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The cicadas buzzed insistently as Iori Utahime arrived at the school gates, already half-regretting her decision.
Gojo Satoru was waiting—tall and unmistakable. His hands were tucked into the sleeves of a navy yukata stitched with silver-blue wave patterns. His round glasses caught the early evening light, perched at a familiar tilt down his nose.
Gojo waved, carefree. “Utahime!”
She stopped several paces away. Her sandals crunched softly on the gravel.
“You’re alone,” she stated, eyes narrowing slightly.
He tilted his head. “Technically, we both are.”
“Where’s Shoko-chan?”
“With Suguru. He’s fine—just a little cursed gunk still clinging to his aura. You know how it is. Yaga-sensei said he needed to rest, so Shoko’s guarding his beauty sleep.”
Utahime’s brows drew together. “You could’ve told me sooner.”
“I did,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck. “Check your phone.”
She narrowed her eyes but pulled it from her sleeve. The message thread with Gojo blinked with unread texts—a thread she usually ignored unless she had the energy to deal with him.
[4:32 PM] Gojo Satoru: yo
[4:32 PM] Gojo Satoru: suguru’s out. shoko's on nurse duty.
[4:33 PM] Gojo Satoru: still down for the festival??
[4:33 PM] Gojo Satoru: i’ll be at the gate just in case. don’t ghost me like usual 🥲
Utahime blinked. “I didn’t read it.”
He shrugged, not quite smug. “Not the first time I’ve been left on read.”
“You’re always texting nonsense.”
“Excuse you,” he said, hand to chest in mock offense. “That was an extremely professional dispatch. I even used punctuation.”
“But no capitalization?”
“Doesn’t matter! Look at the periods and question marks.”
She stared. He smiled like he’d done her a favor just by existing.
“Unbelievable,” she muttered, turning to walk away. “I’m not doing this. Not if it’s just—”
“I’ll give you the name of that antique bookshop in Shimokitazawa.”
Her step faltered.
“You know the one,” he continued, voice deceptively casual. “With the out-of-print charm texts. You’ve been muttering about it all month.”
Utahime turned her head, glaring. “You’re making that up.”
“Nope. Found it during a mission. Bought a cursed cookbook. Terrible for cooking, but I saw at least three texts on barrier reinforcement.” He leaned forward slightly, grinning. “And one was handwritten.”
She rolled her eyes. “You’re insufferable.”
“I am. But so is missing takoyaki.”
“I’m already dressed,” Utahime muttered beneath her breath and started walking toward the station. “Might as well.”
Gojo trailed beside her, hands still tucked, grinning like he’d just pulled off a perfect heist.
“You look nice, by the way,” he said after a moment.
Her yukata was pale green with plum blossoms spilling down the sleeves, tied with a smoky gray obi. Her hair was up, pinned neatly with a simple clip she’d had since middle school.
She didn’t respond, but he kept grinning anyway.
The festival pulsed with life.
Laughter, music, and firelight blurred into the thick summer air. Lanterns swayed overhead like paper moons, suspended on invisible strings. A child squealed over winning a prize; down the path, sparklers hissed as someone screamed at the sparks.
Gojo moved through it like a breeze—loud, impossible to ignore, and always just half a step ahead. He dragged her to every food stall, challenged every game booth, and narrated each moment like it was the climax of an action film.
They were standing in line for grilled squid when he leaned closer.
“You know,” he said, voice pitched low, “you could smile. Just once. I promise it won’t kill you.”
She turned to glare, already forming a deadpan retort—but his grin faltered. For a heartbeat, his gaze flicked down, catching on the plum blossoms printed along her sleeve before jerking away too quickly.
“What?” she asked, frowning.
“Nothing,” he said, a little too fast. “Just—you clean up nice.”
Her eyes narrowed. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Nothing! Just—normally you look like you’ve been elbow-deep in a curse. This is… refreshing.”
“You’re an idiot.”
“And you paid for takoyaki after I beat you at ring toss.”
“You cheated.”
“I’m still taller.”
“That’s irrelevant,” she huffed, which earned a loud laugh from him.
They picked up their fried octopus balls and wandered back into the stream of festival-goers, bumping into each other now and then as they drifted between booths. Soda in glass bottles, a goldfish scoop Gojo failed spectacularly at, some kind of spicy skewer that left them both coughing—and eventually, they found themselves looping back around to the games.
“Rematch?” he said, nudging her toward the ring toss.
She didn’t answer—just took the rings from the vendor, squared her stance, and landed two of the targets with lazy precision.
“Show-off,” he muttered.
She turned and handed him the prize: a small hairpin shaped like a bellflower, its blue petals soft with age, a little lopsided, but charming all the same.
Gojo blinked, mock-stunned. “You’re actually giving this to me?”
She hesitated for a second, double-guessing herself, before slipping it into his hand. It was just a cheap trinket, slightly lopsided, and not her style—but something about it reminded her of him. Unruly, unexpectedly endearing, and hard to ignore.
“You earned it,” she said. “For being slightly less annoying than usual.”
He grinned—and without hesitation, clipped it into his hair just above his ear.
Her breath caught despite herself. The pale blue flower stood out ridiculously against his messy white strands, and yet, on him, it somehow looked… natural. Like it had always been there, waiting for someone to notice.
“What do you think?” he asked, striking a dramatic pose. “Too pretty for words?”
“You’re a show-off,” she muttered.
Still, when he turned, distracted by a yakitori stall across the path, she found her eyes drifting back to the flower nestled in his hair. It swayed a little when he moved, ridiculous and soft against the sharpness of him.
She didn’t hate it.
“You know,” he said suddenly, still facing forward, “I don’t think anyone’s ever given me something like that before. Not seriously.”
She blinked. “What do you mean?”
“Gifts,” he said, rolling one of the unused ring toss tokens between his fingers. “Sure, people give me stuff. Usually snacks, or weird mail, or Yaga-sensei assigning me more missions. But something small, and kind of ugly, and kinda… sincere? That’s new.”
Utahime frowned. “It’s not ugly.”
“I said kind of,” he teased, bumping her elbow with his. “I like it—means more coming from you.”
Utahime stayed quiet, letting the festival noise fill the space instead—drums echoing, children laughing, someone yelling about discounted kakigori.
He turned to her then, not grinning for once. “You ever wonder what we’d be like if we weren’t… you know. Like this.”
The words hung in the air, unsaid but understood—jujutsu sorcerers. Sure, they were needed to maintain peace and order, to protect humanity from curses. But it was so tiring.
She nodded slightly.
“All the time,” she said quietly, realizing that the words came too easily.
At times, she wondered what it’d be like if she were just a normal high school student—waking up without the ache of exhaustion from last night’s mission, free to plan her weekends—without the shadow of danger looming over every moment. No cursed spirits lurking in dark corners, no constant vigilance required, no lives depending on her strength or restraint. Just the simple pleasures other teenagers took for granted: friends, summer festivals without real peril, the chance to dream without fear.
Sometimes, the weight pressed so heavily that she almost envied those who could live without ever knowing what lurked beneath the surface of the world.
But then, a flicker of resolve would rise—because someone had to stand between that world and the one beneath it. Still, in quiet moments like this, beneath the summer lanterns, she allowed herself to imagine a different life.
They stood there a moment longer, the gap between them smaller than it had been an hour ago.
Gojo looked up at the lanterns overhead, their glow painting his face in shifting tones of gold and red. The flower clip caught the light when he tilted his head, and for a strange, fleeting second, he looked soft.
For once, Gojo didn’t wear the mask of invincibility. He didn’t look like the strongest sorcerer of their generation—just a teenage boy trying too hard to be easy to like.
It made her chest tighten.
Utahime’s gaze dropped to the rings still clutched in his hand.
He flicked the rings from his fingers, watching them spin through the air before clinking against three targets.
He grinned, holding up the prize—a small pink keychain charm—and offered it to her.
“Now we’re even.”
She huffed lightly. “You still cheated.”
His grin returned like a switch had flipped. “I prefer to call it strategy.”
She shook her head, exasperated. “I should’ve kept the hairpin.”
“Nah,” he said, tapping it gently. “You’d miss seeing it on me.”
And annoyingly, she kind of would.
The fireworks were late tonight, but the wait had made the crowd restless.
By the time the fireworks started, the crowd had thickened—shoulder to shoulder, head to head, a rising tide of strangers angling for the best view.
Utahime didn’t realize how close they’d gotten until she felt his arm brush hers, the warm press of fabric against fabric. She shifted, but before she could pull away, he leaned in.
“Wanna go somewhere better?”
“This isn’t good enough for the great Gojo Satoru?”
“Not for you.”
Before she could roll her eyes, he took her hand—not with fanfare, not teasing, just quiet certainty—and guided her out of the crowd. They walked past the rows of vendors, past the last lanterns, until the noise faded behind them.
Only then did he let her go.
“Gojo, what—”
“Just a second.”
And then he touched her shoulder.
The world blinked.
They reappeared beside a still lake, tucked into the trees.
No crowd. No lanterns. Just the echo of fireworks, softened by distance, and the mirrored glow of color shimmering across the water’s surface. The air here was cooler. Quieter.
Utahime inhaled slowly. Her voice caught in her throat.
“How?”
“Found it last month,” he said, watching the lake. “Mission out here. Got turned around and ended up by the water. Thought it was kind of perfect. Figured you’d like it better than a crowd.”
She stood beside him, unsure what to say. Not about the teleportation—he did that all the time—but about the thought. That he remembered what she might prefer.
Her shoulder brushed his again as she shifted her weight. A passing touch. Nothing more.
She didn’t think anything of it—until she turned to face him.
His gaze was still fixed on the water, but the tips of his ears were pink.
Something in her chest pinched.
Without thinking, she reached up and brushed her fingers against the flower clip in his hair, light as breath.
“It suits you,” she murmured.
He blinked, startled—but he didn’t move away. His lashes lowered slightly behind the tint of his dark glasses, and for once, he didn’t grin or deflect.
He just let the moment be.
The air between them stilled. The lake shimmered with soft fireworks, and Gojo Satoru stood quiet beside her—unguarded, just for a heartbeat longer.
“Thanks, Gojo,” she said quietly after a while. “This is… actually really nice.”
He didn’t answer right away. Just smiled faintly at the lake, where bursts of gold and red rippled across the surface.
Then, soft as a secret, “Don’t say that. I’ll get used to compliments.”
Three days later, he was back to being unbearable.
“Utahime!” he called across the training yard, waving a paper fan with ridiculous flair. “Wanna go to our secret lake again? Even if you don’t, I promise to teleport you somewhere else romantic!”
“You teleported me without warning.”
“It was for art!”
She threw a pebble at him. It stopped in midair due to his Infinity, but he still ducked like she’d tried to take off his head.
And still, she said nothing when he sat beside her at lunch.
Said nothing when he nudged her elbow and asked if she was free again next weekend.
Said nothing when he teased her about the yukata and how she should wear it more often.
But, she noticed when his hand lingered near hers on the bench.
Just close enough to be noticed.
She didn’t move, but her fingers curled slightly—just enough to let him know she saw.
And for once, she didn’t pull away.