Hotline {Soukoku}

{10}

Curtains left undrawn all night proved to be the redhead's worst enemy this morning.

The moment he awoke, he was met with a blinding light radiating from the window above him, and it seemed to do absolutely nothing for his headache, if anything, it's probably been worsening it.

Chuuya brought his hands up above his face so that he could block the sunlight from his eyes as he slowly opened them, attempting to regain his vision. After a few seconds, his eyes adjusted to the light, and he sat up. He rubbed his still blurry eyes, trying to make sense of his waking circumstances.

He never went to sleep without closing the curtains, even if they sucked, they still somewhat helped, how could he forget to do so? Actually, now that he thought about it, he didn't really remember even choosing to go to sleep. He groaned, as his headache presented itself yet again, and he tried his best to remember the previous night.

But once he remembered who he was with, he suddenly didn't want to remember anything else.

He rolled his eyes, he couldn't believe that he had spent his night drinking with that stupid barista. He hated him, so why did he choose to go? As he went through the events in reverse order, he remembered more about the previous day, including why he felt so terrible, and why he agreed to go out with the barista.

He remembered the meeting he'd had with the lawyer.

Of course, it all made sense. Chuuya would never choose to go drink with Dazai in his right mind.

Well this was a great start to his morning. Not only was he having to deal with this headache, he was also having to deal with the news he had received, and on top of all that, quite possibly worst of all: he had to acknowledge the fact that he willingly hung out with that suicidal maniac.

Of his own free will.

Who knew free will could be so cruel.

But currently, his most pressing matter was the throbbing of his skull. He felt terribly dehydrated, and felt some water might help calm it. He turned to his left, about to swing his legs over the bed to get up, when he saw a glass of water already sitting on the stand beside his bed.

"I did not put that there..did i?" He questioned aloud, as he took the glass into his hand, investigating the drink. Unsurprisingly, he found that it was just water, so he took a sip. It was placed outside of the sun's grasp, so it wasn't totally warm, but it wasn't too cold either. It was slightly colder than room temperature, a bit subpar, but to the headache-ridden, dehydrated ginger, it was just what he needed.

Warm water is better for hydration anyway.

Having finally drank water, his throat felt better, but his headache was still hanging around. He rested his head on his hand, applying pressure to a few of the most painful areas, as he thought more about the previous day.

Unfortunately, the last thing he remembered was walking in the street with Dazai. They were headed to his place, to which he insisted that he wasn't drunk, but looking back, he was. Chuuya hated to admit it to himself, but he was glad that the brunet had walked him home, since he didn't remember anything past the walk, who knows if he'd have made it back on his own. He also knew he was a lightweight, looking back on the times he'd gotten wine-drunk with his brother.

He sighed, realizing that Dazai had most likely entered his apartment, and he shuddered at the idea of that dreaded man knowing where he lived. How could he trust someone like that? He couldn't be paid all the money in the world to trust that man.

Although, all the money in the world sounded very nice, especially in his circumstances.

In the best case scenario, the redhead was simply left at the door, and immediately fell asleep, with no more involvement from Dazai. Feeling gross, having slept in his clothes and likely skipped brushing his teeth, the ginger lifted his head as he decided on taking a shower. He stood up from the bed, stretching as he stood, and was about to turn toward the bathroom, when he noticed something on his kitchen counter.