✦ 𐙚₊˚⊹♡ Inumaki can’t is trying to handle allat !!
based on this request and a part 2 to this !
Inumaki had successfully made his friends believe in his relationship, but now a new trouble had arisen.
No one in public seemed to realise you two were dating. Shouldn’t it have been obvious since you were always together? That’s what Inumaki assumed anyway.
His assumptions were apparently always wrong.
The first incident happened on the beach, the sun casting an overpowering glow over the terrain, providing an intense heat that had people setting up umbrellas everywhere to avoid it.
When you had first pulled off your clothes, revealing your red bikini underneath, he almost got a boner in the middle of the beach. Therefore, he tried to stay close to you the whole time, one hand lingering on your lower back or pecking your lips at any given chance.
It managed to keep the lingering eyes at just that, no one daring to approach.
Until he stupidly decided to rest on his beach towel, two hands behind his head. You were only two or three metres from him, trying to make a sandcastle with the utmost dedication as it fell into pieces for the fourth time.
“Excuse me?”
You looked up.
Inumaki looked up.
“Yeah, you’re like really fit. Can I get your number?”
“No, I have a boyfriend. Sorry,” you replied stiffly, watching the group of boys grumble and hit each other before strolling off.
When you turned to look at Inumaki, he had his eyes closed facing the sky. You walked over to him, tapping his foot.
“Hm,” he grunted in acknowledgment.
“Toge,” you said with a smirk. “I know you saw that.”
He silently flicked his sunglasses over his nose, covering his eyes and causing you to laugh and lightly slap his chest. “You’re such a child, Toge. Did you think I was going to say yes or something?”
Silence.
You lean down and press a kiss against his abdomen, watching the muscles twitch underneath your touch. Then you lean over and press your lips firmly against his, breasts pressing into his chest and threatening to spill out of the skimpy material. His hand finally lifts, resting on your waist as you pull back.
“Salmon,” he hums gently. “Tuna mayo.”
You run your nails down his torso, watching his body shiver as you trailed lower and lower. “You’ve been touchy all day.” Your fingers trail over the waistband of his swimming shorts. “It’s been to keep everyone away, hasn’t it?” You flash him a grin. “You’re hot when you’re protective and jealous.”
He pushes his sunglasses back over his hair and looks up at you from where he’s still laying down.
“Cavier,” he grumbles.
You roll your eyes. “I presume you’re swearing at the boys and not me.”
“Salmon.”
“Good. Otherwise I would’ve gone and actually given them my number.”
Inumakis hand slips lower and grips your ass. Hard.
“Just teasing.” You press another kiss to his lips. “You’ll always be my…” you hesitate. “…alpha.”
He grins at that, laughing when he sees your disgusted expression at what you just said. “Salmon,” he agrees.
The second incident happened at the arcade. A date that the two of you had planned for weeks.
The world was a blur around the two of you as you focused purely on each other, making out in the photobooth machine, hogging the basketball machine, stealing all the balls at the bowling alley from the little kids and claiming they were lucky.
“Toge! Please can we play pool?” You ask as you already begin dragging him towards the empty pool table.
As you pay for it at the counter, hand the worker the money and walk back with your little coin to start the game, a group of boys walks past, not even bothering to look at your eyes before staring straight at your low-cut top.
Luckily, you didn’t seem to notice as you lightly jogged over to your boyfriend. He wrapped a protective arm around your waist as you pressed a kiss against his cheek.
As you leaned down to grab the sticks, your breasts jutted out from your top, the soft flesh looking ever so tempting to Inumaki who was trying to focus on anything else.
Except, every time you’d lean over the table to hit the balls, he wasn’t able to tear his eyes away. Every touch and graze against his arm set him alight, making his thoughts more clouded… and more lustful.
When you finally won, you spun with a squeal of glee to brag. However, he was clearly distracted, zoned out and staring down at his hands which were gripping the stick firmly.
“Toge? Are you okay?” You asked, reaching out to graze your fingers against his knuckles. “You- oh.” When you glanced down, you saw the very obvious problem. In his trousers.
You gaped at him as he nervously glanced at you. “Toge, you are such a horny freak!” You whisper-yelled with uncontrollable laughter.
Placing the sticks down, you quickly drag him into a gender-neutral toilet and push him up against the wall. He pulls in a sharp breath as you grope him through his jeans, unzipping them and unbuckling his belt.
His cock sprang free, flushed head leaking pre-cum as it throbbed in your hand. You rub your thumb over the slit, smearing the pre-cum around his base.
Quiet moans slipped from Inumaki’s mouth as you started moving your hand up and down, hips jerking forward involuntarily.
“I can’t believe you got a boner in the middle of the arcade,” you tease with a giggle, making his cheeks turn a deeper shade of pink.
“Mmm- caviar,” he groans out when your hand speeds up, the thap thap noise getting louder as he covers his mouth with his hand, eyes finally opening and immediately straying down to your chest, breasts jiggling with your quick hand movements.
You watch him intently, how he’s completely fixated. Without giving it much thought, you reach back and untie the strings holding the top together, letting it fall and expose your bra underneath, providing a much better view for your boyfriend.
You giggle again as he whimpers, one hand shooting to your hip and squeezing roughly, not so slyly slipping it down to your ass to cop a feel.
He comes unexpectedly, head tipping back against the cold wall and emitting a loud whimper, biting his lip to hold back the sounds.
Once you manage to clean up, Toge ties your top up again with relentless teasing. “You really like my breasts, huh?” You smirk.
He pulls his phone out from his pocket, quickly typing something on his notes.
I’m sorry. But they are fucking gorgeous.
You laugh, head tipping to rest on his chest. “Don’t apologise. They love the attention.”
More typing.
do THEY love the attention or do YOU love the attention
“Hmm. Both.”
He laughed, pushing his phone into his pocket again. “Salmon.”
smut mdni, blowjob, inumaki speaks a little, for this req
It was only fair to want to help your sweet boyfriend relax, right?
He was clicking away on his controller like he usually does when he has free time. eyes drafting from left to right on the monitor, closely following the targets he has to shoot.
you come up behind him, running your fingers over his shoulder blades, smoothing out his shirt.
"Hm?" he hums, looking up and smiling at you. You grin, leaning down to kiss his lips before dropping your hands to the side. "You're so cute, you know that, baby?" He doesn't reply, but the hue of pink that appears on his cheeks and the tip of his ears says enough.
You let him get back to it and when you know he's into it, you drop to your knees, shuffling to settle between his spread legs.
You bite your lip and start trailing kisses lower, teasing the waistband of his shorts. His breath catches, and he grunts, eyes never leaving the screen. Oh so he wants to stay focused on his game, right? you'll make him forget all about it.
“baby...” he whispers, like he's about to scold you, but the tone’s weak — clearly distracted.
You chuckle and take him in your mouth, slow and deliberate. His controller nearly slips from his fingers, but he fights to keep playing, groaning when your tongue swirls around the tip.
“tuna” he gasps, voice cracking between button presses
You grin, sucking harder, hands gripping his thighs to keep him steady. He shudders, eyes flickering between the game and you.
“Not… fuck,” he pants, making sure it's not loud enough for you to hear, fingers fumbling with combos.
You hum around him, your wet mouth the perfect distraction. His hands curl into fists, knuckles white — equal parts frustration and pleasure.
Finally, he throws his controller on his table, indicating that he won or maybe lost, who knows.
he stares, no, almost glares at you but you know he could never be mad. Especially not at his pretty girlfriend who looks so pretty with her mouth full with his cock.
He whimpers, bringing his hand to the back of your head, pushing you in deeper. his body curling forward, finishing deep down your throat. a strained moan leaving his mouth. Inumaki swears his vision just went white and when he finally opens his eyes, he sees you smiling all pretty with your lips covered in his cum.
Inumaki is many things, but innocent isnt one of them.
This is my first fic back after clawing myself back from nearly meeting Satan himself, so please bare with…
The hotel only has one bed you say…
“Gojo….why is there only one bed….”
“I can’t….hear you….tunnel or something….SORRY!”
The laughter that followed before he abruptly hung up on you cut through you like a hot knife. If it had been Nobara you needed to share the bed with, it would’ve been fine, hell even if it was Yuji you wouldn’t have minded all THAT much, but Inumaki? A guy you barely even managed to communicate with properly, let alone get to know well enough to sleep next to…What the fuck was Gojo playing at.
As you threw your phone on the bed and sank your head into your hands, you heard the click of the bathroom door open and flicked your eyes up to where your new bed buddy was now standing. His towel was dangerously close to barely covering his hip bones, and the remnants of the stream clung to his frame like smoke climbing a glass, your entire face burning up at the sight of him, half naked staring at you like he was looking at a confusing excuse for a curse.
A sudden flush slapped your face as you sat bolt up right, trying your hardest to keep your head facing the opposite direction again, the mental imagine of his abs now burned into your retinas for the foreseeable future, as you tried your best to fumble out an apology for staring.
“Shit sorry, didnt realise you were coming out of the shower, my bad! Um, so yeah….”
You not so gracefully flung your arm around and gestured to the double bed underneath you,
“Looks like Gojo just couldnt help himself…always trying to fuck with us even when hes no where near! I’ll sleep on the floor if you want, dont want to end up kicking you in the night or something…”
“Fish flakes, Tuna mayo.” (It’s fine, don’t worry about it.)
You still had a lot to learn about his way of communicating, those damn rice ball ingredients never got any easier to understand, especially when you were trying to be respectful and not look at his disgustingly beautiful body behind you. After a few seconds, you heard him clacking away at his phone, before hearing the text to speech voice cut through the room.
“I don’t care, as long as you’re comfortable with it. Im sure itll be okay, Kick me and I’ll just tell you to stay still lol.”
“lol? Cmon we’re not boomers here inumaki.”
“How else am I gonna make it sound like im laughing? Have you heard the way this thing says ‘hahahaha’?!”
The automated hahaha caused a laugh to stifle in your throat, not only did it sound incredibly robotic, but the rhythm of which it spoke made it sound more like a bad auto tune remix than an actual laughing reaction. His own chuckle erupted from his throat as he made it say it again, longer this time and way louder as he turned the volume up, both your laughter now filling the room and dismissing some of the obvious tension caused by Gojos butting in and ‘playing Cupid’ antics, helping you both relax even just a little bit more now.
After towel drying his hair and getting changed into some of his comfier clothes, he announced he was decent and you both lay back on the bed, fixing your pillows and awkwardly trying to keep a respectable distance between the two of you. It wasnt as if you didn’t get on, whenever you worked together or hung out in similar settings you both really did seem to bounce off each other quite nicely, it was just that youd never actually spent too much time together, especially not one on one, alone, like this. After a few moments of awkwardly fumbling with your phones, he decided to break the silence by asking who you were texting.
“Salmon roe?”
You flicked your eyes to him to question what he was saying and saw him staring down at your phone, prompting you to quickly close the conversation you were having about him with Nobara and pull up instagram instead, a flurry of memes now flooding your screen.
“Oh just, Nobara asking if I was okay. I told her about the whole bed thing so…”
He flicked his eyebrow up and tilted his head slightly, waiting for you to continue.
“She asked if I was worried about it, and i obviously told her no.”
The nervous chuckle that followed seemed to confuse him, why would you laugh at the idea of sharing a bed with him and someone asking if you were worried?
As you fumbled a string of nervous over explanatory nonsense for why you laughed, his fingers typed away on his phone,the voice now thankfully cutting you off with a question you never thought he’d ask out right so suddenly.
“Arent you worried, like, even a little?”
Shit. Should you be worried? Should you be nervous? Was he the type of guy to try it on with you in the middle of the night, even after everything Nonara assured you of? Your mind cascaded into a full on melt down as you tried to form a coherent answer, only for him to message again.
“That sounded weird. Sorry. I don’t want you to be worried, im just saying….i am a little.”
Suddenly your mouth decided that words could indeed come out again as you questioned why he would be the one worried about you.
“Wait, whyre you worried? Am I coming off as some kinda perv or something?! If this is about me staring at you when you came out of the shower, I really didn’t mean to! I heard the door go and I didn’t even realise you were showering in the first place, and it’s a natural reaction to look when you hear a noise, especially in our line of work and….
“I meant because there’s a hot girl next to me in bed.”
“…hot?”
His eyes widened slightly for a second as he tried his best to keep them glued to his phone, his over confident words hanging in the air as if typing them somehow made them easier to say out loud. It wasnt as if he was trying to keep it a secret that he found you attractive, it’s just with his limited vocabulary it’s not exactly the easiest thing in the world to flirt with someone, especially with one who doesn’t understand the differences between different rice ball ingredients.
After a short while, he eventually lifted his gaze to yours, a small shy smile trying to break the tension as he then exhaled slightly from his nose, his words still clinging to the air like that somehow made it easier to comeback from, or make sense of. You nervously laughed as you looked away, the idea of him finding you even remotely worth looking at causing the flush to spread up your throat, your words now getting caught as you tried your best to think of a response.
“Didnt er, think you were like that. Thought you were Yano, kinda into…panda?”
“Why does everyone think im gay?!”
A roar of laughter erupted from your throat at his apparent anguish at the very real assumptions everyone thought of him and panda hanging out daily together. It wasnt as if you were set on him being gay, it’s just that everyone had told you not to worry about him trying anything when you two went away on this mission together. Hell, even Gojo made a not so subtle joke about how it would probably take a whole army of curses to pin him down, just for him to even think to reach for your hand.
“Im not gay, i very much do like women, okay? Like…a lot.”
“Oh, a lot ey? You might wanna try telling everyone else that then! The amount of people that told me not to worry about you trying anything…”
“Wait, what? They said that?”
Suddenly your words stopped him in his faked annoyance and caused him to turn more towards you, his body now facing yours.
“Oh um, yeah kinda, but they didn’t mean it in a bad way! Yano, youre just so….”
“Gay?” “Innocent.”
Your answer interrupting his made him pause for a second, thoughts ran past his mind as if he himself was questioning just how little everyone around him truly knew him.
“….innocent? Is that really how they see me?”
A beat of silence stretched between the two of you, before you answered again.
“Arent you?”
His fingers hovered over his phone for a moment, his mind trying its best to decide if he was ready to admit to something he wasn’t sure was going to be reciprocated just yet.
“Im not a pervert but, I mean, im still a guy Yano. Ask panda, hes walking in on me a few times…”
“Oh my god, please don’t finish that sentence when I’m right next to you in bed!”
Your laughter caused a tiny smirk to pinch at his lips as he flicked his eyes to the side,slightly towards you, before returning to type again.
“What…scared im not as innocent as you all think I am?”
“What? No, Im not ‘scared’ i just….”
Without skipping a beat he replied quickly to your response, his confidence being less faked now as he let his truer intentions filter through slightly.
“Prove it. Sit closer then.”
Anxiety pinged in your stomach as soon as you heard the voice quickly interrupt you, shit…maybe he wasn’t as shy and reserved as everyone thought he might’ve been. You never were one to back away from a challenge at the best of times, so why would you start now, especially with someone as toned and funny as him right next to you, egging you on.
You shifted on the bed and sat yourself next to him, your thighs now touching as you felt his muscles flex slightly at the contact, your own nearly shaking at the close proximity.
“I ain’t scared of shit, if I can go toe to toe with Megumi when Gojos just annoyed the ever loving crap out of him, for the last piece of tofu then sitting closer to you is like a walk in the park.”
His half lidded, sultry eyes slowly looked towards yours as his eyebrow slowly raised, the sudden shift in atmosphere threatened to grab your throat and pull you under, as he then suddenly slammed his hand down on your thigh and squeezed it once, his fingers daring not to shudder under the weight of what he was about to do. You tensed your thigh, swallowed your anxiety and followed suit, slamming your own hand down on his too, confirming to him and yourself that no matter what, you werent going to be the first one to lose this apparent game of chicken you were now thrust into.
If your heartbeat wasnt downing your hearing out, you might’ve heard him swallow the lump in his throat, or the tiny inhale he tried to suppress as soon as your hand landed on his thigh, but it didn’t matter now, all that mattered was if he moved his hand, then you had to too.
‘See? Walk in the park. Whatre you gonna do eh? Throw some cursed speech my way? Cause that would be the only way youd ever win this game I hope you know.”
His hand suddenly tightened again, causing your chest to rise and your own hand to grip onto him tightly too, both of you stuck in the awkward beginning of something you both clearly wanted, but were too nervous to advance further into just yet. That was until he decided that since neither of you were at home, he had no other choice…
“Tell me to stop.”
Both of your hands were now pinned at the top of your head as he used one of his to restrain you, using the other to awkwardly type out what he wanted to say. Your breathing was ragged and your body now crushed under his as he towered over you, his lean frame now caging you to the mattress under you both. All it took was you guiding your hand up his thigh and calling him out for being a pussy for stopping before he got to your pants, for him to fling you under him and grind down into you, using his strength to overpower you and show you why none of you should’ve ever underestimated him in the first place.
The next words out of your mouth surprised even you, as you lifted your head to meet him, your lips daring to brush his as you whispered your reply into his trembling open mouth.
“Please don’t stop.”
Thats all it took, as soon as he heard your reply, he crashed his mouth into yours, his tongue almost immediately darting to drags cross yours as he pushed his body harder down into you. The intensity of the kiss caused a tiny mewl of a moan to escape you, as your legs instinctively opened up more for him, and your back to arch closer to him, his other hand now grabbing your waist and helping guide you closer. The more he kissed you, the more you could feel his cock begging to push into you, his thrusts staying controlled but intense, as he pushed you now harder into the mattress below.
It took mere seconds before you were both clawing at eachothers clothes, pulling at them like they were personally insulting you by clinging to the others frames, for you both to end up completely naked and back to grinding into eachother again like before. His cock perfectly glided between you, catching your slick and moving against you like it was made to do so, only for him to break away from the kiss and slow his thrusts, his breathing matching yours as he pressed his forehead to you and fumbled again for his phone.
“You sure you wanna do this? Cause once we start, i dont think I’ll ever be able to stop.”
You grabbed his hand away from the phone and pressed it against your chest, helping him play with you as you pressed your open mouth to his.
“Trust me, if I didn’t wanna do this, I’d of flipped you on your ass as soon as you touched me.”
The markings on his cheeks suddenly became crushed upwards as he smirked at your response, his tongue now darting out and teasing yours to follow it back more into his own mouth, as he then continued to thrust more up against you, his cock finding the perfect spot to glide against you and force a moan to echo from your throat again.
He thrusted a few more times against you, the feeling of your warmth and wetness almost making him lose his mind, as he then pulled back and trailed one hand down your stomach and inbetween your thighs, his fingers perfectly finding your clit and rubbing small tender circles across it. The sudden contrast of his cock to his fingers made you jolt slightly, he was tender and soft to begin with, but the electricity that you felt rattle your core caused your hips to jerk upwards to meet his movements, only spurring him on to move his fingers faster. He gently moved them down and curdled them into you, as he peppered from your lips to your neck in tight, hot pecks, his teeth now claiming you as if he needed to taste you since finally feeling how tight you were inside.
He pumped his fingers gently into you to begin with, using the rocking from your hips as guidance on how quickly to push into you, but once he fully pushed in and heard you gasp as he tilted his hand and found the perfect spot inside you, there was very little restraint inside him to stop himself from pumping his fingers into you at a dizzying pace and helping you cum completely undone around him. It didn’t take him long before he found the perfect pace, his fingers gliding in and out of you with ease as you began flooding his palm,his dick thrusting into your thigh as he helped guide you towards your first orgasm of the night.
Your body craved more, the tightening grip of his hand on your wrists, the intense grinding of his fingers inside you pulling you closer to the blinding white light inches away from plunging you under, you couldnt help it, your hips just seemed to be grinding up towards him more as you tried to reposition him so his cock was the one thrusting into you instead of his hand. He used his hips to push you back down, helping you take his fingers first as, even thought he might not be the biggest cock in the world according to his own insecurities, he definitely was thick enough for you to need at least some form of stretching before you took any of him on, no matter how eager you were.
He felt you flutter around him as his name and that of a god he knew you never believed in spilled from your throat, the wave of pure ecstasy fully engulfing you as your back arched and your nails dug into his hand above your head. After he helped you ride that first high, he couldnt contain himself any longer, so as soon as your hips stopping shaking and your eyes fluttered back open to look for his, he gently removed his fingers and fisted his cock, helping glide it back to your entrance and slowly push his head into you. The stretch from him pushing into you was mind numbing, he wasnt the first person youd ever had sex with before, he was definitely the most attentive, and passionate. He took his time, he worked you up, and Jesus fuck did he know how to tease, because the second his head was in you, he stopped pushing and just held it there, his teeth returning back to your neck and claiming it for every curse tomorrow to see.
You moved your hips to help him delve deeper, but the more you moved, the more he moved with you, adamant he would be the one to control the depth and intensity of the session, only to chuckle slightly when you let out a whiny moan at the fact he wasnt pushing fully into you. He kissed his way up to your mouth and held it inches away from you, teasing you with the tip of his tongue, drawing more whines out before finally pushing fully into you and moaning into your open mouth back at you, as your breath got ripped away from you in an instant.
As soon as he was fully inside you, you felt every fibre of your being screaming from him to move more. Instead of quickly pounding you into the mattress, he simply kept himself in you, and only slightly circled his hips, clearly savouring the tightness of you surrounding him finally, before giving in and pulling one of your legs up over his shoulder and pushing deeper inside of you. The more he thrust, the more the air got knocked from your throat, each pound felt like he was pushing you harder into the bed, as he started to pick up a faster more urgent pace, his fingers now almost bruising your wrists as he continued to hold them up by the headboard above you.
What started as a gentle, easing into love making, quickly turned into his own personal declaration as to why innocent should never be a word thrown his way, as his hips slapped against yours, his sweat now trickling down his throat as he finally freed your hands and used his own to dig into your hips, forcing you to meet him with each punishingly fast thrust. He had moved more onto his knees as he helped fuck you back into him, your tits now bouncing and evading his mouth as he tried to latch on and litter you in markings, his mind going numb from just how tightly you hugged him, his own high dangerously close to slapping him across the face embarrassingly too soon. The more he heard you scream and moan, the more he had to make sure he didn’t slip up snd use his cursed technique on you. It was always something he had thought about doing, but understood that it wasn’t something he could just whip out on someone, especially it being the first time he was fucking them, but the way you bounced so perfectly onto his cock had his mind second guessing himself even more, maybe youd be into it? Maybe he could do it just once.
“Cum.”
As soon as he said it, you gushed all around him, your walls dragging him in deeper and clamping down around him. The backlash of his technique and the accompanied intensity of your orgasm caused him to almost instantly cum as well, his cock twitching and unloading the most intense and body crumbling orgasm of his life deep inside you. He didn’t intend on cuming just yet, he wanted to make you cum at least a few more times before he did, but the intensity of you pulling him in and feeling how tight you were milking him, he really couldnt help himself.
As soon as you both started coming down from your highs, he collapsed ontop of you and panted into your chest, tiny kisses trying their best to litter you as he desperately tried to regain his breathing, all but failing as both your visions fuzzed around the edges and your bodies shook from the afterglow. After a few minutes of shared panting and consciousnesses stabilising, he eventually pulled out and laid next to you, his arm out stretched to beckon you onto his chest only to realise your eyes were still fluttering and your mouth was still panting. A gentle chuckle escaped his mouth as he turned to lay on his side, flinging his arm now around your stomach and wiggling his head back towards your neck, exhaling deeply as he let a tiny “salmon?”utter into your hair.
To say you underestimated inumakis ability to make you fold like a lawn chair almost immediately was a wildly inaccurate understatement, especially considering you went another three more rounds before the sun even managed to peak through and declare it morning, still…there were worse ways to unwind before dealing with about 6 grade 1 curses for the next three days straight, I suppose.
Imagining drunk toge accidentally slipping up, saying cum over and over but he’s so drunk and pussy drunk at that point it he just can’t stop himself and you end up cumming back to back with no reprieve-
🗣️This person gets it!!
I'm having thoughts, visions if you will, of an incredibly flushed, panting, and whiny Toge. His grip is nearly bruising on your hips as he buries himself inside of you over and over again, jostling the coffee table next to you with his erratic movements, causing empty bottles to clatter down onto the floor next to you, but he can't be bothered to care. Not when you look like this. Panting and moaning beneath him about how good he feels, running your fingers through his damp hair and looking up at him through your teary lashes, mascara running down your face. Your brows knit in pleasure as your jaw hangs slack, letting out the most erotic sounds he thinks he's ever heard, and fuck, he's gonna cum if you don't stop squeezing down on him so hard; he can't let that happen, he'd die of embarrassment if he came before you and before he even realizes it the words are spilling out of too naturally. "Cum for me," and you do; you cum hard, borderline screaming as you spasm around him and claw at his shoulders, trying to hold on for dear life as your orgasm rips through you. He's not far behind, spilling into you, but before he can think about it, he's repeating himself, "Cum for me," he doesn't care that he's so sensitive that it's bordering on painful when he does it again, brain-melting as he chants "cum, cum, cum..." It was gonna be a long night.
SYNOPSIS: It’s not that he can’t speak. You’ve heard him, clear as day, with everyone else. But when it’s you, something shifts, and suddenly the words just… don’t come out. You try not to take it personally. But it’s hard not to wonder why you’re the only one he can’t seem to talk to.
WORD COUNT: 7.9k
The first time you noticed Toge Inumaki, the campus of Seika University was still new and overwhelming, a sprawling maze of brick buildings, cherry blossoms just beginning to dust the walkways, and the constant hum of freshmen pretending they knew where they were going. It was orientation week, late September, the air crisp with the promise of rain. You were clutching a crumpled map and a too-heavy backpack, trying to find the lecture hall for Intro to Modern Literature, when you spotted him.
He was sitting alone on a low stone bench near the fountain, white earbuds in, hood of his oversized black sweatshirt pulled low. His hair, that pale blond with those striking purple tips that caught the sunlight like ink bleeding into paper had fallen across his forehead. Even from a distance, he looked… quiet. Not in the awkward, phone-scrolling way most people did. It was deeper. Like the world around him simply didn’t require his input. A few upperclassmen walked past, laughing loudly, and he didn’t even glance up. Just a faint nod to himself, as if agreeing with whatever song was playing.
You don’t know what made you approach. Maybe it was the way he seemed perfectly content in his own bubble, or maybe it was the tiny snake-like markings at the corners of his mouth that peeked out when he adjusted his collar. There was something that made him look both mysterious and strangely approachable. You stopped a respectful three feet away, heart thumping a little too hard for a simple hello.
“Hi,” you said, offering a smile that felt too bright. “I’m Reader. First-year, same as you? I think we’re both in Professor Yamamoto’s lit class at ten. Mind if I sit for a second? I’m terrible with campus maps.”
He looked up slowly. His eyes met yours for half a second. Then he gave the smallest nod, scooting over just enough on the bench. No words. Not even a “sure” or a “yeah.” Just that nod and a tiny upward twitch at the corner of his mouth, like a secret smile he wasn’t quite ready to share.
You sat. The stone was cold through your jeans. You filled the silence the way you always did when nervous. Chattering about how the dorms smelled like old ramen and regret, how you’d already lost your student ID twice, how the bookstore line was a nightmare. He listened. Really listened. His gaze stayed on the fountain, but every so often he’d tilt his head slightly, or his fingers would tap once against his knee in what you later realized was agreement. When you finally ran out of steam and asked, “What about you? What’s your major?” he pulled out a small notebook from his bag, flipped it open, and wrote in neat, precise handwriting:
Literature & Linguistics. Same class.
Then he slid the notebook toward you, eyes flicking up to yours again. That same half-smile. Your stomach did something weird. Fluttery, warm, like the first sip of hot chocolate on a cold day.
From that moment, something shifted. Not dramatically. Toge wasn’t the type for drama. But over the next few weeks, you kept finding him in the same seats: back row, left side, near the window. You started sitting next to him without asking. He never protested. In fact, one rainy Tuesday when you were late because your umbrella had flipped inside out, you found his bag already saving the seat beside him. A single onigiri wrapper, salmon, you noticed, was placed neatly on top like a placeholder.
Small victories piled up like autumn leaves.
By mid-October, shared classes turned into shared meals in the cafeteria. You’d slide your tray across from his, and he’d push the extra milk carton he always grabbed toward you without looking up. You learned he liked the plain rice bowls with pickled vegetables. You learned he hated the overly sweet melon soda. You learned he communicated best through gestures: a thumbs-up for “good idea,” a slight head tilt for “explain more,” a soft tap on your notebook when your pen ran out of ink and he offered his own.
Group projects were where the dynamic really settled. In your first one, a collaborative presentation on postmodern poetry, Toge ended up in your group of four. The others chattered nonstop. You tried to carry the conversation, scribbling notes, assigning sections. Toge contributed by sketching out a clean timeline on poster board, his handwriting elegant and tiny. When one of the guys joked, “Dude, you gonna say anything or just vibe in silence?” Toge only shrugged, eyes crinkling in that quiet amusement you were starting to recognize as his version of laughter.
Later, alone with you in the library study room, he wrote on a sticky note:
Sorry if I’m quiet. Words are… heavy sometimes.
You stared at it for a long moment, then wrote back:
That’s okay. I like listening to the spaces between words anyway.
He read it, cheeks tinting the faintest pink under the fluorescent lights. For the first time, he looked away completely, ears burning. You felt the deeper silence. Around the others in your group, he’d at least offered a few short phrases. But with you? It was like his voice caught in his throat every single time. He froze. Not uncomfortable, exactly. More like… careful. Like speaking to you required something he wasn’t ready to risk.
You started to notice the pattern over the months. In the bustling hallways between classes, he’d walk beside you, shoulder occasionally brushing yours when the crowd surged. He’d hold doors, adjust the strap of your bag when it slipped, once even draped his own scarf around your neck during a sudden cold snap without a single word of explanation. But ask him a direct question about his weekend or his favorite book, and he’d just… pause. Eyes on yours, lips parted like the words were right there, then nothing. A soft exhale. A nod. A written note instead.
Your internal monologue became a constant companion during those early days. Why does he do that only with me? you’d wonder at night, staring at your ceiling in the dorm. With your mutual friends like Maki, who was loud and opinionated in the debate club, or Panda, the giant teddy-bear energy of a guy who somehow always had snacks. Toge was still quiet and sure. But he’d toss out a few phrases. He’d just smirk and keep eating.
But you? You were the exception that made the rule feel heavier. You’d catch him watching you during lectures, gaze lingering a beat too long when you raised your hand to answer a question. When you laughed at a professor’s bad joke, his shoulders would relax, like your happiness loosened something in him. You grew fond of the mystery. Fond of the way his silence felt like a language only the two of you were learning slowly and patiently without pressure.
By the end of freshman year, the friendship had roots. You’d shared late-night study sessions where he’d hum softly under his breath while highlighting passages, the sound low and warm like distant thunder. You’d leave little doodles in the margins of his notes: tiny rice balls with speech bubbles saying “You got this.” He’d return them with a single purple star drawn beside your name.
Sophomore year brought more of the same, only deeper. A club you both joined, Creative Writing Circle, meant weekly meetings where everyone read their pieces aloud. Toge never read his. He’d pass his typed pages to you instead, letting you read them for him in that quiet corner of the arts building. His stories were beautiful: sparse, poetic, full of unspoken longing and quiet observations of the world. You’d glance at him mid-sentence, voice catching on his words, and he’d meet your eyes with that same frozen intensity. Speechless again. But his hand would brush yours when he took the pages back, lingering just a second longer than necessary.
Junior year tested it. A group project gone wrong when your partner bailed last minute had left the two of you alone in the library until 2 a.m. You were exhausted, head on the table, muttering about how you’d never finish. Toge didn’t say a word. He just slid his chair closer, took half the research pile, and worked beside you in perfect sync. When you finally looked up, bleary-eyed, he had his jacket draped over your shoulders. His fingers hovered near your hair like he wanted to tuck a strand behind your ear, but he pulled back at the last second. Froze. That deeper silence again.
You smiled anyway, tired and fond. “Thanks, Toge. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
He didn’t respond verbally. Just wrote on the edge of your notebook:
You don’t have to.
And that was enough. For now.
The years blurred in that gentle rhythm. Shared classes turning into shared silences that felt louder than any conversation. You’d grown used to the frustration others threw your way: classmates teasing, “He never talks to you? Ouch,” or friends nudging you with, “Maybe he’s just not that into people.” You brushed it off. Because you saw the truth in the small things. The way he saved you the last onigiri from the cafeteria. The way he lingered at the door after group hangouts, waiting until you were safely on your bike before heading his own way. The way his eyes softened only for you.
By senior year, the dynamic was carved in stone: Toge Inumaki, quiet with the world, but with you… he was something more. Speechless in a way that made your heart ache with curiosity and something warmer, something you didn’t dare name yet. The silence between you wasn’t empty. It was full. Brimming with everything unsaid, waiting for the right moment to spill over.
You just didn’t know how long you could wait.
The rhythm of sophomore and junior year settled into something almost comforting, like the steady hum of the campus during midterms. It was predictable, a little stressful, but undeniably yours.
You and Toge Inumaki had fallen into a quiet orbit. Every Tuesday and Thursday in Advanced Literary Theory, you arrived early enough to claim the two seats by the window on the left side of the lecture hall. He was always there first, already unpacking his notebook and a small bento box wrapped neatly in a blue cloth. Without fail, he would slide the extra pair of chopsticks toward your side of the desk the moment you sat down. No words. Just the soft clack of wood against the table and the faintest tilt of his head that said, Eat with me.
Around everyone else, Toge wasn’t completely mute. That was the part that confused your friends the most.
You’d watch it happen during group lunches in the central cafeteria. Maki would slam her tray down, complaining loudly about her economics professor, and Toge would actually respond, it was short but audible.
“Yeah… she’s brutal,” he’d mutter, voice a little rough from disuse, the words clipped but clear. Or when Panda cracked a dumb joke about cafeteria mystery meat, Toge would let out a soft huff of laughter and say, “Salmon roe,” in that signature deadpan way that made the whole table burst out laughing. He could string together full sentences when he wanted to. Nothing flowery, but enough to participate. Enough to show he wasn’t incapable.
Just… never with you.
With you, the silence was different. Deeper. He would listen. God, he listened so intently it sometimes felt like he was memorizing the shape of your voice. But the moment you turned the conversation toward him with a direct question (“How was your weekend?” or “Did you finish that essay on Kafka?”), his mouth would part, breath catching, and then… nothing. Lips pressing into a thin line. Eyes dropping to the table. A tiny, almost imperceptible shake of his head, like the words had tangled somewhere between his throat and his tongue.
It drove you a little crazy.
One crisp October afternoon during junior year, the four of you, Maki, Panda, Toge, and you, were crammed into a study room on the third floor of the library. Rain pattered against the tall windows. Maki was sprawled across two chairs, highlighter between her teeth, ranting about her latest debate tournament.
“Seriously, the opposing team was so unprepared. I destroyed them. Right, Inumaki?”
Toge glanced up from his laptop, purple-tipped hair falling into his eyes. “You crushed it,” he said plainly, voice steady and low. He even added, “Their opener was weak. You had them from the first rebuttal.” Then he went back to typing, completely at ease.
You stared. The casual way the words rolled off his tongue felt almost unfair. You’d been trying for three years to get more than a nod or a written note from him, and here he was, giving Maki full sentences like it was nothing.
Panda noticed your expression and grinned, nudging you with his elbow. “See? He talks when he feels like it. Maybe he just doesn’t like you, Reader.”
Maki snorted. “Nah, he’s probably scared. Look at him. Every time she looks at him directly he turns into a statue.”
Toge’s fingers froze on the keyboard for half a second. His ears went pink, but he didn’t look up. Didn’t defend himself. Just kept typing, jaw tight.
You forced a laugh, cheeks burning. “Very funny, guys. Real supportive.”
Inside, though, the teasing stung more than you wanted to admit. You’d spent countless nights replaying every interaction, wondering what you’d done wrong. Did your voice annoy him? Did you talk too much? Were you imagining the way his shoulders relaxed when you entered a room, or the protective way he always positioned himself between you and the crowded hallway?
Later that same study session, when Maki and Panda stepped out to grab coffee, the room fell into its familiar hush. You were highlighting a dense paragraph on narrative unreliability when Toge slid a fresh sticky note across the table. His handwriting was as neat as ever:
You’re doing well on this section. Want help with the conclusion?
You read it, then looked at him. He was watching you those dark eyes soft in the warm lamplight. His mouth opened slightly, like he might actually say something this time. You held your breath.
But the words never came. He closed his mouth, swallowed, and gave you that small, apologetic half-smile instead. The one that made your chest ache with equal parts fondness and frustration.
You wrote back on the same note:
I’d love help. Thank you, Toge.
P.S. You know you can talk to me, right? I don’t bite.
He read your reply. His fingers tightened around the pen for a moment, knuckles whitening. Then he simply nodded once, took the note back, and began writing detailed suggestions for your conclusion in his elegant script. No verbal response. Not even a “yeah.”
The near-misses happened more often as the semester wore on.
There was the night the four of you pulled an all-nighter for a joint presentation. Around 3 a.m., Panda had fallen asleep snoring on the beanbag. Maki was power-walking circles around the room to stay awake. You were fighting to keep your eyes open, head drooping over your laptop.
Toge noticed immediately. Without a word, he stood, shrugged off his black hoodie, and draped it over your shoulders. The fabric smelled like him. Clean laundry, faint citrus from the onigiri seasoning he always carried, and something warmer, like sandalwood. His fingers brushed the back of your neck as he adjusted the hood, and you swore you felt him hesitate there, breath catching like he wanted to say something.
You looked up at him, voice soft. “Toge… you don’t have to—”
He froze again. Lips parted. Eyes wide for a fraction of a second. Then he pulled his hand back like he’d been burned, gave you a quick thumbs-up, and returned to his seat. A minute later he pushed a warm can of barley tea he’d been saving toward you. Still silent.
Another time, during a rare sunny afternoon on the quad, your group was sprawled on the grass. You were complaining about a difficult elective professor who kept docking points for “lack of originality.” Toge was lying on his back beside you, one arm behind his head, listening. When you sighed dramatically and said, “I just wish I knew what he actually wanted from us,” Toge turned his head toward you. His mouth moved.
For one heartbeat you thought he was going to speak directly to you.
Instead, he murmured toward the sky, so quietly you almost missed it, “He doesn’t know what he wants either.”
Maki barked a laugh. “See? Inumaki gets it.”
But he hadn’t said it to you. Not really. He’d spoken into the open air, like the words were safer that way.
The tension built in these tiny, bittersweet increments.
You started leaving him little written messages in return. Slipping folded notes into his bag when he wasn’t looking. Simple things at first:
“You always notice when I forget my umbrella. How?”
“I like sitting next to you in class. Even when we don’t talk.”
"Thanks for saving me a seat again."
He never mentioned the notes out loud, but you’d find replies tucked into your own notebook the next day. Always in his precise handwriting:
“I like it too.”
“Because you forget it every time it rains.
Me too.”
“Never spoken. Never explained.”
One particularly cold evening in late November, you witnessed a rare crack in his composure. The two of you had stayed late in the literature building after a club meeting. The others had already left. You were packing up when you noticed Toge staring out the window, shoulders unusually tense. His jaw was clenched, eyes distant. Something had upset him. Maybe a low grade on an essay, maybe family stuff he never talked about. You didn’t know.
You stepped closer, voice gentle. “Hey… you okay?”
He turned to you sharply. For a moment his lips moved, the beginning of a word forming “I—” then it died. He exhaled shakily, looked away, and simply shook his head. One hand came up to rub the back of his neck, a rare show of vulnerability. You wanted so badly to reach out and squeeze his shoulder, to tell him it was okay to not be okay, but you held back. Instead, you pulled out your notebook and wrote:
Whatever it is, I’m here. No pressure to talk.
He read it. His eyes softened, the tension in his frame easing just a little. Then he did something new. He reached over and rested his hand lightly on top of yours for three full seconds. Warm. Steady. No words. Just that touch, thumb brushing once across your knuckles before he pulled away.
The silence after that felt heavier than usual, but sweeter too. Like it was holding something precious.
By the time senior year began, the pattern was deeply ingrained. Toge Inumaki could talk to others. He could laugh quietly at Panda’s jokes, offer short opinions in group discussions, even tease Maki back when she got too competitive. His voice existed. It was low, a little raspy, surprisingly gentle when he used it.
Every single day, he just chose to keep it from you.
And you, despite the growing ache in your chest every time he froze around you, kept showing up. Kept sitting beside him. Kept hoping that one day the words he held so carefully would finally find their way to you.
Graduation was only months away now. Time was running out, and the silence between you felt louder than ever.
Senior year hit like the first cold wind of winter. It was sharp, undeniable, and carrying the scent of endings.
The campus felt smaller now, or maybe you had simply grown larger inside it. The cherry blossoms had come and gone four times since that first awkward introduction on the stone bench. Your shared classes were fewer, but the ones that remained like Advanced Seminar in Contemporary Fiction and an elective Creative Nonfiction workshop had still placed you and Toge side by side by some quiet, stubborn habit neither of you broke.
Time was slipping through your fingers, and you felt it in every ticking clock, every countdown to finals, every casual mention of “after graduation” from your friends.
You tried to ignore the growing knot in your stomach, but it was getting harder.
Mornings in the seminar room were the same on the surface. You arrived to find Toge already there, two seats claimed near the back. He would push a warm canned coffee or a neatly wrapped onigiri toward you the moment you sat down. Sometimes his fingers would linger near yours on the desk, not quite touching, before he pulled back. Around the rest of the small seminar group, he was… present. When Professor Hayashi asked for opinions on a particularly dense Murakami story, Toge would speak up in that low, measured voice you rarely got to hear directed at you.
“It feels like the loneliness is the main character,” he said once, eyes on his notes. “Even when people are together, they’re still alone inside their own heads.”
Maki, who had joined the seminar as an elective, grinned from across the table. “Deep, Inumaki. You’re actually talkative today.”
He gave a small shrug, the corner of his mouth lifting. “Only when it matters.”
The words landed like a quiet punch to your chest. He could speak when it mattered, just not to you.
The teasing from your friends had evolved from light jabs into something that scraped rawer as graduation loomed.
One lunch in the almost-empty senior lounge, Panda leaned back in his chair, mouth full of rice. “So, Reader, you two still doing the whole ‘mysterious silent romance’ thing? Graduation’s in four months. Tick tock.”
Maki smirked, stabbing a piece of karaage with her chopsticks. “Yeah. At this rate, you’ll both walk across the stage without him ever saying more than ‘kelp’ in your general direction. It’s kinda impressive how committed he is to the bit.”
Toge was sitting right there, of course. He didn’t flinch. He simply took a slow sip of his tea, eyes fixed on the table. When he did speak, it was to Panda, voice calm and even. “Pass the soy sauce.”
You laughed along because what else could you do? But later, walking back to the dorms alone, the frustration burned behind your eyes. Three and a half years. Countless shared meals, late-night study sessions, quiet walks across campus where his shoulder would brush yours in the crowded paths. And still, when it was just the two of you, he chose silence.
You started testing the waters more deliberately.
In the Creative Nonfiction workshop, the assignment was to write a short piece about someone important in your life without ever naming them. You poured everything into yours. The way certain silences could feel like safety, the protective tilt of a shoulder in a crowded hallway, the way someone could speak volumes without opening their mouth. You read it aloud to the class, voice steady even as your hands shook slightly under the desk.
When you finished, the room was quiet for a beat. Toge sat two seats away, fingers gripping his pen so tightly the knuckles were white. His eyes were on you. For a moment you thought he might say something. His lips parted. You held your breath.
But he only looked down and wrote something in the margin of his notebook. Later, when the class ended and the others filed out, he slid the torn page toward you.
Your piece was beautiful.
The silence in it feels honest.
No signature. No spoken praise. Just those neat lines and the familiar ache in your chest.
You tried notes again, bolder this time.
One afternoon in early March, after a sudden rainstorm left the campus glistening, you slipped a folded paper into his bag while he was distracted talking to Maki about post-grad job applications.
I’ve been thinking about us a lot lately. Not in a weird way. Just… I don’t want to graduate without knowing why it’s so hard for you to talk to me. If I did something, tell me. If it’s something else, I’m still here. Always.
The next day, your notebook had a reply tucked between the pages, written in his careful handwriting, the ink slightly smudged like he’d written it in a hurry:
You didn’t do anything wrong. Some things are harder to say out loud. I’m sorry. That was all.
The lingering moments grew more frequent as April approached.
He would wait for you after class even when he didn’t have to, leaning against the wall with his hands in his pockets, purple-tipped hair catching the afternoon light. When you emerged, he’d fall into step beside you without a word, matching your pace perfectly. Sometimes his hand would hover near the small of your back when the sidewalk narrowed, guiding you gently away from a puddle or a group of rowdy underclassmen. Never touching. Never speaking. Just there.
One evening, the two of you ended up alone in the empty creative writing lounge after everyone else had left for a department party. The lights were dimmed, only the soft glow of a desk lamp illuminating the scattered papers and half-empty coffee cups. You were packing your bag slowly, heart hammering, when you decided to push.
“Toge,” you said softly, turning to face him. He was standing by the window, staring out at the darkening campus. “Look at me for a second?”
He did. Slowly. Those dark eyes met yours, and for once he didn’t look away immediately.
“I know you can talk,” you continued, voice gentle but trembling at the edges. “I hear you with Maki and Panda all the time. Your voice is… nice. I like it. So why… why is it different with me? Are you angry? Uncomfortable? Because if graduation comes and I never hear you say anything real to me, I think I’m going to regret it for the rest of my life.”
His lips parted. The word “I—” formed, barely a breath. His hands clenched at his sides. You saw the struggle. Raw, visible, the way his throat worked and his shoulders tensed like he was fighting against something heavy lodged inside him. For one dizzying second, you thought this might be it.
Then he exhaled shakily, closed his eyes, and shook his head once. When he opened them again, the vulnerability was shuttered behind that familiar quiet mask. He reached into his bag, pulled out a small, perfectly wrapped onigiri with your favorite filling and pressed it into your hands. His fingers lingered against yours, warm and slightly trembling, before he pulled away.
No words.
You swallowed the lump in your throat and whispered, “Okay. I won’t push anymore. But… I really like you, Toge. More than just as a study buddy or a silent seatmate. I hope you know that.”
He froze completely at those words. Eyes wide. The faint snake-like markings at the corners of his mouth seemed to stand out sharper in the low light. For a long moment the only sound was the distant hum of the vending machines down the hall.
Then he did something new. He lifted one hand and gently, so gently, brushed a stray strand of hair from your forehead. His touch was feather-light, fingertips barely grazing your skin, but it sent warmth rushing through you. He held your gaze for three heartbeats, something deep and aching swimming in his eyes.
Still no words.
But when he finally stepped back, he mouthed something you couldn’t quite catch. Lips forming silent syllables that looked suspiciously like “me too.”
Or maybe you were imagining it. Hoping too hard.
The days blurred after that. You threw yourself into thesis revisions and graduation prep, but every spare moment your mind drifted back to him. You overheard him once, talking to Panda near the lockers after a club meeting. His voice was soft but clear: “Yeah… I’m worried about after. Everything’s changing.” A normal conversation. Easy. Then he saw you approaching and went quiet again, offering only a small nod in greeting.
The contrast hurt more than ever.
As the final weeks of April slipped away, the emotional stakes felt almost unbearable. The thought of walking across that stage, diploma in hand, and leaving behind four years of almosts and what-ifs made your chest tight. You kept leaving him little messages on his desk, in his notebook, once even taped to the onigiri wrapper he’d saved for you:
I’m scared we’ll never get past this silence. But even if we don’t, thank you for every quiet moment. They meant everything.
He never replied in words. But he started lingering longer after classes. Saving your favorite seat even when you were late. Once, when you forgot your jacket on an unusually chilly evening, he draped his own over your shoulders without hesitation, then walked you all the way to your dorm building in silence, hands shoved deep in his pockets, shoulders brushing every few steps.
Graduation was now less than a month away.
And the silence between you that was once comforting was now feeling like a ticking clock.
You didn’t know how much longer you could carry the weight of everything unsaid.
The last official day of classes arrived on a warm, golden Friday in mid-May. The campus felt strangely hushed, like it was holding its breath along with the seniors. Lecture halls were half-empty, goodbyes floated through the hallways, and cardboard boxes already lined the sidewalks near the dorms. Graduation was scheduled for the following Tuesday, but today. This quiet, sun-drenched Friday was the true ending.
You had spent the morning turning in your final thesis, heart pounding as you handed the bound copy to your advisor. Now the afternoon stretched out, strangely open. Most of your friends were already at the big farewell barbecue on the south quad, laughter and music drifting across the grass. You had told them you’d join later. First, you needed to find him.
Toge wasn’t at the usual bench by the fountain. He wasn’t in the library study room or the creative writing lounge. After twenty minutes of searching, your steps led you instinctively to the old cherry blossom grove at the far edge of campus. The place you two had unconsciously claimed over the years. It was quieter here, the trees still heavy with late-blooming petals that drifted down like pale pink snow. A wooden bench sat beneath the largest tree, half-hidden by low branches. You had shared silent study sessions here more times than you could count.
He was already there.
Toge sat on the bench with his elbows on his knees, staring at the ground. His usual black hoodie was gone; instead he wore a simple white button-up, sleeves rolled to his forearms, the purple tips of his hair catching the sunlight. A half-eaten onigiri rested on the wrapper beside him. He looked… smaller somehow. Or maybe the weight of the day made everything feel heavier.
You approached slowly, heart hammering so loudly you were sure he could hear it. When you stopped a few feet away, he lifted his head. Those dark eyes met yours, and for once he didn’t look away. The silence between you felt thicker than ever. Years of it, compressed into this single afternoon.
“Hi,” you said softly, voice barely above a whisper. “I thought I might find you here.”
He gave a small nod. No words. But he shifted over on the bench, making space for you like he always had. You sat. The wood was warm from the sun. Pink petals landed gently on your lap, on his shoulder, on the space between you.
For a long moment neither of you moved. The distant sound of laughter from the barbecue felt miles away. Here, it was only the rustle of leaves and the rapid beat of your own pulse.
You took a shaky breath and turned toward him.
“Toge… this is it, isn’t it? The last real day. After Tuesday we’ll both be gone. Different cities, different lives maybe. And I…” Your voice cracked. You forced yourself to keep going. “I can’t leave without telling you everything I’ve been carrying for four years.”
He watched you intently, lips slightly parted, the faint snake-like markings at the corners of his mouth more visible in the golden light. His hands clenched together on his lap, knuckles white.
“I know you can talk,” you continued, gentler now. “Short sentences, jokes, real opinions. Your voice is quiet but it’s there. It’s nice. I like hearing it. But with me… it’s been different from the very first day. You freeze. You go completely silent, and I’ve spent years wondering why. Did I make you uncomfortable? Did I talk too much? Was there something I missed?”
You reached into your bag and pulled out the small stack of notes you’d saved over the years. His neat handwriting mixed with your messier scrawl. You held them out like evidence.
“Every time I tried to get closer, you gave me these instead of words. They meant a lot. They still do. But I need more than notes and gestures now. Because I like you, Toge. I’ve liked you since that rainy Tuesday when you saved me a seat and pushed the extra chopsticks my way. I like the way you listen like the whole world disappears. I like how you remember my favorite onigiri filling and how you drape your jacket over me when I’m cold. I like the quiet between us… but I’m terrified that if we graduate without breaking it, I’ll spend the rest of my life wondering what could have been.”
Your hands were trembling. Petals continued to fall, landing softly on the notes.
Toge’s breathing had changed. He stared at the papers in your hands, then slowly reached out and took them. His fingers brushed yours, lingering this time, warm and slightly calloused. He held your gaze, eyes dark and stormy with everything he’d never said.
His mouth opened.
“I…”
The single syllable came out hoarse, barely audible, like it had been trapped for years and was finally clawing its way free. He swallowed hard, throat working. His free hand came up to grip the edge of the bench, knuckles bone-white.
“I… like you.”
The words landed between you like stones dropped into still water. Simple. Understated. But they carried the weight of four entire years.
He kept going, voice low and rough, each word deliberate and slow, as if speaking them hurt and healed at the same time.
“I’ve always… liked you. Since the first day. You sat down and started talking and… I couldn’t. The words just… stopped. Around everyone else it’s easy. But with you…” He exhaled shakily, eyes never leaving yours. “It’s too much. Everything I want to say feels too big. Too important. I was scared if I said it wrong, I’d ruin it. Ruin us. So I stayed quiet. Stupid. I know.”
A soft, broken laugh escaped him, it was rusty and self-deprecating. It was the first real laugh you’d ever heard directed fully at you.
“I wrote notes because it felt safer. But every time you left one for me… I wanted to answer out loud. I wanted to tell you that sitting next to you in class was the best part of my day. That I hated when people teased you about me because they didn’t understand. That I’ve been terrified of graduation too. That I don’t want to lose this. Lose you.”
His voice cracked on the last word. He looked down at the stack of notes still clutched in his hand, then back up at you. Vulnerability was written all over his face. His cheeks flushed, eyes glassy, the usual calm mask completely shattered.
“I like you,” he repeated, softer this time, like he was testing how the words felt in the open air. “More than like. I… I’ve been in love with you for years, Reader. And I’m sorry it took until the last day to say it.”
The silence that followed wasn’t empty. It was full. Brimming with relief, with shock, with four years of unspoken feelings finally given shape.
You felt tears prick at the corners of your eyes. A laugh bubbled up, half-sob, half-joy. “Toge… you idiot. All this time…”
He gave a small, sheepish nod, the corner of his mouth twitching into that familiar half-smile, only now it was real and unguarded. “Yeah. Idiot.”
You reached out instinctively. Your hand found his on the bench, fingers threading together. His grip was tight, almost desperate, thumb brushing over your knuckles the way he had wanted to for so long. The touch grounded you both.
For a while you simply sat there, hands linked, petals drifting down around you like a gentle benediction. The distant laughter from the barbecue felt even farther away now. This moment belonged only to the two of you.
Eventually you leaned your head against his shoulder, the way you had imagined doing so many times. He stiffened for half a second then relaxed completely, letting out a long, shaky breath. His free hand came up to rest lightly on your hair, fingers threading through the strands with careful reverence.
“I thought I might never hear your voice like this,” you whispered.
“You’re hearing it now,” he murmured back, voice still low and a little unsteady, but warm. So warm. “And… I’m not stopping anytime soon. If you’ll let me.”
You smiled against his shoulder, heart overflowing. “I’ve been waiting four years for that promise.”
The sun dipped lower, painting the grove in deeper golds and pinks. Neither of you moved to leave. There would be time for the barbecue, for goodbyes to friends, for the chaos of graduation. But right now, the only thing that mattered was this bench, these falling petals, and the sound of Toge Inumaki’s voice was quiet and hesitant, but finally, finally speaking directly to you.
The silence between you had broken.
And what came after was even more beautiful.
The golden light of late afternoon had softened into the warm hues of early evening by the time you and Toge finally stood up from the bench beneath the cherry blossom tree. Petals clung to your clothes and hair like confetti from a celebration neither of you had planned. Your hand was still wrapped in his hands that felt warm and slightly calloused, but it was no longer hesitant. Every few steps as you walked slowly back toward the main campus, his thumb would brush over your knuckles, a silent reassurance that this was real.
The distant sounds of the farewell barbecue grew louder: laughter, clinking bottles, someone’s off-key singing. But the two of you moved at your own pace, shoulders brushing, the comfortable quiet between you now laced with something new. Words, however few, that had finally been spoken.
You broke the silence first, voice light and teasing for the first time in what felt like years.
“So… four years of notes, gestures, and near-misses, and all it took was the literal last day for you to say ‘I like you’?”
Toge let out a soft huff of laughter. The sound of it was low and rusty but genuine. He glanced sideways at you, the corner of his mouth lifting into that familiar half-smile, now fully unguarded.
“Better late than never,” he murmured, voice still carrying that gentle rasp. “I was… scared. Every time I tried, it felt like the words were too heavy. Like if I said them wrong, you’d disappear.”
He paused, squeezing your hand. “Turns out staying quiet almost made you disappear anyway.”
You laughed softly, leaning into his side as you walked. The warmth of his arm against yours felt like coming home after a long, uncertain journey. “You’re such an idiot, Toge Inumaki. A very cute, very quiet idiot.”
He hummed in agreement, the sound low and warm. “Salmon.” The old food-code slipped out instinctively, making both of you pause before dissolving into quiet laughter together. It felt good. Easy in a way the silence never quite had.
The barbecue was in full swing when you arrived. Strings of fairy lights had been strung between trees, casting a soft glow over the grass. Maki spotted you first, waving a skewer of yakitori like a flag.
“There you two are! We thought you’d ditched us for another silent study session.”
Panda turned, mouth full of grilled corn, and his eyes immediately zeroed in on your joined hands. His grin was massive.
“No way. Finally? After all this time? I owe Maki money.”
Maki smirked, crossing her arms. “Told you the confession would happen before graduation. Pay up, big guy.”
Toge’s ears flushed pink, but he didn’t pull his hand away. Instead, he gave a small shrug and said clearly, to them. “Yeah. Finally.” Then, quieter, almost shy, he added while looking at you, “Worth the wait.”
The simple sentence sent warmth flooding through your chest. Your friends’ teasing washed over you harmlessly now, no longer stinging. Because the silence that had once defined your relationship had cracked open, and what spilled out was even better than you’d imagined.
The rest of the evening unfolded in gentle waves. You sat together on the grass, sharing a plate of food. Toge still didn’t suddenly become chatty because he never would be that person, but he spoke more than he ever had in your presence. Short, soft sentences directed at you:
“Try this one. It’s good.”
Or, when you shivered slightly in the cooling air, “Here,” as he draped his white button-up over your shoulders without hesitation, his voice low near your ear. “Better?”
You nodded, smiling up at him. “Much better. Thank you.”
He lingered close after that, shoulder pressed to yours, occasionally murmuring small observations about the night. “The lights look nice” or “Panda’s going to regret that third helping” always with that faint, affectionate tilt to his words when they were for you. Each one felt like a gift.
As the sky deepened into twilight and the crowd began to thin, the two of you slipped away quietly. No grand announcements. No dramatic farewell to the group. Just a shared glance, your hand finding his again, and a mutual understanding that this night still belonged mostly to the two of you.
You wandered back through the now-quiet campus, past the fountain where you’d first met, past the lecture halls that had witnessed years of silent companionship. The air smelled of blooming jasmine and distant rain. Toge walked beside you, steps unhurried, his thumb tracing lazy circles on the back of your hand.
At the cherry blossom grove again that turned to be your spot, you stopped there. The petals had mostly fallen now, carpeting the ground in soft pink. You turned to face him, heart full.
“We spent so long in silence,” you said softly, reaching up to brush a stray petal from his hair. “But I don’t regret any of it. Every note, every gesture, every time you froze around me… it all led here.”
Toge looked at you for a long moment, eyes soft in the dim light. Then he spoke, voice low and sincere, each word careful but no longer afraid.
“I regret the waiting. But not the feeling. Never the feeling.” He took a small step closer, free hand coming up to cup your cheek with surprising tenderness. “Thank you for being patient with me. For not giving up on the quiet guy who couldn’t find his words.”
You smiled, leaning into his touch. “Worth every second.”
He leaned in slowly, giving you time to pull away. When his lips met yours, it was gentle. Hesitant at first, like all those years of restraint were still echoing. Then deeper, warmer, as if the dam had finally broken. His hand slid to the back of your neck, thumb stroking gently. You tasted salt and something sweet, like the barley tea he always drank. When you parted, foreheads resting together, he let out a soft breath that sounded like relief.
“Been wanting to do that for years,” he whispered against your lips.
You laughed quietly. “Me too. Idiot.”
The next few days blurred in the best way. Graduation itself was a whirlwind of caps, gowns, flashing cameras, and tearful hugs with Maki and Panda. Toge stood beside you during the ceremony, his pinky hooked with yours behind the folds of your gown where no one could see. When your name was called, you swore you heard his quiet “Congratulations” murmured just for you as you walked across the stage.
Afterward, during the small celebration dinner with your close group, Toge was still mostly quiet with the others. Offering short comments, the occasional “Bonito flakes” when Panda made a bad joke. But with you, the words came easier now. He’d lean close during conversations and murmur things like, “You look happy” or “I’m proud of you.” Each one made your heart flutter.
The true epilogue came on the evening after graduation, when the campus had emptied out and only a few lingering students remained. You and Toge returned one last time to the cherry blossom grove as the sun dipped low, painting the sky in oranges and pinks. You sat on the same bench, now side by side with no space between you. His arm was around your shoulders, your head resting against his chest. The steady beat of his heart was the most comforting sound you’d ever heard.
You teased him gently, tracing patterns on his hand. “Remember when you could barely look at me without freezing? Now you’re practically talkative.”
Toge chuckled softly, the vibration rumbling through his chest. “Don’t push it. I’m still me.” He pressed a kiss to the top of your head. “But… for you, I’ll try. Every day.”
You smiled, tilting your head up to meet his eyes. “That’s all I’ve ever wanted. You. Exactly as you are, quiet or not.”
The two of you stayed there until the stars came out, sharing quiet conversation mixed with comfortable silences. He told you, in his low, careful voice, about the fears he’d carried. How your brightness had always felt overwhelming in the best way, how he’d worried his silence would eventually push you away. You shared your own frustrations and the deep fondness that had grown despite them. Every word felt like stitching up old wounds with gold.
As the night cooled, Toge pulled you closer, wrapping you in his arms. “Whatever comes next, jobs, new cities, whatever, we do it together. No more waiting. No more notes instead of words.”
You nodded against him. “Together.”
The warmth of a long-fostered connection finally settled over you both like the softest blanket. The years of silence hadn’t been wasted; they had built something deep, patient, and unbreakable. What began as curious glances and shared seats had blossomed into something real. Quiet gestures still present, but now beautifully balanced with the sound of his voice speaking your name, murmuring affections, and promising futures.
Under the same cherry blossom tree where your story had quietly begun years ago, it continued. Not with grand declarations, but with the simple, heartfelt truth:
“I love you,” he whispered into your hair, voice steady and warm.
You smiled, squeezing his hand. “I love you too, Toge.”
And in the peaceful quiet that followed. Now free of longing and full of promise. The two of you watched the stars together, hands linked, hearts finally aligned.
