multifandom madness

Ijichi clears his throat awkwardly, hands clasped tightly to the steering wheel. Beside him, Kento stares out the passenger window, unspeaking. Blood stains the front of his suit, drying aganist the fabric. Most of it is from the curse.

The exorcism had been a standard one, nothing special. A pesky Grade One Nanami had been dispatched to deal with after noon that day. It had gotten a hit on him, yes, but he was barley injured. The mission had taken no time at all.

He feels something running down his shoulder, then glances down. There's blood dripping from his shoulder. It seems the curse had injured him worse than he initially assumed.

"Ah," He says, watching a sizeable stream of red run down his arm. "I seem to be bleeding worse than I thought."

"Oh, hold on." Ijichi mumbles, bringing the car to a stop. He pulls over to the shoulder quickly, seeing as they're still a little ways out from the city. The further into the country side they get, the less cars appear.

Their fingers brush as Ijichi hands him a towel he keeps in the car, just for situations like this. Kento takes it with a grateful murmur, ignoring the spark in his gut from their brief contact.

He takes slowly, calculated breaths as he wipes the blood from his arm, calming the heat under his skin and the rapid thump thump thump of his heart.

He was really hoping that nonsense would've started to fade by now. Seems his heart is dead set on being foolish, unfortunately.

Kento is aware he has feelings for Ijichi. And no, he is not going to act on them. He sees no point in doing so.

He couldn't quite say why he fell for Ijichi, if someone where to ask. But he had, and it was proving to be quite troublesome indeed. It's distracted him quite a few times at work already; anymore and Kento worries he may have to do overtime because of it, truly a headache.

(He supposes he fell because Ijichi is dedicated. Kind. He's only so anxious because he cares. He cares about messing up, about being a burden, about ruining things for others. He worries because he is kind, so much so he needed to switch to the manager track halfway through his first year of high school.

He supposes he fell because, in the aftermath of 2007, Ijichi was the one who sat with Kento and his grief the longest.)

Beaides, Kento's interventions are the only reason Ijichi gets any time to relax. He sees in the way the mans shoulders visibly untense whenever he stops by, or the way he seems less jumpy in Kento's presence. He wouldn't wish to compromise this by adding feelings into the mix.

Plus, he swore off relationships when he returned to sorcery. If they weren't in this line of work he'd very much like to pursue it, seek out a husband or a wife, maybe have a child of his own; but they're both Jujutsu Sorcerers. Their world doesn't work like that, doesn't grant it's inhabitants soft things like love. At least, not without a heafty price.

The relationship would splinter before it even got off the ground, be it from untimely death or other means. Chasing this desire would be irresponsible of him and Ijichi both. This is a fact. He sees no need to reach for something that won't last. It would only hurt them both in the end.

Instead, he does the adult thing. He keeps his feelings to himself and does not let them trick him into doing anything embarrassing, like flirting. He keeps the relationship between him and his friend just that, friendly when off the clock and professional when at work. It is the adult thing to do, it is also the right thing to do.

Kento is not interested in losing anything else.

But, unfortunately, the right thing is not always the easiest. Kento suspects he will have to endure these feelings for quite a while yet before he manages to rid himself of them. Truly troublesome, indeed.

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Nanami is simultaneously a source of comfort and a source of stress. Although he doesn't stress Kiyotaka out on purpose. In fact, it's quite the opposite.Work stresses Kiyotaka out, and he most often sees Nanami at work. It's simply a by product of their environment. Nothing more, nothing less. Nanami actually helps him not freak out, more often than not, though filling away all the paper work from his missons does nothing to decrease Kiyotaka's workload.

It's all a side effect of the job, at the end of the day. This doesn't mean he's not allowed to be sour about it. He'd like to spend more time with his superior outside of their high-strung, high stress environment.

Though, with their schedules, that may not be happening anytime soon...

He doesn't know why he fell for Nanami. Probably because he always shoots for somebody out of his league, which feels like most everyone he knows.Maybe it's because Nanami is a good friend, soft under that stern exterior. Maybe because he's kind. Kiyotaka isn't sure and doesn't really want to introspect on it much, either.

He isn't quite sure what to do with the feelings, but for the time being he's fine leaving them as is. He doesn't want to embarrass himself nor does he want to force anything. He sincerely doubts Nanami feels the same, anyways.

Besides, he's busy. Sorcerers often don't have time for romance, and Kiyotaka is no exception. It's just the way of things.

He's content to simply let things play out naturally, for now. He'd rather not chase something that may never come to pass.

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"Here." Nanami taps Kiyotaka on the shoulder from behind with a coffee cup, both his hands currently occupied by what he bought at his favorite café; the quaint, locally owned one merely a block from the train station that he passes everyday to get to work.

He startles, caught off guard by his coworkers sudden appearance. He's just glad there weren't any papers in his hands; he surely would've dropped them.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to startle you." He apologizes as Kiyotaka whips around, sliding his glasses back up his nose. In Nanami's defense, startling him has never been that hard to do.

"It's fine." He mumbles, taking the cup from his senpai's hands. It's warm against the cold winter air, the interior of the school being as cool as the outside. The air conditioning systems were....primitive at best, despite Principal Yaga's many attempts to fix the issue. "Thank you for the coffee."

His senior simply nods. "Don't mention it."

"You got your own?" He asks, noticing the cup in Nanami's hands. There's a small bag clutched there, too. It looks to have some sort of breakfast item in it, though Kiyotaka can't immediately discern which kind it is.

"Yes. I figured we could share." Nanami seems almost...shy as he speaks. "A little break never hurt."

Kiyotaka turns this over in his head for a moment. He's supposed to be handling something for Gojo relatively soon, but Nanami had been kind enough to bring him a late morning drink. He doesn't wish to slack off, but declining would feel rather rude. "I suppose not."

They settle in one of the staff rooms, sitting at the table tucked the furtherest back. Nanami had bought two ham and cheese scones to share along with their coffee. Kiyotaka takes his gratefully, occasionally glancing over his shoulder as they eat. You never know when Gojo will pop up next, or where.

"Don't worry about Gojo. He doesn't actually care as much as he pretends too." Nanami says around a sip of his drink, as if sensing his friends inner turmoil.

"Doesn't feel like it..." Kiyotaka mumbles, bringing his own coffee to his mouth. It's a simple black coffee, his preferred choice. He isn't sure if Nanami knew that, or just took a gamble when ordering, but he's inclined to believe the former.

Nanami sighs, something long and weary. He too is subjected to his fair share of needless harassment from their resident Special Grade. "He is rather odd, isn't he."

"Yes..." Kiyotaka agrees around another sip of his coffee. Odd is certainly one way to describe their coworker.

They finish their late breakfast (brunch?) in comfortle silence, chatting about whatever comes to mind. Unfortunately, most of that is work related. He doesn't think either of them get out much.

"Thank you again for the food." He says, the two of them now walking back towards Nanami's office together, since his is on the way to Kiyotaka's own.

"No need." His colleague says, slowing his pace. They're outside his office now. "It was simply the least I could do."

(Kento would buy him a pastry everyday, if Ijichi asked.)

He nods. Nanami opens the door to his office, before turning to say goodbye to him. In that moment Kiyotaka spies a stack of papers inside the room and studies forward, an idea forming.

"I'll take this of yours hands, yeah?" He says, scooping the reports off Nanami's desk. They've been completed, but have yet to be put into the database (because, ridiculously, they need both paper and digital copies of everything.)

"But-" Nanami starts to protest, but is quickly cut off.

"It's the least I can do." He says, giving his former upperclassmen a smile. It does add to his workload, yes, but Kiyotaka needs to pay him for the brunch somehow. He doesn't know how else he'll do it.

Nanami smiles back, faint. "Well, I'll leave you to it."

They exchange quick goodbye, before the blonde disappears behind a closing door. Kiyotaka hurries back to his own office and promptly starts on filling away Nanami's paper. He's definitely overdo for his task with Gojo, but that's more than fine. For all he knows, the task from the Special Grade is another trivial one. He won't mind putting it off for longer, especially if he's doing something for Nanami.