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It's just another one of their quips.
It starts with an innocent ‘Why don't you come by? I'll cook you something!’, goes through a neutral 'Sure. What am I eating?’, hops by a playful ‘Dog food!’, and ends in a resolute ‘Forget it, I'm not going anymore.’
It's nothing they haven't gone through on a literal daily basis before, so Satoru is lighthearted in his whiny, childish, ‘Megumi, you're seriously gonna make me cry!’ over the phone, as if he doesn't know for sure that Megumi's getting in the first cab he finds just to go see him.
He's not worried. He's chill. He's being as Gojo Satoru as Gojo Satoru can be, enthusiastically cleaning up, singing along to a song he doesn't know the lyrics to, drinking grape juice from a wine glass, and expertly chopping meat and vegetables for a sumptuous mise en place.
After all, it's just another one of their quips.
Until Megumi rings the bell and Satoru answers the door sniffling, his eyes no doubt bloodshot and puffy as tears roll down his cheeks and drip down his chin, small breaths spilling past his parted lips.
The young sorcerer drops the bags he's carrying, his backpack slipping from his shoulder to drop soundly on the floor. Satoru would ask if he's alright, but the question sounds cynical even in his twisted mind – the glossy veil that covers Megumi's eyes when he sees Satoru's face is telling enough. The very next second he embraces the teacher with enough strength to make a bone crack, spiky wisps of hair tickling the albino’s chin as Megumi hides his face on his sternum. The albino wraps his arms around his student out of reflex.
He doesn't move further, not a muscle. Neither does Megumi.
Satoru sniffles again, his eyes burning with onion poison – it can only be poison, this ungodly death chemical – while the rusty cogs inside his brain spin loudly, trying to make sense of Megumi's behavior.
He's never hugged Satoru before. Never even hugged him back when the albino took him in his arms; in the rare occasions he didn't outright push Satoru away, it was only a brief pat in the back, sometimes a light touch of his palms on the albino's shoulders that lasted for just a second longer. Not… this.
"Sensei," he murmurs into Satoru's chest, "I'm sorry."
The albino produces a weirdly gargled, incomprehensible noise of confusion in response.
"I– I shouldn't have said I wouldn't come. I didn't mean to make you cry."
…oh. Oh.
He doesn’t know Satoru had just been cutting onions, does he?
Satoru opens his mouth to say it's okay, he doesn't need to apologize because this is simply a physiological response to being assaulted by sulfuric acid, that he can stop hugging Satoru now, the albino knew he would come, hell or high water.
But Megumi holds him tighter, the warmth from his palms seeping through Satoru's thin shirt to send a wave of heat and comfort across his skin, and… his touch cages the words inside the albino, key and lock.
If he says anything, then this piece of heaven will be taken from him, no mercy.
With hesitation, the albino buries his nose into Megumi's cool, silky hair; he smells of male shampoo and rust and blood, his lithe body fitting comfortably against Satoru's now that he allows himself to be held – and the albino seizes his chance with, literally, both hands. His arms wrap around Megumi like snakes, his fingertips following a trail of hair from the nape of his neck all the way to his ebony spikes to twirl them around.
Megumi only releases him once he's stopped sniffling – the end of his tears, of his supposed suffering.
Satoru hates the sudden, heavy cold that invades his bones when they part. It takes him a moment to regain any level of coherence.
"I… bought you a pudding," Megumi says in a low voice, his tone careful and almost hesitant as he crouches to grab his bags. He reaches for them with bruised fingers, his injuries spreading all the way to his hands and possibly further up his wrists, hidden by his gakuran jacket. He just finished a mission – successfully, Satoru's aware, but why is it that he always gets beaten up first? "Oh, hell," Megumi hisses, "It's ruined…"
Megumi lifts up a round tray with a transparent cover; there's remains of a mound of caramel and whipped cream inside. Looks as mushy as Satoru feels.
"It's still pudding," Satoru assures, wiping at his eyes before taking the tray from Megumi's hands. "I'll take these inside. Go take a shower and we'll take care of your injuries."
"It's okay, I'm not—"
"Shower. You stink," he insists, crinkling his nose.
Megumi's eyes dart over Satoru's face like he's looking for something there; he eventually releases a sigh. "Alright. Let me just grab my bag—"
He stops moving, his hand halfway into reaching for his backpack.
There's a bottle of juice with its lid open right on top of it. The orange concoction's leaked out, drenching his bag and dripping down the stone steps that lead to Satoru's porch, possibly ruining everything inside and then some more.
"Shit."
"Need some clothes?" Satoru offers with a smile.
"Fine," Megumi relents, hands on his hips, "As long as it's not those hideous sailor pajamas.”
▪️➿➰➿▪️
Satoru gives him specifically the sailor pajamas. As usual.
They look big even on Satoru, which means they’re probably three times Megumi’s size; they make him appear tiny and juvenile, the navy fabric causing his eyes to shine a near incandescent blue – a frozen shot of the bottom of the ocean. The wide collar shrinks his shoulders, narrows his waist; the shorts make his legs look long and thin. Satoru can almost pick him up by the shirt, right between thumb and index, cradle Megumi in his palm like a doll.
It makes Satoru feel things crawling up his stomach. Dead butterflies, maybe. He makes sure to kill them every time, but they keep returning like hungry little zombies. Satoru kills them, and then revives them again, restarting the cycle, giving Megumi the damn pajamas every time he stays over. It's the kind of madness he drinks from a straw – sweet and sour. Addicting. Intoxicating.
Satoru knows he shouldn’t indulge in whatever this is, but he can’t stop himself. It’s his dirty little secret.
These… have started to pile up quite a bit.
Satoru has worn those before. Once.
Just once.
Megumi hated the thing, even made a face to display his disgust. The next time his student stayed over, Satoru accidentally spilled tomato sauce over his clothes and, coincidentally, the sailor pajamas were all he had available to lend. It was just for the laughs; he never imagined the result would give him a dopamine rush he’d start craving like a junkie.
These accidents started to occur quite frequently, so Satoru kept the pajamas always at the ready, clean, ironed, and reserved exclusively for Megumi.
He thinks it's because Satoru's making fun of him. The albino never corrected him.
▪️➿➰➿▪️
Megumi enters the kitchen with a scowl, Satoru's clothes making him look half his size, and the albino waits for the inevitable: Megumi’s side of the repeating cycle, the yin to his yang.
Satoru gives him the pajamas. ‘I really hate you,’ Megumi grumbles. Routine.
Eyes of deep sea briefly meet Satoru’s before drifting off to the side, Megumi’s lower lip sucked into his mouth and his cheeks a fervent scarlet; his long fingers tighten around the hem of his shirt, his pretty knuckles whitening. He doesn’t say a thing, instead taking short steps to the table. It’s already set, so he doesn’t have to help. He sits down – quiet, no yin, no yang.
Did they miss a step…?
Satoru gives him the pajamas. ‘I really hate you,’ Megumi grumbles. Routine.
‘Don’t say that, Megumi!’ is Satoru’s typical response, ‘You’ll make me cry!’
…ah.
“Megumi—”
“Don’t,” he interrupts, reaching for a plate across the table, “Let’s just eat.”
“What about your injuries?”
“I’m fine. Please?”
He whines at Satoru with his eyes, a rare enough occurrence that it instantly shuts him up. The albino grabs a plate of his own and pours steamy curry onto it.
He should feel bad. He doesn’t.
▪️➿➰➿▪️
He convinces Megumi to let him take a look at his injuries anyway – sits him on the biggest bed in the known universe and applies ointment and bandages to the bruises he deems necessary. If his fingertips linger on Megumi’s warm body for longer than they should – if he absorbs that cozy heat into his own cold skin – it’s because the young sorcerer lets him.
Sitting behind Megumi, Satoru lowers the sailor shirt over his pale back. He’s done tending to the sea urchin’s wounds.
What now? He doesn’t have an excuse to touch Megumi anymore.
…unless he doesn’t need one.
Normally, if Satoru tried anything funny, Megumi would stop him with an elbow to the stomach and have a tiny fit of cutesy panic. Normally, he’d brush Satoru away without a second thought, even though his cheeks are always burning and his eyes longing. Normally.
But this isn’t normally.
So Satoru takes a chance – he wraps his arms around Megumi’s waist, resting his chin on the sea urchin’s shoulder, and waits.
And waits.
And waits.
And Megumi responds.
He leans back to rest against Satoru’s chest, one hesitant hand curling over the albino’s. Satoru’s breath hitches. He clenches his jaw shut, closes his eyes and hugs Megumi tighter, makes full use of the unique opportunity he was given. Eventually, they fall backwards in the bed. Eventually, they roll over to the side. Eventually, they fall asleep together, just like that – with Satoru’s heart thrumming against Megumi’s back, and Megumi’s heart thrumming against Satoru’s chest – the back and forth of an intimate lullaby.
▪️➿➰➿▪️
Come the next day, things have gone back to normal.
Satoru wakes up on the floor after being kicked out of the bed – his hand wormed its way inside Megumi’s shirt apparently, and he didn’t want his bare stomach touched like that apparently.
Apparently.
The albino pretends he doesn’t see Megumi subsequently curled up in the sheets, holding his stomach like he doesn’t want to lose Satoru’s warmth, like it’s something precious.
It’s easier to pretend not to see certain things.
Like the way Megumi smiles at him when he thinks Satoru isn’t looking, or the pictures he secretly snaps of the albino and browses through even more secretly, or the fact that he always carries around the Pompompurin keychain Satoru gave him when he was eight – even though there’s no key attached. There never was.
Alternatively, Megumi seems to pretend he doesn’t know that Satoru always carries around the Cinnamoroll keychain that he gave the albino just as many years ago, just as many keys attached.
He wonders what else Megumi pretends not to see.
▪️➿➰➿▪️
When a week has gone by and there’s no sign of Megumi indulging in his (admittedly annoying) displays of affection, Satoru riots.
He grabs an onion from the vegetable bowl and brutally stabs it with a butter knife. Repeatedly.
Satoru lowers his face all the way to the cutting board, the tip of his nose brushing against torn chunks of onion, and sniffs like a dog. His nostrils start stinging first, then come his eyes, and then it burns, what the hell has he done to himself.
He teleports right into Megumi’s room – can’t waste the limited effect of sulfuric acid trying to dissolve his eyes. He’s on a time limit.
It only takes three seconds for Megumi to push himself off his desk – was he doing homework? Cute – and dash all the way to Satoru to embrace him, holding still, quiet. It feels just as good as the first time; Satoru smiles but he feels it may have come out evil. He is evil, after all.
“Are you… alright…?” Megumi eventually asks. Satoru blinks his tears away.
“Now I am.” It’s not a lie. He was upset.
Megumi let him have a taste of his sweet affection and took it away just as quickly. Left Satoru to sleep while hugging his pillow all week long, using the sailor shirt as a pillowcase just to hopefully get a whiff of his scent – to pretend Megumi was still there, letting Satoru hold him like he’s the fitting piece of his puzzle, the one thing the perfect man is missing. Left Satoru to crave his embrace, to want him, to need him.
He uses this chance to hold Megumi to his heart’s content.
Satoru’s next sigh is his joy in semi-physical form – light and airy. His chest fills up with cotton candy, his heart afloat, his smile permanent and so, so genuine.
Megumi takes them to the narrowest bed in the known universe and guides Satoru to lay on his lap, his long fingers carding slowly through the teacher’s hair. He hums a song unknown to the albino, but it resonates with him anyway simply because it’s Megumi and his low voice threading silk inside his skull.
Satoru’s the small spoon this time – Megumi drapes an arm over his waist from behind, his face tucked in the curve of the nape of Satoru’s neck and their legs irreparably tangled beneath the sheets, their fingers following suit as they entwine tightly and squeeze. Megumi’s hand looks so pretty over his own. His breaths tickle the albino and it’s the best feeling in the history of anything ever.
He’s not surprised to wake up on the floor the next day.
▪️➿➰➿▪️
Another week passes – seven days of Satoru sleeping with his hand on the nape of his neck to keep it warm.
It’s time for a new sacrifice.
Satoru’s chosen method of onion execution is peeling to death – he takes off each layer ‘till reaching the core, and only then he realizes he was so careful with his peeling that there was no retaliation from the acidic compounds.
It’s not a tangerine, Satoru. It’s an onion.
He smashes it with his fists.
Then he smashes his forehead on the cutting board to sniff his personal brand of cocaine, and smashes his hands into his eyes because God almighty he’s probably gone too far this time, and crashes every possible limb he has against random furniture as he attempts to go to the bathroom because he clearly committed a mistake and needs to fix it with tap water. Which he could have taken from the kitchen sink.
He reserves the thought that, maybe, just maybe, hyperdosaging sulfuric acid through the nostrils could be lowering his IQ.
At least, when he shows up in front of Megumi, he’s actually sobbing and whining like a newborn puppy. He almost regrets it this time. Almost. But Megumi lets go of the watering can he’d been using on the hydrangeas he’s planted himself, and he hugs Satoru so tight the albino completely forgets this pain was his own undoing in the first place.
They sit down with Megumi on Satoru’s lap, chest to chest, the young sorcerer’s lips on his neck for a whispered ‘I’m here for you,’ and the albino face to face with the flowers.
They’re all blue. Blue like Satoru’s eyes, tiny drops of water clinging to them like stars in broad daylight.
Satoru presses his own lips to Megumi’s neck, mouths a silent ‘I love you’ into his skin and slips a copy of the key to his house into the sea urchin’s pocket.
Megumi gets called in for an emergency mission, so they don’t spend the night together. Satoru sleeps in the biggest bed in the known universe by himself and it keeps looking bigger and bigger with each passing second Megumi isn't there; his only solace is draping the back of his hand over his mouth to mimic the feeling of his yin’s skin. The yin to his yang.
He doesn’t wake up on the floor the next day, but he wishes he had.
▪️➿➰➿▪️
By the end of the afternoon, Nitta shows up with a key. “Fushiguro-kun says his mission will take a while to end. He asked me to give this to you,” she explains. Satoru stares at the shiny item in his palm for so long he’s not even sure when, or if she left his office. He’s blind to everything and everyone, zero eyes rather than six, until he reaches the door to Megumi’s room and pushes the key into the lock.
Click.
That night, he doesn’t sleep in the biggest bed in the known universe. He sleeps in the narrowest bed in the known universe, curled around one of Megumi’s shirts, inhaling his scent that lingers in every square inch, and shedding tears that aren’t fabricated by sulfuric acid.
They’re fabricated by I love him so much it’s killing me inside.
He spends three nights in Megumi’s room before waking up on the floor, and being treated like the annoying gremlin he knows he really is for the rest of the day.
He can’t stand it anymore.
Yet, he wants to do it all again. Again, and again, ad infinitum.
▪️➿➰➿▪️
Satoru becomes addicted to that painful cycle.
He sniffs some onions. Cries in front of Megumi. Megumi pampers him. Kicks him away.
Reset.
Repeat.
Reset.
Repeat.
Reset—
“What…” Megumi exhales, “Are you doing…?”
Satoru widens his eyes at the intruding Megumi.
At the intruding Megumi who just caught him crushing two halves of an onion right in front of his own face like a madman. Satoru’s gut sinks through the floor and takes his heart along with it as he watches Megumi’s eyes gloss over and his jaw tighten with disappointment, his hands releasing the paper bag he’s holding. Groceries spill over. An egg cracks.
A Pompompurin keychain, one key attached, thrust into his chest point blank.
He takes it with trembling hands, his tears blurring his sight and dropping heavy onto his palms. He doesn’t know how many were caused by onion enzymes and how many are genuine.
He’s ashamed of himself.
He tightens his hold over the keychain and dashes out to wrap his arms around the leaving Megumi’s waist, his face buried in the crook of the young sorcerer’s neck as his cheeks burn with guilt and embarrassment. He doesn’t dare open his eyes – not because they hurt, but because his heart does.
“Please don’t hate me,” he whispers brokenly, his stomach painfully flipping on itself with each tiny little sniffle that comes out of the heartbroken Megumi.
The yin broken off his yang.
“You fooled me,” Megumi mumbles, his voice low and cautious. Pained.
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” he attempts, his hold on Megumi tightening into a delirious please don’t leave me grip, “You kept treating me like that when I cried, and–”
“Like that?” Megumi interrupts. “Like what?”
Satoru pauses, breathing in.
“Like you love me back.”
Megumi turns around, his eyes of deep sea watering up to add yet another layer of mystique, blue waves spreading and expanding from its core, receding to the edges of his irises as his pupils dilate. “Maybe I do.”
Satoru lets out the breath he’d been holding, and lets the zombie butterflies inside his stomach take flight so high they lift him off his feet. He slides a hand to the nape of Megumi’s neck, another to his low back, and pulls him into his chest.
Relief.
“Maybe?” Satoru chuckles, “I’m sorry, but I’m not WinRar to keep this going forever; your free trial is over. Nine years is more than enough to decide if you want the full product or not. So?”
Megumi tightens his hold on Satoru, something that sounds a lot like a tiny laugh spilling from him.
“I want the premium package. All of you, heart and soul included.”
▪️➿➰➿▪️
He quite likes this new cycle.
Satoru sniffs the sailor shirt. Confesses in front of Megumi. Megumi pampers him. Kisses his breath away.
Satoru gives him the pajamas. ‘I really love you,’ Megumi mumbles. Routine.
Reset.
Repeat.
Reset.
Repeat.
Reset—