Archive of Our Own ^beta

Megumi does laundry on Sundays.

There’s no specific reason for it, but there is comfort in the routine of it, in the mundanity of it. The dorms share a laundromat, and so he always makes sure to get up before the others and gets a pot of coffee going before stripping the cotton sheets off his bed to put in the laundry basket. It’s almost summer, so the sheets will be hung out to dry. He’ll have to wash his uniform too, dried bloodstains from their last mission still persisting in the sleeves of his jacket, although barely visible, are still there after washing it twice.

He heads to the basement, the hinges creaking as he pulls the metal door open, balancing the laundry basket on his hip, expecting to find a mess someone else undoubtedly left behind, maybe a pile of wet socks forgotten in the washing machine, or an abandoned t-shirt left in the drier.

What he doesn’t expect to find is Itadori.

He’s sitting facing the wall with a blank stare. His eyes are puffy, shoulders slumped like he’s been sitting there for a while. Megumi didn't even know he was back yet. Feeling awkward just standing there, he clears his throat, adjusts the basket on his hip.

“Oh, Fushiguro,” Itadori says finally, a raspiness to his voice, nearly drowned out by the soft staticky sound of the old radio playing one of his old middle school mixtapes in the corner. He either just woke up —which Megumi knows for a fact he couldn’t have— or that he’s been crying. “What are you doing here?”

“This is the laundromat,” Megumi deadpans, making a broad gesture around the room. “I’m doing laundry. What are you doing?”

Itadori doesn’t speak. Doesn’t smile, doesn’t even look at him, not really. That is to say that he’s looking in his direction, but there’s an absence in him.

Usually, during mornings like this, Itadori would drag him back to his dorm room and they would watch movies on VHS in the orange pink haze of the early dawn, cross legged in front of the television, shoulders brushing, waiting for the laundry to be done so it can be hanged to dry. He’d talk over it, too, overflowing with excitement, unconsciously grabbing onto any part of him he could find; arm, leg, torso, anything. Megumi would always leave his room feeling warm.

He’s a naturally touchy person, Itadori. This is one of the first things Megumi learns about him, having to wrestle him off from clinging to his arm after knowing him for merely a day; a touch of the shoulder here, a pat on the arm there, a steady hand on his lower back in a crowded train. Megumi didn’t fully realise how much he cherished it until it’s gone.

He’s changed since then. He doesn’t really touch anyone anymore. Now, there are new scars yet to be soothed with kind hands and there are dreams he never speaks of in broad daylight and now there’s this.

He looks at Itadori, and then at the washing machine. A green light blinks back at him.

“You forgot to turn it on,” Megumi says with a sigh, slightly more fond than exasperated, and presses the button. The machine whirrs softly. A rush of water, the cylinder starts to spin.

“Oh,” Itadori says, barely a whisper. “Thanks,” he says with a smile that doesn’t reach his eyes, and resumes doing… Well, nothing at all.

“Did you sleep at all?” Megumi asks.

Nothing. Megumi wants to shake him.

“Itadori.”

This finally elicits a reaction. Itadori blinks at him, like he’d forgotten where he was, for a moment. Megumi’s eyes are drawn to the dark circles under his eyes, his lips bitten raw.

“…Huh?” he says finally. “Sorry, I was miles away,” he says, fiddling with the hem of his old X-men t-shirt. Where, Megumi thinks, frustration sinking its teeth into his skin, and nearly asks. Where do you go?

“Did you sleep?” he asks again.

A shrug. “A little bit.”

“Okay.”

He watches the laundry spin. One round, two rounds.

Three ro-

”Do you still feel it?” Itadori asks, a distant look in his eyes. He flexes his fingers. ”Like your body is not quite your own. You know. Like your hands don’t quite feel like they’re supposed to, or work like they’re supposed to.”

”Yeah.”

”I keep thinking about it,” Itadori says. ”Losing control. Waking up and—”

”Yeah,” Megumi repeats, because what else is there to say?

“How do you deal with it?”

“I don’t,” Megumi deadpans, gesturing to the laundry basket. “I do laundry.”

“Ah,” Itadori says, and then frowns, shooting a panicked glance sideways. “Shit. It’s Sunday. I’m totally messing up your routine, aren’t I? Sorry, Fushiguro.”

“Yeah,” Megumi agrees, a headache building in his temples. He’s sick of this version of Itadori, who feels like he needs to constantly apologize for even daring to exist. “It’s fine.”

“Are you okay?” Itadori asks softly.

My sister is dead and sometimes you have a look in your eyes like you wish you were, too. “I’m out of clean socks,” he lies.

“Oh! You can borrow a pair of mine,” Itadori says, perking up. He looks almost like himself again, for a moment.

Megumi wrinkles his nose. “No thanks.”

“Hey?”

Megumi ignores him. He takes a breath. “Have you talked to anyone about it?”

Itadori blinks owlishly at him. “I’m talking to you.”

“That’s not…” Megumi says, pinching the bridge of his nose. He sets down the basket. “I mean who do you usually talk to about this stuff?” he asks and then immediately wishes he could shove the words back down his throat.

Itadori’s face falls. His mouth works a couple of times.

“I… well,” he says, his words strained, and his eyes have that faraway look in them again. “I suppose I could. Um...”

There is a ghost in the room. Megumi picks on a loose hangnail, regret weighing heavy in his stomach. He’s so incredibly out of his depth with all of this. “Sorry,” he says quietly.

“No, you’re right,” Itadori says, scratching the back of his neck, and forces a smile. “You have your own stuff to deal with. I shouldn’t burden you with my problems.“

“Don’t do that,” Megumi says quietly. “It’s not a burden.”

It’s not like he gets a choice in the matter, either way. It’s not like it’ll make him care less about him, worry less about him.

“It’s just more concerning when you don’t talk,” he adds.

“Right,” Itadori says, nodding to himself like he’s making a mental note of something, and Megumi braces himself for what inevitably follows with gritted teeth. “Sorry.”

Megumi holds back a sigh. Instead, he tries a different approach. “Do you want to watch something?”

*

Itadori falls asleep in his bed not even halfway through The Shining, which was to be expected with how his eyes keep drooping even before the opening credits. Megumi sits still and watches him from the corner of his eye while the movie reaches its climax in the snowy mountains and wonders if there is a universe where he’s smart enough to regret his decision to save him, after everything. He considers him, the slackness of his mouth, the slightest furrow between his brows, the circles under his eyes evidence of many sleepless nights, the way his hands occasionally twitch in his sleep.

No. There isn’t a single universe where he regrets saving Itadori Yuuji.

The fan whirrs softly in the corner, shaking some loose notes on his desk. Sunlight streams in through the curtains, warming his left shoulder.

Itadori starts to stir after a while, making soft half-asleep sounds under his breath, stretching his arms out with a groan. Megumi’s eyes dip briefly to the exposed skin of his waist where his shirt has ridden up. He looks like he belongs there, in his room, in his bed.

“Is that Velvet Underground?”

He stops humming, something he wasn’t aware he was doing in the first place. It’s one of those things, those small habits you don’t really know you even have, until someone else points them out. Itadori smiles, deepening the pillow creases on his cheek. His hair is sticking up even more than usual.

“It’s nice,” Itadori says, cracking open one eye.

Megumi’s fingers itch to play with the tips of his hair, to trace the pillow creases on his cheek, to fit his hand in the gentle curve of his hip. He wonders what it would feel like, to touch his sleepwarm skin. His throat feels tight.

“Go back to sleep, Itadori.”

A beat. “Yuuji,” comes the quiet correction. “Can you call me Yuuji, just once,” he requests and his face flushes several shades darker, burying his face in the pillow before he adds, muffled, “No one calls me Yuuji anymore.”

“Okay,” Megumi says, clearing his throat, an ache beneath his ribs. “Yuuji,” he says, cheeks starting to warm even though it’s not like that, he doesn’t mean it like that. He savors the feel of it on his tongue. It feels like it belongs there, his name, in his mouth. “Yuu-ji.”

“Got one for free,” Itadori says with a wobbly bottom lip.

“Sure did.”

Megumi forces his name to unstick from the roof of his mouth.

“Thank you,” Itadori says with his smile half hidden under the covers, eyes closed. “Megumi. Me-gu-mi.”

“Sleep,” Megumi says, cheeks burning in earnest.

“‘Kay.”

*

It becomes something of a regular occurance. Or as regular as it can be in their line of work, but a habit nonetheless.

Sometimes he finds Itadori in the laundromat, sometimes Megumi knocks on the door of his dorm room, with a borrowed VHS tape on one hand like the nostalgia freak he is, and his heart on the other, hoping today isn’t the day he refuses to open the door.

And one time he finds him on one of the rickety garden chairs outside after sleeping in, watching the cotton sheets drying on the line flutter with every gentle gust of wind, morning sunlight in his hair. Summer is in full swing now, already nearing the fall, birds shrieking in tall sycamore trees. Megumi squints up against the sunlight for a better look. A shrike. He remembers reading that the bull-headed shrike hunts by impaling its prey on sharp thorns and twigs. Insects, frogs, even small rodents. There’s something mildly satisfying about the fact.

“I was looking for you,” Megumi says, turning his attention back to Itadori.

“Were you?” Itadori asks softly, and normally this is where Megumi would roll his eyes, or tell him to stop being intentionally obtuse, but he sounds genuinely confused, like he’s unaware of the weight of his own existence. Like he’s not quite there to begin with.

Megumi feels his absence like a tangible thing.

“Yeah,” he says, his voice coming out hoarse. He clears his throat.

Itadori turns to look at him, studies him with his head tilted sideways, life returning to his eyes. ”Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” Megumi repeats, rubbing his eyes, realising how he must look, with his hair unstyled and shirt only half buttoned. He’s too aware of his heartbeat, fluttering under his ribs like a caged bird. ”Weird dreams.”

“Mm,” Yuuji says, his eyes softening in understanding, and he carefully asks, “Want to talk about it?”

“No,” Megumi says vehemently, then cringes at Yuuji’s crestfallen expression. Why can’t he be nice for five minutes. “Sorry, I just...”

“I get it,” Itadori says quietly, with eyes like thorn and barbed wire through the chest. “It’s okay.”

The remnants of his dream linger beneath his eyelids when he closes his eyes.

“Have you eaten anything yet?” Yuuji asks, bright and hopeful.

Megumi considers lying for a moment. “No,” he says.

Itadori frowns, predictably. “You have to eat, man,” he says. “Nanamin always—“

He stops. His face does this funny thing where it contorts like when you’re holding back a sneeze. Then, like nothing happened, he smiles again.

“I’ll make something,” he says, pausing to think. “Tamagoyaki?”

Itadori told him once that the kitchen is his favorite room in the house, that he feels most at home surrounded by sizzling pans and vegetable peelings. Despite this, upon piecing together more of his past, Megumi figures that apart from his grandfather before he got sick, he never really had that many people to cook for prior to moving to the dorms.

He inadvertently pictures Itadori, sitting by himself in the apartment alone, murmuring quiet blessings to himself before a meal, and finds himself nodding.

“Sure,” he says, and follows Itadori back to the dorms.

It’s hard not to think about it as he looks at Itadori in the kitchen, grinning while whisking eggs in a bowl, adding soy sauce and mirin before pouring it into a square pan, wildly gesturing with the spatula as he speaks and getting raw egg all over the countertops, about how familiar it all feels. He’s talking about a new horror movie again, one that was apparently recently released in theaters, and Megumi nods along despite the fact that the title has completely escaped him. He doesn’t know why Itadori insists on horror movies, with how their lives are, but maybe that’s the point. Maybe there’s a hidden layer of irony there that Megumi just isn’t able to discern.

It’s hard to look at him, and not think he’s going to leave again, like this is just another meal Megumi is going to miss him by.

“What do you think?”

Oh, he zoned out.

“I… sorry?”

“Friday, next week,” Itadori says with a small hopeful smile as he plates the eggs, clearly expecting Megumi to… to what? What was he talking about, again? “My treat.”

Megumi hesitates for too long and the hopeful expression on his face turns slightly apprehensive.

“Or I could ask Kugisaki,” Itadori says hesitantly, mindlessly picking at the cuticles of his left hand. “See if she’s changed her mind about-“

“No,” Megumi interrupts him, his brain finally deciding to catch up. “I’ll…. I’ll go with you.”

“Oh,” Itadori says, blinking. “Oh. Great. Okay,” he says softly, scratching the back of his neck. “Great. It’s a- it’s settled then.”

Breakfast is a quiet affair.

Not uncomfortably so, but a whispery half-asleep kind of quiet, just a softly murmured itadakimasu and the click of utensils against porcelain.

After he’s finished, Itadori stretches his arms over his head with a satisfied groan, his t-shirt riding up to expose a sliver of smooth tanned skin, and Megumi bites his tongue.

“I’ll wash you dry?” he asks Megumi, already piling up the plates.

“Okay.”

It’s quiet, comfortable.

While he’s rinsing the cups, Itadori’s phone suddenly pings with a text and he quickly grabs it off the counter with dish soap covered hands. Suspicious, Megumi tries to peer over his shoulder at the message but Itadori angles the screen away from him, so instead Megumi snatches the phone out of his hand to read the text.

“Hey.”

Megumi barely hears him over the static in his ears. He must have jinxed it just now by thinking about it, he must have.

“You’re going on a solo mission,” he says blankly, staring at the offending message thread, sidestepping Itadori’s attempt to swipe his phone back. “Again. Why?” he asks, feeling his spine go rigid. He’s fairly sure he spotted the words ‘plane ticket’ and ‘passport’ somewhere. What the fuck.

He knows the answer before Itadori even opens his mouth. It’s not like there aren’t other people available to deal with it, to at least go with him to make sure he doesn’t do anything reckless by himself. Itadori, equal parts bull-headed and kind, must have volunteered himself.

“It’s alright, Fushiguro,” Itadori says with a smile just a little bit too wide, and slowly, carefully, placing a placating hand on his shoulder like he’s dealing with a spooked horse. Pats once, twice.

He grits his teeth. “Don’t do that,“ he says, feeling his breaths shorten, his thoughts start to spiral. “You’re not ready to be back on the field again so soon. We both know that. Last time you- you were- if you get seriously hurt out there, especially without-“

“Fushiguro,” Itadori interrupts, his voice deceptively soft. “It’ll be fine, I’ll be careful,” he says. “I promise.”

“You know you don’t have to do this. It doesn’t always have to be you,” Megumi says, which he already knows is a useless argument with him because it has to be somebody, and if it has to be somebody then—

“I know,” Itadori says, predictably. “I don’t mind it,” he adds, which is somehow even worse.

Megumi says nothing for a while, just focuses on the weight and warmth of his hand on his shoulder. His chest hurts. Deflating, his hand falls limply to the side, still clutching the phone. Why can’t he have this one thing? Just for a while.

He closes his eyes, and his voice wavers dangerously when he speaks. “You’re such an idiot.”

He can feel Itadori shrug, his hand shifts, a slow drag of his fingers across the scapula before letting go.

“Yeah. Well.”

“Don’t die,” Megumi says softly, opening his eyes to see Itadori already watching him with an unreadable expression.

A gentle huff of laughter. His smile draws his eyes to the faded scar on the corner of his mouth; he carries them with such grace, his scars. Megumi envies him. “Or you’ll kill me?”

“No, just… don’t die.”

*

Itadori isn’t back by Friday. Megumi gives his extra ticket to Maki after they both get sent out for a short mission just out of town. Megumi to deal with the curse and Maki to chaperone him as the official head of the Zen’in clan, posing as his personal guard dog, which again is a nicer way of saying that she's babysitting him.

They don’t talk about it.

The warmth of day still lingers outside the theater, the sun dipping just beneath the horizon, not as stifling but it makes his uniform stick uncomfortably to his skin. He’s never been too fond of Tokyo summers. All hot concrete and sweaty skin.

“That was terrible,” Maki says, licking salt off her fingers as she leans back against the railing facing the bay. Her hair has gotten a little bit longer since he’s last seen her, reaching just past her ears and her scars are slowly starting to fade into a softer pink. To say that she looks better is not necessarily the right way to describe it, but she does look more like herself. Relaxed, even.

“Werewolves are one thing but that was just plain bad. I’m starting to think Itadori-kun only picked it because he used to have a thing for Jon Snow.”

Megumi drops the french fry he’s holding. “What? No he didn’t,” he says.

Maki shrugs, balling up the burger wrapper before tossing it in a nearby bin, giving him a pointed once over. “I'm just saying he seems to have a type.”

To his abject horror, Megumi can feel his face start to burn. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he mutters.

Maki just shakes her head. She finishes her drink without another word, and then crosses her arms over her chest with a resolute expression and speaks before Megumi can think to do something to avoid the following conversation, like leaving the country. “Alright. Honesty hour. How are you holding up?”

Megumi bristles. “I’m—“

“And don’t say that you’re fine or I will start screaming.”

Megumi takes a breath. “I don’t know,” he starts, and hesitates. He hasn’t talked about her since the funeral. When he closes his eyes her image lingers. “I miss her,” he says truthfully. He slowly counts to five in his head. “I don’t know what’s worse,” he says. “The nights when I see her or the ones that I don’t.”

“Ah,” Maki says, a little awkward but not unkind. It’s easy to forget sometimes with how otherworldly she seems that she’s barely a year older than him. That Tsumiki was the same age as her. It’s easy to forget that she doesn’t have all the answers, either.

A beat, then:

“You know, it’s funny.”

Megumi glances at her.

“Mai, she- she had every right to hate me. I wasn’t thinking about her when I left, not really. I just needed to get away from all of it, I needed to get stronger,” Her words come out in a rush, a little clumsy, like she’s desperate to get them out quickly. Ripping off a bandaid sort of thing. “And I never regretted it, even knowing how much it hurt her. Didn’t really think about it all that much. Terrible, right? But now,” she leaves the words hanging in the humid air, her smile steady in a way you can only really practice in front of a mirror.

Megumi hums, staring at the scuffs on her shoes.

“I’m sorry.”

“I don’t think I’ll ever not know what it’s like to be a sister,” Maki says quietly, with a pointed glance in his direction. “I think it’s something that’s sewn into the fabric of your being. It’s not something you ever really grow out of.”

His throat is sandpaper dry. “She wasn’t really my—“

“I know, Fushiguro,” Maki says, exasperated but so very gentle. “Does that actually change anything?”

He thinks about Sunday mornings, the smell of laundry detergent and hanging bed sheets to dry in the sun. He thinks about her hands, steady and warm bandaging his bruised knuckles, the worried frown between her eyebrows. He thinks about the kindness of her smile.

“No.”

She just hums, her eyes sympathetic, and says nothing more about it. “Have you been taking your meds? Are you eating well?”

“Yes, yes.”

Maki squints at him. “And how many times have you left your dorm this past week? I know you haven’t been going to class,” she says, her voice turning authoritative in a way that would be funny if it wasn’t intimidating. “And I haven’t seen you at practice, either. Yuuta’s been asking after you.”

“I legally don’t have to answer that.”

“Fushiguro.” He bristles at her genuine concern. “You’re barely holding it together. Even I can see that. You need to get out more. You look pale.”

“Yeah, okay, thanks.”

She studies him, chin cradled in her palm. “He’ll come back, you know. He’s Itadori.”

Megumi grits his teeth. He hates being this transparent. “I know.”

A bead of sweat rolls down his temple. He hooks a finger under the collar of his shirt in a vain attempt to cool himself. A cloud shaped murmuration of starlings flies overhead, twisting and turning in perfect synchrony. Maki finishes her fries, licking the salt off her fingers, and turns to him with a smile.

“You have a ketchup stain on your shirt, by the way.”

*

Kugisaki wanders in on a Sunday morning with a basket of laundry and a bottle of white vinegar. She tells him it’s good for stains. She tells him this after nearly dumping the whole bottle directly on top of his clothes.

“You should take better care of your clothes,” she says and doesn’t wait for permission before starting to rummage through his laundry. “Let me show you.”

“I take care of my clothes?”

“No, you wash your clothes. Obsessively. That is not the same thing,” she says, inspecting his uniform jacket “You need baking soda for the blood stains, and,” she starts, frowning at whatever she sees at the bottom.

“You can’t wash these together,” she says, leaning closer to inspect the offending piece of clothing. She pulls out a pink sweater that definitely isn’t his. The look on her face is pure betrayal. “Fushiguro. This is cashmere. You can’t machine wash a cashmere sweater.”

His stomach drops. “I didn’t know it was cashmere,” he says quietly.

“How-“

“It’s not mine. It’s Itadori’s,” he interrupts her and immediately cringes. “Shut up about it.”

“I didn’t even say anything,” Kugisaki says with a surprising amount of nonchalance, taking a seat on a stool that is next to the washer-dryer combo and pressing some buttons on the machine. Lou Reed sings softly through the radio. A few more seconds pass before her eyes widen almost comically wide. Her mouth works a couple of times. “Wait.”

“Whatever you’re thinking right now, I promise you it’s not like that.”

He’d found the sweater under his bed a few days ago. Selfishly, and rather disgustingly, he’d wanted to hide it under his pillow in secret, to have something of his to hold. Even more than that however, he wanted Itadori to be warm, to be comfortable. How awful.

And while conscientious, Itadori was not really the type to splurge on things like this for himself, which probably means that the shirt was a gift. Meaning someone else looked at him and thought the exact same thing.

And yet, he’d nearly ruined such a simple thing.

“Fushiguro.”

“I just thought, when he comes back,” Megumi finishes lamely, mostly to fill the silence, picking mindlessly at a hangnail until his skin feels raw. Kugisaki says nothing, just stares at him unblinkingly. More seconds pass. “Please stop staring at me.”

She delivers the final blow gently, with her fingers tentatively wrapped around his wrist. The machine whirrs softly.

“How long have you been in love with him?”

It’s not a question of if, or even why, but when. The earth tilts dangerously on its axis but his feet stay planted to the floor. Of course she knows. ”Kugisaki,” he says, his voice coming too soft to sound stern.

Such a perfect day, Lou Reed sings through the static, I’m glad I spent it with you.

“Deny it.”

He doesn’t. He just sighs, defeated. “If my clothes come out smelling like jarred pickles I will end you,” he says instead.

The looks he receives is deeply unimpressed. “Do you really think I would ruin your clothes?”

Megumi smirks. “Wouldn’t be the first time.”

“Wow,” Kugisaki says. “Wow.”

“Who knows, maybe they’ll come out looking like a Marimekko this time.”

She throws one of his dirty socks at him. “Ugh. You’re such a pain in the ass. I’m literally always so nice to you and you’re such a bitch to me,” she grumbles.

“Don’t worry, I’m sure Gojo-sensei had at least five of those shirts,” Megumi says lightly, unthinkingly, looking up when Kugisaki doesn’t reply. “What?”

“Nothing,” Kugisaki says, her voice brittle. “It’s just weird. Talking about him like he’s not,” A heavy pause. He watches her fingers mindlessly trace the edge of her leather eyepatch. “So many people just- and I just wasn’t there. They’re all gone now,” she says. “Am I even allowed to feel crap about that? Is that fair? I wasn’t even there.”

Uselessly, Megumi says, “You did all you could.”

“But I could’ve done more,” Kugisaki says. Megumi says nothing. Strictly disagreeing with her would only feel condescending and she deserves better than that, deserves more than his empty platitudes. “God, I’m so lame.”

“There’s no shame in surviving,” he tries, but the words come out all wrong, too practiced, too mechanical. He misses his sister, in moments like this.

“Isn’t there?” Kugisaki says, idly pulling at the roots of her hair. “I mean why do I get to stand here complaining about this? Why me?”

“I don’t know,” Megumi says simply. Why anyone? Why him? Why any of them? “I’m glad that it’s you.”

“Gross.”

“I’m serious.”

Kugisaki gives him a pained look. “I know,” she sighs. “You’re always so damn sincere. It’s nauseating.”

“I thought I was a pain in your ass.”

“Both of those things can be true at the same time,” Kugisaki says, sounding a bit too fond to be biting, and then she smiles, and then leans in to somewhat awkwardly pat his shoulder but it’s genuine nonetheless- and would you look at that; pot, meet kettle.

“For what it’s worth, I’m glad it’s you, too.”

Her face blurs. Oh no.

Megumi looks away, clearing his throat. “…Thanks,” he says quietly, something raw and unnameable caught between his teeth. He shifts uncomfortably in place under the weight of her gaze, from left foot to right, and right to left.

“Fushiguro.”

Megumi blinks. “Hmm?”

“There is no right time,” Kugisaki says. “Whatever it is you’re waiting for, it’ll never be the right time. So if you have a chance now, don’t miss it,” she says. She gets up, shoving the bundled up vinegar soaked sweater into his arms. “Hand wash it. Thirty degrees.”

*

When Itadori returns on a Thursday there is already laundry piling up in the corner. Megumi recognizes his shadow under his door when he’s already in bed and ready to sleep.

His hand is half raised to knock when Megumi opens the door, his eyes widening in surprise.

“Hi,” he says, clearly aiming for nonchalance and failing miserably, slowly lowering his trembling fist to tuck into his hoodie pocket. “Sorry I’m late.”

It’s hard to see his face. Megumi flicks on the light and Itadori immediately shies away from it, shoulders rigid. There’s crusted blood under his nose.

“What happened?” Megumi asks.

“I got lost,” Itadori says, shrugs, and doesn’t explain further. “Sorry,” he says again, softer, his words more pronounced than usual from exhaustion.

He startles when Megumi lifts a hand to cradle his cheek, clicking his tongue at a bruise high on his cheekbone, a soft wounded sound rising from his throat before he disguises it by clearing his throat.

“You should see the other guy,” Itadori says weakly, yelping in offense when Megumi lightly pinches his cheek, fondness swelling in his chest. Idiot.

Fact one: Megumi loves him. Plain and simple. In whatever way it may be, Megumi Fushiguro loves Itadori Yuuji.

Fact two: he’s terrified for him.

He lets his hand drop and steps backwards to let Itadori enter. A faltering step over the threshold, then another. Megumi closes the door, and watches Itadori gingerly take a seat at the edge of his bed.

“What happened?” Megumi asks again, because he’s learned that the only way to get answers is to be persistent.

“I,” Itadori starts, and rests his hands palms up on his knees. There’s blood under his fingernails, his own maybe. His breath hitches. “I didn’t get there in time.”

Megumi scowls, something bitter stuck in his throat. He’d skimmed the report already, before Itadori showed up on his doorstep. Caught glimpses of the scene between the lines. Second grade, several casualties, nineteen people dead on impact, twenty-four injured. Held his breath. Itadori Yuuji, dispatched. Status: alive. “No one could’ve, Itadori. The domain was already in-”

Itadori’s voice is soft, “He could’ve.”

There’s a ghost in the room. It leaves a trail behind like an oil spill. It leaves a mark like a stain on his favorite shirt. Mindlessly, Itadori tugs on his sleeve. There’s a jagged slash running down the length of his forearm, splitting his palm right in the middle. It’s already stopped bleeding and scabbed over.

Still: “Let me see,” Megumi says, sinking to his knees beside the bed, reaching for his hand. The skin is warm under his fingertips.

“It’ll heal,” Itadori says, dismissive and quiet, picking at the edge of a scab like an act of defiance. There’s also the unspoken fact that Itadori hasn’t used his reverse cursed technique to heal himself either, but Megumi decides to let it slide for now.

“Let me see,” Megumi insists.

Itadori sighs, weary. His fingers unfurl, and his shoulders curve inwards. He looks like he’s barely hanging on by a thread, with glazed over eyes and trembling hands. He doesn’t cry when Megumi carefully holds his arm still to examine the wound, stubborn and foolish as he is, but it’s a near thing, judging from the way his breath hitches.

“You’re lucky it’s not infected with the way you keep poking at it,” Megumi admonishes gently. Itadori just hums distractedly in response, staring blankly at the floor. Megumi swallows around a lump in his throat, holding back his bitter told-you-so’s. “I’ll get the first aid kit,” he says.

“It’s fine.”

“Didn't ask.”

Itadori hasn’t moved an inch when he returns, still staring unseeingly at the wall with his arms wrapped around himself when Megumi walks through the door, his breathing harsh.

“Itadori,” Megumi says, peeling his hands away from where they’re digging indents into the meat of his forearm and traps them between his own. Leaving him alone was a mistake. “Hey. Stop.”

“She was still breathing when I got to her,” Itadori says quietly, like he’s not quite there, not quite hearing him, his hands full-on shaking in his grip, fresh blood under his fingernails. “I tried to help her— if I’d just—”

Unlike Kugisaki and himself, Itadori has always had a tendency to ruminate on failed missions, to let his mind linger for days on end on things that could’ve gone differently, how he could’ve done better, and lately it’s only gotten worse.

A scene plays out in his head, of Itadori—not Itadori— ripping out his own heart. Smiling as blood pooled at his feet.

“Don’t do that to yourself,” Megumi says, phantom blood and viscera spill through the gaps between his fingers. He’s sure his grip on Itadori’s fingers is bordering on painful, his heartbeat pulsing against his fingertips tangible proof that he’s still here, alive, with him. “You’ll drive yourself crazy.”

“I thought I could do it,” Itadori says softly, not seeming to hear him at all. “I was so close.”

He misses Gojo in moments like this. If Megumi was more like him he’d know what to do here, how to make things right. He’d know just the right thing to say, as ridiculous as he was. But he’s not, and he doesn’t.

Sharp, “Itadori. Focus.”

Itadori jolts, wet eyelashes sticking together when he blinks, looking a bit lost. It’s always unnerving, seeing this sudden shift in awareness happen in real time. “I’m doing it again, aren’t I? Sorry, Fushiguro.”

Megumi counts to ten slowly in his head. He watches Itadori take long measured breaths, the way every inhale expands his ribcage.

“It’s fine,” he says after counting 9 and three quarters three times, and loosens his grip. “Let me see your arm,” he says, and tiredly adds. “Please.”

Itadori obliges silently. He twitches at the first swab of antiseptic. The cotton wad stains red.

“I got scraped up from the debris,” Itadori explains finally, his breathing starting to even. “I should probably make sure I have my tetanus shot up to date, huh.”

Megumi hums, glancing down at his hands, then lingers on his bruised face. “You didn't do anything stupid, did you?”

Itadori points to himself. “Me?”

“You.”

Itadori taps his chin, pretends to think about this for a moment. “Couldn’t find any ancient cursed objects to swallow, so no.”

“Funny.”

Megumi pinches the back of his hand for good measure.

“Come on, Fushiguro, have some -ow- have some faith in me.”

“I have faith in you,” Megumi says in reflex, more truthfully than he intends to, and Itadori quiets, his eyes widening just a fraction.

And it is true, he does, just not regarding himself.

He sighs, adding to the pile of pink tinged cotton wads on his bedside table, grabs another one, dips it in disinfectant. Rinse and repeat. “Hold still.”

He leans in and carefully wipes the crusted blood from under his nose, Itadori’s breath warm against his fingers. The moment feels fragile somehow, made out of spun glass.

Quietly, as to not disrupt it, he says, “That movie sucked, by the way.”

“Oh man, really…”

“Barely any werewolves in it, even.”

Itadori clicks his tongue in disapproval and Megumi’s middle finger graces his upper lip. “I’ll pick a better one next time,” he promises, soft. “Any preference?”

“Not really,” Megumi says, hushed. “But I would like my date to actually show up this time.”

Itadori nods quickly, his cheeks turning a pretty pink under the bruising. “Roger that,” he says. Megumi feels a little sick to his stomach with affection. He grabs a roll of bandages to have something to do with his hands.

Itadori sits still while Megumi finishes patching him up, only flinching as he wraps the gauze around his forearm.

“Too tight?” Megumi asks, letting go of him like he’s burnt, heart climbing up to his throat. “Does it hurt?”

“Nah, it’s good, it’s good. Just sore,” Itadori says, flexing his fingers and offers a reassuring smile. “It’s alright.”

Megumi swallows. “Good.”

“So, um, who- who’d you end up going with?”

Megumi blinks, confused by the sudden change of topic. “Maki-san, why,” he asks.

“No reason.”

The first aid kit closes with a snap. Itadori stares at his hands in his lap, a slight furrow between his brows. His eyes flicker nervously towards the doorway, then back down again.

“Are you staying?”

Itadori looks at him, hesitant. A sliver of moonlight filters through the curtains, illuminating his profile, making the cut of his jaw look more pronounced. He’s so handsome. Megumi digs his nails into the meat of his palm. Love isn't supposed to make you feel sick. There's definitely something wrong with him.

“Can I?”

“You don’t have to ask. Here,” Megumi says, picking a clean cotton t-shirt from his folded pile of clothes that has yet to find a way into his closet and tosses it in his general direction.

He averts his gaze while he changes, feeling a traitorous flush crawl up his neck. He climbs under the covers, pulling the sheets up to his chin.

“Thanks, Fushiguro,” Itadori says quietly. He flicks off the light on the bedside table, shrouding the room in darkness, and the mattress dips as he carefully lies down on his side. “Smells like you,” he says softly, and Megumi can feel the heat crawl up to the tips of his ears.

The bed is too narrow to fit two people comfortably, and Itadori’s knee immediately knocks into his thigh and he nearly elbows him in the face while adjusting his pillow. For some inexplicable reason, it makes Megumi want to weep. He hasn't shared a bed like this since-

Megumi shuts his eyes tightly against the pressure building beneath his eyelids, swallowing around the rough lump in his throat.

Then slowly, hesitantly, a hand curves around his trembling shoulder, like testing the waters. Megumi’s breath hitches. He stays perfectly still.

Itadori hums, brushing his knuckles down his shoulder, so gently that it makes something shatter inside his chest, something that was held together with staples and bits of tape. The backs of his fingers trail up and down the length of his arm, mapping the rivers of his veins. They find the space between his neck and his shoulder, thumb soothing the skin between collarbones. Megumi shivers, releases a shuddery breath.

Itadori, of course, notices. He carefully presses the pad of his thumb under his eye, gathering the few stray tears that managed to escape despite his best efforts. Megumi can’t see what kind of expression he’s making in the dark, not sure if he could handle it, anyway. His hands tremble as they guide his head to rest on his shoulder, to hide his face in the crook of his neck where his pulse beats, rabbit quick.

So gentle and so, so terrified.

Megumi’s fingers clutch the back of his shirt, a newfound ache in his chest, suddenly remembering their talk from weeks ago, now.

“You’re here,” he says, and wills him to believe it.

“Yeah,” Itadori responds, the tremors in his hands subsiding somewhat, carefully tracing patterns into the nape of his neck where his hair is cropped short with the pads of his fingers. “Yeah, I’m here.”

*

Late September, Megumi watches the sky darken during the day, murmurations of birds take shelter perching on lower branches of the large trees in preparation, huddled up close. The air pressure feels stifling, making a headache bloom in his temples and his shoulders stiff.

And then just after two, the sky finally cracks open.

The first raindrop lands on his forehead like a warning. Megumi is pulling down the bedsheets from the clothesline to bring inside, when suddenly it’s pouring down, quickly soaking him to the bone.

For a while, he can’t do anything but stand there, staring at the overcast sky in a childlike wonder, feeling his hair stick to his forehead and the back of his neck.The sky looks beautiful, a sliver of sunlight breaking through the dark clouds in the distance and the rain covers him like a heavy blanket. For a moment he can’t feel the cold that sinks its claws into his body, doesn’t feel the way the water slides down the back of his neck, neither the twinge of the fresh bruises on his body from training with Kugisaki earlier, or the joint aches that usually accompany rainy days like this nowadays.

It’s just quiet. Even the birds have stopped singing.

It had rained back then, too, when Itadori died, rainwater mixing with his blood on the concrete.

He hears his name called, almost drowned out by the storm, and turns to see a blurry figure approach. He blinks rainwater out of his eyes.

“–guro. Hey. Fushiguro,” Itadori says, waving frantically at him, hood pulled over his head. “What are you doing?”

The laundry basket lies forgotten at his feet, the sheets wet and grass stained. “I…”

“Are you okay?” Itadori asks, visibly concerned, his hands coming to clutch his upper arms, wincing. “You’re soaked. How long have you been outside?”

Megumi blinks. Itadori’s face comes to sharper focus, the deep cut furrow of his brow shadowing the warm brown of his irises. He swallows. “I must’ve zoned out.”

“Zoned out doing what?” Itadori asks, raising a sceptical eyebrow “Practicing self-imposed waterboarding?”

Megumi hums. “I’m taking a more hands-on approach to my research on the Spanish Inquisition.”

“Very cute,” Itadori says dryly, hoisting the basket of wet sheets on his hip and, oh, he’s in trouble isn’t he. “Why are you even out here in the first place,” he murmurs, tugging firmly on his sleeve to get him to move, leading him back towards the dorms. “It’s like you want to get sick.”

“You’re here too,” Megumi points out.

“Yeah that’s because- well you’re here, aren’t you,” he says, like it should be obvious that where Megumi goes, Itadori follows. Suddenly his throat feels tight, hunger revealing its sharp teeth again.

A series of things happen in a haze. Grass and mud under his feet. A key turning in a lock. Another gentle tug on his sleeve. Megumi, undignified, lurching over the threshold.

Megumi closes the front door behind him. It’s a rickety old thing, and he has to lean his weight on it to close it properly. He toes off both his socks and shoes at the genkan, grimacing at the squelching sound they make, and peels off his jacket, hanging it to dry. Itadori throws him a towel, before presumably disappearing into the kitchen.

As expected, he soon hears running water, and moments later the kettle clicks. There’s something comforting about the routine of it, that makes it easier to breathe. Megumi sheds his remaining wet clothes and does the bare minimum of drying himself off before trudging into his closet for a t-shirt and a pair of sweatpants, stray droplets of water dripping from his hair darkening the fabric.

Itadori returns and in his hands is a steaming cup of tea. Milk tea with a spoonful of honey, Megumi already knows, even before tasting it. He sits down gingerly on the edge of his bed next to him, setting the cup on his bedside table. His eyes trace the letter on his desk, laid open in mockingly scratchy hiragana confirming what Megumi already knew years before, and his eyebrows furrow.

“He was dead to me already before he died,” Megumi says, before Itadori can ask.

Itadori sits perfectly still, the minute widening of his eyes the only indicator that he’d even heard him. He waits, and so Megumi keeps talking.

“It’s sort of easier, in a way. Knowing that he’s not coming. That he’ll never show up at my door and I’ll never have to understand why he did what he did, so that way I’ll never have to forgive him,” he says. “I think a part of me still believed there was a chance, and that tiny bit of hope was holding me back all this time. So I’m glad he’s dead.”

“That’s,” Itadori starts.

“Morbid?”

“Very you.”

Megumi bristles. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Itadori’s face turns serious. “You never ask for anything,” he says. The irony of that, coming from him of all people.

You’re wrong. I asked for you.

“Fushiguro. I’m sorry your dad was an asshole.”

Megumi was six when he promised himself that he’d never cry over it. His eyes burn now.

“Yeah,” he says. It doesn’t feel like closure, but it tastes sweet nonetheless.

The rain doesn’t show any signs of letting up, and Itadori doesn’t seem like he has any plans to leave anytime soon, either. He leans closer, his hand slowly coming up to touch the still wet ends of his hair, twisting a strand between deft fingers.

“You need to dry your hair properly,” Itadori says, soft.

His hand lingers on his cheek, just for a moment, but it does. His eyes linger on his mouth, only for a second, but they do. He seems to catch himself a moment too late, and he pulls his hands firmly into his lap with an apologetic smile and averts his gaze.

Oh.

“Itadori,” Megumi says, strained, heart pounding against his ribs. It’s silent apart from the rain pattering softly against window panels, and the combined sound of their breathing. Itadori is refusing to meet his eyes.

“Tell me that I’m misreading this,” Itadori says, trembling fingers digging into his knees. “Tell me that I’m-”

Megumi kisses him, just a soft peck on the mouth. Itadori makes a soft surprised sound from the back of his throat before his face just crumbles, and Megumi briefly panics.

“Please do that again.”

And so he does, breathing a quiet sigh of relief before pressing his mouth to the soft of his cheek, trailing kisses along the curve of his brow bone with something almost religious in his reverence. Itadori whines low in his throat, his hands tentatively curling around the fabric of his shirt.

“Another,” Itadori requests breathlessly, close enough to count the faint summer freckles on his nose, staring at him like he’s trying to commit every inch of his skin to memory. “Please.”

“Greedy,” Megumi says, but indulges him anyway, pressing into the warmth of his mouth, and Itadori meets him halfway this time, his hands eager and curious, slipping under the hem of his t-shirt, and it makes him gasp and whine softly into the kiss.

Against his mouth, “Yeah, I know.”

The rain patters softly against the window. Itadori pants, equally soft against his mouth. His lips are so soft, and his fingers are sure to leave imprints for how tightly they’re clutching his shoulders and Megumi sort of wants to cry with how good it feels, to hold him like this. His skin is warm, and his heart beats quickly against his palm where his hand is pressed against his chest, against soft yielding flesh. He feels Itadori smile against his mouth.

But there’s a sense of wrongness that creeps under his skin. It sits at the bottom of his spine. It squeezes his windpipe.

Live a long life, okay.

His eyes shoot open and he pulls away- the image of his own blood covered hands lingering behind his eyelids, the image of his own hands hurting him, and hurting him and hurting him and- breathes in, and out- and without thinking rushes out:

“I don’t think we should do this.”

“Huh?” Itadori asks, dazed and half lidded. “Do what?” Tentatively, he touches his shoulder, brow furrowing. “Hey, are you okay? Megumi?”

Megumi recoils. He feels sick to his stomach. “Don’t.”

He looks up just in time to see Itadori’s face fall, and his hands carefully retreat back into his lap.

Quiet, “Okay, man, sorry.”

Clarity washes over him like a cold shower. Wow, he’s such a piece of shit.

“No, don’t,” Megumi rushes out, choking on his own words, guilt weighing heavy like lead in his stomach. He feels nauseous and out of control. “Don’t apologize. It’s not you, I promise. I just–“

“It’s okay,” Itadori says gently, interrupting him, holding up his hands. “I get it. I do. It’s fine. We just got a little carried away, right. No hard feelings,” he says, his voice cracking a little, and gives him a wobbly smile and a weak thumbs up before hastily getting on his feet, already halfway out the door before he can so much as blink, or tell him not to leave. “Goodnight, Fushiguro.”

*

“Spar with me,” is the first thing Okkotsu Yuuta says to him when Megumi joins him in the courtyard after receiving a text from him at precisely 6:30am containing only his location and a running emoji.

Which– Huh?

“Huh?”

He instinctively catches the staff tossed in his direction before recognising what it is.

“Spar with me,“ Okkotsu repeats. Megumi stares at him. “Maki says you’ve been absent during regular training as well, so it’s not just me you’ve been ghosting,” Okkotsu says patiently, brandishing his matching staff. “You’re getting out of shape.”

That snitch. Megumi scowls. “I’m not.”

“Then prove it.”

He’s fast- Megumi has barely enough time to parry his attack, the wooden staffs make a dull clunk upon impact- and his footwork is swift as he smoothly sidesteps his counterattack.

And yet, despite initiating the fight, Okkotsu doesn't seem to be interested in actually making a move to attack him. No matter how many of Megumi’s swings he dodges, he never actually goes on full offense. It’s subtle, but Megumi has seen him fight, knows what he’s capable of.

“Stop holding back,” Megumi snarls, sweat trickling down his neck.

“You could tell? You're as perceptive as ever, Megumi-kun,” Okkotsu says, his smile bright as he deftly blocks his next strike. He doesn’t even seem to be out of breath. Bastard. “I figured you could use a minute to warm up.”

“Don’t patronize me,” Megumi grits out, aiming his next strike right beneath his ribs. Okkotsu kicks the blunt side of the staff, and the force of it throws him back several steps. Then, using that momentum he finally attacks, and Megumi has barely enough time to recover enough to stop him before he takes the full brunt of the swing.

Megumi grins. That’s better.

Okkotsu seems determined to not give him another opening, no matter how many times Megumi swings at him, trying to wear him out and to wipe that smile off his face. The next strike catches him in the stomach and Megumi gags. He grimaces thinking about the bruises he’ll have tomorrow.

On instinct, he presses his hands together to summon Nue, but Okkotsu smacks him hard on the back of his hand before he gets the chance.

“No cheating.”

Okkotsu doesn’t let him recover this time. The hilt of his staff catches him on his ribs, knocking the wind out of him, leaving him gasping for air.

“Yield already?”

Frustrated, Megumi strikes again with a snarl, but Okkotsu sidesteps his attack in favor of aiming a kick at his shins to throw him off balance. Megumi trips, falling on his face, coarse sand getting between his teeth. He tries getting up, but his body aches, muscles protesting as he tries to put weight on his arms. He can feel sweat trickle down his spine.

Fuck. He really is out of shape.

“I win,” Okkotsu announces, tapping his shoulder with the edge of his staff. The worst part is that he doesn’t even sound smug, and Megumi immediately remembers why he admires him so much.

Megumi rolls onto his back with a groan. On the bleachers, Kugisaki is bent over laughing, holding her stomach with tears in her eyes. He’s not sure how long she’s been sitting there.

“Hate you,” he says, pointing a finger in her general direction. “Hate both of you.”

He touches the front of his teeth with his tongue, and spits a glob of blood on the ground. Gross.

Okkotsu’s face appears in his peripheral vision. “You okay?”

“Fine,” Megumi mutters and closes his eyes to ward off a sudden wave of nausea.

Something cold touches his cheek. When he opens his eyes Okkotsu is standing over him holding a bottle of water, looking pleased.

“You did good, Megumi,” he says with a smile. He’s always smiling, it seems. “Same time next week?”

*

When Megumi comes back from the showers still toweling his hair dry, Kugisaki is waiting outside his dorm room leaning casually against the wall. Too casually.

“What’s up, loverboy?”

Megumi’s brow twitches. He certainly never consented to that nickname. But more importantly, “He told you.”

“Of course he told me,” Kugisaki says, rolling her eyes. “I’m actually a little hurt you didn’t beat him to it.”

“It was a kiss,” Megumi says dryly, and pushes the door open and doesn’t look at her. “Not a marriage proposal.”

“Yeah, okay,” Kugisaki says, her voice positively dripping with sarcasm, following on his heels. “Am I supposed to believe that you’re not freaking out about it?”

“I’m not,” Megumi says and plops himself on his bed with an air of finality. Friends kiss sometimes. It happens. It’s fine. He’ll get over it. They’ll move past it.

She sits on his desk chair and regards him, chin in hand, a thoughtful look on her face. She’s wearing one of Megumi’s old t-shirts he’d ‘lost’ months ago. Thief. “I can’t decide whether you’re a really good actor or incredibly deep in denial.”

“Why are you making it such a big deal,” Megumi says, gesturing between them. “We’ve kissed before.”

“On new year's eve. As a joke,” Kugisaki says, undeterred. And once on a dare, but that doesn’t exactly help his case. Thankfully, she doesn’t bring up the obvious elephant in the room. “You hurt his feelings.”

That makes him pause. “W-huh?” he says intelligently. He tries to trace back to the day before, to anything he might have said or done, but nothing immediately pops up. “Did he say something to you?”

Kugisaki snorts. “Itadori? Talk about his feelings?” she says, a bitter edge to it, but there’s more to it, there’s something that feels an awful lot like care. “No, he didn't outright say anything about it.”

Megumi blinks. “Then what did you talk about?”

“He said you guys finally kissed and then he sort of just clammed up about it and went on a ten minute long tangent about some movie he saw with Todo-san last week- axe man or something I don’t know,” she says and shrugs, feigning indifference, but the the concerned furrow of her brow gives her away. Megumi takes some offense at the fact that she immediately assumes that it’s all his fault (although it is) and he’s about to say as much, but she interrupts him before he can get a word out. “I’m not actually here to talk about your love life.”

“You’re… not?”

At that, she makes a face like she just swallowed something sour. “I just wanted to see how you’re doing, that’s all.”

Sometimes her sincerity catches him off guard. “Oh.”

Impatient, “Well?”

The look on her face tells him that he’s not going to get away without giving her a real answer. She’s like Maki, in a lot of ways. Megumi sighs. “I haven’t been sleeping very well,” he offers.

Her eyes widen in understanding. “Nightmares?”

“Not exactly,” Megumi says. “Just. Flashes. Memories,” he says, throat tight. “Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night and my body feels all wrong like—” Like your hands don’t quite feel like they’re supposed to, like—

He winces.

“Yeah,” Kugisaki says, gentle. “I know.”

“The worst part is that I still wouldn’t change anything,” Megumi says. “If it meant saving him.”

Kugisaki says nothing, offers no absolution, just takes his hand and holds it firmly between her own in silent agreement. What a terrifying thing, to be willing to die for somebody.

“Is he okay?” he asks quietly and Kugisaki just gives him a sad smile.

“Are any of us?”

*

Megumi is pouring himself a cup of coffee after practice when Itadori wanders in early one Sunday morning, yawning and rubbing his eyes, feet bare, and wearing a shirt that says 'I <3 wieners' with a picture of a dachshund, that Megumi specifically told him not to buy.

Megumi hasn’t seen him in over a week. He occasionally hears about his whereabouts in passing, from Okkotsu, or Kugisaki, or on one rare occasion from the Kyoto third years. Itadori, who is usually texting him his every waking thought, hasn’t texted him a single thing since—

Well, since.

Now, he freezes in the doorway when he sees Megumi- like a frightened deer, one foot on the threshold like he’s still deciding if he’s going to stay or not.

“Oh. Hey,” he says, strangely meek with his shoulders hunched inwards. He looks small, fiddling with his hands, and takes another step. “You okay?” he asks, eyeing the bandaid he stuck on his chin after eating dirt again. “How’s Yuuta-senpai?”

“Fine,” Megumi says, his voice cracking from misuse. He clears his throat. “There's more coffee in the pot,” he says, and he’s already getting an extra cup without bothering to wait for a reply. “We might be out of milk though.”

“Aren’t we always,” Itadori says wryly although his heart isn’t quite in it, unconsciously falling into their familiar choreography, but his fingers jolt when they brush Megumi’s over the cup handle. He awkwardly takes a half step backwards. “Thanks,” he says.

Quiet. Polite. It’s all wrong. Megumi hates this. They're not like this. He bites the bullet. “I haven’t seen you around much.”

And Itadori- he flinches. He takes a steadying breath before speaking. “Look. Fushiguro,” he says, tentatively, and Megumi immediately knows he’s not going to like what he has to say. “You’re the one who turned me down.”

Megumi frowns. “I didn’t think that would mean losing you,” he says, sounding far less angry and far more hurt than he intends to.

“You haven’t lost me, don’t be dramatic,” Itadori says, equal parts wounded and amused, morning light softening his features. The most beautiful boy he’s ever known. “I just need some time to, y’know, lick my wounds in peace.”

Wrong. It’s all wrong. His throat constricts. “Itadori, listen,” he starts.

“It’s okay,” Itadori says, interrupting him, and Megumi is about to interject, to tell him that he’s misunderstood, that it’s not him- that it’s his own brain that keeps messing things up- but his eyes are pleading, and he just looks so heartbroken and so tired that all the fight leaves him. He did this. He made his bed and now he has to lay in it. “Really. I get it. We don’t have to talk about it.”

He swallows the lump in his throat. “Okay,” he says softly. There’s something almost laughable about the way it’s all right there, all within arms reach, if he was brave enough to reach for it, to ask for it, but he’s not. Maybe this is why he doesn’t deserve him in the first place.

“Well, I was just about to do laundry. I was thinking about checking out that film you were talking about,” he says as a last resort, hoping Itadori would take the bait. “The one with the alien dog?”

Instead, Itadori just blinks. “Oh, okay. I won’t keep you, then,” he says. He takes a sip of black coffee and immediately grimaces at the taste. Megumi feels a strange mix of fondness and heartache looking at him. “I was about to head out anyway.”

“Right,” Megumi says. His eyes sting. His fingers twitch. “Okay. See you later.”

Itadori smiles, strained, and then he’s gone again.

Megumi sighs.

*

Sundays are depressing.

They look like this: seven am, three cups of black coffee and Julian Casablancas singing about heartbreak through the staticky sound of the radio and over the gentle thrum of the washing machine while Megumi sits and watches.

He’s been trying to catch up on months of missed schoolwork, and his English textbook lies tauntingly on the table next to the radio, left there by accident and promptly forgotten.

The stool he’s sitting on is an old rickety thing, one of the legs in desperate need of fixing. It’s fine to sit on as long as you balance your weight just right and don’t let your feet off the ground. The caffeine only serves to make him nauseous after a skipped breakfast and not even a whole lot more awake but the bitter taste is grounding. A faint smell of vinegar permeates the air but it doesn’t stick to his clothes, as promised.

November always comes too early, the beginnings of winter starting to show up in the trees without permission, the falling leaves, the ever growing murmurations of birds. Always too soon. Not enough time to breathe in between, never enough time to prepare for it.

And Megumi, he’s- lonely is one word for it. Ashamed maybe. Guilty definitely. And he worries. He hears from Kugisaki that Itadori has chosen to go on yet another mission, his third one in the past week and a half. Not alone this time, thankfully. But he worries, regardless. He worries and- there’s something else too, more juvenile.

The song changes into something more mellow. Megumi leans back and closes his eyes, suddenly exhausted. He doesn’t fall asleep, but it’s a close thing.

Then- his phone pings with a text. The sound is jarring in the silence of the morning. He cracks one eye open.

Kugisaki: r u sulking all alone in the laundromat again

Kugisaki: (¬_¬)

Me: I’m not sulking.

Kugisaki: [typing…]

Kugisaki: whatever. pancakes. come.

Me: If you insist.

Kugisaki: :)

So he heads upstairs, and knowing Kugisaki he’s expecting to find the equivalent of the aftermath of a hurricane in the kitchen.

Except she’s not alone.

Itadori is laughing at something, his head thrown back to expose the delicate line of his throat, carving the beginnings of laughter lines into his cheeks, pancake batter smeared on his chin. He spots Megumi in the doorway, and the laughter falters for a moment, a blink and you’ll miss it kind of thing.

“Oh hey, Fushiguro,” he says then, smiling at Megumi like nothing ever happened at all. “You’re just in time.”

“I didn’t know you were back,” Megumi says, trying not to sound accusatory because it’s not like Itadori owes him anything, but Itadori winces regardless. Two weeks. Megumi has barely spoken to him for two weeks.

“Ah, yeah, I just got back last night,” Itadori says sheepishly, scratching the back of his neck. He says nothing more about it. Sunny day service is on the radio, undoubtedly courtesy of Kugisaki who is nodding her head along to the melody while she stirs the pancake batter.

Megumi shoots her a helpless look, who just shrugs, unaffected. “Make yourself useful and go set the table,” she says, pointedly turning her back to him. Deal with it yourself, coward.

Traitor.

“Fine.”

He pauses to take it all in as he gathers the plates and the cutlery, the smell of sugar and butter, gentle sunlight filtering in through the open window, the sound of wild geese flying overhead drowned out by the sound of Itadori and Kugisaki arguing over pancake toppings, a strange squirmy feeling in his stomach. It feels nostalgic, somehow, but he can’t quite put a finger on why that is, exactly.

“—you think, Fushiguro?”

He blinks. He’d zoned out again. “What?

“Topping of choice. Strawberries or mangoes,” Kugisaki asks seriously. They’re both looking at him expectantly with matching expressions. It’s uncanny.

“I don’t know,” Megumi says. He’s not really a fan of sweet things in general, and he knows better than to pick a side in situations like this. “Both?” he says, and they groan in unison.

“Useless,” Kugisaki says with a forlorn sigh and Itadori nods sagely, carefully leaning against her shoulder, and Megumi feels an ugly pang of envy. “Absolutely useless, no moral backbone whatsoever.”

Wait a minute- “Why are you attacking me all of the sudden? I’m not even a part of this?” he frowns.

Kugisaki clicks her tongue in disapproval, and gives him a pitying look, and stage whispers. “Cowardly too.”

Itadori shakes his head, perfectly synchronized. What is happening? Did they practice this beforehand?

“Unbelievable.”

Megumi takes a deep breath. Ridiculous. They’re absolutely ridiculous. How lucky he is to have them.

Suddenly he’s six years old again, licking pancake batter off a wooden spoon. Apples, he remembers with a startling clarity. She liked apples.

He smiles.

When he looks up, Kugisaki and Itadori are both staring at him.

His brow twitches. “What?”

“Nothing,” Kugisaki says, elbowing Itadori in the ribs, who whines dramatically in response, so like his old self for a moment that Megumi has to blink a few times to clear his vision. “Nothing at all.”

Itadori leaves for a minute and brings in more pancakes upon returning, steaming fresh and glistening with butter. The smell makes his mouth water. The tower of pancakes already stacked on the plate starts to wobble dangerously.

Megumi raises an eyebrow. “How many people were you planning to feed?”

“Huh?” Itadori says, and immediately gathers four pancakes on his own plate and tops it off with whipped cream and a big heap of strawberries before he starts shoveling them into his mouth at an impressive speed. “Jus’ us, ’y?” he asks.

“Never mind.”

He hears the familiar sound of a camera shutter and turns his head to see Kugisaki taking a picture on her phone. She gives him a thumbs up before going back to scrolling, and predictably, Itadori immediately starts to protest that she should also be in the photo.

“Absolutely not,” she says, not looking up from her screen where she's busy responding to comments on her latest post. “My hair is a mess.”

Itadori scoffs. “Your hair looks the same as always.”

Silence.

Kugisaki’s fingers pause on the keyboard.

“Or not,” Itadori is quick to backtrack, clearly sensing his impending doom. “It looks absolutely horrible, actually. Compared to the usual, which is, you know. Fine. Clearly.”

Sweetly, “Itadori.”

“...Yes.”

“Stop talking.”

*

He joins Kugisaki in the kitchen where she’s washing the plates when Itadori disappears off to somewhere with some flimsy excuse to not be left in the room alone with Megumi. She’s wrist deep in soapy dishwater, something slow and mellow playing on the radio that he doesn’t recognise, and she’s not singing along this time, but there’s a mellowness to her too, the kind he hardly ever gets to see. There’s something disquieting about it.

Megumi clears his throat. She looks up at him in surprise, blinking languidly at him a couple of times before she seems to snap out of it, and simply hands him a towel. He starts drying cups without a word, and carefully placing them in the cupboard. A sun ray warms his back. When he moves, his shoulder knocks into hers.

It’s nice, comfortable.

Glancing over his shoulder, he asks, “So how’d you blackmail him into actually showing up?”

Kugisaki gives him a look like he suddenly started speaking in a different language. “Who, Itadori?

Megumi stares at her. “Yes, Itadori.”

Kugisaki shrugs. “Wasn’t that hard, considering it was his idea,” she says, with that little smile that she gets whenever she talks about him. “He was all mopey about it too, whining about how we haven’t hung out in ages.”

Megumi frowns. That makes no sense.

“Also besides, someone has to make sure you don’t just survive on black coffee and our collective thoughts and prayers.”

“I eat,” Megumi insists. He does, usually. When he remembers. When he was younger Tsumiki used to be in charge of cooking, and since entering Jujutsu High things hadn’t really turned out to be that different, with Itadori often busying himself by the stove in their free time, even managing to rope Megumi into it sometimes. Megumi stopped going to the kitchen altogether for a while after he died.

“O-kay,” she says, soft and condescending, which makes him narrow his eyes. She stares right back, unfazed.

“I don’t like you very much,” Megumi solemnly informs her.

Without a word, she fills a cup full of dirty dishwater and holds it over his head menacingly. A drop lands on his forehead, sliding down his temple. “Say: thank you for making breakfast.”

“Thank you for making breakfast,” he says obediently. “Love you.”

“Aw.”

“Say it back, asshole,” Megumi says.

She makes a face like Megumi asked her to squish bugs with her bare hands and wrinkles her nose. “Do I have to?”

“I’ll tell the third years that it was you who oversalted in the onigiri last week,” Megumi says.

She slowly puts down the cup. Her soap covered hands firmly cradle his face. “I love you,” she says, her face deadly serious. It reminds him of when it was just the two of them for a while and Megumi has to hold back a smile, something hot spreading in his chest like a disease. “Please don’t.”

Megumi wipes his face. The song ends, and a new one begins.

*

Megumi wakes up to the sound of someone screaming. He sits up in his bed with a start, and hastily throws his blankets aside, body stiff and tired from being woken up so suddenly. He’s out of the door in seconds still in his pajama pants, the hallway floor cold under his bare feet. It doesn’t matter. None of it does, because he knows that voice. He’d know it anywhere.

Heart in his throat, he tries the handle before he even tries to knock. The door is unlocked. He steps inside, and squints at the dark, his hands pressed together ready to call Totality if the situation warrants it.

Except there is no one else in the room, just Itadori in his bed, tangled up in his sheets with a sheen of sweat on his forehead, but physically unharmed. Megumi crosses the room and crouches by his side, mind racing. Some kind of curse, maybe? No, there's no way he wouldn’t be able to sense it. Just a bad dream, then.

“Itadori. Hey,” Megumi says softly. Itadori whimpers in his sleep, his breathing shallow, and when Megumi gently touches his shoulder he flinches violently, hands twisting in the sheets, but doesn’t immediately wake. His throat feels tight. “Itadori,” he says again, and keeps his hands to himself. “It’s okay. Hey. It’s okay.”

There’s a hitch of breath, and when Megumi looks at him his eyes are wide open, staring back at him. A number of expressions cross his face.

Fear. Shame. Relief. Confusion.

It’s hard to tell, exactly, even harder in the dark. He’s always been difficult to read, Itadori. He’s a kaleidoscope of emotions, with his bleeding heart laid out in the open in the palm of his hand, and yet. And yet.

For a while there’s no sound other than his ragged breathing.

“You’re in my room,” Itadori observes. His voice is hoarse. His chest heaves.

“Yes.”

“Why are you in my room?”

“You were screaming,” Megumi says, feeling his cheeks heat, gesturing uselessly with his hands. “I thought…”

“Ah,” Itadori says, shoulders slumping. He looks exhausted, scrubbing a hand over his eyes “Sorry, Fushiguro.”

For some reason, this makes him angry. “Don’t apologize,” Megumi snaps. “How many times do I—“ he falters at the expression on Itadori’s face, or the lack thereof. He’s just making things worse again; his stomach turns with the realization.

He really is the worst.

“It’s not your fault,” is what he finally settles on.

Itadori’s laugh is humorless. He idly touches the scar on his mouth, drawing Megumi’s eye to the stubs of his fingers on his left hand. His heart clenches. “It sort of is, though. I mean—“

“No,” Megumi says softly, refusing to humor him. It’s one thing to know about the weight of the guilt that he carries like a second skin, but it’s another to hear him say it. “It’s not.”

“Why did you save me, Fushiguro?” Itadori asks. He sounds so tired.

“You know why,” Megumi says. It’s not the first time they’ve had this exact conversation. It probably won't be the last. The simple truth is that he would do it all over again, just to see him. Just to be able to sit with him like this, look at him like this.

“Tell me again.”

His shoulders tremble, like he’s trying hard not to cry. Megumi wants to hold him, but he’s not sure he’s allowed to.

He digs his nails into the soft giving skin of his forearm. “Because I’m selfish,” he says. “You know that.”

Itadori snorts, a wet ugly sound that somehow only serves to make Megumi ache more. “Only you would see it as selfishness, Fushiguro.”

That’s because it is.

The following silence is a lot less uncomfortable than it’s been for weeks, but even more haunting for it. Itadori lets out a shaky breath. Even in the dark, Megumi can make out the faraway look in his eyes.

Softly, Megumi clears his throat.

“What did you dream about?”

“The same thing I always dream about,” Itadori says after a moment, suddenly keen on studying the cracks in the ceiling, and doesn’t elaborate.

Megumi sighs, tired of talking in circles, prompts, “Which is?”

No response.

His patience is running thin. “Itadori,” he says. Nothing. “Yuuji.”

There’s a sharp inhale, and immediately Megumi can tell this was a line in the sand he wasn’t supposed to cross. He nearly expects Itadori to finally fully break down right then and there.

“I’m fine,” he says softly, instead, nails digging into his shoulders. He sniffles. ”Just go back to sleep.”

Megumi sighs. “Scoot over.”

Finally, Itadori looks at him. “What? Why?”

“I’m going back to sleep,” he says pointedly, and ignores Itadori sputtering indignantly in response.

Itadori relents after Megumi pointedly jabs his finger into his side. He shuffles to the other side of the bed, his back flush against the wall, half-heartedly muttering something about personal space, but Megumi knows it’s all an act by the way his breathing seems to slow the minute he gets under the covers. Megumi pulls the blanket up to his neck and closes his eyes.

The sheets rustle. Itadori softly clears his throat. Megumi keeps his eyes closed.

“Fushiguro.”

“Hmm.”

“I’m sorry for avoiding you earlier. That was pretty shitty of me,” Itadori says.

“It’s fine,” Megumi says. He lets out a heavy breath. Counts to five. “I’m sorry too.”

Itadori makes a questioning noise at that, and he takes it as a sign to continue.

“For freaking out,” he says, and just like that the floodgates are open “It’s not that I don’t l- I thought I- it was just. A lot. It was a lot,” the words come out in a rush, a jumbled mess of unfinished thoughts. God. He sounds unhinged. He slowly breathes in. ”It wasn’t that I didn’t want to. I just need some time, okay.”

He waits, When Itadori says nothing, he deflates. Maybe he’s the one who misread things, after all.

Then quietly, carefully, Itadori asks, “What about Yuuta-senpai?”

Megumi blinks at the ceiling. What does he have to do with this? “What?”

“You like him, right?” he asks.

Megumi frowns, confused. “No?”

There’s a beat of silence. Then, a soft, “Oh.”

“You,” Megumi starts, propping himself up on his elbow, feeling slightly hysterical. This whole thing is absurd. That’s what this whole thing was about? “You thought I liked Okkotsu.”

“Um. Maybe?” A pause. “Yes? I mean you once said you also like boys and he’s cute so, so, like, I don’t think it’s that big of a reach, honestly.”

Megumi feels his face doing… something. This particular boy will be the death of him. “You’re an idiot,” he says.

Itadori huffs, affronted. “And I mean you’re always hanging around him these days, I dunno. I just thought maybe you two were, you know.”

“I’m training with him.”

Itadori shifts to lie on his back, shrugs. “Yeah, well,” he says with a pinched expression, quiet and petulant and-

Jealous. He sounds jealous.

Megumi swallows. He admires Okkotsu, always has, and maybe he even harbored tentative one sided feelings for him a long ago, and that was before- before. Before him, before this.

Carefully, he says, “I don’t like him like that.”

“Right,” Itadori says. “Wait,” he says after a pause. Megumi can practically hear the gears turning as his brain is working overtime. “So you— when we— you said— you freaked out.“

“Yeah.”

“So you actually—“ He gestures to Megumi, then himself. “You wanted— With me.“

From anyone else, Megumi would find the lack of articulation infuriating. As it is though, he just nods patiently.

“Yes.”

Another pause. “Oh,” Itadori says again. He blinks a few times. “Oh, man,” he says quietly, seemingly to himself. His eyes look distant. “Oh, man,” he repeats, and now Megumi is getting a little concerned.

There are many ways Megumi imagined this playing out, back when things were still simple; Itadori smiling apologetically at him before gently turning him down, or finding an excuse to change the topic, to pretend he never said anything, and sometimes when he’s catastrophizing, he imagines him sneering down at him in disgust and, if he’s lucky, walking away. He’s thought about all of it, every possible way he would react; shame, denial, anger, fear. All except… this. His muted, vacant demeanor.

“Itadori?”

That seems to snap him out of it.

“It’s just- I never thought,” Itadori says finally, his next inhale getting caught in his throat. “I mean I didn’t even think I’d have time to-“ His voice cracks horribly. He covers his eyes. “I thought I was gonna- I didn't think I’d get to-“

Megumi’s body is moving on its own before he realises what he’s doing, wrapping his arms tightly around his trembling shoulders. Itadori is stiff in his arms like he doesn’t know what to do with being the one comforted. Megumi holds him tighter, afraid he might somehow turn into dust in his hands if he doesn’t.

“I want you to be happy,” Itadori says quietly, hiccuping, his spine curling with shame, like this is something to be embarrassed about. His arms drop limply to his sides. “I just never thought-“

Gently, Megumi cradles the back of his head, running his fingers through his soft hair. “It’s okay,” he says.

Itadori quiets. He sniffles quietly into his shoulder like he’s afraid of disrupting some cosmic balance if he so much as breathes too loud. His shoulders shake with the effort.

“Sorry, sorry,” Itadori says after a while, muffled by his shirt, before hastily wiping his nose into his sleeve. Megumi adores him so much he’s not even put off by this. “Sorry. Fuck. I’m ruining this, aren’t I?”

“It’s okay,” Megumi says again, gently guiding his head to rest in the space between his neck and the curve of his shoulder, and traces the knobs of his spine with the tips of his fingers. He’s so warm. He’s so good, so lovely, so kind. “You can cry.”

There comes a point in grief where you become painfully aware of your place in it. It’s an x on a map drawn in permanent marker. You are here. You are here and you can’t go back.

Then finally, the thread you were hanging by finally snaps, and the rest is freefall.

Itadori cries, ragged and ugly, into the crook of his neck. Megumi holds him, and holds him.

Outside, it has started to rain again.

*

Itadori falls asleep eventually, more specifically he falls asleep on him, obliviously snoring into his shoulder while Megumi tries to get his heartbeat under control. He stays perfectly still, only shifts the tiniest bit to better accommodate him, shifting his head to rest on his sternum to make sure he doesn’t get a crick in his neck when he wakes, careful not to jostle him in the process.

There’s no real way to get comfortable like this, so Megumi lies awake, and watches the steady rise and fall of his back. His eyes are puffy from crying, the skin under his nose rubbed red and raw, and Megumi, on an impulse, leans down and kisses the crown of his head. He hates him a little bit, for getting so effectively under his skin. Gentleness on him is like an ill fitted suit. He doesn’t know what to do with himself. It makes him want to sink his teeth into his throat, it makes him want to strangle himself.

He lies awake, commiting the lines of his face to memory, tracing the worry lines around his eyes, the faded scar on his mouth. He presses his thumb to the scar that splits his brow, frowning, wondering how he can still be kind, so gentle.

Itadori wakes slowly. He starts to stir around six, making a dissatisfied noise from the back of his throat and pushes unconsciously closer to his warmth, burying his nose in the crook of his neck, mumbling something incomprehensible under his breath. Megumi smiles, small and private, and carefully runs his fingers through the cropped hairs at the nape of his neck.

After a minute, Itadori’s eyes shoot open, suddenly wide awake. He jolts, hastily scrambling off him to the far side of the bed with muttered apologies.

“You should’ve just pushed me off you, man,” he says, his accent a little stronger in the morning before he’s had the chance to iron it out, a Sendai boy through and through. His face glows red, with cowlicked hair and creases pressed to his cheeks. Megumi’s fingers twitch. “I hope I didn’t drool on you or anythin’... Ah jeez, and cryin’ on you like that last night,” he rambles on with a nervous laugh, and buries his face in his pillow. “…Hah. That’s so embarrassing, I’m so–”

Megumi stops his rambling with a hand on his wrist. “I don’t mind,” he says, a strange lump in his throat, tightening his grip when he feels Itadori start to try and gently slip away, determined to make him stay this time. His stomach clenches at how his hand trembles in his grip. “Itadori, I don’t mind.” He stares at the stubborn set of his shoulders. “Hey. Look at me.”

Muffled, “Can’t.”

Carefully, so very carefully, Megumi kisses the scarred palm of his hand. Kisses the soft underside of his wrist.

Itadori squirms, but doesn’t pull his hand away. “You’ll be the death of me, Fushiguro,” he sighs in defeat, and he sounds so fond that it makes the ache in his chest tenfold. His next exhale is soft. “Megumi,” he says quietly. “Me-gu-mi.”

“Got one for free.”

“You can get as many as you want,” Itadori promises solemnly, and turns his head to meet his eye with a bashful smile. He’s so beautiful. “Free of charge.”

“Maybe I’ll take you up on that,” Megumi says, a soft smile pulling at the corners of his mouth. “Yuuji. Yuu-ji.”

And Itadori he- he giggles, and Megumi suffers from a brief bout of tachycardia. “I like you, Megumi,” he says, giddy. “I like you a lot.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” Itadori confirms brightly. “I like how you only use unscented laundry detergent,” he says, resting his chin on his hand. “I like your weird music taste.”

“It’s not weird.”

“It is weird,” Itadori says, but he’s still smiling so Megumi decides to let it go, this time. Then, he seems to hesitate. “Hey.”

“Hm?”

“What did you mean when you said you freaked out,” Itadori asks, anxiously wringing his hands, sheets rustling. “I didn’t do anything, did I?”

“No,” Megumi says, heart clenching in his chest. “No. You did nothing wrong,” he quickly assures him “I just need a little more time.”

“Okay,” Itadori says, visibly relaxing. He nods once, decisively. “Okay, yeah. Time. Yeah. I can do that.”

Megumi loves him so much he feels a little sick with it.

Then suddenly, Itadori shivers, the mornings starting to get colder, and that- that reminds him. The sudden realization makes him scramble out of bed in turn. How could he have forgotten.

“I’ll be right back,” he says, the floor cold against his bare feet.

Itadori makes a questioning sound behind him. “Wh- Huh? Huh- what?” he calls out to his retreating back, his voice a little hoarse from sleep, still.

“Two minutes,” Megumi promises, craning his neck to look shoulder just to look at him. Itadori looks so soft in his bed, his t-shirt wrinkled and worn, the ever-present worry lines of his face smoothed out by the orange-red sunrise. Megumi knocks his elbow against the doorframe, hissing through his teeth. “Don’t move.”

Itadori gives him a confused thumbs up.

In his room, he finds what he’s looking for at the bottom of his dresser, clean and soft and neatly folded into a square, and he runs his fingers over the fabric. His hands hesitate for a moment before grabbing it, the material soft under his fingertips. He breathes in deep.

Outside, a flock of cranes flies overhead, announcing the arrival of winter.

*

Another Sunday. Daybreak finds Megumi in the kitchen, his sheets in the washing machine, nursing a caffeine headache.

He finds Itadori standing by the window bundled up in a familiar pink sweater and boxer shorts, his feet bare. He smells like laundry detergent and apple tree blossoms, and his skin tastes like salt and boy when Megumi presses his mouth to his temple.

“Hi,” Megumi says, thumbing at the skin under his eye. “You okay?”

Instead of replying, Itadori just turns around and tucks his face into the curve of his neck. Megumi’s hands find the small of his back, playing with the hem of his sweater, the material soft under his fingertips.

Megumi has a better handle on his moods these days. There are days when he doesn’t speak, doesn’t react much to anything at all, just sits perfectly still with that same vacant look in his eyes. On those days Megumi usually stays with him. He’ll put on a movie in the background, running his fingers up and down his back. Cooks something simple, makes sure that he eats. On some days, this is enough to help him snap out of it, but not always.

Carefully, Megumi pushes him back to hold him at an arm's length, gently brushing his bangs out of his eyes. His eyes trace the tired slope of his shoulders and the downturn of his mouth. Itadori blinks back at him, slow and languid. Remember, persistence is key. “Did you sleep?” he asks.

Itadori shrugs. “A little bit.”

“Okay,” Megumi says. “We can sleep a bit more after breakfast.”

Itadori hums, burying his mouth in his shoulder. “I want eggs,” he says.

“Fine, fine,” Megumi says, fond. Today is a good day.

Itadori’s weight slumps against him, nearly making Megumi trip over his own feet. “Hey, careful,” he admonishes.

Itadori grumbles something under his breath. Megumi pinches his cheek.

Time ebbs and flows. Itadori watches him whisk the eggs in silence, bleary eyed, perched on the kitchen counter swinging his legs, his heels thumping against the cabinets. There is fresh coffee in the pot, and there is music on the radio.

Itadori is halfway through singing the chorus to Plastic Love when Megumi has to stop what he’s doing to kiss him on the forehead.

“The laundry is done in,” Megumi checks the timer on his phone to inform him. “One hour and fourteen minutes.”

Itadori hums, reaching behind him. A pill bottle rattles. Without a word, he presses a small round pill into the soft of his palm, a glass of water in the other. It doesn’t really taste like anything, but leaves a chalky feeling on his tongue so he drinks the entire glass. When he looks up, Itadori’s smile is a small, gentle thing. He loves quietly, Megumi has learned. It’s deafening, all the same.

“If you want to sleep for longer, you can,” Megumi says, swallowing to get rid of the lingering dryness in his mouth.

“Nah, I’ll help,” Itadori says, hopping off the counter to add a spoonful of sugar to his coffee. Megumi wrinkles his nose. “Anyway, I was thinking,” he says casually, too casually. “There’s this movie coming out soon—“

“Is there, now.”

“—and since it’s your birthday soon I was just, you know, I was thinking maybe we could, like,” he says, his words jumbled, half-finished thoughts. “If you want, I mean.”

He takes a breath. Megumi waits patiently.

“I’ll buy you popcorn,” Itadori promises solemnly with his best puppy dog eyes. “Any kind you like. I’ll buy you anything you want. Anything at all, anything you-”

Megumi steps between his legs and Itadori quiets. He presses his palm flush against his cheek, kisses the corner of his mouth. “Friday, then?”

Itadori’s smile is a wonder, bright and boyish, forming crinkles in the corners of his eyes, a pretty flush rising on his cheeks. His mouth tastes like toothpaste.

“Okay,” he whispers, soft. “It’s a date.”