Work Text:
The second day after being introduced to Yuuji, Nanami calmly walks out of the room, finds Gojo, who's conveniently with them right now, wherever they are—Yuuji isn't actually sure—and screams at him for at least three minutes.
Which is.. yeah. Nanami doesn't seem like a quick-tempered guy, but it's not like Yuuji knows him that well yet. He's pretty sure, though, that even when Gojo initially revealed the whole faking his death situation to him, Nanami wasn't that furious.
Perhaps it was a last drop today when he asked Yuuji how he was doing after all the, well, dying, and Yuuji started breathing funny, and then an already familiar bear plushie hit him in the teeth, which, admittedly, didn't help with the breathing. The cursed corpse is lying on the floor now, after Nanami did something for it to stop requiring a stable cursed energy flow not to box someone, and Yuuji isn't sure if it's still going to work after that, but he hopes that Nanami knows better.
He sat with Yuuji after he pulled the toy out of his sluggish hands and talked until his breathing calmed and evened out, and his heart stopped feeling like it was going to burst out of his chest, again, and he could actually admit that it was the first time he could think about what happened to him without being afraid of getting beaten up by a toy in almost two weeks. Which was actually kind of nice. He thinks that a couple more days like this, and he could've developed a Pavlovian response to any kind of negative thought popping out in his head.
He gets how him getting his cursed energy under control is kind of the whole point of even being in this situation in the first place, so he didn't really complain, but, apparently, Nanami has a different opinion on the topic.
Nanami, who is screaming at Gojo right now. Yuuji would admit that it seems like a little of an overreaction, but he is not an adult here, so he just keeps sitting on the couch, with a decorative pillow in his hands, because he got too used to hugging something while watching the TV after all these days.
The whole situation vaguely feels like listening to your parents getting in a fight over you while you're trying to pretend not to hear the voices getting louder from inside of their bedroom, not that he ever had that kind of experience, but he'd seen it enough in the movies and heard it from his classmates to be able to make an analogy.
He is going to keep this observation to himself, though; he doesn't think Nanami would like it very much, and his vocal cords seem to be, uh, pretty strong, in his personal opinion. He's not jealous of Gojo right now.
Gojo looks slightly guilty about it all after, not that it's easy to tell with his blindfold making most of his facial expressions unreadable when he's not smiling, but he's not smiling, so Yuuji makes sure to tell him that there is really, really nothing to worry about, which somehow doesn't cheer him up all that much. He doesn't apologize though, not that Yuuji is expecting him to. The fact the guy is even keeping him alive still, let alone training him and hiding him away, is a miracle on its own.
And it's not like Yuuji has to reminisce about the dying all that much. There is nothing really to think about. It was scary, yes, and it hurt, and he's sorry that Megumi had to be there for it, but he is still going to die eventually. Sooner rather than later, actually, not that it's a new thought.
So maybe he came closer to it a little sooner than he expected; no big deal, won't happen again. He's better with his cursed energy already. Nanami still looks pissed, though Yuuji can clearly tell it's not directed at him. Gojo sighs, tousles Yuuji's hair, and then, in a few days, warps him out of the basement to what looks like a not-too-lived-in apartment with an unremarkable view of the green bushes from the windows .
When Yuuji asks him if that's his home, he answers in his already familiar vague manner that it's one of them, which is, come on.
Nanami assures him that the place was equipped with all needed systems of protection, and Yuuji decides not to ask if said systems are meant to keep things from getting inside or for what's inside from getting out. There is a lot of natural light, and the kitchen is big, which immediately wins over the basement not having a kitchen at all, and he already started to get really tired of takeouts, which he didn't think was ever going to happen in his life.
He still watches the movies and gets punched by a toy, though not as often as he did before. He talks to Nanami, sometimes, without the toy, and starts to really like him. He seems like a pretty reserved person, and the way he talks sometimes feels a little detached, but Yuuji already knows that he cares, and that is enough.
He watches Gojo cook once and then makes an executive decision not to let him use the kitchen in Yuji's presence ever again. Gojo doesn't seem to mind that.
He's still alone there most of the time, but all three of them eat together at least twice, and Nanami calmly says that he's done a good job cooking, which makes him feel even more proud than Gojo's enthusiastic compliments.
He thinks he's getting ahold of that.
-
He wishes he could talk about the movies with Nobara and Fushiguro. Their tastes in cinema are different; he knows that, but he's watched so many for the last weeks he's sure he would be able to remember something all three of them would enjoy.
He thinks about them a lot. There are so, so many questions he wants to ask them. He knows he can't now, but he hopes he will be able to eventually, so with time, the questions start to form into a list in his head.
He wants to ask Fushiguro how he's doing. He wants to ask him about his dog that was destroyed in the battle. Did he feel it? Will he ever be able to summon it back? Was there a name to it, or her, or him? Did Fushiguro choose it?
He wants to ask him if he's mad at Yuuji for dying on him. He wants to ask him about the classes. He wants to ask Nobara if she's bought anything cool recently, if she likes the big city, if she misses home, and if she's healed alright.
That's kind of crazy, he thinks, to care so much about people you've only known for a month. He always cared about people, he supposes, but never before was he able to get so close to someone so fast. He knows he usually gives an impression of an easy and talkative guy, and he is, but he also can't say he has had a lot of close friends in his life.
His grandpa was always kind of sour about that. He knows he had played with other kids when he was little, and he was on good terms with his classmates in school. He'd exchange numbers, and he'd discuss a new manga chapter on a recess, and he'd talk to guys in sport clubs a lot because they were always trying to recruit him in, even though he was never agreeing. Sports stopped being fun pretty quickly when he realized he will always be five steps ahead of everyone else's best efforts. He used to brush it off, but now, he supposes, he knows there was always a reason for it.
But with all that, he can't remember if he ever wanted to see someone that wasn't his grandpa so much again. He can't remember if he ever wanted to sit with someone and listen to them complain about how stupid their teacher is or to be dragged through a shopping mall for hours, the bags in his hands full of clothes and sweets and cosmetics that aren't his, and genuinely enjoy it.
He wants it back. He knows he won't be able to have it forever, maybe not even for long, but it doesn't make those things matter less. It makes those small moments even more important to him, in a way, the connections they help him build, the memories they create.
He doesn't want to be alone, in the end, or in the time that will lead to it. He hopes his friends will forgive him for that.
-
Junpei is like a breath of fresh air.
Yuuji notices from the start he's kind of an introverted person, but not in the way Fushiguro is. Where Fushiguro is moody and collected and effortlessly cool, not that Yuuji would say it out loud, Junpei is stiff and maybe a little shy, but it doesn't make talking to him complicated.
Yuuji can tell he's wary of him at the beginning of their conversation, but it doesn't seem ill-intended, and when Yuuji doesn't leave immediately after making sure Junpei doesn't have any important information about what happened to those guys in the movie theater, he slowly starts to ease off a little. It's not too hard to get him talking from there.
Nanami is great, and Gojo is.. well, Gojo, but Yuuji now again realizes how much he'd missed talking to someone his age, let alone someone not burdened by the sorcery world, its intrigues, its politics, and the training and fighting the curses.
Junpei finally relaxes when they start talking about cinema, and when he smiles for the first time, Yuuji suddenly knows that he wants to keep talking to him, to get to know him better. When he says they should go to the movie theater together sometime, Junpei's cheeks turn red.
Yuuji can't wait to tell Nobara and Fushiguro about him, too.
-
It's a relief Gojo allowed him to use his phone from now on, even if he still can't contact anyone he knew before the incident.
He and Junpei, however, can actually exchange phone numbers and stay in touch.
Texting is a little awkward at first, like Junpei is not quite used to doing it, but Yuuji doesn't give up, and then Junpei makes a joke that causes Yuuji to choke on the air with laughter when he reads it on his phone screen. It's about... what is it about? What was it about?
It's so blurry, blurry, blurry—
-
It's his fault.
Nanami says otherwise, but he knows the truth. Would it be better if they'd never met?
Yuuji doesn't know that. Mahito would still torment him, probably.
He wants to kill Mahito.
He wants to kill it; he has to remind himself it isn't human, even if it looks like a person sometimes. He never once wanted to hurt someone that much.
It's a terrifying thought.
He wants to kill it. He wants to hunt it down and wipe it out of existence.
He can't now, but he wants to believe he will be able to one day.
He has to go on to make it happen.
-
Junpei's hands are shaky in his when he tells Yuuji about his mom.
His heart sinks, painfully. He remembers the softness in Junpei's voice when they were talking about her before. He remembers the way she looked at her son when Yuuji was at their house, the care, the fondness in her eyes, how happy she was for him to bring home a friend.
They found her in her bed. Half of her. He knows it wasn't the curse that carried her there and tucked her in with the blankets.
It isn't fair. Nothing about it is fair.
But Junpei doesn't have to go through it on his own; Yuuji won't let him. He will bring him to the school, and they will become stronger together, and they will find whoever did it to her and fight it together too, and Yuuji will show him that humans have hearts, they have hearts, and hate is not the only thing that can be born out of them.
Yuuji turns out not to be strong enough to make it happen.
-
There is one more contact in his phone now that he can't call or write to.
Or maybe he can. There is no point in doing so, he thinks.
He doesn't delete it anyway.
-
He asks Gojo what will happen to Junpei's body now.
His teacher hesitates for a short moment, which makes Yuuji wonder if he's going to joke it off and avoid answering the question directly, like he often does, but he doesn't, which Yuuji is appreciative of. He isn't sure he would be able to laugh it off too, and maybe Gojo knows it.
He replies that the standard guideline for a situation like this is cremation; his voice is calm but not pitiful. Yuuji appreciates it too.
He wants to ask what will be done to the ashes after.
He wants to ask if there is any chance he could keep them, have them to himself. But they knew each other for such a short period of time, and Yuuji isn't sure if that would be the right thing to do. If Yuuji has a right to do so.
He doesn't ask.
-
Maybe, if he wasn't so focused on himself and his own feelings, he would notice everything sooner. Maybe he would notice that the shyness was born out of fear, maybe he would notice the scars, the anger, the struggle, and maybe, just maybe, he would be able to do something about it before it was too late.
Before Junpei's mom. Before a special grade curse.
It's not fair that Junpei's whole life was shaped by violence, that even in his death he was mutilated, his essence deposed, shaped into an instrument to only commit destruction.
He was worthy of so much more.
And yet.
-
He knows Nanami and Gojo talk about him again, but he can't bring himself to worry about it.
-
He cooks so much that Nanami has to take the leftovers in a lunchbox Yuuji finds in one of the many half-empty kitchen cabinets home with him when he visits.
He sits on the couch; he scrolls through the old texts. He doesn't go to any more missions.
He thinks about all the questions he will be able to ask and about the ones he won't.
He is not sure how much time passes exactly, but somewhere there, in between the grief and the couch and Gojo's kitchen, he meets Okkotsu Yuuta.
-
The goodwill event is not to happen for a couple more weeks, in Gojo's words. Both he and Nanami seem to be around more these days, and he's not sure if the change has anything to do with the decrease of cursed spirits activity.
He becomes fully convinced of the opposite when he finishes baking milk bread loaves one day, swiping the counters with a wet rug, and Gojo brings home a boy that can't be anything but another sorcerer.
The boy is pale, black-haired, just about Yuuji's height, has a look of someone who hasn't slept in a couple of days, and a radiating presence of powerful cursed energy to him. And a katana.
Yuuji wants to raise his head to the sky—the perfect white of the room ceiling—and ask, why me, God? Does it have to be me? What is it, a second chance? Karma? A cruel mockery from the universe? Or Gojo, for that matter?
He reminds himself that Gojo wasn't there with them on the mission, haven't seen Junpei. Nanami did. He wonders if Nanami knows about it. If he knew about it.
He offers the boy some fresh milk bread.
-
Nanami and Gojo get back to carrying out more missions, and the boy keeps coming back, too.
The boy's name is Okkotsu Yuuta; he is a second year in Jujutsu Tech on an untimely study trip and the third special grade sorcerer to exist right now, as far as Yuuji knows.
He wonders if the boy is here to take care of him or to take care of him. He is not sure which one would be more embarrassing in this situation.
At the very least, the boy—Okkotsu Yuuta—seems to be taking most of Yuuji's culinary experiments with unlimited patience and acceptance, and in a couple of days, Yuuji's even able to talk him into starting giving some meaningful feedback on the taste.
He shares his experience with African cuisine, and Yuuji talks about the dishes his grandpa taught him how to make.
He describes his classmates, ones that Yuuji hasn't yet had a chance to meet with, retells the last year's goodwill event, and chuckles sheepishly when Yuuji's amazed by him sending the whole Kyoto class home as losers.
He listens attentively when Yuuji tells him about the rest of the first years and even shares a couple of stories about Fushiguro he happens to already know, and his effort fills Yuuji with gratitude.
The next time he comes back from visiting Jujutsu Tech after fulfilling a couple of missions he periodically takes while he's in Japan, he tells Yuuji a little about how everyone is doing.
Yuuji doesn't think he tells him everything, but just knowing his friends are doing alright makes him feel a little better, too.
-
Even when the two of them are not talking at all, it's still not entirely unpleasant, at least not for Yuuji.
He moves through the kitchen; his mind is almost blissfully quiet while he's is busy with measurements, ingredient sequences, and timing the steps. His hands are steady when he's whisking, cracking the eggs into the bowl, washing, and cutting, and mixing.
The fueling anger inside of him doesn't disappear. The sorrow doesn't either.
He feels the unmoving presence behind his back, where Yuuta sits quietly on the high chair at the countertop, his dark eyes following Yuuji's movements.
He thinks he can get used to it one day.
-
They are not close exactly, still. They met only a week ago or so, and asking it... Yuuji isn't actually sure at what point of knowing someone it's fine to talk about things like these. He wants to ask Nobara about it, she probably would know. He also wants to ask Fushiguro, but he's pretty sure that even if he were able to, he wouldn't get anything personal out of the guy, with Fushiguro being seemingly allergic to talking about staff that involves being vulnerable with people.
He still wants to, though.
He's not new to missing people. His whole life sometimes feels like missing people who aren't there anymore, now more than ever before: the parents he didn't really know, his grandpa, his classmates, Kugisaki and Megumi.
He doesn't know why it feels different this time, with Junpei. Though, he supposes, he does know, in a way that is not completely logical.
He doesn't have any memories of his parents, so he hasn't really ever missed the people they were, only the emptiness they left after themselves, and though he misses his grandpa a lot, he knows that he had a long life, and it was time for him to go and for Yuuji to move on with his life.
He knows he can call his old classmates, not right now, maybe, but later, when he isn't hidden away from the world anymore, though he doesn't really know if he'll have much to talk with them about, not after all that happened since he left his old school.
He knows he will see his friends eventually. He will apologize, and he will ask them all the questions that have been piling up in his head for so long, and he hopes they will still want to answer, and to watch movies together, and shop, and eat out, and complain about Gojo-sensei together.
He knows he will never be able to do all those things with Junpei.
To go to the cinema. To sit in the park and talk about weird niche films and references to old projects hidden there by the directors and gossip about actors and ponder if another remake will be better than the original.
To watch the sun slowly fall with him by Yuuji's side. To go to his house and eat nice homemade food that isn't his for the first time since his grandpa was taken to the hospital.
He knows why it feels different, deep down.
"Have you ever lost someone you really liked? Like. Not older people, which I know sucks just as much, but," he swallows. Maybe he shouldn't have even started it. He traces the lines on a pattern of a blanket Gojo left on the couch a while ago when he fell asleep there during his weird TV-marathon training again. But he already started it, so he needs to finish it too. The blanket is still perfectly soft and smooth and probably stupidly expensive like most things in this house, but he manages to find a slightly loose thread on the side and starts rolling it in between his fingers. "Like. Someone with a whole life ahead of them?"
Yuuta doesn't reply immediately, not that Yuuji is expecting him to.
The silence between them is not uncomfortable. They have only known each other for so little, but Yuuji would say that he's growing to learn the way Yuuta is. They still don't talk a lot. If he'd met him a couple of months ago, it would be different, he thinks. But he doesn't want to talk that much, not anymore.
He doesn't think Yuuta minds.
"Gojo didn't tell you much about my technique, did he?"
The words give Yuuji the urge to finally look up from his knees and direct his eyes to Yuuta sitting beside him. He doesn't seem mad about the question; there is a pensive look on his face, and a corner of his mouth is slightly tilted in a way that may suggest a smile that doesn't really form. He looks like he's thinking about something ironic.
Yuuji isn't sure, though. He's too afraid to start cataloging the whole variety of expressions Yuuta's face can make. The last time he did it to someone, it didn't end well. He's afraid he's starting to, anyways.
He slowly shakes his head.
He's not even sure what Gojo told Yuuta about Yuuji. If he knows what Yuuji did, what Yuuji is. He's so careful with him, it makes him assume he knows. Or that he's just that good at reading people.
The darker part of his brain whispers that if Yuuta really knew it all, everything would be different. But maybe, he is just a kinder person, to be merciful to Yuuji like that.
Yuuta looks back at him for a couple of seconds and hums in acknowledgement. "I suppose he wouldn't." He turns away again, but it doesn't look like the conversation is over. He looks like he has something to say, but the words take time arranging in the right order in his head. Or maybe he's thinking of the best way of turning Yuuji's question down. He isn't sure. He doesn't think so.
If it was a couple of months ago, or a couple of weeks even, he thinks that it could make him uneasy. He thinks that he could've apologized for intruding or said that Yuuta doesn't have to answer if it's too personal or just laughed it off.
He doesn't now. He remembers how his still beating heart felt and looked in his hand after being ripped out of his chest, and somehow this memory still doesn't make him shudder as much as what happened after. But maybe he's just gotten more used to it. He doesn't think he will ever get used to what happened to Junpei.
So he doesn't say anything. They sit in silence for a couple more minutes, as they did before; the TV in front of them is dark and motionless. He doesn't really want to watch anything anymore, which, he assumes, doesn't matter much, since he already learned how to not get punched by a plushie every time he gets emotional. His cursed energy is mostly under control now. And he doesn't think the soft murmuring of the voices coming from the speakers and the images flickering on the screen will bring him as much comfort as they did before.
"There was once a girl," Yuuta finally says. Yuuji turns his head to look at him again and notices Yuuta's hands carefully spinning a small silver ring on his fourth finger. He'd noticed it before, of course.
He didn't ask Yuuta about it. In the time they've known each other, he never once mentioned anyone besides his three classmates, his mentor from Africa, and Gojo, and Shoko, and Fushiguro, and Kugisaki, a little.
He knew there was a story behind it. He wonders if that's the one.
"There was a girl," he repeats, "when I was little, and she was too. But then I grew up, and she didn't, though sometimes it feels the other way around."
He pauses. Yuuji considers saying something, but all the words he can come up with feel a little hollow when he considers letting them out in the space in between them.
"I liked her, loved her, as much as a child could love someone, I suppose. I think I could really love her, too, if she grew up as I did."
He wonders if Yuuta had someone by his side then. He was little, he says. Yuuji wonders if he had family, or friends, or teachers he could rely on. He wonders what made him want to go on after that. He wonders if the hole in his chest ever stopped aching, if it ever healed, if he thinks it will ever heal, if he managed to find something that matched its torn edges to fill it in.
Maybe he will ask him one day.
"I'm sorry", Yuuji finally says back. Yuuta hums in response, quietly.
"Gojo once said to me that love is the most twisted curse of all. I have to agree with him on that, I suppose. My love for her was so twisted it cursed her soul and bound her spirit to me when she was supposed to be gone for good. It's only recently I was able to free her from that broken, corrupt form, from the sickening burden of caring about me."
Yuuji thinks about what he would've done if he had a chance to make Junpei live, make him stay with Yuuji in his final form, his soul broken and twisted by the curse of human hatred. If that would be life at all. If he would curse him, too, with his desperation, with his egotistical desire not to end up alone again. He isn't sure.
He's glad he didn't have that chance, in a way.
"I think I could love him too," Yuuji offers back, "eventually." It's scary, and it hurts, but it feels right, nonetheless. If anything, Junpei deserves him saying it out loud. "But I will never know for sure, now."
He doesn't even know if Junpei liked guys like that, which now seems like a silly thing to care about.
He doesn't know if it would work between them, even if he did, or if they would just stay friends, or if their paths would part eventually, but it's not really the point.
The point is that Junpei could've lived if Yuuji was smarter and faster and less selfish, and his mom could've lived too, and life is full of potential.
He could've lived, and Yuuji could've introduced him to his friends, and they could've gone to Jujutsu Tech together, and his life could've been better, but he isn't, and he won't, and there is nothing Yuuji can do about it, not anymore.
"I understand," Yuuta says softly, with an exhale, and Yuuji can feel his shoulders relax a little.
He does understand, Yuuji supposes. It's sickening and a little freeing to know there is someone who understands it.
"I'm sorry, too," Yuuta repeats back, and Yuuji knows these words are not just an empty acknowledgement said out of politeness, just like his weren't.
Yuuji hums.
They sit in silence again for a little bit. The curtains slowly get colored in golden and amber and red by the light as the sunset reaches the windows from the outside.
He wonders if Gojo will be able to get some time in between the missions to eat dinner together today. If Nanami will visit them soon too. If he should start cooking something just in case. Maybe he could suggest Yuuta cook with him this time, if he doesn't have anything else planned for the evening.
He smoothes the pulled thread back to the blanket. "Maybe love can be a curse sometimes," he says. "But I don't think caring about someone is a burden."
The corner of Yuuta's lips raises slightly, shaping his mouth into a soft one-sided smile.
It's not happy, exactly. But it's nice, still.
-