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At exactly 1:09 in the morning, Suguru hears the shower turn on.
He blinks at the wall in the guest room of Satoru’s apartment, bleary-eyed and riding the edge between sleep and consciousness, darkness swimming at the corners of his vision. He’s warm, bundled up in blankets with his legs curled up and his arms hugging a spare pillow, taking up just one side of the large mattress, moonlight making him squint a little as his eyes begin to adjust.
The water in the shower stutters. There’s an echoing clatter of something falling, muffled almost immediately as though it were caught, and then nothing but water hitting tiles.
Without thinking, Suguru swings his legs over the side of the bed and walks to the guest bedroom door.
He’s been staying with Satoru ever since he got control of his body again, wrenched the authority away from the brain that is not his own rattling around in his skull, ever since he opened the Prison Realm and freed the strongest jujutsu sorcerer from its clutches. Opportunities have come up to move out, stay with someone else or on his own, perhaps at the school, where monitoring him would be “safer” (as if anywhere would be safe for anyone with him around), and yet Satoru has resisted all of them. And it’s not like Suguru is about to leave him again.
Again. How many times has it been, now?
The hallway is quiet, Suguru’s socked feet sliding over the warm wooden floors. He reaches the bathroom door, hesitating with his hand just over the handle. Headaches are constant these days, a dull throb behind his forehead and at the base of his skull, and he can feel one beginning to flare now; he grips the doorknob as he grimaces, pain flashing and his voice leaking into his awareness, tendrils sinking into his consciousness in an effort to take back control.
Shut up, Suguru advises the brain that is not his, and he tries the door.
It’s a little surprising when it opens, but he doesn’t register it to be so until he’s already pushing it open, hinges creaking just slightly. Satoru isn’t the kind of person to leave doors unlocked; after Zenin Toji, Suguru remembers how he used to lock his dorm room’s windows and door alike, even going so far as to lock training rooms when he was practicing keeping up his infinity, sitting cross-legged in the center of the room for entire days at a time, testing his strength and consistency. During those days, Satoru wouldn’t let anyone in, not even Suguru, and it wasn’t like Suguru was making an effort to talk to anyone at all back then.
Today, the door opens. Today, Suguru steps into the bathroom.
Satoru stands under the showerhead in the loose t-shirt and boxers he wears to bed, eyes blank and glazed over, hands hanging limply by his sides. His clothes have soaked all the way through, fabric thin and transparent and clinging to pale, rose-tinted skin, pink from cold water rather than the heat, Suguru guesses, as there’s no heat to be felt in the air, nothing but a faint chill that suggests the low temperature of the shower water.
He looks beautiful.
He looks like a corpse.
“Satoru,” Suguru says quietly, stepping forward, and Satoru blinks. He looks up, so quickly that Suguru can see water droplets fly into the air, white hair clinging to his face, framing his features and falling into his eyes as his lips part on a slight inhale, like he’s going to say something.
“Suguru,” is all he says, and it comes out surprisingly steady.
Suguru doesn’t say anything. He closes the bathroom door behind him instead, stepping forward until he stands right at the edge of the tiles, where the bathroom ends and the shower begins, leaning forward just slightly for the faucet.
He looks at Satoru.
“Sorry if I woke you up,” Satoru says, barely a whisper. They’re close like this, faces barely a few inches apart, enough that Suguru can feel the cold radiating off of him. He hates it; it reminds him of waking up in a tired body meant to rest, puppet strings sewn into his limbs. “You should go back to sleep; you need the rest.”
“I rested plenty when I was dead,” Suguru says dismissively. It’s perhaps too harsh, lacking that once-characteristic elegance and thoughtfulness he used to have, judging by the way Satoru’s lips tighten just slightly at the corners, but he’s not exactly well-practiced in conversation after all of this time. “Take off your clothes, Satoru. You’re going to catch a cold like this.”
He reaches for the shower handle, twisting it, and warm water spills over Satoru’s shoulders within seconds, causing him to flinch slightly. They lock eyes, Satoru’s gaze fragile and tremulous against his own.
Satoru swallows. His throat bobs.
“Okay,” he whispers.
Suguru slides his hands up Satoru’s torso, helping him tug the clingy, wet fabric off of him. It reveals nothing fundamentally new; Suguru has seen Satoru’s body before, but somehow this is different, a definition to his muscles that certainly was not there when they were teenagers. His collarbone juts out in an elegant slice when he bends to tug off his boxers, no hesitation, and Suguru looks away.
There are no new scars. Suguru shouldn’t be surprised. Satoru became untouchable when he mastered infinity; Suguru was not the exception in that.
And yet, here, he has let it down for him. Suguru’s hands run over Satoru’s skin as easy as anything, as easily as they used to, before everything. If he pretends, he can almost imagine that this is before.
There are veins in Satoru’s thighs, pale blue and purple-hued, trailing beneath his skin like the underglaze on porcelain pieces, delicate and untouchable. Suguru knows that they spill red, has seen it for himself, but here, under the spray of water and in the quiet of the room, they are closed and unspilled and for Satoru. The bones in his hips are defined, a thick scar running up his abdomen from when Zenin Toji must have run him through, muscles lean and compact, his body still so lithe. He is all pale skin and rosy flushes and cold, cold, cold, warming steadily from the heat of the water, and Suguru cannot tear his eyes away.
“Come in with me,” Satoru whispers, and Suguru’s eyes flick to meet his. Bright blue and pleading, the tiniest chip of a scar in his forehead, hidden just partially by his hair. He looks like the stars on a winter night, and Suguru has never seen anyone more beautiful.
“Okay,” Suguru says softly. He glances down at himself, at the sweatpants and shirt he borrowed from Satoru, and says, “Should I—”
“You’re the one who bugged me about not getting a cold,” Satoru interrupts, and there’s a hint of fondness in his tone. It’s overwhelming just to hear.
And Suguru shouldn’t. Suguru should go back to bed, should pull the covers over his head to block out the moonlight and go back to sleep, fall into an unconsciousness that he knows all too well, just as he has been doing for all of these past few weeks. He should be dead. He should not be here. He should stick to silence, should turn the other way just as he did so long ago, should push him away, should go to bed—
Suguru does not go back to bed.
He hesitates for just a moment before tugging his shirt over his head, kicking off his clothes with far less grace than he used for Satoru. Satoru’s eyes are on him the entire time, heavy and all-encompassing, as exposing as Suguru remembers them to be. When he’s bare, stripped to once-golden skin and muscles that are no longer his own, a hand curls gently into his.
“Come here,” says Satoru, and Suguru does. He nearly slips on the wet tiles when he steps inside, and Satoru immediately grabs his forearms to support him, gripping him tightly.
“Calm down,” Suguru mutters, gently poking Satoru’s fingers until he reluctantly relinquishes him. He glances at Satoru, meeting bright blue eyes with a hint of dry humor. “I’m not going to fall.”
“Not while I’m here,” agrees Satoru with a hint of that playful cockiness that Suguru is so used to, and he lets himself roll his eyes, a fond smile teasing the corners of his lips.
“Whatever you say, Satoru.”
The smile that spreads over Satoru’s face is breathtaking. Water trails down his skin, dripping off of the ends of his hair; he is a flawed sculpture of delicate perfection, scars over his bones and behind all-seeing eyes, and Suguru cannot look away.
Satoru reaches out, gently taking a chunk of Suguru’s dark hair, spilling down his back and over his shoulders in an inky river, and twirls it between his fingers. It prompts Suguru to step ever-so-slightly closer to avoid getting his hair pulled, and with the way Satoru’s eyes sparkle, that was his intention.
“Could you wash me?” he asks softly, almost shyly. And then, as if Suguru has ever been able to deny Satoru when he goes all quiet and sweet like that, adds, “I’ll do your hair.”
“Don’t pull on it,” Suguru says, almost a reflex, and Satoru pouts.
“You have such little faith in me,” he says, but he’s reaching for the shampoo bottle, passing Suguru the soap.
Satoru’s hands entangle in Suguru’s hair, fingertips pressing lightly into his scalp before trailing down, following the path that the strands take to the very ends. He brings his hands back up, this time with shampoo in the center of one palm, and gently massages it into Suguru’s hair, smoothing out tangles and running his fingers through it until bubbles foam up under his callused skin. Suguru lets his eyes flutter shut, not realizing that he’s leaning into the touch until Satoru giggles like he’s a high schooler again, letting his forehead thud against Suguru’s, nearly hitting the line of raised stitches.
“If I’d known that this is what it would take to get you naked with me,” Satoru says between those light little waves of laughter, “I would’ve broken down a long time ago.”
Suguru opens his eyes, eyebrows furrowing. They’re close enough that the only thing he can see is Satoru’s eyes, gazing at him. “Satoru—”
“I thought I lost you,” Satoru says, and his hands are no longer in Suguru’s hair; they rest at the back of his neck, cupping him closer, holding him like he’s never going to let him go. “That’s why I woke up. I dreamt that I lost you. I dreamt that I couldn’t let you go, so I let go of myself instead.”
“You didn’t lose me,” says Suguru quietly, even though he did, they both did, heart clenching in his chest; he wonders if Satoru can hear it, how his pulse stutters at their closeness, at the raw words spilling from lips glossed with water. “I’m right here, Satoru.”
Satoru is a vision like this. Pale skin, white hair, flushed cheeks. His eyes are full of unshed tears, shining like the moon that Suguru left behind in the guest bedroom, lips trembling just slightly as he exhales, and Suguru can see nothing but him. Only Satoru.
He lathers soap on his palms, dragging his hands over Satoru’s chest, down his sides, feeling him shiver slightly as his fingers run over each line of his ribcage. He traces a thumb over the final rib, pressing in just slightly so that he can feel the underside of it, and hears Satoru inhale too sharply, too shallowly, at the sensation. It makes him flinch backwards.
Before he can get too far, a hand catches his wrist.
“Don’t you dare stop,” Satoru grumbles, and when Suguru dares to look up, there’s a delicate splash of pink over his cheeks. It’s such an endearing sight, his head ducked slightly and eyes lowered, that Suguru can’t help how his gaze lingers. “I’m not clean yet, dumbass. You can’t hurt me when you’re literally washing my body.”
Suguru snorts. He’s too late to stop it; it’s a soft thing, barely anything at all, but he catches how Satoru blinks at it, the way one corner of his lip starts to turn upwards. “Brat,” he says, too fond. “Turn around so I can get to your back, then.”
“I can’t wash your hair, then.”
“Well, that’s a you problem, isn’t it? Turn around.”
With a huff, Satoru does, and Suguru allows himself two selfish seconds to appreciate the view before he slips his hands over Satoru’s shoulders and down his back.
He hesitates before he speaks again.
“I don’t know why I came in here,” he admits softly, and he almost hopes that the words are lost to the water. But Satoru hums in response, prompting him. “This isn’t where I’m supposed to be, you know. I shouldn’t be here.”
“Here?” asks Satoru. He looks over his shoulder, one eye meeting Suguru’s, shadows cast clean over the far side of his features. “Or with me?”
“Both,” says Suguru, vaguely amused. His fingertip catches on the rough, raised edge of a scar, and he quickly smooths back over it with the flat of his soap-lathered palm. “Here, with you. It’s not something I deserve.”
Satoru frowns, but Suguru feels how he stiffens under his hands. “So, what, you’re going to kill yourself? Don’t be an idiot. That doesn’t even make sense.”
Suguru slaps the side of his shoulder lightly, just enough to make a sound with the water and the soap. “Tactless,” he says fondly. “You haven’t changed a bit.”
“You have,” Satoru says, perhaps a little cheekily. “I didn’t know it was possible, but your fashion sense got shittier.”
Suguru doesn’t respond to that, and they fall into a comfortable silence. He washes Satoru with the gentleness that he deserves, calluses catching on the uneven bumps of long-healed scars, so slight and so pale that they almost blend into Satoru’s skin. Satoru keeps making these soft sounds at every touch, every slip of Suguru’s hands over his shoulders, his sides, his back, quiet things that hardly pierce the air, muffled behind closed lips and a tight throat.
Satoru trusts him with this. Trusts him to run his hands all over his body, wash him with soap and water with hands that he hardly recognizes himself, hands that have hurt and killed even before this body was taken from him, even before he wrenched it back into his own grip with a determination that he never deserved. It’s an unbearable thought, and Suguru falters just slightly in his movements. Satoru turns, a quiet noise of confusion escaping him as he leans back, eyes fluttering open to meet Suguru’s.
“Nothing,” Suguru tells him softly. And he doesn’t deserve to, shouldn’t do it, but he runs a soothing, gentle hand down Satoru’s side, feeling him melt into the touch like it’s all he’s ever wanted.
They were never together, not in that way. It never even crossed Suguru’s mind back then to even take that step, what with the risks and the dangers and everything that warned against even a friendship as close as theirs. But they have gone to the center of the earth and crawled their way back up, have died and come back and forced their way into consciousness and awakenings, fire eating at everything they know, encountered all of the hells that the world has known, and, somehow, this moment feels as natural of a step as anything that they have ever done together. They have fallen into place as easily as they used to, and Suguru—
Suguru should be dead. Suguru is a man promised death, and he stands with dirtied hands cleaning a man whose touch is quite literally infinite, waiting for the water to turn cold once more.
Look, Suguru thinks he could say if he were a braver man, one with less to lose, here is my soul; you have always carried my heart, and I would like to be complete with you.
But he thinks that he has forgotten how to live. He thinks that if the water turned cold, he would not know the difference at all.
They finish up. Water rinses the rest of the soap down the drain, and Suguru gets out first, grabbing a clean towel for Satoru and gently drying him, patting at his skin and ruffling it through his hair until Satoru scowls at him, features all twisted up in the most endearing way. It’s sweet, and Suguru almost smiles, catches himself just in time.
He’s forgotten himself a little. Reality has begun to seep back into the cracks he has allowed to form, and he’s just stepped into the hallway, about to return to the room that Satoru has allowed him to stay in, when he hears his name. Spoken soft and quiet, like it’s something to be treasured.
He turns just before he reaches the door. Satoru stands in front of his own bedroom door, fists clenched at his sides, lips pressed tightly together. He takes a deep breath.
“Stay,” says Satoru, with pleading eyes that waver just slightly in uncharacteristic hesitation, more hope and desperation than Suguru has ever dared to feel for himself lingering behind his gaze. “Stay with me, Suguru.”
Suguru’s hand hovers over the doorknob to the room. He looks away from Satoru.
“I shouldn’t,” he manages, and he has never denied Satoru anything; he cannot bear to do it now. This is Gojo Satoru, laid bare and vulnerable in a way that no one else has ever been able to see. This is the Satoru that Suguru knows better than he knows himself, and he knows that whatever he says now will change everything. “I shouldn’t stay, Satoru.”
“But I want you to,” says Satoru, and Suguru cannot see his face, cannot see anything but the water from his own hair dripping to the wooden floor below, the white of the towel wrapped around himself and the dark shadow beneath the door. “Suguru. Please.”
Suguru looks up. Satoru is still looking at him with those pleading eyes, so beautiful, and Suguru doesn’t think he’s even aware that he’s making that expression. It’s so raw, so exposed, so Satoru.
And it was never really a question in the first place. Not when he’s fallen so many times, followed Satoru for so long.
It’s not a question when this is the man he loves. It can hardly be one when they have lost each other so many times.
Satoru makes Suguru want to keep breathing, keep living. And they are so much older now, but it feels like they’re teenagers again in this moment, clinging to the only thing they know how to cling to. And this is a fantasy, it has to be, because Suguru is dead and he should be dead, should be ashes scattered in the forest from the top of a mountain or six feet under the frozen ground, but reality seeps into the cracks, water dripping through the lines of a broken bowl.
He takes Satoru’s hand.
Satoru doesn’t hesitate a moment. He pulls him into his room, closing the door behind them, and they fall on top of the blankets together, all wet skin and trembling breaths. Satoru curls into Suguru, chests almost pressed together, and Suguru carefully drapes an arm over his waist, feeling the gentle puff of an exhale brush over his neck as Satoru winds his arms around him.
Legs tangle together. Satoru breathes, and Suguru feels it ruffle the soft hairs at the back of his neck.
“I love you,” Satoru says, lips brushing the delicate skin where Suguru’s blood pumps in his neck. He says it like it’s easy, though Suguru knows that that is far from the case for him, says it like it’s the most natural thing in the universe. Like it’s something that Suguru is even allowed to hear.
It feels like a next step. It feels like taking back what they never got to have, a second, third chance at something more, and Suguru cannot help how his hands start to tremble.
Suguru’s inhale is shaky. He exhales, and he presses his face into Satoru’s chest, right where his heart is. A steady thump thump thump beneath him, nearly matching the thud of his own pulse, where Satoru has his lips pressed to.
“I love you,” he says, and he has never felt more real.