— gojo satoru x reader. summary : gojo shows up (semi) unannounced. You catch up.
gojo
can i come over?
You don’t even have the time to finish typing out an answer when three knocks resonate in your hall. Of course, you think ironically, sighing and getting up.
Opening your door to see Gojo standing before you with a plastic bag in one hand and his sunglasses in the other, you stare him up and down. He’s in casual attire, sporting black sweatpants and an oversized black sweater. Same old annoyingly tall figure.
“Hope you don’t mind me-”
“What’s wrong with you?” You cut him off. You know he could care less about inviting himself, regardless of what he says.
“Just wanted to check on my colleague, y’know, after all this time.” He says, smirking down at you. Lifting the plastic bag, out of which coils of smoke are coming out, he adds “and make sure she’s fed well.” A few seconds pass with you staring at him agitating the plastic bag right in front of your face.
You hate how he sounds like he knows you haven’t been eating anything lately, although you hadn’t seen him in a few weeks.
“You know that’s not how questions work, right?” You say, turning around and opening your door wider to let him in. He steps into the hall and out of his shoes.
“Huh?” You hear him ask as he follows you into the kitchen. You turn to face him and take the plastic bag from him.
“Can I take that?” You ask him afterwards, finger pointing to the bag.
He smiles wide and you already feel your eyes rolling upwards. “Why, of course, my dear colleague!” He starts, speaking loud and exaggerating the jolly tone. Moving to the counter, you try not to pay him too much mind. “I am perfectly okay with you doing this, as I wish for nothing but your comfort and satisfaction, and I reckon you should feel free to get comfortable with me as we have known each other for quite a while now!”
Your back is facing him as you fish the bag’s content out of it, trying not to burn yourself in the process. Steamed pork buns, noodles and fried chicken. Good choice. You hope your appetite is going to miraculously reappear as you start eating.
“Which is the answer I was expecting from you, by the way.” You hear him tell you from where he stands behind you.
“Well, that’s cute.” You tell him, getting the chopsticks out of the bag and throwing said bag away. “But you came over anyway, so I’m assuming I can skip this whole part.” You set the dishes on your kitchen table and Gojo sits on the tall chair that’s facing you.
Opening the fridge door, your eyes search for the sweet drink Gojo likes (which he put there himself that one time he came over with a bag full of cans). You pour yourself some water and set the drinks on the table before sitting down in front of him. The both of you snap your chopsticks apart and Gojo digs in immediately. You, on the other hand, hesitate.
Considering that he’d brought you food, you figured you were going to eat at least a little, but now the thought of even tasting a pork bun is making you nauseous. You hadn’t felt hungry for days, maybe weeks. Setting your chopsticks down without having eaten anything, you decide to drink some water, though you doubt it’s going to change anything.
You know Satoru notices. Still, he chooses not to say anything.
You break the silence. “How’s Shoko?” You ask him, putting your glass back on the table. Gojo snorts.
“She asks about you all the time too.” He tells you, gathering a scoop of noodles with his chopsticks. “It’s always the first question the both of you ask me. Just marry each other already.” He jokes. You can’t help but smile at that. You were really fond of Shoko, and despite visiting Tokyo pretty often, you still missed her a lot.
“She’s sleep-deprived. I’d say pretty anxious, too. She’s trying to manage and obviously doing a horrible job at it.” Gojo finally answers. A few seconds pass before he speaks up a second time. “And her smoking is out of control.” He says casually, looking for what he’s going to eat next. You guess that’s a pretty decent reaction to learning one of your friends became an evil curse user and then got killed at the hands of his own best friend.
You lift your head to look at Gojo, but he’s not looking at you. His tone is detached, like he couldn’t be bothered by any of this. It’s actually your first time seeing him ever since all of this happened. Right after the parade, you and your friends pretty much all went M.I.A. for a few days. You didn’t see each other, didn’t call, didn’t text. Not for a while anyway.
Things had slowly started going back to normal — whatever normal was supposed to be without Geto and with an unshakable feeling of impending doom like lead on your stomach. On the picture of a document you had asked Shoko for recently, you had actually noticed remnants of ash in the corner of the frame. Shoko had never went as far as smoking indoors before, let alone at her desk. You didn’t say anything, and she didn’t either.
“Figured.” You say, voice low, eyes even lower. Looking back up at Gojo, you watch him still not looking at you. And how are you? Is what you want to ask, but you’re not sure it’s a good idea. You know you’re probably not going to get much out of him. Know he’s going to brush it off, because he’s the strongest, and nothing gets to him, not even the strongest curses, not even fear, or time, or grief.
“She’s better than she was at the beginning, though.” He says, mouth still full. He finally looks at you. “Also, Megumi asks about you.”
You almost perk up at that. “How is he?” You ask Gojo. Up until a few weeks ago, Gojo frequently took you to Tokyo to see Megumi. You had easily taken a liking to the little boy. He was very calm, an incredibly fast learner and a very thoughtful and caring brother to Tsumiki. But with the whole incident happening, you hadn’t seen either in a few weeks.
“He’s doing well. He keeps learning, his pace is good.” Gojo pauses, sipping his drink. “I think he likes when you’re around.” You nod and hum in response. You’re glad to hear that. When first meeting him, you had figured you’d need to work hard to gain Megumi’s trust.
Gojo sets his chopsticks down and looks at you. He ate about a quarter of what he brought, but you hope he’s going to keep going. “You’re not hungry?” He asks you.
“Not really.” He’d brought your favorite food to you, so you do feel guilty about not eating anything. “Let’s bring these over to Megumi and Tsumiki. I’d like to see them today.” You say, pointing to the food.
Gojo actually isn't surprised to see you have so little appetite. He hadn’t seen you at all since the incident, but he had assumed that your attempt at acting like you were managing would turn out just as bad as Shoko’s. What does surprise him, though, is you suggesting to go to Tokyo. He had planned on going with you today — more like dragging you there, since he didn’t think you’d actually be up for it. He told Megumi you were coming anyways.
“Megumi’s supposed to be with Shoko this afternoon.” He answers.
You’re pleased to hear you’ll get to see Megumi, Tsumiki and Shoko this afternoon. You think it’s finally time to breathe again after the past few weeks spent in darkness.
“Is Nanami in Tokyo right now?” You might as well vist everyone you want to see at this point.
“Uh, I think so. Let me check.” Gojo picks up his phone and starts looking for what you assume is his text conversation with Nanami. After a few seconds of swiping, he starts typing.
“So you’ve just been wallowing in misery and despair while I wasn’t there, huh?” He asks you while texting Nanami. He’s not wrong, but you still frown.
“Can we just act like the past weeks haven’t happened?” You sound more tired than you initially intended to.
After saying this, you try to think of what happened on the last time you saw Gojo. Looking at his face, you can see he’s doing the same. A smirk starts spreading slowly on his face after a few seconds, which, in your experience, has never been a good sign. You try to think faster.
“Okay, then.” He says, voice already laced with a teasing lilt. No good at all. The last time you saw Gojo comes to you in flashes, but you’re missing the important part. A dimly lit room. Gojo in an oversized white shirt, with disheveled hair. “Are your legs better?” He asks, and it clicks.
The rest of the picture appears in your mind : Gojo’s in the same white shirt, back facing you, while you’re sitting on your bed with your knees to your chest, in nothing but underwear. He giggles a bit, because you jut told him something along the lines of ‘fuck, my legs are sore’.
Looking at Gojo now, you sigh out and let your head drop on the table. “Okay, I hate this.” You tell him. Of course, he just barks out a laugh.
The last time you saw Gojo, he’d invited himself over just like he did today. You were cleaning up the place, which he’d surprisingly helped you with, taking on the dishes. You don’t really know how you got there – you never really know – but it ended with you on top of him, both of his hands on either side of your head, holding it while looking straight into your eyes.
You remember it lasted for a while. Maybe it’s because he had noticed how tense you were and, being the gentleman that he is, he’d wanted to take his time helping you relieve all that pent up tension. And it was good, it always was. You kind of hate to admit it, but Gojo has that thing where he just knows exactly how to make you feel ecstatic. The type of sex that makes you want to tell him you love him.
You’d rather slit your own throat, of course, because now he’s still laughing at how embarrassed you are, and it’s making you want to bash his head in. “It’s fine.” He says, dragging out the last word. You get up to collect his leftovers. “You look like you could use some more stress relief anyways.” Bringing them over to the kitchen counter, you start wrapping them up for Megumi and Tsumiki. “Which I’m always ready to help with.” He adds and you sigh out.
“Don’t you ever shut up?” You tell him with your back facing him. Not allowing him any time to answer, which he was going to do despite the question obviously being rhetorical because no, he never shuts up, you speak up again. “Actually, I feel like I should just get something else for Tsumiki.” You say, staring down at the food. You remember her telling you about wanting to eat healthier meals the last time you’d seen her.
Gojo watches in silence as you open your fridge to search for something. Then he watches as you close it and apparently mull something over for a little while. And he’s still watching when you finally open your fridge back up, pick a few things that he can’t quite make out and wrap them up. He can’t help but congratulate himself internally for having picked you to look after Megumi and Tsumiki. As he’d predicted, you were very good for them, and to them. Not that he’d really considered anyone else.
“We’re getting really good at playing house, huh?” Gojo thinks out loud, getting up to go wash his hands.
You glare at him. “We? As in you and me?” He snorts.
“You know we’re the closest thing to a parent figure they’re ever going to get, right?” You know. It’s funny.
The seconds pass and his words sink in. It’s not that funny anymore. “I’m clearly a much better parent than you are.” You tell him.
“Yeah, well, I’m clearly a much better partner than you are.” That makes you scoff. The seconds pass again, his words sink in again. When was this ever about being partners?
“There is no partnership of any kind here. I like these kids, you do too, no strings attached.” You say, going to pick up your jacket.
When you’re done putting your jacket and gathering your things, Gojo’s already put his sunglasses back on. He looks like he’s waiting for you. “Of course, of course.” He tells you, turning around and heading for the door. “Though that’s kind of hard to tell when I come over and we have s–”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. Move.” You cut him off, walking past him in your hallway to open the door.
Gojo smirks, because there are very few things that he likes more than embarassing you. Even fewer things that he likes more than getting you all pent up. And panting all over. Sighing and moaning his n–
Well. Gojo might have to stay away from you.
← previous tape
—
this one took a very long time to come out, sorry! uni has been beating tf out of me
synopsis: there is no doubt that mr. geto is an exceptional dancer, and a kind instructor. you have no doubt, either, that the perverse, voracious need you have for him is unrequited. of course, he calls you little dove and watches you dance low-lidded and teases you with innuendo, but surely he doesn't mean it...right?
pairing: ballet instructor!geto x ballerina!reader
a/n: it's been so long since i've posted a full length fic! i'm sorry and i love you all and please open your holes to me so i may place this fic there
18+! mdni <3
masterlist
~~~~~~~
mr. geto is nothing like the instructors you despised as a teen.
you can remember walking to your car after your first lesson with him and pressing your forefinger to the tender crest of your ear, marvelling at the lack of ringing there. you were used to shrill yelling, to the echo of it against the mirror and back again, to higher and stretch and reach bellowed into your bones.
but mr. geto, it seems, is exceptionally thoughtful about how his sound carries, speaking only as loud as necessary to be heard by the furthest dancer from him. the register of his voice makes the floor thrum and your knees twitch and he seems to notice these things, take stock of them, adjust.
he does not use his hands, either.
all other ballet instructors at your company use their fingers to adjust the body, to create the proper lines. you are completely familiar with fingertips in the crease of your knee, along the slope of your navicular, down your spine: it is not uncomfortable, not anymore, and it is in service of this art you have devoted your life to. you don’t mind. and in the dead of night when your duvet feels heavy over your waist and thighs you think that you wouldn’t mind, in particular, if he used his fingers to adjust your body.
but he simply…doesn’t. he uses the shapes of himself, his own arms and torso, the extension of his own legs, to compose his requests of his dancers. higher, stretch, reach, he murmurs to the group of you, extending himself into position and showing you.
and a part of you likes that a great deal; there is no sense of injustice with him, no upset that he is asking something of you that he cannot himself achieve. you and the rest of the dancers watch as his twists and bows, displaying himself to guide through the moves, and it’s such a striking thing to behold that you can’t bring yourself to mind.
still, his beauty is the hardest part of being his student. the cording of his muscles, the sleek ink of his hair, the lithe curvature of his movements, it’s torturous. all at once you want to dance as he does, want to make your audience feel as he makes you feel, want him to shed himself of all professionalism and touch you somewhere irrevocable. you feel terrible and silly wanting it, wanting him, but there’s no helping it, you think.
and anyway, you insist that this wanting you indulge in in the dark isn’t dangerous. there is no oxygen for it in the studio, nothing to nurture your fantasies, and so you have to believe that they will wither and die with time.
of course, while you tie the ribbons of your pointe shoes around your ankles in the empty studio, you pray this fantasy death will happen sooner rather than later. it’s completely exhausting to be so constantly wondering what his cock feels like, and mr. geto likes to remind you that exhausted is no state to dance in.
you love arriving to the studio early like this. before the room is overtaken with the smell of sweat and resin, you can breathe in the marley flooring and stretch your legs wide, grateful. you seek out lonely moments to appreciate how rare it is that you’ve succeeded in ballet enough to make a living from it; you close your eyes and get overdramatically philosophical, and it’s a privilege. you love it.
and yes, fine, it secures mr. geto’s first five minutes in the studio for yourself. this cannot be helping your attempt to suffocate your wanting, you know, but then he’s walking through the door draped in fine linen and hair pulled messy to the crown of his head, and you go boneless.
“good morning, dove,” he calls over his shoulder, turned away from you as he sets his things down.
you don’t remember when he started calling you that, and you don’t know if he uses it with other dancers, but god how can you blame yourself for getting sticky for him when he addresses you that way?
“good morning, mr. geto,” you call back, trying to sound lazy with the dawn as you continue stretching. you watch your fingers splayed on the floor, the borders of each vinyl panel, anything other than his strides towards his seat at the front of the room.
he plops rather unceremoniously down, legs spread slightly and head tipped back as he groans something truly criminal. you can feel something hot and biting between your legs but you try to ignore it, looking up at him.
“exhausted is no state to dance in,” you say with a smile.
he does not lift his head—you wonder if he wants to cause you pain by forcing you to watch the curved tilt of his throat and jaw—but you can see from the movement of his cheeks that he is smiling a little.
“i’m not dancing, dove, you are.”
you roll onto your back and starfish out, sufficiently limber. “what sort of terror will rain down on us today?”
he does look down at you then, lip still curved enough to look like a smirk, and when his head tilts just slightly you die a little death. “terror? i’m never terrible, i know i’m not.” his fingers make a soft sound against his thigh as he taps on it mindlessly. “you’ll like the combos today.”
you can’t help but bark a little laugh. “you don’t mean that. that’s something you only say when they’re hard.”
a chuckle pushes out through his nose. “yes, i know.” and then, matter-of-factly, he adds, “you like it hard.”
and god you try not to draw attention to the innuendo in that comment. just as he says it the doors are pushed open with a low thunk and the rest of the dancers come filtering in, and so you have every possible opportunity to be normal and professional and not silly and terrible, but you are a silly and terrible woman, so your chest stutters on your next breath. and he watches.
you choose to believe, for your health and happiness, that he still couldn’t quite discern what your reaction was, or why it would have happened. but you cannot deny the fleeting scent of smugness on him, or the way his jaw twitches when his eyes flit to you between greeting your colleagues.
he must be, you decide as you come to take your place at the barre, a cruel and unusual man who has recognized your unrequited lust and wants to punish you for it.
yes, that must be it, you assure yourself.
the rest of class is excruciating. all the typical torment of watching the man whose bones you are so desperate to jump contort himself into beautiful shapes is mounted further by the way he watched you this morning, the way his head dropped to the side just so to see you fluster for a moment.
you try to channel it into the combos. as you travel across the room, you work to carve the feeling from your chest and toss it outwards, anywhere else. your legs burn with your leaping and turning but you push harder, hoping you’ll reach some critical point at which the physical soreness of your muscles eclipses the fluttering behind your navel, but you can’t quite catch it. and every time you hope you might be close, you feel your fingertips just grazing a moment of forgetting, you catch his eye again, and something hungry pulses in your stomach.
you probably need to get fucked. you definitely need to get fucked, actually, because you’ll ruin all your leotards if this continues.
sweat shines down your body by the time class is finally, mercifully over, and the plan has already solidified then. you’ll go out tonight, you’ll get well and sufficiently railed, and at long last you will be able to address your fucking ballet instructor properly.
even collecting your bag from the floor makes your muscles scream. your steps drag as you shuffle about, removing your pointe shoes and slinging your purse over your shoulder in the waning light of the day.
“was that your attempt at proving me wrong?”
you straighten, inhaling sharply. when you look over your shoulder, it’s only you and mr. geto in the studio again. he’s standing in the threshold now, body leaned against the door as he watches you finish packing.
fuck.
normally you might relish this sort of attention from him, but at this point you feel overfilled with the smoke of your desperation and you need to breathe. you need to go to the club and release some of this pent up sexual energy. you need to get out before you spread your legs for him in front of the fucking mirror.
you try to laugh lightly, but it sounds tired and reedy. “yeah, i guess not.” shrugging a little, you add, “couldn’t help it.” and you tried to use that tone of voice one uses when a conversation is over, for the first time since meeting him hoping he simply turns and leaves, but he stays static there, watching you.
you flounder, looking for anything else to say. you want to lighten the tension that’s pulling your hips towards him, so you put on a wry smile. “i’ll try less tomorrow.”
that makes him chuckle as he brings a hand up to massage one shoulder. inevitably you think of how it might feel under your fingers, how it might tense if you were riding him and he was using that arm to lift and drop you on his—
“i do have one note for you, actually,” he murmurs, and you try to mask the horror on your face as he begins walking towards you. “show me your grand adage from the last combo.”
you hesitate a moment, clutching your purse tightly with one arm and opening your diaphragm so he doesn’t see your lungs constrict. this is normal, you remind yourself, he is being a normal instructor.
and it’s true, this is normal, but he has abnormal sex appeal and you are abnormally tightly wound and and he has never adjusted you with his hands before. this is a terrible, horrible, grotesque idea, but what are you supposed to say? no?
you drop your things slowly at your feet, tracking the sweeping of his eyes along your movements. with your hands empty again you stand still a moment, surely looking as bewildered as you feel, but he nods slightly: go ahead.
you steady the soft tremble of your fingers as you extend your arms outwards, aligning your spine as your leg extends behind you. your core engages to keep your hips from tilting upwards, chin high to create a sloping line from your neck and down your torso. even though you do not—cannot—look mr. geto in the eyes you can feel him watching, your muscles twitch when he assesses them, fluttering like little birds under your skin.
“yes, that’s it,” he says, low, behind his teeth. he begins to walk around you, and if you didn’t know any better you’d think he was trying to make you feel predated.
two things happen at once. you realize—and the weight of it nearly buckles your knees and takes you through the floor of the studio—that he is not going to show you want he wants by doing it at precisely the moment one long finger brushes the under side of your thigh. there isn’t even anything promiscuous about where he grazes the fingerpad, but nevertheless you feel like an open wound, a nerve, only barely restraining a full body shudder at the feeling. what the fuck is he doing?
“you can lift this higher.”
you’re almost thankful that you scoff on instinct; it makes you sound less affected by this than you are. “i’m—i’m trying, but–”
and then you really do shudder, hot and tacky from the nexus of your legs as his hand grips your thigh in full, pulling it a centimeter higher and watching your body absorb the movement to balance. your breaths puff sharp and you can’t even attempt to stop them now.
his voice is no louder than a whisper but there’s no breath in it, all timbre and sound. “there, dove. hold that.” his hand pulls away torturously slow, and at such an angle that you feel the point of each fingertip as his palm falls away. you hope he’s spontaneously blinded so he can’t see the goosebumps erupting down your arms, but instead he leans an inch closer to you, close enough that you can feel the warmth of him, watching you strain to keep the position from just behind your shoulder.
“it makes it harder if you hold your breath.” you can hear the twitch of his lips in that and it makes it no easier for you to take in air, but you pull a trembling gulp of air in anyways. to please him, you suppose, because apparently that’s all you’re capable of doing.
he hums in approval, “that’s good enough, dove, thank you.”
and no sooner do the words leave his lips are you dropping your leg and fleeing out the door, only barely remembering your bag.
~~~~~~~
you’re learning that your desperation for your ballet instructor is an exceptionally powerful tool.
earlier today, you pushed your body beyond its limit in the name of exorcising yourself of the curse of him. you were an outward force then, expanding and swelling and trying to expel the dark sweetness between your thighs.
now, haunting the neon shadows of this club in your highest, most painful heels, you think your desperation has a scent. you can’t remember ever being looked at in this way; from across the dance floor and behind the bar and in a far away corner, you catch men’s glances, all of them wolfish and interested. they can tell you need to be fucked, immediately.
you select the largest specimen you can find; a hulking mountain of a creature with a scar down one side of his mouth. he’s not quite handsome in the way suguru is handsome, it’s a louder, more insistent sort of attractiveness, but nonetheless you eye fuck him until he approaches you, knowing his weight will feel nice enough from behind.
he grabs at your side when he arrives in front of you, sliding a paw down your lower back. “come dance with me,” he rasps into your ear, and while normally you’d ask for the decency of exchanging names, tonight you’re sold.
you laugh as he tugs you into the fray, a throng of bodies pressed close and tacky with sweat. there’s a strange relief as he settles behind you, strobes flaring in your vision and his thick fingers around your waist. you can already feel how this ends, something sloppy and vaguely grotesque but you don’t even mind, you’re so coiled and greedy for this man you cannot have.
the music pulls you together and he grinds with you in time with it, pulling your ass against his jeans and twisting your hips back and forth.
he runs his nose down the slope of your neck, feeling how pliant your limbs move for him. “you’re flexible, huh?”
with your head tilted back against his shoulder he brings one hand slowly up the front of your body, grasping loosely at your neck. you grin and nod into it, letting your eyes go hazy as you look up at the rigged lights and the rising fog.
you’re fucking soaked. you really would just like it if he’d bully his cock into you here in the middle of the dance floor so you can finally think straight, and you’re considering pulling him into the bathroom to do something truly indefensible against the dirty basin of a sink, but you feel his tendons tense around your throat and it makes you tilt your chin back down on instinct.
into your ear he asks, almost amused by what he’s seeing, “d’you know him?”
your heart sinks.
whatever buoy you had wrestled between your arms was dissolving back into salt water, you’re slipping, you’re frantic, you’re looking across the dance floor and fucking suguru geto is there.
his hair is down and silky over his shoulders, which pull a white t shirt taut across the planes of his chest. you can see, even from here, the shadows of lean muscle, his body’s capacity for dance. the sleeves of his shirt are short enough that you can see, for the first time, the head of a snake tattoo peeking just below the hem.
fuck.
and no wonder your enormous dance partner figured you knew each other; the way he’s looking at you is lethal, a sharp slice of a stare from across the room, a pointed watching. his lips twitch when he sees you notice him, something conspiratorial and entirely his own there. it looks as though he’s holding a live animal in his mouth, sly and coy and biting down on a moving thing behind his tongue. a single, sinewy hand lifts from his side and he waves.
fuck fuck fuck.
in a fleeting out-of-body event, you can appreciate the hilarity of this moment. it pulls a sound from your throat, almost a laugh, almost a scoff, too, and you stumble slightly out of the hold of the man behind you. “i—well, yeah, actually.” you have no idea what look you’re wearing, but when you turn to face your dance partner, it makes him chuckle under his breath.
“you uh,” he scratches at his scar with his thumb, “you wanna go over there?”
he’s teasing you—this much is obvious to you—and so much of you is desperate to tell him no, i’d like to stay right here, and grip to the veins of his forearms and let him take you home. but then you think of mr. geto’s hands along your thigh as he adjusted it and it’s almost like he has you between his fingers again, towing you towards him.
“i–i’m sorry, i just think i should go and–” you gesticulate behind you, vaguely, reaching for something dignified to say, “and say hi.” a failure of the highest order.
the man in front of you laughs again, deep and from his stomach this time. he’s already tilting his body away from you, already letting you go, already sensing that the smell of your pussy was meant for the long-haired figure a few feet away. “you go right ahead, ma,” you think if he wasn’t so huge a person, his laughing would sound like giggling, “i’ll be fine.”
the sight of him slipping away from you makes you nauseous. you’re watching your own failure, all six feet and four inches of him, dissipating again into the sea of people, already under the manicured fingers of other women who aren’t waiting to arch for someone who essentially equates to their boss.
but there’s something secret and sweet to watching him go, too. standing resigned on the dance floor, accepting whatever honeyed trap fate has set for you, you can unburden yourself from this taxing process of trying so hard not to embarrass yourself. yes, you think, i will simply embarrass myself, and maybe whatever follows won’t feel so excruciatingly painful.
geto watches you carefully as you slink to his table. he keeps the muscles in his face slack, neutral enough to obscure the meaning from his expression, but the faint pull of his jaw reminds you of this morning, of after class. despite yourself, you align your body properly as you take the six odd steps to stand at his feet, extending your legs the way you know he’d want in the light of day.
he smells like musk and something botanical when you get close enough. you hope you don’t smell like your own slick.
“it was sort of deja vu, watching that,” he begins. even under the beating of the music he refuses to shout, voice unfurling from behind his lips and just barely reaching your ears.
you wrinkle your nose a little. “how do you mean?”
the ice in his drink chimes with a flick of his wrist. “watching you dance.”
you tilt your head back and forth, feigning some sort of consideration. “no, i think this might be different.”
he’s smiling enough now that you can almost see his teeth. the part of you that is desperate to be cautious screeches that he’s playing with you, he doesn’t want you, but with each tip of your skull you can feel that voice liquifying. you hope it slips out your ear.
“how so?” he asks.
you do your best to keep a straight face. “well, for one, i don’t want your notes.”
he looks almost joyful to spit this back at you: “oh i have a few, actually.”
your laugh is too breathy and real to truly hear it against the ambient noise of the room, but he tracks it anyway, swishes his ice again. “you’re unqualified, unfortunately. this type of dancing isn’t your expertise, mr. geto—”
“suguru,” he interjects. “suguru here.”
your thighs twitch, almost stinging with need now, but you steady yourself with a breath, humming, “okay, suguru, this type of dancing isn’t your expertise. i only accept edits from experts.”
“i might surprise you, dove.”
you run your tongue along the front of your teeth. he’s asking you to play, you think, and so you raise your eyebrows and tilt your chin the way he does when he wants you to begin.
“well,” he takes a fraction of a step towards you and you match it backwards, pushed by the heat of him and the smell of his cologne, “i think you moved a little too quickly.”
you’re moving entirely in tandem now, him forward and you back, all the way until your head bumps a wall. cornered like this, he eclipses almost your entire line of sight, a vignette of dark hair.
“the part when you tilt your head back here,” and he gestures to his shoulder, “that’s the best part. you fell straight into it.”
something shudders up your legs and you squeeze them together, desperate for a moment of anything against the swelling button between them.
“they need to wait longer for it. makes it better.”
his smirk is slowly fading, something more intimate making space for itself across his mouth. if he recognizes the irony of this, he doesn’t show it, demanding simply: “show me.”
you have half a mind to gape at him, at what he’s offering, but instead you turn—stupid, whorish thing—as he asked, pressing yourself slowly to him. when your ass bumps against his pelvis he groans low. he’s rock hard against you, and a gasp moves up your windpipe but he has his free hand on your chin first, forcing your head back to his shoulder.
contorted like this, his nose grazes your cheek, his breath filtered into your ear. you whine, feline and soft, and he hums in return.
“yeah, it’s good, huh?” and he ruts his hips slightly into yours to emphasize his point, nosing your cheekbone. “so you have to start somewhere else.”
the hand on your chin falls away, moving to the small of your back where it bends back for him. he pushes his thumb to your spine, and then the rest of his palm, bending you forward at the waist. your hands come up to brace on the wall and you let your forehead fall there, too, letting the cool concrete tether you to whatever sanity you have left.
he exhales like veneered restraint watching you tilt, feeling the extra push of your thighs against his cock twitching in his pants. “yes, dove, like that.” he grinds against you in earnest then, dragging the clothed shaft of him over the globes of your ass. “he should work for it a little.”
he pushes again and you moan fully. it leaps from the wall to his ears and it earns you another drag, his fingers bruising against your waist.
“and then,” his composure is dwindling, you can hear it, and he ruts again, “once he’s worked up,” he drags the hand at your hip up your side, around your front, between your breasts to arch you back to him again. your back bows taut and impossible to meet him, head falling immediately to his shoulder this time, eyes squeezed shut. you wonder if your slick is running down your legs now, or if it’s still pooled in your panties. he finishes into your ear, “then you come up here.”
you wiggle your hips against him, needy, and he grunts. “what did he say to you?” he grits out.
your capacity to think is low, practically panting like he’s already inside you. “huh?”
“when he had you here, he said something that made you laugh, i wanna know what it was.” with his hand fanned across your stomach he can pull you tight against his thrusts.
“h-he, he said i—fuck suguru, i-”
“come on, little dove,” he coos.
your eyes flutter open to find him watching you, purple eyes skidding across your skin. “he said i was flexible,” you huff.
he smiles like he’s going to eat you. “oh yeah? and did you tell him it’s because your mr. geto stretches you?”
your fists bunch and pull against the wall. you’re certain he can feel you clenching through your dress. your mr. geto, jesus. “n-no,” you breathe.
“oh, that cuts deep, dove,” he tuts, but he fucks against your ass again anyway, “i work so hard to stretch you open and you’re not giving me credit?”
you find yourself with the fleeting and miraculous wherewithal to laugh, light and towards the ceiling. “i’ll tell him next time, then.”
that makes suguru laugh, too, the both of you almost manic with the truly absurd suggestion that you would ever be touched by anyone else.
you feel very suddenly like a stray dog at his doorstep, scrap-fed by his hand, bony and waiting for something warm to be tossed out again. the fear that he doesn’t mean this the way you’re taking it, that he wants you only briefly, chokes you still.
“are you drunk?” you ask him.
he lets you feel the frenetic pattern of his breathing against your neck. “no.”
and then even smaller, you can’t help it: “are you messing with me?”
slowly, he brings the hand with his drink up, extending his forefinger out around your front. it’s cold from the glass as it taps on your chin once, twice, and then drags down the line of your throat. “no.”
and you aren’t quite sure how you would describe what you feel move through him then, a trembling sort of shake, maybe, but as it buzzes through his hips he thrusts the momentum up into you. later, you would come to realize this was the sensation of him, at last, deciding something he could not take back.
“i think you left something with me at the studio today,” he murmurs. the electricity of knowing you did not leave something at the studio takes hold of your ribs and tugs. “you left in such a rush.”
“i think you know that’s you’re fault, suguru.”
he smiles small into the side of your face. “yes, i know.” a finger brushes under the swell of your breast. “i can drive you there to come get it.”
you’re beginning to squirm in his hold now, the beastly thing between your thighs drooling in full, usurping control of your limbs. “haven’t you been drinking?”
and suguru is all too pleased to bring his glass to your lips, tipping it slowly onto your tongue.
he’s drinking fucking sparkling water.
he isn’t even tipsy.
you’re nodding before you can even gulp enough air to say yes.
~~~~~~~
you barely make it out of his car before he’s on you. pressed against the passenger door, he kisses you like he wants to reach inside and pull out a rib. it’s teeth and tongue and your mewls in his mouth, and it makes him pull one leg up around his hip to grind slow against your clothed pussy.
he strokes his tongue along yours as he guides you to the front door, bucking into you when you bite down soft on his bottom lip.
“fuck,” he pants. “get inside.”
seeing the studio at night is strange. the moonlight glints off the mirror, bathing the room in silver streaks. stranger still is hearing geto come in behind you, locking the door with a low snick.
he passes behind you like a memory, stepping just to graze your back and shoulder before pulling away and towards his usual seat at the mirror. “stand center floor for me, dove,” he instructs.
your body moves without much thought. it’s so easy to do as he says here, to pervert the habit of following his directions as you stand at the center of the vinyl.
suguru runs a hand across his jaw, over his lips, watching you stand static as asked. you know how lust blown your eyes are already because you can see the black depth of them in the mirror behind his head. “stretch for me,” he sighs.
a strange confidence feeds and swells in your belly, something alight and excited as you bend at the waist. your movements are no more salacious than they normally are, simple contortions to warm your hips and thighs, but you slow them enough to match the moment. your dress, too, heightens it; the hem teases the curve of your ass, your swollen mound, tight against you in ways your dance clothes aren’t. geto has sharpened the air to a fine point, and you teeter on it.
your head flips over, legs softly bent and then straight again, swishing open and closed. between each movement you glance up at him, swallowing thick at the shadow behind the tent in his jeans, the clench of his fist as it approaches his length. when you open your legs past second position and bend to stretch between them, he moans, unashamed, and you can tell from the lilt of pain in it that he’s stroking himself over his pants now. your pussy nearly opens in this position, faced away from him, and you feel the fever say his name.
“your middle split now, dove,” he grips himself like he means to strangle, tipping his head back against the mirror to watch you over the bridge of his nose, adding, “please.”
with your hands splayed on the floor, you drop simply into it. when your clit bumps the cool flooring you whine in your throat, settling your weight. suguru is stroking himself in earnest over the denim when you peer up at him. “uh huh,” he pants, “and bend the knees now, just a little.”
your knees cant up and you tuck your tailbone, forcing your dress to ruck up around your hips and display, fully, the wet mess of your panties. the suffocated whine suguru sounds punches the air from your lungs, and you lean back onto your elbows behind you, looking to breathe, looking to survive for another moment.
you wish you could have a picture of the two of you this way; you entirely on display for him—and for yourself, too, as you cannot avoid your own reflection beside him—and your unflappably composed instructor, squeezing down the veins of his cock through the rough pull of his jeans, watching. and because you spend hours every day being directed by him, you know what he will ask you next before he even voices it, but you wait to hear it anyway.
“touch yourself for me.”
your fingers fly to your clit, drawing slow circles around, crossing over to feel yourself jolt. your hole pulses and spits, and suguru growls like he can see it from halfway across the room. the utter relief of friction, fucking finally, makes you tip your head back, moaning wild into the still air.
but then you hear his lips part to say something and you’re pulling your head back straight, still circling over your clit and then your entrance, meaningless patterns over your thong that make your toes curl in your heels.
“you know i never once—ngh, fuck—had the urge to adjust a student with my hands? i always hated that when i was in class,” he grits. with trembling hands, he begins to unbutton himself, pulling his cock out and tugging on it immediately.
god, he’s pretty. long and soft and leaning the way the rest of him leans, gliding between his fingers with the pearls of pre beading at his tip.
“but i thought that if i,” he pauses to groan with you, “if i touched you once i could fucking forget about it.”
you speed your fingers with each word he says, each stroke of his hand over all eight inches of his cock. a far away voice registers that you’re whining, too, but your mind filters it away, tuned completely to suguru’s confession in the dark.
your smile is wry, and reveals as much as anything. “did it work?”
he laughs then, almost at you. “no, you know what dove, it didn’t really—hah—didn’t really work for me.”
your hips buck into your fingers, a buzzing coil now. “suguru,” you begin, but he doesn’t need to hear any more.
“i know,” he moans.
you have transcended his direction, you think, merged into him enough to comply without listening. he’s tearing his shirt and pants off as frantically as you tug your dress up and over your shoulders, and you’ve only barely shimmied your panties down your legs when he arrives in front of you, completely bare. you think suguru geto, tacky with sweat and need and cock nearly swollen purple, has achieved his own pinnacle, descending to his knees to meet you.
and there’s an ephemeral, fleeting moment, when you both simply watch each other in all the places you’ve kept obscured for so long. his eyes circle over your tits, the pert peaks of your nipples, the gleaming of your slit. you track the snake tattoo from the bulge of his shoulder and around his back, pupils flitting between him and his reflection.
suguru takes hold of both your ankles on each side of his narrows hips, squeezing once, and then gliding them up, up, around your knee, along the inside of your thighs. it dawns on you that he knows exactly where to press, where each muscle begins and ends, because of how much he watches you flex and extend. your breathing comes labored and round, small yips and whines when goosebumps push into his fingers.
he can’t help but tug your hips towards his bobbing cock when his hands arrive there. you squirm and twist to try and sink him inside but he holds you to the floor, jaw tight.
“not yet, dove, i need to stretch you,” he grunts.
and you’re giggling before you can stop it. “you use a lot of double entendre, is that on purpose?”
he’s smiling now, too, but more than anything you think its a wicked joy with how your mouth drops open as he circles two fingers around your entrance. your arousal is so hot and so everywhere that you think you can hear it dripping onto the marley.
“keep your legs open.” he uses the tone of voice he employs during class and it only makes you gush more, but you do as he asks, tightening your outer thighs to hold yourself spread as he pushes two fingers inside.
“oh fuck,” you pant.
it seems to affect him in equal measure, cock twitching with each pull of his digits, lips parted ever so slightly. he scissors his fingers apart and back again, feeling along the inside of your walls, looking.
“ah—yeah, yes, there,” you mewl, and he moans something sincere in turn. the pads of his fingers brush and swish along that spot and something behind your ribs is turning over, growing teeth. you whine out a small fuck and that’s it: suguru is gone.
in a single motion, he pulls his fingers from you, breathes in your protest of a whine, and lowers his hips to run the ruddy tip of his cock over your clit, down, down. you run your nose along his forearm as he braces them on each side of your head, feeling the brush of his hair along your shoulder.
his mouth parts directly over your ear like this, and you feel his hand squeeze your left thigh. “lift this for me.”
and as you extend it up to hook over his shoulder, legs spread in almost a full split below his hold, he notches his head inside, a lewd pop that echos up your spine and between your ears.
suguru’s head drops to your shoulder as he bares his teeth. “fuuuuuuck jesus christ.”
you’re no better, winding your right leg around his left and bucking your hips to slide him home. he indulges you this time—perhaps for the first time since meeting him—and cants his hips again. you’re so fucking wet and ready and open for him that he slides to the hilt that way, and both of you are reduced to animals then. the sounds between you are completely inhuman, and you can’t tell where yours end and his begin.
and suguru fucks you like he teaches: not slow, but intentional, precise, every movement with an insurmountable sense of purpose.
and fucking bossy.
“ngh yeah, squeeze me like that again, dove.”
“oh f-fuck, baby, align your hips.”
“c-can you—haah—arch into me a little more? yeah, that’s right.”
with each driving thrust of his hips you rub your clit along his pelvis, warmth spreading behind your belly button and down each leg. suguru never quite recovered from that first thrust, forehead damp and still at your shoulder as he groans directions into the soft skin there. and your hands grab anywhere they can reach: into the roots of his hair, down the planes of his back, along the slope of his ass to feel the muscles grind.
the friction his happy trail makes with your clit is driving you wild, you’re fucking close, and he can feel it in the way you pulse around him.
with the sudden capacity to mock you he coos gently, “oh, little dove, are you close?”
and you can only nod and pant and whine like a bitch in heat, the crest of your pleasure tapping leisurely on the wing of your shoulder, ready to round the corner.
“hah—yeah, i can fucking feel it.” he adjusts his weight to one arm so he can band the other around your back, pulling your tits flush to his chest. the leverage only grinds him harder into you and you’re nearly screeching with the pressure. he wants to kiss you and you want to return it, but your lips meet open, exchanging air to be puffed back and forth.
“make a mess for me,” he encourages, each thrust more erratic than the last—he’s close, too—and every moan pitched higher. “c’mon, i—shit, unh—i wanna feel your pussy choke me.”
you come so hard you feel like you’re spinning, like you’re on stage, like there’s some great applause awaiting you. it detaches from deep in your groin and pulses outwards, gushing arousal and cream over suguru’s cock and entirely fragmenting you, boneless as he fucks you through it.
“fuckfuckfuck,” he bites the juncture of your shoulder with your neck, “i made this body, dove. you’re mine, huh?”
and hearing it, even from his own lips, takes him over, too, hips stuttering to a stop as he growls wild, seed spurting inside you, warm. your name, your real name, unspools from his mouth, and it sounds like thank you.
part of you expects, sweaty and still and plugged with suguru’s softening cock, that a great shame will dawn upon you now. you think maybe you should feel ashamed for letting him fuck you here, raw, his student.
but as you’re whining into each other’s mouths when he pulls out, as he smooths his hands over your stomach and thighs, as he kisses you again without the sort of demands he had before, the guilt doesn’t arrive.
suguru watches you closely—he’s good at that, you’ve determined—as he sits back on his haunches. you realize he’s waiting for that guilt to come, too.
“okay?” he asks softly.
you could laugh at him for that question, but you grin instead. “mhm.”
his chest unburdens a weight seeing that look on your face. you can see something gathering on his palate, too, something he likes the taste of.
and then he spits it: “there’s a shower in my office bathroom.”
you really do laugh this time, full-bodied and sore and wet again.
~~~~~~~
you don’t think you’ve ever seen mr. geto with eye bags before. you don’t think anyone has. though, you suppose he seems the type to prioritize his beauty sleep.
or, most of the time, anyway. you couldn’t help that he wanted you again in the shower, and then at his desk chair, and then from behind with your knee propped against the barre, and then—
nobara bows into a pigeon stretch next to you, snickering as she assesses him in his seat. she heckles him: “exhausted is no state to dance in.”
your body seizes with embarrassment and delight all at once, and even though your chin drops to your chest as you stretch your hips, you can feel him watching you all the same.
nobara is watching you now, too, but you notice it too late. she stifles a giggle next to you. “is that a fucking hickey?”
~~~~~~~
thank you for reading !!! comments and reblogs always appreciated >:)
If I could, I’d pull your strings for one more dance.
A stack of dusty old videotapes, long forgotten. Footage pixelated and too bright. Each one capturing a particular moment you had with that white-haired anomaly of a man, at different points of your life.
You can read these in whatever order you want, however I do recommend respecting the layout established here. Let me know if you want to be tagged on future updates!
— gojo satoru x reader. summary : you’re sitting around depressed at your own birthday party. lucky for you, gojo always has just the words to cheer you up, so he suggests co-parenting.
You can’t remember what you wished for on that day, but you know it didn’t come true.
All you could think about while blowing the candles was how Haibara would’ve cheered for you if he was there. How he would’ve probably looked happier than you. You can picture him, between Shoko and Nanami, clapping for you with a party hat on. His face is candle-lit, but with the smile he’s sporting, he might as well be lighting up the whole room himself.
But then you blow the candles. And he evaporates in fumes.
You’re one year older now, and the smile on your face isn’t quite reaching your eyes. The idea of time passing makes you both sick and indifferent. All you know is you never had that much to begin with.
Abruptly blinded by the brightness of a camera flash, you turn your head to find Gojo taking pictures of you with the cake in your hands. He seems to be taking this very seriously, switching angles and giving you instructions (which you ignore for the most part).
In that moment, you recall thinking grimly that him taking pictures was a good thing. That he’d have those memories to hold onto when he inevitably outlives all of you. When he stands all alone somewhere at the highest point in the sky, while you’re buried six feet under.
When you snap out of it, Gojo’s already gone to pester Nanami by taking unnecessary close-ups of him, almost shoving the camera right in the blonde man’s mouth. That makes you laugh.
“There she is.” Shoko approaches you, a small smile on her face. “Haven’t seen you laugh in a while.”
You fake-pout and speak out in an inflated sad voice. “I know. You guys are so unfunny.” She giggles and swats you lightly.
“So…” Shoko starts, putting her plastic cup down on the table behind her. “You’re going?” She asks you.
“… Yeah.”
The both of you look at each other. There’s something bittersweet about the look on her face for a split second, but then she turns her head and nods towards the table, where Nanami is trying to cut the cake while Gojo keeps trying to have a taste of the frosting, clearly irritating Nanami. Geto is standing in a corner, a slight smile on his face.
“You can’t leave me with these idiots.” From where you stand, you can’t quite hear what they’re saying but you’re pretty sure Nanami just told Gojo he was going to get stabbed. A laugh bubbles in your chest.
“We should both go and leave them here.” You joke.
“You really should.” Utahime joins in, red plastic up in her hand. It seems to be filled with water, which is weird. “Join us, Shoko.” Shoko chuckles.
“You know I can’t. But you two better come see me often.”
“Of course!” Utahime exclaims, putting her arm around Shoko’s shoulders. “Let’s go out and drink whenever we can!” You take it the drink in her cup is not as alcohol-free as you thought it was.
“I'll even sneak off during the goodwill event to come see you.” You tell her.
“How are you already a bad teacher?” She jokes lightly.
The three of you keep the banter and light conversation going for some time. When Nanami’s done cutting the cake, he serves the first part to you and you go sit down next to Geto. He looks exhausted, but he still smiles at you politely, asks about you and your transfer to Kyoto.
(Could you have done something then? Was there anything to be done, really?)
You’d heard of the whole Star Plasma Vessel affair, how Riko Amanai had been murdered by some non-sorcerer with inhuman strength. How Gojo had almost lost to him. They seem to have been put through a lot during those few days. It feels like you’re still waiting for them to come back from that mission.
Geto’s slice of cake stays untouched, and so does yours. You don’t feel like asking him anything, although looking at him, you have a sense of something murky, some sinister and poisonous thing latching on to his brain sluggishly. Somehow, you know the thing’s bigger than you, know you can’t fight it.
In that moment, you remember thinking, foolishly, I hope they come back soon.
(Was it already over at that point? When exactly did the countdown start?)
You both sit in silence, sometimes watching Gojo get on Utahime’s nerves, sometimes staring at the ground. At one point, you get up, and Nanami calls out to you. He asks if you’d like something else instead of the cake, if he put something you don’t like in it. His thoughtfulness makes you smile fondly, makes your heart ache a bit. You decline politely, tell him you’re just not hungry.
At some point during the night, you’re sitting in a corner, watching the party play out. You realize then how much you fantasize about your friends being regular people. About them being bored and alive. The idea never fails to leave you heavy-hearted, so you’re glad when your train of thought gets interrupted.
“Tokyo not suiting you anymore?” Turning to the voice, you’re met with Gojo’s very sharp jawline. Sunglasses on, oversized white shirt, staring straight ahead as he’s sitting next to you.
“Tokyo suits me very well, actually.” You tell him. “I’d just like to try something else.” A little while passes before he speaks up again.
“Toji Zen’in left a kid behind.” He utters. You know. You’d heard about Gojo taking him in charge. “Looks exactly like his father. He’s got potential.” You narrow your eyes.
“Potential?” You echo. “You’re not already thinking about making an orphan boy a weapon, are you?” Gojo looks at you, some cryptic look on his face.
“We’re jujutsu sorcerers.” He states coldly. “That kid was going to be sold off to the Zen’in clan, and probably be miserable. No matter what we do, there’s no way for him to live a normal life.”
“He’s still a kid.” You say, feeling his eyes on you as you stare ahead. “He shouldn’t have potential, at least for now. He should have friends at school, some extracurricular activity, I don’t know.” Gojo doesn’t answer for a while, keeps looking at you.
Looking back at him, you’re met with the same unreadable expression. He looks like he’s mulling something over. In the dim lighting of this room, his eyes, still on you, look phosphorescent. He finally speaks out after a while.
“I think you’d be a good figure for him to have around.” You narrow your eyes once again, which he takes as a sign to elaborate. “It looks like him and his sister are able to take care of themselves just fine, so I’m not asking you to be a mother.”
You didn’t know he had a sister. Gojo keeps going. “However, he is a kid, like you just said. And I’m under the impression he needs that reminder too.” You can already feel the gears turning in your mind at what his suggestion implies.
“I’d like for him to have another sorcerer, besides me, to… watch over him a little, progressively teach him about sorcery, and overall be a stable presence for him. The goal is to diversify the sources he learns and grows from.” He speaks in that serious tone that lets you know it’s something he takes to heart. He’s now sitting cross-legged, cupping his chin with his thumb and index.
“Besides, I’ll frequently be away on missions, so you can be someone he turns to in case he needs something while I’m not there.” You can’t help but be amused by how seriously he seems to have thought about the matter. “Like I said, I’m not asking you to treat him like your son. You don’t have to always be there, just… sometimes. Like a nephew or something.”
The last part sounds like he actually thought hard about the comparison he could make. You don’t even try to contain the laugh that bursts out of you. You’re witnessing a very new side of Gojo.
“Okay, dad of the year.” You manage in between fits of laughter. Gojo is looking at you with the straightest face you’ve ever seen him make.
“I wish for nothing but 500 years of doom and despair upon you.” He tells you in a monotonous voice, which only makes you laugh more.
“Sorry, sorry.” You say after having calmed down, still giggling a little. “Hum… so you want me to– what? Stay here?” You inquire, trying to make sense of what he’s asking you. He’s back to his thinking position.
“Ideally, yes. It would be easier. Plus this old geezer at Kyoto won’t do you any good.” You agree with that. You actually dread the idea of going from Yaga’s supervision to Gakuganji’s.
Regardless, you consider your decision to be final. The air in Tokyo is almost unbreathable for you now. It’s charged with too much, you feel like you’re risking your own sanity everyday. You’re not exactly sure moving away from Tokyo will solve the problem, but maybe starting anew will at least make it better for some time. So until the noise comes back to get you there, you’ll take that.
Kyoto’s far enough and there’s no sorrow there, no memory, no Gojo Satoru to make you feel too much. So your choice is made.
“I can’t stay in Tokyo.” The words come out weaker than you intended. “I share your perspective, though.” You’re aware of Gojo’s commitment to the next generation of sorcerers, which is a trait of his that you admire. “I’ll try thinking about coming back periodically. Give me some time.” You tell him. His suggestion actually doesn’t sound all that unpleasant to you.
“Of course, though I think I should make it clear that I’ve already made up my mind, and that things will go according to what I planned regardless of what you say.” Right. How very Gojo of him to say that.
“Oh, great!” You exclaim ironically. “So I just can’t make my own decisions anymore.”
“You can, actually. You just have to make sure your decisions correlate with mine. Easy!” There’s a big smile you dream of wiping off his face when he says that.
“Gojo, I’m not staying here.” You deadpan. “And it’s too far for me to make the trip too often.” (Which was originally one of the many reasons why Kyoto sounded perfect.)
“You silly little thing.” He exclaims, waving you off with his hand. “I’ll have you know I can teleport.” You raise an eyebrow.
“You couldn’t even teleport to the nearest convenience store last time I checked.”
“Well, you should check again. Might be surprised.” You don’t think he’s pulling all that cockiness out of nowhere, but you also can’t believe he’s made that much progress in such a short period of time. You know he’d been training a lot more since the whole Riko Amanai incident, but this is just inconceivable. “So, what do you say?”
Right. So much for trying to run away from him. Him and his all-seeing Six Eyes, and his God-like abilities. You can never catch a break.
“Didn’t you just say your mind was already made up anyway?”
“Ever the fast-learner.” He says with an overly prideful look on his face.
“I hate you.” You deadpan. He barks out a laugh.
So that’s how it happens every time, you think. Gojo waltz in whatever dark room you’re wallowing in with his loud laugh and his insufferable demeanor, and he feels like sunlight, and your resolve weakens. You hate the things that make you soft. You can’t fight anything with a blunt sword.
“For real, though. I think you’ll be good for him.” He tells you more solemnly. “We can discuss later how frequently I’ll be taking you to Tokyo.” He adds. The wording makes something stir in your stomach.
“You’re really not going to let me think about this, huh?” You sigh out. Regardless, you like how involved he already is in the kid’s well being.
“You can think all you want, sweetheart.” You hate how smoothly the nickname rolls of his tongue. “I can’t guarantee it’s going to change much, though.”
“Don’t call me that.” You reply, getting up swiftly. “Whatever you say, I need a little while to give consideration to everything this implies, and–”
“I told you, you don’t need to worry about a–”
“I don’t want you to do all the thinking for me, Gojo.” You stare down at him. “If you want me to be involved in a kid’s literal education, two kids actually, you’ll have to let me have a say eventually. So I’ll think about it, and you’ll shut up.”
“So bossy.” Looking up at you, he grins like the nuisance that he is. “I’m so gonna be Megumi’s favorite.”
“Ugh.” You roll your eyes and start walking towards the kitchen.
“Happy birthday, by the way.” He calls out to you from where he sits, amplifying his voice. “Hope you like the gift!” There’s a broad smile on display on his face as he waves like you’re a dozen meters away. Idiot.
A little while after, you’re walking home in the cold winter air, holding a piece of cake that Nanami wrapped for you to take home in your hands. You see little puffs of air come out whenever you breathe, and you can barely feel your face anymore.
You hadn’t expected Gojo’s suggestion to lift your spirits as much as it did. Before that, your plans were to transfer to Kyoto, train a lot, and try to move on. Try not to be too heartbroken. You had assumed you’d feel pretty numb for a while, now that you had graduated and that you were moving away from your friends and the life you’d established. Now that the incident happened and that Haibara died and everything changed.
Now, you have something to look forward to, in a way. Though you would’ve never expected this was the turn that things would take.
Needless to say your little plan to escape from Gojo has failed miserably. Speaking of which, you receive a text notification as soon as you step into your apartment, his name appearing at the bottom of your phone screen.
Opening it, you see a picture of a boy carrying a school backpack. He’s very young, probably a 1st grader or so, with dark hair and dark blue eyes. With the glare he’s directing at the camera, he looks like he beat Gojo up afterwards, which makes you snicker. He still looks cute, like a kid would. You already like him.
gojo
this is megumi
he’s not as cute as he looks
← previous tape next tape ➜
—
‘we love you dad gojo!’, we all scream in unison. 🏷️ : @michi7w7 - @tiny-teacup103
— gojo satoru x reader. summary : your memories form a blurry mixture of colors and feelings. one thing stays clear amidst it all (it has white hair and blue eyes).
You remember basking in the warmth of the sun. You remember a gentle breeze, and your friends’ voices. Then came the waves, so blue. The sky, even bluer. And his eyes. Blue as can be.
You remember how at peace your heart felt on that day. Shoko and you walking side by side, giggling about something you can’t remember. Easy conversation and easy laughter. Nanami and Haibara walking right behind you two, Gojo and Geto following a few meters behind. It was a good day.
Cut to you sitting in the warm sand, still with Shoko by your side. You remember what had the both of you giggling like schoolgirls now. With the top of your heads almost touching, you’re looking down conspiratorially at the basket Shoko had brought. She slides the glass bottle out of the basket. Red wine.
“So we’re day drinking at the beach?” You ask her, chuckling.
“Yes!” She answers cheerfully, holding two glasses in her hand (had she taken those from her place? Had she put them in her bag?). It was bound to be a beautiful day.
After that, you remember Shoko and you drinking and laughing, drinking and laughing… and Nanami joining the both of you while Haibara, Gojo and Geto were playing in the water. Nanami had brought a book. He’d have the tiniest smile plastered on his face whenever you or Shoko had just said something particularly silly.
You remember the wine gradually disappearing from the bottle, your trachea getting warmer, the world feeling kinder. Drinking and laughing. Some more time passes, and now your head’s laying on Shoko’s shoulder, the both of you tired from the wine and the heat. With eyes half closed, you catch a glimpse of the three boys from afar.
From your point of view, they’re standing right in front of the sun, so you don’t see much. Things are hazy and golden. It looks like they’re having a debate over something. Actually, it looks like Gojo and Geto are arguing over something, and it’s making Haibara laugh. You focus on the white-haired boy.
In this light, under the clear sky, he looks incandescent. It’s almost like he’s trying to compete with the sun itself. There’s an earphone plugged in your left ear, some sappy song about unrequited love playing. Some time passes, and now Gojo’s back faces you as he’s crouching down, seemingly staring at the sight in front of him. His white locks are swaying in the wind.
In that moment, you feel sorry. You wish it could be just that. A teenage boy spending a day at the beach with his friends, enjoying the view.
He looks up and you do too. He’s not looking at the sun, his head is directed the opposite way. Following his gaze, you see it. The moon hangs in the sky, amid its infinity of blue. It’s only a thin crescent, almost shy. Almost scared of the sun, like it knows it shouldn’t be there at this hour. Gojo stays crouched down for a while, staring at it. And you staring at his back. The moon is beautiful.
Another song’s playing now. You take it all in. The three boys by the sea, in the golden light. Shoko’s head resting on top of yours while yours is resting on her shoulder. Nanami sleeping with his book covering his face. Everything warm and soft.
The melodious voice in your earphone and the guitar accompanying it are lulling you. You feel yourself dozing off slowly, but before you even get the chance to close your eyes completely, you hear—
“Don’t tell me the three of you are sleeping?” It’s Gojo’s voice. “Let’s take a trip to a nursing home next time.” Geto snickers at that.
You pause your music and lift your head to look at them, the sunlight blinding you enough to keep your right eye closed.
“Gojo.” You deadpan.
He crouches down in front of you, points his index finger at your forehead and gives it a soft push.
“No. Try again.”
You sigh and hug Shoko’s arm with both of yours, putting your head back on her shoulder. She’s sleeping. “Don’t want to.” You mutter, eyes closed.
“C’mooon.” He says in that typical Gojo way. “Sa–” one push of his index finger against your bare shoulder. “To–” he punctuates the syllable with a second push, retrieving his finger to go again. “Ru.” A third. He lingers this time. “Try it.”
You lift your head from Shoko’s shoulder a second time and turn it to face his. Now that he’s closer, you take a good look at him. Or at least as good a look as the sun will allow you to.
He looks like he belongs here, with the sea and the sun and the warmth. You’re still buzzing from the wine.
You don’t think you’ve ever seen Gojo relaxed like this. He’s always laid back and confident, but there’s something in the content look he’s had on his face all day that tells you it’s real. He’s not controlling it.
“Satoru!” That wasn’t you. You hear Haibara jogging towards you before you see him.
Nanami and Shoko wake up, both groaning a little as they do so. “Yaga called.” Haibara says, phone in his hand. You close your eyes again. You really don’t want this to end.
“He wants you at school in 30 minutes. Shoko too.” You hug Shoko’s arm tighter.
“Why didn’t he just call m– oh.” Gojo is looking at the three missed calls from Yaga displaying on his phone screen.
“Yeah, he called me too.” Geto tells him, eyes on his phone. “He’s going to kill us.” He says with a sheepish smile and a hand rubbing the back of his head. “Well, you. He’ll just beat me up.”
“Nnngh. Old man can’t manage on his own?” Shoko grumbles, still sleepy.
You wish it could’ve been just that. A bunch of friends at the beach, not worrying about curses or death.
You unplug your earphone. Suddenly, everyone seems ready to go already. Gojo stands back up as Nanami stretches his arms out. Shoko yawns and removes the sand from her knees.
“You guys can stay.” Geto speaks out. “I’m going with them, but you should rest some more.”
“Ah, I’d actually like to come along, if that’s okay with you.” Haibara answers. He can’t stay in place, and he’s quite talkative, so it doesn’t surprise you.
“Then I suppose I’ll come too.” Nanami says, obviously still numb from sleep.
Geto chuckles. “Alright, then. Let’s go.” The three of them start walking. You wave them goodbye as Haibara beams at you and shouts ‘see you!’ (was that the last time you’d seen him?).
You look up at Shoko, who’s already lighting a cigarette. She looks down at you, smiles softly and puts your hair back in place. You lean into her touch. Her cheeks are still red from the alcohol.
“I’ll bring the bottle next time.” You tell her. She huffs out a laugh.
“Staying here?” She asks you. She swipes her thumb across your cheek softly to remove some grains of sand. You don’t know how they got here.
You sit upright and look ahead. The sun has gone down while you weren’t looking. “Yeah.” You tell her.
“Okay. See you tomorrow?”
“Yeah. Good luck.” You tell her as she starts leaving, waving and smiling at you.
After a few seconds, you lie down in the sand, closing your eyes and sighing out when the back of your head hits the warm ground. Opening your eyes again, you’re met with Gojo’s face looking down at you. What is he still doing here? He’s crouched down again, and his sunglasses are back on the bridge of his nose.
“Do you want Yaga to gouge your eyes out?” You ask him, snickering a bit because you can picture it. You think there’s still some wine in you.
“You still haven’t said it.”
Oh.
“You’ve already heard me say your name before.”
“Okay, then let me hear you say it again.” He sounds more serious than he did earlier. You don’t really understand him, or why he’s so insistent about this.
His eyes are looking straight at yours. It’s like he bottled the waves in his irises, his drooping white lashes enhancing his dream-like features. It’s like you bottled the red wine in your heart, and in your cheeks, with how warm you’re feeling. How could they make a weapon out of him?
Your smile stretches as you mimic what he was doing earlier ; you point your index finger right in between his eyes. You’re smiling wide, and a grin starts forming on his face too. A small laugh escapes you. Gojo thinks he’s never seen you like this. Laying down beneath him, tipsy and loose, looking truly happy.
Your faces are paralleling each other as he’s leaning above you, still squatting down with his forearms sitting on his thighs. You can feel the weight of his full attention on you, like there’s nothing else. You want more of this. Will you have more if you say it?
“Satoru.” You articulate after a few seconds, taking your time with each syllable. Your voice is soft, only for him to hear. He could make out your smile in between the letters of his name. His own smile stretches.
“Again.” He commands. You let out a full-on laugh this time, pointing at both of his eyes with your index and middle finger now. You let another while pass.
“Satoru.” It sounds more serious, more firm.
You don’t move for a while. Then you retrieve your hand, slowly, and he pushes his sunglasses back up his nose at the same time. He gets up and you stay laying down on the sand.
“See, wasn’t so hard.” He’s back to the jolly tone.
The moon is higher now that the sun begins hiding. The sky is a darker shade of blue.
“Can you ask Yaga about the upcoming exam?” You ask him. He’s already a few meters from you.
“I will if you say ‘Pleeease, Sato-’”
“Okay, nevermind.” You deadpan. “Get lost.”
“Oh, I will. Hope you don’t mind me borrowing these.” You sit up and turn to look at him. Your sandals are in his hand and he’s smiling at you. “I’ve always had a thing for brown leather.” And the jerk starts walking away.
A couple minutes later, on the way to the school, Nanami, Haibara, Shoko and Geto are taking guesses at what Yaga wants when they see two figures flashing past them.
“Satoru!” They hear your voice yelling, followed by your white-haired counterpart’s laugh. Geto and Haibara snicker.
“There you go!” They hear him tell you, his voice sounding distant and filled with delight. “So you do know my name!”
← previous tape next tape ➜
—
beach episode yayyy!! i’m actually having a lot of fun writing this 🤭
— gojo satoru x reader. summary : catching feelings for the strongest wasn’t your best idea.
Gojo knows. And you know he knows.
It took you long enough to realize it yourself, actually. You just stopped being so carefree whenever you were around him. You couldn’t just laugh anymore. Now you laughed, and he laughed, and you ached. You couldn’t just walk home like you did before. You headed home, and he walked with you. Then he left, and you ached.
Now he shined brighter, and his stare cut deeper through your skin. Now he came over, and he made you feel absurdly good, like no one ever could. Then he left. You watched him go, watched his strong back and his white hair, the look in his pretty blue eyes that you had to imagine because he never looked back. And you ached.
This used to be much easier, you think. He’d walk in on you sitting in an empty classroom, earphones on, focused on some theoretical exercise. Then he’d walk over to you, hands in his pockets, and he’d bend enough to make his face level with yours, stealing one of your earphones and putting it in his ear. You’d look up. Scowls, uncalled-for comments from him, glances, a chewing-gum offering. Light conversation, some bickering, some more scowling. And he left. It felt easy.
He’d sling his arm over your shoulders whenever a picture was being taken, and he’d tell you whenever he thought you looked good. Easy. You’d think he was loud, annoying, cocky, a bit too much sometimes. You still do, but now it’s not the same. And you don’t know how, but you know he knows.
Sometimes you wonder if he’s trying to let you down softly. The way he looks at you, touches you when it’s just the two of you, talks to you a bit softer, makes you feel like he’s trying not to be cruel about it. But then he leaves without a second thought and you reconsider. Sometimes he’s careless in a way that makes you think he’s actually being cruel on purpose.
“What’re you thinking about?” You remember him asking lightheartedly. Tilted head, pale cheeks resting on his fist. The lights are dimmed, the atmosphere soothing in a post-mind-blowing-sex-with-your-friend kind of way.
“Nothing in particular.” You’re laying on your back, staring at the ceiling. Your legs are sitting on top of his.
“So you’re thinking about me.” Still lighthearted.
“Always.” You match his tone, turning your head to look at him.
He’s looking right back at you, his eyes slightly hooded, a smirk on display. He knows, you think. One of his hands is rubbing your leg softly, almost tickling you. Some time passes. You know he’s going to leave soon.
“Still down for those tutoring sessions?” He asks after a while. You’d told him about how you wanted to better your hand-to-hand combat skills.
“Don’t call them that.”
“I’m not teaching you anything unless you call me your mentor.” He’s only half joking.
“Guess I’ll go ask Geto, then. He won’t be as annoying.” He scoffs.
“You know I’m better than him.” He says. And you do know. Geto’s strong, and Gojo also knows that. But it’s simply widely accepted that Gojo is — well, the strongest. Everybody knows, but he still gets a bit childish about defending it.
“I’ll tell him that you said he was — what is it that you said? — a weakling? And a pushover?” You say in a dramatic tone. “God, Gojo. You’re so mean.”
He plays into your antics. “Tell him I also said I could fight him with a missing arm and leg anytime.”
You laugh. “Yeah, I’m not saying all of that. Geto’s too nice to be treated like this.”
“And I’m not?” His hand on your leg is getting slower, softer.
“Well…” you start, acting like you’re in deep thought. “You could be nicer.”
“Yeah?” His hand is going higher and higher, his index finger gradually tracing a straight line from your ankle to your lower thigh. “How?”
By staying, you think. “Are you saying this because I deny you of your orga-”
“Oh my god, Gojo.” He huffs out a laugh. Some time passes again.
“Satoru.” He says suddenly.
“Huh?”
“When are you going to stop calling me Gojo?” He asks. You do still have a habit of calling him Gojo when you’re not having sex, though you’ve known each other for a while now.
It irritates him. It’s nothing much, really, but he hates that you still say ‘Gojo’ as a reflex whenever you’re calling out to him. During classes, when you’re hanging out with your friends, right after he makes you fall apart. Like you’re some acquaintances, putting distance between you as if your relationship was purely formal.
“When I feel like it.” You sit up and look at him. “When you’re nicer to me.”
He sits up too, takes one of your legs, puts it above his shoulder and kisses the side of your calf before putting it back down. You want more. He gets out of bed and you instantly start missing his warmth.
When he’s almost done putting his shoes back on, he speaks out.
“I might stay longer next time, then.” And you find yourself facing his back again, except this time you’re lucky because he shoots you a side glance before leaving.
He knows, you think. You hate that he knows. You hate that you feel like this. Sometimes you want to put an end to whatever you have going on with him, and you feel like you’d be better off never seeing him again. Sometimes the idea of an alternate reality where you don’t know him, where you’re not standing in his light, seems devoid of any and all interest. You’d rather endure the heartbreak.
He might stay longer next time, because he’s not actually going to, and because he knows that’s what you secretly hope for each time. He’s cruel. You wish he was more cruel, sometimes. It’d be easier.
Coming back to bed after taking a shower, you take your phone and notice one text notification from Gojo.
gojo
do you have me saved in your phone as gojo?
next tape ➜
—
okayyyy first gojo fic! i’m probably going to elaborate on this relationship. the title is a lyric from the song ‘ruined’ by Adrianne Lenker, which i think expresses really well the ambience i was trying to recreate in this
No because Geto is seriously such a perv when it comes to you,,,,,, and he fucks mean, he can get cruel. Can mock you sometimes, make you cry a little. Edge you till you loose your mind almost entirely. Oh how he loves to see you look at him with those pleading eyes, you who’s normally so put together, so composed. You’re always trying to keep everything under control, always thinking and calculating and— he just wants you to let go when you’re with him.
But like he can also be so so gentle!!!! So when he’s done being an asshole and considers he’s been mean enough, he takes your face in both of his big hands like you’re something made of porcelain, and he kisses you so sweet, like a lover would. And he speaks so soft, holds you so close, gives you everything you want and more, like a lover does. So sweet it’s almost mean. Sometimes it makes you wonder if you imagined him being cruel to you. And his eyes are always on you, like he wants to catch every single micro-expression, every movement of your lashes and every sigh. ‘Hey, pretty girl. Look at me.’ he’d say. ‘Look at me, please.’ softer, with his thumb under your chin, angling your face to face his.
It’s like his goal is to drive you crazy, to get you to melt under his touch, to completely abandon yourself. And Geto is a selfish, selfish man. When he has you under him, he hates the thought of you being elsewhere. He doesn’t want your mind wandering off to somewhere he’s not, so he makes you feel so good it’s physically impossible for you to focus on anything else. ‘Are you here with me, pretty baby?’, he’d say. He wants to make you stupid, wants to make you forget your own name. That’s when he considers the job done. He likes to ask you ‘how does it feel?’ even though he knows how it feels, knows it feel so good you can’t even give him a proper answer.
Holding hands during missionary, sliding in and out agonizingly slow just to make you curse at him during a mating press, having both of his strong arms around you during cowgirl, holding you by the back of your head so he can kiss you anytime during doggy, yeah he loves all that shit. Lives for it. He also loves when you try to run away from him, whether that be when he’s eating you out or when he has you in a mating press. The fucker loves to pin you down and make you take it. And nothing gets him going like the way you look and sound when you’re almost there, when he can hear the tears in your moans and can feel you surrender completely. ‘I know, I’m here.’ cups your cheek so lovingly with one hand and slides his thumb right under your eye, ‘let go, my love.’ And when he’s talking to you like that, how can you not? So you lean into his hand or crash into his shoulder and you cry out, feeling nothing but all-consuming pleasure.
Geto knows you have him fucked up when he’s sitting in class and the only thing he can think about is how you sounded when he had you sitting on top of him just a few days prior.
He can’t stop those pretty moans and whimpers he kept pulling from you from replaying on repeat in his head. Out of all of the things that turn him on about you — and there are a lot — he thinks your voice is the one thing that could kill him. You could probably talk him into doing anything.
And don’t even get him started on your laugh. He remembers that one time you two were having sex and you were talking a bit while switching positions. He’d said something, and you’d chuckled. One of those light laughs, subtle and airy and oh so soft. He came right on the spot. That’s the precise moment he realized he was so, so fucked. You had him wrapped real fucking tight around your finger.
So when his phone lights up mid-class with a text notification from you, he instantly feels like a shot of serotonin has been injected into him.
hi
come over after class ?
Fuck yes, he thinks. He’s already giddy just thinking about spending some time with you. The way you’re going to greet him and smile when opening your door to let him in, how you’re going to tell him about your day with your legs sitting on top of his, the thought of him getting to touch you, your hair, your hands, your cheeks.
He’s fucked. And he knows it. But he might actually like it.
“I’m a bit drunk right now. I don’t wanna say anything stupid.” Both the cold December air and your inebriation are giving you a hard time articulating, so the words are somewhat slurred.
You hear a soft chuckle, then an equally soft voice responds. “Please, feel free to say all the stupid things you want to say.” He always addresses you like this, you think. Like he’s speaking to a flower, or something made of crystal, something he should be most delicate with.
It’s around midnight but the streets are crowded outside the bar Shoko chose to bring you to, located right in the city centre. Your face feels warm but your hands don’t. Little puffs of air materialized by the cold escape when you speak.
“Now I can’t think of anything.” Geto laughs and the warmth in your throat spreads to your chest, to your ribcage. You’re starting to confuse what’s caused by the alcohol and what’s not. Your body reacts to the cold like it would an electric shock, shivering abruptly. “It’s warm.” You say without thinking. Warm?
Geto chuckles once again, and you think it actually might be warm. Looking down at your cold-bitten hands, your rigid joints, your slightly trembling fingers, you know it’s actually really warm out there, as Geto smiles at you so soft like you’re a flower or something made of crystal, something he mustn’t let go of.
“Share some of that warmth, then. I’m freezing out there.” He tells you.
“You don’t need it.”
“I don’t?”
“You already have all of it.”
“The warmth?” He asks just to make sure he’s following you.
“Yeah.” You scowl at him. “So selfish.”
You can hear him smile as he hums and scoots closer to you, his hands shoved in his pockets. You wonder if your phone’s still in one of them, as you’d asked him to keep it when you went to the bathroom. Coming back, you’d told your friends you were going outside to ‘breathe a little’ and Geto had followed you out.
“Alright, then.” He says as he stands directly in front of you, his chest right in your face. He puts his head on top of yours and you realize he positioned himself right where the cold wind was coming from, blocking it from you. You close your eyes and lean into his collarbone. You could’ve just gone inside, you think, where it was warm and buzzing with people and music and life. “Warm enough?” Geto asks you and you can feel his voice resonate in his chest.
You could’ve just gone inside where it was warm and buzzing, where Gojo was probably still bickering with both Utahime and Nanami, where Shoko was most likely ordering another beer. But it really was warm out there after all, on that December night when your breath looked like smoke and your words were slurred. When you could barely tell where the alcohol ended and where your feelings started. Nuzzling further into Geto’s neck, you answer him. “So warm.”
pairings : geto suguru x fem! reader. summary : that one time you and geto stopped playing around (fluff, smut, some teasing and some more yearning).
a/n : sooooo i wrote this drabble and it made me want to elaborate on geto and reader’s relationship | wc : 4k
—
“That’s not a bad idea.”
Hearing Geto’s voice, you direct your gaze towards where he stands behind you to see him looking at you, his mouth forming a small ‘o’. You pick up the last glass on the opposite end of the table, trying not to make the ones you’ve gathered slip from your grasp.
“Always the smart one.” He adds, now smirking.
“Such high praise.” You answer in mock modesty, throwing a single wave of your hand at him.
He lets out a soft chuckle as you walk past him to put the empty glasses you’d gathered in the sink. You’d found a way to clean the table of all of the glasses in one go, which is what earned you this comment from Geto. The water was already running, and the bubbles from the dish soap were swelling by the second.
Turning back around, you notice Shoko’s scarf on the couch, a little way behind the table. You don’t even have the time to ask yourself if you could catch up to her before your phone lights up, one message notification from Shoko appearing on your screen. Unlocking it, you read her text.
shoko
just realized i forgot my scarf
Your thumb hovers over the screen as the three moving dots indicate another text is coming.
shoko
i never liked that thing anyway
You snicker at the message, typing an answer right away. She did mention her distaste for this scarf once or twice.
i’m still giving it back to you on monday
Her answer comes a few seconds after.
shoko
thanks
feel free to light it on fire tho
You smile and double-tap her message, putting your phone back on the table.
You were in your apartment when Gojo called to ask you if you wanted to come over to Geto’s place and have a drink with your friends.
He had originally gone to Geto’s to pick something up, and he’d found Nanami there, as he and Geto were working on a group project. Utahime had then called Gojo on her way back from campus, and as she and Shoko were not far from Geto’s place, he’d told them to come over. That’s when he called you.
“I know you don’t have anything better to do. Your exam’s like, what, a week away? Just come over.” He’d told you. You realized he had put you on speaker when you heard Shoko shout ‘Girl, come over!’ from a distance. She was obviously a couple of drinks in already.
You’d accepted and had vaguely mentioned not feeling like taking the subway before hanging up. You hadn’t thought much of it and actually didn’t really have a choice, but you got a text from Geto a few minutes later.
geto
Want me to pick you up?
The text had surprised you, even though you knew it wasn't rare for Geto to be like this. So sweet. So perfect. It wouldn’t even take you this long to get to his place, and the subway station was just a few meters from your apartment building.
You’d been typing back an answer when he sent another text.
geto
Be here in 20
So you ended up in his passenger seat, making light conversation. His car looked and smelled clean, everything tinted in some shade of grey. It seemed fitting.
Geto’s presence always felt both calming and unnerving to you. You’d never felt this contrast as much as you had then, sitting beside him in the passenger seat of his car. He calmed you down and made all of your senses alert all the same. And although you’d been attracted to Geto for as long as you’d known him, you hadn’t ever felt this stimulated from simply being near him. Getting out of the car, you had taken a deep breath, feeling like you could finally relax. He was definitely getting in your head.
The small get together felt just like the other ones : homey, warm, easy. Like something you didn’t want to let go of. The conversations, the laughs, the games, the banter — all of this was familiar at this point. It always felt like belonging.
And you hadn’t missed the small glances you and Geto had exchanged all throughout the evening, the way he looked at you like something was going on and only the two of you were in on it. How his voice softened ever-so-slightly whenever he addressed you. How strangely delightful it felt to have his undivided attention.
So now here you were, helping Geto clean up his living room after your friends left, a little past midnight. Nanami had taken it upon himself to drop everyone off, as he didn’t trust any of them to get home safely.
“Okay, let me just find my keys then I can drop you off.” You hear Geto tell you as you fidget with Shoko’s scarf.
“Wait, let me help with the dishes.” You suggest as you fold the scarf, looking for your bag.
“No, no, it’s fine. It’s getting late.”
“It’s okay, really.” You tell him. “It’s Friday, plus I don’t have an exemplary sleep schedule, even on weekdays.”
As you were packing the neatly-folded scarf in your bag, you figured you’d just do what Geto had done earlier — help him regardless of what he says. So you head towards the kitchen sink and start wetting a sponge.
“You know I’m going to be fine, right? I can manage some dishwashing.”
As you begin to work on the task at hand, you answer him without turning around.
“Huh? I can’t hear you.”
Geto chuckles, apparently accepting his defeat. He rolls up his sleeves and goes to stand next to you, picking up an empty glass and shoving his sponge inside. You can’t help but notice how toned his forearms are, how strong his hands seem. Breathing felt much easier when all of your friends were here earlier. Now you were feeling just like you had felt in his car ; like the place was shrinking down. Ironically, it’s Geto’s voice that brings you back to reality.
“You looked like you were having a good time.”
A few seconds pass before your answer comes.
“Yeah. It was fun. Weren’t you having a good time?”
“I was. I still am.” He still has that slight grin plastered on his face. “It’s been a while since we’ve all been together.”
“Yeah.” You saw Shoko and Gojo almost everyday, and you ran into Nanami, Geto and Utahime on a regular basis on campus, but it had indeed been a while since you’d seen all of them in the same room. “I haven’t seen you at all lately.”
Although you’d been focused on your upcoming exams in the last few days, you’d still noticed how you hadn’t even caught a glimpse of him around campus for a while. You’d found yourself hoping you would run into him sometime during the day. You hadn’t.
“Yeah. I looked for you.” You look up at him.
“Did you?”
“I did.” He looks right back at you, putting the last glass on the counter while you hand him a towel and get one for yourself.
“I guess our schedules weren’t compatible at all.”
“I guess you’ve been avoiding me.” He laughs softly at that.
“Couldn’t if I tried.” He says after a few seconds. Please stop saying things like that, you say internally.
“Why didn’t you just text me?” You ask after you let another while pass.
“I don’t know, actually.” You start putting the clean glasses back on their shelf. “Saw you weren’t texting in the groupchat, so I figured you were busy.”
And you were. At least, you had been in the last few days. But you could’ve made time for him. You would’ve, if he’d only asked.
You stretch your arms out after being done with the dishes, glancing to your left to see Geto crouching down, looking for something in the back of one of the lower shelves.
“Let me pour you some wine as a thank you.” He tells you, focused on finding what you assume is a wine bottle.
“Oh- it’s fine, really.” Even though you’d say you feel rather comfortable with Geto now, the two of you still hadn’t entirely dropped the formalities. You’d actually really appreciate a glass of wine right now.
His eyes stop raking over the shelf and he reaches out to the very end of it, careful not to make any brutal move around the glass bottles. He stands back up, holding a bottle of red wine while smiling at you.
“You’re lucky Shoko and Utahime didn’t get their hands on this one.” You smile back at him.
“I see you’re keeping secrets.” You walk towards the living room table, checking your phone while he opens the bottle.
“They’re going to get pissed when I send this to them.”
shoko
still at geto’s ?
The message was sent 5 minutes ago. You type back a simple affirmative answer, still paying attention to your conversation with Geto.
“When?” He asks. “They don’t have to know about that, do they?”
Shoko sees your text immediately and starts writing an answer.
“Oh, they do. I absolutely will be here to witness your downfall in the groupchat.” You hear his laugh over the sound of the wine being poured.
shoko
hmmmm
“And I thought you were sweet.” He gets a second glass and starts pouring the wine. Sweet.
what?
You look up from your phone after having texted Shoko back as Geto joins you in the living room and brings a glass over to you, clinking yours with his own. You plant your eyes in his as you raise your glass to your lips.
“Well, you thought wrong.”
You hadn’t realized how thirsty you were until you had that first sip of wine. It felt sweet on your tongue and harsh on your throat, tracing a warm path as it disappeared into your digestive system. Just how you liked it.
Geto observes you, absentmindedly drawing light patterns on his glass.
“Oh? I’m pretty sure I guessed right.” You take some time to remember what he’s referencing.
Right. Sweet.
In the corner of your eye, you notice your phone lighting up with what you can only imagine is an answer from Shoko.
“What makes you say that?” You ask after having drank some more wine.
Geto narrows his eyes as if to evaluate you.
“You can’t be mean.” He states simply.
Your immediate response was to refute, but you figured responding with ‘I can be mean!’ made you sound a bit childish. You might as well just cross your arms on your chest and huff like a six-year old at this point. Did he say that just to get a rise out of you?
“You’re right.” You say as you take your phone in your hands. From where you stand, you take a picture of the wine bottle on the kitchen counter. You notice Geto’s smile growing slowly. “I’m actually the sweetest angel on earth.”
Setting your glass on the table, you send the picture to the groupchat and start typing.
geto literally just told me he hid it bc none of you cheap drunkards deserved such delicacy
his words not mine
Geto fishes his phone out from his black sweatpants and reads the message you just sent. Remembering Shoko had sent you a text, you go to open her message.
shoko
have a good night :)))
:))))))))))
You feel like both rolling your eyes out of their orbit and barking out a laugh. You quickly type back.
shut up omg
Putting your phone back on the table, you look up to see Geto laughing at his phone before putting it back in his pocket. He looked good like this, an oversized woolen sweater floating around his form, the material perfectly light and loose and perfectly completing his all-black attire.
“‘Cheap drunkards’, huh?”
“Right, why would you say something like that? That’s so mean!” Geto laughs as he shakes his head.
“Gojo’s going to be so dramatic about this.”
“Oh, the worst. And he doesn’t even drink.” You start giggling, not only because you find this funny, but also because you can feel the wine kicking in. You feel warm. Geto’s laugh doesn’t help. You reach for your glass and take another sip.
“So, was it part of your plan to lure me in with some red wine?” You ask, looking at him intently.
“That’s possible.” He tells you, playing into your game. “I might start always keeping a bottle or two in here from now on.” You giggle.
“I’ll consider moving in if you get some white wine. Especially if it’s sweet.” He smirks.
“I’m holding you to that.” He says, his soothing voice always a treat for your greedy ears.
His hand moves around in his pocket and you hear his car keys jingle. You realize you don’t want to go home right now. You feel so warm here.
“I better see you around campus more often now.” You tell him.
“Well, you will if you stop avoiding me.” It’s your turn to grin now.
“Okay, okay, I will. I was getting tired of hiding from you anyways.” He chuckles in that soft way again and you wish he never stopped.
“For real, though. Come and see me sometimes.” He says.
“No.”
“No?”
“Huh-huh.” You shake your head. “Don’t feel like it.” He smiles. “You come and see me or we just never see each other like, ever again.”
“Alright, then. Send me your schedule. Do I have to make an appointment, or will Madam be kind enough to receive me anytime?” You realize he’s gotten a lot closer. You feel warmer by the second, but you don’t hate it. You don’t know why, but you want to put your hands on his shoulders.
“I’ll think about it.” He grins at you, and you return his grin. The feeling of his eyes on you is as delectable as ever. He’s close to you now but it’s not close enough. Not nearly enough.
“Please do.” His tone is hushed now, the both of you anticipating what you know is coming. You’re torn between wishing to take what you want right now and wishing for this particular moment to never end. The chase at its peak, the both of you practically able to feel the other one sizzle at the touch.
“Oh, I forgot.” His widened eyes are still on you, his lips almost touching yours. “You’re not a sweet girl, right? What is it that you were saying earlier — ‘I thought wrong’, yeah?” You can’t help but smile giddily, even as he slightly pulls away. “So why don’t you just take what you want?”
You should’ve known Geto would be like this. Actually, part of you already knew, you just couldn’t prove it. But of course he’d be a tease. You might like it a little more than you should.
“I actually remember saying I was the sweetest angel on earth.” You say as you grab a handful of his sweater and pull him towards you. “So I think you’ll give me what I want.” He mirrors your smile and you feel like you’ve never been this impatient. “Won’t you?”
His eyes absorb you and your thoughts as you stare into them. It feels like you’re both testing each other, trying to gauge just how patient you are.
“Anything you want.”
His eyes devour your lips one last time before his own start doing the same. And it feels like release, like the warmth you’ve been craving all night long — and on many days and nights before this one. Geto kisses you slow and deep, and all of your senses are filled with him. You’re delighted to finally taste him, to finally have him right there, so you trace his jawline, and you tangle your fingers in his hair before wrapping your arms around his neck, and you slightly bite on his lower lip, pulling it towards you with your teeth, and you—
“Fuck.” He says after letting out a groan. You release his lower lip from your teeth and he uses his thumb to angle your chin towards him. He gives you one, two, three pecks as sweet as a lover’s kiss before speaking up, his words muttered against your mouth.
“So we’re finally dropping the formalities.” You giggle into his mouth as he starts kissing you again and relishes the fact that he finally, finally gets to eat his favorite sound up just like he’s been wanting to for a long time now.
Geto was deft enough to have you backed against the counter without you even realizing before he lifted you up swiftly so you were sitting on the edge of it.
He starts kissing your neck like he wants to devour it and then nips at it in the softest, sweetest way just to go back to his initial greedy pace a few seconds after. Your sighs are getting more and more desperate as a handful of his sweater is crumpled in your grip, your balled-up fist pulling him closer. Geto almost moans out at that. The sounds he’s pulling from you only make him grow greedier by the second.
Your hand slides down to reach his sweatpants and, barely reaching beneath, you curl your finger around the hem of the garment just to tease him, your other hand grabbing a fistful of his hair. As hard as he’s trying not to completely lose himself, it feels like you’re trying to wreck him entirely.
As his mouth finds yours again, his hand slides under your shirt and grabs your waist before going up, his touch setting your skin ablaze. His fingers slide against the side of your tummy before reaching your breast, continuing their path as he flattens his palm against your bra and drags it up to touch your skin. His hand is almost cupping your breast but not quite, and he ends up ghosting over the area to trace the strap with his index finger. When he reaches your shoulder, he hooks his finger around the strap and drags it down slowly.
His other hand follows the same path and eventually reaches your strap to replicate what he just did. When he begins pulling at the straps from under your sleeves, you realize he’s taking your bra off before everything else, because of course he’d know how to do that. You let him do it, and when you see your bra scattered on the floor, you wrap your arms around his neck as he carries you with his lips still on yours.
“Bed?” He mutters.
You hum in approvement and he starts moving, hoisting you up and walking you both towards his room. You paid little attention to the room itself, but what your foggy mind allowed you to see appeared pretty fitting — simple and tidy layout, mostly black and grey. Just like his car had, his room smelled of cleanliness.
He lets you down cautiously on the large bed, still kissing you hot-headed and delicate and lustful all at once — like he meant it — without detaching himself from you. With you sitting on the edge of his bed, he immediately gets on his knees, looking up at you while trailing down slowly. His lascivious eyes don’t leave yours as he takes his time on his way down, kissing here and touching there, nipping here and licking there.
Your head rolls back in anticipation. Looking back down, you see his fingers lacing with yours ever-so-slowly and you realize you’re not sure you would ever want this to be casual.
Still, you might be ready to put up with some heartbreak if it meant you’d get to do this again.
—
Your mind has already registered too much information before your eyes are even fully open. One : Geto isn’t in bed with you. Two : your phone keeps lighting up with text notifications, probably from the groupchat, you assume. Three : something smells really good.
Taking your phone in your hands, you will your eyes into functioning correctly before unlocking your screen, trying to read what’s displayed in front of you. You only start being able to read normally after a minute.
gojo
this is outrageous
shoko
shut up you don’t even drink
this is outrageous !!!
utahime
who is he calling cheap drunkards ???
what happened to respecting your elders
nanami
He wasn’t exactly wrong about the ‘cheap drunkards’ part.
However I would’ve appreciated one glass or two.
gojo
actually way to go geto
utahime
shut up
nanami
Shut up, Gojo.
shoko
shut up
were you two waiting for us to leave so you could start drinking wine??
utahime
that’s scandalous
gojo
of course they were
geto knows ball
proud of you son!!!
You decide this is a problem for later as you let your phone fall back on the mattress, sitting up and heading to the kitchen. Walking out of the bedroom, you immediately see Geto’s back facing you as he appears to be cooking something.
You only realize how sore your thighs and legs are when you begin walking up to him. He hears you and turns around, smiling at you like this was a normal Saturday morning. Like this was usual for the two of you. You stop in front of him, not knowing what to do, and he’s the one to make the last step towards you to kiss your nose so tenderly you almost melt.
“Hey.” He greets you, his voice deep, his tone soft.
“Hi.” You greet him back, smiling up at him.
“Did you sleep well?”
“I did. Very well.”
Last night is a hot, steamy, electrifying and mushy blur in your mind. You hadn’t felt that good in forever, you probably hadn’t even felt that good ever before. Geto was perfect. He listened and he cared and he kissed and he touched like he just knew what to do with you and how to do it. And you don’t know much about physics, but you’d say something was going on with the chemistry between your bodies, because rare were the things in your life that just felt that right. You’d get your heart broken a million times over for this.
And God was he the sweetest, cradling your head with both of his hands, barely looking anywhere but straight into your eyes as he made you fall apart over and over. Telling you how good you were, calling you pretty and beautiful along with a range of variants, sometimes baby, and just once you’d heard him whisper my girl through the foggy mess he’d turned your brain into. “C’mon, gorgeous.” He’d say, “give me more, I know you can.”
The last thing you remember before drifting to sleep is having your head on his chest, his chin resting on the top of your head, talking while the two of you were half-asleep. Most of what you were saying was muttered, and you remember him punctuating his words with soft kisses on your forehead. With his arms tied around your waist, he’d asked you ‘do you have anything planned tomorrow?’ and you’d sleepily answered that no, you didn’t.
“What about you?” You ask him.
“I slept wonderfully.” He tells you with his hand on your cheek. “I’m making breakfast.”
The morning is quiet and beautiful, like a Sunday morning. Except this was a Saturday, and as the both of you ate breakfast and talked, you were acting like this was normal. You’d tried your best not to think about the future, about anything that would happen past this day. You’d tried your best not to wonder, not to doubt. Geto had implied sometime during the night before that he wasn’t looking for anything right now, romantically speaking. You’d said the same just a few minutes prior, and had meant it. That was before you knew what Geto could do to you.
Late in the afternoon, he had suggested you both go on a walk. The smell of late winter was fresh in the air, and everything felt right with him there. That night, you slept with one of his oversized black tee-shirts on. You slept with your head in the crook of his neck.
You woke up in the same shirt, in the same position, with the same feeling ; the one that told you this felt too warm, too good to last.
—
Yes I made Shoko, Utahime and Gojo text with the automatic uppercase thing off while Geto and Nanami have it on cause that’s basically canon to me
friends with benefits with geto suguru (basically lovers) (i need him)
friend with benefits! geto who you’d been acquainted with for a while before the both of you started hooking up frequently. as you had a bunch of mutual friends, you saw each other often but generally didn’t exchange much more than small talk. you weren’t boisterous about it, but the both of you could feel some kind of pull towards each other, the quiet kind of mutual attraction. you slowly got closer and closer, until that one night the quiet pull stopped being so quiet, and the both of you finally acted on your attraction to the other.
friend with benefits! geto who’d then started to become a ‘casual’ hook-up, although you never actually discussed your relationship with him, and it didn’t exactly feel casual. but whatever, you just let it happen. he came over, made you fall apart each time without fail, and stayed the night. you woke up next to him, the both of you all tangled up, ate breakfast with him, got ready as you discussed the classes you had on that day. you’d go to university together, he’d often bring you a cup of hot chocolate or a snack in between classes, he’d sometimes pick you up and drive you home.
friend with benefits! geto who grew so accustomed to your body it sometimes felt like he knew it better than you did, often treating it like his favorite toy or instrument. he likes to experiment with it, touching here or applying pressure there just to see what pretty sounds he can pull out of you. and he makes for such a good student, taking note of what you liked and didn’t, always looking to better himself to please you more and more each time.
friend with benefits! geto who kissed you a little more than a friend — even with benefits — should ; heavy make-out sessions often initiated by what seemed like an innocent kiss at first, little pecks in between words mumbled during aftercare cuddles, kisses as light as a feather on your mouth, cheek, nose or forehead whenever you were leaving or he was, and also to greet you, or to say thank you, or to–
friend with benefits! geto who liked taking pictures of you. you had actually recently discovered that there wasn’t much more he took pictures of. there’d be one picture or two of the sunset in between images of you in the bathroom, smiling as you were talking about something you don’t remember while tying your hair up with suguru’s large shirt floating around your form. pictures of you eating your favorite pastry, the one he’d occasionally get you before or after class. pictures of you at parties and get-togethers, in which you were talking or laughing at something with one of your friends. those were his favorites.
friend with benefits! geto who, after you’d told him you were fine with not defining your relationship but you’d still like to have a general sense of what you both were to each other, had stared at you for a while, mulling over an answer that conveyed what he felt, and after some time had simply told you : ‘i want you’. you’d tilted your head, waiting for more, and he continued : ‘everything that comes with wanting you, at all times. complicated or not. i want you, i want all of it.’ and ever since, he’d made sure to remind you. him telling you ‘i want you’ had become a regular occurrence, his way of reminding you how he felt about you.
friend with benefits! geto who was the closest you’d ever been to anybody. who you could get so deeply intimate with it almost scared you. who was the only person that could ever make you feel all of this, who pleased you like nobody ever did. who kept his ever-intense gaze on you as he picked you apart, whose touch could turn your brain to mush, who made you feel so good there were tears rolling down your cheeks, who teased you enough to get a little mean, a little cruel, just to then kiss said tears away as he turned back into the gentlest version of himself.
a/n : oh my god she finally wrote about somebody else than shanks 😯 enjoy this little zoro drabble | wc : 1k
—
“Again.”
You’ve heard him say this countless times over the past two hours, his command always spoken with the same composure, like he could do this for days on end. Firm and unflinching, patient, though not indulging. Never indulging.
So you get back up and you go again, ignoring every single muscle screaming at you, moaning their pain away. Getting in position, you look at Zoro. Your eyes had locked with his so many times over the course of the night — you knew not to let an opponent out of your sight, and he made sure to remind you — yet you hadn’t once been able to decipher what he was thinking.
And now here you were, both sweaty all over and out of breath, both getting visibly exhausted, but you still made no move to stop. You lifted your arms in an effort to fight against the invisible force that was trying to pin you down and tell you to rest, and the fight resumed.
Sparring with Zoro felt like trying to get through a reinforced wall. His strength and his reflexes were already impressive as they were, but he also saw and felt literally everything down to the most insignificant flutter of your eyelashes. To you, his ability to analyze his opponent to then adjust and calculate his way into a victory was, by far, the most impressive asset in his fighting technique. It felt like he could use every irregular breath, every malfunctioning nerve and turn them against you at just the right moment. That’s how you ended up on the floor before even realizing it.
It sometimes got a bit intimidating, feeling like he would find a way to know every single thing you felt. It got all the more intimidating when you felt like this even when Zoro wasn’t sparring with you. And it wasn’t rare. You can think of a few times where, without you having said anything, he’d just sensed that something was going on, that you weren’t being your usual self. You never knew how to feel about this, especially as the both of you didn’t even talk much.
It felt like most of your relationship with Zoro was non-verbal. It took place in the silences. You don’t talk much, but you observe, always mindful, you feel, always alert. It was weird, to say the least. But not necessarily in a bad way.
And apparently it was thanks to his telepathic abilities that he sensed that something was going on with you the second he stepped on the deck, where you were sitting down just a few hours prior. Nothing much happened, really — he walked in, stared, asked ‘what’s up with you?’, didn’t listen when you tried to brush it off, then suggested sparring.
Well, he didn’t actually suggest sparring. He’d said “Well, whatever’s the matter, best way to let it out is to exercise.” Because of course he would say that. “Move, sweat, wear yourself out. Shut your head up for a bit. Thinks too much.”
He had then turned back around and added “I’ll be in the training room, ‘f you wanna sweat those thoughts out.”
You had mulled it over for a bit, then got up after deciding it was the best option you had. You didn’t want to spend the night thinking.
So now here you were, sweating the thoughts — and everything else in your body — out, with Zoro helping you better your defensive stance. The past few hours had all melted into one another, and for the first time in a while, you’d been able to focus for an extended period of time. Both your body and your mind were utterly present, your feet on the ground. The physical exercise was difficult, but the routine of it all made it so easy. The starting stance, the fight, the mistakes, the little improvements, and the—
“Again.”
The steady voice that kept your feet clawed to the ground. And although Zoro had worn more or less the same facial expression and body language all evening, you could tell he was satisfied with your evolution. Little approving hums, almost inaudible, when you perfectly blocked one of his blows, then abruptly leveling up the difficulty just to see how far you could get, or his eyes narrowing and lighting up with that glint whenever you resisted his strength for longer than usual… you didn’t know if he enjoyed this, but it sure felt like he did.
It even felt like he liked provoking you, sometimes. Like testing you was entertaining to him. “C’mon, give me more”, he would say when you initiated an attack, almost coaxing the violence out of you. “You scared of hurtin’ me or something?” he’d almost drawl, apparently trying to get a rise out of you. “That’s not all you’ve got.”, he’d add after a while, more coldly. And—
Again. Again, again.
You didn’t know what pushed you to get up and go again each time. Maybe it was the thoughts you were trying to dodge, boiling like they would all come to the surface and bubble over if you so much as took a breath. It might’ve just been the fact that you were a little hungry for that glint in Zoro’s eyes, as if you had proved yourself to him. A little greedy for the satisfied hums, the quips, even the slight meanness. His focus on you, and yours on him. You were a little curious, also, about all of the reactions you could get out of him, about the way he would respond if you exceeded him, even for just a second.
It might not happen, but it could. And if not tonight, then another. So you stand to your feet, let his voice claw them back into the ground, plant your eyes in his own, ever-assessing ones, and you go again.
a/n : yet another small shanks fic! got a little more emotional with this one idk | wc : 1.2k
—
There are days like this, where you remember the full extent of what you agreed to when you became a pirate.
Days just like this one, when the word goodbye becomes full of meaning, full of little silent pleas you hope will reach the other person. Please let me see your face again. Please be safe.
After all, you could be drinking tea on a beautiful morning, reading the newspaper and coming across an article covering the death of somebody you had happily waved goodbye to just a few months prior.
So the word always sat heavy on your tongue. You’d sometimes catch yourself doing the most mundane things — discussing the latest news with one of your shipmates, breaking up a drunken fight, laughing at someone on the ship having cut their finger and acting like they lost a whole arm — and suddenly thinking ‘please let us live to have more of this’.
So looking at Shanks right now, you don’t know what to say.
“I can’t know when I’ll be back for sure.” He had said with that solemn tone that let you know you were looking at Shanks the Emperor, the captain of your ship.
“It might be weeks or months. I’ll try to be back as soon as possible.” He added.
You looked at him without responding. You know Shanks is strong. More than you can even fathom. And you know he’s not one to be carefree when surrounded by danger. He’s probably safe. But—
“Don’t do anything stupid.” You didn’t know how else to put it. You didn’t want to be too gentle, too caring when talking to him. He’d become insufferable.
“Please.”
Well, you could still be polite.
Slowly, his lips stretched into a grin — the grin you tried to avoid bringing to his face as much as possible. You could almost see the seriousness and sternness in him evaporate in fumes. Shanks the Big Strong Man was gone.
You already rolled your eyes in anticipation.
“Oh, but would you look at that?” He said, feigning surprise like the annoying pest he was.
“Is this you worrying about me?” He titled his head. “You don’t want me to go?”
“I don’t remember saying that.” You deadpanned.
His grin turned into a soft smile.
“Okay. I won’t be stupid.” He tells you after a few seconds.
His voice was soft but it still had a grave quality to it, and if you didn’t know any better, you’d think it meant that he dreaded goodbyes as much as you did. Except when it comes to Shanks, you don’t really know what anything means anymore.
“Don’t be too reckless when I’m gone.” He speaks out again after a little while.
You raise an eyebrow.
“Well, now that I won’t be spending my time stitching you up, I don't know. Might throw myself in a fire.”
Shanks laughs.
“I’ll make sure to come back with enough wounds to make you tend to me for a good while after I return.”
You feel like he’s only half joking.
“Can’t have you forget about me.” He adds.
You hate how you immediately think you could never forget about him. You despise, really, how you know you could try to scrape every trace of him off yourself, and you still never could.
You got so close to the sun the burn is irreversible. And the fall is inevitable.
And when it’s that bad, you have no choice but to try and salvage yourself — at least the parts of yourself that can be salvaged — by covering it all up. Bandage it ‘till it stands on its own.
“I’ll try not to.”
Shanks smiles his knowing smile, the one you might hate even more than the others, because it feels like he’s telling you he sees right through you. Feels like he can plant his eyes so deep down your ribcage he’s able to see your soul along with a reflection of himself. You won’t.
Then you remember.
“Your shirt!” You blurt out.
You turn around and reach out to where the shirt lays at the back of the cabin, clean and folded on your bedside table.
“I found it yesterday, someone used it as a rag- I guess they were drunk. I washed it.”
You don’t know if it’s Shanks’ favorite shirt, but it’s the one you see him in most often. You’d personally hate to go on a long trip without the one piece of clothing you feel most comfortable in.
Shanks holds one hand out, his palm facing you.
“It’s fine. I’ll leave it here. I’m trusting you with it.”
“You’re not taking it?”
“No.” He turns around and opens the door, already on his way out.
You suddenly feel like there’s sand slipping through your fingers, and it makes you uneasy. Maybe you should kneel down and salvage what you can, gather it and never let it go again.
For now though, you just watch as Shanks’ cloak follows after him, lingering a bit before the door closes. You just stand there for a few seconds, eyes on the wooden wall.
You wait some more, then your legs start moving towards the exit of the cabin. Outside, the air feels crisp. Shanks is leaving with summertime.
You step on the deck, walking to the top of the stairs. Although he’s taking his time, he’s already reached the last one. He turns to look at you. He almost looks like a stranger like this, though he’s dressed like he usually is.
His bag hanging off of one shoulder, legs slightly parted, back straightened, he stands tall and proud. He feels warm and too far away. You’re starting to get cold.
“I’m not taking it so you won’t have an excuse to avoid me when I’m back.” He speaks from down the stairs, and you realize how new it feels to hear his voice from afar.
How used you were to him standing directly next to you, or in front of you — closer.
He almost looks like a stranger like this, because you’d never felt this way while seeing him off before. But he certainly doesn’t feel like one. He feels warm and too far for you to catch. But Shanks is strong, and clever, and there’s no reason for you to worry. Still—
“Be sure to be back soon, then. I might take it with me when I throw myself in a fire.”
He smiles yet another one of his smiles, only this time, it’s rarer. It’s the one that makes you feel like your heart is stretching in sync with his lips. So warm it makes you remember why you even got this close to the sun in the first place, makes your burns awake and tingling all over.
You know the seas are wide and unforgiving, you know they take and they swallow without a second thought. You know how cold, how scary, how lonely it gets. You’ve experienced it. But—
Shanks is strong. So strong he can rival with this infinite void. So warm he can laugh you both past it. So there was never a goodbye spoken between the two of you. And you plan on keeping it that way.
Your hand closes on the shirt and you feel its material crumple between your fingers. Still, your palm feels empty. So you try again, grabbing a bigger chunk of cloth, paying attention to the feeling in your hand. Not enough. Maybe you don’t want the shirt.
“What are you trying to do here?”
What a pretty voice, you think. I like the voices in my head.
You smile to yourself, giggling a little. Then you look at the man standing in front of you. You’ve seen him before. Tall, broad, tan. Red-hair, devastating smile, awfully radiant. And awfully close. When did he get so close?
“Why are you so close?” you ask, seeming genuinely confused.
The words didn’t come out like you thought they would. They sounded slow, and slurred.
Shanks chuckles.
“Okay, I didn’t know you had that much wine.”
“I didn’t have that much.”
He looks at the glass bottle at your feet and almost sighs in relief when he sees it knocked over on the floor, all remaining liquor now forming a dark red puddle on the wooden deck.
“Y’know if you wanted my shirt, you could’ve just said so.”
Your brain takes a few seconds to register the words. When it’s done, you frown.
“I don’t want your shirt.” You mutter in a rather childish way. “Smells like you.”
He laughs. It’s irritating and beautiful.
“Okay, so give it back, will ya?”
You frown a second time. Your hand moves before your brain does, and you feel it letting go of something. When you glance down to see where it was, you see the piece of crumpled shirt.
The white shirt. That was just in your hand. You look back up.
“Oh. Sorry.” Still kind of childish, and a little bashful.
“‘S okay. So, tell me…” Shanks crouches down to make his face level with yours. “Do you often hear my pretty voice in your head?”
“What?”
“You just said my voice was pretty.”
You look at him, perplexed.
“No.”
He chuckles. It’s annoying. And also beautiful.
“Yes. You must be used to my voice being in your head then.”
“No. And well, yeah.”
The red-haired man looks surprised. He didn’t expect this answer.
“Yeah?”
“You have the same voice as my captain. What kind of pirate would I be if my captain’s voice wasn’t imprinted in my brain?”
You explained this as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. Shanks looks at you for a few seconds before exploding in laughter.
You frown for the third time. Your eyebrows are starting to hurt. You look at the man, who’s still laughing, and wonder what his problem is.
“Oh yeah? What do I say?” He says after having calmed down.
“Not you, dummy! My captain!” You exclaim before continuing.
“And I often hear him say the things he usually says, y’know ‘fold the sails!’ — you try to take an authoritarian voice to imitate your captain —, ‘we’re casting off!’, ‘more booze!’, ‘cause these are things he always says.”
Shanks smiles, looking amused.
“But sometimes it’s just…”
You look down on your folded knees.
“Like, ‘good morning’, or ‘what do you want for breakfast?’. I don’t know. ‘S weird.”
His smile softens.
“It is weird. Ever thought of getting your head checked?”
He puts his pointer finger just above your right ear.
“Might be really bad, y’know.”
Shanks really tries not to tease you. He does. But before he can say anything else, he feels something tugging at his shirt. Looking down, he sees your hand, doing the same thing it had done just before : gripping his shirt, letting go, then gripping some more.
“That tickles. You sure you don’t want my shirt?”
“Yeah. I just… I don’t know. Don’t move.”
The feeling in your hand still isn’t enough : everytime you grab the shirt, you feel like something is missing. Maybe you don’t want the shirt. You want the warmth.
And Shanks isn’t used to seeing you like this at all, but still, he lets you crumple his shirt and pull him towards you, and he stays crouched down next to you. He lets you borrow some of his warmth.
