#manga readers are insufferable

[pain-in-the-butler]

LMAO he did not say that!

"Then you'll let the matter drop?" What a normal milquetoast benign phrase. This is loser Sebastian erasure, manga readers know that our resident stinky demon takes any opportunity he can to bully a child

^^^ the actual, insufferable words Sebastian says

[awearywritersworld]

i was benevolent and good; misery made me a fiend

sukuna x reader summary: you persuade sukuna to play go fish. the two of you have a small disagreement (he really can't stay mad at you). he confides in you about his past as a sorcerer. w/c: 3.4k tags/warnings: the teeniest bit of angst. mostly fluff. banter. cursing. aged up!yuuji. slight yuuji x reader. not canon compliant. fem!reader. no use of y/n. no manga spoilers. a/n: the first section could be read as a brief(ish) stand alone. and for context, the world's shortest frankenstein synopsis: victor frankenstein brings a creature to life using dead body parts and thrusts him into a world he doesn't understand, then promptly abandons him and wishes him dead. alone and regarded as repulsive by every human he comes across, the creature begs frankenstein to create a wife for him too. when frankenstein refuses, the creature is further driven to hatred and violence. series masterlist // masterlist

"we should play a card game!" you exclaim as if you've just had the world's greatest idea.

"i'll pass."

sukuna sounds listless, like it's quite possibly the worst proposition he's ever heard.

"why's that? scared i'll beat you?"

"i'm opposed to mind numbing boredom, more like."

"you really need to expand your horizons," you suggest, making your way over to where you keep your playing cards. "all you do is read and brood."

"it's gotten me this far."

you don't respond, too busy rifling through your bookshelf. just as you spot your cards, a book catches your eye and you pull it from its place.

making your way back over to him, you drop it in his lap. "since you found jane eyre so insufferable, here's one you might actually like."

he surveys the cover, which reads: frankenstein or the modern prometheus

you take a seat across from him at the kotatsu table and shuffle the deck, while sukuna flips through the pages with new found intrigue.

"what's it about?"

"the dangers of playing god. should be right up your alley."

"your subtly never ceases to amaze."

"i'm just kidding." you laugh. "there's a lot more to it than that— revenge, loneliness, personal responsibility..."

he turns the book over. "it's written by a woman?"

you raise your eyebrows at him. "what, you don't think women have enough depth to write about those kinds of topics?"

"no, it was just an observation," he says off handedly. "you are evidence enough to the contrary."

he doesn't say it as a compliment, more so as a statement of fact. you hope your astonishment isn't written all over your face.

clearing your throat, you begin dealing while explaining the rules to him.

he takes up his cards and seems to understand the game after only a turn or two, but you're narrowing your eyes at him soon thereafter.

"go fish," he says for the fourth time in a row.

your gaze shifts down to his hands. there's just no way. "show me your cards."

"wouldn't that defeat the purpose of this stupid game?"

"not if you're cheating, now let me see."

"no."

you reach across the table, hoping to snatch them from his grasp, but he just holds them out of your reach.

swiftly rising to your feet, you launch yourself at him in a sad attempt to catch him off guard.

with only one arm extended, he easily fends off your attack. "do you actually think you have a chance here?"

you sink to your knees in defeat and sit with your legs folded beneath you. "not really, but i have to know if you'd stoop this low."

"that so? had you believed me to be above cheating?"

you gasp. "so you admit it?"

"i told you i didn't want to play," he deadpans.

"that doesn't mean you had to cheat! now we have to start over!"

he carelessly tosses the cards onto the table. "i don't think so."

"please?" you lean forward, jutting out your bottom lip.

he just stares at you with an air of disinterest.

sukuna can be so haughty sometimes, and frankly, it drives you a little crazy. you'd give anything to wipe that look from his face— to prove that he doesn't find this as miserable as he lets on.

leaning forward even further, your hands meet with the carpet to support your shifting weight. now he's watching intently as your face approaches his, your eyes flicking down to his lips.

unbeknownst to you, sukuna's breath catches in his throat once he sees your gaze shift, though his mind struggles to catch up. it happens so fast that he hardly registers the quick peck you place on his lips (though maybe it's not the speed of the occurrence, so much as his shock).

"please?" you repeat.

he looks off to the side and stays silent, though his demeanor is indicative of some heated internal debate.

sukuna can't let you win, not that easily. you'd be under the impression that you actually have power over him! and for what? some measly kiss?

no, he simply will not allow that. "i already told you—"

grabbing him by the chin, you cut off his words with another kiss, but this time it lasts a few beats longer. your lips don't move against his, they just linger there in a way that that makes him question whether all of the oxygen has vanished from the room.

when you pull away, you're looking at him expectantly with the same pout still playing on your lips.

"fine!" he barks, grumbling something afterwards that sounds a lot like "evil little minx."

"human earthworm two is definitely still the best."

you're walking home with yuuji after a late night showing of the newest movie in the series.

"no way," you contend. "this one was even better."

he gawks at you. "in no world is the seventh film in an anthology the best! you're crazy—"

sukuna's mouth appears, always eager for a chance to undermine his vessel. "she's right, brat."

yuuji can't believe his ears. "what?! you haven't even seen it!"

"i don't know," you interject slyly. "i'm willing to look past that. it really seems like he knows what he's talking about."

"you mean the guy who's existence predates cinema?" yuuji asks, his eyebrows furrowing as a thought occurs to him. "what'd you do all day anyway? watch plays?"

"..among other things, yes." sukuna answers.

"if you look at it logically," you reason, "we probably wouldn't have movies without theater, so we should definitely consider him an expert in this case."

"oh please, baby. when the topic is ancient civilization or being a homicidal maniac, i'll be sure to solicit his opinion then."

"i resent that," sukuna declares, his conviction forcing a giggle from your lips.

"why?" you question. "was it the part where he called you old as shit, or the part where he called you a murderous lunatic?"

yuuji brings a hand to his mouth to stifle a snort, but you're freely laughing now.

sukuna scoffs indignantly and bites back a comment about how partial you seem to be toward said lunatic. "and to think i defended your opinion."

his response has you clutching at your sides and struggling to see through teary eyes.

but perhaps karma is real, because not a moment later, you step off the curb in a way that sends a sharp sensation through your leg.

you gasp in pain and brace yourself for the impact of falling to the concrete, but it never comes. instead, you're left with fingers clamped tightly around your wrist and a strange sense of deja vu.

you turn your head just before the dark lines fade from yuuji's arm completely.

"tch, watch where you're going idiot," sukuna scolds, his mouth disappearing as soon as he finishes speaking.

"are you okay?" yuuji asks worriedly.

"absolutely," you claim, but when you try to put weight on your left foot, you let out a hiss.

yuuji's hands find your waist, hoping to keep you steady. before you know it, he's crouching in front of you with his back turned and beckoning you to wrap your arms around his neck.

once you do, he hooks his arms under your thighs and easily stands up. "this okay? you comfy?"

"yeah. i can't believe i just did that." you hide your face in the space where his neck meets his shoulder. "thanks, yu."

when you get home, yuuji sets you up on the couch with icepacks, heating pads, three different drinks, two different books, and the tv remote.

he still asks if you have everything you need several times, then kisses you sweetly before heading to bed.

around thirty minutes later, sukuna's leaning in the doorway with his arms crossed.

"hey," you greet. your eyes never leave the tv, as you're privy to the slight tension between the both of you.

he skips the evening's pleasantries. "i could heal it, you know."

you finally turn to face him. "really?"

"of course." he rolls his eyes. "some of us can actually use reverse cursed technique."

"and you've just let me hobble around the past hour anyway?"

he shrugs. "you pissed me off."

you blink at him a few times, rubbing at your temples. "well what about now?"

"i don't know," he begins, making his way over to you. he towers over where you're seated on the couch, so you have to crane your neck to look up at him. "just doesn't really seem like something a homicidal maniac would do, but maybe if he were to receive an apology..."

you cover your face with your hands and groan. "i didn't say that. this is really something you should take up with yuuji—"

"i don't make a habit of conversing with the brat, so if that's the way you're going to be..." he turns on his heel and starts for the bedroom, but you grab onto his sleeve just before he's out of reach.

"wait. please don't go."

just like that, your words have his resolve crumbling and any of his lingering irritation ebbs away. he urges himself to stay strong though, especially after the go fish debacle.

when he doesn't speak, you let out a breath.

"i'm sorry, sukuna." he can tell right away that you're being entirely sincere. "i would never purposefully hurt your feelings. i only meant to tease you, but i can see how i was being mean."

are those... are those tears swimming in your eyes? are you in that much pain, or did he just make you feel that badly? in any case, he endeavors to remedy it immediately.

moving around the couch until he's in front of you, sukuna kneels between your legs. he grabs your left foot gingerly, situating it on his thigh before hovering his hand over top of it.

he sighs. "i don't care if you tease me and you weren't being.. mean." the words sounds so juvenile to him.

you weren't necessarily wrong either, goes unsaid.

well, he'd like to consider himself a little more sophisticated than 'maniac' would imply, but that's beside the point.

"then why are you upset with me?"

his jaw flexes as he tries to find the right words. "i would prefer you do that when it's just.. us."

"oh." realization dawns on you, as does another heap of guilt. you know he despises being trapped in yuuji's body, and you completely failed to consider how ganging up on him might make him feel. "i'm... fuck. i'm really sorry, sukuna—"

"stop apologizing," he urges you in a low voice. it's partly because what he just said makes him feel pathetic, but more than that, it's because the look of self reproach you're wearing is akin to a thousand needles in his chest. "it's fine."

he can't believe you're sitting there with so much remorse over a man like him because you... what? wounded his pride?

he probably deserves it anyway.

why should you give a shit when he's done things a thousand times worse, a million different times?

oh, right. because you care about him.

you can't see the cursed energy at play, but you can tell it's working as your pain begins to dissipate.

once he's finished, he carefully moves your foot to the floor and looks up at you. it's not unlike the way a person might gaze at one of the wonders of the world, like they're lucky to be there in the first place.

with the intensity of his gaze, it feels like he can see right into your head— read your every thought and pick apart every emotion. has anyone ever looked at you like that before? you're having a hard time remembering. you're having a hard time thinking of anything at all, really.

so it goes without saying that you don't think about it when you lean forward and kiss him.

it's not at all like when you were trying to convince him to play cards. no, this isn't light hearted or frivolous.

and it's not like the other two kisses you've shared either. it isn't heated or desperate, nor does it leave you gasping for air.

it's tender. it's so fucking tender, in fact, that sukuna wonders whether he's going to crumble beneath your touch.

he grips the area just above your knees, as if needing something to tether himself to before he withers away completely.

his lips move with yours in a way that's slow and careful.

your hands are on either side of his face, ghosting over his skin as a testament to your hesitance— like you're not certain if this is something he would want.

he wonders how in the world you could ever second guess yourself.

when you pull back, you examine his face for a moment before a small, shy smile tugs at your lips and you murmur, "thanks 'kuna."

he just peers at you wordlessly and it makes you nervous, so you attempt to fill the silence. "it feels so much better. a-and i'm sorry again abo—"

his hand finds the back of your neck, pulling your lips against his for a moment longer. "don't mention it, angel."

ever since you gave sukuna your copy of frankenstein, he's spent a decent portion of your nights together reading, his brows drawn together in concentration.

upon finishing, he stares at the page after taking in the final line: "he was soon borne away by the waves and lost in darkness and distance."

he's deathly quiet and wearing some unreadable expression. his eyes seem far off.

you leave him be for a little while, as it's clear he's lost in thought, but eventually you grow a bit concerned. it's been nearly half an hour since he last moved.

"sukuna?"

he turns to you. "why did you think i would enjoy this particular book?"

you consider his question carefully, his mood evoking your own seriousness. "it's... elegant and tragic. i suppose i appreciate the moral grayness of it. why do you ask?"

"no reason."

"did you enjoy it?"

"yes."

"why?"

he ignores your question. "frankenstein— do you like his character?"

you can't help but feel like you're answering some sort of riddle. "i think he's foolish and arrogant, but i guess i pity him to some degree."

"and the creature?"

"i'm much more sympathetic toward him. he's very... complex and certainly less culpable for the events of the novel than his creator."

you're surprised when he laughs. "of course you would think that way."

and with that, he's flipping through the pages of the novel. you move to sit beside him and once he finds what he's looking for near the middle, he begins reading:

"remember, thou hast made me more powerful than thyself; my height is superior to thine, my joints more supple. but i will not be tempted to set myself in opposition to thee. i am thy creature, and i will be even mild and docile to my natural lord and king if thou wilt also perform thy part, the which thou owest me. oh, frankenstein, be not equitable to every other and trample upon me alone, to whom thy justice, and even thy clemency and affection, is most due. remember that i am thy creature; i ought to be thy adam, but i am rather the fallen angel, whom thou drivest from joy for no misdeed. everywhere i see bliss, from which i alone am irrevocably excluded. i was benevolent and good; misery made me a fiend. make me happy, and i shall again be virtuous.”

his voice is strangely even, almost bordering on robotic. you're struck with the notion that he's attempting (with rare difficulty) to mask his emotions.

you regard him quizzically and wait for him to speak. the last thing you expect to hear tumbles from his lips.

"you know they called me the disgraced one?" you nod. "do you know why?"

"i know the story that sorcerers have passed down."

he hums. leaning back into the couch, he looks fixedly at the ceiling before continuing. "i was just a boy when i was orphaned and no one knew anything about my heritage, including me. jujutsu society took me in and raised me as a sorcerer."

"and you didn't care for it?"

"oh, quite the opposite. i reveled in it. my strength was unprecedented, that much was clear from the start. i surpassed my teachers with ease, and eventually, i took to training alone— reading primitive texts and honing skills that they couldn't teach me."

your hand finds his thigh, hoping to offer him some consolation before beckoning him to continue. "then what happened?"

"the men who had been my teachers, who had been the only.. family i'd ever known.. they scorned me. deemed me reckless and dangerous to jujutsu society. plotted my demise."

your voice is small when you ask, "were they right?"

he wants to hate the question— wants to hate you for asking it— but he knows that it's warranted.

"no. i admit i was forward thinking and a bit.. unorthodox, but i wasn't..."

"what they thought you were?" you offer gently.

he nods. "not until they made me that way— not until they abandoned me and backed me into a corner like some animal."

you struggle to find the right thing to say, if any such thing even exists. you're amazed that he's confiding in you, and while it makes your heart swell, you really don't want to fuck it up.

he looks back down at the book, his eyes scanning the paragraph before repeating, "i was benevolent and good; misery made me a fiend."

he says it as if he's coming to terms with the circumstances of his life for the very first time.

"the creature was remorseful at the end of the novel," you recall somewhat bravely. "are you?"

sukuna thinks for a great deal of time before replying. you wait patiently for him.

"no," he answers decidedly.

looking over at you for the first time since he began his story, he's relieved to find your face is free of rebuke. instead, there's a warm willingness to understand him. a sadness because of the way he was alienated.

he's curious whether anyone would be able to read the sentiment on your face, or if he just knows you better than most.

is that a privilege he's worthy of? he doubts it.

"you didn't deserve what they did to you," you whisper, reaching up to rake your fingers through his hair, nails grazing his scalp before your palm rests against his temple.

his head leans almost imperceptibly into your hand, and any regret or unease he may have felt at relaying his past to you disappears. watching a single tear slip down your cheek, he wipes it away with the pad of his thumb.

he means to say "don't cry. not for me," but the words die in his throat.

for once, your tears are for him rather than because of him and it's utterly riveting. the fact that someone like you would cry on his behalf seems to contradict every horrible thing he's ever been told about himself.

he could sit here and bask in the feeling forever— he's always known himself to be selfish after all. and you know it too, don't you?

his eyes flicker between each of yours, studying your face. "do you want to know why i don't regret the things i've done?"

you tilt your head to the side. "why?"

"because even if it's made me into a monster..."

for a moment, he contemplates not saying anything more. he considers forcing himself to pull away from your touch, even if it's the only comfort he's been given his entire life. he might still be able to salvage whatever tiny, laughable pieces remain of his pride—

"all of my actions have led me to you."

your eyes soften before you're wrapping your arms around his neck and pressing your body to his. he returns the gesture after a few seconds pass.

you know he's awful. you know he's cruel. you know that what he's been through doesn't excuse his actions. but still— you want so desperately to take away his pain. to make up for all the things in his past. to wipe the blood from his hands.

as you embrace such an incredibly complicated man (one who is infamous for unrivaled wickedness, yet has his face buried in your hair), you ponder the creature's plea: "make me happy, and i shall again be virtuous."

a/n 2: if you're still w me, thanks for reading!! i'm not sure how i feel abt this part, so feedback is both welcome and appreciated!! also, how do we like sukuna using angel?? in my head he picked it up from the "my good angel" line in jane eyre, so i hope it doesn't seem too unnatural. alsoooo, highly recommend frankenstein. it's one of my favorite books!! mary shelley popped off and literally created the entire genre of science fiction at 21! anyway, thanks for all the love yall, it means the world<3

taglist: @96jnie @ay0nha @sad-darksoul @bbysatoruuu @luciiferian @risuola @lirasmoon @disaster-rose @archivist-ghoul606 @creative1writings @sloppyzengarden @omismicrowave @cecesharktales @tanyeonn @hiqhkey @ruixrei @yellowsubiesdance @thefallofruins @anything-and-everything-here69 @emzalot @thepup356 @browneyedgirl22 @lantsovheiress // users in bold could not be tagged. if i forgot to tag anyone, my apologies!! just give me a heads up.

[asahicore]

real me, real you - psh

pairing. sunghoon x fem!reader (ft. jay... sorry)

synopsis. You’re your school’s popular pretty smart girl, but with a twist - you lead a completely different life at home, where you are messy, lazy and foul-mouthed. Only your family and best friend Sumin know about this, until Park Sunghoon, of all people, finds out. The resident cold and arrogant heartbreaker of your school decides to blackmail you into doing his biddings - but you can’t say no, not even when he asks you to be his fake girlfriend, otherwise he’ll ruin your reputation. But as you and Sunghoon get closer, you realize that maybe he’s not so bad after all, and you may be more similar than you'd originally though - all while your old childhood friend Jay watches from the sidelines.

genre. fake dating, high school au, very slight love triangle action, fluff and angst

warnings. this is the first thing i ever wrote so there may be slightly cringe and awkward things but i didn't wanna change anything lol, hoon is a meanie at some point and everything is dramatic and very fanfic-y, mild childhood trauma for both of them &lt;3

word count. 22.9k

author's note. @end-hyphen genie this one is for you... i hope you still like this fic after all this time lol ! as i said in the warnings i only changed a few typos and punctuation from the original but i decided to not make any major changes bc i think it's nice to see what my writing was like when i had just started out!! hopefully i've improved lol, also this was not inspired by true beauty!! i've never seen the show nor read the webtoon. i was inspired by two mangas called switch girl and kare kano (or his and her circumstances) which have this plot of a girl being two different people at school and at home. anyways hope u guys enjoy this and if u do pls lmk <333

Nobody was supposed to find out.

You were the most popular girl in school, known for your looks, good grades, and kind personality. You had a nice group of friends and the whole school at your feet, students and staff alike. As the student representative, you had an image to keep up and needed everyone to think you were perfect; and they did. So you always wore a smile on your face, kept your head up and made sure your uniform was creaseless, all while maintaining the highest scores in your year. Always being friendly to your peers and helping them out prevented anyone from thinking you were a stuck-up goody-two-shoes. You made high school look like a breeze.

But such a life didn’t exist. Who was happy waking up at 6 a.m. every day and dedicating all of their time to schoolwork and student life? You certainly weren’t. What you thrived off of was having everyone think you were. Hearing whispers in the corridor of, “She’s so pulled together!” or “I wish I had her life”, now, those skyrocketed you to heaven. The cherry on top was a nod of approval from a teacher or an “outstanding job again, Y/N” as they handed you back your graded paper. Your favorite color had become the red of the pens your teachers used to write A+ at the top of the page. 

You’d always been academically gifted, but as you heard those words more and more, you’d started craving them and doing everything to hear them again until they started controlling you instead of the other way around. Everything you did needed to be perfect. And that was how you had created this persona of the perfect girl who had it all together at the ripe age of 17. But that’s exactly what it was; a persona. 

As soon as you stepped off the bus and waved goodbye to your friends, you became another person. Or more accurately, you reverted back to your natural self. You weren’t an evil person by any means; it wasn’t your intention to actively deceive everyone at school, it was more of a side effect of keeping up appearances. Only your family and your closest friend Sumin knew what you were truly like: greedy, messy, short-tempered, self-centered, and sometimes downright insufferable. Your younger siblings, Sunoo and Yeeun, liked to joke that you had a button you switched on and off whenever you left the house. When on, you were the sweetest girl ever, but when off, all your vices crept up and let themselves known to the world, or rather to your family. You didn’t mean to make them suffer, but after a long day of being perfect, you needed to blow off some steam; if they had to be your metaphorical punching bag, so be it. 

When Sunoo entered high school, you made him swear he wouldn’t say a thing to anyone. You trusted him and knew he wouldn’t let your secret out - it was too entertaining for him to see you act perfect at school and reveal your true self at home. There was no risk of anyone finding out - you were so intent on keeping the act up that nothing ever slipped you. It had been that way since middle school, and your senior year of high school was going to be no different.

Nobody was supposed to find out, so what was Park Sunghoon doing right in front of you in the frozen aisle of the corner convenience store, just when you happened to be bare-faced, with thick glasses on and a pimple bright red from just having been popped, in your comfiest pajamas, and a tub of Ben & Jerry’s in hand?

“Kim Y/N? Y/N, is that you?”

You froze in place, not knowing how to react. There was no way this, your worst nightmare, was actually happening.

When you regained your senses, flight seemed the best way out of this. You avoided Sunghoon’s curious gaze and curtly replied, “No, sorry, I don’t know who that is,” before walking away, iron grip on the ice cream.

But the boy was quicker than you and grabbed you by the wrist, forcing you to turn around. “It is you! Come on, Y/N, aren’t we friends? Do you not recognize me or something?”

If it wasn’t for the panic coursing through your veins at that moment, you might’ve laughed at his question. How could you not recognize the Park Sunghoon? Along with Park Jongseong and Sim Jaeyun, or Jay and Jake as they liked to be called, he was only the most popular guy in your year - hell, in the whole school. The three of them had gained attention from freshman year as the three handsome soccer players. Jake and Sunghoon had been attached at the hip since kindergarten, Jay joining them sometime in middle school when he came back from his year abroad in Seattle. 

Your parents and Jay’s had been college best friends and you two had therefore grown up together, and even used to be quite close. You’d grown apart when he joined Jake and Sunghoon’s friend group, and although you still got on well, there was always a bit of an awkward atmosphere when you caught up with each other.

The three friends had quite different personalities but their complicity and shared history made them stick together. Jake was known for his academic achievements, rivaling yours, and his friendly personality; Jay, for his surprisingly funny antics once you got past the somewhat menacing appearance (which he blames on his resting bitch face). Sunghoon, on the other hand, was as cold as ice, so much that he’d earned the nickname of ice prince, but girls continued to swoon over him due to his incredibly handsome features. When turning down girls, Jake and Jay always tried to let them down gently, but Sunghoon wasn’t one to hold back: he’d laugh in their face or straight up say no, staring them right in the eyes. Most confessions ended in tears (not his, obviously), but girls kept on testing their luck, thinking they might be the one to melt the ice prince’s cold, dead heart.

Clearly, you weren’t Sunghoon’s biggest fan.

His behavior had always made you wonder why Jay and Jake were friends with a person like him. They went back a long time, but how did Sunghoon not become a nice and approachable person like his two best friends? They both seemed so genuine, but he looked like he was hiding something. This was what had made you weary of him; you knew all too well how easily an image that was the opposite of reality could be created. So on one hand, you sort of felt for him, thinking he might be in a similar situation as you. But on the other hand, you couldn’t help but feel some kind of jealousy: if you acted the way he did, you wouldn’t receive half the admiration you did. Hell, you’d probably be hated for it - no one likes a girl that’s both successful and bitchy about it. 

One thing was sure, though, and that was that you wouldn’t call the two of you friends, as he just had.

“Y/N? You okay?”

The pure panic in your eyes must’ve made Sunghoon realize something was wrong. He released you and looked you up and down, trying to take your appearance in. The Y/N he was seeing right then was worlds away from the one he was accustomed to at school. 

You realized there was no ignoring him, so you collected yourself and faced Sunghoon. “Uh, yeah, hi, Sunghoon. Sorry, I just wasn’t expecting to see anyone I knew here.”

He chuckled. “Yeah, no wonder. You look quite… different from what you usually do,” he said, voice laced with sarcasm.

This whole situation got you dumbfounded. You usually knew exactly what to retort when somebody messed with you, your friend or a classmate, but this time, you were completely speechless. You just wanted to escape.

“Well, it was nice seeing you Sunghoon, but I need to get home.” You pivoted on your heels and started walking again, but Sunghoon had other plans.

“Aw, come on, so quickly? We barely got to chat!” He followed you through the aisles as you picked up the remaining ingredients on the list your mother had given you as quickly as you could.

“I didn’t know you needed glasses. Do you wear lenses at school?”

“Yes. I need them to see.”

“I figured.” You could hear the smirk in his voice, and your shock was slowly morphing into anger. Were teenage girls so blind that they’d have a crush on someone with such an abominable personality, no matter how angelic his face was? 

“I really like your outfit, by the way. Looks super comfy.” And as if your embarrassment couldn’t grow any bigger, he added: “Too bad you got a stain on the shirt.”

You looked down at yourself and noticed a huge grease stain on the collar of your shirt. Admittedly, you didn’t always have the best table manners. 

You swore under your breath. It was quiet for a couple minutes as you arrived at the register and paid for your items, Sunghoon still on your tail. He had apparently given up his purchases to focus solely on tormenting you. When you walked out of the store, you thought he might finally be done. But of course, he wasn’t.

“You know, my sister has this really effective pimple cream she uses. Do you want me to ask her what brand it is?”

That was it. You sighed deeply. “Alright, Park. What do you want?”

When you turned to face him fully, arms crossing over your chest and an obviously tired expression on your face, the mischievous glint in his eyes made you realize something. That idiot was enjoying this. 

Indeed, he beamed down at you. You had probably never seen him smiling so widely. “Wow, Y/N, didn’t know you could have such an attitude.”

You stayed silent and continued staring at him, waiting for an answer. He mirrored your pose, out of instinct or to irritate you, you weren’t sure.

“You know, when I moved to this neighborhood before the start of school, I was definitely not expecting to see Perfect Miss Y/N out in her pajamas buying ice cream. I thought you were more into, I don’t know, rescuing puppies from fires or something. That sounds like something you’d do in your free time.”

“Well, is there anything wrong with what I’m doing?”

“Oh, absolutely not! Just a surprising sight. Makes me wonder what the rest of the school would say…” He looked intently at you, clearly waiting for a reaction. You weren’t about to give him one, though.

You chuckled and rolled your eyes, shifting your weight on your right foot. “Yeah, like anyone would believe you if you said you saw me looking anything else other than perfect.” It might’ve sounded arrogant, but that was the image people had of you. Even your friends asked you how you did it - if only they knew the truth.

At that, his smile got even brighter. “Don’t worry about that, I won’t need to tell anyone. I’ll just show them!” He pulled out his phone, showing you a picture of you in your god-awful pajamas searching for your favorite flavor of ice cream.

He watched as your face fell, taking your silence as an opportunity to go on. “You were so engrossed in the tubs of ice cream that you didn’t notice a dashingly handsome and tall young man very obviously taking pictures of you.”

This put you into panic mode again. It might have seemed foolish, but you hadn’t worked for years to create a perfect version of yourself only for a stupid boy to destroy it all with one picture. 

You sighed and lowered your head, taking a moment to think. You didn’t know Sunghoon that well, but you didn’t put it past him to send that picture to everyone and ruin your image in the process. You opted for honesty instead of bluff. You took your glasses off and looked back up at him; even if you couldn’t see him as well without them, maybe he’d see the despair in your eyes better.

“Park. I mean, Sunghoon. You can’t show that picture to anyone, okay? You have no idea how bad I need to keep up appearances. It’s really important to me, so just delete the picture and let’s never talk about this again, yeah?”

You tried smiling at him, but his expression infuriated you. You could tell he had something else up his sleeve. “Now, Y/N, why would I do that? If I’m gonna do something for you, you should do something for me.”

You weren’t sure if you wanted to hear the rest of his thoughts, but you needed to know. Eyeing him suspiciously, you told him to go on.

“Well, I can’t think of anything right now, but I’ll let you know when I do, okay? I’ll see you around, Y/N.” He flashed another one of his smiles, patted your head, and walked away, just like that, leaving you standing outside the convenience store on your own, a melting tub of ice cream in your plastic bag. At least for now, you were safe.

Right?

—

“You saw Park Sunghoon? As in, the Park Sunghoon?” your little sister Yeeun asked, looking at you with huge eyes. You two and Sunoo were sitting on your bed, sharing the ice cream by eating it directly from the tub.

“Yes, that’s literally what I’ve been saying this whole time. How do you know him anyway? You’re still in middle school…”

“Are you crazy? He’s famous in our whole school district! I wish we had cute boys in my school as well,” she sulked, pouting.

“That’s not the point, Yeeun,” Sunoo chimed in, then turned to you. “Well, this is either bad news or the start of a beautiful romance.”

“Sunoo! Take this seriously! I’m in a huge dilemma right now.”

Your siblings shared a knowing glance and snickered.

“Hey! I’m right here. I’m not overreacting, you know. If he does send those pictures around, I’m done for.”

“Oh, come on, Y/N, you’d be so much better off if you could be yourself at school. I see you there almost everyday, and the way you laugh always sounds so fake. Nobody would care if you forgot to put makeup on one day or had a crease in your shirt. If anything, it’d make you look more human.”

You could see where Sunoo was coming from, but you chose to ignore it. You sighed deeply. “You guys just don’t get it. They all see me as this perfect, put-together girl. If I showed them even a glimpse of the truth, everything would shatter. It’s too late to go back now.” You ignored their pitying looks and took another big spoonful of ice cream.

It was their turn to sigh. As always, it was impossible to reason with you. Deep in your thoughts, you added: “You know, there was something really off about him today. I’d never seen him act that way before.”

Your siblings looked at you questioningly. “He’s always so cold and distant towards everyone. I’ve only seen him smile when he’s laughing with Jake and Jay or when he makes fun of someone. But just now, he kept smiling at me like he was having fun. He even patted my head when he left.”

At that, Yeeun swooned dramatically, hands over her heart. You looked over at her and said, “I’d be swooning too if it was any other guy than Park Sunghoon. I’m more confused than anything right now, he was a completely different person from when I see him at school.”

They exchanged another look. “You guys stop doing that!”

“Well, it’s just that that sounds an awful lot like someone I know,” Sunoo replied. Realization hit you and you scoffed, mildly offended. At least you were nice to others at school and didn’t act like an asshole with a superiority complex.

“Anyway,” he continued, “what will you do about Sunghoon?”

“I’m not too sure. I guess all I can do is wait and see whatever it is he could want from me.”

“Yeah, do that, and then date him, please. If I can’t have him as my boyfriend, then I’ll have him as my brother-in-law,” Yeeun joked. You didn’t have it in you to retort anything back and started laughing along with her. 

If everything did shatter, at least you’d have your siblings to make you laugh.

— 

The next day, you made your way to the bus stop after your daily morning routine: jogging, showering, eating a filling breakfast, choosing the perfect accessories for your school uniform, applying just the right amount of makeup and going over your subjects and tasks of the day. As always, efficiency is the key. You had become so used to this routine that your body did it on its own, which let your mind wander wherever it pleased. Usually, you’d use this time to prepare yourself for the day ahead, but today, the only thing on your mind was Park Sunghoon. What was that boy up to? Was he up to anything, or did you completely imagine his mischievousness yesterday? In any case, you hoped it would all be over soon. 

You got on the bus and sat down next to Sumin. Your close friend group at school consisted of her, Park Sieun, Lee Heeseung and Choi Jiung, but she was the only one who knew about your secret. You had been friends for so long that you hadn’t even been able to hide it: she’d seen you from all angles, both before, during and after your transformation to who you were now. It was nice having someone else than your siblings to rely on and tell everything to. 

“Minie, you’ll never guess what happened yesterday. I ran into Park Sunghoon at the convenience store next to our apartment unit.”

She raised her eyebrows in surprise, but her reaction wasn’t as big as you thought it’d be. She smiled and said, “Huh! I knew he’d moved to our neighborhood, but I wouldn’t have thought he’d live so close to you that you’d even shop at the same place.”

She registered your confused expression and continued. “Didn’t you hear? He moved out of his parents’ house at the end of summer. Something about a huge fight with them that made him move out. But there are always so many rumors about him and his group that I don’t know what to believe.”

“Oh,” you mumbled, unsure what to say. Now that you thought about it, Sunghoon had mentioned moving in your conversation yesterday, but you were so preoccupied with him seeing you in your wild state that you hadn’t paid much attention to his comment.

“Wait, did he do something? Your face is telling me he did something.”

You got closer to her face and gestured for her to do the same. With lowered heads and in hushed tones, you said, “He saw me on off-mode.”

She gasped and jolted back in surprise, eyes wide and eyebrows shooting straight up. “What?”

You shushed her and pulled her in by her shoulders. “He even took pictures.” Your grip tight, you held her from jumping again. “That’s not even it. You know how he's always really cold and distant?”

“You mean how he’s always being a douchebag?” She scoffed. “Yeah, I know.”

You remembered that Sumin had been one of the first of many girls who shot their shot with Park Sunghoon, only to get rejected. You both grimaced at the memory that always left a bad taste in your mouth.

“He was completely different yesterday. Kept following me around the store and, I’m not sure, teasing me? Like trying to get a reaction out of me? In a weird half-friendly half-bully way.”

“Hm, you’re right, that doesn’t sound like him,” she mused. “It does sound like a stupid teenage boy though, which I guess he is, no matter how hard he tries to pretend he’s not.”

This is what you loved about Sumin. She could see right through people, and never hesitated to say what she thought of them, especially when they acted the way Sunghoon did. Sure, there were some personal feelings attached there, but she had quickly gotten over them when she realized how much of a douche he was towards everyone else.

When the bus stopped to pick up some more students, Heeseung hopped on. You quickly told Sumin to keep it a secret, at which she smiled and made a motion as if zipping her lips and throwing the key. If you told your friends about Sunghoon, you’d have to tell them the truth about how he had dirt on you, but you wanted to keep your friendship clean. You chatted the rest of the bus ride away and tried not to worry over Park Sunghoon too much.

When you finally got to school, you, Heeseung, and Sumin made your way to your classroom to join Jiung and Sieun. Before you could get there, however, Jungwon, an underclassman you had talked to a couple times for student council meetings, called out your name. You told your friends to go on without you and turned to the younger boy.

“Jungwon! Hi, what’s up?”

He seemed flattered that you had remembered his name but quickly got on with his business. “Um, I’m not sure why, but Sunghoon told me to come and get you? I’ve never talked to him, I think he just picked me randomly and assigned me a task…”

You sighed. Park Sunghoon truly was something. “Thanks for telling me, Jungwon. I’ll make sure he gets an earful for this, he has no right to boss students around like that.”

Jungwon’s eyes doubled in size as he frantically waved his hands in dismissal. “No! No need to do that, I don’t want to get in trouble with him. I’m just here to relay the message.” At that, he scurried off, and you headed towards Sunghoon’s homeroom. 

When you walked in, a few people were in the room, some girls gossiping with each other, a couple students doing some last-minute revision for a test. You found Sunghoon sitting at his desk, snickering with Jay and Jake and hoped that the subject of their laughter wasn’t you. They noticed you approaching and the two decent boys greeted you; the other one eyed you, that mischievous glint back in his eyes. What could he possibly have in mind?

“Hi, guys.” You smiled at Jay and Jake and reflexively stood closer to Jay. “Sunghoon, Jungwon said you wanted to see me?” you asked, trying to keep your impatience at bay.

“Oh, was that his name? Well, thank heavens for him, ‘cause I forgot my lunch at home. Would you be a sweetheart and go buy me something at the cafeteria? You know how everything runs out as soon as lunch period starts, and I get really cranky when I’m hungry.”

You stared at him, wide-eyed. His two friends’ reaction wasn’t very different from yours. Go buy him lunch? That’s what he wanted you to do?

“What? You don’t want to? That’s too bad, cause there’s a picture I think everybo-”

You cut him off before he could finish. “No! Of course I’ll do it! Can’t have our star player go hungry, now can we?” You cringed at your own words and Jay eyed you suspiciously. Sunghoon beamed, and Jake’s eyes darted back and forth between the two of you in pure confusion. “Um, any preferences?”

His smile got wider. “A tuna mayo would be amazing. Thanks, Y/N! You’re the best!”

“Sure…” you mumbled and quickly walked away, more bemused than ever. You checked your watch. You had 10 minutes before the first bell rang, and you could not be late for class, which meant you needed to hurry. 

You got back to Sunghoon’s classroom just a minute before the first bell. To your dismay, the class was almost full, and girls had gathered around him, trying to get his attention, but he seemed unbothered by their presence. You braced yourself and walked towards him. As your presence rarely went by unnoticed, most eyes were on you and Sunghoon. Not only were you two some of the most popular kids in school, you also happened to be handing him his lunch, a never-seen-before sight between the two of you. 

“I also got you banana milk, for good measure…” 

What had seemed like a great idea a few minutes ago, something to appease the devil in him, now felt like the biggest mistake of your life. The girls around him started whispering left and right and you weren’t sure whether they felt bad for you, sensing an incoming rejection, or wanted to tear you to shreds for even trying. 

The whispers grew even louder when Sunghoon took the sandwich and milk from your hands, thanking you with a smile. You’d be lying if you said your heart hadn’t done a small jump in your chest at that moment. As much as you hated to admit it, if looks were the sole factor for popularity, then you could definitely understand why Park Sunghoon was so loved. His face looked like it had been carved by the gods themselves. When his eyebrows weren’t turned in a frown, his eyes looked almost sweet, especially when he laughed. His two moles gave him so much charm, the curve of his nose was so delicate and his pink lips looked so, so soft… 

You cleared your throat and smiled back at him before turning around to walk to your own classroom.

“Wait, Y/N!”

You turned back around, all eyes on you. You could feel Jay’s eyes burning holes into you. Sunghoon was still smiling. You thought you’d seen him smile more in the past two days than you had in all the years you’d known him.

“I’ll see you later.”

—

And indeed see him later you did. You always hung back a bit after classes ended to get homework done or work out student council issues. Being in an empty classroom brought you some peace and quiet, very different from the busyness and noise of your home. You couldn’t even focus in your own room, your siblings or parents always barging in to disturb you. The after-school janitors now knew you by name and saved cleaning the classroom you were sitting in for last. 

You had been barely sitting there for 5 minutes, nose buried in a math problem, when Park Sunghoon graciously strode in, swung the chair in front of you around and sat on it, arms crossed over its back as he peered at you. You didn’t even bother to look up at him as you spoke. “What, Park?”

“Oh no, back to last name basis already?” he joked. You didn’t laugh. He cleared his throat awkwardly. “Wow, tough crowd. Anyways, thanks for the sandwich today.”

This made you look at him. Or rather, shoot daggers at him. “Yeah, what the hell was that all about? Did you have to pull that little stunt in front of everybody? You know what our school is like! Rumors are gonna start spreading like wildfire.”

“I already told you,” he said with a defensive tone. “Forgot my lunch, everything was gonna run out, didn’t want to get hungry later,” he said as he shrugged, completely ignoring the latter part of your complaint.

“And you couldn’t have gone and gotten it yourself?”

He beamed. If it wasn’t so damn beautiful, you probably would have started getting tired of his stupid smile already. “Why would I do that when I could get you to do it?”

You sighed. “I knew you weren’t the nicest guy, but I didn’t know you could be such an asshole, Park.”

If you hadn’t been staring him down so intently, you might not have noticed the falter in his smile, so quick it was.

“Oh, come on, Y/N. If anything, I’m doing you a favor by not sending out to everyone that picture you so desperately want to keep secret. Thing is, doing that wouldn’t benefit me in any way, except for getting the satisfaction of seeing everybody realize you’re not as perfect as they think you are. Whereas holding it over your head allows me to do basically anything I want with you. And that, that is just so much fun,” he beams, lowering his voice into a whisper for the last sentence.

What a psycho, you thought. You just sighed once more and returned to your textbook, too weirded out to say anything back. You hoped the silence would make Sunghoon realize how creepy what he had just said was. 

It was quiet in the room, only the sound of your pencil scratching your notebook could be heard. Sunghoon sat in the same position and watched you working. He often saw you like this, focused and benched over a desk, in the library or walking past your classroom. But it was always in passing, and looking at you so closely made all the world’s difference. He could see how you scrunched your nose when the problem got particularly difficult, or how your smirk as you solved another one made your left dimple appear. He also liked the annoyed looks you gave him every once in a while, as if his presence was disturbing your focus. He wasn’t sure what it was, but there was something about seeing someone who always went about their way with such purpose sitting in such silence.

He decided to break that silence. “You know, Jay was asking about you earlier.”

You kept your eyes trained on your notebook but abruptly stopped writing, your pencil leaving a small scratch on the paper. This didn’t go unnoticed by Sunghoon. “Did he?” you said, trying to sound as uninterested as possible, although you couldn’t help but be curious. Ever since Jay and you had grown apart, there was always a part of you wondering what he was up to, how he was doing, if he thought of you once in a while or reminisced about the good old times as you sometimes did. 

“Yeah. I mean, everyone did, but I didn’t really care,” he answers simply, and even though you’re itching to push him to say more, you stay quiet. “You’re right, by the way, I do know the people in our school. The rumors have already started spreading. Up to you whether you wanna deny them or not, though,” he said with a smirk.

“Don’t even think about it, Park. There’s not a chance in hell I’ll let them think we have a thing going on. I have a reputation to uphold, you know.”

He chuckled. “Trust me, I know. Anyway, he wanted to know why you did that for me. Guess he was jealous you didn’t do it for him, too.”

“Why would he be?” you asked, trying to make the question sound as innocent as possible. 

“Well, you two go a long way back, right?” he asked tentatively, as if testing the waters.

“Yeah, I guess.”

“Then it was probably weird for him to see his childhood best friend and his best bro interacting out of nowhere, even though we’ve both seen each other around a lot and nothing has ever come out of that. Don’t you think?”

A beat passed as you thought about it. “Yeah, I guess that’d look weird to him,” you replied, trying to keep the disappointment out of your voice.

You quickly wrote down your last answer, packed up your things, and stood up. “Well, I’m off now. I’ll see you around, unfortunately.”

Sunghoon, surprised at your quick departure, scrambled to get off his chair and chased after you. “Do you want me to drop you off? I’ve got a car, you know. Much more glamorous than the bus.”

You turned around and looked at him. “I’d rather get hit by said bus than get in your car, Park.”

He stood there, watching you walk away with a smirk on his face as your ponytail swayed from side to side. This was going to be a challenge. You were going to be a challenge. 

Thing is, he loved a good challenge.

—

Back home, you flopped down on your bed and buried your face in your pillow. You laid there for a few minutes, taking some time to gather your thoughts and try to understand Sunghoon’s actions. It was of no use; you weren’t a mind-reader, and he seemed impossible to figure out. He could make you do basically whatever he wanted to, and he decided to make you get him lunch, creating rumors along the way? What could he possibly get out of that?

Your reflexions were quickly interrupted, however, by a flurry of incoming messages on your phone. Someone had posted a photo of you handing his banana milk to Sunghoon on your school’s Instagram account - because apparently, your school was so obsessed with gossip that they had created an Instagram page just for it. The photo had blown up among your peers and it made you wonder if people really were that bored with their lives.

People you barely knew but that felt entitled to knowing your relationship status were DMing you, asking about today’s events. You quickly got tired of it, so you texted your worried and confused friends that you didn’t feel like talking tonight and would catch up with them tomorrow. You opened your textbook, deciding that studying would be the best and most efficient distraction.

When your parents called you and your siblings for dinner, you still weren’t feeling great. Your family quickly registered your annoyed expression and could only hope for the best. You already weren’t the easiest to live with, but when you were tired, you just got a hundred times worse.

“So, how was everyone’s day?” your mom asked cheerily.

Yeeun’s eyes lit up instantly. “Mine was great! I met a really cute boy. His name is Nishimura Riki and he just transferred from Japan.”

“Oh, that’s nice!”

“You’re too young to be thinking about boys, Yeeun.”

Your mom and dad had replied at the same time, then gave each other a stern look.

“I’m not thinking about him, Dad, just looking,” your sister replied, earning a chuckle from your concerned father. 

“Mine was alright. I guess the start-of-a-new-year excitement has already worn off. After a week,” Sunoo said with a sigh. 

Your mom turned to you. “What about you, Y/N?”

“It was fine.”

The sharpness of your tone changed the atmosphere in the room at once. You ignored the looks your family exchanged and continued eating your food, eyes not leaving your plate.

For some reason, Sunoo thought it’d be a great idea to chime in. “She’s not happy because she had to buy Park Sunghoon his lunch and everybody went crazy over it.”

“Sunoo!” you protested. Your parents didn’t need to know about this sort of stuff.

“Park Sunghoon? Is that someone we’re supposed to know?” your dad questioned.

Yeeun scoffed. “Uh, he’s only the most popular and handsome guy at Y/N and Sunoo’s school, dad. Duh.”

“Right. Duh,” your dad said, imitating your sister’s tone.

“And why did you have to buy his lunch, Y/N?” your mom asked.

“Because he saw what she looks like when she’s not at school,” Sunoo said, not even giving you the chance to reply yourself.

“Sunoo!” you scolded again.

“And now I guess he’s using that against her to get her to do what he wants? Right, Y/N?”

You glared at your brother and let a beat pass. “Right,” you reluctantly admitted.

“Lucky…” your sister mused, expression like she was daydreaming about being Sunghoon’s personal assistant.

Your dad ignored your sister and looked straight at you. “That’s inadmissible, Y/N. You can’t let him do that.”

“Your father’s right, sweetie. It’s not right,” your mom added when you stayed silent.

With everybody’s eyes on you, you felt obligated to reply. “It’s fine. It’s not like he asked me to do anything crazy. I’m sure he’ll stop soon enough.”

“You know, boys that age, they’ll do anything to get a girl’s attention,” your dad warned. “Just ignore him and he’ll go away.”

“If she ignores him, he’ll tell everyone what she’s really like,” your brother explained.

“And what’s so bad about that? I’m sure it’d be easier if you stopped lying to everyone.”

Everyone suddenly stopped in their motions, wondering why your mom would say something so true yet so controversial. You looked up at her. “What’s so bad about that? What’s so bad? I don’t know, maybe the fact that I’ve worked so hard all these years for everybody to like me and look up to me only for a stupid picture taken by a stupid boy to ruin everything,” you said all in one breath, voice coming out harsh. You were tired of having to explain the same thing over and over again - your parents just didn’t understand why you did what you did.

Your mom opened and closed her mouth again, knowing it was useless trying to talk sense into you. It never ended well when you had this conversation.

“Who put mushrooms in this anyway? You know I hate mushrooms,” you said before filling up your bowl and taking it to eat in your room, making sure you’d slammed your door behind you.

—

On the bus the next day, you tried to explain the events of the previous day to your friends.

“There’s nothing really to it. He just asked me to get him lunch so I did, and when I handed it to him, his whole class was there and saw everything.”

“I get that, but I just don’t understand why he made you do it in the first place, or why you agreed,” Heeseung said, “it’s so unlike the both of you to do something like that.”

You hadn’t even thought to come up with an excuse for your and Sunghoon’s yesterday - your friends were definitely super confused, but you didn’t want to tell them the truth, so you had to quickly find something to say that was somewhat believable, and change the subject.

“I have no idea why he did what he did, but I didn’t want to cause a scene so I just agreed. I don’t really care, to be honest, I just wish it didn’t have such consequences. People seem to think we’re characters on a stupid Netflix coming-of-age series or something, when we literally just go to their school.”

As soon as you’d turned your phone back on this morning, it started pinging with all the messages that had flown in since last night. People were talking about it everywhere: Kim Y/N, highly sought-after bachelorette, had offered Park Sunghoon, notorious rejecter of girls and breaker of hearts, a sandwich and a banana milk, and he had taken them. What’s more, he had been seen at lunch heartily eating them. This was serious.

You didn’t think things could get any worse until you got to school. You were used to random people coming up to you in the hallways or in class for help, except today they weren’t asking for help at all - they were asking what was up between you and Sunghoon, as though handing him a tuna mayo was like asking for his hand in marriage. Most of them were just curious, but some, especially his fanclub members, had an aggressive tone to their voice, which you weren’t used to. If people started liking you less because of Sunghoon, you were going to kill him.

But you had to hold onto that thought, because an all too familiar voice had suddenly called out to you on your way to class. You took a deep breath and turned around, watching him take long strides towards you. You immediately became aware of the amount of people in the hallway and realized you couldn’t talk to him like you had the previous day in front of everybody. You mustered the fakest smile you could and greeted him.

“Hi, Sunghoon. What can I help you with today?”

He smiled, obviously enjoying the fact that you had to be nice to him. “I’ve got my sports bag because of practice later tonight. Mind holding onto that for me for the day?”

Your fake smile turned a bit crazy as your eyes widened in disbelief. "Don’t you have a locker for that, Sunghoon?”

“Yeah, but it’s so much more fun if you’re the one to hold it.” And with that, he threw the bag in your direction, leaving approximately 0.5 seconds to catch it. “I’ll need that later today. Meet me in front of the locker rooms after school, yeah?”

He didn’t bother to wait for your answer and walked away, Jake and Jay following closely behind. Jay sent you a questioning look, to which you could only reply with a shrug. If it wasn’t for all the students in the hallway, you would’ve been yelling Sunghoon’s ear off at that point. Unfortunately, that wasn’t a possibility, so you just smiled to your friends who were looking more confused than ever.

“Let’s just go to class, guys.”

—

Throughout the whole day, you could feel people staring at you, then at the bag you were holding, then starting to whisper among themselves. You tried your best to concentrate in class so you could momentarily stop pondering over what Sunghoon’s evil master plan might be, but everyone seemed bent on making that usually simple feat impossible. When 3:30 p.m. finally came around, you bid your friends goodbye and headed to the boys’ locker room. Every boy walking in eyed you suspiciously, unsure as to what you could be doing there. Of course, Sunghoon had to take his sweet time to get there. 

Staring at the opposite wall and planning Sunghoon’s murder in your head, you hadn’t noticed Jay and Jake arriving. Jay signaled for his friend to go inside the locker room and told him he’d join him in a minute. He waved his hand in front of you to get your attention, a smile on his face. You sighed in relief at the familiar sight of your friend.

“Hey, Jay. Sorry I didn’t see you.”

“You okay, Y/N? You look like you’re about to murder someone,” he said, slightly amused.

“If only you knew,” you mumbled.

He noticed the bag in your hand. “You waiting for Sunghoon?”

“Yeah. If only he could hurry up a little bit. I’ve got stuff to do.”

There was something about Jay that made it impossible to lie to him. Maybe it was the fact that you had known each other for so long, way before you’d turned into what you were now, that made you feel as though showing a side of you that gets annoyed and impatient and doesn’t smile all the time was okay.

Jay looked at his feet before looking back up at you. You were still staring at the wall but your murderous thoughts had somewhat calmed. “Mind telling me what this whole thing with Sunghoon is about?”

You turned to him and were about to fumble for an answer when someone interrupted you. “What whole thing with me?”

Whew. Saved by Sunghoon. You didn’t like that it was thanks to him that you could get out of answering Jay, but at least you didn’t have to come up with yet another stupid excuse.

Jay turned his attention to his friend and stood up straighter. “You know, making her get you lunch or hold your bag all day. There’s dozens of girls who’d be more than happy to do that for you, so why Y/N? She doesn’t have time for this stuff.”

You looked at Jay with surprise. Sure, you were friends, but you hadn’t thought he’d defend you like that in front of Sunghoon.

“Well, Y/N’s just such a nice, reliable person. No one better to ask to do those things.” What a reason, you thought. He turned to you and took the bag from your hands. “Thanks, Y/N. I’ll see you outside in a couple minutes.”

“Huh? What do you mean? I’m leaving,” you said, body already headed towards the other direction.

“What? You can’t leave before practice has even started. Go to the benches outside, we’ll be out in a few.”

You were about to open your mouth to protest, but he cut you off. “You don’t want to?” He started pulling out his phone. “That’s funny, because there’s a pict-”

“I’ll be on the benches! See you soon!” you quickly said, pushing the two boys inside the locker room, Sunghoon smirking, Jay looking at you in utter confusion.

Girls sat in a few different groups in the bleachers. You recognized the girls in one of those groups, so you decided to sit with them. As you approached, they quickly looked at each other and then back at you, expressions half-friendly, half-what-the-hell-are-you-doing-here. 

“Hi guys! Mind if I join?”

“Hi Y/N! No, of course not, come sit,” Jake’s girlfriend, Yujin, said. 

“Are you guys here to watch practice?”

“Yeah! I’m here on girlfriend duties for Jake. These two are just here for the eye candy and to keep me company,” Yujin explained.

“Yeah, but mostly for the eye candy,” added her friend Wonyoung. 

“What about you, Y/N? I’ve never seen you here,” asked the last girl, Gaeul.

“Oh, um, Sunghoon asked me to come, actually.” You regretted your words as soon as you’d let them out. They all ooh-ed at your response, making you blush, which just egged them on. This was nothing to blush about, Y/N. You’d just made the rumors get a hundred times worse with one sentence.

“The whole school’s been talking about you two, you know. Anything you wanna share? Don’t worry, we can keep a secret,” said Wonyoung with a wink. You chuckled awkwardly.

“Oh my gosh, yes, tell us!”

“Guys, don’t make her uncomfortable,” Yujin chimed in, smiling at you. You returned her smile, grateful, once again, that you didn’t have to explain your new link to Sunghoon. “Look, practice is starting.”

You turned your head towards the field as the soccer players started doing laps as per the coach’s instructions. Your eyes immediately drifted towards Sunghoon without you even realizing it. His lean figure hypnotized you. The last time you had had PE with him was in freshman year, and puberty had hit him like a fine, fine truck. You couldn’t take your eyes off of him as he lightly jogged next to his friends, chatting like it was nothing. You weren’t being very subtle with your stare and he eventually noticed you, sending a wink your way. This made you snap out of your reverie and you scowled at him, as if he could make out your annoyed expression from such a distance. You turned back to the girls, who were giggling at you.

“Wow, those were some serious heart eyes you were giving him, Y/N,” Gaeul giggled.

You opened your mouth in mild shock. “Was not!”

“Sure, whatever you say,” she replied knowingly. “Well, look all you want. Warm-up is the best part. It gets boring when they actually start playing.”

“No way! Watching them play is my favorite part,” Yujin disagreed.

“Yeah, that’s cause you’ve got someone to root for,” retorted Wonyoung. She looked at you slyly. “Well, I guess Y/N does, too.”

You scoffed. “Believe me, I will not be rooting for him.”

You started staring at him again, this time with a glare in your eyes. From their silence, you deduced the girls must’ve judged it a better idea to not question you too much. After the boys were done with running exercises and stretching (which you had enjoyed watching a bit too much, if you spoke truthfully), they started playing. The coach split the boys into two teams, Jay leading one and Sunghoon the other. It was a very close game. You could never tell who was leading, although that might have been due to your extensive lack of knowledge in the sport. All you knew was that you desperately wanted to see Sunghoon lose; that might put him down a peg. What you told yourself, however, was that you wanted Jay to win. So when he scored a goal, you surprised the girls next to you, the boys on the field and yourself as you jumped up and down, cheering for him. Realizing what you were doing, you quickly sat down and sent him an awkward thumbs up.

Jay tried to hide it, but he was blushing. Hard. Truth be told, he had noticed your little eye contact moment with Sunghoon during warm-up and hadn’t particularly enjoyed it. So seeing you cheer for him like that made him swell with pride, which only grew when Sunghoon scored and you barely reacted. 

When the game was over, you thought you might be able to finally go home and start studying. But Sunghoon had other plans for you, as always these past couple days. Heading towards the showers, he motioned for you to come down from the benches. As you did, Jay walked past, and you smiled at each other.

“Good game.”

“Thanks, Y/N.” He continued walking as Sunghoon reached you.

“What about me? I scored a goal, too.”

“Oh, did you? Didn’t even notice," you said, looking at your nails. The polish was starting to chip - you’d need to reapply a layer tonight.

“Whatever. Wait for me, yeah?”

“What? No! I gotta go home!” But your protests were in vain, as he completely ignored you. 

You waited outside the school with Yujin, Wonyoung and Gaeul. After a little while, Jake, Jay and Sunghoon joined you guys, having successfully showered and not smelling of sweat and dirt, thank God. Yujin was dropping her boyfriend and her friends off, so they bid their goodbyes and headed towards her car. Sunghoon and Jay also started to walk towards the parking lot, leaving you standing alone, not sure what to do. Sunghoon turned around and looked at you with a frown.

“What are you doing?”

“I don’t know, what are you doing?”

“I’m dropping you and Jay off.”

“Oh,” you mumbled, taken aback. “Didn’t know I was just supposed to guess that.”

As soon as Sunghoon started to drive, you noticed the awkward air between the three of you. Luckily, after years of being a people-pleaser, you had become somewhat of an expert in making small talk, which helped prevent a silent ride. You don’t think you could’ve gone through that without a mental breakdown.

Because you and Sunghoon lived closer to each other (and we all know the consequences of that), Jay was dropped off before you. “I’ll see you guys tomorrow at school,” he said before giving you a last glance.

“Bye, Jay.”

“See you, bro.”

Thankfully, you only lived a couple minutes by car from Jay’s and hoped the rest of the car ride would be peaceful. Which was really stupid of you to hope for, because you were in the car with Park Sunghoon.

“So, Park Jongseong, huh?” he said, eyes trained on the road in front of him. Even though he was trying to keep his tone light, you thought you detected a slight harshness to his gaze.

“What about him?”

“I don’t know, you tell me.”

“There’s nothing to say. We’ve just been friends for a long time.”

It was silent for about five seconds. “You really feasted your eyes during warm-up, huh?”

“Shut up, Park.”

“No, it’s alright, I get it. I’d do the same.” He laughed at his own joke that wasn’t really a joke. Why was he laughing, anyway? 

You looked at him. His face was so different from all those times you’d seen it at school. His eyes, rid of the harshness you’d seen earlier, crinkled at the edges and had an amused glint in them. His smile dug pretty dimples into his cheeks and you let your gaze linger long enough to notice he had sharp, vampire-like canines, which were surprisingly cute. You didn’t know why he was showing you a side of him he never showed anyone, except for his close friends, you assumed. You weren’t sure what overcame you, but you chuckled with him. 

“So, do you already know what task you’re gonna give me tomorrow?” you asked, genuinely curious.

“Hmm, haven’t really thought about it yet. I’d rather keep it a surprise, anyway. Keep you on your toes.”

“Pfft. What a great surprise.” He laughed again, and you couldn’t help but join him. He was unusually giddy that day, but you didn’t want to complain. This was a thousand times better than the arrogant Sunghoon with his I’m-better-than-all-of-you facade. What you didn’t know was that he, too, liked your snarky, no-nonsense side infinitely more than the model student, pretty girl persona you had created for yourself.

Finally at your house, you got out of the car and headed to your house after waving goodbye to Sunghoon. He rolled his window down and leaned out of it.

“Y/N?”

You turned around. “Yeah?”

“About your task tomorrow…”

“…Yeah?”

“I’m sure you’ll love it.” He gave you an umpteenth wink, rolled his window back up and drove off.

You weren’t so awful to your parents and siblings that evening.

—

The next day at school, you were wondering why Sunghoon had said you would love your task. Because you were, in fact, quite loathing it. He had found you studying during your free period after lunch and dragged you to the part of the library where it was okay to talk a bit over whisper level. You were currently going over a scene in The Tempest which you had seen in AP English Lit last year and clearly had no time for. But obviously, that wasn’t a problem to Sunghoon, who just wanted to get a passing grade on his English essay without putting in too much effort. 

After twenty minutes of going over the same five lines, you were about to give up. “Look, Sunghoon, I don’t mind helping you. I’ve tutored dozens of students before so I’m used to it. But you’re not making any effort! If you want to get it, you need to at least try.”

“But it’s so boring,” he whined, not unlike a child. “How am I supposed to find any meaning in this? It’s just stupid people doing stupid stuff on a stupid island.” You cringed at his words and hoped Shakespeare wasn’t listening in on this conversation. 

“It’s not stupid. It’s about power, and being punished for chasing it, and it’s a metaphor fo-”

“Ugh!” he groaned loudly. “You know what, I don’t care enough about this. Just write the essay for me, okay?” He got up and left, again not waiting for your answer. You wanted to protest, but you know what would happen if you said no to any of his requests, so you just quickly got to work.

Everyday over the next couple of weeks, Sunghoon would find something for you to do. Most days, he’d just get you to buy him lunch (although he thankfully had started paying you back) or carry his stuff around like the first two times. He didn’t ask you again to tutor him, however, so you had gotten used to sitting in an empty class together after class, you doing his homework for him and attempting (and failing) to explain it to him, and him alternating between playing on his phone and looking at you. Although it’d flustered you at first, not used to having someone stare at you while you were trying to concentrate, you’d grown somewhat okay with it - all of your complaints were ignored anyway. One time, he even got you to work on his science project with him, a weirdly-shaped volcano he needed to paint and decorate before actually putting the chemicals in. You’d be lying if you said it hadn’t been fun painting it together, occasionally ‘accidentally’ getting paint on the other’s hand or cheek instead of the volcano. 

You went to see him at practice two to three times a week, although you weren’t sure what use that had for him. If anything, you were probably the one who enjoyed yourself more. Perhaps, after being forced to spend so much time with him, you had started to soften up to him. And, perhaps, that made you appreciate his good looks even more. You couldn’t deny the effect his damp hair, stuck to his forehead with sweat, had on you. 

The rumors hadn’t died down, but people had started getting used to seeing the two of you together around, so they didn’t ogle their eyes at you everytime you and Sunghoon had some kind of interaction. Not liking that you couldn’t control people’s opinion of you anymore, you were still a bit bothered by them, but Sunghoon’s little posse of fangirls didn’t seem to be. They’d been the one to question you the most, and you got a few nasty looks in the hallway, but the gossip around school hadn’t stopped them from keeping on following him around, harassing him from morning to afternoon by going to his homeroom at breaks, sitting at a table near him at lunch, and going to see him at practice. Their group had dwindled down, though; most likely, some of them thought you two might be dating and had finally realized they didn’t stand a chance with the one and only Park Sunghoon. Thank God you had your friends and now sometimes Yujin, Wonyoung and Gaeul around you during those times, otherwise, you’d probably have been jumped. Spending so much time with him had kept you a couple times from your friends, which they’d complained about, but sensing that they couldn’t do much about it, they let you be, even though they hadn’t gotten a satisfactory explanation yet.

One person who didn’t want to, or rather couldn’t let it go, though, was Jay. He still couldn’t figure out why you’d started spending so much time with Sunghoon, seemingly overnight, and it created an unpleasant, sour pit in his stomach. Out of all the people you could’ve decided to form a new friendship with, why’d it have to be his best friend, meaning he saw you more often now than before, but not because he was the one you had come to see? Why did you never get him banana milk for lunch, and why’d you only start coming to soccer practice because Sunghoon had asked you to? He’d tried to ask both of you about it, but you always gave him half-assed excuses that didn’t make much sense. 

He realized what he was feeling was jealousy the day you came into their homeroom before the first bell rang and asked Sunghoon how his science project had gone. You’d never asked him how his science project, or any of his projects or tests, for that matter, had gone. He recognized it as the same feeling he had harbored when he had come back from the US in middle school and saw you dating Choi Soobin, or when Lee Heeseung had joined your tight-knit group of friends in freshman year. You and Soobin had only dated for three weeks and a half because you had a relationship-terminating argument over mint chocolate ice cream, and you and Heeseung had never become more than friends, nor had the intention to. But Jay didn’t care about that; all he saw was that there were boys around you that weren’t him. He had never acted upon those feelings, dismissing them as over-protectiveness for someone he had known since forever, but seeing Sunghoon and you laughing together hit too close to home. He couldn’t ignore how he felt because he was reminded of it everyday, but he didn’t know what to do with these newfound emotions.

And what’s the best thing to do whenever you don’t know what to do? Talk to your friends. Or well, in this case, your friend. He didn’t wanna talk about you to Sunghoon. He was a firm believer of bro code, but he didn’t wanna bottle up his feelings like he had all these years. So he went to Jake and told him everything, from your childhood friendship to Soobin, Heeseung and now Sunghoon.

“I know it’s stupid. It’s this whole cliché of, you only realize what you have when you lose it.”

“Well, you haven’t really lost Y/N, you know. It’s not like Sunghoon and her are dating.”

“I guess not, but he clearly likes her. It’d be a dick move to go after her now that they’ve got something going on.”

Jake hesitated for a second, debating whether he should say what he was thinking, but ultimately deciding it might be better to do it. “You know, I’m not sure that he does. You know what Sunghoon’s like. He’s never very honest about his intentions. I don’t wanna bring the subject up with him, cause I don’t wanna cause any drama, but it’s so suspicious to me that he’s suddenly spending time with Y/N when he’s never mentioned her all those years and when he rejects all these girls all the time.”

“I think it’s weird, too,” agreed Jay. “I just can’t seem to figure it out. And I’m a bit scared for Y/N, to be honest. Remember that girl in freshman year? They’d gotten along really well when he suddenly dropped her. I still remember his cold-ass stare when he turned her down. It even chilled me, man.”

“God, yeah, I always forget about that. He may be a jackass to all those girls, but when you know what he’s really like like we do, it seems so unlikely that he’d do something like that.”

Jay sighed and looked out into the distance. “I just hope he doesn’t hurt Y/N.”

Jake looked at his friend, thinking how to phrase his next sentence. “Like I said, I don’t wanna cause any drama… but, man, if you don’t want him to hurt Y/N, just don’t let him. If you make a move on her, you might get to her before he does. Better to do that now than to have to pick up the pieces, don’t you think?”

Jay mentally thanked the heavens for gifting him with a friend like Sim Jaeyun. “Yes, that is much, much better.”

He was going to stop sitting on his feelings and finally let them see the light.

—

But before that, Sunghoon had another one of his requests for you. You were sitting together in an empty classroom after school as you often did these past weeks. For you, today was an ordinary day, but the boy in front of you had something else in mind. He wasn’t saying anything but you could feel his nervousness and it was starting to make you feel anxious as well.

You lifted your head from your notes and looked at Sunghoon who seemed lost in his thoughts. “What is it, Sunghoon?”

This made him snap out of his reverie. “Um, nothing.”

“Well, seeing how you’ve been tapping your foot at the speed of lightning ever since we got here, it doesn’t seem like nothing.” You crossed your arms over the table and looked at him more intently, eyes asking him to tell you what was on his mind.

He sighed, giving in. “I was just thinking… there’s something I wanna tell you.”

“Go on. “

“I need you to date me.”

Your breath caught in your throat. Park Sunghoon… needed you… to date him? Was he asking you out? The way he’d worded it was a bit odd, but you didn’t put it past him.

Taking in your silence and wide eyes, he quickly added: “Not in that way! I, um, need you to be my fake girlfriend.”

Oh.

So he wasn’t asking you out. You weren’t sure why that made you so upset, but you tried to keep the disappointment out of your eyes and voice.

“Right,” you said, tone a bit harsher than you’d meant it to, “and why would I do that?”

Sunghoon smirked lightly. “Well, first of all, you don’t have much of a choice.” You rolled your eyes at that. It’d been a few days since the reason why you had started hanging out in the first place had come up, and you didn’t like to be reminded of that god-forsaken picture. 

“And second of all… I guess I should be completely honest with you.” This piqued your interest, and you leaned back on your chair to listen to him. 

“When I saw you at the store and took pictures of you, I wasn’t really thinking of doing anything. Maybe just get a laugh or two and tease you about it. I even told you outside the store that I didn’t know what I was gonna do. To be honest, I didn’t really think there was anything you could do for me that I’d need to force you to do. So I thought about it all night. And I asked myself, what’s the thing that pisses me off the most at school that you could change?” he looked at you expectantly, as if you could figure it out. You just shrugged.

“It’s those girls that keep following me around. All these years, I’ve acted like a giant asshole with them and still they think they have a crush on me or whatever. And I’ve never liked any of them, they’re all so superficial and ask me out without having ever talked to me before. So I thought, hey, maybe if I have a girlfriend, they’ll leave me alone. Which is why I made you do all those things for me.”

“So that they’d think we were dating?” you asked, trying to take all this information in. You’d sort of known it this entire time, but Sunghoon blatantly admitting he’d been using you hurt nonetheless.

“Yeah. But obviously, you always denied the rumors, so it hasn’t worked as well as I thought it would. It still did a bit though. So I think, if we take it the next step, and actually pretend we’re dating, it should really work. But I need your full cooperation on this, okay?” He looked at you, hopeful eyes and hands in prayer.

You sighed. As he said, it wasn’t like you had much of a choice.

“Please, Y/N? I really want them off my back.”

“Fine, Park, I’ll do it. But this better be the last thing you make me do.” You couldn’t help but sound cold. This made you rethink these past few weeks’ events. Were you the only one actually enjoying spending time together?

“Thanks, Y/N. And yeah, of course. You won’t have to carry my bag or get my lunch anymore if you want. Maybe it’ll be more believable if I do that for you.”

You had focused your attention back to your homework, wanting this conversation to be over as soon as possible.

“I’ll also pick you up in the morning, so you don’t need to take the bus.”

You hummed in response.

“Um, and I’ll also drop you off after school and after practice…” Sunghoon trailed, troubled by your silence. You hadn’t been so cold since the first couple times you two had talked, and he hated the idea that that might be because of what he had just said. So he took a chance.

“You know, Y/N, this doesn’t change anything. I wouldn’t have made you do all those things if I didn’t like spending time with you. You’re really nice to be around,” he admitted shyly.

You were far too flustered to lift your head and let him see your face. You just grinned and murmured, “Whatever, Park.”

—

Sunghoon kept his promise and picked you up in the morning. He called you at exactly 7:55 a.m., saying he was waiting outside and you rushed out of your house, piece of toast still in your mouth. In the car, you two went over what being in a fake relationship would involve.

“We just need to be seen around together, right?” you proposed, hoping your lack of experience wasn’t showing.

Thankfully, Sunghoon had no idea what being in a relationship, fake or not, entailed either. “Yeah, I think. And maybe…” he hesitated. 

“Maybe?” you prodded, hoping he wouldn’t (or actually would, but you’d never admit it) say what you thought he was about to say.

“I don’t know, like, hold hands, and… kiss.” The last part had barely been audible, but you’d still heard it.

“Kiss?” you echoed, voice almost a shriek. “I don’t think we need to go that far, Sunghoon.” A little voice in your head was saying that you’d really like to go that far but you made it shut up.

He was blushing profusely but didn’t want to drop the subject there. “At least on the cheek, or something. We do have to make it believable.”

And there it was. The little sentence, reminding you none of this was real. Seemed like that was a pattern in your life.

You looked out the window. Sunghoon glanced over at you, cursing himself for always saying the wrong thing. He was trying so hard to drown his blooming feelings for you that he kept on hurting you in the process. This whole fake-dating plan was the perfect excuse for him to spend more time with you without having to come to terms with his feelings. 

“C’mon, Y/N, it’ll be fun. Promise.” He nudged your arm playfully, making you look at him. His smile was contagious; you could never help yourself but start grinning when you saw his face light up like that. Maybe he’s right, you thought. Maybe this won’t be so bad after all.

When you arrived at school, Sunghoon told you to wait for a second. He got out of the car and quickly walked around to your side, opening the door for you. You hated how your heart fluttered at the sweet gesture, reminding yourself it was just for show. The important part was that it fooled everyone else, and it did - as you took Sunghoon’s hand, letting him help you out of the car, and walked with him hand in hand towards the school gates, you could feel all eyes on you. You could hear whispers of see, I told you they were dating! and defeated no ways. 

You realized you didn’t care about what anybody might be seeing, which was a first for you. You’d always made sure everybody saw you exactly the way you wanted to see them. As he was the most popular guy in school, dating Park Sunghoon at once helped your reputation and put you on many girls’ bad side. But holding his hand, you felt as though there was some kind of barrier protecting you. You’d never felt so exposed and so safe at the same time.

You noticed Jay standing next to the gates, looking particularly antsy. He’d texted you that morning, saying there was something he wanted to tell you. Usually, you’d have stayed up, overthinking what that could be, but what with today being the day you’d announce yourself to the world (your school) as Park Sunghoon’s (fake) girlfriend, you had had other things to worry about. You gestured at Sunghoon towards Jay. Your friend only saw you when you were calling his name, standing right in front of him.

“Oh, hi, Y/N! I-” 

He immediately cut himself off when he saw yours and Sunghoon’s interlaced fingers. Embarrassed, you took your hand out of your fake boyfriend’s, opting for holding onto his pinky instead, not realizing that it was a much cuter action that made one boy’s heart flutter and the other’s fill up with sadness.

“There was something you wanted to tell me?” you asked with a small smile.

“Uh- yeah, but it’s not important, actually. We can talk about it later.”

“Oh, you sure?”

“Yeah, don’t worry about it.” He returned your smile, hoping to make the situation less awkward. It was very obvious he didn’t want to say whatever it was he needed to tell you in front of Sunghoon, which you had both understood.

Sunghoon spoke up. “Right, well I’ll see you in class, Jay. Y/N, I’ll walk you to yours.” And with that, he started walking, holding his friend’s gaze for a few steps. You turned back to look at Jay for a split second, trying to decipher what had just happened, but Sunghoon grabbed you by the waist, making you look up at him in surprise, and breaking Jay’s heart even further.

—

Once Sunghoon and you got to your class, you felt as though you were in one of those movies where the boy drops the girl off at her house after their first date. Except that this was in a crowded school hallway two minutes before the first bell rang. What you had in common with that girl from the movie, however, was that you were freaking out over what your boy was going to do next. In the car, you’d ended up agreeing to a kiss on the cheek, but you hadn’t realized it would be happening so soon.

As you two hovered around your classroom’s door, you looked at each other and giggled. Damn, you were selling this well. So well that if you could have ascended out of your body and looked at the scene as a third party, you’d probably have barfed all over yourself. 

You were still holding his pinky. You could tell he was too hesitant to do anything now that you had reached the classroom, and so you mustered all of your courage, stood on your tippy toes and softly pressed your lips to his cheeks. (You were pretty sure you’d heard gasps around you.) Your courage went as fast as it came, and as realization hit you, you quickly squeaked “bye, Sunghoon” and practically ran to your seat. The boy stood there for another second or two, hand going to his cheek where you had just kissed him. He walked happily to his own classroom, completely oblivious to the stares he was receiving.

Heeseung, Jiung and Sieun were looking at you in disbelief as you approached them. Sumin, on the other hand, looked like she had paid no attention whatsoever to the scene.

“Y/N,” Sieun teased in a sing-song voice. “Care to explain what just happened?”

“Don’t tell me you’ve actually managed to make the oh-so-great Park Sunghoon fall for you?” Jiung asked jokingly. 

You looked down in an attempt to hide your grin. You usually did that sort of stuff to appear humble when someone complimented you, but this time it was completely genuine. The mere thought of Sunghoon made you all giddy inside. “Um, yeah, he actually asked me to be his girlfriend last night.”

Your three friends gasped dramatically and Sieun pulled you into a hug, as if you’d just received an award of some kind. Heeseung and Jiung patted your shoulders, congratulating you.

“Sumin? Did you know about this?” Sieun enquired, turning to your friend.

“What? Oh, yeah, Y/N called me last night,” she answered, briefly looking at you before turning back to her phone. Sieun looked at you, surprised, not understanding Sumin’s reaction to what seemed like happy news.

You had indeed called Sumin the previous night, and the call had gone similarly to the way she was behaving this morning. Although you usually told her everything, this time, you didn’t want to share the fact that you and Sunghoon were only fake dating. You found yourself actually wanting it to be true - and you thought it’d be easier to believe it yourself if everyone, including your best friend, did too.

“Minie! I’ve got some news,” you’d said as soon as she picked out.

“Ooh! Hit me,” she’d replied with as much excitement in her voice as you.

“So…” you’d started, already giggling. “Sunghoon’s just asked me out. I haven’t told anyone else, I wanted you to be the first to know.”

There was silence on the other end of the line. After a while, you added, “Minie, you still there?”

“Huh? Yeah, um, that’s nice, Y/N, I’m happy for you,” she said, not sounding happy at all. There was no trace of excitement left in her voice.

“Yeah, thanks,” you replied, voice ten times smaller than a minute ago.

“I’m sorry Y/N, but I’ve got to go, my parents are calling me. I’ll see you tomorrow.” She hung up suddenly, giving you no time to say bye in return. You were completely confused. Was Sumin bothered by you and Sunghoon dating? Other than a reminder about his past behavior, she hadn’t said anything when you two were getting closer. So what was wrong? You’d hoped you’d find out the next day at school, but the way she was acting didn’t help at all.

You snapped out of your flashback when Heeseung nudged you, faking a pout. “Not fair! Why did she get to know before we did?”

You forced a smile and said you’d known you’d see them the next day and thought it was better to tell them in person, and that you had just wanted to rant to someone quickly. Your teacher came in as the bell rang and everyone went to their seat. During class, you tried getting her attention so you could ask her if she was okay but she kept her attention on the teacher the whole time. 

After that, as time went by, you kept up your charade of being the perfect student as usual, adding to that of being the perfect girlfriend to Sunghoon. Time with him passed by so quickly: you hadn’t realized you were more than halfway through the semester until you needed to wear a thicker jacket outside and the leaves had started falling, covering school grounds in shades of brown. The plan had worked: he was finally left alone by his admirers. Sumin had stopped being weird after a few days, saying she had had some problems with her parents but hadn’t gone into more detail. Everything was as great as it had ever been: good grades, good friends and a good boyfriend. Well, fake boyfriend, which you needed to remind yourself a bit too often, on the days Sunghoon didn’t do it himself. You felt a pinch in your heart every time he said something like, “there’s my fake girlfriend!” when it was just the two of you, or “great job today, Y/N” after dropping you off.

One day as you arrived home, Yeeun was waiting outside your house, trying to catch you red-handed. She dragged him inside by the arm and you panicked, not wanting him to see how you lived. But your messy room and invasive siblings didn’t scare him off at all; on the contrary, he smiled one of the biggest smiles you’d ever seen on him, canines and dimples on display. Your mom made him stay over for dinner and it was probably the happiest dinner you’d ever had. The idea of bringing someone home and having them see your habits and odd family dynamics had terrified you for the longest time, but you felt so comfortable around Sunghoon that it felt as if he was part of your home as soon as he’d stepped foot inside. You didn’t feel the need to hide anything from him.

After dinner, he helped your parents clear up the table and even washed the dishes, even though they kept insisting he didn’t have to do anything. He had completely won them over. They sat at the table and watched you two laugh together in the kitchen. They looked at each other, knowing they were thinking the exact same thing: their daughter hadn’t looked this happy in a while.

When you were done cleaning up, you two headed to your room under the pretense of needing to study. 

“Alright, but keep the door open!” your mom had yelled after you, making you groan and Sunghoon’s face turn crimson red.

You really had planned on studying - there was a big test coming up and you couldn’t afford to get a bad grade. When you got your physics textbook out, Sunghoon groaned in protest.

“What? You seriously want to study right now?”

You sighed. “I don’t necessarily want to, no, but I need to. And so do you, may I add.”

“We’re not even in the same physics class!”

“Yeah, but we both have Mr. Cho, so I know you’re gonna have a test as well.”

He rolled his eyes and dramatically flung himself on your bed. “Fine.”

When he didn’t move for a few minutes, you guessed what he had meant was that he’d let you study but wasn’t going to do it himself. But after ten minutes, he suddenly got up. “I’m bored to death, Y/N. The test isn’t in another week. Show me what you do for fun,” he said, on the verge of desperation. It had only been ten minutes, but you felt bad having him over and not entertaining him.

“Well, I do have a Switch…” Sunghoon’s eyes widened in awe. “I guess we can play Mario Kart.”

He almost squealed in joy at that. You just chuckled at him, not knowing he was such a fan of car video games. 

“I’m gonna crush you, Kim. Get ready,” he said, already looking victorious.

You smirked, not wanting him to get his hopes up. “Oh, it’s on, Park.”

As expected of a pro player like you (on non-schooldays, you could stay up all night playing this game), you won every single round. Sure, he gave you a run for your money, but you always came on top. He took it surprisingly well, congratulating you each time. After your fourth win in a row, you wiggled your face in front of his with a devilish smile, as you couldn’t help but torment him a little. But he wasn’t smiling. At first, you’d thought he was finally getting mad he kept on losing; but then the proximity between you two hit you. You noticed his eyes flicker momentarily to your lips and had backed off immediately.

“Um, if we go for another round, I’ll go easy on-”

He cut you off by putting his hand on your cheek, making you turn to look at him. You’d daydreamed about this moment before, but you hadn’t imagined your heart beating this fast or the butterflies eating away at your stomach. He was now fully staring at your lips, and you couldn’t look at anything else but his either. Too scared to move an inch, you felt him get closer and closer, so close that his lips were almost on-

“Y/N, mom says it’s late and Sunghoon needs to- AH!”

Sunoo had walked in, eyes riveted on his phone until he looked up and saw you and Sunghoon suspiciously close to each other. Sunghoon practically leaped off of your bed in surprise and you flung a pillow over your face, not believing you had almost kissed Park Sunghoon but that your stupid little brother had ruined everything.

“Sorry! I’m sorry!” the culprit squeaked before running away. You and Sunghoon looked at each other. It was awkward for two seconds, then you both erupted in laughter. 

“Alright, guess I should get going then. Um, thank you so much for tonight. I haven’t had a family dinner in a while, and… Well, it was really nice,” he admitted shyly after you’d calmed down.

“Of course, Sunghoon. I’m sure my parents would love to have you over any time.”

You walked him to your front door, where you exchanged goodbyes and I’ll see you tomorrows. You watched him take a few steps, then turn back and jog towards you. He stood in front of you for a second, then leaned down and placed a kiss on your forehead.

“Bye, Y/N.”

You were too stunned to say it back.

—

After the almost-kiss, it felt as though something had changed between you and Sunghoon. The event had somewhat revealed your feelings: you both knew you wanted to kiss each other. But since those feelings hadn’t been acted upon, the transition from fake-dating to real dating couldn’t happen as smoothly. Well, it could, if you two stopped acting like idiots and told each other how you felt. But the author wanted to get a couple more thousand words in, so it had to wait.

You’d gotten used to Sunghoon’s little requests at school, but you definitely hadn’t anticipated a phone call at past 11pm on a Wednesday night. 

“Sunghoon? Why are you calling me so late?” you asked, groggy voice because of sleep. Since you woke up so early to get ready in the morning, you always went to bed around 9:30 to 10 p.m. Sunghoon was making you lose precious minutes of slumber.

“Late? It’s barely midnight, Y/N.” You groaned. “Whatever, put on some clothes and come outside! I’m waiting for you.”

“You’re what?” you whisper-screamed, suddenly feeling very awake.

“I’m waiting for you! Hurry up!” 

As always, he hung up without waiting for your reply. You couldn’t really turn him down anyway; although you were somewhat obligated, you had stopped seeing it that way and started doing things for him out of your own volition. 

Not wanting to get out of your pajamas, you just threw on a warm sweater, a scarf, some socks, and headed down the hallway on your tiptoes. Your parents weren’t the strictest out there, but you still didn’t wanna get caught sneaking out, and with a boy, at that. After putting on your shoes, you left your house, closing the door behind you as quietly as you could.

The late October night was a bit chilly, but you had wrapped up warm enough. Sunghoon was indeed waiting for you outside, wearing a denim jacket over his gray sweatshirt and matching sweatpants. 

God, he looked good.

“Finally! Took you long enough.”

“Quit it, Sunghoon. Just tell me why you wanted to see me.”

“There’s a place I wanna show you. Come on,” he said, taking you by the hand. You felt tingles in your palm and fingers wherever his hand touched yours. How could something feel so natural yet make your heart race so at the same time?

“Are we walking there?” you asked.

“Yep, it’s not too far. We’ll be there in five minutes.”

Those five minutes felt like five seconds walking with Sunghoon. You chatted and joked around the whole way, not letting go of each other’s hand. You hadn’t even noticed you had reached your destination until he stopped walking.

“Here we are,” he said, facing the building, which made you turn in the direction he was looking.

“The ice rink? What are we doing here?” you asked, confused. It was 11:30 pm; surely, the rink would be closed.

“You’ll see!” he said, heading towards the entrance. To your surprise, he pulled out a key from his pockets and opened the doors.

“What? Sunghoon! How do you have a key to the ice rink?”

“I’m chummy with the janitor. I just need to let him know when I’ll be coming and he doesn’t tell anyone,” he replied, an easy smile on his face, as if this was the most normal thing in the world. He led you first to the shoe rack, helping you find skates your size, and then to the benches next to the rink’s entrance. He knelt in front of you and helped you put on your shoes, doing the laces for you. 

He looked up at you, a glint in his eyes. “I’ve never taken anyone here, Y/N. I know your secret, so I thought I’d show you mine.”

You didn’t know what to say, surprised at the sudden confession, so you just looked at him curiously as he took ice skates from his backpack and laced them up.

He stood up, turned to you and said, “Ready?”

You followed him to the doors leading to the ice. He stepped inside without a trace of hesitation, but you were much more doubtful about your ability to stand on the ice without falling instantly. He turned around and saw you looking helpless. He took your hand in his, helping you step onto the rink. 

“Don’t worry, Y/N. As long as I’ve got you, you won’t fall.”

“Don’t let go of my hand, then,” you said pointedly.

Too focused on not slipping, you didn’t see his smile. “I wasn’t planning to.”

He helped you get your footing, skating backwards in front of you and holding both of your hands. After a few minutes on the ice, you got brave enough to skate on your own, and you miraculously managed to stay on your feet. However, after a while, your bravery turned to hubris, and you dared attempt a spin, resulting in you miserably falling on the ice, butt first. Sunghoon was worried for a second until he saw you laughing uncontrollably. You looked at him, wide-eyed, and said, “This is so much fun, Hoon.” You were so exhilarated that you hadn’t noticed the nickname slipping from your lips but the boy’s cheeks and ears turned redder than the bruise you had surely just earned yourself. Thankfully, if you commented on it, he could just blame it on the cold. 

He helped you up, and you skated on as if nothing had happened. This went on for another thirty minutes, you skating hand in hand and occasionally falling together (but most of the time, just you falling on your own). Sunghoon had been so nervous before bringing you here; he was scared you’d think his hobby was unmanly or lame, as he’d been made to feel. But seeing you have the time of your life, all his worries dissipated. This place was like a second home to him, and bringing someone into your home was always nerve-wracking, but he thought you fit perfectly in it. 

When you told him you were getting tired and wanted to sit for a while, you skated back together to the benches and he gave you some water from his bag. You sat in silence for a while, waiting for your breathing to come back to a normal pace. 

You broke the silence first. “So, why’d you take me here? Not that I’m complaining.”

He hesitated a second before speaking. "I used to come here all the time as a kid.” He didn’t look at you when he answered, keeping his gaze on his hands. “My mom would take me. She left us for another man the summer before middle school started. She left me alone with my asshole father.”

You let out a small gasp, not expecting such a confession. You placed your hand on his back for comfort and said, “I’m sorry, Sunghoon.”

He quickly glanced at you, a half-smile on his face. “Don’t be. Anyways, he had to somewhat start taking care of me now that my mom wasn’t there to do it.” He chuckled darkly. “I guess his idea of taking care of his son was forbidding him from doing the one thing he loved. He thought it was a stupid sport for a boy. He stopped all of my lessons and made me sign up for soccer, even though I hadn’t ever said I wanted to do that. I still came here from time to time, but I didn’t wanna risk getting caught. God knows what he’d have done if he saw me here.”

You weren’t sure what to say. You felt as if no words would be enough to express how his story made you feel. “I- it’s awful, what he did to you. No parent should ever make their child feel as though their passion isn’t worth it. If it’s any comfort, even though you were mostly helping me, I thought you looked ten times better on that rink than scoring any goal. And that’s saying something.”

He finally looked at you and grinned. “Thanks, Y/N.” He seemed to be thinking for a few seconds, and then continued: “I’ve had a lot of time to think about it, and I think that’s why it’s hard for me to open up to people and make lots of friends. I only trust Jake because I’ve known him forever and I can’t really get rid of him now,” he said with a chuckle, “and Jay, well, Jake took to him instantly in middle school so I guess I didn’t have a choice there either, and he’s not so bad anyway. The more people I let in, the more likely I am to get hurt. It’s much easier pretending I don’t wanna have anything to do with anyone than try. 

“I guess it’s also why I talked to you on that day. Sure, I ended up thinking you could help me with all those girls. But at first, when I saw someone like you, who looks like they have it all together, who’s actually the opposite in real life - no offense - it reminded me of myself. And I thought, maybe she’d understand. Which is why it was so easy to be myself around you.”

You took his hand in yours and pressed it slightly. “I’m glad you were.” You didn’t feel the need to say anything else, hoping it was enough.

“Now, your turn. What made you the person you are today?” he asked with a grin, trying to approach lightheartedly this heavy subject, which you appreciated.

“It’s all about making people think you’re someone else, isn’t it? Because, depending on who you are, they’ll treat you differently. I found that out as a kid, because I, too, have a tragic childhood backstory.” He gasped jokingly.

“It’s not as bad as yours, so sorry about that. Back in primary school, I already had this… attitude that I have today. I had quite the ego, and I didn’t want anyone doing better than me at school. I didn’t care about how I looked, if I was the prettiest girl in class or had the cutest shoes. I was the smarty-pants of the class, basically, and a lot of the kids teased me for that. But I also didn’t let myself get trampled over, and fought back, quite aggressively at that, so I was somehow the nerd and the troublemaker at the same time. I didn’t have the best reputation, but I did have a friend. Jay. Or Jongseong, at the time, before he got too cool for his real name,” you joked. “The thing is, I didn’t see him as a friend. Sure, I was only eight or nine, but I really liked him. And the day I was planning on confessing, I saw him hold hands with the prettiest girl in our class. So I never told him, and then he left for the US a few months later.

“During the time he was gone, I had a complete makeover and actually started caring about my appearance, especially when middle school started. So now I had academic validation from teachers, which I had craved since forever, and both female and male validation from all the girls telling me how pretty I was and all the guys liking me. The people who were in my primary school and went to the same middle school told them how I used to be, but nobody believed them, and if they did, they didn’t care, so everybody just gradually forgot about it. And I just got addicted to the validation, which is why I always studied harder and tried to be prettier, even when it turned into a complete lie. I thought that if I could make everyone believe I was perfect, then it didn’t matter what I was like in real life, so at home, I just let myself completely go. And even now that I’m aware of all of this, I still can’t stop.”

Sunghoon looked at you like you had just slapped him. “So, you used to have a crush on Jay?”

You looked at him in exasperation. “Seriously, Hoon? That’s what you get from everything I just told you?”

He smiled shyly. “Sorry. Thank you for telling me.” You sat there in comfortable silence for another few minutes, still hand in hand. Then, Sunghoon got up, grin on his face.

“Wanna see something cool?” You nodded at him, returning his grin. He headed back inside the rink.

You thought he was gonna show off by doing some fancy trick. But he started gliding on the ice, and you couldn’t believe what you were seeing. He took long strides that looked as natural to him as walking. He spinned one, two, three times, and continued skating as though it was nothing. You were completely mesmerized. You already thought he was out-of-this-world beautiful, but his beauty was brought to another level when he skated. His elegant moves rendered you breathless. When he skated back towards you, you were looking at him with only awe and admiration in your eyes. 

After what he’d told you and what he’d just shown you, you couldn't help but get a little emotional. You engulfed him in a hug as soon as he’d stepped out of the rink, your arms around his neck and his naturally coming to your waist. Your hands came up to his cheeks as you leaned back to properly look at him.

“That was- wow. That was amazing, Sunghoon. Thank you for showing me.” You could see the gratefulness in his eyes. There was something else there, and whatever it was, you knew you were looking back at him with as much of it. It was only you two in the building, but it might as well have been the two of you in the whole world. 

All too similarly as in your room, his gaze went from your eyes to your lips, and you couldn’t help but mirror that. This was the perfect moment. You inched your face closer, letting him close the gap between you. Your lips touched and it was as if everything fell into place. The kiss was shy at first, neither of you sure what to do, your mouths moving at a slow but steady pace. But as your hands traveled from his cheeks, to his jaw and down to his neck, and you felt him sigh in the kiss, something unclicked in you, making you want more. You deepened the kiss, and he returned it with just as much force. Your right hand came to grab at the nape of his hair and his hands gripped your waist tighter. After minutes or hours, you broke the kiss in need of some air. Your eyes met again and you smiled at him, relieved it had finally happened. 

You thought he’d have a similar reaction, but he suddenly looked panicked. Realization hit him like a truck. He liked you. Far too much. And even if the kiss and these past weeks told him you might like him back, it scared him. He’d unlocked his heart for you but couldn’t let you keep the key. Otherwise, he’d let you open it more and more and more until there he was completely bare in front of you, and you decided you didn’t like what you’d found and left him. Just like his mom did. Just like everyone eventually does. Just like his dad never even tried.

He took a step back. His panic was rubbing off on you. You called out his name, but he quickly got his bag and said, “Sorry, Y/N, I have to go. I’ll um- I’ll see you.” He took a few steps, turned around, and said, “I think you should take the bus tomorrow morning. Sorry.”

He started walking away. A few steps before he’d be out of your view, he turned back around. He hated the look on your face, how sad, confused and helpless it was all at once. Above all, he hated that he was the reason behind it. But he told himself it was better to leave you now than be left in a few months when you got bored of him, and started walking again without another word.

—

You walked home alone. It was a dark November night, and you were shivering from the cold and from sadness. Try as hard as you might, you couldn’t figure out why Sunghoon had reacted like that. The past month had gone so well, you were only getting closer and more comfortable with each other. The only logical conclusion you could come to was that kissing you had made him realize he didn’t like you. Thankfully, you didn’t live too far from the ice rink and you got home in five minutes. Lost in your thoughts, you couldn’t even be bothered to be quiet closing the front door and walking to your room, and you woke Sunoo up.

At first, he looked like he was about to scold you for making so much noise; but upon seeing your disheveled state, he started worrying. 

“Y/N? What’s wrong, why are you only coming home now? Where were you?”

You couldn’t hold it in any longer. You fell in your brother’s arms and started crying your heart out.

He held you for a little while, but not wanting to wake the others up by staying in the hallway, he said, “Come on, let’s get you in your room. You’re freezing.”

He left for a few minutes and came back with two cups of tea in his hands. He joined you on your bed. You had calmed down a bit and took a sip of the tea, already feeling warmer.

“So, tell me everything.”

And you did. Not just about what had happened at the ice rink, but everything before that: how yours and Sunghoon’s relationship was fake, which you hadn’t even told your siblings, but that it hadn’t kept you from falling for him, and how you really thought he felt the same way. When you got to the part where you told each other about your stories, Sunoo grabbed your arm in surprise, and said, “I can’t believe you told someone about that. Good for you, big sis.”

You sat in silence after a few minutes when you’d finished telling him everything, you, still reflecting on your evening, and him, trying to think of something good to say. He took a deep breath, and started: “You know, this might be completely useless, but I feel like there’s no point trying to figure out why he did that. We’re not mind readers, and assuming things will just go wrong. I think the best thing to do is just ask him tomorrow, or whenever you’re ready to face him, really.”

You looked at your brother fondly. “How can you be so stupid sometimes, yet so wise right now?”

Sunoo and you talked for another minute, but when you yawned for a good seven straight seconds, you both agreed it was time for bed. Before you fell asleep, you told yourself that tomorrow morning, you’d find Sunghoon and make him be clear with you. You at least deserved that.

—

Heeseung and Sumin were clearly surprised to see you the next morning in the bus, but you told them you didn’t want to talk about it and they didn’t push, although it very obviously had something to do with Sunghoon. As you rode the bus and psyched yourself for your conversation with him, you had no idea he was currently in the midst of a heated argument with Jay. The latter pushed him with force, making Sunghoon’s back hit the classroom wall behind him.

“What the fuck did you just say about Y/N?” Jay asked, venom in his voice and fury in his eyes.

Despite the pain, Sunghoon smirked, wanting to rile up his friend even more. “I said, Y/N’s just as stupid as all the other girls. She probably thinks she’s so much better than everybody, but in the end it was so easy making her fall for me. It was almost boring, really, how easy she was.”

Jay pushed him again. “Don’t fucking talk about her like that.”

“Aw, little Jay is getting upset over his little Y/N? You sad that the girl you like actually likes an asshole like me?”

Jay hadn’t had many reasons to get angry in his life. This was making him discover another side of himself; he didn’t know he could get this angry. He didn’t know rage could fill up his veins like that and make him want to destroy absolutely everything around him, but above all, the person in front of him who’d he considered a friend all these years. On the verge of losing control, he reared up his fist, before Sunghoon said:

“You know what’s even sadder? She used to like you, too.”

His arm dropped. “What?”

“Yeah, in primary school. Didn’t you think it was weird how different she was before and after you left? Her little heartbreak made her change everything about herself just so that people would like her. And now all she can do is lie to everyone. I pity her, really. And to think that she thought I liked her. What an idiot.”

That was the last straw. Jay punched Sunghoon square in the nose, making him stumble back a few steps until he hit the wall again. He held onto his bloody, and possibly broken, nose and looked Jay straight in the eyes, still smirking. Thinking his job was done (but not sure what the job was in the first place), he walked away, heading to the nurses’ station. The scene had gathered quite an audience outside. It was less than ten minutes to the first bell, so already quite a few students were there, but no one had dared to venture inside. Jake, arriving too late to prevent any damage, looked wide-eyed back and forth between Sunghoon walking out and Jay standing inside, fists clenched by his side and panting from anger.

Sunghoon barely spared him or anyone a glance as he left the room. What he did notice though, were a crumpled tuna-mayo sandwich and a banana milk on the floor, looking as though someone had dropped them.

What had he done?

—

You had already run back to your friends and were currently crying for the second time in twelve hours in Sumin’s arms. It was the first time ever you cried at school, and probably also in front of your friends, spare Sumin, so it was a curious sight to most; she took you to another room for privacy. 

There, you practically told her everything you had told Sunoo the night before, including the fake dating.

“Wait… so, you and Sunghoon weren’t actually dating?”

You nodded, embarrassed by your lie.

“I- Why didn’t you tell me, Y/N? How could you fool everyone like that?”

You looked up in surprise at your friend’s harsh words. You probably deserved them, but you weren’t used to hearing her speak in such a way, nor to the cold stare she was peering down at you with. 

“I don’t know… I’m really sorry…” you mumbled, ashamed.

She scoffed. “You should be. I just- I just don’t understand how you can already be living such a lie, and still add onto it. It makes me wonder how I’m still friends with you.” The bell rang right at that moment, and she got up, saying, “Let’s go to class. You wouldn’t wanna be late.”

You followed her, but you felt sick to your stomach. Usually, you could always hide your discomfort or sadness, no matter how bad your period cramps were or how serious an argument with your parents had gotten. But this time, it was too much, and fifteen minutes into the class, you asked the teacher to go to the nurse. Not used to you needing to leave class and trusting that it was for a legitimate reason, your teacher let you off and you quickly packed your bag and left. 

When you got to the nurse, you sat down in front of her and said you weren’t feeling well and wanted to go home. For the same reasons as your teacher, she said she’d let you but needed to ask you a few questions before about your general well-being. You answered them quickly, wanting to get this over with as soon as possible and just go home. 

When you finally were able to leave, you only took a few steps out of the nurse’s office before someone grabbed your wrist, making you turn around. Sunghoon, who was resting in the room next door, had heard your voice and gotten up as soon as he’d heard you leave. His nose was covered in bandages and his eye had started swelling and turning blue, and you mentally thanked Jay. You ripped your arm out of his grip and continued to walk away without a word. You were too tired to argue.

“Y/N, please, hear me out.”

This made you stop in your tracks, but you didn’t turn around. “Hear you out? I’ve already heard enough, Sunghoon. No need to explain, you made it very clear what you think of me.”

You started walking again but he doubled you and blocked your path in the narrow hallway. 

“Y/N, I’m sorry, if you’d just give me a minute-”

“I don’t care that you’re sorry, Sunghoon! Sorry doesn’t cut it. I trusted you. Actually trusted you. You out of all people should know how hard it is to do that. Or was that a lie too?” Seeing him in front of you, your sadness retreated to the back of your heart and you were left with only anger. 

“It wasn’t, I prom-”

“That doesn’t mean anything to me anymore.” You pushed past him and walked on. And this time, he let you go, even though the only thing you wanted him to do was make you stay. You so desperately wanted to hear him out and forgive him, but you knew you couldn’t do that. You had too much dignity, and it would only end up hurting you even further. 

So you didn’t shed a tear the whole way home. When you finally got to your bed, you didn’t have the energy to start crying. You fell asleep, tears quietly rolling down your face. 

—

You slept the whole day, waking up to a soft knock on your bedroom door. It was your mom, telling you Jay was here to see you. Everyone had been surprised to see you already at home when they came back from work or school, but they knew better than to wake you up.

“I’m surprised, you know. He’s gotten so handsome.”

You rolled your eyes at her. “Just tell him that I’m not feeling well and he should go home, please.”

“Oh, I’ve already tried to, honey. The boy is adamant on seeing you.”

You sighed. “Fine. Can you bring him here, then?”

A few seconds later, you heard another knock, and Jay opened the door just enough to peek his head through, asking if he could come in.

“Well, you’re already here, so might as well.”

You sat up and gestured for him to sit down on your bed.

He looked around, taking in the messiness of his surroundings. “You know, I thought your room would be much more… organized.”

“Didn’t Sunghoon tell you? I’m a big, fat liar who hides the truth from everyone,” you said sarcastically.

“About that… did you hear everything he said?” You hummed in response. “I’m so sorry you had to hear that, Y/N. I don’t know what happened to him. He’d never said anything like that about you, and then, all of a sudden… What an asshole. I can’t believe he was my friend.”

“Was? You shouldn’t end your friendship over me, Jay.”

“Are you kidding me? I can’t be friends with a guy who talks about anyone like that, let alone you.” After a few minutes of silence, he asked, “Did um- did anything happen, for him to say those things?”

You sighed deeply. “I’ve already told this story twice in the past few days, so I’ll give you the short version, but basically, we were fake dating, and I started really liking him, and I thought he did too, until we kissed, and he left me completely stranded, and then the next day I hear him say all those things.”

Silence again. You suddenly remembered something Sunghoon had said that you had completely put to the side: Jay likes you. At least, according to Sunghoon. You didn’t know if it was true, but judging by his disappointed face, it looked like it. Seemed like all of your friendships were going to hell.

“Oh,” he simply said.

“Yeah…” you murmured back. 

“Well,” he turned to you, “that just confirms to me that he’s an asshole. Cause no guy in his right mind would turn you down, Y/N. I know I wouldn’t.”

He looked straight at you as he said that. Yep. Jay liked you. It was a nice feeling, but it was also about ten years too late. 

“Do you- do you know what I’m trying to say, Y/N?” he asked, gulping.

You hesitated for a second before saying, ”I think I do, Jay. I have to say, your timing isn’t great.”

He chuckled a bit lifelessly. “Yeah, I guess right now isn’t the best time to say this.”

“I also meant, you know what Sunghoon said, earlier? That I liked you before you left for the US? That was true.”

He looked at you, mouth agape. “Oh, was it…” His head hung down in defeat. “I can’t believe I’ve been such an idiot. I feel like it’s my fault that Sunghoon hurt you like this. If only I’d been just a bit earlier…”

“None of this is your fault, Jay. Please don’t think that. It’s mine for thinking Sunghoon could actually like me back.”

Jay took a deep breath. “God, as much as it hurts me to say, Y/N, I think he did. Or does, actually.” You furrowed your brows at him. “Sunghoon, he has this thing where he goes into retreat mode as soon as he gets too close, too personal. It’s a stupid defense mechanism, and when he realizes he’s let you in a bit too far, he snaps everything closed and hurts you before you can hurt him. At least, that’s how he sees it, I guess. He’s done it to Jake and me a couple times, and it takes some getting used to, but he stops after a while. When he knows for sure that you won’t hurt him.”

You didn’t know what to do with this information, so you just stayed quiet, which Jay took as a sign to go on.

“I’m not saying forgive him. Believe me, if I could smack him into space and never let him see you again, I would. But I think maybe, just maybe, and you don’t have to if you don’t want to, hear him out.”

You smiled at him. “You’re a good friend, Jay. And I don’t mean just to me but to Sunghoon as well. I hope you know that.”

Jay tried to ignore the pinch in his heart at the word ‘friend’ and smiled back.

“Oh, there’s another thing I needed to show you.” His tone was suddenly much more apprehensive, and he looked both sorry and scared to say whatever he was about to say.

He pulled out his phone and searched the thing in question. Before showing you anything, he warned, “Nobody knows who did this. It was sent out to the whole school on a library computer-”

Expecting the worst, you snatched Jay’s phone from his hands. And there they were. Pictures of you from your primary school years, recent pictures of you in your comfortable clothes, at home or in close proximity to your house. Sent out to the whole school, as Jay had said. You were horror-struck. You could feel all the years you had spent perfecting your image and maintaining it crumbling around you as though they were paper. Charismatic smiles and trendy accessories had been your brick and mortar, but a sledgehammer had hit them, destroying your foundations further with each swing.

And that sledgehammer had a name: Bae Sumin. You’d figured it out in an instant. You’d been friends your whole life, she was the only one apart from your family to know about your true face; only she would have access to such photos. You knew it wasn’t Sunghoon because the pictures he had taken that day weren’t there.

If what had happened with Sunghoon had made a crack in your heart, then this had shattered it into a million pieces. The person who you’d trusted the most, who you’d thought would never do anything to hurt you, had done the worst thing anybody could do to you.

“Y/N- are you okay?” Jay asked tentatively. You had forgotten he was there.

“Um, yeah, yeah- I think I just need to be alone for now, if that’s okay.”

“Are you sure? I don’t mind staying a while.”

“Sorry, Jay, but I’m sure.”

He looked at you for a few seconds. He’d never felt more distance between you two, not even when you had been oceans apart. “Alright. Call me if you need anything. I mean it.”

You smiled a tiny, tiny smile in response and he left your room. On his way out, your mom hugged him, saying it was nice to see him again and that he was welcome anytime, and he thanked her.

As he walked home, he couldn’t help but bitterly laugh to himself. Even when he confessed, he hadn’t been able to say the words he’d wanted to tell you this whole time: I love you.

—

You didn’t go to school for the rest of the week, the only stain on your perfect attendance record. All of your friends had tried to reach you, asking if you were okay, and you replied in a few small messages, telling them you’d be back when you could. Other people had contacted you, asking if those pictures were real. You obsessed over your school’s gossip Instagram account: the past few days, all the posts had been dedicated to your pictures and Sunghoon’s and Jay’s fight. You had ten missed calls from Sunghoon and seventeen from Sumin. You ignored each and everyone of them, only giving Jay, Heeseung, Sieun and Jiung the time of day. 

On Sunday morning you woke up, already dreading going to school the next day. You could already picture the nasty stares and whispers you’d get in the hallways. You thought about facing Sumin and Sunghoon again, and you thought the worst thing possible would be to have to do it at school. So you decided to wait until they called you again, as you knew they would, and finally picked up their call.

Sumin contacted you first, at eleven in the morning. You agreed to have her come over to your house to talk. When she appeared at your front door, you realized you weren’t sad, angry, or disappointed; you were just confused. You didn’t understand why she’d done it. Looking at her face, you couldn’t imagine her sitting down at that computer and sending out those pictures, writing the comment This is what Kim Y/N is like in real life.

You let her in and walked to your room, your siblings’ eyes burning holes into her soul the whole time. You sat down on your bed, sighed, and said, “Go ahead.”

“Thank you for letting me come here and explain myself. I don’t know what took over me, Y/N. Well actually, I guess I do. Jealousy, as stupid as it sounds.” She chuckled at herself. “I’ve always tried to hide it, but I’ve always been a bit jealous of you, Y/N. You’re the prettiest girl, the smartest, the nicest, and I’m just the best friend. That’s all anyone knows me as. Everybody loves you, yet I know it’s all a facade. And I’m not saying that to be mean, because I know you’re an amazing person even without all the glamor. And when I saw you with Sunghoon, I mean, you saw how I was. I didn't fight with my parents. I was so, so jealous. You hadn’t shown interest in any guy since Choi Soobin and all of a sudden you were dating Park freaking Sunghoon, and he knew about your quote-on-quote ‘real’ face, so I couldn’t even comfort myself that he didn’t know who you really were.”

“Wait- why would you be jealous of Sunghoon and me?”

She took a deep breath. “You remember, freshman year, when I confessed to him and he turned me down?”

“Yeah, but I thought that was in the past.”

“Do you also remember that guy I told you about later on, who I’d gotten really close with but completely shut me off when I thought we were about to start dating?”

Something clicked, but you didn’t want to face it. “Yeah…”

“Well, surprise surprise, they were the same person. Ha. I got mad at you for lying to me, but I did the same thing.”

“Sumin… Why did you never tell me?”

“I’m not sure. When we were in that talking stage, I could’ve bragged about it to anyone, you know, that Park Sunghoon was actually being nice to me, but I didn’t. I wanted to keep him my little secret. And then I confessed, and we all know how that ended.” A beat passes as she takes a deep breath, shaking the bad memory away. “I am over it, it was more than three years ago. Maybe there was a nice part of me that thought he had changed, because you seemed happy with him, and I didn’t want to ruin that. But maybe there was another part that hoped he might hurt you like he did me. And that’s such a shitty thing to do, I know. I should’ve told you when I saw you get involved with him. I can’t believe after all these years, he did the exact same thing to you that he did to me. What an asshole.”

You were staring at the wall in front of you, feeling empty. Why did everything have to happen at the same time? You were just drained of any willpower.

“This doesn’t explain the pictures,” you said plainly.

“Right. When you told me you were fake dating, I guess something snapped in me. I couldn’t believe it was another lie, I thought we had gone past the stage where you hid things from me. So that, plus jealousy, I just went a bit crazy, I think. I really wasn’t thinking, Y/N, and I promise you with all my heart that if I could go back and undo everything, I would. I’m so, so, so sorry. I regretted it as soon as I hit post.”

You looked at your friend and knew she was telling the truth. You believed her, and yet you couldn’t quite look past it.

“I know you are, Minie. It’s just… what am I gonna do now at school? Everybody must hate me.”

“I won’t lie, some people haven’t been saying the nicest things, especially Park’s fangirls. But God, Y/N, and please don’t take this the wrong way, but who cares? They’ll talk about it for a week, two at most. Your life at school won’t be the same, but you’ll still have all of us. I’ve talked to Heeseung, Sieun and Jiung, and they’re not the tiniest bit mad at you. They’re just worried to death. A bit confused too, but mostly worried. And you know what? Even Yujin, Wonyoung and Gaeul, who I’ve literally never talked to before, came to ask me how you were. Jay and Sunghoon are barely on talking terms but they always team up when it comes to practically verbally assaulting anyone they overhear talking behind your back. Jake has to hold them back sometimes but he always glares at those people too. You don’t wanna see Jake Sim glare, I promise you. It’s so scary,” she says in a confessional tone, visibly shuddering just at the thought of angel-faced Jake looking angry, and you can’t help the small chuckle that escapes your lips.

Her face softens as she places a warm palm over your hand. “We all love you and care for you so much, so screw literally every single other person in that school. They don’t matter.”

There was something refreshing about Sumin’s words. The idea that you could live your life without worrying about other people had always been in the back of your head, but you always told yourself you were in too deep to go back. Now that you had been forced to, you understood why you felt so empty: the immense weight of having to keep up a persona, had been lifted off your shoulders. You would only have to carry yourself, and not a second person, which made you feel weightless. You’d just have to get used to it and come to enjoy that feeling.

You took your friend’s hands in yours. “I want to forgive you, I promise I do. And I will. I just don’t know if I can do that right away. I’ll need some getting used to this new life.”

“I completely understand, Y/N.”

“But that doesn’t mean I don’t want you around anymore. And you know what, I’m sure one day I’ll look back at this moment and thank you.”

—

Sumin left a few hours later and you were now waiting for Sunghoon to call you. You waited and waited, until your phone rang with a small ding: he wasn’t calling you, but had sent you a message. A very, very long message. You were very tempted to reply with a I ain’t reading all that. I’m happy for u tho. Or sorry that happened, but you thought it might not be the appropriate moment. 

You opened the message, which had come after thirty unread texts, and started reading, slightly appalled by the lack of paragraphing.

Dear Y/N, 

Is this how you start a long text? I would much rather be telling you this than writing it, but someone hasn’t been picking up my calls. Sorry. I probably shouldn’t be giving you much attitude right now. Where do I even start? The ice rink, I guess. Asshole move #1, obviously. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have left you like that. That kiss was really really good and I really really liked it. Because I really really like you. And I think I’ve known that for a while now, but the kiss confirmed it. And I was happy for a second, but then I panicked. There’s no other word for it, I panicked. I’ve never liked someone this much before and I was so scared. I still am. I’m terrified shitless. But I know that my fear is completely irrational, and that you’re literally the best person on Earth, which is why I’m writing this. I know it’s cliché to say my mom left me and now I think everybody will. And my first reaction to that is to hurt someone before they can hurt me, which is what I did. But as much as I wanna fight it, it’s always there at the back of my mind. You can even ask Sumin about it. Should I be saying that? I feel like I might as well. I was an asshole to her, and I’m so angry at myself that I did it again with you. I didn’t mean a single word of what I said about you to Jay. Not a single one. You’re not stupid, you’re the smartest and most amazing girl I know, and I never pretended I liked you, because I never had to. I think I just wanted Jay to punch me, really. I wanted him to run to you and make sure you were okay, because I was too scared to do that myself. But I regret doing that so much. I hope you know that. And bless Jay, he’s a real one. He told me to get my shit together and talk to you. I can tell he’s still mad at me but still wants to make things good between us. I was already trying to call you before he said that, but I probably would’ve said something stupid that would’ve made things worse. And I can’t afford that, Y/N, I really, really can’t. You get me like no one does and being with you is the most liberating thing ever, I’m never myself more than when I’m around you. You just bring out the best in me. Well, except for that thing I did. Which I promise I’ll never do again. I am so extremely sorry, and if you wanna hate me for the rest of your life, I completely get it. But I would also be very happy if you didn’t. I hope I’ll see you tomorrow at school. I really miss you.

Your Hoon

You wiped away the tears that had formed in your eyes and typed back:

You’re such an idiot, Park.

I’ll see you tomorrow.

—

The next day, as you imagined, was mostly hell. You’d decided not to dress up as usual: there was no point trying to look good after this, it would only make you seem more ridiculous. You put less makeup on, not bothering to hide your eye bags, and didn’t bling your outfit up with accessories or fancy shoes, opting for your worn-out Converse you’d had since your feet stopped growing. On the bus, where people usually ignored each other, you could already feel the gossip being told about you. You avoided people’s gaze like the plague and sat down next to Sumin. You laid your head on her shoulder and sighed.

“I already wanna go home.”

She laughed, “I know. We’ll be with you the whole day, so don’t worry.”

You spent the bus ride catching up on what had happened when you were gone (nothing much), and although there was some awkwardness there, it was nice being with your best friend. When Heeseung got on, he practically screamed your name and suffocated you by means of greeting.

“I’m so glad you’re back. You know, I think you look really cute in those pictures. All these people are just jealous they don’t look as good as you even when you don’t dress up.”

Sumin shot daggers with her eyes at him and he cringed, saying, “Sorry, I shouldn’t have mentioned that.”

You reassured him, saying that it was fine since it was all you were going to be hearing the next few days. “Might as well get used to it.”

It was somewhat easy to ignore the stares coming your way when you walked into school with Heeseung and Sumin flanked at your sides like bodyguards. When you reached your classroom, Jiung engulfed you in a hug and Sieun was almost crying. How the hell had you gotten such sweet friends? 

In the hallways, some people tried to get reactions out of you by calling you out, yelling liar! or you can’t fool us anymore. You couldn’t ignore them as they were very much in your face. When at lunch, a table of girls next to you was very clearly talking about you in the nastiest way possible, you took your tray and were ready to get up and leave, but a very familiar voice stopped you in your tracks.

“You think it’s funny talking about someone like that?” Sunghoon was practically screaming at the girls. “You think you’re any better than her? I bet you do the exact same thing but are just glad someone else got called out for it.” You weren’t sure if that made you feel much better, but you appreciated the effort.

“As a matter of fact,” he continued as he pulled out a chair and got up on it, his voice getting louder, “I’ve got something I wanna say to everyone.”

Somebody whooped (probably Jake) and you tried to get Sunghoon to come down from the chair, but he just smiled his radiant smile at you and turned to look at the students in the cafeteria.

“All of you who judge Y/N are hypocrites. You wanna tell me you’re all as perfect at home as you are at school? That you never relax a little bit? Sure, she pushed it a bit far- (hey! you grunted in protest), but nobody shows who they truly are to everyone. We all judge each other in this stupid high school, so Y/N did what she had to do and protected herself. If anything, this should make you respect her even more. And it’s not like she did anything wrong to you. She didn’t use her popularity against anyone, so you better not use this against her.”

From the crowded tables in the cafeteria, somebody yelled “Nobody cares!”

Somebody, whose voice you thought you recognized as Jungwon’s, joined in: “Yeah, what is it about you seniors and thinking the whole school revolves around you? We still like Y/N!”

Sunghoon, taken aback, simply said, “Oh. Alright. Well, you better keep it that way then!” and got off his chair. 

He turned to you, already a pleading look on his face and said “Y/N, I’m so sorry-”

But you cut him off right away. “I know, Sunghoon, I know. I think this proved it.”

“I really wanna make it up to you. So just tell me what you want me to do, and I’ll do it. Buy you a house, move to another country, you name it. I’ll do it.”

You chuckled at him. “You don’t need to go that far.” You looked down, then back at him. “I think I just want to pretend like nothing happened. Like it was all a huge, awful fever dream. Even if I can’t forgive and forget right away, I don’t think I want you out of my life while I figure it out.”

He let out the biggest sigh you’d ever heard. “My God, you don’t know how happy to hear that, Y/N. Thank you so much.”

“Thank you for defending me just now. That was… definitely something.”

He smiled down at you. "I did my best. Too bad those sophomores ruined everything.”

You could feel eyes burning into your sides, so you turned your head a bit and noticed that your friends and the table of girls that had just been gossiping were staring at you, some of them teary-eyed. When they saw you notice them, they all turned back to each other and pretended that they were having some other conversation. You and Sunghoon chuckled, and you realized how much you had missed him.

Yes, Sunghoon and Sumin had hurt you, but you were a strong believer of second chances. Even if it was hard at first to stop thinking about Sunghoon’s voice when he had said those things or Sumin’s intentions when she posted the pictures, they’d made it up to you in any way they could and you’d reciprocated that by being completely honest. No more trying to look perfect all the time; you were human and were allowed to have low moments. Your grades even dropped by two points, because you’d started spending more time with your friends than with your textbooks. You’d spent whole Saturdays at the ice rink with your now real-boyfriend Sunghoon, and had invited the whole crew. Heeseung was surprisingly good at it. You had even caught your little sister Yeeun on a date with the cute Japanese boy she’d talked about. 

As promised, Jay came once a week or every two weeks to have dinner with your family; Sunghoon always insisted on being present. The tension between them had turned into friendly competition, and you could tell the two friends were glad to have each other back. 

You’d never felt so free. Your relationship with Sunghoon felt like uncharted territory and home at the same time; so daunting and exciting yet so comfortable and relaxing. You kept the PDA at a minimum at school, but when it was just the two of you, your whole body never failed to heat up, even in the cold of the ice rink. He had been nicknamed the ice prince, but he was so, so warm.

In the end, everybody found out. But you had Park Sunghoon by your side, so it was alright.

permanent taglist: @zreamy @sunghoonmybeloved @lalalalawon @sd211 @w3bqrl @raikea10 @wntrnghts @moonlighthoon @4imhry @rikisly @loves0ft @iamliacamila @theboingsuckerasseater9000 @chaechae-23 @baekhyuns-lipchain @hyuckslvr @vernonburger (ask to be removed/added!)

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[odoroshi-rider]

Assuming grinal lives to the homestuck era. Do you think she'd become more or less insufferable when she discovers it?

Yknow given that the yaoi paddle era of anime con culture was almost immediately followed by the great homestuckening and the advent of gray paint smeared on every con hotel in sight (there were straight-up bans at a lot of the local cons I went to back in the day it was very funny), I give it a 50/50 that she either:

a.) gets completely swept up in the craze and becomes the second-worst kind of homestuck cosplayer: a terezi with precisely zero regard for personal space. she knows how to properly seal her face paint—she’s not a fuckin cosplay CASUAL—but she can and will lick unsuspecting fellow cosplayers, and get thrown out for it.

b.) absolutely REFUSES ON PRINCIPLE to read it, because these AMERICAN WEB COMIC READERS are infiltrating her JAPANESE ANIME CONS in droves and god dammit homestuck is NOT a manga and therefore BAD!!! would roll a stink bomb into one of the massive homestuck cosplay meetups and get thrown out for it.

so regardless of which: she would become more insufferable. as she is wont to do

[suosgirl]

Keeping It Cute (& Dangerous) - Hayato Suo x Reader | Ch. 4

Word Count: 4970

୨ৎ Read me before interacting!

୨ৎ Pairing: Hayato Suo x Reader feat. Haruka Sakura, Akihiko Nirei, Taiga Tsugeura, Mitsuki Kiryu, Hajime Umemiya, Kotoha Tachibana

୨ৎ Warnings: mdni, f!reader, manga spoilers (?), ooc (?), loss of loved one, slowburn, teasing, misunderstandings, fighting, grief, swearing, ptsd, 2 stubborn idiots falling for each other – if I’ve missed one, I apologize + please let me know!

୨ৎ Note: Long ass chapter. Why? Because I'm a sucker for relationship development – that's all! (๑>؂•̀๑)

୨ৎ Keeping it Cute (& Dangerous) Masterlist

“If I could describe you in one word, Suo, I’d say that you’re –” “Intelligent? Patient? Cheeky?” “Insufferable.” He laughs lightly at your words as if you hadn’t just offended him, before gazing down at you with a look that screams mischief and something else that you can’t quite place yet.

It’s funny – before all of this, you didn’t think life could go any other way for you but the path you’d chosen. 

You were fine with being alone. If it guarantees the safety of your hometown, then so be it. If your brother could make sacrifices, then so could you.

And you did. 

Leaving wasn’t supposed to be easy, that much you knew. Walking away from the town meant you were leaving the memories you’d made there and the people that you’d grown to love. 

Was it lonely at first? Of course. But as with everything in life, it just took time for this to become your new normal. You knew what you had signed up for when you left – so were you really that shocked that you began missing the presence of others or the feeling of being needed?

Everything was fine – at least, that’s what you told yourself.

But, being here, in Makochi – you didn’t think you’d ever experience those feelings again.

That feeling of being wanted, needed, and loved.

And suddenly – you weren’t so alone anymore.

⋆ ˚｡⋆୨♡୧⋆ ˚｡⋆

It didn’t take much longer for the other boys to finally find where you and Suo were.

They came running in a frenzy, eyes wide and out of breath, and you couldn’t help the small chuckle that left your lips at the sight.

Did they really care that much? They didn’t even know you. But … they wanted to, and that meant more to you than you’d like to admit.

… It was getting harder to ignore the budding warmth in your chest and the crinkle in your eyes.

Whether it was due to Suo’s words or the overwhelming feeling of being, for the first time in what felt like forever, seen and understood – you allowed yourself, just this once, to hope again. 

Fine. If they wanted to, you’d let them. You’d take Suo’s words for face value, and meet them first with your head held up high, like a tiger would. Were you afraid? Absolutely. But – you were hopeful, and that made all the difference.

They stare at you, their faces expecting the worst, and you pity them just a bit. It wouldn’t do them any good to worry – and you were every bit gracious and kind, so you throw them a bone.

You were, after all, weak to dreamy guys.

“Alright,” you let out a deep sigh, “Who wants my number?”

⋆ ˚｡⋆୨♡୧⋆ ˚｡⋆

It starts with a simple invitation through text. 

Nirei messages you first, inviting you to meet him at a place called Café Pothos, and you genuinely consider saying no and that you’re busy – but then, you remember the puppy dog eyes that he has so diligently mastered, and you just can’t find it in your heart to say no to a face like that. 

(Unbeknownst to you, he’s quick to catch on. This would become your downfall.)

When you arrive, you recognize it as the place that they had brought you to before. Back then, you’d been in a much more hectic headspace, so you hadn’t taken the time to appreciate all the little details about it. Now, though, you were able to admire the flourishing plants all over the café and the aroma of coffee in the air. 

Upon entering, you see a girl behind the counter, and you’re quick to take a sharp inhale because – she’s pretty.

You weren’t sure what the people in Makochi ate, but it was terribly unfair that everyone here happened to be blessed with the most spectacular genes that you’ve ever witnessed in your life.

It was, quite honestly, so fucked up.

As you glance around the café, you notice that you’re the only one here – and that she’s staring at you with a good-natured grin on her face.

She’s warm and inviting as she beckons you over, asking what you’d like and if you’re from out of town.

(You make a mental note to gain some sort of backbone against attractive people.)

You easily fall into a conversation with her as she prepares a cup of coffee for you, and you learn that her name is Kotoha and that she’s over at the café more often than not. 

“You could easily be a model, you know,” you tell her earnestly, and she blushes as she waves off your comment.

Once you introduce yourself, her face lights up with recognition – and now, it was your turn to blush.

“Oh! That’s you! I’ve heard about you! In fact, they haven’t stopped talking about you –”

You should’ve expected this, really – but you didn’t. It had been so long since you were on the receiving end of showered praise like this, and you’d already gotten your fill a couple days prior. So, to say that this was overwhelming was an understatement.

“...And,” she continues with a wink, “You’re as pretty as they said you were.”

Your fingers shoot up to cover your lips – partly in shock but mostly in disbelief because you can’t wrap your head around the fact that they’ve been telling people that and – 

“Oh! What’s got you looking so red, bunny?”

…

You weren’t sure if you were going to make it long enough for Nirei to arrive.

Actually, you weren’t sure if you were going to make it long enough in this town.

⋆ ˚｡⋆୨♡୧⋆ ˚｡⋆

To your relief, Nirei comes soon after, and you’re saved from the onslaught of the two biggest instigators that you’ve ever met.

The minute he walks in, you’re immediately jumping out of your seat to greet him, and he matches your energy in a heartbeat. He’s greeting you just as enthusiastically, though you don’t have it in you to explain why you’re so happy to see him. And – you notice that he’s tacked on “-san” to the end of your name.

(If you squint, you can almost make out the furious wagging of a tail.)

The eyes of Suo and Kotoha glinting with sadistic delight behind you only serve as a reminder of the hell that you had once endured, and you silently thank whatever higher power is out there that Nirei has the heart of an angel.

“Thank you for meeting me here! I meant to ask you this when we first met, but you just kept running away!”

On second thought, you’re not so sure now about that last tidbit. 

He begins bombarding you with questions, from your height, to your blood type, to what you look for in a partner, and you briefly wonder if the town of Makochi is hell personified.

“How about we sit down first, Nirei? At, uh – the table right over there in the corner.”

Nirei nods, and you’re so glad that he’s at least a good listener – until he spots Kotoha and Suo.

In the same fashion that a puppy would, he instantly goes over to greet them, takes a seat, looks at you, then pulls out the seat next to him – and pats it with his hand. 

“I –”, you stumble over your words, shaking your head at him. 

Oh god, were you the puppy?

… No. You were NOT a puppy (or a bunny).

You would stand your ground, and give him an ultimatum. That’s what you would do.

But then he starts giving you the eyes, the puppy dog eyes, and you feel yourself start to waver — but you must persist. 

When faced with a challenge, when standing in the path of uncertainty, you must prevail and —

Kotoha and Suo join in, though their eyes don’t quite hit that same twinkle of desperation that Nirei’s does.

Still — you admit defeat.

You sigh before slowly trudging over to the chair that had been so kindly pulled out for you. You really had to pull yourself together. 

Tomorrow, you tell yourself. Tomorrow. I’ll have a backbone by tomorrow.

⋆ ˚｡⋆୨♡୧⋆ ˚｡⋆

You do not, in fact, build a backbone.

At this point, you’re not even sure you know what a backbone even is anymore.

What you do know, though, is that – 

Muscle Power is one of Tsugeura’s favorite food joints in Makochi. You personally really like their banana pound cake – and he knows this. So, whenever he’s in the mood to go when everyone else conveniently can’t – he knows that he can always count on you to keep him company. 

You also find out that he’s really into wrestling, though you’re not so sure if this was much of a secret in the first place. It had all happened so casually too, and honestly, you hadn’t even noticed when you chimed into the conversation. 

The 6 of you were sat at the café, though you were sat at a table separate from theirs as you calculate your budget for the month. You thought it’d be a peaceful experience, just you in a corner and Kotoha behind the counter, but once one of them starts filing in, they all file in.

You try to block them out as best you can as you do calculation after calculation, but you were never that good at multitasking. As your concentration shifts to focus on the numbers in your notebook, you subconsciously start picking up on their conversation. 

You hear Tsugeura go on a tangent about BxB Hulk, a wrestler that both you and your brother had really admired, but he seems stuck as he tries to remember the year he made his debut.

“...2005,” you say absentmindedly, deep in thought as you stare at your notebook, “... with the Dragon Gate Dojo.”

You go to circle something, but Tsugeura’s gasp of shock makes you jump instead. You go to give him an accusatory look, but they’re all looking at you in a similar fashion. 

You blink at their reactions before tilting your head, “What?... I’m not wrong, am I?”

You had no idea that those words would give you a permanent spot as Tsugeura’s #1 person to talk about wrestling with – and you’d never admit this but – you were just as passionate about it as he was.

⋆ ˚｡⋆୨♡୧⋆ ˚｡⋆

You learn that Kiryu is stupidly good at crane games – though, you’ve been able to win a couple stuffed animals for him too so you’d say it’s even. He also teaches you some of his favorite hairstyles, and you do, in fact, confirm that his hair smells as good as it looks. 

When you find out about his older sister, everything suddenly clicks for you, and you understand now why you’re so comfortable around him and why he’s so good at being able to pick up on even the smallest changes in you.

Whenever your time of the month came, he’d seem to always be stocked up with chocolate, an extra pad or two, and ibuprofen. If you did something new with your makeup, like a new lip color or a different pair of lashes, it’d be the first thing that he comments on when he sees you. And – he always checks in on you. If it’s been a couple of days since you’d last seen them, he’s sending you a quick text asking if you’ve eaten or inviting you to a casual hangout. 

There seems to be no end to his thoughtfulness, and it’s something that you learn to appreciate very deeply. 

⋆ ˚｡⋆୨♡୧⋆ ˚｡⋆

Sakura, despite the attitude he portrays and the things he may say, is a huge softie (you belatedly find out that the pink, sometimes red, on his face that blooms at the most random of times is in fact not a skin condition but indeed his blush).

And, you’re glad to learn that he’s as strong as he says he is.

It begins with a petty argument – something about vegetables and how he doesn’t eat them – but you’re both so stubborn that your harmless comment eventually turns into an all out confrontation. And, when he asks if you want to take it outside – you say yes.

You admit that you were worried that he’d be the type to pull back his punches in a fight because you’re you, but you’re pleasantly surprised when he, instead, runs towards you with all the strength of a bulldozer.

As you dodge and evade his moves, you realize how talented he truly is. You had a feeling, of course, but to see in action the way that he has total control of his body is a different beast altogether. 

When you get in close to try and land a kick to his head, you see a smile on his face as he blocks it with his arms. But his smile isn’t condescending or mocking. No, this is a smile that shows that he’s having fun, that he finds you worthy – and you don’t try to stop the smile that’s growing on your face either.

He really reminded you of your brother.

Your sparring only lasts for a couple of minutes before Nirei pulls out those damned puppy dog eyes, but it's enough for you both to find newfound respect in one another. 

And, as he goes to fix his jacket, he mutters a quiet, “I took that seriously, y’know.”

You grin, a radiant laugh bursting from your lips as you look up at him and say, “I���d be offended if you didn’t.”

⋆ ˚｡⋆୨♡୧⋆ ˚｡⋆

To your surprise, Nirei has a sharp memory and an even sharper tongue.

You’ve tried to lie your way out of several hangouts – he always calls you out with no remorse.

(“Ah, man, I’d love to, truly, but I forgot that my laundry is out drying so I really should –”

“You said you folded your clothes yesterday, remember?”)

But as much as you hated it, you couldn’t help but also appreciate the way that he genuinely cared for his friends with his heart on his sleeve. He was earnest, loyal, and caring – everything that you’d soon come to admire about him.

And, when he finds out that you enjoy going to secondhand stores too? Oh, he blows up your phone at least 3 times a month asking if you’d like to join him on yet another “hunt”. This, though, was a hangout that you’d never say no to. It was always so fun getting to dig around together to see what you could find (your brother was never one for shopping), and you enjoyed this time because you got to know even more about the other boys through Nirei, who spoke about them with shining eyes and pride in his voice. 

He really was an amazing storyteller – and an even better friend.

⋆ ˚｡⋆୨♡୧⋆ ˚｡⋆

Kotoha is as honest as she is loving – and you’re so grateful to have grown so close to her within such a short time. After your initial meeting, you find yourself hanging out at Café Pothos way more often than you’d like to admit, and you come to admire how diligent, hardworking, and compassionate she is. 

Your friendship with her blossoms naturally, and at some point she begins to join you and Nirei on your little thrifting trips. She becomes someone that you feel comfortable with confiding in, and you’re delighted to find out that it goes both ways. 

And aside from all of this – she also manages to help you get a job at Café Pothos alongside her.

When you’d mindlessly mentioned once that you were running short on your funds from your last job (as a result of all the hangouts that you were, regretfully, indulging in), Kotoha was the one who offered to see if there was an opening available at the café. When you came in on your first day for training – she was the one showing you the ropes and guiding you with her hands.

And, when you finally met her brother, well – 

The first time you meet Umemiya, you (understandably) burst into tears, and he (understandably) freaks the fuck out.

Nirei, with your tearful eyes and a nod of approval, clues him in on your backstory.

By the end of it, you’ve managed to slow down the crying to only a few tears, a fond look on your face as you listen to Nirei speak.

You open your mouth, ready to apologize but Umemiya beats you to it.

He has a hand gently patting the top of your head, and a smile on his face.

But that smile – it says so many things all at once.

So many things that you haven’t felt in so long.

“He would be proud of who you’ve become.” 

And, for the first time since his death, you finally let your body relax.

⋆ ˚｡⋆୨♡୧⋆ ˚｡⋆

But Suo, despite all of this, remains ever mysterious and tight-lipped.

You still don’t know too much about him, and you’re not privy to prying for information either (though you admit that you’ve asked Nirei about him once or twice). What you are able to gather, however, is that Suo is a huge pain in your ass. The teasing never ends, he always has his eye on you at all times, and – 

At first, you think he’s just being nice.

A warm hand on your lower back guiding you through the bustling crowd of the town. 

A sweet smile on his face whenever he greets you or catches sight of your familiar head of hair.

A passing remark about how pretty your eyes look that day.

But then – 

You notice his hands linger just a bit longer than normal, and they’re starting to gravitate just a little bit lower or just a bit higher, until the resting of his hand on your waist or your hips becomes a new normal.

His smile, you realize, is much more than just sweet. Sometimes, you’ll catch a hint of endearment or amusement, as if he’s in on a joke that you know nothing about.

And the remarks? They progress from just being about your eyes to your hairstyle that day, or your outfit, or your smile, or your laugh.

But it doesn’t just stop there – it seems that, if you’re not working, he’s got to be touching you at all times. Your legs pressed firmly together whenever you sat next to each other. His hands wrapped around your waist when he moves around you. Your arms always touching when you’re standing beside each other. 

And any chance he gets, he’s whispering in your ear. It could be anything, from explaining something that gets brought up when you’re with the group, to casually talking about the weather.

But sometimes, with his lips so close to your ear that you can feel the warm puffs of his breath, he’ll lower his voice just the littlest bit, make his words sound the tiniest bit breathless and then – 

He pulls away, with that stupid little smile on his face and mirth in his eyes.

Everytime, everytime he does it, you’re left flustered and alone, with a hand held up to your ear as if to hold on just a little bit longer to the sensation, to the feeling of his lips so close to you.

And he never ever calls you your name. In fact, you don’t think you’ve ever heard it leave his lips – at least not when he’s around you. 

“Wow bunny, you’re so strong!”

“Bunny, play nice –”

“Oh bunny, you’re here!”

All the “bunny” this and “bunny” that messes with your head. So much so that Suo could say it in a crowded room and you’re already turning your attention to him to see what he wants.

(And if you were to think about it a while longer, you’d realize that no one else uses that affectionate name on you. You’d realize that people have tried, but when they look up, Suo’s already got an eye on them and a tight-lipped smile on his face – and it sends shivers down their spine. Not like you’d recognize that they’re calling you though, your ears only attuned to the way that Suo calls it out.)

Working at the café doesn’t help.

From the moment you clock in to the moment you clock out, you can expect Suo to pop in at least once during your shift – twice if he comes early in the day to have a cup of tea with Sakura and Nirei.

And everytime, everytime you clock out – he’s patiently waiting to walk you home.

It starts on your first day – and you were not prepared for the sight of him, in all his lovely glory, to be standing outside with a smile on his face as you locked up the doors. It was such a shock that you’d dropped the keys in panic, and he quickly bent down to grab them before handing it to you.

When he grabs your hand and gently drops the keys in your palm, you don’t miss the way his thumb caresses yours.

His hands were so damn warm – and soft.

“I – what are you doing here?”

“Is it a crime to escort you home?”

Your lips part in surprise, and you can feel the way your breathing is starting to quicken in response.

“No, uh … it’s not. But –”

He laughs, and you notice that he’s still holding your hand in his.

You don’t make a move to remove it.

“Everyone’s been hanging out with you. I just wanted some time for myself, that’s all.”

His words catch you off guard, and he takes that silence as an invitation to continue.

“Besides – I’m the one who convinced you to stay. Shouldn’t I be able to spend time with you as well?”

You … don’t have a good enough reason to say no.

So, you let it happen.

During the walk, you talk about all the mundane things, from how your day went to what you had for lunch.

And, if your shoulders occasionally bump into one another or your fingers accidentally brush, well –

Neither of you mention it.

When you finally make it to your apartment, he follows you right up to the door. You feel his looming presence behind you, and the warmth emanating from his body, and it takes everything in your power not to drop your keys again.

And, once your door finally unlocks, you feel a shift behind you.

Suddenly, his hands are on either side of the doorframe, caging you in, and your back is pressed flush against his chest.

And goodness did his chest feel strong.

He’s so so close that you can hear his lips part and his soft inhale as he whispers coyly into your ear, “Sweet dreams, bunny.”

Before you can react, he’s already taken a step back with his hand waving goodbye and an innocent smile on his face.

You think about it for the rest of the night.

⋆ ˚｡⋆୨♡୧⋆ ˚｡⋆

It goes on like this for months, and you’re not sure what sick and twisted game he’s playing at, but he never explains his behavior, never confesses his feelings, never addresses the elephant in the room.

And you – well, you’re not sure how to even bring it up.

It’s not that you’re mad about it (quite the opposite), but every touch, every whisper, every smile leaves you wanting more.

But you weren’t sure if you could handle more. Not if it was going to be like this. Your poor heart wouldn’t be able to handle it.

Suo had started a craving that you weren’t sure could ever be satisfied, but no matter how much you tried to ward him off, he remained persistent and stubborn.

“You really don’t have to do this, Suo — though I appreciate the gesture,” you remark, your head tilted up to gauge his reaction as he walks in stride with you.

“But I enjoy doing it, so what’s the issue?”

“The issue, Suo, is that I’m perfectly capable of walking home alone. Shouldn’t you be – oh, I don’t know – spending your time with people who might actually need help?”

He takes a moment to think about this – at least, he acts like he does. But, you know better. You’re starting to be able to differentiate when he’s being sarcastic and when he’s not, and right now, as he brings his finger up to tap “thoughtfully” on his chin, you can’t help but feel the urge to humble him just the tiniest bit.

So you do.

“If I could describe you in one word, Suo, I’d say that you’re –”

“Intelligent? Patient? Cheeky?”

“Insufferable.”

He laughs lightly at your words as if you hadn’t just offended him, before gazing down at you with a look that screams mischief and something else that you can’t quite place yet.

And, with an air of casualty, as if you’d both just been talking about the different blends of tea, he responds with – 

“If you find me insufferable now, I can’t imagine how you would describe me as your lover.”

…

You come to a stop, your eyes blinking rapidly as you try to take in what he’s said but he cuts off your train of thought.

“Looks like you’re home now, my little bunny. This was pleasant, as always.”

Looking around, you deflate at the fact that he was right, you’d stopped right in front of your door, but you needed answers – now.

You go to open your mouth, but he’s quicker – “Oh, sorry, but I really can’t stay and chat. I’ve got to, oh, I don’t know, see if anyone needs my assistance.”

That … shut you up real quick. 

You hated when he made you eat your words.

Biting back your tongue, all you can do is huff as you make your way inside, his eye burning a hole into the back of your head – and, if you weren’t so deep in distress, you’d hear the soft twinkle of satisfied laughter in his wake as he walks down the street.

God, he really was insufferable. 

—

That night, you sit up with a sudden realization as it hits you.

You knew that look.

That was the look that he gave his opponents –

The one that would dare them to fight him, to challenge him, to provoke him.

He was challenging you, daring you, provoking you.

He wanted to see if you’d break first.

He wanted to see if you’d give in.

You laugh so hard that your eyes start to water – and it’s full of disbelief and shock and amusement.

Like hell you’d let that happen.

⋆ ˚｡⋆୨♡୧⋆ ˚｡⋆

You are your brother’s sister, and his stubbornness and competitive streak had been passed down to you tenfold. 

So, you catch up to Suo’s speed – fast.

Now you were the one initiating contact, touching him, teasing him.

Whenever he walked you home, you made sure to hold onto his arm, running your fingers up and down his bicep as you conversed. 

And, you don’t just let go.

No. You were better than that.

Instead, you’d run your hand down his whole arm as you separated, until you got to his hand – then, you’d hold onto that until all that was left was the tip of his pointer finger.

You’d give it a gentle squeeze, thanking him for walking you home, before letting it drop from your grasp.

You don’t miss the way his eyes follow the path of your hand every time, as if entranced by the feeling and the sight. 

Anytime he came into the café with Sakura and Nirei, you’d make sure to briefly touch his shoulder whenever you passed him, or hold onto his hand just a beat longer when handing him his tea.

(And, without fail, Sakura and Nirei erupt in striking hues of red and pink everytime. Though, Suo and you don’t pay them much attention. Kotoha will give you a knowing look, but you feign ignorance.)

You were no stranger to sugar coated words, either – so, you make it a goal to compliment him at least once every time you see him.

And, of course, you give him a nickname too. You take your time when you think of it because you really want it to stick – you really want it to have the same effect on him as it has on you.

So, you start calling him by his first name – and it works. 

“Hayato, you smell so good today.”

“Oh my Hayato, aren’t you looking handsome~”

“Ah, I missed you, Hayato.”

And, the first time you whisper in his ear, light and airy and sweet, you feel dejected when it doesn’t have the same effect on him as it has on you. You’re brought back to the night that he had confronted you, and you’re honestly a bit sad that it seems things haven’t changed.

You begin to pull away, but something catches your eye. So slight and so small that you wouldn’t have noticed it if you weren’t so close. It’s the way his jaw tightens, the way he presses his lips together hard and restrained, the way that he clenches his fists until the whites of his knuckles peek out under the heated skin. And, you hear it – that sharp intake of breath.

His reaction makes you sway just the tiniest bit – and you want to see more. You want to see him flustered and flushed and desperate in the same way he’s made you.

You wanted him to lose his composure.

But – you and Suo keep it cute and casual and friendly.

Simply waiting for the other to break first.

If anyone is brave enough to bring it up, well – 

You both shake your heads in denial, a quick “no” rolling off the tips of your tongues.

(They’ll simply nod at your responses, but their eyes stay glued to the spot under the table where Suo’s got his hand splayed out on your thigh and the arm you’ve got wrapped around his to keep him there.)

… Who knew a friendly competitive sparring match amongst Bofurin would be his downfall?

୨ৎ Chapter 5

[justauthoring]

too early.

you wanted him to live a long life, even if that meant without you

a/n: whos ready for some angstttt woop woop!

tw: minor spoilers for the manga(?), death

pairing: gojo satoru x f!reader

“Satoru.” 

“I know.”

with barely concealed tears, you glance up at him through blurred vision. your shoulders feel heavy, and your heart hurts and Gojo knows that—of course he knows. Yet, there isn’t a single thing he can do. 

He can’t change what’s happened.

“I didn't want you here.”

And he just smiles. in that way that Gojo always has. It’s bright, despite the darkness that swallows you both, and it’s genuine as his eyes sparkle down at you. He smiles even as everything hurts, even as everything else is nothing but a cold, dark space that you’ll never leave and now, neither will he.

“But I'm here.”

Biting your lip, you step towards him.

- 

“You’re insufferable.”

“I know.”

“And annoying.”

“Yup.”

“And you never know when to shut up.”

“But…” and he pauses for effect, face in yours so you can’t look away as his bright (and unfortunately, beautiful) eyes stare back at you with a twinkle of mischief. He’s leaning to meet your height, and he’s grinning far and wide, lips stretched out as he barely contains his own enjoyment. “You love me.”

And, regrettably, you do.

Rolling your eyes, you press a hand to his cheek, pushing him away as you groan.

“As if.”

The words are a blatant lie and both of you know that.

But you’re not ready to admit yet that your feelings for your fellow classmate are anything other than platonic. You think, maybe, hopefully, he isn’t either. 

(He isn’t).

So, you’ll continue to deny it. Feign annoyance and disgust when really your heart beats madly within your chest, showing no sign of stopping anytime soon, and your cheeks burn, dusted rose across the apples of your cheeks. It’s all there, plain to see, but you plead obliviousness and Gojo does the same.

Obliging to you, he steps back, chuckling to himself.

“Yeah,” he mumbles, more to himself than anyone. “As if.”

-

“Do you remember the first time we met?”

Blinking, you turn to Gojo. “You mean when you laughed at me… to my face.”

Frowning, Gojo shakes his head; “that is not what happened.”

“That is in fact what happened,” you correct, shaking your head at him. He’s sitting in front of you, sitting the wrong way on a chair as he leans on the corner of one of the legs dangerously (and you swear he will end up falling soon). You’d been trying to catch up on some homework when Gojo had found you in the empty classroom and had promptly decided you were to occupy him for the time being. 

(Geto was out on a mission).

But, he’s brought with him some candy and even if he whined every time you did, you still proceeded to invite yourself to a couple gummies every once in a while.

So, his annoyance is forgivable.

(And really, you don’t mind, if you’re being honest.)

“I introduced myself to you, you took one look at me, called me ‘weak’ and laughed.” You explain, sending him a deadpanned look.

Gojo continues to stare back at you like you’re lying (the audacity), before he blinks, as if thinking back. The grin on his face falters somewhat as the memory resurfaces, and he blinks back at you, looking oddly apologetic.

Not a look Gojo wears very often.

“Well, I take it back.”

You’re halfway through stealing one of his gummies when you pause, hand left stretched out before you as you stare back at him.

“What?”

“You’re not weak,” he shrugs, “and I shouldn’t have laughed at you. Obviously, I’m still stronger than you,” you roll your eyes, “but I take it back.”

Raising a brow, you squint at him. “Are you trying to apologize?”

“Maybe?”

“The answer is yes or no, Gojo.”

“...Yes.”

It’s more honest than you’re expecting. If you’re being truthful, this whole conversation is not what you’d expected at all. 

But still, he’s apologizing, in his own way, and he seems to mean it. It didn’t really bother you all that much all that more–it was a long time ago and Gojo was just like that, though you’ll admit he’s lessened his smugness a little bit through the time you’ve known him. At least when he’s with you, he does, and he doesn’t make you feel like a infuriable piece of trash next to him, so, you know, he’s making the right steps. 

(All the right steps).

“Well,” you settle on eventually, grabbing your gummies. “Apology accepted.”

And really, his grin is bright enough to forget that his apology was pretty lousy.

-

“Ow.”

“It’s not my fault you got hurt.”

Pouting, you turn away from Gojo, not wanting to look at his face currently because if you have to see his smirk one more time you swear you’re going to strangle him—

“Lift your arm,” he’s calling, a hand wrapping around your wrist to guide the motion. Your lips part at the touch, hating the flutter of nerves that hits you, letting your head rest in your other hand as you listen to him, lifting your arm, and letting him move it until it’s resting on his shoulder.

You stare back at him then.

“You should’ve let me come with you.”

Huffing, you roll your eyes. “I thought you said I’m not weak.”

“You’re not,” he says plainly, pulling at your shirt to place the bandage at your side. Your cheeks warm when you realize he’s seeing skin he’s never seen before, swallowing thickly at the feeling of his fingers ghosting across sensitive skin. It’s enough to pull goosebumps, and you hope he doesn’t notice them.

(He does).

“I’m just the strongest.”

Shoulders falling, you decide to watch him. “It’s not that bad.”

“You’re bleeding.”

“That’s why I said I should find Shoko.”

“She’s not here.”

“Oh.”

(She is–Gojo wants to take care of you).

“Still,” you say after a moment, “it doesn’t hurt.”

He glares at you. “You were hissing not a minute ago.”

“That’s cause you pressed on it!” You argue, shifting in your seat as you ignore his heavy gaze. “You’re very heavy-handed, I’ll have you know. And no skill in cleaning wounds either. I swear, it hurts more now then it did before so–”

You stop rambling when you realize he’s finished patching the wound and is simply staring at you.

“So… yeah,” you finish lamely.

(You can’t think all that well when he looks at you like that).

“Don’t push yourself too hard,” he says after a moment. His voice is oddly serious in a way it rarely is with Gojo. Though, it feels like recently, Gojo sounds more worried and serious with you than he had before. 

You don’t want to think about what that could mean.

(You don’t want to get your hopes up).

“You shouldn’t go on missions where you’ll get hurt.”

“It’s my job, Gojo.” You remind, “I don’t have much of a choice.”

“You do,” he says sharply. “I’ll make it so.”

Licking your lip, you stare at the worry in his eyes. Gojo was very rarely expressive in his emotions and you’ve come to learn that he often hid the way he really felt; but sometimes it felt like you were the only one who really saw how he felt. Because he’d look at you like this, with a furrow in his brow and concern in his gaze and it’d leave you stunned.

Stunned in the way you couldn’t speak.

“Okay,” you whisper, forcing the words out because that’s what you settle on. That’s all you can settle on. “I won’t.”

-

“Gojo–!” 

His back is turned to you, shoulders tensed, his hands clenched by his sides. Whatever you’d been about to say dies on the tip of your tongue because what do you say?

How could you ever say something that would be enough to fix what’s happened?

But still, you want to try. You can’t just leave it alone. Not after what had happened. You couldn’t even begin to think how he must be feeling, the confusion and hurt and rage that must be flooding through him.

And if you could in any way soothe that, you had to try.

(Little did you know, you’d done just that the second you’d called for him).

“I’m…” You hesitate, stepping towards him with a hand stretched out uselessly before him. Even if you wanted to touch him, you couldn’t–not with his infinity… “I’m so sorry.”

Gojo stays still. The slight rise and fall of his shoulders as he takes even shallow breaths is the only inclination that he’s alive and breathing and listening.

“I heard about… about Geto–I was called away on a mission so I’m sorry I wasn’t here earlier,” you explain, your words rambling as you try to sort through the chaos of thoughts in your mind. You’d never had to comfort Gojo before–did he even want to be comforted? Did he want to be comforted by you?

You doubted it.

(He did).

“I’m so sorry.”

And you truly are even if the words mean nothing to him. Even if he doesn’t care that you’re sorry. 

You still are.

You blink, eyes falling to your feet, and you’re starting to think you should just leave. Gojo clearly didn’t want you there or to hear you ramble, and it was silly of you to think that you of all people would be able to help someone like him. 

Then, there are arms wrapping around your shoulders and you’re pressed flush against a strong chest.

“Gojo–” 

He just shakes his head, holding you tighter and understanding, you close your mouth, letting the words you’d been about to say die out. 

Because Gojo didn’t want you to speak and he surely didn’t want to either. It was easier to be silent but better to be silent with you. You made it all a little more bearable and if he was honest with himself, you always had.

He just hadn’t known how much until now.

So, instead, you let yourself ease, moving to wrap your arms around him in return, and his head is moving to cradle into the crook of your neck, his nose pressed against the skin as he lets out the faintest, softest, shuddering breath.

You move to press a hand against the back of his head, and squeeze in the hopes it helps even just a little (—it does and more).

-

“Can I just–fuck it.”

Before you can even realize, his lips are pressed against your own.

Warm, soft lips against yours, his hands finding purchase on your waist as you tense at the contact, stunned, your brain lagging as you try to process what’s happening. A second ago Gojo had been chatting your ear off as normal, the two of you alone in your dorm as you often found yourselves now, because Shoko rarely had time now because of her role in Jujutsu High and Geto… well, Geto just wasn’t there.

Gojo was busy too. Really busy. And you were too. Maybe not as much, but in your own way. 

Gojo made sure any free time he did have was spent with you though. You return the sentiment with ease.

It felt natural, after all.

And yeah, maybe you’d admit the two of you had been dancing around these feelings for a long time. You can’t count on both hands the amount of times Shoko has begged you to just kiss the man already if you were going to make love eyes at him all the time (her words).

There were other instances too, but they were too painful to remember.

You’d known for a long time the way you felt about Gojo, but you didn’t want to mess up what the two of you had. And that had been at first, before it had developed into this comraderie you only could find in him—and you definitely didn’t wanna mess that up by letting your emotions get in the way. So, you just… didn’t. It was comfortable, this bond the two of you had developed and the idea of losing that was too heartbreaking.

Chances were scary when it could destroy everything.

So you didn’t take any.

(Gojo was tired of not taking any).

He’s pulling back before you can move, slightly breathless as he smiles faintly down at you. “The point is to kiss me back, you know.”

And you blink, once, twice, before his words register and you gape up at him.

“I-I–!” You can’t find the words, feeling like your mind is short-circuiting as you stare up at him. Because it was so like him to be so smug when he’d just kissed you without confirming how you felt in return. It was so like him to just know that you were completely and wholeheartedly in love with him. 

(Probably because he was too).

His hands are still on your waist and he’s close, more close than he’s ever been. You can feel his breath against your cheeks, and you’re sure you’re bright red, but you don’t want to pull away and you desperately want him to kiss you back.

Reaching forward, you decide Gojo’s words are all too fitting and to fuck it—you tug at his shirt, leaning to meet his lips.

He chuckles as you do, laugh warm and husky and it makes your knees feel weak as your lips meet his once more, eyes fluttering shut.

(It was, truly, everything you’d ever dreamed about).

And as you both pull away once more, breathless, he leans his forehead against your own and you run your fingers through the hairs on the back of his neck, laughing lightly. 

“I’ve wanted to do that for a while,” you confess, turning to glance up at him.

Gojo grins; “me too.”

“So we were waiting for nothing?”

He shrugs; “guess so. But it doesn’t matter now.”

Your brows furrow, shaking your head as he shuffles closer, squeezing your hips.

“Because now I can kiss you whenever I want.”

-

“I’m gonna go speak to that Megumi kid tomorrow.”

Pausing at Gojo’s words, you close the book you’d been reading, shifting on the bed next to him to face him better. He’s already looking at you, tired eyes focused on your own as you nod at him. “Okay.”

“Just okay?” He asks, as if almost hesitantly. “I could end up with a kid depending on what he says.”

You nod. “I know.”

Gojo seems puzzled, head tilting as he leans over to his side rather than his back. His hand falls on your arm, grip gentle. “You’re okay with that?”

“I am,” you answer. “I want you to do what you think is right.”

“Even if it means bringing a random kid home?”

Snorting, you nod again. “Yes, Satoru. Even if it means bringing a kid home.”

“We’d have to… raise him,” he explains, the words sharp and uncomfortable on his tongue. “Or, at least, pay for him to live. Something like that.”

You laugh, reaching forward to cup his cheek. “Whatever you decide, I’m okay with.”

Gojo still seems skeptical. He eyes you like he’s sure there’s some hidden meaning behind your words or worried you might change your mind suddenly. 

(You’d decided long ago you’d follow him to the ends of the earth if that’s what he decided). 

“...You’re sure?”

Smiling, you hum; “yes.” 

“Okay…” He says slowly, eyes flickering back to you once more just to make sure.

You just giggle, leaning into him and letting your head rest on his shoulder. 

“Remember I have that mission tomorrow, too,” you remind him. “Whatever you decide, I’m okay with it but I won’t be there to help you until I come back from the mission. So, you’d be on your own with him for a while.”

Gojo guffaws next to you; “you’re acting like I’ve already decided.”

You raise a brow, glancing up at him through your lashes; “haven’t you?”

Frowning, Gojo squints down at you. “Maybe…”

Shaking your head, you just laugh. “I look forward to meeting him.”

“...Me too.” Gojo agrees, “if he wants to come.”

“He will,” you shrug. “I’m sure.”

Gojo doubts your certainty, but he doesn’t argue against it either. Instead, he shifts to wrap his arm around your waist and pull you closer against his side. You’ve got an early mission tomorrow, after all, and he doesn’t want to waste every last second he has with you until he’s torn apart from you for a whole weekend.

(Truly, the worst hell those higher up can subject him to).

You feel the same, of course. So you lean into him with ease, relishing in the feeling of his warmth and familiarity.

Thinking to yourself that your whole world will be different when you return—you and Gojo and a… kid.

(It’s crazy, but you still love the idea of it).

-

You don’t come home after that mission, though.

You don’t come home ever again.

And you don’t see Gojo until ten years later.

-

Setting your hands against his cheeks, you frown. 

“I wanted you to live a long life.”

Gojo shakes his head. “Wasn’t worth living without you.”

You sniffle, swallowing back the tears that just continue to fall relentlessly. It was wonderful to have Gojo in your arms once more, but… but you’d wanted him to live forever… raising the new generation of Jujutsu Sorcerers and protecting them. Live a life, even if it meant without you.

You’d been content just watching.

But he was here now, regardless, and it would be silly to deny the fact that a part of you was happy to have him with you once more even if it broke your heart all the same.

“I missed you,” Gojo whispers against the top of your head, pulling you close into a hug. He holds tight and long, savoring the fact that he can have you in his arms once again after years of being forced to live without you. “I missed you so much.”

“Me too,” you agree, pressing your face into his chest and breathing in his familiar scent. “I’m sorry I couldn’t make it home.”

Gojo just shakes his head, a hand pressing to the back of yours.

“It’s okay,” he assures, “because I have you now.”

[guiltyreverie]

Remedy

Part 1 || Part 2 || Part 3

Pairing: Gojo Satoru x reader

Content tags: enemies to lovers; slow burn; afab!reader; clan issues; LOOOONG fic (check word count), there will be another part

Warnings: slow burn, gojo being a dick (even geto can’t save him here), enemies to lovers, arranged marriage, pain :)

Word count: 17.1k

A/N: I need to cope with current manga events and distracting myself with gojo content works best also why do I have the fucking the tendency to never get to the point (at least explains the length of this fic ._.)

There weren‘t many consistencies in your life, if you were being honest to yourself, after all being a jujutsu sorcerer meant having to predict the unpredictable and be prepared for any possibilities, at least thats what those stupid clan elders drilled into your brain at every possible moment but honestly speaking absolutely nothing could‘ve prepared you for Gojo Satoru to be the worst fucking asshole you have and probably will ever meet. You knew since you were a toddler you were promised to this asshole; binding vow infused with cursed technique and what not, basically it meant you keep the promise to get married and stay with Gojo Satoru or the cursed energy will kill you. At this rate though, you‘d consider just dying instead of marrying him, that‘s how insufferable he is.

For as long as you can remember all your family relatives would tell you day in and day out that you were lucky, you would marry the person that‘s guaranteed to have a successful life and you should be grateful for that but honestly, the moment this spoiled toddler looked at you like you were a cockroach and then called you ugly you have felt anything but grateful. In fact that was the first time you felt such inexplicable rage that you straight up threw your ballerina shoe at him and all your mother could do was pick you up and carry you as far away as possible from each other all while you stuck out your tongue at this dummy that called you ugly. Once you guys were far enough away from each other you had to listen to your mother rant about how you shouldn’t treat the treasure of the Gojo-clan like that or she might get in trouble. It felt unfair and this was only the first of many other scoldings to come.

The second time you meet him, your mother specifically asked you to behave, if not, you wouldn‘t be allowed to have dessert and god you‘d die for that dessert. Keeping the dessert in mind you tell yourself you can do this, he‘s just a spoiled baby after all but the moment he looked at you it already felt like he was itching for a punch. He turned around towards his caretaker and actually asked her: “if he really had to marry you“. This time only the dessert your mother told you about protected him because otherwise he would have tasted both of your ballerina shoes. You almost spat at him that you didn’t want to marry this brat either but your mothers warning glance was the only thing keeping your mouth shut. Then Satoru decided he had enough of looking at your ugly face and just turned around without a single word and left you guys. God you really wanted to throw a stone at him. Your mother looked at you and said: “not to worry because boys are mean when they like you.“. This was the first time you actually contemplated your mothers sanity bc why would someone be mean to someone they like. That’s how you decided to hate your future husband and show him exactly that, no matter the consequences.

The third meeting was actually longer than the other two, simply because this time your caretakers decided that a picnic would be nice and good for you two to get to know each other and familiarize yourselves with one another. This time you were prepared for the inevitable, when your nanny asked why you needed a rock you‘d simply state that it was a gift for Satoru and she gushed over how adorable you were being, what she failed to realize was, that it was anything but a gift for him but rather a meanie hitter in case he‘d be a jerk again. Now you two were facing each other and forcefully greeted one another and the nannies both unpacked their lunch and set it up in the middle for all of you to eat. Now, being the respectful child you were raised to be, you thanked them but Satoru let out a simple „hmph“ and began to eat only to spat it out right into your face. He started to complain about how salty the food was and if it weren‘t for your shock in that moment you would‘ve already hit him with your ‚gift‘ but lucky for him your nanny was already distracting you by wiping away the food in your face and then turning to Satoru to apologize since she didn’t know his food preference. Satoru looked at her in disgust and complained about how she lacks basic cooking skills for a mere nanny. That was also the last time you‘ve seen her on your estate and that really made you hate Gojo tenfold. After that day you vow to yourself to make his life just as miserable but the elders decided to stop letting you guys meet until you both were more mature.

The next time you see Gojo, you were both 8 years old and to none of your surprise he still was the same jerk only this time he pulled your hair and called you a pig but there was no one to hold you back from attacking him with a stick to the point you chased him through the entire estate until you actually tripped and hurt yourself and with tears in your eyes you had to listen to Gojos demeaning laughter while he insulted you one more time for good measure.

That’s how you‘d describe your entire childhood with Gojo Satoru up until you are both in Jujutsu High. After not seeing him for about two years, you could argue that he might‘ve changed but it‘s Gojo Satoru, your hopes are as low as believing this arranged marriage can be canceled.

The first time you see him again was while your teacher was introducing you to the other teams and just seeing his face gave you shivers of disgust. He‘d grin obnoxiously at you and all you can do is scoff, while the teacher talks about teams and what not. You were so enraged at seeing him you couldn‘t even listen to what Yaga was saying.

„Yo, did ya miss me? Bet ya did, it‘s not like you can see a handsome face like this every day.“, Satoru grins and it takes your entire might not to just punch him square in the face.

You grit your teeth at the pest you‘d have to see every day now and take a deep breath to calm down: „I might start to miss your face, when it‘s actually handsome, Gojo.“ you shrug and then glance at the guy with long black hair behind him losing his shit and slapping Gojos shoulder.

„Can‘t say I disagree, Satoru.“ he‘d press in between laughters and Gojo would immediately protest, turn around and kick him while he whines about him not having his back.

You just stare at the long haired guy with an amused grin, then look back to Gojo, almost cringe at him, then turn back to the guy standing beside him, „Geto Suguru, nice to meet you, Y/n. I‘ve heard a lot about you.“ he‘d bow slightly and your eyes almost widen in surprise, how can Gojo be friends with such a respectful guy.

„Knowing Gojo, it was probably only bad stuff“, you chuckle and bow to him as well. You raise an eyebrow, provocatively: „rather it surprises me how Gojo managed to find an actually respectful friend.“ you glance at Gojo one more time for good measure, only for him to grin then stick out his tongue at you

„Not all of us are incapable of making friends.“, he states nonchalantly, but the provocative and amused grin on his face betrays him. It really took almost everything in you not to smash his pretty face into the ground and beat it black and blue, but it seems like Geto was one step ahead by smacking him on the back of his head while he scolds him about being respectful to your fiancé.

Gojo in return simply mocks him, then whines about how you two are ganging up on him while he crosses his arms like a child. You‘d just shrug and then say; „it‘s not our fault, you‘re simply insufferable.“

His pout grows even bigger and you had to giggle because he looked like a bubbling fish, that‘s how ridiculous he was getting. He stopped pouting and kept staring at you, his face neutral. Gojo Satoru always was unreadable to you but in this moment he felt like another mystery of the world. Just what is going on in his head? You stopped asking yourself that a long time ago, there was no point in trying to understand him because you simply never would. The silence between you three was turning awkward very quickly and you decide to pull away from this meeting, deciding that you have much better things to do than have Gojo gawk at your face and most likely start to point out all your flaws and insecurities. You bid them farewell with an awkward smile and head to your designated room for the school year.

With a new place came a sense of loneliness that could hardly be described, it‘s comparable to a lack of warmth that flows from the blank walls that have absolutely zero memories attached to them, but you were determined to fill your heart up with beautiful memories in this place as well. This wouldn‘t remain a blank space; you refuse to allow that. You take a deep breath, your clenched jaw unclenching and your shoulders start to relax; the tension, you didn’t even realize had built up, slowly releasing and you felt like you were able to clear your anxiety slowly. This is going to be fine.

You unpack everything from your belongings and decorate the room, make it feel more like yours. The walls slowly are filled with small photos or gifts from clan members and friends. You smile proudly to yourself and put a frame containing a picture of you and your mom and put it on the desk. You hum happily: „I should buy some decorations whenever I have the time to check out the city“. You start to plan what you‘d like to have and whatnot. Some small plants would be nice but a low maintenance plant would fit your busy schedule more, maybe a cactus, at least you wouldn‘t have to worry about watering it, you chuckle to yourself.

A small knock at the door interrupts your planning process. You turn around and walk towards the door and open it swiftly, only to be faced with one of your teammates, Haname. She smiles and gives you a small wave: „Heya, I was done with setting up and was bored out of my mind, so I figured I should check out how my fellow mates are doing.“, she winks and basically barges into your room and looks around in curiosity. Your eyes widen in surprise when she pushes you away to enter the room and you can‘t help but think of a familiar white-haired pest at her boldness, but hers was more adorable, you didn‘t mind.

You continue to observe her, while she is looking around. Her cheeks seem naturally flushed and she had a round face, she reminded you of a squirrel, but it made her look very adorable. She had a small scar on her chin, it made her cute appearance seem a little more serious. You shake your head at your own thought process, it's rude to observe someone to this extent.

A loud sudden gasp interrupts your thought process, „is this your mother?“, Haname asks wide-eyed, „she‘s absolutely gorgeous, you obviously got those good genes from her, oh my god!“

You widen your eyes for the second time in the span of a few minutes, there‘s a small heat growing on your cheeks at her implied compliment, you knew you weren‘t bad looking but someone complimenting you so straight-forward was a rather rare occurrence.

„She‘s breathtaking, isn‘t she“, you smile in fondness, cheeks still flushed and you couldn‘t help but slowly grow fond of this bundle of energy in front of you.

In response she almost beams: „Absolutely! You‘re very similar to her, y‘know?“

You shake your head a little flustered and grin at her, you might‘ve found a new good friend in Jujutsu High: „You‘re also very cute, y‘know?“

She seems to beam even brighter at your compliment and grins and she throws her hair back in an exaggerated manner: „Thanks, gorgeous.“, she winks at you playfully. „So, do you have any plans for today, or can I kidnap you for the day? I heard from a second year there‘s an insane soba noodle restaurant nearby and I can‘t be bothered to go if I‘m alone.“

You tilt your head at her enthusiasm and seeming extroversion: „Just when did you meet a second year?“, you wonder out loud and laugh. You gesture towards the door: „After you.“, you smile looking forward to this unexpected event.

She nods and takes a step forward: „I just met them while I was checking out the training grounds. They‘re humongous, especially considering the lack of Jujutsu students, anyways they were there training and I watched them. Y‘know get some training ideas by observing and when they took a break I talked to them about the school, classes and so on. They were really nice and helpful! I hope everyone here is like that but you never know.“, she shrugs, as if to say, maybe there are assholes here, too.

You laugh at her enthusiasm and her willingness to talk to just about anyone: „You really do have a way with people don‘t you? I bet you could even make Gojo be nice to you.“, your left hand immediately starts to itch when you think about Gojo being rude to her but that‘s a matter for when they actually meet, which will probably be not far into the future, considering that first year students have classes together, despite being in different teams.

She halts in her movements, turns towards you, tilts her head a little to the right and looks at you in confusion: „Who the hell is Gojo? Do I have to know him? Sorry I don't come from a clan or something so I‘m not that good with sorcerer connections.“, she sighs defeated and grabs the back of her neck apologetically.

You furrow your eyebrows slightly, wondering how to explain Gojo Satoru to her, without complimenting his sorcerer abilities and sadly these go hand in hand; that jerk is a confident bastard and he has reason to back it up sadly. „Well, how do I put this,“, your fingers reach for your chin in a thinking manner, „Gojo Satoru, is the next clan head of the Gojo-clan, he has inherited two insanely strong Gojo-clan techniques, the infamous Six Eyes and the Limitless technique. He will most likely become the strongest Jujutsu sorcerer in the future, but I beg you with my entire combined pride, don‘t ever tell him I said this, or I might have to either kill myself or him.“, you explain and warn her. You sigh already feeling a headache forming at the image of his sly grin, if he ever got to hear you say this about him.

She grumbles in response to the new information: „Oh god, an overconfident man and he has valid reasons for that?“, she massages the space between her eyebrows, „i can already imagine just how annoying he is.“

„The. Absolute. Worst. And because of our insane luck, he is also a first year student,“, you smile at her sarcastically, your voice dripping with fake enthusiasm, „and knowing him, when he finds out you hang out with me, he‘ll also probably try to bother you to no end.“, you grumble at the thought of him bothering Haname, but you know it‘s inevitable, he‘ll probably pester all of the students, it‘s just a matter of time.

She sighs: „Well at least you warned me.“, now she grins at you and takes your hand to lead you out of the building and you follow her lead, shaking off the negative feelings that come with Gojo Satoru. At this point it‘s really just a buy one take two for free deal.

Soon the two of you arrived in the heart of the city, you were surrounded by crowds, people were walking by, tourists were reading a map, children were laughing and running around. You grin to yourself; now this is definitely the heart of this place, a new city means a new you. You can work towards improving yourself, become a better sorcerer, nothing is gonna stop you now.

You look at Haname and smile seeing that she‘s just as infatuated with the city as you. You link your arms together so you won‘t lose each other in the crowd. It would be an immense pain in the ass if you lost each other and you really didn‘t want that to happen on the very first day. When you link your arms together she seems to snap back to herself and she drags you forward, probably towards the restaurant she mentioned earlier. Thus your first day concludes with exploring through the city, buying some plants and decorations for each other's room and getting snacks for late nights while gossiping and wondering about the following school year.

The first day of classes started off pretty hectic, you were the type of person to prefer to sleep in for longer than you probably should, so when you realized you woke up an entire 20 minutes after you initially planned to get up, all hell broke loose. You cursed at your habit and got up as fast as possible. After all, you should at least try to look decent on the first day of school. You silently praise yourself at doing overnight curls, at least this would save you a lot of time. You brush your teeth quickly and do your make up so fast, you‘re finished almost entirely 20 minutes earlier than you usually would. You quickly put on your school uniform and check the time, it‘s 7:40 am. At least you were gonna be punctual and not embarrass yourself on the very first day.

While you put on your shoes there‘s a light knock on your door, you can bet it‘s most likely Haname. You open the door, smile a ‘good morning’ at Haname, take your backpack and step out of your room ready to face the first day of classes.

Soon the two of you arrive at the class, which you managed to find easily because Haname also checked out the rooms yesterday. You find yourself being more and more grateful for her presence in your life; she makes it 20 times easier to navigate through everything.

The both of you step in and are immediately faced with the rest of your classmates, one of them being your new teammate. You smile at him and he gives you a small nod back. Even when you first introduced yourself he didn‘t seem like much of a talker, so a small nod seemed like a good sense of appreciation from your teammate and you nod back at him. Haname went ahead and sat herself down in a free spot behind him, so you shrug and decide to do the same and sit next to Haname. The pest- Gojo still doesn‘t seem to be here and you let out a small relief, unsure if you could handle him and his shenanigans this early in the morning. If you were to be honest, if there ever were to be a bounty on Gojo Satoru‘s head you‘d be the one who‘d have put it up.

The devil seems to work hard today because the moment you thought of this, the door flung open and his pesky voice greeted everyone, his teammate Geto seemed to be with him and greeted everyone in a much quieter tone as well. You grumbled as if someone had just threatened to kill you and your entire family and mentally prepare yourself for the incoming headache which comes kind of hand in hand with Gojo‘s presence.

Gojo turns to look at you, probably already having sensed your death stare from thousands of miles away and grins at you and then the seat next to you. You widen your eyes at him and can already imagine his train of thought.

You shake your head at him: „Don‘t you dare even think about it, Gojo.“, you threaten your voice dripping with the intention to kill him

He looks at you mischievously and hums: „it‘s a free country, though? I can do whatever I want, whenever I want.“, he smiles, his eyes glinting provocatively and he pulls up the chair next to you. „Besides it‘s not my fault you can‘t focus in class when you‘re next to me.“, he grins slyly and it takes absolutely every inch of self-restraint in you not to push him off from the chair.

„Sometimes I feel like you were born just to piss me off“, you sigh in defeat, knowing that it‘s impossible to stop him from whatever he set his mind to.

„Please, honey“, he chuckles and leans closer to you while he rest his head on his hand, you scoff at the nickname and you already knew Haname would have to restrain you in the next few seconds, „you should stop being so self-centered, not everything revolves around you and that includes my birth.“, now he is fully smirking at you in victory.

You narrow your eyes at him and retort: “honey, if the world revolved around me, I wouldn’t have to marry you.”

The rest of the class who had been listening to your bickering, now visibly widened their eyes in surprise. Out of all the things that were to be expected, this wasn’t one of them. Your eyes slightly shifted around and sighed at your slip of the tongue, god you really didn’t want everyone to know this early about your predicament. You take a deep breath and start to take out your materials: “Let’s drop this, Gojo, it’s too early for me to be arguing with you already.”, you say almost pleadingly.

Gojo stares at you for a few seconds, which feels like an eternity to you, waiting for his response. Surprisingly he just slightly nods and drops the topic and you almost narrow your eyes at him again in confusion; Gojo never bothers to listen to you after all. You give him a small nod of appreciation and glance at Haname, who is already looking at you as if you had two heads and you almost sigh out loud again and curse yourself once again for already letting everyone know about your engagement with Gojo. She looks at you as if she was expecting an explanation and you whisper that you’ll tell her later about it all and soon after the teacher enters the room and the lesson starts.

While Gojo isn’t actively bothering you, you can feel him constantly glancing or just straight up staring at you, his constant gaze bothering you, you have enough and take a slip of paper and write down ‘Can you stop staring at me?’ then push it towards his table while still focusing on the teacher.

Gojo almost immediately takes the note, scribbles something down and you can see his spreading grin from the corner of your eyes. He pushes the note back towards you and you read his reply ‘Does my attention distract you that much?’.

Your eyes roll almost automatically, you should have expected this, though, he wouldn’t have stayed nice for too long, it’s too out of character for him. You scribble down ‘yes, you’re like a mosquito’ and push it back to him, this time you were the one grinning in satisfaction.

You can see him pouting and then he suddenly pokes at your side. You let out a yelp in surprise, drawing in the attention of everyone in the room. You grit your teeth in embarrassment and tell the teacher you just hit your knee at the table while adjusting your seating position and as soon as his focus is back on the board you glare at Gojo.

He grins at you and whispers: “That’s what you get for calling me a mosquito”

You glare at him again for good measure and whisper back: “i hate you”

He smiles and winks at you and then decided to focus back on what the teacher is saying, as if he’s ignoring you and your response, his lack of proper response seems to irk you even more and you kick him -not so hard to draw attention- under the table, this time you were the one smiling and he was glaring at you. Now you tried to focus on the lesson but the smile never left your face. As much as you hated Gojo you did love when you annoyed him.

While you copy the board Gojo slips a piece of paper towards you which states ‘it’s not over’ and you look at him from the corner of your eyes and start to wonder just what is going on inside his head when he smirks at you but you knew you had to prepare for the worst; when Gojos little head is completely functioning it doesn’t do small actions. You turn around the piece of paper to respond ‘I’m absolutely terrified :o’ and grin to yourself and push it back on his desk.

He gave one small look at the teacher to check if he was still facing the board and then came closer to your face, specifically your ear. Goosebumps ran all over your neck at the sudden close proximity and you had to fight the urge to scream at him and push him away, you didn’t want to get scolded by the teacher on the very first day. You turn to face him- big mistake- he was so close to your face, your noses almost touched and you could feel his breath on your face. Your eyes widen in surprise and you gulp, ‘why did he have to have such pretty eyes’, you start to think to yourself and you almost catch yourself getting lost in them and you flinch back, you turn around to face the board again and put some distance between you, you are more than ready to pretend this never happened. This was completely new territory you didn’t wish to explore with Gojo.

While you did put physical distance between you guys he had reached something today you never knew he could and that idea of vulnerability terrified you, this man isn‘t to be trusted and liked, at least that‘s what you can be sure about. Even if there was something going on you can still pretend it never did you tell yourself.

The only problem is that reality is a bitch and Gojo Satoru is an even bigger bitch and he notices the faint blush on your ears and has to smirk to himself and you really were unsure if you were ready to face whatever is gonna happen next because you knew showing vulnerability to Gojo never leads to anything good.

The class soon ends and you turn to Haname, ready to pretend like the last few minutes never happened. You link your arms together and as soon as you open your mouth ready to say anything, you feel an arm wrapping around your shoulders and a cinnamon like sweet scent fills you.

Gojo‘s pesky voice fills your ear: „Didn‘t I tell you this won‘t be the end?“ you almost shiver; he is too close.

„Don‘t you have anything better to do than pester me?“, you try to untangle yourself out of his arm but his steady grip doesn‘t let you, ‘oh how you wish you had the strength to crush a man's skull right now‘, you mentally grumble and pinch Gojos arm.

He whines about how you‘re bullying him and that is clearly unfair all while pulling you even closer towards him to the point your entire upper body is touching his and you can feel your heart heavily thumping against your chest; it‘s simply because you‘re not used to seeing Gojo like this, you tell yourself and decide on your next course of action: Ignore him.

You turn towards Haname, completely aware of Gojo‘s arm still wrapped around you, you look at her with a defeated gaze as if telling her ‘do you see what I have to deal with?‘. She raises an eyebrow at the irony of the situation, for people who hate each other, you sure were close to one another.

Geto seems to join your small circle with a chuckle and you have to sigh in relief: „Get rid of him. Please.“ you look at him pleadingly. He was your only chance of getting Gojo off of you. Meanwhile the latter is just chuckling at your demise.

He looks at you with an amused grin and then slightly shakes his head no and you grumble at him; you should‘ve expected this, he is friends with Gojo, he has to somewhat be an asshole as well.

„What happened to your inner moral compass?“, you whine while still trying to get rid of Gojo‘s death grip.

„It left the moment, this got a little too amusing for me to interfere.“, he just chuckles and faces Haname, „i feel like we should get used to this, if we‘re gonna hang out with them.“, he hums.

You glare at Geto: „and here I was genuinely respecting you yesterday.“, now you turn towards Gojo, „if you decide to do this regularly, at least put on some deodorant or shower regularly, you stink.“.

Gojo scoffs at your words: “I’m anything BUT stinky, and you know that. I bathe in more oils than some people ever see in their lives.”, he brags like the spoiled brat he is.

“At least something good about marrying you.”, you glint at him in amusement.

The playful mood suddenly changes and he rolls his eyes and whispers something about being a gold digger and suddenly lets go of you and steps away without a goodbye or anything. Geto looks at both of you confused and you wish you could give him an answer but you didn’t have one either, ‘did you do something wrong?’, you had to wonder to yourself. He follows Gojo after saying his goodbyes with an apologetic smile and your side suddenly feels cold.

You shake your head in a weak attempt to sort your thoughts; this is Gojo, he was never easy to understand and never will be. You have to admit, you hated this, this feeling of doing something wrong but you don't understand what. He knew you were joking, right?

Haname snaps her fingers in front of your face and finally gets you out of your thoughts. She looks at you with concern: “You alright? You look a little shaken up.”

“Yes- no, I'm just confused? Like what was that?”, you say unsure of yourself and about the current situation.

She shrugs: “I don't know, maybe you hit a nerve? I still don’t know the guy but he definitely seems like he has some sort of heavy mood swings going on. Anyways I thought you didn’t care about him?”, she looks at you as if she’s hinting at something.

“And I still don’t.”, you stare at her as if she should immediately disregard that thought, “It was just an odd situation and I don’t know how to interpret it.”

“Mhm, sure you don’t.”, she hums, “anyways, what’s the deal with you guys getting married to each other, despite seemingly not getting along?”, she wonders and waits expectantly for an answer.

“Clan matters, really. We were promised to one another before we were even born.”, you sigh, “so it wasn’t really either of our decisions.”

“Have you never tried to make it work?”, her eyebrows wrinkle up in curiosity and she seats herself on top of one of the desks, “I mean there’s no way out. Might as well try to get along.”

“With Gojo?”, you laugh in disbelief and sit down next to her, “hell would freeze over first.”, you grip her shoulder, “besides, you saw him earlier, he’s ten times worse usually.”, you sigh, still wondering if your little comment actually struck him that badly, Gojo was one complicated human to read, besides you shouldn’t care this much about him, it shouldn’t matter, you hate him and that will never change.

The only thing you want to know is if what you did was wrong so you decide to ask her.

“Anyways, did I go too far? He seemed pretty offended by my comment.”, you wonder.

“Nah”, she drags the word and makes a ‘pff’ sound, “you were joking around obviously, and so was he, he shouldn’t get his panties twisted so easily.”

She is making sense, you nod along, slowly getting reassured by her words. “Yeah, I’m probably just overthinking this.”

“Yep”, she smiles, “so don’t worry.”.

Soon after the first few weeks of classes pass and not much happens between you and Gojo, instead of annoying you like on the first he simply didn’t acknowledge your presence. You couldn’t help but welcome this peace but you also couldn’t deny that it made you uncomfortable, it was too odd, too out of place, something was missing and you hated that you felt this way and you would never admit that.

Now that the basics have been taught the school deems you all fit to finally go on your own missions with the supervision of a teacher and of course the missions would depend on your skill levels and teamwork. Your first mission went pretty well considering that this was the first time you guys were facing curses on your own. Actually fighting and seeing them was completely incomparable to reading about them, especially facing the ones in Tokyo. They are stronger here, even if they’re considered a low rank simply because of the quantity of humans in the city. Nonetheless if you wanted to grow your strength as a sorcerer just fighting curses isn’t enough, you have to train regularly and evolve your techniques, being weak and unfocused can easily lead to your death, you knew that. Hence why you were sparring with Haname right now, with your other teammate, Shinsuke, observing the both of you.

You both wanted to try out your hand at various weapons and improve your hand to hand combat, even if you don’t need a weapon, it’s not bad to have several aces up your sleeve and Haname apparently uses dagger, that she can cut herself with any time, it works best with her blood manipulation technique you only got a small glimpse of it but it seemed to have enormous potential despite being quite self-harming, she mostly only needed a small amount of blood and with further training she’d be able to manipulate the blood of other curses as well without even drawing their blood.

Ice manipulation was your cursed technique and with your vast amount of cursed energy you have inherited thanks to your bloodline, you barely had any limits. Your biggest problems apparently will be facing drawn out battles and having teammates, you can manipulate the ice easily but it needs more refinement, saving your cursed energy and instead of targeting the entire area you should learn to just target the enemy since it could freeze your mates as well. But you figured this will be easier following with the experience you will gain from your missions. That doesn’t stop you from still training in your spare time.

The three of you build up this system where two would spare and and the other observes and gives criticism and possible improvements and then you test them out. Sometimes the seniors or other teams would join and the same system repeats. The only ones who you haven’t seen were Gojo and Geto, heck even Utahime and Shoko have joined you all except for them. It irked you, it felt like he was avoiding you and Geto simply followed his nonsense ideas but you shouldn’t let his childish behavior affect your state of mind nor your good time at Jujutsu High, at least that’s what you try to tell yourself; your mood still gets sour whenever you think of him.

At least Geto is still acknowledging your presence whenever he sees you and gives you a smile or wink as a greeting. He’s like the sunshine that follows your broody mood whenever Gojo is nearby but all in all your interactions with the both of them didn’t exceed 2 seconds. On one hand you were relieved and on the other it still pisses you off that Gojo took a small joke this serious and personal when he jokes and pisses you off all the time and you were supposed to get over it.

‘This guy needs to grow up’, you grumble internally.

You were ready to take up a wooden spear and familiarize yourself with it; this daily training for several hours has helped you immensely with your stamina and focus and it actually helps you relieve some inner pent up anger, you don’t even realize you have until you start hitting something.

More and more weeks go by like this: School, Train, sometimes you add a sprinkle of going out and having fun and there are also the occasional missions you guys have and complete with success and only small casualties.

Your team has grown closer and closer to one another to the point you guys spend almost every minute, except for sleeping, with each other and they’ve grown to be your second family; already saving each other more than you can count and a non describable trust has formed between you.

Currently you were seated in the backseat of a car and boredly looking at the constantly changing scenery outside while silently humming along to the music on the radio. The song was just about to reach the refrain when the passenger princess decided to switch the radio channel again.

“For fuck’s sake, Gojo, this is the fourth time you’re switching the song before it gets good.”, you complain. This guy always manages to ruin any type of peaceful mood you could ever have. “Just connect it to your phone if you don’t like the songs playing”, you offer in hopes you can enjoy at least one song before you have to face your pesky and annoying elders.

Gojo and you were invited to a ‘small’ family dinner involving both of your close family, you didn’t know why but you got called and told to bring Gojo with you no matter how and it was no easy feat. As much as you hated your elders or these family gatherings you still could gulp it down and still attend even if you’d rather die than go to one of these. Gojo on the other hand never attends these and they know that, which means this gathering is important as hell and you’d rather face Gojo’s wrath than your mother’s for not obeying the elders.

The deal was: Gojo attends the gathering and you basically get him at least 20 Mochis daily for two weeks. How this man doesn’t have diabetes yet, is something you have to ask yourself daily; his daily sugar intake is worse than an unsupervised toddlers.

The grown toddler in question faces you and rolls his eyes: “These songs are boring, how can you manage to enjoy them?”

You could feel your eye twitching in annoyance: “Just connect it to your phone then, Gojo. It’s not that hard.”

He shakes his head, and switches to another station, provoking you even further, and he takes a small second to consider his next words, “then I wouldn’t be able to keep pissing you off.”

Your entire body tenses up in annoyance, you can basically feel your fingers tickling, basically demanding to choke him but you have to contain yourself, if he’s dead before you even arrive at the gathering, your mother is gonna scold you. All you can do is scoff and face the window again, if he was hoping for a bigger reaction out of you he wouldn’t get it tonight.

For the rest of the car ride, you ignored Gojos shenanigans, except for a few eye rolls here and there; in the end you were also just human and there’s only so much rage you can keep in.

You guys arrive at your not so humble abode; Gojo rushes out of the car and you have to question his next action, specifically his motive, because not even a second later he is making his way towards your door and you have to hold yourself back from opening the door and hitting him in the face with it. The reasonable part in you, knows a clan member is probably watching you from afar and this is the only reason he’s doing it but it still feels incredibly odd.

Satoru opens the door and holds out his hand, waiting for you to take it, he’s lightly and impatiently tapping his foot, which basically tells you he can’t wait for tonight to be over and done with so you take a deep breath and put on a smile before you grasp his hand and let him lead you out of the car. When you step out, he lets go of your arm and puts his hand on your back while simultaneously closing the door.

He leans down to your ear, his lips lightly touching it; you feel tingles run down your spine, physical contact really wasn’t your strong point, you almost curse at yourself and at the effect he can have on you.

“Let the show begin.”, he whispers and you have to cough slightly in a weak attempt to pull yourself together at his raspy voice being so close to you.

You nod to reassure yourself and repeat: “let the show begin.”

The both of you head towards the house, his hand never leaving your waist and you can’t help but feel comfortable, at least you aren’t the only one suffering tonight; the thought makes you chuckle out loud and Gojo looks at you as if you’re about to go insane. Mischievously you just keep looking at him but it’s only in moments like this you realize just how much he towers over you, he’s almost an entire head taller than you, if he wanted to he could spit on your head and you wouldn’t even see it.

This thought makes you slightly mad and you have to narrow your eyes at him: “Don’t even think about spitting on me or anything like that or I will get you Mochis only for a week.”

He genuinely looks lost for a moment, “Just what goes on in that stupid pretty little head of yours?”, he shakes his head but then grins as if he realized something, “thanks for the idea, shortcake.”, he hums, now happier than before.

In response you groaned, you just had to open your mouth. Now you wish you could unwrap his arm around you.

“Don’t you dare or I’ll spit on every meal you’re gonna eat for the rest of our lives.”, you threaten and you mean every single word.

He hums and pulls you closer towards him before he winks and blows a kiss in your direction. Leave it to Gojo Satoru, to make you feel like you’re on an emotional rollercoaster and have your fight or flight mode activated all the time, and right now, you wish you could fight him, he is basically asking for it, but sooner rather than later you already arrive on the front door and ring the doorbell.

You both take a deep breath and you warn Gojo to behave once more for good measure. Soon the door opens and you’re faced with the clan elder greeting the both of you. Albeit they can’t let you guys step inside without a small side comment about how an engaged couple should show up together more often and you have to strengthen the grip on your purse to hold yourself back from either rolling your eyes or pushing the elder away in annoyance. You fake a laugh and respond that you both are very busy people and rarely can make it together to events like this then head inside and greet the rest of your families.

The two of you engage in small talk with the different family members and go from group to group together. Whenever you guys part from one group Gojo whispers small side comments in your ear as if he was a gossiping auntie and you can’t help but laugh at some of them, no matter how much you hate him, you have to admit he does make wonderful company for events like these.

During the passing of the night Gojo’s hand never left your body, even if he let go sometimes his hand always found its way back to your waist and you can’t help but feel giddy at the realization, if you were in the unknown about your feelings for one another you’d genuinely think the both of you were in love given the plain intimacy between you guys. The worst part is, you could get used to it, in fact you are getting used to it, and you don’t like this. At all. Being vulnerable with Gojo Satoru is never a good sign and you dread whatever comes with being comfortable around him. It’s like you are waiting for the killer to finally catch the unassuming victim and waiting for their impending doom but right now you aren’t in a spot to put distance between you guys.

Finally the both of you are done talking to everyone and make your way towards your and Gojo’s parents, after all they’re the ones who are most likely the ones to be the happiest to see the both of you well and happy together.

Your father looks at the both of you and lets out a small whistle before he looks at Satoru and his face wrinkles up in a huge smile: “Did you finally tame the dragon?”, he asks Satoru teasingly then pulls him into a hug, “I hope she hasn’t been threatening you too often. That anger of hers is unstoppable.”

You gasp at your fathers betrayal and Satoru grins at you victoriously, his eyes basically telling you that he’s got your parents wrapped around his finger and you can do absolutely nothing about it.

“Don’t worry about her, give her a little affection and all her worries and anger are gone within seconds.”, he hums happily.

You fake a smile, wrap your arms around his waist in a half hug and subtly step on his foot with your heel, “How can I be angry at you, when you’re this adorable.”, you coo and your mood genuinely brightens up when you see him slightly hiss in pain.

He wraps his arm around your waist again and slightly pinches your side and you have to hold tight onto him to not show a physical reaction towards your parents.

He then looks at your mothers and grins, “she’s such a catch, isn’t she?”

They laugh at the both of you before they stop and start scolding the two of you: “You should attend these events together more often.”, while the other says: “Do you know how awkward it is to always come up with excuses for why you never attend our gatherings?” and much more until they finally hug the both of us.

Satoru’s father now steps in to greet the both of you and then looks at you apologetically: “I hope Satoru hasn’t created any trouble for you.”

You have to genuinely laugh at this, if he only knew, albeit you didn’t want to give neither your nor his family a bad impression but still wanted to keep some type of honesty so you simply answer with: “Only his usual shenanigans, but don’t worry, he’s improving.”

This time Satoru gasps, “I’m not that bad, I’m a fucking delight and you know it, darling.”

“Satoru!”, his mother looks at him pointedly, “no swearing!”, she scolds him.

He apologizes, but you can see from miles away he doesn’t feel the slightest bit sorry about the slip of tongue.

You engage in further small talk, answering all their questions about your wellbeing, your stay at Jujutsu High and basically everything else.

At one point the gathering seems so normal, so ordinary that you can’t help but wonder why they insisted so heavily on the both of you attending together. There’s no way they would have been this adamant about it if this was just a normal gathering.

Satoru beats you to it, though and asks the question you’ve been dying to know and skillfully mentions he had important stuff going on tonight, “so, what is the purpose of tonight’s event? I even had to ask my teammate to take my mission for tonight”

You had to physically restrain yourself from patting Satoru’s head proudly for coming up with this excuse, at least he can sometimes make that brain of his work.

“Oh,”, your mother smiles, “well there are two things planned on today's agenda. First of all we wanted to announce future plans that would follow your guy's marriage in the future, that involve both of our clans and then we wanted to discuss details of your future engagement party, i mean we still haven’t officially celebrated it.”, she explains.

You look at her surprised: “I thought the official engagement announcement would be after we graduate?”, you wonder out loud and Satoru nods along.

Now Satoru’s mother chimes in: “Please, everybody already knows you two are going to wed each other, might as well get the engagement over and done with.”, she chuckles and you can’t help but gulp.

You knew it was bound to happen at one point or another but actually deciding on a date and being engaged officially makes this entire deal so real and it feels like you can’t hold on to the bubble you’ve been living in for the entire time you’ve been at Jujutsu High. You and Gojo Satoru are actually going to be engaged and there’s no actual change to your situation but something about this feels so much more different to your situation before and you can’t pinpoint why yet.

You take a deep breath and for the first time genuinely look at Satoru. He has a blank expression and even though you can’t read minds you just know he’s going through the same predicament as you right now.

You slightly squeeze him in a weak attempt to get him back to reality, you guys still need to pretend everything is alright between you two. Lucky for you it works and now he’s looking at you. You can see the hidden dark look in his eyes; he didn’t want this and your heart feels like it twists in pain, this is probably the only time you’d be the one who could understand Satoru’s thoughts and feelings better than anyone else and you slightly nod and squeeze his arm in a reassuring manner, no matter what, it’s gonna be ok, you try to convince the both of you. This is the only thing you guys won’t be able to change; you two are gonna end up married, whether you liked it or not.

Satoru takes a deep breath then suggests to discuss these matters in a more private setting some time next week and excuses himself before he goes anywhere but near our parents. His mother looks at you confused and worried.

You grasp her hand and squeeze it lightly to reassure her, “he’s fine.”, you smile and follow after Satoru.

He is outside, sitting on the edge of the terrace currently ruffling through his hair, while you slowly walk towards him. The cold of the night breezes against your naked shoulders. Never in your life before have you had to comfort Gojo Satoru nor did you ever think you would but it seems like there’s a first time for everything. Every fiber in your body is screaming to leave him alone, telling you that it’s not worth it, but you can’t, not when you know, not when you understand and you really hated your caring heart in this exact moment so you bite your teeth and swallow down the cold you’re currently feeling and sit down next to him.

He notices you and lets out an annoyed huff: “can’t you leave me alone? At least for now? Before we actually have to stick together side by side for forever.”, you tense up at his sudden rude behavior, you knew he wasn’t exactly ecstatic about the current events but you failed to predict that he’d be pissed enough to let it out on you and you suddenly wish you hadn’t come outside but you grit your teeth together; you both needed to talk about this, whether you liked it or not.

You sigh in order to somehow gather your thoughts and consider your next words, you need to stay calm.

“I don’t like this either, Satoru, just as much as you do. But we can’t change the inevitable. It is going to happen and the best we can do is try to get along and make the best out of it.”, you shrug and look at him, waiting for his reply.

He chuckles coldly, his face unreadable, the only thing visible in this dark terrace that’s only lightened by the moonlight are his furrowed eyebrows, and he snaps: “Make the best out of it? Did you forget all the past years we have spent together so far? I fucking hate you, y/n,”, he stands up and you get up as well, you wrap your arms around your body, is far too cold out here for your type of attire, “that’s not gonna change any time soon, so stop trying to act all high and mighty as if this doesn’t bother you.”, he takes a step closer to you, you two are only a few inches apart now, “Don’t fucking lie and say we fucking make the best out of it, when we both perfectly know this is literally the worst shit anyone can pull on the both of us.”

You scoff, ignoring the small peng in your chest, clearly offended and annoyed by his attitude: “I’m not trying to be high and mighty, I’m trying to fucking deal with this like a mature human being and you snapping at me isn’t going to change our arrangement, Satoru. Grow up and accept it.”

His hand runs through his hair and you can’t help but let your eyes follow his movement and you gulp, realizing how attractive he looks pissed off and you want to hit yourself for being distracted by this in this type of situation and then the realization hits you, you are attracted to Gojo Satoru and it feel like someone suddenly punched the air out of your lungs.

You are attracted to Gojo fucking Satoru, your future husband, who hates you like the fucking pest and the feeling should be likewise; you almost start to curse out loud at yourself, just why did you have to realize this now out of all moments, while he’s expressing his unending hatred for you, why did you even have to be attracted to him in the first place?

“You see, y/n”, you can see he’s clenching his jaw, “right fucking now, i’d rather wish one of us died, rather than grow up and accept it.”, he almost spits out and you know, he is just angry and he just wants to hurt you right now but something about your sudden realization and then Satoru immediately spewing these harsh words out combined makes you snap and you slap him. Satoru widens his eyes in shock and you almost were surprised at your own actions too, at least you would’ve been, if you were in a normal state of mind.

It's just like you thought earlier, being vulnerable around Gojo Satoru is not a good thing.

You shake your head in disappointment and remark harshly and visibly angry: “Out of all the things I expected when I stepped outside, you stooping this low, wasn’t one of them, but I guess there’s a new low every day for you, isn’t there, Gojo?”, you turn around and step away from him. You can’t be near him, not now, not like this. You both needed to cool down, before this gets even worse than it already is.

You step inside and take a deep breath, you need a distraction, anything will do, you can’t even bear to look at your parents right now, you know when they did this deal, this wasn’t what they were expecting for you, and yet you still can’t help but feel angry at them. They took your right to love and be loved like you deserved from you, instead you had a future spouse wishing your death rather than be with you. Anger is slowly starting to be replaced with sadness and the urge to cry is growing stronger and stronger.

What a fucking fun night, you grumble and do your best to keep your inner tumult together, you can’t afford a breakdown in front of your families.

Your cousin approaches you, having noticed you’re not so okay, she tugs you by your hand and pulls you somewhere more private, “you okay?”, she whispers and she knows you’re not okay but how else would she be able to approach this?

You shake your head: “I need to leave, before I break down this entire house, either with my tears or my anger, I haven’t decided yet.”

She nods, barely following along, “okay”, she goes and grabs her car keys, “where are we going?”, then walks out of the house with you following right behind her.

“Bring me back to Jujutsu High, please. And no questions, I’m begging, I can’t form answers right now.”, you plead and step into her car.

She nods affirmingly, “no questions” and drives you home.

The car ride is quiet, only quiet music playing through the car speakers, your cousin leaves you to sort your own thoughts and even after the car ride when you’re already at Jujutsu High you still feel lost about everything. You thank her and step inside, you’d take her out to lunch one day but now you’re in no state of mind to properly converse or do anything else other than think.

Why are you even so affected by this, this is what confuses you the most, yes Gojo is attractive, you established that earlier, but he hates you and you hate him, nothing has actually changed between you guys, or has it? You groan out loud in frustration. No matter how much he hates you or how angry you are in a certain moment and no matter how much you actually don’t mean it, you don’t wish someone else their death, that was a real low blow of him and you don’t think you could ever look at him the same again.

You sigh, you had no intention of solving this situation, this wasn’t your fault and yet you were still standing in front of Geto’s room. Seems like your feet automatically carried you here while you were deep in thought. You contemplated if you should knock or not but apparently Geto didn’t even let you think about that before he opened the door and looked at you in confusion.

“What is bringing you here, princess? I know I’m attractive but I’d rather not do something with my best friend's girl.”, and now you notice how this might come across but you couldn’t care less right now and he winks apparently not realizing that you are here for everything but sleeping with him.

“Bad timing for jokes, Geto.”, you shake your head, “speaking of your best friend, though, fucking fix his dipshit brain or something and give him something against emotional constipation.”, you grumble, clearly frustrated.

He looks at you even more confused before it dawns upon him, something happened and given that you went to him, it was bad, like horribly, only Gojo fucking Satoru could do this, type of bad.

“I’m going to leave it to him to tell you but punch him at least twice for me, please, I already hit him once, but he doesn’t care about me.”, you sigh and you swear you could see the gears turning in Geto’s head.

“That bad?”, he asks genuinely concerned and you only nod, then apologize for disturbing him, wish him a good night. You don’t even give him the chance to ask any further questions before you turn around and head to your room.

You were absolutely done with Gojo Satoru, you grumbled and cursed him all the way up until you arrived at your room. Once you reach the small space you take a deep breath. Feelings come crashing down like a barely holding up dam broke loose and you curse Satoru even more.

It hurt, it hurt seeing him so pissed off about this, about you and you can’t help but feel like your self worth is completely lacking, thoughts start to spill you never thought you’d think and you know tomorrow you probably won’t care and it’ll just be back to Gojo being Gojo but tonight you cared, you let him in even if only for a split second and it was already enough to make your lips quiver and your eyes threatening to spill with tears, Gojo Satoru is your own personal and he proved that to you tonight. You still can’t believe his implication; he’d rather choose death than get along with you, what does that say about your personality? Your desirability? Were you that ugly or was your personality that unlovable? Your insecurities grow bigger and bigger and you’ve put yourself into a circle of constantly demeaning yourself without even trying to.

You don’t even know how or when you fall asleep; only in the next morning when your alarm bell rings and you’re still in your evening dress with completely smeared makeup do you realize you fell asleep. You look like absolute shit and you also felt like it; but you can’t go on like this. In an attempt to get rid of your pathetic behavior you slap your cheeks hard and mutter to yourself: ‘Don’t give Gojo Satoru the satisfaction of having power over you.’ and you pull yourself together even if it’s out of simple spite, if it keeps you going, it keeps you going.

The dress is being discarded and so is everything else, you take a quick shower and put on your daily makeup and blow dry your hair, you’d simply leave it straight today and out on your uniform; you didn’t feel like attending classes but you’d only repeat yesterday’s events if you stayed in your dorm room, and the circle of toxicity would continue. At least classes would serve as a good distraction.

As punctual as always at 7:40am Haname knocks at your door and invites herself in, she gives you a double take and looks at you, or well, more like analyzes every inch of your body before she simply states: “You look good but you also look like shit, I can’t describe it. Was last night that bad?”, she wonders out loud.

You grasp her hand and lead her out of the room with an exaggerated groan: “an absolute fucking disaster.”, you repeat yesterday's events and she listens attentively and proceeds to curse out Gojo with certain insults you can’t even properly pronounce. Now for the first time you genuinely felt like smiling and reassured, your feelings finally felt valid and you were glad you decided to open up to her.

“Anyways”, you shrug, “let’s stop talking about this, or him, he is simply not worth it anymore, I learned my lesson, I have to put my guard up before I fall into a rabbit hole I can’t get myself out of.”, and you sigh, this won’t be as easy as you hope it will be and you knew that but you have to, otherwise you might actually not make it out of this alive.

The both of you arrive at your classroom and you sit down at your regular seats; the room is quiet, everyone either being occupied with their thoughts or still trying to get a few minutes of sleep before the teacher steps in.

Gojo’s seat is empty, so far, you have to wonder if he’s going to show up today, considering how angry he was yesterday. You weren’t sure if you even wanted to see him and yet here you are checking the door whenever it makes the tiniest bit of noise, you really wish you could slap yourself right now in frustration; stop caring about him, you chant like a mantra in your head.

Then the door opens again and you face the sunglasses Gojo wears every single day; your body tenses up and you catch yourself holding your breath, he is looking at you while you are looking at him and everything stops for a few seconds; you really don’t know how to face him or what to do. Do you behave like usual? Are you even capable of doing that? Or will you ignore him, god, you hate this uncertainty.

The tension between you guys breaks when Gojo is being pushed from behind, Geto steps into the classroom and you’re finally able to look away from them, from him. Your head turns towards the window while you rest it on your arm and you know he’s still looking at you but you don’t think you can handle another fight at the moment.

He seems to be sitting down next to you and you can feel yourself tense up even more, you didn’t think he’d actually sit next to you today and thought he’d switch seats with Geto, but it seems like he’s mature enough for that at least, you think to yourself bitterly.

His gaze doesn’t leave you this entire time and you’re almost about to tell him to stop staring at you, when jumps up and mutters something along the lines of ‘Fuck it’ before you can feel your chair being pushed back and Gojo right in front ouf your face. He was so close you could see his sparkling blue eyes hidden behind the sunglasses and his severe eye bags, to be specific, he looked worse than you this morning and it made you feel some sense of satisfaction, at least you weren’t the only one affected by this last night.

He stares at you and then whispers: “We need to talk.”, the eye contact between the both of you doesn’t break and he keeps looking at you so deeply you could almost think he can read your mind.

“Classes are about to start, Gojo”, you barely mutter out; you don’t trust yourself, your voice to properly speak out right now.

“I don’t care”, he says in a hoarse voice, “what I care about is fixing this.”, he looked at you almost desperate and pleading and you feel your entire strength leave your body when he pulls you up by your arm and drags you out of the classroom and you let yourself be carried away.

The only thought screaming into your mind is ‘I don‘t think I hate him‘, you care for him in a certain way because all he has to do is genuinely look at you and your determination is crumbling at his demand.

When you‘re just about to leave the classroom you can hear a faint whistle; it‘s Geto probably.

Gojo‘s hand is softly wrapped around yours while he still keeps tugging you to wherever he wants to go and you follow him silently while your eyes keep following his tall frame. You don‘t know what you‘re going to face, an apology? An explanation? Neither?

Your entire body is tense, and you doubt the tension will leave you any time soon, before you can even realize you already are in an empty classroom and you‘re anxiously waiting for Gojo to say anything.

He clears his throat and takes a step closer towards you, you take a deep breath and step back -you swear you can see a glint of hurt guilt in his eyes- you know that the physical distance won‘t actually put distance between you guys but you don‘t trust yourself being too close to him at the moment, leading to you perfectioning the mask of indifference towards him, even if you feel anything but indifferent towards him on the inside.

His hand grabs the back of his neck and he looks away, probably contemplating his next choice of words. It‘s rare to see Satoru at a loss for words and you didn‘t think you‘d ever be the reason for that but here you were, waiting for him to open his mouth.

Your foot lightly taps on the ground, your pride not letting you even think about being the first to say anything, he was still the one who screwed up so he should take the first step.

After you wait a few more minutes expectantly, you‘re starting to grow disappointed, if he decided he could cut you off from classes and then proceed to just stand there and look at you; you weren‘t gonna have it.

You raise your eyebrow, impatiently before you finally decide you have enough and then make your way back towards the door ready to go back to class.

“Wait..”, you stop and look back at him expectantly, “I’m sorry, okay?”, he grabs your hands and slightly tugs you towards him, “I went too far yesterday, I was angry at the world but then let it out on you, that was wrong of me.”

“I know, Satoru,”, you make no motion to move away from him, “and I understand, but even if I understand, there are certain things I just can’t overlook.”, you sigh, “I’m not a punching bag nor will I let myself get treated like one.”

“And I won’t treat you like that, I promise”, he pleads and steps even closer, “I really mean it when I say I regret it.”, his hands cup your cheeks, “I’m genuinely sorry, y/n.”, and he looks at you with so much sincerity you have to genuinely question if you aren’t dreaming right now; his hands are warm and you suddenly felt like you needed more of this, more of him.

You need to get rid of this thought, you can’t have more of him, no matter how much you want it; Satoru is unattainable like that.

“It’s okay”, you manage to whisper, afraid that if you would speak too loud, you would ruin this bubble the both of you have surrounded yourself with, “well, it’s not okay, but I accept your apology.”, he lets go of your face and smiles brightly, on a whim you decide to grab him by the collar and pull him really close to your face, his smile slips a little and you can see him glance down at your lips, then look back into your eyes. “You pull this shit one more time and I will make sure, there will be no heir of yours”, you whisper your face traitorously getting closer to his, he gulps, “understood?”

“Understood.”, he whispers, the space between your faces getting smaller and smaller.

You let go of his collar and pat out the wrinkles: “good.”, you back away from him and start heading back to your classroom.

As you make your way back to the classroom you don’t spare a single glance back to Satoru, all you can focus on is your heart beating loudly and rapidly as if you had just sprinted through the entirety of Japan, and your mind wanders, you let yourself think about what would’ve happened if you didn’t stop whatever happened in there. Would he have pushed you away? Kissed you back? Those are questions you’ll probably never hear the answer to and you have to almost physically fight yourself from looking back at him; you were afraid that you wouldn’t like whatever is written on his face.

The class is vividly discussing something and you bow to your teacher and apologize, clearly embarassed for being this late. However the teacher just shrugs you off, someone -probably Geto or Haname- explained why you weren‘t there despite your stuff lying on your desk, Satoru is a few steps behind you and grins sheepishly at the teacher, he then stops Satoru him and warns him to solve private issues out of class time.

You have to hold back a shit-eating grin at being treated much nicer than him and Geto doesn‘t even hold his laughter back and you almost start laughing, too. These guys will be the death of you, you can feel it. Geto grins at you, and you know that‘s his way of checking up on you and you feel grateful for him; he was most likely the one to get the stick out of Satoru‘s ass.

While you and Gojo sit down Haname explains what you had missed during the time you were gone, apparently you guys would be divided into different teams for the next three months. It‘s basically going to be a rotation system, where two members of each team will go to two different teams every two weeks; The reason for that being that we need to get used to working with different types of people and training our flexibility, after all the teams weren‘t going to always be the same either when we are grown up.

The two of you look at each other, you knew you didn‘t want to switch teams so early but their reasoning made perfect sense and you could hardly disagree with them.

They were discussing the importancy of team dynamics and what they need to pay attention to even when you aren‘t used to your team members yet; they even made a list of the do‘s and don‘ts when it‘s the first time you‘re working together.

This also led to the big debate going on right now, who would go where in the first round and because the class was being so indecisive the teacher simply decided to draw lots.

While he was drawing the lots Satoru chuckles beside you: „Don‘t worry, y/n, I‘ll take very good care of you, when we‘re going to work together.“ and you groan in response, but he‘s right, you‘ll have to work with this goofy clown for two entire weeks at some point.

He grins and ruffles your hair, leading to you scoffing at him, while Geto chirps in: „He is as bad as he seems.“ and you have to bury your head in your arms in frustration.

Whatever was out there hated you and loved to see you suffer at the hands of Gojo Satoru. At least they took mercy on you and decided that today wouldn’t be the day you’d have to suffer. You almost sigh in relief when your name and someone else's gets called out and it wasn’t Satoru’s.

Another few weeks pass and you have to admit, it’s incredibly exhausting to always get used to new team mates once you get used to the ones you just got paired up with, you at first thought, yes it would be mentally taxing but not to this extent. The entire dynamic changes and with new members, one minute you’re the main act and then the other you’re the support and then the next second you have to save your teammate from getting annihilated by a blast they didn’t see, and then the same game over and over just with other people.

At one point you work together with Geto and you find out you guys actually get along even better now that you weren’t constantly annoyed by the white-haired manchild, they do usually come only in pairs of two, after all. If you were to describe your relationship with one another it would be like two grannies sitting next to each other and gossiping about everyone and everything and you were actually kind of sad when you guys had to part ways but all good things have to come to an end unfortunately.

Just like the good things have to come to an end, the bad things have to show up sometimes too, you think to yourself, while you can only dread your existence for the next two weeks, Satoru is grinning from ear to ear next to you and almost jumping up in excitement. You don’t have enough migraine pills for the upcoming weeks, you were 100% sure of that.

“Hello, partner.”, he stretches out his hand to you, as a form of greeting, with the same grin as before, reluctantly you stare at it before you take it and he abruptly pulls you towards him; you crash against his chest and almost hit him in the chin for being so rash with you. He lifts his hand towards the other person and waves at them: “Yo!”

He has his arms so tightly wrapped around you, that even when you try to push him away, you can’t escape his death grip, ‘at least he smells nice’, you grimace and greet your other partner. He only lets go when your assigned team leader shows up and even then his arm remains wrapped around your shoulder.

The leader frowns a little upon the physical contact but says nothing and you wish you could bury yourself six feet deep; sadly Satoru will never cease to embarass you.

Even when you guys are on missions he keeps calling you weird nicknames and every time he does, another curse would be sent flying towards his direction but this lucky motherfucker doesn’t even have to dodge since his infinity stops them from touching him and it irks you even more, especially when the teacher scolds you afterwards for being reckless and that you shouldn’t throw back curses at your teammates, no matter how annoyed you are.

Today you were sent to a particularly hard mission because, obviously, Gojo Satoru was in your team and the elders decided that since he’s there nothing is impossible. Curses after curses were coming at you, it was like an entire army of them, they weren’t particularly strong but the sheer quantity of them was what exhausted you - no matter how many times you freeze and crush them many more appear, there has to be some kind of power source but even Satoru’s six eyes can’t figure out where its at at the moment; there is so much to analyze, he needs time, is his explanation and you wish his stupid brain could work faster, your output was slowly getting weaker.

Finally he comes up with an idea, he teleports next to you and asks: “Are you capable of freezing the entire area?”, you look around the incredibly large area, it should be doable, but you doubt you’ll be able to stand properly after that but that’s a matter for later.

You nod at him: “Just step behind me.”, you start rushing towards a relatively empty area and wait for everyone else to step behind you. When they are, you freeze absolutely everything, including the walls and ceiling, leaving only the area behind you, where your team is, unfrozen.

Satoru quickly looks around, then teleports away and shortly after the curses that have been surrounding you disappear into thin air; he did it, you smile proudly and then everything starts to spin and you prepare yourself to get down on your knees but you feel strong arms wrap around you holding you steady.

“You okay?”, Satoru’s voice suddenly appears next to you, he must be the one holding you right now.

“I’m fine, give me a second.”, you hold yourself up against his arms; when everything stops spinning you slowly get out of Satoru’s grip only for your knees to finally give in and at lightning speed he is once again holding you securely.

He puts your arms around his shoulders and lifts you up and carries you piggyback style, you rest your head on top of his shoulder, you blame it on your exhaustion although the faint blush on your face could tell everyone else, it wasn’t just because of that. Maybe if you hadn’t closed your eyes to relieve the trembling headache slowly appearing you also would’ve noticed the slight tinge of red on his ears.

Before you even know it, you fell asleep and wake up in the middle of the car ride back to the school, you look at Satoru sitting at the other side of the car, looking out of the window, it seemed like he was thinking about something and you couldn’t help but stare at him. Your eyes wander from his drop dead gorgeous eyes, to the slight crease between his eyebrows then towards the frown on his face that’s usually covered in a smile or grin and it makes you want to frown as well - the mission went well in the end, why does he look so bothered?

“Good work out there.”, you say in an attempt to make that crease between his brows disappear.

He looks at you and then finally smiles: “Good morning, sunshine.”, now he completely turns towards you, “You okay?”, the crease between his eyebrows appears again, “You went off to fantasyland not so long ago.”

“Yeah, I’m fine”, you smile at him, “just used too much of my powers, too quickly, a little rest and I’m back to the usual.”

A little longer than necessary he keeps staring at you, analyzing you and then finally spills out in a sing-song tone: “You went a teensy tiny bit overboard, didn’t you?”

Now you were the one frowning: “You said freeze everything, that’s what I did.”, you shrug, “besides at one point I did have to let out all this pent up frustration I get from working with you.”

Suddenly he grins at you like a pervert: “There are so many different ways to let out your frustration on me and that’s how you decide to do it?”

Your eyes widen in realization and you hit his shoulder: “I did not mean it like that!”, you grimace, “Fucking pervert!”

Unfaced by your hit, he just playfully rolls his eyes and hums: “Uh-uh, sure you didn’t”

Too embarrassed to even look at him anymore you now face the window and have to scoff, leave it to him to ruin any type of nice moment between you guys and you can see from the reflection of the window, he still has that shit-eating grin on his face - how you wish you had slept through the entire car ride now.

When you arrive back at the school you still feel slightly wobbly on your feet but it definitely was better than before, the driver told you to go and visit the infirmary just in case and of course Satoru volunteered to bring you there; if you were strong enough to properly walk on your own, you definitely would have protested with your entire might but you weren’t really in a place to argue so you just let it be and used Satoru like a crutch and weirdly enough he let you.

Once you were in the infirmary they did a general check up on you and already sent you back to your dorm telling you, you just need to charge up again.

Satoru insists on walking you back to your room and wraps one arm around your waist, you stare at him in confusion.

“You do know I can walk by myself now?”, and attempt to wiggle yourself out of his arms.

He doesn’t let you go and just smiles: “No risks; better to be safe than sorry.”, he winks at you and you swear you could feel his arms wrap even tighter around you.

If you or someone else would ask you ‘When did you get so used to him always touching you in one way or another’, you wouldn’t have an answer to that; it just happened, when or how, you didn’t know either, all you know is at some point it felt odd not having his hand somewhere on your body whenever you were together.

Satoru brought you to your room and when you prepare to thank him and say goodbye to him he walks past you and just sprawls on top of your bed, without a single care and you just stare at him, too shocked to do anything else.

A few seconds later you finally get a grip on yourself and scowl: “Out of my bed, Gojo.”, your eyebrows furrowing in annoyance.

He just moves a little more to the side, probably making room for you, “Don’t wanna”, he pouts and pats the spot next to him, initiating that you should just lie next to him.

‘He’s going insane’, you think to yourself, there was no other explanation for this random clingy behavior; you were sure that if you’re going to lie down next to him you would be going insane as well and sigh, “did you hit your head?”, your head tilts slightly to the left in a questioning manner.

He moves his head towards your general direction and opens one of his eyes, he doesn’t say anything but his facial expression definitely says ‘are you being serious right now?’; you look at him with the same expression until you finally realize he isn’t going to move any time soon.

“At least take off your shoes on my bed”, you grumble and step towards your occupied bed and lie down next to him.

Satoru quickly takes off his shoes and then lies back down facing you, the two of you were so close that whenever you guys breathe out you’d feel the other person's breath on your face and it takes everything inside of you not to freak out or curse at Satoru for putting you guys in this awkward position - two people in a bed made for one person.

At some point you close your eyes and try to sleep but you can’t; not when you know Satoru is lying right there in front of you in your own bed. The two of you weren’t actually touching but it sure didn’t feel like it, instead it felt more like he was touching your entire soul, his presence consuming all of your senses and at one point the only thought you were capable of thinking is ‘Gojo Satoru’.

In frustration you turn around, your back is facing him now - a weak attempt to escape his presence - you perfectly know it’s useless but you’re tired and your head is aching and all you wish is to sleep.

Finally you get used to the heat and soft snoring behind you, at some point it even seems like a lullaby and you drift off to sleep.

When you wake up the first thing you notice is the lack of warmth next to you. You turn around to the spot Satoru lied in earlier, of course he left, before you could even wake up. It was a weird situation to begin with but you still can’t help but taste the sour aftertaste it leaves on your tongue. Satoru isn’t the type to stay, you don’t even know why you’d delude yourself into thinking he would in the first place.

Your warm feet hit the cold ground and you almost wrap yourself in your blanket again but just put on your slippers and a sweatshirt from your closet until you get ready and dressed for the training ground today - the classes today will focus on physical combat and honestly, you were in need of pummeling something to the ground today.

Haname, as always picks you up and you walk together; you contemplated telling her what happened last night but telling her would mean it is a big deal - and it isn’t, you convince yourself. Gojo was just tired after carrying you back to the car and then dragging you to the infirmary so he decided to nap in your room and leave as soon as he got up, it’s completely sensable.

She interrupts your train of thought when she asks: “How was your mission yesterday?”, she nudges you, “I heard you exhausted yourself completely.”

“I’m okay,” you sigh, “just went a little overboard. Not really that bad or anything.”, and nudged her back as a comfort.

The look she gives you clearly says that she doesn’t believe you and gives you a once over before she decides to drop the topic, noticing that you don’t really want to dwell on it.

You look around and see some of your other classmates gathered, some are sitting on the ground and some are warming up and stretching; you decide to follow them and gesture to Haname that you are going to start stretching and she joins you quickly.

You decide to stretch your legs and sit down and touch your toes with your hand, after a few times someone pushes you from behind deeper towards your toes and you curse at them ready to punch whoever is messing with you like this.

Gojo’s wide jerkish grin greets you, you push him away and flip him off - the audacity of this guy. For a second you consider asking why he left but you decide it’s not worth mentioning and you once again push down the tight feeling in your throat.

Geto is right behind him cackling while you glare at him: “Piss me off and you’re next.”, you scowl. They really are going to be the key reasons if you ever switch to the dark side.

These two don’t stop, though instead they join you and sit right beside you; one mosquito on each side. At first you try to ignore them and go back to stretching but then they decide to - as childish as they are - make faces at one another and basically yell loud jokes and there’s only a certain amount of patience you have and you’re running out of it.

You flick the both of them on their forehead: “either stretch or go somewhere else.”, you glare.

They stare at each other for a few seconds and then they continue to bother you; one pokes your cheek while the other pokes your side and then Gojo asks, while he's digging his finger deeper into your cheek: “What’s gotten you so grumpy today, hmm?”

A loud scoff leaves your lips: “How can I not?”, you slap their fingers away, “it’s way too early for your shenanigans.”

The both of them chuckle and you wonder what you have ever done to deserve this until they both get slapped by someone on the back of their head: “leave the poor girl alone.”, the teacher scolds them and you sincerely thank him before you grin at the both of them in satisfaction.

They both grumble but don’t say anything else - they better not- they’re already on your bad side today, you weren’t sure if you could handle more of their relentless pestering.

The class immediately starts after this incident and you can finally let out some of your inner pent up anger.

In your head the training dummy is Gojo and he gets the beating of his life; it’s almost therapeutic to beat up dummy!Gojo and you really wish you could do this more often.

Your life continues the same as always: you attend classes, train, sometimes go on missions, are pestered by dumb (Geto) and dumber (Gojo). Well in Geto’s defense; he’s okay sometimes, especially because he’s the one who stops Gojo from overstepping too much but he sure loves teasing you too and they don’t miss out on their daily intake of annoying you.

Now you guys have reached your second year at Jujutsu High, sadly not all of you have made it and when the first one of your classmates died you felt like the world is about to end but you had to recover and continue this path; you knew sorcerers die daily and sometimes it’s the ones you know.

Everything went fine and you had your daily routine, you had improved massively compared to your first year and even got promoted to Grade 1 - you’ll probably become a special grade in the future if you manage to get a better hold of your reverse curse technique.

Then the incident happened and you weren’t really sure if things were fine by then. Satoru and Geto failed their mission and Geto started to spiral into someone you didn’t recognize as Geto. When you first heard of it you tried your best to console him but nothing you ever said really went to his head and you decided to let him; it was something he had to realize on his own.

As it turns out leaving him alone wasn’t the best of ideas because not long after Geto steps towards the wrong path and kills more than 100 people and turns towards the wrong path. You wish you could scream at him, beat him, do anything to make him regret his actions but he had chosen his path and now he was considered to be your enemy.

Gojo was even more closed off right after this, even more unapproachable, yes he still talked and bothered you to no end but you knew he had closed off his heart and had his walls up as high as possible. He hid himself behind his mask of cheeriness and dumbassery but you couldn’t stop him.

Today was another day you were paired up with Satoru, the only difference now to before is that he didn’t bother with team effort; he’d kill the curse in a few seconds and call it a day.

You grumble at him: “Y’know, you can at least try to let us take part in exorcizing the curse.”, you raise your eyebrows in annoyance.

He shrugs: “it’s not my fault, nor is it yours. I’m simply out of your league.”, he grins and you weren’t sure if he just said that to get under your skin or actually meant it.

Your head shakes in response: “It’s still a team effort, Satoru.”, you scoff, “how am I ever supposed to increase my reverse curse technique efficiency if you always clear the job by yourself.”

He just walks away from you before he turns his head around to face you and smirks: “Now that’s not my responsibility is it?”, he interlocks his hands behind his head and you wish you could kick his knee caps, “besides, look at this from a positive perspective - i finished the job for the both of us.”

“I wouldn’t be attending Jujutsu High if I wanted others to do the job for me”, you grumble and slap his arm in offense.

He chuckles and shakes his head: “Chill, once in a while you can lie low and let me handle it.”

You grumble at him but don’t respond anymore - it’s pointless to argue with Satoru; he'd never bother to see your point of view, not anymore at least. Another thing that had changed; you knew it wasn’t really his fault but there’s only so many times you can excuse him.

At one point you do point out his changed behavior; it was a normal Saturday evening, you were on the way to his family's household to finalize the small details of your engagement party, the car ride was silent - which already was unusual in itself but you expected some complaints from Satoru and it took one faint bitter chuckle on your side for him to question what’s wrong and you drop the bomb on him.

“You changed, Satoru, in some ways for the better, in some for the worse.”, you point out.

He didn’t take it that well; he furrowed his eyebrows in anger and scoffed: “Yeah, it’s called growing up, maybe you should try it, too.”

“You know exactly, that is not what I meant”, you roll your eyes, he knows what you mean he’s just deflecting.

“Maybe, it’s none of your business, y/n?”, he snarls and it feels like he punched you right in the guts; you had expected this but still nothing could prepare your heart for this, “Nobody asks you to care for me or my -apparent- lack of emotional well being”, he snarls defensively.

“But I do care, Satoru!”, you respond, or maybe even yell back, you don’t know, you mostly hear your thumping heartbeat and not your own voice.

He rolls his eyes: “Well then fucking stop,”, he scoffs, “it’s annoying.”

It felt like he stabbed you in the guts, took out your organs and tried to put them back in in the wrong places; you know you relationship to one another is complicated, one time you try to murder the other and another time you’re joking around as if you never had a care in the world and despite these complications you thought he cared -at least to a certain degree- about you, but Gojo loves proving you wrong it seems.

A switch got turned off inside of you and your entire demeanor changed - Gojo wasn’t the only one with his walls up now.

You snicker coldly: “You’re right, caring about you isn’t worth it.”

For a faint second you swear you saw something flicker in his eyes but you refuse to believe it was actually real and it was just all in your head - he doesn’t care, he has proven that already.

He turns back around to face the front and the car is once again filled with silence.

You don’t even want to speak anymore but you had to settle at least one thing: “Remember to act when we’re at your place.”, you sigh, hoping he listens to you for once in his life. “I don’t want to hear our parents nagging us because we can’t get a grip.”

He doesn’t turn around but you can see him nod stiffly - at least you’re on the same page on this matter.

Not long after you arrived at his mansion and you almost felt like hurling out of the car; it felt too exhausting to be in there - it took everything inside of you to wait for Gojo to open the door for you.

When he opened the door, he held out his hand - the same tense expression on his face as earlier and you almost grimaced at him; nonetheless you took his hand and stepped out of the car. You were stiffer than a stick to release the tension, you take a deep breath and try to relax.

‘This is going to be terrible’, you sigh to yourself and a coldness fills you the same way Satoru’s cold hand is wrapped around yours.

One of the servants greets you and invites you in, you glance at Gojo out of habit but he doesn’t even bother looking at you and stares straight ahead. You hold back an eye roll - if this man could be any more stubborn you’d actually blast your own head off.

He puts his arm around your shoulder and you have to tense up, it feels weird to be at odds with Gojo and yet so close to him; you two couldn’t be any closer and further apart at the same time.

He silently whispers: “C’mon, we don’t have all day” and guides you to the dining room.

Once inside you both greet each other's family and sit down to eat; not long after the plans already begin - the choice of flowers, other decorations and so much more, well it’s not like you had much of a choice just like almost everything else that involved your and Gojo’s future. It was incredibly frustrating but you knew it was to no avail - you’d just have to bite your tongue.

The evening is getting worse and worse and the more time passes the more you’re tapping your foot impatiently - you just want to get home as fast as possible and sleep; all you want to do is sleep.

Every time someone commented on something Satoru would give passive-aggressive back-handed compliments towards you, like “weed would look best on y/n” or “she should wear something bright to balance out her personality” and you’re one comment away from actually slapping him - he’s going too far with his sappiness.

When they’re finally done with everything you almost jump out of your seat until Gojo’s mother looks at you with those pleading puppy eyes and you curse your nice heart for always bending to other people’s wills.

You keep staying for even longer than necessary; to the point your back even starts to hurt and you’re almost close to begging Gojo to leave; gladly he beats you to it when he slaps his thighs and calls it a night - you would kiss him thank you if he wasn’t the reason why you were in such a sour mood.

The moment you leave the house you speed walk towards the car - you couldn’t handle anymore of his nasty comments nor his nasty attitude; you just want, scratch that, you need to get away from him.

Without a word you sit down in the car and wait for the driver to start driving. You were beyond pissed but mostly hurt, you wanted to scream at Gojo but it wasn’t worth it, he wasn’t worth it, at least not anymore.

[stopthebig3]

What do you think of girls hating in Kikyo for no reason? She suffered so much in Inuyasha and treated unfairly.

Shipping. She actually does come in the way of the ship because Inuyasha does love her too. Kagome is more relatable than her. Even the way Kikyo was brought up is just not something a lot of readers can relate to. Personally I find her a fascinating character. There should be more female characters that aren't moefied and sexualized to death while still having that "cool" personality. It would also be nice if people could look at Kikyo and Kagome's characters and realize they come from totally different backgrounds. I don't hate either of them.

Sakura hate on the other hand is not due to "coming between a ship" because neither Sasuke or Naruto care about her enough. Naruto and Sakura don't even interact much anymore, and Sasuke literally react like this when he saw her after many years;

And he never kissed her in canon.

The reasons people dislike Sakura are:

a) she wastes most of the screentime and many important situations she's in (which is a lot compared to many other characters) by being useless

b) she treats naruto poorly yet naruto is the one who has to save her ass all the time, and if not him then kakashi, yamato, you name it

c) she treats sasuke like an object, she doesn't care to listen to him at all, and acts like a victim because sasuke isn't romantically interested in her

d) she treats other women who help her poorly

etc.

As for me I dislike her fanbase more than her. They are insufferable and toxic, and can't accept the fact she's just not an amazing role model, badass or a likeable character in canon. They call you a misogynist for disliking her canon manga character, but then change her character into something different in fanon. Not to mention they always blame other characters for her failures.

[deadite-central]

This took some time but HEYY let’s talk one piece manga experience again

Looking back on Jaya it’s actually insane how many things got introduced here, how much set up is done for stuff that will be still going on two decades later

I really like the little scenes that show Robin getting accustomed to living with the straw hats. They’re genuinely sweet and a good way to show the reader the other side of Robin that we didn’t get to see that much in Alabasta

Blackbeard introduction is really funny and I’ll say iconic at this point in time, especially with that one meme going around TikTok. I think it works really well even if I would have never thought on my first watch that THIS was the main narrative foil to Luffy

Jaya also introduces us to Bellamy, a man who doesn’t have a dream for his own future and refuses to allow other people to dream. He has his own set of ideas of what a pirate is, and the Romance Dawn trio all showing how they’ve grown when encountered with this guy is such a good scene. Luffy reacts like Shanks would, Zoro listens to his captain and Nami despite not understanding the situation doesn’t let Bellamy’s crew convince her to abandon her friends. She never will

And oh god this iconic panel. Dreaming is a forever important part of One Piece and the white background opposed with the four people we see is such a good visual. Everything there is to be said about this spread has been said but is was it great to see it

Back to Bellamy for a second, Luffy only turns to fighting him when he attacked old man Cricket, and when the fight happens, considering how ANNOYING AND INSUFFERABLE Bellamy was in Jaya, this punch feels so deserved

As I’ve said at the beginning, Jaya makes set up for things that will come up again later, so we get the introduction of Whitebeard which takes up entire two pages, and the first look at the Five Elders, Fleet Admiral and two more Warlords. I think it’s really interesting how Doffy and Kuma get introduced at the same time considering how much they are opposites of one another, but I’ll get back to this WAY LATER

We finish Jaya off with a blast, the Straw Hats making their way to the Sky Island, filled with fun exchanges and a sense of excitement for what’s to come

[olivialau]

Shadow's Embrace Ch. 14

Sukuna x Reader

Disclaimer:

This is a work of fanfiction based on the universe of "Jujutsu Kaisen," created by Gege Akutami. The original manga, anime, and characters belong to their respective owners and creators.

Notes:

This story unfolds in the Jujutsu Kaisen world, set in a slightly altered universe where Sukuna inhabits his own vessel distinct from Itadori Yuji's body, making him a separate entity.

Summary:

Ryomen Sukuna, the King of Curses, becomes fascinated with a female sorcerer rich in potential but lacking control. Initially seizing her for his destructive plans, Sukuna aims to bind her abilities through a contract. Yet, as he tries to dominate her, he finds himself intrigued by her strength and determination. Over time, his interest evolves from strategic advantage to a deeper, personal connection.

---------------------------------------------------------

CHAPTER 14 - Black Flash

Without further ado, Sukuna swung open the door at the bottom of the staircase. The sight that greeted you beyond was a chilling echo of the past.

Sukuna had manifested his innate domain in the space under the apartment. A grotesque landscape that was all too familiar. The pile of skulls, the damp, murky floors, and the jagged rock formations—it was the same domain he had taken you to on that first fateful night.

It was here that he had unleashed a horde of curses upon you, pushing you to the brink of collapse in a brutal test of your abilities.

As you stood at the threshold of Sukuna's domain, you were surprised to find that the usual chills of fear were absent. Perhaps the constant exposure to danger over these past weeks had hardened you, forging you into a more resilient person.

Or maybe there was a part of you that recognized the potential for growth in this twisted arrangement. Sukuna, in his own way, was offering you the chance to become stronger, to hone your abilities through his 'training.'

The notion of power as the ultimate currency in this world was not lost on you; it was a harsh truth that had been imprinted upon you from a young age.

Your parents' tireless efforts, their kindness and ambition, had been swallowed whole by a world that favored those in power.

And Ayumi... the thought of her stung sharply, a wound that refused to heal. Her lack of strength had cost her everything, and your lack of strength had left you unable to protect her.

That is why you had decided to become so incredibly strong that you'd never feel helpless again. Besides, it was the only thing that could be gained from the vow that was forced upon you—and you were determined to exploit the circumstances to their fullest.

With a steadfast stride, you passed through the threshold, following Sukuna into the gloomy domain.

Your feet splashed against the muddy ground, and you thought about how you had much preferred the openness of the abandoned factory over the dark, oppressive atmosphere of this place. Bringing it up would be completely futile though, knowing that the King of Curses couldn't care less about your preferences.

Instead of assuming his usual position of 'towering dominance' atop the pile of skulls, Sukuna stood before you, only a few feet separating the two of you. He stared you down, his expression morphing into a scoff.

"You know," Sukuna began, his voice a low, menacing purr, "I sought you out because I'd heard whispers that Satoru Gojo himself had taken an interest in you. That arrogant fool claimed you possessed 'great potential.'" He spat out the words as if they left a foul taste in his mouth.

"But what did I find upon dragging you here? A weak, pathetic insect, not even worth the effort of squashing beneath my heel."

He took a deliberate step closer, his cursed energy pulsing around him like waves. "And yet..." Sukuna's voice dropped to a near-whisper, "that insufferable sorcerer isn't one to waste his time. So what could he possibly see in you?"

It was as if being in Sukuna's domain enhanced the weight of his presence somehow—it felt more suffocating than ever before.

You could barely focus on what he was saying, but Sukuna continued his monologue nonetheless. "It didn't take me long to notice it—that spark of potential he thought he could cultivate."

He took one more step towards you, closing the already small gap between you. The weight of his cursed energy now intensified exponentially, crushing down on you as your breaths became ragged, each inhalation a struggle against the pressure.

"It's laughable, really. You possess this power, yet you're too pathetic, too ignorant to even grasp the nature of your own cursed technique. What a waste."

It was as if a curtain fell away when he turned around and walked away again, finally giving you room to breathe.

Only now could you truly process his words. What did he mean by 'your cursed technique'? The very notion puzzled you.

You were still grappling with the basics, still trying to find your footing in the world of jujutsu, where a cursed technique seemed to be a must in order to become a powerful sorcerer. And all this time without a proper cursed technique had left you wondering if maybe you'd never develop one at all.

But now Sukuna was telling you that you already possessed a cursed technique? There was no way...

Though thinking back, this wasn't the first time someone had implied that there was something latent within you, a power you were oblivious to.

Gojo's remarks during your training with the bear-shaped cursed puppet suddenly resurfaced.

"That's amazing," Gojo had said, a rare note of surprise in his voice. "That thing you're doing with your cursed energy – it's quite impressive. Though a bit scary, too..."

His words echoed through your head. God, this was frustrating. Why couldn't you see?

It pained you to admit it, but right now you needed Sukuna—you needed him to tell you about your cursed technique. So you swallowed your pride and turned to him.

"Tell me," you called out, your voice firm despite the churning emotions within. "What is my cursed technique?"

Sukuna's laughter erupted suddenly, a harsh, grating sound that echoed throughout his domain. It was as if your question was the funniest thing he had heard in ages. His eyes gleamed with cruel amusement as he looked down on you. "You think I'd just tell you outright? Stupid little sorcerer...You'll have to earn it."

Of course, nothing came easy with Sukuna. He thrived on torment and challenge—what had you expected?

Sukuna spoke up, the laughter now subsided and his voice more serious. "I'll give you a clue, under one condition," he said, as he started circling around you.

"You must land a Black Flash on me."

Black Flash. You were certain you had heard that term before, but to be fair, you couldn't remember at all what it meant. Your confusion was apparent, and Sukuna's expression twisted into one of disgusted amusement. "You don't even know what that is, do you?" he sneered. "Pathetic."

The gap between you and him seemed wider than ever, a chasm not just of power but of understanding. Doubt gnawed at you—did you have any right to call yourself a jujutsu sorcerer?

Sukuna sighed, obviously annoyed that he had to bother with an explanation. "A Black Flash is a moment of pure synchronicity between your cursed energy and a strike. It's the mark of a true sorcerer's power and control." He stopped his circling, as he sought your gaze and locked eyes.

"If you can manage that," he continued, his voice low and menacing, "I might consider telling you more. But don't get your hopes up. Weaklings like you rarely achieve such feats."

You squared your shoulders, meeting Sukuna's gaze with newfound resolve. "Fine," you said, your voice steady despite the storm of emotions. "I'll do it."

Sukuna spread his arms as if welcoming you to attack him. "Excellent," he purred. "Then let's see if you're capable of anything more than being a disappointment."

Steeling yourself, you channeled your cursed energy, feeling it pulse through your veins. You launched yourself at Sukuna, aiming a punch at his face. But he sidestepped effortlessly, his mocking laughter ringing in your ears.

"You call that an attack? Put some real force behind it, woman."

Gritting your teeth, you whirled around and swung again, this time with more power. Sukuna barely moved, parrying your strike with a flick of his wrist. The impact sent a shockwave up your arm, but you pushed through the pain and kept attacking.

"Too slow," he taunted, his voice without any trace of effort, as he kept evading your hits. "Your moves are obvious. Make it less predictable."

You tried to take his advice, mixing up your strikes, but each one missed its mark. Sukuna danced around you, his movements a blur, his contempt palpable. Desperation gnawed at you as you felt your energy depleting.

"You're not focusing your cursed energy properly," he snapped, catching your wrist mid-punch and twisting it painfully. "Feel the flow—let it enhance your strikes, not hinder them."

With a grunt of pain, you wrenched free and tried to focus, feeling the cursed energy coursing through you. You aimed a kick at his midsection, infusing it with everything you had. Sukuna caught your leg effortlessly, throwing you to the ground.

"Disgraceful," he spat, looming over you. "Do you even understand what you're trying to achieve? Synchronize your cursed energy with your physical movements. It's not just power—it's precision."

Scrambling to your feet, you tried to absorb his words, feeling the frustration boil over. You closed your eyes for a brief moment, focusing inward, seeking that elusive synchronicity he spoke of.

When you opened them, you felt a faint but noticeable shift in your energy.

You charged at him again. This time, Sukuna's expression shifted ever so slightly, from mocking amusement to mild interest. You swung, and though he still dodged, it was by a narrower margin.

"Better," he acknowledged with a condescending smirk. "But still far from enough."

Breathing hard, you didn't relent. You pressed the attack, each strike coming closer to its mark. Sukuna's movements remained fluid, but you could sense his attention sharpening.

"You've got some fire in you, brat," he jeered. "But do you have the guts to finish it?"

Now he was just asking for it.

With a roar, you focused all your energy into a final punch, feeling a sudden, intense alignment of your cursed energy and physical strength. As your fist hurtled toward him, the air around it seemed to distort. For a split second, time seemed to freeze.

You felt an unbelievable sense of confidence. Everything came into focus—the flow of your own cursed energy, his. It was as if, for the first time, you could truly see it.

Sukuna's eyes widened slightly, and he moved to block, but your punch connected, a burst of energy rippling through the air. The force made the ground tremble, and you both stood still for a moment, the echo of the impact lingering.

Sukuna's expression shifted to one of mild approval, though his eyes still glinted with his usual menace. "Well, well, look at that—a proper Black Flash. Perhaps there's a sliver of worth in you after all, though it's hardly anything to brag about," he drawled.

God, you hated his guts, but right now, you didn't care about that. You felt a rush of exhilaration, high on the fleeting sense of power you had just experienced. It was intoxicating, and without a second thought, you charged at Sukuna again, driven by a surge of impulsive confidence.

But Sukuna was quick to remind you of your place. With a swift, effortless flick of his wrist, he sent you crashing to the ground with brutal force, leaving you gasping and reeling as pain flared through your body.

You struggled to push yourself up, casting a weary glance at Sukuna, who stood imposingly above you.

"Know your place and don't get too full of yourself, brat, or you'll find out exactly how powerless you are against me."

The impact of the blow shattered the exhilaration from your earlier success, bringing you back to reality. As you lay there, pain still radiating through your body, your mind fixated on one thing: understanding more about your cursed technique.

"You promised me information about my cursed technique," you said, forcing the words out despite the ache in your chest. "I need to know more."

Sukuna's eyes narrowed as his lips twisted into a mocking smile. "Oh? Still hungry for answers, are we?" he drawled. With a languid motion, he walked over to the pile of skulls and seated himself at the base with a relaxed posture.

"Fine then," he continued, surprisingly compliant for once. "Did you notice the flow of cursed energy during that Black Flash? Can you sense your own energy and that of others more clearly now?"

You nodded, feeling the residual effects of your earlier effort. "Yes, it's like I can see it clearly now."

A smug grin spread across Sukuna's face. "Good girl. Here's your clue: From now on, pay close attention to the flow—yours and others'—especially at the moment of impact."

He moved his gaze from the floor below him to meet your eyes, and somehow you found you couldn't look away from his crimson stare.

"That is where the key to understanding your technique lies."

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Thanks for reading! I appreciate the support 🙏❤️

Taglist: @sukunasthightattoos , @tomiokasecretlover , @6demonize6me6 , @blindbabycadder , @domainofmarie , @marcoschuitmaker , @geniejunn

If you want to be added to the taglist, so you don't miss any updates, please let me know in the comments or with a private message. Thankyou!

[delawaredetroit]

And to add on to the previous person's statement most of the rescuing scenes get overshadowed by the fights they're typically shown in quicker sequences compared to those fights also dekus influence on others is brought up a whole lot of times but his unreliable narrator status still hasn't been cured yet because no one has told him of his impact on others directly yet

Well yeah, this is a battle shounen manga. The fights are going to take up more panel time that's a staple of the genre.

BNHA is one of the few manga where I wish we spent less time in the protagonist's head in the first half of the manga. Because a lot of readers have internalized Izuku's view of himself as fact. BNHA is full of unreliable narrators, but when we stay in the head of one too long, people start taking that pov as gospel.

I'm not saying we should of had a different protagonist. I like Izuku as the the protagonist for BNHA. Quite frankly, it's usually the worst of the Bakugou, Shouto, or Shigaraki stans saying otherwise. And if you want a Bakugou as protagonist, go read about 50% of other shounen for a usually less insufferable version of Bakugou. As for if you want a Shigaraki is protagonist and wins story, Attack on Titan is right there...

I have more empathy for the Shouto as protagonist arguments because unlike Izuku, Shouto has been able to address his trauma and is allowed to feel resentment for his abuser. And there wouldn't be nearly as many Izuku haters if the reader spent more time in Shouto's headspace... But it wouldn't work with the story Horikoshi is trying to tell for two reasons: (1) Shouto tends to be rather self/family focused so most of the worldbuilding and society-wide themes would be missing and (2) Shouto's character arc is primarily based in his emotional growth and this is a battle shounen.

[sixteen-sugars]

satosugu - a review

pic by: Fanku19 on tw

(SPOILERS FOR SEASON 2 AND SHIBUYA)

I am writing this in honor of Season 2 dropping! I am a manga reader so I know what's going to happen, but that's not the point. Its about seeing my boys! 

I literally am shitting bricks for these two. I would give up a kidney for these two to be happy. This ship has so much canon backing and parallels. Thus far, this ship has 2 parallels in canon;

The first one being Itadori and Megumi (ItaFushi). Itadori is from 'normal' parents and more importantly a jujutsu-society free upbringing. He is known as a curse eater. This is important because he parallels Geto. They both are either dead or going to end up dead, with Itadori hopefully being executed by Megumi. This death and execution is to parallel the KFC-breakup. Since the prodigy, and the one with the power to change to the world will have to kill the only person that could hope to understand them on such a personal level. Megumi here would parallel Gojo. Since both are treated like prodigies from birth, and told that they are the 'best'. Now, back to Yuji and the Shibuya incident. Both Geto and Yuji have killed millions of people (or monkeys, if you must) But, this is where their characters split, as this is a similar archetype taken different ways. As Yuji sticks to his guns, feeling absolute guilt for killing these people. Geto falls off the wagon, and he kills without remorse because he is a example of a very kind character warped by others and being used by them. I believe Itadori will also follow a similar path, albeit a little less intense towards the end of the manga. 

The other one being Yuuta and Rika. The score that plays during the KFC-breakup is the same that plays when Yuuta says, "this is pure love," That was a conscious choice, be it platonic or not both Rika and Yuuta were going to be the death of each other if they continued the way they did. And that is exactly what happened to SatoSugu, they saw they own eminent destruction and couldn't stop a  train on a dime. They came crashing together and destroyed so many in their wake. 

Tropes Associated: 8/10

(the friends to enemies to lovers is STRONG with these two, along with the only one that understands me etc. They are both insufferable. But the tropes are either soul-crushing and sad or like yay! Shibuya didn't happen and everyone is happy :D)

Dynamic: 10/10

(I love these two, they are such big jerks and so annoying to literally anybody but each other. But, they are also the only ones who every truly understood each other. Since both were burdened with Jujutsu society and trying to be the strongest.)

Looks:  9/10

(Sun and moon duo, contrasting hair. Also Geto has ass, Gojo has no ass to speak of, simply math, also Geto hot :3 sue me man) 

All in all: 28/30

[lotus-pear]

JUST FINISHED THE ATTACK ON TITAN FINALE.... AND MY GOD......EVEN AS A MANGA READER IT WAS SOUL CRUSHING SHEET GRIPPING HEART CRUSHING CHEST HEAVINGLY SAD. LITERALLY BROKEN MAPPA PUT THEIR ENTIRE MAPUSSY INTO THIS HOUR AND FORTY MINS I AM SCREAMING IN PAIN ON MY BED RN. SO BITTERSWEET. SO WHOLE AND COMPLETE AND FINAL. AN HONORABLE ENDING TO ONE OF THE GREATEST AND MOST TIMELESS PIECES OF FICTION EVER WRITTEN. TEARS OF JOY BUT SLSO INSUFFERABLE PAIN

[len-yx]

What I think the eggs favourite anime(s) would be

Chayanne:

Bleach (obviously) and Cowboy Bebop

He’s not an annoying fan of either and probably isn’t actually crazy into anime and will just watch it with Phil.

Bobby:

Jujutsu Kaisen (totally unrelated to me comparing his and Roier’s dynamic to Megumi and Gojo’s) and Spy x Family (reminds him of his family)

He’s probably such a stan. He’d go on tangents about how Gojo negs and all that (also probably cried when he saw people crack shipping Gojo and Makima), just one of those insufferable fans. But he’d still def sobs over stsg.

JuanaFlippa:

Chainsawman

Definitely was a manga reader

Probably related a lot to Asa, also probably spoiled character deaths when people pissed her off

Dapper:

Bungou stray dogs

I feel this one in my bones (ha get it?)

Probably hasn’t touched the manga (mostly bc I’ve never met a bsd fans who still enjoys the anime after reading the manga 💀)

Tilin:

Deathnote and Neon genesis Evangelion

She thought she was sooo edgy

Tallulah:

Wheathering With You and My Neighbour Totoro

I think she’d be a movie nerd so naturally both of her fav animes are movies

She kinda just likes wheathering With You so much because it looks insanely pretty

I’ll do the other 3 later

(Maybe)

[sunlightandsuffering]

https://www.tumblr.com/sunlightandsuffering/738648319635652608/nico-maam-can-i-have-some-character-development

Ajajaja no bc Nico is literally one of my fav OC characters ever. Bestiee don’t make me fight you about my baby cousin. Uno I love this little kid 😂🤣😂🤣

And it’s so funny bc in one of your post you mentioned how you hate OC characters and I do to. Usually I find them so annoying lol.

But I think Nico is soo Eren and Mikasa but just a tiny version of their personalities that I can’t help but love him 🥰

you did your big one with Nico boo. And his name is just everything 😊

AHAHAH UR BABY COUSIN! HE'S EVERYONE'S FICTIONAL CHILD NOW!!! AHAHAH omg as much as I feel medium towards Nico I love that other ppl love him, means I did a good job and he's not insufferable like some OC's are! BUT OMG NAMING OCS DONT EVEN GET ME FUCKING STARTED ON THAT SHIT!!

Nico's name for me was a labour of love, honestly all my fake EM children's were 😭😂😂 Because for me it has to be something that they could POSSIBLY be named, and like also taking into consideration that Mikasa is part japanese and that AOT is in fact an anime/manga in the first place !! I always fucking HATE, HATE HATE HATE!! When someone is like oh yes, and here is their child: Gerald, Jeffrey, Alex, something so fuckiong regular and mundane I just hate, it feels weird, it feels like reader fics for me 😭😭 So i tried quite desperately to give them some names that have good overlap and are not just pulled out of top 100 baby names 2024 😂😂 IM GLAD IT SEEMS LIKE I DID A GOOD JOB THO BESTIE ILY!

[neonscandal]

"JJK really went from a loved manga to a mid-to-bad story with insufferable fans 🙏 may more of us hate it in the future. It snatches the spotlight from genuinely good shows and its another case of "general shonen fan will call any trash 'goat' if the fight is well animated".

I used to be a fan, until the start of the culling game. And after this controversial, inconsistent and inhumane adaptation of shibuya, im glad that I have no interest in both manga and show anymore"

Do you think Culling Game really that hard to understand? Cause I saw quite a llt got turned off to JJK since that arc....

⚠️ Content Warning (no real spoilers) for the Culling Games arc. Nothing in depth to warrant burying beneath a "Keep Reading" but fair to mention just in case.

I don't know how to say this without generalizing negatively but the sentiments very much sound like they came from a cishet dudebro. I've noticed that shonen series' that have a fanbase made up of vocal queer people and/or womxn fans are widely renowned for their "insufferable fans" and this specifically is applied to JJK and MHA across social media. I wonder why.

From the lack of sexualization of female characters/students, the immediate shutdown that Nobara was going to fall for Yuji or Megumi in typical shonen fashion, the cast of men being curated for the female gaze across the manga and anime adaptation (Gojo, Geto, Nanami, Toji, etc.), the overt queer coding and presence of canonically queer/trans characters... also, the simple fact that the canonically attractive and OP characters aren't insufferable assholes? Maybe that's just a me thing but it seems like these factors have been rubbing certain people the wrong way.

Re: the animation of Shibuya and the practices that delivered the work with such an insane timeline and not to the quality of the team of animators' liking... that's valid. But that is a Mappa shortcoming in an effort to snatch up all the prolific and iconic adaptations they can, not a JJK shortcoming. As such, throwing the baby out with the bathwater there doesn't seem like a particularly sound argument but just a means to pile on.

A/N: As it stands, Mappa held the reigns on AOT's final season (taking over from Wit Studio due to production schedule), S2 of Vinland Saga (taking over from Wit Studio due to production schedule), JJK S1, JJK 0 movie, CSM adaptation of S1, Hell's Paradise adaptation of S1, JJK S2, CSM movie adaptation for Reze Arc, Zom 100... all since 2020 and does not encompass other, smaller series'.

I'll concede, it makes sense that the culling games left a lot of readers lost in the forest, myself included. Not the point of the games since we know, to what end, Kenjaku!Geto hopes to achieve at this point.

I think readers were stymied by how much time was spent on developing unique characters who were offed like.. a chapter later. A necessary evil to maintain the living core cast of characters who would later have to take on the Big BadsTM while also moving along the point system for the Culling Games. It seems like Gege Akutami took their time to cultivate these mini-fights though it wasn't clear to what end from a plot standpoint... yet. Empirically, we've seen small details woven back into the story which didn't seem apparent at the time given the exposition style of the mangaka.

As a reader, I love guessing at the end of stories. You can see the crackpot theories that pepper the Manga With Me tag. But the Culling Game arc spans long enough to lose the plot and make it so much harder to forecast where the story is going. Especially when Gege Akutami generally seems like a troll of a person anyway.

I think the Culling Games happening immediately after the Shibuya arc was a choice. Based on anime only fan reactions to Shibuya, what's to come is not for the faint of heart fans. Especially when you consider the losses suffered in Shibuya are immediately eclipsed by the regular losses and disappointments within the Culling Games. However, as a fan, I'mma let Gege cook even if they're using my tears and angst as seasoning because we haven't seen enough of the story to determine the Culling Game's true place/meaning within it.

I think, story wise, they started off too strong with emphasizing Gojo's overpoweredness. Subsequently, they had to write in caveats and build ways to close the gaps between him and other characters to allow for the story to press forward with or without him. I still don't know how this story is going to end though I think I have a new hypothesis from the last time I guessed at who would survive.

At the end of the day, it's definitely that person's opinion to jump back in once more of the story has been fleshed out should they choose to do so because a lot of people don't like dealing in uncertainties. Whatever they decide, don't let it sway your enjoyment one way or another, anon. ❤️