The rooftop wasn’t special—cracked concrete, rusted railing, and the occasional graffiti scrawl that someone tried too hard to make poetic. But it was high enough that the noise of the world thinned out, and that was enough for Dazai and Chuuya.

They weren't friends. Not even close. Dazai was the guy people whispered about in the halls, the one with bandages on his arms and too many jokes about death to be funny. Chuuya was all fury and fists, a short-tempered storm in a school uniform, always one misstep from detention—or worse. They had no reason to talk, no common ground. And yet, somehow, they ended up here, together, almost every afternoon after class.

It started with silence. Dazai showed up first, throwing himself onto the rooftop bench like he had nothing better to do. Chuuya came a few days later, pissed off and needing a place to breathe that didn’t smell like cheap cologne and crowded classrooms. They didn’t talk much, not at first. A grunt, a sigh, a muttered curse. But over time, it turned into something else.

Not friendship. They didn’t want that. Friendship could rot and break and leave you worse than before. But this—whatever it was—felt safer. There were no expectations, no pressure to be okay. Dazai could talk about the emptiness that curled around his ribs without watching for pity. Chuuya could rage about everything and nothing, and no one told him to calm down.

Maybe it wasn’t much. But in a world where they felt like too much or not enough, it was something.

And they told themselves it meant nothing. Because if it meant nothing, then it couldn't be taken away.

Right?