Love and Parenting

1- An unexpected call

It was 5:45am in the morning as Dazai walked towards the locker room of the emergency department. The corridors were less noisy than the busier hours of the day, nurses and doctors working quietly to handover shifts and administer morning doses for the critical patients in the ICU.  He walked into the men's locker room, quickly changed out of his scrubs, and took a short but well needed shower, and dressed into a clean pair of dark jeans and plain t-shirt. 

After he was done, he grabbed his cell phone, detaching the charging port, and checked for any missed calls or messages he might have missed during his 20-hour shift. He found the usual flood of messages from Kunikida which ranged from asking him about the dosages of certain pediatric medicines, whether a mole on one of his children's cheeks would turn into a cancerous tumor or if he was coming for the usual monthly dinners that Odasaku organized at their house.
It was something that the couple had decided to do after Dazai had jokingly lamented about missing home cooked meals because of his grueling shifts. He never understood why Kunikida and Odasaku took it seriously, but he humored them by attending the dinners. It's not like he ever missed home cooked food because he didn't. How could you miss something you never had? 

After answering Kunikida's ridiculous barrage of messages that reflected his helicopter parent personality, he skimmed through some scam mails and a few social media notifications that he never bothered opening, and turned off his phone before putting it back into his pocket. 

Taking all the necessary things he required- like his wallet, house keys and a couple of spare face masks, Dazai locked his locker door and walked out into the corridor, a tired sigh leaving him as he trudged slowly towards the staff exit. Dazai was dead on his feet after the grueling shift he pulled, and all he desired at the moment was to get home and crash land on his bed, and possible conk out for the next two off days he had. 

"Dazai!"

The said man stopped before turning around and raising a questioning eyebrow at the woman who was jogging her way towards him. 

"You off the clock, right?", Yosano huffed lightly, bending over to catch her breath. "Let that asshole of a landlord know that the light fused out on my floor."

She had not yet changed into her scrubs and was wearing a knee-length black skirt with a tucked in shirt and a brooch on her breast pocket. Her short hair was secured in a small ponytail by her nape with her signature butterfly clip. She held a to-go coffee cup‒possibly from the hospital cafeteria‒and her standard tote bag in her other hand. Dazai never understood why Yosano put so much effort into her outfit, when for the rest of the day, she would be in hospital scrubs. 

"And if I say no?" 

"C'mon, I'll treat you to lunch next week." Yosano said, with an irritated sigh.

"Fine," Dazai gave her a teasing smile, "buy me lunch plus the first round of drinks when we go to a bar next time."

Yosano glared at him, but Dazai didn't back down. Eventually, she agreed and gave him the middle finger before jogging back to her locker room to get changed for her shift. 

With a pleased smile, Dazai exited the hospital after dropping in his locker keys at the key drop station and breathed the fresh early morning air into his lungs. He decided to buy something from the nearby convenience store before making his way back home.
Since it was still dark outside, owing to the early hour as well as the rain shower that Yokohama had been experiencing since the last week, roads were near deserted, except for the occasional cars and early morning delivery vehicles on the road. The hospital parking was not as deserted, with a few nursing staff members and interns scuttering by, either joining or leaving from their shifts.