The first year of being in the Mafia was a faded memory for him that hurt like hell now. Because he got friends and then lost them immediately. One single year he got to spend with the promising youth of the Port Mafia, the Flags. God. He missed them. Dazai didn't really hang out with them since he was under Moris wing, but normally the younger members were under Pianoman's care. And Chuuya was now working on the gem network the Mafia had. It was one big money maker and as Chuuya learned later on, he was only supervising Dazai's leftovers, because that jackass was in the gem department before him. He saw a few memories of him and Dazai having to do little missions together, more bickering than doing any real work, but they got the job done every time; perfectly. Dazai's thoughts were getting more and more interesting. Seemed like the little demon was starting to get really attached to Chuuya. Chuuya couldn't pin Dazais emotions down, he still was a genius piece of shit and his thoughts were so contradictory, but if he didn't know it better, he'd call young Dazai out on developing a small crush. Which seemed so out of place. Dazai and having a crush. That was just not possible, especially not if he had a crush on Chuuya. Dazai always treated him like, well, a fucking dog.

Right now, Dazai was getting ready to go outside of his shitty container home. He wore his typical Mafia attire and sighed as he heard a heavy knock on the door. But Chuuya could see the happy smile he had on his lips that he immediately dropped when he opened the door and was looking at the young Chuuya.

"Are you finally ready?" His younger version asked and Dazai just nodded. "Good, then let's go. We're already late." The Flags held a party every month. The date was not set in stone, because Mafia business didn't have a time schedule. But once a month, the young members of the Mafia got a chance to be dumb, stupid teens, because if you could kill a men, you could drink booze too. It was as simple as that. This was the first time Dazai was going to the monthly party. And young Chuuya took a little pride in the fact that it was because of him. He sort of lost a bet to Albatross, but, like, not really. He was planning on inviting Dazai anyway and dragging him out of that stupid container to -for once in his life- be a careless teenager. The bet just made that easier for him, like he had to do it. Thus, if everyone would be like 'why did you drag him here', Chuuya could play the victim and say 'I lost a bet'. It was perfect. Dazai looked so unamused by having to go to that 'stupid party'. He was constantly complaining when young Chuuya pushed and shoved him up the hill. But his thoughts? Absolutely adorable. This is our first meeting outside of a job and I can't believe he really invited me and What if I say something stupid in front of his friends? He probably would never invite me again and so on. It was really cute. The demon prodigy was acting cute. Not on the outside, but his inside was so mushy right now and Chuuya couldn't help but grin a little. God, he got so much blackmail material out of this. That Dazai probably was collecting just as much material couldn't spoil his good mood.

____

"He probably thinks he's too good for us," that was Doc talking, with a slight smile. Chuuya was laughing with his flag friends and then their talk switched to the monthly party thing. And then somehow to Dazai.

"No, he just isn't used to other people," said Lippmann and god, he hated this. He hated sitting in this stupid bar while Chuuya and his old friends were playing pool and talking about him like some sort of mental case... which, okay, fair, he did have a chemical unbalance in his brain, but that still didn't give them the right to talk about him like he was some sort of animal. Kinda ironic that this even bugged him, since he called Chuuya a dog all the time. But he always said it to his face, because he might have been raised in the Mafia, but he still had some manners.

"Hey, Chuuya! Why don't you invite the little demon prodigy?" Albatross suggested, excited and with a mischievous glint in his eyes.

"Wha— Why should I? I hate him. Does that ring a bell?" Chuuya answered with a growl. Dazai smiled because he knew that the feisty redhead would do just that. He always declared he hated him, but somehow always made an effort to reach out to him.

"Mhm," said Albatross and then he flicked his fingers together, creating a sort of impressive loud sound. "If you lose this round against me," he pointed the pool stick at Chuuya, "you have to invite the demon!" Every other member -except Iceman- made an ooooh sound and Chuuya just accepted.

"But if I win, you have to do it," he smiled and Albatross' attitude deflared for a second, he was clearly scared of the consequence of losing.

"Deal."

A bet. Chuuya only invited him because of a bet. That fucking hurt. It shouldn't be that important. He shouldn't care, but damn, their first time hanging out without having a mission was only because the Chibi lost a bet? He felt like shit. He just wanted to curl up and die, because the real Chuuya probably was having a blast in Dazai's own pathetic memory. Realizing just how important that day was for young Dazai and in general and laughing his ass off, because it was only a bet. The memory started to fade to that obnoxious white and suddenly Dazai was alone again. He had enough of this already.

He wanted to get out of this shitty ability and die.

____

While the young Dazai continued to complain to young Chuuya, the real Chuuya looked around. It was rather impressive. Dazai had an excellent memory, because it almost felt like actually walking there, he could look down the hill to see the bright lights of the city in the distance. And he could even hear the wind rustle the leaves of the big trees and smell the fresh air of the forest. He could also see starry constellations when he looked up into the sky. It was really interesting how Chuuya could move freely. He could open doors, pet a stray cat and touch trees. It felt so real. Dazais intelligence was truly something and it did make Chuuya's stay in his memories pleasant. Maybe he'd compliment the bastard later for this.

The monthly party always had the same location, just in case the mafia needed a young ability user. They didn't really need security as no one would be dumb enough to attack the youth of the Port Mafia. And if they were dumb enough to do that, it would be the last stupid decision of their life. Right now, the younger versions were reaching their destination. On a clearing in the woods stood an old mustang and around the old car were tables with booze and fairy lights in the trees. Chuuya never questioned why the car was there, but he was sure it had to be because Albatross decided 'it looked cool'. Big music boxes were surrounding the area and the low bass was lightly lingering in everyone's bodies. The atmosphere was totally clashing with the fact that all the teens were part of the Mafia.

"Chuuuuuuya!" And that was the only warning he got before Albatross tackled him, or at least tried to tackle him, but the young Chuuya just made a quick sidestep and the strawberry blond guy crashed into Dazai. They made a dull sound as they landed on the ground and as soon as Albatross realized who he accidentally tackled, he jumped to his feet in a hurry. "Haha ah, sorry," he said and reached out a hand to help the younger boy up, which the boy accepted. That certainly surprised both Albatross and young Chuuya. This is his friend. Be cool. Oh, real Chuuya was having a blast. This was great. He always wondered why Dazai was so tame that night towards the Flags and now he knew: He wanted Chuuya's friends to like him. Just adorable. He would tease Dazai with this as soon as the ability stopped. By the way... when was it going to stop? How long would he be stuck here? It wasn't bad per se but Chuuya didn't want to spend eternity in Dazai's memories.

"No need to apologize, Chuuya is stupid for stepping away," Dazai said and dodged Chuuyas kick.

"It's the first time I see you here," Albatross casually pointed out. Chuuya had made all of the Flags promise to not bring up the bet in front of Dazai at any cost. That'd just be... mean? In some sort of way? He couldn't really pinpoint why he thought it would be. "Why's that?"

"Partying isn't my thing I guess," Dazai shrugged. A happy gathering is basically the opposite of suicide, isn't it? That thought had Chuuya laughing, because the young boy was kinda right in his assumption.

"Oh?" Albatross lifted an eyebrow in a challenging way. "Can't hold your liquor?"

"I'm not Chuuya," Dazai just deadpanned and Albatross -that damn traitor- laughed. And Chuuya probably would've been a little sour over the fact that he really can't hold his liquor that well if it wasn't for the sweet little thought he just heard. I made him laugh. That's good, right? It was so strange hearing the demon prodigy, the feared strategist, thinking such simple things. As if this was the first interaction he had with another human being and wanted to fit in. As if he wasn't scarily good at manipulating people. It was flattering in a way.

"What's that supposed to mean?!" His younger self screamed at them, but only earned snickers in return.

"C'mon Dazai, you need a drink," and with those words, Albatross was leading the way to the booze table with Dazai and Chuuya following right behind him. They are looking at me. And only because he heard this, he looked around. He didn't realize this when he was younger, but everyone was staring at Dazai and the teens started whispering in little groups. He could hear every single hushed word.

Demon

Arrogant prick

Why is he even here?

Mori's favorite

Should we leave?

He's so scary

I hope he doesn't speak to us

His ability makes you feel so defenseless, don't let him touch you

Why would I want to be touched by him anyway?

Scary kid

Who the hell invited him?

Chuuya was furious. He wanted to kick every stupid one of those whispering cowards, till he realized something: There was no way Dazai could hear what they said over the loud music. Was this Dazai's imagination or did he really understand the low whispers? This was so weird. The pleasant atmosphere of Dazais memories was suddenly replaced with the itchy feeling of being watched. Was this part of the reason why Dazai never attended social gatherings if he could ditch them? God, why did Dazai say 'yes' when he invited him? This was a horrible feeling, Chuuya wanted to just curl up and hide from the hostile gazes he could feel crawling on his skin.

"To your first time being here and hopefully not the last," Albatross' happy voice suddenly broke the creepy atmosphere in Dazai's memories. "Cheers!" And they downed their drinks. Albatross because he usually did that and Dazai probably because he wanted to feel less watched. "Ah damn, I already like you!" The strawberry blond said with a cheeky grin as Dazai refilled his drink immediately.

"You need to meet the others," Chuuya insisted and dragged the demon prodigy to the spot where his friends usually stayed during these parties. Pianoman, Iceman and Lippman usually just watched the party play out. They did talk to others, but they didn't really dance or play stupid games like Chuuya tended to do. Pianoman was responsible for the monthly parties and liked to keep an eye on everthing. Lippman pulled his connections so that non-Mafia teens would be here because the older members used the monthly parties to get laid and needed 'fresh meat'. Iceman just silently sipped his drink and listened to the conversations. Albatross, Doc, and Chuuya usually danced and jumped around. And at some point, Albatross and Doc would be very interested in getting Chuuya drunk to make him 'spill all the blackmail material'. As expected, the rest of his friends were standing under the big tree. It hurt to see them. It hurt in a bittersweet way. They were so alive and vivid in Dazai's memories, but that is all that they were now: memories. They died and Chuuya couldn't do anything about it. It was all his fault that his friends couldn't host their monthly parties anymore.

"Ah, Dazai, so nice to finally see you at one of our parties," Pianoman's words crushed Chuuya's dark thoughts. He couldn't loop into depressing thoughts while being in Dazai's memories. He should just be happy to hear their voices this clear again.

"Chuuya wouldn't stop bugging me," Dazai said with a sly grin, but now Chuuya could hear the little happiness coating the words.

"Liar!"

"Me? And lying? Oh, Chibi, you wound me, I'd never do something so sinful," Dazai whined in a dramatic way and Albatross snickered at his performance, whereas Lippmann and the others -apart from ever stoic Iceman- just smiled amused.

"You're so full of shit you should reak!"

"I reak? Chuuya's dog stench is all over the place."

"What did you say, you bastard?!"

They started their trademark bickering without realizing that the Flags were watching them. But now, real Chuuya could see it. The fond gaze in the eyes of his friend, even Iceman had a small genuine smile on his face as he watched them go on and on with their insults. Did they already see what Chuuya himself would only realize years later?

"And you are a stupid—" Young Chuuya suddenly lost all his insulting energy. Right. He remembered who rained on his parade. "Shirase." And the bickering stopped immediately.

"The sheep boy?" Dazai asked as if he didn't already know that, turning his head to follow Chuuya's gaze.

"Oh," Lippman said. "Seems like my connections reached the wrong person. I can tell him to leave if—"

"Don't be ridiculous. I don't care," his younger self claimed and -oh god- he didn't sound convincing at all. He also didn't look the part of someone who didn't care. His shoulders slacked and he stared into the red liquor filled cup he held in his right hand.

"Are you su—"

"I am sure," Chuuya harshly interrupted Pianomann, still staring at his cup, till he decided to down it all in one go. Not noticing how everyone watched him with a worried expression. Stupid Sheep, he heard Dazai's angry thoughts, shouldn't affect him now that he has the Flags. Chuuya was just a sad little lump at this point and he remembered thinking to ditch the party after, like, ten more minutes.

"So what am I stupid for?" Dazai tried to start their insulting game again.

"Ha? Ah, just everything," Chuuya countered weakly, not really feeling like being able to put up with Dazai. Come on, be your loud annoying self. The bandage waster had a rather strange way of cheering him up.

"Everything? Always knew that stupid hat would eat away your brain, you can't even come up with a good insult." Real Chuuya saw that Lippman wanted to say something, but Pianomann quietly silenced him with a look.

"Hm, good insults would be a waste on you," Chuuya said without the usual fire.

"You aren't even capable of good insults," Dazai proclaimed but Chuuya just made a noise in response. "I mean, what is there even to insult? I'm amazing and can do everything better than you." Take the bait, I'm making it so easy, come on!

"You wish," and it seemed as though Chuuya got a little invested in their bickering again. "Name one thing you're better at!" Finally.

"Mhm, my incredible charm?" He asked with a wink, at least Chuuya thought he winked. Couldn't really tell because of the bandage around his other eye. Young Chuuya made a barfing sound. "Oh? Chibi insists on having more charm?"

"I definitely do! And I can prove it!"

"How?"

"I—" Chuuya looked around for a bit, eyes scanning the people surrounding them, "—will get the number of a girl before you do!"

"Boo, that's boring," Dazai declined. "You probably know the girls already anyway, since you've been going to this party for months now."

"You are just scared!"

"Proving Chibi he doesn't have charm by letting poor innocent girls listen to his stuttering is booooring," the boy explained and before Chuuya could say anything, Pianomann chirped into the conversation.

"Dancing is charming. You could dance," he suggested and Dazai was immediately on board with it.

"That's a good idea. Yeah, Chibi should prove he has charm through dancing with me, so he doesn't traumatize a poor girl by stepping on her feet," it was sort of funny how Dazai could twist everything other people said just to get what he wanted. And this time he clearly wanted to dance. With Chuuya. Geez, his younger self was really blind.

"Dance with you? Blegh, disgusting!"

"Afraid to lose against my irresistible charm?"

"You don't have any charm!"

"Oh, so Chibi is afraid because he can't dance?"

"No, I just—", the redhead didn't seem to know what to say, so Dazai did what he did best: Use it to his advantage.

"Chuuya is afraid~" he teased and got a little louder. "Oh, the great former king of the sheep is afraid to lose to my charm!" Dazai dramatically moved to the middle of the clearing, voice loud enough to be heard over the music.

Ugh, what is his fucking problem?

No one wants him here so why is he making so much noise?

Can he just shut up, I'm trying to have a good time here.

Poor Chuuya, always being stuck with that waste of space.

The atmosphere of the memory changed again. The icky feeling was back, but Dazai put up his clowning, careless show. But why? Why put up with this if— You're doing this to cheer him up. You can handle this. No way. He put up with this just to cheer him up? Chuuya always used to think that Dazai didn't care about what others thought because he was always so indifferent, but now he knew that he cared in some way, but that he cared even more about Chuuya...Shit. Could he even face the real Dazai after all of this? The bandage wearer was now standing on the hood of the old mustang, looking at Chuuya and the icky atmosphere disappeared.

"I'm not afraid!" His younger version screamed at the top of his lungs and Dazai just laughed.

"Then prove it or otherwise I'll print in the Mafia newspaper that you are a scared chicken," he teased and held out a hand in the way you ask for a dance whilst lifting his eyebrow in a challenging way. "Are you that afraid to dance with me?"

"You disgusting piece of shit!" Chuuya spat out, but was already making his way to Dazai. "You good-for-nothing bandage waster." His ability wrapped his body in a slightly red glow, making his hair move smoothly and trees around them shake a little. He wasn't actively using his ability. He was just pissed off by Dazais shit-show. "You stupid dead fish," he took the hand Dazai still held out for him and his ability was canceled with the blue circles from 'No Longer Human'. What did those stupid whispering people know? Dazai's ability felt like soft waves washing over him, it wasn't making him feel defenseless at all. Maybe the people who thought that were just fucking weak. "I'm never afraid and certainly not of your pathetic ass."

"Then let's dance, Chibiko." Dazai just smiled and Chuuya glared at him as the music changed to a more danceable song.

Real Chuuya just stayed with the Flags, watched the first awkward steps of their younger versions. They were dancing on the small hood of a car which was weird at first, but they both got over that pretty fast. It was fun. It was one of Chuuya's favorite memories, he always felt like his surroundings disappeared as he danced with Dazai and now he can see that it must be the same for Dazai, because the scenery changed. Faces blurred and voices faded out. Just the car was in focus and the flag members standing beside Chuuya right now.

"Woah," Albatross sounded awestruck. "They are really dancing and they're amazing at it."

"They are also amazing at diving in that river in Egypt," Iceman commented dryly and made everyone laugh, except for Albatros.

"What river? Why are they diving?" He asked, confused, and Iceman just sighed.

"He meant that they are in denial," Pianoman took pity on the confused teen.

"Ah, but why a river that—"

"Just let it be, please," that was Lippman, who was rubbing two fingers in a calm circular motion against his temples.

"It's honestly crazy that they are in denial, just look at them," Doc said with a soft smile on his face, one that even reached his voice. And Chuuya's friends were looking at the dancing teens. As did the real Chuuya. The sight was mesmerizing: They totally got lost in that moment, laughed and giggled -which young Chuuya would later blame on the alcohol- and skillfully twirled each other around. They played with their abilities, Chuuya using his to jump a little higher and Dazai's being activated as soon as they touched, which created a lovely blue shine around them. "I wish I had that with someone," he sounded sulky and now his friends laughed.

"Naw, don't worry we'll find you a cute little girl," Lippman insisted.

"Or boy!" Albatross supplemented with a wiggle of his eyebrows. Why could he even hear them talk? There's no way Dazai is hearing this over the music and apart from that, he wasn't focused on anything but Chuuya right now. Real Chuuya started to walk closer to the car. Seeing their smiles and the happy gleam in their eyes. He loved this memory. Dancing with Dazai was the highlight of that night and to think it only happened because the bandage wearer tried to cheer him up made it an even sweeter memory. The song stopped and their dancing came to an end. Standing way too close to each other, breathing heavily while looking at each other with exhausted happiness.

"Did I prove myself?"

"Yeah," Dazai admitted in a hushed voice. "Is my charm irresistible?"

"Maybe, just a little," he softly answered, knowing that this little exchange wouldn't be used for blackmail. This quiet conversation was only for them. Sudden applause made them bring distance between them. The teens and the surrounding came all back into focus. All the others had watched them dance as well and now they cheered, which was their signal to get away from each other. "See?" Chuuya stated in a loud voice, for the crowd to hear. "Not scared!" And then Chuuya jumped down from the old car and walked back to his friends. No, you're never scared of me. Dazai fondly smiled watching Chuuya go to the Flags, who already started to tease him over the dance. Then he jumped off the car himself and walked away. Real Chuuya followed him interested. The partying people made room for Dazai, clearly still afraid, but being a little bit less hostile now. Dazai clearly searched for someone and seemed to know exactly where to find them, because he was confidently walking in a certain direction. They almost left the party, that's how far outside Dazai's goal was.

"Former King? Ha, he wasn't even that important. We are way better without him." Shirase.

"We should just leave. Please. This bumps me out seeing the Mafia everywhere. You said this would be fun!" A girl said. Chuuya didn't know her. She wasn't a member of the sheep as far as he knew and she definitely wasn't happy to be at this party.

"We needed to attend this to gather information—"

"Information?" Dazai decided to crash their little talk. "What for, Shirase?"

"Ugh, it's you," disgust was as clear as day in the other boy's voice and facial expression.

"Jup, it's silly old me and you should just get the fuck away before I tell everyone that you were attending this party for information. The Mafia doesn't really like little lambs that try to use our parties for intel." His gaze was icy cold and his smile was sinister. "We slaughter them." The girl shrunk down in fear, her voice trembling as she asked, begged, Shirase to leave.

"Are you sure that you don't just dance with them?" The other boy mocked, despite his obvious fear. "Because you, the oh-so scary demon prodigy, seemed to have a lot of fun doing so." God, Chuuya always forgot how stupid the other boy used to be. You should only every piss off Dazai if you could handle it.

"Chuuya isn't a scared little lamb," Dazai said in an even voice. "He is part of the Port Mafia now. A way better organization than The Sheep that was just using him."

"Oh, that being said by the expert of using people is almost an honor for poor little Chuuya," Shirase clearly hadn't realized that he just stepped on a frozen lake that just waited for the best way to drown him. "Don't play all high and mighty, you piece of shit. You made Chuuya turn against us in the first place."

"No, I didn't. That's all on you. You didn't believe him. You sheep always counted on him for every careless mistake you made. Because Chuuya owed you that, right? Because you saved him when he was little, right? Disgusting," Dazais voice was hissing in a way that reminded Chuuya of the warning a venomous snake gave before striking and killing a threat. But the difference was that Shirase wasn't a threat, no, he was the scared little mouse that would be devoured.

"You don't get to say that, you—" Shirase couldn't finish whatever he wanted to say because Dazai made a big yawning sound, acting totally bored and indifferent.

"This conversation is boring. You should just go."

"I'm not scared of you!"

"Oh? Okay, then be my guest and stay, but I will make sure that the little weapons you keep stealing will be discovered." Dazai said with a friendly smile but a voice that easily cut through stone.

"How—"

"What? Did you think we wouldn't notice? You aren't as sly as you think. Actually, you're pretty dumb. A dumb little lamb and now leave this party or be slaughtered." That was the final warning and it seemed to get through Shirase's thick skull.

"I'm only leaving because this party is lame anyway. Not because I'm scared!" The boy said unconvincingly and grabbed the girl's wrist to make her follow.

"That was so scary," the girl whispered before they disappeared behind the trees. Dazai just smiled. But that was weird. Chuuya remembered being told that someone else got rid of Shirase and—

"Woah," sounded an awestruck voice behind Dazai which made his smile disappear immediately, eyes wide in shock. But as he turned around, he faced Albatross with a bored expression. "That was so cool! I wanted to scare the boy of myself, but holy shit, you did it way better than I ever could!" Dazais eyes scanned the surroundings, coming to the conclusion that the strawberry blond boy was the only one who witnessed this.

"It was nothing. I'm just allergic to dumb boys," he tried to play it down. Fuck, if he tells this Chuuya, I'm screwed. And oh no, that wasn't true at all. Young Chuuya would've felt so much better knowing that Dazai made Shirase disappear. Because that meant that he did care. Real Chuuya knows that now and he wished that young Chuuya did, too.

"No," Albatross grinned, "you did that because of that river!"

"Huh? What river— What are you talking about?" A confused Dazai looked cute. But that was nothing new to Chuuya. His younger self discovered that fact ages ago.

"You like Chuuya! That's why you shooed that boy away, because he made him sad!" Albatross declared.

"I don't like him, I'm just being a good owner and making sure that my dog doesn't have to play with stupid dogs. Otherwise Chuuya might get even more stupid then he already is and that would be fatal," Dazai explained, but Albatross was having none of it.

"Naw, you hide behind that little bet you made. You use it as an excuse to care. That's so adorable," he snickered.

"I am not adorable!" The feared demon prodigy said in a really adorable way. His eyes were closed tight, his ears were getting a little pink and his hands were balled into fists. Chuuya giggled at that.

"Whatever you say, buddy," the older boy dismissed with a smile. "Now let's go and tell Chuuya what you just did," Albatross declared and caught Dazais wrist in his grip.

"What? No!" The bandage wearer tried to lose the hand that was towing him along, but to no use. Dazai was intelligent and he could turn your own words against you in the blink of an eye, but he wasn't particularly strong. His ability also wasn't made for fighting, so he didn't stand a chance against Albatross. He still tried to wiggle out, complaining that it 'hurt' and 'pain is shit', but the other boy's grip was merciless. Dazai stopped his attempts as soon as they got into the sight of other people, now looking totally unfazed even though his mind was running wild with every step they made in Chuuya's direction.

"Looks like Albatross found our little charmer," Pianoman said amused as they got in earshot. Young Chuuya had his back turned to them and before he could spin around, Albatross tossed Dazai against him, making them collide. The younger boy stumbled a little till he stood steady once again as Chuuya turned around.

"What the fuck, Dazai! I almost spilled my drink," Chuuya complained immediately. But the real Chuuya was stunned. His younger self looked beautiful, light surrounded him and his eyes shone so bright and what the fuck is this? He didn't look like this. He looked like shit that night. After all that dancing, Chuuya just barfed because his body wanted to remind him that being a little drunk and moving pretty fast didn't go well together. Beautiful, absolutely mesmerizing. Woah. Dazai really did have a crush on him, huh? And it definitely wasn't a small one. Wait. This is his memory, so...Chuuya is looking at himself through Dazai's eyes. And the brown eyes of the younger boy had a really endearing filter. Chuuya couldn't help but smile.

"Come on! Say it!" Albatross demanded in an impatient tone.

"Say what?" Chuuya looked at Albatross and then at Dazai again.

"Eh," Dazai said and then he seemed to realize that he was supposed to be the smart one, 'cause he grinned and was starting to play his part again. "Oh nothing, just that Albatross here," he pointed at the boy, "scared the sheep boy away!"

Simultaneously and like a pistol shot, that earned him two exclamations of 'What?': a confused one from Chuuya and a no less confused, but undoubtedly more tense one from Albatross.

"It was so sweet. Albatross really tried so hard to scare Shirase and he was so good at it too! Really, I almost couldn't have done it better myself if I ever wanted to. He was all like 'lambs like you are only going to get slaughtered here'," Dazai began to explain the scenario that never happened.

"He's lying!" Albatross said in a slightly pissed way, still confused as to why Dazai decided to twist the truth like that.

"Oh Albatross, no need to get embarrassed about the fact that you care for the little Chibi," Dazai mocked as if he didn't put up this whole act because he was embarrassed himself and couldn't face knowing that Chuuya knew he cared.

"Chuuya, I swear Dazai was the one who—" he tried to clear up the situation, but, in a way, this was Dazai's revenge for being dragged here by the strawberry blond boy. Because now Dazai was in his element and Albatross at his mercy. Dazai wasn't strong, but twisting words and making up lies in the blink of an eye? Yes, that was his strength and Albatross didn't stand a chance.

"Me? You seem to get something mixed up here, buddy: Chuuya is my dog and thus, he has the honor to protect me, not the other way around," he said and dodged Chuuya's kick with ease. "So you should really thank your knight in shining armor, Chibi," Dazai declared and grabed the red cup out of Chuuyas hand, who was so confused that he just let it happen. With his other hand, Dazai pushed Chuuya in Albatross's direction, making them collide in a way that could resample a hug, while he downed Chuuyas drink. Totally ignoring the gazes of the other flag members and setting the empty cup on the booze table, where he also snatched three small vodka bottles and slid them into his coat pockets. "Well, this was fun," he then said in a voice that teased that he would be going now. "But I should go now."

"What?" Albatross was still deeply confused, "Why?"

"I have a mission in a few hours and maybe sleep wouldn't be that bad," he explained even though everyone here knew that it was a lie. And not even a good one: Dazai's sleep schedule was so chaotic that it practically didn't even exist. Chuuya knew that the manic insomniac either only slept after one of his suicide attempts or he straight up fell asleep in the weirdest places every time his body demand the sleep it so desperately craved. "So yeah, my cue to leave now. But thanks for having me," he made a little bow and it was only partly out of mockery.

"But you just came here," Chuuya mumbled out, surprised, as he tried to hide that the thought of Dazai leaving made him somewhat sad.

"Naw, does Chuuya want me to stay?" Dazai asked, a teasing smirk on his face. Please, say yes. Please just—

"As if!" Young Chuuya spat out, doing his best to cover up the fact that he really wanted that. "You can die in a ditch for all I care!" Figured as much.

"Oh, what a lovely idea, maybe I will do just that. Thanks, Chibi!"

"You can't be fucking serious!" That was loud, but it didn't startle anyone as the real Chuuya was the one screaming it at the top of his lungs. This was so fucking frustrating to watch. It was so obvious that they both wanted him to be and stay at the party. It was almost ridiculous, really. How could they both be so blind?

The first thing he'd do after getting out of this fucked up ability was to punch Dazai. He was supposed to be the smart one here! He should be able to see through Chuuya's defense mechanisms, but no, apparently he decided to be stupid and just leave the party.

____

"Do you want to go after him?" Lippmann asked as Chuuya stared down the path where Dazai had disappeared.

"Tze," Chuuya made. "Why should I? I only invited him because I lost the bet." Yeah. That's right. One of Dazais fondest memories was just the result of a lost bet. And he didn't even get to see them dancing on that old car, because apparently it wasn't important enough to stay in Chuuya's memories. Fuck. He was so screwed. Chuuya would know everything about his pathetic little crush after seeing his memories. This wasn't fair. He hated every stupid second of this ability.

____

Chuuya paid no mind to his younger version that stared sadly at Dazai's leaving silhouette. He knew what happened after the bandage waster left. Young Chuuya would hide his feelings behind the bet and just get fucking wasted. Regretting that decision as soon as he had to deal with the hungover the next morning and the sudden realization that he couldn't drown his feelings in alcohol, since his stupid feelings seemed to wear little life jackets, leaving him with the bitter thought that he did care about Dazai, right before running to the bathroom to throw up. So, naturally, the real Chuuya was running after Dazai, like his younger self should have done back then.

"Stupid, stupid, stupid!" He heard Dazai curse. "Demon prodigy, my ass," he said while clutching his brown fluffy hair in a tight grip. "I can't do shit. Why can't I just say 'Hey, Chuuya, I care about you -yeah, disgusting, I know- but I made Shirase leave so could we maybe dance again? Because that was the most fun I ever had' and be done with it?" Dazai opened a little vodka bottle and emptied it in two big gulps. "Can't be that hard, can it? Apparently it is for a so-called genius!" He angrily kicked a little pebble out of his way as he continued to walk down the hill back to the city. "Damn, I'm so pathetic with this stupid little crush of mine. Maybe I should just say 'I like your stupid fucking gorgeous face' and let him kick me to death," he mumbled and sighed, already pulling out the second bottle.

"Wow, I knew you were a mess but I didn't think you were an even messier gay mess," a voice said and Dazai's faced twisted into something of pure horror. He didn't turn around. He knew it was Albatross and only Albatross that stood a few meters behind him. Chuuya didn't even realize that he wasn't the only one who followed Dazai, but he was in Dazai's memories and the young boy was definitely not expecting this, so it made sense that his memories didn't show Albatross following him.

"Bisexual mess," Dazai corrected on autopilot, clearly still in shock.

"Oh, so at least you've got your sexuality figured out."

"Are you here to laugh at me?" Dazai's voice was as cold as ice. "Then go ahead." Dazai sounded tough but on the inside he was panicking. He was so afraid that Chuuya just wanted to hug him.

"No, I'm not. Listen—" Albatross stated, closing the distance between them, until he stood next to the younger boy. "I'm sorry."

"Why are you—"

"I clearly put you in a spot back there and made you feel so insecure that you decided to leave the party," Albatross explained with a hand up to his neck. "I'm sorry for ruining your night."

"I'm not insecure," he defended himself, but it came out flat.

"Buddy, I listened to your whole ass monolog," the older boy said and placed a gentle hand on Dazai's shoulder which caused him to look at the other. "It's okay to be insecure," he assured him with a gentle smile. "Actually, it's sort of cute and sweet that you always have your shit together and are the smart and feared demon prodigy, but as soon as you talk to Chuuya, your brain gets all mushy." Yeah, Chuuya thought that it was really endearing. "But even though I would pay you a lot of money to go back up there and just say 'I like your stupid fucking gorgeous face' to Chuuya, we should definitely take a different approach."

"We?" Dazai had a puzzled look on his face and Albatross just smiled at him warmly.

"Yeah, we are in this together now. Because you clearly aren't diving in that river, you just need a push in the right direction," he fondly said which left Dazai even more baffled.

"What is it with you and rivers?" He asked and Albatross smirked.

"The others," he pointed back up the hill, "watched you two dance and were like 'they are so diving in that river in Egypt', which, apparently, is called 'Denial'. We thought you two are in denial. But you, my friend, already admitted to having a huge crush on Chuuya."

"I never said 'huge' crush", Dazai commented weakly. "But there is no river in Egypt named 'Denial', it's a pun."

"How so?"

"Well 'the Nile' -which is the actual river in Egypt- kinda sounds like 'denial'. So yeah, that's the joke," Dazai elucidated, which earned him a sound of acknowledgement from the older boy.

"So smart, but unable to admit you care for Chuuya," the strawberry blond boy giggled and he did have a point there.

"That's just— Chuuya doesn't even— He wouldn't care that I care," and oh, Chuuya was really surprised how the smartest person he knew was somehow also the dumbest person he knew.

"Of course he would! Didn't you see his sad little face when you decided to leave?" Oh. That's why Chuuya could see his sad face even though Dazai was already walking away and this is the reason why he could hear the Flags talk: Albatross told Dazai and Dazai's genius mind just put it into place.

"He looked sad?" Dazai couldn't hide how his lips tugged up in a shaky little smile. Albatross grinned, which made Dazai shut down immediately. "I don't care."

"God, just adorable. But don't worry, you beautiful, insecure, bisexual mess—"

"Hey!"

"—I, the great Albatross, am going to be your faithful wingman," he spoke in a very dramatic way, clutching his chest over his clothes.

"Wing— I don't need a wingman!"

"Oh, you certainly do, young warrior," Albatross was having a blast with this. "And who would be a better wingman than me. I mean, come on: My name's Albatross, after all!" He grinned proudly.

"I— What would you even do as a wingman?" Dazai asked, sounding kinda small and shy all of a sudden. God, Chuuya could just die and the cause of his death would be a sugar shock, because Dazai was behaving way too sweet right now.

"Well, first of all, you get to talk to me about your little crush so you don't go around monologuing your feelings like some sort of supervillain" Albatross deadpanned. "And secondly, I'll get Chuuya to spend more time with you. I'll be your man on the inside!"

"But, why help me?" The younger boy seemed really perplexed by the unexpected support he suddenly got. "What do you gain from this?" Well, Albatross probably found the whole situation just as frustrating as the real Chuuya did only a few minutes ago. So yeah, him helping made sense.

"Because Chuuya is my friend and you deeply care about him. I know you'll make him happy," his voice was so soft and the smile was so sweet. Chuuya wanted to cry. Albatross was dead. "Apart from that, it's actually pretty amusing seeing the demon prodigy all like 'Please notice me, Chuuya. I am so adorable'," he joked a little but kinda regretted that as he saw the way Dazais face sunk in.

"So you want to make fun of me, after all?" Chuuya really wanted to punch Albatross for making Dazai sound so vulnerable.

"No! I was just joking a little, but not to— Not to make you feel bad. Why should I ever laugh at your feelings? I take them very seriously, but teasing you when you are all mushy like this is fun, I mean no harm and if you really want me to stop—"

"No, it's fine. Talking about feelings is just new to me, so sorry for overreacting, I guess," Dazai said, hiding the little smile behind his fist that pushed against his mouth, in a way to help suppress his emotions. His attempt failed adorably.

"Don't apologize. If I ever cross a line, tell me and then I will immediately stop," Albatross said and Dazai nodded. "Good."

"Hey, you won't go around and tell everyone about this, right?" The fear that had been plaguing Dazai for the entirety of their conversation finally surfaced.

"Of course not. This stays between us," he reassured with a serious face and then a teasing smirk grew on his face. "I want to enjoy being the only one seeing you this flustered. I have to enjoy every second of it, because as soon as Chuuya sees this side of you, he is selfishly going to monopolize it!" And this time Dazai just laughed at the tease and the way Albatross playfully hugged him as if he were a drowning man. The older boy was right in a way: If young Chuuya would've witnessed this down-right adorable behavior, he maybe wouldn't be in his state of denial for much longer.

"I'm not flustered," Dazai protested and Albatross just touched his slightly pink ears.

"You kinda are. Your face doesn't show it, but your ears light up!"

"That's a lie," Dazai covered his ears immediately while Albatross just started to laugh at the scene.

"So, let's make this official! You still have the little bottles of vodka, right?" He asked and Dazai just pulled out the two still full bottles, handing one over to Albatross. "Ah, perfect, so-" He struggled a bit to open his bottle, "-let's raise a glass to our newly found friendship and our mission!"

"What's the name of the mission?" Dazai inquired interested.

"Name, eh, well, hm... Ah! Let's raise a glass to our mission: Drowning in a blue river!"

"Drowning? As in suicide?" Dazai sounded very happy, excited even.

"Yeah, kinda knew you'd like that but now—" And Albatross didn't get to down his vodka in celebration, because Dazai kept having more questions.

"But why blue? Like, why say that, don't most rivers seem blue because of the light effects?"

"Yeah, well probably, but I was referring to Chuuyas eyes so—"

"You also think about drowning in his beautiful eyes?" Dazai was so ecstatic right now and Albatross couldn't handle it. The older teen just wanted to seal the deal and drink.

"Well, no, but I thought you would like that meta—"

"I definitely do, this is—"

"Dazai!" And the younger boy shut up. "Please," Albatross sounded so pained right now, "can we finally toast to this?"

"Oh, yeah, sorry," and with that, they clinked their vodka bottles together while both cheering 'To our mission', immediately celebrating the declaration by downing their drinks.

"Fucking finally," Albatross laughed a little bit as he tossed his empty bottle away, whereas Dazai carefully placed it back in his coat. "Now, give me your number." Dazai just handed him his phone.

"You are not going to be obvious about the whole wingman thing, right? Like, Chuuya will not suspect a thing, right?" Dazai asked a little jittery as he watched Albatross type in his name and number before calling himself to save Dazais contact later in his own phone.

"Obvious? No, don't worry: He won't know what hit him!"

Well, in a way, Albatross was right, Chuuya really didn't know what hit him...

____

"So, when are you two going to fuck out that sexual tension?" Albatross asked casually and the real Dazai wanted to die so badly right now as he watched Chuuya spit out his drink in a shocked manner. Chibi was complaining about Dazai and then Albatross said that.

"Wh—Aht," Chuuya wheezed weakly between coughs that shook his little body.

"Well, you tell me you hate him, but you basically talk about him all the time," Albatross seemed totally unfazed by Chuuyas reaction.

"What's your point?!" Chuuya barked as soon as coughs didn't interrupt him anymore.

"My point is that maybe you don't actually hate him, but like him instead?"

"So gross!" With that, Chuuya jumped up and immediately left Albatross's apartment. "Move, jackass!" He screamed and, a few seconds later, a very confused young Dazai was standing in the doorway.

"What did I do this time?"

"Nothing, buddy. Wanna order pizza?"

And the memory faded as soon as Chuuya was out of earshot. Well. What did Dazai expect when he made Albatross his wingman? This was so embarrassing. Please let this be the only time the older teen said something stupid like that!

____

God. Dazai was probably enjoying himself in Chuuya's memories because of Albatross's subtle wingman-behavior. The older male was an expert at steering any conversation in Dazai's direction. Honestly. Albatross did his job really well, a little too well. Chuuya was -it was really silly- feeling kinda jealous that Albatross spent so much time with Dazai. At that time, he couldn't really pinpoint whom he was jealous of, but he figured it out after snapping at both of them.

Right now, they were at Chuuya's place. The older Flag members decided to throw a birthday party for Chuuya. He was turning sixteen and they all convinced him to actually celebrate his birthday. The only condition Chuuya had was that he didn't want any presents and they all agreed, even if they didn't like that. So it was basically just Albatross, Lippmann, Iceman, Doc, and Chuuya sitting in his room on the red couch, eating cake and watching a movie. Dazai was also there because Albatross was a really good wingman and pulled the right strings to make Chuuya invite the bandage waster. But since there wasn't enough room for all of them on the couch, Dazai sat on a chair that was standing beside the sofa. Albatross tried to switch places with him, but Chuuya didn't let him. So yeah, Dazai was just sitting beside them, actually divided from the others by the armrest of the couch. Dazai looked around and Chuuya remembered that his younger self thought that it seemed like the bastard tried to memorize the whole fucking place and damn, he was right. Dazai was exactly doing that: Looking around, focusing on every little crack in the paint on the walls and even being able to memorize the whole ass movie even if he didn't really pay attention to it. And the real Chuuya was standing in his scarily accurate memories, kinda regretting that he didn't let Albatross switch with Dazai because he looked so out of place. He looked so small and tense on that chair, but his thoughts were all content like Chuuya invited me and He wanted me here on his birthday and the real Chuuya just wanted to hug all the tenseness out of him.

"It's almost midnight!" Albatross declared and jumped up from the couch. They decided to celebrate into Chuuya's birthday. Real Chuuya stared at the clock: 11:50pm.

"Really, I don't need one of your weird ass toasts," the redhead just sighed, still not exactly happy with the thought that they were celebrating his birthday. He didn't need that. Birthdays were not that special to him. Besides, he couldn't really remember his childhood and all the birthdays he's probably had. Celebrating it was just like pretending to be a normal human and it didn't sit well with him.

"Weird? My toasts are excellent! Dazai, buddy, please tell Chuuya that—" Albatross stopped talking as he looked over to Dazai. The younger boy had his eyes closed and was leaning in a really weird angle against the backrest of the couch. The strawberry blond boy carefully walked over to the boy. "Unbelievable. He's asleep. How the fuck is he sleeping in that position?" Now all of them were getting off the couch to gather around the sleeping Dazai.

"I honestly thought he would just do some kind of blood-ritual instead of sleeping," Doc said while poking the sleeping boy in the cheek. "What now? Should we wake him?"

"Nah, let him sleep. That bastard wouldn't wake up anyway," young Chuuya said, watching Dazai sort of relieved.

"How do you know?" Lippman asked and Chuuya just shrugged. Everyone was staring at him, waiting for an explanation, and then he sighed.

"You all know he's an insomniac. And since he doesn't really sleep, at least not enough, his body just takes the sleep he's depriving it of. With the worst timing imaginable." The others wanted to know an example so Chuuya told them of the time he was on a mission with the sleep-deprived boy: Dazai was at the wheel of the car since Chuuya needed to focus on protecting them and his insomniac ass just fell asleep. Then Dazai crashed the car and he fucking slept through it.

"What?!" His friends screamed as he reached the car-crash-part of his story.

"Did you tell the boss?" Iceman wanted to know. "He endangered you and your mission."

"Of course not and you won't either!" Chuuya demanded and gave his friends a glare.

"Chuuya, you should really—", Pianoman was cut off.

"No! Look, I did that once. I told the boss the first time it happened and he gave him sleeping pills and Dazai," his voice broke a little, "he just took them all at once." The group made little 'oh' sounds and just stared at the sleeping boy. "Mori probably expected that to happen so it wasn't enough, obviously," he pointed vaguely at Dazai, "but I never want to see him like— I just— Don't tell anyone. And just never let him drive a car, he's terrible at it anyways." It had been a horrible sight when he found him. He was just walking around aimlessly, just enjoying the weather and the fact that Dazai hadn't shown his annoyingly stupid face in quite a bit. And then he saw the body laying on the old bench in front of the river. Curiously, he had walked up and then realized that it was stupid Dazai. It luckily didn't take him long till he drew the right conclusions after seeing the empty pill bottle. He immediately dragged him to Mori.

"Okay," Pianoman simply said, gently placing a hand on Chuuyas shoulder in a comforting way. So, naturally, Chuuya immediately straightened his shoulders so that it slid off him. "We never let him drive and we let him sleep. We're going to keep an eye on him," every one of his friends agreed.

"And now we all need a fucking drink," Albatross decided, already having glasses in his hand and a sect bottle. "I'll even spare you the toast, birthday boy." Chuuya's gaze jumped to the clock and it was midnight. "But I think we should sing you a—"

"If you start to sing now I'll kick you out, just give me the booze already, please," Chuuya said, so done with Albatross's shit and all of his friends just snickered. It was nice. Albatross probably told Dazai everything, otherwise the real Chuuya wouldn't be able to witness this memory. They clinked their glasses and Chuuya allowed Albatross to do a really short toast. His friends stayed till 1am, then they started to leave one by one.

"What about Dazai?" Albatross asked as he was already standing in the doorway, ready to leave.

"I'll just kick him out when his three hours of sleep are over. Till then I clean or draw on his stupid sleeping face. I haven't decided what I should do first yet." And with that, he closed the door on the older boy, who just went to his own apartment upstairs. Chuuya looked around and sighed, starting to collect the plates and the glasses to rinse and clean them in the kitchen sink. Then he suddenly stopped, mumbling something as he stepped closer to Dazai. He watched him for a few seconds and then slid his arms under the sleeping figure to carry him to the couch. After that, he finished cleaning the plates. Real Chuuya was kinda impressed, Dazai was really good at guessing what Chuuya did while he was sleeping. He just got the order wrong.
The first thing young Chuuya really did was carry Dazai to the couch, then he started cleaning.

____

"Slept well?" And that got the head of young and real Dazai spinning in Chuuya's direction. "The others left a while ago." Right. Chuuya's 16th birthday. Dazai remembered pathetically falling asleep at the party. So embarrassing.

"Oh, did I really fall asleep? Lame," young Dazai said, sleep still evident in his voice.

"Yeah," Chuuya was still not looking at him, washing the stupid dishes instead. "Really lame."

"So I should leave now, right? But before I do-" Dazai was standing up and walking towards his coat, digging something out of the pocket "-where is it...Ah!" After fishing something out of the pocket, he closed the distance between him and Chuuya, clearly hiding something behind his back. Not that he really had to, Chuuya was still not paying attention to him. "Here, for you," he just pushed the gift into Chuuya's eyesight.

"I didn't want any presents," the redhead just said, still doing the fucking dishes.

"Oh," Dazai said, slowly taking the present out of Chuuyas view. "I didn't know that." Chuuya sighed and finally turned to face him.

"Well, now that you actually got me a present, I should just open it," he said and reached out his hand. Dazai immediately placed the present in his palm. "Wow, I think this is the ugliest wrapped gift I've ever seen. Not your strong suit, huh?"

"It's the first present I ever wrapped and I don't think it's that ugly," he defended the gift. The paper was a light blue and all crinkled up. All over the paper were stripes of tape and there were a few spots where Dazai just gave up and used duct tape to make the stubborn paper stay in place. Small cracks in the paper were covered with a lot of tape. It looked really sad. Still, he did put in an effort and this stupid wrapping costed him so much time and was really frustrating. So it kinda hurt that Chuuya was just judging it, even if he was right: It did look ugly.

"The first gift you ever wrapped, should I feel honored?" Chuuya mocked, but started to tear the paper apart, using a little bit of his ability to get rid of the annoying duct tape. He finally freed his present of the ugly wrapping and just stared at it. "That's the dog from the arcade machine." In Chuuyas palm sat a plushie that was roughly fifteen centimeters tall. It was a light brown Shiba Inu in a kawaii style with an adorable angry expression.

"Yeah, I saw you furiously kick the machine a week ago so I thought his angry expression is the perfect gift for you," he explained. It was a real pain to get that dumb dog out of the claw-machine. The machine was clearly rigged and it was driving him insane, but he won. It took him 27 tries, not that he would ever admit that. No, if Chuuya were to ask, he got it on the first try.

"You weren't even invited a week ago," Chuuya called him out. Ah, awkward. Dazai's younger self wanted to give him a present even before he knew about the party, but then Albatross persuaded Chuuya to actually invite him.

"At first I just wanted to show off that I got it on the first try, but then your birthday party came up and I thought: Yeah, that's perfect," being a liar really saved him a lot of awkward situations.

"You didn't get it on the first try, don't lie to me! That stupid machine is rigged."

"Oh, but I did, Chuuya. I'm a genius, remember?" He just replied with a smug grin that had Chuuya rolling his eyes.

"Yeah, yeah, whatever," he dropped the topic and looked fondly at the little plushie. Then he lifted his gaze to face Dazai again. "Thank you," he said quietly with a little smile on his face.

"Happy birthday, Chuuya."

The memory faded and Dazai just stared into the white abyss with a soft smile on his face.

____

"The Flag members know," Albatross said in a small voice. "I'm sorry, I didn't want to tell them, but I maybe pushed Chuuya a little too far, because he kinda snapped at me and then they wanted to know why I kept teasing him." They were sitting on Dazais bed in his little container. Dazai just looked at the older teen, quietly looking into his soul. Chuuya didn't really know when this conversation happened, but he vaguely guessed that it was probably a month after his birthday. God, it was so cute that Dazai got him that stupidly adorable plushie. Especially, since it took him 27 tries to get it. Chuuya pushed the newly discovered information aside to focus on the current memory.

"That's okay," the younger one said after a while of silence.

"No, it's not. Look, I promised you to—" Albatross was really worked up over this.

"You didn't really promise me anything, you just said you wouldn't tell anyone," Dazai corrected and he was right, but—

"Same difference." Exactly. It was the same as a promise, because Albatross knew how insecure Dazai was about this. The bandage wearer just sighed.

"You are really worked up over this. I'm not angry at you. It's okay," the younger boy clarified.

"You should be, really, I—"

"Okay. Tell me what happened exactly."

"What?"

"Tell me who said what and who looked at who. Just tell me everything you remember," Dazai explained what he wanted to hear. "And then everything is fine. I mean, it already is, but you don't seem to believe me so do that and we are even."

"Oh, okay. So it was, like, roughly an hour ago in my apartment," he started to recount his memories and the container suddenly turned to Albatross's apartment. Dazai was imagining it. It looked so real. They even sat on a bigger looking bed. "And the others were talking about—"

"Where did they sit?"

"—Oh, eh," Albatross closed his eyes, using his arms to point in different directions to orient himself. "Lippman and Pianoman were sitting on the chairs at my little table," and as the older teen said that, Dazai imagined them sitting exactly there. God. Dazai's mind was a masterpiece. "Chuuya was spinning around in my office chair," and now an imagined Chuuya was doing just that. "Iceman just sat on the bed leaning against the wall."

"Mhm, was he in the middle of the bed or—"

"He was lying on the left side, not on the edge exactly, but close to it." And now Iceman was doing just that. "I was just, sitting on my bed like I usually do, you know?" A second Albatross appeared, sitting on the edge of his bed, rather in the center and having a really slumped posture.

"Okay. What did each of you say? When did it start to spiral?"

"Oh, well let me think..." Albatross closed his eyes again, trying to remember how he steered the former topic to Dazai. "Ah," he opened his eyes again, "we were talking about the gem market and then I said that..." And now something amazing happened: Albatross's voice faded out and was only a background noise. The imagined Flag members were talking now.

"Well, Dazai used to handle the market, after all, so of course—"

"Why do you always have to bring him up?" That was Chuuya, who stopped spinning around in the office chair to glare at Albatross.

"What?"

"Do you think I'm stupid?" He asked, sounding pissed. "It doesn't matter what the fuck we talk about, you always change the topic to him."

"I do?" He feigned innocence, but it wasn't really convincing.

"Yes, don't you dare to play dumb!" Chuuya raised his voice. "So why the fuck do you do that?"

"Well, he's not that bad? I think you would actually get along, if you would—"

"Oh, so you think I'm the reason we don't get along? You're telling me I'm the problem?!" Chuuya jumped out of his chair.

"That's not what he meant, Chuuya," Pianoman tried to assuage, but the redhead didn't care.

"That's exactly what he implied!" He yelled. "Dazai is the one insulting me every single time we talk!"

"But you do insult him back," Doc interjected, just to get silenced by an angry glare.

"He started it!"

"You're old—" Lippman tried, but Chuuya was having none of that 'you're older than him' talk.

"I'm only a few months older than him so why the fuck should I put up with his bullshit?!"

"That wasn't what I was going to say," Lippman sounded really pissed now. "Before you fell into my word like a fucking brat, I meant to say that you're old enough to stand above the insults and be a little bit mature, but hey, maybe that was a wrong assumption."

"Okay, okay, everyone, please calm down, I didn't mean to start a fight," Albatross tried to calm the discussion but regretted it immediately, because now everyone was focused on him.

"That's right, you started this. You and your weird focus on Dazai. When did you even start to hang out with him?" Doc wanted to know and now Chuuya looked confused.

"You actually hang out?" His anger was completely gone. His voice was timid and he looked small all of the sudden.

"Yeah, it just happened and after seeing the inside of his stupid container you would also change your mind about hating him so much," Albatross joked a little, but realized his mistake as he saw how Chuuyas eyebrows were drawn together in irritated furry.

"He let you in his container? He never lets anyone in there!"

"It's really not that big of a deal to him," and Albatross accidently just kept saying more and more things that riled Chuuya up.

"Oh, what? Are you the fucking Dazai-expert now?!" Chuuya spat out, suppressed anger clear in his voice.

"What, no, I—"

"Why the fuck do you hang out with him anyway?" The redhead interrupted.

"I already told you, he's not that bad, really, just start to hang out with him and you realize that he's actually a pretty decent guy," Albatross calmly explained, but it was no use. Young Chuuya just completely misinterpreted this entire situation and he was stupidly going to confront that misinterpretation.

"'Pretty decent guy?' Are you in fucking love with him or some shit?" Yeah, Chuuya really regretted saying that.

"In love—" Albatross lifted his hand in confused defense, trying to make sense of what Chuuya just said. "Where did you pull that conclusion from? I don't—" and then Albatross started to understand and his irritated facial expression was replaced by a smug one, his chin now resting on his hands. "Are you jealous?" He asked with a grin.

"Jealous?!" Chuuya shrieked, his ability glowing around him in confused anger and denial. "Why the fuck should I be jealous? You can go fuck out that sexual tension with that bastard and live happily ever after in that stupid container of his for all I fucking care!" He declared, screaming very loudly as he hurried to leave the room and slammed the door shut behind him, still screaming insults as he started to go downstairs to his own apartment.

"What just happened?"

"You pushed him too far, that happened," Pianoman just sighed exhaustedly.

"What did he mean by 'sexual tension'? You only just turned 18, please don't tell me you're fucking a minor," Iceman commented, looking at him with disgust even though his voice was completely neutral.

"Ew, no! Listen I am not in love with that kid" Albatross clarified.

"Yeah, figured, but why do you spend so much time with him lately? When did you become friends?" Pianoman asked, intrigued, and the others were clearly interested in that answer too. Well, maybe except for Iceman.

"I—" He paused. "What I'm about to say is never going to leave this room." The others hesitated for a second, exchanging glances, but then nodded slowly. "I swear if I find out that anyone did say even just one word about this, I will...well, I don't know what I'll do, but it will be very unpleasant!"

"Okay, just spit it out already," Doc pushed impatiently and Albatross sighed.

"Remember the first time Dazai was showing up at one of our parties?" He asked his friends.

"Yeah sure, that was roughly 5 months ago," Lippman said and Albatross nodded.

"Yeah, remember that Dazai told you guys that I got rid of that sheep boy?" They nodded. "Well, I didn't. Dazai did."

"Honestly, not that surprising, he acted pretty weird. I had a hunch that he was twisting the truth around a little bit," Pianoman interjected, closing his eyes as if to remember the scene.

"I pushed him to tell Chuuya and he clearly couldn't handle that and then he left. I felt like I ruined his night, so I went after him."

"I always wondered where you had disappeared to," Doc mumbled quietly.

"And Dazai was talking to himself, cursing himself for being stupid and not being able to tell Chuuya that he cared. He really scared me there for a second. Monologuing like that? I felt like I pushed him over the edge to become a supervillain," his friends snickered a little at that, even Iceman snorted amused. "And then he was talking all like 'I'm so pathetic with this stupid little crush of mine' and then I decided to announce my presence."

"Oh my, so he's not in denial, unlike our angry little gremlin?" Doc asked even though he already knew the answer. Gremlin? What's that supposed to mean?!

"I just couldn't leave him on his own devices, he was so adorably mushy about his crush and so I announced myself to be his wingman. That's why I started to hang out with him, but we're friends now," he finished their little friendship-story.

"I have to admit that you're a surprisingly good wingman—"

"Surprisingly?" Albatross asked, offended.

"—but you did take it a tad too far today," Lippman said and yeah, he was right. "So I guess we'll just stop you when you get too confident in your matchmaking abilities."

"Good idea. I will mention you all in my wedding speech. I'm already writing it, because they are so in love and Dazai gets all pink-eared as soon as someone mentions his little adorable Chibi, because he's all like 'Please notice me Chuuya' and—" The imagined scenario shattered.

"You did not really say that, did you?!" A panicked Dazai asked the older teen, who just laughed.

"Of course not, but I think it's pretty rude of you to just go face the imagined persons instead of looking at the person who is actually telling you all of this," Albatross teased and Dazai apologized in a sheepish manner. "Don't sweat it, buddy. Having such an amazing imagination is a good thing. Will probably get you through a lot of lonely nights—" He was interrupted as Dazai slapped him with pink ears. "Sorry, sorry. But your imagination is really nice. And your genius? It's almost frightening." Dazai just quietly raised an eyebrow. "Nothing, really? C'mon, that was such a good reference to that meme and— Wait. Dazai, do you know what memes are?" The younger teen opened his mouth. "And no, I don't want to hear a Google definition right now. I want you to actually quote a meme you know and don't you dare to recite my reference right now!" Dazai stayed awkwardly silent. "Oh, my sweet, innocent little angel," Albatross pulled the teen into a hug, "I am going to make a man of culture out of you." Ah. So it was Albatross's fault that Dazai occasionally just spammed Chuuya with memes.

____

Real Dazai followed a very angry Chibi whose destination seemed to be his old container home. Ah, right. He remembered this. Chuuya just banged aggressively against the container door, making the loud metallic sound spread through the quiet afternoon. The Chibi was looking like a furious dog. A small dog, a small angry dog: A Chuwawa. Real Dazai giggled a bit at that thought. It didn't take long till young Dazai opened his door, clearly annoyed until his gaze met Chuuyas. Then his expatriation turned into confusion.

"Why are you—" Young Dazai couldn't finish his question.

"Why the fuck do you let him into your stupid container, but not me?!" Chuuya snapped immediately, eyebrows drawn together, hands balled into fists and lip trembling. His ocean blue eyes swirled with emotions, making young and real Dazai drown in them. He looked so adorable, so alive, so unmistakingly human.

"Well," Dazai was stepping to the side inviting Chuuya in. "Do you want to?" The anger disappeared in the blink of an eye and Chuuya hurried inside. He looked around, his brows drawn together again, but this time they formed a sad expression as the older boy kept looking around.

"What do you even do for fun?"

The memory began to fade and the real Dazai screamed frustrated. Why was he only seeing fragments of their memory? And why didn't the ability let him see the wonderful memory that came after that conversation with Chuuya? That was so unfair! Dazai moved aimlessly around in the white abyss, still sulking about the fact that the ability was being mean to him.

____

Real Chuuya smiled fondly at their younger versions. They were currently half-sitting, half-laying in Dazai's bed, watching a movie over Chuuya's Laptop. The blanket wrapped around them, their bodies gently touching each other and a big pillow under their heads and backs. Young Chuuya was already asleep as the movie ended, but Dazai was wide awake.

"I know you think my container is sad," Dazais voice interrupted the credit music. "But it's actually nice when you're here," his soft smile was clear as day in his voice and the real Chuuya couldn't fight off his own smile, "because you make everything better." Dazai waited a few seconds and then he just turned to the older boy. "Chuuya?" He shyly asked. "Are you— Oh," he said as he saw the closed eyes and the evenly breathing movements. "You're asleep." Dazai sighed. "I waited for too long, hm?" Dazai closed the laptop and carefully placed it on his desk, moving really slowly in order not to wake the sleeping Chuuya in his bed. He positioned himself next to Chuuya again and watched the sleeping boy with a smile, staring at him for a few moments until he suddenly frowned. "Watching him sleep is probably creepy... but what am I supposed to do now?" He asked himself and the real Chuuya was amused by Dazai's helplessness. Dazai then reached for his phone and the real Chuuya decided to look over his shoulder. The younger boy just opened a text messenger and clicked on the chat with Albatross. Chuuya was pushing the feeling aside that he was prying into Dazai privacy, as that ship already sailed away the moment the ability started to show him the first memory.

Me

Help

SOS

Pls

A

L

B

A

T

R

O

S

S

Dazai really had a thing for spamming people. Especially at night since he couldn't really sleep because he was and still is an insomniac maniac. Chuuya read on the small clock on Dazais phone that it was 3:02am at the moment.

Albatross

Go to sleep

You being bored is not an emergency

Poor Albatross was clearly already used to Dazai's sleepless antics and Chuuya really pitied the older boy right now.

Me

Chuuya is here

He just fell asleep

What do I do?

Do I just leave?

Can I even do that?

I mean this is basically my house

God, Dazai was so adorably helpless with his emotions. It was endearing. Chuuya just wanted to lock him up and keep his mushy side all to himself... Probably not a good and healthy thought. Definitely a red flag. And also the exact behavior Albatross predicted. If he could, he definitely would monopolize this side of the bandage wearer.

Albatross

Don't leave!

Dazai was in the middle of typing as Chuuya's head suddenly fell on his shoulder. The younger boy immediately tensed up, slowly moving his head to gape at the still sleeping Chuuya. His ears turned pink and he was turning his attention back to his phone, panicky texting the older boy.

Me

HELP

His

Head

Is

On

My

Shoulder

Ahhhhhhhh

What do I do?

Is this my life now?

Am I just a pillow?

His bi panic was absolutely adorable and so was the fact that Dazai would really just play his pillow, trying to make less to no movements to not wake him up. God, he was such a dork, but a cute one.

Albatross

Calm down, buddy.

Just let him sleep or wake him up

Me

Wake him up?

An angel is laying on my shoulder and you just tell me to wake him up???

Monster

Demon

Apage satanas!

Real Chuuya laughed at every little angered huff and every scarily fast written message, especially at the last one. Dazai really liked that little phrase. It roughly translated to 'Go away, satan' as Chuuya found out years ago through Google translator.

Albatross

Is that fucking latin?

You know what? I'm not even surprised, of course you speak latin.

Me

What do I

D
O
O
O
O
O
O
O
O

Help meeeeeeee

Albatross

Listen to music? Watch some shit on YouTube? Do what I was doing -before ur panic ass woke me up- and sleep

Chuuya could feel Albatross's pain through the screen. The older one just desperately wanted to sleep, instead of listening to Dazai helpless bi panic. Chuuya smiled. Albatross really was a good friend. Chuuya blinked away the tears that were forming in his eyes. Albatross is dead.

Me

But I don't do sleep

Sleep is boring

And I don't have my headphones

And I don't want to wake Chuuya

Because he is an

Albatross

Because he is an angel

Yeah, yeah keep ur bi panic at room volume, pls

Me

A
N
G
E
L

Ah, perfect u already knew

Albatross

Enlighten me: How did this happen in the first place?

And while you explain that, I reevaluate my life decisions that led me to this exact moment where I'm listing to your bi shit at fucking 3AM

Did Dazai have a friend like Albatross at the agency? A friend who complained about being awake but still answered his phone to talk Dazai through his adorable panic? Could he be this open to anyone or was he quietly monologuing to himself. Did Dazai even still have a crush on him? Because Chuuya sure hoped he did.

Me

Okay so you and I were talking about Chuuya snapping at you, remember?

Albatross

Yeah, I remember

That was fucking yesterday

I was happily asleep yesterday

Dazai snickered at that and so did Chuuya. God. He missed Albatross. He missed all the Flag members.

Me

Mhm

Well

Chuuya came to me after you left actually and was like 

Why the fuck do you let him in your stupid container but not me?!

He's so adorable when he's angry

What. Did Dazai really think that? Was that the reason behind the teasing and pranking? Dazai had a thing for him when he was angry? Geez, that idiot really had a death wish.

Albatross

He is terrifying when he's angry

I'm kinda worried about your survival instincts if a scary angry Chuuya is your definition of adorable

Me

¿¿¿¿Survival instincts????

Albatross

...

Yeah sorry, forgot who I was talking to

I'm clearly not awake enough to function

Me

Anyways

Chuuya was being all adorable

Albatross

*Terrifying

Pls, go on

Me

And then I just was like Well, do you want to? 

And made a step to the side to like let him in

Albatross

Oh, you didn't malfunction, that's progress.

Me

Right?

So he was starting to look around and I was getting nervous, because Chuuya was in my room

But Chuuya was all sad looking???

Who could blame him? It was devastating to witness Dazai's living conditions. Sure, Dazai didn't really want to live anyway, but still. The steel structure did nothing to keep the cold outside and it heated up during the summer. The stupid battery fan couldn't do shit against the burning heat. Also, Chuuya didn't know how Dazai handled his hygiene, because there wasn't a shower, not even a sink or a toilet. The redhead was still afraid to ask where Dazai used to go when he needed to use the bathroom or reaked so much he had to shower. His container included a total of six furniture elements: A light bulb which didn't work, a fridge that was empty except for a few cans of crab and water bottles, a desk, a chair, a bed, and LED strips surrounding said bed. Chuuya knew that Albatross actually gifted the LED's to Dazai. They worked with batteries so it was most likely the only light source the idiot really had.

The container itself was located near the center of an illegal dumb site. It smelled like shit and no-one in their right mind would ever want to live there. No-one would expect a higher ranking member of the Port Mafia to live in this terribly unhealthy place. Everywhere, toxic substances and the paint of the containers leaked and stained the ground in an unnatural colour. The place wasn't located on any map and was used to quickly get rid of highly toxic chemicals. No-one could find him there. Well, Chuuya could, and The Flags, or at least Albatross, could, too.

Dazai always made a big secret out of his 'home' and Chuuya only knew the location and the fact that it was a container because he won a bet. They were drinking and then the topic just came up and the future executive bugged the bandage waster till he sighed and proposed a bet. It was simple: The first one to empty a beer, spiked with whisky, in one go would win. Dazai underestimated Chuuya, because the older one might not be able to hold his liquor, but he can drink really fast. He was drunk, but he did win and Dazai showed him where he lived. He didn't let him inside that day, which kinda pissed Chuuya off. Now he was happy about that because he didn't know how we would've reacted back then. Soon, all Flag members knew, but not through Chuuya. Albatross told the older ones because he asked them for battery-powered LED's, since he couldn't find them himself.

Chuuya never really understood why the younger one chose to live in that terrible dump. He could probably live in a fucking suite if he wanted to. The redhead knew for a fact that the bandage wearer made a lot of money. Then Dazai defected, and the puzzle piece clicked into place: His shitty home was easy to abandon. No noisy neighbors, no people who wanted to move in after him, no unpaid rent, and no traces. The Port Mafia couldn't find Dazai. The fucking mafia couldn't find him.

So as Chuuya was invited into Dazais 'home', he just wanted to hug the younger one and tell him that everything would be alright. 

Albatross

Maybe because you live in a fucking container? When someone sees your sad-ass living condition they just want to hug you and tell you that everything is going to be alright

Yeah. Exactly. Albatross gets it.

Me

I do remember your first time visiting me in my container, yes

But he didn't do that

He was all sad and then he turned to me and said What do you even do for fun?

Albatross

Oh, pls tell me you did say you

Chuuya snorted, because Dazai will really answer questions like that in the future. And now Chuuya knew why that jackass made such infuriating comments: He had some sort of angry-Chuuya-kink.

Me

NO!

Albatross

Sad, that was a missed opportunity

So what did u say then?

Me

I told him about the movies I watch and the games I play and the books I read 

He listened to me and then he was like You're free tonight, right?

Albatross

Oh, did Chuuya just ask you out?

Damn, you two are suddenly moving really fast.

Seems like yesterday that he screamed at me to fuck out our sexual tension

But look at him asking if you're free

Not a date. It really wasn't. Young Chuuya just wanted to befriend him, still jealous that Albatross already was a close friend to him.

Me

So I said yes and he was like good, now you're not free

Albatross

Ah yes, Chuuya and his ability to make everthing sound like a fucking threat.

Me

I know, so cute

Dazai did have a lot of problems, really. He seemed to think anything Chuuya did was adorable or cute, but Chuuya's behavior was sometimes downright awful and honestly, he didn't want Dazai to not only be okay with it, but even like it. That seemed very unhealthy.

Albatross

Yeah, cute, totally

Me

And then he left

Albatross

Huh

Me

And came back later, with his laptop

And I was like I don't have wifi 

He just looked at me and was like yeah, figured and then threw DVDs at me

Albatross

He really has anger issues

He didn't have anger issues at all! He was just a little bit on edge all the time and snapped easily at— Okay. Maybe he did have issues with anger management. But who could really blame him when Dazai was going to provoke him just because he thinks it's 'cute'?

Me

He threw all of my favorite movies at me and then we were sitting on my bed next to each other, really close and then he threw my blanket over us and started the first film, it was so nice

Albatross

Oh, look at him Netflix-and-chilling you all of the sudden with your favorite movies like a pro.

What the fuck. He didn't Netflix-and-chill Dazai, he just— Oh god. He totally did, didn't he? Yeah, he was forcing Dazai to sit close to him while watching the movies, but he really didn't— That was not his intention at all! He just wanted the younger one to stay under the blanket and enjoy some quality friend time!

Me

But it wasn't Netflix?

Albatross

Dazai

Buddy

Pls don't

Me

Okay, okay I'll stop, but technically not Netflix and also not doing that other thing

Albatross

Yeah, I know that it was the innocent version, because otherwise you wouldn't be texting me rn

Oh yeah, Dazai definitely wouldn't be able to text Albatross if they really did it, because a) young Chuuya would still be making him feel incredible or b) he already made him feel incredible and fucked the insomniac bastard to exhaustion so that he would be blissfully sleeping right now and— Wait. What the fuck was he even thinking about?! He needed to get his mind out the fucking gutter, he was in Dazai's memories, currently stuck with a 15 year old version of him and himself. Yikes. God. His thoughts were getting very creepy. Technically, he was thinking about the young Chuuya and the young Dazai doing— Didn't even matter. Still creepy. He shook his head, trying to get rid of those weird ass thoughts, putting his focus back on the screen.

Me

Anyways

After the last movie I said I know you think my container is sad, but it's actually nice when you're here, because you make everything better

Albatross

OMG

YES

DAZAI

I'M SO PROUD!

Me

Yeah, he was already asleep

I thought he was awake but he wasn't

Albatross

Say it again when he's awake

Say it again

Don't you dare chicken out

Say it to his stupid fucking gorgeous face

Me

I'll try

Chuuya smiled. Dazai would really say that to him in the morning.

Albatross

Good

And now pls sleep

Me

Alright, I'll try that too

True to his word, Dazai put his phone down and closed his eyes. He wasn't really comfortable, though, because they were still half-sitting and leaning against the bed frame. Dazai made a little huffing sound, clearly not happy. "Chuuya?" He asked, slightly shoving the sleeping boy. "Come on, you shouldn't sleep in that position," he said a little bit louder and just sighed as he got no response. "Here goes nothing," he mumbled and then carefully moved Chuuya into a lying position. Then he slowly moved next to him to lay down as well. He carefully repositioned the blanket.

"What're you doin'," a sleepy Chuuya asked, peeking through barely opened eyes.

"You fell asleep," Dazai explained quietly. "I just moved you a little so you would be more comforta—" He stopped, eyes wide with shock, letting all the air out of his lungs with an 'uff', as a sleep-drunken Chuuya just threw himself at Dazai, nesting his head on his shoulder once again. Real Chuuya didn't remember this, thus, he was just as shocked as Dazai from the sudden cuddling attack. Young Dazai got over his shock, just looking at the quietly snoring Chuuya, and then he started to smile. It was way too big for his face and his eyes were shining in the dim light of the LED strips that were on his bed frame. He just smiled, tried to suppress it, and failed endearingly. His entire face just beamed with happiness and he giggled a little, unable to contain the amount of sheer joy he felt. Real Chuuya just stared in awe as young Dazai moved his arm to delicately wrap it around Chuuya, gently pressing him a little closer. Then he moved his head till his face was touching Chuuya's. "You're going to be the death of me," he happily whispered in Chuuya's hair as he closed his eyes. And the real Chuuya just watched that scene with a sappy smile on his face. The memory faded to black but went immediately back to normal. If Chuuya would've blinked he would have missed it. The little fading was probably from Dazai actually sleeping without being told what happened. Good to know that his mind wasn't always trying to cover up holes. That would be really exhausting, at least Chuuya imagined it would be. Now Dazai was slowly sitting up in his bed. "Good morning," he yawned with closed eyes. "Did you—" His question died as he realized that Chuuya wasn't in his bed anymore. "Chuuya?" The boy called out, already seeing that no-one but him was in the container. "Oh," his face dropped to a sad expression as he reached for his phone, immediately opening Albatross's chat once again and typing. He isn't here anymore so I couldn't say it. He didn't send it, he just stared at it and eventually allowed his phone to fade to black. He didn't turn it on again, he just carelessly threw it next to him on the bed. Real Chuuya just smiled, already looking at the door. He knew why his younger version wasn't here. And as if he gave his younger version a cue, a loud knocking sounded through the container.

"Oi, open your stupid door, Dazai!" As soon as he heard that voice, the younger boy jumped out of his bed and stormed to the door to tear it open. "Finally, took you long enough," Chuuya said as he pushed past Dazai.

"Why did you—"

"You don't have anything to eat here," Dazai opened his mouth but Chuuya was already shushing him. "No, fucking canned crab is not something you should eat on a daily basis. Especially not for breakfast. So I flew to that bakery," he took Dazai's arm in one hand to micromanage him into accepting the brown paper bag Chuuya pushed into his hand. "Eat up," he ordered and sat down on the desk while he fished his sandwich out of the paper bag. Dazai just stared at him and Chuuya realized that. "Ah, right, here," he threw a can at Dazai who catched it a little clumsy.

"That's my favorite," he mumbled while staring at the yellow design of the Monster energy can. Young Chuuya just smirked at that. Truth be told: He only bought that to prove to himself that if anyone was a Dazai-expert, it would be him and definitely not Albatross. They ate in comfortable silence and after he was done, Chuuya started to gather his belongings. Then he turned to the door, already opening it to leave. "Chuuya, wait," Dazai stopped him. He turned to the younger boy with a questionable raised eyebrow. "You probably think my container is pretty sad, right?" Young Chuuya didn't hesitate to nod. "Well, it's actually pretty nice when you're here," he admitted shyly and young Chuuya looked surprised, but smiled after a second.

"Then you should invite me more often," he said softly, stepping out of the container and closing the door. They really got closer that day. If only it didn't have to be overshadowed by death. Chuuyas smile turned painful. If only Albatross and the other Flag members would've been around for a little longer. Maybe then they would've actually figured their feelings out and confessed to each other. He watched Dazai happily type a message on his phone. Chuuya's expression darkend.

Happiness would soon be gone.

----

Autor's notes

I'm honestly surprised that I could post this so flawlessly. This chatper is roughly 15200 words so yeah, didn't think Wattpad could handle it- 

Fun fact: I listen to Anne-Marie's "2002" and then I had this headcanon of them dancing on a car in the middle of the woods. 

"[...]Dancing on the hood in the middle of the woods // On an old Mustang, where we sang // Songs with all our childhood friends [...]"

https://youtu.be/Il-an3K9pjg

And then I had that picture in my head and wrote this story around it. As of now I also drew the scene: 

Ah btw was the texing part annoying/confusing or coo? I tried to mimic a real chat with the messages being on differnt sides. I hope you liked it otherwise I can change it. 

The next chapter might take a while, because I have university shit I need to do (sadly). This story will have 8 chapters in total (prolog, chapters 1-6, epilog). I hope Wattpad will continue to let me post them, because they  probably will be the same length as this. 

Also there is going to be a lemon (in later chapters). I will update the rating then, but as for now it's fine like this. 

The next chapter contains:

-A brother

-Despair

-Two extra minutes