Chapter Text
Everything depends on the target of your seduction. Study your prey thoroughly, and choose only those who will prove susceptible to your charms. The right victims are those for whom you can fill a void, who see in you something exotic. They are often isolated or unhappy, or can easily be made so — for the completely contented person is almost impossible to seduce. The perfect victim has some quality that inspires strong emotions in you, making your seductive maneuvers seem more natural and dynamic. The perfect victim allows for the perfect chase.
(Robert Greene, the Art of Seduction)
*
It all starts on a Friday morning, and it’s not Dazai’s fault. Really.
He’s leaning against the kitchen counter, sipping at a cup of coffee and trying to wade through the morning fog in his brain when the guy he brought home last night flits past the three of them, only stopping at the door to slip into his shoes and mutter a hurried, “bye!”
“Goodbye, Marcus ~” Dazai calls after him without lifting his eyes from his phone only to hear a choked breath.
“It’s Mark! We’ve been in the same class for the last two months?”
Dazai stops scrolling for a moment, only to see Kouyou Ozaki, his roommate’s girlfriend and pain in his ass, raise an unimpressed brow.
“Mark,” he corrects quickly, turning to shoot the redhead a blinding smile. “That’s what I meant, obviously. My voice is always so —”
The door slams shut before he can finish the sentence.
“— scratchy in the morning,” he finishes under his breath before looking back at the screen and all the various e-mails that have piled up in his inbox. So many people that want things from him. So many people to ignore.
“Don’t you have any shame?” That’s Kouyou. See? Pain in the ass and devil incarnate.
He doesn’t bother looking at her because he knows exactly what kind of expression will greet him: patronizing, vainglorious, and full of disdain. “Don’t you have anywhere else to stay other than my apartment?”
“It’s also Akiko’s apartment, so I can stay here as much as I want. Just like your bed-warmers.”
“Great,” he drawls and shoots her a smile that he knows will piss her off even more. “So why are you making me listen to your irritating voice if we both agree that we can do whatever we want?”
“I’m just saying. You can do with your body as you please, but would it kill you to have enough respect to, at least, remember their names?”
“Oh, I’m sorry that my memory isn’t as perfect as yours. I didn’t know my own home was a discriminatory space like that.”
The snort that comes from Yosano, who has been ignoring both of them in favor of typing away at her laptop, says as much as liar. Because they both know that Dazai’s memory is more than good, that it’s the thing that has brought him through school and the past four years of college despite his piss-poor attitude and discipline when it comes to academics. It’s just that to use that valuable attribute of his, he has to actually listen. And he can’t say that he was listening to what Marc was rambling on and on about last night — aside from the noises he made, of course. Those were music to his ears.
“You’re a pig,” Kouyou mutters as she gets up from the table and walks past him. “I’m waiting for the day someone treats you like you treat all your conquests.”
Which is an ironic thing to say because it’s not like the people he goes home with aren’t in it for just the sex either. Same as him. Dazai doesn’t promise anyone committed relationships or grand romantic gestures or a lifetime of boring dates and snotty children. Not to mention that his reputation in certain circles on campus has probably established by now that he’s only good for a night of fun. And if his charming, eccentric personality occasionally does evoke more than mere physical attraction, that’s not his fault. So…
Dazai treats people the same way they treat him.
Once again, Kouyou proves that she knows nothing about him. And that’s fine and well. Dazai has heard enough gripes in his life to let it ricochet off him like tiny bouncy balls and go on with his morning as usual: take a hot shower, change his sheets, pick up 30% of the things off his floor, take his medication, lie down and feel his body swim through wave after wave of lingering liquor in his blood. It’s only when Yosano comes in without knocking and makes herself comfortable next to him that the real problem starts.
“So I have to talk to you,” she starts.
Dazai hums as he watches the tiles on his laptop float.
“Ozaki asked me for something and —”
“You finally decided to have a threesome,” he finishes for her. “Oh, I’ve been waiting for this one. Although I must say I didn’t think Kouyou would be the type, considering, you know, she hates me because we used to have nasty, amazing sex all the time.”
Yosano cocks her head. “You through?”
“Or not,” he concludes and turns back to his laptop, “so what is it?”
“You know Chuuya? Nakahara Chuuya?”
Dazai squints.
“Redhead? Blue eyes? Always wearing a leather —”
— jacket. Yes, of course, he knows Chuuya. Nineteen. In his second semester. Cute laugh. Grumpy glare. Very sloppy drunk. And he has the best ass Dazai has ever seen on c—
“— Kouyou’s little brother?” Yosano finishes.
The image pops like a bubble, leaving him drenched in instant regret and with an antiseptic, sanitary taste in his mouth. “That’s Kouyou’s little brother?”
“Yes? She's mentioned him, like, a thousand times by now.”
“But he’s so laid-back and nice and…” Even though Yosano is more than aware of the constant antagonism between her girlfriend and her roommate, Dazai probably should still be careful with his words. Yosano can be very, very cruel if she wants to be. (And she always does.) “… they have that same murderous glare. Yes, I totally see the resemblance now,” he saves himself. “What about little Nakahara?”
“Well, Ozaki wanted me to tell you to keep little Dazai out of little Nakahara.”
Dazai turns to his best friend, half-curious, half-offended. “Why? I’ve talked to him perhaps three times, at most.”
“Probably because that’s all you need to set your sights on someone. So don’t. She just doesn’t want you to go all man-whore on him only for him to end up getting hurt.”
“Don’t you think that’s a bit presumptuous? It’s not like I go around wooing people with relationships only to dump them the next day.”
Yosano throws one arm behind her head and stares at her ceiling, letting out a sigh. “Honestly? Yeah. I think everyone with a healthy brain knows what they’re getting into when they talk to you, but she’s my girlfriend, and asking for this one thing, so for the sake of my sex life: please just leave her brother alone. Everyone but him. That’s not hard, is it?”
It’s not, but it’s the principle of the matter.
Still, besides being his roommate, former hook-up partner, and unofficial best friend, Yosano has done enough things in her life to deserve a favor. So Dazai lifts his shoulder and lets out a deep, melodramatic sigh. “Fine, whatever. I’ll keep my dirty, slutty hands of poor, little Chuuya.”
“Thank you.”
“Isn’t it strange, though? He’s an adult, for crying out —”
“Osamu.”
“Geez, all right. I’m letting it go.”
***
And it is simple. Turning a blind eye to someone you have barely paid attention to before is very simple. Totally doable. Child’s play.
It’s just that the brain is a fascinating organ because sometimes the things you aren’t allowed to have, are the things you end up wanting the most.
The forbidden fruit.
Humanity’s ultimate downfall.
***
“— it’s not that urgent and a mess anyway, so it’s okay if it takes you more time.”
Dazai waves Odasaku’s concern away as he scans the document on his iPad. “Stop fretting. I always have time for this.”
“Are you sure? I thought this was that time of the year where all of you students get crazy busy with assignments.”
Well, Dazai does have two presentations and a few dozen cases due next week, but he will burn those bridges when he gets to them. For now, he’s sitting in a diner with his friend and only focusing on being a good writing beta, just like he promised. Because he keeps his promises.
“Totally beside the point, Odasaku. I have wanted…” He trails off absently when he sees a group of college students stroll through the diner and settle in the booth right across from them, as loud and energetic as a bunch of golden retriever puppies — something he would be too happy to ignore if not for the trademark red hair, pulled into a tousled ponytail, and a crazy-infectious laugh that reverberates through Dazai’s bones like bass.
It’s little Nakahara and his group of friends: all of their different hair colors blending into a rainbow cocktail of young and hyper, but still making him stand out the most for some strange, inconvenient reason.
“... Dazai?”
He drags his gaze back to Odasaku and his auburn hair. Very handsome. His scruff? Sexy. And the whole gentle-giant vibe he has going on? So much better to focus on.
“Present,” he quips. “As I was saying, I’ve been looking forward to reading the next chapter ever since the last one. I’m excited to see how their conversation is going to play out after all that build-up.”
Odasaku scratches the back of his neck. “Don’t get too excited. I have rewritten the entire scene six times, and I’m still not satisfied with it.”
“I’m sure it’s good. You’ve read it so… “
In the other booth, little Nakahara tilts his head as he listens to one of his friend's talk, revealing a black leather collar around his neck, and Dazai blinks several times, trying to gauge whether his brain hallucinated that picture or whether he’s actually seeing this.
“Uh.” He tries returning to the topic at hand when it becomes clear that little Nakahara’s collar is pretty real. As real as life. “You’ve read it so many times by now that, of course, you’ll automatically look for the faults in it. And that’s not necessarily bad. But it always helps to let someone else, who hasn’t been working on it for so long, get a look at it.”
“I hope so. If I have to see or rewrite this scene again, I’ll delete the entire file and start looking for a new hobby.”
Dazai deliberately keeps his eyes locked on the screen to not accidentally catch another flash of auburn hair or a collar that looks sinful for something so plain and commemorative of those four-legged, stinking beasts called dogs. That is a huge sacrifice as far as sacrifices go considering Dazai would love to see the frustrated expression on Odasaku’s face immortalized in a square-shaped photograph so that he can have a look at it every time life starts to lose all sense and meaning — which it does every morning, like a clock — because there is nothing quite as inspiring as seeing a man who is the human equivalent of a steady mountain get defeated by a couple of words on a blank page. It reminds him that it’s true, life doesn’t make any sense whatsoever, and that it’s the beauty in it. You might as well set your pants on fire and go sailing off the roof of your house in the nude. It is not any less logical than a floating rock in space, printed money, or the appeal to do the exact thing your best friend asked you not to do because something is very wrong with your brain.
Bad Osamu, he thinks to himself. Bad, bad Osamu, and bad brain.
“You can even obliterate your laptop and flush it down the drain,” he tells Odasaku with a voice as light as a summer’s breeze. “I’ll still have all of your files, and while you can get rid of them, you will never be able to get rid of me.”
“You scare me sometimes, Dazai.”
Puffing out a melodic chuckle, he tucks his hair behind his ear. “And you flatter me, Odasaku.”
“That wasn’t really a compliment,” Odasaku replies flatly.
“As a writer, you of all people should know that there are no right or wrong interpretations as long as you have evidence to support it.”
“So, what’s your evidence?”
“My guts.”
Odasaku snorts out a breath before redirecting his full attention back to the bowl of curry in front of him. It leaves Dazai with time and space — too much of it because the next thing he knows, his eyes immediately try to fly away from the iPad and into forbidden territories as if the silence and the lack of direct, immediate objective personally cut off the strings that tie them to safe grounds.
Nope.
Bad Osamu.
Slapping his hands on the table, he announces, “I’m going to get myself something to drink.” Something so grotesquely potent that it will take up all of his senses to process it, leaving them no time to pay attention to anything else.
Odasaku squints at the laptop in front of him, his cheeks going up and down as he chews and responds with a mechanical hm.
But that’s Dazai's first and final mistake: losing sight of the target. Because the moment he gets to his feet and spins on his heel to swerve around the booth, someone very short, very red, and carrying water crash-lands against his chest. Clothes get wet. Muscles that shouldn’t be tensing tense. Somewhere Kouyou Ozaki scowls at the air. And, most importantly of all, Dazai gets the front view of a show called Nakahara Chuuya and his freckles. And his frighteningly blue eyes. And his fingers, long and slim and covered in silver rings —
“Man, I’m so sorry,” Chuuya mutters, though he sounds 43% less agitated than the general population about spilling his drink all over Dazai’s shirt and pants as he pats the clothes in question. How ridiculous. What is skin going to do about water? (Unless he is a secret mermaid, that is, though Dazai doubts he would risk turning into one in public.) “You kind of blind-sided me there. You okay?”
Dazai recovers from the little power blackout in his brain and musters up a picture-perfect example of his most suave, shallow smile. “It’s just water. I’ll survive.” Unless he was a mermaid but then again —
You know how the story goes.
“But you’re still wet,” Chuuya says, and his tongue basically rolls over the words as his hands keep rubbing. “Even your pants.“
And that’s Dazai’s second mistake: not immediately cutting off the conversation and slithering out of it. Because Nakahara freckles Chuuya acts fast, and he acts smoothly as he drops down to one knee and uses the edge of his sleeve to rub on the inside of his thigh. Well, pants, but his thighs are clearly covered in those.
“No, no, no.” As soon as Dazai sees the top of Chuuya’s fiery head, his hand shoots down to grab his arm and yank him back up. “Really, it’s fine, Nakahara-kun. Don’t worry about it.”
“Oh, so you do know my name,” is the thing that Chuuya says out of all the possible combinations of words to utter out there. His head cocks slightly, and the smirk he shoots Dazai is light enough to describe as breezy but still strong enough to knock over some of Dazai’s organs. It’s sweeter than a peach. Definitely fruity. And so, so, so forbidden.
Dazai only notices that his hand is still wrapped around Chuuya’s wrist, a very lovely one, when he feels Chuuya’s muscles twitch despite the way he doesn’t make any attempts to get out of the grip.
“Heh.” He spreads his fingers and lets go. “How could I not remember the name of Kouyou’s little brother?” Grinning blindly, he pats Chuuya’s head. So peachy. “So little. So very… brotherly. To Kouyou. Your sister. Not to me, obviously.”
Chuuya’s easy smirk wavers for a moment before he rolls his eyes and tries to slap Dazai’s condescending hand away. “I’m only a few years younger than you, don’t get it twisted.”
“Still tiny,” Dazai insists.
“Oh well.” Chuuya shrugs, and Dazai is almost stupid enough to commit his third mistake of the day. “I don’t mind being short. Climbing tall things is a passion of mine.”
Dazai’s smile turns painful as he fights to keep it there. “Okay, Kouyou’s tiny, little brother, I’m going to get myself a drink and a few napkins now. Nice talking to you.” He makes his escape before Chuuya has the time to say something else that will make his brain short-circuit.
As it turns out, he doesn’t have to. (Talk, that is.) After Dazai successfully gets himself his distracting sugar bomb and a stack of napkins, he realizes that while words are powerful tools of manipulation, a simple, cheap lollipop and a nice pair of lush, pink lips wrapping around it are more than enough to bring someone to their knees. Well, figuratively speaking. Dazai doesn’t actually go down. He just feels like he might, considering how jelly-like his muscles feel.
He holds Chuuya’s shameless smirking gaze just long enough to slide into his booth — next to Odasaku this time, forcing him to make space for him.
“What are y—”
“I am being chased,” Dazai declares in a whisper-hiss.
Odasaku’s eyes flit around the coffee shop. “By whom?!”
“By a forbidden fruit.” Shoulders drooping, he scrubs a hand over his face. The chase — oh, he is all too familiar with it. Familiar with the stoking flames of resistance, with the slow but steady build-up, and with the eventual thrill of wrapping someone around his finger and letting them dance in circles. The thing that he is not so familiar with is being on the other end of it, being the prey rather than the predator. Mainly because it doesn’t make sense. Why would someone put effort into chasing him when he is so… easy?
His brain machinery squeaks and roars as it works.
It must be a test. Why else would little Nakahara start a mating dance merely a week after Yosano asks him to leave him alone?
“We have to go before I turn into Eve,” Dazai says, grabbing his iPad and shoving it into his bag.
“I’m not done with my curry yet,” Oda argues.
Dazai wraps his fingers around his drink — useless, now that he is making a swift escape — and dumps its repugnant contents in his friend’s bowl. “Now you are. Let’s go.”
***
Although Yosano does have a sadistic streak that Dazai has got to personally experience quite a few times, he does not think that she is behind the little problem that has been testing him lately. If she had something to say to him, then she would go ahead and just say it. No mind games or temptations or chess moves. No, but who would go out of their way to torture him is her not-so-lovely girlfriend, Kouyou.
Maybe she is sick of seeing him every time she is over. Maybe that little possessive bite of hers is getting out of hand, and she still sees Dazai as her rival rather than just the guy who once got used by Yosano the same way he used her: as physical relief and emotional support. Nothing less, but also nothing more than that. Or, maybe this is supposed to prove all the mean things she has been saying about him once-and-for-all: look, here, Dazai can’t even keep one simple promise. Do you really want to be friends with someone like that?
Dazai wouldn’t put it past Kouyou to use her little brother like that. Chuuya is quite good at… chasing. Of course someone with a heart of ice would be willing to sacrifice her beloved siblings in a battle of loyalties.
And the best strategy against that — aside from actually keeping the promise — is finding something equally dirty about Kouyou and using the same technique she’s trying to pull on him: blackmail her into keeping silent about whatever promise he might or might not accidentally break.
That’s why Dazai finds himself strolling past overzealous posters that are hard on the eye because of the blatant abuse of colors and a few dozen framed photographs depicting smiling faces frozen in the flash of the camera. This is the place where Kouyou spends most of her time when she isn’t being busy making plans to destroy Dazai’s only long-lasting friendship and living situation. It’s some kind of youth center near campus where she teaches several classes in physical activities that Dazai never bothered to remember — the standing proof that she did something awful in her past. Why else would someone volunteer to spend time with children and teenagers if not to repent for their sins? And where else to get better dirt about Mrs. holier than thou if not out of over-eager, gullible half-assed adults?
The only challenge lies to stay out of Kouyou’s radar, though Dazai has an excuse at hand if needed — and another ten if the one before that doesn’t pan out.
Keeping his eyes open for any suspicious activities, something like Kouyou being a little too friendly with one of her colleagues perhaps, or Kouyou drinking Yosano’s most loathed brand of coffee, Dazai blends into the sparse crowd of young and dumb, peeking into the rooms on each side of the hallway now and then. He pauses when he spots an overtly familiar thermos bottle on the window sill —
Now, he knows what that sounds like. It could be anyone’s. But no. It’s Kouyou’s. He knows that because he spent three entire hours being dragged through a mall when Yosano was doing the Christmas shopping last year. (In the end, Yosano’s Christmas gift to him was letting him go home instead of spending another two hours with the dreadful task of buying things that don’t matter.) Which means that Kouyou works here, Dazai thinks as he enters the room, empty aside from a plant in the corner and all the sunlight that fills it and goes to inspect the thing to make sure that it’s —
“Oi, what are you doing here?”
Dazai freezes. That’s a voice. Not Kouyou. No, that’s —
“Little Nakahara,” he says, turning around calmly and unsuspiciously with his hands innocently behind his back and a face full of smiles. “What do you mean what am I doing here? Isn’t it obvious?”
Hands folded in front of his chest, Chuuya raises his brows. “Beats me.”
Well, apparently, little Nakahara has no plans to finish his sentence for him. How unfortunate. But it’s not that hard to figure out. It’s a youth center, and Kouyou teaches something. So…
“I’m obviously taking the class,” he says with a shrug.
“Really?” Chuuya asks, his low voice dripping with crystal-clear skepticism.
“Of course.” And because tossing the ball back is always the easiest way to slither out of the spotlight, he adds, “I think the right question is what are you doing here? Are you stalking me?”
Except that all his tactical calculations fail him again when Chuuya opens his mouth. “Hm, I think if I were to stalk you, I’d have better luck on tinder. Or in that bar, you always hang around in. Or that coffee shop… but maybe not anymore since you left it pretty early last time.” Then he places his hands on his hips and throws out an arresting grin. “I’m here for the class, too!”
“Cool,” Dazai replies. Cool, cool, cool, cool. Now he just needs an excuse to get out here before he actually has to take a class with Chuuya taught by his sister — and that’s when a crowd of people enters the room, dealing him the card that he needs. He can slip out and —
A hand twisted in the back of his shirt physically stop his escape. “Oi, wrong direction. The mats are over there.”
“Mats?” Dazai repeats with a suspicious squint as the people around them — all of them… very young and lankly and oozing teenager angst — indeed grab mats and spread them out on the floor.
“Yeah, for the class,” Chuuya says and places a hand on Dazai’s back, all but guiding him forward with both such firmness and gentleness that Dazai is positive something inside him dies from hyperhydration. “You can’t do yoga on the floor. It will hurt like shit.”
“Right, yoga. Of course. Actually —” Dazai plants both his feet on the ground. Although it makes Chuuya pause too, it does not make him retreat his hand. Still warm on his back, despite the layer of clothing separating it. “Now that you mention it, I’m realizing that I forgot to bring my clothes! Can you imagine?” Dazai tsks at himself. “I was so excited to try out the class for the first time that I just left the bag at home. Real bummer.” And a reason to take a step back. And another. Twenty more of them and he will slink his way out of this yoga class and back into safety. “Anyways, I’ll go now, but you have f—”
“I have a spare change of clothes,” Chuuya offers.
“No offense, but we’re not exactly —” He wiggles his fingers between them, trying to point out the glaringly blatant size difference.
“Relax, the shirt is oversized and the pants are pretty stretchy,” Chuuya assures him with a wave of his hand. He even winks before starting to drag Dazai towards the other end of the room all over again. “Besides, I’ve got a way bigger ass than you.”
Well… he isn’t wrong. Granted, Dazai has put on a considerable amount of weight ever since he started college: his ribs aren’t poking through his skin anymore, his arms have filled out, and he has a pouch that he isn’t too fond of, but when it comes to the volume of his bottom, then yes, Chuuya definitely has the advantage of having a way bigger, more bodacious ass than him.
“Why exactly do you keep a spare change of clothes with you?”
“I don’t carry it with me. It’s always here in case I forget mine since my memory’s shit.” He bumps shoulders with Dazai. “You know how that is, right?”
Sighing miserably, Dazai rubs his arm. “No. My memory is quite good, actually.”
“Forgetting clothes for a class you’re attending sounds like the opposite to me.”
“Okay. Cards on the table: I don’t think yoga is for me. I forgot my bag on purpose so I wouldn’t have to participate. I only said I would because my roommate, who is your sister’s girlfriend, wanted me to make an effort to work on our… rather hostile relationship.”
“Kouyou would probably pop 10 blood vessels at once if she saw you in her class. How was that ever supposed to help?”
“Well, Yosano thought… wait, you know that she doesn’t like me?”
Chuuya shoots him a look that says as much as duh.
Maybe this is it. Maybe Dazai can use this. “So, you don’t keep to some high sibling loyalty code, huh?”
Chuuya snorts out a breath. “I love my sister, but she’s got half of the planet on her hit list — and 99% of them are there because they looked at her the wrong way once. I don’t really decide who I like or don’t like based on her grudges.”
“What if I’m the other 1%?”
“Oh, really?” Stopping in front of a door, he cocks his head and glances up at Dazai with razor-sharp bright blue eyes. “What’d you do then?”
And Dazai can’t help but feel cut in half by them. “I don’t think telling Kouyou’s little brother would be a wise choice.”
Chuuya rolls his eyes and opens the door. “I know you didn’t do anything serious, or I wouldn’t —” Abruptly, he stops himself and lifts his hand to scratch the back of his neck, some of the shameless, innocent confidence that’s he’s usually glowing with leaking out for the first time. Dazai squints suspiciously. “Or I wouldn’t even be here talking to you,” Chuuya finishes. “Because I don’t care about petty grudges, but I do care about serious ones, which you didn’t do. So whatever.” He opens one of the small lockers and grabs the clothes before offering them to Dazai. “Here.”
“Didn’t you say me participating in this class would only escalate our situation?”
“Oh, did I not mention it? Kouyou’s not here today. I’m teaching it in her place.” Shoving the clothes against Dazai’s chest, Chuuya’s mouth curves into another brilliant smile. “So you have nothing to worry about.”
Dazai has never met someone so persistently ignoring everything he says — aside from himself. Usually, he would have slithered out of this damn building twenty minutes ago — usually, he does because he actually wants to slither out. In this case… he knows he has to, but he doesn’t want to.
Well, he is still not too keen about the whole yoga thing. Dazai is pretty sure the last time he did a stretch, he got a cramp and spent twenty minutes wailing on the floor until Yosano kicked him back into functioning. There’s just something about Chuuya that makes him want to go through the torture anyway.
Finally accepting the clothes, Dazai catches his gaze. “I’m a very irritating student, for your information.”
“Maybe you just need a good teacher then.”
Dazai has to dig his nails into his hand and mentally chant: Kouyou’s little brother, Kouyou’s little brother, Kouyou’s handsome, charming, magnetic, and off-limits little brother.
“Heh.” He searches for words that will let the tension bleed out of this room again. No tension allowed in here. “High aspirations for such a short man.” But remembering that Chuuya can even weaponize his height into aggressive flirting, he clutches the clothes to his chest, eyes actually inspecting them for the first time. “I’m going to… wait, I’m supposed to wear these?”
Between his fingers are dangling a pair of flashy red booty shorts with the words ENEMY OF THE STATE written on them.
“You don’t like them?”
“I sure do like them,” Dazai mutters. “I like looking at them. I just never thought of wearing them myself. They seem sorta… short.”
“Oh, well, in that case —” With an innocent shrug, Chuuya tugs at the hem of his own shorts — simple plain Adidas ones, definitely longer, reaching his knees but still good looking. “We can switch —”
“No!” Dazai shouts and physically stops Chuuya from undressing right here and now with his fingers around his wrist. “Don’t. I said I had never thought of it before, not that I didn’t want to wear them. I’m sure they’ll look bombastic. So no need to change. Please.”
“Okay,” Chuuya says.
“Okay,” Dazai repeats and lets out a breath. Okay. “That’s….” Good. Crisis averted. Well, almost — his hand is still wrapped around Chuuya’s arm, and he’s still criminally close to him, able to pick out the notes of the cologne he’s wearing and feeling the stupid urge to lean even closer and…
Nope. Bad Osamu. Very bad, Osamu.
He only lingers for a second too long before he lets go of Chuuya and takes a considerable step back. Although that one second is definitely palpable, seeping into the air and adding to the crackling static wafting between them, it’s still better than two seconds. Or even worse: three.
“I’m going to change now,” Dazai declares.
Nodding, Chuuya turns to the door. “Great. I’ll keep a mat saved for you.”
The shorts do fit him. Actually, they make the curve of his butt look even somewhat plump, Dazai assesses as he takes a look in the mirror. So that’s why everyone is so fond of these things. And that’s why everyone always wants a fat ass. It lets his paper-thin self-worth soar to new heights. His bandages make it look a bit ridiculous, but, hey, maybe once Chuuya gets a look at the mummy that’s always hiding under all the layers, he will realize the thing he is currently trying to climb isn’t really worth the sweat and lay off.
It has happened before — it didn’t feel great, of course, but Dazai thinks the prickling sensation of being seen and rejected might actually come in handy and save him from a fallout with Yosano this time.
To his utter disappointment but not surprise, Dazai finds that the only free mat available is the one in the front row — right in front of Chuuya, so he can forget his plan to hide somewhere in the back of the room.
The first five minutes are not that bad. They just have to sit and do breathing exercises before doing light stretches that even someone like Dazai can follow without any dramatics. Chuuya’s voice is a pleasant melody to listen to under duress. It starts going downhill once the actual torture starts.
“Inhale and tilt your pelvis back for the cow pose,” Chuuya says, presenting an obscenely deep arch of his back, “then exhale and tuck your tailbone for the cat pose.”
Oh, dear god.
Dazai tries to tear his gaze away, which is hard because Chuuya’s right there in his face, arching his back and sticking his ass out, and Dazai’s —
“Dazai.” Oh, double god. “I said tilt your pelvis back.”
“I am tilting my pelvis back,” Dazai mutters as he stares at the floor.
All around them, he hears snickers. This is why he doesn’t associate with teenagers. They are heartless, smelly monsters.
“It’s easier to follow the exercises if you actually look at what the teacher is doing. You’re not looking.”
“I thought Yoga was supposed to be about stilling my mind?! How am I supposed to do that when I have to keep looking here and there and doing all those things and sweating and —”
“It’s a Yoga workout,” he hears Chuuya say, “but we also have a proper yoga class on Thursday. You’re welcome to join us there, too.”
Dazai breathes out a frustrated grunt and drags his eyes back to…. Chuuya’s stupid cow pose. He doesn’t look like a cow! He looks like… like a forbidden fruit. “I’ll just tilt my pelvis.”
Chuuya hums. “Good boy. That’s so much better.”
No, that makes his dick twitch, and Dazai really doubts the booty shorts are going to be of much help if something happens — and he’s in a room full of children!
Okay, Dazai tells himself. You are in control. You decide what your body does, not the other way around. You can do this. You will think about the shriveled up, rotten lemon that you once forgot about in your fridge for six months and nothing else.
“Next up: the downward facing dog!”
What’s with all the animal names? Are people who do yoga just secret furries? Is that it?
Again, Chuuya demonstrates his insane flexibility as he plants both his toes and his palms on the mat and holds a pose to form a perfect triangle, clearly in charge of every muscle in his trained body.
“Now I know some of us are still working on our flexibility, so I’m going to show you some alternative poses as well.” Then he promptly drops to his knees, pressing his entire upper body to the mat instead as he keeps his hips high in the air. The picture burns itself into Dazai’s mind.
Oh, that’s not good.
Not at all.
Before Dazai can imagine the perfect curve of his hips and his arched back somewhere else, he pinches his arm and hurries to copy the damn pose, hoping that the agonizing burn of his muscles stretching to their limits will distract him.
Perhaps he should have bothered to actually take a look into Christianity once because then he would have known that the forbidden fruit is just the handsome devil in disguise.
“I like your determination, Dazai,” he suddenly hears Chuuya’s voice right above him, “but if you’re not going to make use of the alternative pose, try not to bend your arms. Back straight.” A hand suddenly pushes the place between his shoulder blades. “Oh yeah, like that.” Is it even legal to sound so sultry when you’re teaching yoga to teenagers? “Make it nice and deep…”
Dazai’s hands curl into fists, but even that is a mistake.
“Nuh-uh.” Chuuya must squat down in front of him because he not only sounds like he’s a lot closer, but Dazai feels like he’s swimming in his cologne. And then he’s touching Dazai’s hands, physically untangling his fists. “You gotta let go of all the tension. That’s the point of this entire class.”
“I told you I’m a horrible student,” Dazai hisses through clenched teeth.
“I think you’re doing great. Amazing, even.”
With a sniff, Dazai gives up, rises back to his full height, and finds the best possible distraction that he points at with his finger. “Why don’t you go help her? Her form looks like a square instead of a triangle!”
“Hey!” the girl exclaims. “I’ve had spinal surgery four months ago!”
Dazai recoils. Oh.
Chuuya pushes him back on the mat without even blinking. “Stop deflecting. Kouyou and I see these people every week. It’s your first time here. I’m just trying to help you.”
“No, you’re just being mean,” Dazai grumbles under his breath as Chuuya all but forces him back into the stupid downward dog pose, again with that hand on his spine, pressing him, or trying to, into the correct form.
Chuuya snorts. “I think you and I have different definitions of being mean.”
Oh great. He has good hearing, too.
“I think you and I know exactly that you don’t,” he whisper-hisses.
“Okay, class, get back to your feet and do some stretches,” Chuuya announces to the room, and his gaze meets Dazai’s as soon as he isn’t facing the squeaky texture of his mat anymore. “I’ll stop if I get an invite to that Eternal party next week.”
“No,” Dazai replies in an instant.
Chuuya’s eyes narrow. “Why not?”
Because parties are the most dangerous hunting ground for prey like Dazai? Because alcohol is involved? Inhibitions are lowered? Promises forgotten? Because Dazai might snap if he has to spend the entire night trying to escape the most handsome person in the room!
“Because it’s only for law students,” Dazai says, and he can’t resist poking Chuuya’s forehead. “You know that, or you wouldn’t be asking me this.”
“Yeah, and I also know it doesn’t matter when someone like you brings a plus one,” he retorts. Such a clever boy. He clearly has done his research.
“Hm, so you will continue to be mean to me there, too? No thanks.”
“It’s only mean because you —” Chuuya makes an indecipherable gesture with his hand, probably something that is meant to paraphrase the way Chuuya has been throwing himself at him like a cat in heat while Dazai has been running away like a timid damsel in distress. When Dazai doesn’t offer to say that though, Chuuya juts out his chin, a low growl coming from the back of his throat. “Because you are making it mean, but that’s the beside the point. I want to go there to socialize and network.”
“Aren’t you a gymnast? Why do you need to network with a bunch of law student pricks?” Including Dazai.
“Who said it’s for my career?” Chuuya’s head tilts. “Maybe I want to find myself one of those pricks so I can do whatever I want without worrying about money.”
Dazai considers that. It could be just another ploy — pretty honest for once — but… maybe… maybe he can actually use Chuuya being at the party to his advantage. Maybe all Chuuya needs to see is that Dazai is a scumbag that he doesn’t want to climb to tap out of this chase.
“Well, in that case,” Dazai finds himself drawling, “how could I possibly intervene in that grand plan of yours? Fine. You can come.”
“Really?”
“Sure.”
“I’ve never been there before. Can you pick me up?”
Dazai snorts. “No. You can google the address. It’s not hard to find.”
The scowl returns to Chuuya’s handsome face, and the way he yanks on Dazai’s shirt is not gentle at all. “Back on the mat. You better write my name on the guest list, or so help me god, I’ll get inside anyway and ruin your whole night.”
Not if Dazai ruins his first.
The rest of the yoga class is considerably easier without Chuuya’s full attention on him but no less painful when Dazai has to watch him display all the incredible ways he can bend his body. It’s just unfair, so unfair that this guy has to be the brother of ice queen incarnated.
When Chuuya announces that it’s over with a clap of his hands and grants the room his most gorgeous smile yet, Dazai uses the temporary murmur of voices to locate the kid that radiates the most atrociously horrid vibes and sidle up to her.
“So glad that Kouyou wasn’t here today, right?”
The girl doesn’t even bat an eyelash, only stares at him like she is trying to kill him with that look alone.
“She cheats on her girlfriend all the time,” Dazai tries. “What kind of person does that?!”
“Ew.”
“Huh?”
“You’re, like, thirty years old. Leave me alone, freak.”
Dazai watches her go with his hand clutched to his chest. Twenty-four isn’t that old, is it? People tell him that his life is only beginning all the time!
“I’d be careful with that one, or your feelings will get hurt,” Chuuya’s voice says behind him.
Dazai turns to him with a sigh. “Too late. Already hurt.”
“What’d she say?”
“That I’m old.” Dazai touches his forehead, trying to feel whether he’s already developing wrinkles. Given how much he used to glare in his peak angst era, he wouldn’t be surprised, but he was kind of hoping to be spared from them for at least another few years. “And a freak.”
The only thing stopping more frowning lines from appearing is the sound of Chuuya’s gentle, raspy laughter — fleeting like all good things in the world are. “I’m a hyperactive freak, according to her.”
“Ouch. I guess yoga hasn’t been much help, huh?”
“Yeah, I guess.” Chuuya lifts the phone in his hand, then and wiggles it back and forth. “Hey, can I take a picture of you?”
Dazai squints. “What, I look that funny?”
“No…. I just want to put this memory on record.”
“Me in your yoga class or me —” Dazai glances down at his backside. “— in the enemy of the state booty shorts?”
“Both?”
“Fine, whatever. Make fun of me all you want. Just don’t show it to your sister.”
Chuuya looks like an excited child as he unlocks his phone and snaps several pictures. “Don’t worry, your secret is safe with me.”
“Since we’re on that topic, do you mind not telling her I was here as well?” Dazai casts a glance at some people shuffling out of the studio. “And are these hormone bombs friendly with Kouyou, or do I need to bribe them to keep their traps shut?”
“Don’t worry, that’s not even Kouyou’s class. It’s mine. So she won’t know.”
Dazai blinks. “I thought you were just covering for her?”
“Hm, I lied. I figured you’d run for the hills If you knew.”
“Little Nakahara… you’re very sneaky.”
“Please don’t call me that.”
“Freckles then.”
Chuuya’s smile is less smug and more genuine this time, and something that Dazai never even knew was hard inside him softens. “I guess that’s better. So…” He tosses his phone from one hand to the other. “Care to give me your number while we’re at it?”
And that’s where Dazai has to draw the line. “Nope.”
“Seriously?”
“Seriously.”
“But I have to get inside that party. How am I supposed to do that if I can’t call you when I’m there?”
“I gave you the promise to get you inside, and I will keep it. Don’t you worry about that, freckles,” Dazai says, brushing past him on his way to change back into his normal clothes. “But that’s the only thing that I promised you.”