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Geto stood in the usual spot. He and Gojo would usually play basketball, but instead, the albino male ditched him to help their batchmate Iori Utahime with something. He rolled his eyes.
Those two were probably making out in the janitor’s closet.
He sat on the bench wiping the sweat off his forehead when the smell of smoke suddenly entered his nostrils. He turned his head around, scanning the field. Geto Suguru was a man of righteousness, or at least that’s what most people thought. Student council vice president, even Geto himself, admits he’s a bit of a teacher’s pet, but for a good reason. Unlike his male counterpart, his mischievousness was a lot more subtle. He was a righteous man until he gained the motivation to commit similar deeds to Satoru.
He played his cards right, always making sure he got what he wanted and needed. If it meant he had to be a teacher’s pet, he’d do it. He believes that if you want something, you’ll have to do everything in your power to get what you want, even if it means doing unpleasant things. He continued scanning the perimeter. A puff of smoke comes from behind him, the unpleasant hitting the back of his neck, snaking its way around and into his nose, then lungs.
"I find you irritating."
Straight forward as always...
He turns around, giving the short-haired girl a charming smile that has no effect on her. He’d never bothered talking to her often outside of the classroom, he found her dull, irritating, and had no filter whatsoever. I guess a man with many masks would hate someone like her, someone whose words hit you as hard as a truck, someone who was brutally honest.
He only ever talks to her if she needs something from him or if he needs something from her. Group projects, things like that. Other times it would be him giving her a warning since she was caught smoking in the courtyard once.
"I thought I told you to stop smoking, Ieiri."
She scoffs, "You’d be one big fucking idiot if you thought I cared. Also, face me when you’re talking. I thought you had manners, Geto."
She lightly bit her cigarette, just enough to keep it balanced in her mouth but not enough to split the end in half. Using the hand she originally used to hold the cigarette, she grabs his shoulder and forces him to face her.
"That’s more like it." She mumbled, loosening her grip on his shoulder.
"Sorry, I didn’t mean to come off as rude." He said, letting the towel hang on his left shoulder."
She clicked her tongue in annoyance, letting out a big puff of smoke that hit his face. His eye twitches in annoyance. He pushes it aside, telling himself to be more patient.
"Stop with your bullshit. I won’t fall for your little act, unlike Yaga-sensei."
He sighs, sitting back down onto the bench, motioning for her to sit as well. She doesn’t care. She continues to stand beside him.
"If you’re so irritated at me, we can talk this out in a responsible fashion. Tell me the things that you don’t like about me, and I’ll do my best to change them. How does that sound?"
He looks up to her, trying to talk to her kindly, but he feels like he’s going to crack soon enough.
"See? That’s the bullshit I’ve been talking about. Your little goofy act, trying to seem like this selfless, saintly person who leads those around him, when in reality it’s just a strategy to get what you want easier. Everyone’s so damn blind to it. It makes me sick as fuck looking at you sometimes. You're so plastic, so fucking plastic to the point I wonder how the turtles in Japan are still breathing."
Silence engulfs the two of them. The long-haired man sat there, staring into the distance. He suddenly cracks, letting out a loud laugh that echoes in the courtyard. Thank god nobody else was there, or people would have been staring at the pair.
"Of course, you, of all people, caught on."
"Of course, I caught on. You’re not exactly the best at acting. The best you could do was be a clown."
"So what are you going to do now? Tattle on me? Blackmail me? Do anything as you please. We both know that nobody will believe anything that comes out of your mouth, not even Satoru. "
She sits down beside him, crossing her legs. "Hell nah, I could give less of a shit. I only said all of that because it bothered me. I just wanted to tell you to fuck off. "
"Goddamn, you hate me that much?"
"Of course I do; you’re everything I hate built into one person. Under all that sack of lies, it’s just some idiot who just wants to get what he wants because he’s never had anything that he truly cherished. In your state of mind, everything is a piece in a board game that you can move on your own accord. Nothing has meaning unless it’s something that can take you one step further than everyone else. "
"I do cherish things-"
"Yeah, but you can’t name a single thing you cherish that isn’t some astounding goal that the oh-so-great academic awardee, student council president, Geto Suguru earned in a way where it’s just for the fun of it."
His eyebrow twitches in annoyance, "What do you even mean by that? Of course, I care for everything I’ve done. I’ve done things for fun. You’re such a know-it-all, Ieiri, you don’t even
know me that well and yet you assume so much about me. I’d say this is fan behaviour."
The corners of her lips curve, and she gently flicks her cigarette, getting the remains of the ash that sticks to the end of her cigarette off. It falls right next to the man.
"C’mon, I thought you were smart." She lightly shoves him. The man stays still, watching the girl laugh to herself.
"Fun to you is gaining something in some way. Becoming student council president, getting the highest mark-"
"Yeah, and what’s the problem abou-"
She interrupts him, smacking him in the head, blowing smoke into his face once more.
"Don’t interrupt me, as I was sayinggg-" She lazily drags out the last letter.
"Have you ever tried having fun without gaining anything but satisfaction and happiness? Something that isn’t supposed to improve you, something that you do just for the hell of it?" She asks, tilting her head slightly at him.
He stays silent.
"Just in case you’re too stupid to understand again, I’ll give you an example. I smoke cigarettes despite knowing this shit could fuckin’ kill me, but I do it anyway, ‘cause why not? I don’t gain much from it, and yet I still have fun. I do the stupidest shit that I know will get me in trouble, but I enjoy it. I bathe in the pleasure of it despite knowing there’s nothing to gain. "
The two sit still for a couple of minutes. Shoko lets him think about what she said. The birds chirp in the distance. You can hear their other batchmates in the background, making their way home, talking about the latest trends in the magazines that they’ve seen recently. As the wind blows past them, she closes her eyes, avoiding the dust that could possibly get in her eyes, but keeps it that way even after the wind stills.
As Shoko Ieiri sits there bathing in the silence and the comforting environment, multiple things are swarming Geto’s mind. It dawns on him that she’s right. Almost everything he’s done that he considered fun was simply built to feed his ego, to meet the expectations he’s put on himself, to finally reach higher than his best friend Gojo. Everything has been in black and white for so long. He’s played his role for so long that he never realized was starting to make the actual person within him decay and feel empty. Maybe that’s why he wanted so much, maybe that’s why he kept trying to achieve even bigger goals and expectations because, in the end, Geto Suguru was like anybody else in the world; he just wanted to fill the void within him.
The void that almost ate him up some days, the void that whispered in his ear that he had to perceive, he had to improve, he had to develop.
"You’re right." He says, his head hanging low as he admits defeat.
“Y’know as much as I hate you, I wanna help you.” His head moves to look at her, raising his eyebrow.
“Why so?” He inquires, she shrugs. “Dunno, maybe it’s just on a whim.”
“Come ‘ere” She motions for him to move closer, he questions it but does it anyway. He shuffles forward, their knees touching.
“Let’s commemorate this moment, this moment of realization.” She says in some weird voice, trying to sound like some scholar trying to celebrate an important event to humor the man. It works, he softly chuckles. She plucks the cigarette out of her mouth and grabs him by the jaw.
“Open wide, big boy.” She says as she lips the cigarette between his lips. He can feel the warmth spread through his cheeks, he moves away from her, looking in the other direction. He accidentally breathes in deep, the smoke enters his lungs. He starts having a coughing fit, Shoko laughing in the background as he does.
This is his first.
She pats him gently on the back as his coughing dies down, the cigarette falls to the ground, she steps on it. “Oh god, that had me balling!” She wipes the tears that formed around the edges of her eyes. Her cheeks hurt from how much she’s been laughing and smiling today and yet she never stopped.
First moments of realization.
A guard suddenly walks into the courtyard, he smells the smoke. His eyes land on the two. He yells at them, waving them off. “Oh fuck that’s the guard who caught me smoking a few weeks ago. Suguru, get up, we gotta go!!” She pulls him to stand. Now he’s the one laughing. “Holy shit stop fucking laughing, you can do that later. GET UP NOW OR WE’LL BE SCOLDED BY YAGA!!” He stands up and starts running hand in hand with her.
First moments of fun.
“Run faster!!” She tugs him even harder. He wheezes, clutching his stomach in pain from how much he’s laughing. “I-” He interrupts himself, laughing even harder, his eyes squinting as he does, tears falling from his eyes. “I can’t run faster or I’ll fall over!!” He yells, panting in between his words from how fast they’re running. She lets go of his hand, “I don’t wanna get caught, I’m leaving you.” She says and starts picking up her pace, her figure gets even smaller till it fades in the distance.
And there will be more to come, more moments with her by his side.