Chapter Text
"Come onnnnnn,"
Chuuya Nakahara groaned at the time on his phone. He only had ten minutes until his first class started and since it was the first day of his year at university he did not want to start it off by being that kid. That was not a great way to start off his university career, it was a terrible first impression. Unfortunately, he had agreed to wait for his friend, who was late. Tachihara was that kid. Even more unfortunately, the two have been friends ever since they were children so Chuuya was stuck with his fellow redhead.
Chuuya tapped his foot impatiently on the ground.
Another minute and he leaves.
He kept an eye out on passer-by's in hope he'd see Tachihara approach. Nothing. That useless- he took a deep breath, like his therapist told him. Chuuya would be having words with him when he arrived.
Despite what all his friends, his sister, his dads and his therapist all say Nakahara Chuuya does not have anger issues. He does not, sometimes he gets annoyed and sometimes he punches people, but they always deserve it!!
What did catch his attention was a tall brunette walking by while reading. How he managed to navigate his way through the corridor with his face buried in a book Chuuya had no idea. The brunette walked passed Chuuya and made his way up the stairs.
Chuuya shrugged, maybe he was busy with some kind of project over the summer. He knew the feeling of leaving it all the the last minute an rushing to get it done. Can’t say he’s ever done it on the way to class though.
Chuuya resumed searching around the hallways. Still no sign of Tachihara. When that idiot does appear Chuuya will give him a punch.
"Ah."
It was a quiet sound. If Chuuya didn't have such good hearing he would've missed it easily, especially in the busy hallway but when he turned to see where the noise came from he saw the brunette falling.
Without thinking Chuuya lunged, he reached out and used his body to shield the stranger from the floor.
They both went tumbling down. Judging from the others size Chuuya expected it to hurt more, but the other barely weighed anything. Like he was nothing but skin and bones, but bones that don’t weigh anything. Weightless bones, was that a thing?
"Hey! Are you alright!" Chuuya demanded as soon as he was thinking clearly.
"My book," the other mumbled. "Is my book alright?" He jumped off Chuuya and reached for the book. All the redhead could do was gape in astonishment.
Who falls down the stairs and their first priority is ensuring their book is okay? What the fuck?!
"Ah thank god, it's fine," Chuuya was still staring at the man still not believing his ears. Did the fall cause him to lose brain cells or was he always deficient in them. "Did you save me?"
He turned around and Chuuya saw his face.
Fuck. He was the prettiest person Chuuya had ever seen, a literal angel. With soft brown hair that curled around his cheeks and honey brown eyes with long lashes. He had a perfect nose and lips that were so kissable.
Now Chuuya was staring for another reason. He wondered how he would look under him-
Nope! Not going there!
"Thank you," he smiled at Chuuya and the redhead nearly went into cardiac arrest. "I need to be going then,"
He bowed again, completely oblivious to Chuuya’s mental distress, and then picked up a pair of round glasses Chuuya hadn't noticed before and made his way up the stairs again. This time paying attention to where he was stepping.
Chuuya was aware he was blushing (could he even call this blushing? He felt like his face was on fire. Was he about to engage in spontaneous human combustion???) but who could blame him. The brunette was gorgeous!
"Chuuya?" A voice called out. "Why are you on the floor?" Tachihara questioned glancing down at his friend confused.
"None of your business!" He snapped before jumping up. Tachihara was here, he’d been waiting for him to get to class. Right. Class. "And you! Where the hell have you been?"
"Eh... oh no we're going to be late..." Tachihara said before running off.
"Oi! Come back here!" Chuuya screamed chasing after his long time friend.
.....
After their first lecture Tachihara looked like he was ready to start crying. Chuuya patted his back sympathetically.
"Take physics they said," he mumbled into the table where he had face planted as soon as the lecture was over. "It will be fine they said, they clearly didn't take into account my lack of brain cells!"
"Well, they say the first step is acceptance, maybe now you'll actually study hard," Chuuya raised his eyebrows at his fellow ginger who seemed to deflate even more at that idea.
"Urghhhh! Stooooppppp!" Tachihara complained.
Chuuya snickered.
....
A few days since the start of university Chuuya had grown used to his classes, the campus and the obsessive thoughts of the brunette he can't seem to get out of his head.
Okay. Maybe he wasn't completely used to the thought but he'd get used to them. It's not like he'd seen the guy since the first day of school.
"I've never been to a library before," Tachihara grinned like it was a brag.
"Don't be proud of that imbecile," Akutagawa spat out. He then turned to Chuuya. "I'm surprised you haven't been yet, Chuuya,"
Ah. There was the classic Akutagawa Ryuunosuke judgementTM.
"I haven't had a chance yet, jeez," Chuuya rolled his eyes at his friend, quite frankly a little insulted he was being lumped in with Tachihara. "Besides not everyone is a literature student like you, we don't all live in libraries,"
"If you think I'm bad you should see some of the others in my course," this made Chuuya think of the brunette with his face in a book. "Speak of the devil, there's the absolute worst bookworm I've ever seen,"
"Huh?" Chuuya followed where Akutagawa was indicating to and then he saw him. (Cue the shoujo sparkles.)
He was reading peacefully in the corner of the room. Completely oblivious to his surroundings as though they didn't exist. Long eyelashes fluttering as he gazed intently down at his book. God. Chuuya wanted him to look at him like that.
He wanted him to look down at him as he told Chuuya he was doing such a good job and-
Seriously. That’s enough of that.
"Dazai-san is a real genius, it's only been a few days but everyone can tell. He doesn't talk to anyone and he's always reading," Akutagawa informed Chuuya.
"Dazai?" Chuuya repeated, liking the sound of it on his lips, now there was something else he wanted on his- seriously brain stop.
"Dazai Osamu," Akutagawa informed him.
"Oh! I know him," Tachihara said which surprised Chuuya. How did his idiot friend know some literary genius? "I heard some girls gossiping, apparently there's some kind of tie between who the hottest freshmen is,"
"And one of them is Dazai-san?" Akutagawa scoffed at the ridiculousness of such a ranking.
"Yup, and he's tied with Chuuya here,"
"Hah? Me?"
"Of course, have you seen a mirror," Tachihara nodded his head.
"Ridiculous, come on let's sit down," Akutagawa marched over to a spare table Chuuya and Tachihara following like lost puppies.
Chuuya didn't get much studying done that day though.
He spent most of his time staring at Dazai. Why was he so pretty?
Urgh. He hasn't even really spoken to the guy and he was already screwed!!
(Dazai noticed the pretty redhead who had saved him on the stairs last week staring and he found his cheeks heating up but he refused to look up from his book.)