༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ Aperture—A Mini Series °❀.ೃ࿔*
❀˖°❀˖° Pairings: Ex-husband!Gojo x American Photographer!Reader
❀˖°❀˖° Rating: Explicit (MDNI) 18+
❀˖°❀˖° Chapter Content Warnings: heavy angst, verbal familial abuse, sexual language and descriptions, mentions of infidelity, yearning
❀˖°❀˖° WC:10.1k
Headcanons // Masterlist // Chapter Two
Art credits to the lovely @/3-aem // Playlist
Chapter One: Now That She’s Back in the Atmosphere
(Satoru’s POV)
Satoru feels like he’s going to be sick as his family and friends raise their champagne glasses like this is something to celebrate. It’s not. How can they all smile and laugh like this is a special occasion when all he can think about is how she’s actually taking your place? It’s been six years since the divorce and he hasn’t stopped thinking about you, not one goddamn day. The truth is, he already knows why they’re so thrilled, why they don’t care at all that his heart feels like it’s slowly being juiced like a pomegranate in his chest. It’s been six years and he still remembers the sound of your voice, the softness of your skin, how pretty you looked in the early mornings when you slept with your head on his chest, and the tender way you kissed him goodnight. Every memory carves into his brain like a bullet
It’s his engagement party to Kaori, but all he can think about is you. It’s like a sickness, a curse. You’re a poltergeist that haunts his life—unseen, unspoken of, but silently wreaking havoc on him. Miss is too small a word to convey what he still feels about you, but it’s an accurate one nonetheless. You are missing from him, a hole carved out of his heart that will never heal over. Some days, the ache is so bad that it makes him sick to his stomach. But the worst part about it is that you’d still be here, you’d still be his, if he hadn’t fucked it all up.
Six years since he last laid eyes on you. Six years since you left him in the ashes of the marriage he burned to the ground. He hasn’t known a single moment of peace since. All he has known is the ache of want hollowing out his gut since the day you left.
So, he smiles at the right times, flashing that smarmy, lying grin when the constant anguish in his chest almost shines through to his eyes. He keeps his arm around Kaori’s shoulders, having accepted his fate a long time ago. He didn’t stay with her out of any amount of love. No, Kaori is his punishment. Marrying her is his boulder to roll up the hills of Tartarus, his self-flagellation. He never wanted to be with her, not really. The only reason he cheated at all—well, there were a few reasons, each one more shameful and cowardly than the last.
Kaori says something to him that goes in one ear and out the other so he just leans over and presses a kiss to her temple, closing his eyes to pretend she’s you. That’s how he gets by. When he’s fucking her, always from the back, he imagines she’s you. Every forced declaration of affection, every sweet nothing, every promise he’s made, has been made with the ghost of another woman behind his eyes. He should feel guiltier about what he’s doing to Kaori, but he doesn’t. She’s just as complicit as he is in what happened, as are his parents. The whole lot of them deserve to burn for what they did to you.
Under the glittering lights of this five-star restaurant in downtown Tokyo, Satoru dances like a monkey at the circus for Kaori, for his parents, for the rest of their friends. The only person who knows the truth of the agony he’s in is Suguru. But then, Suguru doesn’t have a lot of sympathy for him.
“Satoru, don’t you think a summer wedding?” Kaori asks, glancing up at him, her large dark eyes meeting his. She smiles up at him, her delicate hand sliding up the front of his chest possessively. The engagement ring, a huge fucking rock that his parents picked out, glitters in the light. He just nods along to whatever she says because what does it matter anyway?
You chose an autumn wedding. Outdoors, and when he’d worried about the rain, you’d just smiled and told him that a little rain was good luck on your wedding day. It didn’t end up raining at all that day. Maybe if it had, he would have had the spine to be a decent fucking husband to you.
“A live band is a must, maybe we could hire some musicians from the Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony,” she prattles on and on about forgettable details that don't matter. This is how it usually goes though. She talks at him not to him. He doesn’t care about any of it. She could plan a wedding where they exchange vows on the back of a jet ski and it wouldn’t make any difference to him. Because this marriage is nothing more than a formality, a marriage in name only. He’ll make damn well sure there will be no children. He’ll work as much as possible. It's like he can see the future.
She says something to his mother that sends them both into a fit of giggles, the sound making him fucking nauseous. Across the table, Suguru shoots him a look that says his misery is showing a little too much on his face, so he turns the wattage up on his smile. His friend only shakes his head and looks away.
Satoru tosses back the amber liquid in the glass clutched in his fist. He doesn’t even like drinking, but he finds himself getting shitfaced more and more often lately. At least his parents haven’t noticed yet, otherwise, they’d probably ship him off to rehab.
“Don’t you want to slow down a little honey? I’m sure you’d hate to end the fun so early.” Kaori’s sickly sweet voice curls in his ear. Her hand wraps around his wrist, not tight, but with enough pressure to force him to pay attention to her. He hates when she says shit like that. Taking her own ideas and framing them as his. He’d rather she just tell him to cut down on the drinking outright, but that’s not how Kaori operates. No, everything with her is a mind game.
Satoru’s hand clenches around his glass and he looks down at Kaori—his fiancée and the woman he cheated on you with. She’s every inch the perfect wife his parents wanted—good breeding, sophisticated, and most importantly not American. They wouldn’t have settled for anything less than a good Japanese girl.
She looks beautiful in her red designer dress. Her long black hair is lustrous under the lights, her dark eyes like black pearls, skin fair and clear. But as beautiful as she is, she’ll never compare to you in his mind. She’ll never be as beautiful to him as you were, no matter how much his parents and friends go on and on about how lovely she is.
The entirety of his marriage to you, all they did was criticize and belittle you, your marriage, and even him for choosing you. Kaori, they love her, give her the grace and respect they never gave you. He didn’t choose Kaori. Not really. Yes, he slept with her. And it’s a sin that he’ll carry on his shoulders for the rest of his existence, but he didn’t sleep with her out of love, or even attraction. At first, he didn’t know why he did it, but after years of agonizing over his past decisions, he finally understands. He was nothing more than a pathetic, weak coward who caved to his parents’ constant pressure. He didn’t need to choose Kaori because his parents chose her for him.
“Sure, sorry,” Satoru says, not sounding very sorry at all. She gives him that pinched expression she makes when she’s upset about something but doesn’t want to make a scene. He doesn’t care though.
Kaori glances over at his parents and he’s sure she’s going to find some way to rat him out. It’s her go-to move when he does something that pisses her off. She just runs to his parents. He hates that. You never would have done something like that because you understood how much he despises his parents. All Kaori cares about is the Gojo name, but you loved him. Him. Not his name, not his parents’ money, not their influence, but him. And here he is still rotting in the corpse of that love, wishing there was something, anything, he could do to resurrect it.
But you’re gone and all he has left is this misery. Fuck, he needs another drink. Letting out a breath, Satoru looks up and his heart fucking stops in his chest. Across the room, turning down a hall, he could almost swear it was you. That’s your hair, your build, those curves he remembers, although maybe a little curvier than you used to be. It can’t be. He has to be hallucinating. The stress of the engagement, the already overwhelming wedding planning, must be getting to him. That has to be it, because there’s not a shot in hell you’d set foot back in Japan after everything. But still …
He leans down to mutter to Kaori, “I’ll be right back. Bathroom.” And before she has a chance to reply, his long legs are already eating up the distance between him and that hall. He shoulders his way past other patrons, not caring even a little if he’s being rude, not a single apology passing his lips. There’s a wild, feverish look in his eyes because the mere possibility of it being you sends him into a tailspin. His heart feels like it’s going to jump right out of his chest, even if he’s getting himself all worked up over something that will probably turn out to be nothing. After nearly running smack into a waiter and almost sending an entire tray of food splattering around the restaurant, Satoru slows down a little.
He ducks down the hall. It’s quieter here, like it’s cordoned off from the rest of the establishment in a way. The doors to the restrooms taunt him. Maybe the person he saw went inside. Five minutes, he tells himself, I’ll give myself five minutes for this wild goose chase and if you don’t appear by then, I’ll just chalk it up to a grief-induced hallucination. So, he leans up against the wall and he waits. His stomach roils like a boat in a storm, nausea crawling up his throat.
It can’t be you. It just can’t be. He repeats that to himself over and over to keep it in his mind so he’s not too disappointed when it turns out that it’s not, in fact, you at all. The likely truth of it is that it’s a woman who happens to bear a passing resemblance, but just in case, he waits. Minutes tick by, each second pricking at his skin like a needle. Letting out a sigh, he cranes his neck to look across the restaurant where his family and Kaori are all gathered, celebrating this cursed event. Just as he’s about to give up, about to turn away and seal his fate of misery, the door to the women’s room opens and there you are.
The breath in his chest freezes. His heart thumps so hard that the vein in his neck throbs under his skin. All of that love, longing, and regret crash into him at once as he looks at your familiar, beautiful face. It’s like a tsunami wave barreling into his chest and he’s helpless but to flounder in it.
Satoru swallows. There’s no doubt about it. It’s definitely you. He’d know that face anywhere and those eyes. Back when you guys met in college, he fell in love with your eyes at first sight—so gorgeous and sharp. His world feels like it’s crashing in around him as you look up at him with an expression of panic and horror. Your mouth opens, then closes. Your name comes out of his mouth like a prayer uttered moments before certain death. His heart pounds and flutters in turn, torn between anxiety and that all-consuming adoration he’s never stopped feeling for you.
“Hi,” his soft, broken voice cracks on that singular word.
♡
(Your POV)
“Mommy, I used the potty all by myself!” Ender practically squeals with excitement. His snowy white hair bounces as he runs over to the sink, nearly tripping in the process. He’s at that age where he’s trying to be as independent as possible, while still being a little too small for some things. He looks so cute in his little outfit—the brown pants, button-down shirt, and suspenders you picked out for him this afternoon. It’s a pity he’s pretty much a carbon copy of his father. You went through all the work of carrying him for nine months and gave birth to him entirely alone, only for him to come out looking exactly like his father. Figures.
You can’t even think his name. If you think about him for too long, your eyes start to well up with tears. Being back in Japan has been nerve-wracking to say the least. You keep expecting to see him everywhere, to turn a corner and there he’ll be, but you’ve been reminding yourself that it’s a big city. The likelihood of running into each other is slim to none.
The last time you were here, you had your heart ripped out of your chest, still beating, by the love of your life. Since then you haven’t been the same. Some part of you was broken beyond repair by him. You haven’t been able to trust and every relationship you’ve tried has gone up in flames as a result. It would be easy to blame it on being a single mom, but it’s not Ender’s fault. It’s you, you’re the problem.
“Good job, baby,” you say warmly, watching as he tries to stand on his toes to try and turn the water on.
“Can you help please?” His request is so heart-meltingly polite that you have to bite your lip to keep from bursting into tears, although he’s still working on how to make the ‘pl’ sound properly. He’s getting so big now and neither your mind nor your heart can keep up. Unfortunately, the kid is sprouting up like a beanpole. It’s starting to look like he got his father’s height as well. You’re already dreading the day he gets taller than you, but you know it’s going to happen eventually.
Slowly, you walk over to your son, a soft smile on your face. His blue eyes sparkle at the praise and he bounces on his toes. Flipping the water on, you watch as he runs his hands under the water, giggling as he plays with the strong stream, using his finger to block parts of it at different angles. With a shake of your head, your smile deepens as you help him get soap into his small palms. It feels like just yesterday he was so small that he rarely left your arms, now he insists on doing everything himself. Stubborn boy.
“Mommy, can I go to the moon one day?” He asks, looking up at you as he rinses his hands.
“You could go to the moon if you wanted. Maybe even to Mars,” you say softly, shutting the water off once his hands are sud-free. “But Mommy would miss her little astronaut a whole awful lot,” you add, your fingers trailing through his silky-soft hair, the same snowy white as his father’s. “Now, go dry those mitts, bucko. Mommy’s gotta pay for dinner before we leave.”
Ender giggles and runs over to the hand dryer. With a grunt, he slaps the button hard, but he manages to turn the machine on. You head toward the door, pulling it open to call over your shoulder, “Hurry your cute lil butt up.” But you turn your head back to look out the door, and your heart drops like a stone into your stomach. It feels like the world comes to a screeching halt.
Satoru.
He looks exactly the same. How can he look the same? It’s not fair. Here you are—wider hips, tits that don’t sit up the way they used to, a little curvier than you used to be. And he looks the same.
No. No. No. No. This can’t be happening. A look of horror and panic crosses your face as you stare into the vivid blue eyes that match Ender’s exactly, the mop of silky white hair he never could seem to get a handle on. It’s cut differently though. He wears it with an undercut now.
He breathes your name. The voice you’ve dreamed about, the same one you’ve had nightmares about. You can’t seem to move, you can barely breathe, and you want to grab your son and book the first flight out of Japan. Fuck the photography showings you’re supposed to do, fuck every single one of your plans. The tangled knot of emotions you’ve been harboring for the past six years bubbles black and sticky in your chest.
“Hi,” he whispers like he didn’t shatter your heart into a million pieces, like he never ruined you for anyone else.
You don’t say anything. You can’t.
It’s like it happens in slow motion. You can hear the squeak of Ender’s shoes as he runs up behind you and jumps up on your leg, clinging to your limb like a little monkey. “Mommy, can we get the fishies for dessert?”
Satoru looks down at the kid. Instantly, you scoop your son up and settle him on your hip. He babbles something about the yummy beans as he wraps his arms around your neck and his legs around you. Ender’s head turns to face Satoru and it makes you go stiff. All you can hear is your heartbeat, pounding in your ears as if it might burst through your eardrums. You stare at Satoru, willing your mouth to open, willing your body to move.
“Is it really you?” Satoru whispers, eyes darting from your face to the little boy settled in your arms, who’s currently playing with your hair. “I—“ whatever he was going to say gets choked off in his throat. He’s all dressed up in a nice suit, his clear blue eyes staring at you like you’re something out of a dream. His hand rises and then falls back down to his side.
His accent is thicker, like he hasn’t spoken English in a while. Then again, your Japanese is atrocious. You’ve pretty much completely forgotten everything you learned. Back home, you hired a tutor for Ender in Japanese, starting last year. He’s a nice old man, a first-generation immigrant. In their classes, he not only learns Japanese, but he also learns about the culture.
“Mommy, he looks like me,” Ender whispers, not very subtly against your ears. You love your son to bits and pieces, but at this moment you want to clap your hand over his mouth to keep him quiet. You’re gonna be fucking sick, right here in the hall, yack all over the polished hardwood floor.
Something in Satoru’s face becomes unbearably soft as he looks at your son. It makes you cling to the little boy tighter, your heart feeling like it’s about to jailbreak your ribcage. “Hey kid,” he says softly, his blue eyes shining, “What’s your name?”
Ender blinks up at him, his matching eyes curious. “I’m Ender,” he says cheerfully, completely oblivious to the storm brewing between you.
You squeeze your son a little more firmly and look down at him. Finally, your tongue catches up with your brain and you murmur, “Baby, what has Mommy told you about talking to strangers?”
Ender pouts, jutting out his lower lip in the same way Satoru used to when he didn’t get what he wanted. “Sorry, Mommy,” he says quietly, sounding appropriately apologetic. He hugs his arms lightly around your neck and rubs his head against your shoulder
When you look back at Satoru, you manage to say, “I think you’ve mistaken me for someone else.” When in doubt, play dumb. There’s not a shot it’s gonna work, but you’re still gonna try. You attempt to squeeze past him, but he steps in front of you to cut you off. “Excuse me, my son and I were just leaving.” The bitterest, pettiest part of you has you whispering saccharinely, “Hope you find who you’re looking for.”
Deep down though, you know that he’s not just going to let this go quietly. For the first time, you truly wish Ender looked more like you. Sure, you might crack a joke or two, but you love him just the way he is, even if he does look like a clone of his father. A million thoughts and fears run through your mind at once, most of them consist of Satoru trying to take your son away from you. The very thought makes your blood freeze, makes you want to snap and snarl like a wild animal. You’d sooner die than let that happen.
Satoru doesn’t budge though. Instead, he leans down to examine Ender’s face more closely. “Hey, you’re a pretty cute kid,” he says, a lopsided smile tugging on his mouth, “I mean, you’ve got the prettiest mommy in the whole world so it makes sense. Gotta wonder though, where’s your dad, Ender?”
Your molars grind together at the question, but you’re certain he’s not gonna like the answer. This might be good actually. Looking down at your son, you give him a tiny nod.
“My dad?” Ender echoes back at Satoru, “My dad is dead.”
Satoru chokes, all the blood draining from his face. “Dead huh?” He bites out, his voice tight and cool. Slowly, he straightens and meets your eyes, outrage blazing in those blues.
“Yes. Dead,” you repeat, just to grind your heel into the wound. “Boating accident. Very tragic.”
Satoru hums, his mouth tugging into a bigger smile, but there’s an intensity about the way he’s staring at you that makes your spine stiffen. “Seems so,” Satoru says in a voice that’s all too casual for the look on his face. “A real shame.” He doesn’t tear his eyes away from you as he continues, “You disappeared.” It doesn’t sound like an accusation, but it sure as hell feels like one. “Six years is a long time to avoid someone,” he adds, the ghost of that familiar smirk clinging to his lips, but there’s no humor in his eyes. When you got divorced, you didn’t exactly tell him that you were leaving. The day everything went through, you just blocked him on everything and simply left.
“I’ve been in America,” you say tightly. You would have thought he’d have figured that out, or maybe he did and he just wants to hear you say it. “I’m only back in Japan for work over the summer,” you add making it clear that this is temporary.
“You’re leaving again soon,” Satoru says slowly, looking at you with that ferocious intensity that makes you want to hide. “Lucky me, catching you before the vanishing act.” Now that, that sounds like an accusation. Then, quieter, he adds, “We should probably talk, huh?”
“I don’t see any need for that. Neither my son nor I has anything to do with you. Have a good night, best wishes,” you shoot back, squeezing past him to stride quickly down the hall. You reach the edge of the main dining hall, only to have a large, familiar, heavy hand grasp your arm. That’s when you see his parents across the room and that woman, Kaori, the woman he cheated on you with. Everyone is all dressed up, like they’re celebrating something.
Satoru refuses to release you. In fact, his hand only clamps tighter around your arm, “Nothing to do with me? That’s the story you’re sticking with? It must be nice getting to decide what truths get told.”
His mother, or as you like to call her, the viper, looks up and you whirl around to hide Ender and almost smack right into him. Fuck, fuck, fuck. You feel like you’re trapped between a rock and a hard place—his parents on one side and Satoru himself on the other. The thought of his parents finding out about Ender scares you shitless, way worse than Satoru knowing about him. You need to get the hell out of here before you get caught up in a situation plucked from your nightmares. “Mr. Gojo,” you say, putting intentional distance between you by addressing him with his last name, “You should really think twice before ascending your high horse. To my memory, you seem to have your own aversion to the truth.”
Satoru visibly winces, which sends a thrill through you. Good, you want it to hurt. A muscle in his jaw feathers as he clenches it, eyes flicking between your face and the boy in your arms. “Five minutes. That’s all I’m asking. Or are you that determined to rewrite history?”
History? Is that what this awful, monstrous thing that exists between you is? It doesn’t feel like history. It feels like a fresh, raw, bleeding wound.
“Can we not do this here? Now?” You grit out. There’s no way you’re ever letting Satoru’s parents anywhere near Ender and the longer you linger, the greater the risk of being discovered.
“Then when and where?”
Your teeth grit together. Never and nowhere is the answer you’d like to give, but the last thing you want is Satoru making a scene (which you know he will) and drawing the attention of his parents. Glancing over your shoulder just long enough to see that woman staring at the two of you from across the room, you quickly turn back to face Satoru. You don’t think she’d recognize you because the two of you never officially met. The only reason you know what she looks like at all is that you stalked her social media back then. Either way, it makes you uneasy.
You rattle off the address of the apartment you’re renting for the summer. There’s no escaping this now. Once Satoru sinks his teeth into something, he doesn’t ever let it go. So, you just say coldly, “If you tell your parents about him or me, I will pack up and run without hesitation. They are not to know, do you understand me?” You mean it. Every word. Satoru’s parents terrify you, not just because of how they used to treat you, but because you’re certain that if they ever laid eyes on Ender they’d try to take him from you, or they’d pressure Satoru to. Yeah, right. They can pry him out of your cold, dead arms.
Satoru glances over your shoulder, towards where his family is all gathered before drawing those blue eyes back to you. “Yeah, yeah okay, I won’t say anything,” he lets out, “That a real address? Or am I gonna have to hunt you down?” His fingers tighten minutely around your arm, fingers that used to carve marks into your skin when he fucked you just the way you liked, fingers that used to trace gentle circles over your skin when you were sad, fingers that held your hair back when you were sick.
If you did give Satoru a fake address, you have no doubt he’d tear Tokyo apart looking for you and your little boy. God hates you. That’s the only explanation for such shitty luck. Barely in Tokyo a week and your worst fears already realized.
Your teeth grind together and you grit out, “It’s a real address. Now please, seriously, let me leave.” You throw another nervous look back towards his family only to see that woman walking towards you and Satoru. Without waiting another second, you pull your arm free of his grip. “Either believe me or don’t, but we’re leaving.”
Through the din of the restaurant, you swear you could hear the click of her heels against the floor getting closer and closer, but it’s probably just you, courtesy of the anxiety slowly gripping your throat harder and harder. Holding Ender close, you flee the scene as fast as possible. Your hands and legs are shaking as you carry him up to the front. The girl is really nice, Ender says a few words in Japanese to her, giggling at her smiles. Just like his father, he’s a magnet for attention. While she runs your card, you pull out your phone to order an Uber. Thumbs sliding across the screen, you idly stroke Ender’s arm for comfort.
“Mommy, who was that man?” He asks as you’re tucking your phone back into your bag.
Your head jerks up and you swallow, that tangled knot of emotions bubbling in your chest growing like some radioactive fungus. But you can’t let him see what his father does to you. “He’s just an old friend from when I used to live here before you were in my belly,” you lie to your son tenderly, reaching up to run your fingers through his silky snowy hair. Like you and Satoru could ever just be friends.
“Before I was in your belly?” The way he says it is like he can’t believe a time like that ever existed. It makes you let out a huff of laughter despite the situation.
The girl offers you your card back and you tuck it back into your wallet. Then you scoop Ender up. As you’re walking toward the door, Ender waves at the host over your shoulder. “Sayonara, bye-bye,” he calls out both words a few times as she coos and fawns over him. He’s really hamming it up for her.
A little bell jingles overhead when you step outside. The breeze tugs at your hair as you stand by the curb to wait. At least you’re out of that building though. You force yourself to let out a long slow breath as you wait for the driver to arrive.
“Mommy, what do the stars do when they’re gone?” Ender asks as you set him carefully on the ground and hold his hand instead. Those little fingers grow longer and soft baby skin gets firmer with each passing day. He looks up at the sky, squinting his eyes like he might see them winking down at him behind the brilliance of the sunset. The sky is smeared in vivid shades of pink, lilac, red, and orange.
“Maybe they sleep,” you say as you ruffle his hair, “Or maybe they just take some time for themselves and sing and dance and laugh just like people do in their secret lives.” You gently squeeze his cheek and wiggle it, earning you the cutest giggle, complete with a little snort, “Maybe they wonder about what it is people do during the day.”
Luckily, the driver doesn’t take long to arrive. As soon as the white sedan pulls up to the curb, you pick Ender up and slide inside. Once the two of you are safely inside the car, your shoulders feel instantly lighter. Although you can’t relax completely because for the first time in six years, you have to actually face the last man you let close enough to break your heart. The only thing keeping you grounded is your son’s little body pressed against your side as he snuggles up against you.
♡
(Satoru’s POV)
I have a son. I have a son. I have a son. The words loop endlessly in his mind. Satoru is in a daze by the time Kaori makes it over to him. She has to repeat herself three times for her questions to actually start registering. He feels like his entire world has had the rug ripped out from beneath it.
He’s never wanted anything more than to follow you out that door, stick to you like glue, and pull that beautiful boy into his arms. How many things has he missed out on? Sonograms, feeling your belly as it grew round with his child, birth, first smile, first words, first tooth, first steps—so many missing moments that he’ll never be able to reach no matter how much he stretches out his fingers.
“Who were you just talking to?” Kaori asks, a suspicious edge to her voice. She flicks her long, glossy black hair over her shoulders and looks toward the front of the restaurant where you disappeared. Ran from him. That beautiful little boy in your arms, you ran from him, from his family, from all the reasons that made everything between you fall apart in the first place.
“No one,” Satoru says with forced levity, lying through his fucking teeth. Everything. His whole heart pulled out of his chest, walking around this world, cursing his name. That’s what you are, and that little boy. You can deny it all you want, but that boy is his. Some sick, twisted part of him is grateful to whatever god is looking out for him because now you can’t just run, you can’t just leave him again. “Just some mom I nearly ran into. I was just apologizing and talking to the kid.” The words feel hateful in his mouth.
Ender. Satoru savors the name like a hard candy on the tongue. Kaori gives him an expression like she doesn’t quite believe him, but she has no reason not to. She’s never seen what you look like, never heard your voice; he’s not even sure she knows your name. He doesn’t talk about you with anyone, not even Suguru. He can’t. Most days he can barely stand to think of you without feeling like he’s going to be sick or crying or both. Talking about you is out of the question.
“Well, they’re about to serve dinner,” she says looping her arm through his and guiding him back towards where his parents and friends are all celebrating like his entire world didn’t get turned on its head. He lets her guide him back to the party, but Satoru isn’t really there anymore. All he can think about is you. It was bad before, but something he could swallow like bitter medicine, but this is different. You’re here, in his city, for the first time since you left him.
Satoru isn’t sure how he manages to make it through dinner, but his anxiety grows the longer the cursed thing stretches on. He can’t just leave, otherwise, it might tip off his parents that something is amiss. No, he sits there and pretends that this farce matters even though he knows that it doesn’t. Nothing matters besides you and that boy who may as well have been his clone.
While his mother discusses wedding colors and auspicious days with Kaori, Satoru wonders if his son likes sweets, if he prefers robots or dinosaurs, and what his favorite cartoon is. So many questions, so many gaps, so much missing from him. He wonders if you have a boyfriend, if Ender has a stepfather. No, no, that’s not something he wants to think about at all. It makes him want to throw up on the table.
The whole dinner, he’s in shambles. With each second that passes, the urge to leave grows stronger. He’s distracted, out of it, and he can hardly focus enough to at least appear normal. The table jumps from his long legs bouncing, knocking into it repeatedly. Every so often, he adjusts his posture because he just can’t seem to sit still for longer than five minutes. His appetite is completely gone but once dinner is brought out, he still shovels a few mouthfuls of food into his mouth. It tastes like ash between his teeth.
Suguru keeps shooting him worried glances so he must look as shitty as he feels. He tries to pull himself together, paste that stupid smile on his face, but he can’t even do that. So he settles for silence. The party happens around him—conversation, food, drinks—and he’s just there like a silent statue, a part and yet apart.
When everything draws to a close, friends trickle out by ones and twos until it’s just his mother, his father, and Kaori. “Don’t forget, Satoru, there’s the auction tomorrow. You must wear the custom navy Italian suit I picked for you last Summer. Pair it with the thin baby blue tie. Make sure you bring the black card. Oh, don’t forget to prepare a suitable engagement gift for sweet Kaori.” The list of instructions goes on and on. All he fucking wants to do is leave and it’s taking everything in him not to lose his shit. His chest is starting to feel tight and heavy, like an elephant is sitting on it.
Of course, his mother’s list of orders starts his father off. “I saw that you decided to discontinue the patent on the X12 memory chip. I have to say, that’s not a decision I’d make. Tomorrow morning, I’ll head with you into the office and you can explain why you think that’s a good idea.” Great. Just fucking great. All that means is a few hours of sitting there while his dad nitpicks and over-analyzes all his decisions to death.
“Dad, I know what I’m doing—” Satoru starts, but his dad dismisses him with a wave of his hand.
“Nonsense, we have to make sure that we’re making the best decisions for the good of Gojo Inc.,” his father cuts in. Ah, the royal we. That’s how it always is with his father … we, we, we, we. Except, there’s no we, there’s only his father’s way, anything else is just wrong. Somehow, his father’s gotten softer as he’s gotten older. He grew up on insults and curses thrown his way. Things like “Are you fucking stupid? You must be if you think that’s the right way to do things,” and “You can’t even get this one simple thing right? You’re useless waste, you unfilial child,” and, “This is your best? Really? Second place is as good as last.”
Suddenly, he just can’t fucking take it anymore. “Mother, father, Suguru has a few possible clients he’d like to meet tonight,” Satoru lies for the second time tonight. He looks down at Kaori and leans in to kiss her cheek. “Take the car back to the penthouse. I’ll Uber.”
“Satoru!” His mother exclaims, like he’s doing something egregious by going to ‘meet his best friend and some clients’ instead of standing there and listening to them beat him down.
“I’m sorry, mother. I know it’s last minute,” Satoru says, smoothing it over like he’s been trained to do. When he was little, if he didn’t do things to his mother’s exact specifications, she would ignore him for days. He learned quickly that if he did things exactly how she wanted, she would love him again. “I’ll come visit you tomorrow night before the auction, okay? We can all go together.” He’s trying to mollify her. Just let me go, please, let me go, he begs silently.
His father harrumphs and they grumble amongst themselves, but Kaori stares at him, her dark eyes shrewd. Satoru bows to his parents, hoping to keep them from getting suspicious. Gesturing to Kaori, he says, “Please take care of her. Make sure she gets home.”
Then, before any of them can protest further, Satoru spins around and starts out of the restaurant. As he weaves around tables, he pulls his phone out of his pocket and orders an Uber to the address you practically spat out at him. The cool night breeze strokes his cheeks, but the air is heavy with moisture from the lingering summer heat. His head tilts back and he rocks on his heels while he waits for the car. The stars are invisible in Tokyo, the light pollution too strong for them to withstand.
Every second it takes the driver to arrive is agonizing. When he does, Satoru practically scrambles inside, settling in and buckling up in record time. The old man tries to make polite conversation with him, but he’s got too much on his mind for small talk. The whole mess is tangled up in his head. You, Ender, his parents, Kaori. He doesn’t even know where to begin getting a handle on it; hell, he’s not even sure if he can.
When the driver pulls up outside a nondescript apartment complex, one shared by dozens of average families. It’s nothing like the luxury he was immersed in from childhood, but he doesn’t care, because this is where you’re living; it’s where his son is living. Satoru thanks the man and gets out, pausing to stare up at the building.
He suddenly feels so nervous, like when he asked you out. He asked you in English because your Japanese was god-awful, but he was worried you’d hate his accent, worried you’d tease him. But you didn’t. You just gave him the softest, sweetest smile he’s ever had the pleasure of seeing and asked him when and where. He almost couldn’t believe the pretty little foreigner from the land of movies and cowboys and guns agreed to go out with him. It was all over from there. He fell in love with your irreverence, with your blunt edges, with your pretty eyes, with everything, everything, everything.
He feels like he’s in a dream as he walks up the three flights of stairs to the top floor of the apartment building. It doesn’t take him long to find the apartment. Before he knocks, he swallows down his nerves and bounces on his toes as he works himself up to it. Eventually, his fist comes up and he raps his knuckles gingerly against the door. He feels like he’s going to pass out and throw up at the same time, his heart starting to go so hard again that he feels lightheaded.
There’s some shuffling inside and he just about stops breathing again when you actually open the door. You’ve always done that to him, stolen the oxygen from his lungs. Cute. No more pretty dress. Now you’re dressed down in an oversized T-shirt and a pair of fuzzy shorts. Six years ago, he used to peel you out of outfits like that and fuck you until your knees shook, until you were crying out his name like it was the only word you knew. The fact that he can’t touch you now digs into his heart like a shard of glass.
He instinctively looks around for Ender, his son. The little boy is nowhere to be seen though.
“He’s in bed,” you say, looking at him like he’s grown two heads. “Did you really think we were going to have this conversation with him around?”
You open the door a little wider and Satoru doesn’t hesitate to take the opportunity to slip inside. Your home. Your space. He stands awkwardly off to the side while you shut and lock the door behind him. It’s a nice space—Western style, clean, well-lit, in a quiet neighborhood, and fully furnished with simple, but tasteful decor and furniture.
When you turn back to face him, Satoru shrugs, “I guess not.” He pauses, shuffling from foot to foot. Finally, he takes a breath and meets your eyes. “So, are you going to admit it or do I have to guess?”
A muscle in your jaw feathers. You always did grind your teeth when you were pissed, even in your sleep. At first, you don’t answer, just slip past him and go around the corner. Satoru follows you into a dimly lit living room, complete with a loveseat and two sitting chairs around a wooden coffee table.
There are crayon drawings scattered across the table, crayons strewn across them like Ender got distracted mid-activity, a pile of toys sits in a foldable crate in the corner, overfull, with some still scattered around, and a half-built Lego firetruck sits on a side table. One of your books sits spread open on the loveseat and you drop down beside it, tucking your legs under you.
Satoru sits in one of the chairs. He has a feeling that you might beat him with your book if he tries to sit there right now. Silence stretches for a minute longer and Satoru almost opens his mouth to tack on a smart-ass comment.
“What would you like me to admit?” You say stubbornly, lifting your chin. Somehow, even though you’re shorter than him, you still manage to look down your nose at him.
“He’s mine, isn’t he? Ender is my son.”
You stare at him for a moment before you mutter sarcastically, “No, he looks exactly like you, but actually, his father is someone else.”
But all Satoru can focus on is the fact that you admitted it. Ender is his. His and yours. A piece of proof on this earth that at one point he truly was happy. “How old is he?” Satoru rasps.
You hesitate, like giving him even crumbs is distasteful to you. He deserves it. He knows he deserves it, because his parents are right: he’s a useless, stupid waste. But they were also wrong because he never, not for a single moment, deserved you. “Five,” you say at last, “And a few months.”
“You kept him from me,” Satoru accuses, thinking of all the moments he’s missed out on, all the time was robbed of. Then, he remembers what Ender said earlier. ‘My dad is dead.’ For some reason, that infuriates him almost more than the fact that you hid the boy. “You told him I was dead,” he adds, glaring across the room. He’s well aware he’s on thin fucking ice already, but come on? Dead?
“I could have told him you just didn’t want us,” you snap coldly and you may as well have slapped him.
The words throb in his mind. “Yeah, okay, I guess I earned that,” Satoru rasps, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees. He lets out a long sigh, “But still, you didn’t think I deserved to know?” He digs his elbows hard into the meat of his thighs. “That he didn’t deserve to have a father?”
Your jaw clenches again. You take a long time to reply, “Deserve? You want to know what I deserved? I deserved a husband who loved me enough to stay faithful. I deserved a husband who would fight for me. You deserve absolutely nothing from me.” He can tell you’re pissed off from the quirk of your brow and the way you white-knuckle your grip on the couch, “Don’t fucking talk to me about what we deserve.”
His eyes lock on yours, “Christ, you don’t have to remind me. I know fucked everything up, okay? I have spent the last six years paying for it, and I’ll keep paying for it, but this isn’t about us.” He pauses and looks down at his lap. “That kid has the right to know he has a father who would have loved him to the ends of the earth. Fuck, I don’t even know the kid and I do love him.” It’s the truth. From the moment he laid eyes on Ender, all that love he’s buried in his chest for you doubled and tripled, his heart expanding to accommodate the little boy with his eyes and your sweet smile.
“That’s the thing Satoru,” you reply slowly, “How do I know you’re not full of shit? How do I know that you’ll do for my son what you couldn’t do for me, hmm?” You pause, your eyes blazing, “For years, you allowed your parents to treat me like wayside trash, belittle me, hate me for something I have no control over? All because I wasn’t born in this fucking country, because I’m not Japanese. How am I supposed to know that you’d actually stand up for him if your parents bullied him for being mixed? If they mocked him for his American accent? Over my dead body will Ender ever be treated the way I was treated.” Satoru can see your whole body shaking. Guilt eats away at his gut, acidic and bitter.
Satoru looks stricken, by both regret and grief. His voice is soft, broken when he says, “Is that what you really think? That I’d ever let any of them treat him the way you got treated?” He pauses, a shuddering sigh slipping out. His jaw flexes as he grinds his molars together, eyes fixed on you with a burning intensity. “I already made that mistake once and it cost me everything good that I had.” He pauses, fighting to keep his expression stoic, to keep tears from filling his eyes. His voice comes out rough when he starts speaking again, “I was an idiot. I thought … I thought I could have both. I thought I could somehow make my parents happy and keep my own happiness. But I was wrong.” He shakes his head and lets out a sigh. Throat bobbing, he swallows down the mass of emotions sitting at the base of his throat before continuing, “It doesn’t matter. You’re right not to trust me.”
Silence lapses between you for several minutes. The tick of the clock on the wall, the soft sounds of both of your breathing, the occasional distant rumble of a car engine. Satoru restlessly taps his finger against his leg. No matter what, no matter how hard you push back against him, he’s not giving up on this.
To his surprise, you’re the one who breaks the quiet. “I—“ you start, but it’s faltering. Your eyes fall to the ground before you say in a small voice that breaks his heart, “Please don’t take my son from me.” Your teeth sink into your lower lip, that face you make when you’re really nervous or uneasy about something. A second later you add, “Don’t let your parents take my son from me.”
“I know that I’m in no position to be believed, but if you trust anything, please, trust that I would tear this city apart before letting them take him from you. No one is taking Ender away. I swear on my rotten life, for whatever measly amount that it’s worth,” Satoru manages, but his eyes are burning. It’s taking everything in him not to fucking break down right here. It’s his fault that you could even think that of him. He spent so long trying to appease his parents that he forgot about the one person who truly mattered and he lost you because of his own blindness.
“Please, he’s mine too. I’m not asking for you to give me everything. Just let me know him,” Satoru pleads. He’ll get down on his knees. He’ll grovel like a dog for a bone if he has to. “You deserved so much better than whatever I gave you and I know nothing I do or say could ever fix what I broke, but I can be better for him, for that beautiful boy that you …” He trails off, getting all choked up. He wants to scream his throat raw and bloody for the grief in his chest, “That you chose to bring into this world despite everything.”
You blink at him, your face a mask that he can’t read. Eventually, you murmur, “I almost had an abortion, you know. I agonized over it for weeks, made the appointment, and everything. When I get there though and they put my legs up in those stirrups, I lost it. I was screaming, crying. I just couldn’t bring myself to do it.”
His heart slams against his ribs at your words. The thought of you going through all of that alone makes him sick to his stomach. “Thank you,” Satoru breathes at last, “For deciding to have him. Thank you.”
But you don’t acknowledge it. Your head snaps up, tears limning your lower lashes and you break his heart. “Tell me, Satoru, was your parents’ approval worth it? Are you happy now?” Your voice is shaking, those beautiful eyes so full of rage and a raw pain that mirrors his own.
He can’t speak at first. The words sit in his mouth like tungsten. “No,” he mutters at last, each word scraping on his teeth as they’re pried out of him one by one, “None of it was worth it.” He swallows again. This fight against the tears welling in his eyes is a losing battle. “I swear that if you decide to let me into his life, I’ll spend the rest of mine proving that I can do this right. Not for you. Not for parents. But for him.” The conviction in his words is palpable, like the raging current of a river. “I can’t undo what I did to you, but I can be someone that he won’t have to recover from.”
Your jaw flexes and you look out the window. It’s full dark out now, the only illumination from the distant glow of the streetlights and the moon overhead. The dim, golden of the lamplight highlights your beautiful features and he wants nothing more than to wrap his arms around you, pull you in, and bury his face in your hair. But he can’t.
“You’re not to tell your parents about him. In fact, don’t tell anyone at all. But your parents especially are to have absolutely no contact with him. The same goes for Kaori. Do you understand me?”
It takes him a moment to realize that you’re agreeing. His heart feels like it’s going to burst as relief floods his system. You have every right to tell him to fuck off, but you’re not and he’s never been more grateful for anything in his life. “I won’t breathe a word,” he agrees eagerly, nodding along. “Tell me what you need from me. Ground rules, supervised visits. Whatever it takes for you to feel safe about this.”
“You can spend some time with him. No alone time,” you continue, laying out your rules, “And not as his father. I refuse to confuse and risk emotionally hurting my son for something unlikely to last.”
“Right, because his father is dead,” Satoru lets out bitterly, unable to stifle it.
You shoot him a venomous look and he shuts his mouth so fast that his teeth clack together. “I thought it was rather fitting. I never expected to see you again. You were effectively dead to me,” the words a cruel reminder of everything that he screwed up to begin with.
“Fine. I can work with that, but you do realize he’s gonna figure it out eventually. The kid is walking around wearing my face,” Satoru says tightly.
You sigh, an unhappy frown tugging at the corner of your mouth as you mutter stubbornly, “We’ll cross that bridge when we get there.”
“Right. Well, you’re gonna have to tell me what I’m supposed to be since dead isn’t exactly a role I can play,” Satoru counters, slumping back in the chair. He rakes his long fingers through his snowy white hair, the same hair that’s on Ender’s head.
“You’ll just be an old friend of mine for now,” you reply. He can hear you swallow and he wonders if all this is to you is pain or if even some tiny part of you misses him a fraction of the way he misses you. Silence stretches again between you before you say quietly, “I will tell him eventually that I lied. I will. But before I do that, I need to know that he’s not just another thing you’ll walk away from when shit gets hard or complicated.” You pause before saying fiercely, “Ender comes first no matter what. You get one chance at that. If you fuck it up, you’ll never see us again. I’ll make damn well sure of it.”
“One chance,” Satoru agrees, nodding again. “It’s all I deserve anyway.”
The conversation sputters out again, seconds ticking by, then minutes before you say, “You have to know this is temporary, right? Eventually, Ender and I are going back to America. We have lives there. He’s got friends and school. I’ve already paid the tuition for next year and I won’t uproot our lives just to give you a chance to be his father.”
“I know,” Satoru says, scrubbing the heels of his palms into his eyes. “We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it, right?” He lets out a mirthless chuckle. His mouth tugs into a frown and he can’t help but whisper, “I know it’s my fault, but I hate how much I’ve missed out on. Things I can never get back.”
You let out a sigh, your fingers drumming against your thigh. Conflicting emotions cross your face and eventually you say, “Is your email still the same?”
What the hell does that matter? But Satoru nods despite his confusion. He watches as you grab your phone and tap the screen a few times. It’s hard seeing you like this, so soft and beautiful, and not being able to touch you. His phone pings and he sees that you sent him an email. His heart pounds in his chest. It’s the first time in years his phone has lit up with any kind of message from you. That alone makes him want to burst into tears.
He unlocks his phone and opens the email. Photographymama0101 has invited you to view their album Ender Yuki. It’s a link to a Google photo album. When Satoru taps on it and it loads the album in, he feels like he’s going to lose it. Hundreds, thousands of pictures of his son—from belly progress pictures to sonograms to his birth to every milestone captured for him to see. As he scrolls through the album, he can’t help it anymore. Tears roll down his cheeks. He pauses on a picture of you nursing newborn Ender, thin wispy white hair all puffed up on the tiny baby swaddled in your arms.
Fuck, fuck, fuck. He feels like his heart is both swelling and being ripped out of his chest in slow motion. Later, he’ll look at the album later, when you’re not watching his every move and reaction. Stuffing his phone into his pocket, he looks up at you and croaks out, “Thank you.” Satoru lets out a sigh and uses the back of his hand to wipe away the salty, sticky tears on his cheeks. “So … when can I see him?” He asks eventually.
You hum reluctantly, shifting in your spot on the loveseat. He catalogues every movement, every hesitation, every tug of your pretty lips into a frown. “We’re going to the aquarium tomorrow afternoon,” you say at last, “You can meet us there.”
The aquarium. An outing, with his son, with you. If someone had told him yesterday he would have laughed in their faces but prayed for them to be right. Satoru nods, “I’ll be there. Just name the time and place.” He pauses before adding, “We should probably exchange numbers, you know, to communicate.” An excuse, really. He does need your number for Ender, but he wants it for himself.
“Right. Just add me on Telegram. It’ll be outrageous if we communicate by phone,” you say haltingly before rattling off your username.
He has you added in less than a minute. He even sends a message to make sure you know it’s him, although his icon is unmistakable. When he’s done, he pushes himself to his feet. He doesn’t want to overstay his welcome and risk pissing you off. Plus, he needs to get the fuck out of here so he can have a proper breakdown away from anyone’s prying eyes. “Tomorrow,” he confirms, looking down at you. There’s still so much he wants to say, so much he wants to tell you. I love you, I love you, I love you. The words loop in his head, sit on the tip of his tongue, threatening to come out. “Thank you, for giving me this chance,” he murmurs, “For the record, it means the world to me and I refuse to let him down like I did you.” He’s not bullshitting. Ender’s existence might be the only thing that could save him from misery for the rest of his life.
With that, Satoru gives you one last lingering look, the longing visible in his sorrowful blue eyes, then he walks away, leaving you alone in the apartment. Once he’s outside, he shuts the door behind him and slumps against it. Tears roll down his face and he looks up at the ceiling. And on the other side, he can hear you sobbing with the same agony that’s ripping him apart. It takes everything in him not to go back in there and gather you into his arms and hold you. But he doesn’t do that. Wiping away his tears one more time, Satoru takes a deep breath and forces himself to walk away.
Tomorrow. Tomorrow he gets to be with his son, he gets to be with you.
A/N: Well, I finished with this a little earlier than I though. I hope you all enjoyed and if you did, likes, comments, and/or reblogs are always appreciated.
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