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How long had it been since Higuruma last had a woman? He couldn’t remember. His days as a defense attorney had been filled with never-ending work: gathering evidence, building cases, courtrooms and disappointment. He’d barely had any time for himself, let alone a girlfriend. Love, and even sex, required a certain mindset that Higuruma just couldn’t muster up, not when his mind was constantly weighed down by the faces of the people he’d been unable to help.
The ones he couldn’t save.
But now, soaking in a tub with the ends of his hair curling from the damp heat, Higuruma says your name aloud — testing the shape of it in his mouth, teeth and tongue working each syllable and finding it pleasantly malleable, the sound of it echoing off the tiled walls to soothe his ears in a way he hadn’t quite anticipated.
And he wonders what it would feel like to have you join him — here, in this bath. Wonders about the shape of you, bared and hot and slick under water, the weight of your body above him, skin to skin and nothing in between...
Warnings: MDNI (18+/adults only please)! Spoilers (manga & anime - some lines are direct quotes), allusions to depression and suicidal thoughts, brief mentions of exhibitionism, oral & vaginal sex, jealousy
Word Count: ~3.7K words
👉🏼 Read Part II Here
“I’m already someone who can’t look you in the eye.”
Higuruma had told Yuji that exactly six months ago today, sitting by himself on concrete steps when the pink-haired boy — because that was what he was, really; a teenager who had been made to carry far too much for shoulders that young — approached him and asked, very sincerely, whether he had a death wish.
For volunteering to fight Sukuna.
It would’ve been deserved, Higuruma had thought then, to die in that fight. Still thinks, though that line of thinking is very gradually declining in frequency. Higuruma Hiromi had killed. Taken the lives of others, mostly other sorcerers in the name of self-defence during the culling games, but the judge and prosecutor who had borne the brunt of his violence when his cursed powers first awoken took up a majority of his guilt.
The tension pulled too taunt when the string finally snapped somewhere in his soul.
When Higuruma’s hands found the gavel in that courtroom on that fated day, something dark and sinister and enormous compelling him to slam it down over and over again on the sounding block until all the accumulated discontent slid out from deep inside him to blot out the light, like a theatre when a movie is about to start.
Showtime.
Because wasn’t that all that the courtroom was? A piece of theatre? Everyone in it a prop or actor reciting lines in a story that had already been written before anyone had even stepped foot in the room to hear the case?
Japan’s criminal justice system has a conviction rate of 99.9%.
“It’s always gone against my nature to leave things alone when I feel like they’re wrong.”
“I just never managed to fix this habit.”
Wrong.
Higuruma was wrong.
He felt this deep within him with all the conviction he had channeled whenever he sought to defend people he truly believed innocent of the crimes they’d been charged with. He, a lawyer possessing knowledge of the laws that were meant to uphold society, had blood on his hands, because what was the point when the law never actually protected the people they were put in place to protect?
The system, in which he had placed so much faith when he was younger and much more naïve, had failed. Failed his clients. Failed him.
He had killed the judge and prosecutor in the case where his client, who had previously been found innocent of murder charges, was convicted during a retrial in which no new evidence had been brought forth.
Higuruma was a murderer. And, he would argue still, they had deserved it. His specific brand of guilt was not rooted in the deaths of two supposed innocents. Rather, it stemmed from the fact that, as someone who had very blatantly committed a crime, he would not be held accountable for it.
So now he was a man lost.
He knew the top brass had put in a pardon for him, had chosen not to prosecute him for his misdeeds. Higuruma was too valuable now to them as a jujutsu sorcerer, someone with the intelligence and innate talent to rival even Gojo Satoru himself. An asset who had essentially become untouchable.
Above the law.
It was laughable. The greatest irony of all.
So he had plucked the sunflower pin from his lapel, the one that had taken him years to earn the right to wear as an attorney, and placed it in the palm of his former colleague after she had declared her intent to continue prosecuting him on behalf of his victims’ families.
“Return this for me. And I hope you make a better attorney than I did.”
“Higuruma? Like sunflowers? What a great name!”
Tuesday, March 3, 20XX. 9:13 am.
The first time Higuruma Hiromi met you.
Briefing room with Ijichi sitting to your left and Ino on your right.
He has never seen a smile that bright before.
Bright enough to be incongruous with the world of jujutsu; with the world itself, as Higuruma knew it.
There was something in it that reminded him of Itadori Yuji, and he felt one corner of his lips lift a fraction in response — the feeling like the return of something so faraway it had almost been forgotten.
He had caught the rise of Ijichi’s brows before the man quickly schooled his features into one of stoic professionalism, handing out printouts from the folder that lay open on the table before him, coordinating details of the mission Higuruma had been assigned along with the other two sorcerers in the room.
Ino he had worked with a few times before, found the young man easy enough to get along with. He was always enthusiastic, often talking about Nanami Kento, a senpai he had looked up to and still held in great regard even after the man had been killed in action.
“You know, you kinda remind me of him sometimes, Higuruma-san. I think the two of you would’ve gotten along really well.”
Understanding the enormity of that comment, Higuruma had responded with a solemn nod.
But you…
You were a new factor. A different variable.
Someone who, like him, had found yourself with newly-awakened powers during the culling games. A woman who had inadvertently stumbled upon Hakari Kinji and willingly offered up a portion of your points when you learned what it was they were trying to achieve. In return, the remaining members of Jujutsu High had sought you out after the dust of Sukuna had settled and strongly encouraged you to continue on as a jujutsu sorcerer.
“I couldn’t really say no to Panda. I mean, have you seen him? He’s just too cute! I guess that’s why they brought him along when they asked me. Devious move.” You tapped a finger to your temple as you sat in the backseat with Higuruma, Ino riding shotgun beside Ijichi as the bespectacled man chauffeured the three of you to the mission site. “What about you, Higuruma-san? What they’d bribe you with to stay in this crazy jujutsu world?”
He had paused then, suddenly conscious of his words in a way that wasn’t entirely tied to the reasons for self-flagellation he’d been committing for months now.
He thought back to when the culling games first started, the country suddenly thrown into violent and bloody disarray; a veritable Battle Royale of kill or be killed. He should’ve been horrified. Any normal human being would’ve been.
But Higuruma Hiromi had long since stopped being normal.
Because finally, finally, here was a system that worked. A system that was honest in a way that the scaffolding meant to uphold the law wasn’t. A system truly impartial to anything but objective evidence: that the strongest survive.
“Have you ever killed someone who ticked you off?” he had asked Yuji back when the boy first barged into the theatre, requesting that Higuruma relinquish his points to him. “It feels much better than I expected.”
He thought about this then, sitting in the backseat of the moving car, sensing the patience radiating from you as well as something more shadowed lying in wait beneath the brightness of your words.
“I didn’t really have a choice,” Higuruma finally replied, gaze finding his hands on his lap.
The pardon from the top brass. Their intention on recouping whatever loss they’d incurred by his actions in the courtroom that day by working him to the bone as a jujutsu sorcerer.
Then he looked up, just in time for your eyes to lock with his for a moment longer than necessary. You nodded and didn’t say anything more, which he appreciated, given the audience in the close confines of the car. But then your smile grew into something warmer, sympathetic — private in the way that a secret passes between two people who understand exactly what wasn’t being said because both had lived through their own versions of darkness.
He discovered that he envied you then. The way you could still smile. The humanity that still clung to your aura like warmth nestled in the fibres of a wool coat.
And before he could think any further on it,
“We’re here!”
Ino’s announcement — completely unnecessary given that Ijichi was clearly in the process of parking the black sedan — sliced through the moment. Higuruma quietly spooled back the thread of thought, tucking it away to be re-examined at a more convenient time and place.
Wednesday, March 4, 20XX. 10:25 pm.
“Ahh.”
Higuruma let out a quiet sound of content as he stepped into the tub. He’d deliberately drawn a warmer bath that night, and as he sank into the water, steam rose up in a cloud of humidity to temporarily obscure his view of the tiled walls. As the heat began to penetrate his stiff muscles, he closed his eyes and tried to quiet his mind, but to no avail.
He thought about the mission, about meeting you for the first time the day prior. Recalled how composed you had been throughout it all, coordinating seamlessly with both Ino and himself to exorcise a slew of curses in the abandoned hospital in Sendai. Remembered how his mouth had fallen open a fraction to witness your cursed technique in action; the sheer power and devastating precision of it all, which had undoubtedly given you a massive advantage during the culling games.
Higuruma finds it somewhat problematic, the way his thoughts keep tracking to you. And if he were a less honest man, he would tell himself that it was due to sheer novelty; the fact that you had only just entered his professional orbit. Because this was what it was, after all, wasn’t it? He had been impressed with your skill, your efficiency. With the way you had delivered your report during the debriefing at Jujutsu High, words polished and intelligence glaringly obvious even at 7:30 in the morning.
Cupping his hands, he scoops up warm water and splashes it over his face, as if the act could bring clarity.
Because at the end of the day, Higuruma was an honest man. And right now, he found himself honestly curious about what your life had been like prior to the culling games: what you had done for a living, what you had studied in school. Whether you’d had a boyfriend or a husband, or maybe even a family of your own. He honestly tried to reconcile how someone so clearly capable of destruction as yourself could also be so…
…so beautiful.
It was ridiculous, he knew. One could never judge hearts by appearances alone. He himself was the perfect example of this. And yet, Higuruma found that far from being put off by your lethality, he was drawn to it — the image of your smiling face overlapping with the gruesome way you’d dispatched the curses doing something to Higuruma that he hadn’t felt in so long, it took him a while to name it:
Attraction.
Higuruma Hiromi was attracted to you.
How long had it been since he had last had a woman? He couldn’t remember. His days as a defense attorney had been filled with never-ending work: gathering evidence, building cases, courtrooms and disappointment. He’d barely had any time for himself, let alone a girlfriend. Love, and even sex, required a certain mindset that Higuruma just couldn’t muster up, not when his mind was constantly weighed down by the faces of the people he’d been unable to help.
The ones he couldn’t save.
But now, soaking in a tub with the ends of his hair curling from the damp heat, Higuruma says your name aloud — testing the shape of it in his mouth, teeth and tongue working each syllable and finding it pleasantly malleable, the sound of it echoing off the tiled walls to soothe his ears in a way he hadn’t quite anticipated.
And he wonders what it would feel like to have you join him — here, in this bath. Wonders about the shape of you, bared and hot and slick under water, the weight of your body above him, skin to skin and nothing in between. In his mind’s eye, he is drawing you with the same meticulous care that he brought to his legal work, Higuruma’s considerable skills of observation automatic and working overtime even as he fought alongside you on the mission, subconscious filing away the curves that were only partially hinted at beneath your dark navy uniform.
He thinks about wrapping his arms around you, this spectre of his imagination. Thinks about where he would touch first: the rounded joints of your shoulders, the hollows just above the collarbone where hot water would pool. Or perhaps the gentle swell of your breasts, pliant as he kneads from their soft sides towards the middle, just so he could watch them heave beneath his fingers — pinching and teasing at your nipples to test how hard they would grow at his touch.
Hard, like the way Higuruma currently finds himself beneath the water.
“Hmm.”
Sighing, he sets about traversing your body in his head, large hand reaching down until those long, tapered fingers are curling around his considerable girth to languidly stroke once, twice — mouth falling open wider as he inhales deeply at the contact, at the sensation of his palm reacquainting itself with his cock. And as he begins to build up to the pocket of a rhythm that makes him grow longer and thicker and harder, he wonders what you would do to him if you’d have him, whether that ruthlessness you’d displayed in the field would translate into something just as violent and necessary to completely unravel him behind closed doors.
Or not.
Because Higuruma Hiromi was not beyond taking you wherever and whenever you’d tell him to. And he knows this. Knows without a doubt that if you’d directed him to lay you out on the hood of a car and sink his face between your legs in broad daylight, he would do it, no hesitation. Even if Ino were there and Ijichi had still been buckled in the front seat, helpless behind the wheel.
“Shit—"
His breath catches as his hand picks up the pace, water sloshing over the sides of the tub when his body suddenly jerks upwards, undone by the mental image. He wonders what you would say to witness how quickly he’d kneel, perhaps chiding how careless he was to tear his dress pants on the sharp dig of the gravel beneath his knees. He would take it all in stride, anything to continue tasting you on his tongue, burying his face, his nose, deeper and deeper into your pussy just to drink you in, drunk on your juices.
And he would smile to feel the forceful pull of your fingers in his hair, driving him further into your body as if intent on swallowing him whole between the clench of your thighs. Would pant out how far gone he was for your flavour in between each deep dive — lips and tongue making a veritable mess of his face and your cunt, spit and arousal shiny on flesh that trembled in just the right way to make him your prisoner, Higuruma unable to do much else but press kiss after kiss to your slit, until you’re boneless and begging him to fuck you.
And god, how he wanted to fuck you.
To see you try to smile with all sincerity even with his cock in your mouth, the pink corners of your lips straining to contain him when he was hard and full, throbbing over the slippery surface of your wet tongue. He wondered if you’d look up at him with that same sweetness in your gaze as when you’d made that offbeat comment about his name and sunflowers, how you’d react when that voice in his head would inevitably grow louder, urging him to thrust farther and faster towards the back of your throat — how much more beautiful your eyes would appear when they began watering with the effort of taking him in.
Head falling back on the lip of the tub, Higuruma picks up his pace on instinct, squeezing hard around his cock, vaguely aware of the increasing intensity of the throbbing that pulses in the veins that snake along his length, ensuring that each pass of his hand teased at the sensitive spot just beneath the swell of his swollen head until the effect was enough to make his jaw clench, pressure building through his abdomen.
He thought of the way Ino had looked at you during the mission — the man’s expression filled with an awe that Higuruma was sure had mirrored his own when they saw you fight. Ino’s cheeks had been visibly pink when he finally lifted his face mask at the mission’s end, sidling up beside Higuruma to whisper, “Incredible, isn’t she?” as if Higuruma didn’t have eyes of his own.
Yes, you were incredible. Are incredible. And Higuruma Hiromi wanted you all to himself.
He could admit this now to himself in the privacy of this moment with nothing but water and steam around, stepping back to examine his feelings with all the rigour he usually reserved for court cases. It was ridiculous, he knew, to be jealous of Ino; to have been silently irked whenever you laughed at a joke the younger man made on the ride back to headquarters. Even more outlandish to have felt that tightness in his chest to see Ijichi smile when you had thanked him for taking care of the post-mission documentation.
Have I always been this jealous?
Higuruma could count the number of girlfriends he had had on one hand. And with each, he had, unfailingly, treated them with decency and respect, as should be expected. He had never been the type to feel the sting of insecurity whenever he witnessed them smiling or laughing in the presence of other men. Didn’t get angry, didn’t feel annoyed. He was self-possessed in a way that his friends and colleagues didn’t understand, slapping him on the back with a chuckle as they made some comment about how they wished they could do the same.
People couldn’t be owned. And to desire this was, in his mind, no different from wanting a puppet or a toy.
And yet.
Higuruma had known you for less than 48 hours. There was simply no rhyme or reason for him to feel so…so…
…possessive.
In nearly every other aspect of his life, Higuruma Hiromi had always been a measured man…
…until he’d gone off the rails after hitting his mid-thirties.
And perhaps it is the remnants of this breakdown that is the source of these thoughts, the ones that are spurring his cock to jump and twitch within his grip, precum spilling from his tip to immediately dissipate into the bathwater. Because Higuruma knows that he would relish the chance to fuck you before an audience, to drive the full, hard, hot length of him into you over and over again until his name is being torn from your throat in a clear reminder to all of exactly who was capable of reducing you to this debauchery, that a woman like you would only choose a man like him.
Yes, he would make it known.
Would throw your legs high over his shoulders just so he could bend over and fold you close, lips sealing tight upon yours to steal every breathless whimper that escapes every time his hips snap against your backside, the particular geometry of your body sheathing his cock like your pussy never meant to let it go. The pursuit of pleasure would be shameless; every tensed muscle, every wet sound, amplified in the lewd knowledge that they could watch but never touch.
Not you.
Not the way he could.
And when you come apart around him — wet heat squeezing in tight pulses, hands clinging to Higuruma like he is the only solid ground in a tilting world — he would follow suit, stilling the blistering rhythm of his lovemaking just for a fraction of a moment before he, too, arrives, spilling deep into your greedy body, your cunt begging for every last drop as each subsequent spasm milks him of all he had.
He would give it to you gladly, every last drop—
“Fuck—!”
The word escapes in a hiss, barely formed when he finally comes, the cloudy haze of cum spilling from him in spurts that dilute in the bath water as if it were never there at all.
Like you were never here with him.
Inhaling on a trembling breath, Higuruma strokes himself a few more times, pressure precisely applied to ease the rest of his cum out. And as he does so, he allows himself one final image: his seed slowly leaking from between your folds, delicately swollen from the attention he’d lavished upon you with fingers, lips, tongue; the rhythm of him moving inside you to draw forth something that bordered on overwhelming — the specific alchemy of his body in the crucible of yours.
Higuruma sat for a few moments longer, water now lukewarm. He unplugged the drain. Washed himself again and let the water from the shower head beat upon his face.
Clarity, he thinks. Clarity is what he needs most when he sees you next.
So he could look you in the eye as a colleague, as a professional.
Not the man who had brought himself to ecstasy on thoughts of you after having spent just a handful of hours in your presence.
So that the next time you say his name and “sunflowers” in the same breath, smiling like you were made of light, he could tell you,
Yes.
The seeds are being planted.
The garden is being tended to.
One flower at a time.
I’m learning. Rebuilding.
And when the flowers finally bloom, when he’s finally done the work and earned the right, Higuruma will hand you a bouquet of sunflowers and say,
“I was wrong. But every day feels a little more right.”
“So please, smile like that for me again.”
👉🏼 Read Part II Here
Thank you so much for reading and hope you enjoyed this piece! Please stay tuned for more writing to come and check out the masterpost! 😊💕
"Midnight Sun" is copyright 2026 Kintsukoi, all rights reserved. Please do not repost/modify/translate/plagiarize in any manner or on any platform.
Midnight Sun (JJK Higuruma x Reader) (Series Masterpost)
Synopsis:
Boy meets girl.
Boy falls madly in love with girl.
Except the boy in question is Higuruma Hiromi: brilliant legal wunderkind with the heart of gold. Disillusioned with the system in which he placed so much faith, he goes off the rails in his mid-thirties to awaken to his true genius as a jujutsu sorcerer, but it comes at the cost of his soul.
And the girl? Well, it’s you: kind, mysterious, and also grappling with newfound cursed powers, the full extent of which remains to be seen but has already been deemed by some to be dangerously unacceptable — incompatible with the new world order in the aftermath of the Culling Game.
And for the second time in his existence, Higuruma Hiromi will have to make yet another decision that could change everything:
Decide how far he is willing to go in the name of love.
Specs:
angst/smut/moments of warm fluff/possibly dark content ahead (trigger warnings will be listed per chapter)
Midnight Sun - Part IV: On The Edge Of Daylight (JJK Higuruma x Reader)
Description:
After a vicious battle with a curse of mythical proportions and an equally big and unexpected morning wood situation, you and Higuruma finally get a chance to breathe...and learn more about the deepening attraction growing between you 🔥
Your high-stakes love story with Higuruma continues in Part 4 of Midnight Sun: On The Edge Of Daylight
Read previous chapters here: Part 1/Part 2/Part 3 👈🏼
Warnings: mentions of arranged marriages, difficult, angsty conversations, fluff, fluff and more fluff...
WC: ~2.6K words
A/N: Hope everyone is doing well! Thank you all so much for waiting so patiently for this next chapter in the Midnight Sun series and many thanks to every one who has liked/reblogged/recommended this story - it honestly means the world to me! With that being said, I hope you all enjoy the read 🥰
“Sorry, I know it’s a bit ridiculous. But I saw it and couldn’t stop thinking of you, and when I told the owner about your name, he absolutely insisted on me cutting off a stalk! Oh, and he told me to take his bike too, saying it needed riding and that he hasn’t been able to get around to it after he had his hip replacement surgery months ago…”
You were rambling, yes, but Higuruma listened as intently as if you were a judge delivering a verdict, his gaze fixed on the shape of your lips as they formed each word — a melodic accompaniment to the traditional breakfast the innkeeper had served in your shared room; so different from the quiet of his life hitherto as a bachelor. You’d stopped long enough to sip miso soup from a lacquered bowl, eyes rolling to the back of your head as you murmured, “Oh, that’s good!” before continuing with the meandering explanation as to why you’d returned from your walk that morning with a bicycle and giant sunflower in tow.
“I don’t know how you’re going to carry that back to Tokyo,” you nodded at the freshly-cut flower, laid across Higuruma’s lap as if it were something precious. “It’s a bit much, isn’t it?”
And the sheepish smile you gave him made something in his chest flutter.
Shaking his head, Higuruma felt a tinge of heat warm the tips of his ears. “Not at all. It’s…it’s lovely.”
Your smile grew into a grin, the uncertainty in your expression melting into it. “You’re sure? It’s bigger than your head.”
Setting down his chopsticks on the ceramic rest, Higuruma held the stalk up to his face in comparison. The ring of petals easily eclipsed him, blocking out his view of you so entirely that all he could make out from behind the screen of the bloom was your sudden peal of laughter, suffusing the room like sunlight.
He lowered the flower a fraction, peeping out from overtop its yellow halo — the effect so reminiscent of paintings of Heian court ladies feigning coyness from behind the delicate slats of folding fans that you couldn’t help but laugh even harder, your body shaking in minute tremors that had you bracing the sides of the low table for support.
And Higuruma is left awestruck.
Because for thirty-six years of his life, the man has only ever been a giver of flowers:
Daisies and cosmos picked in the playgrounds of his youth and braided into crowns before being delivered on one skinned knee to the girl with pigtails in his nursery school.
Or a bouquet of roses — red and long-stemmed — wrapped in kraft paper and curled ribbon and presented to a girlfriend on a second anniversary, right before she informed him over wagyu steak that she refused to continue competing with his work and wished him well.
Never once has he been on the receiving end.
And now, here you were, sitting across from him and laughing like that, completely unaware all the while of the way it was becoming more and more difficult for him to breathe.
All because you had given him a flower.
Because you had walked down a quiet road in the pale light of a nascent sun and come across a field of yellow giants swaying in gentle wind. And they had reminded you of him: Higuruma Hiromi. A man who, in his mind, deserved not to be remembered at all.
It was the best gift he had ever been given in his life.
“Oh my god, this is perfect!” you clapped, having regained your ability to form a coherent sentence as the laughter finally died down. “You can totally use it to hide behind when they try to saddle you with more work at the school. What? You didn’t think I noticed that they barely give you enough time to breathe?”
Your head cocked to the side, eyes still carrying that softness as you contemplated him.
Clearing his throat, Higuruma shifted on the seat of his cushion, feeling uncomfortably transparent. “I’m managing.”
“For now. Doesn’t mean that you don’t have a breaking point. Everyone does.”
He swallowed, dropped his gaze to the fine grains of rice plucked between the pointed tips of his chopsticks and found that he had suddenly lost his appetite.
“I…there are certain amends I have to make. Terms and conditions that I have agreed to in exchange for…for the things I’ve done in the past.”
“You mean the men you killed, the judge and prosecutor.”
The words were so matter-of-fact that Higuruma couldn’t be sure whether he had imagined you speaking them. His eyes flicked up to meet yours, the deep chestnut of his irises growing darker in hue.
He nodded once.
Setting down your own chopsticks, you folded your hands together on the table in front of you, seeming to consider your words. “We all have blood on our hands, Higuruma-san. There’s no such thing as a jujutsu sorcerer with an unblemished past—“
“This was different. I had no right. I let anger and frustration get the best of me in the courtroom that day and I…I lost control of myself, lost my humanity. Threw away everything I ever stood for when I knew the law and broke it anyway.”
“And you’ve been torturing yourself for it ever since.” Your voice hardened.
Higuruma blinked. “There is no one else who would hold me accountable. Not when they’ve deemed me above the law.”
“Okay. But can a dead man carry out his sentence?”
The silence that followed was thick, smothering.
“Death would be—“
“The easy way out,” you interrupted, tone rising in pitch now, the expression on your face just a fraction shy of agitation. “Atonement comes through action, by trying to make the world a better place than the one that existed before. But you can’t do anything if you’re dead.”
Closing your eyes, you took a deep breath before trying again. “I…I’m sorry. Listen, I don’t know exactly what the higher-ups have said to you, what they may or may not be threatening you with, but…I just want you to know that you cannot keep up with the pace they’ve been pushing you at. You’re going to keel over and die, if not from a curse then from exhaustion. You and I…we’re not young anymore,” you added for good measure.
Higuruma stared at you; studied the furrow of your brows, the shine in your eyes. Let his gaze drop to your hands, clenched now into fists on the table, your miso soup having long grown cold.
He wanted to deny it. To say that he’d be fine, that he could handle it. That bone-deep fatigue wasn’t anything he wasn’t already used to. He wanted to tell you that this was, in fact, exactly what he deserved. But now, looking at your face, he just couldn’t bring himself to believe it.
And Higuruma is just as surprised as you are when he slowly lifts a hand to your face, compelled by the sight of a single tear falling past the rim of your lashes and rolling down the curve of your cheek, to stop it with the soft brush of his index finger.
“Don’t cry for me,” he says, low voice barely above a whisper. “I’m not worth it.”
You pulled back as if burned, like you had suddenly startled to the awareness that you’d been crying. Hand hovering in mid-air for a moment longer, Higuruma finally returned it to the fold of his lap, fighting all the while against every instinct that urged him to overturn the entire table just so he could pull you into his arms.
“That’s not what Yuji-kun says, or Ino. And I bet you Judgeman would agree with me as well,” you chuckled despite yourself, voice wet and wavering when you press your palms to either cheek, the entirety of you encapsulating some strange amalgamation of melancholic mirth.
And despite everything — the guilt hanging over his heart like an omnipresent dark cloud — Higuruma Hiromi laughed.
How desperately he wanted to believe you were right about him.
Wednesday, March 24th, 20XX. 8:45 pm. Hakone.
“You’re joking.”
“No! That’s the worst part; I wish I were! Everyone saw that puddle on the middle of the dojo floor! This guy — easily two heads taller than me — who had talked so big about kicking my ass, ended up peeing his pants, and get this: I hadn’t even struck him yet with the wooden sword!” And with that, you once again broke into laughter so raucous it drew glances from other festival goers around you and Higuruma.
But he couldn’t care less.
Instead, he made a mental note to thank the young man at the reception desk of the ryokan again for informing the two of you about the matsuri that was happening that night, a local festival held every year around this time that brought in many tourists from the surrounding areas. The pair of you had been about to check out a day early when he’d mentioned it, and you’d looked at Higuruma, that easy smile forming on your lips as your eyes twinkled with something he now recognized as your particular brand of mischief.
“Come on, Higuruma. They OWE us. Especially you. Neither of us have submitted a report to Ijichi. For all they know, we’re still investigating the curse! Why not stay an extra night on their dime?”
The old Higuruma Hiromi would’ve said no. Would’ve already been cataloguing his to-do list at the back of his mind and decided against being frivolous with his time. But then again, the old Higuruma hadn’t had you by his side, looking up at him with an anticipatory excitement that made him feel as if he were a teenager again. And if he were completely honest with himself…
…it would’ve been his first time attending a festival with someone he actually loved.
He knows this now, watching as your eyes crinkled wonderfully at their corners, brandishing the fan decorated with cartoonish yokai of all things that had caught your attention at one of the brightly lit stalls, the one Higuruma had insisted on paying for.
He had cared for his previous partners, he knows this. Had even gone so far as to think — when he did have a moment to actually stop and consider something other than work — that he might settle with Hana, his last girlfriend, a mild-mannered secondary school teacher who had more patience than he was worth. That maybe someday soon, when the cases slowed down enough, they might start a family together. One by one, Higuruma’s friends were all getting married; it seemed like every week, he’d receive a new wedding invitation in the mail. And every time they went out for drinks, they’d tease him about when it would be his turn to greet his bride at the end of the aisle.
It was the natural course of life, he’d thought. Getting married was just what people like him did. He wasn’t getting any younger, and if he ever wanted children, he’d have to consider both his own age and that of his partner. Fertility was one thing; keeping up with the boundless energy of a toddler was another beast entirely, as his mother liked to warn him. And love…well, love was just something that grew with time and proximity, wasn’t it? The marriage of his own parents was a constant reminder of that, having been arranged by a matchmaker and largely out of the control of his father and mother.
He had liked Hana, sure, but he hadn’t really considered the depths of his own feelings before he’d accepted her invitation for coffee when they were undergraduates in university. She was kind, and her company was pleasant enough, and so, with time, things had progressed. But never once had he felt even a fraction of what he feels for you with Hana. Or any other person, for that matter.
So it was that at the age of thirty-six, Higuruma Hiromi fell in love for the very first time.
He wondered if you would laugh at him if you knew. Such a beginner. Late-bloomer.
But he finds that he would welcome even this, your laughter at his expense, if only you would aim that smile in his direction — brighter than even the bonfire burning at the centre of the temple grounds, a multitude of locals taking the stage around a tall, wooden tower constructed adjacent to the flames to guide the crowd in a beautiful, coordinated dance.
“I prefer this,” Higuruma says suddenly, the hand at his side twitching for a moment, as if undecided about whether it wished to grab hold of yours or clench into a tight fist.
“Prefer what?” your head tilted as you asked the question, lazily fanning yourself.
“You laughing. As opposed to crying.”
Your gaze immediately dropped to the geta on your feet as you mumbled, “Sorry again about earlier. I, um…I tend to get carried away. My sister always said I’m too emotional—“
“Don’t be sorry. I like it when you let your feelings show.”
Pom! Pom! Pom!
Taiko drums resounded through the night, the rhythm reverberating through the tall trees bordering the temple grounds as a small ensemble of shamisen players plucked a haunting melody that filled the silence between Higuruma and yourself.
Looking up into his eyes, your lips parted slightly, as if whatever words you’d had a hold on had suddenly just died on the tip of your tongue.
BANG!
A shower of bright sparks in hues of red, blue and green exploded in the star-studded sky overhead, throwing shimmering reflections upon the pair of you, standing face to face like an island to yourselves amongst a sea of people. Higuruma swallowed, throat bobbing as his vision gradually narrowed to a singular point of focus:
Your mouth.
And that is when Higuruma Hiromi, 36 years old, finds himself leaning closer and closer towards you, until he senses your eyelids fluttering shut as his do the same, pressing his lips to yours in a kiss.
It is not the heat, though indeed your lips were warm, nor the softness of your mouth yielding beneath the gentle, insistent pressure of his own, but rather the way your breath hitched when his tongue slipped past the seam of your mouth, the sound your fan made hitting the pavement when you’d dropped it to circle both arms around his neck, pulling him closer.
This, he thinks.
This is what I’ve been missing.
Because the feel of you in his arms touches something tremulously similar to hope, and for a single, blessed moment, Higuruma Hiromi, 36 years old, can forget about the man he is; the voices in his head finally silent, having ceased their endless accusatory drone whereby every one of his crimes and vices were listed out, over and over again. Instead, the brilliant mind of the prodigy is blank — an empty room with walls of fresh canvases, waiting to be painted on in shades of you.
Higuruma Hiromi loves you. Is in love with you.
He knows this now, certain in a way that he has never felt before, the feeling bypassing all reason and logic…
…because the heart has always played by its own rules.
And his was telling him, in no uncertain terms, to hold onto you until his final breath.
(AHHHH! Finally! - THE KISS!! 😘)
To be continued in Part 5...coming soon!
Thank you so much for reading and hope you enjoyed this piece! More reads are available on my masterpost! 😊💕
“Midnight Sun Part 4: On The Edge Of Daylight” is copyright 2026 Kintsukoi, all rights reserved. Please do not repost/modify/translate/plagiarize in any manner or on any platform.
Awesome cloud divider by @ pxrce-lain (thank you so much!)
Midnight Sun - Part IV: On The Edge Of Daylight (JJK Higuruma x Reader)
Description:
After a vicious battle with a curse of mythical proportions and an equally big and unexpected morning wood situation, you and Higuruma finally get a chance to breathe...and learn more about the deepening attraction growing between you 🔥
Your high-stakes love story with Higuruma continues in Part 4 of Midnight Sun: On The Edge Of Daylight
Read previous chapters here: Part 1/Part 2/Part 3 👈🏼
Warnings: mentions of arranged marriages, difficult, angsty conversations, fluff, fluff and more fluff...
WC: ~2.6K words
A/N: Hope everyone is doing well! Thank you all so much for waiting so patiently for this next chapter in the Midnight Sun series and many thanks to every one who has liked/reblogged/recommended this story - it honestly means the world to me! With that being said, I hope you all enjoy the read 🥰
“Sorry, I know it’s a bit ridiculous. But I saw it and couldn’t stop thinking of you, and when I told the owner about your name, he absolutely insisted on me cutting off a stalk! Oh, and he told me to take his bike too, saying it needed riding and that he hasn’t been able to get around to it after he had his hip replacement surgery months ago…”
You were rambling, yes, but Higuruma listened as intently as if you were a judge delivering a verdict, his gaze fixed on the shape of your lips as they formed each word — a melodic accompaniment to the traditional breakfast the innkeeper had served in your shared room; so different from the quiet of his life hitherto as a bachelor. You’d stopped long enough to sip miso soup from a lacquered bowl, eyes rolling to the back of your head as you murmured, “Oh, that’s good!” before continuing with the meandering explanation as to why you’d returned from your walk that morning with a bicycle and giant sunflower in tow.
“I don’t know how you’re going to carry that back to Tokyo,” you nodded at the freshly-cut flower, laid across Higuruma’s lap as if it were something precious. “It’s a bit much, isn’t it?”
And the sheepish smile you gave him made something in his chest flutter.
Shaking his head, Higuruma felt a tinge of heat warm the tips of his ears. “Not at all. It’s…it’s lovely.”
Your smile grew into a grin, the uncertainty in your expression melting into it. “You’re sure? It’s bigger than your head.”
Setting down his chopsticks on the ceramic rest, Higuruma held the stalk up to his face in comparison. The ring of petals easily eclipsed him, blocking out his view of you so entirely that all he could make out from behind the screen of the bloom was your sudden peal of laughter, suffusing the room like sunlight.
He lowered the flower a fraction, peeping out from overtop its yellow halo — the effect so reminiscent of paintings of Heian court ladies feigning coyness from behind the delicate slats of folding fans that you couldn’t help but laugh even harder, your body shaking in minute tremors that had you bracing the sides of the low table for support.
And Higuruma is left awestruck.
Because for thirty-six years of his life, the man has only ever been a giver of flowers:
Daisies and cosmos picked in the playgrounds of his youth and braided into crowns before being delivered on one skinned knee to the girl with pigtails in his nursery school.
Or a bouquet of roses — red and long-stemmed — wrapped in kraft paper and curled ribbon and presented to a girlfriend on a second anniversary, right before she informed him over wagyu steak that she refused to continue competing with his work and wished him well.
Never once has he been on the receiving end.
And now, here you were, sitting across from him and laughing like that, completely unaware all the while of the way it was becoming more and more difficult for him to breathe.
All because you had given him a flower.
Because you had walked down a quiet road in the pale light of a nascent sun and come across a field of yellow giants swaying in gentle wind. And they had reminded you of him: Higuruma Hiromi. A man who, in his mind, deserved not to be remembered at all.
It was the best gift he had ever been given in his life.
“Oh my god, this is perfect!” you clapped, having regained your ability to form a coherent sentence as the laughter finally died down. “You can totally use it to hide behind when they try to saddle you with more work at the school. What? You didn’t think I noticed that they barely give you enough time to breathe?”
Your head cocked to the side, eyes still carrying that softness as you contemplated him.
Clearing his throat, Higuruma shifted on the seat of his cushion, feeling uncomfortably transparent. “I’m managing.”
“For now. Doesn’t mean that you don’t have a breaking point. Everyone does.”
He swallowed, dropped his gaze to the fine grains of rice plucked between the pointed tips of his chopsticks and found that he had suddenly lost his appetite.
“I…there are certain amends I have to make. Terms and conditions that I have agreed to in exchange for…for the things I’ve done in the past.”
“You mean the men you killed, the judge and prosecutor.”
The words were so matter-of-fact that Higuruma couldn’t be sure whether he had imagined you speaking them. His eyes flicked up to meet yours, the deep chestnut of his irises growing darker in hue.
He nodded once.
Setting down your own chopsticks, you folded your hands together on the table in front of you, seeming to consider your words. “We all have blood on our hands, Higuruma-san. There’s no such thing as a jujutsu sorcerer with an unblemished past—“
“This was different. I had no right. I let anger and frustration get the best of me in the courtroom that day and I…I lost control of myself, lost my humanity. Threw away everything I ever stood for when I knew the law and broke it anyway.”
“And you’ve been torturing yourself for it ever since.” Your voice hardened.
Higuruma blinked. “There is no one else who would hold me accountable. Not when they’ve deemed me above the law.”
“Okay. But can a dead man carry out his sentence?”
The silence that followed was thick, smothering.
“Death would be—“
“The easy way out,” you interrupted, tone rising in pitch now, the expression on your face just a fraction shy of agitation. “Atonement comes through action, by trying to make the world a better place than the one that existed before. But you can’t do anything if you’re dead.”
Closing your eyes, you took a deep breath before trying again. “I…I’m sorry. Listen, I don’t know exactly what the higher-ups have said to you, what they may or may not be threatening you with, but…I just want you to know that you cannot keep up with the pace they’ve been pushing you at. You’re going to keel over and die, if not from a curse then from exhaustion. You and I…we’re not young anymore,” you added for good measure.
Higuruma stared at you; studied the furrow of your brows, the shine in your eyes. Let his gaze drop to your hands, clenched now into fists on the table, your miso soup having long grown cold.
He wanted to deny it. To say that he’d be fine, that he could handle it. That bone-deep fatigue wasn’t anything he wasn’t already used to. He wanted to tell you that this was, in fact, exactly what he deserved. But now, looking at your face, he just couldn’t bring himself to believe it.
And Higuruma is just as surprised as you are when he slowly lifts a hand to your face, compelled by the sight of a single tear falling past the rim of your lashes and rolling down the curve of your cheek, to stop it with the soft brush of his index finger.
“Don’t cry for me,” he says, low voice barely above a whisper. “I’m not worth it.”
You pulled back as if burned, like you had suddenly startled to the awareness that you’d been crying. Hand hovering in mid-air for a moment longer, Higuruma finally returned it to the fold of his lap, fighting all the while against every instinct that urged him to overturn the entire table just so he could pull you into his arms.
“That’s not what Yuji-kun says, or Ino. And I bet you Judgeman would agree with me as well,” you chuckled despite yourself, voice wet and wavering when you press your palms to either cheek, the entirety of you encapsulating some strange amalgamation of melancholic mirth.
And despite everything — the guilt hanging over his heart like an omnipresent dark cloud — Higuruma Hiromi laughed.
How desperately he wanted to believe you were right about him.
Wednesday, March 24th, 20XX. 8:45 pm. Hakone.
“You’re joking.”
“No! That’s the worst part; I wish I were! Everyone saw that puddle on the middle of the dojo floor! This guy — easily two heads taller than me — who had talked so big about kicking my ass, ended up peeing his pants, and get this: I hadn’t even struck him yet with the wooden sword!” And with that, you once again broke into laughter so raucous it drew glances from other festival goers around you and Higuruma.
But he couldn’t care less.
Instead, he made a mental note to thank the young man at the reception desk of the ryokan again for informing the two of you about the matsuri that was happening that night, a local festival held every year around this time that brought in many tourists from the surrounding areas. The pair of you had been about to check out a day early when he’d mentioned it, and you’d looked at Higuruma, that easy smile forming on your lips as your eyes twinkled with something he now recognized as your particular brand of mischief.
“Come on, Higuruma. They OWE us. Especially you. Neither of us have submitted a report to Ijichi. For all they know, we’re still investigating the curse! Why not stay an extra night on their dime?”
The old Higuruma Hiromi would’ve said no. Would’ve already been cataloguing his to-do list at the back of his mind and decided against being frivolous with his time. But then again, the old Higuruma hadn’t had you by his side, looking up at him with an anticipatory excitement that made him feel as if he were a teenager again. And if he were completely honest with himself…
…it would’ve been his first time attending a festival with someone he actually loved.
He knows this now, watching as your eyes crinkled wonderfully at their corners, brandishing the fan decorated with cartoonish yokai of all things that had caught your attention at one of the brightly lit stalls, the one Higuruma had insisted on paying for.
He had cared for his previous partners, he knows this. Had even gone so far as to think — when he did have a moment to actually stop and consider something other than work — that he might settle with Hana, his last girlfriend, a mild-mannered secondary school teacher who had more patience than he was worth. That maybe someday soon, when the cases slowed down enough, they might start a family together. One by one, Higuruma’s friends were all getting married; it seemed like every week, he’d receive a new wedding invitation in the mail. And every time they went out for drinks, they’d tease him about when it would be his turn to greet his bride at the end of the aisle.
It was the natural course of life, he’d thought. Getting married was just what people like him did. He wasn’t getting any younger, and if he ever wanted children, he’d have to consider both his own age and that of his partner. Fertility was one thing; keeping up with the boundless energy of a toddler was another beast entirely, as his mother liked to warn him. And love…well, love was just something that grew with time and proximity, wasn’t it? The marriage of his own parents was a constant reminder of that, having been arranged by a matchmaker and largely out of the control of his father and mother.
He had liked Hana, sure, but he hadn’t really considered the depths of his own feelings before he’d accepted her invitation for coffee when they were undergraduates in university. She was kind, and her company was pleasant enough, and so, with time, things had progressed. But never once had he felt even a fraction of what he feels for you with Hana. Or any other person, for that matter.
So it was that at the age of thirty-six, Higuruma Hiromi fell in love for the very first time.
He wondered if you would laugh at him if you knew. Such a beginner. Late-bloomer.
But he finds that he would welcome even this, your laughter at his expense, if only you would aim that smile in his direction — brighter than even the bonfire burning at the centre of the temple grounds, a multitude of locals taking the stage around a tall, wooden tower constructed adjacent to the flames to guide the crowd in a beautiful, coordinated dance.
“I prefer this,” Higuruma says suddenly, the hand at his side twitching for a moment, as if undecided about whether it wished to grab hold of yours or clench into a tight fist.
“Prefer what?” your head tilted as you asked the question, lazily fanning yourself.
“You laughing. As opposed to crying.”
Your gaze immediately dropped to the geta on your feet as you mumbled, “Sorry again about earlier. I, um…I tend to get carried away. My sister always said I’m too emotional—“
“Don’t be sorry. I like it when you let your feelings show.”
Pom! Pom! Pom!
Taiko drums resounded through the night, the rhythm reverberating through the tall trees bordering the temple grounds as a small ensemble of shamisen players plucked a haunting melody that filled the silence between Higuruma and yourself.
Looking up into his eyes, your lips parted slightly, as if whatever words you’d had a hold on had suddenly just died on the tip of your tongue.
BANG!
A shower of bright sparks in hues of red, blue and green exploded in the star-studded sky overhead, throwing shimmering reflections upon the pair of you, standing face to face like an island to yourselves amongst a sea of people. Higuruma swallowed, throat bobbing as his vision gradually narrowed to a singular point of focus:
Your mouth.
And that is when Higuruma Hiromi, 36 years old, finds himself leaning closer and closer towards you, until he senses your eyelids fluttering shut as his do the same, pressing his lips to yours in a kiss.
It is not the heat, though indeed your lips were warm, nor the softness of your mouth yielding beneath the gentle, insistent pressure of his own, but rather the way your breath hitched when his tongue slipped past the seam of your mouth, the sound your fan made hitting the pavement when you’d dropped it to circle both arms around his neck, pulling him closer.
This, he thinks.
This is what I’ve been missing.
Because the feel of you in his arms touches something tremulously similar to hope, and for a single, blessed moment, Higuruma Hiromi, 36 years old, can forget about the man he is; the voices in his head finally silent, having ceased their endless accusatory drone whereby every one of his crimes and vices were listed out, over and over again. Instead, the brilliant mind of the prodigy is blank — an empty room with walls of fresh canvases, waiting to be painted on in shades of you.
Higuruma Hiromi loves you. Is in love with you.
He knows this now, certain in a way that he has never felt before, the feeling bypassing all reason and logic…
…because the heart has always played by its own rules.
And his was telling him, in no uncertain terms, to hold onto you until his final breath.
(AHHHH! Finally! - THE KISS!! 😘)
To be continued in Part 5...coming soon!
Thank you so much for reading and hope you enjoyed this piece! More reads are available on my masterpost! 😊💕
“Midnight Sun Part 4: On The Edge Of Daylight” is copyright 2026 Kintsukoi, all rights reserved. Please do not repost/modify/translate/plagiarize in any manner or on any platform.
Awesome cloud divider by @ pxrce-lain (thank you so much!)
Midnight Sun (JJK Higuruma x Reader) (Series Masterpost)
Synopsis:
Boy meets girl.
Boy falls madly in love with girl.
Except the boy in question is Higuruma Hiromi: brilliant legal wunderkind with the heart of gold. Disillusioned with the system in which he placed so much faith, he goes off the rails in his mid-thirties to awaken to his true genius as a jujutsu sorcerer, but it comes at the cost of his soul.
And the girl? Well, it’s you: kind, mysterious, and also grappling with newfound cursed powers, the full extent of which remains to be seen but has already been deemed by some to be dangerously unacceptable — incompatible with the new world order in the aftermath of the Culling Game.
And for the second time in his existence, Higuruma Hiromi will have to make yet another decision that could change everything:
Decide how far he is willing to go in the name of love.
Specs:
angst/smut/moments of warm fluff/possibly dark content ahead (trigger warnings will be listed per chapter)
One restless night, you find yourself wandering the streets and soaking in the bright lights of a city that never sleeps when you come across a handsome stranger.
Player One, who will be accompanying you tonight?...💗
Look out for these fun categories in the works below!
Love Me Like You Love Him
RATING: 💖/🧸/😭/📚/🔥
Rejection stings. Even when it is delivered in such a kind and considerate manner as your colleague and long-time secret crush, Nanami Kento, does.
So when Gojo Satoru, the strongest sorcerer alive and totally over the top, shows up for you as an entirely unexpected source of comfort, you hesitantly accept his help, completely unaware, all the while, of the life you used to share together…and the fact that he loves you still.
In Love Me Like You Love Him, you and Gojo learn what it means to love someone so deeply that you’d do anything for them...even wait forever.
💗 Chapter 1 / Chapter 2
💗 Vague Reasons(starring Reader x Gojo/Nanami)
RATING: 😭/🔥/🩹
Gojo's in pain. Nanami's in pain. You're in pain. Can love still blossom in a world where tragedy abounds? A story where people do the best they can with the pieces of broken lives.
Boy meets girl. Boy falls madly in love with girl. Except the boy in question is Higuruma Hiromi: brilliant legal wunderkind with the heart of gold. Disillusioned with the system in which he placed so much faith, he goes off the rails in his mid-thirties to awaken to his true genius as a jujutsu sorcerer, but it comes at the cost of his soul.
And the girl? Well, it’s you: kind, mysterious, and also grappling with newfound cursed powers, the full extent of which remains to be seen but has already been deemed by some to be dangerously unacceptable — incompatible with the new world order in the aftermath of the Culling Game. And for the second time in his existence, Higuruma Hiromi will have to make yet another decision that could change everything: Decide how far he is willing to go in the name of love.
💗 Nanami Loves It When...
RATING: 💖/🧸/🔥
NSFW Headcanons for our favourite blond sorcerer
💗 Written in the Stars
RATING: ⭐️/🧠
Nanami Kento Astrology Analysis & Headcanons
💗 Vague Reasons (starring Reader x Gojo/Nanami)
RATING: 😭/🔥/🩹
Gojo's in pain. Nanami's in pain. You're in pain. Can love still blossom in a world where tragedy abounds? A story where people do the best they can with the pieces of broken lives.
💗 Twilight Thoughts: Ino Takuma
Rating: 🔥
NSFW mini-headcanons for our sweetheart in a ski mask.
Love Me Like You Love Him (JJK Gojo x Reader) (Series Masterpost)
Synopsis:
Rejection stings.
Even when it is delivered in such a kind and considerate manner as your colleague and long-time secret crush, Nanami Kento, does.
So when Gojo Satoru, the strongest sorcerer alive and totally over the top, shows up for you as an entirely unexpected source of comfort, you hesitantly accept his help, completely unaware, all the while, of the life you used to share together…and the fact that he loves you still.
In Love Me Like You Love Him, you and Gojo learn what it means to love someone so deeply that you’d do anything for them...even wait forever.
Midnight Sun (JJK Higuruma x Reader) (Series Masterpost)
Synopsis:
Boy meets girl.
Boy falls madly in love with girl.
Except the boy in question is Higuruma Hiromi: brilliant legal wunderkind with the heart of gold. Disillusioned with the system in which he placed so much faith, he goes off the rails in his mid-thirties to awaken to his true genius as a jujutsu sorcerer, but it comes at the cost of his soul.
And the girl? Well, it’s you: kind, mysterious, and also grappling with newfound cursed powers, the full extent of which remains to be seen but has already been deemed by some to be dangerously unacceptable — incompatible with the new world order in the aftermath of the Culling Game.
And for the second time in his existence, Higuruma Hiromi will have to make yet another decision that could change everything:
Decide how far he is willing to go in the name of love.
Specs:
angst/smut/moments of warm fluff/possibly dark content ahead (trigger warnings will be listed per chapter)
Love Me Like You Love Him (JJK Gojo x Reader) (Series Masterpost)
Synopsis:
Rejection stings.
Even when it is delivered in such a kind and considerate manner as your colleague and long-time secret crush, Nanami Kento, does.
So when Gojo Satoru, the strongest sorcerer alive and totally over the top, shows up for you as an entirely unexpected source of comfort, you hesitantly accept his help, completely unaware, all the while, of the life you used to share together…and the fact that he loves you still.
In Love Me Like You Love Him, you and Gojo learn what it means to love someone so deeply that you’d do anything for them...even wait forever.
Description: What happens when a careless whisper turns love into a prison? A complicated relationship between Reader x Gojo/Nanami. Smut interspersed with a ton of angst because sex is best when everyone is crying.
Warnings: MDNI (18+/adults only please!). fem!reader, trying to be as canon-compliant as possible (hence spoilers for JJK 0, JJK Hidden Inventory/Premature Death Arc). Brief mentions/depictions of: depression, PTSD, character death, jealousy, marriage but longing for another, unrequited love, fwb, codependency, satosugu, oral, fingering, piv, rough sex, cum eating, impotence. Lots of angst.
Word Count: ~6.1K words
Author's Notes: Hi everyone! This is my first ever fanfic written for the JJK fandom! Thank you all for reading and I hope you all enjoy it ☺️💕
Suggested listening: Vague Reason by Yoshimasa Terui (照井順政) off the JJK Shibuya Incident Original Soundtrack.
One.
“You still wear a suit?”
Nanami tilts his head a fraction at the sound of your voice, cup pausing on the way to his lips. The garish fluorescent lights overhead somehow throwing softness on his neatly combed hair, a contrast against the sharp angles of his face.
“I thought you would have left that behind with everything else.”
You walk past him in Jujutsu High’s break room, careful not to brush against his arm when you reach for the kettle, steam rising to cloud your vision of the teabag dancing on the deluge of hot water before it settles and sinks, seeping slowly to darken sepia to brown.
“Old habits die hard.”
His voice.
Deeper than you remembered, though you had heard it many times in dreams. Rough with an exhaustion that resonated with the marrow in your bones. Sanded down by life.
Or perhaps it was memory playing tricks. Maybe Kento had always sounded like this, but a younger you had been too busy revelling in the immortality of those halcyon days to notice.
That is, until the day Haibara died and endings became something lived and not just a speck in the periphery, out of focus and easy to ignore.
Kento had left then. Barely said goodbye, trading one world for another.
Last you’d heard, he had made it to the position of regional director for his firm. Making an inordinate amount of money for people who already had too much, sitting in the comfort of an office building, surrounded by glass and concrete and steel.
“Why did you give it up?”
The teaspoon clinks gently against the sides of your cup as you pour in milk, watching the swirl of white merge with the dark like the sky on the verge of sunrise.
“Because if a job was going to kill me, I’d rather it be on my own terms.”
The response is solid. Certain. Words like stones that have been turned over in the mind innumerable times. You would expect nothing less from him.
Because Nanami Kento had always been economical with words.
Even when he told you he loved you.
Without preamble or explanation, just a confession laid at the corner of your lips like flowers placed on a grave.
Why?
He didn’t say. Did not even talk.
Had only stared at the ceiling fixture above his bed, hazel eyes tracing the rounded fluorescent tube on an interminable loop.
You hadn’t spoken either.
Had only wished for time to stop. To have the chance to process Haibara’s sudden absence like grief lodged in the throat, to understand — somehow, someway — how the sun could set on a boy whose smile shone with the carefree warmth of a summer’s day.
Kento didn’t talk about it and you knew better than to ask. The wound was raw, festering with realization that had by then become obvious to everyone: that the intelligence had been erroneous, that Nanami and Haibara were completely outclassed by the curse they had been assigned to deal with.
That it was like sending lambs to slaughter.
Then Gojo was on the case. Exorcised it in under a minute.
And Nanami Kento realized the senseless futility of it all.
So he had pulled you into his room that night, any and all words superfluous as he held you in bed against him, making no advances while cradling you in the stillness of loss until his lips found yours hours later in a singular act of affection.
Colour had began to bleed across the sky in streaks of blush by the time you finally left his room.
And then, before the shell shock of his gentle confession could release its grip, Nanami Kento had left.
Years later, when a mission took you into Marunouchi, the financial district.
Had caught the shape of him through the window of a bakery, felt like you were looking at someone whose name had just escaped your tongue. Kento was barely recognizable in his pinstriped suit, his polished shoes. The hair that had swept against your cheeks that night now cut short. And he looked…
Tired.
Standing in the check-out line holding a tray with a lone sandwich.
Normal.
Easy.
Like it was simple to leave the world of jujutsu behind.
Like all it took to lead a normal life was to choose it.
Like it was of absolutely no consequence to say I love you and just go.
People die everyday. What’s a broken heart?
You pulled your collar up against the wind, reminded yourself that Satoru was waiting at the meeting point.
Pretended you didn’t see the smile on his face reflected on the woman’s at the register when it was his turn to pay.
But he still put an arm around your shoulders and pulled you close, long legs dangling off the exposed steel beam you were both seated on in the middle of the derelict candy factory.
The curse was gone. Semi-special grade. Would have probably taken you about forty-five minutes to exorcise.
But Satoru had done it in five.
He didn’t have to be there, strictly speaking.
It was convenient, however —
“But I want you anyway.”
— for the things both of you needed to keep buried.
You close your eyes, feel the breath of his approach fanning hot over you: forehead, cheeks, chin.
Lips.
The last one he takes greedily, mouth already open to taste you on his tongue, heat scalding when he slips past the seams of your lips to explore, like he has done so many times before.
And every time his kisses land on that particular corner, you remember…
I love you.
The man who left.
And now you’re with a man who has never once said the same to you.
Because he is also thinking of one who left.
And it isn’t you. Never you.
Because when Satoru closes his eyes, he sees Geto Suguru.
Curse user. Mass murderer. His best friend.
Another casualty of Haibara’s untimely death, driven to despair only to find comfort in violence’s embrace.
And now, you and Satoru pick up the pieces of being left behind.
Because when Satoru pulls your hair from its ponytail, he is running hands through the ebony strands of Suguru’s. When he curls his fingers to anchor at the base of your scalp to pull with barely restrained force, he feels as broken as you do by the weight of absence.
You cry. Every time.
And so you fuck with abandon.
Hold onto Gojo Satoru like it’s the last thing — the only thing — keeping you afloat in this drowning life, hips snapping up to meet his over and over again until you are both merged in a brutal rhythm where all that is demanded of you is to feel.
Close your eyes and pretend that your nails are raking down Kento’s back, every slash of red an admonition.
Because he had opened the door to love and left without closing the gate or the shutters, and even now, a candle burns within as the wreckage of the seasons pile in upon the doorstep:
The blistering frost of winter.
The interminable rains of spring.
The desiccating heat of summer.
The death and decay of fall.
So you wrap arms and legs around Satoru in this communion of pain, offering yourself to the Strongest because it turned out that he, too, had a heart of glass.
He doesn’t take off his blindfold.
It is easier this way.
Shaves off the edge of guilt when you come hard on the rising tide of ecstasy, body wracked with pleasure made all the sharper when you imagine that it is Kento buried deeply inside you, Kento sinking teeth into the tender flesh where neck meets shoulder, Kento gasping your name in desperation instead of Satoru’s muffled moans of Geto’s into your hair.
“Make it hurt. Please.”
And Satoru does.
Knows by now just the right way to dig fingers into your hips until they leave tell-tale marks he can later admire on your reflection in the full-length, the right way to catch your hardened nipples between his teeth, biting down until you’re on the edge of tears before he finally relents, soothing the sting with broad licks from a flattened tongue. Acknowledges your pleas for more, harder, faster until sweat beads on his forehead and coherence is no longer an option, the only thing keeping you tethered to consciousness sheer anticipation — waiting for each moment of impact, Satoru hard, hot and swollen as he stretches the walls of your wet heat, wringing your body from the inside out till you are given over completely to brutal sensation.
Until the thoughts are gone.
Until Kento is replaced by the staccato refrains of your heart beating hard against your chest.
Until Satoru drapes himself over you like a blanket and your hands move as they always do: hold him close to run fingers through his dampened hair. Press kisses to his temples even as he softens slowly inside you, unwilling to break apart from this tenuous connection wherein you both felt human.
There’s something in Satoru’s voice like an animal spooked — the act of performance, of bravado, long since dropped around you. Pointless now, when you and Satoru knew each other the way you did.
His hand finds your face, fingers caressing as his thumb brushes slow circles on the apple of your cheek. He places the tip of his index against the ridge of your cupid’s bow, tracing from corner to corner of your parted mouth before he presses smoothly inside, chest heaving at the feel of you sucking him deeper on instinct.
“Called me the other day. Finally admitted that he couldn’t do the corporate thing anymore.”
He keeps his tone light, but fear tracks in the tremor of his voice; minuscule but you sense it nonetheless like an animal attuned to danger.
Reaching out, you slide his blindfold off — movement slow and gradual, giving him ample time and space to stop you if he so desired.
Satoru allows it.
Lets you kneel before him on the bed in the penthouse suite he’d booked even though you’d only be staying for a few hours. Watches with a steady gaze as you undress without an ounce of hesitation: top, skirt, underwear discarded in a careless heap on the floor. And when you reached for your stockings—
“Leave them.”
Pushing off from where he had reclined against the pillows, he trails his hands along the length of your stockings coloured like second-skin: tips of toes drawn to the arch of your foot, fingertips slowly ascending from the swell of your calf to the peaks of your knees, tracing slow circles just to hear the rhythm of your breath falter.
You watch as his blue-eyed gaze fixes on the angles of your legs, falling into each other and obscuring the view in between, as if playing coy. His tongue emerges in a flash of pink, licking slow along the edge of his bottom lip.
“Are you happy to hear it?”
He has a hand in between now, palm gliding back and forth along the insides of your thighs, reaching further and further up each time until he is almost touching you. The contact makes you arch, hips rising off the bed in the hopes of meeting him halfway, fully aware that the sumptuous sheets beneath you were going to get soaked tonight for neither of you had bothered to lay down a towel.
“He’s married now. My happiness is no longer of any consequence.”
Satoru stills for a moment, studies your face. Absorbs each reaction flickering across your features as the movement of your body grows increasingly erratic when he resumes his, desperate to seek contact with his fingers. Your pussy parts with the motion, just enough for him to see how you glistened already, flesh darkening with the swell of lust coursing thick and fast through your veins.
Married.
Nanami Kento is married.
Ino had showed you the photos in the break room months ago, swiping on his phone through the carousel of images: Ino himself seated beside Satoru and Yaga at a table delegated for friends and colleagues from a past life. Shoko hadn’t been able to make it but sent a gift along with well-wishes for the new couple.
And as for you…
…Kento hadn’t even seen fit to send you an invitation.
“I won’t go if you don’t want me to,” Satoru had said when he found out, doing up the buttons of his shirt and sliding his blindfold back in place before he turned to look at you, naked and tangled in the sheets of a love hotel this time, staring intently at the remnants of his cum on your fingers.
You had lifted your hand to your face, inhaled deeply before licking each finger clean, the tepid salt of him on your tongue grounding you in the moment. Satoru’s weight shifted on the waterbed.
“I’ll be fine,” you had lied.
Even now, you sometimes wondered if Satoru knew the true extent of what fine had looked like when you trashed your apartment the day Nanami Kento promised himself to another woman.
That your neighbours one floor down had knocked, concerned, after feeling the impact of you sweeping every book off the shelves lining your walls. That there was so much broken glass it took you forever to get the shards out of the thick pile of your area rug. That you taped garbage bags to the windows after tearing your blackout blinds to shreds because you still had that 6 am mission to get up for the next day.
Satoru finally relents, touching you to elicit a gasp from your lips while your eyes flutter shut against the sensation, against the memories — raw like a wound that had yet to learn how to stop bleeding out. But the darkness is not a friend for Kento lives there like a curse, smiling as he waits beside an altar for you, beautiful bathed in the golden halo of his hair and dressed in a tuxedo you’ll never see him wear.
It is cruel.
He is cruel.
“It matters to me. What makes you happy?”
Satoru’s words are whispered between your legs, his shock of white hair tickling against your inner thighs and you have to remind yourself not to clamp his head between them.
He kisses you first. Always does. Breath skating across skin before he is pressing his lips to your core, reverent as if caressing a lover’s face. Seeking permission through softness, tastes experimental on the tip of his tongue before everything deepens and you witness — feel — the full extent of his hunger.
Teasing flicks encouraging the swell of your clit before he is drawing it entirely into his mouth. Flattened tongue adding to the dew on your folds before he is slipping a gentle finger in the space between, long and dexterous, to feel you from the inside out.
You clench hard around the desired intrusion. Let out a shuddering breath when a second finger joins the first. Eyes flying open when he introduces the third just in time to see him twitch in his pants, Satoru inhaling deeply to tamper impatience down.
“Tell me. I want to know,” he presses.
And it would have been so simple. So easy. To fall in love with Satoru. To lie with him, make love to him and forever entangle your lives together without the ghosts that haunted your lives — unreachable people who held hearts in iron grips like delicate bouquets of forget-me-nots.
Happiness?
What did it even look like, feel like, to you now?
So you draw Satoru up from between your legs, taste yourself when you kiss him — on his mouth, his tongue, on the shining surfaces of his cheeks and chin. Do your best to smile even with tears prickling at the corners of your eyes when you say,
“You. You make me happy.”
Then you help him undress, slide down his body until your hands are caressing the muscular contours of his thighs, and take him in your mouth.
Satoru groans softly, closes his eyes.
Do I make you happy?
Tilts his head back until you can see his Adam’s Apple bobbing in sharp relief.
Even though I’m not Suguru?
If Satoru doesn’t believe you, he does not say.
Just threads his fingers through your hair, shuddering to feel your tongue tracing the veins that pulse along his shaft. Breathes out heavily when you sought to take more and more of him in, easing flesh down your throat to fill the hollowness in your chest, only ever echoing one name…
You press a kiss to the nape of his neck. Slip both arms around him, chest pressed to his back. Feel the slight tremor that courses through his body though to anyone else, Gojo Satoru looked cool and unaffected.
“The Night Parade of A Hundred Demons. You’d think he’d have more to say after ghosting us for ten years,” he scoffs.
If Geto Suguru returned, would you go to him?
If Nanami Kento came back, would you leave me?
“I’m sorry,” you murmur, staying silent about how all this was inevitable. Keep quiet because Satoru’s reunion with Suguru had come at such a high price.
“Stay close to me when we mobilize.” He is already back to business.
“Yaga assigned me to Kyoto—"
“I don’t care. You’re coming to Shinjuku. I need to be able to see you at all times.”
You open your mouth. Hesitate. “It’ll look strange.”
“I’m beyond caring at this point about who knows about me and you. Unless you’re worried about him.”
Him.
Kento.
The man with a golden band on the ring finger of his left hand.
“Don’t be stupid.”
“Can’t help it. I can’t think straight when it comes to you. You’re the only one I have left.”
Arms tightening around him, you brush your lips against the pulse at Satoru’s neck, feel its rhythm throb beneath your kiss.
His hands still but Kento doesn’t look up from rewrapping his blade, the Dalmatian spotted cloth so familiar you ache at the sight of it. His wedding band gleams in the light of the setting sun, dying ember rays streaming through the windows of the school’s faculty lounge.
You had waited till everyone else had filed out, using the last couple of hours before sunset to prepare for the battle of their lives: Geto Suguru’s twisted reenactment of the Night of a Hundred Demons, whereupon he was set to unleash thousands of curses on civilians in Tokyo and Kyoto.
And if there was a chance that either you or him would die tonight, you had to know.
“Don’t give me bullshit. Vague reasons about soul-crushing work or choosing how to die.”
Your tone was sharper than you initially intended but you didn’t care. Because the dregs of unrequited love were surfacing now with all the impact of a volcanic explosion beneath the ocean’s surface: all the tears you had cried, the men you had dated only to push away because they couldn’t compare to the one you had built up in your mind. The ten pathetic years that had passed whilst you stood still, unable to move beyond that single confession laced with a kiss.
Because you needed to know whether Nanami Kento had really meant what he said, or whether he was a sadist playing a trick.
The blade is only midway wrapped when he places it down carefully before him. Silent. The space between you and him swelling with time and memory.
And you cannot help the tears that fall though you had sworn you wouldn’t cry.
“I saw your wife once. Before you were married. The woman at the bakery, right? Red beret, white uniform? You…didn’t even invite me to your wed—"
“I meant it.”
The low bass of his voice cuts through the air.
“When I said I loved you. Before I left.”
Love.
Loved.
And now?
“And I came back because I needed to see that you were all right.”
All right.
The words are poison. Thorns. And you do not know whether to rage or despair because frustration is lead in your lungs and your mind has shut down.
I am not okay.
You manage a scoff, manage to brace yourself with a palm to the wall because your own legs could not be trusted.
“What constitutes ‘all right’ to you, Nanami? ‘I’m in one piece,’ all right? ‘I still haven’t died fighting a curse,’ all right? ‘Still show up to do my job,’ all right?”
You despise the way your voice shakes. The way you can’t quite modulate your volume anymore.
Kento removes his glasses, eyes closed as his index and thumb meet at the bridge of his nose.
Breathes.
Stands.
Takes one step, then another. Brown leather oxfords tracking across wooden floorboards until he is toe to toe with you.
And he is close, so close to you that you have to keep reminding yourself that this is not a dream. That the rise and fall of his chest — indigo cloth stretched broad over muscle and sinew — is real, cruel like the heart that beats beneath.
Rhythm strong and ongoing though your own had withered to dust long ago.
“I wish you had stayed away.”
The words leave your lips in a whisper.
You do not look at his face. Keep your eyes trained on the dots of his spotted tie. Imprint upon your mind the way his hands twitch at your words, long fingers curling tight until you could no longer see the golden band you knew he wore.
And the only thing your traitorous heart wants is…him.
Close enough to touch, to smell — clean and calm because fuck him, how dare he keep cool when you are once more teenaged and vulnerable and lying in his arms, staring at the same ceiling and thinking of Haibara and silently mourning a childhood lost.
So many questions and not a single satisfactory answer Nanami Kento can give either to you or himself.
Because how does one turn back the pages of a mistake?
And Nanami Kento — practical, prudent man that he was — had been careful with everything but his heart.
And now, on top of that, he could add cowardly to the list.
Others might call it being responsible. Being an adult. Living gracefully with the irreversible choices one has made.
But Kento knows that honesty is the hardest, bravest thing that has ever been asked of him. And instead, he had chosen silence.
Because what would have been the point of telling you that he had not meant to ever come back? That seeing Haibara draw his last breath while working out a way to extricate his best friend and himself from an impossible situation had fractured something inside him he couldn’t even name? That Jujutsu High was so full of ghosts and memories that life had whittled away into days of grey, a simple act of putting one foot in front of the other while pretending he wasn’t ash on the inside.
Kento had to leave. Life itself had depended on it.
And he hadn’t really been thinking that night when he pulled you into his arms, holding you to him and finding a modicum of peace in the space between your synchronized heartbeats. The only thing he was certain of was that he loved you, had loved you since the day you noticed him slipping Kawabata’s Snow Country into his bag and sheepishly confessed to having cried while reading it. That life, temporary like the seasons, meant that time could not be wasted.
So he pressed his lips to yours for the first and last time.
In the beginning, Nanami thought about you every day.
Getting adjusted to a new workplace, new people. A new life.
Back when he was trying to force himself to belong in spaces that felt like wearing someone else’s clothes.
But then gradually, the days got easier — monotony a well-oiled machine driving life towards its final destination: earn enough money to retire while he could still enjoy it, live out the remainder of his years on a beach somewhere nice. Malaysia, perhaps.
Finally get a chance to read all the books he had accumulated on the shelves that lined the walls of his apartment, fingertips tracing haphazard patterns in the sand when he turns to the lounger beside him to ask what you’d thought about the book—
No.
Not you.
Nanami had given up that right a long time ago.
And every time he thought he’d finally worked up the courage to ask Gojo for your number, he faltered.
Hello. It’s me. I’m sorry for everything. Can I be a part of your life again?
There is no deterrent greater than shame.
And then…Keiko happened.
Kento had pretended not to notice the way her eyes never left him whenever he frequented the bakery she owned, always buying the same sandwich day in and day out. Keeping conversation to the polite minimum required to maintain social cohesion, careful not to encourage, not to give false hope.
But then he’d noticed the curse on her shoulder — Grade 4, at most — and exorcised it with a simple gesture of the hand. And after many, many repeated requests, he finally relented and accepted her plea for a date.
“Just one dinner! To thank you for helping me! My shoulder’s been feeling so much better ever since you did…whatever you did!”
Kento had dreamt of you that night. Saw your face across the table at the French restaurant, lovely and lit by candlelight. Felt the warmth of your fingers beneath his hand when he reached for you, unable to believe his good fortune at having the chance to actually share a meal with you like this. You had whispered something just beyond his limit of hearing, and when he had leaned in closer and asked you to repeat yourself, his elbow caught the stem of his wine glass, spilling Pinot Noir across the front of his pants.
He had jolted awake. Hated himself a little more.
Hated himself a lot more when he said yes to a second date. Then a third.
The first time Nanami made love to Keiko, he couldn’t get it up. She was kind about it, had put her hand gently on his lap when he explained that it’d been a long time. He had appreciated her understanding. Then stepped into the shower and promptly turned up the temperature to near scalding, letting water beat over his face because the thought of you alone was enough to get him hard every single time.
She had been the one to bring up marriage. Said no other man made her feel safe like he did. Secure. Keiko had mentioned wanting children eventually, as did he. Maybe we could start a family together? she had asked one day after dinner, eyes shy and cheeks flushed when she placed a cup of tea onto the table before him.
And Kento…
…could not find a legitimate reason to say no.
It had been almost a decade now since he told you he loved you. Since he left. Whatever might have blossomed between you and him had surely died by now. You were brilliant, beautiful; everything anyone would ever want in a partner. And though he had held tenaciously onto sentiment, Kento knew it was ridiculous of him to think you would be cut from the same cloth.
It made Keiko happy, the wedding planning. His own mother had been over the moon when they broke the news to her. And when it came time to drawing up the guest list, Kento’s hand had hovered over your name between Gojo’s and Shoko’s before finally drawing a thick black line through it.
Because he couldn’t do it.
Couldn’t trust himself not to break down in the middle of his own wedding day.
To renege on his vows right after he had said them if you happened to appear before him.
The girl of his dreams…
…forever to remain in his dreams.
“You’re a fucking idiot. You know that, right?” Gojo had cornered him that night at the reception, slinging an arm over Nanami’s shoulder and smiling like he was tipsy though not a single drop of alcohol had passed his lips. “And here I thought Suguru was the heartless one.”
Knew he went overboard when he grew more and more silent as the celebrations wore on, reassuring Keiko in her white dress that he was merely tired. He couldn’t let anyone know how shaken up he had been by Gojo’s words.
The insinuation cutting like a knife, the hidden hope that had flared dangerously in his heart to think that maybe…maybe you still cared? Still cared about him while he…
…he was now a married man.
Gojo didn’t stay long. Had made his exit soon after delivering his message, mentioning something about an emergency that necessitated his immediate attention before he left the banquet hall.
And in a moment of insanity, Nanami Kento excused himself and followed him.
All the way out to the lobby of the hotel before he stopped in a dead halt. Because he had heard your name on Gojo Satoru’s lips, stretched into a smile as he spoke on the phone, saying:
Three months into married life, Kento made his decision.
He would quit his job. Return to the jujtusu world he had sworn to leave for life.
He had discussed it with his wife. Given Keiko ample time to think about it, to adjust. To come to terms with the reality of things like curses and jujutsu. Reassured her that a sorcerer of his calibre could earn enough to ensure that they’d continue to live comfortably.
“It’s not about the money, Kento!” Keiko had exclaimed in exasperation when he first broached the subject with her. “I’m worried about YOU, my husband! Curses…these things…they all sound so dangerous!”
He’d had nothing to say to that. Not when it was true.
But he needed to do this.
Needed to find you again in that abandoned world, make sure you were fine, though he had long lost that right, probably never even had it in the first place.
To return to that place of hurt for reasons so vague they didn’t even seem coherent to him at times, aside from the one truth that had never quite left Nanami Kento’s heart:
Kento knew this was deserved. That it was more than he deserved.
But what had hurt him more were your tears, running freely down your face and him, completely impotent in the moment. Unable to reach out and touch you, hold you like he had so desperately wanted because he was a husband now.
Just not yours.
And you are even more beautiful than he remembered. As brilliant as you are deadly, confirming without a doubt that Kento had committed the most grievous error of his life, one from which he could never recover, never set right.
Despite the blindfold, he could sense the way Gojo’s gaze tracked you in every room the white-haired man entered; seeking you, always seeking you. And though it pained him in a way Kento knew he had no right to feel, he also knew no one stood a better chance of surviving in this world than one under the protection of Gojo Satoru, the Strongest.
So he pretended that it didn’t cost him to say,
“Stay close to Gojo.”
Pretended he couldn’t hear you cry when he packed up his blunt blade and left the faculty lounge, footsteps taking him farther and farther away from love.
Rubbed the ring on his finger and reminded himself of family and responsibilities…
…and silently mourned that a single decision had been enough to cleave his entire life in two.
And once again, you are transported back to that bed in the student dormitory, staring at a ceiling as you took comfort in the heat of another’s body even as you sought to soothe them all the same.
“I did it. Finally killed him.”
Satoru’s voice is cold. Devoid of feeling that you knew was overwhelming him with the force of a tsunami on the inside. Always on the inside.
There was no other way.
He had threatened the students. Put them at risk.
Geto Suguru might as well have attacked Gojo Satoru’s own children.
Tightening your embrace, you draw Satoru closer to you, each mourning love forever lost by way of a silent understanding that has characterized so much of your relationship with him. It is strange but necessary, incomprehensible perhaps to anyone but you and him, but neither of you could work up the will to care at this point. Maybe never have.
Geto Suguru is dead.
Nanami Kento is married.
And you and Gojo Satoru…
…you’ve got each other.
Part of you would always harbour a piece of Kento as he was all those years ago: before the wedding, before the leaving, before Haibara.
Just as you knew that Suguru would always have a place in Satoru’s heart: forever untainted — the best friend who had never gone astray.
And yet…
“I love you, Satoru.”
You were sick of standing still.
His breath hitches, body suddenly stiff in your arms.
Hey Satoru, want to come with me?
Let’s leave this heartbreak behind.
Find happiness of our own.
We deserve it, no?
I think we do.
I think it’s time.
Satoru pulls off his blindfold. Stares at you with red-rimmed eyes.
And you know in this moment, that even if he says no, even if he doesn’t feel the same, even if he accuses you of ruining everything with those three words, it wouldn’t matter.
Because you had spoken your truth.
You did love him, in your own way. Had gradually, unwittingly stumbled through the fog of trying to find the answer to heartache in the arms of another to actually building something that could potentially resemble a real relationship, if you and him would just give each other the chance.
Give yourselves the chance.
To be the ones who stay.
Together.
“It’s okay. You don’t have to say anything—"
“I love you too.”
Hand finding the back of your head, Satoru pulls you flush against his chest, embracing you so tightly the rhythm of his heart beats against your cheek.
“Someday, Satoru — maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow — but someday, let’s try for happiness together, okay?” you say, trying to keep your voice from wavering.
For a long while, Satoru says nothing. Only nods, breath shaky when he draws it in upon a deep heave before finally whispering into your hair:
“You. You make me happy, too.”
You close your eyes, swallow down the emotion that rises within you to hear those familiar words falling from his lips this time.
He clears his throat. “Have done so for a while now, actually. Guess it’s something you have a knack for.”
“Don’t leave me?”
You wondered whether Satoru could hear the smile in your words.
“I won’t.”
Because you could hear the love in his.
And as his lips found yours, reasons fell from your shoulders like a heavy winter cloak that had been worn for too long. Because in Gojo Satoru’s kiss, you finally sensed the coming of spring.
You made it to the end! Hope you all enjoyed this piece! Please stay tuned for more writing to come! 😊💕
P.S. For all my Nanami lovers, please know that Kento WOULD NEVER!! 😂. Sweet baby is responsible to the core but I had to amp up the angst somehow lol.
"Vague Reasons" is copyright 2026 Kintsukoi, all rights reserved. Please do not repost/modify/translate/plagiarize in any manner or on any platform.
Love Me Like You Love Him (JJK Gojo x Reader) (Series Masterpost)
Synopsis:
Rejection stings.
Even when it is delivered in such a kind and considerate manner as your colleague and long-time secret crush, Nanami Kento, does.
So when Gojo Satoru, the strongest sorcerer alive and totally over the top, shows up for you as an entirely unexpected source of comfort, you hesitantly accept his help, completely unaware, all the while, of the life you used to share together…and the fact that he loves you still.
In Love Me Like You Love Him, you and Gojo learn what it means to love someone so deeply that you’d do anything for them...even wait forever.
✨Written in the Stars: Nanami Kento x Astrology Analysis/HCs✨
Stats:
Name: Nanami Kento
DOB: July 3rd
Sign: Cancer (2nd Decan)
Warning: MAJOR spoilers for the manga/anime. Please do not proceed if you haven't finished the manga (unless you're cool with some big reveals lol). A bit of profanity thrown in here and there. Post is gif & image heavy!
While Nanami's birthday - 7/3 - is an obvious nod to his name, he nonetheless possesses heavy Cancerian traits
(Funnily enough, Cancer's lucky numbers are said to be 7 and 3. Who knew?!)
He is, for one, the fundamental "dad" of the group
This is true whether it’s referring to actual family, amongst friends or students he's responsible for (he is perhaps the most significant father figure in Yuji's life, certainly one who has left an indelible impression upon him)
Ijichi has referred to him as the "most adult of all adults"
Even during Nanami's final moments, he tells Yuji, "You've got it from here," which is very much like the passing down of a torch from one generation to another
The Cancerian man is responsible, reliable and gets the job done, which is why Gojo entrusted Yuji to Nanami
As a Cardinal sign, they are among the initiators of the zodiac - they take action when shit matters
They also don’t play around when it comes to business (some of the most prominent businesspeople in the world share this sign) and can be quite shrewd when it comes to finances (notice how Nanamin also went into finance after quitting jujutsu society)
Money is absolutely central when it comes to security for Cancerians; they never really feel secure despite how much they make
Cancer is the sign of the crab, which carries its home around at all times. It also rules the 4th House in the natal chart, which is the house of home and family
Nanami is similarly minded: home and his downtime is never far from his mind. Overtime is a binding vow and one which he’d prefer not to use. The man really just wants to go home, cook something delicious and eat it by himself with a fine glass of wine and a good book
Home — and, by extension, his privacy — is his safe place; Nanami’s refuge from the violently topsy-turvy world of jujutsu
Gege has mentioned that Nanami would've wanted to get married, just not while actively working as a sorcerer, which, once again, makes perfect sense because he's just too caring and responsible to leave someone he loves as a WIDOW!! 😭😭😭 (we shall NOT talk about this)
The 4th house also presides over childhood (e.g. his insistence on letting kids be kids), nostalgic memories (more on this below) and parental figures (see Yuji above and Ino as well, to a certain extent)
In short, the 4th house is about FOUNDATIONS, and Nanami's character, in particular, feels as solid and reliable as that of a well-built house
Much has been made about his desire to retire to Malaysia, and in a sense, this can be seen as a return to his roots, as evidenced by the following panels in the manga:
Going somewhere south, to return to who he once was, is very reminiscent of the both the 4th house and the South Node (one's "home base," comfort zones, habits and patterns) - more on this later
The 4th house is the most sentimental of the houses, and Nanami can arguably be considered one of the more empathetic characters of the JJK verse (along with Yuji, Yuta and Yaga, for instance)
All that softness aside, don't fuck with Cancers. They may be the nurturing "parents" of the zodiac, but just like a mother bear protecting her cubs, they will cut you if you mess with them and the people they care about. They are STRONG AF in ways that result in more than just visible muscle mass and they take their responsibilities seriously. That shell is hard for a reason. They can take whatever life dishes out.
Sometimes though, they may have to retreat within that shell to heal, much like Nanami did by leaving the jujutsu world after Haibara's death. But they eventually come back to clean up that bullshit garbage
The hard shell protects the soft, emotional innards of the man — the empathetic side that exists deep within Nanami at his core. The stoic face is a form of protection for someone who has already seen and felt too much, too soon
Resilience is the name of the game (even Gojo, after finally escaping the Prison Realm, mentioned that he thought Nanami, of all people, would survive anything)
Nanami Kento, however, continues to live on through the deep influence he's had on others, not just Yuji Itadori and Ino Takuma (who always asks "what would Nanami do?"), but also via his own blunt blade being reincarnated to a second life as a weapon in Ino's hands:
Like the moon by which Cancer is ruled, Nanami's influence enables others to find their way when they feel lost in darkness
Cancers can also feel insecure and inadequate on the inside
One gets a very visceral sense of this especially after Haibara's death, when Nanami says to Geto, "why don't we just let Gojo handle everything from now on?"
Furthermore, in a later scene, he advises Yuji not to compare himself to Gojo because it’s a sure path to disappointment - highly suggesting that Nanami, at one point or another, also harboured similar feelings of not being able to measure up to the Strongest
In addition to the watery elements of his chart, Nanami Kento also strikes one as having significant Earth influence
Virgoan vibes in his insistence on getting things done correctly in the right way (whether as a jujutsu sorcerer or in his role as a salaryman) - see the Virgo insistence on PRECISION below:
The Virgo influence can also be seen by the way his mind never seems to be at rest: he loves to read, is commonly depicted with a book or newspaper on his downtime, and said he would love to get around to finally reading all the books he accumulated but haven't yet had the chance to read (his general stoic demeanour makes me feel like this is more of a Virgo influence than Gemini, which tends towards a more sociable and lighthearted personality despite both being ruled by Mercury)
Taurus placements are hinted at in the way he delights in earthly and sensual pleasures: good food and wine, his desire to retire to the beach and surround himself with sun, sand, surf and simplicity (Gege makes no secret of the fact that this man is a canon foodie)
Capricorn folks, like Cancers, are also all about their business. Real boss energy.
Undoubtedly, Nanami’s character has a very heavy Saturnian influence: stern and strict when adhering to rules and regulations, he believes in structure and order. This typically puts him at odds with Gojo's flighty nature, and the two serve as beautiful foils to each other, especially in Yuji's life
Saturn is Father Time, and nothing characterizes Nanami Kento better than his near-obsessive relationship with time (Overtime, anyone? lol)
He can't help noticing all the ways in which time is passing him by (e.g. finding more and more of his hairs on his pillow, no longer being able to find his favourite sandwich at the konbini)
And he looks forward to a retirement he will never actually have 😭
When it is revealed near the end of the manga (see earlier manga panel) that he asked Mei Mei for advice on where he should relocate to for retirement, she gave him the option of heading North if he essentially wants to live for the future, but opting for the South if he wants to revisit the past. Nanami chose Malaysia, which, once again, harkens back to the 4th house and South Node themes of nostalgia for times gone by
Saturn's iconography is typically associated with a sickle, reminiscent not only of death but also the reaping of the harvest (c.f. Nanami's special connection with wheat through his great love of bread)
Nanami Kento's character is very much a man of the earth: no-nonsense to the core. He is the one you call on when shit hits the fan
Along a similar vein, part of his decision to return to the jujutsu world involved his thoughts surrounding why people whose jobs are so far removed from the circle of life are paid disproportionately more - it didn't sit right with him
But underneath all this heavy earthiness, the man is a Cancer that cares to its own core about the people in his life
this is highly apparent in how he prioritizes the safety of the students and others
Finally, let’s talk about the fact that Nanami’s birthday falls within the second decan of Cancer, which means there is a significant Scorpio (Plutonian) influence on his expression of the sign. These folks aren't afraid of death.
Nanami's trusted inner circle may be tiny, but they truly understood the fierce loyalty and devotion he's capable of (e.g. his willingness to sacrifice himself as a shield to protect Megumi when they were in Dagon's domain)
He is a man who would (and did) put everything on the line, fighting until he was literally on his last legs...
...which is why we crown him KING KENTO 👑💕
For being hearth and home, parent and protector - a place of safe refuge for so many characters in this show.
RIP King
Thanks so much for reading and please stay tuned for more writing to come! (Check out the masterpost! 😊💕)
Copyright 2026 Kintsukoi, all rights reserved. Please do not repost/modify/translate/plagiarize in any manner or on any platform.
Midnight Sun (JJK Higuruma x Reader) (Series Masterpost)
Synopsis:
Boy meets girl.
Boy falls madly in love with girl.
Except the boy in question is Higuruma Hiromi: brilliant legal wunderkind with the heart of gold. Disillusioned with the system in which he placed so much faith, he goes off the rails in his mid-thirties to awaken to his true genius as a jujutsu sorcerer, but it comes at the cost of his soul.
And the girl? Well, it’s you: kind, mysterious, and also grappling with newfound cursed powers, the full extent of which remains to be seen but has already been deemed by some to be dangerously unacceptable — incompatible with the new world order in the aftermath of the Culling Game.
And for the second time in his existence, Higuruma Hiromi will have to make yet another decision that could change everything:
Decide how far he is willing to go in the name of love.
Specs:
angst/smut/moments of warm fluff/possibly dark content ahead (trigger warnings will be listed per chapter)
Warnings: (18+/NSFW/MDNI): very brief mention of intruder fantasies
A/N: Because Ino needs more love...
This man is the human embodiment of earnestness
All he wants to do is please you, and he will go to great lengths to do it
Any position, any type of toy, anything you want to use, anytime, anywhere: over a railing, pressed to the glass, on the counter, against the wall, under a table, in the hall, bathroom stall, at the mall, in the club he’ll show you love, in the shower - fuck you for hours, he can’t stop, you’re just too hot (you get the picture)
Ino is a big fan of education and you’re his teacher. He wants to learn EVERYTHING about you, especially the things that get your pussy to swimming pool-levels of wetness
High-key has a thing for older women - big MILF energy
His praise kink is real. So smug when he makes you cum so hard you’re shaking from head to toe and tears of ecstasy are running down your cheeks in mascara-streaked tracts. The messier you look, the prouder he is (like he aced a test he’d been secretly studying for since he first laid eyes on you). A well-placed compliment during sex and the man revs up 200000%: hips and glutes jackhammering you into the mattress or wherever else you happen to be fucking
Dry humping is one of his favourite things (especially if you’ve got his black sweater on with nothing else underneath)
Loves to casually slip a hand under the loose collar of the sweater you're wearing (read: his) and caress your breasts as you're cuddled next to each other on the couch, "watching" something on TV
He’d be reduced to soft, whimpered moans as you grind into him on the couch, hips drawing circles on the tops of his muscular thighs, core applying pressure to his rapidly stiffening cock with each go-round
And when he can’t take any more, he’ll fold you in half and settle his weight between your legs, pushing up against you just so until you’re panting into his mouth in between kisses when your tongues aren’t sliding past one another because you just can’t get enough of each other's taste
Ino Takuma LIVES to eat pussy, especially when it’s through your panties: will lick and suck and tease his way through cotton/silk/satin/lace until that item of clothing is completely drenched with his spit and your juices (feels like that man is trying to quench his thirst with your body)
If you want him to indulge your intruder fantasies, he would totally comply and fuck you with that black mask over his face
Aftercare? Ino’s got you covered. Tell him what you need ONCE and he’ll literally take notes on his phone so that you’ve got that warm washcloth, glass of water, etc. every single time.
A massive cuddler, especially after sex. Expect to fall asleep to him spooning you, his arms wrapped tightly around your waist and him breathing softly into your hair (he will literally be dreaming about making love to you again and again)
Love Me Like You Love Him - Part 2: Never Let You Go (JJK Gojo x Reader - NSFW)
Synopsis: (From Gojo's POV)
In the aftermath of comforting you through your rejection by Nanami, Gojo reflects on the life he once shared with you...and the love that burns still.
Pairing: Gojo Satoru x afab!Sorcerer Reader
Warnings: brief mentions of su*cide (in a curse context), dashes of fluff, angst-heavy, slight spice, profanity
Word Count: ~1.7K
Read Part 1 here! 👈🏼
Series Masterlist here! 👈🏼
“Satoru…do you really have to be filming me first thing in the morning?”
“Yup. I’m immortalizing this moment so I can rewatch it over and over again for the rest of my life.”
The sound of sheets ruffling on a bed on-screen; laughter in a woman’s voice, soft and slightly rough from sleep.
Yours.
And then, Gojo’s voice continues off-camera, saying: “Hey, no hiding under the pillows!”
“I look like a mess! And why do you need to watch a video of me if I’m not planning on going anywhere?”
“Is that a promise, Mrs Gojo?”
A fresh burst of your laughter, as Gojo’s hand moves into the frame: long, lean fingers sneaking in to pull back the duvet, slowly revealing your bared leg all the way to the lace trim of your black satin panties. The same hand then begins to tip-toe up your ankle…then calf…upper thigh…before stopping at the gentle swell of your hip, where his fingertips draw lazy circles that result in you laughing even harder.
“Oh my god, that tickles! Stop! Yes, yes, it’s a promise, Mr Gojo! I promised you on our wedding day when you got piss drunk from three sips of sake like a total lightweight! Ahahaha! Stop! No more tickling!—“
“You DARE to reveal my secrets on camera?! C’mere you!-”
Your laughter devolved into a high-pitched squeal as Gojo’s body entered the frame completely, dressed only in a pair of silk pyjama trousers slung low on his narrow hips in a way that automatically drew one’s line of sight to his six-pack abs, the strength of his broad shoulders and muscular arms readily apparently even with the view suddenly tilting, barely catching the moment when he straddled you on the king-sized bed, the phone with which he’d been filming you tossed carelessly onto the bed just in time to capture the moment of tenderness that followed:
Gojo Satoru, face bare without his usual blindfold or sunglasses, staring down at you with those glowing blue eyes, the intensity of his gaze palpable even through the screen. Closer and closer he moved, until strands of his white hair merged with your own, his long frame completely bent over your body when his lips sealed over your mouth in a kiss…
Soft, like the gentle morning sun that filtered in through shaded windowpanes.
Slow, like the two of you had all the time in the world.
Gojo sets his phone down and runs a hand over his face, blindfold loose around his neck and fingers rubbing into his eyes before he blinks them open once more, watery gaze training onto the exposed wooden beam in the ceiling of the home he’d once shared with you.
He can still hear your voice filtering through the speaker of his phone; the video he’d been watching on repeat for the past two hours continuing to play. He knows it like the back of his hand by now, would be able to describe in complete detail exactly what he’d find on-screen if he were to look at this moment, based on the sound of your breath alone:
You, the remnants of laughter dying on your lips to transform into a smile instead, soft and infinitely seductive to Gojo in ways he cannot explain other than the fact that it is yours. You, reaching up slowly to loop both arms around the back of his neck, fingers making a gradual procession into the strands of his white hair where they’d weave and curl while he nestled himself in the space between your legs, widening to accept him into the place where he belonged.
“Ahh…”
On-screen, Gojo moans, voice low and breathy as he lowered himself, laying kisses along the column of your neck as he carefully guided himself into you, driving deeper and deeper into your core with each rhythmic sway of his hips, the sudden sound of your gasps making the hairs on the back of his neck rise even now…
…three years later.
“I love you, Satoru.”
Three years.
“I love you more…” he hears his own voice — discombobulated now, from another time.
1,095 days.
“…you are my life.”
Innumerable hours, minutes, seconds, since a curse ripped you away from him and left a gaping, empty hole where you — his heart — used to be.
And he has since lost count of the times he has sat in the dark by himself in the home where you’d begun life together as husband and wife after tying the knot five years prior, watching and rewatching old videos of you and him in happier times together. Staring at your face staring back at him through the cruel indifference of a smartphone screen, his gaze tracing the shape of your eyes, nose and lips and wondering how different things might’ve been had he been the one to be struck by that curse instead of you…
…if he had been the one to lose all memory of the one person he loved most in this world.
To not be the one left behind, for once.
But it was not to be.
And now, Gojo Satoru is haunted by nightmares of that day when he couldn’t reach you while you were on a mission, no matter how many times he called; his heart constantly reliving the sensation of it sinking far down into his chest like it had when he heard Yaga’s voice on the other end of the line, saying:
“Come to the infirmary, Gojo. NOW.”
Shoko didn’t look up when he had entered. Kept her eyes trained on you, unconscious but stable on the hospital bed. And nobody protested when she pulled the mask from her face to light up a cigarette, the smoke curling in tendrils to partially obscure the digital display of your vitals from the machine beeping at the side of the bed.
“She doesn’t remember you, Satoru,” Shoko finally said after what felt like hours. “I tried to reassure her when she was first brought in. Told her you were on your way. She said,” and she took a deep breath here, “…’Why is Gojo coming? He’s not my family.’ ”
Those words. Like someone had injected ice water into his veins.
“What the fuck are you saying?” Gojo’s voice had begun to shake.
Ino Takuma, sitting beside you and looking worse for wear, flinched from the sudden pressure of cursed energy flaring in the room. And for the life of him, Gojo couldn’t remember the last time he hadn’t been able to keep it perfectly controlled, having honed it to the point of it being automatic by now.
“I’m so sorry!” The younger man prostrated himself on the ground before Gojo in a formal bow of apology, Ino’s black mask bunched up around his forehead like a toque. “She pushed me out of the way and got hit by the curse instead. I-I didn’t see it coming and she was trying to protect me!”
A curse.
Born of a courtesan and the poor clerk of a kimono shop who had fallen in love with each other centuries ago. Star-crossed and unable to be together in their lifetime, they had decided to commit shinju, double suicide, by binding their wrists together and jumping in the Edo river. Except the towel they had used to fasten themselves had loosened in the process, and the young male clerk had washed up, barely breathing but still alive, only to learn that that his lover had perished without him.
Heartbreak had been their lot in life. And now, the curse had set out to inflict the same upon its victims.
You will lose all memory of the one you love most in this world.
And so, you had forgotten Gojo Satoru.
Your husband. Your lover. Your soulmate. Your best friend.
And after Shoko had cleared everyone out, lowering the lights and drawing a curtain around the hospital bed to give the pair of you privacy, your husband had whispered into your ear:
“I’m not letting you go. Ever. I’ll make you remember me. And if that proves impossible, I’ll make you fall in love with me all over again. So wait for me…wait for your Satoru…please.”
Still, you had slept, blissfully unaware of the heart breaking just beside you.
Gojo had tried every method he could think of.
When it became obvious that whenever someone, no matter who, tried to speak the truth of who Gojo Satoru really was to you, the words would simply become incomprehensible in your mind, like it hadn’t even occurred to you that someone had been speaking.
Photographs would appear blank. Videos would refuse to play.
Any and all evidence surrounding Gojo in your life prior to being afflicted with this curse simply wouldn’t register.
Shoko, poring over every obscure text she could access, was unable to find a way to reverse the effects.
For once in his life, the Six Eyes were at a loss.
And no matter who Gojo — with all his power and money and connections — sought out in the jujutsu world at large, even going so far as to seek aid from the abbot of an ascetic mountain monastery and a modern-day onmyoji descended from Abe no Seimei himself, it was all to no avail:
Gojo Satoru just did not exist in your life in any capacity other than the one everyone else was already well acquainted with: the strongest sorcerer alive.
By the time Shoko had cleared you for discharge from the infirmary, Gojo had already moved your things back to the room in the dormitory that had been yours prior to your marriage, watching as you settled in like you had never left the space he’d reconstructed solely from memories of loving you over and over again in the cramped confines of that single bed.
And Gojo…
…Gojo returned to a home filled with the ghost of you, a place where echoes of your laughter chased after his footsteps down empty hallways and rooms left chilled without the warmth of your presence.
The sudden sound of a text notification interrupts the video. Picking up his phone from beside him on the couch, Gojo reads the message from Nanami:
Got your message. Still on to meet at the izakaya tonight? I can be there in 20.
Closing his eyes, he heaved a heavy sigh before typing out his reply:
Of course. I’ll grab the corner table.
Flipping back to the Photos app, he stares at your face for a moment longer, trying to emulate the smile that was spread across your lips in an attempt to hype himself up for a conversation he really did not want to have.
Awesome cloud divider by @ pxrce-lain!
⭐️ Part 3 coming soon! ⭐️
Thanks so much for reading! Please stay tuned for more writing to come and check out the masterpost! 😊💕
