where does it come from, the thread that ties us together?
@curseforged / where does it come from, the thread that ties us together?
december 6 — gojou skips breakfast and pretends his coffee is more than enough to count as a meal. he begins his day by reviewing the new stack of paperwork on his desk ( neglecting it ) and then sliding into the classroom, waiting for his students to file in. never the type to lecture, he flies through missions and before he knows it, it's lunch time, which means a quick trip to the convenience store to pick out his bento of the day. today, he's in the mood for grilled eel and vinegar rice and he eats half of it — partly because food is sustenance more than anything, but also because he has to save room for dessert. after lunch, he resumes class until the day is over and then, he spends the rest of the evening grading papers, investigating new areas of suspicion and in meetings with other faculty. sometimes, they send him out, sometimes, they don't, but even if gojou happens to have a rare evening off, he's always on call. tonight, his evening is full and he doesn't come home until three in the morning, bone-tired, but his brain doesn't know it, shaking from the sugar and the terrifying amount of caffeine. if being a jujutsu sorcerer doesn't kill him first, the caffeine overdose just might.
he washes up, brushes his teeth and then restlessly slips into bed, not capable of falling asleep for another hour and waking up several more times in-between, but he's ready to do it all over again tomorrow. december 7 — happy birthday, gojou! when the alarm sounds off, gojou can barely open his eyes ( so dry, he can hear the sound of them reluctantly sliding open and he knows it isn't true, but it feels like he has to open all six of them and it's so much work ). he checks his phone, reviewing incoming birthday texts from people he doesn't like ( his frigid mother, his rigid father ) or people who don't know gojou very well ( the family caretaker, a pitiful house servant — ah, she must be new ). nanami texts him a coupon to his favorite bakery. shoko asks him out for drinks, which is customary and is customary for gojou to decline — no, it wasn't customary, was it? once upon a time, he used to get drinks with shoko on his birthday even though it goes against his policy to drink, but that was because geto suguru was his exception to every rule. once upon a time, he used to get drinks with suguru on his birthday even though it goes against his policy to drink because suguru made him want to break systems, made him want to break rules, made him want to make the impossible possible. ... ah, right. they won't be able to celebrate his birthday together anymore. on top of that, it's a saturday, which means there is no class, there is no morning routine of skipping breakfast and drinking inhuman amounts of sugar and caffeine, there is no class and there is no geto suguru, there is no geto suguru, there is no geto - stop it.
gojou takes a deep breath, turns off his phone and goes back to sleep, thinking of thread and dreaming of scissors to cut the thread only to decide he doesn't want to cut it after all so he ties the ends together only to untie them because he shouldn't hold onto any regrets, but it feels disrespectful to suguru's memory so he glues the metaphorical string back together and then cuts it again once it dries because what would suguru think of him? he wakes up at 4 pm. today is a good day. gojou satoru was born! curses across the world, fear his pleasant wrath for your days are numbered! the world is forever changed, the world is forever tipped in favor of humanity. behold, the great teacher gojou satoru! long may he reign! today is a bad day. gojou satoru was born after centuries of careful breeding to produce a child with six eyes and he has never known what it's like to be mundane, to be boring. december 7: the day of the great teacher gojou and he has no friends or family. he is a man-made god who bursts with the pleasantness of the world, which, to be honest, means absolutely nothing. he is nothing. he doesn't remember how, but he finds himself standing where he once stood, confronting suguru about his crime. the city hasn't changed and neither have the people. the crowd walks past him without sparing a glance, minding their own busy lives and everything seems to move so fast in that moment while gojou is frozen in three years of his youth. he feels a tug, rough fingers impulsively wrapping around a thread he swears is real and pulls back like some naïve part of him hopes that suguru is somehow still alive, but knows his thread will simply fall away because gojou cut the thread a long time ago. he sits in his apartment, staring into the city below as he stuffs his face with strawberry shortcake from nanami's bakery, thinking of absolutely nothing and everything at the same time. 'where does it come from,' he wonders. 'the thread that ties people together?' perhaps, it's too romantic of a notion, but today is kind of a romantic day. he thinks not of three birthdays spent, the best in his life, with suguru at his side, loitering at the neighborhood arcade, looking through bookstores to check new releases of manga and eating cake like they were two regular high school boys living regular high school boy lives, but he misses them if he's honest and will miss them for the rest of his life even if he has to carry that secret to his grave. he opens a bottle of sake, intending to drink it alone as depressed lovers do, but he takes one sip and throws the entire bottle away. damn, that burns. so, he opens a bag of dark chocolate, unwraps one and lets the sugar melt on the flat of his tongue while closing his eyes. "happy birthday, satoru." ( the ghost of a fox smile. the soft lilt of his voice. the bittersweetness dissolving on his tongue. )
the thread is there and not there.
‘where does it come from’, he wonders, ‘the thread that ties us together?’
and where does it go?
