Week 2, Saturday, post-trial: Fitzgerald.

[thesettingsun]

[Later - later enough that maybe both of them have cooled off a tiny, tiny bit - Dazai tracks Fitzgerald down. It doesn't matter where he is, Dazai will Find Him.]

I don't have any weapons and I'm not going to kill you when I might be punished for it, I just need to tell you that you're stupid. And you don't want me shouting this where everyone can hear it, so it's in your best interests to stay put.

Comments

[spondulix]

...

[He just stares down at Dazai, his mouth curled back in a sneer.]

Thanks. Absolutely something I need right now.

[thesettingsun]

You're welcome.

[Just choosing to ignore the venom in that reply.]

So let's start by how you're spending time you could be spending with your wife, who obviously needs the support, on a wild goose chase that will probably never come to anything except wasted years and work from there.

[spondulix]

I spent as much time as I could. But she never got better. In fact, she got worse.

[And it pained him to see her deteriorate.]

And it's not a wild goose chase. I know what I was doing. You don't know anything.

[thesettingsun]

...Someone I know closely had a mental breakdown after the death of his child. Delusions, regression, the works. Never really recovered from it. He spent a few months in a hospital and died later that year. I visited his grave and realized I should have visited him more while I still had the chance.

If she's not in a grave yet, you could still be spending time with her, instead of whatever the hell you think you're going to accomplish by searching for a way to cheat death.

[spondulix]

...

I provide everything she wants. I make her happy. I tell her our daughter is alive when she asks. She's an emotional woman, you know. To give her any indication that something is off...

[He looks off to the side.]

I'm going to get my daughter back. I have everything. Money, power, status...I will bring her back.

[thesettingsun]

And if you don't? Or even if you do, but your wife is no longer here to greet her? Will you be satisfied with how you spent that time?

Everyone dies, Fitzgerald. The children of the wealthy and the powerful are buried in nicer coffins than the poor and easily forgotten, but they're equally as dead.

[spondulix]

...Shut up.

[His fists curl at his sides.]

I'll bring my daughter back, and it'll just be like nothing ever happened.

[He's gritting his teeth.]

I won't rest until I make that happen. I'll do anything to make that happen. You don't get to say what I can and can't do.

[thesettingsun]

You're not the first person to have ever mourned your child. Not even the first person with wealth, power, and status. But you can't go into the past. I'll say that for you just as I would say it for anyone else.

I don't like you. But I've known too many people who lost sight of reality in their grief, some who've been given the highest quality care money can buy, who only wanted to be able to see their loved ones more often.

Your wife deserves better than this.

[spondulix]

You can't go into the past? [He laughs.] Why, of course you can!

[It's true. Zelda isn't the only one broken by their daughter's death.]

My wife deserves to have the daughter she keeps asking about. My wife deserves to see her face again. My wife deserves to be happy. Truly happy.

[He lets out a shuddering sigh.]

That's all I want.

[thesettingsun]

And in the pursuit of a perfect happiness for her that may not even be possible, you'd abandon her. To the greatest quality of care and everything she wants, but it's abandoning her all the same.

That... strikes me as very like you.

[spondulix]

[He stiffens at that.]

[And then, without another word, he slaps Dazai in the face.]

[thesettingsun]

[Sure got slapped in the face! Didn't even try to avoid it. That'll bruise, probably.]

...You needed to hear that.

[spondulix]

You don't know the amount I've sacrificed for my wife.

[He lets his hand fall back to his side.]

So I won't listen to boring topics from men who think they can judge me from very little.

[thesettingsun]

Your wife's happiness is a boring topic?

[Dazai clicks his tongue, judging him even more.]