Work Text:
“Help me.”
Throat like sandpaper, body rigid like granite, Gojo Satoru sits on her apartment’s floor, his back leaning against the walls, knees up.
“What do I do,” he rasps, panicked, eyes probably squeezed under the blindfold. In the dim light, Utahime cannot tell. “Tell me what I should do. You tell me.”
There is no silence between them because Satoru’s breathing is agitated and audible. But Utahime is calm; she does not allow herself to be swallowed by Gojo Satoru’s concerns because he says, expresses, outright begs that he needs her – and at least one of them has to stay composed if they want to tackle this together.
Gojo Satoru must get married.
This is not a clan drama, this is not a jujutsu society kind of expectation. Satoru could trample those without batting an eye. He always has, and his disrespect for clan business has only grown stronger, what with his involvement with the Zen’ins concerning Fushiguro Megumi. No, this is a matter of a Binding Vow, and therefore grave, menacing, and potentially lethal.
It takes time for Utahime to understand because Satoru is incoherent. Apparently, in the time of the previous Gojo who bore the Six Exes and Limitless, a Binding Vow was formed between the sorcerer and the Gojo clan. The condition: the bearer of the Six Eyes has to get married before the age of 30 to ensure the clan’s chance for survival. The result is tangible today: Gojo Satoru’s power vastly surpassed his predecessor – partly due to the historical binding pact. The risk: if the bearer does not get married in time, their cursed energy will slowly dissipate until the sorcerer is reduced to an average human.
“I have no choice,” Satoru sobs without tears. “I wouldn’t mind losing it all, I wouldn’t. But no one lets me. Family doesn’t let me. Higher ups don’t let me. No one lets me wriggle out of this. When it’s about the Six Eyes, I am never free.”
Utahime places her hands on Satoru’s knees. Her touch is light. Her heart is heavy.
“What do you want?” she asks gently.
His answer is bitter. “Not this.”
Ah, that’s right. Talking emotions with Gojo Satoru is a special struggle of its own.
“Who do you want, then,” she words it differently for him.
“No one,” Satoru responds with the same stubbornness that has characterized him about this topic for decades now. “I’m done with relationships.”
Utahime takes it all in. The unusual sight of Gojo Satoru. His shaking body. The nervous dance of his strained fingers rubbing and tapping against the floor. His face hiding behind his knees. His back, always straight, always cocky, always confident, now bent forward in surrender.
He trusts her. She trusts him. They are close, as close as friends get, close enough to finish each other’s sentences, close enough to catch silent glances, but distant enough to be on their own without missing the other at night. She knows he doesn’t do relationships. She knows he doesn’t want any of this. She knows he will resent the situation. She knows he might even resent her. She knows he will agree.
“Marry me then.”
Gojo croaks, “You wouldn’t.”
“Yeah, I would.” Utahime stands in front of her like a deity; mouth firm, eyes resolute, chin raised an inch higher than usual. Satoru stares at her as if this moment were the first time he had ever seen her. “Occam’s razor.”
“Huh?”
“Entities should not be multiplied beyond necessity,” Utahime slips into teacher mode effortlessly. “The less assumptions we make, the best results we get. Marry me because it only includes two assumptions. First, that the marriage cannot be avoided, the Binding Vow cannot be circumvented. Second, that I’m trustworthy. This solution cuts through the entirety of your problem without posing any risks.”
Satoru gapes at her.
“Come on, Gojo. Pull yourself together.”
And when she commands, he cannot say no.
No, Hime. There is a risk here you didn’t think of.
Satoru paces in his apartment to gain clarity on the pitfalls. Of course Utahime’s logical mind wouldn’t think about Satoru’s concerns, because Utahime is oblivious. She doesn’t know just how much he misses those times when they were together. She doesn’t know how Satoru is a champion of Tokyo-Kyoto cooperation solely because he wants to see her. She doesn’t know that the stupid jokes – they really are stupid, Satoru is not at his wittiest around her – are his pathetic attempts to see if he can capture her attention the way he used to.
Marrying Utahime is not a bad idea.
But marrying her because of a Binding Vow? Horrible, horrible idea.
Satoru said yes anyway.
The worst part is that Utahime handles the narrative so smoothly as if the Binding Vow was a ribbon of silk not a chain of sorts. She delivers the announcements with rational grace. Everyone is entirely convinced that this is a logical decision, the best decision, an easy solution to a suffocating Binding Vow, allowing Gojo Satoru to remain powerful. Everyone sees it as a marriage that will be consummated only to remain empty. Everyone expects him to be cocky and free – everyone expects her to be prim and dutiful.
But this is not what Satoru expects to happen.
Satoru expects a marriage of awkwardness, a marriage in which it feels like you’re kissing your best friend.
Satoru expects a marriage of painful longing in which one party desires more than the other.
When Satoru thinks back to that night, he remembers Utahime with an ethereal aura, his brain perceiving her as a rescuing goddess of some sort, a deux ex machina, an angel who can undo any magical contract with a touch of her fingertips. Her brown eyes seemed darker in the dim lights that illuminated her face, and her scar seemed bumpier than normally, with the soft shadows cast across her face. Satoru shudders. She could do anything she wanted to, with him, that is. If Utahime told him in that moment to defy the elders and leave jujutsu society, he would have.
It is almost scary how much power she has over him.
Later that week he meets Fushiguro Megumi.
“Not many people are invited to the wedding,” he tells him, “but you are, Megumi, and I hope you’ll come.”
“Is that so?” Megumi responds. “Of course I’m coming, but why the short guest list? I expected a bigger party from you.”
Satoru looks away from Megumi, bothered by his piercing, thoughtful gaze. “I don’t organize it, do I?”
“You sound frustrated,” Megumi states with the sort of distant, matter-of-fact tone that he specializes in.
“I am frustrated,” Satoru snaps. “This is not how I wanted this to happen, this isn’t—”
Megumi interrupts him with a curious tilt of his head, “But you wanted this to happen?”
Satoru stutters. He suddenly misses those times when Megumi was five and he could dance away from the grip of his logical deductions.
“Well,” Megumi settles when Satoru makes a show of refusing to answer his question, “my point is simply this. Iori-sensei is kind and has the maturity to deal with you. I think this deal is fortunate and I hope you will not disappoint her.”
If he didn’t raise Megumi, Satoru would resent him now. “That is precisely my concern, thanks Megumi.”
“Disappointing her?”
“Yeah.”
Megumi hums thoughtfully and Satoru doesn’t bother to break the silence. With Megumi, staying silent is a must; through all these years Satoru has learned to master the art of shutting up sometimes. He now wonders if this skill will be useful if he is married to Utahime.
“I’m sure you’ll be fine, Satoru,” Megumi says finally. “When you set your mind to things, when you make an effort, you can be pretty good.”
Satoru spares a quick glance at his protégé. “Speaking from personal experience?”
“Yes, it is my personal experience.” Megumi looks at him, intently, a small, imperceptible smile playing around his lips. “Make the same effort, will ya?”
Satoru exhales through his nose, “You make it sound easy.”
“I dunno,” Megumi shrugs. “You’re the older. You should be giving relationship advice to me, not the other way around.”
“I didn’t ask for it!” His voice is colored by the frustration, the helplessness, the lack of control, and Satoru wants to scratch out the whiny undertone.
“So what? Make the most out of it,” Megumi tells him, and Satoru can’t shake off the feeling that this is the only piece of advice he will receive concerning this marriage.
“This is not what I want,” Satoru chokes out to his reflection in the steamy mirror of the bathroom. The same steam swirls in his brain, the same fogginess, the same lack of directions. He sketches two heads on the steamy mirror.
One has a blindfold. One has a scar.
He draws a sad mouth on the scarred sketch.
He doesn’t finish the blindfolded sketch.
Utahime is the friend he trusts the most. She was there when he left his clan to enter Jujutsu High, never to look back – until now. She was there when Geto Suguru left. She was there when Megumi and Tsumiki had their first meal with him. She was there when Nanami Kento left.
Some of the fog dissolves when he comes to term with his own fear. The problem here is not getting married to Utahime. The problem here is losing her to a coerced matrimony. If she will be the kind of wife as she is an employee to Gakuganji – obedient but distant, modest but soulless – then Gojo Satoru is about to lose his oldest living friend.
The problem is really not about the marriage itself, Satoru thinks when he remembers Utahime’s young body, scarless and shy, a decade ago, pressed against his when they first kissed. That’s a good memory. The problem is not having her on her own account. The problem is his clan forcing her way. Satoru knows better than anyone that Utahime might be prim on the surface, but her spirit cannot be reined in. And when Satoru attempts it, he will lose her.
So he runs.
He runs, maybe warps, to where she stays, and knocks on her door, and he has no idea what he will say when she opens the door, but he knocks with a desperate urgency as if his life depended on it. And she opens the door, it feels like they are back to the same night, the night when she offered her hand to him, angelic and serene, and he took it, he took everything she offered, greedily, because this is what he wants – but not like this.
“Gojo?” Utahime looks surprised. “Are you okay?”
“Utahime,” he chokes out.
“Okay. You’re not okay,” Utahime assesses him with a concerned sigh, then steps away from the door, “Come in.”
He kicks off his shoes and follows her, all six of his eyes are fixated on her presence. The room is devoid of her because her things are still in Kyoto, but the wedding will take place near Tokyo, so this is just where she stays; a hotel’s living room that lacks warmth and its main furniture is a tacky fake leather couch.
Which is surprisingly comfortable to collapse his tall body onto.
“Make yourself at home,” Utahime grimaces and Satoru almost laughs because talking to her is so easy.
“You could come sit next to me,” he tells her with a smirk. Utahime hesitates for exactly one second, then she sits next to him.
“So what brings you here?” she asks, and Satoru marvels at her calmness. At how natural she behaves around him. At the peaceful rhythm of her breathing.
“You,” he blurts out with much less grace.
Utahime frowns at him.
“I’m hardly a taxi service.”
“I mean,” Satoru clarifies, “I wanted to know—about how you feel. About the marriage. About us.”
Is there an us, he wonders without words. More importantly, does Utahime want it to be there an us?
Utahime tilts her head.
“I understand that this is complicated,” she says pensively, and Satoru cannot take his eyes off her, the elegant waves of her hair around her face, tickling the scar on her cheek which she then absentmindedly rubs. But then Utahime looks at him and her eyes almost set him on fire, he knows this look, it’s the one when she is about to roast him— “Are you nervous, Satoru-chan?”
“About what, you breaking into tears during the ceremony?”
“By the looks of it, it seems like it’s you who would do that.”
Satoru fumes at her. “You already act like an old hag, and you aren’t even married!”
“Will you finally give me an ounce of respect when I’m your spouse?” Utahime snaps back.
“I already respect you!” Satoru lashes out. “That’s exactly why I’m here. To… probe. If you still want this.”
Please don’t roast me, I just want to talk to you. Because Satoru is staring with each and every eye he’s got, he doesn’t miss the moment when Utahime’s facial expression softens. She places her hand, a tiny hand, onto his arm, a tender little gesture, and Satoru can’t help but grin. Stupidly. With the kind of grin that Utahime likes to scoff at.
She does.
But her hand stays on his arm, so it’s okay.
“Yes, I want to go down with the marriage,” she clicks her tongue. “I genuinely think it’s a good solution. But,” she lifts her other hand in a teacher-like gesture, “it is a good solution only if you too think it is good. You are not a very accommodating person, Gojo Satoru, and I don’t want to be on the receiving end of your bullshit if you can conceive another plan. A better plan.”
She finishes it with the kind of flair that indicates that she is sure he can’t come up with anything better.
This is accurate. Satoru already went through most other possibilities.
“The best plan would be if you wanted to marry me for my good looks and awesome personality,” Satoru drags the words out through his teeth as he does when he says the truth hidden behind an obnoxious joke.
“Too bad you’re gross,” Utahime deadpans.
“This is why I have no respect for you,” he hisses dramatically, as if in pain. “Trampling on my feelings when we’re having heart-to-heart.”
She simply raises an eyebrow. “We are having a heart-to-heart?”
“Sorta?”
“Tell me why you said yes, then.”
Utahime looks at him. More like into him, as if Gojo Satoru had no blindfold on his face. Satoru hates this particular gaze of hers – those blindfolds are there for a reason, he doesn’t want to be exposed just as much as he doesn’t want to be overstimulated – so he grits his teeth.
“Because you’re pretty.”
He hopes to make her blush. A faint blush, a tiny thing. Just to make him feel like he has any sort of impact on her. As a reassurance, perhaps, that he is important to her.
Utahime does not blush. She looks at him seriously, “No, that’s not it.”
“What is it then, o Utahime-senpai, expert in all things Gojo Satoru?” he probes with an annoyed tone and a curious heart.
“It’s because this time you want to make it work.”
Satoru has to close his eyes and look away. Somehow her words hurt, even when they say nothing malicious.
“Will you let me try?” he asks, fragile and quiet.
Utahime nods.
“I want both of us to try.”
They try.
They kiss at the wedding ceremony.
Her lips are cool, and Satoru finds himself holding her with too much strength, the smooth material of her ceremonial garments twisted in his hands, and he kisses her with his entire too-much-ness.
He steels himself for an exasperated look or anger from her, but instead Utahime’s face is pink, pink, and unfadingly so. For the first time in a long time, Gojo Satoru is genuinely giddy; he kisses her again, ignoring the rituals of the jujutsu wedding, and she doesn’t pull away.
“You don’t have to move in.”
“I want to move in.”
Satoru, honest to all gods out there, can’t keep up with her. It is like a torturous dance, dealing with Utahime. She pulls away, but never to far, then she swirls back into his arms, and Satoru finds himself wanting to keep her there. Except nothing he can do can influence her. It’s insane.
Maybe he is going insane.
Once the Binding Vow was satisfied and Gojo Satoru’s cursed energy was assured, Utahime told him that she wanted to continue teaching. Satoru insisted that he wanted her nearby, selfishly, because turns out waking up with someone else is in fact comforting. Utahime soothes the sore wounds of loneliness, and Satoru wonders if there is anything he could offer to her in return. But Utahime doesn’t seem to perceive the world in this give-and-take fashion. She walks through these preconceptions with ease, ignoring them without bothering to crush them apart. The way she goes against tradition and jujutsu society is admittedly less loud than Satoru’s, but nowadays Gojo Satoru genuinely believes that her strategy is more effective.
After all, Utahime singlehandedly convinced the relevant boards of Jujutsu High to ensure that she is transferred to Tokyo so she could continue teaching while moving in with Satoru.
And once she moves in, any resistance, any struggle, any doubt that Gojo Satoru may have ever had just melts away.
He arrives home late that night.
There is something exhilarating about fighting curses when one is invincible. Removing the Jujutsu High uniform, Satoru walks into the bedroom—
—the room he forgot Utahime would be in, being the attentive husband he is.
He drinks in her silhouette. The dark hair of hers, now let loose, cascading down on her back. Her exposed shoulders look oddly bright against the darkness of her hair, even though her complexion is far from pale. She wears a nightgown, a simple white thing, Satoru’s brain doesn’t bother registering its details.
“Utahime,” he calls to her, and she turns towards him, her body language is open, and her face is calm and maybe, just maybe, wears a smile. Satoru growls inside. It is so hard to figure her out. Does she like him? Does she want him? She did say she wanted them to try, so what is she waiting for?
Is she waiting for him? Satoru wouldn’t blame her for that. He has been gnawing on his nails about the marriage situation for way too long.
“Satoru,” Utahime interrupts his thoughts. The use of his given name is so agreeable that Satoru dares to take a step closer. “Long day, huh? Wanna come to bed?”
The problem with being married is that ‘come to bed’ can mean sleep. Or sex. Or both. Or neither. Getting the right meaning requires social finesse, and Gojo Satoru has the social skills of a hamster.
Hamsters are solitary and territorial creatures.
Still, he forces himself to begin, “Tomorrow’s Sunday.”
He could bang his head against the wall at this nonsensical in medias res opening he started with. Utahime’s eyes are already smiling, the face she makes when she knows he is losing in the tug-of-war of their interactions. But goddamnit, he is not going to let her win so soon. “You know what, let me just restart. Can I sit with you?”
“I’d like that.”
Her voice is tender. Almost eager. Satoru is confused by the sentence. Has she been expecting something? Did he mess up? But the tone, her tone, is so uncomplicatedly kind that he doesn’t have it in himself to overthink.
Satoru drops Infinity when he places himself next to her.
“You seemed upset when I walked in on you.”
Utahime glances at him, her eyes are really something else, Satoru thinks, but her frown stops his thoughts from going wild.
Utahime begins to talk with the ease of someone who possesses emotional intelligence, “I am... tired and worried. Wondering where things go.” She looks at him with a pointed look, “Wondering if you’re okay.”
“Why would I not be okay?”
The reply is quick. “You’re restless and more stupid than usual.”
“Aww, are you worried?” Satoru can practically feel his own eyes twinkling.
Utahime is once again quick to come back at him, but her cheeks are two gradients pinker than before and she looks like a preening bird, one that wants to keep up appearances while busying herself with her feathers. Satoru feels a sudden urge to kiss her especially once her words register in his mind, “Sue me for giving a shit.”
Gojo Satoru for sure won’t sue her. Instead, he reminds himself of the original purpose of this conversation. With an unexpected burst of confidence, he places one hand on her thigh. Utahime’s eyes drop but her face grows unmistakably red and Satoru notices how she seems to shiver somewhat as if the proximity was welcome.
Gojo Satoru’s proximity.
“I’ve been meaning to tell you something, but I don’t exactly know what it is or how to say it.”
“Oh no,” Utahime replies with a sugary-sweet dramatic whine in her voice. Satoru simply decides to squeeze her thigh, the one his hand still rests on, and Utahime silences in his death grip.
“You know that I think highly of you,” he begins with a serious, honest voice.
Utahime raises an eyebrow. “Do I?”
“Why am I so attracted to you when you never listen?” Satoru scoffs.
“Attracted to me?”
Utahime’s answer is so quick as if she had been waiting for Satoru to slip. The room’s walls seem to shake a bit, or maybe it is Gojo Satoru who is shaking somewhat, but he is determined to hold her gaze. The silence between them is akin to the silence in an old cathedral; heavy but not oppressive, solemn but not paralyzing.
“I wanted you way before we got married,” Satoru says, his voice is husky and uncertain. “But I didn’t really… want a relationship anymore. But then we had to get married, right? And here I am, feeling as struck by you as if I gazed into the burning sun. I’m not good with words, Hime, you know that. But I don’t want to just be married to you. Come on a date with me this Sunday is what I’ve been meaning to ask you. And every Sunday after. And I’ll date you and make you happy just like I promised in the wedding vows.”
“I know.”
“What?”
Seriously, what.
“I know,” Utahime says again.
All words Satoru could’ve said in response died on his lips, so he settles with weakly saying – not asking, simply stating – what Utahime just said, “You know.”
“It was pretty obvious, Gojo,” Utahime laughs a little. “Except to you, maybe. I thought you needed time, so I wanted you to come to terms with your feelings yourself.”
“My feelings.”
“Apparently, I was wrong,” Utahime continues with the kind of airiness that indicates she is about to roast him, and Satoru braces himself mentally, “you’re still in the ‘figuring it out’ phase?”
“N-no. No. No. Maybe. I’m just,” Satoru breathes out loud through his nose, “I’m just surprised you knew it all along. Wow. And do you like me back, or…?”
“What do you think? Would I be waiting for you to have your heavenly realization if I didn’t?”
Satoru hums in agreement, but he doesn’t look at her anymore. The entire situation is mortifying on such levels that not even his ego can salvage it.
“I appreciate this, Satoru.”
Utahime’s voice is tiny in the big bedroom, but it is enough to make Satoru turn back to her, neck snapping into her direction so quickly it cracks.
“I wanted us to try… I want us to try because you’re a good person,” Utahime shrugs with rosy cheeks and a small smile quirking in the corners of her mouth. “Because I enjoy your company. Because I think we are compatible and have a good dynamic. Because of literally any of the reasons your ego is already feeding you. But yes, I was waiting for you to decide what you want because you were obviously struggling. Sunday dates sound nice. Thank you for inviting me.”
How on Earth does she manage to sound so unbearably warm? She reminds Satoru of his pumpkin spice latte in which the spices create a tingling sense of warmth on his tongue long after the temperature change the hot drink could have created.
He rubs his hands together in excitement, “Sounds settled! I’ll think of a cool place to take you to – you hardly remember Tokyo and all the good places, so it will be my pleasure to reintroduce you to the city!”
“I’ll give you a hint: just take me to sport events. I like those.”
Satoru hears the unspoken please do not take me to places that only serve sugary food behind this, but he decides to cherish the open communication between them, so he ruffles Utahime’s hair with a silly, affectionate gesture.
“Anything, you want, sunshine,” he tells her languidly, throat tight with relief. They can take it slow and figure out what their relationship can look like in an arranged marriage – what’s not to like? If he weren’t already married to Utahime, he would choose her again and again, twice over, Satoru thinks.
Eyes wide at the term of endearment, Utahime grins at him, then leans in, and although Gojo Satoru has no clear idea about what she is going for, somehow, miraculously, they do manage to hug each other in a perfectly natural, loving fashion.
Satoru buries his nose in her hair.
It’s perfect.
Those Sunday dates will be nice.