Double Black

now i'm (down bad)

A/N- Dazai Day 2024 !! (title from down bad by taylor swift)

The subject of conversation came up entirely because of Naomi and one of her many daily rants about her beloved brother. Today, during lunch break, all the Agency members were gathered around a few joint desks, deciding to have lunch together in the office instead of Cafe Uzumaki, for once.

In between bites of rice and carrots, Naomi fussed stressfully, "I haven't even figured out what to get brother for his birthday! It's super soon."

Tanizaki was away from this setting on an errand to get drinks for everyone, and hence his sister had clearly decided it was perfectly acceptable to steer the conversation towards his birthday and plans for the same. Unused to birthdays and such, Kyouka asked in confusion,

"Isn't his birthday over a month away, though?"

See, it was understandable. Kyouka was from the Mafia, and surprisingly enough, they had a pretty good culture of celebrating birthdays. Not that all of the mafiosos remembered their birthdays or anything. But she'd spent a lot of time with Kouyou, and the Mafia executive was definitely big on birthdays. Every year, Kyouka and Chuuya's birthdays were special occasions, and Kouyou made sure to arrange some sort of dinners, at the very least.

But despite being quite used to celebrating birthdays of her colleagues and seniors, Kyouka (or any of the others, for that matter) couldn't really comprehend why it was necessary to plan a birthday over a month in advance. To this, Naomi had some rather questionable arguments,

"A month and five days to be exact! But that's not nearly enough time to figure out what my brother my want and exactly what I can do for him to make sure that he understands how much I love him!"

Glancing at the framed picture of the siblings on their joint desk, Kunikida muttered under his breath, "I think he gets it already."

Before Naomi could go on yet another tirade, Kenji piped into the conversation, "But really we don't have birthdays really frequently, right?"

Atsushi blinked, "Really? My birthday was just last week though."

It was in between conversations about birthdays and presents and such, that the Agency's resident doctor came to an abrupt realization. Not that many of their members were aware of it, but Yosano was unusually close friends with Dazai. It seemed impossible at first glance, anybody being considered close to Dazai. But the rest of the Agency members couldn't really hope to understand how similar Yosano and Dazai's pasts were, thanks to a certain Mafia boss.

Funnily enough, it wasn't over their qualms about Mori that these two bonded over initially. When Dazai had first joined the Agency, Yosano had been fairly reserved towards him. The first time the two of them ever had a proper conversation was in the infirmary, after Dazai had been attacked by one of the many enemies he'd made during his time in the Port Mafia.

By extension, Yosano was also the first person to understand that Dazai was from the Mafia. He didn't have to spell it out explicitly, but she could tell. She'd had enough experience around people, after all. Plus, there was something in Dazai's eyes and a rare type of expression on his face that reminded her of Mori Ougai. She knew better than to be biased against him for such petty reasons alone, though.

Despite their few years of friendship, Yosano just realised that she actually couldn't recall Dazai's birthday. With her voice low enough so the others couldn't hear her amidst all their chatter, Yosano nudged Dazai, "Hey, when's your birthday, actually? I don't think I know it."

If Dazai was surprised, he didn't show it. Instead, he just lazily waved his hand, "Eh, that? It's June 19!"

For a second, the doctor remained still. A few seconds later, she checked the calendar on Kunikida's desk twice to make sure she was right. Only then, she yelled out incredulously, "Today's your birthday?!"