𝕣𝕠𝕦𝕘𝕙 𝕨𝕒𝕥𝕖𝕣𝕤 || dazai osamu

one; the feeling of not caring

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The man on the bench stood up. His dark coat was wrinkled from sitting down so long. He walked over to the edge of the dock. Stopping before the cracked pavement met sea. 

The water was as smooth as glass, except for the place that the girl had fallen through. The water there was shattered and disturbed like a mirror after breaking and the image that reflected back from the water was like a funhouse mirror. 

The man waited for a while. Just standing there staring at the sea, almost as if looking for something. After a few minutes a light started emitting from the sea. It was so frail anyone would have  mistaken it for a moon ray reflecting back from the sea. But the man didn't. He took off his wrinkled coat and let it fall on the cracked pavement. Soon he saw a figure raising from the sea, it felt almost familiar. The girl rose from the sea as Aphrodite had once risen. 

A faint wind blew from the sea, carefully blowing the hair out of the mans face, like a mother caressing her child's hair. The man bowed down. The girl was peacefully floating in the sea's delicate embrace, emitting faint light from her body. Yet as soon as the man touched her, the light stopped shining. He carefully picked her from the sea's embrace, set her down to the pavement and covered her with his coat.

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When she opened her eyes the first thing that she saw, was the cracked white ceiling. The cracks made a delicate web, where one would lose themselves in if they weren't careful enough. She felt the hard floor under her, still freezing from the night's cold touch. 

She could faintly hear the sound of traffic. People rushing to their jobs, eager to fulfill their purpose as somebody's pawn, working away their life as they gain nothing while the people above have everything. It's the circle of life. 

The floorboards creaked as somebody was walking around in the other room. Soon muffled voices started talking. The girl pressed her hands on her ears trying to muffle out everything, all she wanted was silence. Yet nothing happened. She still heard the door open and the people come in. 

"Maybe this is the last judgement day that decides whether I will rise to heaven or descend into hell," she thought to herself. She knew it wasn't true. Heaven was the societies way of making sure that people felt pressured to be good, to not sin, it gave them hope that if they did everything right, maybe their life wasn't pointless and maybe they would be rewarded.

The footsteps stopped right next to her as she slowly sat up, the moth eaten blanket slid to the ground. Her sight fell on two men. By their demeanor she was sure, that if it was the last judgement day, they would take her to hell. 

They stood there looming over her, like two of the four Horseman. Shivers went down her spine and she looked away, it felt like she was facing the Death. In reality she wasn't far off. 

Suddenly the taller man crouched down. He gave the girl a cup of water and said in an overly sweet voice: "Good morning!" His voice disturbed her, it was so sweet it almost felt poisonous. He talked to her like she was a wounded animal, a child, who wasn't capable of understanding him. It made her feel small. he made her feel small. 

She didn't  take the cup from his hand and for a couple of a minutes they just sat there, until the other man turned around and walked out of the door while saying: "Make sure she lives, Dazai."

As the door closed Dazai put the cup on the floor. "Drink," was the only thing he said. Yet he didn't leave, he was just crouching in front of the girl looking at her. His stare was uncomfortable. It was the stare of a man who analyzes other's every move, trying to find a way to get the best possible outcome for him. She wasn't even sure if it was the stare of a man. 

The girl extended her hand to get the cup. Her nimble fingers danced along the cold porcelain trying to find the handle. The water rippled when she lifted  the cup and brought it to her lips. The water tasted sweet, almost too sweet. She was aware that there was most definitely something in her drink, but she couldn't bring herself to care. 

When she was finished, she carefully put the delicate dish on the slanted and dirty floor. It felt almost comical how such a delicate pure thing could fit in the dark unkempt and dusty room.

She stirred from her thoughts when she heard Dazai standing up. His tall figure blocked any light coming from the small window. He walked over to a corner where a stool was. As he sat down, he pulled out a book, the cover was faded and the book itself worn out. The girl stared at him intensively as he was reading. She couldn't make sense of anything, why was she here, who was he, who was she? Thoughts rambled through her head as she tried to find anything to grab onto. She could remember only a few tiny fragments. A bouquet of wilted forget-me-not's in the corner of a familiar, yet a foreign room, and a laugh. The laugh was full of happiness, it sounded warm and hopeful, it sounded welcoming. After that it was darkness. She couldn't remember anything else, no matter how hard she tried.

She was lost so deep within her thoughts, that she didn't even notice falling asleep. But the figure in the corner of the room noticed. He stood up, placed his book on the stool and walked over to her, carefully putting the worn out blanket over her body. He just stood there for a moment and then he walked out of the room quietly closing the scratched door.

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