Chapter Text
In the end, even with their combined efforts, they’re no match for LINE’s state of the art end-to-end encryption. Letter Sealing, Rimbaud had said with a defeated shrug, before terminating all of their running processes and closing the fifty tabs of Stack Overflow they’d opened up in their search for ever shadier exploitation tips. He’d had to leave then for his afternoon shift at the bakery, so of course Verlaine had to tag along in order to flirt with his boyfriend under the guise of keeping him company.
So it seemed the contents of Chuuya’s LINE messages would remain a mystery.
At this point, a less determined person might have given up. But Verlaine hadn’t spent all those years in France slowly prying back control of his life from his old man’s crusty grip just to be stopped by a measly smartphone app. He’d dealt with everything from a fractured home life to the unbearable loneliness of living in a nation full of bread lovers—as if he would let some sweet-talking harlot lay their grimy hands on his brother.
If they’re out of leads, they’ll just have to go about their investigation the old-fashioned way.
This is how he finds himself huddled shoulder-to-shoulder with Rimbaud behind a line of shrubs at the local park one Saturday, watching as Chuuya shares an animated conversation with another boy. How they decided on this day is rather simple, and it hadn’t involved any advanced feat of espionage—their reason is that Chuuya had circled the date in red on his calendar and written above it, quite literally, IMPORTANT.
Some would call this stalking. Verlaine prefers to think of it as protecting his brother from a distance. And without his knowledge.
The subject of interest, copper-haired and well-toned in his baggy t-shirt and shorts, says something that has both him and Chuuya cracking up, and Verlaine is filled with the incredible urge to drive them apart, because they’re too close. He focuses on redirecting his energy into tearing the leaves off of the shrubs instead.
Rimbaud looks at him with an expression stuck between concern and amusement. “Is that…?”
“Tachihara Michizou,” he answers, shaking his head. “A first year in Chuuya’s soccer club. He’s a winger, if I recall. And to my knowledge, he should already have someone he’s interested in.”
“I see. So this is likely not the main appointment. Do you happen to know what their meeting is for?”
“I believe Chuuya wanted to return a CD he borrowed.”
As if on cue, his brother’s voice filters through his earpiece, transmitted from the listening bug Verlaine planted on him earlier that morning.
“Anyway, thanks for lending me that CD, Tachihara. SCREEN mode’s got some real bangers.”
“For real though, SCREEN mode slaps. And no problem, I had a feeling you’d vibe with them. I always see you jammin’ out to GRANRODEO. ‘Bout time you switched it up, y’know?”
“Look, GRANRODEO’s goated, okay?”
“Haha, sure, sure. So which track was your favorite?”
“Probably TRUE STORY. That guitar solo was pretty fire.”
“Eh, TRUE STORY? Kinda mid. Reason Living goes harder.”
Sinking back down onto his heels, Verlaine exhales slowly and resigns himself to the knowledge that it’s becoming increasingly difficult to understand what the teenagers of today are talking about. Rimbaud, who’s been listening to the conversation through his own earpiece, offers him a sympathetic smile before continuing to scribble notes in his journal.
His brother and his friend exchange a few more words about beat drops and bass lines in their incomprehensible dialect, and then Chuuya is turning on his heels with a breezy wave.
“Alright, good talking to you, Tachihara. See you Monday.”
He makes to leave, but Tachihara catches him by the wrist, overcome with a sudden fervor.
“Wait, Chuuya-san! Actually, you have something else of mine!”
Chuuya stops mid-stride, turning back to blink at him curiously. “Shoot, was there something else I forgot?”
“Yeah…” Tachihara swallows nervously before meeting his gaze, a determined light in his eyes. “You forgot to give me back my heart.”
Something snaps in Verlaine’s hands, and he numbly registers that it was the stem of the shrub he had been pruning, the skin on his fingers lacerated by the jagged ends. But that’s not important, because what did he just hear? Surely, it was an auditory hallucination, right?
Chuuya seems to share that sentiment, his face twisted in utter bewilderment at the confession. He looks back and forth between Tachihara and the hand wrapped around his wrist like he’s waiting for the prank to be revealed. “Your what?”
“Look, I can’t help it, okay?” Tachihara averts his eyes, the slightest hint of red dusting his cheeks. “You’ve got a killer kick and good taste in music. Plus you have a nice face. You’re basically the whole package.”
“Are you high, dude?”
“The only thing I’m high on is that 10/10 smile,” Tachihara says without missing a beat.
Almost reflexively, Chuuya slaps him in the face. He realizes his mistake a second later, his eyes widening in regret as he gingerly cups Tachihara’s swollen cheek. “Shit, sorry. You were acting so weird that I kinda freaked out. You good?”
Tachihara gives him a thumbs up. “Better than ever.”
“Did Gin put you up to this?”
“No, I swear she had nothing to do with this. Actually, please don’t tell he—”
There’s no need to hear the rest, because Tachihara Michizou won’t be long for this world. Well, he wouldn’t be if Rimbaud didn’t wrap his arms around Verlaine’s waist the moment he sprang up to tug him back down behind the shrubs.
“No, Paul.”
“I won’t hurt him, I swea—”
“No.”
“I just want to have a nice, civil conversa—”
“No.”
They go back and forth like this for a bit, but Verlaine eventually gives in, if only because Rimbaud is currently clinging to him with twice the grip strength of a sloth to a tree branch. For someone with as weak a constitution as Rimbaud, he has a surprising amount of power—but that’s to be expected of someone so well-versed in the art of bread-making. It also isn’t to his disadvantage that he gives really nice hugs. Verlaine is not proud to admit that his resolve had started to waver about five seconds into their game of tug-of-war.
Unfortunately, while they were preoccupied, Chuuya had already wrapped up his strange encounter and gone on his way. They share a moment of brief panic when they realize the park is conspicuously free of high school soccer aces, and then they’re scrambling to catch up to the tiny figure crossing the street two blocks down.
To Verlaine’s chagrin, he would soon find out that Tachihara’s confession was only a portent of worse things to come.
It happens again when Chuuya is browsing the candy aisle at the convenience store, his focus divided between two brands of chocolate. In the midst of his inspection, someone reaches over and plucks one of the chocolate bars out of his hand.
“I thought athletes were supposed to watch what they eat,” Edogawa Ranpo, part-time detective and full-time know-it-all, says around a mouthful of lollipop as he waves the chocolate bar in front of Chuuya’s nose. “But here you are, bumming out at a 7-Eleven. No balls to kick around this weekend, Mr. Fancy Feet?”
Two aisles down, peeking out from behind a shelf of condiments, Rimbaud mouths who? and Verlaine supplies the information in a hushed whisper—upperclassman, president of the school’s mystery club, self-purported great detective, and Dazai’s friend. He and Chuuya had crossed paths once during a locker room theft case in which Ranpo had managed to solve the mystery and insult the entire soccer team in the same breath, and Chuuya had ended up trying to punch him instead of the culprit.
They’ve been on bad terms ever since. Or so Verlaine hears.
“I could say the same to you, Holmes wannabe,” Chuuya snaps back with a roll of his eyes. “No cases to play detective for today?”
Unbothered by the jab, Ranpo only shrugs lazily. “Sherlock Holmes wishes he could be me. Sadly, our club’s only been getting boring cases lately. None of them interested me, so I’m letting Poe-kun handle them.”
“Oh really? You sure you aren’t just saying that because you got stumped?”
“The only one who would fall for that kind of cheap provocation is you. But if you doubt my abilities, I’ll give you a free demonstration right now.” Extracting his lollipop from his mouth with a pop, Ranpo proceeds to make a deliberate show of looking Chuuya up and down. (And is Verlaine imagining things or is that bastard checking his brother out?)
“Oh. I see,” he says finally, his gaze roaming to the left, and for a second, Verlaine almost thinks he’s been discovered. But just as quickly, Ranpo’s attention returns to Chuuya, his eyes twinkling with a hint of mirth. “So that’s how it is.”
“Oh, I see, my ass. You didn’t even do anything.”
“You’ve got a date,” Ranpo declares.
Chuuya scoffs, clearly unimpressed. “The hell I do. I knew you were a hack after al—”
Ranpo cuts him off by shoving his lollipop into Chuuya’s mouth. The lollipop he was just eating. The one that has his saliva all over it. The one he just shoved into Chuuya’s mouth.
“That’s a shame. If you were free, I could’ve given you the honor of a one-on-one lesson with me. Since your grades are so abysmal and all.” His lips part to reveal a devious grin. “Oh well. Have fun on your date, Chuuya~”
He places the chocolate bar back into Chuuya’s stiff hands, shoots him a wink, and slips out through the automatic doors before anyone can react, humming a tune as he goes.
Chuuya is so stunned that he forgets to spit the lollipop out until a few minutes later.
“…What the fuck?”
Needless to say, Verlaine has to be stopped, once again, from trying to commit murder in cold blood. He hasn’t felt such uncontrollable rage since his father told him in an intoxicated stupor that he’d never wanted more kids—he hadn’t even wanted the first one—but at the very least, they’d turned out better than Verlaine, and maybe his greatest mistake was having been born, because what recourse is there for an existence as wretched as his—
“Breathe,” Rimbaud urges him, his forehead pleasantly cool where it presses lightly against Verlaine’s. “Just breathe, Paul.”
And Verlaine does. Staring into those lovely golden eyes, full of warmth, he forgets about wiping that detective brat off the face of the planet and takes a deep breath. Then another.
Rimbaud continues to talk to him in that soothing tone of his, his hands clasped around Verlaine’s with gentle insistence. “We are not here to kill anyone.“
“…Right.”
It seems like an obvious thing, but somehow, it’s a lot more convincing coming out of Rimbaud’s mouth. And spoken in Rimbaud’s voice. And accompanied by Rimbaud’s face.
“We only want to find out who Chuuya-kun is meeting.”
“Yes.”
“Don’t lose sight of your goal.”
“You’re right.”
Satisfied with the response, Rimbaud pulls back and gives his shoulder a squeeze. “There. Better now, ma biscotte?”
Verlaine’s only answer is to lean forward and reduce the gap between them to zero.
Some people are unloved by God. This, Verlaine knows all too well, the way he knows each of the seven types of bread Rimbaud is most fond of making, and the twenty odd peculiarities of his siblings’ tastes in food. Still, here in front of a shelf of soy sauce bottles, with an expanse of cheap fluorescent lights above him and his partner by his side, he feels like he could conquer any hell.
And God must have been listening, because hell is indeed what he thrusts upon Verlaine—a hell in which nearly everyone Chuuya runs into tries to make a pass at him.
Like the disciplinary committee member whose composure crumbles as he stammers out a compliment with a mortified blush.
“G-good work on that last game, Nakahara…Just remember not to neglect your studies.”
Or the upperclassman with the dangerous smile and the butterfly hair clip who pins him against a wall and bats her pretty lashes at him.
“Next time you get injured, just come on by and I’ll patch you up for free.”
Or the sickly young man who pledges his undying devotion in the midst of a coughing fit.
“Chuuya-san, I’ll follow you to the ends of the earth!”
In front of the bookstore, on the sidewalk, in the middle of a busy intersection, atop a pedestrian bridge—any and every location Chuuya passes through becomes an impromptu confession spot for an acquaintance trying to win his favor. One person even hijacks the neighborhood announcement system to serenade him with a violin rendition of Setsuna no Ai on full blast, ending the song with a phone number and a nervous C-call me!
Verlaine is reminded, once again, of the time he ate that slice of brioche in his sleep-deprived state, and the unending agony that had plagued him for days afterwards in the wake of his devastated intestinal tract. His body had been wracked by sweat-inducing chills, his bones had ached terribly, and he had felt cramps so severe that even his sister, in the midst of her monthly cycle, had called him to offer her condolences.
But this? This is so much worse.
“If I’m in Hell…” he whispers deliriously, staring up into the face of the one who is to lead him to salvation. Or maybe it should be retribution. Neither means much to him anymore. “Are you a fallen angel? You’re far more beautiful than I imagined.”
The angel cradles him in his arms and cries out in alarm. “Paul? Paul, stay with me!”
And so his torment would continue.
***
It’s funny how a desperate situation can make even an unappealing option seem vastly more desirable. For example, Verlaine has never been all that fond of Old World, but seeing his brother stop by the run-down billiard club today feels like finding the one gluten-free option at an all-you-can-eat carbs fest—an instant relief. At least there, no one would hit on his brother. (Or rather, those punks masquerading as a youth association had better not.) Verlaine tries to comfort himself with that thought as he and Rimbaud eavesdrop on his brother’s conversation by the back exit of the club.
In no time at all, Chuuya’s irritated voice reaches them through the half-open window by the exit. It’s not hard to see what has him so wound up—the center of the room is littered with scattered furniture, there’s fake blood everywhere, and his friends are all standing around him with injuries of varying severity, laughing themselves silly.
Rimbaud is understandably confused about why it looks like a serial murder just took place, and Verlaine has to wearily inform him of the association’s latest fixation—pranking Chuuya. What had started out as a silly initiation tradition for their group had since evolved into an all-out undertaking to get a rise out of Chuuya. In fact, they seem to have perfected the art of annoying him.
Reenacting an elaborate death scene, of all things, might have been a bit much though. Chuuya had dropped his shopping bag in horror when he walked in to find the supposed dead bodies of his friends strewn about the floor, at least until Albatross started giggling through a punctured lung and a few missing ribs. Needless to say, Chuuya hadn’t been happy to find out the truth.
“That’s it. I’m done with you fuckers,” he grumbles as he turns his back on them and stomps towards the entrance. “We’re through!”
“Don’t be like that, Chuuya!” Albatross pops into his path, one hand keeping the pieces of his fake ribs in place. “It was just a joke!”
Without hesitation, Chuuya flicks him on the forehead. “Jokes are supposed to be funny, dipshit. Does it look like I’m laughing?”
“Actually, you look a little pale.” The emaciated one, Doc, has a teasing grin on his face as he lugs his IV pole over, the fake blood dripping down his chin only adding to his sickly appearance. “If you need a blood transfusion, you’re in luck. We have a lot left over.”
“He’s pale from shock, not blood loss,” Pianoman, their so-called leader, says in barely contained amusement. He pulls the prop knife stuck to his stomach off and spins it around on a finger. “Were you that distraught at the thought of losing us? To think Chuuya would miss us after all.”
Chuuya rolls his eyes. “Miss you? I’ll fucking put you under with my own two hands.”
“You’d have to reach my knees first.”
Lippmann—is that the one who likes to crossdress?—inserts himself between the two of them with a smile brighter than the room’s interior lighting. “Maybe we did go a little overboard,” he says, ripping off the remains of his prosthetic arm to reveal the real one hidden inside his coat. “I’d been meaning to try out some new SFX makeup techniques before I debut them on my channel, but I might have made it too realistic…I didn’t think Chuuya-san would start crying.”
“Oi, who the fuck was cryin—”
“02:44,” a bored voice cuts in, and the person himself emerges from behind a curtained off area with a phone in hand. “Eyes appear wet. 02:50—Visible tear formation. 02:59—Crying softly.”
“Iceman didn’t wanna play dead with us cause he’s a party pooper, so we had him record your reaction,” Albatross explains.
“I’d rather not spend my weekend washing fake blood out of my clothes,” Iceman says flatly.
Chuuya, of course, takes all of this in stride—by crossing his arms and telling the five of them to get fucked.
Pianoman sighs dramatically. “Believe us, we’ve been trying. But then you had to go and seduce all the available men in town.”
Another round of uproarious laughter breaks out as Chuuya chases their leader around the room with a pool cue.
It’s a familiar scene—one that calls back to June weekends passed in lazy sunlight and a summer of tumultuous self-discovery. That year, caught up in the whims of his eccentric peers, Chuuya had finally learned to face forward again.
(For the record, Verlaine doesn’t observe them all that often these days. It’s just that Chuuya had been so vulnerable at the time, and Verlaine had to make sure his brother wasn’t being led astray by people of ill character, so he had no choice but to investigate them.)
Allowing himself to relax, Verlaine turns his back to the window and slides down to the ground, his back resting against the chipping brick wall. At least for now, they could put their worries on hold. Rimbaud seems to be thinking the same thing as he scoots over to join him, their knees bumping lightly.
“Chuuya-kun’s friends seem nice,” he comments.
“I suppose.”
“It’s a joyous thing to be surrounded by people who accept you for who you are.”
That, Verlaine could wholeheartedly agree with. “That’s true.”
He’d had his doubts when he first heard of Chuuya’s new friends. The Flags, they liked to call themselves, for the little pride flag pins that they each wore. A group of misfits who had earned themselves a reputation for being unruly—but in reality, they were just youths with troubled home lives finding solace in unlikely companions.
If there’s one thing Verlaine appreciates about those ruffians, it’s that they had always been there for Chuuya, even if they insisted on parading around with their silly little codenames and dragging his brother along on outlandish escapades that bordered on illegal.
He quickly amends that favorability rating when an obnoxiously loud voice rings out next to them.
“Hey, it’s Chuuya’s crazy brother and his boyfriend!”
“Oh putain!” He scrambles to his feet at the same time Rimbaud does, their wary stares trained on the blond-haired menace that’s appeared before them without warning.
Albatross only tilts his head, his posture relaxed as he observes them from the entrance of the alleyway. When had he even gotten there? The back door is still closed, so he must have gone around from the front. A praiseworthy feat for someone who can usually be heard from several kilometers away.
“How did you know we were here?” Verlaine asks, one ear listening for his brother’s inevitable outrage at being followed. Thankfully, all he hears from within the room are the cheers and jeers of an intense round of pool—it seems the others are too absorbed in their game to notice the commotion outside.
“It was a piece of cake,” Albatross says proudly. “Iceman’s gaydar is never wrong.”
Rimbaud blinks at him uncomprehendingly. “Pardon, his what?”
“You know, gaydar.” Albatross makes a vague gesture with his hand that explains nothing. “Iceman gets tingles on his skin whenever there’s a homosexual nearby. He’s already used to tuning us out though, so he really only notices if it’s someone he’s not familiar with.”
“He’s joking, right?” Rimbaud asks, a desperate edge to his voice, and there’s nothing Verlaine can do but avert his gaze and let out a heavy sigh.
He hadn’t wanted to believe it either, but it would certainly explain how the expressionless one always managed to catch on to his presence when he was tailing their group. Of course, Verlaine was never careless enough to actually get caught, but the accuracy of that gaydar was uncanny.
Albatross looks between the two of them with a crooked smile. “Anyway, what are you guys up to? Spying on Chuuya again? He’s totally gonna lose his shit when he finds out.”
“That’s hardly your business,” Verlaine says cooly. “Everything I do is for Chuuya’s sake.”
“Hmm. I see.” Albatross furrows his brows as if he’s mulling over something of great importance. Then, he turns to face the door and hollers, “HEY CHUUYA, YOUR BROTHER IS HE—”
Verlaine tackles him down faster than he can react and slaps a hand over his mouth. “Fine, I’ll tell you, so keep it down, goddamnit!”
Albatross lets out a muffled cheer.
***
Predictably, once they fill Albatross in on their mission, he insists on tagging along so he can witness Chuuya’s blossoming love story. Verlaine would have preferred to just tie the brat up and leave him in a dumpster somewhere, but Albatross had threatened to expose their location to Chuuya, so Rimbaud had made a reluctant statement about the more the merrier, and then they were stuck with him.
Which brings them to their current situation—the three of them have somehow ended up seated around the window side table at a bakery, watching Chuuya survey the floral selection at the flower shop across the street.
“Man, Chuuya is really packing the rizz today,” Albatross says as their target turns down his tenth suitor of the day. The rejectee, a girl with blonde hair secured in a bun, gives Chuuya a respectful bow before exiting the flower shop, her head hanging in defeat.
Rimbaud sets his coffee cup down on their table and makes a quizzical face. “He keeps mentioning this rizz. What is it?”
“Apparently it’s short for charisma,” Verlaine says with disdain as he uses his fork to cut his strawberry daifuku in half. They’re only hiding out here because it provides a good vantage point, but Albatross had insisted on ordering something to complete their cover. The rumbling of his stomach when he saw that tray of fresh egg tarts, however, had immediately given away his true intentions. “Internet lingo is absolutely asinine.”
Across from him, Albatross snorts, a half-eaten melonpan raised to his mouth. “Okay boomer.”
“What does boomer mean?” Rimbaud starts to ask, but Verlaine signals for him to stop with a shake of his head.
“Just ignore him, love. You’ll catch his idiocy.”
“L take,” Albatross says.
Verlaine chews on his daifuku very, very slowly and reminds himself he is not allowed to cause grievous harm to minors. At least not in any way that can be traced back to him. That old man Murase might not be the sharpest, but even he would notice if a loudmouth teen or two suddenly went missing.
Besides, as annoying as Albatross is, he’s still one of Chuuya’s friends. He was the one who had convinced (read: endlessly pestered) Chuuya to join their school’s soccer club in their first year and introduced him to the Flags, so he couldn’t be all that bad.
“So like,” Albatross mumbles through a mouthful of melonpan. “If you and Chuuya are brothers, how come you’re white?”
Verlaine bangs his head against the table, much to his boyfriend’s alarm.
His brother, meanwhile, has struck up a conversation with another customer as he waits for his order to be prepared. There’s something familiar about the tall figure standing next to him with a small bouquet of orchids in his arms—on closer inspection, Verlaine recognizes the man as the soccer club’s advisor.
Adam Frankenstein. A man whose enthusiasm for terrible android impersonations could rival his love for soccer. There’s not much Verlaine knows about him, aside from the fact that he teaches social studies at Chuuya’s high school and that Albatross had somehow convinced him to become their club advisor by giving him a pack of gum.
Bored and unwilling to listen to any more of Albatross’ ramblings, Verlaine tunes in to his brother’s conversation with a curious ear.
“…she feeling better these days?”
“Eve is still adjusting to the jetlag, but her mood has improved considerably. I thought I might cheer her up with her favorite flowers. It’s nice of you to ask, Chuuya-sama.”
“Well, that’s good. Hope she enjoys her stay here. And how many times do I have to tell you to lay off the honorifics…”
“But Chuuya-sama is Chuuya-sama. How else would I address someone I greatly respect?”
“I feel like this comes up every single time…You know what, forget it.”
“I will commit to forgetting it right away. Deleting it from my logs. Clearing out the cache.”
“Oh my god.”
“On a more serious note, I hope you manage to convey your feelings to the person those flowers are intended for, Chuuya-sama.”
“Ah, yeah…I don’t know if it’ll really make a difference, but he’s been going through a rough patch lately. I want to do what I can to help him out.”
“He must feel blessed to have you.”
“It’s the other way around. I owe him a lot.”
The florist hands Chuuya his order then—a bouquet of pure white lilies, wrapped in shiny cellophane and tied together by a golden bow. Its extravagance leaves no doubt in Verlaine’s mind that it’s a gift for someone special, and the thought once again makes his stomach twist. He’s been so hellbent on his mission for the past few weeks, but will he actually be able to face the truth once he’s confronted with it?
Chuuya pays for the flowers, bids his advisor goodbye, and leaves the shop. Verlaine and the others follow.
For once, his journey is uneventful. (Though the thought that his brother might just have run out of schoolmates looking to confess their affections for him isn’t exactly one that Verlaine wants to entertain.) It doesn’t take long for Chuuya to reach his destination—a column off to the side of the west entrance of a busy train station. And there he waits, bouquet in one hand, convenience store bag in the other.
It’s obvious to anyone that he’s waiting for an important appointment. But, surprisingly, that isn’t the heaviest thing weighing on Verlaine’s mind right now.
This day has seen his brother go through a veritable gauntlet of enthusiastic suitors. But there’s one person who’s been strangely absent in all of this. Someone who could claim to have a closer bond with Chuuya than most.
From his hiding spot behind a nearby directory sign, Verlaine takes in the look of quiet anticipation on his brother’s face, the restless tap tap tap of his foot as he scans the crowds for a certain figure, and is struck by a horrible premonition.
“Don’t tell me it’s actually Dazai-kun…” he mutters to himself in dread.
His boyfriend and Albatross glance over at him quizzically, but before either of them can say anything, a fourth person speaks up.
“What about me?”
The three of them react with varying degrees of surprise at finding Dazai standing behind them—Rimbaud jumps a little, Verlaine utters a string of curses, and Albatross lets out a thrilled whoa!
“Now this is a rare sight!” The spawn of Satan smiles innocently as three pairs of eyes fall on him. “Who would’ve thought I’d find this kind of combo out here?” He gestures to each of them as he names them off. “Albatross-kun, Rimbaud-san, and Paul-onii-san!”
Verlaine takes a calming breath, which does absolutely nothing to calm his nerves. “Dazai-kun, I implore you to never call me that again.”
“My bad. How about I call you aniki like the bean sprout does?” Dazai suggests, before breaking out into giggles at the dirty look he receives. “Kidding! I wouldn’t want to get on Verlaine-san’s bad side.”
Rimbaud, in his infinite graciousness, steps in to redirect the conversation before Verlaine can do something illegal. “What brings you here, Dazai-kun? Running an errand?”
The billion yen question indeed. Dazai’s outfit today is a tan cardigan over a white shirt and trousers, along with his usual underwrapping of bandages. Not exactly something someone would wear to a date, unless they didn’t care much about impressing the person they were seeing. In addition, he’s carrying a plastic bag around his wrist, the logo of Mainichi Pain stamped on it in its signature colors.
“Hehe. Actually, I was on my way to meet with someone when I saw you guys,” Dazai admits.
“A meetup?” Rimbaud says, sensing where Verlaine’s thoughts are heading. “Is it with—”
“Chuuya-san!”
All four of them pause, their attention drawn to the young man running over to Chuuya in a breathless rush. With choppy silver hair and an unassuming manner of dress, he doesn’t look like anyone particularly outstanding. But all the same, Chuuya’s eyes soften when he sees him.
“Sorry I’m late!” the boy says, his entire stance radiating an apology. “Even though I was the one who asked you to come all the way out here…”
Chuuya waves it off goodnaturedly. “It’s fine, Atsushi. I just got here a few minutes ago.”
“Really? Thank god.” Atsushi breathes out a sigh of relief, his shoulders relaxing ever so slightly. He finally seems to notice what Chuuya is holding and points to it curiously. “Is that…?”
In place of an answer, Chuuya pulls a chocolate bar out of his shopping bag and tosses it to Atsushi, who catches it with a start. “You looked like you could use a pick-me-up,” he explains. Then, with a smile, he hands over the bouquet of flowers. “And this is for you too. I know you said you weren’t planning on bringing anything, but I figured it couldn't hurt. It doesn’t have to mean anything if you don’t want it to.”
Atsushi stares at the bouquet in his arms, seemingly at a loss for words. He blinks a few times, his head hanging low, before enveloping Chuuya in a sudden hug. The cellophane around the bouquet crinkles as it gets crushed between them, a few of the petals fluttering to the ground.
“Thank you,” he says in a tremulous voice, his words punctuated by sniffles. “Really, thank you. It means so much to me.”
Chuuya’s astonishment quickly gives way to fondness, and he brings his arms up to wrap them around Atsushi. “Hey, it’s the least I could do.”
It’s a sweet scene. So sweet that Verlaine has to look away, his heart swirling with an unsettling mixture of guilt and bitterness. Because maybe Chuuya really does like that boy, and there’s nothing about him that Verlaine can hate, and all that leaves him with is an overwhelming sense of loss.
He should be happy that Chuuya was able to find someone he loves. He isn’t. Chuuya is no longer a child. He knows that. But it feels like only yesterday that his brother was two and tried to fit an entire stapler in his mouth. He used to trail behind Verlaine on his tiny feet, demanding to be picked up, and Kouyou would pout in jealousy while pretending she didn’t want the same. That was how his siblings had always been—annoyingly cheeky, and adorable beyond measure.
Isn’t it laughable that he should come to this realization now, as his brother smiles in the arms of another person? His fear isn’t that some mysterious boy will steal his brother away. It’s that his brother will grow up and no longer need him, just like the parents who had long since tossed him aside.
That’s how he’s always been—endlessly self-centered, and far too afraid of loneliness.
Dazai has left them to join up with the other two, dodging a jab from Chuuya to give his bakery purchase to Atsushi. There’s quibbling and laughter, and an argument about being late that Verlaine doesn’t quite catch.
“Isn’t this great, Paul?” Rimbaud says as he takes in the scene with a quiet sense of satisfaction, and Verlaine only wishes he could do the same.
He tries to keep the emotion out of his voice as he answers. “I suppose I should be glad it wasn’t Dazai-kun.”
“It wasn’t my intention to imply that Chuuya-kun is seeing that boy. I meant to say that you should be relieved, since this isn’t a date at all.”
Verlaine searches those pensive eyes for any hints of insincerity, but as expected, he finds none. He already knows that Rimbaud wouldn’t lie to him. And yet, he has to wonder what the basis is for such a bold claim.
“Why do you think so?” he asks.
Rimbaud’s smile grows a touch more melancholic. “Because the flowers are lilies.”
***
The grave is still relatively new, the deceased’s name cut sharply into the pristine marble of the headstone. All the same, it’s a buzz of activity—bouquets and garlands of colorful flowers decorate its length, along with little snacks of fruits and canned drinks. Farewell messages scrawled on postcards in crayon speckle the headstone like notes on a bulletin board. To an outsider, it looks like the memorial of a well-loved person.
Crouching down in front of the grave, Atsushi places his bouquet of lilies on it—another few to add to the sea of mourning flowers already there. The bakery cake Dazai gave him, he removes from its bag and places in the corner, next to a can of shiruko. He stays like that for a minute or two, unmoving, unspeaking, his eyes tracing the shape of the name carved into the headstone.
“Hey,” he finally says. “I know I’m late, and to be honest, I thought about not coming at all. But I’m here. You probably wouldn't have cared either way…”
He continues speaking as if no one else is around, lost in a conversation with the ghost of his past. A sea salt scented breeze sways the wildflowers sprouting through the dirt around the grave. Standing behind him, Dazai and Chuuya look on in silence.
The mood is heavy enough to affect even Verlaine and the others, hidden in the shadows of a cluster of trees nearby.
“So it wasn’t a date but a grave visit,” Albatross says, sounding less than enthusiastic for once. “Unexpected downer.”
It must be the end of the world, because Verlaine actually agrees with the little gremlin for once. “I see. Lilies can be mourning flowers…”
From what he could gather of their conversation, it had been a sudden passing. Atsushi had harbored a great deal of resentment towards the man, but on the day of his death, he was struck with an inexplicable sense of loss. He questioned if a tiny, pathetic part of himself actually missed that man. And that thought tore him apart.
Chuuya’s recent preoccupation is starting to make more sense now—he must have been helping his new friend work through a mess of traitorous feelings. To despise your father, but mourn the connection you never had. And never could have. His brother probably understood that feeling better than anyone else.
Knowing all of this should have relieved Verlaine, but he only feels disgusted with himself. For the past few weeks, his brother had been doing his best to support his friend through a difficult time, and all Verlaine could focus on was some silly hypothetical crush.
He runs a hand over his face in frustration, wishing he could disappear. “I should have just trusted him from the start, like you said,” he murmurs to his boyfriend. “Instead, I made you waste an entire day on this farce.”
“I don’t mind.” Rimbaud gently moves Verlaine’s hand out of the way to press a kiss to his lips. “After all, I was able to spend it with you.”
“Can we please think about the single people!” Albatross groans. “Some of us are bitchless out here!”
Unfortunately, he forgets to adjust his volume—against the serene backdrop of the cemetery, his voice is as loud as a firecracker. Chuuya’s head snaps up, his eyes zeroing in on their location, and that’s when Verlaine knows that they’re well and truly screwed.
Albatross, realizing that there’s no way to get out of things now, slips on a maniacal grin and waves as Chuuya, Dazai, and Atsushi make their way over. “Heeey!”
Breaking away from Rimbaud, Verlaine scrambles to collect his thoughts while maintaining a cool exterior. Should he explain himself? Greet Chuuya’s friend? Get an apology in before his brother tries to break his shins? Ideally, he should do all three, but the order seems vital to whether his brother will ever want to speak to him again.
He doesn’t get the chance to make a decision, because Chuuya storms up to him and growls, “You’d better give me a damn good reason for why you’re here.”
The bad news—his brother is now within shin-kicking range. The good news—before Chuuya can commit any acts of violence, Atsushi moves past him to greet Verlaine with a warm smile.
“You must be Chuuya-san’s brother. I’ve heard so much about you!”
Verlaine blinks in surprise. That’s a first, considering his brother has never mentioned anything about this boy to him before. “You have?”
“Yes. I can tell Chuuya-san really treasures you. He’s always talking about you,” Atsushi says, earning him an affronted look from Chuuya.
“What the hell, Atsushi! Those were complaints! I was complaining about him! Because he’s lame and annoying!”
“But didn’t you say last time that you wished you could be more honest with your brother? And that you don’t mind hanging out with him, but it’s too awkward to bring up now because you spent the last five years acting like you hated him? And what about the time the two of you had a disagreement and you were too stubborn to apologize, so for the next two weeks, you started fights with him for no reason in order to get a chance to talk to him?” With each new revelation, Atsushi gets more worked up, and Chuuya turns increasingly deeper shades of red. “Now’s your chance, Chuuya-san! You can tell him all of that!” he concludes excitedly.
“I think you already did that for him, Atsushi-kun,” Dazai points out, looking one step away from uncontrollable laughter.
Albatross has his phone out like he’s recording something. “Oh man, he totally exposed you.”
“Ugh, this is why I didn’t want you two to meet…” Chuuya groans into his hands.
Verlaine, on the other hand, has never been more intrigued by one of his brother’s friends before. Chuuya doesn’t often divulge his true feelings to other people—some sort of teenage pride, presumably—so he must have deemed this boy trustworthy enough to do so. “Atsushi-kun, was it? It’s a pleasure to meet you. I’d love to chat with you over a cup of coffee.”
As if on cue, Atsushi’s stomach lets out a thunderous growl. He covers his mouth with a start, a sheepish smile peeking out through the gaps between his fingers.
“It’s been a long day. Shall we go for dinner now?” Rimbaud suggests to the group.
The response from the younger ones is a resounding yes.
It’s not exactly the way Verlaine expected this day to end—fingers entwined with Rimbaud’s, descending the hill as his brother and his friends engage in an animated chat a few steps ahead of them—but he would be hard-pressed to find a reason to complain. The early spring air is just cool enough to be pleasant, the city lights glint prettily in the distance, and his brother is as soft as ever.
Chuuya would probably fall in love someday. While that thought still pains Verlaine, he finds that it’s a bit easier to accept now. Even if Chuuya gets married, or moves halfway across the world, he’ll still be Verlaine’s one and only little brother. And that’s enough for him.
“Oh right, before I forget,” Albatross says, breaking off whatever conversation he was having with Dazai to turn towards Chuuya. “Since you’re not dating anyone, I guess now’s my chance.”
Chuuya stops in his tracks to raise an eyebrow at him. “Your chance to do wha—”
The rest of his sentence is muffled by Albatross stepping into his space and smashing their lips together. Chuuya makes a sound of surprise and nearly trips over his own feet, but Albatross catches him by the waist, pulling him closer to deepen the kiss. A second later, they break apart, the air between them charged with heavy breaths and palpable heat.
“Chuuya, go out with me,” Albatross says.
Verlaine blacks out.
***
“I can’t believe you fucking paid everyone you knew to hit on me,” Chuuya grumbles, violently jabbing a ketchup-dipped french fry in Dazai’s direction. He’d had his suspicions when Higuchi of all people tried to ask him out, but to have the damn waste of bandages confirm it without a drop of remorse is enough to make his blood boil. “Were you dropped on your head as a baby?”
Dazai takes a break from sipping his iced tea to wag a finger at him disapprovingly. “I didn’t pay all of them. Some of them were blackmailed. Kunikida-kun, for example. You should have seen how pale he turned when I said I would reveal the contents of his journa—”
He ducks to the side as a fry flies his way, pushing his nearest neighbor into the path of the projectile. The fry nails Atsushi right between the eyes and he yelps, his half-eaten burger tumbling to the ground. Forehead dripping with ketchup, he looks upon the scattered remains of his burger in dejection.
“Dazai-san, please don’t involve me in your petty squabbles.”
“Forgive me, Atsushi-kun!” Dazai springs up from his seat with feigned urgency. “How could I have done that? To make it up to you, I’ll buy you a replacement! Chuuya’s treat!” With that, he dashes over to the counter, just as Chuuya feels his back pocket and realizes his wallet is missing.
“Get back here, you bastard!” he shouts after the thief's retreating figure.
Through all of this, Albatross casually continues chewing on his chicken nugget. Chuuya turns on him in an instant, snatching the nugget away from him with a stony glare. “And you. Don’t think you’re off the hook yet, birdbrain.”
Albatross responds by biting the nugget out of Chuuya’s hand with his mouth. Like a fucking animal. Appalled, Chuuya grabs the rest of the nuggets and dunks them into Dazai’s uncapped cup of iced tea.
“Aw, come on, Chuuya!” Albatross whines. “I said I was sorry.”
“No you didn’t.”
“Oh right, I didn’t.” Albatross pokes at one of the submerged nuggets with Dazai’s straw, as if debating whether it’s still worth eating. “Okay, but wasn’t it hilarious when your brother fainted? He didn’t see it coming at all.”
It was pretty funny, admittedly, but any humor Chuuya might have felt about the situation is somewhat dampened by the harassment he’s been subjected to all day. To add insult to injury, Albatross had known about the entire scheme all along, and instead of telling Chuuya, he’d decided to help Dazai with it. Maybe the bastard should shave his head and change his name to Snake.
“I’m all for teaching that stalker a lesson,” Chuuya admits. “But a heads up would have been nice. You know, before you went and stuck your tongue down my throat.”
“My bad, kinda slipped my mind. Besides, your acting kinda sucks, you know? We had to keep you in the dark for the plan to succeed.”
“Oh sure. For the plan,” Chuuya says flatly, his fingers curling around Albatross’ collar to jerk him forward. “Was it also part of the plan for you to grab my ass at the end?”
The little shit has the audacity to flash him a smile. “What can I say, you have a nice ass.”
Chuuya would have knocked his teeth in, if it weren’t for Dazai dumping a trayful of apple pies onto their table then.
“Dessert time!” he sings.
Albatross and Atsushi ooh and ahh in appreciation, and even Chuuya is so distracted by the golden brown of the crust and the piping hot apple filling peeking through the scoring that he momentarily forgets whose money Dazai had used to buy the pies. He can always teach those two conspiring assholes a lesson later. Dessert comes first.
He spares a glance at the table next to theirs, where Rimbaud is patiently providing a lap pillow to his unconscious brother. The fall hadn’t actually been that bad—his brother seemed to have taken more mental damage from witnessing…whatever the fuck Albatross had pulled earlier. Chuuya would have felt more sympathy for him if he didn’t think the busybody deserved every bit of what he got.
“Hey, Earmuffs!” he calls out. “Forget about that loser and come join us!”
Rimbaud gives a vague response about how he’ll be there in a minute or two, and goes right back to fussing over his brother.
Shrugging, Chuuya returns his attention to his own table, only to be poked in the cheek by something warm and buttery. Twisting his neck, he stares down the length of a freshly baked apple pie to find a stupid seabird grinning at him.
“Are we good now?” Albatross asks.
“You’re rubbing an apple pie on my face. What part of that makes us good?”
Albatross’ response is to prod him in the cheek with the pie again. “I’m feeding you. You know, the way a bird feeds its starving young.”
“That’s not how birds fucking feed their young,” Chuuya says, and he would have elaborated if he didn’t remember how inappropriate the topic was for mealtime. “You know what, give me that.” He grabs the apple pie with a roll of his eyes and breaks it in half, handing one piece back to Albatross.
“Race to see who can finish theirs first?” comes the usual challenge.
He scoffs. What a complete waste of time. “You’re on.”
Across from them, Atsushi is blitzing his way through their mountain of apple pies like a wild beast while Dazai cheers him on. Chuuya hasn’t seen him eat like that in a long time, not since the death of the orphanage director, and the sight makes the corners of his mouth quirk up a little. Atsushi would be fine after all.
And that, despite this absolute shitshow of a day, is what makes everything worth it in the end.
***
When his brother wakes up an hour later, he congratulates Chuuya on his new relationship with such an anguished expression that Chuuya decides to hold off on telling him it was all a prank for another week or two.