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Maki’s been a little stressed lately.
She can hear this voice inside her head saying that this “lately” has actually been going on for eighteen years, and it sounds suspiciously like Panda. Then, she feels an urge to beat his ass in real life, which kind of proves his point and makes her a little more stressed.
Shibuya and Shinjuku are just distant memories now. Places they go to in their minds when they want to mourn the choices they’ve made, when they want to regret.
But Shibuya and Shinjuku are still there too. In the commas.
In Panda, who will never be stitched back together by Yaga again. In Yuuta, and the long scar across his forehead. In Toge, and the right arm he lost inside Sukuna’s domain. In Megumi, and Yuuji, and all the ones they watched die, and Nobara, who saw nothing, because she was trapped in a hospital bed, knocked out by a coma, her left eye blown apart.
And Maki, too. In Mai, and the body she left behind for Maki to figure out what to do with.
She’s changed a little since all of that. The burns on her skin, of course, but also more.
Because the binder digs into her skin and hurts when she trains, making it hard to breathe sometimes, and Maki knows she’s not supposed to wear it while exercising, the instructions on the package are pretty clear, but she does it anyway.
Her hair is also long enough to be annoying when she’s sweating during training, but still too short for Maki to tie it up without it coming loose five minutes later, and she has no idea how Nobara could stand a haircut like that last year.
Maki has barely told anyone she’s a lesbian, and until recently, she even thought she might be in love with Yuuta. That Yuuta. Her idiot special-grade sorcerer friend Okkotsu Yuuta. Honestly, she’s fine with it, really. So why is it so hard to say?
Why, at that moment, when she, Panda, Toge, and Yuuta finally found some time between missions to eat together like old times, and Maki thought, I want to tell them, did she almost throw up? Why did she get so nervous at the mere thought of someone receiving her order and discovering what she’d bought when she got a binder for the first time?
Why can’t she be like Nobara? Who’s younger, and effortlessly, wonderfully everything she is. Who likes Maki — yes, she knows. Probably everyone, because doing so is also so effortlessly Nobara that no one bats an eye —, and was never less her. While all Maki ever did was be a confusing mess and keep her waiting.
For too long. Maybe even for someone like her.
It starts a few weeks ago. Maki doesn’t notice it at first. Nobara usually spends a lot of time on her phone, probably only a little less than Megumi, so seeing her with it on the table while they eat, or on the way back to the dorms after a mission, isn’t exactly unusual, and doesn’t catch Maki’s attention any more than Nobara herself already does.
It starts to bother her, subtly, when Maki runs into her in the hallways, some days later — one leaving, the other arriving — and Nobara is so caught up in whatever she’s doing on her phone that she doesn’t seem to notice Maki at all, walking right past her without saying a word.
Then, later that same night, when Maki returns to her room from the mission with Yuuta, she hears Nobara’s muffled voice through the wall they share. Her laughter is soft. The one Maki knows she makes when she tucks a strand of hair behind her ear and looks up with that beautiful eye.
The one Maki thought only she could draw out of Nobara.
It all peaked one afternoon, during training. Again, Nobara being on her phone during her free time wasn’t unusual, like during breaks, for instance; Toge does the same thing. But she never missed one of Maki’s matches. Never.
Her position, sitting on the steps, is the same as when she’s on the sidelines, watching every move, cheering for Maki to crush whoever dares to face her in the middle of the training field. But that’s where the similarity ends. Nobara doesn’t say a word. Not even when Maki takes Toge down for the third time (you’re fast, but you can’t run forever, little boy, she said, after Toge showed that stupid seal on his tongue and threw her a peace sign).
And then, when Maki glances her way, she realizes Nobara probably didn’t even notice Maki had won. Maybe she didn’t even notice she was fighting at all.
Too busy smiling at her damn phone.
Yuuji is standing one or two steps below, waiting for his turn to spar with Maki, having just come from a training session with Yuuta. She notices, however, that as she approaches, Itadori’s attention also seems fixed on Nobara. His face contorts in a curious puppy-like expression, a tragically comical contrast to Maki’s own perpetually — according to Panda — furrowed face.
“Kugisaki, what are you always doing on your phone? You’re worse than Fushiguro,” she hears him chuckle softly at his own words. “Though, he doesn’t use it as much anymore. Says the light gives him headaches.” Yuuji seems to be talking more to himself now, scratching the back of his neck. “Doesn’t it bother your eye, Kugisaki?” he asks, curious.
Nobara looks up from her screen just long enough to give him a thoroughly unimpressed look. Maki finds it attractive how expressive she still is, even with the eyepatch. "What eye? Stupid”, she says.
“The one that’s left!” Yuuji blurts out, with no tact, as if it were obvious.
In response, she rolls the said one eye, making Maki smirk slightly. “You bothers my eye.”
Itadori makes an indignant face, but gets easily distracted when Nobara simply ignores him and goes back to her phone. “Hey, you didn’t answer my question, Kugisaki! What are you doing on your phone? You were using it even during class.”
“Just chatting with a friend from my old town,” Nobara’s voice finally softens after a sigh, something Maki can’t help but notice. She finishes typing the message she had been writing when Yuuji interrupted her and turns off her phone, letting it rest in her lap. Maki doesn’t even notice how slowly she’s moving closer, a part of her wanting to hear what Nobara has to say. “We kind of drifted apart when I moved here, so she reached out a few weeks ago, said she’s planning to visit Tokyo.”
Itadori looks genuinely happy as he grins.
“This is so cool, Kugisaki! You’re bringing her here too, right? You're going to introduce her, your former best friend, to me and Fushiguro, your current best friends!” Nobara lets out a dry chuckle, but opens her mouth to respond, never quite managing it, because the sound of Maki’s staff hitting the floor catches both their attention.
Yuuji looks surprised for a moment, but Nobara just rests her chin on her hand and smiles.
“Maki-san,” she greets.
“Nobara.” She doesn’t know why she says the girl’s name. Nobara keeps looking at her as if expecting Maki to say something more, logically. Then, she says the first thing that comes to her mind as Itadori shifts his weight from one foot to the other at the edge of her vision. “It’s your turn. Let’s fight.”
“Oh, okay.” Nobara blinks, shifting her gaze from equally-confused Yuuji, the next most likely opponent, to Maki, who is already walking back to the center of the field, and finally looks engrossed as she hurries to catch up, tucking her phone into her clothes.
“I heard you and Yuuji. You… are going to bring your friend here to school?”
Maki speaks when she feels Nobara drawing near, her voice just loud enough for only her to hear, because Maki likes things that way. Hers, Nobara’s, and what belongs to them. Only them.
She seems to think deeply. “I don’t know. She said she wants to come at the end of this month. Maybe next time.” Then shrugs.
The end of this month… Maki repeats to herself, mentally, like a timer ticking in her head. Some pop song suddenly starts playing, pulling Maki out of her thoughts. It’s indisputably Nobara’s phone ringing.
“Oh, she’s calling me now,” Nobara practically murmurs, staring at the device as if it were a special-grade curse, and it’s utterly captivating.
And because Maki is weak, pathetic, and a lesbian, she finds herself saying, “It’s okay, you can take it. We’ll practice next time. But just this once, ok.”
She barely finishes speaking, and Nobara is already breaking into a huge smile and hugging Maki, her grip firm but her hands delicate over the burned skin, practically on tiptoe while Maki braces her with one surprised hand on her waist.
Unfortunately, as quickly as she jumped on Maki, she pulls away.
“I love you! See you, Maki-san,” Nobara calls, running off to answer the phone.
Maki lets out a sigh, the sigh of a terribly crisis-stricken lesbian, and goes over to Yuuji again, with whom she was supposed to spar from the start. They exchange looks, Itadori seeming even more confused — if possible — at why Maki called Nobara, and then, let her go.
As they fight, Maki thinks that she just assumed Nobara would always be there. Guaranteed. With her attention devoted solely to Maki. Of course, Megumi and Yuuji are there too, but it’s different. They are girls, the girls, the only ones. It’s completely natural to orbit around each other.
But now, she knows what that means. She arrived too late. They aren't the only ones anymore. It seems Nobara has found someone, got over her, when they didn't even have anything to get over, which is even more pathetic.
It also reminds Maki of when, once, she read online that being lesbian and having a weird relationship with gender is fun and freeing.
Based on recent events, and the fact that Yuuji had just punched her painfully right in the face, she can confirm that none of it feels fun at all.
It is freeing, though.
Yuuta is away on a mission, always the most requested of them all, so it’s just Toge and Panda squeezed together in front of the medium-sized mirror in Maki’s room, after being summoned by a text that left little room for refusal. Maki extends a hand toward Inumaki, a pair of definitely dull scissors resting in her palm, and says, “I want you to cut my hair.”
The duo goes quiet. Maki catches Toge pointing at himself in disbelief.
“Did Yuuta dump you or something?” are the first words out of Panda’s mouth, sounding genuinely concerned, and for a split second, Maki thinks maybe she won’t even need a haircut, because her hair might just fall out from sheer stress.
Toge discreetly elbows him in the ribs. “Okaka.”
“What? Girls only do stuff like this when their hearts are broken, right?” Panda scratches his chin. Again, irritatingly genuine because of course he has zero sense.
“Ugh, it’s not like that!” Maki snaps, louder than she means to.
Which is deeply ironic, because maybe that’s exactly what it is.
Honestly, she’s been thinking about cutting it for a long time. Which is also ironic, because Maki already had even shorter hair after Shibuya, so there’s nothing truly new. Except that everything feels new, everything feels different, and Maki keeps stopping in front of the mirror with the scissors in her hand, threatening to snip the strands that so much resemble Mai’s hair now.
She knows that once Toge takes the scissors, it’ll be for real, because he knows Maki hates to repeat herself. That’s exactly why she asked him.
The thought of asking Nobara had crossed her mind too, since it made the most sense. Of course, Maki would trust her steady, decisive, beautiful hands more than the three idiots she called friends. But Nobara was probably busy getting ready to go out with Fumi. And probably busy being the cause of Maki’s crisis in the first place.
Maki had nothing in mind when she asked him, so she makes no demands. She just wants to change, to become something she isn’t now, to be something she is. She needs to. “Sujiko,” Toge finally says, shrugging as he takes the scissors into his own hand.
Up to you, it means.
And as she stares at that reflection in the mirror, for what she hopes will be the last time she sees it, she nods. “Yeah. It is.”
It doesn’t take more than twenty minutes, partly because there isn’t much to cut. The result ends up looking like Toge’s own hair — maybe a bit more layered, like he wore it in their first year. It’s slightly different from the haircut Maki had after Shibuya. Now, the sides are shorter than the nape and the top. Probably because Toge cut too much on the left side when Panda tried to give his opinion and had to even out the sides. Also probably because it’s the best he can do with only one hand. Which Maki discovers she doesn’t care about in the slightest.
It looks good as she tilts her head from side to side, looking at the mirror.
“Yuuta’s going to like it,” Panda calls out from his post, safely distant from the mirror, a scissor-wielding Toge, and Maki — unarmed now, but never not a threat. She mutters something that barely forms words in response, uninterested, even as Inumaki gives a thumb up behind her in approval.
Panda opens his mouth to make another comment, one that would surely make her question whether he truly values his life, but he’s fortunately cut off by the creak of the door opening.
And it’s both funny and embarrassing that Maki knows who it is before she even hears the voice, because no other soul in this place would ever enter her room without her permission.
No one, except — “Senpai, can you tell me what you think of my outfit?” Nobara bursts into the room like it’s her own, completely unfazed by the two other intruders, walking straight toward Maki as if she could find her with her eye closed. Which, honestly, she kind of was. Waving her hands, gesturing dramatically, rolling her eye, and Maki tries to follow the motion with her gaze.
“Fushiguro has terrible taste in fashion, and Itadori just goes hell yeah to every single thing I try on and—” she finally looks at Maki. “Oh.”
Maki suddenly feels shy and considers either slamming her head against the desk or asking Toge to knock her out with cursed speech.
“You cut your hair,” Nobara says.
“Yeah, it was getting annoying,” Maki explains, even though there’s no real reason to explain, because cutting your hair should be the most normal thing in the world, and she’s just going insane. “I like it better this way, too.” She lets out a sigh, because, more than anything, that’s what it really is.
“It’s nice. Looks good on you.”
Well, leave it to Nobara to say something like that as if it’s nothing at all. Maki needs a moment to take a deep breath, like she’s just walked across the country on foot. Toge tilts his head subtly behind her, and suddenly, she doesn’t want him to erase her anymore. She wants to erase him.
“So…” Nobara hums, picking up the previous topic, unknowingly putting Maki at ease because, yeah, it’s no big deal. She doesn’t want it to be a big deal, doesn’t want it to be awkward, she just wants to be her. Nobara points to herself and spins lightly. “About my outfit?”
So Maki props her elbow on the desk, resting her cheek in her hand, and eyes Nobara from head to toe, thoughtfully evaluating her, just like she asked. She is wearing dark bell bottoms jeans, and an red tank top that reveals a strip of her midriff. Her medium-length hair is partially tied back in a small bun, most of it still falling loose over her bare shoulders.
She has to hold back the urge to say that Nobara can make anything look good on her, because that’s not what she wants to hear and it’s not why she came to her.
“I really like the tank top, but… something’s missing.” Nobara nods eagerly at Maki’s comment, as if to say that’s exactly what I was saying! her eye glinting with anticipation, waiting for her to go on. “Maybe if you swapped it for that black one? The one with the open back. It’s casual but elegant, just how you like it, and the view is excellent too...” Maki says, thinking out loud. Before Nobara can say anything, she rushes to add, almost tripping over her own words, talking to herself. “But if you both stay out late, it might get cold, and you’ll catch something. You need something else…” Maki huffs under her breath, too focused to notice Nobara’s soft, affectionate giggle in the background. “What about that jacket you wore when we went to that fancy café opening last month?”
When she finally looks up, Nobara’s wearing a small, happy smile, and for a moment, Maki’s heart squeezes in that quiet, bittersweet way it does sometimes. But then Nobara’s expression shifts into a pout. “Shit, I think I put that one in the wash the other day.”
Maki bites the inside of her cheek in thought, until something tossed over her bed near Panda catches her eye. “Use mine,” she says, pointing at the jacket, a brown leather one.
If it’s even possible, Nobara’s smile grows wider. She practically radiates happiness. “I love you, Maki!” she exclaims, bright and bubbling, as she rushes to grab the jacket and presses it tightly against her chest.
The shared glance between Toge and Panda goes completely unnoticed by Maki, whose full attention is fixed on Nobara. “You’re heading out already?”
“Not yet, but soon,” Nobara answers, still grinning. “Fumi doesn’t know her way around Tokyo at all, so I’m meeting her at the station. I don’t want her getting lost.”
Maki looks away without meaning to, nodding slightly. Her thoughts are already spiraling into something self-deprecating and embarrassing and probably homosexual when she feels a small kick against her leg. Toge.
Without thinking, she kicks him back, not nearly as subtly, which earns a melodic laugh from Nobara, bright enough to make Maki forget why she was even annoyed. The sound distracts her just long enough for Inumaki to catch her attention again, his wide, exasperated eyes darting between her and Nobara in a way that makes the message painfully clear.
And suddenly, Maki understands what he’s implying.
“Ah. You want some company? Just so you don’t… get lost too…” She cuts herself off for everyone’s sake. That came out terribly.
Panda scratches his chin from where he’s standing, looking genuinely confused, and Toge mutters a quiet “Mentaiko?” which Maki knows is his onigiri version for are you serious right now? but she chooses, very deliberately, to pretend she didn’t understand.
But Nobara just smiles. “I’d love that,” she says. And Maki, once again, is far too focused on her to hear Panda’s whistle (Good for him.)
The train ride to Harajuku feels far too short. Or maybe it’s just Maki. Maybe the time she has with Nobara is never really enough, or maybe Maki has this problem of being terribly insatiable and okay, that’s not a maybe, it’s a certainty.
Nitta had given them a ride to the station closest to the Jujutsu school, and from there the two of them took the train toward the city center, where they would transfer to the line connecting Tokyo to Morioka, where Fumi was coming from.
The train car isn’t crowded, but there are no empty seats, and they find a corner to squeeze into, Nobara leaning against the wall of the train while Maki props herself up with one hand beside her shorter head.
It’s a good spot at least. Not that it matters to them, but Nobara’s eyepatch and Maki’s burned skin, exposed by the black tank top she always chooses to wear to reduce friction between her scars and the fabric, never go unnoticed. Maki offers to carry Nobara’s jacket (which is hers actually) and when a nearby seat suddenly becomes vacant, they immediately start arguing over it, “you sit” “no, you sit” “the seat opened up on your side” “but you’ll be walking around all day, you need to rest”. Which Maki wins.
Though she suspects she actually lost. Because Maki ends up standing protectively in front of Nobara, leaving some space so her legs won’t feel cramped if the car fills up, who smiles so beautifully as she chatters the whole way about hers and Fumi's plans for the day, looking perfectly content exactly where she is with both hands resting casually on either side of Maki’s hips, lazily holding onto the waistband of her loose sweatpants, supposedly to help Maki keep her balance on the moving train, though they both know she absolutely doesn’t need it.
Then they get off at Harajuku a few stops later. “Oh, wait—your shoe…” Maki murmurs once they’ve broken away from the crowd, then drops to one knee, adjusting the buckle on Nobara’s sandal when her phone vibrates.
“Fumi said she just got off the train,” Nobara reads aloud, already furiously typing what’s probably instructions on where to meet or how to find her.
Maki looks up. She watches Nobara quietly from below even after she’s already finished fixing the sandal, because Maki doesn’t get to see her from that angle often and honestly, maybe she should. Then she rises to her feet. Nobara gives her knee a few light pats to brush off the dirt on her pants, eye still glued to her phone. “Well, then, I guess I’ll be going,” Maki murmurs.
Nobara stops typing instantly, her fingers frozen as she looks up, brow furrowed. “Hey, you can’t just come all this way and not at least meet her.”
She doesn’t know how to say that she’s not exactly excited for this meeting. Especially since there’s no plausible and not ridiculous reason for it. She doesn’t even know who Fumi is. This girl hasn’t done anything to her! Which is why Maki can't say anything at all and finds herself being dragged by Nobara shortly after, heading to meet the totally lesbianistic childhood friendship of the girl she has a ridiculously silly crush on.
Nobara seems to recognize the girl from afar. Probably because she's also the only person standing timidly in the middle of the station, not as if she’s lost, but not exactly sure where to go either. Fumi has her hair tied in a high ponytail, with bangs so similar to the hair Maki had before Shibuya that it’s almost ironic. She’s taller than Nobara but shorter than Maki, and her hair is much longer, even longer than Maki’s was back then.
She couldn’t be more different from Maki, even in the ways she resembles her, and she’s quite unlike Nobara as well.
But when she sees Nobara from where she stands, her eyes grow even larger — though that seems impossible — sweet like a deer’s, and it’s so Nobara that Maki finds herself stopping in her tracks, even as Nobara continues toward Fumi, who is also walking in her direction. The two meet halfway, sharing a tight hug.
That’s it. Maki has lost her. How clichéd and dramatic. Maybe Maki never really had her. Maybe Maki was always the version of Fumi that wasn’t exactly Fumi but almost and that would do. Maybe Maki isn’t anything like Fumi at all, so it doesn’t even make sense. She’s standing there in a binder, her freshly cut hair messy from the wind because she still hasn’t decided how she likes it, while Fumi is there, beautiful and… feminine, being something Maki isn’t and never wanted to be, and that’s why it stings.
She doesn’t want to be that. She wants that. She wants Nobara.
But then Nobara pulls back from the hug and looks over her shoulder. Her eye lands on Maki and she calls her over with a wave, that gorgeous smile on her face and of course, Maki follows. How else do you think she ended up in the pit she’s in?
And as if to prove it, Nobara also greets her with a lingering kiss on the cheek. “I’ll text you when I leave. Same place, okay?”
Maki, still a little stunned, manages to whisper, “Same place.”
“Great, love you,” Nobara says, grabbing the jacket from Maki’s arm and giving one last wave before taking Fumi’s hand and heading toward the station exit. She sees Fumi gently waving from where she stands, and she waves back, a little awkwardly and still dazed.
And as they walk away, Maki can still catch a teasing, “She must be the Maki-senpai…” followed by Fumi bumping shoulders with Nobara and the two of them giggling.
Maki smiles.