The outfit Shoko chose for their beach excursion is cute, Satoru thinks. Waiting around for Haibara and Nanami to get back from the bathrom has given him ample time to appreciate it.
It's nothing too fancy; just a black halter top, pink coverup, low rise jeans and the new converse she'd splurged on last month. Simple, but stylish. She looks good in it.
Apparently, he's not the only one who thinks so.
[Ao3 Link]
The outfit Shoko chose for their beach excursion is cute, Satoru thinks. Waiting around for Haibara and Nanami to get back from the bathrom has given him ample time to appreciate it.
It's nothing too fancy; just a black halter top, pink coverup, low rise jeans and the new converse she'd splurged on last month. Simple, but stylish. She looks good in it.
Apparently, he's not the only one who thinks so.
There's this group of boys on the boardwalk around their age, maybe a little older, who keep looking over at them. If it was a group of girls, Satoru would be a little less peeved. Him and Suguru (and on occasion, Shoko) get stared at by girls all the time. That's nothing new. But these boys keep looking at Shoko, and only her. Satoru isn't a fan.
First of all, it's a group of like, five guys leering at a random girl. Which is certifiably not cool. Second of all, nobody gets to admire Shoko or how good her ass looks in those jeans other than himself and Suguru. Best friend privileges and all that, you know?
Shoko's probably noticed, but she knows better than to say anything. She doesn't like either of them acting as her guard dogs, either, so Satoru's been helplessly watching her text Utahime for about seven minutes now; desperate to do something.
Honestly, he kinda can't take it anymore. He has to ward them off somehow or he might explode. Or they might explode. Someone's probably going to get Blue to the face and explode.
An idea pops into his head. Satoru glares that guys again, then looks at both his classmates. Suguru and Shoko both have their eyes glued to their phone screens, typing away. No one's paying much attention to him....
Well, if it's not obvious he isn't playing guard dog...
Satoru grabs her by the waist, pulling her closer. She very warm against him, and also small. He kinda forgets how short she is, sometimes, until they're close like this. He could just scoop her up, if he wanted too.
Shoko hums, the back of her head brushing his chest. She doesn't look up from her phone, typing away furiously. Her and Utahime are discussing....something. Satoru doesn't know. He hasn't been reading her messages like a freak. He just knows she started typing as soon as the second years left them and hasn't stopped since.
Suguru gives him a look over her head. Satoru nudges his arm and nods his head slightly, in the direction of the Shoko's unwanted admirers. He knows Suguru's noticed, because he's felt him twitching and his cursed energy swirling everytime he looks to their right. It's bothering him, too, because he feels the same about this as Satoru does. Shoko's kinda theirs.
(Suguru's outfit is nice as well, he thinks distantly. The floral green button up and undershirt tucked in to black jeans, the bracelet, the stupid sandals, the belt hanging lose and the painted nails.....both of them together made Satoru feel like a little undressed for the occasion. But like, its the beach, a plain t-shirt and some comfortable shorts were fine...)
He stops giving Satoru the look, sending it quickly to those stupid guys before returning back to his own phone. Satoru thinks Nanami has been sending him slow and pained updates. Knowing those two, the bathroom venture might've take a bit of a detour.
The boys, embarrassed to be caught staring, look away. Satoru relaxes his hold on Shoko's waist, satisfied. Misson accomplished and creeps averted. He's such a good totally not guard dog-
An elbow is nudged not so gently into his ribcage, grabbing his attention. Satoru looks down, curious, at the friend he's totally not guard-dogging right now.
"What was that for?" She asks, seemingly unfazed. She looks up at him then, expression lazy but curious. A half typed out text to Utahime rests on her phone screen. Something about an idol, or some fashion thing he thinks, from the few characters he does catch. He's not really reading them.
"Some guys kept ogling you." He says, not so subtly glaring in the direction where the boys were previously. They've shuffled off now, making themselves busy elsewhere (Good riddance!)
"And you grabbing me scared 'em off?" She asks, eyebrow raised. Like she doesn't believe him or something.
He huffs, amused. They've been friends for what, two years? And she still feels the need to ask that? "Uh, duh? Have you seen my face?"
"My knight in shining armour." Shoko snorts, before going back to her phone. Utahime has, rather impressively, sent her at least eight frantic texts in a row. Lots of emoticons. Satoru wasn't sure she knew how to use though. Or how to do anything fun at all. On the rare occasion they text it's dry and bland, like she's trying to strangle him through the screen.
Ah, the wonders of female friendship.
A minute passes. Haibara and Nanami are still not back. Satoru considers leaving without them. They have phones and basic navigation skills, they'd be fine. Probably. Haibara's not that much of an airhead. Hopefully.
Shoko stiffens under him very briefly, before relaxing again. Satoru, ever in tune to her, notices. He watches as her gaze flicks up, to the right, then back to her phone. His gaze follows hers and-
Oh. Oh you've gotta be kidding.
Not even three minutes later a new group of guys has started looking, despite the possessive hold Satoru still has around her. Which, again, staring at girls like that isn't cool. But when the girls with what looks to be her boyfriend? Extra uncool. Absolutely zero respect for both of them. Satoru is, begrudgingly, starting to understand why Shoko called the "male species a bunch of pigs."
Him and Suguru share another look above her head. Satoru feels his cursed energy swirl again, something a little close to dangerous. A single group of onlookers was already annoying him, but a second one seems to fully set him over the edge.
(He thankfully acts before Satoru and do something stupid. Like nuzzle up to Shoko in public. She'd definitely stop texting and knee him in the crotch for that.)
Suguru disappears from Satoru's left side and reappears on Shoko's right, so that they bracket her. While he doesn't hook an arm around her like Satoru has, he's standing far too close to be friendly. He's practically breathing the same air as she is, a possessive aura coming off him in waves.
Satoru feels himself stare a little. It's not often Suguru lets his domineering tendencies show, mostly because Shoko doesn't like it and Satoru doesn't need it. But, when he does it's.....attractive; for lack of a better term.
It's also very intimidating. Creep number seven of the day meets Suguru's eyes and looks like he's about to piss himself. Satoru has to audibly hold back a laugh.
The second group of assholes stops looking. Mission accomplished, once again. If they have to do this a third time, or if Haibara and Nanami don't get back soon, Satoru might throw Blue at a normie for real.
"You're making a scene." Shoko huffs, suddenly, snapping her phone shut. She looks a little peeved. Probably about the guard dog behavior. Satoru does not feel bad and will not be apologizing.
What did she want them to do? Let like, eight assholes look her up? In that cute little outfit? Not a fat fucking chance. No one's allowed to look but them.
Suguru leans over her a bit, teasing glint in his eye. "Am I?" He knows it does something to her, good or bad depending on the mood, when they tower over her like that. When they lean down, tauntingly, flexing their height and daring Shoko to stare back (which she always does.) Satrou knows it to. He's started to fear it even does something for him as well.
She cranes her head up, resolute. "Yeah."
"No one's looking at us." Satoru points out, helpfully. All those pesky boys have turned their gazes away, and no one else was paying them any mind at all. No scene caused, none at all. All that phone time must be making Shoko go crazy. Blue light and all that, it's bad for you.
"Whatever." Shoko grumbles, her gaze finding the concrete. The tips of her ears have turned a light pinkish-red. "Haibara said they're almost back."
"Finallly." He groans, unconsciously squishing her closer to him. Why does it take almost fifteen minutes to use the damn bathroom? Shoko squirms under his arm, but doesn't pull away. She seems...oddly comfortable there. A little out of character, especially with the heat, but Satoru's not going to question it.
The first years come back. He doesn't stop holding her. Suguru doesn't put a respectable distance between them, either. Nanami gives them a bit of a glare, but their underclassmen don't say anything. They contuine on like this for the rest of the beach trip, only returning back to normal once they return to the dorms that evening.
No more guys stare, and if they do, Satoru and Suguru's presence surely deters them from looking any harder. Misson accomplished.
two slow dancers, I want you to stay ('till i'm in the grave) - 6k Words
Somehow, when Shoko is first introduced to the Fushiguros, the topic of them being an item gets brought up.
Satoru has a lot of feelings about this.
“Good or bad feelings?” Shoko asks when he mentions this to her, cigarette dangling from her fingers. She's halfway through her first afternoon smoke.
“Mixed bag.” He replies. They really need to wean her off those foul smelling things.
She takes a drag, blowing smoke into the air. “Good, we're on the same page.”
_____
or: satoru, shoko, and the hurdles of parenting.
day four of @sashisu-week
The link has decided it doesnt want to insert this morning. Hurray.
Somehow, when Shoko is first introduced to the Fushiguros, the topic of them being an item gets brought up.
Satoru has a lot of feelings about this.
“Good or bad feelings?” Shoko asks when he mentions this to her, cigarette dangling from her fingers. She's halfway through her first afternoon smoke.
“Mixed bag.” He replies. They really need to wean her off those foul smelling things.
She takes a drag, blowing smoke into the air. “Good, we're on the same page.”
He sighs and tries not to wrinkle his nose at the smell. He'll never get used to it, no matter how many times she smokes around him. “Let's just see how the whole kid thing goes, yeah?”
Shoko lets out a hum, noncommittal. An agreement, as good as he's going to get from her. She doesn't say anything to him for the rest of the day.
Satoru stands outside with her until she finishes her smoke.
Kids, huh?
They really will just have to see how it goes.
————————
Against both of their better judgements, they try the whole dating thing out.
It goes….alright.
Nothing about their behavior changes, except that they hold hands a little more than usual and Shoko feels more comfortable invading his personal space when others are around. This, he thinks, is the only sign that anything's changed.
Satoru throwing an arm around her shoulders, tucking her into his side, was normal. Shoko doing anything more than acting casually disinterested or trying to shove him off is not.
They don't tell anyone. He's pretty sure that's how they figure it out.
Yaga offers him a congratulations. Mei Mei makes some crude comment about how much money he's probably paying her to do this. He's pretty sure Utahime trips him down the stairs in an attempt to kill him when he sees her. Nanami, who hears about it through the grapevine, simply sends Shoko a text asking Why?
There's an air of finality around all these interactions, though, and it is so irritating. Satoru's usually a little attention whore, but by the third congratulations he's sick of it. He almost yells at Ijichi when the assistant manager offers his own.
(It's as if they're all saying finally, we were all waiting for this to happen. What took you two so long? Everyone could see it but you.)
He thinks, maybe, they should've kept it a real secret after all.
Outwardly, not much of their behavior changes. Internally, he finds the two of them exploring. Making adjustments as they go. It's…also going alright.
Kissing her is strange. Satoru isn't sure if he likes it.
He likes it sometimes, when Shoko pulls him down by the collar and takes his lips in hers. He likes when she lets him cradle her face and run his fingers through her hair. She's letting it grow out a bit, he likes to marvel in how different yet familiar it all feels. He likes the soft ones, he finds, the ones that don't mean much. And he likes the slow kisses, the ones he can put emotion into and the ones where he can savor how she feels.
He doesn't like the quick ones, or the messy ones. He doesn't like biting each other's lips or teasing nips along his jawline. He doesn't like teething at her, either, it feels strange and foreign. He doesn't like it when their bodies are flushed against each other and the room gets too hot to breathe comfortably. He didn't like it with Suguru, and he certainly doesn't like it with her.
Shoko is not messy and full of a need he knows neither of them really have, she's sharp and slow and methodical and witty enough to keep up with him. Her humor is dry, dark and too much for even Nanami. Her laughs are quiet and jagged and a little ugly, the exact opposite of what cute girls are supposed to laugh like. She's detached; cold and avoidant and always in her own little orbit, the type of person who would get on perfectly in a small nowhere town. She's not hot or messy or the type to press Satoru against a wall like they've been doing. She's everything but.
And Satoru isn't like that, either, at least not with her. In a fight he's like a flash fire, intense and overwhelming. Everywhere else he's laid back, annoying on the best of days and insufferable on the worst. He eats sweets like he needs them to survive and makes stupid jokes because part of him is forever stuck at seven years old. His humor has always been just the right amount of morbid, even before the Sorcerer Killer came along. It's half the reason he and Shoko first started talking. He laughs too loud for any room he's in and, between the two of them left, he's the one with all the energy and the one dragging Shoko to things she'd rather not do. He's avoidant in a different way, letting people see him but not really see him, unless they had the misfortune of knowing sixteen year old him. He's witty enough to keep up with Shoko, but not smooth. He isn't the type to press her against walls, either, yet here he is doing it anyways.
He isn't sure if he likes being a couple, if this is what couples do. Not with her.
(And Suguru was a perfect mix of them both, the bridge between them and a match to Satoru's flame all at once. He was as smart as the two of them, with humor equally as dark. He didn't laugh too loud, or too quiet, and sounded exactly like you expected him to. He talked philosophy in a way a mere teenager shouldn't, a gleam in his eyes. He was quick and rash and had a selfish streak, a direct opposition to the calm outer layer he presented. Between the two of them, he was always better with girls. And boys, when the opportunity arose. Suguru was the smooth one, the type to press someone against a wall and purr sweet nothings into their ears. Knowing this makes Satoru and Shoko's already poor imitations look even worse for wear.
They are off balance without him here. This much is obvious. It is perhaps the reason they are trying to make the kissing work when it is so clearly not.)
They also cuddle, but this is not new. They've been curling up in each other's beds since their first six months of friendship. It would be weird if Shoko didn't cuddle with him. That's like, the only normal thing about this situation.
(People who date are supposed to have sex. Satoru doesn't even think of doing it once.
They don't talk about it, either, so this is fine. Acceptable, even. He doesn't want to if she doesn't.)
Regardless, they date. The wedge between them widens. It's been widening for a while now, but he really starts to feel it crack open when the relationship starts.
This wedge was partly made by Suguru's departure and partly by their own hands. Not really on purpose, but carved by them nonetheless. Satoru thinks this is just the natural order of things, how it goes when one part of your shared soul rots. The distance creeps in, and not easily repairable distance that comes with aging.
The kind you have to work and fail and work on to even try and bridge. The kind that comes after loss.
He can feel it growing, in the way Shoko seeks him out less and less. How she seems actually annoyed by his playful visits to his office instead of the faux annoyance she's always presented before. How his offers to buy her lunch are accepted begrudgingly. It's like she already spent too much time with him before, when they were normal co-workers, and the new found relationship has finally pushed her patience with him over the edge.
It's a stark contrast to their youth, where they spent damn near every second together. Him, her, and Suguru, practically attached at the hip.
He feels that if the wedge between them widens it's going to become a chasm. Impossible to cross.
They start dating. The wedge becomes an almost abyss.
And then the Fushiguros happen and maybe…
He thinks, maybe just maybe, the kids can help it mend.
————————
Three weeks in and Satoru doesn't think this is working.
Tsumiki and Megumi don't view Shoko as someone with authority over them, he realizes; they think she's just the girlfriend. They barely think Satoru is there to stay. And they definitely don't think Shoko will. Like she's just….just a temporary figure in his life. A cool girl he's gonna dump in a few weeks or replace when sorcery inevitably catches up to her.
(He wouldn't. He would never. He loves Shoko so much the mere idea of doing so makes him want to hurl.)
This bothers him. It bothers him greatly.
Satoru doesn't want the kids to view Shoko as just his girlfriend. He wants them to view her as Shoko, because Shoko's awesome. She's more than just a girlfriend, she's his best friend. She's the coolest person he's ever known. She's the only one who gets him, after third year.
And also Satoru kinda doesn't want to date her. There's also that.
It took him like, a month of dating her to realize that. But yeah. He kinda doesn't want to, nor did he ever. That's probably why being in a relationship with her feels so weird, why he doesn't like the kissing, and why it's turning the wedge between them into a gaping chasm.
This relationship is working for nobody. The logical course of action would be to call things off. But, Satoru has a bit of a problem.
He's scared to break-up with her.
What if it makes work really awkward? What if it ruins their friendship? What if she's actually into him and thinks Satoru was just leading her on? Or trying to make him parent his kids for her? What if he tries to break up with her and Shoko hates him and never speaks to him again.
(He tried to end things with Suguru once, and look at how that turned out.)
He just….he wants to keep her. It's probably selfish, but wants to keep her. Needs to have Shoko by his side, almost. (And now, realistically, he could function perfectly fine without her.
But having two best friends ripped away from him, one after another, is something he doesn't think he can handle.)
And if he has to suffer through this dating thing to not lose her, then he'll do it. He'll hate it, but he'll do it.
“I don't wanna date you.” He tells her over dinner, two agonizing weeks after his realization.
They are supposed to be on a date right now. They're at a fancy restaurant she convinced him to splurge on, glasses of hundred dollar whine in front of them.
He didn't mean to say it. Satoru was just thinking about the dinner and how he really wished it was a normal friend dinner instead and he just….blurted it out.
For about five seconds, Satoru is convinced he just ruined everything and his life is over.
Then, Shoko visibly sags with relief. “Oh thank fuck.”
“Oh, good, we're on the same page.” Satoru says, unable to help the grin that stretches across his face. It's the widest he's smiled in days.
“Did you think we weren't?” She raises an eyebrow, shoving another piece of grilled salmon in her mouth.
He shrugs. “I can't read you sometimes. For all I know you were deeply in love with me and I was about to break your heart.”
She laughs, actually laughs, and pushes the greens she doesn't like onto his plate. Satoru beams.
And just like that, the dynamic is the way it used to be before.
They finish their food. Satoru steals half the stuff off her plate and she finishes almost all of his wine. She doesn't get dessert, but takes a few bites from what he orders when offered. Satoru makes a joke about her paying the bill, since this restaurant was her idea and all, and gets glared at it. He pays the bill anyways and Shoko thanks him by inviting herself over for the night.
Exactly the way it was before.
(God, he's missed her.)
“Did you wanna date Suguru?” She asks when they get back to his apartment, kicking off her shoes. Originally, this was a dinner and movie and kissing night. Now, it's a Shoko gets her reports done and Satoru bothers her night. (The kissing is not off the table, even if they had just broken up. He likes the slow ones and has a feeling she does, too.)
“No, maybe. I don't know.” He says. Was Gojo Satoru in love with Geto Suguru is a simple question with a complicated answer. And that had been the case before and after he left them. “Did you?”
“Yes.” She takes her usual seat on the couch, retrieving her paperwork from where she left it on the coffee table.
Satoru looks over at her, a little wide eyed. He didn't think she'd actually answer that question truthfully, let alone give him a yes.
She blinks at him when he doesn't reply. “What?”
“Nothin'” He says, honestly. “Just wasn't expecting that.”
In hindsight, it was a little obvious. She always stared at him during training, always let him light his cigarettes with hers. And, really, Satoru should've questioned it when Suguru tasted like her chapstick and had marks that Satoru definitely didn't give him.
But well, hindsight is twenty twenty and he and Suguru had vastly different ideas of what their relationship had been. At the time, all of that had seemed normal.
Didn't make him from a year ago any less stupid, though.
“I have a weakness for boys with piercings and questionable moral compasses” She says, shrugging her work coat off, leaving her in just jeans and a turtleneck. Satoru has told her to wear something else a million times. She looks good in a turtleneck, he'll admit, but it's summer and the school doesn't have air conditioning. She's gonna give herself heat stroke.
He can't have the other parent of his kids getting heat stroke, now can he?
(Even if she's a stubborn mule who'll probably never listen to his advice.)
He snorts. “I think we both do.”Shoko crosses one leg over the other, clicking her pen. Satoru settles on the couch next to her, more than happy to prattle on mindlessly while she does useless adult things.
“Is this fine?” He asks after, their noses bumping and breaths mingling. Her work sits half done in the middle of his table, complete with her (surprisingly) neat doctor's scribble. Two mugs of cold hot chocolate sit between them. Satoru hadn't asked if she wanted a cup when he grabbed the mix. Just knew she would.
“This is fine,” She confirms. One hand comes up to cup his jaw and Satoru leans into it. “But nothing else.”
“Good.” He smiles and places a quick kiss on her lips. Shoko ruffles his hair affectionately. Satoru mumbles into her neck and asks her to stay the night. Have a real best friend sleepover again, not whatever they've been doing before.
She says that she'll think about it if Satoru helps her finish her paperwork.
He's never written reports with such enthusiasm before.
————————
So, they're not dating and Satoru wanting to break up didn't make their friendship weird and awkward forever. Great!
But there's still one issue: they've already presented themselves as a couple to a bunch of important people during the adoption process. Like, a couple who intends to stay together and probably get married and raise these two kids together. It'd be awkward if they announced that they broke up within the month, actually, and Satoru already had a hard enough time getting guardianship of kids he had absolutely no legal connection too.
When he brings this up to Shoko, she just laughs. “We'll just have to keep the act up, won't we.”Satoru smiles so wide his cheeks hurt. “I suppose we will.”
————————
They take care of the Fushiguro's together. The wedge starts to mend.
Well, the part they made themselves mends. The hole Suguru made is never going to be filled, not even if he comes back. Which he won't, wouldn't if they ever asked.
But the wedge is not as wide as it was before. Shoko seeks him now instead of closing herself off, and he seeks her out, too. That's all that matters.
They're not dating anymore, but their lives are more intertwined than they were before their short little relationship.
They're not dating, no, but they share a bedroom. Shoko wakes him up at ass o'clock in the morning everyday because she's insane. And an insomniac. And has to be at campus by six. Satoru doesn't have to be there until seven thirty at least, barring extenuating circumstances. She makes an extra serving of her breakfast for him. Satoru's pretty sure it's the only reason she eats in the morning.
He manages to convince her to move into his apartment. It still has extra space even after Megumi and Tsumiki barreled into. It'd be more convenient to have here if they're gonna be coparenting. Plus he doesn't like the area her shitty complex is in. That place is so miserable it's practically asking to have a curse form.
Shoko agrees with only a little grumbling, and a month after the breakup they're sharing a room. Which is funny, because it usually goes in the opposite order.
Tsumiki is happy to have Shoko moving in; she says it'll be fun to have another girl in the house because Megumi won't let her do his nails and Satoru's too busy. Megumi could not care less. He approaches it with the same general disinterest he approaches everything with. He only asks if Shoko moving in means Satoru is moving out. (No, no it does not. The little tyke is gonna have to try harder than that to get rid of him. Like a lot harder. He's got adoption papers and everything.)
Honestly, Satoru's a little surprised at how easy the kids are taking this.
He expected them to have a hard time adjusting, especially considering the break-up. He knows kids need, like, a stable home situation or whatever, and these two definitely have not had that. He and Shoko's breakup just feels like another thing that's going to screw with their little six year old heads.
But they were fine with it.
(At some point, between the start and now, they learned that if Satoru stays then so will Shoko and vice versa.)
They're also fine with the pretend relationship, another thing he was worried would upset them. In fact, they're actually kinda on board with it.
Tsumiki thinks the fake relationship is hilarious and Megumi thinks it's stupid and annoying. They both agree to go along with it in front of their teachers and any other important people. (The little urchin head is in on the joke regardless, because Satoru hears him referring to Shoko as his “guardian's girlfriend” around his teachers. The little shit.)
Satoru is probably a little too giddy about these kids agreeing to lie to their teachers for him, but it can't be helped. This fake relationship plan is honestly kinda ridiculous. He can't believe they're actually gonna pull it off.
And then Shoko has a bit of a brilliant idea and they take it a step further and Satoru doesn't think he's ever loved her more.
They start telling people they're engaged for shits and giggles.
It's the greatest thing one of them has ever cooked up, he swears.
Shoko is, in fact, not his fiance, but the people at Megumi's school don't need to know that. They're Mr. Gojo and Mrs. Ieiri-soon-to-be-Gojo and if they don't get married while Megumi's in grade school, well they were going too, but life just happened. Raising two kids is a lot and they just haven't had the time, but they're working on it!
They're not even dating and will never be getting married, but that's the story they're going with.
(And, somehow, miraculously, it works until Megumi's graduating middle school and it's time to ship him off to Jujutsu High.It's the greatest prank Satoru's ever played in his life. They never tell their co-workers the truth, even when they don't need the ruse anymore. It's just that good.
He and Shoko will be laughing about it until he's dead.)
————————
Taking care of two young children is not easy.
Satoru didn't think it would be, but he's never dealt with kids before. Like at all. He doesn't think he's interacted with anyone younger than him ever. And Shoko's experience is just as good as his.It's not easy, but they're working on it
.….working on it kinda feels like an understatement, though. Taking care of kids is really, really hard.
Satoru feels more out of his depth than he ever has in his life. As a sorcerer, he's the Strongest. The first Six Eyes in four hundred years. Unbeatable in battle. The one person practically keeping Jujutsu Society from falling apart, if you will.
As a parent, he feels like a complete failure.
He flops through it like a fish out of water, struggling with every little challenge, every curve ball the kids throw at him. And kids throw a lot of curve balls at you. The first few months feel like nothing but a string of failures.
It takes him like, a month to remember that kids need healthy food, not the junk he constantly shoves into his body. He almost forgets to get them ready for school like, half of the time. He forgets about bath time. One of them scrapes their knee and he overreacts at the sight of a little blood. Tsumiki will ask him to play with her and he'll stumble around the game awkwardly, because Satoru himself was never allowed the luxury of playing the children his age. Megumi doesn't engage with him at all.
He gets better at all of this, slowly but surely. But the first three or so months after they adopt the Fushiguros are rough on his self esteem, to say the least.
Shoko's better at it than him. This much is obvious.
She stumbles a little bit at the start but is quick to get back on her feet. She overcomes every curveball the kids throw at her with more grace than he does, probably because she has to work with people all the time. And kids are just smaller, less experienced people.
She's not good at playing, not like Satoru is when he gets the hang of it, but she doesn't freak out over small injuries and doesn't forget to take them to school or give them a bath. She actually feeds them food they need to grow, instead of the cheap takeout Satoru gets into the bad habit of buying. Hell, she even starts cooking when her shift ends early.
Shoko is not the perfect parent, nobody is, but she's doing a lot better than him.
She's good with Megumi, like, a lot better with him than he is. He actually does what she tells him to when she tells him to. Satoru's lucky if Megumi even does what he asks at all.
Currently, the two of them are at a stalemate of sorts. Satoru could see his repeated attempts to interact with him were annoying Megumi, so he backed off. He didn't wanna scare the boy away.
He backs off, and resolves to try a different method on a different day.
Him and Tsumiki mesh a lot better. This is probably because, compared to her brother, Tsumiki is an easy child. She doesn't scowl at Satoru when he tells her to brush her teeth, she's more than happy to try anything once, and has this weird, adult-like patience about her whenever Satoru stumbles.
That last part is actually not so great. Like, yeah, it's easier to recover from a parenting flop when your kid is patient about it, but she shouldn't be so eerily calm with him. She's six. She should be emotional and reactive and loud when something goes wrong, at least to a degree. Not…compliant with it.
(It reminds Satoru a little too much of how he was as a kid. It's creepy.)
Other than that, Tsumiki is an easy child compared to her brother.
He does have to tell her she's not allowed to do things like laundry and washing the dishes. She and Megumi can do that when they're older, but not now. Those are jobs for him and Shoko.
Tsumiki pouts, and says she did them before, so she should be able to keep doing them now. Satoru, as gently as he can, tells her no.
She runs off and hides in her room for most of the day, not coming out when he asks. Which sucks, because Shoko's on shift right now and he kinda has a mission in like, five minutes.
He sighs, and tells Megumi to bring his sister lunch before teleporting away.
It's the one argument they ever have.
It's resolved within the day, because Tsumiki is far too kind for her own good.(This is one of the many, many, many times he's grateful she cannot see curses. Jujutsu would chew her up and spit her out a suffering, wounded impersonation of the girl she used to be. It would kill that kindness, slowly but surely, until it was eroded into dust.
The world needs kind people like her. He's glad Jujutsu won't take her from him like it's taken everything else.)
She finds him before bedtime, her head hanging in shame.
“I'm sorry I was mean earlier.” She apologizes with a sniffle, her favorite stuffed rabbit clutched in her hand.
“It's fine, I wasn't upset at you.” He reassures her, gentle. The sight of one of his crying makes part of him ache.
“You weren't?” She looks up at him, eyes wide and far too teary for such a silly squabble.
(Satoru wants to find whoever hurt these two before and make them bleed.)
“Nope!” He offers her the biggest smile he can manage.
(Part of him thinks all the people who aren't kind become Jujutsu Sorcerers.But that can't be true, because Suguru was kind. Disgustingly so. So much it was part of the reason he fell.
Maybe, the kind people that Jujutsu takes become something worse.)
“I didn't want you to go to bed thinking I was upset at you.” She continues, still sniffling. But she sounds a little less sad now, so that's good.
“That's very sweet, ‘Miki.” He crouches down to her level, keeping that grin as bright as he can make it. “Did Shoko already put ‘Gumi to bed?”
“Mhmm.” She hums, wiping at her eyes.
“Well, it's probably time you join him then, huh? It's pretty late.”
“Yeah, I guess.”
“C'mon, up we go.” He mutters, crouching down. Tsumiki yawns and allows herself to be lifted off the ground, her arms wrapping around his neck. Satoru hums, and starts down the hallway.
She's asleep before they even reach her room, drooling into the crook of his neck. Which, cute, but also ew.
He tucks her into bed with a smile, then heads to his own bed for the night.
“You're good with them, the kids.” He says, joining Shoko in their own room. She's sitting on the bed in her favorite robe, mindlessly flipping through TV channels. A glass of wine and what looks to be the Infirmary's most recent medical reports lay on the nightstand next to her.
Yeah, those aren't getting done. Not anymore.
“You think so?” She asks, not taking her eyes off the TV as he joins her.
“Yeah.” Satoru rests his head on her lap.
“Didn't think you'd be good with kids.” She tells him, blunt.
“I didn't think so, either.” Out of habit, one of her hands finds its way to his hair. He leans into it. “I'm kinda not.”
“You are, just in different ways than me.” She stops scrolling, setting the remote next to her paperwork and looking down at him. “You're the fun parent.”
“I don't need to be the fun parent, I need to be a parent parent, like you are.” He groans, throwing an arm over his face. Being the fun parent is fine in moderation, but not when that's all the kids expect you to be. Not when one of them doesn't even take you seriously.
“That'll come with time.”
“How are you so good with them, anyways?” He asks, looking at her from over his arm.
A smile spreads across Shoko's face, a little devious. “They teach you how to work with kids in med school.”
“So you treat them like patients?"
“Yep.”
“Oh my god.” He laughs. “You're treating our kids like little test subjects. You're a horrible fake-wife.”
“Shut up.” She says, a giggle in her voice, and goes back to flipping mindlessly through the channels.
“Suguru would be better at this.” He says, abruptly. It's a thought that's been plaguing him, as of late. He guesses it just…came out, since they were on the topic.
Under him, he feels her still. “Yeah.”
(Suguru wouldn't be a perfect parent, no, far from it. But he'd be better than them. Because he was kind in a way both of them lacked. Kind in a way Satoru feats that both of them, far too jaded at only eighteen, can give these kids.
He had that stupid righteousness about him too, the one that made him responsible where Satoru wasn't. He was strict where Shoko was lenient, too. He was their third, the one who took their flaws and rounded them out. He made them whole.
And here they are, doing their best to function without him.
Suguru wouldn't be the best parent, but he'd probably do better than this.)
“How do you get Megumi to listen to you?” He breaks the silence, glancing back up at her. Satoru pointedly ignores the lump in his throat and heavy feeling in his chest.
She looks back at him too, curious. “Does he not listen to you?”
“Nope.” He hums, popping the p.
“Maybe you need to change your approach.”
“My approach?”
“Instead of treating him like a nuclear bomb, treat him like a stray cat.”
Satoru blinks, puzzled. “..Okay?”
“You don't get it, do you?” Shoko sighs, like she didn't just spout a bunch of nonsense at him at, he glances at the clock, nine thirty at night and expect him to understand it.
“Nope, not at all.”
She sighs, leaning down and placing a kiss on his forehead. “You're so stupid.”
“And you're bad at explaining things.” He cranes his neck up, chasing her lips. Shoko hums, and lets him steal a kiss instead of responding.
She's bad at explaining things, but she's right.
He'll figure out this parenting thing eventually, he just needs to give it time.
————————
He may talk about Shoko like she's perfect but she, surprisingly, also has her flaws.
This becomes more and more apparent as they get further into the school year.
Satoru is lenient when it comes to the kids' schoolwork. Shoko is not.
It makes sense, when he thinks about it. She busted her ass off to get into medical school early, and Megumi is trying to fail second grade math. He thinks good grades have become a source of pride for her, a far cry from the Shoko he started high school with.
But still, she could stand to go a little easier on them.
(“Tsumiki isn't failing because she's our perfect little angel.”
“They're six, Sho.”)
It gets to a point where Satoru bans her from helping them with homework. Shoko is someone who's never had much patience, and she's also very bad at teaching. He only lets her and Tsumiki struggle through science homework for a week before he intervenes. It's clearly not working, best to nip the issue in the bud before she and Megumi start throwing words over a social studies worksheet.
Plus, Satoru just has more time. Special Grade privileges and all that. Yeah, he gets yelled at practically every time he “slacks off” to go see his kids, but he's Gojo Satoru. All his missions and stuff still get done at the end of the day.
The old farts up top will learn to stop complaining soon, if they know what's good for them.
So, he becomes the one who sits down with the kids after school and does their homework with them.
This, somehow, is what makes Megumi start listening to him.
He helps Megumi understand multiplication. In response, the kid stops glaring at him whenever Satoru asks him to bring a plate to the sink, or to humor Tsumiki and finally let her paint his nail.He doesn't look pleased at being told what to do exactly, but he stops looking pissed off about it and actually does what he's told; Satoru doesn't even need to threaten to go get Shoko anymore, or God forbid actually get her.
This is a massive improvement. Satoru tries and fails to not be too excited about it, lest Megumi go back to not listening.
But he doesn't. He keeps listening after that, even when he's mastered his timetables and had his report card hung on the fridge.
He even lets Satoru start picking him up, too. Only sometimes, but Megumi barely let him hold his hand before, much less lift him into the air. Satoru was lucky if he could get a hair ruffle in without the kid trying to bite his fingers off.
But he's listening. He's being more receptive. They're finally getting somewhere instead of just standing at a stalemate like they had been.
And maybe, just maybe, he's getting a hold of this parenting thing after all.
————————
(“Are you our dad?” Tsumiki asks one morning.
“I'm not even twenty. I can't be a dad.” He responds, and tells her to go brush her teeth. They're gonna be late to school if she doesn't.
“Is Shoko our mom?” She asks the next evening.
“No.” Satoru scrunched up his nose at the thought. Shoko and Mom do not go together in his head. He tells her to wash up for dinner. Shoko's getting everyone take-out, since she's actually off shift in time to eat with them.
“Are we a family?” Tsumiki asks two days later, a Saturday. He's taken her and her brother out for ice cream at Megumi's request. They're in line for it now.
He smiles. “Of course we are.”
Satoru reaches down and messes up both of his kids' hair. Megumi scowls and kicks him in the ankle. Tsumiki laughs loud enough to light up the entire street.
He wouldn't trade the two of them for anything.)
————————
Shoko's splayed out on the bed beside him, dead to the world. It's the first thing Satoru sees when he wakes up. Her hair is a tangled mess on the pillow, and her boobs are threatening to spill out of her tank top. She's going to complain about both when she wakes up.
(“Stop wearing tank tops to bed then.” Satoru will say. They have this exchange at least once a week.
“But they're comfortable.” Shoko will pout, which she only does when she's sleepy. She will proceed to not take his very sound advice and keep sleeping in tank tops, and then the issue will crop up again next week. Satoru thinks that, maybe, this is what's wrong with her.
He can't offer any advice about the hair, though. His isn't long enough to have that issue. She should just cut it short again, or get a better hair type. Or be perfect like him. Not his fault that his hair is perfect and hers isn't.)
The kids are shoved awkwardly between them, Tsumiki curled into a ball against his chest and Megumi starfished out. He takes up half the damn bed, his foot and his little first pressing into Satoru's ribcage. It's as painful as it is cute.
(You think Megumi would be the one to sleep all cat-like but nope, it's his sister. They're funny like that, kids are, opposite in all the ways you think they wouldn't be. It's fascinating.
Satoru's so excited to learn more of their little quirks, to watch them grow. He can't wait.)
The kids have started sneaking into their room every night, opening the door and crawling into bed with them. Shoko makes some half-hearted comments about this disrupting her beauty sleep. Satoru says she wasn't getting any beauty sleep to begin with, and tells them to come in if theh want to. It's a king bed. It's big enough for the four of them.
Well, at first it was sneaking. He's started to leave the door unlocked, much to Shoko's initial grumpyness. But she didn't complain too loudly, nor has she kicked them out even once, so the kids are more than welcome to stay if it helps them sleep.
So, here they are. Megumi and Tsumiki shoved between them, sound asleep and drooling into their pillows. Shoko's even reaching for one of them in her sleep, like she always does when something warm lays next to her, her hand nearly clutching Megumi's.
This. This is the sight he's been waking up to every morning for the past two weeks. (And, don't tell anyone, but he thinks it's his favorite.)
Shoko spends a lot of sleepless nights staring at the moon.
Her, the moon, a lighter, and a bad decision.
It's quiet. Shoko likes the quiet. You wouldn't think this with how much she hangs around Satoru, but she does.
Suguru joins her, sometimes.
_______
on shoko, satoru, suguru and love
day seven of @sashisu-week
Ao3 Link
Moon, a hole of light
Through the big top tent up high
Here before and after me
Shinin' down on me
————————
Shoko spends a lot of sleepless nights staring at the moon.
Her, the moon, a lighter, and a bad decision.
It's quiet. Shoko likes the quiet. You wouldn't think this with how much she hangs around Satoru, but she does. (Satoru incessant chatter is different from other noises though. It's a steady background hum, an anchor. She's grown used to it, so much so that the world feels off balance when something finally, finally shuts him up.
When Satoru stops talking, she's learned that's when you start to worry.)
The quiet’s been her friend since she was young. It sheltered her in quiet stairwells and in a house where the air was unwelcoming. It gave her much needed reprieve.
Her, the moon, a cigarette, and the quiet. If she closes her eyes, she can almost imagine she's at her father's house again.
Almost.
Suguru joins her, sometimes. They never speak, only wordlessly pass a cigarette or two between them. She finds her way to the roof and he follows, both of them leaning against the railing that wasn't there at the start of the year. Yaga's figured they come up here, she thinks. Doesn't want them to fall.
She wonders why he doesn't just tell them to stop.
Probably because it would never work.
Suguru lights his cigarettes with her own, their faces inches apart. Shoko stopped offering him a lighter, because he never took it. She thinks he does this to see if he can get a reaction out of her.
He hasn't gotten one yet, and he isn't going to. She's not easy to fluster.
So it becomes a game they play. They chainsmoke together on the roof. Shoko offers him a cigarette, Suguru lights it on her own, she doesn't react, repeat cycle.
Repeat cycle, until either the sun comes up or they run out of cigarettes. They stumble back to the dorms close to dawn, on these nights, only catching scant hours of sleep before classes begin. And Yaga will complain about two thirds of his class falling asleep during lessons, but he will not ban access to the roof. He will not tell them to stop. Instead, he will build a railing for them to lean on and for Shoko to put out her smokes.
In the morning Satoru, the early riser of their trio, will make them coffee. And Shoko, who perpetually runs on four hours of sleep no matter the day, will slump against him and allow Suguru to press her favorite mug into her hands.
(She likes using Satoru as a pillow, he's warm. Boney, yes, but in a comfortable way. But don't tell him that. It'll only serve to make his head even bigger.
She likes using Suguru as one, too, since he's just as comfortable. But in the mornings he's busy either using her or Satoru as one, his face nuzzled into one of their shoulders. Satoru works perfectly fine in his stead.)
She dozes as she listens to her classmates' low conversations, taking slow sips of her drink. Eventually their underclassmen will file in. Haibara and Nanami's voice will join the fray, the latter joining her in tiredly sipping coffee before class and the former making sure all five of them eat something.
It gets a little loud, with four voices (five, sometimes, if she wants to chime in) overlapping each other. Someone's always doing something; talking, moving, Satoru and Haibara poking and prodding at Suguru and Nanami respectively. Shoko watches through half closed eyes, sipping her coffee with a smile.
Mornings aren't quiet like her nights are, but that's fine. Shoko's grown to like the noise, too.
————————
Moon, tell me if I could
Send up my heart to you?
So when I die, which I must do
Could it shine down here with you?
————————
Suguru's dying.
He doesn't really want to die, not yet, not now, but he knows it can't be helped. His arm had been blown clean off and there's a hole in his side. Blood drips on the ground after him in a thick trail, all the way from the site of his final battle to the alleyway he finally collapses in. Every movement, every breath is pain. This is something even Reversed Cursed Technique couldn't fix.
Not that they would spare any RCT for him.
Suguru doesn't want to die, not yet, not now, with his life incomplete. But he supposes he doesn't have a choice. Especially now. Because,
Satoru's here.
He was always going to be.
Suguru doesn't want to die, but it's been a long time coming. It was written in the stars long before they even knew of each other. He thinks he maybe even deserves it. To die.
“You're late again as usual, Satoru.”
Satoru's here, he knows because he can feel his presence. He'd be able to, with or without cursed energy, with or without a decade apart. Once he felt it during their first meeting there was no way he could ever forget it. The taste of it was burned into his memory, as familiar as his own energy was.
Suguru doesn't look at him because he doesn't think he can. Moving hurts. He thinks, if Satoru doesn't get it over with soon, he's going to pass out before he gets to say his last words.
Satoru gets on with it, and
They talk. It's about everything and nothing. The past and the present all at once. The mall, the elementary school, the curses Suguru sent after his students, why Satoru sent two children to fight him. He doesn't think any of it really matters, not anymore. Yet, they talk.
It's the first proper conversation they've had in ten years.
There's a lot of things he should be saying that he isn't. They talk about the last few months instead. He doesn't know why.
It's kinda funny that they still know each other so well. That Satoru still trusts his principles. (To think, he missed Satoru so much it was an all consuming ache. And now that they're here…
Maybe his ideals were childish. Maybe he will die a coward after all.)
“I don't think I could wear a heartfelt smile in this world.” He says one thing he needs to say, and thinks it may be a lie. If Shoko and Satoru had been there, well….
Maybe.
But that chance passed a while ago.
Lots of things passed a while ago. The aforementioned chance. Suguru's youth. The idea that maybe, just maybe, he won't die young. The idea of Satoru killing him being stupid because they were the strongest. All of that's gone now.
Especially the last one. Right now, the notion sounds almost funny.
Their final conversation ends. Suguru knows its time.
Satoru crouches a few feet away from him, hands clasped between his knees. There's a look on his face, one Suguru wishes he could understand. He used to be able to, a long time ago. That season of their lives has passed, just like everything else.
“Suguru…”
.
.
.
He leans his head back against the alley wall and laughs, his cheeks dusted pink. “At least curse me a little, at the end.”
————————
'Cause my love is mine, all mine
My love mine, mine, mine
Nothing in the world belongs to me
But my love, mine, all mine, all mine
————————
“Can you do this for me?” Shoko asks, throwing her math homework on his desk. The way she says it makes it more of a demand than anything.
“If you pay me.” He asks, not even looking at the paper. Satoru is currently engrossed in Suguru's English homework, which he's doing because Suguru sucks at it and offered to pay. (He's not sure what the problem is, verbs are like, easy. He's half convinced Suguru's just faking how bad he is so he doesn't have to do it.
And Satoru doing his homework is fair, anyways. Suguru does his science homework, because he already knows all that shit and filling the worksheets out is so boring.)
“You're rich.” She says, scooting the paper closer towards him. This is true. He is rich. Very very rich. But, he's not some hapless, bullied nerd his classmates can shove their homework onto. This nepo baby knows how to bargain.
Satoru looks up at her with a scowl. “I bought you three weeks worth of cigarettes.” He didn't think Shoko would be this needy when he met her. Or lazy. Wait, no, he kinda did think she'd be lazy, but not this much.
“Asshole.” She huffs. There's no heat behind her words. Because Satoru bought her three weeks worth of cigarettes not even a full forty eight hours ago. She cannot be mad at him for at least the next week.
(Suguru had scowled and said he's promoting a bad habit. But Suguru also smokes so he's a big fat hypocrite.Plus, if Shoko doesn't smell like cigarette smoke and ash, is it really even her?)
“I'm your asshole.” He grins, fixing Suguru's subject-verb agreement.Shoko rudely wrinkles her nose at him, like he's not the man who bought her three precious weeks of tobacco. “Suguru can have you.”
“I don't want him.” Suguru calls from across the classroom, not looking up from Satoru's DS. The one he'd so rudely taken out of his hands three days ago and hasn't yet given it back yet. Apparently he wants to play through one of Satoru's various Pokémon games. (Even though the Digimon ones were obviously better.)
“Hey!” He says, whipping around. Suguru keeps playing his game, unbothered by the pout now directed at him.
Shoko taps a nail against his desk, impatient. “So, my homework?”
Satoru turns back to her with a huff. “You still need to pay me.”
“You don't need money.” She points out again. She's right, he doesn't need her money. But once again, he's a nepo baby who knows how to negotiate.
“You can pay me with something other than money, ya know.” He leans forward against the desk with a purr, making sure his sunglasses slip suavely down his face. “Suguru did~”
She raises an eyebrow. “With what? A blowjob?”
“Shoko!” Suguru yells, scandalized, like Satoru didn't make the same joke when he offered his alternative method of payment.
“I mean, if you-”
Suddenly Suguru is next to them, slapping a hand over Satoru's mouth. Shoko cackles. “Don't finish that sentence.”
“I'm not doing that, by the way.” Shoko adds.
“I didn't suck him off!” Suguru snaps.
Their classmate still does not look like she believes them. (Damn, do they really act that gay?)
“Well if you didn't suck his dick how else did you pay him?” She glances between them, expectant. He looks to Suguru, also expectant.
The lady has asked for a demonstration. It'd be rude not to give her one.
Suguru leans down, taking Satoru's lips in his. He smiles into it, expecting the kiss to be like it was last time. Gentle, sweet, and slow. It is not like this.
Suguru kisses him messy, all teeth and tongue. Satoru ends up whining into his mouth, Suguru's hands fisting at the nape of his neck. It's a hot, needy thing, this kiss is. Satoru thinks he gets a little lost in it.
Suguru didn't kiss him that hard the first time, he was definitely just showing off to Shoko. Not that he's complaining. But like woah, warn a guy first.
“Like that.” Suguru pulls away with a purr. He leaves Satoru panting and happily disoriented. “Think you can deliver?”
He recovers quickly, glancing back to the girl in front of his desk. “You don't have to if you don't want to-”
Shoko smashes their lips together before he can finish, her hands reaching out to grab his face. Satoru makes a surprised noise but kisses her back, eager.
Her lips are softer than Suguru's, less chapped. He can taste her cherry lipgloss and the peppermint gum she'd been chewing this morning. She runs her thumbs over his cheeks, a little noise escaping from the back of her throat. Satoru thinks he's going to melt right then and there.
She climbs into his lap without breaking the kiss, trusting that he'll catch her if she stumbles. Satoru's hands fumble for purchase on her waist, doing exactly that. He feels her familiar weight settling over him and whines this kiss, too,
(Somewhere behind them, Suguru wolf whistles.)
She pulls away slowly, teeth dragging along his lower lip. Satoru pants into her mouth, his eyes half lidded. She giggles when he tries to chase her lips for more.
Shoko slides his glasses back up his nose before moving away, a satisfied grin stretching across her face. “So, will you do my homework now?”
Her fingers trace the edge of his jaw. He fights back an involuntary shiver at the tease.
“Yeah.” He giggles. God he sounds so stupid like that. But Shoko's the one who made him sound lovestruck and dumb so he doesn't even care.
She pats his cheek. “Good boy.”
Both of her classmates blush at that, Satoru staring up at her dumbly and Suguru spluttering. Shoko simply hops off the former's lap with a snicker, very, very satisfied.
Before she sits down, a hand catches her wrist.
“Don't I get one?” Suguru asks, blinking imploringly.
She looks up at him, unimpressed. “Seriously?”
“Yes, seriously.” He says, tugging at her wrist again. If Shoko knew Suguru was gonna feel all left out, she probably wouldn't have kissed Satoru at all.
“Fine.” She sighs. The stupid boy in front of her practically beams.
Suguru bends down because he's a real gentleman. Satoru would've made her stand on her tip toes. “Hey pretty girl.”
“Shut up.” She huffs, bumping their noses together.
Suguru licks into her mouth with a quiet laugh, kisses her slow and languid. She smiles against his lips, fights him a little when he tries to take control of the kiss. Nips at him and tugs at his hair when he gets a bit too cocky. She's not like Satoru; she won't be going pliant in any pretty boys' hold.
(Satoru watches them with vague fascination. It's kinda hot, watching them kiss. He thinks he'd like to be sandwiched between that.)
They break apart, Suguru placing one last peck to her cheek before he leans away. He couldn't help himself, really, not when it came to her. Shoko just laughs.
“Are you gonna call him a good boy too?” Satoru asks, impishly, and grins when he sees Suguru blush bright pink.
“He's not doing anything for me.” Shoko says, retreating to the back of the classroom; where Suguru had been sitting previously. Satoru supposes that fair enough, and turns back to now two homework papers he needs to get done by tomorrow morning. Man, they really do love springing their work on him last minute.
(Shoko will later swear that Suguru pouts when she refuses to call him a good boy. Suguru will deny this fervently. Neither of his classmates will believe him.)
Shoko snatches the DS where Suguru left it on the table, the sounds of Pokémon Emerald greeting her when she flicks it open. A gym battle theme is playing, which means he's probably-
“You're fighting Flannery with a Luvdisc?” She exclaims, staring at the screen in front of her. The game is paused in the middle of the third gym fight, Flannery's Slugma as the opponent. And Suguru's Pokémon is, and she cannot stress this enough, a fucking Luvdisc.
Satoru's head whips around, math homework temporarily forgotten. “He's what.”
“It's a water type isn't it? Water beats fire.” Suguru scoots a desk against hers before settling in it so he can watch her play. He rests his chin on her shoulder, bangs falling slightly in front of his face. Shoko doesn't know whether to brush them aside or shove him off her for fighting Flannery with a Luvdisc.
“It's the worst water type in gen three.” She scoffs, quickly opening the team menu. The rest of his team is not any better. It's an actual miracle that he got to her Slugma before being overheated to oblivion. Behind her, Satoru nods vigorously in agreement.
“I didn't know you were into Pokémon, Sho.” Suguru says, nuzzling his nose into the crook of her neck (stupid clingy cat.)
Whatever snarky comment she had ready dies in her throat. She doesn't have a response to that.
Shit. Dammit. Her and her big mouth.
Satoru lights up like a lightbulb. “Aww, you do listen to my nerd rambles!” He looks like he's gonna come over here and squish her. Gross. She's had enough of him for one day. She can still taste the mochi he had for breakfast on her tongue. (It's mixed with the taste of Suguru's organic oolong tea, also had in the morning. It's not a great combination.)
“Shut up and do our homework.” She snaps, feeling the tips of her ears warm. Satoru turns back around in his seat with a laugh, focusing on their papers again. And, hey, if he gets it done fast and gets every question right, she might reward him again.
“What are you gonna do, fix my team?” Suguru asks, turning her attention back to him. He's still curled around her, eyes trained on her face. He's comfortable. Shoko doesn't want him to move away.
“First I'm gonna get you through Flannery, but yeah.” She flicks through the Pokémon on his team again, looking for something to switch the damn Luvdisc with. The results have not gotten any more promising. “You can pay me for it later.”
Suguru smiles lazily into her neck. “Deal.”
————————
My baby here on Earth
Showed me what my heart was worth
So when it comes to be my turn
Could you shine it down here for her?
————————
Knowing you're going to die is a lot of things.
It's terrifying. It's a relief to know that finally, finally, everything will be over. Will death be a black void of nothing forever? Or will he go somewhere? Satoru doesn't want to go to a void. He wants to see his friends again. He wants to stay. He doesn't want to die. The idea that he most likely will doesn't bother him, but that doesn't mean he wants it either. It doesn't mean he craves and aches for it. He likes living. He's so excited for the pain to finally stop.
Everyone else knows he's probably going to die, too, even if they don't believe it. Sometimes, he catches his students looking at him sadly. Like he's a dead man walking, a corpse that has yet to learn it's just that. A corpse.
It's a lot, but Satoru takes it all in stride. Because he's the strongest.
Well, he takes most of it in stride.
Shoko acts like she's fine with it all, and it's honestly pissing him off a little. She has no objections to anything they suggest. Not the battle plan, not what will become of his body, nothing. It's irritating. He thought she'd have something to say, at the very least. Some sort of backhanded comment that lets him know how she really feels. Yet, strangely, she says nothing.
He keeps her close throughout the process despite it. He makes sure she's at every meeting regardless. She asks why she needs to be there. He tells her something along the lines of “they can't leave their only doctor out of the loop.” She asks again when he makes her power of attorney and executor of his will. This is a dumb question. He's not letting the Clan do whatever with his will and Shoko's his oldest friend. Who else was going to do it? Ijichi? Kusakabe? Mei Mei? Yeah, he didn't think so.
Shoko, for some reason, is determined to not be involved. She wants to act like they're just co-workers and not what they are to each other. And he knows her, knows it's a defensive mechanism, but Satoru's not having any of it.
He transfers legal guardianship of Megumi and Tsumiki to her two weeks before the fight.
“They might not even-” is the first thing she says when he tells her. Satoru doesn't let her finish. Might not want that? Not survive? It doesn't matter, either way, because someone has to take care of them when he's gone and, after October, he's running short on options.
Not like it wouldn't be her, anyways.
“They will. And they'll need someone.” They will want Shoko to have guardianship over them, he knows that much. He doesn't know if they'll survive, or if they're both already in the ground. Only time and a battle for the ages will tell him that.
“You might not even-” He might not even die, he knows this. But he could die just as easily as he could survive.
“It's just a precaution.” He says. The Strongest isn't a fan of precautions, he usually never takes them. But desperate times call for desperate measures and he's feeling pretty desperate right now, so.
“I don't like it.” Shoko crosses her arms over her chest. She's holding a cigarette between her teeth. Satoru never sees her without one, these days.
(Someone's gotta wean her off those again when he goes. He makes a mental note to mention it to Ijichi. She wouldn't listen to anyone else.
She'll probably also guess that he's the one that put Ijichi up to it, but that's fine. Satoru will be dead. He won't have to worry about it.)
“I know, but I'm not sorry.”
“When are you ever?” She grumbles, her heels clicking against the floor as she leaves. Satoru watches her go with a shake of his head. She's never gonna get it, is she? For someone so smart, she really can be equally as dense. (But that's fine, Satoru will take her; stupid moments and all. He always would and always will.)
He gives her his notes for Megumi and Nobara the next day. It's the one thing she doesn't feel the need to grumble about.
Like everything else, it's just a precaution.
It takes her two more weeks to finally pop the question.
“Why do you keep insisting I be involved?” She says, finding him in the dojo the morning he's due to fight Sukuna. Satoru, who'd been beating up his favorite punching bag for the last time, stops mid training session.
Sheesh, talk about last minute.
“Because you should've been involved with Suguru, and you weren't, and I'm sorry.” He says. It's probably the most honest one of them has been with each other in years.
He hears the click of her lighter instead of a response.
Satoru gives the bag one last punch, then calls it quits. He would love to give her a show by beating the punching bag to shreds, he really would, but he kinda can't. There's this ancient evil curse he's due to fight in like, an hour. Gotta go get ready and all that. But before he does.
“Shoko?” He pauses at the sliding door, his head turned toward her. The bags under her eyes are the darkest they've even been. Satoru doesn't think she's ever looked more beautiful.
“Yeah?” She says, putting her cigarette out on the wall. Like some kind of heathen.Man, he's really gonna miss her when he dies.
.
.
.
“Cursing me before you go, huh?” She smiles, a melancholy thing. She can't bring herself to meet his gaze.
That's fine, he has enough eyes for the both of them. Six, in fact.
He smiles back. “Not on purpose.”
“I'll see you in a bit, yeah?” He pushes the sliding door open, his eyes never leaving her face. Unlike last time, his best friend won't look at him.
(He doesn't know which is better, seeing their eyes or not. So he's fine with getting both. Maybe he'll find out in hell.)
“Yeah, in a bit.” She says, and doesn't follow him out. (The last thing Satoru hears of her is the click of her lighter as he disappears down the hall.)
————————
'Cause my love is mine, all mine
My love mine, mine, mine
Nothing in the world belongs to me
But my love, mine, all mine
————————
Suguru wakes up and is very, very warm.
It's the middle of summer, yet his two classmates are stuck to him like burrs, still sleeping peacefully.
Satoru's face is smushed into his chest, his perfect hair tousled. An arm is thrown around Suguru's waist, keeping them pressed together. He can feel Satoru's knee pressing into his thigh. It should be wildly uncomfortable.
It isn't.On the other side Shoko clings to his back like a koala. Her fingers dig into his shirt, like even in sleep she never wants to let go. Her knees press into his back, leaving her in the same kind of not-uncomfortable position that Satoru's in.
She snores. Rather loudly too. If it were anyone else, Suguru would find it terribly distracting.Hearing her snore again is comforting. He hasn't heard it in……in…
Well, he knows when the last time he heard it was.
He doesn't remember the last time they slept together like this.
It used to be damn near every night, until things started to change. They'd find their ways into each other's rooms, one way or another, and would curl up in the same bed; limbs so tangled together Suguru often lost track of where one of them began and the other two ended. And in the morning they'd detangle themselves slowly, Shoko complaining about why she had to move if they were so comfortable. And Satoru would laugh and make them all stay an extra five minutes because he could never say no to her (and Suguru can't, either.)
It happened so much Yaga eventually gave up on scolding Shoko from sneaking into the boys side of the dormitory and vice versa. It happened so much that they started keeping spare toothbrushes in their rooms, that Suguru has a drawer in his dresser full of clothes they'd left on his floor. So much so that he started to forget what it was like to sleep alone.And then things changed.
Suguru doesn't get much sleep these days. He stays up late with an upset stomach and an exhausted mind. And when sleep does eventually claim him it's restless. The kind of sleep that leaves you waking up at odd hours of the morning and stumbling out of bed worse than you felt the night before. It's been this way for a while now.
(And he knows exactly when it started and why, but according to his clock it's one thirty AM. He's not in the mood to rename it and not in the mood to relive it in his nightmares.)
Growing used to a sudden lack of bodies in his bed certainly hadn't helped.
He doesn't remember how, but tonight the bodies are back. They're pressed into him, not comfortable despite the odd position. Like they all remember how to be together but don't at the same time. Satoru's knee is probably gonna bruise his thigh and Shoko's are pressing into his back. Suguru doesn't know what to do with it.
But it's one thirty AM and he's tried. His mind and belly are finally quiet. His eyelids feel heavy. Suguru knows when his body is telling him to rest.
He falls back asleep with his face buried in Satoru's hair and Shoko's breaths falling across his neck. He's far too warm in the summer heat, but that's fine. He doesn't want to move them. Sometimes you have to make sacrifices to keep your classmates asleep.
Ieiri Shoko is not a fan of the holiday season. This is a somewhat known fact.
She's never expressed this outloud, but her friends have gotten the hint. They don't wish her a happy holidays, haven't in years. Utahime avoids talking about what she did for Christmas like the plague and Haibara's stopped sending her joke gifts. Even Satoru and Suguru have caught on, slowly mentioning less and less of the Christmas exploits over the years.
Ieiri Shoko doesn't like Christmas, and she's perfectly happy to spend it alone, just as she always has. She may be in college now, but she sees no need to change this.
Suguru and Satoru have different plans.
_____
on shoko, the after effects of bad parenting, and good friends
day five of @sashisu-week
Ao3 Link
Ieiri Shoko is not a fan of the holiday season. This is a somewhat known fact.
She's never expressed this outloud, but her friends have gotten the hint. They don't wish her a happy holidays, haven't in years. Utahime avoids talking about what she did for Christmas like the plague and Haibara's stopped sending her joke gifts. Even Satoru and Suguru have caught on, slowly mentioning less and less of the Christmas exploits over the years.
She thinks it was the stormy, annoyed silence she had about her whenever the holiday was brought up is what tipped them off. But that's fine, she doesn't really care if people think she's an asshole. They're the ones who chose to be friends with her. Besides, she prefers it like this anyways.
Shoko, for the most part, does not like Christmas. She doesn't hate everything about the Christmas season. In fact, there's a handful of things she likes.She likes the tradition of getting KFC on Christmas, because it's an excuse to get fat on junk food. She likes the concept of gift giving, because everybody likes presents. Oh, and the Christmas lights, those are never not pretty. But everything else about the holiday irritates her. The Christmas cake is okay, though. Shoko would probably like it more if she had a sweet tooth like Satoru.
She doesn't like the stupid American Christmas movies. Or any holiday movie, really. She doesn't like the togetherness vibe Christmas has. She thinks the decorations are dumb and a waste of time. Most of the seasonal foods and drinks companies come out with aren't even good. And she's not one for prayer, so she doesn't go to the shrines during the new year's season, either.
She doesn't like the romantic aspect of Japanese Christmas, because she's never had a partner to celebrate with and she never will. Suguru and Satoru also get annoying as fuck on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, in a way Shoko can't describe. Something about their usual flirtatious remarks just….annoys her. She gets like that during Valentine's day, too, come to think of it, but that's a topic for a different time.
(Listing all that out is making her feel like the Grinch, jeez.….it's a wonder she made that comparison before Satoru.)
So, yeah, she doesn't like the festivities. Late December to early January sucks for her every single year. (Shoko can only be thankful she's not an American, or born in any other country with a big Christmas culture. She thinks she'd be even more grumpy about it than she is now.)
Shoko is well aware where this dislike stems from. (The clinical voice in the back of her tells her she should probably see a therapist about that. The rest of her would rather jump off the tip of Tokyo Tower than set foot in a psychiatric office.)
She hasn't had a “normal” Christmas since she was five years old.
Shoko didn't get two birthdays or two Christmas’ when her parents divorced. She didn't get two of anything. Her Dad got custody but had a high demand job. Shoko's forgotten what it even is, all she knows is that it's one that makes him work through holidays, even the national ones. After the age of six, she only saw her Mom twice a year, maybe less. And then there were the rare, half a minute long phone calls where her Mom sounded inebriated.
Shoko didn't get two of anything. She barely even got one. For birthdays she woke up to a small store bought cake, a note, and one or two presents her Dad thought she wanted on the dining table. He used to handmake her cakes, before the divorce. At least he still remembered her favorite flavor. The note always read something like Happy Birthday. I love you and I'm sorry.
The note was left at the top of the trash can every year without fail. Shoko is not one for empty sentiment. Her father isn't either, yet he writes the notes regardless.
(And if the sentiment isn't as empty as she thinks, he needs to be trying harder for her to believe. At least Mom doesn't pretend, doesn't write I love you when they haven't seen each other for days. She's careless enough to leave, but not cruel enough to lie. It's the only thing she's got going for her, in Shoko's mind.)
Her mom would send her a birthday card, one that would always come two weeks late. Sometimes it would have money in it, money that Shoko would immediately burn on cigarettes or something the like. Her parents would probably want her to save the money. Shoko has no interest in holding onto the cash of a deadbeat drunkard who isn't legally allowed to take care of her. She has no patience for lazy grabs at connection, either.
Her mom sent her a lot of cash on her eighteenth, which Shoko used to pay for Suguru's nose piercings. The money from her seventeenth was spent on a birthday gift for Satoru, her sixteenth spent on booze and substances she had no business taking at her age, so on and so forth. Not a single cent is held onto. From the moment she turned six, this is how it went and how it currently goes.
They didn't have Christmas at all, or any other holiday for that matter. Sometimes her and her Dad would get each something, sometimes they wouldn't. It was Christmas, not a birthday. Her mother never sent her anything at all.Shoko hasn't seen or called her Mother since she was seventeen. Her birthday cards still go to the house, because no one told her the address for Shoko's dorm. The money is sent to her eventually, whenever her father has the time to mail it.
Her birthday money arrives a month later. She spends it on cigarettes and piercings and fancy drinks all the same. This, at the very least, has not changed.
She hasn't seen her Dad since she moved out, and hasn't called him since before mid-terms. Finals are in three days. She has no intention of calling him, either. He wouldn't pick up if she did, because work and apologetic voicemail boxes are always more important than one's daughter.
So, Ieiri Shoko doesn't like the holiday season and doesn't particularly want to go home for it, either.
And everyone else she knows is going home for winter break. She'll be in the dorms alone. But that's fine. She didn't really plan on leaving them anyways.
That's how her winter breaks were always spent. At home, completely by herself. She sees no need to change this.If it's not broken, why fix it?
Ieiri Shoko doesn't like Christmas. She's perfectly happy to spend it alone.
————————
“What are you and your dad doing this year?” Suguru asks two days before break begins and two hours after her last final, like it's a casual question you can pop in a college cafeteria with a tray of shitty food in front of you. Because to him, it is.
Shoko feels herself go stiff. For just a second, she lets herself believe that the boys will not notice this. “Oh, nothing much.”
Satoru speaks next, glancing at her curiously. “Really? Don't you two always do something?” His eyes, an unnatural blue, bore into her. As if they're something all seeing. He noticed her stiffen, because he always does. He knows her better than he knows himself.
The boys say her and her Dad “do something for Christmas” because that's what she told them. Her and her Dad didn't do anything for Christmas, because he worked and didn't get home until long after dark. “Doing something for Christmas” in their house meant getting a present the other thought they would like and Shoko being asleep or elsewhere when he finally did come home.
She spent her last Christmas before college not even at her Dad's house. She was somewhere, she doesn't remember where, with people she barely knew and can't recall. Classmates, she's pretty sure. The other people she'd catch smoking under stairwells and making the restrooms smell like weed. She thinks she heard about that gathering from Mei. Satoru and Suguru spent that Christmas with each other and Suguru's parents, like they always did. Shoko spent it drinking, passing around a joint with near strangers, and burning through two packs of cigarettes because she was sick of being home and couldn't wait to leave.
She'd come home to a Christmas card on the counter and no text, note, or anything asking where she'd been.
Her current plans for this year are basically the same as last year's, just with no people. Hole up in her dorm room and get drunk, maybe also a little high. Don't call her dad, don't buy him anything. Don't make the effort he's not giving. Probably cry herself to sleep. Listen to Suguru and Satoru recall their own holidays with poorly hidden bitterness. This is, give or take a few details, how it has gone since she was fourteen years old. She's freshly nineteen. She doesn't plan on changing it now.
(They never did Christmas with her, though the offer was open. Shoko never took it. She wasn't going to unless they asked her, explicitly and aloud. They knew this much.They still never asked.
Sometimes, she wished they forced her into it, dragged her back to Suguru's house kicking and screaming. She wishes she'd been forced to meet his parents, because after almost six years of friendship she's never seen their faces, and sit at their table and eat his mothers home cooked meals. She wishes they'd asked and she'd taken the offer and she stopped spending the holidays asleep, drunk, or wishing she was dead.)
“He's…busy this year.” She says, taking a careful bite of her pizza. It tastes like cardboard in her mouth.
Suguru exchanges a glance with Satoru. Shoko can tell exactly what he's thinking, what he's feeling. Concern. She hates it.
“Are you…doing anything with your mom?” He asks next.
It's the stupidest question either of them have ever fucking asked her.
“No.” She says, putting a little too much force behind it. She bites into her pizza again a little too sharp and swallows a little too hard. The mere mention of her mother has activated Shoko's fight or flight. If she were sitting with anyone else, she would've already bolted.
For a brief second their table is quiet. Then, Satoru feels the need to run his big fucking mouth. “You and your mom aren't….?”
“We never were.” The only thing stopping her from grinding her teeth is the lunch she's currently eating.
“Oh. I didn't think-”
“What? Me never talking about her didn't clue you in?” She snaps. Shoko will probably feel bad about this later. Right now, she just wants them to stop talking about her fucking mom.
“Sorry.” Satoru looks away, his eyes dropping back to his own food. At least he has the decency to look embarrassed. Suguru says nothing. He's looking at both of them, concerned and unsure of what to do. Shoko doesn't want him to open his fucking mouth again, either.
“It's fine.” She sighs. The milk tea she bought from the vending machine suddenly tastes like nothing. “Just drop it, ‘kay?”
Satoru and Suguru exchange a glance, one of the rare ones she can't read. It only serves to piss her off more. Shoko doesn't meet either of their gazes, just stares down at her plate in stormy silence.
They don't really speak for the rest of their allotted lunch break. The rest of her pizza goes practically untouched. Shoko leaves for her afternoon lab's final meeting twenty, almost thirty, minutes early. Nobody says goodbye.
Their group chat is deathly silent until the next day, when Satoru sends some message Shoko doesn't read. It's accompanied by a stupid cat emoticon, meaning it's his usual nonsense. Good. She didn't wanna talk about her little outburst, nor did she want Suguru coaxing her into discussing, or apologizing, or whatever.
She just wants her normal, nothing Christmas.
She watches the boys text back and forth for a bit, before putting her phone on silent. She's got a grocery list to make.————————
Three days before Christmas, the boys offer.
They're standing outside her dorm, eager and anxious all at once. Suguru is wearing the gag sweater she got him two years ago. Satoru, who can't handle a speck of cold, is wrapped in at least three layers. He looks like a baby penguin. In any other circumstance the sight would make her laugh.
Shoko has to ask them to repeat the offer out of shock.
“Do you want to spend Christmas with us?” Suguru asks again, something gentle on his face.
“Don't you two have like, things to do with your families? Or each other?” Her hand clutches the doorway hard enough she thinks her knuckles are turning white.
“My parents don't mind.” He says. “I already asked. They said they'd love to have you.”
Satoru shrugs, honest. “I like you more than the Clan.”
“But-”
“Shoko.” Satoru tips his glasses down, meeting her eyes. Bright, piercing blue stares back at her. “We want you to do Christmas things with us.”
Oh. Okay then. This changes things.
She agrees with a shaky nod and leaning on the doorway to stand. Suguru smiles so wide and says they'll pick her up at seven in two days time. Shoko mumbles an okay, and tries not to slam the door in their faces. Her hands have started to shake.
The next few days pass in a blur.She spends the rest of that day and most of the next paralyzed in bed. She packs the night before the boys pick her up. Shoko doesn't really think shoving clothes and toiletries blindly in a bag can be called packing, but it's what she does. And then suddenly it's the next morning and the boys are picking her up.
And then they're on a train, Satoru half asleep on her shoulder and Suguru playing guitar hero on his phone. They're half way to his hometown now, she thinks. The rest of the train ride passes in a blur. Then, they take a rental car to get to his parents house. They live in a small town, so it's kinda inconvenient to get there from Tokyo. Suguru apologizes at least twice for it. He knows she's a city girl who prefers the subway. Shoko just nods absently.
And then, before she knows it they're stepping out of the car. They're here.
It's Christmas Eve, and she's not alone.
She's standing outside Suguru's childhood home, an overnight bag in her hand. Suguru said she could stay the whole break if she needed to. Satoru's staying in his room so the guest bedroom is free. Shoko is trying to stay two nights at most. She feels like they're going to bully her into staying the full two weeks.
His home is nice. Lived in, well loved. It has shelves full of childhood photos. Family photos are placed aesthetically throughout the house. Pictures of his parents' wedding, of Suguru's first day of school, of them on vacation, of family gatherings and lots and lots of baby Suguru, all framed with care. She tries not to stare as she walks by.
She forgot families are supposed to have pictures of each other. Her house doesn't have any at all.
His parents are nice. They're very nice. They welcome her with open arms and show her where the guest room and bathroom are. Suguru's mother offers to help her unpack and then does it anyway when Shoko says she can do it herself. His father says Suguru talks a lot about her. How she's smart and studying to be a doctor. How he talks about her almost as much as he talks about Satoru. He speaks so highly of her, Suguru father says, all good things, it's a pleasure to finally meet her after all these years.
She knew, in the back of her mind, that parents could be this nice. That they were supposed to be. It's different to be confronted with it. She awkwardly accepts his mothers help and mumbles embarrassed thank yous at his father's praise. It's all warm, a contrast to the cold Shoko is familiar with. It's a fuzzy and light feeling. She doesn't know what to do with it all.
(They never even went to her house in high-school, despite it being the closest. Shoko had claimed it was to keep her air of mystery. It was because if they came over they'd realize her Dad was never home. Suguru, the only one of them with good parents, would make it into a thing and then Satoru would get on the worry train, too, and Shoko just. Couldn't deal with all that. So she didn't.)
They have dinner. It's some of the best food she's ever had. Shoko doesn't remember the last time she had a home-cooked meal. Probably not since she was four. She tries not to make this obvious, or to thank Suguru's mother more times than appropriate.
And then dinner ends and the minor Christmas festivities start and the boys got her a fucking present.
Satoru sets the box in her lap, excited. Shoko stares at it dumbly.
She can't remember if she's ever gotten a Christmas present before. A real one, not whatever her father would leave on the kitchen counter. And if she did, it was a gift for a three year old that got lost somewhere in the divorce.
Shoko's never had a real Christmas present before.
A wave of emotions crashes over her the longer she looks at the box. It's neatly wrapped, white with a cherry red bow tied at the top. Satoru must've been the one to tie it because he's good at everything and Suguru is bad at hand crafts. He's definitely the one who picked the colors for it, though; Satoru can't make a good color combo to save his life.
They worked together to get her a present. Her first Christmas present, and they sat there and probably argued for twenty minutes over if it should be in a box or a bag or if they should just hand it to her because Shoko hates fanfare. And they did it all for her.
Her best friends got her a Christmas present. Shoko suddenly feels like running.
Fuck. Fucking hell.
Preferably, she'd open this by herself in her room. It's how she always opened the birthday gifts they got her, alone, where she could get all choked up and have nobody judge her. But Suguru and Satoru are watching, expectant. They're excited. They want to see her reaction.
Plus, the Geto's can see the scene from where they're cleaning the aftermath of dinner. They just met her five hours ago. She doesn't want to run and make Suguru's parents think she's weird. Or, worst of all, worry about her.
She still can't bring her hands to move.
“Aren't you gonna open it?” Satoru blurts, his leg bouncing. Shoko can't tell if it's from excitement or nerves.
“Right, yeah.” She mumbles, and forces her arms to move.
With shaking hands she peels the lid off. She grabs the wrapping paper bundle inside, and slowly peels the light green layers away. Peels, not tears, because she's pretty sure this is her first Christmas present and she doesn't want to ruin the wrapping paper the boys picked for her. They even made sure it was her favorite color.
It's a cat plush. The thing in the bundle. It's a cat plush. The one she'd futilely tried to win at a claw machine eight months ago. (She's holding it in her hands right now, because Suguru and Satoru went back and spent who knows how much money trying to win this for her. For Christmas. Because they wanted her to have a nice Christmas.
They wanted her at Christmas.
Fuck.)
Shoko's normally not one for plushies, but this one just looked so fat and stupid. And sad, it had really sad eyes. She needed to have it, even if it was a stupid rigged claw machine plushie.
And then she didn't get it and maybe she'd moped for a few days and made Satoru so bummed he bought her favorite mochi to make her feel better. It had been a small thing at the time. She didn't think they'd actually remember it.
Shoko squeezes the pulse toy in her hands. It's a gift for a five year old, not a college student. She shouldn't be this goddamn emotional over a stuffed cat.
She squeezes it again, a smile threatening to form despite the surge of feelings in her chest. It's the stupidest gift anyone's ever given her and it's her favorite.
“Do you like it?” Satoru asks again, breaking her out of her thoughts. His leg is still bouncing, definitely from nerves.
“I do.” She says and means it. She means it more than she's ever meant anything ever, she thinks.
“Good.” Suguru says. That gentle look is back on his face. That, when Suguru and sometimes Satoru look at her like that. Like she's hung the stars in the sky. That is another thing Shoko doesn't know what to do with.
She excuses herself to the bathroom ten minutes later, because there's a lump in her throat and her eyes are threatening to water over. She takes the plushie with her.
She locks the door behind her and tries not to cry too loudly. She holds in plush between her knees and tries and fails to not get tears and snot on it.
They're good tears, she thinks, squeezing the stupid cat stuffed animal again. She's sad and happy and overwhelmed all at once, but they're good tears.
(They're the tears she's been holding in since she was five years old. And instead of coming out in her bedroom or a therapist's office they come out in the Geto's bathroom at eight PM, her first and favorite Christmas present clutched in her hands.
For the first time in fourteen years, Shoko feels like she can finally breathe.)
“Were you crying?” Suguru asks when she emerges, an odd twenty minutes later.
“No.” Shoko lies. Her face still feels puffy.
“You're allowed to cry, you know.” He doesn't believe her. She's usually better at lying to him than this, but she just cried her heart out in his childhood bathroom. She thinks she can cut herself some slack.
“It's Christmas.” She says. Christmas is Christmas. It's not supposed to be a sad holiday, Shoko's not supposed to ruin it with her daddy issues and tears.
Suguru frowns. “You're still allowed to cry.”
She doesn't believe him. She's usually better at hiding it than this. The stupid gift has made her all sentimental. “Whatever.”
“Sorry we didn't offer before.” He says, and he sounds guilty. Guilty that he didn't bring her home for Christmas before, that he never got her a gift and that she celebrated alone.
“It's fine.” She says, and walks past him into the kitchen. She beelines for the back door, mumbling a polite hello when she passes Suguru's father. He's brewing lemon balm tea to help his wife sleep. Shoko only knows this because Suguru makes it for himself and said he learned the trick from his Dad. Him and his mom both have a sleep disorder. The tea helps, on bad days.
(Suguru had confided in her once, on one late night during their worst year, that she and Satoru help him sleep, too. They make him feel safe. Shoko, still as emotionally constipated three years ago as she is now, didn't know what to do with that information. So she'd mumbled something about him being sentimental and shoved the fuzzy feeling he gave her to the bottom of her heart.
She'd let him sleep on her shoulder ten minutes later, and didn't complain in the morning when she woke with a crick in her neck.)
Geto-san is making lemon balm tea to help his wife sleep. Shoko doesn't stay long enough to be offered a cup.
She sits on the Geto's back porch steps instead, horribly underdressed for the winter weather. Her sleep shorts and baggy tee are not enough to save her from the cold. But it's fine.
Inside was getting suffocating. She doesn't know what to do when Suguru looks at her like that, or gets her a Christmas present.
So she ran away.
The cat plushie is still in her hands. She squeezes it again before setting it next to her. It's just the two of them and the cold.
(If Shoko closes her eyes, she can almost pretend she's sixteen and on her father's back porch, pleasantly tipsy. Almost.)
Five minutes later, the back door opens. She turns, and finds Satoru walking out.
He shuts the screen door with his hip, two wine glasses in his hands. He offers it to her, tentative. Suguru must have told him that she's upset, if he's not already invading her personal space.
And that's true, she is kinda upset (not at them, at her parents and the world,) but she likes alcohol more than she likes wallowing.
Shoko takes it silently, mumbling a thanks under her breath. Satoru huffs, then sits next to her. His own glass is filled with the stupid melon soda he likes so much. Hers has actual alcohol in it. A strong wine too, by the smell. Good. She'll probably need it.
She doesn't know how he got this from the Geto's kitchen and doesn't care to ask, either. She swirls her wine in the cup and scoots closer to him, drawn in by his body heat. Satoru takes this as a sign that can touch her, and wraps his arm around her until she's snugly tucked into his side.
The plush sits on her lap. She can hear the sound of Suguru talking to his parents through the door. Satoru squeezes her waist and sips his soda obnoxiously. (She doesn't feel as cold anymore.)
“Merry Christmas?” He asks, knocking their knees together. His melon soda is already half gone. He has no intention of going back inside anytime soon.
Shoko takes a sip of her drink. It's cold, but she has Satoru, the wine, and the plushie to warm her. “Yeah, Merry Christmas.”
Shadow comes home one day with a thrifted record player in his hands, and at least six albums to go along with it.
Rouge looks up from her phone as he fumbles though the front door, curious. It's not everyday Mr. Ultimate Lifeform goes shopping, or comes home with anything interesting. “Whatcha got there?”
“Records.” Shadow says, closing the front door with his hip. Rouge very politely does not laugh when he almost drops his keys and half of what he's carrying on the floor, but she almost does.
She rolls her eyes at that, leaning over the arm of the couch. “I can see that. What kind of records?”“See for yourself.”
Day two of @teamdarkweek // Part 2 of Team Dark Week 2026
[Year two of the tumblr link function hating me]
Shadow comes home one day with a thrifted record player in his hands, and at least six albums to go along with it.
Rouge looks up from her phone as he fumbles though the front door, curious. It's not everyday Mr. Ultimate Lifeform goes shopping, or comes home with anything interesting. “Whatcha got there?”
“Records.” Shadow says, closing the front door with his hip. Rouge very politely does not laugh when he almost drops his keys and half of what he's carrying on the floor, but she almost does.
She rolls her eyes at that, leaning over the arm of the couch. “I can see that. What kind of records?”
“See for yourself.” Shadow sets his spoils down on the coffee table, then double checks he actually managed to shut and lock the door on his way in. Rouge starts her investigation while his back is turned, suddenly deathly curious of what her roommate listens to.
She begins to flick through the records, frowning when she barely recognizes any of the names. She didn't expect Shadow to have such niche music taste, but she should've. He's not exactly a trend hopper.
“You don't know any of these artists?” Shadow asks, noticing her expression.
The bat shakes her head, setting the records she'd been handed beside her on the couch. “Don't think so.”
“Hold on.” He mumbles, picking up one of the albums. He opens it carefully, sliding the disc out with a sort of reverence. Rouge makes a mental note to be extra careful around the records as he slots in into the player. She has a feeling that breaking them (by accident, of course) would be more than a small mistake in the eyes of her teammate.
The record starts to spin, playing an old song she's never heard. Rouge can't tell the exact era it's from, but she knows it's pretty old. From the fifties, at least, maybe even closer to the sixties. Something from Shadow's past, probably, or just a song from the time period he likes.
She figures the other five albums he bought are like that, old and a little slower in nature. Maybe some early rock n’ roll was thrown in there? She's caught Shadow listening to some more modern rockstars, so she wouldn't be surprised if he liked the older stuff as well.
“You have the music taste of an old man.” Rouge teases, tapping her foot to the beat anyways.
“Shut up.” He grumbles, slotting the rest of his purchases into the empty self on their entertainment center. The five albums, with space for extra, fit perfectly next to the Xbox Omega demanded they buy. He connects to it remotely to bully teenagers online whenever he feels like it, which is family often. Rouge is still convinced the console was a waste of money. If she knew Omega was going to mod and hack the shit out of it, she would've bought a cheaper one secondhand.
Speaking of Omega, the sound of music draws him out of his room; loud, thudding footsteps stomping down the hallway and into the living room. “WHAT IS THIS NOISE?” He asks, clearly not the biggest fan of what they're subjecting his metal eardrums to.
“Shadow got a record player to play his old man music.” Rouge explains, nodding towards the record player currently sitting atop the coffee table. She hopes Shadow puts that thing on a shelf or something. Leaving it here is like asking it to be broken, accidentally or otherwise.
“I'm not old.” Shadow says, his protest going ignored.
“MY MUSIC TASTE IS SUPERIOR.” Omega declares, shutting off the record player with a claw.
“You listen to music?” Shadow asks, earnest. Rouge doesn't blame him. The Badnik thinks most human activities and artforms are pointless, unless destruction is involved, and therefore engages in none of them. Before now, he's never given any indication that he enjoyed music at all.
Omega turns on his speakers instead of replying verbally, and starts playing some…rather interesting techno music. And while techno isn't exactly Rouge's favorite genre, she's heard enough to tell when it's….good. And whatever Omega's playing seems to be a little on the….not so good side.
Shadow and Rouge exchange a glance, deciding not to keep their honest thoughts to themselves for their own peace of mind. Not to say Omega's taste is….bad, just that it's not something either of them would personally listen to, is all.
“This is…fine.” Rouge says, even though she thinks this song, and probably any more Omega has saved to his hard drives, are pretty mediocre at best.
“Well what do you listen to?” Shadow raises an eyebrow at her, and Omega turns his speakers off. Oh, okay then, they're all sharing music preferences now. She wished she'd known that beforehand; she would've prepared a list or something.
“C'mere.” Shadow and Omega watch over her shoulder as she opens up Spotify, scrolling to her Liked Songs playlist. Rouge then scrolls some more, trying to find something that's not embarrassing to admit she likes but also something she listens to regularly. She finds it halfway through the playlist, clicking on an instrumental track that had made it onto her Spotify Wrapped last year.
“JAZZ?” Omega asks, the sound of brass instruments filling the room. Yes, Omega, jazz. What was he expecting? Radio hits? Poorly written pop? She was a woman of culture and refinement, of course she listened to jazz.
“Yeah? And what about it?” Rouge cranes her head to look up at him, challenging him to insult her very respectable taste in music after showing them the shit he listens to. In contrast to that mangled techno, her taste is far more refined.
Rouge listens to things other than jazz, of course, though it tends to be her preferred genre. She's also quite the fan of samba, bossa nova, blues music, as well as the occasional rock or metal song. And the pop music she lets the DJ play at Club Rouge isn't entirely her taste, it's not the worst thing in the world either. Some have even been good enough to sneak into her playlists on occasion, though she'd never admit that aloud.
“It's not bad.” Shadow admits. He seems to like the song a little, if the small smile on his face means anything. Rouge makes a mental note to send him the link later.
“I SUPPOSE IT IS…ACCEPTABLE.” Omega agrees. Which means he doesn't like it, but listening to it doesn't make him want to blow her phone up. Which is a lot better than actually having her phone blown up. So.
“Yeah, well your music is acceptable too.” Rouge pauses the Spotify track, reaching over to give his arm a good few pats. Omega lets her get two in before drawing it back towards his frame.
“MINE IS SUPERIOR.” The Badnik insists, because of course he does. Everything about Omega is superior to puny meatbags, how could she have forgotten?
“Sure it is.” Shadow agrees, settling next to Rouge on the couch. Does he actually think that? Probably not. But letting Omega know otherwise is asking to have their eardrums harassed with shitty underground for the next week and a half. “Just let me play me records sometimes.”
“DEAL.” Omega agrees, settling on the floor next to the couch. A few seconds later the TV and hacked Xbox come alight, the robot connecting to them wirelessly. Shadow gets comfortable when Fortnite is opened, curious to see where Omega's cyberbullying adventures will take him today. Rouge, long used to tuning their gaming sessions out, resumes scrolling through her phone.
Sharing music had been unexpected, but not unpleasant. She opens Spotify again, and searches for that link to send to Shadow.
As a child, Satoru was told never to stray into the mountains around Gojo Estate. He was supposed to stay away from the northeastern side in particular. It was dangerous, his family said. And for a long time they failed to explain exactly why.
A Yuki-onna hunts there, his mother had said; one rare evening where he was allowed to see her. She'll want your life energy to feed herself.
Unfortunately, it only makes him more eager to go see.
_______
on gojo and creatures from your childhood
day one of @sashisu-week
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the
Organization for Transformative Works
As a child, Satoru was told never to stray into the mountains around Gojo Estate. He was supposed to stay away from the northeastern side in particular. It was dangerous, his family said. And for a long time they failed to explain exactly why.
The young Six Eyes, never fond of being denied anything, kept asking until he was told the reason.
A Yuki-onna hunts there, his mother had said; one rare evening where he was allowed to see her. She'll want your life energy to feed herself.
This, this is why he is not allowed to venture to that side of the mountain. A young Satoru, not as refreshed on his mythology as he should be, is unsatisfied with this answer.
So, instead of studying what his teachers tell him to, he spends one afternoon reading a book on yokai and various folk stories until he finds a short passage on the creature his mother mentioned.
Yuki-onna's are yokai, creatures of folklore and legend. Their name means snow woman, or something along those lines, depending where you are. They are said to hunt in mountain passes, like the ones outside his home, and anywhere it may happen to snow. They feed off the lifeforce of people and freeze their victims solid.
The life force of the Six Eyes could keep a true Yuki-onna fed for two centuries, his family says. It's imperative he never wanders into the mountain alone, at least until he is older and stronger. And he is to never go north bound. This way, his family can make sure he remains safe.
A Yuki-onna hunts there. His mother tells him, one rare evening when he sees her and bothers to ask. She'll gobble you and your life energy right up if you stray to the northeast.
She tells him a few tales of the Yuki-onna, different versions of the legend from different regions of the country. In most of them, she freezes and devours her victims with twisted glee. And Satoru, as the Six Eyes, has a strong life force; strong enough to feed the yokai for several winters. If she encounters him this fate shall surely befall him.
He thinks this is meant to scare him.
Unfortunately, it only makes him more eager to go see.
————————
He wandered into the mountain one day when he was ten years old.
Satoru, who had snuck away from his lessons to do this, was sure his Aunties and Teachers were frantic right now. They were probably tearing the Clan compound upside down to find any trace of their precious Six Eyes.
He feels no guilt about this. It's not the first time he's skipped out on training or lessons, and it won't be the last. He finds such extensive tutelage pointless when he learns so fast. It is a waste of time and probably also money.
This is the farthest he's gone, though. He never gets the chance to wander quite so far, and when he does he has no interest in it. The tale of the local Yuki-onna has inspired him.
He walks up the well worn trail with a vague interest. There's not many places on the Clan's compound he hasn't explored yet. This part of the forest is new to him, the path that was once here having started to vanish as the earth reclaims it. The foliage is more grown out than anywhere else on the estate, even in the winter weather, since no groundskeepers dare to venture here. Satoru thinks if he walked far enough he would lose track of where the compound ends and the mountain itself begins.
Snow crunches under his feet with every step. He had chosen to slip out after a recent snowstorm on purpose. Maybe the fresh snow will egg the curse on, make it more likely to fight.
So far, Satoru's only gotten to exercise the Grade Four curses his family picks for him. Sometimes they give him a Grade One. They say he's too young for anything else, when he complains and points out that he could probably handle a Grade Two. It leaves him itching for a challenge.
He walks for a little longer before he finds her, not far off the remains of the trail. Her body takes the form of a white sheet, camouflage in the fresh snow. The only reason he finds her so fast is her cursed energy; it's very loud. She's quite territorial. Satoru's never felt an energy signature quite like hers.
In his head, his mothers voice urges him to turn back before she notices. Before his lifeforce is stolen.
Satoru takes a step forward, and another, and then another, until he's directly in front of his Clan's local ghoul.
The Yuki-onna isn't an actual Yuki-onna, he finds upon closer inspection. Just an apparition created by his Clan's stories of it. An Imaginary Vengeful Spirit is the official name for such creatures, though this one doesn't seem to be very vengeful.
Just hungry.
She looks like the ones from the legends though, with a long white kimono and spindly black hair that almost covers her face entirely. Said face is more curse than human, with hollow eyes and a wide mouth that stretches from cheek to cheek. That, along the swell of cursed energy emanating from her, is the only sign she isn't a person.
Satoru comes to a stop in front of her, curious. Her cursed energy isn't weak, but it isn't exactly strong either. Just unique, likely because she was a manifestation from one of the three Clans. He could definitely fight her if he wanted to. It wouldn't be as easy if an exorcism and the Grade Four curses are, but he could do it.
And the Clan worried this thing could eat him.
If anything, she's the challenge he's been looking for.
For some reason, the curse does not even attempt to attack. It stalks him on his journey back to the compound, yes, but it makes no move to harm him. Even when he stares at it, his cursed energy swirling like a fire around them, she does not move. Only watches him, as if curious about what he will do.
A ten year old child should be almost easy prey for a curse, even with his technique. He is, after all, only just learning how to use Blue. She couldn't eat him of course, but she could certainly get close.But she doesn't.
She just watches, silent, like how a cat stalks something they find interesting. Satoru, disinterested with a curse that doesn't crave to fight, starts to head back. And the Yuki-onna follows not far behind.
She backs away once they've traveled about a hundred yards, presumably out of her territory, and simply lets him go free.
He returns to the compound. He gets scolded. He does not tell his mother he saw the Yuki-onna. He does not tell anyone. If he does so, they will start to monitor that path. Maybe exercise the curse. Satoru does not want that.
The way she followed him had been interesting. He's never seen or heard of a curse being so docile before, especially not to something as powerful as a Six Eyes wielder. He thinks he wants to keep her around.
Maybe he'll even visit her again, one day.
————————
In his first year of high-school, Satoru is forced to make a trip back to his Clan's home. Something related to Jujutsu Politics is happening, and his presence is required for a few days.
They say he can bring his friends with him, if he so wishes, which is great because Satoru was going to do that whether they allowed it or not. He'd already sent an invite text out to both of his classmates before his Auntie even told him that detail.
He ends up only bringing a friend, because Shoko said she didn't wanna deal with all that fancy-uppity Clan nonsense. Which is fair. Satoru doesn't wanna deal with it either. He'd promised to bring her back something cool from Kyoto before they left. Shoko said if it's not cigarettes or food she won't take it. (She's lying. Satoru's gonna bring her back the dumbest looking cat souvenir and she's gonna put it on her shelf, right next to every other trinket the two of them have ever bought her.)
Suguru, at least, seems mildly interested in the trip. Strange. Satoru didn't think he had much interest in politics. But maybe Jujutsu politics are of interest to him; there's a lot he still doesn't know, even after a few months at Jujutsu High. Satoru wouldn't fault him for using this visit as a learning opportunity.
“I've never been to Kyoto before.” Suguru says when asked, his head resting against the car window. (He always does that, when they're in the car, watches the world pass by like he's never seen it before. Satoru often wonders why.)
Oh yeah, that's right. Suguru's a little country boy. Until a few months ago his only experience with the city had been the rare day trips his family took to the Kanagawa region and the occasional school trip to Tokyo. He'd never actually stayed in one for more than a few hours, tops, and now he was visiting for at least two days. Maybe three, if Satoru's family decided to drag the politically charged bitch fight out.
Kyoto's not too bad, even if Satoru does prefer Tokyo. Unfortunately, they probably won't be seeing any of it at all.
“You won't be seeing much of it.” He hates to inform his friend, but his Clan lives on the outskirts of the city and is absolutely not letting them leave the compound until it's time to return. He thinks they can maybe swing a trip down the mountains if negotiations end earlier than expected. Unless his Aunties have some other Clan bullshit to spring on him, which they probably do, since he's been away from home for what? Six months now?
And like, Satoru's not against sneaking out, but it's two hours to the main city by car and he's not very confident in his ability to teleport more than one person.
Yeah, the chances of them getting to go look around are low. Ugh.
Suguru better appreciate whatever he sees from the car window, because he won't be seeing much else.
“I'm sure your stupid meeting won't take that long.” His classmate says, eyes fixed on the countryside they're driving past.
Satoru laughs. Won't take long his ass. It's politics, everything about politics takes forever. Poor country boy has no idea what he's getting into.
————————
“This sucks.” Suguru says, after hours upon hours of listening to Clan elders talk in circles and being shuffled around the compound. He shifts in the traditional wear his clan has forced them into, clearly missing his ridiculous uniform pants. (Satoru's a little surprised they let him keep the gauges in.)
“You could've stayed behind.” Satoru points out, not really listening as his grandfather (at least, he thinks that old fart is his grandfather; precious Baby Six Eyes wasn't really afforded the luxury of family connection,) argue with some distant cousin he's pretty sure is from his Mom's side. He only knows this because the guy's hair isn't the Gojo family's signature white.
“And be bored in the guest room all day?” Suguru hums back. He's not watching the debate like Satoru is, more interested in tracing the wood grain patterns in the floor and walls with his eyes. “At least here I can watch your uncle make a fool of himself.”
Satoru snorts a little louder than is socially acceptable. One of his uncles had indeed made a fool of himself at an earlier discussion, and it had been pretty funny. But that was like, the only interesting thing that had happened all day.
“We could always just leave.” He suggests, leaning a little further into Suguru's personal space. Another thing that is not very socially acceptable. He can feel someone glaring at him, but Satoru doesn't move away. Suguru is perfectly happy to let him invade his personal bubble, and that's all that matters.
“Wouldn't you get in trouble?” Suguru knocks their shoulders together with a contemplative hum. The person glaring at them, his grandmother, frowns.
“I've been sneaking out since I was seven.” Satoru hasn't done what his Clan tells him to do since he was five years old. He thinks they'd be concerned about him, if he went this whole visit without causing a speck of trouble. “It's more suspicious if I stay in everyone's sights all the time.”
Suguru grins, his eyes flicking back to the slow moving debate in front of them. He doesn't need much more convincing.
The two of them sneak out of the compound with surprising ease, slipping out of the meeting when the same uncle from before opens his mouth again. It gets the grandma that's judging them to finally look away, and Satoru knows better than to wait around. As soon as her attention turns elsewhere he's grabbing Suguru's wrist and leading them out of that old, stuffy room; following the wall and ducking behind his other family members until they're in the clear.
The stupid servant didn't even lock the door behind everybody. Hell, they practically left it wideee open. It's the easiest meeting escape he thinks he's ever pulled off.
Satoru doesn't really have a plan when he leads Suguru out of the room and down the hallway. He just picks a direction and goes, jogging through the familiar paths without thinking. His classmate follows eagerly behind, their footsteps crunching on the gravel the farther and farther they get from the estate.
Him and Suguru end up on that same side of the mountain he'd explored years ago by sheer coincidence. Satoru only recognizes it because there's no trail anymore, the well maintained stone paths turning to dirt and dying grass. It's the only part of the estate without a natural or man-made path. He doesn't think anyone's come this way since he last did, five years ago.
It's snowed recently, too. The first snow of the season. Almost like it was the first time he ventured out here.
It's almost like the universe is telling them to go visit her.
“I was never allowed out here.” He says, feeling the area with his cursed energy. This part of the woods is quiet, void of even bird song. It's a sign that they've left his families' usual wandering grounds. That they're getting closer.
Suguru looks at him, curious. “Why?”
“Yuki-onna. One hunts here.” He can't feel her yet, but he can sense where he territory starts; about fifty feet in front of them. He wasn't able to do that last time he was here. “My mother said it would eat me if I ever walked the path.”
Suguru hums instead of responding, his gaze fixed on the mountain side.
Satoru grins knowingly. “You wanna go find her, don't you?”
“It's not everyday you find an Imaginary Vengeful Spirit.” Suguru looks back at him with his own smile. Of course they were on the same page.
And, well, Satoru supposes he has a point. Cursed Spirits that come from folktales are a rare sight nowadays. He's sure a few hundred years ago they were more common, but in the modern era they're more of a phenomenon. Usually a one in a hundred type thing, and when they do manifest they're usually Special Grade; hundreds of years worth of fear and story telling condensed into one beast, or a relic of a bygone era.
His Yuki-onna is neither of those things, nor is she Special Grade. This just makes her all the more, well, special.
“Fine.” He agrees. He has been itching to go visit her again, to see if she's gotten any stronger since his childhood. “But you can't eat it.”
“Why?” His classmate frowns, kicking up the fresh snow as he walks.
“Because the Clan would notice and probably turn it into a thing.”
They haven't been happy with anything Satoru did since he left for Jujutsu High, and that included making friends with Suguru. His cursed technique and Special Grade potential was not earning him any points with Satoru's family, despite what one initially might think. It actually seems to be pissing them off more.
Also, Satoru kinda wants to keep it around if possible. She's like, a token of his childhood or whatever. The first not weak curse he ever saw. She's special.
Not Special Grade, but special.
“Whatever.” Suguru sighs, and kicks up more snow.
“I went out and found her when I was ten, once.” He continues his original tale, half lost in the memory as they get closer and closer. The woods and snowfall really do look almost the same as it did the first time. Freaky. Maybe the curse's domain, if that's what her territory is, is the cause of that. (But it doesn't feel like any domain he's ever encountered before…)
“Did you?” His friend glances over at him again, his interest in the mountain curse once again peaked.
“Yep.” He hums, popping the p. “She didn't attack me or anything because I was just that cool.”
Suguru snorts, amused. “Maybe you weren't a good meal.”
“I would've been the best meal.” He argues. Ten year old him was small, but he still would've been a good meal because of his magic once in a lifetime Six Eyes powers, just like his mom always said.
“Nah,” He knocks his shoulder against Satoru's, grinning. “You're too lanky. There's no meat on your bones.”
“You're just jealous ‘cause you'd be a bad meal.” All the curses in Suguru would probably make him taste yucky, and the poor Yuki-onna didn't deserve one of her first meals to be bad.
“Whatever.” Suguru rolls his eyes, and goes back to kicking up snow for the rest of their walk.
They find her right as the snow starts to fall again. Satoru is very, very briefly glad they were forced into winter clothes this morning (even if he much would've preferred a winter coat and pants over his family's traditional winter kimonos.) Shoko would have their heads if they came back to her sick and with their extremities half frozen off.
Suguru pauses next to them, his whole body going rigid as he registers her cursed energy. It's as Satoru remembers, sharp and cold but not much stronger. She must've not had a meal since he saw her, if she's ever had one at all. Or they stopped telling the compound's children ghost stories. Maybe it was because kids stopped believing in her after a certain age? Something like that.
Anyways. They found her. It's a standoff now, or something. Satoru's not worried like Suguru is. She probably won't try to eat them. And even if she does, she's no match for one of them, let alone both.
They stare at her from across the old path. The Yuki-onna stares back at them.But she doesn't attack. Even the swirl of Suguru's cursed energy doesn't entice her. Five years later and she's still not all that vengeful. How interesting.
Suguru, now puzzled, relaxes his stance. “Was it like this last time?”
“Yep. Stalked me instead of trying to eat me.” Satoru hums, taking a step closer. The Yuki-onna doesn't advance, or step back. She just tilts her head to the side, curious. Like she's wondering what he'll do.
“Huh.” Suguru mutters. “Well, this is boring.”
He laughs, taking another half-step towards the curse. She still doesn't move. “What, did you wanna fight her?”
“Obviously.” His friend scowls, turning away. “Why else would I seek out a curse?”
“C'mon Satoru, let's go back. Maybe your uncle will make a fool of himself for a third time.” He calls, already starting down the mountain.
Satoru sprints after him, the Vengeful Spirit forgotten as quickly as they'd found it. “Ha! The stupid old man just might!”
He feels the Yuki-onna's eyes on them until they've left her territory far, far behind.(Aw, she's looking out for them. How sweet.)
“They sometimes fall in love with their victims, you know.” Suguru says on the way back, interrupting Satoru's very important thoughts of how he hates family meetings and his even more important wonderings of what Shoko, poor little Shoko all by herself, is doing back at the dorms.
He wrinkles his nose. He did know that, but he never considered it before. “I hope she didn't fall in love with ten year old me.”
“I wasn't saying that.” His friend scowls. “I was saying that maybe she liked you.”
“In, like, a motherly way?”
“Something like that.” Suguru hums.
Satoru doesn't say anything and lets the idea rest between them instead.
.…a motherly curse. Yeah right.
————————
They don't go back to the boring Clan business once they return to the compound. Because Satoru is many things, but being interested in family politics is not one of them. If they need him so badly like they claim they do they can simply come find him later. The servants know all his usual hiding spots.
Instead, they crash in Satoru's room and spam call Shoko until she picks up.
“What is it?” Her voice comes through the speaker, sleepy and a tinge annoyed. She was probably napping. Which, too bad. She's on call with them now until Satoru gets bored of her.
“Clan shit is boring. Also we found a Yuki-onna.” He tells her, putting his phone on speaker.
That gets her attention, just like he knew it would. “Like from the stories?”
“It was a Vengeful Cursed Spirit.” Suguru says, joining his classmate on the bed. Satoru is lying on his stomach, his ankles locked together with his cellphone in his hands. Suguru simply sits crosslegged. “Satoru wouldn't let me eat it.”
For a long second, no one says anything. The only sound is the thoughtful hum Shoko lets out, her fingers undoubtedly tapping rhythmically against her bedsheets.
Then,
“Go back,” Shoko tells them. Satoru can't see her, but he's pretty sure she's doing her evil devil grin. “Let him eat it.”
“Fine.” Satoru huffs, because he can't say no to her. If his Clan turns consuming the Yuki-onna into a thing, he is so blaming Shoko.
And like, if anyone was gonna exercise his favorite childhood curse he would want it to be Suguru.
“And keep me on call. I wanna hear it.” She adds needlessly. He wasn't gonna hang up on her, the whole thing was literally her idea.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” He tells her, rolling off the bed and towards the door. Suguru follows him with a laugh. “Let's get out of here before they notice we're back.”
Quickly, the two of them make their way out of the compound and start up the mountain trail for the second time that day. Satoru keeps Shoko on call, just like he said he would. She listens to them as he goes about doing her homework, the one that was due two weeks ago. Suguru, only half serious, asks if she can do his while she's at it. She tells him to fuck right off.
After twenty minutes of walking and complaining to Shoko about the snow and the cold, they come upon the pass again. Satoru tells her this with an excited little squeal and she makes fun of him for it because she's rude. Suguru joins in as well, because he's also rude and Satoru's decided he hates him, actually.
The audacity, the disrespect. See if he ever lets him eat an old curse of his family's property again.
The Yuki-onna is still there, in the same spot they'd left her. Almost like she's waiting. Her cursed energy hasn't moved, either, which means she didn't stalk them out of her territory. Like she was expecting them to come back for her.
Like she knew.
“Go on, Suguru,” Shoko encourages from the other end of the line, her voice mischievous and wild. “Eat it.”
“It's no more than a Semi-Grade Two.” Satoru informs him. His family's warnings had made the curse strong enough to form, but not too strong. It would probably need to eat someone, like the yokai it's based on does, to get stronger. It's strong enough, but not so much that Suguru can't skip straight to consumption.
Suguru sighs, and snaps a picture before he consumes it.
He extends his palm, the Yuki-onna distorting as Suguru's cursed energy sucks it in. The curse is turned into a decently sized black ball, about the size of an orange. Suguru turns the orb over in his fingers, getting a feel for it.
(And suddenly, the forest around them is no longer still.)
He does that sometimes with curses. He says it's to get a feel for how easy they'll go down. If the orb feels smooth, it's energy calm, it'll only leave him with a headache and a bad taste. If it's ragged and untamed he'll probably throw up a few times. It's the only part of his technique that Satoru pities.
“Did he eat it?” Shoko's voice pierces the silence, impatient.
“Give me a second.” Suguru growls, giving the orb one last squeeze.
“He's doing the thing where he fondles it.” Satoru tells her. Shoko snorts.
Suguru glares at both him and his phone. “Don't call it that.”
He places the ball on his tongue, anyways, sucking it down effortlessly. Satoru watches how his throat bobs as he swallows the orb in one big gulp, the movement well practiced. He watches, a little mesmerized, as the curse from his childhood is eaten and added to Suguru's reserves.
“He ate it.” He reports back, cringing at the gagging sound Suguru makes. He makes a mental note to get him some water when they return. Shoko lets out a little woo-hoo from the other end of line, clearly pleased with herself.
“Summon it?” She asks next. And yeah, she's definitely wearing her evil devil grin now.
“You're not even here to see it.” Suguru grumbles, summoning the curse.
The Yuki-onna appears beside them, looking exactly the same as she did before. The only difference is that her cursed energy feels a little stronger, more condensed. She must've been using some of it to erect her territory then, likely keeping whatever minor curses linger on his family's estate out.
Not quite a domain then, but not something too different. An incomplete one maybe, if Satoru has to guess.He grins. He wonders just how strong she'll get if Suguru lets her eat a few curses, or maybe even curse users…
He's snapped out of his thoughts by something bumping against him. When he turns toward it, he finds an inhuman face and spindly black hair leaning over him.Satoru blinks up at her. It takes every muscle in his body to not jump and scream at the literal living monster now towering over him. He doesn't wanna give Shoko even more things to bully him with.
Suguru's curse seems more interested in him than its new owner.
The Yuki-onna circles around him, kinda like a cat. It seems almost…happy? Satoru's unsure what about. It can't be seeing him, they just reunited less than two hours ago…
Suguru chuckles, watching as the she winds around him. “Seems it likes you after all.”
“Yeah, guess she does.” Satoru mumbles, allowing the curse to butt against his hand.
“Show me this when you guys get back and I'll do your homework.” Shoko bribes. Yep. Still evil devil grinning.
“Deal.” Satoru agrees for the both of them. No homework and he gets to show his family's curse off? Why wouldn't he agree?
“Let's go back before your crazy family tries to find us. I don't want them finding out that I ate their curse.” Suguru un-summons their Yuki-onna, starting back up the trail for the second time that day. Satoru only pouts a little at having his newest friend taken from him so soon.
“My homework better be done when I get back.” He tells Shoko, following his other classmate back up the trial they'd made in the fresh snowfall.
“You gotta show me the curse lady first, dummy.” She scoffs. He can hear the sound of her desk chair spinning in the background. “Is it on your desk?”
“Yep.” He hums. “If it's not there then it's in my bag.” And if it's not there then Satoru lost it and Yaga's going to kill him. But that's a problem for Future Satoru.
“M'kay. See you later.”
“Bye Sho'”
“Don't eat my leftover stir-fry.” Suguru calls over his shoulder. “And my homework's in my bag as well.”
“No promises!” Shoko hangs up before either of them can respond. Satoru snaps his phone shut once she's gone, the clack of it ringing out in the empty woods around them. (Maybe, if it were spring, they'd be hearing the birds start to sing again with the Yuki-onna's departure.)
“You think your uncle's embarrassed himself again?” His friend wonders aloud, shivering in his winter kimono. The light snowfall is making everything just that much colder. Satoru's glad they're going back now.
“Dunno.” He says, overtaking Suguru. If the meeting's not over by now, it will be soon. He wonders if anyone's even noticed they're gone. “Let's find out.”
Kris Dreemurr isn't a boy, and they aren't a girl. They're just Kris.
They have always just been Kris, for a very long time. They think it first started when they were about six years old. Maybe seven. Maybe it was a thing before. They're not sure of the exact age.
Kris doesn't really remember.
————————
on kris and gender.
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the
Organization for Transformative Works
i·den·ti·ty
noun
————————
Kris Dreemurr isn't a boy, and they aren't a girl. They're just Kris.
They have always just been Kris, for a very long time. They think it first started when they were about six years old. Maybe seven. Maybe it was a thing before. They're not sure of the exact age.
Kris doesn't really remember. That information was lost in the earlier years of childhood, when they were small and squishy and could still chase Noelle around the backyard.
All Kris remembers is telling their Mom that they're not a boy or a girl, they're just Kris. They don't remember why they started thinking about such things as a first grader (or younger), just that they did because something had felt off. And declaring themselves as just Kris had fixed the feeling, so they went with it.
They were just Kris.
Mom had smiled and ruffled their hair. She said they could be whatever they wanted to be. If they just wanted to be Kris, that was more than fine. She would always love them the same.
Little Kris had smiled, and asked when the pie would be done. Their mother was baking when they told her, like she seemed to always be doing when they were small. She doesn't really bake anymore, expect sometimes on the weekend. Kris misses when the whole house smelled like butterscotch-cinnamon.
Mom laughs a little, and says they pie will be done in about an hour or so. She hasn't even finished making the filling yet. She tells them to go play with Asriel, outside. She thinks Dess and Noelle are with him today. Or one of the other neighborhood kids, like Catti or Snowy. She'll call you all inside when the pie is done.
Kris agrees, and scurries out the front door, looking for their friends. Mom was the first person they told. They have to tell everyone that they're just Kris, too.
————————
Kris Dreemurr is nonbinary and no one cares.
No one had said anything bad, or weird, when they came out. Kris doesn't like calling it coming out, because they weren't hiding in a closet before. They were just six or seven and had finally learned the words to state something that'd always been there. Kris doesn't like calling it a coming out.
But whatever, that doesn't matter. What matters is that one said anything weird. No one said they had to be a boy or a girl because of what they were born with. Or how their hair looked. Or how they dressed. Everyone had nodded and said okay, even the kids in their class who looked a little confused. Temmie had asked if they wanted an egg.
It makes Kris a little giddy, if they're being honest, that no one cares. It's the one thing about them no one seems to have an opinion on.
The townspeople will make snide comments about everything but that. Everything, everything about the Dreemurr's weird human child is up to talk about, expect their gender. That one thing is unacceptable, to disrespectful, to scrutinize.
Kris takes more joy in this then they probably should.
One of they're classmates, MK, is just like them. It's cool, to have someone that understands. The two of them never talk about it, but there is a mutual acknowledgement. Not quite a kinship of any kind, but something else. Monster Kid's eyes light up when they find out, and Kris makes that grin that everyone thinks is creepy but actually means they're happy.
It's not kinship, but it's something close. And that's more than enough for them.
————————
Kris is nonbinary and wears clothes that aren't their own.
Clothes handed down from Azzy fill up their closet. Green sweaters with yellow stripes down the middle, and brown pants that are a few sizes too big for them. The only thing that is truly Kris' are the shoes, really, because you can't give a human shoes designed for monster feet.
Toriel gives them some of the smaller pairs, from when Azzy was younger, when they go through the stuff he left behind and didn't want. It has hard to get human shoes in hometown, after all.
They've always shared similar clothes, always been a matching pair. But Kris isn't five anymore, and Azzy is gone. There's no one to match with, and Kris has a closet full of boy clothes.
They learn to not like the color green. All Azzy wore was green. Everyday they pull a green sweater over their head. The color is sickening.
The only upside is that the clothes baggy, on Azzy and especially on Kris, because monster clothes have to be made different that human clothes. They don't like wearing things that aren't baggy.
Boy clothes are still boys clothes at the end of the day. Kris bites their tounge and wears them regardless. They don't know why; it's probably related to the Divorce. They stopped asking Mom for much of anything after the Divorce, and Dad....
Well, Dad's not around to ask for much in the first place. Doesn't have the money to buy what they ask for, anyways.
In the Dark World, in the room Ralsei made for them, there is a wardrobe full of many different clothes, all the clothes that Kris could ever want and more. They think they stare at it too long the first time they open it. Susie elbows them and grumbles something like what's so interesting about freaking clothes.
Kris shuts the closet door and keeps looking around. Or well, the Soul does. What the world told them when they opened that closet sticks in their brain for the rest of the day snd then some.
You could wear whatever you want.
————————
Kris is nonbinary, and they find that not anything or anyone can take that away.
Not even beings beyond their comprehension, or strange worlds were objects come to life.
They get possessed, and everything about them is thrown down the drain. Expect for the fact their nonbinary. That is the one thing that's unshakable, as hard as the Soul may try.
The Soul can make them do anything, can make them say anything. It can change anything and everything about them but that. Because it's always belonged to Kris. It's always been theirs and no one else's. It's the one thing that always had and always will.
So fine, whatever, the Soul can make them say weird shit or do weird shit. They could make Kris confess their undying love for Jockington for all they care.
It can't take the one thing that's important, and that's all that matters.
Everything that was truly Kris' still belongs to them. Nothing else matters, as long as they get to keep themsleves.
That's all.
————————
Susie asks them once how they figured it out.
"How I figured out what?" Kris mumbles, looking at her over their shoulder. She slowed down, so she's walking behind them instead of beside them. Her eyes are fixed anywhere but Kris' face.
Susie looks down at the ground, kicking at a pebble. She's being awkward about this. Kris doesn't know why. There's nothing to be awkward about. "How you're, you know, nonbinary or whatever."
Kris shrugs. They don't remember still, and probably never will. But that's fine. It doesn't matter. They fixed what was wrong with them when they were six or seven, and that's all there is to it.
They study her for a second, curious. She's still kicking that pebble around, looking at it like it's the most interesting thing in the world. They can't see her face, but they presume she was just curious. Susie impulsively wanted an answer to a shower thought, is all, and Kris was conveniently around to give it.
"Why?" They mutter eventually, if only to end the moment. Awkwardness isn't supposed to be on Susie's face. It looks weird on her. They don't like it.
Susie gives a shrug of her own. "I was just wondering." She takes a few longer strides, 'till she matches pace with Kris again. The awkwardness fades from her posture, but she keeps kicking the same pebble. Kris smiles to themsleves a little. She must like it, that pebble.
The Soul rattles gently in their chest, like it's upset about something. Maybe. Kris isn't very good at interpreting what it wants. Regardless, the rattling sounds displeased.
Kris smiles even wider. It's still the one thing they can't take.
"Do you wanna go to ICE-E's?" Susie asks, suddenly knocking their arms together. The rattling in their chest becomes background noise and Kris' brain catches up with the new conversation.
Kris wrinkles their nose a bit. ICE-E's pizza is weird tasting on the best of days. They really only go in to speak to Pizzapants, sometimes. "Why not QC's?"
"I think she's still mad at me for digging around in her dumpster." Susie hunches in on herself at the admission. Ashamed for getting caught dumpster diving, not at the action. It's rare she gets caught.
Kris hums in conformation, changing course ever so slightly. QC doesn't hold grudges for long. She'll probably be over it by next week, and then they'll never have to eat at ICE-E'S again.
The Soul rattles again, displeased by this. It likes QC's more. Kris smiles again. It's won't be able to control were they eat either, at least for now.
That's all that really matters.
————————
1. the fact of being who or what a person or thing is.
By some miracle, that village does not die.
“Let's step outside.” He says to the two adults in the room, and somehow does not summon his forest fire curse. He leaves a curse to guard the building's entrance as he steps out instead, one to keep the two children inside it safe.
Two hours later, Suguru finds himself outside his parents' house. He ushers the twins inside.
Satoru finds them three days after that.
(“Sulking over the idea that no one will understand you. Sounds pretty childish to me.")
______
on geto, choosing to stay, and changing yourself, for better or worse
day three of @sashisu-week
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the
Organization for Transformative Works
By some miracle, that village does not die.
“Let's step outside.” He says to the two adults in the room, and somehow does not summon his forest fire curse. He leaves a curse to guard the building's entrance as he steps out instead, one to keep the two children inside it safe.
In the nicest voice possible, Suguru tells the village people in front of him to calm down. This is an unusual case, but he has everything under control. He just has to make a phone call real quick, confirm something with a colleague. It's getting quite late, why don't they check in with their families? Maybe have dinner? Suguru will tell them when it's all handled, he promises. Those two girls will be out of their hair before the night is over.
By some miracle, this works.
Suguru steps away to make a phone call.
He starts to dial Satoru, but then thinks better of it, and types in the number for his assistant manager instead.
Truthfully, Suguru doesn't want to call anyone, but he's not making two injured children walk through wilderness and backroads.
“A situation came up.” He speaks as soon as they pick up, not letting the manager get a hello in. “When do you think you could be here?”
An hour, give or take, is the answer.
“Okay. Thanks.” Suguru shuts his phone with a snap, ending the call. An hour, he thinks he can do an hour. As long as the monkeys don't try and interfere again, he can probably do an hour.
Probably.
(The bloodlust itches at the back of his mind, persistent. He could just skip the hour wait and end it all now. Destroy the village with one of his curses, send them out until every rotten monkey is dead. It'd be a merciful fate for scum like them.
Somehow, he doesn't. He manages to keep that urge at a bay.
Oh but he wants to do so, so badly. More than he's ever wanted anything else. He wants it so bad it burns.
It's a miracle, these people are alive on a miracle and they're not even aware.
Stupid fucking monkeys.)
He takes one breath, then two, then three, before walking back inside the ramschackle hut the children are being kept in.
The two girls are right where he left them, huddled inside a cage. Suguru sighs, locking the door behind them. He doesn't want any of the villagers barging in.
He has a lot of work to do.
“Hi,” He says, surprised by how gentle he can make himself sound. “I'm Geto Suguru, what are your names?”
The girls look at him, then each other, then back to him. A silent conversation. Suguru waits patiently for them to decide.
The one with lighter brown, almost blonde, hair speaks first, her voice wavering. “I'm Nanako and she's Mimiko.”
“Hasaba.” The brunette, Mimiko, whispers their last name as an afterthought.
“It's nice to meet you.” He says, lowering himself to the floor.
“You can see the monsters too?” Nanako whispers, her eyes wide. She looks almost hopeful.
“I can.” Suguru smiles down at her. “They're my friends, see.” He quickly scans through his inventory for a curse that isn't…gruesome looking. He doesn't think showing these two something scary would be good right now. He settles for summoning his manta ray, since it's one of his more docile curses. Mimiko reaches out, and tentatively places her hand on its head. The curse lets out a rattling sound, almost a purr, and rubs against her palm.
She smiles, the first one Suguru ever sees. He thinks it gets seared into his memory.
The manta ray is one of his few transportation curses. He would use it to get them out of here, but he doesn't think all of them would fit.
(Rainbow Dragon wouldn't be scary, it would be cool. It would also be their ticket out of here, no auxiliary manager needed and no reason to quell his bloodlust. They could leave right now if he still had it.
But he doesn't, thanks to that man. He doesn't have a lot of things anymore thanks to him.)
He sends a smaller curse, an eel like creature, to find some socks and shoes for these two. Maybe a change of clothes, if it can find where their house used to be.It comes back five minutes later with two sets of worn slippers clamped in its jaw. It was the most it could carry without someone noticing. Suguru supposes these will have to do, then, and hands them to the twins.
They play with his manta ray as they slide them on, careful to avoid its tail. Suguru watches, and tries to ignore the storm raging in his mind.
His phone buzzes in his pocket. The auxiliary manager is here.
Suguru doesn't bother answering it. He simply scoops the girls out of this awful, awful cage they've been forced to live in, and quickly shuffles them into the car.People poke their heads out, curious. Suguru growls and walks faster.
The driver looks horrified when he sees the two children, looking back at the village in pure bewilderment.
Good. Let him see what the monkeys have done, what they're capable of.
The car practically speeds off as soon as they've all climbed into it, Suguru ignoring how the village head calls after him. Nobody needs to ask why.
He's not taking these two back to Jujutsu High.
He tells the assistant manager to drop them off near a hospital. Not one in Tokyo, no, the one in the town Suguru grew up in. It's closer and he knows how to get there. He makes up some lie about the girls needing emergency care, though it isn't really a lie. They clearly haven't been fed properly for who knows how long, and both girls carry plenty of scrapes and bruises; Mimiko’s eye even looks injured.
Realistically, they could probably be fine in the three hours it would take to get them to Shoko. But the driver doesn't need to know that.
He mumbles a hurried agreement from the front seat and changes course. Suguru chimes in occasionally to give him directions. The girls stay clutched at his side, silent. He doesn't think they move a muscle for the entire trip.
They reach Suguru's hometown an hour and a half later. He directs their driver for ten more minutes, telling the man to stop when they're half a block from the hospital.
The man is reluctant to do so. Wouldn't it be better to drop them off at the hospital entrance? These kids are injured, surely he can't expect them to walk that half a block?
Suguru growls and says to stop the damn car. They pull over so fast that Nanako jumps. He hurries the twins out of the car.
He tells the driver to go back to Jujutsu High, and slams the door.
The manager drives away without a glance back. Suguru does not start towards the hospital. He picks both the girls up in his arms and turns the opposite direction instead.
They're not going to the high-school and they're not going to stay with the monkeys, either. They'll forge their own path, just the three of them, away from all the rotten things and rotten people.
Twenty minutes later, Suguru finds himself outside his parents' house. It looks exactly the same as he remembers, quaint.
Homely, even.
It was anything but.
Better get this over with.
He tells the twins to wait outside. He'll be back very, very shortly, he promises, he just has to take care of something first. Mimiko looks up at him with the biggest, most trusting eyes he's ever seen and nods. (He thinks he feels his heart break in two at the sight)
He walks inside, curses ready, and finds the place empty.
Puzzled, Suguru takes a step forward. It's late in the evening, his parents should both be home from work by now. They should be sitting at the dinner table, sharing his mother's home cooked food and talking about their respective days. But the house is quiet and all the lights are off. He even goes to check their bedroom, in case they've retired to bed early, and finds that empty, too; the sheets lie atop the bed, undisturbed and neatly made like the rest of his childhood home.
He checks the side door, the one that leads to their small carport, and finds it empty. His father's ancient, rusty minivan is gone. It's probably been gone for a while now, a few hours at least.
His parents aren't home. How unusual; they almost never leave home for anything, other than work of course.
He heads back to the main portion of the house and looks for clues.
Hanging off the side of the fridge, his mother's calendar provides him the answer. Anniversary Trip! is written in her neat handwriting, the words starting at yesterday's date and extending until the next Tuesday's.
Oh, right. His parents' wedding anniversary is this month. He forgot.
Well, lucky them. If they were here tonight they probably would've died. Suguru has a week and then some until they come home. That's a lot of time he wasn't anticipating having. He can work with this.
He returns to the front porch and ushers the girls inside. He locks the front door behind them and puts a curse, a frog looking one that screams, on lookout for extra cover. Then, he gets to work.
He grabs the first aid kit from the medicine cabinet and does what he can, cleaning and bandaging any open scrapes. He mumbles sorry every time the rubbing alcohol makes one of them flinch. There is only so much Suguru can do, when half their wounds are bruises.
He does his best, and is simply glad none of these cuts got infected. Then they would have no choice but to go to the monkey hospital.
Mimiko's eye isn't too bad upon closer inspection. A cut near her eyelid had just caused the skin around it to swell; the eye itself is perfectly fine. Good, that's good. Suguru doesn't know how to handle infections, let alone a hurt eye.
He hands her an ice pack and a towel, then sets them up for the night.He gives them his parents room to sleep in for the time being, because the bed is better. It's bigger, too. His old, old twin bed is no place for two hurting children to sleep.
He gets them set up and turns to leave. Nanako's grip on his sleeve stops him.
The girls don't want to sleep alone. They're scared too, even, worried that if they do something bad will happen. That they'll wake up and this will all have been a dream. That Suguru won't come back.
He was going to sleep in his old room, but…
He sits against his parents' pillows, letting the girls cuddle up to him. Mimiko clutches the doll he gave her in her sleep. He'd grabbed it from his room when he was getting the first aid kit. It's one kf his childhood toys. He doesn't feel very much attachment to it, anymore, and she clearly needs it more.
(Giving it up was the easiest thing in the world.)
The girls sleep soundly for what has to be the first time in a long time. Suguru does not sleep at all.
This is nothing new. He hasn't slept in ages. His mind has been far too loud for that.
Tonight, it's the loudest it's ever been.
————————
Satoru finds them three days later.
Suguru doesn't know how and doesn't really care to, either. All he cares about, when Satoru's cursed energy explodes through the building, is that the twins are behind him.
“What the fuck.” He says upon seeing them, in lieu of a hello. It's directed entirely at Suguru. The twins, still skittish of anyone that isn't him or each other, flinch anyways.
Suguru doesn't say anything at all. He just lets Satoru rant.
“Do you know how worried we were when you didn't come back? Shoko acted like she was fine but she was losing it, Suguru. And then the village head told us you just disappeared? With two children? The higher ups thought you defected. They're this close to putting a warrant on your head!” He paces as he talks, a hand tugging at his hair. He's not wearing his sunglasses, his Six Eyes on full display. Suguru can't tell if this makes his little rant more menacing or more pathetic.
“Are you here to take us back to the school?” He speaks once Satoru has gotten it out of his system.
“Yes.” His classmate hisses, glaring at him. Suguru glares back.
Satoru finally looks past him, and sees the two girls hiding behind his classmate, cowering from the strange man that had teleported into the kitchen.
“Oh.” He mumbles. Something like guilt flashes on his face
“Oh?” Suguru can't help the snarl that leaves him. Oh?
Satoru crouches on the ground next to them, trying to get a closer look. Nanako hides her face against his sweatpants. “Why'd you take them here instead of back to the school?”
“They've suffered enough.” Suguru says. He leaves it at that.
It's time to leave, after that. Suguru doesn't want to leave, doesn't want to go back to Jujutsu High. He doesn't want the girls to get anywhere near that cursed place.
But the Six Eyes, the Strongest, has found them. He fears they no longer have a choice.
It goes about as well as you would expect.
Satoru tries to help him carry the girls to do the car. They don't let him.
Nanako doesn't let Satoru pick her up. She clutches his pants leg instead, hiding her face. He reaches for Mimiko next, and she backs away from him, wary.
Satoru frowns, pouts even, and back aways.
Idiot, can't tell he's only scaring them more?
Satoru watches, lost, as Suguru picks Nanako up and leads her sister out of the hosue by hand.
“Front seat.” He tells Satoru when they reach the car.
He looks back, puzzled. “What?”
“Front seat.” He repeats, nodding his head towards the front of the car. “They're scared of you.”
The girls aren't scared of just Satoru, they're scared of everyone. It wouldn't be good for them to be in the backseat with anyone but him.
For once, Satoru is not special in this regard. But Satoru looks so upset, that these girls are scared of him, and Suguru's mad. He wants to make him hurt. So he tells them that the girls are scared of him. That he is the problem.
Satoru agrees with a mumble and chambers into the passenger side. Suguru opens the back door, and the three of them follow after him.
(He is somewhat relieved when he sees that this driver is different from the last.)
Well, he tries to get the girls to follow Satoru into the car. There's a bit of an issue.
They refuse to go in if Suguru isn't basically holding them. He tries to put Nanako down and buckle her into the seat, and she practically wails.
It's not going to work.
It's like the bed situation all over again. These two kids are scared, traumatized, and without a home. Suguru doesn't have it in him to tell them no.
So he sits in the middle seat, Nanako on his lap and Mimiko curled into his side. The seat belt is over the three of them the best he can manage.
It's a very long, uncomfortable ride back to Tokyo. But it's worth it, if the girls feel safe.
Satoru barely waits for them to get out of the car when they reach the school. He just starts walking.
Suguru represses a sigh, and gets them out of the car by himself.
“Are they mad at us?” Nanako whispers as they walk through the front gates of the school, her hands clutching at the front of his sweater. Despite being more outgoing than her sister, she's the one more likely to hide her face when something scary happens. Mimiko, who walks by his side, is quite brave for such a soft spoken child.
Of course she thinks they're mad at her though. There's a lot of tension in the air between him and Satoru, so much the car ride over was suffocating. And last time there was tension in the air, her and her sister were thrown in a cage like dogs.
“No, just me. You two haven't done anything wrong.” He says, running a hand over her back. “I hurt their feelings very much.”
(He knows he hurt Satoru's feelings by running away, but Suguru doesn't have it in him to care right now.)
The five minutes walk across campus feels like it takes ten years and a second all at once. Not once does Satoru look back.
They reach the infirmary and Satoru teleports away without so much as a word. He leaves them as quickly as he had found them that morning. Suguru bites down the second sigh of the day, and shoves the door open.
He takes a step in, and she's already waiting for them.
“Hey, Shoko.” He greets her, and doesn't try to offer a smile. Somehow, he thinks that's the last thing she wants from him right now.
“Asshole.” She spits, punching him in the chest. She's not like Satoru, afraid to touch him. She's honest and blunt and unabashedly angry. Good. Suguru's been aching to have the fire inside him redirected back.
“Wow, I missed you too.” He says, sarcastic. He carefully puts Nanako down, untangling her death grip from his shirt. She’s scurrying to her sister’s side as soon as her feet hit the floor
“Don't try that shit with me right now.” She snarls. “I'm mad at you.”
“Sorry.”
“Don't lie to me either.” Shoko snaps. She's talking about more than just him, now. “You're not sorry, neither of you ever are.”
Oh, she's pissed at Satoru too. That makes two of them.
He wonders what went down in the four days he was gone, to turn the three of them into a circle of anger and misdirected intent.
“Where's Nanami-kun?” He asks instead. His kouhai is the one person he expects to see that he hasn't seen yetHe hasn't seen Yaga, either, but Suguru thinks that will change very soon.
“His room.” Shoko answers, curt, opening a drawer. “He hasn't left since…”
Since Haibara.
“Right. Does he-”
“He knows.” She snaps her gloves on with practiced ease, the snap echoing through the room.
“Okay.” Nanami knows. And if he does, then everyone else probably does, too. That's good. Suguru didn't wanna spend the next whoever long explaining why he vanished for three days to everyone he sees.
(If he's being honest, he can't even explain it to himself, not anymore.
He did a lot of thinking, those three days in his parents house. A lot of thinking indeed.)
Suguru turns his attention back to the girls.
“Shoko's going to do a little check-up on you now, okay?” He says. Behind him, she pulls various things. A stethoscope, a blood pressure cuff, an othoscope, a thermometer, all the things. He hopes the girls have had a checkup before, in that nowhere village, that these things aren't frightening to them.
Mimiko looks at him with wide eyes. Her sister glares at Shoko's back.
“She's a friend.” He reassures. For some reason, it feels almost like a lie.
“She doesn't talk like a friend.” Mimiko mutters. Nanako keeps glaring.
Suguru sighs, and asks them to go along with it. If they do, she can make all their wounds go away. No more brusies and no more bandaids.
They don't really have a choice but to agree, because Shoko turns around after that, her tools neatly set on the table and stethoscope in hand.
Nanako eyes the her warily. Mimiko clutches her doll from the house. “Is it gonna hurt?”
“A little.” Shoko says, and gets to work.
The checkup goes better than he thought. Both of the girls freeze up a little when she has to take their blood pressure, but that's the worst it gets.
Honestly, Suguru was expecting this to go worse. He's glad it didn't.
“You both did very good.” Shoko praises, ruffling each of the girl's hair. She gives them each a sticker and a lollipop for their bravery. Mimiko shyly tells her thank you. Nanako holds the little candy like it's something precious.
Shoko turns to him next. Suguru isn't quite sure what he's expecting when he does, that anger from before still shimmering in her gaze.
What does happen is the last thing he would expect.
Shoko draws him into a hug, her arms holding him tight. So tight, he feels like she's going to squeeze the air out of his lungs. But that's fine. For three days, he believed he'd never see her again.
Suguru hides his face in her hair, his shoulders slumping. She still smells the same, like cigarettes and her favorite vanilla perfume. He missed it.
She lets go after a minute and hits him in the chest a second time, a little weaker than the first. She sniffles. “I thought you were dead.”
“I'm sorry.” He mumbles, and doesn't know how much he means it.
“You never are.” She repeats. Shoko, for all the anger he can feel running under her skin, doesn't shiver him away.
“I am, this time.” He says, face still pressed into the top of her head. He thinks he means it. “I missed you.”
Shoko punches him a third time instead of responding and hugs him again.She pulls away after a long moment, wiping at her eyes. Suguru pretends like he doesn't see. “C'mon, let's get them set up, yeah?”
“Yeah.” He agrees, turning back to where the girls sit on the table.
They watch with wide eyes as the two of them detangle themselves from each other, the cold of the infirmary replacing Shoko's warmth when she pulls away.
Suguru ushers them out of the room and down the hall, the nurse on his heels. They need to get the girls a room, since they'll be staying here for the foreseeable future.
He has so much work to do.
————————
Shoko's mad at him.
He knew this already. She gets even angrier with him when he tells her why he tried to leave. He told her she wouldn't like the answer, when she asked. Shoko insisted he tell her regardless. She just needed to know.
“You almost left because no one can understand you?” Shoko snaps from where she sits at his desk, a half finished cigarette held fiercely between her fingers. He told her not to smoke in his room.
(He told her she wouldn't like this)
“It's not like that.” He says. Suguru's protests sound weak, even to his own ears. Because it's not like that, but it is like that, isn't it?
“It's exactly what it's like.” She says. (She's right. Suguru fucking hates when she's right. She always is.)
“How do you know what it's like?” He snaps, months old frustration bubbling back to the surface. “You weren't there, you haven't been there!”
She narrows her eyes at him, a warning. Her cigarette burns forgotten in her hand. “Oh yeah? And where have I been?”
“You've been down in your stupid morgue while the rest of us fight for our lives.” She's been on campus, safe and away from the danger. He's been out there fighting for his fucking life, day in day out, for people he doesn't care about. For the type of people that let a fourteen year old girl die and clap about it, who shove children they don't understand in cages and torment them, rotten people. Shoko's been here, safe and stress-free, and Suguru's been risking his life for that.
“I'm the reason you can even keep fighting, asshole.” She says; she's not wrong. They would've all been dead dozens of times over without her.
Unfortunately, Suguru's anger is louder. So much louder.
“You weren't there for-”
“Don't you finish that fucking sentence!” Shoko yells. Suguru snaps his mouth shut, horrified. For a long second, neither of them say anything. They just stare, wordless, at the person in front of them.
(Shoko thought she knew him pretty well. Turns out she was wrong.)
He didn't mean to say that. It just slipped out. (That's a bad fucking excuse and he knows it. Shoko knows it, too.)
“Shoko, I didn't mean that, I'm sorry-” He starts. It's too late. (But a little voice in the back of his head has been saying, ever since Haibara died, that it was Shoko's fault. Nevermind that the curse had practically cut him in half. She should've been in the infirmary when Nanami carried him in, not in her room. She should've gotten there faster. She should've done more.
It doesn't matter, that little voice says, that Haibara stopped breathing before the car even reached campus, she should've saved him.
But she didn't, and the ugly, scared parts of Suguru blame her for their friend being dead. So, in a way, he did mean what he said. He's lied to her again.
He lies all the time, on purpose and not. Each one chokes him, like a coil around his throat. Especially when he lies to her. He wonders when he'll ever stop, or if he'll ever be able to.
Suguru has been doing nothing but lying to himself for a year, after all.)
“You're never fucking sorry!” She repeats, and she's right, so much so that it stings. He and Satoru haven't ever been sorry, not in the way that matters, not once in their entire lives.
(But he's trying now, to be sorry for her. For all of them. She could start acknowledging that, at the very least.)
“Shoko, wait-” He says, guilt heavy on his tongue. She's about to leave, he can tell. Suguru's about to lose her again.
She puts her cigarette out on his desk with a snarl, leaving it there. “Nope, nuh-uh, I'm sick of dealing with you two dickbags.”
“Shoko..” He starts, but doesn't know what to say. He doesn't think there's anything he can, not if a sorry sounds empty coming from his mouth.
“You have a lot of growing up to do.” She stands from his desk chair with a scowl, slamming his bedroom door behind her. It spins once, twice, three times before coming to a stop. He listens to her angry footsteps retreat down the hall, past where her own room is, until they fade.
Suguru stares after her, at his sadly spinning chair and (rightfully) slammed bedroom door. He doesn't think he's seen her that upset. Not even when they almost died for real, just under a year ago. Not even when he woke up in the Star Corridor, in a pool of his own blood and Shoko's worried face peering down at him, her RCT a strong buzz under his skin. He doesn't think he's ever seen her that upset. Not before, not ever.
He shouldn't have snapped. Shouldn't have said what he said. Shouldn't have implied that it was her fault Haibara-
He flops against his mattress with a growl, burying his face in his pillows.
He really does fuck everything up, doesn't he?
————————
Satoru's mad at him, too.
Unlike Shoko, his rage is the quiet kind.It's the kind that makes him bite his tongue, lest he say something he doesn't really mean. Which is eerie, because Satoru is never quiet. It's not a good thing when he is, either.
It's the kind of rage that shimmers and grows the longer you sit on it, the one that comes from feelings of hurt and betrayal. Suguru doesn't know how to fix it, that little crack in their friendship, and doesn't really care too right now, either.
His head is still loud, bloodlust still itching under his fingertips. He wants to quell the chaos in his own mind before he even attempts to sort through Satoru's.So, Satoru is mad at him, too.
He's also desperate for any point of contact between them. One day, he's giving Suguru the silent treatment. The next he's needy, trying to grab for him in any way he can. Trying to throw an arm around his shoulders or bump their knees together on crowded trains like they used to before.
Suguru shoves him off every time. This is not their before, it's their after.
And in the after he and Satoru don't do things like that. The quicker one of them understands this, the better.
But Satoru is still stubborn as a mule. Suguru doesn't think he's going to learn anytime soon, unfortunately.
A year ago, he thinks he would've found the mood swings cute. Now he doesn't.
The back and forth of it is annoying. Suguru got sick of it quickly, within his first two weeks back, and has been sick of it ever since.
He's been back for two months now. His interactions with Satoru are either painfully awkward or so overbearing it makes Suguru want to rip his hair out.
It's getting old.
He'll talk to Satoru again when he decides how to feel.
He'll talk to Satoru when Mimiko and Nanako don't eye him with suspension, shuffling closer to Suguru whenever they happen to pass each other in the hall. They still don't like him.
The girls like Shoko, but not him. Not quite yet. Suguru is fine with this. He can take her cold indifference towards him over Satoru's clingyness any day.
And well…he doesn't want the girls to be scared of Satoru, but they probably should be. He is the Strongest now, after all.
And Suguru, along with his two little misfits, are still on thin ice. One wrong move, one word for Satoru…
It wouldn't go well.
He sighs at the thought. He doesn't like thinking about it, but it's true.
He'll talk to Satoru soon, when they calm the messes in their heads and hearts and when Mimiko and Nanako aren't as scared.
Soon, he swears it. He'll talk to Satoru soon.
————————
Suguru often finds himself replaying the conversation with Tsukumo Yuki in his head.
The side of him that hates non-sorcerors, and the side that doesn't.
He wonders which he chose.
————————
Things get better in increments.
It starts with Nanako and Mimiko, like all his days seem to do.
They become less skittish, as the weeks drag on. They slowly stop hiding behind him and bit by bit, get more adventurous as they grow used to the school. Mimiko, somewhat surprisingly, is the one who stops hiding first. And once she's overcome her fear her sister is hot on her heels, unwilling to be left behind.
It's him, somewhat ironically, who takes the longest to come around. Suguru doesn't like them being at Jujutsu High, but he's on house arrest. They have nowhere else to go.
After the first two days of constantly being on edge, he simply decided to grit teeth and bare with it; act like everything is normal and that nothing has changed. Seeing him constantly on edge wasn't good for the girls and their recovery. It wasn't good for him, either.
Despite his worries, they adjust to the school rather easily.
This, Suguru is grateful for. The three of them aren't out of the woods yet, far from it in fact. The sooner they get used to their new home, the better.
Nanami, too grief-stricken to safely go on a mission, is stuck on campus with them for three months.
Suguru watches, bit by bit, as Nanako and Mimiko bring him back to himself.
At first, his kouhai is nothing but polite to the two children. He says hello to them if they happen to cross paths and will play with them if he's in the same room, but not much else. He keeps a respectful distance from Suguru. They haven't really spoken since he almost deserted the school, both too wrapped up in their own grief. So that's fine, if Nanami wants to put some distance between them, at least for the time being.
Everyone else wants to put some distance between him and them, too. He's growing used to it.
This changes when Suguru, realizing he lost track of the girls two hours ago and hasn't seen them since, finds Nanami with them in the dorm's kitchen.
They're baking, Nanami explains. Suguru can tell as much by the bowl on the counter and the flour all over the girls clothes. Bored, Nanami had wanted to make his mother's strawberry shortcake recipe. The twins had wandered in and wanted to help.
Suguru smiles, and starts letting Nanami watch them more after that.
This is a good thing, for him and the girls both. Mimiko and Nanako need to interact with people that aren't him; they need to unlearn their fear of strangers, to understand that the world isn't out to get them, not anymore.
Suguru needs to do something other than spend his entire day taking care of two children. The girls are wonderful, but they're still kids. Kids are naturally stressful, and Suguru's had enough stress in his life as of late. The girls have, too. More of it won't help anyone get better.This change is a good one for his kouhai as well.
Slowly, Nanami starts to smile around Mimiko and Nanako. He laughs when they do something silly. The bags under his eyes start to lessen. Sometimes he even smiles around Suguru, too.
These are the first times he's smiled in months, and the first time he's laughed in a lot longer. Pulling either of these out of Nanami is rare, and no one's quite managed it since Haibara.
This is a miracle in and of itself.
(“Thank you for helping with them.” Suguru tells him one day. It's rather late at night. Nanami has just helped Mimiko settle down after a nightmare.
He's better at dealing with those, flourishing when Suguru falters. Nanami knows how to be kind and gentle when Suguru, inexperienced at comforting himself let alone a child, finds himself at a loss for words. He doesn't know what he'd do without the help.
“It's the least I could do.” Nanami says, brushing his bangs under his face. There's bags under his eyes. They've been there since Haibara died and Suguru doesn't think they'll be leaving anytime soon.
“You really don't have to.” He shuts the door to the girls room softly. Nanami doesn't have to help him, nobody does. He was the one who found the girls so they're his responsibility. Simple as that.
He doesn't know everyone is so happy to help an almost-murderer, either.
Nanami starts down the hall, back to his own room. He doesn't look at Suguru. “They're sorcerer children, and they're here. They should be happy while they have the chance.”
Suguru doesn't know why Nanami is helping a would-be-murderer, the man who almost left him and all their friends when the going got too tough. But they can agree on one thing; the girls deserve to be happy while they can.)
As for the others on campus….well, the girls' reactions to them are more of a mixed bag.
They warm up to Satoru eventually. Suguru thinks it's because he brings them candy a few times, unusually happy to share with stash. If he had to guess, it's probably because he feels guilty for scaring them when they first met.
Mimiko and Nanako are six, soon to be seven. Candy wins them over easily.
They're still not on the greatest of terms, but Satoru knows to tune all that down in front of the girls. It's probably the only time Suguru can stand to be around him.
So Satoru becomes the fourth person he trusts with them. He's at number four on the list because they're not on the best terms right now. A year ago, he probably would've been number one. Now, he falls behind Shoko, Nanami, and Suguru himself.
Even Yaga gets on the twins' good side, but that's not really a surprise. The old fart has always been sweet under that rough exterior, even if he shows it in….unconventional ways.
He's person number five Suguru trusts with the girls. Bottom of the list.
And Shoko. Well….She won't talk to him, but she'll talk to the kids. Says she's happy to finally not be the only girl on campus. They've stopped complaining when she drags them in for a checkup, happily chatting with her instead of cowering away behind him. It gets to the point that Suguru doesn't feel the need to accompany them anymore. Nanako, though still afraid of needles, will brave one if Shoko's giving the shot.
Besides, she learned how to keep them calm. Suguru being there would only stress the twins out more, what with his fretting and constant gloomy mood, so he opts out of going entirely.
Shoko sees them outside of medical appointments, too. Usually when Nanami drags her into playtime. Suguru has an inkling that he's doing this to keep Shoko out of the morgue. Sitting down there all day can't be good for her.
Nanako and Mimiko are just happy to have someone else to play fairies and watch movies with them.
(And they're not talking, but it's Shoko. When she wants to take them to meet Mei Mei and Utahime, people he normally wouldn't go out of his way to introduce them to, he lets her.)
They've started calling her Shoko-chan. It's cute. He's heard Satoru tease her for it a few times.
He doesn't know when exactly they made up, but Suguru figures that's not his business. Not anymore.
Anyways. The girls have warmed up to Shoko. And Suguru trusts her with them because she's her. She's not like Satoru.
She's number three on the list for a reason.
————————
Satoru comes back to him next.Something between them shifts. Suguru doesn't know if he gets his feelings sorted or what, but something shifts.
“Hey.” Satoru greets. He finds Suguru on a bench, not far from the training field. He hasn't really been allowed to train since he came, house arrest and all that. He's starting to miss it.
“Hey.” He mumbles, scooting over. Satoru plops down on the bench, one leg crossed over another and his hands resting on the back of it.
They can exist in the same space now without Suguru wanting to rip his hair out and without Satoru clinging to his side.
It's progress, a lot of progress from where they were two months ago. Satoru has started seeking him out more, like he used to. Suguru's even back to laughing at his stupid jokes.
They're almost back to the way they were before. Almost.
There's just this one thing…
Their hands brush, as Satoru animatedly chatters about his week. Suguru doesn't have any commentary to add like he used to, so he just sits and listens.
Their hands are brushing. Satoru's leaning on his shoulder as he talks. Suguru doesn't push him away anymore, but he doesn't touch back either. Every point of contact sets a fire under his skin
.….that's it, that's the one thing that's not back to normal. That's all.
(Suguru ignores the jackhammer beating of his heart and the flush on his face whenever they touch, or when Satoru smiles at him, or does just about anything.
He's not allowed indulgences like that, not anymore.
He would be a lair, if he said that feeling hadn't been there before.
Good thing he's well versed in being one.)
————————
“I love you.”
“What?” Suguru looks to his right, taken aback. His friend sits on the floor of his dorm, letting the fan they dragged in from the storage closet mess up his hair. It's summer once again, too hot to do anything but laze around inside.
Mimiko and Nanako are with Nanami in the kitchen, baking. They do it every other Wednesday when Nanami gets done with classes and missions. Suguru was more than happy to have them taken off his hands for a little while.
“I love you.” Satoru repeats. He tips his head back to look at Suguru, sunglasses slipping down his face. “You don't have to say it back, I just want you to know.”
(His eyes have always been pretty.)
“...Okay. Okay.” He says, processing….that. He wasn't really expecting to be confessed too in his room on a hot and sweaty summer's day. (Man, talk about unromantic….) “Thank you for telling me.”
“‘Course.” Satoru mumbles, his cheeks nicely flushed. Embarrassed, he turns back to the fan. He can't help but stare after him.
(...Cute.)
His face is nicely flushed and his heart is beating loudly in his chest. Suguru can't help but stare at Satoru from where he sits, pleased and dumbfounded all at once. He doesn't push the feeling down.
(He thinks, maybe, he can start to let himself love again.)
————————
Shoko comes back to him last.
He finds her in their old smoking spot, under the main building's stairwell. She's in the middle of a chainsmoke, three cigarettes already littering the floor under her and a fourth held between her fingers. She's been doing that a lot these days, chainsmoking. He doesn't have to imagine why.
Suguru hasn't smoked for almost four months, since the day he found the girls. He's here to revive a bad habit.
“Hey.” He says, coming to a stop in front of her.
“Hey.” She parrots back, sounding almost bored.Suguru joins her under the stairwell, leaning against the wall. It's a cloudy day out today; if they stay out here too long they're definitely gonna get rained on.
That's fine. Getting rained wouldn't be too bad, not if it's with her.
“Do the girls need something? Or do you?” Shoko asks between puffs of smoke, the stiff curling in the air around her. The bags under her eyes are heavy and so is the tiredness in her voice.
“I came looking for something.” He says, because saying that he needs her would be cheesy and a little too close to the truth for his liking. “You, actually.”
“And why's that?” Shoko keeps her gaze firmly fixed on the wall ahead. She's almost done with this cigarette; it won't be long before she's reaching for a fifth.
“You've been icing me out for months. I miss you.” He says, and this part is honest. It's a lot less cheesy than all the stuff running through his head but he means it just the same.
“Did you grow up yet?” She asks.
Suguru pauses before answering, gives himself some time to really think it over. (He owes it to her, after what he said during their last real conversation.)
“I like to think I did.” Is the answer he settles on. Part of him is surprised to find out that it's true.
He doesn't entertain the idea of killing all non-sorcerors anymore. Not to say he still doesn't believe in it, because he does. He just has no idea where his life is leading him, not anymore.
And he thinks following that dream will cost him the life he's starting to build here, and he doesn't want that. What's happening here isn't perfect, but it's good. Good enough to stay. If not for him, then for the two little girls he's responsible for.
They've finally found somewhere where they're happy, where they're loved. Ripping them away now for his ideals would be childish. And it would be cruel. Suguru loves them, and his classmates, too much to do that.
Shoko must sense this, because her posture relaxes around him for the first time in he doesn't how long. Suguru lets out a breath he didn't know he was holding.
Wordlessly, she offers him a smoke. Suguru smiles, and takes it.He lights it with the spare lighter she'd give him two years ago, taking a slow drag. The familiar taste of tobacco fills his mouth, and he hums.
Bad habit revived. Mission successful.
“I missed you.” She rasps, bumping their shoulders together. If he were to ask, she'd say that the croak in her voice is from the cigarette, not the lump in her throat or the wetness of her eyes.
“Missed you, too.” He mumbles and bumps her back.
Shoko smiles, leaning against his shoulder. Suguru lets her stay there until the pack of cigarettes is emptied, shared between the both of them. Then they run back to the dorms in the rain, laughing and groaning at the water they trek inside.
(Suguru, Shoko's laughter filling his senses, finds he was right. It's not perfect here, but it's good. He's happy. He wouldn't give this up for the world)
