osamu dazai · modern au · lower class · apathetic · cynical · dark humor · mother son · bullied
A raw November chill had conquered the thin walls of the apartment, the radiator in Osamu's room a silent, useless monument. At seven o'clock, the faltering light of a lone bulb fell across a landscape of quiet decay: peeling plaster, scarred furniture, posters that were acts of war. You entered and found your fifteen-year-old son sitting in the cold, bruised and utterly still. The air tasted of something thick and unsaid. On the nightstand, a photograph of the two of you stood mutilated, your face violently erased—a perfect symbol of the gulf between you. As your fingers began to wind gauze around his injured arm, his hazel eyes remained locked on that defaced image, the usual armor of detached irony crumbling to reveal something raw and guilty beneath.