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“Hey, dumbass!” Nobara calls loudly. She’s a meter away, standing with her arms crossed nonchalantly and an unimpressed expression. With disgruntled cries, a flock of birds in a nearby tree lift and flap away.
“Whas’up?” Yuuji asks, walking towards her, absentmindedly sticking a finger in his ear and squinting one eye closed. “Food?”
He settles a heavy arm over her shoulder, smiling. Nobara looks close to puking.
“What, are you a pig? You only think about food?” Yuuji shrugs, unconcerned. “...Whatever. You’re paying. But first--”
Nobara bends her knees slightly and then bursts up all at once, shoving her shoulder into Yuuji’s armpit and her elbow into his side. She cackles when he squawks and nearly trips over the railing of the covered wooden walkway.
At the last second, he whirls his leg around and slams it into her stomach. She makes a wheezing noise and yanks on his foot, causing him to fall towards her. Yuuji uses that momentum to make a fist; Nobara uses the opportunity to also make a fist.
A couple minutes, a few bruises, and a sudden decrease in the local wildlife presence later, they both walk together towards the gate. Yuuji’s arm is slung over Nobara’s shoulders. He’s bleeding from a cut on his cheek and smiling.
“We’re getting ramen.”
“Eh?” Yuuji pouts. “But we got that last time. Isn’t it my turn to pick the place?”
“Why on earth would anyone ever let you choose anything, ever?” Nobara snipes back. “Is it even possible for you to look in the mirror, once in your life?”
Yuuji raises his eyebrows in confusion. “You think I’m a vampire?”
The sound of a smack echoes through the courtyard.
“Stupid boy,” Nobara mutters, cracking her knuckles. Yuuji nurses the back of his head with a wounded expression. “Did Sakuna eat your brain?”
“It’s not my fault I’m stupid,” Yuuji says, then straightens his shoulders into his customary posture. He swings his hands loosely by his sides. His eyes look forward, as if they’re seeing something far in the future, or the past. “I was just born this way.”
Nobara side-eyes him, red hair swinging to shade her face as she walks. She looks simultaneously disgusted and begrudgingly impressed. She eventually turns her head forward.
“Wait, hold up!” Yuuji suddenly yells, stopping abruptly. He turns to Nobara, eyes wide. “Did you mean, I’m ugly?”
“Stop shouting, stupid!” Nobara yells back. She scoffs. “I didn’t say you’re ugly. I said I’d rather die than let you make important decisions.”
Yuuji thinks for a moment, eyebrows lowered. He blinks, coming to a conclusion, then looks at her. “You don’t trust me in a fight?”
“Eh??” Nobara says. “I didn’t say that.”
“Yeah you did.”
“No I didn’t!”
“Yeah, you did!”
“No, stupid, I said I don’t trust you with decisions .”
“Yeah, like deciding what to do in a fight!”
“Ugh.” Nobara rolls her eyes. “ Important decisions. That’s not what fighting is.”
Yuuji blinks. Then blinks again. He’s confused. “What?”
With a sniff, Nobara tucks her hair behind one ear. She props a hand on her hip. “Fighting’s not a choice. It’s just something you do.”
“But don’t you have to… choose to do it?”
“Guh.” Nobara punches towards Yuuji’s face. Yuuji’s arm swings up and blocks it. “There. See? Did you think at all, just then?” Quietly, as she brings her arm down, she rubs her knuckles and mutters, “Stupid quick reflexes. I wanted to punch you.”
Yuuij ignores her. He looks at his arm, raised strong and instinctively towards his face. He lowers his hand to his chin, tapping as he thinks. “Ohhh. I see. But that wasn’t fighting. That was defense.”
“That’s the same thing.”
“Is it…?”
Yuuji looks out over the green forest and quiet enclave, mouth pursed in thought. He’s stronger now, and he’s fought more, so he thinks he might be able to think this throught.
He’s grown, since he fought that first cursed spirit. And before that, when his grandpa first started getting really sick. And even up to then, he had been stronger than the other kids and far away from them too, somehow.
Yuuji’s had a small life, a quiet one-- at least, until recently-- but still, he thinks, doesn’t he know what strength is? What fighting is?
There were too many times he’d seen schoolground battles turn bad. Turn into lunchroom tripping, into street confrontations, into alley beat-downs. Turn into sideways glances in class, into hushed whispers, into eyerolls and harsh words and small cruelties.
There are mean people everywhere. And there are good people too, who are mean. Just like how there are bad people who sometimes do good, even though people think they can’t, or won’t.
But it’s not a matter of can’t, when it comes to kindness. That’s a choice. But good, bad? Yuuji has long-stopped using labels like that. Is it bad to hurt someone who hurts you? Is it good to hurt someone who hurts other people? When does defense become a choice? When does defense become fighting?
There aren’t really boundaries for that. There aren’t clear lines, but there is a difference. Yuuji tilts his head, lost in thought.
He turns back to Nobara and shrugs. “I don’t think they’re the same,” he says simply. Then: “And I want to get ice cream this time too.”
Maybe Nobara senses something in his gaze, or maybe she’s just bored by his answer, but she doesn’t bother with arguing. She just rolls her eyes and starts walking. “Keep up, idiot.”
Yuuji steps into rhythm with her, humming to himself. “...wait. So what is an important decision?”
Nobara hmphs, raising her chin. “Fashion.”
… huh.
Yuuji looks down at his outfit. Jeans and a hoodie. “So my fashion is bad?”
“You look like you drool in your sleep,” she says.
“Ah, I do, I think. Sometimes when I nap my pillow is wet afterwards.”
Nobara shoves Yuuji over. “EW,” she shouts, face screwed up in disgust. “Where’s your propriety? Why are you telling that to a lady?”
Yuuji just laughs and ducks under her sideways kick. “What’s propriety mean?” he asks sincerely, then ducks again.
Nobara has just taken out her hammer when Megumi appears around a building corner.
“Fushiguro!” Yuuji shouts happily, waving at him. He sidesteps a hammer swing. “Wanna get food with us?”
Megumi looks like he regrets walking this way. His face becomes slack with annoyance and regret. “No,” he says, but walks up to the cloud of dust and flailing limbs where Yuuji and Nobara are fighting. It doesn’t even make any sense. The floor is made of wood.
“Ramen!” Yuuji shouts entreatingly from the dust ball. “Nobara’s paying!”
“Okay,” Megumi says immediately.
“Hey!!!!” Nobara growls. “I’m not paying, you stupid boy! You’re paying! You’re paying for all my food! For the rest of my life! Die!!!!!”
~~~~
Eventually, they make it to lunch. By then, the sun’s a quarter of the way across the sky, and the fading warm light casts the tree they’re sitting under golden.
Yuuji slurps up his ramen. “Hey Nobara--”
“Don’t talk with food in your mouth, gross.”
“Is my fashion really bad?” Yuuji holds out his arm and examines his yellow hoodie sleeve. It’s stained near the sleeve from hot sauce. “I think I like it.”
Nobara looks at him scathingly. She seems pitying. “I don’t even know where to begin.”
Megumi covertly peers down at his own clothing, questioning.
Nobara holds a pointer stick up to a projector screen that displays a crudely drawn Yuuji. She clears her throat. “If we start with your hoodies--”
“Where the hell did that board come from?” Megumi asks.
“--I honestly have nothing to say. Get rid of them. You look like a delinquent.”
“I am a delinquent.”
“Your jeans don’t fit well, your shoes are dirty, your shirts are boring , and you don’t accessorize. And to top it all off--” Nobara peers down at Yuuji, where he’s sitting attentively and taking notes. “That hair color doesn’t match anything. Why dye your hair pink ? It looks fine , I suppose , but I’m sure the thought process behind it would give me a migraine.”
Yuuji takes the pencil he was chewing idly out of his mouth. “Oh,” he says, and shrugs, “I didn’t choose the hair color. I don’t dye my hair.”
It’s silent. Megumi looks up from where he was attempting to decipher Yuuji’s hieroglyphic handwriting, a monocle now resting on his nose-- there’s a stick-figure dancing around a fire, he’s pretty sure. Maybe a bird with a really cool hat.
The pointer in Nobara’s hands snaps. Yuuji slurps his ramen, blinking up at her.
“What,” Nobara says, disbelieving, “your hair is naturally pink?”
“Yeah.” Yuuji smiles. “Always been like this. I might have some baby pictures I can show you.”
“No, no, hold up, wait. Pink?!” Nobara raises her two sticks threateningly. “I don’t believe you! Why would I believe you? Huh? Who would? Does Fushiguro?”
“I believe it,” Megumi says.
Nobara turns to him in betrayal. She looks murderous. “ Eh ?”
Megumi leans away, one side of his lip pulling down in annoyance. “Yuuji doesn’t lie.”
“Aww, bro!” Yuuji beams at Megumi, sparkles and mini hearts floating around his head. Megumi blinks back, then nods once.
“Your undercut is brown.”
“Yep.”
“That makes no sense!”
“Why not?”
Nobara holds a metal nail up to Yuuji’s throat. When she speaks, her voice is low and silky smooth. “Wanna play this game? Are you sure? I’m not going to lose.” She presses the nail a little closer and leans in, hair swishing forward. Her grin is manic. “Do it. I want you to say it again.”
Yuuji moves his mouth to the side. “Okay. I don’t dye my hair.”
“You--!”
Fushiguro restrains Nobara by lifting her up like Rafiki. “Have you ever dyed it brown?” he asks, as Nobara hollers threats and kicks wildly.
“Nah,” Yuuji says. “I like it this way. I figure there’s no need to change it.” He turns to Nobara. “If it bothers you that much, I can try dyeing it?” He then scratches at his elbow and mutters, “But it might not work.”
Nobara throws a rock at him, then dangles limply in defeat. “Fine,” she snarls, and somehow maintains her dignity despite her feet being a foot off the ground. “And it’ll work. There’s no reason for it not to.”
~~
It does not work.
Nobara kneels on the ground, her skirt pooling over her knees and barely skimming the floor. Her arms rest lifelessly at her side. She stares forward blankly, eyes empty and yet full of agony.
“I’m going to kill you,” she whispers blankly. “I’ll kill you. You shouldn’t exist. You’re dead.”
Yuuji rests his chin on his knees, curled up comfortably on the toilet cover. “Sorry, Nobara,” he says, and means it. “My hair’s weird like this, I guess.”
Megumi runs his hand repetitively through Yuuji’s hair. It’s the exact same shade of pink as before they attempted to dye it brown. It’s damp post-shower, but Megumi doesn’t seem to mind, fingers trailing through the strands over and over again. His face is blank, but his eyes are narrowed in thought.
“Hm,” he says, and pulls on a peachy lock.
Yuuji shivers, then tilts his head to look up at him. “What’s up?”
“...” Megumi glances down at him, then turns his attention back to the top of his head.
Nobara’s still muttering in the background. “Kill, kill, kill,” she chants quietly but fervently. Yuuji pouts for a moment in thought.
“Oh!” he says, after a couple minutes of silence, interspersed with death threats, pass. Nobara finally moves, slowly turning her head sideways to look at him. Yuuji smiles. “Want me to wear a wig?"