The cruel being that is Izaya Orihara never deserved a happy ending. Going all the way back to childhood, nothing had ever worked out in my favor. From parents with a work ethic that outweighed their love for their young son and newborn twin daughters, to unrequited love in high-school and even sexual abuse at the cusp of adulthood, it seemed like I would never get a break. Though, sadly, that's how I came to deem my worth. I was worth lies and secrets; Gathering information for nefarious men for even more nefarious deeds. I'd found my niche there, sinking into a trench filled with the most toxic people in the most toxic environment. Maybe it was my own doing, a bad decision in high-school turned full time underground career, or maybe, it was fate.

Wiping the accumulating tears in my eyes, I gazed at my bedroom ceiling. After hearing Shizuo admit to me so honestly that he could be in love of all things, I'd retreated into my bedroom, locking the door and encasing myself within a cocoon of duvet covers and fancy silk sheets. I didn't want to think about things like love, especially with every 'what if', 'why', and 'how' that came from being the monster's person of interest. I'd never been anyone's crush; I'd never even been anyone's boyfriend! How was I expected to deal with a confession from the Prince of Destruction? I'd never imagined falling in love, let alone be it with him, so how was I supposed to act in the face of such atrocity? 

I just had to settle in with the fact I was disintegrating. The faceless mask of Izaya, the amazing informant for Shiki Haruya, was slowly falling from my face, exposing the quiet and loveless boy within. I was shedding my exterior, unwillingly letting go of the facade I had put up for nearly 10 years. It was pitiful and horrifying all the same. After pretending to be unfeeling and cold, manipulative and cunning, sociopathic and unforgiving, I had come to believe these were truly my personality traits. Now, when all I was left with were my true thoughts and feelings, I felt anxious and alien in my own skin.

"Izaya," Shizuo's muffled voice called through my bedroom door, "You're acting like a spoiled child,"

I scoffed, "Childish? You think someone who grew up both without a concept of love and with multiple rejections of love is acting like a spoiled child for finding it daunting? You've got to be fucking kidding me,"

I could hear Shizuo shuffling from the other side of the door, weight shifting uncomfortably between his two legs. "I love you. What is so fucking daunting about that? Do you still not trust me? How many times have I kissed you now, or held you protectively against me? Do you really think I'm that much of an dishonest asshole?"

Sitting up pin-straight I glowered at the door. I'd thought in the past he'd definitively earned the crude nickname protozoan, but right in this very moment, he'd never fit the bill more. Sure, I was paranoid about his sudden attitude change towards me, my brain still trying to comprehend the lips of someone who'd tried to kill me enveloping me with such affectionate warmth. This whole situation was uncharted territory for me, there was no reason to crucify me for being careful. I didn't believe in love.

Rising from my spot entangled in my sheets, I stomped over to my bedroom door and swung it open, slamming it into my desk with enough force to send my pencil cup sideways, knocking all my writing utensils straight to the floor. Glaring a hole through Shizuo, I crossed my arms over my chest. "Why?"

"Why what?" He sighed, annoyance barely contained.

"Why me? Why do you love me specifically? You have plenty of less problematic people in your life to consider as potential mates, so why me?" My gaze didn't waver, the ironclad stare hoping to draw the truth that I needed to hear from him.

He exhaled heavily through his nose, leaning his weight against my door frame, "There isn't a reason Izaya," I nearly slammed my door in his face, his monstrous strength the only thing keeping it from shutting me away from him once again, "Will you listen to me for two fucking seconds you prima-donna?  There isn't one serious answer I can give you alright? I spent years of my life wishing you were dead, hoping one day I'd read in a newspaper that you'd finally gotten what you deserved. You know why? Because you thought it was so fucking important to be a sarcastic temperamental asshole to every single person you came into contact with. I didn't know you had any shred of humanity in you. To me you were a lowly disgusting flea. Then a week ago I find myself in Shinra's apartment after being jumped by some gang members, who I assumed you sent on me, hearing you give your own fucking eulogy over the phone," Shizuo paused, breath heavy as he watched as I took in all the details of his exasperated explanation.

"I didn't think about the reason why I was doing it Izaya, I just took off in a dead sprint. When I was dangling you off that rooftop trying to pull you up, I wasn't reasoning with myself. I wasn't working through my head why it was a good or a bad idea, I just fucking did it. Not everything needs to be so goddamn analytical. Sometimes people don't listen to their brains," Shizuo paused again, looking directly into my wide eyes this time, "They listen to their hearts. And that's exactly what I did. Some sentimental and stupid part of me didn't like seeing you in such a pathetic state. I hated it. Deep inside me it physically hurt to see you suffer- every cell in my body screamed to do something, anything, to make you better. Even if I don't know what love really is in essence, considering I've never been in love, I consider these feelings to be just that. An overwhelming feeling to protect, to shield and to care for, that is what my love is for you. No reason behind it. It's just something I feel for you. Something I've never felt before,"

I stood in absolute astonishment, his words hitting me like a freight train. Truly when I'd asked, I hadn't expected an answer at all. I'd anticipated his protozoic annoyance to take over and render him a confrontational idiot like I'd always known him to be. I certainly didn't expect a well thought out and sentimental explanation of his actions. My heart burned in my chest, now even more conflicted than it was before.

I'd known that over this last week spent with Shizuo I'd awakened some idiotic selfish desire within myself, but whether that was 'love' or not, I wasn't sure. I'd only felt two kinds of love in my life. One, the love from my parents I'd so craved, a feeling so raw and painful when it was denied over and over again that it sent me into an almost mute state for years after, and two, the love from my first crush, a pain so agonizing and revolting- a clawing selfish infatuated and jealous tide that plagued me enough to attempt to take my own life, had been all I ever had known of love. Though compared to both these instances, Shizuo was on a completely different plane.

Shizuo was warm. Everything about him was summery, whether it be his heart, his body, or his soul, all had seemed to exude that same infectious calidity. Perhaps that had been what had drawn me in; As my days got colder, my life outlook becoming more pessimistic and oblique, he'd seemed to shine through as my proverbial sun breaking through the storm-clouds. My paranoia at any possibly ulterior motives still threatened to outweigh all of my careful thinking, but the explanation that Shizuo gave seemed to have made so much sense in my mind that I wasn't sure if it was preventing me from being fearfully critical or if it was pushing me to see the truth that was in front of me this whole time; Shizuo was in love, and he was in love with me.

Snapping me out of my self-argumentative daze, Shizuo closed the distance between us, backing me up until the back of my knees were colliding with my bed-frame, my back hitting the mattress with a small thud as I fell backwards.

"What did I tell you about thinking too much? Radio silence Izaya. Over-thinking things is just going to put you in an even worse mood," Shizuo exhorted, the goading in his deep velvet voice making the hairs on my arms stand up, "Did you take nothing from what I've told you today? I love you and I want to protect you from all the bullshit your head keeps feeding you. Shut it off. Live in the moment here with me awhile, please?"

My face heated in defiance, fist colliding with the hard exterior of Shizuo's torso. Belligerent tears fell down my face in hurried droplets as I narrowed my eyes at him once again. "Is this what you want?" I cursed, voice coming out hoarse and weak, "You want to see all of my weaknesses? You want me to open up to you and spill my guts- to expose myself until theres nothing left? You want to see the uncensored unedited version of me? The weeping confused boy who wondered what he'd done to be shut out from any semblance of affection? Well you've got another thing fucking coming Shizuo Heiwajima because I am nobody's cry baby!" 

Disobeying my rant, my eyes continued to pour tears out even harder as shudders and sobs wracked my body. I slammed my palms against my eyes, both shielding my shameful appearance from Shizuo and hoping that the pressure on my weeping eyes would stall any further tears from leaking through. I felt absolutely abysmal; death right at this very second wouldn't even be a kindness, the embarrassment at wearing my heart on my sleeve was too great of a damage that had already been done. At this moment I found I couldn't hold the facade any longer, as I felt any pretense of who Izaya Orihara had formally been melt away under the honey eyes that seemed to unravel me so well. 

"Izaya, will you look at me?" Shizuo asked, gently moving my palms from shielding my vulnerability, "I'm not asking any of that from you. If you don't want to show me something, shit, fine, whatever, I'm cool with that. I'm never going to force you to do anything, especially when it has to do with you crying. Why would I want you to be a cry baby when just seeing you like this makes me want to beat the crap out of myself for not preventing it? Fuck Izaya, all I'm asking is for you to be yourself. That's all I want. How many times do I have to tell you I love you until you get it through your thick skull?"

"Never stop saying it," 

The words left my mouth before I could stop them, surprising even me when the weight of them settled into the atmosphere of the room. I hadn't meant to say them- I hadn't meant to say anything, my mind too consumed with mortification as I became a blubbering mess right in front of the protozoan to even formulate a sentence. Was this what Shizuo meant when he'd tried to explain that his affectionate actions towards me were thoughtless? Was I simply mimicking what I'd seem from Shizuo over this past week, or was that my heart saying what my brain could never?

"What?" Shizuo choked out, astounded almost beyond words that he'd heard me correctly.

Cheeks already feeling red hot as I was sure they were tinted a bright scarlet, I covered my face once more, hoping that hiding enough would shrink me away into nonexistence. Why was he doing this to me and how was he doing it? Were these really just grateful affectionate feelings, or was I falling into the love trap once again? If he ended up hurting me as Shinra had so coldly in the past, would I be able to recover this time? My psyche had weakened considerably over these barren toxic years, did I dare risk taking the chance knowing full well what the consequences could be?

"Are you serious?" I asked, voice barely above a whisper, "About love? About loving me?"

Without hesitation, Shizuo blurted, "Yes, absolutely!", before clearing his throat and regaining his composure once more. Settling his serious eyes on me, he elaborated, "I don't think there's really ever been anything I've been more sure about,"

Peeking through my fingers at him, I scoffed through my ceasing tears, "You're going to regret it,"

Leaning down and hovering his lips above mine, he let his hot breath ghost over my face, chuckling softly when I unconsciously bit my lip at the entrancing sight. "I'd like to find that out on my own Izaya. You never know until you try,"

Narrowing my eyes from behind the fingertips that barely covered my face anymore, I glanced between his intoxicating caramel gaze and the lips that hovered only centimeters above mine. "Oh? And how to you plan to try on an unwilling participant?" I weakly countered, his warmth and earthy tobacco scent already putting me under his spell.

Letting out a breathy chortle, his eyes lit up in amusement as I squirmed anxiously beneath him, "Just say the words Izaya, and I'm all yours,"

His words soaked into my skin starting a small fire within my chest. As if I was issued a challenge, I was tempted to take him up on it, my competitive nature almost being my downfall multiple times, but this time the stakes were too high; It would take a copious amount of convincing to even get a bet from my end. At least that's what I'd thought. As Shizuo leaned into me, strategic points of his solid long frame connecting with mine, my head started to spin. As his body melded with mine perfectly against the mattress, I was being coaxed further and further into taking the life-changing chance I'd been dreading since that insolent doctor ripped out my heart and stomped it into the ground.

Grabbing Shizuo by the collar of his shirt, I pressed my forehead against his. Closing my eyes and consulting my better judgment once more, I breathed out a heavy sigh and softly sank into his irresistible heat.

Seconds before pulling him into a harsh and needy kiss, I gave him the few words he was looking for- words that had daunted me for years and effectively just sealed my doom.

"I think love you too Shizuo,"