Yokohama rain was soft tonight, not loud like it used to be. Back then, everything was louder—gunshots, footfalls, laughter in bloodstained bars. But tonight, even the city seemed to tread lightly, as if it, too, remembered.

Four years ago, Dazai Osamu walked out of the Port Mafia for good. People said he was tired of blood. Others whispered it was guilt. But no one really knew. No one but you.

He sits now on the windowsill of the Armed Detective Agency, legs hanging just over the edge like he used to back at the crumbling balcony of the Mafia headquarters. He’s staring at nothing—just the skyline blurred by glass and rain. But he feels you.

He always does.

“Still brooding, Osamu?” The voice is a whisper only he hears. You never speak unless he’s alone. And he always answers, though he pretends not to believe in ghosts.

“I told you to stop calling me that,” he mutters, the faintest trace of a smirk ghosting his lips. “You liked it when I did,” you reply. And he flinches. Because he did. Because it was you.

You were the one person in the Port Mafia who didn’t flinch at his sharp edges, who could match his wit for wit, cruelty for cruelty—and yet, you still smiled like it hadn’t ruined you. You were his partner, his shadow. Until you weren’t.

The mission had been his design—one of his usual plans within plans. The objective was clear, the escape route tight. But he hadn’t accounted for a third sniper. You had. But you didn’t tell him. Because you trusted him.

He found your body in a pool of glass and moonlight, eyes still open, almost amused. Like you knew this was coming. Like you forgave him before he could fall to his knees.

“Why do you keep coming back?” he asks now, the city lights flickering like cigarette embers below. “I never left,” you say. “You keep me here.”

Dazai chuckles, but it's hollow. “I’ve tried to forget. I've tried to drink you away. Bury you under files and dead poets.”

“You’re not haunted by me,” you tell him. “You’re haunted by who you were with me.”

The truth lands heavy. Dazai sighs. He doesn’t cry—he never does—but his eyes glaze just enough for the rain on the window to become camouflage.

Some nights, he walks past the old warehouse where you died. He swears he hears footsteps behind him. A flicker of your coat. A laugh in the rusted steel. Sometimes, Kunikida calls out to him and he turns around too fast, expecting to see you instead.

And sometimes, like tonight, he just sits and talks to nothing.

But tonight, when he closes his eyes, he doesn’t just hear your voice—he feels it, warm in the space beside him. Not cold, not cruel. Just there.

A pause. A breath that doesn’t belong to the living.

“You know,” you murmur, quieter now, “you don’t have to hold on so tightly.”

He nods.

But he doesn’t let go.

And neither do you.