Hooligan | Dazai Osamu

Love Of A Hooligan

I never thought, I was capable of love. All these years, I thought, that my heart was too shattered and tortured to be given to someone's hands. I thought, that even if I loved someone enough to confess to them and hand them my heart, then they would just get horrified by the mere glance at it for it was so ugly. I just always thought, that a human like me didn't deserve anything even closely related to love. Moreover, what for could I deserve it? For killing innocent people? For being in the mafia for so many years? For torturing living, breathing humans? Definitely, no.

I also always thought, that not only my heart and soul were ugly, but my physical appearance as well. I know, I'm often saying, that I'm handsome, and even look rather confident when flirting with women, but when I look at myself in the mirror, I see nothing, but the worst and ugliest man in the world. I sincerely don't understand how can some people think I'm handsome because in my opinion, I look disgusting. Maybe, they just think so because they don't know me as well as I do. But if I showed them the whole truth, I'm more than sure, that there would be no one, who'd stare into my lifeless brown eyes and still be in love with me.

I always thought so.

Until one day, I realized, that it just depends on whose eyes are looking unto yours.

Azure space is aflame up above,
I've forgotten my home destination...
For the first time I'm singing of love,
For the first time I give up contention.*

I once managed to find those unique eyes, that didn't mind staring into mine. It wasn't that they didn't see all those horrible things in me - they did. These eyes simply weren't judging or hating me, but instead, they looked at me with great care and tenderness, and this way, they were making me a better person.

These eyes belonged to (Y/N). She was that special human, whom I regretted not finding earlier in my life. She was the one, who made me feel at ease with her. I never thought, that someone else could make me feel that way, except for Odasaku. After he died, I thought, I would always be doomed to walk on this earth on my own and, like a stray dog, pleading for some bits of love and warmth.

But here, among all the people in this world, I managed to find her. (Y/N) wasn't the same girl as others. She wasn't light-headed like everyone else, she wasn't overly positive or dramatic. She was...extravagant. She hasn't been through such horrible things like me, but somehow, she managed to understand how I was feeling even if I wasn't saying anything. I often joked how it was her ability to sense others' feelings, when in fact, she didn't have any. She didn't need an ability to be special though. Some people need to put on some overly-expensive clothes and do bizarre things to at least somehow impress others and stand out from the rest, but (Y/N) didn't need to do anything of that. She could do doing nothing and still be extraordinary.

I was all like a desolate grove
Loving women and heavily drinking.
I don't drink any more and don't  love
Like I did, living fast and unthinking.

Or maybe, I just fell for her too much.

I never planned to fall in love with her, to be honest. She was always an interesting person to be with, but I thought, that we would just stay friends. I was afraid of falling in love. I was terrified by the idea of trusting someone and loving them and then, being abandoned. I knew, that this would be that one thing I would not survive. I lived after being tortured numerous times, after being traumatized, after escaping the mafia and living in fear for my life each day, but losing someone I love would surely be the death of me and in my first plans, I was planning to avoid it at any cost.

But as time went by, I didn't even notice, how I started missing (Y/N)'s presence because these were the only times, when I could breathe calmly. I didn't notice, how I started craving more of her touches and hugs. I didn't even notice, how my heart started to tremble whenever I saw her or when she was calling my name. When I finally did though, I was terrified because I knew, that now, this was either something, that would make me fall in love with life or that it would kill me and I had no idea what it could be.