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arranged marriage Nanami with a people-pleasing reader
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When you were a child, you used to beg your parents for a sibling. You wanted someone to share your room with, you wanted a friend.
You made good arguments for a child. No, you didn't mind losing the space; you would take responsibility and be a good role model, you would do extra chores, and even watch over them when everyone was too busy. Please, you just didn't want to be alone anymore...
Sometimes, you would fall asleep and imagine a little brother or sister to read to, to whisper silly jokes with, and slip into rest beside. You cherished the ebbing loneliness it brought.
--
The silence stretches between you both as you stare at the singular king-sized bed that is now quite obviously taking up the room. It's an elegant space, really. Floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the now dark ocean, soft lighting that casts everything in warm amber tones, and, of course, those plush white linens that couldn't be more inviting after a long day.
One bed.
Your mind races.
You could offer to sleep on the couch that you had spotted in the sitting area, but then again, that would probably cause Kento an aneurysm at the very mention. Maybe the hotel could bring a cot or something? Though given how late it was, and how much commotion you'd already caused...
"I'll take the couch,"
"I can sleep on the couch."
You had said it simultaneously.
The look Kento shot you was exactly what you expected. Despite the tension of the evening, despite your lingering embarrassment and his obvious concern, you both crack smiles.
"Absolutely not," His kind voice is somewhat mocking, he's shaking his head. "You need proper rest. Especially after-" He stops himself, jaw tightening at the memory of your collapse in the hallway not half an hour ago.
"I'm not kidding, I really am alright now," you insist, and, perhaps anticipating his reply, you continued quickly, extending your hands and shaking them with desperation. "Believe me, also, you're far too tall for that couch. You'd be miserable."
He tilts his head, a disappointed look in his eyes that you're beginning to recognize as his 'I'm about to be stubborn' stance. "I don't care about my comfort. You fainted just moments ago."
"That was just from too much swimming, not because I need a special bed," you argue, moving past him toward the sitting area to prove your point. "See? This couch is perfect. Ooooo how plush, I'm feeling sleepy already."
You pat your hands against the cushions, beginning to sit when he comes before you, gently tugs on the backs of your forearms, and softly holds you upright.
"Please," he says quietly, and something in his voice makes you stop because he doesn't sound amused at all. He's looking at you with such earnest concern, his thumb absently stroking the inside of your elbow. "Please just... let me take care of this one thing. You can reject everything else, but not this. Not tonight."
He appears tired, or maybe this is how he is when he's frustrated, you don't know, what you do know is that the fight drains out of you pretty much immediately.
You're silently apologizing, and for a moment, the two of you are stood there, him holding your whole weight up by your arms, and you, a bit dazed. You attempt to find your footing, shaking your head, you are suddenly aware of how your legs still feel slightly unsteady once more, and how nice it would be to just sink into those impossibly soft-looking sheets.
"Sorry," you repeat. "I...okay, but tomorrow... let's get this sorted out properly. I won't take the bed for the next two nights while you're here; this vacation is for you."
Once you've stood, he leans back, blinking away that concern that had startled you, "Oh, you won't? Is this how you look when you're putting your foot down?"
You bite your lip, a part of you wants to yeild, knowing he would be more comfortable giving you the bed, he wants you to accept, but right now, you care about him more than you care about pleasing him.
"I suppose so." You raise your chin, standing up straight.
Nanami runs a hand down his face, his eyes never leaving yours, "Oh dear..."
He doesn't take his palm from his face, and he seems to be running his tongue along the inside of his cheek. He's quiet for a long pause, "Mmm, it's a good look, you asking for something."
Your brain sputters a bit at his meaning, but soon you're spun around, looking down at his sat form on the couch. You've swapped positions. "Why don't you shower first? I'll..." he glances around, "organize things out here."
You want to continue talking, though, you don't want to leave, want to argue that there's nothing to organize, but you're too sleepy to come up with the words. Instead, you nod at him and grab your toiletry bag, a clean set of pajamas, and escape to the bathroom.
--
The shower is nice. Hot water glides over your salt-sticky skin, washing away the ocean and sweat, the lingering sand, and the slight discomfort of that man's hands on you. You try not to think about it, about how frozen you'd been, how your cursed energy had felt so far away when you had needed it most.
Maybe this was the reason you hadn't wanted to leave Kento just a moment ago; his presence just seemed to dull whatever ache you had subconsciously dampened down. A perfect distraction. Is this what a romantic partner felt like? None of your friends had been able to make you feel so light.
You scrub harder at your skin.
It takes longer than you'd like to admit before you feel clean again.
When you finally emerge, a fluffy towel wrapped around your head, the hotel's plush robe around your cotton pajamas, you find Kento has indeed been "organizing."
Your luggage has been neatly placed on a travel rack, the basket of snacks has been moved to the bedside table within easy reach, and a glass of water is set down with what looks like some kind of supplement beside.
"The hotel manager sent up iron tablets," Kento explains, noticing your gaze. "I thought, maybe you would want them. I'm not sure."
You smile at the thoughtfulness. "Thank you," you manage, picking up the small bottle. "I usually take something, but I... forgot to pack them."
It's not exactly a lie. You did forget. What you don't say is that forgetting happens often, that these past few years you have been managing yourself by occasionally pretending you don't have any weakness that needs managing at all.
Kento's expression shifts, something complicated passing across his features, he simply nods, though, and gathers his own things. "I just wish you had said."
You feel guilty suddenly. You know he's not embarrassed by you, but a small part of your brain feels like he ought to be. You know he wishes your clan had told him of your health so he could look after you properly, but some secret whisper speaks of regret for such a burdensome bride.
Kento, of course, is simply concerned.
You should get into bed. You should take the iron tablet, drink the water, settle under those covers, and let your exhausted body rest.
Instead, you find yourself hovering near the windows, looking out at the dark ocean. The beach is quieter now, though you can still see lanterns dotting the shore and hear distant music carried on the breeze. You think about how somewhere out there, on another night, the water glows.
You aren't sure how much time passes, but as you press your fingertips against the cool glass, you are a bit startled by how quickly Kento showers.
You know he's there for a bit before he speaks, "So, does anybody else know?"
You turn, finding Kento in the doorway. He's changed into some loose pants and a simple t-shirt; his hair is damp and falling across his forehead. He looks serious, but not the least bit unkind.
"Know? About what?" you ask, though you could guess what he meant.
"About..." He points to you weakly, motioning with his hand, "your anemia." He moves closer, but maintains a respectful distance. "Your family, the higher-ups... do they all know?"
You turn back to the window. "Oh, of course... I'm surprised they didn't tell you, actually, not that it's their fault... or even a big deal."
"I mean..." He squints, "I would argue otherwise."
"It's quite manageable, actually. Perhaps they forgot because I've been so well. It's just that today-" you wonder if you should go into all the menial details that might bring on your symptoms.
"You haven't had a proper meal since breakfast, you swam for hours in the heat, and then..." He rubs the junction on his chest where his collarbone meets his neck. "And then," He just motions at you again, a lost look on his face. He seems to not want to bring it up for fear that you might... what? Break down? You're not sure.
He cuts himself off, takes a breath. "I'm so sorry." And suddenly you're wondering if he had spent this entire evening feeling at fault. "You needed me, and I was not there."
You shake your hands as if to woosh his worries away, "Please. No, Ken, you were getting the room keys. You were twenty feet away. Besides" The words hold you short, and you're embarrassed all over, "I could have handled it, I could have... I just... I don't know what happened. I don't..."
The words stick in your throat.
Weakness is a sin, and you are full of it.
You hadn't been able to defend yourself the way you should have been able to. Just like when you'd fainted during training all those years ago.
The female form is simply not built for sorcery.
"Hey." Kento's voice is soft, he pads across the carpet, and despite his size, he seems so unintrusive, so gentle. "You don't have to explain. Not if you don't want to."
But it's weird, somehow, for the first time, you do want to. Maybe after all of this time swallowing it down, maybe you want someone to actually know. Isn't this what friends are for?
"It's just," you start slowly, wrapping your arms around yourself. "This was kind of why... the proof, if you will, that I couldn't be trained so intensely. They... thought it was a health risk, that it could affect my... you know." You motion with a hand to your pelvis, and Kento tilts his head.
He looks sort of like a dog. "My fertility." You finish.
Kento's eyebrows raised, apparently not having expected you to say that, he stays quiet, never interrupting.
"My father agreed. There really was no point in me developing my technique further anyway. My value would come in the form of children, not in my strength as a sorcerer." You nod, recalling how you had to beg to go back to school then. "I still attending though, but I wasn't to push myself."
"I see..." Kento nodded, his voice was light and airy.
"My mother..." You pause, wondering how you should explain, "back then, it was thought that she had Fanconi Anemia." Kento squints, likely not knowing exactly what that meant.
"She was young when she had me, it was possible..." you tilt your face downwards, shaking it slightly, "my grandfather was furious, there hadn't been a boy born, and now, the only child in the clan would be weak...I guess they thought she had hid her condition in order to win favor with the clan, and she was punished severely."
Kento looked affronted, not saying a word, and you shrug, "It is what it is. Clans have their own rules, she was married off with expectations."
"That doesn't make it right."
"No," you agree quietly. "but to them, a physical weakness would only confirm my mother's fear. That her child was defective. So I was to pray, to ask for a body that would carry cursed energy for my spouse." You gesture vaguely again.
Kento is quiet for a long moment, studying you with that intense focus of his. Then, "You're not weak."
"Ken-"
"You're not," he insists, sitting down suddenly on one of the chairs in the master bedroom, as though preparing for a long discussion. "Managing a medical condition does not make you weak...I'm so sorry to hear about your mother." He gulps, "I would not care at all if my child required bone marrow or a special diet... I can't really imagine..."
You don't know what to say to that. He was speaking as if this imaginary child was something precious.
He sighs, muttering your name, "You don't have to do it all alone, you know. I am your husband, that's what I'm here for, it is my wish to know how to care for you best, I want to know when you need something or feel unwell."
"You'll get sick of it," you say before you can stop yourself. You're not trying to be negitive, you smile as if it was a joke. He doesn't seem to find it funny. "I don't have as many limitations as you might think, but there's a reason why I am not a real sorcerer."
"Firstly, you are a real sorcerer so I'm not sure what you're saying, and you're not a limitation," he says firmly. "Accommodating your needs is not a burden, it's..." He pauses, seeming to search for words. "It's what I want to do. What I ought to do."
The sincerity in his voice makes your eyes sting. You blink rapidly, turning back to the window.
Thank you is what you want to say, but you simply nod.
His reflection appears beside yours in the glass, you can tell he is looking your way. "Will you get some rest now? Please?"
You can't help but smile. "Only if you're done speaking to me."
He laughs, and the pressure in the room fades.
--
You settle into the massive bed while Kento busies himself arranging pillows on the couch. The sheets are as soft as they looked, and despite your lingering guilt about the sleeping arrangements, you're greatful to have the space to yourself.
You drink half the glass of water, and watch as Kento slips onto the couch. "Are you comfortable?"
You call to him across the room in an intentionally loud whisper when you see his head settle onto one of the pillows from your spot on the bed.
"I am perfectly comfortable." He yawns, a smile in his tone.
"Me too." You tuck the blanket under your chin and smile at the situation. "Kento?" You murmur, after some extended silence.
"My wife?" He seems to sigh, not with exasperation, but in a playful way.
Your heart stops and you look around the room, asking the wallpaper if your had heard him correctly, and if it was entierly normal to be gaping open mouthed from just a few syllabals. Eventually you get the words out, "Thank you. For today."
He hums, honestly not sure what you were thanking him for, but he was used to you at this point, "Get some sleep. We have a long day tomorrow."
"Goodnight, Kento."
"Goodnight."
You turn off the lamp light beside you and hear him settling in with more rustling and adjusting than should be necessary. You bite back a smile.
Tomorrow, you decide. Tomorrow you'll figure out a better arrangement. You'll convince him that you're not so fragile that he needs to sacrifice his own comfort.
But for now, you let yourself drift off, feeling safer and more cared for than you have in years.
--
You wake to sunlight streaming through the windows and the smell of coffee.
For a moment, you're disoriented, this isn't the train, isn't your room back at the estate. Then everything floods back.
You sit up slowly, testing your body's response. You feel fine. Well-rested, actually, and nowhere near as shaky as you'd been last night. More embarrassed than anything else.
The sound of movement from the other room draws your attention, and you slip out of bed, padding quietly to the doorway.
Kento is at the small table in the sitting area, and it's clear that he has ordered everything off the room service menu. Eggs a dozen ways, rice, grilled fish, miso soup, fresh fruit, pastries, roasted potatoes, the list could go on.
"You're awake," he says, looking up with a smile. "How are you feeling?"
"Good," you say honestly. "Really good, actually. Did you order all of this..."
"I wasn't sure what you'd want," he says, a bit sheepishly. "I ordered a bit of everything. The hotel has excellent room service." He seemed excited at the idea.
You move closer, taking in the spread. "This is more than 'a bit,'" you giggle.
"Of everything." He corrects, "You need to eat properly," he says matter-of-factually.
"I don't think I can eat all this."
"Oh, don't think you won't have help." He chuckles, pulling out a chair for you. "Please, sit. Coffee?"
You're about to protest that he doesn't need to wait on you, but the look on his face stops you. He seems to like this, almost like he wants to service you.
So you sit.
He pours your coffee and starts loading a plate with a little of everything. You watch his careful movements, the way he makes sure to include protein and fiber, the way he sets it in front of you like an offering.
"This is too much," you say, but you're already picking up your chopsticks.
"Eat whatever you want," he says, settling across from you with his own plate. "We can save the rest if you want to come back to the hotel."
You eat in comfortable silence for a while, everything was delicious. You can see that he has opened one of the windows and outside, you can hear the beach coming to life.
"What would you like to do today?" Kento asks eventually. "We have no obligations. We could stay here, go back to the beach, explore the island..."
"What do you want to do?" you counter automatically.
He raises an eyebrow. "Really, lets not, I asked you first."
"You do realize you've made me decide on everything this whole trip, right? Why don't we do something you want for a change."
"I am doing something I want." he uses his chopsticks to point to his plate, "I'm having breakfast with my wife, and by the way, that wasn't an answer."
You roll your eyes. "You're very persistent, you know that?"
"Oh, yes I know." He's smiling, though. "So? What appeals to you?"
You think about it, it's somewhat easier this time considering there is less to do on the island. Instead of trying to guess what he wants to hear, you decide, "I'd like to see more of the island, maybe find somewhere quieter than the main beach? But tonight..." You pause, already sure he agrees, "Bioluminescence. Don't we need to see it?"
"I couldn't have made a better plan," he nods. "I'll ask the concierge about quieter beaches."
He stands to gather the dishes, and you move to help, but he waves you off. "Finish your coffee. There's something I got downstairs that I want you to try."
He disappears briefly into the kitchen and returns with a small package wrapped in paper. He sets it in front of you with that slightly mischievous look you're beginning to recognize.
"What is this?" you ask, carefully unwrapping it.
"Try it. The attendant at the desk said they were her favorite."
It's some kind of chocolate-covered confection, delicate and clearly expensive. It has ornate detailing across the exterior, and a soft middle. You take a bite and nearly moan. It's incredible, creamy and rich, you think you could eat a whole box.
"This is fantastic," you say around the mouthful. The filling tastes of marshmellow, only softer, "Where did she get them?"
"They're supplied by the hotel." Ken leans against the door frame and crosses his arms. "I'm glad I grabbed it, there was only the one left." He watches you, casual.
You freeze mid-swallow. "What?"
"Mmm, that's the last one." He points to the half-eaten piece in your hand, "the staff was raving about how good they were. I'm sure they'll get another shipment soon."
"What?!" You repeat, staring at your hand in horror. "Ken, what? Where can we get them?" It's difficult for even you to understand it, but the idea that you have consumed the last of anything, when someone else might want it, is painful.
"Why on earth would you grab this?" You're standing, looking around for your shoes as if you might be able to find more in a local shop if you leave now. "We should at least try and replace it."
But Kento is looking at you all funny. He's making that silly dimpled face, that you're not sure you've seen on him. It makes your heart do gymnastics, or maybe that's just the underlying guilt.
"Now, why would we do that?"
"Ken..." You look at him now and try to soften your voice, explaining, "she probably wanted it, if it was the last they had, you should've left it for her."
"How could I do that if I knew you would enjoy it?"
"Who cares, it's just not right."
Kento squints at that, unfolds his arms and reaches around behind him for something on the table.
"Now that just makes me sad." He sighs and pulls out a plastic bag.
Understanding dawns slowly as you read the label.
You look down at the parchment in your hands from the chocolate, then back to the bag in Kento's, "This wasn't actually at the desk, was it?" you ask suspiciously.
"No, honey," he says, and the endearment makes you freeze for an entirely different reason. "I was just teasing you but now you've gone and hurt my feelings. I bought these at a shop yesterday while you were looking at postcards."
You sink back into your chair. Your heart was tight but you knew that it was from the anxiety. You were torn between relief and embarrassment. "That was terrible, what was all that even for?"
"I cannot deny that I wanted to see your reaction." He sighs, "I'm learning that you value other's happiness a lot more than your own. You would do any number of things if they meant everyone else gets to enjoy something before you do."
You don't really get his meaning. It's not that you're even trying to be self-deprecating, isn't it just polite?
"My goodness," he says, still in that amused tone. "This is part of your thing, I guessed it would be, and I was right."
"Ken, you are obsessed," you shake your head at him, though there's no heat in it. "Please, do pull out your tinfoil hat."
He does laugh, and the sound is genuine. "I wouldn't say I'm obsessed, just observant."
He leans forward, elbows on the table. "An obsession would be unhealthy. This is just me getting to know my wife. Understanding how she thinks, what makes her tick."
"And what have you learned?" you ask, trying to sound flippant even as your pulse picks up.
His expression grows serious, though his eyes remain warm. "That you feel you need to make yourself easy for others. You know, you take the last seat, the smallest portion, choose the most convenient option for others. You seem to believe your wants matter less than everyone else's."
You roll your eyes, it's weird to be picked at so closely like this, "Isn't it better though? Instead of being selfish?"
"As if you could be selfish." He groans, reaching across the table, his fingers brushing yours. "I wish you would be. There's nothing wrong with being considerate. But you don't have to erase yourself to be kind."
You swallow hard, and respond quietly, "Old habits," you manage.
"Then we'll build new ones," he says simply. "Starting with you finishing that chocolate without one ounce of guilt."
You look at him, at this man who seems determined to see every part of you that you've spent years hiding, who treats each small revelation like a treasure rather than a burden.
"Thank you," you whisper.
"Always," he responds, and you believe him.
You take a chocolate. Wave it around for him to see, and pop it into your bag.
--
The rest of the day unfolds like something from a dream.
The concierge directs you to a smaller, more secluded beach on the eastern side of the island, accessible only by a winding path through jungle foliage. It's worth the trek though, pristine sand, crystal-clear water, and something you are surprised to enjoy most, barely anyone around.
You spent a decent amount of time there, Kento had ensured you wouldn't strain yourself, swimming lazily in the shallows, enjoying a fresh smoothy from a distant vendor who passed by every once and awhile, and eventually, napping in the shade of palm trees.
Kento insists on reapplying your sunscreen himself, his hands gentle on your shoulders, your back, the delicate skin behind your ears.
"I can do it myself," you protest weakly.
"I know you can," he says, working the lotion into your skin with careful thoroughness. "But you'll miss spots, and then you'll burn, and then you'll be uncomfortable tonight when we're supposed to be enjoying a glowing sea."
He's probably right. He's usually right, you're learning.
At one point, you wade into the water up to your waist, and he follows, staying close but not hovering. You appreciate the balance he's found, marriage isn't as overwhelming as you had thought it would be, he is attentive without being overbearing, protective, but never controlling.
"You're a good swimmer," you observe, watching him move through the water with easy confidence.
"I had to be," he says. "When I was younger, before I became a sorcerer full-time, I used to swim in school, It was the only place to relax that I had."
You understand that better than he might realize. Childish memories resurface, "No expectations underwater."
"Exactly." He floats on his back, closing his eyes against the sun. "Just you and the water."
You float beside him, close enough that your hands occasionally brush, and for a long moment, there's nothing but the sound of gentle waves and distant seabirds.
"Kento?" you say eventually.
"Mm?"
"I'm glad..." You pause a moment, too embarrassed to say, 'it's you', instead falling upon, "that we're friends."
He opens his eyes, turning his head to look at you. Water droplets cling to his lashes, and the sun catches the amber in his eyes.
He's tanned and beautiful, and he must've read your mind because he smiles, responding, "Me too. I'm glad that it's you."
It's the most natural thing in the world when his fingers find yours beneath the surface, just kind of floating there together in the crystal-clear water.
Neither of you mentions it, and neither of you pulls away.
That evening, you dress carefully for the "Blue Tears" viewing. A simple sundress over your swimsuit that won't be ruined by saltwater, sandals you can easily kick off. You catch Kento watching you attempt to handle your damp hair.
"What?" you ask, meeting his eyes in the mirror.
"Nothing," he says, but he's smiling. "You look lovely."
"I'm wearing a dress I bought at a hotel gift shop."
"I know, I was there. Still lovely."
You turn to face him, and the words are out before you can stop them: "So do you."
He's in relaxed attire, nothing fancy. You recall that first time you had ever seen him, it seems so far back now, before the two of you had ever really be introduced. He had been handsome, but he was dressed so... formally, a bit uptight. This must be your type, you supposed, casual and kind.
He was unfairly attractive in the golden hour light filtering through the windows.
You're a bit set back to see his ears go pink. "We should head down. I think it'll be popular and the viewing starts at sunset."
"Right. Yes. Let's go."
Neither of you moves for a moment, caught in whatever this thing is between you, this pull that keeps growing stronger.
Then Kento clears his throat and extends his hand. "Shall we?"
You feel flushed at the idea that maybe he thought you were waiting for his hand when that hadn't been the case, but he did not seem to mind.
--
The beach appeared to have transformed.
As the sun set, painting the sky in shades of oranges and pinks, groups of people gathered along the shore. There's an excited energy in the air, everyone waiting for the moment when the water would begin to glow.
You and Kento found a spot away from the crowds, close enough to see but far enough for relative privacy. He had been given a blanket by a gentleman on the beach and he spread it out across a dock. The two of you settle down, knees tucked up to your chest.
"What if it doesn't happen?" you whisper, a smile on your face as you watch children chasing each other in the sand, "What if we don't get lucky?"
"Then we'll still have tomorrow," he says simply. "And if not then, we could come back for our anniversary."
The notion sort of startles you. How is it that you hadn't even thought about the fact that, yes, you do have an anniversary. A special day commemorating the fact that you are bound to Nanami.
You don't have to wait however, as full darkness falls, the first glimmers appear, tiny sparks of blue-green light dancing in the water where waves break on shore. It grew steadily more, and more, until the entire beach seemed to glow with an unearthly beauty.
"Oh," and after all your waiting, you're on your feet, drawn toward the water.
The dock is cool beneath your feet, and when you stand to see the stretch of the worlds beauty, it seems as thought everyone has fallen silent in awe. You look out at those standing on the beach, like watching people walking on stars.
You see Kento kneeling down, watching you, his face is illuminated by the blue tide, wonder is clearly written across his features.
You don't know what to say. "I guess we are lucky enough..."
He's looking right at you, a silly girlish part of your brain wonders if you look as striking as he does in the glow. "It's beautiful." He's shaking his head, the word doesn't seem enough.
You sit right beside him again, wanting a photograph, something to commemorate this. The water comes alive beneath your footing.
"Come here," Kento says, it doesn't appear that he has stopped looking at you since he spoke before, and when you turn, he's holding out his hand.
You take it, and he pulls you close, down onto the docks flooring. One hand at your waist, gently tugging. You're stunned speechless as the light only grows. Glowing water dances under a star-filled sky, and the only music is the gentle lap of waves.
"You're right." He hushes. "We must be lucky."
Kento has yet to let go of your wrist. He's sliding his thumb over your pulse, you're both smiling, and he hums, "Is this okay?".
"Yes," you breathe.
He's so close you can feel his warmth, can see the reflection of the water in his eyes. Your free hand comes up to rest on his chest, and you can feel his heartbeat, it seems intimate, maybe even inappropriate, the pulse is quick, like yours.
"I should tell you something," he says, his voice low. "When the higher-ups first approached me about this arrangement, when they told me who you were..."
You hold your breath.
"I looked into it. Into you. I asked around, tried to learn what I could." His hand tightens slightly at your wrist. "Everyone told me you were perfect. Obedient. Agreeable. Everything a clan daughter should be."
Your stomach sinks, wondering what he could say next.
"and then I met you," he continues, "and I saw something else. This... spark. This person you keep so carefully tucked away." His hand comes up to cup your face, thumb brushing your cheekbone. "And I thought, if I could just... if I could give you space to let that spark grow, to see who you really are beneath all those expectations..."
"Kento," you whisper, had this come out of nowehere? You hadn't anticipated something so... romantic.
"I know this started as an arrangement," he says. "I know we didn't choose each other, not really. But I'm choosing you now. I'm choosing to know you, the real you. And I hope," He pauses, seeming almost nervous. "I hope you might choose me too. Not because you have to, not because the higher-ups said so, but because you want to as well."
The water glows around you, and somewhere in the distance, you can hear other people exclaiming over the beauty of it all. But in this moment, it's just you and Kento, suspended in light.
And a possibility that you hadn't even considered until this very moment.
You nod, like an idiot, but you just didn't know what to say. Kento doesn't seem to care though as he rests his forehead against yours.
How is it that the beach was the least distracting thing in this moment?
"We should probably head back soon," he murmurs, making no move to step away.
"Probably," you agree, equally still, but all too focused on what he had said earlier, and what you had been feeling since.
Kento drags his fingers from your shoulders to your elbows and squeezes a bit. It might've been a signal to get up, but you're somehow trapped in this moment.
And when he finally pulls back, his face right before yours, you're stuck wondering what on earth you had started to allow yourself to feel.
--
"This is ridiculous," you rub the back of your neck staring at the enourmus bed. "It's hug." You throw your hands up.
Maybe you had been toying with the idea since last night, but you only allowed yourself to say it now, "We can share it like adults, you know."
He pulls back to look at you, eyebrows raised. "I'm sorry?"
You laugh.
Whoops. How embarassing. What if he didn't want to? What if the idea seemed less pleasant than the couch. "I'm not saying we have to or should, I'm just saying I would be okay, and I don't see an issue." You squeeze your own hand. "I would absolutly take the couch but I know you wouldn't let me, so... yeah, I figured I could offer."
"So..." He seems more stunned than you had expected. When you had first fiddled with the idea of asking to share, he had been tame and cool in his agreement within your fantasy. "You... feel obligated? Please don't. I promise. I don't mind."
He seems weirdly still.
"No, no! It's not that. I don't...really, I just" You scratch the back of your neck. "I figured I would offer because...I don't image it would be uncomfortable... besides, that couch is terrible for your back. I could hear you shifting around all night."
You're mumbling a bit now and Ken slowly starts to grin, "I was trying to be quiet."
You try to talk a bit slower. Why were you feeling so flustered over this? "You were failing."
He laughs, and the sound is full of joy and relief and it sounds like it had been trapped within him until just then. "If you ask, I'll share. I have no issue with it."
You both look at each other.
"You have to want it." Kento tilts his head, and he smiles at your reaction. "I'm sorry, but it's the only way."
Is he sorry because he can tell he's embarassing you? Or is it something else? You cannot tell, but the idea of wanting makes you cringe. Only, you know Kento now, at least a little, and he seems to quite like you wanting.
"Sure." You nod after a moment. "I do."
"You do?" And oh, that grin is so silly.
"Right."
"You...want to share the bed?"
You furrow your brows, "Why are you making me say it again?" You feel flushed, conatations you hadn't precisely meant linger in the air, and they make you feel hot.
Kento laughs again, but not at you, never that. "I'm sorry". At least he sounds like he means it.
When you march your way over to the bed, you pat the mattress, after you settle on of the long pillows in the center, you see Kento with his eyes closed, standing by the bedside.
He has a grin on his face.
--
After washing your face and changing, you've settled in. Your mind is reeling just as you expected it would when you feel his body slip under the covers you share, but as the energy from the night slowly slides away, you can't help feeling that something has changed.
It feels right to have him beside you, even if you have politely separated yourselves. It feels good.
And you suppose that must have to do with the fact that you chose it.
In the darkend room, with Kento's steady breathing, and your tumbling heart, you feel most certain- you have learned to want.
〰・♡・〰〰・♡・〰〰・♡・〰〰・♡・〰〰・♡・〰
tags: tag list is unfortunately full :(
If you ever want to be taken off the tag list, please just let me know :] (if your name is here but you didn’t get tagged. I think it’s either because your blog is new/blank/empty or you need to check your privacy settings.) might go in and edit though because I think some of these blogs have deactivated now
how does he react when you send him a "happy birthday" text, but you're not dating?
genuinely giggling and kicking his feet, he's obsessed with you and his plan to get you to fall in love with him is working
↳ gojo satoru, ijichi kiyotaka, ino takuma, itadori yuuji, kaminari denki, kirishima eijiro, takami keigo, bokuto kōtarō, hinata shōyō, kuroo tetsurō, oikawa tōru, caleb, sylus
gets awkward and doesn't know how to respond, he didn't even realize you knew his birthday...but does this mean you're thinking about him when he's not around?
↳ fushiguro megumi, hiromi higuruma, kamo choso, nanami kento, okkotsu yuuta, amajiki tamaki, iida tenya, midoriya izuku, todoroki natsuo, kageyama tobio, ushijima wakatoshi, xavier, zayne
tries to pretend he doesn't care, but he so cares, this was the only "happy birthday" he cared about
↳ fushiguro toji, geto suguru, kong shiu, bakugou katsuki, sero hanta, matsukawa issei, sawamura daichi, tsukishima kei, rafayel
honestly....probably does not care that much
↳ ieiri shoko, sukuna ryomen, aizawa shota, todoroki shoto, todoroki touya, kozume kenma,
when people ask me to write bully nanami…which shows to me that they actually just don’t know his character at all...or don't care…and want me to purposely mischaracterize him because they think he’s physically appealing and nothing more…as if there aren’t hundreds of characters who fit that bill better than him…just my opinion….it doesn't happen frequently, but it has before and I find it so odd :/
operation birthday | fushiguro megumi, fushiguro toji, gojo satoru, itadori yuuji, kamo choso, kong shiu, nanami kento, sukuna ryomen
↳ miscellaneous birthday texts with your boyfriend.
a/n: post 3 of birthday week! I'm having so much fun with it, honestly! warnings: cussing probably, very obvious allusions to sex...that's all, I believe. I couldn't tell if I made it obvious enough or not in yuuji's but he's throwing you a surprise birthday party (hopefully that came through)! tomorrow will be a fic, I hope :) I'm coming to like smaus more and more, so leave requests for me! and I've recieved the past couple requests for headcanons and they will be coming next week!
𝘉𝘶𝘵 𝘐 𝘤𝘢𝘯'𝘵 𝘭𝘦𝘵 𝘨𝘰 𝘰𝘧 𝘸𝘩𝘢𝘵'𝘴 𝘪𝘯 𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘯𝘵 𝘰𝘧 𝘮𝘦 𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦 | LADS + when they're having a bad day
info: angst, spoilers for their main stories but it's lowkey been so long idk if I should spoiler it, insecurities, mentions of death (zayne), me and exploiting raf's lemuria trauma name a better duo
happy birthday | fushiguro megumi, fushiguro toji, geto suguru, gojo satoru, kamo choso
↳ they're determined to celebrate your birthday while also respecting your wishes...some of them more than others. 9.5k words
a/n: post 2 of birthday week! headcanons like these are by far my favorite kind of posts, so this was a lot of fun to write! because some of these characters will star in fics later this week, I wanted to do something different with each of them, so this stars: college megumi, yandere cult geto, just basic sorcerer gojo, and vampire choso :) warnings: cussing probably, allusions to sex, kissing, yandere themes, manipulation (geto just loves you, ok?), showering together, social anxiety, etc.
the earliest ones are a blur, too far back to touch properly, all vague feeling and no detail, and then there is gojo, sudden and blinding as a floodlight, taking over with both hands and all of his impossible money and even more impossible personality. deep down, in a place megumi does not often visit and would never willingly speak about out loud, he loves him for it. loves him for trying. loves him for showing up. loves him for deciding, over and over, that megumi was worth keeping, worth raising, worth celebrating. but that does not mean megumi enjoyed any of it.
gojo’s version of love has always had a tendency to arrive in too-large quantities. too much noise, too many people, too much insistence on making a moment into an event. cakes that looked like they belonged in magazine spreads. balloons. surprise visitors. gifts piled up in corners. the kind of thing that made megumi feel like everyone in the room was looking straight at him and expecting something in return, some visible reaction, some performance of gratitude or joy that he never knew how to give. he appreciated it, in his way. he always did. he just hated the feeling of being pinned beneath all that attention, forced into the center of it, expected to shine back. to megumi, a birthday had always felt like a regular day that everybody else had decided to manhandle into something louder.
and then he started dating you. and for the first time, he met someone who understood immediately, instinctively, without needing it explained three different ways. you thought birthday parties were ridiculous too. you hated the way people acted like the day belonged more to them than it did to you. you didn’t want to be paraded around or smothered in decorations or made into something shiny and public. megumi had never felt more seen by something so small.
on his birthday, you took one look at the way gojo was gearing up to turn the school inside out and somehow, impossibly, got him to tone it down. not completely, because nothing on earth could make gojo satoru subtle, but enough that megumi made it through the day without wanting to crawl out of his own skin. you handled it delicately too, never making him feel like he was a problem to be managed, never making him feel childish for caring. you just stepped in where he couldn’t, smoothed the edges, made excuses on his behalf when he got too quiet.
and then, at the end of the day, when everyone had finally left him alone and the halls had gone still, you celebrated him in the way that actually meant something. it had just been the two of you in his room, half-curled together in that easy, sleepy way you always managed to end up, your shoulder pressed to his, your voice soft as you handed him your gift. a sketchbook. homemade. full of drawings. him, caught in little moments he hadn’t realized you were keeping—the crease between his brows when he was reading, the line of his jaw when he looked away to hide a smile, his hands in the pockets of his uniform. him and you. him and itadori. him and gojo, in one sketch that hit him somewhere so private and unguarded he’d had to look away for a minute before he could bear to look back. tucked inside had been a letter too, sincere in that unbearable way only you could manage, full of things he would never say about himself and could barely stand to read because they made his throat ache. he’d waited until later, until you were asleep beside him, to read it again by the weak light of his lamp. he cried a little. you were so damn affectionate and perfect without even trying. all of your words culminate into every chest-aching emotion megumi’s ever felt. god it was fucking tragic and beautiful and everything he’d always dreamed of, assuming he’d never, ever have it.
after that, your birthday became a problem. he understood gojo better now than he wanted to admit. the desire to make a day bigger than itself. the almost frantic urge to take something as ordinary and miraculous as your existence and lay it out in visible proof. to point at the world and say, look. look what I got. look who was born. look who is here. megumi had never had language for that kind of feeling before you. it embarrassed him a little, the intensity of it. the way your birthday made him almost angry with affection, restless with it, like it had nowhere to go inside him and was starting to press against his ribs.
he wanted to give you everything. he wanted to make the day beautiful for you. he wanted you to understand, without him having to say it, that your being alive had altered the shape of his life in ways he could never explain cleanly. he wanted to show you love the way gojo had always tried to show it to him, only gentler, quieter, in a shape you could actually stand to hold. so he tried to treat it casually.
that was the plan, anyway. he wakes up earlier than usual that morning, before the sun has fully risen, and nudges you awake with a hand at your shoulder, murmuring your name until you blink up at him with that sleepy, suspicious expression you always wear when he disrupts your routine. he says you’ll miss your workout if you stay in bed any longer, which earns him a half-hearted complaint and then, eventually, your cooperation. you grumble the whole time you’re getting dressed. he pretends not to notice how fond it makes him.
the air outside is crisp and cool, the track still mostly empty, the school quieter than it ever is once the day gets going. you run side by side, your breathing evening out together, feet striking pavement in the same rhythm. he likes mornings with you best. there’s less pressure to talk. he can stay close without having to perform closeness. he can just hand you your water bottle when you slow down and press his palm briefly to the small of your back while you stretch and let that be enough to say what he means.
you have a morning mission after that, quick and irritating and simple enough to be more inconvenient than dangerous, and then hours of studying hanging over both of your heads afterward because exams wait for no one, not even on birthdays. it should feel like any other day. that was what you wanted. megumi knows that.
he is doing a decent job of it too, right up until your phone buzzes. you glance down at the screen. then up at him. then back down again. “happy birthday!!!” itadori’s text is followed by enough exclamation points and cake emojis to make the whole thing vibrate with sincerity. there’s another message directly under it. “don’t let fushiguro pretend he forgot!!!” you turn your head very slowly.
megumi, who has been caught so completely there is no point trying to deny it, looks off to the side and mutters, "I just asked him a question.”
“you told itadori?”
“I needed help.”
“with what?”
he goes a little pink around the ears, which is about as dramatic as megumi ever gets. “getting you something.”
your expression softens immediately, your annoyance too light to ever be real. “megumi.”
“he wasn’t supposed to text you, I’m sorry. but he cares about you; is that so bad?”
a laugh slips out of you, warm and helpless, and the sound of it unclenches something in his chest. you bump your shoulder against his. he accepts the scolding because he deserves it, and because even this feels strangely precious, being the reason you’re smiling before noon.
after that he gets worse, though he tries not to. he touches you more. keeps finding excuses. his hand at your wrist when you’re about to walk away. fingers brushing your hair back behind your ear. kissing your cheek when no one’s looking, then once when someone probably is looking and he doesn’t care enough to stop himself. looking at you for a little too long whenever you’re bent over your notes, when you’re talking, when you’re simply there in front of him being alive in a way he is still not used to having.
it is a special day. he can’t help that. it’s the day you got here. the day the world, by some miracle, ended up with you in it. he feels insane about that if he lets himself think too hard, so mostly he doesn’t. mostly he just hovers closer than usual and lets his affection leak out in ways he cannot quite contain.
that evening, once the studying is done and the halls have thinned and the sky has gone dark at the windows, he takes over one of the school kitchens and makes you food. to call it “dinner” is vaguely generous. it is simple. very simple. megumi is competent enough not to burn anything and thoughtful enough to remember exactly what you like, but he is still cooking in a school kitchen with limited ingredients and exactly zero talent for presentation. still, when he sets the plate down in front of you, trying so hard to look like it was nothing, like he didn’t spend the past hour second-guessing every step, there is something almost unbearably sweet about it. you look at him for a second before you say, softly, “you didn’t have to do this, megs.”
he shakes his head once. he doesn’t know how to explain that this is the easiest thing in the world. that if he had the ability to hand you every good thing you had ever wanted, every comfort, every quiet joy, every proof of love that would not make you flinch, he would do it without hesitation. a meal is nothing. a few stolen hours with you are nothing. he would keep going forever if that was what it took. so he doesn’t say any of that. he just tells you to eat before it gets cold. you do, smiling into your food in that small way you have when you’re trying not to make a big deal out of being happy.
later, when the two of you are back in his room and the day has finally narrowed down into something private and safe, he gives you your real gift. a photo album. it is awkwardly assembled in places, the edges not perfectly aligned, some of the pages too full and others a little sparse, but it is unmistakably him in the care of it. pictures of the two of you, some printed from your phones, some stolen from nobara and itadori, some that you didn’t even know he had saved. you half asleep with your head on his shoulder. the two of you after a mission, dirty and exhausted and grinning in spite of yourselves. a blurry one of you laughing so hard your face has gone soft with it. there are pictures of your joined hands, of your shoes lined up at the door, of all the tiny domestic proofs that the life megumi has with you is real.
inside is a letter too. shorter than yours had been. more halting. megumi has never been good with feelings once they are made to sit still on paper. the sentences are plain. a little rough in places. he does not try to dress them up. but they are his. and they say enough. not everything, because there is too much of you inside him now to ever fit neatly into words, but enough that when you look up at him afterward, eyes soft and shining in the low light, he knows you understood every single thing he couldn’t bring himself to write.
that is the strange part about loving you. he has no real language for it, no smoothness, none of the ease other people seem to have when it comes to saying what they feel. he trips over it. hides from it. hands it to you in clumsy offerings instead—food, photographs, quiet time, the way he remembers everything you say. and somehow, you always know. you always seem to know.
toji never thought he’d end up with someone like you. not just someone he cared about—that was already pushing it—but someone who lived the same kind of life. someone who disappeared for days at a time, came back with blood under their nails and a half-finished story they didn’t bother telling. someone who understood the work without romanticizing it, who didn’t flinch at the violence or pretend it meant something bigger than it did. it should’ve been a terrible idea. two people like that, circling the same orbit, constantly in danger, constantly one bad job away from not coming back at all.
too much risk. too much to lose. he’d never been the kind of man who worried about losing anything.
it happens slowly, at first. a few shared jobs because shiu thinks you’ll work well together. a few long drives in silence, the kind that aren’t uncomfortable, just…easy. you don’t talk unless you need to. you don’t ask questions that don’t have answers. you don’t try to be anything you’re not. toji finds himself watching you more than he should, cataloging things without meaning to—the way you move, efficient and clean, the way you check your surroundings without making it obvious, the way you don’t react when things get ugly, just handle it and move on.
and then, somehow, you end up in his bed. just convenience. just proximity. just two people who trust each other enough not to keep a weapon under their pillow when they fall asleep in the same room. it’s easier that way. warmer. quieter. he doesn’t notice when it stops being casual. or maybe he does. he just doesn’t call it what it is.
he doesn’t know your birthday for a long time. it’s not the kind of thing either of you talk about. dates don’t matter much when your schedule is dictated by jobs and payouts and whoever’s hiring. time passes in contracts, not calendars. so he doesn’t ask, and you don’t offer. it stays like that until one afternoon when you’re out on a job and shiu’s distracted, arguing over the phone about something that sounds expensive and annoying.
toji flips through the file without really thinking about it. just killing time. it’s clinical. cold. height, weight, known skills, prior jobs, notes written in shiu’s neat, precise handwriting. and then there it is, tucked between lines of information that don’t feel like they belong in the same category. your birthday. he pauses. looks at it a second longer than necessary. commits it to memory. doesn’t say anything about it when you get back. doesn’t say anything when the date gets closer, either. he tells himself it doesn’t matter. you didn’t tell him for a reason. he’s not the kind of guy who makes a big deal out of shit like that anyway, and neither are you. he remembers his own birthday this year only because you caught it the morning of, half-awake beside him, and pressed a kiss to his mouth that lingered longer than usual.
“happy birthday,” you’d murmured, voice still rough with sleep. that had been it.
no gifts. no plans. just that soft, rare smile you don’t give out easily, the one that makes something in his chest tighten in a way he doesn’t like examining too closely. later, you’d dragged him out for tacos from that shitty little cart down the street, the one he always claims is the best in the city, and the two of you had sat on a park bench eating in silence, shoulders brushing, the city moving around you like you weren’t part of it.
it had been…nice. too nice, maybe. domestic in a way that didn’t fit either of you, but still settled somewhere under his skin like it belonged there. so when your birthday rolls around, he doesn’t overthink it. doesn’t buy anything. you wouldn’t want it. you don’t like excess, don’t like clutter, don’t like feeling like someone’s trying to impress you with money. he gets that. he respects it. figures he’ll do something similar to what you did for him. keep it simple. keep it quiet. spend the day together. that’s enough. that’s the plan.
then he wakes up, and you’re gone. that, immediately, pisses him off. you’re usually a light sleeper. so is he. it’s rare for one of you to move without the other noticing. the bed is already cold on your side, sheets half-tossed back, the faintest trace of your presence left behind in a way that tells him you’ve been gone for a while. he checks the time. early. too early. his jaw tightens. he grabs his phone, thumbs out a message.
no answer. of course. he waits. when you finally respond, it’s clipped, all business. on a mission.
he stares at the screen for a second. he never texts you when you’re working. never. it’s one of those unspoken rules the two of you don’t break. distractions get people killed. he knows that better than anyone. still.
it’s your fucking birthday, he types back anyway. finish it and get home.
there’s a beat. then: don’t start. I’ll be done in a couple hours.
he scoffs under his breath, tosses the phone onto the bed, runs a hand through his hair like he can physically drag the irritation out of himself. you’ll come back when you come back. you always do. you can handle yourself. he knows that. doesn’t stop him from pacing. doesn’t stop him from checking the time again. and again. by the time you finally get back to the apartment, he’s already there. waiting.
he doesn’t greet you properly. doesn’t say anything right away. just looks you over the second you step inside, eyes scanning automatically for injuries, for anything out of place. you’re a little messy, clothes rumpled, faint smudges of something dark along your sleeve. nothing serious.
still.
“later than you said you’d be,” he mutters, like it’s an accusation.
you roll your eyes, already shrugging out of your jacket. “it ran long.”
“yeah, no shit.” there’s no real heat in it. just irritation threaded through something quieter. something you don’t call out, and neither does he. he takes over without asking. guides you toward the bathroom, hands already at your clothes, peeling them away with practiced ease. you don’t fight him on it. never do. the shower turns on, steam filling the space, and he steps in with you like it’s automatic, like it’s part of the routine you’ve built without ever discussing it. he cleans you up carefully. efficient. makes sure there’s no blood left behind, yours or anyone else’s. fingers brushing over your skin in ways that linger just a second longer than necessary, checking for bruises, for anything you might’ve missed. you lean into it without thinking, letting him handle it.
when you’re done, he towels you off, grabs the dryer before you can protest. you hate when it stays wet. so you sit there while he works through your hair, warm air blowing over your scalp, his hand steady, movements surprisingly patient for someone like him. when he finishes, he leans down, presses a quick kiss to the top of your head like it’s nothing.
the rest of the day is…quiet. he takes you out, but not anywhere special. just downtown. walking without a destination, hands brushing occasionally, sometimes talking, sometimes not. it’s easy. comfortable. the kind of thing that would look like nothing to anyone else but feels like everything when it’s just the two of you.
back at the apartment, you end up napping. it’s rare. you don’t let yourself do it often. too restless, too wired, always halfway alert even when you’re exhausted. but today, you sink into it, body finally giving in, breathing evening out beside him on the bed. toji doesn’t sleep. he just lies there, watching you. there’s something about you like this—unguarded, still, completely unaware of him—that does something strange to his chest. softens it in a way he doesn’t trust. he studies your face like he’s trying to memorize it, like it might disappear if he looks away too long.
he doesn’t like how much he cares. doesn’t like how obvious it feels, even if you’re not awake to see it. you wake up eventually, slow and a little disoriented, blinking at him like you forgot where you were for a second. he doesn’t comment on it. just gets up, heads to the kitchen, throws together something simple. nothing fancy. enough to eat. enough to keep you there, sitting on the couch afterward while you pick up a book and start reading out loud, because you like the sound of your own voice filling the space, and he likes listening.
he stretches out beside you, arm slung loosely behind your shoulders, eyes half-lidded as you read. it’s quiet. steady.
yours. at some point, when the words start to blur and your voice softens, he leans in, presses his mouth briefly to your temple. “happy birthday,” he murmurs, like it’s an afterthought. like he hasn’t been thinking about it all day. later, when you’re already half-asleep again, he carries you to bed. you don’t wake fully, just shift against him, instinctive, trusting. he sets you down carefully, pulls the blanket up over you, lingers there for a second longer than he should.
lucky. the word sits in his head, heavy and unfamiliar. he doesn’t say it out loud. doesn’t need to. he thinks it anyway. he’s a lucky fucking man.
there are things you do not often share about yourself. dates, for instance, that you never thought to guard, never thought to make sacred or hidden, because why would you—what could possibly be done with something so small, so ordinary as the day you were born? you speak carelessly sometimes, in half-thought sentences, in idle recollections that drift loose from your mouth like petals shaken from a dying flower, and he gathers them all, every single one, cupping them carefully, reverently, until there is nothing of you that exists outside of his knowing.
so of course suguru knows. he has known for a long time, long before you ever realized there was anything to be known. he does not tell you this. he does not need to. he prefers the way you move through his world believing yourself unobserved, unrecorded, untouched by the quiet, constant attention that follows you like a second shadow—because it makes the moment sweeter, doesn’t it, when you wake that morning to the soft weight of his arm around your waist, to the hush of his breath against your ear, to the low murmur of his voice curling around your name like something sacred.
he has been awake for a long time. long enough to watch the night thin at the edges, to feel the slow turning of the world beneath the weight of this day, to hold the knowledge of it quietly in his chest like a secret too precious to speak too loudly. your birthday. the day the world was made correct, in his estimation, though he would never frame it so crudely aloud. he lets the thought settle instead, lets it root itself deeper, lets it bloom into something reverent and consuming and entirely his.
you shift, just slightly, caught somewhere between sleep and waking, your body already beginning its habitual rise toward consciousness—too early, always too early, that restless instinct to give yourself away to the day before it has earned you. he does not allow it. his hold tightens, not enough to trap, never enough to be named for what it is, but enough to anchor you back into the warmth of him, back into the soft, carefully curated stillness he has built around you.
“go back to sleep, angel,” he murmurs, voice low, threaded with something gentler than usual, something almost indulgent. there is a pause. then, softer still, as though the words themselves might bruise if handled carelessly: “you don’t need to get up yet,” he adds, quieter now, closer, his lips ghosting the shell of your ear. “stay with me a little longer.”
you stir, lashes fluttering, something soft and uncertain blooming across your face as you sink back down, as you choose—without quite realizing you’ve chosen—to remain where he’s placed you. he watches you with that unbearable stillness, that patience that is not patience at all but a kind of disciplined hunger, a restraint honed into something elegant and indistinguishable from devotion, as you drift back under, as your breathing evens, as your body softens fully into his again.
there was a time you would have resisted. a time you would have blinked yourself awake, insisted on getting up, insisted on doing something, anything, to justify the shape of your day. that time feels distant now, worn thin by repetition, by the steady erosion of your habits beneath his careful, insistent care. it is not that he forbade you from leaving the bed. he would never be so crude. he simply learned you—your rhythms, your hesitations, the places where you were softest, most easily guided—and now when he tells you to rest, you do, because it feels natural, because it feels right, because he has made it so. you sink back down without protest. good. he lets you sleep for hours.
he does not sleep with you. he rarely does, not truly. even when his eyes are closed, there is something within him that remains sharply, painfully aware, fixed on you as though you might dissolve if his attention falters. so he watches instead. watches the slow rise and fall of your chest, the way your mouth parts faintly when you breathe too deeply, the subtle shifts of your body as you drift further into rest. he maps you in silence, again and again, as if memorization could become preservation, as if knowing you perfectly might anchor you here, might prevent the inevitable entropy of a world that insists on taking things from him.
when you finally wake, it is late. the light has shifted, softened, stretched across the room in long, golden lines, and for a moment you look disoriented, like you’ve lost something in the hours you cannot account for. he is there before the thought can fully form. “good morning,” he says, though it is anything but, his voice warm, pleased, threaded with something quieter that you never quite name. you smile at him. soft. trusting. his chest aches with it.
he brings you breakfast in bed, not just left for you to manage on your own—no, that would defeat the purpose entirely. he sits beside you, close enough that your legs brush, one hand steadying the tray while the other lifts each bite carefully, deliberately, offering it to you as though it is the most natural thing in the world.
you hesitate, just for a second. “you don’t have to, suguru.” there is that small protest, the echo of who you used to be, still flickering faintly at the edges.
he smiles, sickeningly sweet. “I want to,” he murmurs, tilting his head just slightly, the motion so gentle it feels like an invitation rather than a correction. “you’ll let me, won’t you?”
and you do. because it would be rude not to. because he looks so pleased, so quietly intent, because he has always been so good to you, so attentive, so careful with your comfort that refusing him feels almost cruel. you open your mouth, accept what he offers, and he watches you with a kind of reverence that borders on worship, as though this simple act—this tiny surrender of autonomy, this soft acceptance—is something holy. he feeds you slowly. not rushing. not allowing you to rush either. the day unfolds like that—unhurried, deliberate, each moment shaped and guided with invisible hands that never quite close around you, never tighten enough to be named for what they are.
your gifts are waiting. he does not present them all at once. he understands you too well for that. excess unsettles you. overabundance feels like pressure. so he gives them to you piece by piece, folded gently into the rhythm of your day.
a dress first. soft fabric, something light and elegant, chosen with a precision that betrays just how closely he has studied your preferences, your comfort, the subtle ways your expression shifts when you touch something you like. it is not extravagant, not ostentatious—simply perfect in a way that feels almost coincidental. later, a book appears in your hands, one you had mentioned once in an offhand comment weeks ago, something you had wanted to read but never prioritized. you do not remember telling him. he remembers everything. he settles beside you while you flip through the pages, his arm slipping around your shoulders, drawing you in, keeping you there. there is no need for you to move, no reason to leave his side. anything you might want is already within reach, already anticipated, already provided.
he does not let you do anything alone. not in a way that could be called restrictive. he simply…remains. always near, always present, always offering a hand before you realize you need one, always guiding you back into his orbit if you drift too far, too long. you begin to lean into it without thinking. of course you do. it is easier that way. safer. he makes it so.
by the time evening settles, you are soft with it—your edges worn down by a day of quiet indulgence, your movements slower, your thoughts gentler, your resistance, what little there ever was, dissolved into something pliant and warm. you sit with him, tucked neatly against his side, dressed in something he chose, holding something he gave you, living within a space he has so carefully constructed around you that it no longer feels constructed at all. it feels like home.
he watches you. always. there is something in his gaze tonight that is heavier than usual, something that lingers longer, presses deeper, as though he is trying to see past your skin, into the fragile, beating thing beneath it, into the ephemeral miracle of your existence that he refuses to treat as fleeting. you shift under his attention, not uncomfortable, not quite, just…aware. “suguru?” you murmur.
he hums softly, his fingers brushing against your cheek, tilting your face toward him with a touch so gentle it barely registers as guidance. “happy birthday, my love.”
the words settle over you like a spell. soft. sweet. unavoidable. and when he smiles at you like that, warm and certain and impossibly right, the question dissolves before it can fully take shape. of course he knows. of course he would. he leans in, presses a kiss to your temple, lingering just a fraction too long, breathing you in as though he is trying to pull you into himself, to keep you there, safe and contained and entirely his. you relax against him. you always do.
and somewhere, deep beneath the softness, beneath the careful gentleness and the endless, patient devotion, something darker coils and tightens, something possessive and absolute and utterly unwavering in its certainty—that you are his, that you will remain his, that every piece of you, every day that marks your existence, every quiet, unguarded moment will be gathered, kept, cherished in a way the world could never deserve. he will make sure of it.
gojo finds out from shoko. of course he does—because there is very little in this world that stays hidden from him for long, and even less when it concerns you—but it still lands strangely when she says it, casual and offhand, like it’s nothing, like it hasn’t just rearranged something small and tender inside his chest.
your birthday. you hadn’t told him. he laughs it off, of course. rolls his eyes, flicks her shoulder, says something light and teasing about how you’re clearly trying to keep secrets from him, and shoko just gives him that look, the one that says don’t be stupid, satoru, and takes another drag like she knows exactly what he’s not saying. he doesn’t let it sit too long. doesn’t let himself linger on the quiet, almost childish sting of it—because you’re you, and you have your reasons, and he knows you well enough to understand that anything you don’t offer isn’t meant to hurt him. still…he can’t quite help the way it echoes.
because his birthday with you had been loud. full, bright, brimming with attention in a way that had settled into his bones and stayed there long after the day ended. you’d followed him everywhere, through crowded little shops and neon-lit streets and stupid cafés where he ordered too much and you tried to rein him in with that soft, exasperated look. you’d let him be ridiculous, let him drag you into his orbit, and you’d smiled the whole time like you meant it.
and then you’d made him something. not bought. not ordered. made. a whole spread of sweets you’d spent time on, careful and deliberate, things you weren’t even sure he’d like, and he remembers the way you’d watched him taste them, quiet and a little nervous, like his opinion mattered more than it should’ve. he’d loved them. loved you for making them. loved the way your face lit up when he told you so.
he doesn’t understand why you wouldn’t want that for yourself. but then…you’re not him. you never have been. and that’s part of why he loves you. you move differently through the world. softer, quieter, more contained. you don’t chase attention, don’t need it, don’t crave the way it settles on your skin like warmth. you don’t fill silences just to hear something break them. you exist in them, comfortably, like they belong to you.
he thinks about you as a kid. tries not to, but he does. small. quiet. maybe sitting at a table that didn’t have anything special on it, maybe watching the day pass without anyone marking it as different from any other. no candles. no noise. no one making a fuss. something in his chest twists at the thought. you deserved better than that. you deserve to feel seen.
so he does what he always does. he adjusts it to cater to you. he tells everyone to keep it simple. itadori gets a warning that sounds like a threat wrapped in a joke. nobara gets a narrowed look and a very specific “don’t make it weird.” megumi doesn’t need to be told, but gojo tells him anyway, just to feel like he’s covering all his bases. shoko just hums like she expected this from the beginning.
no surprises. no spectacle. just…care. he even keeps his own schedule. doesn’t take the day off. goes on a mission like normal, like it’s any other day, like he’s not already planning every second around you. but he can’t help himself that morning. you wake up to sunlight and the smell of something warm and sweet, something rich enough to feel indulgent without tipping into excess, and before you can fully piece together what’s happening, he’s there, bright and smiling and entirely too pleased with himself. “morning, birthday girl.” you blink at him.
there’s a pause. a flicker of realization. a quiet, almost embarrassed little exhale. “…shoko told you.”
“wow,” he says, hand to his chest like you’ve wounded him, “and here I thought you’d come clean on your own.”
you huff, but there’s no real bite to it. just that soft reluctance, that hesitance he recognizes now for what it is—not rejection, not disinterest, just…uncertainty. not knowing what to do with something that’s supposed to be yours.
he doesn’t push. just grins, reaches for your hand, presses something small and wrapped into it. “open it.” it’s not big. not overwhelming. a few things, carefully chosen. things you’ll use. things you’ll like. nothing that feels like too much. he watches your face more than the gifts themselves, tracking every shift, every tiny reaction like it’s the most important data he’ll gather all day.
breakfast follows. he’d gone out of his way for it—something from a place he knows you like, something you don’t get often because it feels like a treat, something warm and comforting that he insists on setting up properly, even if you try to tell him it’s not necessary. “just eat,” he says, softer than usual, nudging the plate closer. “don’t argue with me today.”
the day splits after that. you go to teach. he goes to work. it feels almost normal, which is exactly what you wanted, exactly what he promised himself he’d give you. but he cuts it short. he shows up where you are before you expect him, leaning casually against a wall like he’s been there forever, like he hasn’t rearranged his entire schedule just to get you alone for a few hours. “c’mon,” he says, pushing off, already reaching for your hand. “I’m stealing you.” you don’t resist. you never really do.
the picnic is…perfect. not extravagant. not overwhelming. just a quiet spot with a view he knows you’ll like, food he picked out himself, a blanket spread beneath you, the city humming distantly instead of pressing in too close. he talks more than you do, like always, filling the air with easy chatter, but there’s something softer threaded through it today, something warmer, more intentional. he keeps looking at you. like he’s trying to memorize you. like he’s trying to make up for something you never asked him to fix.
the rest of the evening follows that same rhythm. gentle. considered. back at his place, more gifts appear—just little things slipped into your hands when it feels right. a book he remembers you mentioning. a jacket that fits you perfectly. something small and stupid that makes you laugh in spite of yourself.
he pulls you into games after that. cards, something light and competitive enough that he can tease you, grin when you get annoyed, nudge your shoulder when you lose. a movie after, something you picked, draping himself half over you like he always does, like proximity is second nature to him. it’s easy. it’s fun. it’s yours.
and then, when the night starts to dip into something softer, something quieter, he takes you out. you hesitate. of course you do. “satoru—”
“come on,” he cuts in, already tugging you along, his voice light but edged with something firmer beneath it. “I take you to dinner all the time. this is no different.” it’s a lie. and you both know it.
the place is too nice. too polished. the kind of place you don’t usually let him drag you into without a fight. but he keeps it easy, keeps it normal, keeps you grounded in conversation and stupid little comments and the familiar cadence of him, so it never tips into overwhelming. just…special.
by the time you get back, you’re quiet. not in a bad way. not shut down. just…full. he notices. of course he does. he always does. he doesn’t say anything about it right away. just lets you settle, lets you breathe, lets the day land where it needs to inside you.
later, when you’re in bed, the lights low, the world finally narrowed down to just the two of you, he turns toward you, one hand coming up to cup your face, thumb brushing along your cheek in that absent, affectionate way of his. “you know,” he says, softer than you’ve ever really heard him, “you don’t have to hide things like that from me.” there’s no accusation in it. just…something honest. something a little vulnerable in a way he doesn’t usually allow.
you look at him, uncertain. “I just didn’t think it was a big deal.”
he huffs out a quiet laugh, leaning in until your foreheads touch. “it is to me.” the words hang there. simple. unadorned. he presses a kiss to your mouth, slower than usual, less playful, more…certain. “you’re a big deal,” he adds, almost like an afterthought, but his hand tightens just slightly against your jaw, grounding the words in something real. “so your birthday is too.”
you don’t really know what to say to that. you don’t have to. he doesn’t need you to. he just pulls you closer, tucks you against him, holds you there like it’s the most natural thing in the world, like you’ve always belonged right there in the space he’s carved out for you. and for once, he lets the quiet sit. warm. full. enough.
choso has lived long enough that human time should have stopped mattering to him. days pass. years pass. centuries, maybe, though he rarely speaks of them with any precision, as if numbers that large have begun to dissolve at the edges, losing shape, losing urgency. seasons register more strongly than dates do. the quality of light. the taste of the air. the way the world turns colder, then kinder, then green again. he understands hunger. he understands waiting. he understands devotion in the old, ruinous sense of the word, the kind that turns living things into relics and altars and habits so deeply engraved they begin to resemble fate.
but birthdays? birthdays are yours. human, sweet, almost unbearably tender in the way so many human rituals are—small and ridiculous and fragile and completely, entirely sincere. the first time you explain them to him properly, he looks at you with that deep, solemn focus of his, dark eyes fixed on your face as though he is trying to memorize every word, every movement of your mouth. “so it is a celebration,” he says slowly, carefully, “for the day someone was born.”
you smile. “that’s the general idea, yeah.” he thinks about that for a long moment.
his expression changes in one of those tiny, nearly imperceptible ways that you have learned to read, the slight softening around the mouth, the faint crease between his brows smoothing away as some thought settles heavily and reverently in his mind. “the day you were born,” he repeats.
and you laugh a little, because he says it like it means something enormous, like the sentence itself contains too much wonder to be spoken casually. it does, to him. that becomes obvious very quickly. because once choso understands what a birthday is—once he understands that there is, every year, a day set aside simply to honor the fact that you came into the world—he becomes almost overwhelmed by it. quietly overwhelmed, of course, because choso rarely does anything loudly, but still. you can see it in the way he holds you when your birthday approaches, in the way he watches you with that soft, awed intensity that makes it feel as though he is looking at something holy.
you show him the traditions over time. presents, first. he doesn’t understand at all why they have to be surprises. to him, if you want something, he should simply give it to you. immediately. preferably before you ever have to ask. the notion of wrapping an object in paper only to make you wait longer for it strikes him as a little absurd, though he listens with complete seriousness while you explain that anticipation is part of the fun.
“the point,” you tell him, smiling at how intent he looks, “is that someone thought about you. they picked something because it reminded them of you, or because they know you’d like it.”
his gaze on you turns so soft it almost hurts. “I am always thinking about you,” he says.
you have to look away for a second after that, cheeks warm, because choso says things like that so plainly, so earnestly, with none of the self-consciousness human people usually wrap around their feelings. then cake. candles. the whole strange, charming ritual of lighting tiny flames and making a wish before blowing them out. he watches the first time with an expression of deep concentration, as though you are teaching him something far more complex than frosting and sugar and wax.
“you wish for something,” he says.
“usually.”
“and then you destroy the fire.”
you laugh. “I mean, when you put it like that—”
he smiles, faint and beautiful and a little shy around the edges, and leans closer to inspect the candles before they’re lit, his cool fingers resting against the table while you arrange them. “you humans make many things into ceremonies.”
“we do.”
“I think this one is good.” that, perhaps, is the understatement of the century, because once choso decides something is good, something meaningful, something tied to you, he throws the full force of his heart behind it.
your birthday becomes his favorite day of the year. not because of the presents or the cake or the rituals themselves, though he comes to cherish all of them. it becomes his favorite because it is yours. because it gives him a language, however small and imperfect, for the huge and steady thing he feels inside himself whenever he looks at you. a day dedicated, openly and without shame, to your existence. he cannot imagine anything more worthy of celebration.
and this year, because he has had time to learn, because you have taught him so patiently, so sweetly, because he has spent months quietly preparing, he is determined to do it right.
the room is still blue with early morning, the fragile hour before sunrise fully arrives, and choso is awake, as he always is, propped slightly against the headboard with you tucked into his arms, your body warm and heavy with sleep against his chest. vampires do not need rest in the same way you do, and choso has long since developed the habit of lingering there while you sleep, simply holding you, listening to the soft rhythm of your breathing, watching the subtle changes of your face as dreams pass through you.
on this particular morning, he is even more attentive than usual. it is your birthday. the words seem to pulse quietly through him, rich and reverent, impossible to separate from the deep swell of affection in his chest. your birthday. the day you were born. the day the world received you, though it did not deserve you and still doesn’t, not really. he thinks of that often too, in the dim private chambers of himself—how miraculous and improbable your existence feels to him, how fortunate he is in ways he never expected to be.
when you begin to stir, lashes fluttering, your body instinctively shifting toward waking, his arms tighten around you just slightly.
“stay,” he murmurs, mouth brushing your temple, his voice low and smooth from disuse. “a little longer.” you make a sleepy sound, half protest, half surrender, and he feels something like delight move through him. “it is your birthday,” he reminds you softly, as if that explains everything. as if your body should understand immediately why it deserves more rest, more gentleness, more indulgence than usual. “you should not get up early.”
that gets a tiny laugh out of you, still drowsy, still mostly asleep. “shouldn’t i?” you mumble. he presses his face more firmly into your hair, inhales the familiar scent of you like a man starving in a cathedral.
“no,” he says, with complete conviction. “my love should be rested.” that does it. you smile, small and helpless against his chest, and settle back down. choso spends the next hour with you exactly like that, holding you while the light changes, letting you drift in and out as you please, occasionally brushing a cool hand over your back or your hair, soothing you deeper into comfort whenever you threaten to wake too fully.
by the time you do finally rise, slow and soft and blinking, he is ready. there is breakfast waiting, though “waiting” is perhaps too passive a word. choso has arranged it all with the grave concentration of a man laying offerings on an altar. your favorites, every one of them, assembled with almost painful care. he has learned your tastes with the same devotion with which he learns everything about you; he remembers every preference, every offhand comment, every tiny pleased hum you’ve ever made over a particular food.
you pause in the doorway and stare. “choso.” he looks up immediately, and the expression on his face—hopeful, tender, just a little nervous—makes your heart twist.
you cross the room and he meets you halfway, gathering you into his arms before you can even think to speak. that is how the day goes, really. choso keeps you close at every possible opportunity, with a kind of instinctive, adoring possessiveness that feels less like a decision and more like a law of nature. if you sit, he sits with you and draws you against him. if you stand, his hand finds your waist, your wrist, the small of your back. if you so much as look chilly, a blanket appears and then his arms with it, as though the two things belong together. you tease him about it, gently. “I can still move around, you know.”
he studies you for a moment, then says, very seriously, "I know. I simply prefer when you are with me.” and what can you even do with that except laugh and go soft around the edges?
he gives you your presents one by one. he has wrapped them carefully, though the corners are slightly imperfect, the ribbon tied with such visible concentration that you can practically see the effort still clinging to it. each gift is something chosen with eerie precision, because choso pays attention in a way that can feel almost supernatural even when you know exactly what he is. a book you mentioned months ago and forgot you’d ever wanted. a silk ribbon in your favorite color. a bottle of perfume he once paused over because he said it smelled “gentle” and then remembered. a delicate piece of jewelry, simple and lovely, something he can fasten around your wrist or your throat with fingers that linger against your skin.
“you remembered,” you say at least twice, maybe three times, and every time, choso’s expression turns faintly puzzled, as if forgetting anything about you is the more impossible concept. of course he remembered. how could he not?
the cake is his proudest achievement. you helped him make one before, once, so he would understand the process, and this time he has done most of it himself with a level of determination that would be funny if it weren’t so endearing. the icing is a little uneven. the decorations tilt charmingly off-center. it is, in every possible way, perfect.
he lights the candles with a solemnity that nearly undoes you. “there,” he says quietly, stepping back just enough to admire it. then he looks at you, his face opening into that soft, awestruck affection that still catches you off guard even now. “make your wish.” you do. or at least you pretend to, because the truth is your wish has been standing in front of you all day, dark-haired and beautiful and a little too earnest for his own good.
when you blow out the candles, choso actually smiles—small, genuine, radiant in its own restrained way—and claps once under his breath, like he is trying to be polite about his own excitement. then you cut the cake together. then you sit on the couch and eat it from little plates while your legs drape over his lap and he absently strokes your calf with one cool hand, his eyes never fully leaving your face.
there are texts throughout the day too. yuuji sends you something enthusiastic and adorable. a few others follow. choso watches you read them with the calm patience of someone who has accepted that other people also care for you, though he very obviously believes his devotion exceeds all of theirs put together. every time your phone buzzes too long, he grows quieter, edging closer until you inevitably smile and lean back into him, and then he relaxes at once.
by the evening, the whole day has gone gentle with love. that is the only phrase for it. gentle with love. saturated by it. every hour softened by choso’s attention, every small thing made sweeter by the fact of his joy in giving it. he sits with you on the balcony as dusk slides over the city, wraps you in a blanket and then in himself, chin on your shoulder, arms folded around your middle.
he tells you again how thankful he is that you’re here. how this day matters to him. how he loves that he gets to know you at all, much less celebrate you, much less hold you like this while the evening cools and the candles inside the apartment burn low. “this is the best day every year,” he murmurs into your hair.
you turn your head, smiling. “better than your own birthday?”
he goes still for a moment, considering. then, very simply: “yes.” it comes out with such complete sincerity that you laugh, though your eyes sting a little too.
he kisses you then. slowly. with the same reverence he brings to everything involving you, as if kissing is still a marvel, as if he is still a little astonished every time you allow it. maybe he is. maybe he always will be. choso kisses the way some people pray—patiently, deeply, with his whole self involved—and by the time you pull away you are warm and breathless and smiling in that dazed little way he adores.
he brushes your hair back from your face. “happy birthday,” he says again, because he has said it all day and will likely keep saying it until midnight forces him to stop. then softer, his gaze fixed on you with all the ancient, aching devotion in him laid bare: “the world was very kind to me when it gave me you.” and there it is, really. the whole truth of the day. the whole truth of choso. he adores you. he is thankful for you in a way so profound it sometimes seems to frighten even him. he would keep you in his arms every hour if he could, not to cage you, never that, but simply because his body seems to have decided that holding you is its highest and most necessary function. so he does.
through the last movie you half-watch with your head on his shoulder. through the quiet washing of dishes because he refuses to let you do them tonight. through the final sleepy hour before bed, when you are soft with sugar and love and the pleasant exhaustion of being cherished so carefully. and later, when you are tucked beneath the blankets and he is curled around you once more, his mouth at the nape of your neck, fangs dragging slightly there like his desire for you simply cannot be contained, his arms secure around your waist, he says it one last time into your skin. “happy birthday, love.” as if the words themselves are precious. as if you are. as if he will spend every year for the rest of your life trying to make sure you know it.
if we’ve been mutuals for long enough i don’t even care what you post anymore. if one of my mutuals of two years suddenly gets really into competitive caber toss i just accept zenlike that half my dash is going to be gifsets of burly men hefting logs forever now. i adapt to all online conditions like an animal with high toxicity tolerance
today? | fushiguro megumi, gojo satoru, hiromi higuruma, ieiri shoko, itadori yuuji, kamo choso, nanami kento
↳ they find out that today's your birthday and you hadn't told them before — pre-relationship
a/n: welcome to....birthday week!! I explained this already in a post, but this week I'll be posting birthday related content all week! warnings: vague allusions to family problems, mentions of alcohol, I think that's all. this got a little repetitive, sorry fam. but be on the lookout for more birthday posts! ^.^
slightly yandere cult geto thoughts...they consume me. I don't normally post just my rambling thoughts, but I love geto too much to keep himself to myself, we must share. (warnings: dark content, yandere suguru, manipulation, allusions to sex, just creepy geto in general.)
he can’t hold you in one shape long enough to understand you, every attempt at thinking you cleanly dissolves, runs, stains everything it touches until there is no thought left that isn’t in some way marked by you, a seepage, a slow saturation, like damp in the bones of a house that was once sturdy and now gives under the slightest pressure, and he notices it happening even as it happens, that creeping softness in places that should have stayed rigid, intact, principled, and it should alarm him, it does, distantly, the way a wound registers after the blood has already started pooling, too late to prevent anything, only enough awareness left to catalog the damage, to name it, and still he doesn’t stop, doesn’t pull away, because you are there and you are unbearable in your quiet, in your unguardedness, in the way you offer yourself up in small, thoughtless increments to people who will never understand the enormity of what they’re taking, and it makes something inside him twist so tightly it borders on pain, not sharp, not clean, but a slow, grinding ache that builds and builds until it becomes almost pleasurable, almost something he leans into just to feel it crest.
you are too open, too easily accessed, too reachable, and it feels wrong in a way he cannot quite articulate without sounding like something he refuses to become, because what right does he have to decide how you should exist, what right does he have to want you contained, to want you less available, to want....
no, not less. never less. just…different. angled toward him, maybe, though even that thought is slippery, dangerous, something he presses down on and then circles back to anyway, because it lingers, it always lingers, the idea of you turning, just slightly, choosing where to place your attention with more care, with more intention, withholding it from the masses of people who take and take and do not even recognize the theft, and offering it instead in a way that feels—god, he doesn’t even have the language for it anymore, everything he had before feels insufficient, too small, too brittle to hold the weight of what you are doing to him simply by existing within his field of perception.
he watches you and it is not passive, it is never passive, it is a kind of consumption that leaves him hollowed out and overfull at the same time, a contradiction he cannot resolve, because every detail becomes something he cannot discard, the tilt of your head, the cadence of your voice, the infinitesimal hesitations before you speak as if you are constantly measuring yourself against something no one else can see, and he wants to reach into that process, disrupt it, dismantle it, not to harm, never to harm, but to see what remains when you are no longer editing yourself for the comfort of others, to see if there is something sharper buried beneath that endless gentleness, something that belongs wholly to you and not to the expectations placed upon you by a world that does not deserve the luxury of your consideration.
and when it surfaces, those rare, flickering moments where you falter, where irritation or overwhelm or something more volatile slips through the cracks, unpolished, unrefined, imperfect in a way that feels almost sacred, it stays with him, it echoes, it embeds itself so deeply he can recall it with painful clarity hours later, days later, the exact way your expression shifts, the tension in your posture, the unfamiliarity of it all, like you are wearing something you have not yet grown accustomed to, and he finds himself wanting—god, wanting, the word feels insufficient, too light for the weight of it—to prolong it, not out of cruelty but out of something far more insidious, a desire to see you claim that space more fully, to stop shrinking yourself to fit the confines of other people’s comfort, to take, for once, instead of give. it is selfish. he knows it is selfish. it curdles somewhere deep in him, that knowledge, but it does not deter him, it only folds into everything else, becomes another layer, another justification, another thread in the tangled, tightening knot of thoughts that refuse to resolve into anything clean or manageable. because you should not be like this. you should not be so easily touched by a world that will leave fingerprints on you and walk away unchanged. you should not be something that can be diluted.
and he cannot stop thinking about what it would mean to keep you from that, to gather up every fragment of you that is scattered so carelessly into the hands of others and hold it somewhere it cannot be worn down, cannot be diminished, cannot be misunderstood, a preservation, a safeguarding, something that sounds noble when he frames it that way and something far more dangerous when he lets the thought run unchecked, because it does not stop at preservation, it does not stay contained within the boundaries he sets for it, it expands, it blooms into something too large, too consuming, too—
he exhales, but it does nothing to steady him, the breath comes too shallow, too late, because the image has already formed, half-formed, dissolving at the edges and yet persistent, a sense of closeness so absolute it borders on suffocation, of you existing within a space so near to him that separation becomes irrelevant, impossible, and it should horrify him, it should send him recoiling from himself, but instead it lingers, warm and terrible and strangely comforting, like pressing on a bruise just to feel the ache of it.
he is not a man who loses control. he has built himself too carefully for that, layered restraint over instinct, ideology over impulse, purpose over everything that might compromise it. and yet, you exist. and everything he has constructed begins to feel less like a foundation and more like something brittle, something that might fracture under the sustained pressure of this quiet, unrelenting fixation that refuses to be categorized, refuses to be dismissed, refuses to be anything other than what it is: a slow, creeping erosion of certainty.
he tells himself it is temporary. he tells himself it will pass. he tells himself he has endured worse, resisted more, that this is nothing, this is manageable, this is...fucking unbearable.
you laugh, somewhere close enough that it cuts through him before he can finish the thought, and it unravels instantly, every careful justification collapsing under the sheer, undeniable fact of you, of the way you sound, the way you are, and he feels it again, that tightening, that ache, that unbearable, exquisite awareness that he is already too far gone to return to whatever version of himself existed before you entered the equation. and the most dangerous part, the part he does not let himself linger on for too long because it feels like stepping too close to an edge he may not be able to step back from is that he does not know if he wants to be pulled back at all. that maybe, somewhere in the quiet, decaying corners of his thoughts, he has already begun to accept the fall.
he shouldn’t be thinking about it like this, he knows he shouldn’t, there are structures in place, hierarchies, purpose, a thousand moving pieces that once demanded his attention with an urgency that felt absolute, necessary, righteous even, and now they blur at the edges, soften, lose their gravity the longer you linger in his mind, because how is he meant to return to anything as mundane as doctrine and obedience when you exist in such a way that renders everything else ornamental at best, obsolete at worst, a hollow performance he can no longer fully commit to when the only thing that feels real—achingly, suffocatingly real—is the thought of you seated somewhere elevated, not as a symbol, not as an idea, but as something tangible and breathing and devastating in your quiet, your softness made opulent, draped in something that finally matches the weight of you, silks pooling at your feet, gold catching in your hair, light bending around you as if it understands instinctively what the rest of the world has failed to grasp.
and it makes him furious, in a way that coils low and simmering, not explosive but enduring, because you walk so freely among people who cannot even recognize what stands in front of them, who look at you and see something simple, something accessible, something they can touch and take and leave behind without consequence, and the thought of it turns in his stomach, a slow, nauseating churn that never quite settles, because you are wasted here, squandered on a world that does not know how to kneel properly, how to lower itself, how to look at something like you and understand that reverence is the only appropriate response.
he thinks about it too much. about removing you from it. never anything so inelegant as violence, but gentle, decisive maneuvering, the way one would relocate something fragile to a place where it can be properly preserved, properly appreciated, properly seen, because that is what it comes down to, isn’t it, the simple, undeniable fact that no one sees you the way he does, no one could, they lack the capacity, the awareness, the depth required to comprehend what you are, and so they reduce you, unintentionally, thoughtlessly, into something smaller, something manageable, something that fits neatly into their limited understanding of the world.
he refuses to do that to you. he won’t. and the thought of others—of those filthy, grasping hands, those empty, incurious gazes—lingering too long, drawing too close, existing in the same space as you without the decency to recognize the privilege of it, it makes something in him tighten until it borders on unbearable, a pressure behind his ribs that demands release, that demands correction, that demands...
he exhales, but it does nothing, it never does, because the image is already there, vivid and unrelenting, of you placed somewhere above all of that, removed from the reach of those who would mishandle you, elevated not as a spectacle but as something sacred, something untouchable unless approached with the proper understanding, the proper devotion, and even then—no, even then he hesitates, because the idea of others looking at you like that, even in reverence, even in awe, it sits wrong with him, it twists into something sharper, more possessive, something that feels too close to the edge of what he has been trying so carefully not to become.
because he does not want to share. not your attention, not your presence, not even the idea of you. and that realization lands heavy, undeniable, something he cannot reframe into anything gentler or more palatable no matter how he turns it over in his mind.
so the vision shifts. tightens. narrows. no longer a room filled with worshippers, no longer a collective reverence, but something far more intimate, far more consuming, where the space around you is emptied, cleared, stripped down until there is nothing left but the two of you and the quiet, suffocating weight of his attention fixed entirely, unwaveringly on you.
because if anyone is going to understand you, to appreciate you, to devote themselves properly—it will be him. only him.
and the thought of it sinks into him, settles, roots, becomes something dangerously close to comfort, because it simplifies things, doesn’t it, removes the complication of others entirely, eliminates the need to share something that should never have been shared in the first place, something that was always meant to be…contained. with him. he would give you everything. it is not a promise, not something he articulates out loud, but a quiet, absolute certainty that threads through every thought, every image, every fleeting, intrusive desire that takes hold and refuses to let go. everything he has built, everything he has amassed, all of it suddenly feels secondary, incidental, tools rather than ends, resources to be redirected, repurposed, reshaped around a single, consuming axis that he cannot escape.
you.
he imagines it in fragments, never fully formed, never clean, but persistent, insistent, the way your life would shift under the weight of his attention, the way it would narrow, simplify, not in a way that diminishes you but in a way that removes everything unnecessary, everything that drains from you without giving anything of equal value in return. he would surround you with things that matter, things that reflect you, things that elevate you, that reinforce what you are instead of eroding it piece by piece the way the world insists on doing. he would watch. constantly. not out of suspicion, not out of distrust, but out of something far more consuming, a need to witness, to absorb, to catalogue every shift and nuance and fleeting expression so that nothing of you is ever lost, ever overlooked, ever taken for granted the way it has been by others who lack the awareness to understand the significance of what they are in the presence of.
and you would soften into it. that is the thought that lingers longest, that curls around everything else and pulls it tighter, the image of you gradually, inevitably yielding to the sheer, overwhelming weight of his devotion, not forced, never forced, but drawn in, coaxed, convinced by the consistency of it, the constancy, the way he would be there, always, attentive and unwavering and impossible to ignore. until the rest of the world fades. until he becomes the center of it. until you look for him first, instinctively, before anyone else, before anything else, because why wouldn’t you, when he has made himself so indispensable, so deeply embedded in every facet of your existence that the absence of him becomes unthinkable, unbearable, a void too large to ignore.
he knows it is too much. it teeters on something dangerous, something unsustainable, something that would consume not only him but you as well if left unchecked. but he does not pull back. he does not loosen his grip on the thought, does not let it dissolve the way he knows he should, because it feels right in a way that defies logic, defies reason, defies everything he has built himself upon. because you deserve to be worshipped. and if the world refuses to do it properly, he happily will.
Hi, I love your fanfics! Especially the gojo ones! I just had one question… do you use chat gpt in your writing because you use a lot of m dashes and it sounds like ai 🤖 and I put one of them through an ai detector and it came out to a whopping 60%! Please do not take offence 😅
i will take offense actually.
why would you take my work, copy it, and send it to an ai detector without my consent ? you don't know where those tools store text or what they do with it and you didn't even think to ask before pasting something i spent hours working on into god knows where to probably train the very models you're accusing me of using.
that's a massive violation of my privacy as a writer and deeply disrespectful.
the em dash is a stylistic choice for pacing and emphasis that has been used in literature for centuries. if you go read classics like wuthering heights or jane eyre, you'll see they are full of them. would you copy and paste charlotte brontë into an ai detector and accuse her of using ai too ?
this really bothers me a lot, not just because of this message, but because how disrespectful people on tumblr have become toward authors in general.
you don't know how much time i put into my writing. you don't know how many hours of my free time go into planning, drafting, editing, and rewriting. this is something i do for free, purely because i want to share something i made with others.
so yes it's genuinely violating to find out that my work was copied and pasted into an ai detector without my consent and then waved back at me like proof of something. interactions like this are exactly why i consider taking everything down.
edit: i also need to say how deeply unsettling it is to know that my text is now "out there" somewhere i have zero control over. i only post my work on tumblr and ao3. that's intentional. once something is copied and fed into an ai tool, i have no way of knowing where it ends up or how it's used, and that loss of control is genuinely disturbing.
i am very clear about my boundaries. my rules explicitly state no ai feeding. ignoring that and doing it anyway shows a complete lack of respect for my work and my time.
so i genuinely have to ask: if you love my work, why is there so little respect for the effort behind it, or for me as an author? it would have taken seconds to read my rules or ask beforehand. you chose not to.
instead, you took something i've spent countless hours on, enjoyed it, consumed it, taken for granted, and then treated as something you could do whatever you wanted with, even in ways i explicitly said no to. that's not appreciation. it's entitlement. and it's violating.
i am still a real person behind the screen. my work is part of my very being. if you've read it, you know how personal it can be. how often it comes from something deeply vulnerable in me. knowing it was handled without care, consent, or respect is awful.
Hiii, just wanted to say I adore your work. The Care series is so good and you write our dear Nanamin beautifully <3
thank you thank you! nanami is my fav to write for, I think, though it changes everyday.... but I love writing the series too! part four will come sometime this week, I hope!
how does he react to you saying, "you didn't ask me to be your leprechaun for st. patrick's day"?
immediately plays along, incredibly guilty and instantly asks if you'd do him the honor of being his leprechaun
↳ gojo satoru, hiromi higuruma, ino takuma, kong shiu, yuuji itadori, kaminari denki, kirishima eijiro, sero hanta, takami keigo, bokuto kōtarō, oikawa tōru, caleb, xavier
has put up with this for god knows how long and is yet to understand how your brain works
↳ fushiguro megumi, geto suguru, ieiri shoko, nanami kento, aizawa shota, ida tenya, shinso hitoshi, todoroki natsuo, kuroo tetsurō, matsukawa issei, sawamura daichi, rafayel, sylus
rightfully very confused, probably doesn't even know what a leprechaun or st. patrick's day is
↳ ijichi kiyotaka, kamo choso, amajiki tamaki, midoriya izuku, todoroki shoto, hinata shōyō, kageyama tobio, ushijima wakatoshi, zayne
"what the fuck does that even mean?"
↳ fushiguro toji, sukuna ryomen, bakugo katsuki, todoroki touya, kozume kenma, tsukishima kei
anchor | nanami kento
↳ the gala is exactly as you both expected: lavish, overpriced, and a myraid of obligatory social situations that were terribly boring and exerting. what nanami didn't expect is for the vaguely cat-and-mouse game you've been playing to come to a crux in the ladies restroom. 6.6k words
a/n: part four to care series about nanami! finally, we got somethin' going on ;) due to a fun event I'll be doing next week, I won't be done with part five for a little while, but she's coming! and I think this'll be either a six or seven part series, I don't know I can't decide! warnings: cussing, social anxiety, I think that's all.
nanami prepares for the evening with the same quiet exactitude he applies to most things in his life: deliberately, methodically, with a patience that borders on ritual. the apartment is still, the late afternoon light slipping in through the narrow balcony window in long, pale ribbons that stretch across the floorboards and catch faintly against the polished edge of his dresser. he has already showered, already shaved with the careful precision that comes from years of habit rather than vanity, already combed his hair into its familiar, controlled order. there is nothing hurried about the process. nothing theatrical. nanami has never been a man who rushes himself when composure is required.
his suit waits for him where he laid it earlier that morning, draped neatly across the back of a chair as though it, too, understands the importance of maintaining its structure. he slips into the trousers first, fastening them with a practiced ease, then the crisp white shirt whose collar sits perfectly against the line of his neck. the fabric is cool when it first touches his skin, faintly starched, the scent of clean linen lingering just enough to register when he inhales. his cufflinks—simple, silver, unadorned—click softly into place.
nanami has always taken care with his appearance. not out of vanity, exactly. vanity implies a kind of self-indulgence he has never possessed. for him it has always been something closer to discipline. order. the quiet reassurance that if the world insists upon chaos, at least he can meet it properly dressed.
still, as he reaches for his tie, his thoughts drift. not to the gala itself. the event holds little appeal for him beyond its inevitability. a room full of political maneuvering and polished conversation rarely offers anything he finds particularly enriching. the higher-ups will posture. the faculty will endure. gojo will make a spectacle of himself before inevitably being reined in by geto with that peculiar patience the man seems to possess.
nanami can already imagine the entire evening with perfect clarity. what he cannot imagine—what his mind insists on returning to with quiet persistence—is you.
he pauses for a moment, the tie draped loosely around his neck, his reflection staring back at him from the mirror with the same composed expression he wears almost everywhere else. it would be easy, he thinks, to dismiss the thought as trivial. you are a colleague. a quiet presence in the building. someone he speaks to only in fragments, small exchanges that rarely extend beyond professional courtesy.
and yet. you will be there. the realization carries a strange, uncharacteristic warmth with it, something soft and almost embarrassingly hopeful that settles beneath his ribs as he begins to knot the tie with slow, careful movements. you have never struck him as someone who enjoys spectacle. if anything, you move through the world with a kind of deliberate restraint, as though drawing as little notice as possible is the safest way to exist within it. but even imagining you dressed simply does not diminish the way his chest tightens faintly at the prospect.
nanami has never believed beauty to be dependent upon presentation. in truth, he suspects you could appear in the most unremarkable clothing imaginable—a borrowed coat, perhaps, or even the drab uniform of the students you teach—and still manage to look so quietly striking it would unsettle him all the same. there is something tragically beautiful about you. not the kind of beauty that demands attention. the kind that aches.
he smooths the tie against his shirtfront and reaches for his jacket, sliding his arms into the sleeves with a practiced motion. the fabric settles comfortably across his shoulders, the familiar weight grounding him. in the mirror, he looks exactly as he always does. composed. controlled. respectable enough to stand in a room full of political sorcerers without inviting comment. and yet beneath that steady exterior, something softer lingers. a quiet anticipation he cannot entirely justify.
because perhaps—just perhaps—this evening will offer him something small. a glance across the room. a moment of conversation. the simple, fleeting privilege of seeing you somewhere outside the cold fluorescent glow of the classroom halls. nanami exhales slowly, smoothing an imaginary crease from his cuff. it is a foolish thing to hope for. but he finds, as he reaches for his watch and fastens it carefully around his wrist, that hope has never been particularly obedient to reason.
—
your apartment slowly fills with the quiet disorder of indecision. it begins subtly enough, a brush left abandoned on the edge of the sink, a cluster of hairpins scattered like fallen needles across the counter, the faint scent of your perfume lingering too heavily in the air because you sprayed it once, then again, then a third time without quite meaning to. the dress lies stretched across the bed where you laid it earlier, dark fabric spilling outward in elegant folds that look far more confident in their purpose than you feel standing before the mirror.
you had believed, earlier in the day, that preparing for this evening would be simple. dress. shoes. hair. leave.
but the act of transforming yourself into someone suitable for a ballroom full of powerful sorcerers proves unexpectedly complicated, your reflection shifting every few minutes into a slightly different version of yourself as you gather your hair up, twist it, secure it with pins, study the result with uncertain eyes, then pull the entire arrangement apart again until the strands fall loose across your shoulders in a soft cascade that feels immediately more familiar and somehow less appropriate all at once.
the process repeats. up. down. pinned. half-pinned. abandoned.
your hair develops a quiet rebellion against order, slipping free of the arrangements you attempt to impose upon it until the counter becomes littered with small metallic casualties and your patience begins to thin in soft, frustrated breaths that fog the mirror before fading.
eventually you stop fighting it. the brush moves through the length of it slowly, smoothing the darker strands until they fall naturally along your back, framing your face in a way that feels softer than you intended but far easier to live with than the careful structures you had been attempting before. loose, then. you can live with it. the dress waits patiently on the bed.
you step into it with the same reluctant resignation one might feel while putting on ceremonial armor, the fabric sliding cool against your skin before settling into place with an unexpected elegance that makes you pause for a moment before the mirror again. it is a deep color, richer than you typically choose for yourself, something drawn from the quiet jewel tones of winter fruit and shadowed wine. the skirt falls in a smooth line all the way to the floor, the sleeves long and fitted, the neckline modest enough that you do not feel exposed beneath the imagined scrutiny of strangers.
utahime had looked at the dress earlier that week with a long, evaluative silence that carried far more authority than enthusiasm. she had turned the hanger slightly in her hands, examining the fabric the way someone inspects a piece of work they intend to approve whether they like it or not. “it will do,” she had said finally, the words delivered with the practical decisiveness she applied to most things.
shoko had been sprawled in the lounge chair nearby, cigarette balanced between two fingers, watching the exchange with faint amusement. her gaze had drifted toward you then, lingering for a moment with the kind of quiet perceptiveness that always made you slightly uneasy. “you should wear it,” she’d said, voice mild, almost distracted. “it suits you.” neither of them had pushed after that, though the message had been clear enough. you were expected to look the part this evening, whether you particularly wanted to or not.
you suspect you may fail at that particular request. still, standing here now, the dress feels…acceptable. strange. slightly theatrical. but acceptable. you smooth your hands along the skirt, feeling the subtle weight of the fabric as it shifts around your legs. for a moment you wonder if perhaps you look ridiculous, some academic accidentally costumed for a world she does not entirely belong to.
the clock interrupts the thought. you are already later than planned. your phone vibrates with the arrival notification for the taxi waiting outside, and the evening moves suddenly from theoretical to unavoidable.
the coat goes on carefully, draped so the sleeves do not wrinkle. your bag finds its place against your shoulder. one last glance at the mirror offers a reflection that still feels faintly unfamiliar — you, but polished in ways you rarely allow yourself to be, your posture instinctively restrained even as the dress lends you a quiet sort of elegance you had not expected. then the lights go out. the door closes. and you are on your way.
the taxi ride does nothing to soothe the growing agitation in your chest. traffic coils endlessly through the streets like a stubborn river refusing to yield to urgency, every red light lingering just a fraction longer than seems necessary. your driver hums softly along with a radio station that crackles faintly through the speakers, weaving through unfamiliar routes that twist your sense of direction into something slightly nauseating as the minutes slip past.
you check the time on your watch. then again. then again, the irritation tightening in your shoulders. you hate being late. it unsettles you in a way that feels disproportionate to the situation, the simple act of arriving after others already have creating a subtle pressure behind your ribs that makes the approaching building loom larger in your mind than it has any right to. by the time the taxi pulls up beneath the golden spill of the venue’s entrance lights, your pulse has already quickened into a quiet, persistent rhythm.
the building glows. tall windows cast warm illumination onto the pavement, music drifting faintly through the glass along with the murmur of voices that have already gathered inside. it looks exactly as you imagined it would: elegant, excessive, full of people who understand instinctively how to move through rooms like this without hesitation. you step out of the car with careful composure, smoothing your coat as though the gesture might restore some sense of control over the evening.
inside the ballroom, nanami has been looking for you. he has done so discreetly, the habit woven into the rhythm of his evening as naturally as breathing. conversations come and go around him, polite exchanges with colleagues, the inevitable moment where gojo drapes an arm around his shoulder and begins narrating some elaborate complaint about the champagne quality. nanami listens, responds when necessary, moves through the room with the same calm attentiveness that characterizes everything he does.
but his gaze keeps drifting. across the ballroom. toward the entrance. you are not there. minutes pass. then more. and just as he begins to wonder whether perhaps you have chosen not to attend after all—
the doors open. you walk in. the moment unfolds quietly, the way most meaningful moments tend to do, without spectacle or announcement. conversations continue. laughter rises and falls somewhere near the bar. no one else seems to register the significance of the late arrival beyond a brief glance toward the entrance.
nanami notices instantly. the world narrows with surprising ease. you stand just inside the doorway, coat still gathered loosely around your shoulders, eyes scanning the unfamiliar space with the careful awareness he has come to recognize so well. and the sight of you settles warmly into his chest.
the dress suits you perfectly. it is not elaborate, not dramatic in the way many gowns in the room seem determined to be, yet the deep jewel tone catches the light in a way that brings a soft richness to your appearance. the long sleeves frame your arms gracefully, the skirt falling all the way to the floor in a line of effortless elegance that moves gently when you shift your weight.
your hair—your beautiful hair he has privately admired more times than he will ever confess—flows freely tonight, cascading down your back in dark waves that catch the warm glow of the chandeliers. and your eyes. those thoughtful, luminous eyes framed by the thick natural lashes that soften every expression you wear. nanami feels an unmistakable sense of quiet satisfaction settle over him. you look beautiful. the realization carries a simple sincerity that requires no embellishment at all.
rooms like this possess their own rhythm, a quiet machinery of expectation that carries everyone forward whether they wish to participate or not. the orchestra murmurs gently somewhere beyond the sweep of the ballroom floor, chandeliers scatter light across the polished surfaces of glass and gold, and clusters of faculty and dignitaries shift gradually through the space like drifting constellations, rearranging themselves with each new arrival or departure.
you manage well enough at first. better than you expected, perhaps. the trick, you have long ago discovered, lies in remaining purposeful. if one appears to have a destination—if one moves through the room with quiet intention rather than idle hesitation—people are far less inclined to stop you for long. so you navigate carefully from one polite obligation to the next, offering greetings where they are required, nodding with measured attentiveness when introductions are made, positioning yourself beside yaga for a few minutes so the higher-ups can register your presence without needing to search for it later.
your voice remains calm, reserved, practiced. someone asks about your research. another about the lab. the same question repeats itself in slightly different forms throughout the hour, and each time you attempt the delicate balancing act of explaining your work in terms that sound respectable without becoming incomprehensible. curse evolution, you say. historical pattern analysis. minor manifestations across generational bloodlines. you simplify where you can, trimming away the deeper complexities until the explanation becomes something smooth and palatable enough for polite conversation. you are aware, of course, that most of them are not truly listening.
their attention flickers toward you briefly, politely, then drifts elsewhere the moment you pause long enough for them to speak again. your explanation becomes merely a stepping stone toward their own grievances—stories about long missions, frustrating bureaucratic changes, the exhausting expectations of students, the mild theatrical complaints of people who are accustomed to being heard.
you nod when appropriate. offer the occasional brief response. all the while the room presses steadily closer. someone hands you a glass of champagne. you accept it out of courtesy, though it remains untouched in your hand for the better part of twenty minutes. another guest offers you a different drink moments later, smiling as though the suggestion itself were a kindness. you decline gently. the music swells. laughter rises and falls in bright bursts that echo faintly against the walls. the lights feel warmer now than they did when you first arrived. perhaps brighter. perhaps closer.
across the room, nanami kento has been attempting—quietly, carefully—to reach you. he has spotted you several times since your arrival, each glimpse of that deep jewel-toned dress catching his attention as naturally as gravity pulls water downhill. the sight of you moving through the crowd remains unexpectedly compelling, your posture composed but slightly guarded, your hair falling down your back in dark waves that reflect the warm chandelier light each time you turn your head.
nanami does not intend to corner you. the last thing he wants is to trap you in conversation while the room presses too closely around you. still, he finds himself drifting gradually through the crowd in your direction more than once, pausing to exchange brief words with colleagues along the way, waiting for the natural moment when your paths might intersect. once he nearly reaches you. a faculty member stops him. another pulls him briefly into conversation. when he looks up again you have moved elsewhere, slipping between groups with the same careful efficiency he has come to recognize from the corridors at school. the pattern repeats itself. nanami does not take offense. he simply watches. you appear…tired.
the observation settles quietly in his mind as he studies the subtle changes in your posture from across the room. the tension in your shoulders has grown slightly more pronounced. your smile—when required—appears thinner now, your eyes shifting toward the edges of the ballroom more frequently as though searching for some point of relief.
these kinds of environments wear on you. he knows that much already. you are someone who thrives in quiet rooms, in the steady solitude of your lab where chalkboards and diagrams demand far less emotional negotiation than crowds of well-dressed strangers. the constant hum of conversation here, the subtle expectations embedded within every exchange, the simple proximity of so many bodies moving through the same shared air—it is exhausting in ways most people never bother to notice.
nanami sees it. and yet he waits. just one moment, he tells himself. one brief conversation. he wants only to tell you that you look lovely tonight. the word feels inadequate even in his thoughts. lovely does not quite encompass the quiet elegance of that dress against your skin, or the softness of your hair beneath the warm lights, or the thoughtful depth in your eyes as you listen patiently to people who are speaking more to themselves than to you. still. it would be enough.
but when nanami looks across the ballroom again—you are gone. the space you occupied moments earlier now contains only a small group of guests speaking animatedly over glasses of wine. no dark cascade of hair. no deep jewel-toned silhouette. no careful posture that he has unconsciously learned to recognize even from a distance.
his attention sharpens immediately. he scans the room once more, slow and methodical, searching the shifting crowd for any sign of you. nothing. the absence is strangely immediate. then, near the far edge of the ballroom, he catches sight of movement. the side door. you are slipping through it into the hallway beyond.
the gesture is subtle, nearly invisible among the constant motion of the room, but nanami notices the small details others might miss—the way your hand presses briefly against the wall as you push the door open, the faint rise and fall of your shoulders as you step out of the light. your breathing looks uneven. the door closes behind you. and nanami is already moving.
the bathroom offers a small and temporary mercy. the door shuts behind you with a quiet, decisive click that cuts the ballroom away as though someone has drawn a curtain across it. the music dulls instantly, reduced to a distant, muffled murmur beneath the steady hum of overhead lights. here the air is cooler. still. empty in the blessed way that empty spaces sometimes are.
for a moment you simply stand there. your hands rest against the porcelain edge of the sink while you look at your reflection with a kind of detached appraisal, as though the woman staring back at you might belong to someone else entirely. the dress is still immaculate, the jewel tone rich beneath the harsh bathroom lights, your hair falling over your shoulders exactly as it had when you arrived.
you look composed. which is fortunate. because adults do not have little fits in the bathroom. the thought arrives with the firm, steady logic you have spent most of your life cultivating. you have not cried. you have not panicked. your breathing is a little uneven, perhaps, and the room had begun to feel unbearably loud, unbearably close, but that hardly qualifies as a crisis.
you have been here almost an hour. that is more than enough. plenty of time for your presence to be noted, for the necessary pleasantries to be exchanged, for your obligation to the evening to be fulfilled. no one will care if you slip away now. in a room that large, filled with people who are mostly interested in hearing themselves speak, departures rarely attract attention.
you inhale slowly. the breath feels tight in your chest at first, like something working through a narrow space, but it loosens after a moment.
you will leave. that is the solution. you will gather yourself—just a little—walk calmly through the hallway, retrieve your coat, and disappear into the night before the ballroom has the opportunity to swallow another hour of your patience. you are not close enough with anyone here to require an explanation. yaga will assume you left early. utahime might notice eventually, but she will understand. you tighten your grip on the edge of the sink for a moment, the cool porcelain grounding beneath your palms. you are not crying. you are not falling apart. you are simply tired.
a few more steady breaths pass. then you turn for the door. the hallway outside is quiet. the transition from the warm, crowded ballroom to the open corridor sends a faint chill across your skin as you step through the doorway, your mind already moving ahead to the simple relief of going home—washing your face, removing the dress, slipping into bed where the world can shrink again to something manageable.
and then there is something enormous standing in front of you. for one brief, disorienting second your body startles instinctively, your breath catching in your throat as your eyes try to reconcile the sudden, imposing presence occupying the hallway. then recognition settles. it is not that you are particularly small. nanami kento is simply a very large man.
tall—taller than most people you know—with broad shoulders that fill the space around him almost effortlessly. his suit jacket stretches across a chest so expansive it seems to dominate your entire field of vision at this distance, the crisp white shirt beneath emphasizing the strong lines of his frame. his arms are folded loosely at his sides, the muscles beneath the fabric of his sleeves unmistakable even in stillness.
he is trying, you realize almost immediately, to make himself appear smaller.
the effort is painfully obvious.
his shoulders are slightly rounded forward, his stance deliberately relaxed, his posture softened in the careful way someone might behave around a startled animal. it would almost be amusing if the effect were not so endearing.
of course, there is only so small a man like nanami can reasonably become. your heart takes a moment to settle. but the instant you recognize him, something in your chest loosens without your permission. oh. nanami. nanami will not hurt you.
that much has been clear for a long time now, though you have never quite allowed yourself to articulate it aloud. he has been patient in a way that borders on incomprehensible, quietly orbiting your existence for months without demanding anything in return. there has never been pressure in his voice, never impatience when you retreat from conversation, never the subtle frustration that so many others eventually reveal when they decide you are too quiet, too complicated, too exhausting to bother with.
it occurs to you suddenly—standing here in the hallway beneath the soft overhead lights—that nanami kento might be the only man who has ever truly attempted to know you without first deciding that the effort would not be worth the inconvenience. the thought makes your chest feel strangely warm. perhaps he deserves some credit for that.
though if you were being honest, there is nothing here for him to discover. you have tried to make that clear over the past months with your careful distance, your short answers, your deliberate refusal to encourage whatever quiet interest seems to live behind his thoughtful eyes. you had hoped that eventually he would understand the truth of it: that you are difficult to know, difficult to keep, a person shaped by too many strange edges to ever become easy company.
if only you knew how much he loves being around you. how every small interaction feels like a victory he treasures quietly. how he would accept infinitely more of your presence without hesitation.
nanami says something. your thoughts have carried you too far away to catch the first attempt, his voice arriving as a deep, warm vibration that brushes the edge of your awareness without fully reaching you. he repeats himself. “are you alright?” the rich bass of his voice settles the room around you like gravity. you blink. of course. you cannot admit weakness in front of a man like this. not when he is standing there looking so steady and capable and painfully kind.
you nod. the motion is small, restrained. but your throat feels strangely tight. nanami notices immediately. he always does. his gaze studies your face with the quiet attentiveness he seems incapable of suppressing. “are you leaving?”
you nod again. “yes.” the word barely emerges.
something in his expression softens further. “would you mind if I walked you out, then?” the question lands gently, without expectation, as though he would accept refusal without protest.
you find yourself nodding before your mind has the opportunity to argue. he turns first. nanami always seems to understand instinctively how to guide a situation without making you feel pushed, his long stride adjusting easily to match your pace as the two of you move down the corridor together. after a few steps his hand finds your lower back. the contact is firm and warm and impossibly steady. his palm is enormous. the heat radiating through the thin fabric of your dress sends a quiet wave of warmth through your entire body, the kind of warmth you realize with faint surprise you have not felt in months. nanami seems to notice that too. his hand remains there.
outside, the night air is cold enough to sting. without hesitation he slips out of his suit jacket and settles it carefully over your shoulders, the familiar scent of clean linen and faint cologne surrounding you as the fabric drapes around your arms.
“I can take you,” he says, voice low, steady as the rhythm of his breathing.
you shake your head almost immediately. “no, it’s alright. I’ll take a taxi.” you do not want to inconvenience him. you do not want to ask for more than you already have.
the refusal comes gently enough, softened by habit, wrapped in the careful politeness you’ve spent years perfecting so that rejection never sounds like rejection. to you it feels reasonable, even considerate. he has already walked you out, already given you his coat, already stood here in the cold beside you longer than necessary.
there is no reason to trouble him further. nanami, however, receives the answer with a quiet tension that settles almost imperceptibly through his shoulders. it isn’t anger. it isn’t offense. something deeper moves through him instead—an old, familiar frustration that arrives whenever you treat his presence like an imposition rather than an offering.
because in nanami’s mind you have never once been a bother. not even for a moment. if anything, the opposite has always been true. the thought that you might someday trouble him—that you might interrupt his evening with a phone call asking for help, or knock on his office door because you needed something, anything at all—carries a strange and deeply satisfying appeal he has never fully unpacked.
he would welcome it. god, he would welcome it. nanami is a man who has spent most of his life solving problems. that is, in many ways, the entire structure of his existence. identify the difficulty, evaluate the situation, step forward and handle what needs handling. it is a pattern so deeply ingrained in him that he rarely notices it anymore.
and you stand before him wrapped in his coat, eyes a little tired, shoulders still carrying the faint remnants of the evening’s strain, and you refuse even the smallest opportunity to lean on him. he understands why. you have lived too long without reliable help to believe in it easily. independence becomes armor when the world repeatedly teaches you that relying on others invites disappointment. nanami recognizes that instinct with a painful clarity.
still. some stubborn, quiet part of him wishes you would let the armor slip. just once. he wants you to bother him. truly bother him. he wants you to ask him for inconvenient things—rides home at unreasonable hours, help, carrying too many books back to your lab, someone to walk beside you on evenings when the city feels too loud and the sidewalks too crowded. he wants your problems to appear on his doorstep so he can solve them with the calm, steady competence that has always defined him. if you asked him to stay late, he would. if you asked him to drive across the city, he would. if you asked him to sit quietly beside you while you worked, saying nothing at all, he would consider it a privilege.
nanami has never been afraid of responsibility. and caring for you—however gently, however gradually—feels less like a burden and more like something instinctual. something he has already accepted without realizing the moment when the decision was made. but you will not ask. you thank him politely. decline politely. keep the careful distance that has always defined the fragile boundary between the two of you. so he exhales once through his nose, the sound almost inaudible in the cold air, and nods.
“alright,” he says simply. there is no pressure in his voice. “then I’ll walk you to the taxi stand.” you do not argue. when the taxi arrives, you instinctively begin shrugging off the jacket to return it. nanami’s hand stops you gently. “I’d like you to wear it home, please,” he says, his voice low and steady. “if you insist on returning it, you can do that on monday.” your stomach flutters unexpectedly. you nod. he opens the car door for you, one hand steadying the frame as you slip inside. “goodnight,” he murmurs. and something about the way he says it feels different. there is a softness in his eyes you have not noticed before.
a quiet light. the taxi door closes. as the car pulls away, you find yourself wondering if perhaps nanami kento is not as frightening as you once believed. perhaps there is something there after all.
later, at home, the apartment feels impossibly quiet. you eat something small without really tasting it, wash the evening from your face, brush your teeth slowly beneath the warm glow of the bathroom light. your hair falls forward again as you braid it loosely over one shoulder before climbing into bed. soft sheets. comfortable pajamas. and nanami’s coat draped over the chair beside you.
sleep comes easily. but your mind wanders. you dream of warm hands slipping the heels from your feet. of gentle kisses pressed against your cheek. of strong arms wrapped carefully around you. and somewhere in the soft blur between waking and sleep, the image of a tall, golden-haired man lingers quietly in your thoughts. you had told yourself you could never have him. now, you are no longer certain what the future holds.
—
he does not linger outside for long. the cold settles quickly once you are gone, the taxi’s taillights dissolving into the slow current of traffic until there is nothing left of the moment but the faint imprint of your warmth lingering in the sleeves of the jacket he is no longer wearing. for a few seconds he remains where he is, hands resting loosely at his sides, his gaze lingering down the empty stretch of street as though the night itself might offer some small confirmation that what just happened was real.
then he exhales. and turns back toward the building. the ballroom greets him again with its warm gold light and the steady, conversational hum of people who have settled comfortably into the later half of the evening. somewhere across the room someone is laughing too loudly. the orchestra has shifted into something softer now, a slow drifting melody that fills the empty spaces between voices.
nanami slips easily back into the crowd. he knows gojo will notice if he disappears entirely. the man has a remarkable ability to detect the absence of people he considers part of his orbit, and the teasing that would follow tomorrow morning would be…extensive. still. nanami finds that he does not mind the room nearly as much as he did earlier.
in fact, there is something dangerously close to delight lingering beneath his calm exterior. he had been alone with you. the thought settles in his chest with quiet, glowing satisfaction. it had been brief, yes. a small moment carved out of the chaos of the evening. but it had existed. you had spoken with him. walked beside him. accepted the warmth of his coat without protest. allowed his hand to guide you gently through the hallway without pulling away. to anyone else those details might appear insignificant. nanami catalogs them like treasured artifacts.
you had declined the ride home, of course. he smiles faintly to himself at that. of course you had. you are consistent in your careful independence, always determined to avoid asking for more than you believe you deserve. it frustrates him sometimes—quietly, privately—but even that stubborn distance feels strangely endearing now that he understands it better.
he will warm you up to things. gradually. patiently. nanami has never been a man who rushes what matters. he moves through the room again, exchanging brief nods with colleagues who greet him as he passes, accepting a glass of something amber from a passing server even though he has little interest in drinking it. his thoughts remain several steps removed from the conversation around him, drifting instead toward the quiet image of you wrapped in his coat inside the taxi.
he wonders if you are warm now. if you are already home. if you will remember the way his hand rested at your back. a faint warmth spreads through his chest again. he had offered you things tonight. small things, perhaps. a walk. a ride. a jacket against the cold. you had refused some of them, yes—but not all. and even your refusals had come softly, without the sharp retreat he once feared from you.
progress. the word slips through his mind with surprising ease. nanami is aware, dimly, that he may be getting ahead of himself. the rational part of his mind understands the improbability of it all. you have spoken fewer than a handful of sentences to him across the better part of a year. your instinct remains distance, not closeness. there are entire continents of silence between you that patience alone may never bridge.
and yet. he finds that he does not care nearly as much as he should. because tonight you stood beside him in the hallway with tired eyes and trembling breath, and you trusted him enough to let him walk you outside. that is something. and nanami has always been a man who knows how to build something meaningful from very small beginnings. he takes a slow sip from the glass in his hand, gaze drifting briefly toward the ballroom doors as though he might still expect you to reappear there.
you will get used to him. he is certain of it. little by little. and when you do—well. nanami smiles faintly to himself. then he will give you everything he can, everything you’ll allow.
—
the night does not remain happy forever. at first it is only a sound. a faint, irregular tapping somewhere beyond the edges of sleep—soft enough that your mind folds it easily into the half-formed scenery of dreams. in the hazy, drifting space between unconsciousness and waking, the noise becomes something distant and abstract, like rain against a window or the quiet settling of old pipes in the walls.
you turn slightly beneath the covers, pulling the blanket closer around your shoulders, the warmth of the bed wrapping you in a cocoon that feels almost impossibly comfortable after the long evening. then the sound changes. not tapping anymore. something heavier. a slow, irregular dripping that seems to echo through the apartment with a hollow persistence that sleep cannot quite swallow. your eyes open. for a moment you lie perfectly still, staring into the dim gray darkness of the ceiling above you, your mind moving slowly through the fog of sleep as it tries to place the noise. the room is quiet otherwise. the soft hum of the refrigerator down the hall. the faint distant rush of late-night traffic beyond the window.
drip. a pause. drip.
your brow furrows. you sit up. the floor is cold beneath your feet when you swing your legs over the side of the bed, and the sensation sends a small shiver up your spine as you stand there listening more carefully now, the sound becoming clearer with every second.
drip. drip.
it is coming from the hallway. or perhaps the kitchen. you move slowly at first, still caught halfway between sleep and the waking world, your loose braid sliding over your shoulder as you push open the bedroom door and step into the narrow stretch of apartment beyond.
the air feels damp. the observation arrives faintly at first, almost abstract. then you hear it. not dripping now. running. water is hitting the floor somewhere ahead of you in a steady, quiet cascade. your heart stutters. you turn the corner toward the kitchen. and stop. for a moment your mind refuses to understand what your eyes are seeing. water is pouring from the ceiling.
not a small leak. not a polite, manageable trickle that might be contained with a bowl and a phone call to the building superintendent in the morning. no—this is something far less cooperative. a steady sheet of water spills from a widening seam in the plaster above the kitchen cabinets, spreading outward across the ceiling in dark, creeping stains before breaking free and falling to the floor below.
the kitchen tile glistens beneath it. your socks are soaked almost immediately. the sound of the water fills the apartment now, a relentless rushing that drowns out the quiet nighttime stillness that had existed here only minutes ago. you stare.
the ceiling groans faintly. another thin crack appears beside the first, widening with a slow, sickening patience that sends a cold wave of realization through your chest. oh, your apartment is flooding. the thought lands with strange clarity. and suddenly everything begins to move.
you turn quickly, heart hammering now as adrenaline burns away the last remnants of sleep. towels—no, pointless. a bucket—equally useless. the water is already spreading beyond the kitchen, slipping into the hallway in shallow reflective streams that creep toward the living room carpet.
another groan echoes through the ceiling above you. that decides it. you grab your phone from the nightstand and begin moving with purpose. a bag. necessities. the small emergency instincts you didn’t know you possessed begin surfacing quietly, guiding your hands through the process with surprising efficiency. a change of clothes. your laptop. the folder containing your research notes. a small bundle of toiletries swept quickly from the bathroom counter. you pause briefly beside the bookshelf, staring at the rows of carefully collected volumes that have quietly accumulated around you over the years.
you cannot carry them. the realization stings. but the ceiling groans again, louder this time. you zip the bag. water has reached the living room now, creeping slowly across the hardwood floor in glistening sheets that reflect the pale glow of the overhead lights. you slip your shoes on.
the apartment door closes behind you with a quiet click that feels strangely final. for a moment you stand in the hallway outside your own home, the bag slung over your shoulder, your damp socks already beginning to chill in the cooler air of the building corridor. the distant sound of rushing water continues behind the door. you stare at the wall across from you.
you will have to find somewhere to stay. the thought arrives slowly. it is the middle of the night. your apartment may very well collapse before morning. and you are suddenly, unmistakably homeless.
