Shizaya week day 3 prompt! Day 3's prompt was Regret. This is a bit late, because my Friday's are always hectic, and I didn't have a chance to work on this until really late, and I just finished this.

This has post-Ketsu spoilers, in a sense, though it is a canon divergence. That being said, if the ending of Ketsu fucked you up - or if you haven't gotten to the end of Ketsu, please don't read, or at least be warned for spoilers ahead.

Disclaimer: I don't own Durarara

Words Unspoken

Sometimes, the words you don't say are the ones you regret the most. AU - Canon Divergence

"So, ah, this is where you've been." The words fumble awkwardly out of his mouth, but Shizuo feels like he has to say something. Anything. "Should've guessed a shitty flea like you would've been hiding all this time right under my nose like this."

As expected, Izaya says nothing. Shizuo keeps talking, because he doesn't want the silence to linger.

"Everyone's been wondering where you went," He desperately wants a cigarette, craves the nicotine to help him through this situation, but he can't around Izaya. Even if he never liked the bastard, Shizuo isn't about to light up in the middle of a conversation. "Well, had been, anyways. I suppose everyone knows now."

"Man," He grumbles, more of an aside to himself than to Izaya, "I don't want to deal with your sisters because of this, you shitty louse."

Shizuo sighs, kicking a shoe against the ground as he turns his gaze towards the sky. Clouds are drifting lazily, and it's a rather warm day. Stony silence surrounds them.

"I think…" Shizuo starts, "That this is where I'm supposed to say I'm sorry. But I've never liked lying, so I can't say that. Because I'm not sorry, not completely."

"Look," He presses the heel of his hand against his forehead, frustrated beyond belief, but he can't let himself get too riled up. Not here. "This never would have happened if it wasn't for your shitty personality, got that? If it wasn't for you pushing me, I would have never snapped like that, and you never would have –" He stops himself, breaking away into quiet murmurings of "Stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid," pounding his heel against his forehead.

Izaya doesn't stop him, only waits until Shizuo is done.

"I hate this silence of yours," Shizuo tries not to snarl once he's stopped berating himself. "You were so chatty, that I can't believe anything ever made you shut up like this." Shaking his head in disbelief, Shizuo scolds himself, "God, I can't believe I miss you talking."

Silence, like always, is Izaya's response.

"Shinra's still insisting that we would've been great friends had we gotten along when he first introduced us." Changing the subject, because he feels like he's getting nowhere and Shizuo doesn't know what else to say. "I think he feels guilty." He hesitates for a moment, before admitting, "Maybe I do too."

"I mean," Shizuo's fumbling for words again, not sure how to phrase what he wants to say. "I've always hated this strength of mine. I've made it clear time after time after time and yet you still pushed me into using it and look where it got you."

He's pretty sure Izaya understands perfectly well where it got him.

"I think I might feel bad about it," Shizuo looks anywhere but Izaya. "Not about what I did before – okay, I guess I do, because I never thought I'd do something like this with my strength – but what I did when we first met. I think I regret sizing you up too quickly. Judging you from my first impression, instead of attempting to get to know you better."

"Shinra… the other day, he was talking," Shizuo doesn't know why he's ratting Shinra out like this, but it's not like Izaya will be able to do anything to the perverted doctor. Not like he used to. "He said that you liked me. Like, in the romantic sense of things. I mean, everyone would say that about us, but Shinra said that you actually did. That you'd had a crush on me since high school, and the only reason why you did all that shitty crap to me was because you didn't want to be rejected. So you made it so I would never like you that way you would never have to deal with your feelings."

He wants to believe that the silence settling around them is one of mortification, of Izaya being embarrassed of having been found out. Maybe it is – Shizuo will never know for certain, after all.

"You're a real asshole, you know," He says instead. "A coward, thinking that how you acted is how someone's supposed to deal with emotions." Shizuo gives a harsh laugh. "And you called me the monster – you're the one who never understood human emotions, choosing to run away from them instead."

Because that was what the asshole always did – ran away. He ran away from Shizuo, he ran away from his problems, he ran away from everything, that way he didn't have to face whatever he was afraid of.

"Look," He's embarrassed to go on, a hand on the back of his head as he tries to figure out how to string together his words. There's supposed to be some sort of catharsis in telling Izaya everything, that's what Celty had told him, but all Shizuo feels is nausea. "I guess, I mean, what I want to say is – I might have liked you. Too. In the, you know, romantic sense or whatever. Like you, I think. Which is why I regret immediately judging you as a bad person because – well, you know. Things might have been different. Would have been different. Maybe."

Shizuo can hear Izaya's rebuttal echoing in his head as if the man himself is saying the words,

My, how eloquent of you Shizu-chan. Tell me, do you confess to all your imaginary girlfriends this way, or am I just special?

And things, between us? Be different? Just from one meaningless meeting, one meaningless confession? Do you really think that? Be honest, Shizu-chan.

He does, honestly. Think that things would have been different, if only slightly.

"You were always an asshole," Shizuo reiterates, if only to make sure Izaya knows that even after he just finished confessing. "But, maybe, not as much as everyone thought. Or something."

He kicks the ground, sending up clods of dirt, disrupting the roots of new grass.

"God, I need a cigarette." Shizuo's fingers twitch towards the pocket where his smokes lie, but doesn't move further than that.

"You were a pain," He says once his urge for nicotine has been willed away. "And I think I might have liked you, in both senses, I guess, and I do think that even though I might have liked you that you deserved at least some of what you got handed to you. But," Shizuo leans down, and sets the bouquet of flowers he's been holding the entire time down in front of Izaya, making the eye contact he's been afraid of making this entire time.

They're lilies, what Shinra told him was the louse's favorite kind.

(Oh, the irony in retrospect, the painful, painful irony.)

"Even I don't think you deserved to die."

And he turns away from the gravestone, making his way back to his apartment.


Sorry? Ahaha, please read and review.