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When Sisyphus chained Thanatos, for three weeks the earth lurched towards despair.
The meat could not be slaughtered, the harvest could not be reaped. The men on the battlefield could not die, could only bleed and bleed and bleed. Could only glut the valley with blood.
For three weeks the world wailed for death, wailed for the salted root and the scorched earth. Anything to spare them from the rot.
It has been over a year since Suguru did not die, and three weeks since he was bidden back to his own mind. And now he lies, sticky and overripe, beneath the sheets of Satoru’s guest bed.
It’s still dark, some late, moonless hour, and the room is over-warm. There’s sweat beading behind his knees and on the back of his neck. He sits up, casting off the bedding.
3:09 am , the analog clock on the bedside blinks.
He’s not going to sleep, Suguru decides, not tonight. Instead, he stumbles from Satoru’s sterile guest room down the hall to the bathroom. It’s clean, meticulously so. It reminds him of Satoru’s dorm room during their first year, flawless and impersonal.
Suguru strips off his t-shirt and boxers, catching a glimpse of himself, bare, in the mirror. He is the same, mostly. The topography of his body is familiar, the scar curving over his hip, another over his shoulder, two more, twinned, beneath his pectorals. But then, he’s not as tan as he used to be. His forehead is marred by an angry pink line of still-healing skin, tender and puffy with excess collagen. His hair is longer than it has ever been.
The bathroom door clicks, then swings open.
“Little early for a shower, isn’t it,” Satoru says, bare-chested and leaning against the doorframe.
He’s stark against the blackness of the unlit hallway, exhausted under the bathroom lights.
“How do you know I was going to take a shower?”
“Oh? Spend a lot of time standing naked in front of mirrors, do you?”
“Maybe I just sleep nude.”
“You don’t,” Satoru says, with an absolute sort of certainty that makes Suguru’s stomach flip. Of course, Satoru would know, of course, he would remember from the nights Suguru spent in his bed.
“Hm,” Satoru continues, unperturbed, “your hair’s getting long.”
Suguru shrugs, sweeping a couple of errant strands of hair back over his shoulder. “I guess it is,” he says.
“I can cut it for you.”
“...Really?” Suguru asks incredulously.
“I’m offended by your tone,” Satoru replies. “And I’ll have you know I cut my own hair.”
“That hardly fills me with confidence.”
Satoru takes a step into the bathroom, reaching to smack Suguru’s shoulder. Suguru grabs his wrist, holds him there. How long has it been since someone touched him? How long has it been since someone touched him the way Satoru does?
Satoru shuffles closer, threading his free hand through Suguru’s hair. Suguru shudders a little beneath his fingers.
“Just a couple inches,” Satoru says, softer now. “We can wash it in the shower, and then I’ll cut it for you.”
Suguru could say no. He could ask Satoru to leave, and Satoru would. And they would both ignore the bone-deep itch, the lingering knowledge of Satoru’s hand on Suguru’s bare skin.
But the wood of Suguru’s foundations has gone rot-soft, caving easily under the weight of his and Satoru’s share history. He nods, not trusting himself to speak.
Satoru shucks off his boxers and reaches to turn on the shower. He doesn’t go far, leaves his wrist in Suguru’s grip.
They shuffle into the shower, Satoru shrieking as the still-cold water hits his back.
“Shit, fuck, that’s cold!”
Suguru huffs a laugh.
“How are you not bothered by this,” Satoru asks, rubbing his arms and shivering performatively.
“Considering your apartment is approximately a million degrees, I think it actually feels pretty good.”
“Not all of us can be human furnaces,” Satoru gripes, pressing forward so that his chin is hooked over Suguru’s shoulder.
“That sounds like a you problem.”
“Mm,” Satoru hums. “Lemme wash your hair.”
Suguru nods again, and Satoru maneuvers around him easily, nudging Suguru out from under the quickly warming spray of water and squeezing a dollop of shampoo into his hands. It smells sweet and vaguely floral. Jasmine, maybe.
Satoru’s hands are surprisingly gentle as they work the shampoo through his hair, picking at the worst of the knots. A few suds slip down Suguru’s neck as he works. The water runs in rivulets from his shoulder to his elbow, to his fingertips. He can feel his toes and the beds of his nails. Not the aching, raw-nerve awareness that has haunted him the past few weeks, as he adjusts to being constantly, painfully in control. No, this is something gentler, something suffuse.
Suguru gives himself over to Satoru for the time being, lets Satoru’s fingers scrape at his scalp, lets Satoru guide him back beneath the steaming spray. He is handed soap and washes himself, reminds himself what it is to be clean.
When they step out of the shower, Satoru’s skin is flushed pink. Suguru rests a hand on Satoru’s ribcage, thumb pressed to the surgical scar on his chest — faint, courtesy of Shoko’s handiwork — as Satoru reaches past him to grab a towel.
They’re close enough to kiss. They don’t.
Satoru presses a towel to Suguru’s chest. “You dry off,” he says. “I’ll grab the scissors.”
He slips on his boxers and darts from the room, and Suguru watches, the lines and angles of his body, the rippling of his muscles beneath the skin. It’s a long moment before Suguru moves. It feels momentous when he does, like the low, rumbling prelude to some natural disaster. The mountain of his body, shifting, shifting, shifting, to lift the towel, to pull back on his boxers.
He’s stilled by the time Satoru returns, hair shears in one hand and a stool in the other. Suguru settles on the stool, and Satoru settles behind him, taking his hair in hand. “Just a couple inches, right,” he says.
“Yeah.”
Satoru hums and sets to work. For a moment, there is no sound but the snick-snick-snick of the scissors, and the deep, even rhythm of Satoru and Suguru’s breathing. The quiet is glass-fragile, and Suguru breathes in, lines up his strike.
“Is this the part where I’m supposed to apologize,” he says, rough around the cotton fullness of his mouth.
Satoru pauses. “I don’t know,” he says slowly. “Do you want to apologize?”
Suguru presses his tongue to the back of his teeth, jaw tight.
Satoru resumes his haircut. “For what it’s worth,” he says, “I’m not sorry.”
“Okay,” Suguru replies. “I’m not sorry either, then.”
“Okay.”
“Okay. Great.”
There’s another beat of silence. Suguru breaks this too. “I thought you’d come with me, you know,” he says. “You never gave a shit about humanity or serving a higher purpose, and I just thought — You’d choose me. Over them.”
“I thought you were supposed to be our moral compass,” Satoru replies. “So I guess we were both wrong.”
“I guess we were.”
Satoru pauses again. “Fuck you for making me choose, by the way. You asshole . You’re such a dick, I don’t even know why I love you.”
Suguru’s chest caves in on itself. “I love you too,” he chokes out from beneath the rubble.
Satoru steps around to face Suguru. His fingertips press against Suguru’s jaw, only to flit away, feather-light. “Hold still,” he says. “I’m gonna trim your bangs.”
Suguru takes careful, shallow breaths as Satoru trims his bangs, eyes tracking the furrow in between Satoru’s brows. After a long, aching moment, Satoru sets his scissors to the side, using a discarded towel to brush off Suguru’s chest.
Suguru looks over Satoru’s shoulder into the mirror. He looks like — himself.
“This is a shitty haircut,” Satoru announces. “I always hated this haircut.”
“You did not,” Suguru replies. “You kissed me when I had this haircut.”
“You have no proof.”
“I definitely do.”
“You do not, asshole,” Satoru says. Then, his mouth softens. “Stop arguing. Come to bed.”
“I’m right though,” Suguru says, a little helplessly.
“Sure you are,” Satoru replies. “Come to bed.”
Satoru offers his hand. Suguru takes it, allows himself to be drawn into Satoru’s bedroom.
It’s different from the rest of the apartment, warmer. There are photos of his students on the walls, photos of Shoko and Suguru too. There are knickknacks stacked on the desk and the bookshelves, little useless, human things, and Suguru finds himself hopelessly endeared.
Satoru pulls him down onto the bed, and Suguru follows easily. He presses one thigh between Satoru’s legs, feeling the downy hairs of Satoru’s thighs against his own. Satoru twists, twines an arm beneath Suguru’s head so that he’s pressed close, with his face buried in the juncture between Satoru’s neck and shoulder.
“If you don’t forgive me,” Satoru whispers, “and I don’t forgive you, then we can just keep making it up to each other. Suguru, let me make it up to you.”
Suguru hums. “Anything you want.”
Satoru yawns, wide and jaw-cracking. “Anything,” he says, “in the morning.”
Suguru can hear the steady drumbeat of Satoru’s pulse. Between one beat and another, sleep claims him.
Tonight and every night, death carries out its work. But Suguru is alive in Satoru’s bed as dawn creeps over the city.
No salt, no flame, no rot to excise. The sun flares golden through the window. With his face tucked against Satoru’s neck, Suguru rests.