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I’m in front of his door, Shoko texts him the next afternoon, when the deed is done and the body is already disposed of. (Not in the traditional sense; not clean from this earth, but put away, maybe for safekeeping or as some kind of provision. Or maybe Yaga took one look at the body and became all too gripped with emotion. Hell if Satoru knows.)
Satoru doesn’t realise he’s sprinting through the courtyard toward the student dorms until he’s at the bottom stair, panting with his cheeks bright and raw from the windy, tear-streaked walk. He mutters curses under his breath and wipes his eyes roughly before heading up the stairs. He’s never let Shoko see him cry before, and he thinks this still isn’t a good enough reason for a first time.
With each slow step, Satoru listens to the wind—listens for the cold and pathetic howling of it against the sheet-white sky. It’s Christmas Day and the ground is just sleet now and Satoru thinks, very briefly, whether it’s just deep enough to wedge himself in. Suguru’s room is on the second floor, and if he falls hard enough maybe he’ll lose feeling altogether.
“You won’t die that way, you know,” Shoko informs him, and Satoru is only now aware that he’s reached the second floor, and he’s staring hard at the ground like it’s a challenge. Shoko knows this look on Satoru well enough; he’s just surprised and a little touched that she remembers what it means. “The snow’s just going to catch you, and then you’ll still be alive, and borderline hypothermic, and looking stupid as hell down there.”
Satoru sidles up next to her, where she’s leaning against the railing. The door behind them is locked; no one ever took up the room again since they’d left school, this much he knows. The wind is showing no sign of letting up, and it’s the rare occasion when Shoko isn’t smoking, so Satoru lets her take up as much of his space as she wants.
The cold is a lot worse than it had been yesterday, and Satoru wonders if this is how every day without Suguru is going to be from now on. It’s strange to think about Suguru freshly dead when he’d made himself gone for so long. Suguru had always made himself more present in the winter (Satoru hates the winter, despite being born during the worst of it) and had always made it a point to walk closely beside Satoru when the trees started swaying around them. Suguru had always, always found a way to warm him up and make him forget. Maybe this is the curse Suguru had left him with—the curse of knowing things from so long ago that he’d rather leave unknowable.
Something in his chest slips sideways, as if on ice itself, when it dawns on him that he is already thinking of Suguru as a memory instead of a living, breathing person. There’s a sharp ringing in the back of Satoru’s head that goes on for too long, and he fights the urge to throw up.
“It’s cold,” Satoru comments instead. The silence between them is getting depressing as all hell and the wind is starting to sting a little, especially around his face area. He blinks through the mist. “Like, it’s really, really cold that it kinda hurts, y’know?”
Shoko gives him a strange look and purses her lips once. “I don’t think it’s the cold, Gojo.”
He reaches up to touch his face. It’s wet. “Ah, fuck.”
As Satoru wipes his cheeks again with the heel of his palm, he notices Shoko fidgeting a little in her spot. He thinks, a little egocentrically, that maybe it’s because of the fact that she’s seeing him cry for the first time, but when he catches one of her hands shaking and the other toying with the inside of her left coat pocket, he realises that this might be the first time he’ll see her cry, too. She’s trying her level best to keep it together.
“Oh,” Satoru says lamely. “Uh.”
Shoko snorts. “I’m not going to cry, Gojo. Don’t worry.”
Her eyes are already red-rimmed, but Satoru’s not about to argue. It’s always easy not to, with Shoko, and it’s what he appreciates the most about her. He never feels the need to pry or question anything, and he never feels the need to open up. It’s how they’ve been all this time, emotionally detached and comfortable that way. The silence settles in fittingly then, and it stays long enough so that Satoru thinks the cold might be something he could learn to get used to. Maybe he won’t ever need to talk again, and maybe it’s really for the better.
And then that dull sensation slides back into his chest; sharper this time, double-edged and taking up space in every groove of his heart. He remembers, with an aching fondness, when Suguru had called him upstairs to his room for hot chocolate, with extra whipped cream the way Satoru liked it, and he’d drink it so sloppily that Suguru would always have to wipe the cream off his lips. The touch comes back to him startling and visceral. Satoru slumps forward against the railing, shivering as the cold doubles down on him and the wind flicks at his bare hands.
“Fuck, it’s cold,” Shoko mutters, and shoves both her hands into her coat pockets.
It’s a funny thing—they’ve both mentioned the cold at least six times in passing now, and yet neither of them has suggested they go elsewhere. Satoru looks over at Shoko and watches as she sinks further into her coat, her eyes steadily focused on the far end of the school where the training grounds are. Her teeth are chattering like crazy and her lips are turning blue around the edges.
“Why don’t you just smoke?” Satoru asks.
“I quit.”
“Since when?”
“Since yesterday.” Shoko doesn’t meet his eyes. She sucks in a breath, and when she exhales her breath forms a cloud. “It got… lonely.”
It’s as close to a confession as anyone can get out of Shoko, and probably the most intimate thing he has ever heard her say. In a confusing cross between awe and jealousy, Satoru is suddenly overcome with a longing that’s so unbearable it becomes hard to breathe. There is a lot contained within Shoko’s words, and the time Shoko had shared with Suguru, and maybe Satoru is selfish to want that for himself, too. He hears his own ragged breathing as the wound in his chest opens in its entirety, the ache raw and still fresh and probably strong enough to kill him if he ever let it.
“I don’t wanna lose him,” Satoru says, abruptly. “I can’t—I don’t know how to—”
“Neither do I,” Shoko admits, and the honesty in it takes him aback.
Satoru’s gaze drifts to her mouth. He wonders if they’ve ever shared more than a cigarette. He wonders just how much of Suguru she holds within her. And he wonders, for the very first time, what he might find if he kisses her.
Shoko’s eyes are level with his. He gives her a curious, knowing look and she replies in tandem, nodding. It’s always so easy with Shoko. Slowly, he tilts his head and meets her lips with his own.
It’s instantly awkward. Shoko’s lips are very dry and chapped in the cold weather, and Satoru supposes smoking hasn’t helped. She keeps her hands planted in her pockets the entire time, and Satoru places his hands on her shoulder to keep them both steady. Her mouth still tastes faintly of cigarettes, which means she’d definitely lied about quitting, but beyond that, nothing else. In a last-ditch effort to cling on to what Suguru had been to the both of them, Satoru grazes his mouth upward, exploring.
He keeps his eyes open throughout the whole ordeal.
When they finally pull away, Satoru can’t bring himself to look Shoko in the eye. Her lips are still bright pink and kiss-swollen. Her hair, side-swept, is so long now that it reaches her waist, and the circles under her eyes have grown twice in size since he’d last seen her. He notes, with a small touch of affection, that she hasn’t grown an inch since their schooldays. She looks worse for wear, and Satoru feels some form of guilt pressing into his side. He stuffs his hands into his own pockets to try to steer it away.
“So,” Shoko says, gathering her breath, “did you find what you were looking for?”
Satoru has to drag his gaze up to meet hers. “Nope. Sorry. About that.”
Shoko shrugs. “It’s fine.”
There’s some degree of embarrassment that follows their scene, but Shoko being Shoko, she recovers from it all too easily. She pats herself down like she’s just finished wrapping up a business deal, or completed a successful bypass operation, and reaches into her pocket for a cigarette.
“I thought you said you quit,” Satoru accuses.
“I’m just feeling… nostalgic about my student days all of a sudden,” Shoko says coolly, flattening the cigarette between her lips—the very act of it quickly dampens any lewd thoughts Satoru might’ve had about them. “And anyway, I needed to clean my mouth.”
The smoke billows out around Satoru, as if mocking him. “Rude.”
He’s glad that the tension between them’s been dispelled, at least. It almost makes him laugh. Satoru slumps forward again, letting his body lean against the railing. He lets out a final rough, ragged breath. “I miss him. I just really… yeah.”
Shoko does not say, Me, too. She doesn’t say, I know.
Instead, Shoko slips her free hand out of her coat pocket and carefully reaches into his, and gives his hand a gentle squeeze. Her lips purse into something like a small smile, something hopeful; it gives Satoru enough courage to think that the cold will pass just as quickly as it had arrived.