It's Always Been You ~||~ Soukoku

~•Crush•~

Atsushi's POV.

At some point in my life, I figured out that I was gay. I was just having trouble accepting it, mostly because I was surrounded by homophobic people.

I had only one friend in the orphanage I grew up in. He was the only one I trusted, so when I realized that I was attracted to men, I told him. I made him promise not to tell anyone, but he told our caretakers when I wasn't looking.
Maybe that was partly the reason why I was kicked out. They never said anything about it, but I always believed that our caretakers were homophobic.

Anyways, back to the point, I think I found out that I was gay at the age of...13? I don't remember when I found out, but I remember telling myself that I was far too young to make a decision that could completely change my lifestyle.

So I pushed those thoughts away and never really thought much about it...before Dazai-san entered my life.

The day I saved him from the river (even though he didn't want me to) and he offered me a position at the ADA, I felt like I was being given a reason to live.

That's mostly the reason why I love Dazai-san so much, during the darkest times, he still manages to keep everyone's spirits up, he makes them forget about their troubles for a few minutes.

I really did adore Dazai-san...he was the one I was meant to be with. I honestly don't know how he would react if I told him about my feelings, but I think that I won't like the outcome.

Why do I say that?

I'll explain. Lately, the Port Mafia has been causing a lot of trouble, especially with the ADA.

They had managed to sneak those weird lemon bombs into the building. I remember walking in on the whole team covered in ashes.

Ranpo-san was eating snacks as if nothing happened.

Yosano-sensei was busy "treating" Tanizaki-kun.

Dazai-san was standing next to Kenji-kun near the window, trying to spot anything out of the ordinary.

Kunikida-san was scribbling in his notebook, mumbling something about expenses and damage repair costs every now and then.

Naomi-chan was asking Kyoka-chan if she was ok.

We soon figured out that the ones behind the bombs were the Port Mafia. Fukuzawa-dono said that the mafia was only messing around and that it was something to be ignored, and so we did.

But then we heard that the PM had caused a ruckus with other organizations that were working under the ADA. The PM had somehow convinced those organizations that the ADA was just "evil disguised as good." Those people ended up quitting.

This led to the ADA being mentioned in the news. Everyone was talking about how our members and coworkers were slowly quitting.

We had no idea why the Port Mafia was acting like this. Kunikida-san and Dazai-san predicted that the Guild had spread false information about us to the Port Mafia. That information may have made them angry and they decided to drag our public image through the dirt.

That was the most logical explanation. The Guild was planning on having the Port Mafia and the Armed Detective Agency destroy each other. Fukuzawa-dono told us to continue ignoring and denying everything.

But they had pushed it over the top. The Port Mafia had managed to kidnap Naomi-chan. This obviously enraged Tanizaki-kun and he went to get her back.

When he returned, Naomi-chan seemed to be fine but Tanizaki-kun was injured. Fukuzawa-dono decided that we should take action. 'We can't just sit back and watch our employees get hurt,' was what he said.

So we spent the next few days wondering how to stop the Mafia. Ranpo-san noticed something.

We were keeping a track of all incidents in the form of a file. Under the "culprits" section of all the incidents that took place regarding the ADA and Mafia, one name was repeated over and over.

"Nakahara Chuuya." Ranpo-san announced as he pointed to the name.

"Nakahara Ch- wait. Dazai, isn't he your ex-partner?" Yosano-sensei turned to Dazai-san, who actually looked like he was listening.

I had noticed this. Whenever we're talking about 'regular' cases, Dazai-san was never paying attention. He would just reply with "mhm," or "yeah," or "nope." But when we would talk about the mafia, he'd seem more...excited. Well maybe not excited, but more like intrigued.

Especially when we talked about this "Nakahara Chuuya" person. Dazai-san would always pretend to be upset about us mentioning that name, but I quickly figured out that he was faking it.

Whenever that name was spoken, Dazai-san would stop doing anything and everything and would listen in, or even take part in the conversation.

Of course no one else found it weird. At this point, they had stopped questioning Dazai-san's life choices because they knew it was a waste of time.

He looked slightly sad when Yosano-sensei used the word "ex." Dazai-san nodded, "Yeah...Nakahara Chuuya is my...ex..partner.."

I found it so suspicious, so I ended up asking Kunikida-san about it.

"Kunikida-san?" I peeked over the small counter that was separating our desks.

"Yes brat?" He answered, still not looking up from the computer screen. Yes he still calls me "brat." No, I do not know why.

"Uhm.." I looked around. "Can I ask you a question about Dazai-san?"

"Sure but I will probably just reply with 'because he's Dazai.' "

"Does Dazai-san have some sort of connection with Nakahara Chuuya? He acts really weird when we mention that name." I asked him.

I was hoping he would say something like "it's because they're ex-partners" or "yeah he's someone Dazai despises." But I hated the response I got.

"Yeah, Dazai used to like him in a romantic way."