#tachihara atsushi friendship...... can anyone hear me!!!!

[zukkaoru]

any character(s):

The sun does nothing to light [character name]'s way.

The sun does nothing to light Tachihara’s way. Nothing does anymore, not when his world has been doused in darkness twice over and he’s sunk himself into it instead of clinging to the light he was offered.

The Hunting Dogs offered to let him rejoin even after his betrayal, and their doctors said surgery could fix his vision. The mafia doctors said glasses would help since his vision isn’t gone entirely and offered to set him up an appointment with a trusted eye doctor. But Tachihara turned everything down.

He wears sunglasses, and he carries a red-tipped cane from Jouno, and he’s technically still mafia even though he can’t really do anything. His blood runs darker than the world around him, and it’s the life he chose for himself.

He doesn’t know why, really. No one in the mafia is there by choice.

Except for him.

But he found something in the mafia that he has yet to find anywhere else, and he was so desperate to cling to it that he allowed himself to be absorbed by the darkness entirely. He doesn’t deserve the family and friends he found. He doesn’t deserve their support or concern. But he doesn’t deserve it from the Hunting Dogs either. He doesn’t—

His cane bumps into something—someone’s foot, he thinks, and he freezes.

“Oh!” A vaguely familiar voice exclaims. “Sorry, sorry, I wasn’t paying attention to where I was going.” The foot moves. “It’s Tachihara-san, right?”

Tachihara nods slowly. He angles his face towards the voice. “You’ll have to excuse me for not recognizing you based off voice alone.”

“Oh! Of course, sorry, my bad! It’s Atsushi, from the Agency. We haven’t really talked much.”

“Right. The weretiger.”

“Can I help you with anything?”

“No,” Tachihara answers too quickly. But he is actually sort of lost, and technically the mafia and Agency still have some sort of truce, and Atsushi doesn’t seem to be acting openly hostile right now. So he sighs, and he backtracks. “Actually…I don’t…entirely know where I’m at. So, um…maybe directions would be nice?”

“Sure!” He can’t see Atsushi’s expression, but he can hear the smile in his voice. He relaxes, marginally.

It’s been a while since someone has been so friendly towards him.