Chapter Text
Osamu is five when he meets a boy who makes the sunbeams dance when he laughs.
It’s a sunny Saturday morning. Osamu has commandeered the sandbox all to himself, where he’s building the most majestic sand castle known to man. All of the other kids have left him be—as they should, because they suck at following orders and they keep messing his castle up, and they’re so stupid Osamu doesn’t want to deal with them at all.
Hirotsu-san keeps telling him it’s not nice to call other people stupid—but they really are, and it’s not Osamu’s fault he doesn’t like them when they’re just so… unlikeable.
Different people see the world differently, is what Hirotsu-san would always tell him, but like what Osamu always answers: what if they’re wrong?
No one is right all the time. Hirotsu-san would say, then squeeze his shoulder. But that didn’t really… explain anything, did it?
Osamu somewhat understands that he’s not always right, that he won’t always be right—he just thinks that everyone else is more likely to be wrong, that’s all.
He sprinkles a little bit more water to his mound of sand, lips pursing in concentration so the wetness will be just right. But he gets distracted, and accidentally upends his small cup of water because of a loud burst of laughter that reaches his ears. He huffs in annoyance and looks around for the culprit.
There’s a new boy in the playground, and he’s wearing the stupidest white hat Osamu has ever seen. It has a pink band around it, and it matches his stupid rich kid outfit too. He looks stupidly delighted at being handed the inflatable ball the other kids are playing with.
What’s so fun about tossing a ball anyway? The ball goes up, then it goes down. Boring.
Osamu doesn’t get the appeal at all.
It’s only because he’s already looking that Osamu notices.
The new kid seems to… shine brighter? He’s really brighter than the other kids. It’s so weird. Like the sun, while shining bright in the sky, is shining specifically down on him. It’s not super visible—it’s not like everyone else is shadowed in comparison. His hair just looks weirdly lighter and the metal buckle on his belt—seriously, who wears a belt to the playground?—nearly blinds Osamu from how strong the light bounces from it.
Bright is such a weird word. A person doesn’t shine bright.
(Illuminated. That’s the word he learns two years later, and that’s the word he’s been looking for.)
Osamu scoops more sand from behind him to fix his too-wet mound. He looks up again at the sound of that laughter coming nearer.
The ball is flying towards him.
White hat boy almost catches it with his outstretched hands, but he trips and falls down—his wrist accidentally hits the ball, and it bounces straight towards Osamu’s castle.
(It’s funny—whenever Osamu looks back to this moment years later, the most vivid part of his memory are the gleaming dust motes surrounding this overly-enthusiastic boy as he runs near.)
There’s a giant, neon green ball sitting where his creation used to be and Osamu wants to cry.
He sees a shadow move closer from the corner of his eye, and its owner kneels down just outside of the sandbox. Small hands remove the ball carefully and set it aside.
“I’m sorry,” says a small voice. “I’ll help—”
“You ruined it!”, Osamu yells, his voice breaking. He’s been working on that sand castle all morning, and he has to go home for lunch in half an hour so now it won’t be finished, ever, and all his hard work was for nothing.
The other boy looks like he’s about to cry too, with the way he’s swallowing back those tears that keep forming in his eyes. He shifts back into his heels and hugs his knees as though making himself into a small ball.
Good, Osamu thinks. He should feel guilty, because Osamu worked so hard.
(This is the other part Osamu clearly remembers, how after all these years, his friend still reacts the same way: he’ll hunch into himself in his attempts to keep his emotions on hold, becoming too quiet when he’s truly, heartbreakingly remorseful over something, over anything. It will always unsettle Osamu, to no fail.)
The light around them gets dimmer, and Osamu looks up to see clouds forming overhead.
“Great, now it looks like it’s going to rain and I’ll have to wait another week to finish my castle and it’s all your fault!”
“I said I’ll help you finish it!” The boy yells back at him just as loud.
No one has ever talked back at him before and it stuns Osamu into being quiet.
The boy stands up, visibly taking deep, heavy breaths while angrily wiping his tears away. Without care for his fancy clothes, he steps into the sandbox and forcibly shoves Osamu to make some room for himself in front of the ruined castle.
“HEY,” Osamu angrily protests as his shoulder almost hits the sand. He scoots to the side against his will, resentful at how the boy starts touching his toys without his permission.
“I didn’t say you could sit here and join me!”
The boy ignores him and instead inspects the various sizes of the plastic cups around them before he settles on one. He holds out the chosen cup at Osamu and waves it almost threateningly.
“I need water, the sand's too dry.”
“The fountain’s over there. Go get your own water.” Osamu points to the other side of the playground while scowling at the other boy. His fingers itch to grab all his toys away from the boy’s reach.
“But there’s a full bucket beside you,” the boy says, puzzled.
“So??? I’m not sharing my water with stupid people.”
The boy frowns back at him, then does the unthinkable: he lets go of the cup to grab Osamu’s plastic shovel and hits Osamu on the shoulder.
“OW! What did you do that for?!?!”
“Don’t say the word ‘stupid’, it’s bad.”
“I don’t care! You ruined my castle and now you want to take my water, you’re stupid, just go away!”
The boy hits him with the shovel, again and yells back even much louder than before. “I said stop calling people stupid! It’s not nice, it’s mean, and it hurts people’s feelings! That’s why no one wants to talk to you!”
He punches the sand with the shovel in anger, sending some of the dirt flying. Osamu can only stare at him with wide eyes. Why is he so angry when it’s Osamu who’s the clear victim here?
“I said I’ll help you and I’m trying to be your friend but I don’t like mean people, so stop it already!”
The boy continues to glower at Osamu with his bright blue eyes. The sun remains in the sky, but already Osamu can hear the distant rumbling of thunder, which means that anytime soon, Hirotsu-san will arrive to pick him up.
Why is this boy trying so hard to make friends with him anyway?
Osamu thinks friends are annoying. They just keep disturbing his space and keep on saying stupid things and then they get angry. And then they leave. They always leave. Whether it’s those fake friends in daycare or his parents—they always leave.
Well, there’s Hirotsu-san, but Osamu doesn’t think he counts when it’s his job to stay.
Because really, no one is ever patient enough to deal with Osamu, and he got used to them giving up on him quickly enough.
Osamu kinda wants to cry when he thinks too much about it.
Which is why he doesn’t—he doesn’t think about it at all.
Sniffling, Osamu takes the fallen cup and fills it with water from his bucket. He holds it out without looking at the other boy. He hits really hard with a shovel, so Osamu has no choice but to tolerate him for now.
They won’t talk again after today anyway.
“Your clothes are stu—I don’t like your clothes.” Osamu changes his words, because the boy won’t stop waving the shovel threateningly at him.
“My grandma bought them for me, and we visited her at the hospital before coming here. They’re kinda tight but I don’t mind.” He scoops up a pile of sand and tries to dump the sand inside one of the cups. More than half of the contents miss the brim.
How stu—he’s so bad at this.
I don’t like mean people, so stop it already!
There’s a confusing lump in his throat that Osamu swallows down. He focuses on filling his own cup with sand and packs it tight. The other boy leans forward to watch what Osamu is doing.
“My name’s Chuuya. Nakahara Chuuya. What’s yours?”
“Dazai Osamu.”
“Osamu. Okay.” Chuuya nods to himself as if he’s committing Osamu’s name to memory. All the clouds have disappeared again, the sun blinding in its brightness.
“What’s this?” A stubby finger points to the bandage on Osamu’s cheek, Chuuya looking very curious but he makes sure not to touch it.
“I fell down the stairs.” More like pushed—accidentally maybe, but still pushed—but no one likes hearing that answer. Or any answer similar to that, so Osamu learned how to lie every time someone asks.
“Oh. That sucks. Here.” Chuuya takes out a piece of candy from his pocket and holds it out to Osamu. He recognizes the brand immediately; Hirotsu-san would sneak one little piece for him whenever his mom wasn’t looking. He knows that flavour: it’s like a milky kind of grape and it’s too sweet and tastes so disgusting.
Osamu takes the candy and pops it into his mouth without saying thank you.
They never get the chance to finish that castle. A nanny arrives for Chuuya, and Hirotsu-san appears soon after.
Then the rains keep falling unceasingly during Saturday mornings with no fail for months, and Osamu isn’t allowed again to go to the playground.
But despite all that, Chuuya doesn’t disappear and leave him, like what Osamu expected. He finds out Chuuya lives only a few houses away. He finds out they share kindergarten school, when Chuuya suddenly plops on the cushion beside him in class.
No one had really sat beside him before. That’s new.
Chuuya still yells at Osamu when he’s being mean. He still hits Osamu on the shoulder whenever he doesn’t listen to Chuuya. He drags Osamu to have snacks with the other kids, and strangely knows when not to insist because Osamu needs to be alone.
He’s still there, being Osamu’s friend no matter how much Osamu makes it purposely annoying to be around him.
But, to be honest? Despite Chuuya being really nice and insistent, Osamu still isn’t sure he wants them to be friends.
Because Chuuya... still shines??? He shines brighter than everyone else sometimes—too bright if anyone asks Osamu—it’s so distracting. It’s so weird. Osamu thought he was seeing things back in the playground a few weeks ago, but—Chuuya really… does that.
Who even does that?
And what’s weirder is that no one else really notices how his yells always bring dark clouds and winds and thunder even!
Wasn’t there one time when he rushed that big boy who shoved their classmate until she fell and the sky suddenly got so angry and loud they all thought something had exploded?
They even had a lesson about thunderstorms that afternoon because of it.
Osamu finds Chuuya so confusing.
He doesn’t know what to do about it.
Should he ask someone?
He can’t ask his parents; they don’t like it whenever he asks anything.
He can’t ask Chuuya either, Osamu will just sound stu—Chuuya will just laugh at him for asking a really silly question.
Maybe he’ll ask Hirotsu-san.
Or maybe not.
What is he even going to say anyway?
It was dark and gloomy and raining and Chuuya was playing in the puddle and he almost slipped but it just made him laugh which made the sun come out to shine down on him do you know what it means?
Osamu will just—maybe he’ll make a list. Not a written one—no, mother checks all his notebooks regularly.
He’ll write down a list of things about Chuuya—a list that will have all the weird things that happen around him. Everything that Osamu observes. He’s really good at that, watching and observing people.
Like how it can be the cloudiest day but whenever Chuuya laughs a beam of light would shine down on his hair. Or how a drizzle started when he dropped his ice cream, and it only stopped when Osamu found enough coins to buy him another cone.
Osamu will keep all these—and more—locked inside his head. He’ll keep it a secret and he won’t tell any of the other kids because they always talk too much, and he won’t tell any adults either because they’re tricky.
Even Hirotsu-san could be tricked by other adults, and it just makes him look sad when that happens. Osamu doesn’t want him to be sad.
So he’ll just keep quiet and say nothing.
He’ll focus on building his list, and say nothing.
For now.