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longing, leaving, loving.
It feels as if a lifetime has passed since Yuuta last walked these halls. Which, he decides, isn’t necessarily far from the truth; many lifetimes have indeed ended and been cut far too short since he left Tokyo. But it’s only been a few months. How has everything gone so wrong since then?
He sighs to himself, deciding that it’s probably best to not think about it; no, it's all locked away in the cell in his mind where he keeps these hard things now, and it'll stay there.
Sealed up.
A shiver passes through his body and he shoves the thoughts away. Not today. Not now.
As he walks down the familiar dormitory hallway, the katana strapped to his back clink-clink-clinks with every step he takes. It matches the beating of his heart, he realizes, as he turns the corner that will lead him home. To his dorm room. To Toge.
Toge, who he should have been with in Shibuya. Toge, who would never hurt anyone who didn’t deserve it. Toge, who lost his arm and almost his life along with it.
Toge, who Yuuta hasn’t seen since he left and now he’s not certain if he can even face him.
Deep down, he knows he can. Toge is his best friend and so much more; he holds nothing but love for Yuuta. But that was before. Before Shibuya, before Africa. Before hope became something so scarce and fragile that Yuuta can’t remember the last time he truly felt it.
No, that isn’t true. He remembers the last time he hoped, of course he does. It was a Christmas spent in Toge’s arms, surrounded by warmth and friends and love, and he’d clung to Toge’s small hands and thought that maybe everything was going to be okay. That it wasn’t the end. That he could even be happy for once.
Yes, that had been the last time he’d felt hope’s glow.
Certainly not now, with the future looming heavy and dark with so much uncertainty.
By the time he reaches Toge’s room, he feels weighed down to the point of immobility. He can barely bring himself to open the door, can barely force himself to step inside, to breathe. And then he sees Toge, so small and young as he sits up in bed, and all the bad feelings evaporate. Like that. It’s so quick, so pervasive that if Yuuta didn’t know any better, he might think it’s a technique of his. That maybe Toge is taking every ounce of negative energy in his body, his soul, his heart, and turning it into something easier. Something brighter. Something warm.
It’s only when Toge looks at him that Yuuta remembers they haven’t spoken real actual words to each other in months. Sure, they texted while Yuuta was away and when reception had been decent enough they’d tried calls… but that was different.
That was before.
And Toge looks so tired. Dark circles beneath his lovely eyes, a gauntness to his cheeks that wasn’t there before. Skin paler than death. The tank top that hangs off of his slender frame gives Yuuta a perfect view of the bandages wrapped around him.
He tries his best to keep his gaze from straying, if only because he doesn’t have the strength to look at it. It’s bad enough knowing that it happened, that he wasn’t there with him, to protect him, to comfort him, to --
“Kelp.”
The sound of Toge’s voice is soft and sweet and visceral, calling him home, and Yuuta almost falls to his knees. Almost gives up and breaks right there, on the cold, hard floor of Toge’s dorm. But he can’t, because it isn’t fair.
Because he wasn’t here.
“Hey,” he whispers around the knot in his throat. “I… I don’t have long before I have to leave again -- “
Toge’s face falls, and Yuuta has never hated himself more than in this moment.
“ -- but can I sit with you until then?”
Toge nods before he even finishes speaking.
Which just leaves Yuuta to cross the distance between them, and maybe he’s spent the last several months convincing himself that what he’s thought was yearning flashing through the amethysts in Toge’s eyes isn’t actually there. The distance certainly helped him think like that, and why would he think otherwise when he’s cursed the only other person who looked at him like that?
Why indeed.
As Yuuta takes that first step -- and it’s the hardest one to take, after it his feet move of their own accord it feels like, he’s drawn to Toge in ways he can’t explain, and maybe he shouldn’t even try -- Toge scoots closer to the window he’s lined his bed up with. Making room for him. Yuuta watches pain flicker across his features as he holds himself up with one arm, and if Yuuta could bear every ounce of it so that Toge doesn’t have to, he would. In a heartbeat.
After he drops his katana to the floor without a second thought, Yuuta murmurs a quick thanks as he settles himself on the familiar firmness of Toge’s mattress, as he lets fingers brush soft white sheets, as he remembers the cold mornings they spent bundled up here. The cocoon of warmth they’d created beneath Toge’s blankets, bare skin pressed against bare skin until Yuuta felt as if he could finally breathe. Until he felt alive, like Toge had reached inside him and melted the ice from his heart with nothing but the warmth of his fingertips and the brightness of his eyes. Bright like the sun breaking through storm clouds.
Even now, Yuuta feels Toge’s sunlight pour over his skin as he looks at him, and he shifts to rest his head on Toge’s shoulder. Gently, of course; it’s been barely more than a week since Shibuya and the last thing Yuuta wants to do is hurt him even more. But Toge welcomes his weight, and bears the brunt of it, as he presses Yuuta into him with a small hand on his head, fingers weaving into his hair. A shiver ripples through Yuuta’s body and he throws an arm across Toge’s waist, holding him as tightly as he can because he doesn’t know when he’ll have this chance again. He doesn’t know when peace, more unknown than hope, will return to them. If it ever will.
But it feels like it might someday, with the way Toge strokes his hair from his eyes. With the steady, grounding sound of his heartbeat in Yuuta’s ears, the slow rise and fall of his chest.
There is so much Yuuta wants to say -- stories from his travels, pictures he wants to show Toge that take up far too much space on his phone, apologies and regrets -- but if he’s learned anything from Toge, it’s that sometimes words don’t need to be said out loud. He can say far more with his hands and his touch than he can with his words, and he lets his kisses speak for themselves as he tilts his head to reach the soft skin of Toge’s throat. His pulse thrums beneath Yuuta’s lips, a frenetically-growing beat that Yuuta would explore if they had more time, if there wasn’t an actual countdown looming just out of reach, but there is no time. Technically he knows there is no time for this either. He should have left the school as soon as he, Maki, Itadori, and Fushiguro parted ways earlier.
There’s a lot Yuuta should have done, a lot he should do, and this is part of that. It has to be.
Even if it has to end sooner than he wants.
When he finally lifts his head to meet Toge’s lilac-colored eyes, he has no idea how much time has passed. The sun is still out, so it can’t have been that long, but it doesn’t feel like enough to make up for everything. Will they ever reach a point, Yuuta wonders, where their time doesn’t feel so borrowed?
He opens his mouth to speak and he can tell Toge knows what he will say; his sweet eyes plead with him and if Yuuta could give up his duties without hating himself for the rest of his life, he would.
But he can’t.
“I have to go,” he whispers.
Toge shakes his head, and the hair falling into his eyes follows the movement; Yuuta smiles and brushes it back. Lets his fingers linger as they trace a path across Toge’s face. Along his thin, white eyebrow, down his soft cheek (he forces himself to ignore the gauntness), until he reaches the seal painted into his skin. He brushes the corner of his lips next and Toge closes his eyes, the warm shudder of his breath damp on Yuuta’s fingertips.
“I wish I could stay,” he whispers.
Toge’s lips purse beneath his touch in light, barely there kisses.
Yuuta shivers again and he leans in, forehead touching Toge’s. There’s a breath of space between them and it should be enough but it’s not. It won’t be, until Yuuta can stay for good. Until he stops counting every kiss, until he knows the beating of Toge’s heart as well as his own. An exhale he didn’t know he’d been holding trembles past his lips and he cups the back of Toge’s neck, tracing the circle of the seal with his thumb.
“I will return to you,” he murmurs, “and then I’m through with leaving. Unless you’re by my side, with me.”
Toge responds with a kiss, and it’s all Yuuta needs; it starts as a gentle press of his lips and then Toge shudders against him, and Yuuta wants to taste the breaths he takes. Their mouths open, slotting together, and Yuuta sinks into it, into Toge, pressing as close as he can and it’s not enough, it never is.
When they draw back, Yuuta can’t bring himself to look in Toge’s eyes. His resolve hangs by a thread so worn and frayed he’s quite frankly shocked that it’s still holding on. But, he tries to tell himself as he stands from Toge’s bed, this is why he must go on. Why he will fight until the very end. Why he will come back safe and sound.
He doesn’t say I love you as he looks back at Toge through his open door, and not just because of the lump forming in his throat, thick and heavy and making him ache. No, he doesn’t need to because Toge knows. Just as Yuuta does.
They share a smile as Yuuta stands there, willing every ounce of whatever strength he has left in him to close the door because he doesn't think he can do it on his own. Not with the afternoon sunlight, dappled through the trees, casting its warm glow across Toge's skin like this. Not with the way Toge smiles at him, eyes bright and sweet.
And then they narrow pointedly, and Yuuta manages a laugh. It sounds weak and broken.
"I know, I know," he says, fondness swelling in his heart. "I'm leaving. I... I'm leaving."
But if he takes another few moments to just look at Toge, no one has to know. And if those first few steps he takes back down the hallway feel like his soul splitting in two, katana clink-clinking against his back, no one has to know.