, and it just wasn't fair.
That night replays when you want to sleep, laying down on your mattress that suddenly feels too big, once occupied by two bodies instead of yours, and you stare out at the midnight sky. The stars mock you, twinkling and illuminating the way, sitting amongst the moon and other planets, and the Milky Way feels inhabitable. They wink at you, as if to say I know something you don't, but you wouldn't begin to know what secrets they harbor. It seems pretty clear, after three months and three days, that he doesn't care to get you back. To reach out to you. To make a casual bump along the sidewalk wasn't one of his carefully planned encounters to have you falling right back into his embrace. He said you would have made the wrong choice to stay with him and made sure you would never see him again; Yokohama's a big city, and it never occurred to you just how big until you tried searching for him.
You nod along, not paying attention to your date, the things he says — probably — important, but it all sounds like static and 'blah, blah, blah'. You wear a well-practiced smile, twirling your food around the chopsticks, hunger a rarity these days, and you can't help imagining Dazai is across from you instead. You have felt insane the past month, giving into your harmful delusions, and allow yourself for an ounce of manufactured sanity that your date is your momentary lover that changed the trajectory of your entire life. This guy is nothing like Dazai, though: he's taller, has blonde hair — which seems strange to come across in Japan, wears glasses, and he's kind of boring. Or is it just because I haven't paid attention?
"Do you not like your dish?" He asks, gesturing to your plate, pretty much still full from whatever you had ordered, and you stare at him briefly before raking your disinterested gaze to your food. Your silver chopsticks have been aimlessly pushing the contents around, making some weird concoction you definitely wouldn't ever eat, and your stomach churns. "I'll get the waiter and see about getting you something else." He states more than asks, and the initiative mentally jolts you, a brow raising as you stare at him once more, his otherworldly blue eyes scouring the restaurant behind his lenses, and you blink a few times.
"N-No, no, really, it's totally fine," you breathe out an uneasy laugh, waving him off, but he seems to be ignoring you when he is able to flag down your server.
"Nonsense," he politely tells you before directing his attention to the server. "I apologize for troubling you, but she doesn't seem to like her food. Could you bring us a menu so she could look for something else?" He speaks for you, and in any other instance that would piss you off, throw your napkin and leave, but — and maybe it's the depressed, agonizing delusion — it makes your back straighten and go along with it. The server doesn't waste any time, telling him 'right away, sir' before diligently taking your plate away and scurrying off to the kitchen.
"You... You really didn't have to do that," you tell him again, watching as he adjusts his shirt collar and rolls up his sleeves. No bandages, because he's sane. "They'll make you pay for both."
"No matter," he gently pushes his plate toward yours, gesturing over it. "Would you like to try mine? See if you'd prefer it?" You can't stop yourself from staring at him, this guy whose name was lost on you the moment he said it, and your head slowly tilts at his actions. His polite forwardness, his manners and poise. He's everything any normal girl would want in a boyfriend. He wouldn't leave you dangling from an aircraft in the sky hanging by your fingertips. You observe him, him staring back at you with patience, and your lips part, getting to speak up, when the server is back offering a menu. Mildly overwhelmed, taken aback by the stark contrast in your date and previously damaging fling, you merely smile and accept, hesitantly looking over it to — per his suggestion.
"I'm so sorry," you clear your throat, looking at him over your menu, and he gives you his full attention, brows raising. "I uhm, I don't recall your name. It was so noisy when you said it." You lightly chuckle, trying to hide behind the lie, and blinks once, believing you.
"Right, of course," he adjusts his glasses as he straightens his already astounding posture, then nods in your direction, well-mannered, and smiles. "Kunikida Doppo. Please feel free to just call me Kunikida." You nod in return, slowly, fingers lightly drumming on the laminated paper, and offer somewhat of a sincere smile. Where have I heard that before?
"Kunikida… I like that name."
While you're not miserable for once since the entire incident happened, Dazai is out on the roof of the dorm building, laid back with his hands folded behind his head, and stares at the sky, painted with sunsets that he remembers you once said remind you of his eyes. The pain lingers, the dwindled cigarette hanging from his lips, and he feels like he's been chain smoking worse than usual. His chest hurts, blaming it on his lungs having to readjust their functionalities to handle his previously rare bad habit becoming a more common thing in his day-to-day. He can't sleep like he used to, nothing like before when it was due to nightmares and past lives creeping into his living room to surround him while he lies on his futon. I miss the luxury of a mattress.
He sighs heavily, a cloud of smoke mixed with his deepest regrets billowing out past his lips, the fleeting light at the end of the stick igniting on another inhale, and some benign ashes fall onto his shirt. He recalls how these past three months or so have been, his mind filled with the memory of you, your face slowly dying out, and he's been grappling for it ever since. He sneaks swinging by your place of work into his route if he can, for a glimpse, so he can remember the outline of your features, careful not to be spotted by you since he knows it would only cause damages he can't bring himself to fix. He'll catch your silhouette in the crowded cafe from time to time, tucking away in the corner to avoid being in your line of sight, and has to tell himself he isn't allowed to chase after you when he watches you float out the door.
He, unbeknownst to himself, mopes around the agency when he's working, shuffling along to get from point A to point B; fingers take their time sorting through paperwork and reports because his ever-moving mind can't stop distracting himself with your image. Your laugh, your smile, your kiss. He sits silently more than anyone's used to, stopping to gaze out the window or stare off elsewhere, thoughts in a different universe than everyone else, and Ranpo took notice a long time ago there seems to be a permanent frown on his otherwise emotionless face. No one dared to ask him what's wrong, and he doesn't exactly want to explain to people that he might actually be upset that he had let go of someone who could be his perfect girlfriend. They'd crucify me then point and laugh at my self-induced teenage petulance.
He sits up, eye bags weighing his head down as he stares blankly at the street, wrapping his arms around his legs, and fingers come up to pry the cigarette he has been nursing from his cracking lips. Even he has seen, if he allowed a full glance in the mirror, that his eyes have died. They no longer resemble the evening's orange skies you would sit with him at the park in comfortable silence with your head on his shoulder, but now the blackholes he had all but thrown you into by saying it's—
Dazai's head jerks up from his desk the next morning, blinking rapidly when he hears the setting down of another laptop and shoes scuffing on the floors. He's at a point that he's just a mess: he didn't sleep last night — as if that's any different from all the nights before; when his eyes finally did decide to close, he had fleeting but lasting nightmares about losing everyone in his life from his own doing — to be left alone in the galaxy he stowed himself away to, just how he thought he preferred it; his alarm went off for the morning, reminding him he has work; and he missed the train, forcing him to run down the sidewalk and miss his opportunity to go by your building to hopefully grab a glance at you.
"Good morning, odd to see you here early," Kunikida greets, eyeing his partner up and down, noticing his hair is more mopped on his head than usual, and his face appears withered. "Are you alright?" He asks, slowly, sinking down into his chair across from him, preparing to start his day.
"Yeah," Dazai lies, waving him off as his fingers comb through his messy strands. "How uhm, how was your date last night?" He yawns, still not believing that between the two of them, Kunikida is the one scoring a date instead. And it is not for lack of trying, but the last girl he tried flirting with and seducing said he gave off "dead wife" energy and 'couldn't put myself in that position' before leaving him dumbfounded at the bar.
"It went extremely well," Kunikida responds, no hint of elation in his voice as usual. "She will actually be stopping by later to meet me for lunch." Dark brows shoot up at that, mildly impressed his colleague pulled off getting a second date so soon.
"Wow, look at you go, Kunikida," he tauntingly sings, propping his cheek on his fist as he peers over the laptop at him. "What's she like? Probably as boring as you to wanna talk more." He continues joking, using this as a means to get his mind off of everything that's been infuriatingly bothering him lately.
"Hmm? She's sweet, kind of quiet at first," he shrugs. "She didn't seem interested and a bit distant in the beginning, so I had already started preparing to never see her again. I think she changed her mind about mid-way."
"Yeah? Why's that?"
"Well, she wasn't eating, so I assumed she didn't like her food, so I got the waiter and asked if she could order something else," his blue gaze flickers up to meet brown ones, shockingly into the conversation, and it darts back down to his work as fingertips type away at the keyboard. "I suppose being more forward and taking initiative is something she liked because she was incredibly engaged after that. Even sent me a message before bed to tell me she had a great time and would like to see me again soon." Dazai stares at his partner for a long moment, the silence unbearable for him, and wonders how in the world Kunikida of all people was "forward" and "took initiative" with a woman. He's a bossy guy, sure, but with women? Dazai assumed his friend lacked severely in that department, so this news is huge.
"Does she meet all your silly little ideals?" He goes on with more jokes, and that one actually makes a smile crack along his colleague's face.
"No, actually, but I think I can get past it," he sighs, sorting through his bag for some reports, and the other continues with his staring, brows twitching together, and doesn't really know what to say. He's aware of how important Kunikida's ideals are to him; someone not meeting them but he's still willing to resume seeing them is also big.
"You must really like her."
"I wouldn't say that," he glances back up again, pushing his glasses up his nose. "I am incredibly intrigued, so I am more than willing to see where it can go. It was only one date, it went well, it wouldn't hurt to go for a second." Dazai nods slowly, eyeing him up and down, a finger messing with his hair as he ponders about that sentiment. "I know you were seeing someone previously. How'd that go, by the way? You haven't talked about her, so I am assuming you grew bored as usual?" Deep brown voids snap in his coworker's direction, trying to hide the chord that struck, and his jaw flexes a few times as his stare shifts into a glower.
"Just didn't work," he rushes, tone dropping some that causes Kunikida to falter, eyes bouncing around to take in the strange lack of composure, and he squints before correcting himself. "Haven't talked to her in months."
"Right," the other responds, leaving at that, suddenly not wanting to continue conversation, and goes back to clacking away at the keyboard, doing everything he can to ignore the looming glare from across the desk, and occupy himself until lunch.
♡ for a moment, i was heavenstruck. ♡
You sigh inwardly as you approach the building Kunikida said he worked at, worried about just... walking in, but he insisted it was alright. You take the elevator up, it a bit creaky, and shake out the nerves in your hands, the anticipation getting to you. You haven't felt really much of anything for quite some time, so I guess it's good to be antsy.
A few people walk by on the landing when the doors open, texting him that you're there, following the instructions he had given you, and hesitantly stand at the doorway, knuckles to the frame, eyes scanning for an out-of-place blonde. "Oh, you're gonna cause trouble." Someone beside you, out of nowhere, says with a weirdly taunting sing-song voice, making you jump and whirl around to see a black-haired guy with bright green eyes that your head cocks at. He has a pair of glasses perched on the bridge of his nose, middle finger pushing them up further, and he offers you a knowing smirk while observing you further. "And who, exactly, are you looking for?"
"Uhm... Mr. Kunikida Doppo..." You lean back a bit as he leans forward, taking you in with his hands hidden away in his pockets, and breathes out a scoff alongside an eye roll.
"Are you sure? No one else brings you here? Piquing your interest? Occupying your thoughts? Harboring space in your heart? Hmm?" He hums after the onslaught of questions, and you feel as though you're being interrogated. Brows knit, taking a step back over the threshold, and you're clearly confused.
"What—”
"Ranpo, that's quite enough," the vaguely familiar voice sighs behind you, neck twisting to look up and meet Kunikida's slightly agitated expression. "Leave the poor girl alone. She's here for me."
"So you say," this "Ranpo" person straightens up, wearing an impish beam, and tilts his head. "However, I know of a little invisible theory that says otherwise." His bright eyes glide back to meet yours, mentally acknowledging your confusion, and shrugs before lowering his voice so it can be heard only between the two of you. "Good luck." With that, he saunters through the door and heads to his desk, leaving you more overwhelmed and — quite frankly — a little scared in his wake.
"Ignore him," Kunikida reassures, a sudden smile forming as he gazes down at you, and it's enough to mildly ease your nerves as you grant him a timid smile in return. "He's our master detective, so he thinks he knows everything and enjoys messing with people by pretending he knows something about you that you don't." You nod slowly, that explanation not helping in the slightest, your smile turning quizzical.
"Oh!" You play at understanding, but that's an incredibly strange thing to say about someone you just met. "That's... helpful." You clear your throat, fingers reaching up to nervously tuck some hair behind your ear and try regaining your mental footing after the interaction with the "master detective". "Are you ready to go?"
"Yes, just give me a moment here to wrap up what I was working on," he looks over you, admiring your attire, and noting the way your hair is styled with curls today, as well as your makeup more subtle than last night. "You look lovely." He murmurs with a nod before turning back to his desk, your eyes following his movements, and an intensity you have felt before is on you — here? Your gaze slides to the person sitting in front of your date, and the entire world comes to a complete standstill, your heart halting mid-beat, and it seems as though every star had worked overtime to collide into one another to bring you here.
Across the way, feeling the black hole he has been residing just caved in on him. The moment his eyes lifted to make fun of Kunikida for his "girlfriend" picking him up, his body went rigid, the blood in his veins icing over, and the stars he wished upon last night before bed have granted it, but in the cruelest way possible. You're here, sure, but not for him. His fingers curl into a fist, eyes wide, shaking in their sockets, and the intense burning of his raging jealousy is setting aflame throughout the entire room, reaching you easily, and you don't know what to say. You don't know what to do.
The man that had carried you off to a world of his creation with promises of emotional security and endless late-night conversations with charming silver-tongued divinity and whispered kisses shared with one another — who took off without much of a moment's notice and seemingly no remorse in his heart — is staring at you as if you have betrayed him. That wild-eyed glare cranes its way to Kunikida, unaware and living in a reality separate from you two, narrowing to a forgotten hunter's instinct that he has to quickly correct — dwindling down to a glower that silently says 'you're just my understudy'. As if he has a right to allow such jealousy to exist, to brood in, to irrationally hurl at his colleague and friend.
Miles, an ocean, a galaxy, a lifetime, a past life away, you stand frozen in your spot, unable to move, unable to utter a sound. Unable to do anything other than gape, and your heart's stitches unfurl once more to spill your hurt feelings and its copious amounts of blood on the floor at your feet. Months have gone by that you hadn't seen Dazai, the insanity gradually making you believe that you had made him up, that your time together was a fleeting, well-remembered and documented dream that had you waking up with tears for what could be, and here he is. Sitting at an ordinary office desk at a detective agency, across from your current prospect, with a strange loathing visibly growing in his increasingly breathing.
Those thirty seconds are the worst to ever cross the scale of time, everyone and everything fading away to nothing, only you two, shattered in an instant by an unsuspecting Kunikida stepping between your lines of sight, offering his hand to you, and politely interrupting: "Thanks for waiting. Ready?" Tearing your gaze away is painful, worried Dazai will disappear again if you don't keep him nailed down in one place, locking with those soft, gentle, reassuring blue eyes that make you feel as though gutting your heart is an overdramatic response to a temporary bout of emotional suffering.
"What's your name?" That voice calls out, distant, out-of-turn, both you and your date turning to see the source. Dazai's to his feet, bandaged fists tucked away in his trenchcoat pockets, and you have never seen this outfit on him before.
"M-Mine?" A finger presses to your chest, gesturing to yourself, unsure if it would be best to play along, be dumb, or make it known you have history with your date's coworker. That might not bode well. He nods, more eyes than you would like on you, but all you can see — can focus on - are the amber irises that you have missed and yearned for. The ones that still replay in your mind before a restless night's sleep, a comfort and a disturbance. You give it, hesitantly, sheepishly, along with a nod of your own, and something changes in his demeanor, as if he thought you as well were a figment of his imagination — a ghost walking in from his past mistakes to haunt him into the future.
"Dazai Osamu," he whispers, and the grip on your hand accidentally tightens some, dropping it to ghost over the small of your back. "You're Kunikida's new girlfriend?"
"Dazai, that's invasive," his partner warns. "We had one date, and we're running late for our second." He speaks for you, that authoritative initiative that he displayed last night, and anyone else would be reasonably swooning over it, but there is a huge difference between his and Dazai's: Kunikida does so with regard for your feelings, what would be in your best interest; Dazai does it because he knows you, and what would make you feel better. If these roles were reversed, Dazai would have agreed in an instant, 'yes, she is my girlfriend', staking his claim even if it weren't true. Kunikida corrects, not wanting to overstep boundaries or think he even has a "claim".
Kunikida is the man you should be with, a true gentleman that would fight for your honor if needed. Dazai is the man your heart calls, cries, and yearns for alone in your room as you reminisce on your shared brevity, a gentleman in his own right that would make any sacrifice necessary to ensure your safety. And whatever is good for us isn't what's best; but it isn't best to crawl back to what you want for the sake of thinking you'd die without it.
"I'm Ranpo Edogawa!" The master detective interjects, breaking the weird tension that encroaches on the whole room, and everyone takes the time to all give him an equally strange look etched in each of your impressions, but he merely smiles, waving to you, and you awkwardly wave back.
"Well, let's be off before this continues eating into my lunch hour. I have an unfortunate amount of work to do upon my return, I don't want to put it off," Kunikida explains, gently pushing you out the door, and you can't resist peering over your shoulder back to the amber skies that burned their way into your memory for eternity, staring back at you with an unknown emotion — thoughts only he would be able to decipher hidden behind the gaze that you can only hope is distraught, regret, and longing. Everything you have felt from the moment he said it's—
Your mind is elsewhere the entire meal, expression vacant as he speaks to you, hands placed delicately in your lap as you stare off into the open space behind his head. Seeing through him. The entrance bells ring now and then in the cafe you two are sitting in, each jingle making your ears perk, but not daring to turn and check if the ghost that permanently haunts you would float in. A silent hope, an urging wish, an unheard prayer.
Every word said is mumblings, incoherent blabberings, sounds indicating a statement or question, nothing worth giving an answer to. Running into Dazai after all this time was more than a gut punch; it was tying you to a rocket that sends you out into the deepest parts of space that no one would ever be able to find you to help bring you back to Earth. A part of you wants to stay out there, until the suffocation ends your suffering; another part of you wants to find your back on your own, to prove to everyone you're completely fine.
"What are you doing here?" That question snaps you back, one absurd enough to grab your attention, causing your eyebrow to raise in Kunikida's direction only to see him looking beside you. Your blurring eyes rake along to the side of your seat, trailing up to the neck of bandages then a coy smirk you could point out in any crowd. Dazai stands next to the booth you're in, a hand resting on the back, and he avoids looking in your direction.
"Thought I'd join you!" He states while wearing that practiced smile, helping himself to the open spot on your right, scooting in to leave but a centimeter of room between your bodies. There was once a moment he wouldn't dare let any ability for you to breathe without inhaling his cologne, and now he has to refrain from treating you like something that belongs to him. "I wanted to get to know your girlfriend." He aims that smile to you, noticing it doesn't reach his eyes, and he seems detached from this plane entirely.
"Please do not make assumptions for things you do not know about," Kunikida sighs, adjusting his glasses while he mildly glares at his partner, who is picking up the menu across the way to review. "We only met last night." You don't say anything to agree or deny, hands shaking in your lap, gaze trained on the side of his face, a few strands of his hair falling to cover his eye from you. You swallow, tightly clasping your fingers together to prevent yourself from reaching out and touching him, and your line of sight drops to the menu in his bandaged hands, before flitting back to see he is glancing at you once more.
"Oh, so you two aren't together?" He asks, words tight, and it makes your brows furrow briefly before turning away to stare at the table. Suddenly, you're incapable of speaking, and Kunikida thinks that means you're uncomfortable. You are, but not because of the same reason he is thinking.
"If you insist on sitting here to irritate me, so be it, but please leave her alone," he leans back, folding his arms over his chest, then throwing his leg over the other. "We are just wanting to enjoy our lunch together."
"And who am I to stop you?" Dazai chuckles softly, turning the server that comes by. He points to something on the menu, the same thing you ordered before he got here, but requests there to be no mushrooms, and you internally kick yourself for not realizing those would be on there. It might be too late to ask them to fix it. He sets it to the side before folding his hands in front of him, directing his attention to you regardless of what the other said, and you stare at him wide-eyed, having to stop yourself from crying due to how overwhelmed you are. He notices, those all too familiar eyes softening, and his voice lowers. "How did you two meet? Have you been talking long?"
"We've... We've been talking for about a week. You know, dating apps," you murmur, shrugging. "We decided to meet up last night for our first date and it was... it was nice." His brow arches at the sound of Kunikida being on a dating app, glancing at him sidelong — who is trying not to make it abundantly clear he doesn't want Dazai here — before staring down at you.
"Really?" Is all he can think to say in response, knuckles going white at the thought that you are having a good time, unsure how to feel entirely about the situation. Watching you from afar is one thing, seeing you with someone else entirely is another. He believes he needs to insert himself, to find a way to break you apart, but he also doesn't know if he wants to do that to his friend since he never seems too interested in dating these days. You nod, diverting your attention to the table, fingernail picking at your skin, and you don't know what to do either. Maybe under any other circumstance, your emotions would be different.
"No mushroom?" The server asks the table, other plates in her hands, and Kunikida's lips part to state who ordered it when Dazai is already smiling up at her and pointing in your direction.
"That's hers. Mine's with," he quickly interjects, both you and his partner staring at him with bewilderment, since the two of you had heard him clearly order without. Your chest thumps once, a single butterfly flying around to your throat at the gesture, seeing the plate be sat in front of you, then what you ordered being set in front of Dazai, then Kunikida's last. He doesn't move or say anything, blue eyes darting between you then his colleague, accidentally narrowing. The creeping suspicion he had previously in the office is sneaking its way back in, but he doesn't want to be rude to call it out in front of you.
You're too busy staring at the man beside you, avoiding your gaze once again, beginning to eat his lunch as if none of that happened. You remembered?
"Dazai, I thought you didn't like mushrooms?" Kunikida eyes the way he eats the food in front of him, purposefully pushing around the pieces of mushroom floating around, and those broad shoulders shrug after a moment of silence.
"Didn't want her having a reaction," he mutters, almost inaudible, under his breath, and Kunikida leans over, trying to hear him. You stall, utensils in hand, staring down at your food. He clears his throat, straightening his back then offering the other a big, fake smile. "Thought I'd try getting over it for once. Can't be that bad with all this other yummy stuff that I do like to mask the taste." He hunkers back down, making a point to nab up a few loose pieces with some other elements, then shoveling it into his mouth.
Kunikida slowly nods, watching him closely, glancing over to see you doing the same, wordless. "Right, of course."
♡ fuck it, if i can't have us, i might just not get up. ♡
Quite a few weeks go by with you and Kunikida attempting to continue seeing one another. However, somehow, Dazai always seems to show himself wherever you end up. Such as the restaurant you picked for dinner on the other side of town; the cafe when he is supposed to off the clock and didn't see you stop in to pick up Kunikida for lunch; the ice cream shop near your apartment; and the department store he said he needed to go to as an errand and asked if you'd go with him.
Everywhere. Those mysterious and mischievous brown eyes were everywhere you went. He will purposefully slot himself between you and Kunikida, forcing space that wasn't previously there, throwing his arm around his partner or staying close to your side with his hands in his pockets. You feel like you have seen Dazai more when dating someone else than when you were dating him. It only makes you cry at night because there isn't anything else you can really do — you lie awake in your bed, hugging your pillow, the thought you maybe had moved on completely throwing itself out of your head while mascara tears and muffled wails land into the sheets. The pain being relived over and over with every new date you go on with Kunikida simply due to Dazai thinking he has the right to insert himself into your space.
Recently, when alone, you had cornered Dazai into a small conversation, asking him what exactly was the reason for him tagging along on your dates when he was never invited nor would he have actually known where you were. He stared down at you, quiet, his hands behind his back while you spoke in a hushed whisper, and there was one time he wore a shirt you gifted him. It felt like a cruel joke, no matter how it was spun, because whether he remembered or not that it was from you, he was still wearing it while parading around on dates he shouldn't have been helping himself to after months of no contact.
"Kunikida isn't very good with women," he lied, straight through his teeth, that very same day, wearing the shirt you picked out especially for him, and looked at you with such practiced faux sincerity. "I know you already, I thought I could help him. I mean, you did almost die from mushrooms." He smiled, empty, biting his tongue to prevent telling you the real reason he was following you around like an abandoned puppy.
"You know me?" You asked, disbelief prominent. "I'd say we're strangers at this point." You didn't know where that came from, knowing deep down within your soul all you wanted to do was jump into his arms again and leave wherever the hell you were at, and go back to your apartment so you two could make up properly. His smile visibly faltered, twitching its way down into a frown that he had to fight from forming, but his eyebrows furrowed at that false statement.
"Don't say that, bella," he whispered, and you wanted nothing more than to disappear into the nothingness of space and atoms where you stood. Bella... I haven't heard that in ages. Taken aback, your mouth slowly closed shut, eyes wide in a sorry attempt to prevent your tears, and he didn't realize what he had done. "I'd know your laugh anywhere. I can pick your eyes out in any crowd. Strangers wouldn't be able to do that." You sniffled, a tear slipping that you rushed to swipe away, grateful Kunikida — your actual date — was distracted with investigating what new pots and pans to get for his kitchen.
"That's not fair," you whispered. "It's not fair that you get to go about your life as if we never happened while I'm still stuck. I'm... I'm exactly where you left me behind." A small, hiccupped shudder escaped your quivering lips, doing everything you could not to break down in the middle of a department store in front of your ex-lover, but the pain was unbearable. "It hurts. You hurt me. And you don't even care or regret it!" You gasped out, covering your mouth as you whirled away to go in search of a bathroom to hide in, keeping your head hung so no one would try to question you.
The real kicker, the gut punch to everything was that you were wrong. Dazai stood there, watching after you into rare, stunned silence, lips parted with the desire to say something to you, but he was frozen solid in place. He watched you take off, getting farther away from him, and he didn't stop you. He didn't chase after you when he knew he should have; he did care, he did regret it — he regretted it the moment he left you hanging for those three hours. The fact of the matter is he had to admit one thing and one thing only: he was terrified of being in love with you. The thought sent him into a panic, emotions and feelings he hadn't experienced before that he couldn't understand, ones that made his heart ache and hurt and twist in place, that had him crawling up on the rooftop every night with a pack of cigarettes hoping he'd smoke enough to kill him right there. Or at least the feeling he had for deserting you when he should have been sweeping you off your feet into a lifetime of what seems like forbidden happiness.
He wants you so badly he hasn't dared to sleep with anyone else because they aren't the same. They aren't going to fill the empty void he carved out of himself. They aren't you.
Who he had originally planned to be one of his usual girlfriends of the month turned out to be his undoing.
"Where'd she go?" Kunikida came up beside him, knocking him back to Earth, rapidly blinking and lightly shaking his head, but his line-of-sight remained where he last saw you.
"Uhm, b-bathroom," he cleared his throat, hand subconsciously coming up to rest on his chest, that dull pain growing, and sweat began breaking out over his lip and brow. Blue eyes stared at him, silent, only ever seeing Dazai like this once, and his suspicions only grew more intense.
"What is the real reason you are intruding on my time with her?" He abruptly asked, a question far out of left field for anyone else, but between him and Dazai, it was long awaited. A ticking time bomb that they were staring at, waiting to see who would kick it first. "I wouldn't say it's fair that you find my potential lover attractive and try to take her from me when you can have literally anyone else you set your eyes on."
"No... No, I'd never do that to you, Kunikida," Dazai murmured, feeling as though he was outrunning his death. "That isn't it at all." His colleague side-eyed him, noting how pale his face had suddenly become, the visible distress, and his fingers were curling in on the material — right above his heart.
"I'm a big kid, Dazai," Kunikida mumbled in return, but neither of them could look at each other. "I'm also a detective. Do you think I wouldn't have figured it out by now?" Dazai's eyes closed, nearly in defeat, mostly because he knew he hadn't kept it as under wraps as he should have. He was blindsided, completely caught off guard to see you with his dear friend — neither of you knew prior to meeting, but it seemed to him like a sick joke. Something to rub his face in. Something to purposefully hurt him, make him curl up under the covers at night in wallow in self-pity that he didn't deserve to experience. Yet, there he was, standing in the middle of a semi-empty department store with Kunikida, waiting for you to come back from crying your eyes out in the bathroom, being confronted on both ends for his pestering of your lives.
"She's the girl I've been debating on killing myself over," he softly blurted, that sentence striking lightning right through Kunikida's spine, not expecting a confession with such grandeur, something so vulnerable and real and raw. A wry chuckle slipped out past Dazai's lips, head finally lowering, wishing he were elsewhere entirely. "How juvenile, killing myself over love. That doesn't sound like me." He meant to speak to himself, under his breath, and he thought he had, but his partner heard every word, taking it into account to think over, to make some decisions, and it started to make a bit more sense on why you never really said much when he came around during your dates. You weren't uncomfortable for the reasons he initially believed — Dazai being his typical manwhore self — but because he was your ex. The one you mentioned extremely briefly, in passing, that dumped you so out of nowhere it couldn't have been predicted by the nearest fortune teller. "I... I selfishly hoped I would bother you two so much that she'd just call things off, because I'd rather her be miserable and alone like me than be with anyone else."
"Dazai—"
"I'm gonna go," he lifted his head, wearing that forced smile Kunikida was so accustomed to, no longer believing it, but he couldn't tell his friend that. Not when he looked like the life had been completely drained from him. "Uhm... I'm... I'm s-sorry for... For everything I had been doing lately." He swallowed, turning on his heel and trudging out, hands in his pockets, and Kunikida thought he'd feel more awkward with this reveal. However, it was anything but; he expressed a disgustingly immense amount of pity for both you and Dazai. He knew that it took a lot for the other to admit, the thought never occurring to him that Dazai could feel such intense emotions — especially when it came to the matters of the heart.
The scuffling of shoes along the linoleum made his head turn, seeing you trek your way toward him, looking a mess equivalent to Dazai's, and he decided then there wasn't much use in delaying the inevitable.
"You're what?" You look up at Kunikida, eyebrows knit together, standing in the doorway of your apartment, a swirling of different, conflicting emotions forming in your chest at the news.
"I am respectfully calling things off between us," he repeats, even going the extra mile to bow. "While I have enjoyed our time together, I am afraid I can't see this going any further than what it is. I hope you can understand." Of course you can understand, you didn't see it go much farther yourself; you were getting ready to break things off with him had he not beat you to it. While essentially the decision is mutual, there is something underlying in your brain about being dumped twice that has shattered your already annihilated ego.
Yet, you force a smile, nodding as you gesture for him to stand up straight. "Yeah, it's no big deal. I just appreciate you coming to tell me."
"It's only the right thing to do," he straightens his back, adjusting his tie, and ignores your wide-eyed, pain-filled reaction. In reality, he didn't want to stop seeing you; he initially thought you two could keep this up, continue seeing each other, become more than friends. However, with Dazai bombarding on your dates, then his shell shocking reveal about how much he apparently loves you, he couldn't bring himself to go on like this in front of his friend — carelessly flaunting you around on his arm while Dazai suffers in silence. Whether or not Kunikida liked how things ended between you two, he wouldn't be able to live with himself if he kept dating you.
It is also clear whenever he is near that your heart quietly yearns for Dazai. Your dulled gaze drifts in his direction, Kunikida never capable of holding your attention long enough to get your eyes back on his. He would notice the small smile or muffled laughter you'd try to hide when Dazai did something stupid, silly, or funny — you didn't laugh too often at anything your real date would say. He took note of the gravitational pull your bodies had on one another; you may have never touched or accidentally brushed knuckles, you two were still in one another's orbit, as if you belonged there.
He also wasn't blind to Dazai's frighteningly dangerous jealousy and possessiveness — those glowing amber eyes would set ablaze if Kunikida dared to touch you, hold your hand, put an arm around you. The way his jaw would tighten, flexing, the vein in his neck prominent under his bandages, if you would link arms with your date, his colleague. Don't get him started on the murderous intent in that deceptive grin stretched on his friend's lips if Kunikida took the leap to kiss your hand or cheek goodbye — the fire in his irises would grow, searing through the other's clothes down to his skin, and it was as if being put under a microscope in mid-July's afternoon sun.
Kunikida wasn't about to be a constant second place while you lied to his face that he was first. It may have been an irrational fear, but he also didn't want to subject himself to be on the misfortunate end of an affair.
He bids you farewell, no other words spoken, turning to leave you behind just as quickly as he came, and you are getting quite tired of things being too good to be true — for it is becoming glaringly obvious that it all is too good to be true. Heavenly bodies that take you to what you thought to be Heaven are actually heartless demons dragging you to Hell in disguise after failing arbitrary tests you weren't aware you were taking; prince charmings are actually just like the rest of society — they date until they are bored, then move on to the next.
Your door creaks closed, resting your forehead against the surface, and it seems there are not any useless tears left to cry, as they have all been shed and sent to evaporate into the atmosphere to be launched into the stratosphere to ignite the midnight skies alongside sparkling corpses pretending to be extortionary nebulas. For things are too good to be true, where Dazai was once back in your life, even if he was just out of reach, and now he is gone again by another's doing. Ripping you apart further inside the blackhole you can't quite dig yourself out of.
I guess it doesn't matter, since it's—
♡ i might just die, it would make no difference. ♡
Another let down, even if you weren't exactly rooting for you two to work out; it doesn't help in the slightest in aiding the misery that ails you. You wonder, as days pass, bend, and swirl into one another, flying by without warning of their change into the next, if maybe you deserve this. You can't help allowing those wretched voices whispering in your ear that this has been a revenge scheme built from the ground up to destroy you — as if you are important enough for the entirety of existence itself to make room in its busy schedule of keeping the world spinning merely to break your own.
Upon meeting Dazai, you told yourself, quietly, off in the hidden crevices of your brain, that it wouldn't last. However, there wasn't any possibility to believe those baseless — but incredibly correct — words when he treated you as if the universe and its many galaxies revolved around you, like the moon and its fellow stars shine in the dead of night to illuminate your way, that you could mend his broken pieces back together with your very own fingers? How could one think it would all come crashing down the way it had when he made you like the chosen one, that the world is bigger than you two?
Why on Earth would anyone concoct such a notion when he showed you cosmic love? A bond stretching beyond human and otherworldly comprehension, one so intense and radioactive and healing and pure at once. He who created a reality that superseded this old town that has somehow now grown so hollow.
You sit in silence on the train, limbs to yourself while you keep your body tucked in on itself, eyes staring straight ahead out of the window across the aisle, loose bodies here and there lingering, waiting for their stop. You don't know where you're going, wanting — needing — to get out of your apartment before you die there. The rush and rattle of the wheels racking along the tracks is an accompaniment to the dings and chimes of the robotic voice letting others know over the intercom the next destination, and for a brief moment, the thought of hurling yourself through the glass entering your mind that just as quickly exits, a twitch in your eye, a flinch in your fingers, and a shift in your feet.
Yokohama is a big city, big enough to get lost in if you don't know your way; it isn't immune to invisible drag paths, dug down to the Earth's core that only muscle memory can take you through, step by step leading you to places you have been before but don't recall. Images and scenes flashing before your eyes like tangled film reels when a building goes by that is recognizable, or a secret hiding spot shared only between lovers brushes past the corner of your eye, nothing captivating enough to make you stop and stare. People blur and melt into another, certain they are duplicated extras for a movie set, parts of your own Truman Show orchestrated down to the very detail of a crack in the pavement that is on air for the heavenly and devilish entities crowding around to watch with their snacks, pointing and laughing at the sad girl that can't get over a guy.
Steps slow, neck craning, taking in the ginormous building you had gotten so used to going to on a near daily occurrence as it stands tall on the corner, and that is enough to make you stop. To face it, stare at the bricks that line their ways to the top, eyeing a window that you know belongs to the office you used to visit — to pick up Kunikida and to selfishly marvel at Dazai from afar, at least until he had started to join you on outings as some jealous shadow that needed to watch over your every move, ensuring you weren't doing anything he wouldn't approve of, as if he was entitled to such nonsensical behavior.
"And what case are you needing solved today, miss?" That singsong, playfully arrogant voice you have come to know sounds beside you, a deep sigh inward following, before your tired and disinterested eyes glide over to see Ranpo standing there with his hands in his pockets. Glasses sit atop his nose, head tilting as he looks at you with a somewhat serious expression. "Wouldn't be here if you didn't need help, right?" You slow blink once, sighing outwardly this time in a pointed huff, and carefully lull your head back forward.
"I don't need help with solving a case, Ranpo, but thank you as always for your generous offer," he hums in response, arms coming up to fold over his chest before beginning to encircle you, and a finger lightly taps his arm.
"Then what else is there for you to be here, hm?" He questions, reasonably, another, more dramatic and pointed hum following as his brow raises. Your eyes involuntarily dart upward, the window you have seen a multitude of times, grabbing a small sigh of that shaggy mop of hair, back turned, and that trench coat wrapping around his shoulders before looking down. The master detective doesn't need deduction skills with a tell like that, his own flitting upward, seeing the same silhouette as you, then back to your sullen expression.
"Simply a bad habit I'm needing to break," your head raises, then your hand in the form of a wave, wearing a pained smile. "See ya later!" With that, you turn around and walk back the way you came, shrouded in deceptively fake confidence that will last you long enough until you round the corner — out of sight so it's easier to let the few tears slip without anyone there to question you. Ranpo watches after you, a quizzical brow arched, honestly expecting you to tell him the truth on how you couldn't stay away from Dazai any longer and that you were about to beg for him back. He's more than surprised to find that deduction had been wrong. Oh, you are interesting.
It turns out there isn't much to do when your mind is both preoccupied and emptied of all thoughts to ever exist. Walking through the market seems like a detour to the gallows; roaming the library and flipping through pages of fantastical stories is merely delaying the electric chair; taking a stroll beside the lake is the foreshadowing of being shoved off the plank; and flitting around aimlessly here and there, running your fingertips along soft wildflower petals with their crisp leaves, is outrunning the stake. The path home is filled with menacing whispers and somber shadows, things you hadn't noticed were there until he left.
You aren't fun to be around anymore. Friends tell you to reach out if you need anything, but they don't invite you out anymore. Family asks how you're doing, but you'd sooner run out of your door naked than tell them the truth of your current life events. Coworkers just pick up your slack without another word, all in mutual agreement to let you go through the motions, awaiting your bounce back.
You don't leave your house much these days, only if the cabin fever gets too high and unbearable — even then, it's only for the briefest of moments, one to two hours maybe. You sit in the park, breathing in fresh air, listening to children and families and friends all laugh with one another, sometimes you'll hear arguments that someone else is trying to hush with birds chirping, dogs barking, and horns blaring over it. The sun feels therapeutic to your graying skin; the blossoms' scent is a welcoming healing through your senses that aids in melting the ice in your veins. But, of course, none of it lasts long — you'll be back in the closed-off space of your apartment with the curtains drawn, the TV playing any old thing that you're paying attention to, and tormenting yourself by wearing the only thing of his you could steal before never seeing him again.
Your hands fist the sleeves, fingers bunching them up tight as you sit down on the floor, back pressed to your couch, tears you haven't been aware of streaming down your face, and a dead-eyed stare forward at your television. Pictures and scenes go by on the screen, portrayals of actors pretending to be in love with characters that don't exist, an ironically accurate commentary on life — you never know the person you're with, no matter how much time you spend with them. They are but a character in your life that can come and go as they please, to never appear on screen again, a character loved by the audience killed off much too soon that even you are heartbroken over the loss. Questioning if the feelings you had were manufactured from working so closely together as fictitious lovers or authentic unspoken emotions that might be too late to reveal.
You've been sitting like that for a while, an open bottle of cheap wine you grabbed on your way back from work the other night, and some snacks abandoned on a disposable plate, and you can't really tell if the sun has gone down or not. Not that it really matters, since it's always dark in your place anymore. A waiting game of how much longer until they send you away, though I think they forgot to get me.
A few knocks at the door startle you, causing you to jump in place, worried you have spoken too soon and they've finally arrived. Your head gradually turns toward it, staring at it, when another handful of knocks sound, and your lips part, debating making it known if you are home or not. More knocking happens, whoever is on the other side not relenting, and you scramble to get to your feet. "One sec!" You call out, throat scratchy, hurrying to your room to yank on a pair of pants before rushing back to the front door. Your hand hovers over the knob, other frantically wiping at your face with the sleeve, shaking out the depression, and turning it to see who has come to take you in.
When it draws backward, your heart stops then falls down at your feet, eyes bugging out of your head as you stare in bafflement, starting to think you are dreaming. Or highly medicated. Eyes with irises matching the sky behind him meet yours then drag to your torso, taking in your attire, lingering on the sweater he has been going crazy searching for in his dorm for ages, pretty much giving up on it and presuming it gone forever. What he wasn't expecting was you to be in it.
"D-Dazai..." You breathe, barely coming back to this reality, blinking rapidly at his figure standing on the other side of the threshold. Dazai doesn't say anything just yet, still staring at you in it, and goosebumps cover his skin, under his bandages, and a strangely foreign sensation is prodding at his eyes. Dazai? Since when do you call me that? His brows twitch together, hands tight fists in his coat pockets, and his jaw flexes momentarily. The soft, chocolate brown material drapes over your shoulders, the fabric heavy to keep you warm — it's his favorite for a reason, and all this time it has been safely wrapping you in comfort when he couldn't. "What're you doing here?"
His eyes flicker to your features, scanning your reaction to store in his expansive memory, and a small, tight smile forms on his lips. "I wanted to check on you. Kunikida told me what happened today." You aren't sure which one of those statements is the most unbelievable: him wanting to check on you or that Kunikida only just now told him that he broke things off.
"He told you... today?" You repeat. He nods. "Why? We—He called it all off weeks ago." His features twist, visibly confused, because his colleague made it sound as though he did it recently, within the past week at the very most. He did this weeks ago? You've been alone for that long?
"I-I guess that makes sense why you haven't been coming around nearly as often as before," he forces out a light chuckle, obviously fake, and you stare at him. His teeth briefly bite onto his bottom lip before his gaze downcasts, clearing his throat. "I asked him how things were going, since he stopped giving me updates. He said that 'things' weren't really going anywhere, so to avoid wasting time, he broke it off." You nod, slowly, listening to him, but you are still not understanding why he bothered showing up to your apartment to check on how you're holding up — considering when he was the one to dump you, you pretty much got a silent "fuck you" after ghosting you completely with no other words exchanged. "Are... Are you alright?"
Am I alright?
No... No, not really. Not at all, actually.
"You're not one to check on someone when they get dumped unless you're trying to swoop in and play the hero," you state, blunt, tone flat. "It's how we met in the first place." He blinks once, eyes mildly widened at your straightforward observation, and he may have written you off too quickly when it comes to understanding him.
"I genuinely was worried about you," he whispers. "Ranpo mentioned running into you—"
"What do you want, Dazai? What do you want from me?" You interrupt, making his jaw snap shut. "If you're looking for an easy lay from a vulnerable, broken heart, go elsewhere. I'm sure there's a trail of girls you've left behind that would be weak enough to fall for your fake sincerities." You shake your head, hands moving to shut the door in his face, not able to take any more of this, when a force jerks your body back, seeing the side of his fist slammed against the surface.
"That's not fair," his voice stays low, shaking, and he almost looks hurt underneath all of that anger building.
"You want to talk about fairness?" You bite back. "You told me that we could make it to forever then the next day, you leave me hanging for three hours before texting me that you don't think it's going to work! That's not fair, Dazai!"
"Stop calling me that!" He shouts, taking you both by surprise, but he's only getting started. "You don't call me that ever!"
"Your name?" You respond, incredulously puzzled. "Everyone calls you that! You might as well be one of those people that only goes by one name." You scoff, hand dropping down dramatically to your side.
"Not you! You call me by my given name!" He demands, and you're completely thrown by this. First, he shows up unannounced to your front door; second, he pretends to care about your pain and wants to check on you; third, he is yelling at you for calling him by his family name, just as everyone else does. Going as far as commanding you to call him by his given name. Your features drop down, eyes steeling and biting down on your back teeth.
"You have a lot of nerve, Dazai Osamu," you murmur, gripping the knob tightly in your white knuckles. "It's one thing to be the one to send me into heartbreak, it's another to play some white knight to be the same one that pulls me out of it."
"Did you ever think maybe I wanted to fix it?" He retorts, a foot daring to cross into your home, broad frame towering over you. "That maybe I wanted to show you I have been just as miserable as I made you, and that maybe I do need you?" A small bout of silence befalls you two after that, tears welling up in your tired eyes that you have to swallow, to shove deep down because you can't cry in front of him. He's gotten the upper hand in everything that's happened to you, he can't get the satisfaction of seeing me cry, too.
"Don't you dare say things to me you don't mean," your words tremble, glaring up at him. "Don't tell me this just to plan on leaving again. I won't make it, I won't survive." His eyes, previously dark from his misplaced anger, soften down to empathy, a rare feeling for him as is. He knows exactly how you feel, learning embarrassingly later than the average person that he has been plagued with a broken heart. His arm slips down, fingers shaking as they reach out to cup your jaw, gently forcing you to look at him after your weak fighting back, and his thumb runs along your quivering lip. You sniff, everything you said being the truth: if he does this again, it would surely be the end of you.
"I miss you," he admits. "I know I'm the one who did this, but I shouldn't have."
"Did you really think you could come back here and ask me to take you back?" Your hands come up to grip his wrist, burying your face in his bandaged palm, and squeezing your eyes shut only forces those tears to come down anyway. "Did you think I'd so easily say yes?"
"No, I came here to beg you to."
Your blurring vision raises to meet his, lashes wet and more lining up to drop, but you won't release him. Not when you have him here with you. He gazes down at you, leaning down, noses touching, and he's just as beautiful as you remember. "Then beg." The whisper flows out past your lips, bouncing off of his when he thought he could kiss you to make this all go away, and his body freezes. Those deep brown eyes are staring into yours, a flickering of a flame crossing from one to the other, a shuddered breath fanning over your mouth as he registers your request.
He withdraws, slowly, as to not startle you, before he sinks down to his knees. He avoids looking at you, long arms wrapping around your torso, one hand gripping at the back of your shirt while the other digs its nails into your hip. His head rests on your stomach, hugging you close to his body, and you grant him the privilege of slotting your fingers in his mop of hair. "Take me back." He begins, quiet, broken, defeated. "Take me back, forgive me for what I did. For everything I did. For everything I'll ever do. Please, just take me back. I need you.
"I don't want to live without you anymore," he continues. "I thought I was more scared of being in love with you, but I fear having to live in this horrible, disgusting, suffocating world without you at my side to breathe life into me." He pauses, swallowing, and his voice drops more, barely audible. "I-I'm so sorry, bella. I shouldn't... I miss you. I wanna come home. Wanna come home to you." His hold tightens, afraid to let you go a second time, and takes relieving comfort in your fingertips gently massaging his scalp — he hasn't felt the touch of another human being since he walked away from you. He knows now, in this moment, he doesn't want anyone else to touch him ever again if they aren't you.
You sigh, the other hand coming around to hold his head, hugging him closer to you, and you are the perfect lover's fool.
"Come inside, Osamu. I haven't slept in months and want you to sing to me."
. ۫ ·
"I'll build you a fort on some planet where they can all understand it."
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dividers from pixopix and cafekitsune here on tumblr
Nico should, probably, be more familiar with the route to Mount Sinai. That's eighty percent of his client base, after all.
But he isn't.
Or, maybe: he doesn't want to be.
It takes him time to walk there. He is stalling, a little, but he does not have to; he does not recognize the route, or the bodegas along each side of the road. He does not frequent Queens or the several back alleys Cecil directed him through, which he does not take, because his suit is Armani and he is not stupid. Not that avoiding the back alleys helps. He can feel the stares on him, appraising him, up and down, gauging how well he will defend himself. If he will at all.
He must look as rotten as he feels, because no one bothers.
He makes it finally to the hospital and slips through the first doors he sees, not bothering to ask further directions. Hospitals have signs and only fools get lost. He makes his way to the third floor, shuddering through the chill in the ICU, through the heavy air of quiet hopelessness. There is a nurse's station, in the dead center of the wing, and this he approaches, clearing his throat.
"Hiya," says a nurse, orange hair dyed a bright, awful green and clinking pony-bead necklaces going up and down her arms. "What can I do you for?"
"I'm, uh." Nico clears his throat, fiddling with his tie. "I'm looking for Will?"
Too late he realizes he should have included a last name. Too late he realizes he doesn't know it.
"Oh!" says the nurse, brightening. "Will! Yeah, he's with his brother. You a friend?"
Nico pushes past the dryness of his mouth. "Something -- like that."
"Aw, good you're comin' to sit with him, then. He gets real lonely sometimes I think. And bored. Lordie does he get bored. But that's always kind of nice, because when he gets bored he comes and does paperwork for us." The nurse grimaces, glancing back. "But, uh, don't tell anyone I said that."
Nico bites back a small, sad smile. Another crime. Another good reason.
"My lips are sealed."
The nurse -- K-dog, if her nametag is to be so believed -- stops at the last door of the hallway, blue and rusted where the metal edge meets the floor. A yellowing piece of paper is taped to the one window, reading 'Lee' in rushed, crooked handwriting. Nico recognizes the tiny counter of the 'e's and swallows hard.
"He's in there," says the nurse, hushed. She peers through the edges of window, but there isn't much to see with the paper in the way. "There's no music, though. Tread light."
She squeezes Nico's shoulder and walks off, humming. Nico stands there, facing the door, breathing, for longer than he would like to admit -- he hates hospitals, has always hated hospitals, since he was 9 years old and sliding to his knees in the floor of one, life shattering in front of him. But he is not unique in that, he supposes. Not even unique between the two of them.
He pushes the door open, forcing himself in and closing the heavy door behind him.
Will is on the bed.
Well -- balanced on the bed would be the better term; there is another man, hooked to countless machines, who is actually in the bed, but there is Will, to his left, dirty converse perched precariously on the bending edge of the mattress, tongue poked out of his mouth, paint marker held in delicate fingers, drawing, in smooth, confident strokes, a stylized yellow sun in the corner of the room, surrounded by circle stars, shining on the man's -- Lee's -- lifeless face.
"Well," says Nico, drily, "I'm beginning to see where half these bills are coming from."
Will shrieks, paint marker going flying, and tips right over: he lands, nearly, splat on the narrow smidge of tile floor between the wall and the bed, taking an array of machines with him; Nico manages to catch him, barely, damn near stumbling himself under the sudden weight but steadying himself in the last moment. They breathe in heavy tandem.
"You're gonna get charged for vandalism, dumbass."
In seconds Will has pulled away, scrambling, wide eyed, to put space between them.
"Nico." He breathes out. "Oh."
It does not escape Nico's notice that he stands between him and his injured brother.
It does feel like shit.
There is tension, clear and foreign in the line of his broad shoulders, there is a rigidity in his spine almost completely alien to the softness of his features. His lips, too, are pulled in, bitten white by his worrying teeth.
Nico steps back, beating back the ache of his own chest. He sits down in the lone, ancient chair and waits.
It takes a minute. Will sits down, eventually, doodled-on jeans making contact with the light, scratchy hospital blanket. He folds his shaking hands under his thighs and chews on his lip, eyes never leaving Nico's face for a second. They breathe. The machines beep, and beep, and beep.
"I'm sorry," Nico says, finally. His shoulders slump, and a balances, barely, elbows to knees. "I made a mistake."
There is a sharp inhale from across the room. Nico does not have the bravery to look up, but Will says, eventually, hesitantly: "I, uh. I did technically funnel several thousand dollars from your company. You were not exactly in the wrong."
Nico shakes his head. "I mean more than that." He stops, swallowing hard. "I did not treat you well."
"...You don't treat anyone well."
"You're different."
"I'm different?"
"Yes."
Nico pauses, staring out the window. He can feel Will's eyes on him, still, wide and blue, blue, blue, and it makes him twitch, makes him sweat.
"I took advantage of you, I think."
Will doesn't answer. He stares, still, eyes burning, eyes guarded, until Nico looks back, finally, and he has his hand, brushing over Lee's arm. Absentmindedly, by habit pulling up his covers and brushing back his hair. He doesn't flinch away once.
Nico says, softly: "I think you are a carer."
Will's breathing upticks.
"A carer, most of all. You care for people. And you came to my company and I was in this dark space, that I have been in most of my life. I was used to it." He stops, closing his eyes. He thinks of hospitals and dark rooms. Of his father's grip on his shoulders. He blinks and continues. "And then you came in with your brightness and your heat. I clung to you, even as I scorned you. And it's -- it's the light after Plato's cave, you know? You were honest and it stung and I was sullen and hesitant but God, for the first time everything lit up."
Nico stops, again. Stares at the ridges of his knuckles.
"And that just wasn't...that's not fair to you, I guess. I never thought about what you needed. You're a person, not a bright thing. And I'm sorry for that."
He meets Will's eyes again. He follows the bob of his scarred throat, as he swallows.
"Well, I was, like. You're hired assistant." He squirms, picking at a loose thread in his jeans. "And, honestly, you kind of...helped me. Too."
Nico shakes his head. "You're friend." His voice is hoarse, lined with guilt. He doesn't bother clearing it. "He says you were a doctor."
Will nods. "Almost."
"A doctor, Will. I didn't even know."
"Well, I don't talk about it."
Will avoids his gaze. There is a beeping from Lee's monitor, so he stands and fiddles with the machine with practiced ease, pressing the buttons until the screen flashes and quiets. Nico watches his shaking fingers still as they adjust his saline, like it is nothing.
"I don't know -- how," Will says, softly. "My brother won't talk to me. Lee is -- dead, functionally."
He chokes as he says it, brushing the sides of his fingers over his brother's forehead.
"I relied on my brothers every day of my life and then I woke up one day and didn't recognize myself in the mirror and my two favorite people in the world were -- gone. I was adrift."
Will shrugs.
"I quit my program. I -- couldn't do it anyway, I guess, can't cut someone open with shaking hands. I just cried most days and struggled and the debt kept getting worse and I wanted to -- well."
He doesn't say it but Nico gets it, suddenly and horrifically -- Will fiddles with the bandage always wrapped around his wrist and Nico realizes what it hides, what Will tried to do. He tastes acid.
"I convinced myself I didn't have a purpose, Nico. I was so sure of it."
He looks to Nico and his eyes are so dark in the setting sun. Nico can't breathe.
"But you gave me something, again. I mean, you were a piece of work and I went home and complained to you to anyone -- and I mean anyone -- who would listen --" He grins, and Nico huffs a laugh, not doubting it -- "but fuck, Neeks. For the first time in too long I was me again. There was someone I could help. And, well. Not a bad someone either."
He looks down and there is a curl to his shoulders that is almost shy. Nico stares at it, at the curve of his throat, and his mouth goes dry.
"You're funny, even when you're being a jackass. And you care about people and you get things done and you aren't bothered by my attitude."
"I like it," Nico admits, heart pounding. Will looks at him and he flushes but pushes forward, still, forces the words out of his mouth. "I like it when you push back at me. It makes me feel like a -- human, again. Like someone who can be wrong instead of an untouchable entity."
Will snorts. "Well I can most certainly promise you that you are wrong often."
Nico quirks his lips. "I know. I know." He breathes out, smile dropping. "And I was hugely wrong, Will, in casting you away." The foam of the arm rest creas under his fingers. "I -- want you back, if you want to come back."
Will exhales, fingers tracing the swirls of Lee's bedsheets. Nico's heart sinks, and he knows what Will is going to say before he says it.
"I don't think I can work for you anymore," he confirms. He bites his lip. "I -- it was a lot, Nico."
Nico nods, chest tight. "I know. I totally under--"
"Plus, there's something of a conflict of interest."
Nico whips his head up. "What?"
Will avoids his eyes, breathing quick and shallow, shoulders up to his ears. "I'm. I think it's frowned upon, when the PA wants to sleep with the boss." His fingers twitch. "Whole trope and everything."
Nico feels his heart stutter. He meets Will's guarded, careful eyes with his own wide ones, and stares, one minute, two, until the barely-there hope in Will's eyes starts to fade, until he nods to himself.
"I hope you'll still write me a reference letter," Will jokes lightly. "I meaning, I don't see a lot of PAing in my future, but --"
"I'm in love with you," Nico blurts. "Marry me."
Will freezes. "Uh."
"I mean! I mean, fuck, I'm sorry, I --" Nico is bright red and he feels it, and Will's nervous little giggle makes it worse, fuck, what is he doing.
He exhales, long and slow. He balls his fists and lets go of the tension, like Jason taught him. He meet's Will's eyes again, but this time his voice is steady.
"Not yet," he says firmly. "Don't marry me -- yet. But." He breathes out again. "Try, with me." He swallows. "If you want to."
"I want to," Will says, softly.
"We can get you back to med school, if you want. Something other than surgery. People need doctors, Will, you can always --"
"I want to."
"-- any school you want, if you still need school -- do you still need school? -- I'll pay for it, I can --"
"I want to."
"-- I promise I am not hurting for money and that's what this whole organization is, isn't it, making the medical field more accessible, and --"
"Nico."
Nico freezes, gulping in a huge breath. Will sets his brother's hand lovingly down and moves until he is crouching in front of Nico's hyperventilating form, both hands gently squeezing his.
"Deep breathes, Nico. Follow me."
Nico does, inhaling when he breathes in, huge and exaggerated, and exhaling when he breathes out. Will keeps breathing with him until the shake in his chest steadies, until the bounce of his leg slows to nothing.
"I'll marry you, Nico," he says quietly. "If you still want to marry me."
Nico nods frantically. "I do. I do. God, Will." He places a hand on Will's scarred cheek, and Will leans into it, tired but soft, hesitant but believing. "I do."
"Long engagement," Will says. He smiles wryly. "It'll take you two years at least to make up for all the shit you've thrown at me."
Nico laughs, pulling him close. "As long as you need," he promises. "We'll do it your way, for this. We tend to anyways."
Will scoffs. "As fuckin if --!"
But Nico leans in, and kisses him. And he rolls his eyes, kiss fracturing as he smiles, and slides his shaking hands up Nico's side, resting on his chest. Nico reaches down to meet them, hands gentle, thumb tracing the ridges of his grafts, of his dotted-aborted freckles, until he sighs, and leans in. And kisses Nico back, gentle and willing and trusting.
"You're way," Nico vows, murmured against his lips. "Whatever you need, Will. However I can take care of you."
"Okay," Will whispers, breath shuddering. His hands twist the silk of Nico's dress shirt. He doesn't care, in the slightest. "Okay, okay, okay."
-- -- --
Epilogue
-- -- --
His last patient of the day is very young, very sick, and has very, very, long hair; Will removes his ring, knowing better than to assume the stone won't get caught, with his luck, and pushes into the exam room, waiting for the mother's waving hand before coming in all the way.
"Hey, Gracie," he says, keeping his voice low. He shoots her a sympathetic smile. "Long time, no see."
"I don't want to see you again," the young girl grouches, butting her head into her mother's stomach. Her mother snorts. "Your office makes me sick."
"...Is it the office that makes you sick, kiddo."
"Yes."
Will snorts at her vehemence, knowing better than to argue. Grumpy sick people, Will has noticed, are more stubborn than a mule. Especially grown men who know better, but that's neither here nor there.
"If you say so."
"I do," she mutters, but it is muffled in her mother's shirt, and she quiets when Will approaches with the stethoscope. Her heartbeat if fine, if a little higher than usual, and as her mother holds the light for him, he can see that her ears are stuffed. Her throat, too, is swollen.
"I'm thinking strep," he says apologetically. "I'm sorry, sweetheart."
She groans -- this is the third time this year, and it is only June. He makes eye contact with her mother, knowing that if it happens again, they'll have to discuss further options.
"Pray for us," says her mother, quietly. "I can't -- the surgery is --"
Expensive. Upwards of $4000, in New York; higher, if Gracie goes somewhere where she can be comfortable as she is six and sick and scared.
Will knows that the cheapest option is too much.
"Let get you in touch with my husband," he says, squeezing her hand. "Well, his secretary, actually, but Rachel is probably a better bet. Nico is a grouchy person." He meets Gracie's peeked-open green eyes and grins. "He handles high bills like that, here. You won't see a cent of charge."
His patient hesitates. Will cannot blame her -- this family is a new transfer, to this office, and Will does not doubt that she has heard the same promise before.
But Will means it. And he has the funds backing it to prove it, so he finishes Gracie's check-up, lets her pick a lollipop (she picks two, Will turns a blind eye) and guides them back to the front desk, quickly scrawling some last notes in Gracie's file. Kayla has gone home already -- last minute Saturday appointment, and Will knows she has band -- so he gets the papers himself, scrawling the company's number on legal paper and tucking it in with her prescription. Gracie's mother takes one gratefully, one hesitantly.
"He'll help," Will promises. "Else he's sleeping on the couch, so."
The woman laughs. Finally, the tension in her shoulders seems to ease, and Gracie, clever girl that she is, relaxes too, pressing her sticky fingers to the desk to enjoy the smudge they make.
"That's a threat I recognize," she teases, eyes sparkling. She rans a hand over her daughter's braids. "Lets hope it doesn't come to that, though, huh, Gracie-girl."
Gracie gives a sleepy nod and lets her mother lift her. Will walks them to the door, waving as they make their way to the bus stop, and ducks back inside, quickly gathering his things. It takes some shoving, but his messenger bag has taken him this far and it will take him farther. He makes it to the curb only nineteen minutes late -- a near-record for him, honestly -- and grins at Jules-Albert's exasperated eyeroll.
"Hi," he says, placing his hands angelically under his chin, and the chauffeur visibly softens. "Interview over already?"
Jules-Albert nods.
"Aw."
He doesn't say it, but Will has grown fluent in raised eyebrows and judgmental stares. Nico doesn't speak for a full hour and a half after waking up. He will down four espressos before his office coffee before uttering a word. It is hilarious.
"It's not my fault! I got a call. I brough another case for the company, anyway. That'll perk His Highness up. It puts us above Octavian and his crew, I think."
Jules-Albert doesn't say anything, but he switches to a more upbeat radio station. Will smiles triumphantly. Score.
Now, obviously the goal is to help people. Always.
But it does not hurt to rub it in Octavian's thieving face that they're better at helping people, so. Plus, well.
Nico gets handsy when he's winning.
They pull up to the office quickly. Will blows Jules-Albert a kiss, snickering at his hidden smile, and bounds up to his husband's floor, blowing by security. They wave as he passes, jovial, and he waves back. Nervous excitement churns his stomach, and he pauses in the bullpen, fiddling with his -- aw, fuck, he forgot to leave his coat at work.
"Damn." Jason strolls over, making a show of checking his watch. "Only thirty-two minutes late…you're practically early."
"Lotsa traffic," Will lies. Jason sees through him easily and rolls his eyes. Will grins. "Did he make it?"
"Go see for yourself," the man says, but he's grinning, and Will cheers, dropping his bag -- his laptop will be fine probably -- where he stands and sprinting for Nico's office. Rachel pretends to trip him on his way in but he notices last second and jumps over her foot, which unfortunately makes him ram into the half-open door, but he takes that one as a win. Both parties inside have seen him do dumber.
"Dr. Brunner!!!"
They could hear him in the Bronx, probably, but Will can't bring himself to care. In the dead centers of the sunlight spilling from the Palladian windows sits his old teacher, in the flesh: his favorite professor, his professor who visited him, when he was injured and disoriented, who came banging on his door the day he quit.
"Will," he says, smiling broadly. "It is grand to see you again, child."
Will rushes to crush him in a hug, beaming. "I am thirty-two!"
"Almost through toddler, then."
Will snorts, sinking into the embrace: the smell, of pen ink and hand sanitizer, the feel of tweed and scruffy beard tickling his ear. It has been a good year since he has seen his mentor -- not since the wedding -- and he has missed him. Before that, even, visits were sporadic. A pointedly cleared throat ruins the moment.
"Am I chopped liver."
"I see you every day, you needy loser."
"Well, Dr. Brunner, since you're not trying to seduce me, I'll go ahead and advise you not to speak to me like that during your employment."
"Oh, is that how it happened."
But Will is flushing, and Dr. Brunner is laughing, and he pulls away, giving Will the space to pinch his husband or at least try to.
"It's not," Will says darkly, "but there is a spray bottle in my old desk if you need to train some manners back into him."
That shuts Nico right up. Will smiles triumphantly and tangles their hands together, holding them up in his victory. Nico sighs as if this is such a big inconvenience but curls into the space it makes at Will's side, bringing heir joined hands back down so his arm is around Will's hips, fingers still clasped so that Will can feel the shape of his ring.
"…You still have that, huh."
"Well, unless you found the hiding spot."
He didn't. Will knows he didn't. Will meets Dr. Brunner's sparkling eyes, wordlessly promising to reveal it to him. Nico notices and scowls.
"What is the deal with MDs and torturing me," he grumbles. "Didn't you guys take an oath or something."
Will snorts and kisses his grumbling away. He softens, against him, and when he pulls away again he is smiling.
"We're happy to have you on board," he addresses Dr. Brunner, extending his hand. Dr. Brunner shakes it. Will thinks of his own tumultuous onboarding and bites back a grin. Nico must be thinking the same, because he sighs. "I have been in need of a PA for a time, but it has been a process trying to find someone as competent as my last."
Dr. Brunner feigns ignorance, stroking his beard.
"Ah," he says, "I have heard the rumors. Your last assistant must have been quite the person to soften the notorious di Angelo's frigid heart."
Nico squeezes Will's hip. Will glows.
"One of a kind," Nico says, softly. There is no mistaking the love in his voice, and he makes it so.
"Well, then," says Dr. Brunner, suddenly just as serious as gentle. "I will have some large shoes to fill."
A fic rec of One Direction fics in which the main characters have a fight/argument and then make up as requested in this ask. If you enjoy the fics, please leave kudos and comments for the writers! You can find my other recs here. Happy reading!
- Louis / Harry -
☄️ Time Passed by coffinofachimera
(E, 66k, canon) Louis struggles with their relationship as Harry grows into his identity.
☄️ let me carry your weight by @soldouthaz
(E, 28k, trainer Harry) louis is fresh out of a bad relationship with someone who made him feel awful about how he looked. on his journey to better himself, he meets harry - the ridiculously attractive and fit personal trainer.
☄️ Lover Boy by @brightgolden
(E, 27k, CEO Louis) Where Louis wants to tell everyone about his relationship with Harry, but his boyfriend clearly thinks otherwise.
☄️ the evenness i fake by @shimmeringevil
(E, 26k, omegaverse) Harry doesn’t do relationships. He has a perfectly enjoyable friends-with-benefits agreement with a perfectly lovely omega, and he doesn’t see the need to change that anytime soon.
☄️ your lips in the low light by etherealbliss / @givesuethemoon
(E, 20k, uni) Set over the course of one night, at one fateful frat party. Louis and Harry find that there are not many things they will ever need more than each other.
☄️ Midnight by @kingsofeverything
(E, 10k, omegaverse) All Harry’d wanted to do was be a good neighbor. Now, here he is, half a year later, balls deep and four months into a no strings attached, sex only situation with the Omega of his dreams. He’s still not sure how it happened.
☄️ this love is alive by @stylinsonwritingpalace
(E, 10k, writer Louis) When Louis's favorite fictional character, Harry Styles, comes to life, it's up to him to decide if he should stay.
☄️ My Home And My English Rose by @nauticalallusions
(M, 8k, established relationship) Everything is uncomplicated, perfect, even, until Harry gets an offer to become a famous musician if he goes to Nashville. Louis supports him, as always, with his decision to go and make it big, but it’s never as easy as it seems.
☄️ Sex Drunk Suckerpunch by thinlines / @thinlinez
(E, 7k, age difference) Sugar Baby Louis did what any sugar baby should avoid doing but (clichely) end up doing anyways, that is, failing for his sugar mama.
☄️ Good-Old Fashioned Lover Boy by not_fitzwilliam / @not-fitzwilliam-darcy
(NR, 5k, omegaverse) When a miscalculated decision leads to an accidental courtship with the sweetest, most gentle alpha, Harry is torn between breaking the alpha's heart and telling the truth.
☄️ Can we please get back to Loving by umbroshirt
(NR, 5k, canon) Harry's mad and Louis doesn't know why. Or, the silent treatment fic I thought of the second Written All Over Your Face came out
☄️ Changing Weather (For Worse or For Better) by @haztobegood
(M, 3k, 5 times) Five times it's raining and one time it stops.
☄️ I'm Falling Again by @jaerie
(M, 3k, canon) Harry sat on the edge of the bed, looked down at the screen of his phone and pressed call once again. Just like the last three times, his call went straight to voicemail, driving home the fact of just how badly he’d fucked up.
☄️ i’ll always look out for you by orphan_account
(NR, 2k, omegaverse) Harry and Louis get into an argument but that doesn’t stop them from loving each other all the while.
☄️ Just Dump Me by DirtySweetStyle
(M, 2k, mpreg) Harry’s smile dropped. Louis froze and his heart was suddenly washed in ice as he watched green eyes well up with clear tears and red exhaustion.
☄️ Tuesday night by 28moon
(NR, 2k, canon) “Cuddle me” Louis mumbles to his neck.
“You smell like her '' Harry mumbles and pushes Louis rudely off.
☄️ Let me feel at home again by mirilik
(NR, 1k, canon) the one where Louis and Harry seem to be on different sides but really are on the very same page about everything.
- Rare Pairs -
☄️ We'll Always Have Blockbuster by @disgruntledkittenface
(NR, 3k, Harry/Louis/Nick Grimshaw) Nick has been casually seeing Harry, his coworker at the video rental store. When Harry starts dating their friend Louis, Nick tries to be the bigger person. It turns out that he’s just an idiot.
Deepest - Jegulus - @taylorswiftmicrofic - 335 words - Part 2 of Alone - AO3
James has been avoiding Regulus all week. He just doesn’t know what to say to him. He doesn’t know why he did that at the party. He doesn’t even like women! He’s not mad that he didn’t kiss him (well, maybe he is a little), but there were plenty of guys he could have kissed instead. Why did he choose Lily? Was it because he wanted to know what it was like for him when they were together? Was it his jealousy showing? Or is he just not as into him as James is?
“Oh…sorry, I thought this room was empty,” James says when he enters the Charms classroom he was planning on using to practice for his N.E.W.T.s. He should have checked the map before entering.
“Wait!” Regulus calls out as he turns to leave. “I- We-”
“It’s fine, Reg. If you don’t like me that way, it’s fine.”
“What? No, I- I do…” He lets out a long breath. “I really fucked things up last week, didn’t I?”
James sighs. “It’s fine, Reg.”
“No, it’s not fine. I just saw you two dancing earlier and I...”
He turns to look at him. “You were jealous?”
Regulus squeezes his eyes shut as if he just revealed his deepest, darkest secret. He nods his head minutely in response and James crosses the room, gently cradling his cheek. “I was jealous too, when you two kissed.”
“Really?”
“I mean, I agree with Mary that it was hot, but I would have rather been the one kissing you.”
He leans into his touch, gazing into his eyes and he can see the nervousness in them as he asks, “What are we, James?”
James beams, obsessed with the way his name, his first name, sounds on his tongue. “I would like us to be boyfriends, if you’ll have me.”
“Of course I’ll have you.”
Their lips connect tenderly. “No more kissing others to make me jealous, okay? Especially not for dancing with my friend.”
