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Chuuya has never once had a dream in his entire life. This is a fact; Chuuya cannot dream, almost as if the installation of Arahabaki into his soul took with it the ability to have dreams altogether.
His theory - or at least the concept of such, from what he’s decided over time - is that because N had treated Arahabaki as ‘God’, that the idea of God’s having dreams when they are supposed to be ‘almighty’ is somewhat counterintuitive. What use does a God have for a dream, when they could do fuck all without having to hope for it, anyway? Very little, Chuuya would imagine. Not like he would ever know, one way or the other, but there’s something odd enough about being able to explain away the reason that makes him feel just a little more human than he usually does at a base level.
To be fair, though, Chuuya also doesn’t think he’s really missing that much by NOT being able to dream. If dreams are thoughts, and he’s still capable of thinking, then what does the absence of unconscious thought weaved together by the worst of his internal monologue really do for him? He has plenty of less-than-savory thoughts during the waking hours as it is; at least he can say that he’s never woken up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat because his teeth fell out or some dumb shit like that. And Chuuya’s seen more than enough mind bending violence for a lifetime that he assumes he’d have very few, if any, pleasant dreams.
Everything he knows about them has come vicariously through Kouyou, who had been cooperative with his many, many questions about them when he was a teenager. With as indulgent as Ane-san often can be in his case, though, she definitely overshared when it came to her evening fantasies. That’s the only reason Chuuya has such a solid grasp of the ‘point’ of a dream, whether it was worth it or not.
(Sometimes he thinks ‘not’, because Kouyou has never been shy about her ‘feminine wiles’ as it is.)
So, no, Chuuya doesn’t really feel like he’s missing some ethereal human experience. It’s not like there aren’t OTHER reasons that people don’t dream, anyway (of course, very VERY few are probably able to claim it’s because of blood experiments done on them in their youth, but that’s neither here nor there).
If only the same could be said for his boyfriend.
They’ve been together for well over a year, and spent at least half of those nights together in Chuuya’s apartment, which is more than enough time for him to know when there’s a nightmare ebbing in his consciousness before it’s really started to affect Atsushi himself. The first time he’d been woken up by flailing limbs on the other side of his bed, Chuuya had yelled startled expletives towards his ceiling while trying to get his bearings to the bare minimum of being able to tell what the FUCK was going on, and if not for the fact that he was sleepy as all hell, he might have kicked a hole through his mattress with the back of his heel.
It’s almost, ALMOST crazy enough to be funny in retrospect, but Atsushi had cried and apologized so profusely in the aftermath that Chuuya had thought he was going to make himself pass out, so he doesn’t like to think about it too much. His bleeding heart rejects little but his own pride when it comes to being SCARED by something.
Thankfully for the both of them, that doesn’t happen anymore, but that doesn’t make the twitching of Atsushi’s fingers against his palm any less disheartening. They’re still two stops away from Chuuya’s high rise, and the trains are running slower than usual because of a threat of inclement weather, so the timing couldn’t really be worse, actually. Atsushi’s been dozing on and off with his cheek pressed into Chuuya’s shoulder since they sat down half an hour ago by the window, but he hadn’t realized that his boyfriend was THAT asleep. It’s nearly eleven, sure, and they had a long day out in Sagamigaoka that had clearly worn him down, but Chuuya swore he’d been mumbling something about takoyaki just a few minutes ago.
“Atsushi,” Chuuya murmurs under his breath, tilting his head closer to Atsushi’s ear. “Hey, wake up, beautiful. We’re almost home.”
(What a weird word, home is.)
(He doesn’t think he’ll ever get past the euphoria of sharing it with somebody.)
Atsushi doesn’t respond. His silver hair is splayed over the side of his face, a bead of drool hanging from the corner of his mouth. To any other bystander, he might look peaceful, and damn it all if Chuuya almost doesn’t think so himself. It’s so fucking CUTE, the way he presses into Chuuya’s side and inadvertently tangles stripes of stark, uneven black and white bangs with Chuuya’s burning red curls. But his hand draped limply in Chuuya’s glove curls up into a fist around his thumb and it makes his stomach lurch at the thought that Atsushi isn’t enjoying what SHOULD, for all intents and purposes, FEEL as peaceful as it seems. He’s tense. And that’s not good.
“Atsushi,” he tries again, a little louder. The train isn’t crowded, necessarily, but he’ll be damned if he draws any attention to them NOW. He nudges his side lightly with his elbow for good measure, though it doesn’t seem to make a difference. “Everything’s fine, so you gotta get up, okay? I ain’t gonna let anything happen to you, but you gotta let me getcha home safe so I can take care ‘a ya properly.”
It’s not like Chuuya can’t handle it - this - out in public, but he knows that Atsushi will have a much harder time rationalizing anything if he wakes up frightened in unfamiliar territory. He can only be thankful that there isn’t anyone sitting around for several rows ahead of them, but that won’t do much for Atsushi’s groggy perception of the world if he can’t immediately recognize something safe. This is way too exposed for the Atsushi that wakes up gasping for breath after having been beaten within an inch of his life. They sure as hell don’t ride the train often enough for it to qualify as a ‘safe space’.
The third time is SUPPOSED to be the charm. At least, that’s what shitty Dazai always liked to say. Not that Chuuya is the habit of taking his advice, but-
Atsushi makes a tiny, tiny little noise, something akin to a pained whimpering. His eyes are already closed, but they become creased at the edges with an undeniably uncomfortable sort of strain. His nose brushes against Chuuya’s neck as though he were to try to hide himself in Chuuya’s side.
-Atsushi is already tough to wake up when he isn’t fully in control, - an attempt to protect himself, most likely - so Chuuya doesn’t have a lot of options on a normal day, let alone sitting on the train 20 minutes from the apartment.
“Hey,” Chuuya wraps his fist up in his own hand, squeezing lightly around Atsushi’s knuckles. “We’re just about home so let’s get ourselves ready to go.” He tries switching tactics; casual, easy, offering some semblance of a goal for Atsushi to come back to, rubbing his thumb across the top of his hand-
Atsushi flinches. Not with his entire body, but pretty damn close to it. His hand is pulled away from Chuuya’s and he folds minutely into himself, his head sliding down Chuuya’s bicep in the process. He whines a second time, like the loss of stability, the absence of Chuuya’s shoulder, physically hurts. It probably does, with his neck at that awkward angle.
So much for Dazai’s advice meaning jack shit. “Atsushi, ‘yer okay,” he grits out between teeth clenched in concern that he KNOWS is poorly masked. He applies just a little bit of pressure with his ability, allowing Tainted to pull Atsushi’s head back upright and wrap him in something close to the weight of a heavy blanket. “Dammit, I’m not gonna let you spiral, you gotta stay with me here, beautiful. Focus on my voice.“
He cards the tips of his fingers through the top of Atsushi’s tangled hair in one gentle movement, brushing stray tresses away from his eyes. The pad of his thumb grazes over his forehead and-
The static of the train intercom fizzles into life overhead, buzzing with all the instability of an older microphone system on its last legs.
‘We are now arriving at Futamatagawa Station. The time is eleven-eighteen, with two stops left on the Sotetsu Line this evening. We will proceed to Nishiya Station five minutes following arrival. Please prepare for your departure-‘
Chuuya doesn’t have the time to react to anything else before Atsushi pulls in a breath loud enough that it might even hurt as he jolts awake in his seat. Whether it’s the contact with his face or the presence of an evidently unexpected - though autonomous - third party, he doesn’t know, but his boyfriend’s eyes blow wide open, his pupils dilated into cautious slits beside an abnormally hazy shade of ametrine. His hair is a mess of frizz where it’s been pulled away from Chuuya’s shoulder, and his cheeks are flushed pink with exhaustion. He looks all manner of confused, startled into a consciousness he clearly wasn’t anticipating. His back stiffens into something closer to ramrod straight when he suddenly starts to look around himself, eyes darting one way and then the other without ever managing to move his head.
It’s never a good sign when he goes nearly still like that, and it’s worse that Chuuya can very clearly hear his breathing picking up, up, up, as though he’s struggling to take in air. His chest heaves under the weight of a thought, and he doesn’t seem to notice Chuuya at all in the several seconds that pass them by wherein his breath is nothing short of strangled out of his throat. Atsushi brings a trembling hand to his chest, palming around his shirt right where his heart is underneath as if to feel whether or not it’s actually there.
The feeble hold that Tainted had on him is released instinctively, just to be safe, but Atsushi doesn’t seem to notice any difference, either.
Chuuya leans forward ever so slightly. His hair falls off of his shoulder and down onto his back. “Shit, Atsushi-“ he mumbles, trying so HARD to keep the worry from seeping through to the point of obvious (and he knows he’s doing a terrible job at reining that in). “Hey, are ya with me? Yer on the train, with me- Chuuya- we’re on the way home still- gotta little ways to go but yer safe-“
“C-Chuuya?” Atsushi blinks rapidly, cutting him off.
And despite the fact that he’s this damn close to hyperventilating, awareness this soon after a shitty dream is so fuckin’ RARE for him that Chuuya can’t help but take it as a win.
“Yeah, beautiful. Right here,” Chuuya replies, relief palpable in every tiny syllable. A ghost of a smile tugs at the corners of his lips before he asks for a second time, careful still. “You with me?”
Atsushi blinks again, then nods, slowly, as if he isn’t quite sure (he probably isn’t, but that’s just fine with Chuuya as long as he’s not completely lost inside of himself to the point of not being able to breathe in the first place). “I- I think so… I’m not-“ he swallows hard. “I don’t really-“ and then he’s cut short by a hiccup, his face contorting first with a shock that hardly lasts two seconds, before melting into the beginning of tears as his chin wobbles and his bottom lip trembles under his teeth so plainly against his will.
“Hey, ‘s okay,” Chuuya hurries to reassure him before he has the chance to get himself worked up. “Take a second, then tell me what ya need when you’re ready.”
Wordlessly, Atsushi reaches out both of his - shaking - hands towards Chuuya’s, palms down; it’s a familiar ask to be held. Chuuya doesn’t waste the time wondering whether or not that would actually benefit him right now when he can barely string a sentence together, instead taking each hand into one of each of his own and holding them steady in between his thumbs and the balls of his wrists. As if by magic, Atsushi immediately manages to take a deeper, more defined breath in through his nose, and Chuuya responds in kind by running his thumbs slowly across his knuckles to try to keep up that damn perfect rhythm.
Chuuya turns his body more fully towards Atsushi - or, as much as he’s able to in the small train seats. He takes several deep, controlled breaths of his own for Atsushi to copy. It’s too dark outside of the window for anything to be clear, but he can see the distant fluorescence of station lights coming up soon. Combined with the dim overheads inside the train, the redness of Atsushi’s face is illuminated in orange highlights that fail to mask how worn his eyes look. He’s TRYING not to cry.
Rather than pointing it out, Chuuya elects to keep his focus on the pressure of their fingers pressed together.
Atsushi isn’t someone who’s used to talking openly about how he feels, even now. Hell, it’s not like Chuuya is, either; neither of them really seemed to ever have that luxury until they started spending time together, and it wasn’t until a few months into taking day trips to the local aquariums and making out in Chuuya’s car that Atsushi was first willing to divulge his lesser known haunts in a show of trust. He was less acclimated to being CARED about than Chuuya was, and it took a lot of convincing on Chuuya’s end to get him to understand just how deeply he had fallen in love; that it was OKAY to get close, because he wasn’t going to HURT him the way everybody else who came before had done.
Chuuya isn’t a goddamned liar; he was head over fucking heels and it had TERRIFIED him, in the beginning. He was so used to getting close to someone only to watch them go, brutally or otherwise, and even if Kouyou stuck around and took him under her wing for real, his love life had been limited to one-night stands and hasty kisses in bathroom stalls that meant nothing more than a mutual exchange of pleasure. Falling in love with Atsushi - Akutagawa’s accursed weretiger, Dazai’s new protégé, the biggest bounty this side of Europe - was not only unexpected, but entirely NEW. And no amount of trying to convince himself that it was in Atsushi’s best interest for him to stay innocent within the Agency managed to prove a match for how badly Chuuya WANTED to love him.
Chuuya’s never had a real dream, but maybe-
‘We are now arriving at Futamatagawa Station. The time is eleven-twenty-one, with two stops left on the Sotetsu Line this evening. We will proceed to Nishiya Station in five minutes. Please prepare for your departure, and have a good night-‘
The intercom crackles, and Atsushi squeezes Chuuya’s hands with a more reassuring strength than he had before.
“Can we- can we get off here?” Atsushi mumbles, glancing up to meet Chuuya’s gaze with a light violet that seems a little less clouded, now.
Chuuya can’t help but tilt his head in a silent ask. ‘This isn’t our stop’, more informing than it is refusing, to try to understand, first, to make sure Atsushi knows where they are.
He sighs, flushing something deeper still. “I know we’re not back yet but I feel- it feels- it’s hard to breathe in here, a-and I don’t- I wanna get off the train-“
And Chuuya will do anything for him, anything at all, so-
“Of course,” he answers, smiling with all the geniality behind it that Atsushi clearly needs. “I can call us a car, don’t worry about it.”
The relief makes Atsushi’s shoulders sag, and Chuuya knows for sure that he’s doing the right thing for him here.
“O-Okay.”
“Okay,” Chuuya grins.
Tugging lightly on his hands, Chuuya guides his boyfriend carefully out of his seat as he stands up himself. The train rocks minutely beneath them, but one quick look outside the window affirms what he already knows; they’re sitting at the station, the engine winding down as they come to a complete stop. Atsushi seems a little unsure on his own feet, but Atsushi doesn’t even try to pull his hands back and Chuuya doesn’t let go, so he WILL be there to catch him if need be, height difference between them be damned. What is Tainted for if not holding up his boyfriend (lots of things, but nothing nearly as important nowadays)?
They didn’t bring any bags with them to Sagamigaoka, - it was a day to sightsee and get away from work, nothing more - so it’s easy enough to maneuver them both out of the narrow space behind the seats in front of them and into the aisle. It had been significantly more crowded when they’d boarded, and they’d taken the first available space right beside the closest doors. Atsushi allows himself to be led by both arms until Chuuya has no choice but to shift to holding only one hand so he can watch in front of him and get them outside without walking into fuck all. Atsushi doesn’t so much as make a sound in the entire seven seconds it takes to pass the threshold from the train car onto the platform, holding the hand Chuuya still offers in a vice-like grip that would probably hurt anyone else WITHOUT his experiences.
Unsurprisingly, the platform is abandoned on a weekday at this time of the night, so he doesn’t have to worry about Atsushi feeling suffocated out here, either. Thank fuck for Lady Luck.
“Wanna sit?” he asks easily, in the same moment that he hones in on the nearest bench sitting under the overhang beside the train line guide.
“Please,” Atsushi mumbles, and his wish becomes Chuuya’s command.
The fresh evening air is nothing short of wonderful, a cool but comfortable breeze rolling through Chuuya’s hair and ruffling the curls around the brim of his hat. It smells faintly of electric currents and steel, but not so much that it bothers his nose; he’s become accustomed to much worse than the usual train station air over the years. He glances back at Atsushi to find his face has, thankfully, relaxed in the still of the night, as well. Natural air works miracles for the mind, and Chuuya can appreciate that more than most people would probably expect from him.
He urges Atsushi to sit back down first, if only because he’s way too concerned that if he lets go for a second too long, Atsushi will collapse. Not like Atsushi is protesting at all, practically falling into the chipped paint and rusted metal of the bench seat with a very loud, very EXHAUSTED sigh. Chuuya snorts out a laugh that he didn’t know he had in him right now, and follows suit. He leans against the back all the way and as soon as his mandatory three seconds of fidgeting into the space is over with, Atsushi’s head finds his shoulder again.
“‘M sorry,” he sniffles, sounding utterly miserable. It makes Chuuya’s heart ache, and his blood boil.
He worms his arm up and around Atsushi’s shoulders to hug him securely into his side; to give Atsushi the space to hide away from the world if that’s what he wants. “What’d I say about apologizin’ for bein’ human? You know I ain’t mad at you, not for a damn minute,” and, okay, maybe it would sound harsh to anyone else, but in their little bubble, it’s how Chuuya shows he CARES, dammit. “I’d do whatever for you, so don’t go thinkin’ you did something you shouldn’t have.“
Atsushi clears his throat, burying his nose further into Chuuya’s jacket. “Sor- uh, I mean I-“ he huffs in annoyance, before sniffling again, like snot and grime is stuck in his nose with nowhere to go.
Chuuya chuckles under his breath. Old habits die hard, to be fair. As long as Atsushi knows he’s loved, dammit. “Yer safe here, beautiful,” he tries again. “If you gotta cry, don’t go forcin’ it down, either. I got ya, okay?”
“Don’t have to,” Atsushi responds too quickly. A beat passes and he clears his throat. “At least I don’t think so- just got startled I guess- but ‘m fine.”
Chuuya squeezes his arm tighter around his tiger until they’ve practically melded together, and dips his head to bury his nose in the mess of Atsushi’s hair.
He’s too well-trained in sniffing out lies, and understanding his boyfriend, to think that Atsushi is ‘just saying that’ to try to keep it down; if he was, Chuuya would know, because he knows Atsushi, and Atsushi is a terrible liar. Which is good, at least in moments like these, because it means that he’s doing better with this whole thing than it might look. That makes Chuuya feel leagues better and - more importantly - it tells him that Atsushi actually IS feeling ‘okay’, all things considered. That’s all that really matters to him.
That’s the thing about falling in love - well, in general he supposed - with someone as caring and gentle as Atsushi is. Atsushi is more than capable of holding his own, and Chuuya’s never once gotten that twisted. That fucking weretiger - Byakko, Atsushi calls her - is a force of goddamn nature, and Chuuya knows that she could probably tear HIM limb from limb if she ever wanted to. But that’s just it: Atsushi is mortified by the very IDEA that he COULD do that, and even more insistent that he would NEVER hurt Chuuya. And Chuuya believes him without needing to be told in the first place, because Atsushi’s ability and Atsushi’s personality are so fundamentally DIFFERENT that he can hardly stand to tear apart his enemies, let alone imagine hurting someone he cares about even by ACCIDENT.
Atsushi is the kind of person who holds the door open for forty people without ever expecting a ‘thank you’. He’s the kind of guy who offers his seat to literally anyone standing on the metro who so much as breathes in his direction. He’s the first to lend a hand when you ask and the last to go home when he’s done, he’s there when you’re hurting and he’s there even when you aren’t. He tries to help Chuuya carry groceries inside regardless of the fact that Tainted can handle them all at once just because it’s the polite thing to do. On the evenings they don’t spend together - which are few and far between these days, admittedly - he sends little messages wishing Chuuya goodnight and reminding him that he loves him. He wakes up in the morning when Chuuya has to leave earlier just for the chance to kiss him goodbye and wish him safety because he’s afraid that if he doesn’t, something horrible might happen to him on the job (which is not a totally unfounded fear, in the Port Mafia, regardless of Chuuya’s own capabilities).
There are countless reasons that Chuuya fell so deeply in love with him, but his kindness, his sweetness, is unparalleled by all. It makes the already primal urge to protect him - to keep him safe, to make sure that he’s alive, that he’s LOVED - overwhelmingly HERE. It means that, when Atsushi wakes up from a nightmare on the train twenty minutes away from Chuuya’s apartment, he’s there to chase the ghosts away until he’s physically out of breath, and nothing else matters until they’ve dissipated into indistinguishable clouds of fizzling steam.
Even if ‘nothing else’ is a sort-of-rotting old bench at Futamatagawa Station in the middle of the night on a Tuesday, when they both have work in the morning and they’ve been up since six already.
The train rumbles to life, working up to pull out of the station. Muffled voices of the intercom filter through the doors as they slide closed, but Chuuya pays them no mind.
“Was it anything new?” he ventures to ask as the moments begin to pass between them in quiet breaths.
Atsushi shakes his head against his shoulder without needing elaboration.
“The usual.”
The usual, meaning blood. A lot of blood. Yelling, just as much. Dark rooms and rattling chains. Tiny windows and brick walls. All of which Atsushi has told him about in great detail over time, through choking sobs and desperate pleas for the assurance of his safety. The orphanage director, - a man whose throat Chuuya would have slit a long time ago were it not for the fact that he was already dead - looming over him, berating him, beating him until it stings.
Chuuya bites down HARD on the inside of his mouth to stop that thought from going any further than it already has. If he starts to get angry about it now, he’d be hard pressed to stop it.
Atsushi doesn’t need that.
“Thank you,” Atsushi murmurs when Chuuya doesn’t immediately reply, and he feels his hand tugging lightly at the hem of Chuuya’s shirt. “You- you’re too good to me sometimes. Now we won’t get home until late.”
“Nonsense, there’s no such thing as too good for you. I’m givin’ you all the good you deserve to have,” Chuuya snorts without skipping a beat. “Don’t care about any ‘a that. I just care about you. Gotta admit though, I was a little freaked out when ya started twitchin’, ‘cuz I didn’t realize you were conked out like that,” he mumbles, muffled ever so slightly by Atsushi’s hair.
Atsushi’s jaw clicks like he’s about to say something, though Chuuya already has an idea what about.
“And don’t go apologizin’ for that, either. I’m always gonna worry about you,” he hastens to add before Atsushi can try to bring himself down like he has a terrible habit of doing. “That’s what happens when someone loves you.”
Atsushi’s mouth audibly clicks shut.
“And I love you. More than anything. I would bend the fuckin’ world for you, Atsushi. Don’t ever forget that,” he says a little louder, his voice dripping with a passion, a sincerity, that he wouldn’t be able to reign in even if he wanted to.
(He doesn’t want to. Not now, not ever, not for Atsushi, where it’s more real than anything else he’s ever meant in his entire life.)
His breath catches in his throat akin to an aborted gasp, and he finally allows himself to melt fully into the safety of Chuuya’s embrace. It’s like a blessing, being allowed to hold Atsushi like this, despite all of the blood, the loss, staining his fingers. And hell, he’ll be damned foolish if he ever lets this go for even a second.
“Love you too, Chuu,” Atsushi whispers like it’s a precious secret meant only for them. “I’ll never forget. It’s impossible. Love you too much.”
Chuuya grins into his hair, pursing his lips at the same time and pressing them gently against the top of his head in a perfectly soft, perfectly present kiss. He lets it linger, keeps his lips ever so slightly parted to breathe in the lingering lavender shampoo that he borrows from Chuuya’s shower. He lets it stay for as long as he’s damn well allowed, and Atsushi noses at his throat in some appropriately cat-like equivalent in which Chuuya relishes the contact.
The train rumbles entirely to life as it begins to pull away from the station, and while the absence leaves them alone in the warmth and darkness of the quiet platform, half-past eleven and huddled together on the world’s least comfortable bench, Chuuya can’t help but feel grateful that he doesn’t dream.
That’s how he knows for sure that this is real, that this is THEIRS, and he wouldn’t have it any other fuckin’ way.