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Atsushi finds him sitting atop a thin railing on the rooftop of Yokohama’s sixth-tallest skyscraper somewhere just shy of 2 A.M.
He watches as the breeze sweeps through Akutagawa’s hair, pulling it apart and threading it back together, and the way Akutagawa frowns even before Atsushi steps into view, and the sharp outline of his silhouette against the night sky, bold and dark and sad all at once.
“Hi,” he mumbles quietly, stupidly.
Akutagawa doesn’t lash out immediately. He doesn’t even look at him. Atsushi catches the ease in his shoulders and the relaxed line of his lips and hopes, guesses, he isn’t going to pushed away—not today.
“You sought me out,” Akutagawa says. It’s not a question.
Atsushi sits down gingerly next to him on the railing, keeping a good distance away. “I did,” he agrees easily. He looks out over the city, taking in the bright lights and the occasional outline of a speeding car. Atsushi thinks briefly about lying, turning the idea over in his mind before he thinks better of it. “Let’s talk,” he tries.
Akutagawa scoffs. “There is nothing to talk about with you.” And just like that, irritation sears hot across Atsushi’s skin and he caves.
“That’s because you never try,” he snaps back. “You never listen to me, and you always think that—”
“And you listen to me?” Akutagawa interrupts him. Atsushi bites down on his tongue.
“I just think we should talk,” he says weakly. “It might help.”
Akutagawa sighs. “You are being more difficult than usual, weretiger.” The exasperation coating his words is palpable, but it edges more into the soft folds of resignation than it does irritation—and the slight relaxation in the other’s brows as he looks out into the distance definitely isn’t an invitation, but it’s not rejection, either, and it’s more than enough to ignite childish hope in Atsushi’s veins.
“Well,” Atsushi tries. He swallows, turning away from the other to stare down at his hands instead. “I don’t think anything between us has ever not been difficult.”
It goes quiet after that. Atsushi swings his legs carelessly over the edge of the railing and waits.
“I’ll kill you,” Akutagawa mutters out darkly. But the words are empty, flying far above his head and hurtling somewhere into the stratosphere.
Atsushi looks at him again. “You promised,” is all he replies calmly, watching the way Akutagawa steadily avoids his gaze.
“Weretiger.” Akutagawa pauses. The silence stretches infinitely wide and vast between them, and for so long that Atsushi has half a mind to grab the other in frustration, but this moment is far too fragile for that. The fact that Akutagawa is still here, still sitting besides him, still talking to him—it’s too delicate to be ruined by a hasty, reckless outburst. He wrestles with the impatience in his chest and waits.
“You’ve saved my life before,” Akutagawa says finally. He turns to Atsushi, eyes dark. “Why?”
“You’ve saved mine, too,” Atsushi replies quietly before he can stop himself, heart in his throat. It’s the first time he’s acknowledging the fact outside the privacy of his mind, and saying the statement aloud only makes it infinitely harder to deny. The words linger in the air, sharp and charged and weighted. He holds his breath.
“You haven’t answered my question,” Akutagawa snaps, and Atsushi grits his teeth together in attempts to quell the flash of irritation that races up his spine.
“Is it really that hard to understand?” He demands angrily, staring back at Akutagawa. “Yeah, you’re not my favorite person in the world, but no one deserves to die, okay? I’m not just going to let you—” He pauses, inhaling deeply. “I’m not just going to stand there and let you die in front of me.”
Akutagawa’s eyes narrow. The artificial buzz of the city lights cascades over his face, and Atsushi stares at the clench in his jaw, the anger in his eyes, the tension in his shoulders. The night is dark, but Akutagawa seems to shine impossibly darker against the sky.
“And yet you have tried to kill me before,” Akutagawa says tersely, looking away from him.
Atsushi falters. “I—”
He stops, clamping down on his tongue. Because as much as he wishes he could deny the words, as much as he wants to prove Akutagawa wrong, to stake his position as the good side, the right side—he can’t. In the heavy heat of battle, he’s lunged at Akutagawa far too many times with throbbing anger and vicious intent. To hurt, to strangle, to defeat. To kill.
“Yeah,” he murmurs, swallowing with difficulty. “I have.”
Quiet washes over them. Atsushi’s stomach flips and turns and flutters about anxiously. It doesn’t make sense—the fact that he’s tried to kill Akutagawa and then turned around and saved his life. It doesn’t make sense that Akutagawa has done exactly the same for him, if not more. Nothing about them makes sense. It’s paradoxical, he thinks. Two waves crashing angrily against each other, night and day fighting to conquer the sky, comets that belong in different orbits.
And yet here he is. Sitting on a rooftop far past his bedtime, feet swinging out dangerously over the edge of Yokohama with Akutagawa’s quiet, looming presence beside him. It’s foreign, and it’s uncomfortable. And he should want to leave. Atsushi wishes he wanted to leave.
But he doesn’t.
“Akutagawa,” he almost whispers. The other doesn’t turn to look at him, and Atsushi pushes down the disappointment that claws its way into his chest. “Why do you kill?”
“It is my only use,” Akutagawa answers immediately, and Atsushi blinks at the lack of hesitance. He frowns, unease slithering up his throat, but bites back a response when it seems like the other isn’t finished. “It is what I do best: cutting down and eliminating enemies. And it is useful to the mafia.”
Atsushi makes a noise of frustration. “Just because you’re good at it doesn’t mean—”
“I was raised a killer,” Akutagawa cuts in harshly. “From the moment I was taken into the mafia, it was determined that killing was where my use would lay.”
“People aren’t meant to be used, Akutagawa!” Atsushi blurts out angrily. His pulse simmers hot beneath his skin. He’s pushing dangerous territory now—he can tell by the lock of Akutagawa’s jaw and the darkness of his eyes—but he can’t be bothered. Not with the way his chest swells tight with the distinct blend of rage, irritation, and something veering narrowly close to sorrow. “The mafia made Kyouka-chan think her only worth was in killing, but they were wrong, because—”
“I am not Kyouka,” Akutagawa snaps, so forceful in its volume and weight that it stuns Atsushi into silence. “Kyouka was manipulated into becoming an assassin. I was not manipulated. I was trained, I was raised, I was groomed: killing is, and always will be, my livelihood.”
He seethes, body tense. Atsushi eyes the curve of his spine against the skyline and traces the tension everywhere in his body. It’s so visible, the blossoming of anger and frustration all over Akutagawa—every emotion he bleeds is always as clear as day. The other still isn’t looking at him, and Atsushi takes a moment to push away his own irritation and gather his thoughts. He sucks a deep breath inward.
“Kyouka-chan said,” he starts slowly, eyes still on Akutagawa. “That you told her you were happy for her. When you two fought last time.”
Akutagawa goes silent. Atsushi tears his eyes away from the other and opts to settle his gaze on the sea in the distance, glittering soft and slow under the moonlight. They’re playing a careful game of tug-of-war. One step forward, two steps back—and every pull feels like both a death sentence and a liberation.
“She found purpose,” is all Akutagawa says, voice low.
Atsushi closes his eyes and feels the wind tickle his face. “So you’re happy for her because she found purpose in her life.” Silence. Not an agreement nor a disagreement. He swallows, before opening his mouth again and filling the chasm between them. “What about for yourself?”
He hears the faintest noise beside him as Akutagawa shifts in place. “I have a purpose,” he replies tightly. Angrily. Atsushi just sighs. Killing isn’t a purpose, he wants to yell, but he’s too tired to have that argument right now.
Instead, he opens his eyes and seeks out the dark hold of Akutagawa’s gaze. “But are you happy?”
The cold air presses into his skin, seeping down into his bones and making him shiver. Akutagawa doesn’t reply, and Atsushi doesn’t expect an answer—not really. He lets the question float over them for a while, stealing glances at the dip of Akutagawa’s eyelashes and the downwards pull on his mouth, before he makes a decision and steels himself.
“I don’t think you’re happy,” he declares loudly. Akutagawa tenses visibly, and Atsushi can already feel the venom radiating off of him, but he plows forward regardless. “Sure, you can kill, and you’re useful, or whatever, but doing that for the rest of your life isn’t going to make you happy.” He pauses. “I think it’s going to make you miserable.”
Rashoumon shoots out to wrap around his neck before he can blink, and Atsushi chokes—half in pain, half in anger.
“I am going to kill you, weretiger,” Akutagawa hisses, voice deadly sharp and serious. Atsushi can almost see his eyes smoking with the heat of rage, and the sight alone ignites a deep, burning fire in his chest. Whatever semblance of calm and gentle he has goes flying instantly out the window.
“Do it, then,” he spits out, hands shaking. He holds Akutagawa’s glare with one of his own. “Kill me—right here and right now. Strangle me. Throw me off this building. Do whatever the hell you want with me, but I guarantee,” he clenches his fists so hard he thinks he draws blood “I guarantee you won’t feel any less miserable after you do it.”
A tense silence falls over them as Akutagawa continues to bore holes into his skin. Atsushi stares right back at him, taking in the locked jaw and the furious expression. And he’s angry, he’s so, so unbelievably angry at Akutagawa—for not listening to him, for resorting to violence, for thinking his only use is killing, for being in the mafia, for everything. He’s angry beyond words.
But he doesn’t want to kill him.
“You are insufferable,” Akutagawa forces out finally, face pinched, before he drops Rashoumon in the blink of an eye.
“Likewise,” Atsushi mutters under his breath. He reaches up to rub the skin around his neck gingerly. Akutagawa’s eyes are still on him, and irritation spikes in his blood as he purposefully touches his neck again, as if to tell Akutagawa this is your fault. The weight of the other’s gaze on him prickles uncomfortably.
Atsushi should apologize. He should. The conversation replays dully in his mind like a broken record. Apologize, part of him whispers in his ear. But this Atsushi is not the same Atsushi sitting locked in a cage. This is not the same Atsushi crying in the orphanage. No, he shoots back angrily. He’s already said what he wanted to say, and regardless of how unpleasant it was, regardless of how much he’s going to be hated for it, regardless of the faint burn around his neck—it was something Akutagawa needed to hear.
“Why is it of any concern?” Akutagawa asks suddenly, teeth gritted and fists clenched but sounding considerably less angry.
Atsushi blinks. “Huh?”
Akutagawa scowls in irritation. “My purpose. My happiness. Why is it of any concern?”
Atsushi presses his lips together. Why do you care, it feels like he’s asking. And he doesn’t. He doesn’t care about Akutagawa, and he shouldn’t care about his purpose, or his happiness, or the perpetual darkness in his eyes, or the wrinkle-free skin around his mouth like he’s never smiled a day in his life. He doesn’t. And he shouldn’t; he really, really shouldn’t.
“I—” he tries. Atsushi’s heart jumps out of his chest. “I don’t know,” he says weakly, because that’s the only thing he trusts himself to say. He lifts his gaze to look at Akutagawa only to find the other already staring intently at him, eyes unreadable. The surprising weight of Akutagawa’s eyes on him makes him jump so hard he fumbles, losing balance on the thin railing and tipping precariously backwards and he’s so stupid—
Rashoumon’s tendrils dart out before he can process the world tilting ever-so-slightly, grabbing onto his arms and anchoring him firmly back down onto the railing. Atsushi blinks rapidly, heart in his throat, before the black bundle of fabric around his hands unfurls just as quickly as it had appeared, retracting silently back to their owner.
Akutagawa isn’t looking at him anymore.
Atsushi stares at the other for a long moment, taking in the annoyed twist of the lips. From where they’re sitting, the moon barely catches on Akutagawa’s face, but the smallest hint filters into his eyes and they’re dark, still—always and neverendingly dark, but they shine regardless. The feeling of Rashoumon lingers everywhere on Atsushi’s skin as his pulse stutters in his chest. Tight and burning around his neck, firm and reassuring on his arms. One with intention to kill, and the other with intention to save.
Funny, how nothing ever makes sense when Akutagawa is involved.
“Thanks,” Atsushi murmurs, and it’s hard to tear his eyes away from the other this time.
“You are foolish and naive,” Akutagawa mutters, so low that Atsushi has to strain his ears to hear. “To believe you can save everyone.”
Atsushi’s brows furrow. “I’m not trying to save—”
Oh. He bites down at the inside of his cheek, hard, and blinks a few times out into the distance. He’s treating Akutagawa like a case, like a problem he needs to fix. As if with enough prodding and investigation he’ll be able to magically solve him, and bring him into the light. Akutagawa is looking at him again, and Atsushi suddenly feels the need to bolt, to run, to do anything to avoid facing those dark, unreadable eyes.
“Kyouka-chan did it,” he says quietly. He stares at his hands, heart racing. “And so did Dazai-san.”
Akutagawa jerks as if he’s been electrocuted. “Do not mention that man’s—”
“Dazai-san saw the light,” Atsushi pushes forward stubbornly. “He—he must have, I mean, to leave the mafia and then join the Agency, he—”
“Dazai-san is not a good man,” Akutagawa interrupts him harshly, and Atsushi freezes. Processes. I erased his past crimes, he hears Ango say, slowly, reluctantly, painfully, not looking at him. Dazai’s sunny laugh dances in his vision, truer than he’s ever known and false all at the same time. Dazai’s hand resting on his head, his proud smile, gentle eyes.
Atsushi wonders what sides of Dazai Akutagawa has seen.
“I know,” Atsushi barely manages to whisper, and the words feel like betrayal, hot and heavy on his tongue. He exhales shakily, hands clenching, before he looks back at Akutagawa. “I know he’s done bad things in the past. I know. But that doesn’t mean he can’t do good. People change, Akutagawa, they don’t just—”
“And you believe he is happy?” Akutagawa cuts in abruptly. He’s looking out into the city again, and Atsushi desperately, inexplicably, wants him to turn around.
“I don’t know,” he says honestly, almost helplessly. “But I think he’s happier than he was before, and that’s all that matters.”
There’s a moment of silence, and Atsushi carefully weighs the next words on his tongue.
“And I think,” he starts carefully, looking at Akutagawa. “I think that’s what Dazai-san wants you to learn.”
Surprisingly, Akutagawa doesn’t move. Doesn’t attack him, doesn’t bring out a fist. Doesn’t say anything. He just sits there, looking out into the distance with a frustratingly blank expression and Atsushi fights the urge to grab him and shake him by the shoulders just to get some sort of reaction.
Akutagawa sneers. “And that is why you believe you are better than me.”
Atsushi flinches, eyes wide. “I never said—”
“You believe you are superior to me, simply because you are on the side of the light. Simply because your hands have never been dirtied, and because your blood is clean. You think,” Akutagawa is looking at him now, and a slow, ugly feeling of dread creeps into Atsushi’s veins. “That because you have been bathed in a pool of praise and camaraderie, that you are invincible.”
“Akutagawa—”
“As compared to a mafia dog,” Akutagawa talks over him, voice raised. “Who is filthy, who is drowned in blood, who only knows to kill.” His lips twist. “You think that’s disgusting.”
His words ring out in the silence like gunshots. Atsushi sits frozen for a second, stunned, as his mind races to catch up. Akutagawa is still staring at him, eyes hard. And it might just be the angriest Atsushi has ever seen him, but there’s something else there. Something besides the anger, that burns brighter and stronger and far more dangerous.
“Oh my god,” Atsushi murmurs. “You’re jealous.”
Akutagawa lunges.
Pure instinct is the only reason Atsushi dodges the first punch, before panic flows hot and heavy into his blood. The narrow railing they’re sitting on is flimsy, and laughably unstable, and Akutagawa unleashes Rashoumon relentlessly as if he’s been holding back his entire life.
“Akutagawa!” He calls desperately. “Stop! I didn’t mean—”
“Leave,” Akutagawa barks out loudly, voice venomous. Atsushi dodges another hit and flinches when something cuts the edge of his cheek.
“Stop!” Atsushi yells again. “I was only—” Another shot of black whizzes by, and he barely manages to avoid it.
Well. Atsushi grits his teeth and clenches his fist, feeling a rush of power thrum faintly into his body. There’s only one final way to solve this. Akutagawa is being reckless, far more careless and scattered than he usually is, lashing out everywhere and anywhere. Atsushi waits out the barrage for a couple of seconds, ducking rapidly to avoid being hit, before he hones in on an opening.
He pounces, springing forward with all the power he can and tackling Akutagawa onto the roof of the next building over. They slam to the ground with a loud noise, the roof shuddering beneath them with the force of the impact. Atsushi heaves out a breath, heart racing.
“Get off—"
“Akutagawa,” he repeats desperately, miserably, straight into the other’s ear. “I’m not making fun of you. I swear. I—” His voice breaks, with distress and another unidentifiable feeling, clamping hard around his heart. “I don’t want to fight you. Not anymore. I just—I just want to talk.”
He closes his eyes, pulse flying out of his skin as he leans down against Akutagawa’s body. The other struggles beneath him, kicking erratically, but Atsushi just waits, hopes. He doesn’t move, and doesn’t say anything else. Just continues to breathe into the other’s ear. Akutagawa is a hurricane of emotion and movement beneath him, bleeding out so openly Atsushi can almost taste the anger on his tongue.
Atsushi waits. Painstakingly, desperately—he waits.
Eventually, the thrashing slows down, and Akutagawa’s body goes still beneath him. His eyes are still closed, and he listens to the furious thundering of the other’s heart. Feels the warmth of Akutagawa’s body, the faintest smell of his shampoo, the brush of his breath.
“Get off of me, weretiger,” Akutagawa snaps, and Atsushi’s eyes fly open. In a haste, he extracts himself from Akutagawa, almost falling over himself in the process, before he finally settles for sitting on the ground a short distance away from the other. Akutagawa isn’t looking at him when he pushes himself back up into a sitting position, carefully rearranging his legs. And he still doesn’t look at Atsushi after a few seconds pass.
The tension could cut diamonds. It’s far brighter on this rooftop than in their old location, and the lights beat down harshly on Akutagawa’s face to fill in the shadows under his eyes and the curve of his lips. He looks tired, and angry, but mostly just tired. Atsushi stares at him, throat tight, as he thinks.
There are so many things he could say. There is so much he wants to say. But there is only so much space on the ride from his heart to his mouth, and there are so, so many more ways Akutagawa is going to keep running away from him.
“You’re so stupid,” he blurts out in a rush. Akutagawa jerks violently and Atsushi grabs his arm in a panic to keep him in place. “No,” he snaps. “Listen to me. You’re—you have no reason to be jealous of me. Akutagawa, you’re strong, and you’re smart, and you think fast, and you have good control over your ability—which I don’t, well, not really—and you’re just,” He waves his other hand nonsensically in the air. “You’re Akutagawa. And I’m just—Atsushi.” He stares blankly at the ground. “I’m just Atsushi,” he finishes quietly.
Akutagawa doesn’t say anything. His eyes are cast somewhere to the side, not looking at him, and his arm stays warm under Atsushi’s touch.
Atsushi sighs. “And I don’t think I’m superior, or whatever, just because I’m with the Agency and you’re not.” He swallows, looking hesitantly at the crown of Akutagawa’s head. “I do think I’m better than you because I don’t kill, but it’s more because I know why people shouldn’t be killed.” He glares at the other. “That’s why I wanted you not to kill anyone for six months, so you would learn. So you would get that not everything has to end in death, and that people’s lives have value.”
It’s deathly quiet for a moment, before Akutagawa says, voice low, “Killing is the only thing I know.”
“Well,” Atsushi snaps, “Then just go learn other things to replace it. Learn how to care about people, instead. Don’t you—you have to have someone you care about.” He pauses, thinking. “Your sister?”
Akutagawa freezes against him. “Don’t you dare mention—”
“No,” Atsushi cuts in. There is so much emotion bubbling under the surface of his skin, at the roof of his mouth, beneath his tongue. The anger, the frustration, the desperation, almost, for Akutagawa to just understand, burns on every inch of his skin like fire. “You care about your sister. If she was in danger, wouldn’t you take a bullet for her? Wouldn’t you throw yourself in front of a car for her?”
“Gin would never put herself in a—”
“That’s not the point,” Atsushi interrupts angrily. He forces out a sigh, letting his blood simmer down before it bursts, and when he opens his mouth again it comes out considerably calmer. “My point is that if, somehow, she was ever in danger, you would risk your life to protect her without thinking twice.”
The silence sweeps over them for a long, long time. Atsushi turns his head to look out onto the glare of the city lights, and waits. His heart races quietly in his chest, and he feels a similar pattern under his hand, coming from Akutagawa’s still frozen arm.
Finally, Akutagawa makes a noise somewhere between a sigh and a grunt. Atsushi turns his head back to the other, and finds dark eyes pinning him in place, knocking the breath out of his lungs.
“I am not a good man,” Akutagawa says evenly.
Atsushi swallows hard around the cold, bitter taste of honesty. “Yeah,” he forces out finally. He holds Akutagawa’s gaze in defiance. “But that doesn’t mean you can’t learn to do good things.”
He takes another deep breath, before pushing forward. “And if you’re jealous of me, because I wasn’t taken into the mafia, that I got to see the light, then that just means—” Akutagawa’s stare is growing overbearing, piercing straight into him, but he doesn’t relent. “It means you want to. Do good things. It means deep down, you have it in you to do good.”
“Akutagawa,” Atsushi murmurs. “Don’t you want to be happy?”
Akutagawa looks away. The weight of his words hangs heavy in the space between them, the wind gently lapping at his face. Atsushi watches the flutter of Akutagawa’s eyelashes, dark against his pale skin, and wonders what kind of expression he’s making.
“You are truly beyond foolish,” Akutagawa mutters quietly, at last. But there’s no bite, no sting, no nothing.
Atsushi closes his eyes and smiles. Akutagawa shakes him off of his arm and he relents easily, trying not to mourn the warmth of the other when it leaves. He takes a breath in of the night air, feeling cold slip into his body and fight with the heat in his chest. Then he opens his eyes again.
“Someone told me once,” Atsushi starts, heart flipping nervously in his chest. “That the pain in my past has nothing to do with me anymore.”
Akutagawa stiffens beside him.
“They were right,” he says wryly, staring up at sky. “My past shouldn’t matter anymore—it shouldn’t, but it’s,” he sucks in a deep breath. “It’s hard.”
“I still get nightmares,” he laughs shakily, voice harsh against the quiet. “And I still see him—the headmaster—sometimes. And I still hear voices in my head telling me I’m not good enough, that I’m never going to be good enough, but—”
Akutagawa’s voice cuts in like a knife. “Do you expect me to pity—”
“I don’t,” Atsushi says firmly. Akutagawa turns to look at him, and Atsushi stares at him dead in the eye. “I don’t expect you to pity me, and I don’t want your pity, Akutagawa.” He sighs. “Yeah, it’s hard, and it sucks, but I’m trying. And sometimes,” Atsushi shrugs, aiming for nonchalance as his heart hammers in his chest. “Sometimes trying is all you need.”
He traces the details of Akutagawa’s face: the sharp curve of his neck, the brush of his eyelashes, the way his lips are pressed together like he doesn’t want to speak. Atsushi looks at skin he has scratched and a body he has torn and feels an uncontrollable surge of warmth flow through his veins as his hands suddenly itch to reach out.
“I despise you,” Akutagawa says under his breath, not looking at him.
Atsushi smiles. “I know,” he replies, eyes still running over Akutagawa’s features. They settle on the corner of his mouth, where his lips tug downwards like that’s the only direction they know. He drags his gaze away and up into the sky again. “You should smile more,” he says quietly, absentmindedly.
There’s a pause, before Akutagawa grumbles. “Do not tell me what to do.”
“Okay,” Atsushi counters easily. “I won’t.” He catches Akutagawa’s gaze again, his eyes narrowed slightly like he’s trying to piece Atsushi together. Atsushi looks at him steadily, and wonders if he can feel the weight of his words when he says, “It’s just a suggestion.”
Akutagawa doesn't respond well to pushes and nudges, no matter how gentle. So Atsushi won't. His words pave out a path that Akutagawa probably has never seen before: one that is far more illuminated than the dangerous trail he is used to, that is warmer, softer. That Atsushi hopes he chooses to walk down one day. Maybe not now, maybe not six months later, and maybe not for a long, long time, but one day.
“You do not make any sense, weretiger,” Akutagawa sighs after a moment.
And he’s right—he doesn’t. But nothing about them has ever made sense, and it probably never will. And somehow, Atsushi is okay with that.
The wind rushes noisily around them, blending fuzzily with the murmur of the sleeping city. Atsushi distantly wonders just how late it is. His body yearns for the warmth of his futon, miles away in his small, humble dorm. But his heart aches, oddly, at the thought of leaving. He stares at Akutagawa—someone who is prickly, stubborn, violent, who he’s trusted with his life and who has called him foolish far too many times.
Atsushi could probably build a trophy case with all the stupid decisions he's made; there’s really no harm in adding one more.
“Akutagawa,” he starts seriously. His pulse trembles beneath his skin and he can hear every fiber of his being laughing hysterically at him, but he pushes on before he loses the courage. “Give me your phone number.”
Akutagawa visibly starts, and stares at him like he's grown a second head. “I refuse.”
“Well, your refusal is refused,” Atsushi retorts.
Akutagawa scowls, looking away from him. “We are not—”
“What,” Atsushi demands forcefully. “Partners? Friends?” Akutagawa goes still and Atsushi sighs, letting some of the heat cool down on the tip of his tongue. “That’s fine,” he says quietly. “I just—I think I should be part of your life. I want to be,” he finishes lamely.
He stares at Akutagawa again, watching as he looks down at the ground. He doesn’t look dangerous—not like this. Or maybe he never has, and Atsushi has just never bothered to notice. Akutagawa’s skin shines faintly under the light and he watches, mesmerized, at the way his eyelashes dip when he blinks. Even the outline of his mouth against the dark of the night is nothing but graceful, elegant, beautiful, and the urge to reach out and touch—
Akutagawa raises his head and their gazes lock. Embarrassment races inexplicably under Atsushi’s skin, and he feels a flush settle on his face like he’s been caught. Unceremoniously, he grabs his phone from his pocket and nearly throws it into Akutagawa’s hands. Akutagawa jerks as though shocked and his jaw clenches, mouth opening to protest—but Atsushi doesn't yield.
“Akutagawa,” he says firmly, slowly. He exhales. “You’ve saved my life before. Why?”
They’re back to where they started. But the ball is in Akutagawa’s court this time, and Atsushi just folds his hands and waits. Push and pull. Hot and cold. Black and white. Akutagawa is a mystery he’s just barely starting to grasp, but he feels like—for once in his life—he might be heading in the right direction.
“Perhaps your foolish ways infected me,” Akutagawa murmurs, voice low.
And then he looks down at Atsushi’s phone, fingers wrapped around the device, and begins to type.