Your Love, Like Birth and Death
cw. jjk faerie au, banshee!reader (she/her pronouns, afab), seelie prince!gojou, mutual pining but gojou's love is heavier, descriptions of blood and injuries
pairing. gojou x reader
notes. i should be working on the unseelie lord toji fic but this concept is still wracking my brain so y'all are getting this right now instead. lovesick faerie prince gojou for you, you and you! (also, spot the furuba and mirai nikki references lol.)
This Court is dyed in the colors of Life, you note this particular morning.
Of course, this is something you’ve noted every morning since you’d been brought to this palace nearly a month ago. Yet you aren’t tired of noting it.
The Court you have found yourself in is beautiful. From the ledge you lean against, it almost feels like you can see everything in Faerie.
You see the royal gardens, a mass of long grasses and moss dotted by colorful wild blooms. Overgrown and yet each flower seems right where it is supposed to be.
Beyond the walls of the castle, you see stretches and stretches of blue spruces and just beyond that a lake that almost seems purple. If this were a palace in Unseelie territory, you might have thought a kelpie lived in it.
Across the courtyard, souls living and deceased move as if in a dance. The living with their duties for the day, unaware of their ghoulish companions drifting about. Some have the ever permanent dribble of poisoned wines falling from their lips, others' have blood seeping into their clothes from their torsos and others are missing limbs although they find no difficult in moving.
The sight of death faeries is one that gruesome. A mixture of life and death, the path you folk walk on until you return to nothing.
Neat yet unkempt, wild yet tame, expected yet unexpected ー that is the beauty of Faerie you’ve grown accustomed to in the centuries since your creation.
A beauty you rarely have the opportunity to appreciate when you often find yourself in the realm of humans, heralding death.
You wonder how much time has passed there since you’ve come to the Court of Reckoning. All while the skies have lost the traces of violet, peach and marigold that painted the dawn skies and have begun settling into a lovely shade of pastel blue.
“I see I’ve finally found you,” when you look over your shoulder, it’s one of the prince’s advisors that greets you. The one with the long raven-black hair and brown eyes that remind you of humus-rich soil. You see the makings of a black tail with a tuft of fur peeking from his cloak and believe him to be some sort of phouka. “I almost thought for a moment our honored guest had disappeared,” his voice is light and airy, but he seems relieved to an extent. “I’m glad my concerns were proven untrue. Satoru would be quite unmanageable if that were the case.”
You shake your head, smiling politely, “I enjoy watching dawn turn into morning.” You look at the large bouquet in the phouka’s hands ー an assortment of lavender roses, baby’s breath and ferns.
“Our prince is too busy to deliver these himself this morning,” Suguru explains once they’ve caught your eye. You make sure to not let your fingers brush against one another when you reach for the blooms carefully. “Love at first sight, purity and fascination it is supposed to symbolize,” the advisor recounts the meaning of each bloom dutifully. He’s exasperated, you can tell. “Do you like them?”
“Yes, they’re quite lovely,” you believe so truly. Everyday since your arrival to the palace, the prince has had bouquet after bouquet gifted to you. Even if he cannot deliver them himself. “As were the rest I’ve received.”
“I’ve never seen Satoru so smitten,” you avoid the phouka’s gaze. “You should have met him when we were younger. He was adamant that he’d never be besotted with anyone lest he become a fool.” There’s a light pause as Suguru recalls the evening Satoru brought you to this palace. You who are cloaked in death and all of her colors. “Look at him now. He’s certainly caused a stir in his insistence you’ll be his queen. He’s a charming fool, though, I am sure.”
You prefer to think of the prince as a ridiculous fool but you cannot deny that he is charming. Dangerously so. If you hadn’t known better, you would have thought him to be a gancanagh, a love-talker.
“Please marry me,” came the soft request as sky blue eyes stared into your very being. “And I’ll love you more faithfully than any man, fae or otherwise.”
You try not to remember the way your chest clenched in surprise. How you were so surprised it almost felt like your skin had warmed. It’s best not to focus on that memory at all.
It’s a ridiculous notion, a seelie prince in love with a banshee.
“The prince is simply confusing gratitude with love,” you return Suguru’s gaze with a polite smile. You hope he believes you. “He’ll realize that soon and I will leave this place.” You know that will bring palace staff a great sense of peace. If there is one thing you’ve learned in your long life as a banshee it is that even if the Folk spurn mortals and their blink-of-an-eye lifespans, there are many things faeries and humans have in common.
A fear of death is certainly one of them.
As such, to the vast majority of faeriekind, Death Folk like yourself are not looked upon favorably. Banshee and dullahans alike, you’re more like pests in their eyes.
You banshee women who scream and keen if death is near.
The dullahans who hear those screams and arrive when that final hour has approached.
Yes, you know how death fae are viewed. You’ve heard the whispers in the palace, how you are an omen of malevolence to come. That your kind are like roaches. Should one appear, others will soon follow suit.
This is why you’ve come to appreciate this private ledge on the castle walls that receives less foot traffic than the rest. You’d rather the staff of the palace have peace of mind in your absence while you live in the palace even if their prince insists you can venture the halls as much as you’d like.
Once the promised revel he hopes to throw in your honor comes to pass, you know the prince will lose his interest in you. Then you will leave and continue about your existence until you fade into nothing but a vague memory in his subconscious.
That's what you truly hope when you see the prince in question later on in the day for lunch in the garden.
How his eyes light up and he stands to his feet as Cypress, a lovely pixie tasked with being your attendant, announces your arrival. How he doesn't even wait for you to reach the table before he comes to meet you. You are unused to being treated like royalty and yet their prince insists that you are. "You won't believe how the old hags go on and on," he sighs, remnants of annoyance dancing in his tone but his voice is soft with you. Cypress takes the dismissal in stride. "I couldn't even come see you for breakfast. Did you like the flowers?"
He wraps your hands in his own large palms, seemingly unaffected by your corpse-cold skin, as he has done every time you've met since your arrival. "Yes, they were beautiful," your smile is small and doesn't quite reach your eyes. You hope this ridiculous yet charming fool realizes that loving one such as yourself is more trouble than good. That his love truly is just misplaced gratitude. "You really don't have to send me flowers every morning."
The prince disregards your words the way water rolls off the back of a duck, "next time I'll bring you the flowers myself." He guides you to the table filled to the brim with food you aren't accustomed to eating. "Will you tell me your favorites finally? I've been going out on a limb with my guesses."
"My tastes in flowers are unique, to say the least," maybe it's your nature, but your favorites tend to circle around the prevailing theme of your kind. Lavender to give the dead peace in passing on, calendula for blessing and love. Dandelions in the seed head stage were quite popular with ghost children, still finding them just as amusing as they did when they were alive. "The flowers you send me are more than enough." The prince pouts but he decides to let you skirt around his request once more. You bring focus back to the spread, "it looks like you've demanded everything in the kitchen."
There are strawberry-and-whipped cream filled pastries, cold cut platters and buttery biscuits to name a few things. The tip of the iceberg of everything on the table.
"I wanted to make sure our bases were covered," the prince grins, teeth as white as his hair. "I hope you like lavender chamomile, that's today's tea. I've never had it before." He drops cube after cube of sugar into his cup, drizzles the contents with honey before finally pouring in a splash of cream.
You take your tea plain and enjoy the gentle fragrance. Lavender buds are just barely visible below the tea's surface. You close your eyes as the flavor hits your tongue. It tastes as wonderful as it smells. "Yes, this is quite nice. I really like it."
"Should we have it for tomorrow as well?" He's too eager to curry your favor.
You open your eyes to dissuade him but your attention is instead drawn to a headless hob nearing your table. You've seen this hob before, skirting about the palace bitterly as he carries his head in his hands much like a dullahan. He's old, even by fae standards, with a long beard. There's no question as to how the man died, beheading. You hope it was quick.
His beady eyes glare at you with a quiet rage similar to how most fae spirits do. You wonder how long he has been like this, refusing to board the carriage of any dullahan that may come to collect him and bring him to the Otherworld.
You personally believe that faeries leave behind ghosts more than humans do.
It's why you've often seen ghosts from a distance at revels, dancing from dawn til dusk even if they will not be perceived by the living. Even if they can no longer don the fancy dresswear they were able to dress in.
Time and time again, they will do this. Staunchly refusing death even after they're already in its hold.
"Oh, is there a ghost with us?" The prince notes how your eyes dart between him and the space he perceives as empty. "What's it saying?"
"Tell this lout that I sooner hope his rule is contemptuous and brings the Court to ruin!" The hob's head seethes. "That his many days are fraught with danger! Gakuganji is my name and this is the curse I cast upon him!"
Folk can't lie, but you you prefer not to relay the bitter message. "He hopes your rule is one that is," you lick your lips and raise your cup to your lips. "Filled with exciting thrills," not an exact lie. Perhaps to this radical prince, those sorts of threats are exciting. "He says his name is Gakuganji."
"Exciting thrills, you say?" The prince barks in amusement, shoulders shaking with his laughter. "That doesn't sound like the traitorous scoundrel I know. You don't have to lie, he's probably cursing me and my bloodline for generations to come as we speak." The hob growls at the lackadaisical nonchalance of the elf. But it seems he has had his fill as he stomps off before he can hear more insult to his person.
"Gakuganji has lost his touch even in death," the prince's amused chuckles turn into light sighs "You wouldn't have liked him very much when he was alive," you're sure you can agree with that much of the prince's words. Gakuganji, as you now know him, has been one of the more unpleasant spirits in the palace. "He was very stuck in his ways. What's it like, seeing ghosts all the time?"
Normal?
You can't quite remember what it was like when you were a newly-made banshee and everything was new. Nor can you remember the life you once led as a human. You simply remember your death was a terrible, terrible thing. "It's as normal to me as it's normal for you not to see them," you set your cup down. "If someone asked you what's it like to see the blue sky everyday, it would be a strange question, correct?"
The prince takes in your words thoughtfully, not slighted in the least. "I guess that's true," he nods to himself. "I just wondered if it was something that took some getting used to." The prince removes his darkened spectacles from the bridge of his nose. "I told you before I have pretty good eyes. I'm able to perceive a lot of things no one else can from mana to the shape of one's soul. But the spirits of the deceased are exceptions to my eyes, it seems."
"Your Highness," you begin.
"Satoru," the prince corrects you swiftly.
"Your Highness," you insist. This boundary you won't cross for yourself. "I'm not sure it's really wise for you to tell me about your eyes. I'm not a member of this family or your closest allies."
"But you will be," he tells you as if he's simply remarking on how pleasant the weather is. "I will become king of this Court and you'll be by my side as my queen." You're quite sure that if his mother, the High Queen, has anything to say about it, she'd sooner relinquish her throne to a random nixie than allow a banshee to wed her son. "I trust you as much as I trust Suguru or Nanami."
You wish he wouldn't.
A Seelie prince and his banshee queen? That sounds like the start to a ballad meant to insult him.
It's misplaced gratitude, not love. That's what this prince feels for you. You tell him as such once again as you have everyday since you were brought here. "You'll realize that soon, maybe even before the revel you plan for me," you whisper ー no, you pray. "There will be another you yearn for and you'll realize the difference."
The prince will fall deeply, truly, unapologetically in love with someone and he'll discover the truth.
Perhaps it will be a lake maiden of Spring whose dreadlocks drip with water droplets that fall onto dewy cinnamon-brown skin. Who sings of the beautiful red and pink of the roses and of love.
Or maybe it will be a selkie man who doesn't mind living far from the sea as he's brought a love as deep as the ocean with along with him. Whose coat is donned in scars and scratches from battles past, a reflection of his form as a seal.
Or maybe he can grow enraptured with his phouka advisor whom he trusts more than anyone in this life.
Someone dyed in Life's colors.
Someone beautiful.
When that time comes, you'll be happy for him. Maybe then the ache that resonates through your heart and bones will end.
The prince isn't the only fool here, you admit reluctantly. You're just as much, if not more so. But this feeling will come to pass, "this is just gratitude. Fascination. Not love."
"You think I don't love you?" The prince asks quietly, resting his chin on his palm as he looks at you. He says he has good eyes, he wonder what you look like to him through them. You who once was dyed in Life's colors but have since become painted over by Death's brush.
Death folk with death folk.
Life folk with life folk.
"I know you don't," he can't. You can't allow either of yourselves to do so. "A banshee by your side as queen," you want it sound ridiculous to both of your ears. "It's absurd."
There are no rules that state your union is forbidden, this you know. But the laws of nature are simple. Life and Death co-exist separately, unable to exist without one another. But there has never been a tale where the two joined together as one.
Maybe you're just too scared to be the first.
"I want the woman that I love by my side as queen," the prince replies smoothly. "Your species is of little importance to me. All that matters is that my love is returned in full. Please, allow me to be yours," he reaches for your hand once more, stepping out of his chair in favor of sitting on bended knee. "More than anyone has or ever will, I love you. This is an unwavering truth."
The blood of the love-talker must run through his veins. Why else do you feel like this? Your desire for this prince will eat away at you until you become undone and return to nothing. "You're a prince. It's the duty of the royal family to provide heirs," even the smallest sprite knows this to be fact. "Are you asking me to stay with you and have them?"
"Please have my children," azure stares seriously into your pale eyes that were once [color] when you were human.
Your skin feels warm at his unabashed request.
Gojou Satoru has no shame, that you have become sure of in the near month of knowing one another.
He had no shame when he asked you to be his bride when you first met.
There was no shame to be found when he insisted that you stay in the palace as an honored guest he owes his life to.
Nor is there any shame to be found in him now when he cups your cheek in his furnace hot hands to guide your lips down to his, long white lashes fluttering shut.
I shouldn't, your mind screeches at you. I shouldn't allow us to get even one millimeter closer. Yet you make no move to do so as your lips are just barely touching whenー
"Your Highness, your mother is requesting you," Nanami's mild-mannered drawl saves you at the last minute.
You jerk back into your chair in relief, heart pounding. You aren't able to make eye contact with anyone, least of all the overworked horned elf-kobold hybrid brought to receive the Gojou heir.
The prince clicks his tongue in annoyance, glaring over his shoulder at the advisor, "she can't wait? We haven't even begun eating yet."
Nanami looks just as annoyed to be there, "the faster you heed her call, the quicker you can go back to fawning after the object of your desires." He tells his prince. "And the faster I can get back to resting."
The prince with snow-white hair clicks his tongue once more, but he doesn't argue against it. He turns to you regretfully, "I'll have to leave again. Perhaps we'll have more time together at dinner," you hope the wait for dinner is longer still. You know the prince hopes the time passes as quickly as he can blink.
Warm lips press against the back of your hand, lingering for five seconds longer than they should.
The bones of your hands ache.
Extra:
Title comes from a Nizar Qabbani poem: [Your love / Oh you with fathomless eyes / Is extreme /mystic / holy / Your love, like birth and death / is impossible to repeat]
My favorite bit in this is having the reader refused to call Gojou by name even in the narrative dialogue, in a futile attempt to keep distance between you both. I hope you guys found that riveting as well
Part 2? Should there be one? Perhaps there should be... y'all let me know
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the summer moon was born from the waves to be loved (gojo x reader) pt 2
or, you got pregnant and the ghost of university days past finds out five years later.
tags: 18+, afab!reader (she/her), baby daddy gojou au pt 2: electric boogaloo
AO3 || pt 1
TAGLIST: (bold couldn't be tagged) @cafedanslanuit @ainescribe @chiyoso @wishing--butterfly @hash-slinging-slasher-trash @sweet-evie @korrynn-nadine @strawberrycrash @juzestellium @theabbies @evalynanne @mghostsworld @syynnaaah @cupidezlyia @princessrow12 @lindascosmos @hydraafk @moosey
o. buoy
If Satoru was forced to use some sort of ocean-related terminology to describe you, he’d say you’re a buoy.
You were the marine biology major. (What was the difference between that and oceanography? Satoru had no idea. You explained it to him at least twice though). Because of that, Satoru heard his fair share of marine terminology from you.
Buoys were those floating things at sea, the ones from Finding Nemo that had all the seagulls on it. You said they were guiding posts, gave heads up for reefs or they could be warnings for hazardous zones.
To Satoru, you were like an anchorless buoy that ー no matter how far he sailed ー he could never reach.
i. halocline
You’ve never felt permanent; not to Satoru.
You sooner felt like one of those quickly formed friendships you thought would last forever only for it to dwindle out as fast as it started. Then that person was just a forgotten name in your contacts list until you’re scrolling down and going ‘Who the hell is this? Delete’ without a second thought.
It was strange.
An oxymoron of the highest degree.
How did someone who was such a constant in his life from the moment you set foot in it simultaneously feel as impermanent as foam on the waves? One minute you were there, the next you weren’t. Satoru wasn’t sure when the fear of you disappearing entirely crept in.
When those looks started appearing on your face.
All he knew was that it started long before he started sleeping with you and it started long before you left.
One moment you’re hanging out ー undoubtedly doing something stupid. Singing the wrong lyrics to a song on the radio, putting Suguru’s hair in pigtails, watching María la del Barrio with Utahime who took one Spanish class and made telenovelas her entire personality for a month ー then you’d grow quiet and this far away look would be in your eyes. Satoru never knew where you went in those moments, but it wasn’t there.
So he’d do something to anchor you back to land. It didn’t have to be much.
A poke to the cheek,
a tickle to your side,
calling out to you,
sometimes he’d even play with your fingers.
It didn’t matter what he did as long as you’d blink and grin and go “what’s up?” and everything would feel right in the world.
It never would feel right long enough though; the look always came back and the feeling would persist.
When you sang songs in the car.
(“I can do it fast or slow, it really doesn't matter, though. 'Cause I'm a pro, what you say? You wanna take me toe to toe? Uh no, dude, I think so,” you’d rap Kel’s verse flawlessly like you’d rehearsed it for hours. “My style is phat and Immature’s got my back on this funky trackー” you pointed at Satoru enthusiastically.
“You want fries with that?” Satoru would point back with way too much passion for a line that went way too hard for what he was actually saying. “Coo coo ca-choo whatcha gonna do?”
Shoko would roll her eyes but she’d still be smiling when Suguru softly brought in the chorus with rhythmic bumps of his head, “watch me do my thing, I like to do my thing, watch me do my thing, everybody sayー”
Your head continued to bump along but you stopped singing along and looked out the window. Satoru remembered he threw his arm around your shoulders loudly belting the rest of the lyrics until you laughed and joined back in.)
When you indulged Utahime’s telenovela personality change.
(“[First], quit zoning out. I’m bored.”
“Hey, unlike you, I’m actually paying attention.”
“Oh yeah, then what’s been going on?”
“Soraya Montenegro is gasping in Spanish right now.”
“Can you both shut u- OH MY GODー”
“IS NO ONE GONNA STOP THIS BITCH?”)
And at parties.
(Satoru always knew you were about to leave when you made that face. Things could start perfectly at the beginning of the night. You’d finally skulk out of your cave like you were Gollum from Lord of the Rings and wave him over. The next moment? You were in deep thought while your friends made joke after joke, rip after rip.
“Sorry gang, but my lips don’t touch anything but Don Equis and Asahi,” you’d say with an air of regality not suited for a party of college students. “Maybe Corona if there’s nothing else. I’m not drinking... whatever this is. So I’m gonna head out, there’s a 24 hour liquor store around here somewhere.”
“You coming back?” Satoru didn’t know why he asked, he already knew what your answer would be.
“Nah, I think I’m done for the night. I’ll catch you guys later though.”
“I’ll walk you back to your place then.”)
He doesn’t know why he looked at your lips that night at the park.
You were friends, he liked being your friend. That’s all there was to it. It had always annoyed him up until that point when Suguru and Shoko joked the two of you were more like a couple than anything else. That he chased after you like a lovesick puppy, the pathetic but funny kind. He wasn’t sure why it annoyed him so much.
Maybe it was because it felt like it reduced everything about his friendship with you into that shit take that the opposite sex couldn’t just be friends.
Maybe it was something else entirely. He doesn't know.
You weren’t permanent.
Not while you sat beside him in a park at who knows when in the morning and not even when you reassured him his life would work out the way he wanted and you touched him like he was something precious to you.
“Be careful I don’t disappear for months, spirited away by the sea folk on my Children of the Sea shit. I’ll come back to shore occasionally, mysterious as the sea itself.” You already were as mysterious as the sea itself.
“Even if you got spirited away, I’d just go and bring you right back.” Satoru meant it. Even if, more than anything, it felt more like he was making that promise to reassure himself. It didn’t matter how far off to the sea you went as long as Satoru could bring you back to the shore. “You’ve doomed yourself.” More specifically you said that to him. Maybe he should have taken it more of a warning than a light-hearted nudge.
“You said it first, remember?” You did. He remembered it as clear as day. He’d stumbled onto an unstable boat and you were a buoy far off in the distance.
“There’s no ditching me now, not even at sea.” So stay. That’s all Satoru needed you to do.
The sprinklers that decided to join in on the moment must have been a sign that he was in the middle of a prophecy that was going to be fulfilled whether he wanted it to or not. That’s why he kissed you first in the doorway of your bathroom when you just came to ask if he wanted tea.
Buoys are supposed to have anchors, right?
Maybe he could be yours.
When Satoru woke up the day after the first time you slept together, he woke up alone.
It wasn't until he reached out an arm lazily to your side of the bed and he patted the mattress several times that he realized no one was there. The bed had long since gone cold so you had to have been gone for a while. Yes, you called five minutes later from McDonald’s cheerily going “Yooo, Satoru, I’m at Mickey D’s, what do you want?” Still it cemented your impermanence and that was only the first of many times he woke up by himself.
You could be out the house or in; Satoru preferred when you were in. Sometimes you’d be in the kitchen humming some unknown tune, other times you’d be watching TV on the couch. Either way, he could drape himself over you with a tired ‘morning’ and hold you close.
(“What are you wa- is that the new episode of Love is Blind?”
“Um… I only just started it two minutes ago?”
“[First], what the hell!? While I was asleep?!”)
From then on when Satoru saw those far away looks, he’d kiss you since it was on the table now. Satoru put everything into those kisses and you’d kiss him back just as hard.
Don’t go anywhere. He’d thread one hand into your hair and the other would pull your waist closer to his. Satoru didn’t want or need anything else. Stay.
You kissed him like you would.
It’s crazy how easily you could just slip away from everything like a ghost that hadn’t been there at all. It was shockingly apparent that impromptu trip you took to the beach in the middle of the semester.
Everyone had been together in awe of the bioluminescent dots in the sea and it donned on him you hadn’t said anything in a while. You were gone.
He’d painted his panic in his usual bravadoー nonchalant and grinning, claiming he was gonna go bother you for a bit.
It was a relief when he found you.
It was dreadful when he found you.
Satoru couldn’t see your face clearly but he could tell your look was intent on the sea and how it shined with the glow of a billion bright lights. If there was a ghost ship calling you out to the depths, Satoru knew you’d leave in a heartbeat.
You slowly became more noticeably distant from your group of mutual friends after that trip. It didn’t start immediately, you’d acted the same as usual at first. You still sang songs in the car, Utahime had grown out of her novela phase in favor of all of you losing your shit at the editing of Indian serial dramas and in between those moments Satoru found himself in your bed again.
It was around that time you started kissing his forehead; when the kisses started, that’s when you started drifting away from his orbit. You said it was homework, your profs telepathically communicating to increase your workload.
You alright?
What kind of sadists are your professors if you’re this busy?
Just let me know if you need me to come over some kind of distraction. Sorry for coming over earlier unannounced, I shouldn’t have assumed. Just wanted to make sure you were okay.
“Do you think she thinks I’m being clingy?” Satoru mumbled as he stared at your text that you were fine just dying from homework. You definitely thought he’s being clingy. He’d always been a bit clingy with his friends. He was probably more overbearing than usual though.
“Yes,” Kenjaku replied without missing a beat. “You’re gonna get dumped if you keep this up.”
God what does Suguru see in this guy? He’s like a fucking parasite. “I wasn’t asking you,” Satoru glared. “And she isn’t my girlfriend.”
Suguru snorted, running his hands through his boyfriend’s hair, “play nice both of you,” he said lightly and Satoru rolled his eyes. “But if [First] is saying she’s fine, then just trust that she’s fine. She’ll come back around when her workload decreases.”
Satoru glared with a pout, “you’re worried too, don’t act like it’s just me.”
“I never said it was, it’s just that between the two of us I’m handling it better. I sent her a surprise uber eats delivery yesterday.” Asshole, that was a brilliant idea. Satoru wished he thought of it first. Instead he asked Shoko to check on you; maybe you’d be more receptive if it wasn’t him bothering you for the tenth text in a row.
Shoko went to check on you. Apparently you were fine and Satoru was worrying for nothing. She even said that you would come and hang out with them soon. Some people might say it’s a bit petty to celebrate the failures of others. In another universe, Satoru might even agree with them. But in this universe, Satoru was a hater first and foremost. So if he and his friends wanted to go out to eat to celebrate the fact Zenin Naoya was bitching about a failing grade on an essay, he and his friends were going to go out and eat to celebrate Zenin Naoya failing his essay.
Apparently, you were all haters.
It was also just nice seeing you again. If Satoru was more poetic, he’d probably add a bunch of other things to that statement. It was just nice to have you back.
“Karma is probably gonna come back to clap us in the ass for celebrating someone getting a bad grade,” you snickered.
“Sounds like a problem for future us,” Suguru grinned with a twinkle in his eyes.
“We go to school with the Japanese version of Ben Shapiro,” Satoru choked on his strawberry smoothie when Shoko said that. “I think we’re covered on karma.”
“Y’all are terrible people,” Satoru clicked his tongue, shaking his head in disbelief and shame.
“Hey, good neighbor, this dinner was your idea,” you nudged him with a dry tone and a smile.
Satoru nudged back with a grin of his own.
Dinner was fun, lots of drinks and jokes. It was a non-alcoholic beverage sort of night. Shoko said it was because they’d clearly been drinking too much if Satoru of all people had gotten better with holding his liquor. Her point was fair but rude nonetheless yet when Satoru turned to whine for you to come to his defense, the distant glaze was over your eyes and your smile was smaller than it had been the last time he looked at it.
“[First],” your motion to close your apartment door stopped and you hummed with a raised eyebrow. Satoru felt more dread than usual that night. Something about the air had been different. The face you made felt different than it normally did. It was always distant, you were always far away, but tonight was the worst it had ever been. “We’re good, right?”
You look at him like he grew an extra four eyes. “Why wouldn’t we be?”
Satoru couldn’t meet your eyes as he shrugged wordlessly. You’d probably say he was being ridiculous and clingy if he mentioned anything but he couldn’t find anything else to say to make himself seem unbothered either.
You rolled your eyes with a grin before stretching your arms out wide. “You’re being overdramatic, you big baby. Come here, big guy,” Satoru pulled you in close, burying his nose in the corner of his neck. Despite welcoming your embrace, it did nothing to soothe Satoru’s anxieties.
“I’ll see you later, yeah?” Satoru asked without pulling away from you completely.
The way you smiled at him was warm but it still somehow felt unreadable. Satoru knew all of your smiles. Your happy ones,
the sad ones,
the one you made when Sora finally got into Smash.
The ones you made when you were mad that he was successfully charming his way out of you being mad at him.
Satoru didn’t know this one.
Despite that fact, Satoru let you cup his face in your hands and he let you stand on the tip of your toes to place a kiss on his forehead. “See you, Satoru."
ii. undertow
Sleep didn’t come to Satoru after he laid in bed.
His head was too full as he kept running back through what you told him after he took you home.
You didn’t say you’d see him later.
You’re just being overdramatic, Satoru forced his eyes to close. You’re always overdramatic. It’s my best trait 30% of the time.
No one else said anything that night, it was just him who felt like this, right? It was always just him. If everyone else felt like something was off all night, someone would have mentioned it by now. With that, Satoru forced his eyes closed for all of five minutes before he decided to send, at the very least, a dumb meme. Something that’d make you laugh when you saw it and would make you reply “I’m wheezing” or “that’s so us!”
A quick stroll through his photos was all it took to find something suitable. He can’t remember exactly what it was, only that it was stupid.
It was stupid and didn’t go through to your phone.
A disconnect and reconnect dance to his wifi later and it still didn’t go through.
Satoru’s feet was on the pavement before not even a heartbeat after he calmly made sure his apartment was locked.
He just had to be sure you were okay. It was just him being an overdramatic, big baby. Your phone died or something and that’s why nothing was going through. Or maybe this was like the time you put your phone in airplane mode to narrowly avoid sending Shoko the wrong meme and then forgot to switch it back off.
You don’t answer the door when he knocks and he goes back and forth between knocking and trying to reach you on your other socials.
Twitter? Blocked.
He can’t find you anywhere else.
Instagram.
LINE.
Discord.
It’s like you were never there, gone from all the group chats and servers you once shared.
Satoru stayed outside of your apartment for the better part of an hour before one of your neighbors opened her door tired and annoyed.
“Dude, do you know what time it is?” Your neighbor asked groggily. She’s a nice girl, the reason rent was low enough in the area you could afford an apartment on your own. Apparently she wrecked shit in the neighborhood on the low to keep the rent down. Even better was the fact she was the landlord’s daughter. Not all heroes wore capes.
“Sorry,” Satoru knew he must look like a maniac with his messy hair and wide eyes. “have you seen [First]? I’m having a hard time reaching her.”
The neighbor gave him a funny look, “she moved out tonight,” she told him like that was the fifth time she told him that her favorite color was orange. “I thought it was weird you didn’t help with moving her stuff out a few days ago. She gave me the key to give it to my dad tomorrow. Didn’t she tell you she was leaving?”
iii. la niña
Satoru didn’t know which was worse sometimesー the fact Shoko kept the fact he had a daughter a secret for five years or how he found out.
It wasn’t like Shoko approached him one gloomy night when memories of the most prominent ghost in his life began bubbling to the surface. She didn’t grimly say that she needed to tell him something and he should sit down for it. She didn’t start off with apologies, saying she felt she had no choice or that if things had gone different she would have told him.
None of that happened.
Satoru found out by accident.
Accident.
All because Shoko didn’t hear him approach her when she was on her phone scrolling through instagram. She was so focused on whatever she was looking at, she didn’t even notice how Satoru quietly snickered to himself and snuck behind her to give her spook. He was just about to say something, ready for swears and ‘you’re so annoying, what are you 12?!’s when he took an instinctual glance at her phone and he saw you.
Thoughts of scaring Shoko went out the window in a matter of milliseconds. He didn’t even feel his body move when he snatched her phone out of her hand.
“Heyー” Shoko started with an offended hiss but when she looked over her shoulder, she looked like she saw an impending storm and her jaw clamped shut.
Satoru took in the photo like it was the last thing he’d ever see. You were dressed in a blue t-shirt and cream colored shorts, some aquarium’s logo stitched into your clothes. You were holding a kid, hugging her tightly and kissing her cheek while the girl was caught mid-giggle. And when Satoru looked at the little girl in your arms, it was his eyes that looked back.
“I- she told me not to say anything,” Shoko murmured, brown eyes looking anywhere but at him. Then the secrets came rolling out one after the other.
“If I didn’t see this picture,” Satoru’s grip tightened on Shoko’s phone to ground himself to the present. “Were you still going to keep this a secret from me?”
Her answer was silence.
iv. el niño
“I have to be honest,” from the corner of your eye, you see Satoru chasing after Itsuki, Nanako and Mimiko. Suguru is watching next to you on the bench, your respective care bags for accidents and playground injuries at the ready between you. “I thought I’d be more surprised you’re a dad now. But it kinda just makes sense. You always had ‘single mom’ energy in school.”
Brown eyes flash with recognition, “you had a dream about me adopting kids once, right?”
“No, I had a dream where you were off a perk and calling people without powers ‘monkeys’,” you correct your old friend petulantly. As if he should have remembered after all these years without contact. “You just happened to adopt children in the process of all that.”
Suguru snorts, “my apologies for getting the details wrong. So you had a dream that I adopted kids once and that I was off a perk."
"Exactly, thank you."
A silence somewhere between comfortable and awkward settles over the two of you, save for the squeals of little girls and Satoru’s manic laughter as the evil sorcerer king.
Suguru looks nice.
He’s still rocking the man bun but he’s opted to let some of his hair hang loose and he’s a couple hundred pounds down a shitty, parasitic boyfriend. Suguru and Kenjaku broke up halfway through the semester after you transferred. “Before you ask, yes, we had dinner to celebrate,” Suguru told you when you saw him for the first time in years a few days ago.
You’ve had your fair share of private updates on the lives of your old friends you didn’t keep in contact with. Shoko kept you up to date on everything. A surprising number of your old friends had gone into the field of educationー Utahime, Suguru and Satoru. You wonder how Satoru’s parents reacted to that information. You have yet to ask; it seemed like too much of a mood killer when Satoru happily recounted stories about his students a few weeks ago.
When Itsuki almost trips you make to stand but Satoru catches her before you can blink.
“He’s pretty good with her,” Suguru says like he’s a mind reader. “There was this kid we used to babysit, Riko, when we were younger. He said he hated it but he’s always been pretty good with kids.”
You can believe it. There’s plenty of things you remember Satoru complaining about despite his inherent talents in them. It makes you want to cry sometimes seeing how good he is with Itsuki. Your daughter is smart enough to play neutral when he asks but you’re pretty sure your daughter has a favorite parent. Adorable little traitor, you laugh softly to yourself. You’d think five years would give someone an edge.
Five years.
“Are you… mad?” You look at your old friend from the corner of your eye.
Suguru takes his time answering, mulling over unknown thoughts in his head. Playful as you remember Suguru being, he’s always been introspective. He thinks before he acts, lets things slowly come to a boil before turning off the stovetop. “I was more worried than mad to start,” he finally speaks. “It’s not everyday an entire group of people gets ghosted. I’m a little mad you didn’t open up though.”
Your smile is small and your eyebrows knit apologetically.
“But at the end of the day, this is nothing compared to what went down between Satoru and me in high school. So I guess I can forgive you.” You never did get the story about Satoru and Suguru’s mysterious high school turning point. The itch to know all the details is minor compared to the way your shoulders relax when Suguru shoots you a familiar smile. I missed you too. “Just don’t do anymore disappearing acts.” Smooth as they come, Suguru raises a closed fist just above your care bags.
Smile a bit more grand, you bump the side of your fist to his. “I can happily vouch that it won’t be happening again.”
“Good. It’s nice to have you back.”
“It’s nice being back.”
v. sea state
“Did you get an undercut?”
“Yeah, a while ago,” Satoru grins. “I look nice, right?”
“Please accept the compliment normally so your arrogance doesn’t rub off on our daughter,” you shake your head but a good-natured grin is plastered on your face. “Itsuki, make sure Daddy behaves. You’re in charge as the honorary aquarist.”
Itsuki’s eyes fill with delight at the duty bestowed upon her. “I will,” she promises, chest puffed with as much pride as a five year old can produce. It’s a rare day off in the middle of the week for Satoru. Normally he’s confined to his school during these hours, but thanks to some school holiday you scheduled in advance for him to take Itsuki around your aquarium. It isn’t the first time Itsuki’s been, you’d taken her there before she could even walk. It might as well be her first visit though from how she’s beaming. “Daddy, you have to be good so Mommy doesn't get mad.”
“As you command, general,” Satoru salutes playfully, picking Itsuki up in his arms. “Now then, if you excuse us, this father-daughter duo is gonna enjoy the aquarium while you work.”
“Bup bup bup,” you tut before the man can take off. “At least let me get my goodbye kiss before you run off to have fun without me,” you peck Itsuki’s cheek once, twice before blowing a raspberry and she squeals. “Alright,” you place your hands on your hips. “You two go have fun. Tell Daddy all the names you gave the whale sharks, okay?”
You think that’s that until Itsuki innocently asks, “where’s Daddy’s kiss, Mommy?” You blink once. Maybe you misheard- “You’re supposed to give both of us goodbye kisses, aren’t you?” Apparently you haven’t.
“I think Daddy’s too old for goodbye kisses, Itsuki.”
Itsuki squints, unsatisfied with your answer, “but Grandma always kisses Granny and they’re ancient.”
Why do your parents have to have a long lasting and fulfilling love life?
You and Satoru share an awkward smile as you both wonder what either of you can do to get out of this situation. Kissing Satoru used to be as easy as breathing. He’s always been the more affectionate of the two of you and it rubbed off on you some time during your university days. But you’re not in university anymore and your relationship has most definitely changed since then.
Still with bated breath, you gesture for Satoru to bring his head low enough for you to kiss his forehead, “there. Now both of you go have fun.”
If you think you see Satoru’s expression dim, he’s all smiles the moment you blink. “Try not to be jealous when you see us feeding the stingrays, [First].” He’s gone before you can tease you’re the one of the employees that help with that.
Once a maelstrom, always a maelstrom.
You love your place of work, it always has a familiar noisy sort of peaceful bathed in the light of blue decorated in corals, pinks and purples. Aquariums have a special magic to them. You fell in love with the sea when you were young and never fell out. The magic somehow is renewed every time you clock in, even on the most trying days.
How can you not when you see the dozens of people that stop by with the same love?
How can you not when you see dozens of people that stop by and fall in love with it for the first time?
“Hi, Mommy!” You hear Itsuki call from a distance. You wonder how she can even see you when you look up and see she’s on Satoru’s shoulders. It’s so natural, the two of them together. She’s wearing his sunglasses, if you can really say that. They keep sliding off her face but she holds onto them resolutely and Satoru is smiling widely in front of the tank full of black tip reef sharks, whale sharks and dozens of other fish in between.
You don’t know how your heart can fill with even more affection than you thought possible but it does. “Hi, baby,” you wave back. “I love you!”
“I love you too!” I have to enjoy that before she gets old enough to start thinking she’s too cool to tell her mom I love you. You know Satoru should too when you see her lean over to plant her father an awkward kiss on his head. You can’t hear what she tells him but you can guess she must be saying she loves him. Even from his profile, you can tell Satoru is saying he loves her back from how adoringly he looks up at her.
You see Itsuki giggling and saying something else you can’t hear, looking down at her father in earnest.
Whatever it is she says, Satoru looks over at you with eyes that are wide and somehow reflect all of the blue from tank lights. Despite how it makes your heart twist, you give him another small wave. When he doesn’t wave back, you wonder what it is your daughter could have said that had him in such a stupor.
Whatever he says to Itsuki, his eyes stay on you while he says it.
vi. nearshore
“Do you still like the same brand of honey or no?” You call over your shoulder from the kitchen.
It’s unusually quiet in your apartment since Itsuki is at your parents’ house for the weekend. You only realized you’d forgotten to tell your co-parent when he showed up at your house with sweets in hand. “What Itsuki doesn’t know won’t hurt her,” you told him with a snicker when you invited him inside to eat them.
“Satoru?” You call out again.
No response.
You turn off the eye your kettle is on and look out into the living room. He’s right where you left him. “Hey,” you sit on the ottoman in front of him. He blinks in surprise when he sees your hand waving in front of face. “Are you alright?”
“Yeah, I’m fine,” Satoru smiles but it doesn’t reach his eyes.
“Let me rephrase that question,” you start anew. “What’s wrong? Come on now,” you grin crookedly. “You’ve always sucked at pretending to be okay in front of me.”
Satoru’s smile falters for a heartbeat, “yeah?”
“Yes, Mr. Bravado,” Satoru might have been an expert at fooling others, but you know him. He was the guy who never took notes but passed every test because he worked his ass off in the background. The type who’d act oblivious but you realize halfway through a meal that the reason he took you is because he noticed you’d been feeling down lately. It’s one of the things you love about him. “So come out with it, fess up.”
One, two, three seconds pass before Satoru finally cracks.
“I’m mad. More at myself than anything.” Before you can reply, Satoru opens his mouth again but it feels more like he's talking to himself. “I shouldn’t be upset anymore, right? We made up.” Satoru runs his fingers through his hair in frustration. “We made up,” he says again. “I shouldn’t still be mad about anything. Things have been going great.”
Satoru finally falls silent and he looks tired. You hate you’re the reason for it. “It’s okay to still be mad about Itsuki. I’m sorry,” you whisper. “I… I’d take it back if I could. I know that doesn’t mean anything after five years but I mean it. Even if I was scared I should have told you. I just- I don’t know, it had gotten into me. I was thinking how you couldn’t commitー”
“You thought I was non-committal?” Satoru raises an eyebrow and he looks hurt by your revelation.
“Satoru, you have never been in a relationship with anyone throughout the time I’ve known you,” you rub your finger and thumb together nervously. Five years later is as good as any time to have a conversation you should have had long ago. “You were scared when I asked what our relationship was, remember?”
“I didn’t know what the right answer was,” Satoru argues with his hands raised. “I thought you were tired of our friends always talking about us being a couple.”
“You were relieved when I said that-” you stammer over your words thoughts going much faster than your mouth could. You remember the tormented days of unrequited affection quite clearly. If there was someone who avoided romantic relationships like the plague, it was Satoru. He was a flirt, relished in the attention he received for his well-known good looks. Regardless, he’d never committed to anyone. “You said fucking someone else was a non-issue! For all I knew you were sleeping with someone else, it wasn’t like we were-”
“It was a non-issue if it meant you weren’t going to take off and start avoiding me!” Satoru snaps like you’ve grown a second head. Maybe you did judging by how he looks at you incredulously. Your mouth closes, unsure what to say next and Satoru looks away with a scoff. “It’s the other way around,” he mutters so soft you almost didn’t catch it. “you were the non-committal one.”
“Excuse me?” It’s your turn to look at Satoru like his body has magically sprung additional body parts. When he doesn’t immediately say anything, you double down. “Satoru, you don’t get to say that and then turn around and not elaborate on it.”
“You know, the first day we met, Suguru told me that I acted like the sun shined out of your ass,” Satoru says much to your confusion. But he went on, lost in his memories, “it might as well have, I thought you were so cool. I wanted you in my life so bad from pretty much the moment you said I doomed myself. I didn’t care what happened next in my life as long as you were there for it.
“But you left me,” Satoru croaks with a smile, crystal blue eyes dark and empty. “You left me.” The way he says it breaks your heart. “I’m so gone for you. I’ve always been gone for you. I just didn’t want to see it. Somehow I always knew you’d leave.” He laughs, cold and humorless and completely lost. “And you did.
“You could be right there with me and then suddenly be so far away. It always felt like you would just up and leave one day. You and Utahime always talked about intuition and trusting it. I guess mine was saying from early on ‘this girl is gonna break your heart one day, don’t fall in love with her.’”
“I knew it when you got those far away looks in your eyes. I knew it when I woke up that first morning alone. I knew it when you didn’t say you’d see me later. And just like that you were gone on that ghost ship. You left and didn’t even tell me you were going. Do you know how much that fucking hurt? I wait outside for hours and your neighbor’s the one who tells me you’re gone. I may have purposely lied to myself about how I felt but I never slept with anyone else. I didn’t want anyone else. I was the one who kept reaching out, you never reached back.
Itsuki’s the second tier on the cake and the rest of the frosting. You’ve been gone on that ghost ship for five years and when I finally catch up, I still feel like I’m drowning.”
“... I didn’t mean to make you feel that way. I didn’t know.”
“I know. That’s almost the worst part. Guess I didn't wear my heart on my sleeve as much as you thought.”
.
.
.
“It was the week after our second year midterms,” you recall when you were six years younger and the biggest problem you had in life was a professor was out to get you. Midterms had finally passed and you were on a victorious emotional high after finishing your last exam. At least until some asshole who should have covered their mouth coughed and you were coughing by the end of the day. “I got a cold and just so I could breathe better when I slept, you let me lay on you on the couch the whole time even though you ended up getting sick afterwards.”
You’d felt so bad, coughing all the while but Satoru hadn’t let you budge an inch, proudly claiming ‘I don’t get sick, I’m built different so cough away.’ When he got sick days later, he said over coughs, ‘This has nothing to do with when you were sick. This is from Suguru.’ “That was when I realized that I’d been stupidly in love with you ever since I met you.”
Gojou Satoru has been called many things throughout your years of knowing him. But for you, the fall child has always been easy to love. He was made for it. “You were a pain in the ass but you were my pain in the ass. I never wanted it any other way.”
“Stop being mean to me,” Satoru leans forward to rest his head on your shoulder just as you wrap your arms around his back. “Don’t you know who you’re being mean to when you’re being an ass?”
You laugh weakly, “the guy I’m still gone for?” When you hear a sniffle in the corner of your neck, you tighten your grip.
"Don't go away this time," Satoru hugs back.
vii. ocean deep, seafoam soft
Satoru finds himself in your bed again for the first time in years.
“I confess my love to you and you try to kill me, I'm hurt.”
“Oh don’t be such a baby, I didn’t even know it was there,” you chuckle fondly after the two of you stumble into your bed after nearly tripping on a stray toy on your floor. Satoru loves that laugh. He loves how you look up at him with all the adoration in the world. “Remember that time we forgot that textbook was on your bed?”
“Please don’t remind me, my back hurts just remembering it,” Satoru whines but laughter escapes him despite his apparent trauma. It wasn’t one of your best moments during your shared years of sexual escapades in college. You pull him down kiss his lips tenderly and he practically moans, relishing the feeling. No more forehead kisses, he wants to tell you. You did that a lot before you left.
"I love you," Satoru whispers in awe at the words falling out of his own mouth. In awe at the fact you’re even there with him at that moment. “I love you.”
Your hands cup his face like he's something precious and you thumbs away the tears pooling in his eyes despite the ones in your own, "I love you too.”
Satoru’s had sex with you more times than he can count.
He memorized everything, refused to forget a single detail. It feels like the first time all over again.
The way one set of your fingernails dig into his back while he envelopes your other hand with one of his own. How your fingers intertwined tightly. How amazing you feel squeezing around him tightly. The speed of your pulse as he peppers your throat with kisses and soft nips. The ache between his legs as he rolls his hips into you gently yet persistently, chasing his high but wanting it to last long beyond the confines of this singular moment.
It’s not just this one moment anymore though. “[First],” Satoru squeezes your hand tighter. “[First].”
I love you.
I love you.
I love you.
Don’t leave me this time, Satoru gasps like a man starved for air before kissing you again desperately. Stay.
(When Satoru wakes up the next morning to you in his arms and playing with his hair at the base of his neck, he feels like could cry. He nestles into your chest with a tired grin, “morning.”)
viii. anchor
Gojou Itsuki, that’s the name staring back at him.
Satoru loves when it’s his birthday. Until Itsuki was born it was arguably the best day in the universe. The importance of birthdays tends to titter on the rope of priorities, but it’s the one day of the year when the people important to him would pop up to say ‘hi’. Even people from the past. An old teacher he used to drive crazy but always said he thought Satoru had a lot of potential.
His mom still sent him a birthday text even if most of their exchanges are dry the rest of the year.
Even his students will tip in to get him a card and some sort of celebratory gift on December 7th.
December 7th lost a bit of its shine when you exited from his life. With you and Itsuki both in it, it shines tenfold.
It’s just the light is too blinding when Satoru takes out his last present of a plain envelope and he sees Gojou Itsuki written in bold and clear text.
Gojou Itsuki
Father: Gojou Satoru
v. sea state private ver.
"Daddy, do you love Mommy too?"
"Yeah. Daddy loves Mommy."
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