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Nobara was sprawled on her mess of a bed, her forearm covering her eyes. The afternoon had been slow, and she endured in the weight of silence in her dorm that seemed to exude cold loneliness.
The days have been empty, bleak, bereft of any warm presence ever since Itadori died. But Kugisaki Nobara did not want to acknowledge that. She was strong. After all, she’s not some simple woman who breaks down bawling when a guy she barely knows dies. She’d only been with Itadori for two weeks. Two weeks was not a lot. She can move on from loss after all she’s been through in the short span of her life. She could move on.
Lies.
Gojo Satoru urged Nobara and Megumi to take the week off, despite the looming Kyoto Sister School Exchange Event. Even so, his students didn't let up. They had been training with the second years for three days now. They came out of it with new bruises in new places every time, which they wore like badges of honor.
Today, Maki was kind enough to consider giving both Megumi and Nobara a break. Death is supposed to be normal for jujutsu sorcerers, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t stop for a quick moment to grieve. And it was good for their performance to take breaks.They are still humans, after all.
Now Nobara finds herself flooded with memories of Yuuji in this idle time she was supposed to spend resting.
Her, Megumi, and Yuuji had been inseparable since the day they were formed over two weeks ago, like a freshly completed puzzle. They travelled around Tokyo, sometimes even all around Japan (even without Gojo, because he’d always be away on business trips), in search of curses that needed to be exorcised but also would enhance their abilities as jujutsu sorcerers they’d set out to be.
Nobara didn’t want to outrightly admit, but she missed the stupid grin that was always plastered on Yuuji’s face. That stupid grin he wore every time he’d win against her whenever they debated on which restaurant to go to after their missions. How his eyes sparkled like hers in front of food. His boyish, playful laugh that filled the bubble that was Nobara, Megumi, and Yuuji. She was hearing it even now when she was alone, filling the corners of her quiet room. His presence was effervescent, even in his absence.
Tch. That dumbass. So noisy. She shifts in her bed, now facing the door down the hall. Now she becomes painfully aware of the bed space where two of the boys had always occupied on lazy afternoons and slow nights after exhausting days. She remembers how easy it was to be with them both, to convey herself through touch, to bask in the quiet as she listened to their breaths, head resting on either Megumi or Yuuji, arms and legs intertwined with each other. They were a set, not to be separated. She felt security in them both.
Her lips quiver and her face scrunches as the weight of complete silence and desolation descend upon her. She curls up like a child. Just then, she hears faint knocks on her door. She doesn’t respond right away in hopes that the person on the other side would go away. She didn’t have the energy to deal with anything at this moment.
A few seconds pass and she sighs relief, but the soft taps on the wooden door return.
Tsk! Nobara stomps on the floor as she swings herself up from bed, aggressively swiping the tears that have escaped her eyes just now with the back of her hand. “This better be something important!” she growls as she makes her way to the door.
She pulls the knob and the door reveals Megumi. He was standing timidly, hands in his pocket.
“What?” Nobara snaps as she taps her bare foot on the hardwood flooring. Tap, tap, tap.
Megumi scratches his neck, seeming to have lost the words to say in front of the timebomb that is Nobara. His undereyes have become noticeably darker and heavier. His hair looks more disheveled and his face looks paler than usual.
Has he always looked like this? The past three days, Nobara hadn’t really paid attention to him, so she wouldn’t notice the small changes in his appearance. She also avoided talking to him, because she didn’t want to hold sappy conversations, given the situation they were in.
“Look, I don’t have time to be standing around the doorway for nothing,” Nobara says after a couple seconds of Megumi’s hesitation. She grabs the black-haired man’s wrist and pulls him into her lodging, much to his surprise.
“Sit down.” She points to the chair by the coffee table. “I don’t know what you’ve been up to but you look like shit,” she snarkily says. She scurries over to her cabinets, slamming on the cupboards as she scours it for some tea and cups. She then fills up the electric kettle on her study table and plugs it up to boil.
“Yeah, thanks,” Megumi says. “You look like shit as well, if I may say so myself.” “Huh?!” she turns to him, hands on her waist. An unshowered Nobara clad in her pajama shorts and tank top scoffs at him and is looking like she’s ready for a brawl. She doesn’t look so bad, to be honest.
Megumi attempts to stifle a chuckle after seeing her like that, but to no avail. It wasn’t this easy to make the nonchalant Megumi bear a mere smile like this. But since they both haven’t seen each other in a while, it felt like a cultural reset. Nobara was too surprised to form a retort.
Once the tea was ready, she placed a cup in front of Megumi and pulled a spare chair to sit with him.
“So?” Nobara asks expectantly. Megumi sips from the cup then softly clacks his lips. “I don’t know. I guess I just came to see how you are.” He looks at her intently. “I-I was thinking of you.”
Suddenly something raw begins to build up inside the amber-haired woman. The air becomes thick between them.
“O-Of course I’m alright. I’m just GLAD Maki-senpai gave us a break. Falling exercises with Panda-senpai did a number on my skin, you know? I gotta rejuvenate.”
The raven-haired man just stares at her, completely unconvinced of the facade she is trying to present.
“H-How about you? Looks like you’re not taking a beauty rest after all. Jeez, you should take a look at a mirror.” She averts his gaze by staring towards her window. The setting sun has painted her room in all sorts of yellows and oranges.
He doesn’t answer for a moment, contemplating on the words to say. “It’s okay, you know?” he manages. She turns to him at his response, the softness of his voice pulling the rawness out of her. “It’s okay to show your weakness. It’s just me, after all.”
With that, tears brim her eyes and her sight becomes hazy. Before she knows it, a sob has escaped her mouth, then she’s crying uncontrollably. She hasn’t cried since learning about Yuuji’s death. Now her heart feels seized by barbed wire, fervent grief taking hold of her.
The sight of Kugisaki Nobara bawling takes Megumi aback. He knew that she was just putting up a show all this time, but he was not used to Nobara’s vulnerable side. She had always been a strong woman with unswayable character. Fierce. Uninhibited. And that image was just crumbling before his eyes. He could see her pain.
Nobara and Yuuji were close, in sync. They were almost like soulmates. Thinking about this, Megumi doubted if he could fill the void that Itadori had left, but there was no time to be thinking about that. He is in pain, too, after losing the person he so wanted to save from the very beginning.
The rawness of the moment makes the black-haired man realize something: Nobara needs him, and he needs Nobara.
Megumi stands and grabs hold of Nobara’s wrist, which was held up to her face as she wiped her flooding face. He led the crying woman to her bed and they sat on the edge. He pulls her to an embrace, his right hand caresses the back of Nobara’s head and the other squeezes her shoulder as it shudders. The broken-hearted girl succumbs to this comfort and wraps her arms around the man, welcoming the warmth that he offered.
“W-Why did that-- Why did that dumbass have to die?!” she cried onto Megumi’s chest. “Live a long life? That doesn’t mean much when he goes and dies himself. This is bullshit!”
There was no one to blame. And Megumi was sure that Nobara was just spewing out her frustrations, but her question weighed in him heavily nonetheless. He was reminded of how weak he was. How there was no escape from the situation but to watch Itadori fall to his death - a memory that has been robbing him of sleep for days.
The stoic, black-haired man had never felt so consumed by his own and another’s emotions before. He holds Nobara tightly as his lips tremble and his chest constricts with grief.
“I’m sorry… I’m sorry…” he mumbles as he presses his face atop Nobara’s head. They held each other like this, spilling out their anger, sadness, frustrations, and pain onto each other. This is the price they pay for being jujutsu sorcerers. They knew this, but the gravity of it dragged them all the same.
It had been a few minutes before Nobara had calmed down. Her face was sticky with tears and snot. The crying had taken much of the pair’s energy, now they were wrapped in each other’s arms and legs, lying on Nobara’s mess of a bed. A few pieces of clothing lay with them, her blanket was unravelled but didn’t cover their meshed bodies, her stuffed animals scattered here and there.
“Oi,” she says, breaking the silence. It was now dark outside, streaks of moonlight peeking through the window.
“Hmm?” Megumi hums, the baritone of his voice reverberating in her ear. He played with his partner’s hair, while her head nuzzled on his solid chest. Her hand moved side to side, tracing the valley of his chest and gently rubbing on the fabric of his shirt.
“Not a word of what happened tonight will ever reach Gojo-sensei and the others, got it?” she looked up at the young man’s face, which the moon seemed to favor as it dazzled under the faint light. His long eyelashes held her gaze.
Megumi chuckles, his breath brushing her amber hair. “It’s not like we did something scandalous or whatever.”
“H-hey,” Nobara innocently stutters at his mischievous comment. Heat rises to her cheeks as Megumi meets her eyes. Their faces were so close. The cool and collected man’s features seemed gentle in the dark and he stared at her with heavy, intent eyes that made her want to melt.
Seeing Nobara turning a shade of pink under the soft moonlight, he realizes the implication of what he just said. He bites his bottom lip and a pool of warmth fills his face. He clears his throat, “No, what I m-meant was-- what I meant was, you don’t have to worry about it. What happens here, stays here.” Nobara blinks her puffy eyes, and sniffs the remainder of mucus in her nose from her crying. She just gapes at him with her brown eyes sparkling, like a child with wonder.
Seeing this made the black-haired guy laugh. Nobara in an unpresentable, unguarded state like this was a sight to behold. He suddenly felt giddy and brave: two things that seemed alien to him before.
“You really do look like shit.” He shifts his body so that their faces are on the same level. Nobara frowns at him but doesn’t say a word.
“But I’m glad to be the only one who can see you like this.” He lifts up his hand and gently brushes the locks of amber hair that stuck to her face with his fingers, then he cups the scowling woman’s cheek and tenderly caresses it with his thumb. All the tension leaves Nobara’s face as she relaxes into his affectionate touch.
“That’s why I told you not to say a word about anything tonight,” she says, pinching Megumi’s nose with her index finger and thumb. “Yes, yes, I got it already,” Megumi says.
“Since when did you learn to become so mean?” she continues pinching his nose until both of them giggle like children.
“How can I not learn when I’m always with you?” he sneers. “You’re the meanest, after all.”
“That’s it! You’re dead meat!” Nobara playfully jumps at him so that the black-haired boy is caged under her frame. Her knees secure the sides of his pelvis and her hands plunge in swiftly for an attack. Megumi is now at the mercy of Nobara’s fingers prodding at his ticklish sides.
“Hey, hey! Stop it!” he attempts to push away Nobara’s hands, but the frolicsome woman moves too fast.
Megumi felt gleeful. His eyes start to water from laughing, such a rare treat for Nobara who is taking so much pleasure seeing him like this. She savors her dominance a few seconds more until a tittering Megumi turns the tables on her. He grabs a firm hold of her shoulders and pushes her down towards the bed. Now he is on top and Nobara makes an “oh no” face. Megumi smirks at her reaction and commences his own form of ambush.
With her wrists locked to her sides by Megumi’s strong, slender hands, she closes her eyes and turns her head to the side, as if bracing for what’s to come. The atmosphere falls silent for a second.
When it seemed like the man had no intention to do anything, Nobara turns to face Megumi who now has a gentle curve on his lips.
“Ha?” Nobara raises a brow, confused as to why he had such an enchanting smile painted on his lips.
The next thing she knows is that the raven-haired man had dove in to land a light kiss on her forehead and pulled back.
“You’re safe with me.” He leans in above her eyes again and presses his lips onto her skin, leaving a trail of tingles that made her heart feel light and heavy as it throbbed fast in her chest.
It takes a few seconds for Nobara to recover from this, her face burning anew. She never knew Megumi could be so tender.
He pulled away from her forehead to find her once-again sparkling brown eyes and flushed cheeks, her mouth left slightly open in shock. He loosens the woman’s hands free and plops down on the bed, nervous about her reaction.
Sooner than later Nobara snaps out of it. She shots up from lying down, where she had momentarily stared at the ceiling, momentarily froze with her hands positioned on both sides of her face.
“You…” she starts. Megumi is now flustered, expecting a slap to the face, so he prepares for it. He closes his eyes and moves his face away from her.
The next thing he feels is one hand cupping his right cheek, the one away from her reach. Then he feels something wet dampen his left cheek. It takes him a second to realize that Nobara’s lips had touched his face. He briskly turns to her, wide-eyed. She was giggling. “You’ll be safe with me, too,” she reaches in again and plants a soft kiss on the same cheek.
He places a hand in his mouth in disbelief. He feels his cheeks flush a bright red, and to this Nobara laughs even more.
“Idiot. You think you’re the only one who can do me like that?” She giggles at the stupidity and the sweetness of it all, and Megumi follows suit.
They’re there, laughing their pain away like two idiots with so much love and need for each other. Both of them wanted this forever, and they knew they would have to fight so hard for it.
But for some reason, this moment felt so easy, so light, so pure, that the thought of the future’s danger eventually befalling upon them seemed like nothing. They spilled into each other, filling in the emptiness that Yuuji had left behind. This moment hammered it down for them both.
Megumi needed Nobara and Nobara needed Megumi.