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“Fuuushiguru!!!”
He can hear the whining through the door, a high-pitched nasal begging accompanied by a hand pattering against the frame. Megumi had two options at this point; he could roll over and feign sleep until the imploring stopped, or he could dare put his feet on the ground, at which point Itadori would get so excited he’d probably burst inside anyway. Itadori’s charm was that his overexcitable nature was too easy to forgive, and he was denied far less frequently than he should be. Truth be told, Megumi already knew which one he was going to do, but he lay motionless for a moment more before huffing and pulling off the blankets.
“Hey are you awake in there?” Itadori cawed, “He-AY!”
“Obviously I’m awake do you think I could sleep through all that noise?” Megumi scowled to no avail, the joy on his friends face was palpable, “What time even is it?”
“I found a new movie on my filmtracker app and I thought we could watch it together! We haven’t had movie night” – since you died – “in forever, and I thought it might be nice to hang out! What do you think?”
Megumi dared not roll his eyes, torn between irritation and solace. It wasn’t like he’d been sleeping anyway, and with Yuji’s disposure at the detention centre they haven’t had the opportunity to hang out much. Even in the Goodwill event, the most they got to spend time together was either during the baseball game or Megumi’s stint healing up in the clinic – otherwise, Megumi’s time had been engulfed in training, while Yuji seemed preoccupied fleeing from Todo at any given opportunity. Megumi had fully intended to rinse Yuji for faking his death, but over time the anger had dissipated into relief, and the euphoria of seeing him again had overpowered all other emotions. Now he bore witness to that same cheerful nature, and he couldn’t strive to imagine staying mad at him for anything.
“Fine, but it better not be one of your weird hack-and-slash movies, I’m really not in the mood tonight.”
“It’s not I promise! Although it’s a shame there have been a bunch of new releases flagged up, Yoshin-“ Itadori catches himself for a moment, and there’s fleeting expression that Megumi doesn’t quite recognise caught in his eyes, “I had a friend who would have loved some of the new ones that have just come out. I won’t bore you with it though, don’t worry!”
His laugh returns, sturdy and easy, but Megumi’s sure he’s seen that on Itadori’s face before, a sense of anguish that feels so wrong on such bright features, “Go bother them with that then.”
Instantly it feels like wrong thing to say, and he wishes to retract it the moment he sees his friends lip twitch. It’s a distance, he realises, that appears on Yuji’s face, a chasm too deep and dark to throw a torch down that shows how big a rift had grown since they first met. Something aged Itadori in his time playing cadaver, and it rears itself now in the stillness of his room. Undeterred, Yuji shakes it off, and the melancholy once again dissipates, “Hey, how come you’re still in your uniform anyway? Shouldn’t you have been asleep?”
He plucks at his own outfit, not even considering how little he’d hidden his insomnia. Some days, when he’s resigned to no sleep for the night, he barely even bothers to change until the small hours of the morning when the need for comfort and cleanliness overtake his listless nature. Now he realised how hard it would be to conceal this, and raised his head to be met with eyes that were far too gentle and imploring than he deserved, “Uh yeah. I was going to get changed before bed but I must have crashed out.”
“Oh, I’m sorry for waking you up!” Itadori said but made no attempt to leave or rectify this. Instead he let himself in, walking past Megumi to perch on the edge of his bed, “This one’s only a short one so it won’t be keeping us up forever.”
“Sure.” Megumi was conscious now of his clothes and picking at his collar, pulling at the offending item as if it were preparing to strike him, “Feel free to get everything set up, I’m going to get into some more comfortable clothes.”
“Got it!” Itadori toed off his socks and pushed himself further up the bed so he was cross-legged, his back against the wall and his phone comfortably positioned in his lap. Well, that took no time at all. Megumi rolled his eyes again but there was no mirth in it, rather a familiar fondness that he’d missed when Yuji was gone.
Seeing his friend alive and across the room for him didn’t stop the nightmares or the panic, of course, but occasionally now when those nights struck, he could lean his head up against the adjacent wall and listen to the tell-tale sign of snoring that lulled the anxiety, if only a little. It didn’t seem to matter how hard he scrubbed at his clothes; the weight of Yuji’s lifeless body, the dark droplets of his blood gushing from his chest, his last words like a curse to Megumi - none of these things ever seemed to wash out. He wondered now if he were to lift Yuji’s shirt if his chest was disfigured from it, or if Sukuna had done the small mercy of sealing the skin without a trace. Mercy didn’t befit the King of Curses, and yet he was almost certain there would be no sign of that night on Yuji’s body.
Megumi crouched down and yanked his uniform shirt off, tossing it into a neat pile inside his wardrobe and rummaging for something black and baggy to serve as the replacement. As he did so, he heard a sharp intake, and whipped his head around to see Yuji looking like someone had struck him.
“Fushiguro?”
“…Yeah?”
Yuji slithered off the bed once more and took a step closer, crouching down so they were almost eye level. A hesitant hand out reaching out, but not willing to break the distance, “What happened to your back?”
Oh right. That. His body had always been a patchwork of scars quilted together – school fights, curses, training gone wrong, that sort of thing – but his most dominant marks were now the thick indents that dragged down his body. He could still feel the fall into the building, how the pain had burst into every stretch of his body when his frame was thrown through it and the floors below him continued to crumble. He hadn’t the time or capacity to summon help, and the cursed energy he had been using to protect his body had dispelled somewhere during his decent. All he had was his friends face, contorted into something wicked, peering down at him, ready to deliver another blow the second Megumi got back to his feet, if he even could. Had Yuji felt it? Megumi’s face under his palm, or each time his knuckles connected? How much had he been able to see? Enough to give his life over that much was clear, although he supposed it was conceited to assume that was just for him.
“Just from fighting some curse, it happens,” Megumi shrugged, looking forward into his wardrobe so he didn’t have to face the guilt he knew would be tarnishing Itadori’s features.
“Tell me the truth, I did that, didn’t I?” Yujis hand dropped, then sharply struck up again, covering the space between his eyes and his cheek. Of course, Sukuna would have something to say now, after remaining dormant for so long in the last few weeks. Muffled under Yuji’s palm came the quietest sound of snickering, “That was from me at the detention centre, wasn’t it?”
“It wasn’t you,” Megumi shrugged, reaching to rub a pseudo-ache on his shoulder. After all, it hadn’t been that fall that broke him, “Don’t blame yourself for that. You saved me in the end, didn’t you?”
There was something mumbled that sounded distinctly like ‘not soon enough’, and suddenly he could feel a new warmth on his skin. Yuji’s index finger traced the damaged skin with a gentleness unbecoming to his enormous strength, and it burned against the chill of Megumi’s body. The rest of his hand gently lowered too, so his palm was flat against Megumi’s back, and he felt Yuji beginning to move more, staring from the highest point where rebar had broken his fall, then moving down between marred skin to sooth it.
“You really are something special you know?” Yuji said tenderly, an admission that sounded almost like it wasn’t meant to break for air, “To have walked out of that. You’re amazing.”
Megumi pulled his shoulders in tightly, too aware of his own physical form now. The touch was both a comfort and a malaise, and Yuji must have felt his tensing for the motions stopped and the contact began retreating. Without thinking Megumi twisted around slightly and caught Yuji’s retreating frame, holding his thin wrists gently, “No it’s okay, you don’t have to stop. It’s just surprising that’s all, where’s this all coming from?”
Itadori flushed for a second before smiling and putting his hand back on Megumi, resuming the oh-so-conflicting touch once again, “I just wanted to let you know, that’s all! I’ve always thought you were pretty awesome; from the first time we met and took down those curses together.”
“Technically the first time we met was the hospital,” He hummed in reply, no longer feigning his search for a shirt and instead just enjoying their moment. He always had been a fool, hadn’t he? Somewhere the dregs of an old memory swim back up, something about Gojo and loves and curses, but it was too late to negate anything he felt now, that was just something he’d long since come to terms with. Adoring a dead man walking.
“Fushiguru?”
“Hm?”
“I’m really sorry about this,” Yuji’ leaned forward and his forehead pressed against the thick scars. The hand that had been gently caressing had scrunched itself into a fist, clinging to him like a scared child might when faced with a monster, “I couldn’t stop him – I watched, and I couldn’t… I never wanted to hurt you.”
“Idiot, I already told you it wasn’t you. I don’t need to forgive you when it’s not your fault,” Megumi stared down at the floor by his feet, unsure of how to comfort his friend. So, he did remember his time as Sukuna; how would Megumi have coped with that, watching his own hands sully Yuji’s skin? He twisted around once again but this time moved his bottom half too, so they were now face to face, “Come here you moron.”
Without thinking he pulled Yuji into a hug, his arms thrown around their neck while Itadori wrapped himself around his bare chest and back, “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry Fushiguru!”
“Hey what are you getting all worked up about? Everything’s fine, honest,” He tightens his hold as he feels the frame in his arm beginning to shake – not yet in tears, but somewhere in the precursor for them – and buried his nose into the pink hair. Yuji’s warmth surprised him, but he supposed the last time he had gripped onto his body like this, it had been far more lifeless, “None of it’s your fault.”
“I wasn’t strong enough before to protect you from him,” Yuji’s voice comes again, spoken into the crick of his neck, “I have to be the strongest, that way I can make sure it never happens again.”
“Stronger than Gojo?”
“Stronger than Gojo,” He affirms, and Megumi huffs a half laugh into his hair as he does. Itadori is the one to break the hold, pulling his arms back and positioning himself so they held him up at his side. Coincidentally this position also meant he was half ontop of, half leaning over Megumi, but after their embrace the contact hardly seemed peculiar, “I’m going to save you, Fushiguru. I won’t be responsible for anymore scars of yours.”
“You really are an idiot,” Megumi sighed, reaching up to put his hand on the side of Yuji’s face, “You already have saved me, in all the ways that matter.”