Work Text:
August, 2006
It has to end someday, it has to. It can’t go on like this forever.
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That day replays constantly in Suguru’s head over and over again. Every sound, every smell, every sight. He can still feel the way his heart stopped and he immediately felt light-headed when they all realized there was an intruder inside the school’s barrier. He can still feel how his mouth dried out and his tongue suddenly felt too big for his skull when he realized Satoru had been stabbed. He remembers how he wanted to throw a fit like a small child, scream and cry at Satoru when he told him to leave with Riko and Kuroi, to finish the mission when all he wanted to do was stay and ensure Satoru was safe. But he didn’t. He listened. He listened to Satoru because he trusted him more than he trusted himself most times. Satoru never would’ve told him to go if he wasn’t sure that they’d all be okay. It was the first time in Suguru’s life he ended up regretting blindly trusting him.
Suguru had never heard a gunshot before, not in real life. He had only ever heard gunshots in the action movies and tv shows he had never cared about when he was younger but grew to love because he only ever watched them with Satoru. His first time hearing a real gunshot almost felt like an action movie. He saw Riko fall to the ground in slow motion. He could still smell the thick iron that filled the air as crimson leaked out of her head and caked her hair. He could even taste it if he thought hard enough about it. At that moment he knew Satoru was dead before the words even reached his ears, Riko wouldn’t be dead on the cold floor if he wasn’t. He couldn’t hear anything else after that, only the rushing of blood in his ears.
In hindsight, Suguru wasn’t surprised he lost. The man in front of him had killed Satoru and Suguru wasn’t in the right state of mind after hearing the news. He fought, desperate for vengeance and nothing else, and he failed. He could still feel the splitting pain in his chest as it got sliced into. He remembers the way he prayed for the first time since he was a child before he lost consciousness. The way he had prayed and begged for Satoru and Riko to not be mad at him because he failed to avenge them. In that moment, so sure he was about to be killed, he prayed that Satoru would still welcome him to heaven with open arms, despite being too weak to kill the man who had taken them away from each other in their final moments. And then he woke up.
If it were up to him after he woke up Suguru would’ve just laid there until someone eventually found him, would’ve curled inward on himself and begged God to take him too, would’ve cursed God for leaving him there when Satoru was already gone. But he couldn’t. The man who had ambushed them had taken Riko’s body, his mission wasn’t done until she was back in Jujutsu Tech’s custody. Despite the X carved into his chest tugging whenever he moved, begging him to stay put and die, he got up. He dragged himself out of Tengen’s area and almost got sick when he found Satoru’s blood. He only found Satoru’s blood. He continued to the Time Vessel Association Headquarters with newfound vigor. He had two bodies he needed to bring home.
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The fact that Satoru had somehow survived despite all the blood Suguru had found didn’t fully sink in until two weeks after Riko’s death. For two whole weeks, every single night, Suguru would wake up from vivid nightmares in a cold sweat and think he was waking up in the underground tombs again only to look through the darkness around him and remember he was back in his dorm room. If his sleep was interrupted early enough in the night, he could press his ear against the wall and strain to hear Satoru moving around getting ready for bed in the next dorm room over, reminding him that despite all the horrors that had happened that day, Satoru came home in one piece. However, if his nightmares woke him up after Satoru had already gone to bed, Suguru couldn’t fall back asleep, no matter how hard he tried. He would sit against their shared wall for hours until the sun began to creep over the horizon and he could finally hear Satoru moving as he began his groggy start to the day. He could just ask Satoru if they could sleep in the same bed, that’s what they had done almost every night before the incident, but he felt selfish for even considering asking when Satoru was certainly in a state of grieving as well. After two weeks the nightmares abruptly stopped and the lack of sleep hit Suguru like a truck.
“Suguru, did you hear me?”
“Hm?” Suguru looked up from where he had been staring at the ground to look at where Satoru was sitting next to him. He hadn’t been listening, not one bit. He couldn’t stop thinking about how his head felt like it was full of cotton or how hot the sun felt on the back of his neck. He had personally suggested hanging out in one of their dorm rooms or in the dormitory's common room but Satoru, making a more sensible choice for once, said that they could both probably benefit from getting some fresh air after the tough couple of weeks they had both had.
“No,” Suguru said quickly, “Sorry, I’m a little tired today. What’d you say?” If he hadn’t been too sluggish to look somewhere else, he might’ve missed the way Satoru’s lips quickly flashed a small frown before falling back to their resting position.
“I said I’m going on a mission tomorrow.”
“Huh, that’s weird,” Suguru mumbled, slowly rolling his neck to work out the crick that had developed from sitting against the wall all night instead of sleeping, “They haven’t given me the file debriefing yet.” This time, the small frown stayed on Satoru’s lips as he began speaking again.
“That’s cause they’re not sending both of us, they’re sending me alone.”
“What?”
“I mean, I doubt they’re sending me alone alone, I’m sure there’ll be some other sorcerer there to supervise the whole thing, watch me and make sure I don’t screw it up.”
“Why wouldn’t they send us together? They’ve always sent us on missions together.”
“The higher-ups probably think that since I’ve finally reached Limitless’ true potential I’m too strong to have a partner on missions, that it would slow down my growth,” Suguru's face must have contorted painfully at that because Satoru quickly added, “You know I don’t think that. If I had it my way, I’d never go on a single mission without you. I wouldn’t even exorcize some puny grade four without you. We’re a team, always will be, regardless of what the higher-ups say.” Satoru gently bumped his shoulder against Suguru’s before gently hooking their pinky fingers and letting their knuckles brush against each other where they rested in between their bodies.
“Can you call me?” Suguru asked, slowly leaning into Satoru and allowing his cotton-filled head to fall onto his shoulder.
“While I’m away?”
Suguru nodded.
“Of course. I’m only gonna be gone for two days though. I’ll be back before you know it. Try and get some rest while I’m gone also. I know you’ve probably been having a hard time since…everything that happened, I have been too, but you look like you haven’t slept in years.”
He wasn’t wrong, Suguru felt like he hadn’t slept in years. After the couple of weeks he’d had, he deserved some dreamless, restful sleep.
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The next few days passed in a haze. Satoru left early the next morning before Suguru woke up and the next two days were uneventful. Suguru woke up, went to his classes and training, went back to his dorm room, fell asleep, woke up to the sound of his phone ringing, spoke with Satoru until the voice on the other end groaned and begrudgingly told Suguru he had to go, and then he fell back asleep. He had never slept so much in his life, it reminded him of the way babies slept all day, unaware of the way time continued to pass by without them.
On the morning of the third day, unaware of how much time had passed since Satoru left, Suguru was roused from his sleep by his bedroom door slowly being pushed open. Unable to see who it was in the darkness of early dawn, Suguru groggily rolled over to face the wall, back to the door.
“I don’t feel great Shoko, tell Yaga I’m not gonna be there today.” Suguru mumbled, assuming he had overslept and the figure in his doorway was Shoko coming to wake him up for class. He heard the door quietly click shut but instead of Shoko’s footsteps disappearing down the hall, they instead slowly approached the edge of his bed.
“Shoko, I’m serious, I just need a day to myself. I’ll be back in class tomorrow.”
“I guess that means you don’t want to spend the day with me instead, huh?” A voice, that was very distinctly not Shoko’s asked. Suguru shot straight up, ignoring the slight head rush he got, and looked towards the voice.
“Satoru,” his shoulders relaxed and he smiled gently at the tall figure that stood expectantly next to his bed, “You’re home.”
“I told you I wasn’t gonna be gone long,” Satoru said with a chuckle as he toed off his shoes and took off his uniform jacket. It was true that Satoru had promised he would be home in just a few days, but Suguru was too embarrassed to admit he had slept through all of them, completely unaware of what day it was or that Satoru would be home today. “Come on, I just got home, I’m tired. You’re not really going to kick me out and make me go back to my own room, are you?” Satoru pouted as he asked. Suguru knew why he was doing it, it was to get a rise out of him. Satoru knew Suguru would always roll his eyes and tell him to stop whenever he looked at him like that. Today though, it didn’t irritate Suguru. Instead, he pushed himself over to make room on his bed and lifted up half his blanket.
“Don’t just stand there with that dumb look on your face, come on, I missed you.”
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“I think he’s starting to get better, Shoko.”
“What makes you say that?” Shoko asked, eyebrow raised as she threw another small rock at Satoru from where she was sitting in the grass, watching as the rock bounced off his infinity before hitting the dirt at his feet.
“Because,” Satoru started, a big cheesy grin on his face as he looked down at her, “When I went into his room the other day when I got back…he smiled at me Shoko. I haven’t seen him smile since…since everything that happened. I think he’s taking a positive turn, he even agreed to go on a solo mission today. I know he’s upset we’re not being sent out together anymore, I am too, but I thought it was going to take him at least a few months before he was willing to actually do it.”
Shoko frowned before taking a cigarette out of her pocket and slipping it in between parted lips.
“Did he not tell you?”
“Tell me what?” Satoru frowned, not liking the look on Shoko’s face or the fact that whatever Suguru hadn’t told him was clearly so grim she decided she needed nicotine to even tell him about it.
“He was unconscious the whole time you were gone, Satoru,” Shoko sighed, running a hand over her face before lighting her cigarette, “Even when he was technically awake, I don’t think he was all there. Yaga-sensei would ask him questions or talk to him in class and he just wouldn’t answer, it looked like he didn’t even hear him. The same thing happened whenever I tried to talk to him. I don’t think he was really aware of his surroundings either. He clipped a corner really hard the first day you were gone and when Haibara asked if he was okay, same thing as before, he didn’t even react he just kept moving.”
“What are you talking about? I called him both days and he sounded fine, a little tired maybe but not completely unaware of everything around him.”
“Look, I don’t want to put more pressure on you when the higher-ups are already asking so much of you, but Suguru’s not doing well, he isn’t. I think he feels better when he’s around you, but I don’t want you to only see those good moments and think he’s doing better when it’s so clear to the rest of us that he’s doing worse . We’re all worried about him Satoru, but he won’t talk to any of us. Just keep an eye on him, please. I know he’s your boyfriend but he’s also my best friend and I hate seeing him like this.”
“Shit,” Satoru mumbled, sitting in the dirt before dropping his face into his hands, “I don’t know what to do Shoko. I know he’s struggling, I can see it, but I have no clue what to do. I’m bad at feelings, always have been. After what happened to Riko I just kind of, blocked it out and ignored it pretending it didn’t upset me until it really did stop upsetting me. Suguru can’t do that, I know he can’t but I don’t know how I’m supposed to help him move on.”
“I’m not sure you can do anything to help, not until he actually accepts that he needs help. Just be there for now, make sure you’re there when he is ready for help. I’ll do the same. We’ll all do the same.”
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It has to end someday, it has to. It can’t go on like this forever.
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September, 2007
“Satoru.”
“Hm?” Satoru looked over his shoulder to look at Suguru who was sitting behind him with his arms lazily wrapped around him. They were in the dorm’s common room, just the two of them watching a movie and Satoru had assumed Suguru fell asleep ages ago with how still he was sitting and how silent he was.
“Are you busy tomorrow? Are you assigned to a mission or anything?” Satoru thought for a moment before shaking his head.
“Nope, not unless the higher-ups spring something on me last minute. Why? What’s going on?”
“Can you…” Suguru took a deep breath, sighing and shaking his head before he continued to speak, “Can you come with me on my mission tomorrow?” Satoru frowned.
“Are you still thinking about what happened to Haibara? Shoko said he’s gonna be fine, make a full recovery. Sure that mark on his face is pretty nasty right now, gonna scar, but scars are sexy. Doubt you’ll ever hear Nanami shut up about it once it heals.”
“They’re not even dating,” Suguru mumbled with a distant chuckle, genuine but his heart not fully in it.
“They should be! They’re more obvious than either of us and yet we’re the ones Utahime complains about?!”
“Utahime complains about you because she thinks you’re a spoiled pain in the ass. I am on good terms with her.”
“Rude,” Satoru scoffed before glancing back at Suguru again. He frowned. Suguru was smiling softly but his eyes looked empty, “Hey. Seriously, he’s gonna be fine. Is that why you want me to come with you tomorrow?”
“Maybe,” Suguru shrugged, “I can’t really explain it, I just, I can’t keep doing missions by myself anymore. Exorcize, consume, exorcize, consume, exorcize, consume, that’s all my missions are these days. I used to enjoy missions, getting away from campus for a few days, spending time with you, playing card games at night with you and Shoko on the rare occasion she got sent with us. I’ve always hated swallowing curses but it was bearable when there was more to missions. But there’s nothing anymore. Just exorcize, consume, exorcize, consume, exorcize, con–”
“Hey,” Satoru, who had at some point turned around to face Suguru, gently placed his hands on his shoulders, “Calm down. I’ll come with you. I’m sorry, I knew you didn’t like going on missions without each other but I felt like we didn’t have any other choice so, I just let it happen. We’re not doing that anymore. Whenever you have a solo mission, I’m gonna come with you, and you’ll do the same thing whenever I have a solo mission. And if the higher-ups ever give us solo missions at the same? We’re just not gonna go. We’re the strongest after all, they can give us all the shit in the world if we refuse but they can’t force us.”
Suguru didn't say or do anything for a long time. Satoru was convinced by the glassy look in his eyes that Suguru was going to burst into tears at any moment but instead when he finally moved again he just dropped his forehead onto Satoru’s shoulder and shuddered.
“I’m so tired Satoru.”
“I know,” Satoru whispered, wrapping one arm around Suguru and using his free hand to gently finger comb the knots out of his hair, “I know you are. I’m sorry I made you deal with it by yourself for so long. I’m never going to leave alone again though, I promise. We’re in this together, we’re always going to be in this together.”
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“So, give me the run down one more time,” Satoru said, putting the manga he had been reading on the dashboard and looking over at Suguru where he was driving up the bumpy mountain roads. Suguru glanced at him out of the corner of his eye, giving him an incredulous look.
“I still cannot believe you can read in here without getting car sick,” He mumbled with a sigh before explaining the mission they were on for the umpteenth time since last night, “Small mountain village. Reports of a cursed spirit kidnapping people and causing strange, otherwise unexplainable deaths. From the sounds of it, I doubt it’s anything above a grade three. Should be pretty quick and easy. The worst part is probably just this nightmare of a commute. You’re driving us back to school when we’re done.”
They drove in comfortable silence for a few more minutes before Suguru groaned and stopped the car.
“That road looks like shit,” Suguru muttered, already turning off the car and unbuckling, “I don’t think the car’s gonna make it through there, we’ll just get stuck and have to push it out. We’re on the outskirts of the village anyway, let’s just walk to where we’re supposed to report, look for curses on the way there.”
They both got out of the car, making sure it was locked before beginning their walk deeper into the village. It was late, sometime after ten and most of the houses had their lights turned off. A small river ran parallel to the road they walked on. The sound of rushing water mixed with the occasional cicada chirp, the last sounds of summer dying for the year. They continued to walk down the overgrown dirt road until something hit Suguru’s foot, causing him to stumble slightly.
“The hell?” He mumbled, crouching down to pick the small object up. He held it up to the moonlight to get a better look at it before showing it to Satoru.
“Human bone?” Satoru questioned, leaning down to get a better look at it as Suguru stood back up.
“Our curse has gotta be around here somewhere,” Suguru said with a nod and started walking toward the edge of the road. As if on cue, a small moan and cry came from behind a rock closer to the riverbed drawing both boys’ attention.
“Think we just found our guy,” Satoru said as they started walking down the bank toward the noise. The curse, just as weak as Suguru had hypothesized, only took a moment to exorcise. In all likelihood, they could’ve sent their weakest sorcerer here and it would’ve taken the same amount of time. The fact they had sent Suguru on such an insignificant, trivial mission almost felt insulting but he did his best to ignore the feeling in his gut. It hadn’t been the first (or likely the last) time the higher-ups had been inconsiderate when assigning a mission and this was far from the most damaging example.
“Great, we’re done even earlier than we thought we’d be. Let’s head back.” Satoru said, cringing as he watched Suguru swallow the curse, remembering what he had said about it the night before.
“We can’t,” Suguru replied, shuddering as the curse went down and he wiped his mouth on the back of his hand, “We’ve still gotta report to the couple that called in the curse in the first place.” Satoru groaned loudly.
“Stop your bitching, the sooner we report to them, the sooner we can go. Come on.” Suguru noted, already climbing back up the river bank.
“I can’t believe they sent us on such an easy mission,” Satoru whined as he followed Suguru up the bank and they continued down the road, “This is so boring. Such a long car ride too.”
“What are you talking about? You know they only sent m–” Suguru cut himself off and smiled softly at Satoru, “Yknow what? You’re right, they should’ve sent someone else.”
“I know, right?! They could’ve sent anyone here to deal with that weak-ass curse and instead, they’re wasting our strength! They should’ve sent us after some grade one or something! Something more exciting!”
As Satoru kept prattling on, Suguru found a tension in his shoulders release and his smile climbed a little bit higher.
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“What is this?” Suguru asked, failing to hide the slight tremble in his voice. Whether it was out of fear or anger, he wasn’t quite sure.
“What do you mean?” The garish woman who had led them into the room screeched, “This is why we called you. These two monsters have been terrorizing our village!” she shouted, pointing an accusatory finger at the two girls in the cage. Suguru noted how small they were. Sure they were very young, likely no older than five or six, but they were really small, likely not being fed well. That was very clearly the least of their damages though. Both girls had one eye swollen shut and they were covered in blood and bruises. It was a miracle they had even gotten here before they died in each other’s arms in that cage.
“We told you when we first got here,” Satoru cut in, “We found the curse responsible for the disappearances on our way here. It was by the riverbank, we already exorcised it.”
“We told you, we didn’t do it! The cursed spirit, we saw it!” The blonde girl weakly cried only to be met with the screaming of the older man accompanying the woman.
“Shut up you little monsters! You’re just like your parents! I don’t know who decided it was a good idea to let you live long enough to hurt anyone here!”
“Will you please be quiet, you’re giving me a headache,” Suguru mumbled angrily as he rubbed the heel of his palm into his forehead, voice likely too quiet for anyone but Satoru to hear him.
“There’s no way these two could’ve been the reason for the deaths in your village,” Suguru began again in a louder voice, “not only did we exorcise the curse on the way here, the residuals are completely different.”
“Nonsense,” the garish woman began again, “Their rotten parents were the same way! We were told you kill curses so take care of these little nightmares before they hurt anyone else!”
Suguru began moving completely on autopilot for a few moments, not actually able to see or hear anything around him. He must’ve taken a step toward the man and woman and started to summon a cursed spirit because he regained awareness as Satoru grabbed his bicep and leaned in to whisper in his ear.
“Cool it a little. We’re going to figure this out, but we can’t do anything rash, not yet.” He whispered, giving Suguru’s arm a reassuring squeeze before dropping his hand and turning his attention back to the man and woman, “I’m sorry, we have a specific protocol we’re supposed to follow in these kinds of situations,” Satoru explained, lying out his ass, “Do you mind if we step out for a moment to call our superior? I know it’s inconvenient, but it is unfortunately necessary in this case.” The woman scoffed and waved her hand.
“Whatever, just please make it quick so you can deal with these nightmares.”
“Thank you, ma’am, I apologize for the inconvenience,” Satoru said with a slight head bow, feigning politeness like Suguru had never seen from him before. With her permission to leave, Satoru once again grabbed Suguru’s arm and pulled him out of the room. Not before Suguru slipped an arm behind his back and let a cursed spirit wriggle out his fingertip to talk to the two young girls.
“It’ll…be…okay…” It promised and as Suguru glanced over his shoulder before being completely pulled out of the room, he thought he saw the girls trembling lessen, even slightly.
Both Suguru and Satoru stayed silent until they were far enough away from the room that there was no chance they’d be overheard. When they stopped walking, Suguru was the first one to break the silence.
“We are not killing those little girls.”
“I never said we were.”
“We’re not leaving them here either, Satoru! If those two monsters don’t murder them god knows how much longer they’re going to survive without food or with those injuries. We can’t leave them here to die , alone, scared, and in pain!”
“I’m not planning on leaving them here, Suguru but you’re acting too rash. You started summoning multiple cursed spirits. We’re not leaving those girls here, they are not going to die here but we can’t kill those two either. Think this through a little more. We kill them and run away from here with those two, what then? How are we going to feed them? Cause they’re not gonna get food from the school. How are we going to house them? Cause none of us will be allowed on campus, let alone in the dorms. Who’s going to deal with their injuries? We wouldn’t be able to ask Shoko for help. We’re not leaving them here but it’s incredibly reckless to just take them and run. We need to figure out a way to take them out of here while making that man and woman think they’re also getting what they want.”
Suguru didn’t respond for a long time. He opened his mouth to speak, felt bile climb to the top of his throat, closed his mouth again, and swallowed. He tried to speak again and felt his body start shaking and his eyes get teary. He quickly rubbed his eyes before shaking his head and feeling his face heat up in frustration.
“I don’t get it,” he choked, voice cracking, “How’re you so calm right now?”
“Cause one of us has to be,” Satoru whispered, grabbing Suguru’s hands, “Do you still remember…right after Riko was killed, at the cult, I asked you if we should just kill everyone there. If you weren’t there, I probably would’ve done it. But you were there, you told me it wasn’t right, they technically hadn’t done anything. Even if they wanted her dead, hired a hitman to do it for them, none of them actually pulled the trigger and killed her. You told me how we sorcerers can’t kill without a justifiable cause. How despite all the horrible things they had done, that wasn’t a justifiable cause. You were my anchor then and I’m here to be your anchor now, we can’t kill these people.”
“But they deserve it, they deserve it a million times over.”
“They do,” Satoru nodded, “But we’re not god, we can’t be. We’re jujutsu sorcerers and we have a code we need to follow. I still think everyone in that cult was responsible for what happened to Riko, I still think they all deserved to be killed the moment they hired someone to murder her in the first place, deserved it even more so when they celebrated over her dead body. I know you still think that too, I know you still think about it, even if you refuse to tell me what’s going on in that beautiful mind of yours most of the time. I know Riko’s in there, I know what happened to her in is in there, I know what happened to us is in there. But it’s not our job to play god, never will be. Right now, our job is to get those girls out of here and back to the school while leaving everyone else in this village unharmed.”
“How’re we supposed to do that?” Suguru asked, his eyes getting glossy again but this time, he didn’t rub them. He blinked quickly a few times and let a few stray tears run down his face.
“I have an idea. Do you trust me?”
Suguru nodded without hesitation.
“Okay. Take a minute and then we’re going to go back in there, okay? We’ve got this.”
After a few minutes, after the redness had faded from Suguru’s face and he had managed to dry his face and eyes, they went back into the room with the cage. The man and the woman were closer to the two girls than they had been before, likely berating them again. The two adults turned their attention to Suguru and Satoru when they heard them walk back in and the latter cleared his throat.
“Unfortunately it is what I thought. We’re not authorized to perform executions on-site. We need to take them back to our superiors so they can decide what the best course of action is.” Satoru informed the two, once again bowing his head and feigning respect. As he explained the ‘situation’ to them, Suguru let the curse wriggle out of his fingertip again to speak to the girls.
“No…execution…home…with…us…safe…”
“Thank goodness!” The woman shouted, “As long as you get these monsters out of here I don’t care where they’re killed, just get them out of here! Out!”
It took a little while to get the girls out of the cage, out of the house, through the village, and back to where they had parked the car but they managed to get back to the car without incident.
“I’m Geto Suguru, this is Gojo Satoru,” Suguru introduced the two of them as he dug through the bag he brought with him, digging out two hoodies and handing them to the girls who looked like they were probably freezing. The hoodies were massive on them, but it was far better than letting them shiver in the back seat the whole way back, “We’re sorcerers from Tokyo and we go to a school just for sorcerers. We’re going to take you there, okay? I promise there are lots of nice people there too and it’s gonna be super safe there. No one from your village is going to know you’re there or be able to hurt you. When we get there, you’re going to go see a girl named Shoko. She’s a very good friend of ours and she’s going to take care of your injuries, alright? And we’ll get you something to eat and get you cleaned up before we get you two settled into an unoccupied dorm room for the night.” After he finished explaining everything to the girls, Suguru glanced at Satoru and nodded, telling him he was good to start driving. He looked into the back seat again when the car started moving and he heard one of the girls start speaking.
“Thank you Geto-sama, Gojo-sama,” the blonde girl began, staring down at her hands, “I’m Nanako,” she glanced up through her bangs at Suguru, “My sister’s Mimiko.” The brunette, Mimiko, nodded quickly at her sister’s words.
“Thank you for saving us Gojo-sama, Geto-sama,” Mimiko added, voice much softer than her sister’s. Suguru smiled softly at the two of them and nodded.
“Of course. If you two have any questions or need anything, feel free to ask us but otherwise, try and get some rest back there, okay?” With that, the two sisters nodded and leaned against each other. It only took about five minutes of Satoru carefully driving down the winding mountain road for the two of them to be lulled to sleep.
When Satoru checked on them in the rearview mirror and was sure they were asleep he glanced over at Suguru, seeing him staring out the window.
“Hey,” He whispered. Suguru flinched slightly at his voice but didn’t look away from whatever it was he was staring at out the window, maybe nothing.
“Hm?”
“We did the right thing Suguru, I know we did,” Satoru assured him, gently placing his hand on Suguru’s knee, “I know you must be thinking a lot and I know you must be tired. I’m not going to make you talk about it if you don’t want to, but I’m here, I’m always going to be here. You don’t have to go through this alone, not anymore. I love you.”
Despite Suguru never taking his eyes off the window to look at Satoru, he did slowly pick his hand up and grab Satoru’s hand where it was on his knee, interlacing their fingers.
“I love you too.”