Ambivalent • DazaixReaderxChūya

17. To Want

'And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side of my darling—my darling—my life and my bride,
   In her sepulchre there by the sea—
   In her tomb by the sounding sea.'

Your eyes slowly open to your room lights dimmed, your body laying on your bed, blankets encasing you, and a warm towel lay on your forehead. You shift in your sheets and manage to sit up, pulling off some layers and setting aside the towel beside you. There is complete silence, and after a few minutes of sitting and wondering how you'd gotten there in the first place, you force yourself off the bed, walking towards the door and opening it slowly, peaking outside your room. There is only darkness. A flashback of the night you'd found Chūya with your bottle of wine leads to a memory of him holding you as your body froze over, and your thoughts had been all of peace that you weren't dying alone.

Except you weren't dead, and you had woken up alone.

You walk through the halls aimlessly, your footsteps hardly making a sound. The Port Mafia felt so much like a prison in the dark, the walls closing in on you the further down you went. You wondered if perhaps you really had died, and this was your afterlife. Forever roaming the halls that you hid in, that you pretended to build a life in. Maybe it was your own personal hell.

No...I'm not dead. I can still feel too much to not be alive.

You don't know how long it is until you find an unlocked door with the lights on, but when you do, you feel relief until you open it and your eyes meet Chūya's, and you feel the memories of before you gave up on the waking life flood back in. The screams of the man you tortured to in turn torture your limits, the thoughts of internal conflict that drown every noise around you, your desire to make someone suffer as much as you even if it killed you...or rather, you hoped you'd die to stop everything. The cold that had taken all your control and willpower as the last thing you saw were those blue-grey eyes...

"[l/n], what are you doing here? I wasn't even sure if you-" he stops himself, walking over to you, stopping when he sees you flinch back.

"I was hoping I died. I would have been ok if I died next to you." You say flatly, looking over Chūya and realizing his usual overcoat was hung up on a rack, his figure much more noticeable than usual made it easier to read his body language, and it didn't take a genius to realize he was bothered by your words.

"What?! Why would you say something like that?" Chūya asks defensively, his short temper startling you even though it was to be expected.

"I don't see a reason worth living when I've sacrificed having anything meaningful for strength and..." You let the answer come out effortlessly, trailing off when you couldn't bring yourself to say you had power, because you no longer believed you did.

I've only made myself see what I want to see.

You keep watch on Chūya's every move. His shoulders stiffen, his eyes seem to harden, looking you over thoughtfully before choosing to step towards you and take your arms, keeping you still with a gentles but firm grip.

"You don't see a reason because you think you're the only one that thinks about you. You think it's you against everyone else. It's not. I didn't teach you to survive so you could die from your ability like an idiot." Chūya pauses and hesitates before adding his next words. "I wouldn't have been ok if you died next to me."

You search his eyes for some kind of amusement, some sort of game he was playing. Chūya was always one to tease you, to make any situation fun for himself, but right now, you couldn't see any sort of joke in the way he spoke and looked at you. Taking what he said in, it took you a bit to think of a reply, as sometimes you found his more serious side in personality slightly intimidating. In the Mafia, he was always the first one to lose his temper, but with all the respect he had from others it didn't matter. He is an executive and had the full right to be one. To you, he was what power should be. One thing had always stood out to you however, and that was that with all his theatrics in the mafia, he did have a set of morals of a sort. Chūya was more than just his strength, and he knew it.

"You know I'm not under your direct orders anymore right? I'm not...your responsibility." You say, misunderstanding completely what Chūya had meant.

Chūya's face is one of disbelief and frustration when you talk, and he looks away with exasperation before letting you go and taking a step back, his expression when he turns back to you one of pure minor distress.

"[f/n] [l/n]! Are you still so dense? Did your flirting with death fry your brain? I don't let everyone kiss me, even when drinking I'm not a moron."

"I didn't say-" He interrupts you before you can say anything.

"Even when I think you're impossible, I always want more from you."

Your eyes widen, unable to fully process what Chūya was saying only because you never imagined he'd be so blunt. It was like you expected him to be more like Dazai, when really he was the opposite. Chūya never says things he doesn't mean.

"I-um...you want me..?" You ask while at the same time repeating it to yourself, your face heating up and turning a bit red from the embarrassment of your wording.

Chūya sees your flustered state as an opportunity, and walks towards you and brushes your hair out of your face, his eyes searching yours for anything resembling his own desire, and you wonder yourself if you mirrored it back. Chūya had always felt like safety, and right now you didn't want anything less than his being. It did cross your mind that you didn't know what time it was, or what day, but being in this moment felt right, no matter the hour.

Satisfied with your relaxation to his touch, Chūya leans in and gives you a kiss just as soft as the first time, but there was something different about it. Like he wanted to answer you by showing you himself what he meant, and it was sweet, but it was demanding. The heat radiating from his every touch felt as good to you as the kiss against your cold skin. You wanted to absorb every bit of it.

'To burn with desire and keep quiet about it is the greatest punishment we can bring on ourselves.' - Lorca

-❦-

Is it so wrong to feel so much with two men? After claiming to hate one but not the other, yet I'm so willing to be absorbed by both. Is it unfair when I can forget one when with the other? Is an apology enough for holding both so high up in my thoughts?

Chūya, your body next to mine fills me with so much warmth, your every kiss like a little flame burning for the purpose to make me understand. Your gentle touch that could hold so much power at its command, your certainty in everything you do...

Dazai...you're more like electricity, ready to run through and cause a fire with so much passion, no matter the consequences of either of our feelings. You waver between light and dark, and you have such a beauty to the way you see everything. You aren't afraid to share it, not with me.

I can't help wonder which is my light, what is wrong from right. If neither are the answer am I stuck in a shade of grey until I chose?

But...

I can't help my ambivalence, and it's going to destroy me without an end.