DEADLY ENCHANTMENT / dazai osamu

001; mistake

Dazai and Atsushi go on with their usual antics as they walk their way towards their dorms. The sunset paints their world with yellows and oranges, allowing the shadows to stalk the vulnerable. Atushi doesn't think twice when Dazai abruptly stops and says he has something to do, sparing the time to say goodbye and continue walking down the forgotten street.

Once he's out of sight, Dazai wanders into a narrow alleyway. The darkness embraces his figure and the wind kisses his cheeks. Silence covers the alley like a thick blanket, smouldering any sound screaming to be heard.

"What are you doing here, Sora?" Dazai's voice pierces through the burning silence, his cold tone contrasting with his usual warm one.

A low, feminine chuckle echoes in his eardrums. An all too familiar sound. When he turns around, he's face to face with a girl he once knew. Her ocean blue eyes present as waves crashing down on him, watching him choke on the water as he scrambles for air. Her red stained lips are lifted into a sickly sweet smile and her long brown hair cascades down her shoulders like a waterfall.

He doesn't show any reaction to her appearance, knowing that even an acknowledgment is more than what she deserves. Instead, he keeps up his blank facade and boredly stares into her eyes, ignoring the sense of nostalgia he feels within her presence. She won't try anything, she's too smart for that, but he always found that Sora is anything but predictable.

"Can't I visit an old friend, Osamu?" She asks with the innocence of a small child, emphasising the use of his first name. Her sweet smile widens when he rolls his eyes. The tension in the air is suffocating, but they both pay no mind to it. After all, whoever acknowledges it first, loses.

"You're allowed to, of course," he says and her eyes somewhat brighten before he tilts his head, "but that's not what you're here for."

Her smile drops immediately, revealing her own monotone facade as she stares back. The silence between them is deafening, an unavoidable nothingness. They both wait for the other to make a move, to shatter the silence like glass.

Sora flinches with a hiss as if she had been burnt, "you always manage to win, Dazai-kun. You're such a dick."

The glass has been shattered and the harsh atmosphere transforms into a light toned one, as if there was never any tension in the first place. Dazai grins, "why of course I always win, Sora-chan! Nobody could ever beat me~."

He speaks with his hands, and Sora closely observes the way he moves. He's never been easy to read, he's too detached from the world, off with his head in the clouds with the girl he hopes to commit a double suicide with. Yet a part of him is stuck on the ground, and he's left desperately screaming and crying to get up and go home. This is not his home.

"That's true," she agrees to satisfy him, "you're the best of the best."

It does satisfy him. His mocha eyes light up with happiness, flickering like a candle flame threatening to go out. A sight she was once accustomed to, but seeing it again after so long hits hard, her chest tightening with heartache.

Dazai is studying her too, capable of noticing what's going through her head. He breathes. In, and out.

"What are you doing here, Sora?" He asks again slowly, taking a step closer to her. She doesn't back away, instead welcoming him into her personal space.

She laughs, a beautiful and warm melody to his ears. He never allows her to beat around the bush, always pushing her to get to the point. Talking to him is a dangerous game, especially after two years, but she allows herself to become vulnerable; to welcome him with open arms in hopes he'll return it. There's a tiny voice screaming at her from the back of her head that seeing him was a bad idea, that the backlash she's going to receive will tear her apart, limb from limb and she'll fall into a deadly void of a mental state, wishing she agreed to die with him all those years ago. But she ignores it, no longer caring for her well being.

Her mouth feels dry and she licks her chapped lips for moisture, swallowing harshly in hopes that he won't leave once again. That he'll hear her out and they can be friends again, just like old times.

"I left the Port Mafia," she tells him.

"I know."

She blinks, aware of the lack of enthusiasm in his voice. Despite the agony she's going through internally, she continues.

"And I don't know where to go."

"I know." His cold expression freezes her in place. "I'm a member of the Armed Detective Agency," he reminds her, "we're acutely aware that Siren has disappeared without a trace and the Port Mafia has placed a large bounty on her head."

Sora sucks in a breath at the use of her title. Siren, one of the most deadly members of the Port Mafia. The mere sound of her voice brings out one's urge to kill, allowing everyone who hears her deadly beautiful song to go berserk with bloodshed.

"Do you not wonder why?" She manages to soak up every bit of courage left in her being to indirectly ask him if he cares, if he had even once thought of her within the last dreadfully slow two years, if he wanted to know what was going through her head; but she already knows the answer.

He takes another step closer, and she feels her heart plummet down into her stomach at the charming smirk that makes its way onto his face, "I don't need to."

His warm breath caresses her cheeks as she watches the way the wind sends whispers through the brown curls that frame his face. It whispers about the past, reminding them of the memories they once shared.

Sora smiles.

Seeing him was a mistake.