Chapter Text
If one thing defined Gakuganji Yoshinobu as a professor, it was his no-bullshit agenda, and his insistence to keep anything not work-related outside of the classroom. The only instance of fun was the half hour he spent at the start of each semester going over his near negative score on ratemyprofessor.com, a tradition as old as the website itself. He often quoted Socrates and exclaimed happily when anyone quoted him or Plato, but ran a tight ship and had a passing rate of 67%. He curated the syllabus carefully, picking authors and philosophers across the continent, could quote pages out of thousand-page-tomes, and rebuted the belief that "there are no stupid questions", by which he made sure to ridicule at least one stupid question each lecture. None of these things helped convince Yuuji that he wasn't a heartless monster.
46 students had dropped the course over summer; not a rare occurence. This degree wasn't the easiest, and most treated English Language and Literature studies as a placeholder until spaces freed up in the city's law school, or switched degrees to psychology. The fact that Yoshino Junpei hadn't dropped the course, but instead planted a bullet in his head, didn't matter. He was part of a number that Gakuganji didn't have to deal with— a statistic that lessened his workload when he corrected assignments. He did not care that one student in his 70-people-class was affected despite the four months that had passed.
Itadori Yuuji did not know about the statistic and was upset about the lack of understanding surrounding him. The loss of his best friend weighed heavily on him. Classrooms seemed empty without him, the lectures useless. He missed Junpei's notes in class and caught himself repeatedly leaning in to empty space to repeat a joke. He missed Junpei's pranks and the times they spent preparing for exams together. He missed Junpei. Nothing could ever make his absence okay.
It started small, with missing afternoon classes when he felt too tired to deal with classmates he hardly spoke to, but it became more and more as his absences started pilling up. In the end, it had snowballed into three weeks worth of consecutive missed classes, one missed mid-term exam, and a gap in his already leaky knowledge. Grandpa didn't know— he left the house in the morning, half an hour before Yuuji was supposed to leave, to get to his job, and didn't question finding his youngest grandson already at home when he returned.
But Choso had been home since last week, finally back from his overseas project, and Yuuji couldn't spend the days in his room anymore. A voice deep down told him that Choso was only looking out for him when he forced him to get up each morning, though he couldn't help but resent him for it. But getting up was torture. Getting ready was torture. Eating more than a bite was torture. And worst of all, Choso insisted on walking with him to uni each day, on his way to the gym. The same road he took with Junpei and Sukuna now seemed like a desert, or rather, a Cavalry.
Gakuganji was already handing out the attendance sheet when Yuuji slipped into class, settling into the seventh row, which quickly emptied. He tried not to take it too harshly, after all, he did look like he'd spent the summer being tortured, but it sucked and over all was the cherry on top of a bad, bad start to a week. He took out his notebook and started doodling away, before reaching for his phone without even half an hour having passed.
"Phones down, people. If you can't let your device down then why bother coming to class at all?" Gakuganji's voice cut through the classroom, and a couple of heads whipped to the direction he was not looking at. Yuuji was sure he turned one shade shy of beetroot and tried to make his phone disappear on his lap, clumsily hitting his desk with his hand. Awesome. He could already feel his knuckles turning red. He'd hit his hand in the worst spot, but no one reacted because today's tempo was swift. The two missed classes because of the elders' conference had to be made up one way or another, after all.
"MARXISM," the professor was just underlining on the chalkboard, as Yuuji lifted his head, his face a pink matching his hair colour. He sighed and picked his pen up, ready to jot down his definition of Marxism and its impact on literary analysis, when he noticed he was being watched. At the end of his row, divided by just five seats, Fushiguro Megumi, best second-year student, was eyeing him up and down scornfully, his stylus in hand.
Class went by agonizingly slow, with more and more terms dropped, suggested readings added to a never-ending list, and questions answered with words Yuuji was sure he heard for the first time. He felt his head spinning at the end of it and wasn't sure he only imagined a faint lightheadedness.
"For those who haven't picked up their assignments yet, come by my desk to get them. This is your last chance," Gakuganji finished the lecture, thanking the students and headed to his ancient laptop, plucking cables from it like tugging weeds from the ground.
Yuuji knew that this affected him as well. The assignment he'd turned in three weeks ago was a horrifying mix of a caffeine overdosis and an anxiety induced study session that had lasted one hour. He wished he never handed it in. It was with a timid voice that he asked for his paper, and no surprise -nor any other emotion- appeared on his face when he saw a paper littered with red ink.
"Go over the syllabus again, focus on Gadamer. Make a list of your questions. Office hours are on Wednesdays, 13.00-15.00, no appt needed." signed, Gakuganji. Say what you will about the old man- if there's one thing he could do, that was be correct. Yuuji knew that hardly any other professor would add this to such a failed text sample, but couldn't bring himself to appreciate it. it was just another failed test, another piece of proof that he was a failure, a red stamp of nothingness looming over him.
"What the hell is a gadamer," he asked himself as he shoved the paper into his bag and left class without looking back.
He found himself kicking rocks on his way back home. If Junpei were here, they would laugh about the eccentric professor and compare assignments, which would hopefully not have been as red as his. Then they'd pregame at his house and attend Toge's party, and they would end their night sleeping over at either one of their houses. Instead, Yuuji was left to walk back home alone. Junpei haunted his memories, and he found himself back at the questions he'd been asking all summer:
Where there any signs? What had pushed his friend to commit suicide? Did he feel any pain? Was suicide truly a solution?
Day after day, he weighed his odds, and found himself leaning more on his absent friend's shoulder.
"Tonight is the night," he told himself as he unlocked the front door. Choso was waiting for him in the kitchen, meal ready, table set, and a curiosity on everything that had transpired.