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Nowadays, it is not uncommon for Suguru to close the door to his day later than the other students. Today is a perfect example of this fact, for the sun hasn’t even risen yet when Suguru enters Jujutsu High’s dormitories.
Tired.
Suguru is so, so tired, yet the word “tired” doesn’t give justice to how exhausted he feels.
His legs are nearly jelly as he drags himself down the hall that leads to his dorm room, every limb screaming for rest. The bun that used to be neatly wound to the back of his head merely hours ago is now an unfurled mess, wild strands dangling over his face and teasing the nape of his neck. He hasn’t gotten the chance to get a good look at himself, but he’s sure that his hair and clothes are tattered and matted with filth. Not exactly the picturesque poise he’s known for, but that’s not the main thing pressing on his mind right now.
Sleep. Suguru just wants to sleep this awful day away.
Returning from missions tired is nothing new to Suguru. Even when he and Satoru were together, Suguru would return from missions feeling drained. Being strong hadn’t meant their missions were effortless. Exactly the opposite; because they were the strongest, their missions matched or often exceeded their strength in difficulty.
However, not many missions have tried Suguru’s sanity as much as the one he just finished.
Suguru shakes his head. He doesn’t want to think about that. It will only bring back his dark thoughts.
Bed. Sleep. Those should be his main priorities.
Powered solely by his will to reach his bed, Suguru pushes through his exhaustion to reach his room’s door, a shining beacon blurring in and out of sight. The prospect of sinking into the comfort of his mattress is enticing, just a door knob-twist away—
“Good morning, Geto-senpai!”
Suguru flinches, eyes wincing. The chipper voice bouncing with energy is a cold splash of water to his face that he does NOT need at this particular hour.
Suguru turns his heavy head to the source of the voice. He has to strain his eyes to bring the person into clarity, but there’s no need as he can tell just by the voice.
Haibara immediately wilts when their eyes meet. “Oh man, you don’t look too good. What happened to you?”
The sugar-coated observation of Suguru’s disheveled state is greatly appreciated. Though, a better question is, what in the name of the gods is someone like Haibara doing awake at this hour…?
“Long mission,” is all Suguru offers, forcing on a weak smile as assurance. Ironically, this makes Haibara wilt even more. For extra assurance, he adds, “It’s not as bad as it looks.”
Haibara’s eyes narrow, scanning over Suguru’s body with a fervent scrutiny that is unforeseen. If Suguru weren’t so blindsided by his tiredness, it would have been a bit unsettling. “You’re covered in all sorts of cuts and bruises. And you look like you’re on the brink of collapsing. I’d say that’s pretty bad.”
“I’m not dead, at least,” Suguru counters in a light grumble. He twists the door handle to give it an audible click, hoping that Haibara will take the hint. “Anyways, don’t worry about me. I’ll see you in the—”
Before he can get another word out, the last of Suguru’s energy peeters out of him. The world blurs and a low ring drones in the back of his skull. His knees buckle.
Numb. Utterly numb, Suguru is helpless to the sudden pull of gravity, as well as sleep’s lull.
Suguru hardly registers the hand underneath his elbow. The worried voice floating in his ear. These sensations just barely pass the threshold to make him realize that he hasn’t face-planted onto the door. Rather, he has been saved from such embarrassment.
Haibara is saying something and he’s loud, too loud for so early in the morning, but his words are muddled. The world feels like it’s submerged under water and Suguru is trapped in its deep, endless depths.
Limbs too heavy to cooperate with his thoughts and consciousness teetering on the edge, Suguru allows his body to be devoured by the depths, letting himself drown in a quiet darkness.
***
A wave of dull body aches rouses Suguru into a mild state of wakefulness. His eyes flutter open to light, then a ceiling comes into view—Suguru’s dorm room ceiling, more specifically.
So, he must have shooed Haibara away and finally reached his bed. Then, why isn’t he laying down?
Suguru comes to the realization that he is sitting in a chair in the middle of his room. Memories catch up to him, of his conversation with Haibara and suddenly… darkness. Did I pass out?
The floorboards creak behind Suguru, thrusting him into complete wakefulness. Battle instincts triggered, he jolts out of his seat, only for the grip of a calloused hand on his shoulder to keep him still.
“Don’t get up yet! I’m just about ready to start,” he hears Haibara say from behind.
Haibara is here? Inside of my room?
“Start with what?” Haibara’s excitement, for some reason, doesn’t sit well with Suguru.
Haibara chuckles like a giddy child and exclaims, “Geto-senpai’s Special Relaxation Treatment!”
Confused, Suguru swivels around to look at Haibara. “Come again?”
Haibara’s smile grows larger. Without repeating himself, he twists Suguru’s head back to its forward position and gives his shoulders a reassuring pat. “Just sit back and relax, senpai! When I’m finished with you, you’re going to feel like a whole new person.”
Suguru is startled by the sound of something being wrung and the clattering of water. He turns his head a little, catching a glimpse of his bare arm, riddled with splotches deepening to a purplish hue. He grimaces at the evidence of his failures, his inadequacies… but, wait.
Suguru looks down at himself to see that he’s wearing his white undershirt. Something is missing. “Where’s my jacket?” he asks.
“Being washed as we speak! I made sure to remove anything you had in your pockets. They should be lying on your bed,” Haibara replies over the sound of water clapping against water.
The items Suguru possessed in his uniform jacket were, indeed, lying on his bed. However, he has become increasingly curious about Haibara’s activity. “What are you doing, exactly?”
“Just wringing a towel.” Haibara titters, and Suguru is almost inclined to find it cute if Haibara weren’t suspending him by his cluelessness. “Since you’re so curious, I’ll only tell you that I’m gonna tend your wounds. The rest will be a surprise!”
Numerous protests rushed to the tip of Suguru’s tongue. It’s, what time is it exactly…? Well, given how the sky is still bathed in darkness from out his window, he figures it’s early morning. Way too early to be taking care of another person who can take care of himself… excluding the passing out part, anyways. There’s no reason for Haibara to be wasting his precious sleep on him.
But, Suguru is silenced by a steamy, damp towel to a gruesome bruise on his forearm. A hiss escapes Suguru’s lips. Haibara, taking notice, makes a small sound in apology, though remains intent on continuing.
Haibara is anything if not persistent. Once his mind is settled on a task, he focuses all of his efforts in fulfilling that task until the very end. Suguru knows better than to get in his way, so he allows him to continue.
Silence hangs over the two as Haibara tends to Suguru’s wounds. Though normally inquisitive, Haibara doesn’t inquire about the history of a bruise here or a laceration there, and Suguru is thankful for that. Even so, Suguru wonders if he’s being rude by not striking up conversation.
To be honest, Suguru is sure that he is poor company, has been poor company for a long time. Yet, the content look on Haibara’s face does not speak the same opinion. Haibara always seems pleased to be in Suguru’s presence, even during his worst moods. As for why, Suguru can never hope to understand.
While Haibara’s at it, he offers to rub the dirt and debris off of Suguru’s face, and clean the muck trapped between his toes and inside of his nails. This time, Suguru does manage a protest, but it does nothing to deter Haibara’s willingness. Again, Suguru has no choice but to not get in Haibara’s way. With time, this so-called “Geto-senapai's Special Relaxation Treatment” starts to feel more and more like an at-home spa.
After cleaning Suguru, Haibara lathers his wounds in antibiotic ointment and wraps them with bandages. Nodding in admiration at his work, Haibara disappears behind Suguru. Soon after, fingers lightly comb through Suguru’s unkempt hair, splaying the ends against the back of his chair.
“May I, senpai?”
The question comes out low and uncertain. Wary, even, as if Haibara is afraid of Suguru’s response. Yet, the slight inflection at the end implies anticipatory permission.
“Why ask when you already plan on having your way with me?” Suguru asks. It’s meant to be tongue-in-the-cheek, a playful tease of a senior towards his junior. He doesn’t expect for Haibara’s movements to slow, his fingers eventually falling away from Suguru’s scalp altogether. While Suguru can’t see Haibara’s face from his position, he can nearly feel the aura of his pout. So childish.
Chuckling, Suguru tilts his head upward, meeting Haibara’s worried gaze with a smirk. “Yes, you may wash my hair, Haibara.”
Haibara’s face lifts, any trace of worry vanishing as if it were never there. His fingers return to the tangled tresses of Suguru’s hair, parting away thick knots before pouring a generous scoop of warm water onto his head. Coolness tickles his scalp as a floral aroma fills the air.
And then, it comes to Suguru’s awareness that he hasn’t even asked if Haibara knows how to wash hair of his kind. Or at all.
Suguru's expectations of others have become calloused to the point where he is no longer surprised by human nature. However, Haibara is a constant reminder that you truly cannot judge a person from their looks or on your own superficial understanding of them. Haibara, known for his tendency to jump into things without so much as a thought, washes Suguru’s hair with trained coordination and delicacy, even kneading small, rhythmic circles into his scalp. One would think that he does this for a living.
Feeling that his hair is in safe hands, Suguru takes a deep sigh, closes his eyes, and tries to relax.
Silence once again claims the scene, only broken by the lilted hums of Haibara marveling at what Suguru assumes to be his long, twilit locks. With each rhythmic circle kneaded into Suguru’s scalp, he can feel his mind take a wandering step away from reality, away from the stress and grievances this day has brought. Sleep tugs at his consciousness. He wants to give in to sleep, and he should, but even more than that he craves the comfort of Haibara’s tender care.
How long has it been since Suguru felt this way? Since he felt completely at… peace? Free from the haunting voices that challenge his resolve on a daily basis. Free from the drawl of living. Free from that cursed clapping—
Wet hands shift their location to the gap between Suguru’s shoulder and neck, thrusting him out of his peaceful state. Without intending to, he twitches as Haibara’s hands travel to a knot that had stubbornly clenched itself by the end of his mission. Then, Haibara’s fingers press into the knot and begin to rub, sending a shudder rippling down his back.
A sigh is pushed out of Suguru, waves of pleasure wafting against his consciousness as the muscle starts to loosen.
Unfortunately, Haibara must have perceived his initial shudder as displeasure.
“Sorry!” Haibara apologizes. His touch moves away from Suguru’s shoulders and the tension returns.
Suguru scrunches his eyebrows and releases a groan that's speckled with a pinch of irritation. It’s petulant, but he doesn’t care. “No, don’t stop.”
“Oh!” Haibara's hands ghost over Suguru’s skin, the uncertainty permeating from his fingers palpable. But, he quickly regains his confidence. The smile in his voice is pure and bright. “If you say so.”
Haibara resumes massaging Suguru’s shoulders, returning Suguru to that state of peace that feels like it could last forever, if he deludes himself enough. Far better than wasting away in a meaningless existence…
Ah, there are those dark thoughts again. Not even peaceful bliss is a good enough escape from them.
“... makes me wonder how you got yourself so wound up and injured,” Suguru catches Haibara saying by the time his mind wanders back to reality again. He doesn’t need to piece the context together to understand Haibara’s confusion. Suguru, supposedly one of the strongest sorcerers, beaten and haggard? Unspeakable.
“Long mission,” Suguru reiterates in a slurred mumble.
Haibara traces a line down Suguru’s lifeline, then traces a line back up. “Well, your long mission is over now, and you’re safe. You deserve to take it easy for now.”
Guilt pinches Suguru’s heart. No, he doesn’t deserve to take it easy. Not after everything that happened today.
After a beat of silence passes between them, Suguru quietly admits, “I… wasn’t a very good sorcerer today.”
“How so?”
Suguru wrings his wrists in repetitive motions. Nervous warmth creeps up his neck. “Made a bunch of mistakes. Amateur ones. The higher-ups were pretty upset with my performance.”
Haibara hums thoughtfully. “All of us have our good days, our not-so-good days, and our outright terrible days. But, that’s normal. We can’t be perfect all the time.”
Oh, Haibara. So simpleminded. So naive and innocent. Someone like him could never understand the cost of failure, and perhaps that’s for the best.
“I needed to be perfect today.” After a sharp inhale, Suguru reveals in a barely perceptible voice, “I almost got a lot of people killed because of my mistakes.”
Haibara’s motions stall for a second before returning to work. “What happened?” he asks softly.
Suguru shoots his eyes open, straining to re-acclimate to the light. Haibara’s figure bleeds into view, the look on his face attentive and patient. No judgement, no mockery.
“I… was fighting a cursed spirit,” Suguru begins warily, “but I let myself get distracted, and it fled into a populated area.”
Water washes away the soap from Suguru’s hair. Then, Haibara starts combing through the wet locks. “And, did you exorcize it before it hurt anyone?”
Suguru nods.
Haibara smiles. “Then, all's well that ends well, right?”
All had not ended well. When Suguru returned back to campus, he was immediately summoned by the higher-ups, who were beyond livid. He felt so small and helpless as the higher-ups barraged him with an onslaught of insults from all angles, all at once, as if he was the cursed spirit in need of excorcizing.
Weak. A disgrace. A disappointment. They may not have used those terms, but that was how Suguru felt by the time they spit him out after being chewed up into a pulp.
“It doesn't matter how it ended. The fact of the matter is that I was pathetic,” Suguru grumbles.
“Don’t you think you’re being too harsh on yourself?”
“Too harsh? Haibara, people could have died—”
“But, they didn’t. You protected them. You saved them.”
“And what if I hadn’t?” All it takes is one moment of distraction for an entire mission to fall apart. An innocent life to be snuffed out with a gun. A friend to lose. “Lately, it seems all I’ve been doing is getting distracted. Making mistakes. Disappointing everyone around me.”
“Geto-senpai—”
A curt laugh, verging on hysterical, escapes Suguru’s lips. He continues forth in a grim tone, eyes staring up at Haibara, though completely unseeing. “Exorcize. Absorb. Repeat. That is all that’s required of me. It’s so simple. Yet, I screw up all the time. Even when I’m given missions scraped from the bottom of the barrel, I still find a way to screw up. I wouldn’t be surprised if the higher-ups decided to get rid of me because of how worthless I am—Agh!”
Without warning, Haibara’s forehead collides with Suguru’s forehead. The impact isn’t hard enough to inflict pain, but it does take Suguru by surprise.
They stay that way for a few seconds. Suguru is about to question what has gotten into Haibara, but Haibara is faster. “So? How do you feel right now?”
How is Suguru expected to answer? He doesn’t even know what’s happening right now. Though, Instead of voicing his confusion, he says the first thought comes to mind.
“Warm.” Suguru clears his throat. “I mean, you’re warm.” And it feels nice, too.
“Guess that’s good enough!” Haibara pulls himself away. For some reason, he’s smiling away, laughing as he rubs the spot on Suguru’s forehead where they had collided. “If you weren’t in such a bad state, I would have actually headbutted you. You certainly lucked out!”
Suguru’s eyes widen. Did I hear him correctly? "Headbutt me? But why?"
“It’s a trick my mother taught me when I was younger! Whenever I start to think negative things about myself, my mother told me to have someone I care about headbutt me to knock those thoughts out of my head.”
Suguru blankly blinks up at Haibara. There is so much to unpack from that one revelation, but he decides to accept it all with a slow nod. “What an, er, interesting lesson.”
“Uh-huh! Did it work?” Haibara asks, eyes glowing with expectancy.
Suguru places a palm to his forehead. The warmth that spread from Haibara to him lingers there as if fresh. Though their connection had been brief, his self-hatred, nearly on the verge of consuming him, dispersed from his mind in a manner unlike how light comes in contact with a shadow.
“Yeah,” Suguru chuckles softly. “Don’t even remember what I was so upset about.”
Haibara releases a weighted sigh, like he had been holding his breath. “That’s good to hear. I don’t like it when you say ugly things about yourself. You’ve worked hard, really suffered. I hope you always remember that you’re the pride of Jujutsu High.”
Suguru’s lips twitch. Him, the pride of Jujutsu High? Does that title not belong to Satoru Gojo?
No one has ever called Suguru their pride, especially not as he is now. He had long assumed that he lost all respect as a Jujutsu sorcerer ever since the failed Star Plasma Vessel mission, even though Satoru’s reverence had increased despite sharing his part in the failure. Why else would the higher-ups assign him scraps for missions? Put his performances under a microscope and scrutinize every subtle sign of faltering?
Yet, Haibara calls Suguru the school’s pride so casually, as if it's an indisputable fact.
Suguru internally curses as he feels tears sting the corner of his eyes. He doesn’t trust his voice, so he says nothing in response, remaining silent when Haibara refocuses his attention on his hair.
Haibara gives his hair one more wash down before lifting Suguru’s head and wrapping it in a white towel.
“That’s the end of Geto-senpai's Special Relaxation Treatment! Hope you enjoyed your service!” Haibara exclaims.
“I did. It was wonderful,” Suguru says honestly, expressing his gratitude with a small bow of his head. “Thank you, Haibara.” Then, just before Haibara turns on his heels, Suguru calls out, “Actually, Haibara?
A peculiar coyness takes over Suguru when he says his next words. “Can we, uh, do this again someday?”
A wide smile beams on Haibara’s face. “I’d love to! I had such a fun time taking care of you, especially washing your hair! Maybe next time I could even give you a real bath—”
“No, no,” Suguru cuts in before Haibara’s excitement ventures into questionable territory. He shifts his gaze to an uninteresting corner of his room, scratching the back of his flushed neck. “I mean, can we just spend time to… talk?”
Haibara tilts his head, confusion painted on his face. “Well, sure senpai, but you don’t need permission to just talk to me. We can talk whenever you’re in the mood. I’ll listen to you laugh until you can’t breathe, or cry until your eyes run dry, or babble as much as you want. I’m no Gojo-senpai, but I’m here for you all the same!”
Suguru has to refrain himself from laughing at the idea of dealing with another Satoru. Truly a horrifying thought.
“I’m not looking for Satoru in you, Haibara,” Suguru assures quickly. “I only want you.”
A certain truth has made itself prevalent in Suguru’s life since his movie outing with Haibara awhile back. Being near Haibara and lavished in his optimism, his unwavering hope, his empathy, his kindness—all the light that Haibara carries with him eradicates the darkness brewing in Suguru’s heart. Even today, when it feels like he has been in an entirely different world all day long, Haibara becomes a warm blanket at the end of his day.
Perhaps Haibara is the balm to Suguru’s suffering, the clarity to his madness, the light to his darkness. Hard days are surely to come, and the future is uncertain. But, with Haibara to end his days with, maybe Suguru will learn to believe that the life of a Jujutsu sorcerer is truly worth living once again.