Chapter Text
It had probably been ten days—if Dazai hadn’t lost count—since Chuuya started acting strange. Was he exhausted? Was something going wrong at work? But then … why hadn’t he told Dazai? Or maybe Chuuya had simply grown tired of him. Maybe someone else had already taken Dazai’s place. If that were true, then Dazai could only hope "Chuuya’s new lover” would treat him better—or at the very least, not become another burden the way Dazai always seemed to be. Chuuya must be exhausted from dealing with someone like him. After all, it was only a matter of time before Dazai got discarded by the person he loves most, considering he’s nothing more than a pathetic man who can’t do anything without—
No, no, no. Chuuya wasn’t that kind of person. He wouldn’t leave Dazai alone. Chuuya had always promised Dazai that he would stay by his side no matter what.
But now, everything feels different. Maybe Dazai was simply overreacting—well, he always did. A slight change in his boyfriend’s behavior was enough to send him spiraling like this. Still, lately Chuuya’s replies had grown shorter, sometimes disappearing entirely. And whenever Dazai cracked a joke, Chuuya would laugh, yes—but it sounded hollow, like he was only doing it to keep the silence from turning uncomfortable. What unsettled Dazai the most, however, was the way Chuuya had started avoiding his gaze.
In the past, Chuuya would express his anger openly—shouting, throwing insults, or even hitting him whenever he got upset. But now, he chose silence instead. He would let their conversations trail off unfinished before walking away to the kitchen, opening a bottle of wine, and drinking alone on the balcony until late at night.
The worst of it happened a few days ago. Chuuya came home stumbling from how drunk he was, collapsed onto the bed, and fell asleep without saying a single word to Dazai. The more Dazai thought about it, the more anxious he became. Right now, he desperately needed Chuuya beside him—if only to calm him down enough to sleep peacefully without drowning in thoughts he knew he shouldn’t be having.
Even though, it had actually been a long time since something like that last happened.
Maybe that was what made Dazai so anxious. Maybe that was also why he hadn’t eaten for an entire day—or perhaps it had already been more than a week since his eating habits had completely fallen apart. He couldn’t bring himself to swallow anything, even the mere sight of food was enough to make him lose his appetite. His sleep schedule was a mess as well. More often than not, the urge to end his life would cross his mind right there on the bed he usually shared with Chuuya.
However, Dazai always forced those thoughts far away. It would only trouble Chuuya, who would have to clean the blood off his spotless bed, he thought. Just thinking about it alone already made Dazai’s chest feel tight; he really had been struggling to breathe lately.
Now, Dazai lay flat on his back atop Chuuya’s bed, staring at the ceiling of Chuuya’s apartment that was always dark. His fingers moved restlessly over his stomach. Dazai’s heart pounded so violently it hurt in his chest, as though it wanted to leap out at any moment. Cold sweat began pouring down his forehead even though the apartment’s air conditioner was running at an unbearably cold temperature. His thoughts were truly a mess right now. A fear he couldn’t explain slowly filled his mind—suffocating him, making every breath feel shorter with each passing second. His hands trembled violently as he tried to grip the side of the bed to calm himself down. His vision began blurring at the edges. Dazai tried to take a deep breath, but it felt impossible. He truly felt like he was losing control over both his body and his own mind.
The world around Dazai seemed to shrink. His vision blurred as black spots encroached on the corners of his eyes. A wave of severe dizziness hit him, making the room feel as though it were about to collapse. At the height of that terror, his mind screamed in panic. An irrational dread consumed him, leaving him with the suffocating sensation of standing on the very edge of death. Every muscle in his body tensed and shook uncontrollably. Just as he felt himself completely losing control, the metal doorknob slowly began to turn.
Chuuya came home.
Chuuya's footsteps sounded heavy as he walked into the room. His black hat was tossed carelessly onto the desk, followed by the soft clink of the wine bottle still in his hand. He noticed Dazai lying silently on his bed. But instead of said "I'm home" for Dazai, Chuuya simply walked past without saying a word. He headed straight for the bed and dropped himself onto it in complete silence.
His return was the only thing that managed to pull Dazai out of the depths of his anxiety, bringing his heartbeat back to a normal rhythm. But that relief felt like slow-working poison. Dazai realized the peace he felt was only temporary. In an instant, the calm mask he had been wearing began to crack. The emotions he had been holding back all this time—the fear, exhaustion, and uncertainty—finally demanded to be let out. Dazai grabbed Chuuya’s wrist tightly, with the possessive grip of someone tired of uncertainty.
"You really don’t care at all, do you?" Dazai whispered. His gaze was fractured with an overwhelming dread—fear of what awaited him, fear of losing Chuuya, and fear of things he couldn’t even begin to understand.
“Not now, Dazai. I’m tired.” Chuuya rubbed at his temple, leaning against the kitchen counter of the apartment they had shared all this time.
"Tired?" Dazai let out a bitter laugh. A hollow laugh he deliberately used to hide the way his chest had begun pounding far too hard. "Is that really your brilliant solution for handling your ‘exhaustion’? Shutting me out? I know damn well something is broken between us, Chuuya, so why are you pretending it’s not? You—you have absolutely no idea what it’s like. You don’t know what it’s like to live with a mind that screams for death every single second the moment the silence hits—"
"I know, Dazai." Chuuya cut in defensively.
"Then why, Chuuya?" Dazai shattered the silence, his shout breaking into a ragged breath. His eyes blown wide, he stared at the man before him, trapped in an escalating spiral of vertigo and sheer panic. "You know exactly how loud the chaos in my head gets, you know that I need you so bad ... but yet, you still choose to look away...." Dazai pressed, his voice fracturing into a tremble as the terror finally clawed its way to the surface
Chuuya stopped walking, his shoulders rising and falling as he held back months of buried emotions. Here we go again, he thought bitterly, sick of the endless loop of fixing Dazai's broken pieces while his own mental health collapsed. Every wall he had built around himself was starting to crack, and as the overwhelming exhaustion finally took over his remaining self-control, Chuuya completely snapped, his buried anger finally exploding into the room.
“You’re asking why?” Chuuya answered, his voice rough with deep frustration.
"I sacrificed my own piece of mind just to drag myself into the depths of your darkness, Dazai. Every day, I come home to this apartment terrified that I'll find your corpse in the bathroom. Every night, I stay awake just to make sure your chest is still rising and falling!" Chuuya looked away with a frustrated sigh. God, not this again. He hated this situation. Just this once, he didn't want to argue in the middle of the night. The past few weeks at the Port Mafia had already drained him dry, and he simply didn't have the strength left for another fight.
"I come back from work completely dead on my feet, with my own damn world falling apart around me. But the second I open the door to this apartment, I have to swallow my own shit and throw away my exhaustion—just because you’re always standing on the goddamn edge of breaking down!" Chuuya stepped forward, pointing at Dazai's chest with trembling fingers filled with anger. "When do I get to come home and feel at peace for once? I gave you everything—my time, my space, my fucking sanity—just so you could have a safe place to crawl back to! I buried all my own goddamn pain just to keep you from falling apart!"
Chuuya clenched his fists so tightly that his nails turned white. "So now you know why I’ve been acting like this, right? Because I am fucking sick of it, Dazai! Every single time we try to talk like actual adults, you always hide behind the topic of death. You use your mental state as a weapon to make me feel guilty so I’ll just cave in again, again, and AGAIN. You purposely guilt-trip me so I can never leave this place, don’t you? You're manipulative...."
Dazai fell silent for a few moments, trying to process Chuuya's words before finally speaking the thoughts he had been holding back inside his chest.
“I never thought about manipulating you, Chuuya...” Dazai said quietly.
Dazai voice suddenly cracked with a rough sob full of desperation. His shoulders shook violently. His clutched his chest tightly, as if his heart would burst at any moment if he didn’t hold it down. The tears he had been holding back finally poured freely, soaking his pale face as the lack of air in his chest became harder to ignore.
“I—I never meant it like that.” Dazai gasped, his words breaking apart between angry sobs he could no longer control. His mind and mental state had already reached their limit after weeks of forcing down his own madness.
"This broken brain of mine just works like this every single second, Chuuya. Why is it that the one time I actually tell you the truth, you look at me as if I’m playing a game? Well, alright—I am a manipulator. I know that. But, do you honestly think I would weaponize my own shattered mind just to keep you by my side—?" Dazai couldn’t finish his sentence through his boiling sobs.
"Am I really that manipulative in your eyes, Chuuya?"
The question hung heavily in the air, leaving a tense silence between them. Chuuya opened his mouth to fire back, but the words just wouldn't come out. The sheer exhaustion was written all over his face. Dazai slowly lowered his head, his messy bangs casting a shadow over his eyes, making the room feel incredibly cold. "...Then what am I supposed to do?” Dazai muttered, his voice sounding dangerously fragile.
Chuuya’s breath hitched, a deep frown settling on his face. "You keep talking about everything I've taken from you. About how tired you are.” Dazai fingers tightened around the shirt over his chest in desperation, "Maybe you're right. But what am I supposed to be without you? You’re the one who taught me how to depend on someone, Chuuya." Dazai whispered and his voice cracking again.
"—You came into my mess, looked at all my broken pieces, and told me you could handle it. You convinced me that I could stay, that I could finally stop running. So, don’t blame me now for not knowing how to survive without you...." Chuuya's expression faltered. That raw honesty from Dazai always threw him off. Staring blankly at the floor, Dazai continued, “I've spent so long building my life around you that I don't even know who I am when you're gone." and painful silence stretched between them.
Chuuya closed his eyes as a heavy, sickening guilt settled deep in his chest. Because the worst part was Dazai was entirely right. Chuuya had barged into his life. He had promised to handle the mess, thinking his love would be enough to cure the darkest parts of Dazai. He couldn't deny the truth in those words, and it broke him. But as he opened his eyes and looked at Dazai, the harsh reality hit him even harder. He couldn't do this anymore. Loving Dazai meant slowly destroying himself, and he was running out of pieces to give.
"That's—exactly the problem, Dazai."
Chuuya finally spoke, breaking the silence as Dazai slowly looked up, only to find him standing there with his fists clenched at his sides, struggling to keep his emotions in check, “Do you even hear yourself? You should have a life outside of me. You should have dreams, friends, reasons to keep going that don't revolve around my goddamn existence." Chuuya let out a bitter, furious laugh. He's expression tightened, something painfully disappointed flickering in his eyes.
“You think hearing that makes me feel loved?" Dazai froze completely, the air leaving his lungs as if he had been punched. Chuuya shook his head aggressively, his composure finally breaking under the sheer weight of his frustration.
“No. It doesn't. It terrifies me, Dazai!” the words hit Dazai harder than any physical blow ever could. Taking a sharp, heavy breath, Chuuya took a decisive step forward, closing the distance between them. His jaw was clenched tight as he glared at the man before him.
“What happens when I'm tired? What happens when I can't carry your burdens anymore? What happens if I break first, Dazai?” behind all that anger, Chuuya sounded completely broken, a side of him Dazai had never heard before.
"Did you ever even think about that? That I—Died a lot to live a little with you."
Dazai looked at Chuuya with red, tear-filled brown eyes, showing both deep pain and anger from feeling misunderstood by the only person he truly trusted. Chuuya could only grab his own hair in frustration. He hated this situation. Just this once, he didn’t want to argue in the middle of the night. Chuuya was already far too exhausted to deal with all of this, but Dazai would never understand that.
“If you really—if you really think I’m that horrible....” Dazai sobbed again, “Then why don’t you leave? Why do you keep staying if you actually hate me?”
“I don't hate you, idiot. And that’s my mistake—because I love you.”
Dazai froze for a second, but his broken mind immediately twisted those words into something defensive.
“You love me?” Dazai argued, his voice rising and trembling badly from hysteria. “Don’t joke around, Chuuya. Love doesn’t make someone look at their partner like they’re a monster. You don’t love me—you just feel responsible for not letting me die in your apartment. You stay because you’re afraid of carrying that guilt for the rest of your life!” Dazai stepped backward, clutching his head as if it was about to split apart. “If you really loved me, you wouldn’t treat me like some patient you constantly have to watch over. You wouldn’t avoid me like all the sickness inside my head could somehow spread to you!”
“Dazai, enough—” Chuuya tried to cut him off, but Dazai’s emotions had already overflowed beyond control.
"You want me to get better so badly, don’t you? You want me to become normal like everyone else out there!" Dazai shouted in sheer frustration, his tears blurring his vision as they fell unchecked. "You always demand to know what’s wrong with my head—but every single time I try to show you, you look at me as if I’m some kind of disease! You can’t handle me, Chuuya. You never truly accepted—"
“I’M NOT YOUR THERAPIST, DAZAI!”
The moment those words left Dazai's lips, Chuuya’s patience finally snapped. It felt as though all the air had been sucked out of the room as Chuuya took a heavy step forward and exploded. His shout shattered the silence of the apartment—sharp, heavy with pain, the final breaking point of someone pushed too far. Instantly, Dazai fell dead silent. The mouth that had been rambling in a panic suddenly shut tight. His body froze. His brown eyes widened in shock, staring at Chuuya who stood before him, chest heaving rapidly as he fought for breath.
“You want to know why I stayed all this time?” Chuuya’s voice was quiet, but it felt unbearably heavy in the silent room. Chuuya took one step closer, staring directly into Dazai’s brown eyes.
“Not because I wanted to be some kind of hero. But because I was stupid, I loved you, and I pitied you,” Chuuya said, each word spoken with a calm but deadly emphasis. “But now I realize something. Being close to you is this destructive. Loving you was the most exhausting mistake of my life. You know what’s the most disgusting part? You’re always so convinced that you’re the one suffering the most in this world that you don’t even realize you’ve slowly turned into a parasite draining all my happiness and sanity just to feed that damn ego of yours. Your arguments alone already prove that you’re manipulative, Dazai. And what did you say earlier? That you’re not manipulative? How funny ... you’re dragging me into the same trap all over again, aren’t you?”
Chuuya let out a short breath, a bitter smile forming on his lips. “Looking at you now, I don’t even see a human anymore, Dazai. I just see a bottomless black hole. You don’t need a lover. You just need a trash can to dump all your insanity into, and I refuse to be that trash can anymore.”
Dazai’s body immediately stiffened.
The words “parasite,” “most exhausting mistake,” and “trash can” struck directly at the center of his deepest fears. The mask of calmness and logical arguments he had just built collapsed in a single moment. His tongue suddenly felt numb. The sarcastic remarks that usually came so naturally to him completely disappeared.
Dazai stared at Chuuya with wide, disbelieving eyes. His proud soul suddenly felt exposed and painfully small in front of the man who had always been the only place he could return to. Shock and panic spread from the tips of his feet all the way to his chest, making it feel like his lungs were being crushed.
None of his arguments had any strength left anymore.
Seeing Dazai suddenly fall silent with such a shattered expression, the anger in Chuuya’s chest slowly faded, replaced by a painful tightness rising in his throat. A sudden wave of guilt hit his heart.
He looked at the man he loved, looking so fragile that it felt like one more sentence from Chuuya would completely break Dazai apart. Chuuya shut his eyes tightly for a second, holding back his own tears before they could fall. His clenched hands at his sides had started trembling. The guilt was torturing him, but his exhaustion was far greater. If he took his words back now, they would only fall into the same endless cycle again. This relationship had to die tonight. Chuuya opened his eyes again, looking at Dazai with a softer gaze filled with complete resignation.
“We’re—”
A heavy hesitation choked his throat. Everything in him screamed to stop, to leave the sentence unfinished, but he knew he had to say it. The crushing weight of his exhaustion wouldn't let him back down this time.
"—We’re done, Dazai.” Chuuya finally said that.
His voice was no longer raised. Instead, it came out soft and trembling with deep sorrow. “You were right. I can’t handle you. I can’t keep going any further with you.”
Dazai stood frozen. The look in his eyes, usually filled with cleverness and carefully prepared plans, had gone dim, leaving behind only emptiness. The words he had feared the most had finally slipped from Chuuya's lips, shattering whatever hope Dazai had left. There was a strong urge inside him to deny everything. But seeing the pain in Chuuya's eyes made Dazai unable to speak. For the first time, he realized that his mask could no longer save something that had already been destroyed.
“I see....” Dazai whispered after the unbearable silence. His voice was hoarse, trembling, and completely drained of energy. He gave up. He wouldn’t defend himself anymore because he knew everything Chuuya had said was the truth he feared the most. Without another word, Dazai stiffly turned around. He walked toward the room and grabbed his coat.
Dazai reached for the doorknob, and when he lifted his arm, the sleeve of his coat shifted slightly upward. Chuuya's eyes accidentally caught sight of Dazai’s wrist. There, beneath the loose bandages, were fresh scratch marks that still looked red and painful. Chuuya's heart dropped. Guilt suddenly struck his chest like a heavy hammer. A part of him instinctively wanted to grab Dazai hand and pull him into an embrace. But Chuuya shut his eyes tightly for a second, forcing his broken heart to stay firm. If he gave in to guilt now, this endless cycle would never end.
Chuuya took a deep breath, trying to steady the shaking in his voice.
“Dazai,” Chuuya called softly, almost in a whisper. Dazai stopped at the doorway, but he didn’t turn around. He stayed silent, his back looking painfully fragile.
“I'm sorry,” Chuuya said, his voice filled with exhaustion. “I’m sorry that I have to give up.”
Dazai didn’t respond, there was no need to, no? His shoulders tensed slightly at the apology, but he still walked out of Chuuya’s apartment and closed the door behind him with a quiet click.
The moment the door shut and he was left alone in the cold, empty hallway, the rest of Dazai’s defenses completely collapsed. His body suddenly gave out, and he fell to his knees against the apartment door. There, behind the door where he once felt safe, Dazai clutched his painfully tight chest as another panic attack crashed into him over and over again, this time without Chuuya there to calm him down.
Meanwhile, after Dazai left, Chuuya remained standing silently in the middle of the room that suddenly felt far too large and cold. His legs felt weak. He slowly stumbled toward the bed, dropping himself onto the mattress, only to be greeted by a familiar scent—Dazai’s perfume mixed with the smell of antiseptic from his bandages. Chuuya’s chest ached painfully.
At that exact moment, a wave of regret hit him immediately.
Go catch him. He might do something reckless tonight.
The voice in his head screamed in panic. Chuuya pushed himself halfway upright, his eyes fixed on the bedroom door. His hands clenched tightly, ready to stand up, run out of the building, wrap his arms around Dazai’s waist, hold him tightly, and apologize for saying such cruel things.
But Chuuya shut his eyes tightly once again. He grabbed the pillow, forcing himself to stay where he was.
“No. Not now,” Chuuya whispered into the silence of the night, trying to calm the wild beating of his heart. “This is for the best. You can’t keep living like this, Chuuya.” He took a deep breath, trying to convince the logic that was beginning to weaken under the weight of guilt.
If he ran after Dazai tonight, everything would return to the same endless cycle. Dazai would become dependent on him again, and Chuuya would slowly destroy himself trying to protect someone else’s sanity. Saving Dazai over and over again meant letting himself drown instead. Chuuya turned his body toward the wall, facing away from the empty side of the bed. He pulled the blanket up to his chin, ignoring the fact that it still carried Dazai’s warmth.
“I need to rest,” he murmured to himself, even though he knew sleep would not come easily tonight. “Let him go. I deserve peace too....”
But the truth was, he never wanted tonight to happen at all.
The bond that had fused them together was finally severed, leaving nothing but a bleeding, hollow space in its wake. When your entire existence has been built around another person, how do you even begin to find yourself again?