track twenty-five: if you're gone | prev track< | setlist
three rockstars! one you!
synopsis: your best friend has always been an asshole - whether it's in his band or in his bed. him ditching you? nothing new. but when one bedroom door closes, another one opens
pairings: rockstar!Suguru Geto x f!Reader x childhood fwb!Sukuna (+ rockstar!gojo!!)
content: mdni, angst and fluff, rockstar au!, complicated relationships and messy emotions, avoidant attachment, HEAVY PINING AND YEARNING, denying feelings, reader is a mess, conflicting emotions, more of all them suffering, tension and teasing
a/n: art by @torucider !! div by @/tsumiinum
There had to be an ending to the seemingly bottomless pit of bad decisions you'd been making lately.
But every day you were more fucking scared you weren't at rock bottom yet.
How much lower could you go?
Especially when you were already sitting at your ex's dining table and ignoring the constant buzzing of your phone on the closest counter.
Why look when you knew what would be waiting there?
Sukuna asking you to come back. To speak to him like a mature adult instead of acting like an avoidant child who couldn't handle confrontation.
But if you did, would that be it?
Inviting the real ending you'd been desperately trying to ignore?
"Shoko said she'd keep the girls tonight," Suguru called out, examining a bottle of wine before putting it back on his nice rack and grabbing a different one.
You were surprised he still bought the brand you liked.
A little stunned at how smoothly you seemed to slip back into the old swing of things. He had picked you up from the street less than ten minutes after you called, hurrying to open the door for you and asking you what felt like a hundred questions all to confirm you were really okay before bringing you back home.
You lied, of course.
Okay was no longer a word that could be applied to you. But being back with him was about as close as you could get.
He took you back to his place, half-shoved you into the bathroom with that stern stare of his, insisting that you take a warm shower and get changed while he washed your wet clothes. By the time you got back out, food had already been delivered. Sit out all nicely on the table as if this was some pre-planned get together instead of him rescuing you from yourself once more.
"I'm sorry for calling you like that," you awkwardly apologized, curling up in the seat as you opened up your to-go box, a comforting scent wafting up from it.
"You can always call me," he casually replied, unbothered by you just intruding on his evening. "If you need me-"
You didn't want to need him.
To need any of them.
You used to be completely fucking fine on your own. And here you were, shivering and feeling like a total stranger in someone else's home because you couldn't handle your problems by yourself.
"You can take my bed. I'll sleep on the couch," Suguru continued, offering up even more assistance as you tried to train yourself not to let the heat rise to your face at his unnecessary generosity.
"I'm really-"
"I'm not trying to be an asshole, but do you really think you should be alone right now?" He asked, arching up an eyebrow as he poured himself a glass of wine.
You hesitated, swallowing your pride as you considered the unfortunately not entirely unlikely possibility you'd end up on the phone with Satoru or Sukuna if he returned you to the lonely apartment thatstill didn't really feel like home.
"Just pour me a drink too," you muttered.
Suguru was too nice to say no to you.
Even though he probably knew as well as you that you weren't going to find what you wanted in the bottom of a wine glass.
You watched his hands when he grabbed you the cup you used to like back when you practically lived here, how the veins and tendons flexed as he carefully poured a pitiful amount in, like he didn't want you to think he was trying to get you drunk.
Your cautious man still playing his own games. Still preoccupied with how things looked - and you got stuck in how things were.
How were you ever supposed to get to how you wanted them to be?
"Can I ask why you called me?" Suguru finally asked the one question he'd been avoiding as he took the seat next to yours, taking a sip out of his glass as the hard edge of the table pressed into your calves. Knees scrunched close to your chest, stabbing purposelessly at the food in your box as you tried to think of an excuse that wouldn't make this whole thing, well, messier.
"You were who I thought of," you shrugged your shoulders, biting your lip as the scent of him clung to your skin. His t-shirt hanging loose on your frame, skin still damp and sticky as you shuffled in the familiar kitchen seat.
For a second, you felt like you were back in the therapist's office, heart laid bare for someone to break, feeling the scrutiny of his dark stare, no matter how much he softened it for you.
"Does Sukuna know you're here?" He carefully asked, like he was trying to decide if he was going to get assaulted again just for playing your knight.
"No," you muttered. Even if he could probably guess it if he went back to the apartment he bought you and discovered it empty.
He had predicted it too, hadn't he?
That you'd run off to someone else? Seeking comfort in places you shouldn't be instead of finding it in yourself?
"Should I make sure the door's locked?" He tried to joke, and you didn't even have it in yourself to smile.
"I might deadbolt it," you dryly muttered, stabbing at the food and popping it in your mouth.
His small smirk faltered, and you wished you could make it easier for him.
You wished you could make it easier for all of them.
Sure, they hurt you. Okay, well, Sukuna and Suguru had. But it was getting harder and harder to hold onto it. Not when all of the anguish felt like acid on your tongue, seeping down your throat and burning your stomach the longer it sat inside of you.
If you weren't so fucked up, if you had your shit figured out a little more, wouldn't you save all four of you so much heartache?
"What happened today?" Suguru pressed, and you could only shrug your shoulders.
"I, uh, went to therapy," you mumbled, biting down on the inside of your cheek before admitting the tougher part, "With Sukuna."
"Oh."
Yeah.
You supposed you should've seen it for the monumentally awful idea it was from the start instead of just accepting to acquiesce Sukuna after the whole 'surprising you with a brand new fucking apartment' thing.
"Guess it didn't go well?" He wryly replied, and you almost rolled your eyes.
"That obvious?" You exhaled, pushing the food around before forcing yourself to look up at him. "I kinda ran away."
"You tend to do that," Suguru unhelpfully remarked, your lips pressing in a thin line as you found yourself tempted to fling a forkful of food back at him.
"You're so funny," you sarcastically commented, squinting at him just for him to give you that annoyingly charming smirk you wouldn't admit you missed.
"And yet you're not saying I'm wrong," he hummed, bringing his wine glass back to his lips.
Taking a swig of your own was better than agreeing with him.
Letting the bitter taste takeover your tongue so you didn't have to stew on the regret festering there already. All the what-ifs being back in his house brought up, wondering how things might have played out if you just made a few different decisions back then.
"You know," Suguru continued when he carefully placed his glass back down. "Shoko knows a couple good ones, if you didn't like the therapist or-"
It was sweet of him to assume the therapist was the problem instead of you.
"You might benefit more from some solo sessions," he kept going, still trying to take care of you long after you left him. Picking up all the broken pieces and doing his best to glue them back together.
Was it guilt?
Or had losing you simply made him a better person?
Jesus, this fucking sucked.
How come they only got their shit together after you? Why couldn't they work it out when you were with them? Why were you the only one still shattered?
You never asked for either of them.
They had given themselves to you and fucking screwed you over once it was done.
"Can you be, like, awful for five minutes?" You huffed, scowling at him as you forced a sharp exhale out of your nose.
His lips parted in a surprised 'o', dark eyes narrowing like he was trying to work out what you meant by that. "Why-"
"It's so annoying that you get to be all mature and perfect after we break up," you admitted, picking at your cuticles beneath the table as you glanced back to where your purse was laying on its side.
"Perfect?"
"It's so infuriating sometimes," you mumbled under your breath, shaking your head as you interrupted him, about to reiterate that he was infuriating before he let out a low chuckle.
"Do you want me to be mean to you?" He offered in that honeyed voice of his.
"I want to be mad at you," you muttered, feeling a lot more defeated than you expected.
"You can be mad at me," he calmly accepted it, evenly meeting your stare as if you being upset was better than the alternative of you feeling nothing at all for him.
You tried to switch to ignoring him.
Finishing your food with a tight-lipped frown and polishing off the wine even though it just left an uncomfortable heat compressing your chest. You slipped out of your chair to go throw away the styrofoam box, but Suguru just had to get up and do it for you, leaving you awkwardly standing there and swallowing your feelings.
Tempted to ask what now?
Were you supposed to sit on the couch together and watch tv like old times? Ask him to just take you back home anyway? Go back to the bed he used to fuck you in and pretend you couldn’t smell him on the sheets?
You ended up awkwardly leaning against the wall while you watched him clean up, trying to find something wrong to bicker about.
But god, he’d forgiven you for fucking his best friend.
Comforted you and came when you called and took care of you even when you weren’t his anymore.
“Maybe Shoko could refer me to someone,” you muttered.
You needed help.
The kind that you had to find on your own. With the help of a licensed professional.
“I’ll text her,” he replied, a hint of pride bleeding through his voice as you folded your arms across your chest.
What happened to the independent girl you used to be? The one who was too stubborn to admit it when you were out of your depth? What happened to everything you used to be?
The strangest part was that you weren't even sure you wanted to go back to being her. She let Sukuna break her heart. And then handed over what was left of it to Suguru so he could take a few swings at it too.
But even now, being around him like this, watching him walk around like you were reliving in an old memory, you were the tiniest bit tempted to go back to the old days. Just for one night.
You could see it now.
Almost feel how solid his hands would be on your waist, how warm his chest would be when you were pinned underneath it.
It would be so simple, wouldn't it?
To let him pick you up and cradle you close? To call him by his name and let him whisper yours in that tender voice of his?
He wouldn't feel like home. But he'd feel close enough to safe to settle the storm still wearing you down and ripping through your rattled bones.
Suguru caught you staring as he finished up, thin brows knitting together as he walked over to you, one hand reaching for his pocket for his cigarettes before he remembered that they weren't there anymore.
"I'm not sleeping with you," he murmured softly, as if he wasn't looking down at your lips as like he could still remember the taste of them.
"I didn't ask you to," you whispered back, like you weren't looking at his either. And then he reached out, like he was going to cup your cheek and caress you the same way he used to.
"Angel," he gently spoke, sighing as his palm stopped just shy of your cheek. "You know you have to pick."
"I know," you confessed.
You couldn't keep doing this.
"I will still do whatever I can to support you and fix the mess I made," he reassured, swallowing hard as he steeled his resolve. "But you're just hurting yourself."
And he was too selfless to say you were hurting him too, even though you could see the pain shining in his deep stare.
You wanted to play it off.
Pretend that you weren't painfully aware that no matter who you chose, you'd still be second guessing yourself for maybe forever.
If you chose Sukuna, and it crashed and burned, would you spend eternity wondering what would've happened if you mustered up the courage to kiss Suguru right now?
And if you did kiss him, would you just wish it was Sukuna's lips instead?
"I wish I never fucked us up to begin with," Suguru murmured, maybe loosened up from the wine to be speaking so plainly about what you both lost when his face was hardly inches from yours. "But I guess I know how Sukuna feels now."
"You're making it so much harder for me," you defensively mumbled, trying to keep your breathing steady when he was looking down at you like he wanted to memorize the view.
"That's because I want you to pick me," he smoothly replied, your mouth twitching up into a smile you had to push back down.
You had to make yourself slip away from him, turning around and walking around the corner to go back to his living room. About to come up with the excuse that you could watch a movie or something to pass the time and avoid the topic at hand when you spotted a stack of papers across a side table where the coasters usually were.
And noticed your name neatly printed at the top of one.
"What's this?" You asked, picking it up the moment you were close enough, eyes already scanning the page as he started to hurry over.
"It's nothing, just a stupid fucking idea Satoru's dad was-"
"It's about me," you pointed out, turning around and refusing to let him have it back, swatting at his outstretched hand while you squinted at the fine print.
"Baby, it's bullshit, I didn't want to worry-"
"I can make decisions for myself, Suguru," you scolded him, a lump taking shape again in the back of your throat as you realized what it was.
An offer.
"This is the PR relationship thing, isn't it?" You frowned, flipping the page as you started scanning the terms. Satoru had been telling the truth.
His dad wanted to throw a fuck ton of cash at you to get you to do what he wanted.
An apartment with 24/7 security. Biweekly paychecks for playing pretend girlfriend. Health and dental insurance. New clothes for required public appearances.
God, why the fuck was it a better job offer than anything else you received?
Six months.
Half of year of hanging onto your ex-boyfriend's arm in public now that your private life had been dragged out for everyone to see.
It was long enough for the album and press rollout but right before their tour would start. Enough for them to turn the PR disaster of a leaked sex tape into something slightly less scandalous the media could sink their teeth into.
You'd be dropped once they sold out all their shows.
Suguru was silent, just staring as you studied the stapled sheets in front of you, waiting for you to say something.
To say it was stupid and to shut it all down.
"Is he actually serious?" You asked, a hard lump in your throat as your stare drifted back to the promised paycheck, wondering what price you could put on your pride.
You were clearly losing this game anyway.
They weren't going to leave you alone.
"You don't need to do this," Suguru softly said, not answering your question as you glanced up from the papers to see his conflicted expression.
Would Sukuna hate you if you did?
Satoru might.
How much could making a deal with a devil cost when you already lost everything you cared about?
You weren't replying to his texts.
Go fucking figure.
The harder Sukuna tried to have you, the more you pulled away from him.
Still, he knew he shouldn't be doing this.
Leg bouncing impatiently as he stared down at the phone screen in his hand, trying to work up the willpower to either swipe everything away or shut it off.
That's what a more mature person would do.
Someone who had his shit together.
But that had never been him.
Jin had called, told him to come over and just crash there. Kaori had snatched the phone from his brother and told him to go find you and fucking fix it.
Like it was so goddamn easy when you were too hurt to see how hard he was trying. Too broken to even want him to put you together.
And despite what his therapist tried to say otherwise, he couldn't stop blaming himself for being the one to fuck it all up in the first place.
All the same thoughts looping in his head, replaying a million moments he wished he could go back and do differently. The thousand nights where you were in his bed, beneath his body where you belonged, his hands skimming over your side and his teeth sinking into your soft skin when he should've been kissing you and asking you to be his girlfriend.
Not his best friend with benefits.
Not some unnamed third thing you both swore wasn't that serious.
He wanted to be your man. To get to marry you one day and have a stupid little chubby baby with your eyes and his hair.
Sukuna didn't want to just be some fucking asshole you used to sleep with.
Someone you used to know.
A page in a book you shut and shoved on a shelf to be forgotten.
Maybe bringing you to his therapist was a mistake, something that he should've waited a little longer for. But he didn't know how to help you himself.
No matter how badly he wished he could.
And honestly, what he was about to do was probably an even bigger one in the making.
But fuck, he wanted to prove you wrong.
Show you that what you were scared of wasn't going to happen.
He could watch you having sex with your ex-boyfriend and not strangle him for it. He wasn't going to leave you.
And by no means, was he going to stop loving you.
No, instead, he just nearly threw up when the sketchy site on his phone finally loaded and he saw you splayed out nude in soft blue sheets, touching yourself and looking at the camera all lovestruck.
Asking Suguru for help.
You didn't do that with him.
It was different. Knowing that it had been serious with Suguru and actually seeing it for himself.
The trust shining in your eyes before all the light in them had been stolen from you.
He almost dropped the phone.
Pacing the floor and swallowing the bile threatening to flood his throat as your soft voice replayed in his ears.
Sukuna was greedy. Selfish. Used to taking what he wanted and never needing to justify it.
Until he realized what he wanted the most was what was best for you.
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synopsis: you never meant to get in the middle of a marriage. but when your caught between your beautiful best friend and the king she was forced to wed, you find your position as a maid-turned-concubine particularly challenging - especially when he begins demanding an heir from one of you. can gojo keep you all to herself? or will everything else keep getting in the way?
pairing: queen!gojo x concubine!reader (x king!geto)
wc: 20.7k
content: mdni. angst + smut, medieval setting, FEM!JO!!!, YURI YURI YURI!!!, lots of yearning and pining, intense jealousy, loathing, childhood crushes, gojo is obsessed, yandere!femjo tbh, piv sex, character death, trauma, reader is suffering, heavy angst, fear of being abandoned, cold and conniving gojo, but she's also a sweet puppy for her girl, they want each other so bad, humiliation, wrongful imprisonment, unbalanced power dynamics, master/maid relationship, use of nicknames (princess, angel), confessions, kissing, oral sex (f! recieving), fingering, blindfolds and restraints, 69, multiple positions, happy ending
a/n: this was a commission for my incredibly lovely angel @cantarcantar + the art above is from the super talented @anniewinniie and the div is by @/tsumiinum
“Fuck, Suguru, you’re so-”
As much as Satoru enjoyed hearing your pretty little pants and moans, she was rather sick of hearing you whine his name instead of hers.
But of course, even if she was the queen, what could she do when you were her husband’s concubine?
“Someone’s going to hear you, pretty,” he wryly replied, and she could practically hear the smirk in his honeyed voice, syrupy sweet just for you.
Blegh.
She held in her gag, grimacing at his deep grunt.
Satoru parted the thick vines concealing your not-so-secret garden hideaway. Tucked behind flowering bushes, forget-me-not covered trellises, a blanket was spread out on the green grass of your hidden nook as Suguru fucked you right there, your dress bunched up above your hips as he greedily plunged his ridiculously oversized cock inside you.
Where was the patience?
The preparation?
Treating you like a princess rather than rutting into you like some ruthless animal?
Satoru felt her mouth twitch down, heart freezing as she found herself slipping through the gap in the trellises, forcing herself to slyly smile as she interrupted the scene.
“Suguru,” she called out, keeping her voice airy and calm as she condescendingly looked down at your bodies tangled together. Containing the cold anger that had sunk its claws into her heart as she cleared her throat, sucking in a slow breath, “Your advisor is looking for you.”
Her husband threw an annoyed look over his shoulder, dark bangs falling in his face as his soft purple eyes hardened into a scowl.
“He can wait,” he grimaced, as if to say, so can you.
But Satoru could be just as stubborn.
“I heard it’s about a rather important matter,” she lied, shrugging her shoulders as the skirt of her finely embroidered dress swung and shifted by her feet.
“I will be finished in just a-”
“We can always continue when you return,” you reassured him, brushing his bangs back out of his face and biting down on your glossy bottom lip.
You knew your place.
Content to be that knave’s concubine, free for him to use whenever he pleased. Unbothered no matter how many times he expected you to wait and adhere to his whims when he should be doing his damndest to make your every wish come true.
Satoru despised it. Detested the infuriating way her husband took and wasted every ounce of your attention.
You were her best friend first.
“Fine,” Suguru hissed, hesitantly pulling out of you but not before throwing Satoru a heated glare.
“I can keep your concubine company,” she smiled, blue eyes sparkling with satisfaction as Suguru unceremoniously shoved his cock back inside his pants, storming past her to go off and search for an advisor who was likely already tucked into his bed.
He would just come back for you once he figured it out.
But by then, Satoru was sure she could kill the mood enough that he wouldn’t get to have you tonight.
Not without her in the room.
“I’m sorry,” you softly apologized once he was gone, hastily pulling your dress down, embarrassed that she’d seen you so exposed.
As if it wasn’t the first time.
She was well aware of her husband’s preference for you to not wear any undergarments when he was planning on seeing you. Had walked in on the two of you in their marital bed more times than she could count.
At first, she thought it was better you than her.
Held no interest in having sex with him herself or making any heirs, no matter how much the court tried to convince her that it was necessary.
Why would she ruin her body for a man she could barely stand? Who she was forced into a political marriage with?
Lately?
She was growing tempted to just take her clothes off and offer herself up if it meant Suguru would go a single day without insisting on having sex with you. Even if she’d be resisting the urge to gag and roll her eyes at every one of his groans.
“I’ll return to my chambers, Your Majesty,” you respectfully murmured, averting your gaze with faint shame creeping into your fair features. You were trying to not make this strange or strained, smoothing out your dress as you pushed your palms off the blanket.
“How many times must I ask you to call me Toru, hm?” She teased, breaking the tension with an easy laugh.
It used to be breezy to be around you.
Before he snatched you from her grip.
Back when you were both girls growing up together, as a princess and her maid. Your delicate hands brushing her hair and working all the knots out with nimble fingers at the end of every day, chatting about the scullery gossip before Satoru would pull you into the blankets and demand that you sleep next to her.
To keep the nightmares away.
Everyone always let Satoru do what she wanted.
Except for having you.
Sure, she could drag you around, take you everywhere she went, but instead of simply being hers, you were more of an accessory.
The most you could be was a maid. A servant.
Not a lover.
Satoru tried to be content with that. Truly.
Accepted it from an early age that you weren’t going to be hers when she was destined for a political relationship and your stare often lingered a little too long on knights instead of ladies.
She told herself that at least she got to bring you along to this palace to be by her side for this marriage, but the moment Suguru saw you standing next to her, he stole you.
Made you his concubine within the week, put you in your own room and dolled you up in gowns and gems. Satoru had been sneaking blue dresses in your new closet, replacing the jewel tones and purples with the shades of the sky, of the ocean rather than the rich hues he had such a proclivity for.
But it didn’t make much of a difference when you were tending to him now instead of her.
“Toru,” you said her name so sweetly, chewing the inside of your cheek now as you reluctantly met her stare. “I’m sorry you had to see that.”
“You are not the one who should apologize,” she exhaled, shrugging her shoulders as she walked over to where you were sheepishly staring at the blooming flowers.
Skimming a delicate hand over your arm, appreciating the warmth of your skin as she stopped just shy of your shoulder, tracing a little heart with the edge of her thumb as she soothed you.
“Come with me,” she murmured.
Your head snapped up, your eyes wavering and wide. Unsure. “Where?”
“My room,” Satoru hummed. “Like old times.”
Back when the only hands that ever had the fortune to brush over your body were hers. When you belonged solely to Satoru.
Funnily enough, you were still sleeping in her bed. Just with her husband.
What would she have to do to keep his calloused palms off her prize?
“Are you sure Suguru will be-”
“No man would complain about two beautiful women in his sheets,” she rolled her eyes, interlocking arms with you and pulling you forward.
It wasn’t exactly true.
Suguru would have plenty to grit his teeth and groan about when he wouldn’t get the chance to put his dick inside of you.
But you were naive enough to not realize that, smiling back at Satoru the way you used to, leaning against her arm and sighing with relief, relaxing once it struck you that she wasn’t upset with you.
“I’m not nearly as beautiful as you,” you wistfully mumbled under your breath, and Satoru’s heart soared. Pale cheeks heating up at your compliment, squeezing you reflexively as she laughed.
She knew she was beautiful. Blessed by the gods in nearly every aspect from the moment she was born.
But even when they had given her a face any male would love, they had cursed her with a heart that could only belong to a female.
To you.
Had been stamped with your name and sealed to be yours from the first day she found you.
It wasn’t fucking fair that Suguru got to just reap everything she sowed.
Got to be the one inside you, on top of you, beside you. Who could just openly want you with no repercussions.
If his smug smirks and sly remarks weren’t enough for her to loathe him, Satoru still would have hated him for that fact alone.
“I think you are far lovelier than any of these lousy flowers,” Satoru spoke softly, tilting her head around the garden she’d grown to only feel disgust for too.
It had been beautiful at first. A work of art she’d taken to walking the winding paths through in the evenings to calm her chaotic mind when the two of you first came here.
But all it had taken was to walk in on Suguru mounting you on a patio table the third week in for every last petal and blossom of this place to become tainted.
He was making a fucking fool of her.
Freely flaunting how much he adored fucking you wherever he wanted, whenever he wanted.
No doubt she wasn’t the first to catch the two of you.
“You flatter me,” you blushed, turning away from her as you picked up the pace.
You already knew the way back to her marital room.
Even if she wasn’t the one you usually came there for.
Satoru had separate chambers, of course, ones that were made solely for her, but she knew that Suguru would retaliate in some petty fashion if she brought you there instead.
“I am merely being honest,” Satoru hummed, lips curling up in an easy smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes.
She knew you well enough to know you were too embarrassed to respond. That you weren’t truly taking her seriously.
Shouldn’t you know by now that the only person she saved her sincerity for was you?
“I find myself missing you more and more,” Satoru slowly added, heart thumping so hard she was sure it would somehow end up lodged in her throat as you looked back at her with those big, apologetic eyes.
Guilt-ridden.
Weighed down by the obvious worry you carried for fucking her husband.
“I miss you too,” you murmured quietly, lip curling up in your best attempt at a smile before it immediately fell again.
“You seem tired,” Satoru observed, reaching over with her free hand to brush the hair away from your face. Treasuring the few seconds her fingertips skimmed across your soft cheeks. “Let’s get some rest.”
“But Suguru-”
“Do me a favor,” she purred, offering her most reassuring grin. “Do not worry about him.”
She could deal with it.
It was worth whatever trouble would come to watch you trade your dress for one of her silky blue nightslips, staring at the bare expanse of your exposed back as you bent over to shimmy it on, holding her breath as you turned around, looking absolutely delectable.
The sweetest dessert she could ever dream of.
And the only one she wasn’t allowed to taste.
“Do you want me to do your hair?” You asked, fiddling with your fingers as you nervously looked around the room.
Satoru wished she could wipe your anxieties away.
“I would never say no to that,” she said instead, putting up a far more carefree front than she truly felt.
Perching on the edge of the stool of her vanity, passing you her hairbrush as you slowly pulled all of her long, silky white strands back over her shoulder. You took your time brushing it out, carefully separating it as you went and making sure there were no tangles before you slowly began to braid it, nimble fingers working to twist the parted hair.
She could see your reflection in the mirror, the way you bit your kiss-swollen bottom lip, brows pinched together tightly in focus as your practiced hands made an easy job of it.
“There you go,” you hummed once you finished, tying a white ribbon at the end as you looked in the mirror back at her. “Do you like it?”
“I like everything you do,” Satoru replied on instinct.
Except for Suguru.
Your face flushed, smiling as you stepped back away from her, glancing over to the bed.
“Good night then,” you muttered.
“Good night,” Satoru replied, shoving down the lump in her throat as she tried to discreetly dry her clammy palms on her own nightdress as she stood up. Snuffing out a few of the candles so that the only light was from the flickering fire, crawling into bed after you, pretending to be unaffected by your proximity as she got under the sheets next to your body.
But she wasn’t quite as good at it as she used to be.
Unable to slow her breathing, chest rising and falling far too fast as you tossed and turned, the short hem of the slip riding up on your thighs under the covers as Satoru desperately stared at the ceiling of her four-poster bed and ignored the heat ignited in her core.
A steady pulse, an irritating throb straight to the center of her, speeding up each time your leg brushed against hers, or your hand accidentally grazed along her arm.
“Sweet dreams,” she belatedly whispered, but you had already fallen asleep, soon snoring on one of her pillows like you once did so long ago, hair sprawling out that Satoru couldn’t stop herself from softly stroking.
Her pretty maid, right where she belonged once more.
But for how long?
When would Suguru do something that would fully free you of her?
God, what the fuck was she going to do if he knocked you up? Forced you to bear his heir? Make you raise a whole brood of miniature hims?
That asshole would surely move you to a separate palace, maybe claim that Satoru made threats or something equally absurd to justify giving you a title or some security.
Satoru refused to let any of that happen.
You were more than just a breeding mare.
More than just a pawn to be played with – no matter what her husband attempted to turn you into.
Like she summoned a demon, the door swung open, and Satoru immediately removed her hand from by your head, sitting up in bed to stare at the intruder.
The real interloper here.
Suguru scowled at the sight of her next to you, his lips pressing in a thin line as he peeled off his expensive robe.
“Return to your private chambers,” he dismissed, irritation heavy in his voice.
“This marital bed is mine too,” Satoru retorted, patting the spot next to her to gesture for him to join.
She’d prefer not to spend the night suffering the masculine scent of his cologne, but she supposed she could just roll closer to you to inhale your much sweeter smell. It was always light, flowery, like some intoxicating summer bloom she wanted to pluck and preserve.
He laughed at the idea of sleeping together too, a low and cruel one.
Satoru wanted to snarl back that if she were a man, if they were both vying for your hand, you would have chosen her without a blink.
But she just had to bite her tongue and stare at the one person who had everything she wanted.
“Funny that I only find you in here when it’s with her,” he knowingly scoffed.
“Is it?” Satoru feigned ignorance. “I was the one who brought her here.”
Her husband didn’t care though.
No, he just walked over as if she had no place in this room, no right to her spot in the bed beside you, stripping his shirt off before removing his pants, as if a little bit of nudity would scare Satoru off.
“What do you think our love would do if she knew you lusted after her even more than I do?” Suguru mocked, barely making an effort to disguise his thinly-veiled threat. One corner of that irritating mouth of his curling up in a crude smirk, casually dismissing the weight of her affection for you to a simple sin.
His love?
Satoru almost laughed back at him.
You were hers. Had always been.
And would be once again.
“Shall I tell her?” He asked, tilting his head towards your sleeping figure as he pulled back the blankets to get in too.
“She would think it’s just a jest,” Satoru rolled her eyes, her nose scrunching up as he actually got in next to her.
It didn’t matter how obvious she made it to you.
You were blissfully unaware.
Clueless to the hunger she harbored in her heart to chain you to her.
“I suppose we’ll find out soon,” he muttered under his breath, and despite the shield she’d prepared, it splintered with sheer panic at the thought of you taking his word.
At the risk of you being repulsed by the realization, rejecting her and refusing to exist in the same space for the rest of her life.
That wouldn’t do.
Suguru was already a persistent problem.
But now it appeared she had no choice but to solve it before he could screw her over. Before he could wreck what she’d spent so long building.
She’d prefer to prepare a guillotine for his cock, to punish him for the crime of being inside you, but she refused to be the one put in prison for it.
No, Satoru needed a plan. A foolproof way for this to end with you in her arms.
Perhaps some poison to put His Royal Majesty in a grave while she was at it.
ε✿з
“Morning, beautiful.”
You wondered who your king’s groggy morning voice was meant for. You?
Or his wife?
Your true master.
“Good morning, husband,” Satoru replied, her usually sweet voice cold and clipped.
Of course.
You weren’t exactly surprised.
But what did throw you off was the two very different arms strewn across your waist, one thick and muscled slung low towards your hips while the other far daintier one was delicately tangled just below your breasts.
Somehow, you had ended up in between them.
Rather fitting, wasn’t it?
“I wasn’t speaking to you,” Suguru scolded her, and your stomach just curdled at the annoyance in his tone.
The weight on your midsection disappeared, and you tried to roll on your side, to pretend you were still asleep, but then he was pulling you against him, and you could only bite the inside of your cheek and focus on the taste of blood on your tongue to hold it together as something hefty and hard pressed into your spine.
It was just wrong to do this in front of Satoru.
You didn’t understand what Suguru saw in you anyway.
It wasn’t like you truly were stunning. Not compared to her.
You weren’t blind.
You’d always been rather plain put next to Satoru’s perfect face.
She was the one people stopped to stare at when she walked in a room, the subject of whispers and wishes and fools willing fate to just give them a single chance for the pleasure of one conversation in her presence.
And beneath her beauty was the sort of one-of-a-kind soul someone could spend the rest of their life searching for.
Even now, when you were sleeping with her husband, she was still being sweet to you.
Swearing that she knew you couldn’t do anything about being his concubine, bringing you back to her bed for a sleepover like she hadn’t caught you having sex with him.
You didn’t deserve her. And you really couldn’t comprehend why Suguru wouldn’t want her.
Yet, she always tried to spare your feelings.
Sent away any maid who mocked you and scolded any staff member that attempted to tease you ever since you were children.
Going from dismissing any knight that tried to flirt or feel you up as teenagers to stripping some lower noble of her rank simply for speaking ill of you two weeks ago over suggesting that she should punish you for trying to steal her husband.
You hadn’t asked for any of it.
All you wanted was to watch her fall in love. To stand by her side and see her find her happily ever after.
Instead, you were embroiled in an affair with the man she married.
And now the guilt was gnawing through your bones, shame shattering you every time she saw you with him.
You sort of felt like your life could be divided in two groups.
Before Satoru. After Satoru.
She saved you. You were born into servitude, to parents who worked in the worst kind of noble homes. The ones where the money was passed down with generations, belonging to spoiled gamblers and drunks who didn’t know how to do anything other than spend it — and couldn’t care less about their staff members.
You learned how to scrub baseboards and sweep instead of how to read and write. To never speak unless spoken to. To make yourself smaller than a speck of dust just to survive.
It didn’t matter.
They had a son a year older than you.
One that was particularly fond of pulling your hair and ripping up your uniforms every time you hung them out to dry.
Who found a passion in pushing you down and pretending to his family that you had committed every variety of petty crimes against him.
Your life was a living hell.
Until your angel showed up.
In a pretty white dress that matched her soft hair, the sun shining on her pale face as she blinked down at you with big, blue eyes. She was visiting with her parents, supposed to be attending a play date with your personal tormentor, only to walk in on him attempting to cut off a chunk of your hair with a knife he’d stolen from the chef.
He had accidentally cut you with it, a thin streak of blood trickling down your throat as you sobbed hysterically, unable to stop yourself as you curled up against the tree he cornered you against.
“Drop that,” she commanded, an air of authority to her even when she was still a child.
He did, even though his obedience seemed to surprise him.
“You’re not the boss of-”
She was already stepping forward though, kicking the knife away before graciously approaching you, unbothered by the sniffing mess you’d become, just squatting down and drying your tears with her sleeve.
“You’re coming home with me.”
And you did.
She had half-dragged you inside, forcing herself to fake tears of her own before crying to her parents that he had attacked her, and that you’d gotten hurt defending her.
They believed her lie.
And she bought you from the hellhole you were born into.
You would probably be dead without her.
Starved or beaten for not performing your duties well enough, discarded like some cheap possession instead of a person.
The boy was punished, his family’s status revoked — although you never learned what happened to them after that.
At least with Satoru, you could be her doll.
Someone she dressed up and dragged around to tea parties and meals, forcing everyone to have a chair for you like it was normal for a mere maid to dine with royalty.
She grew out of it when she got a little older, when people began to look down on you for her behavior instead of her.
But when they announced her marriage, she still refused to go unless she brought you with her, insisting that she wouldn’t adapt without a familiar face before whispering to you in private that she’d never leave her favorite friend behind.
Did she regret that now? Wish she never took you in to begin with?
You felt like a nuisance.
It was impossible to ignore the whispers of the court here, the constant discussion of the heir that didn’t currently exist.
All of it felt like your fault.
Surely, if you weren’t here, if you weren’t imposing, then Satoru might have already gotten pregnant, or perhaps have even had a child already.
As far as you knew, they had yet to even consummate their marriage.
You used to whisper about what it would be like to have sex. So sure that she would be the one to experience it first. Giggling under the covers about how the whole thing seemed sorta gross. To let a guy stick it inside of you and listen to him grunt and groan?
Honestly, you never thought it would be you giving up your virtue before her.
Sugugu hadn’t been shy about the fact you were the only one he was intimate with.
Turning his nose up and scoffing when you inquired about the status of their relationship, the same way Satoru did, as if it was simply absurd that they could ever have a baby together.
And now his royal advisors had started whispering suggestions that he should plant his seed in you instead, murmuring that if Satoru was too stubborn, he must secure his line another way as if you weren’t in the same room when they said it.
As if your loyalty hadn’t always lied with her.
But she wouldn’t listen to your warnings.
How were you supposed to convince two people who acted like they couldn’t stand each other to not only have sex, but create a child?
You knew you were a fool. Naive to still presume that there must be some way to make this work without making Satoru suffer. But you couldn’t stop trying.
“I would like you to leave,” Suguru snapped at her, and years of experience had engrained the instant impulse to protect her in you.
To interrupt and insist that she had every right to be here too.
Even if Satoru had never once needed you to defend her. Not the same way you needed her.
“Will you drag me out if I do not?” She cheekily returned, and you finally forced yourself to start to stir, to stop the argument already in progress as they both immediately fell silent. Satoru’s soft hand skimmed over your forearm, delicately dragging her fingertips up to your shoulder before yawning, “Good morning, sleepyhead.”
“Morning,” you muttered, slowly cracking your eyes open and beginning to sit up just for a second hand to shift to the small of your back.
“Did she bother you with all her tossing and turning?” Your king asked, concern veiling his contempt for his wife as he peered down at you with those dark purple eyes. Devoid of the light you were used to seeking, swirling with something you weren’t quite comfortable enough to name.
Sometimes, you wondered how much he wanted you, and how much he wanted to piss her off. Equally unhappy at the situation he’d been thrusted in, forced to marry a stranger he didn’t know or want and finding refuge in pissing off the one person that was also innocent in this. Taking it out on her instead when he had no way to punish the system he was stuck in.
“Satoru never bothers me,” you answered honestly, still doing your best to mend the bridge between them as you peered up at him with an expression you hoped would earn some empathy from him.
Or at the very least, get him to not toss her out before she even stepped foot out of the bed.
“You’re too sweet,” he muttered, sitting up straighter to let the blankets fall down around his bare waist. Tenderly caressing your cheek as you stilled, thinking of what he seemed to leave unsaid. Too sweet for whom? Him? Or her?
You supposed you were just overthinking it, blinking nervously before he leaned down to kiss you on the lips right there in front of her, pushing his tongue in as you tried not to scrunch your nose up at the thought that he had yet to brush his teeth before slipping his tongue in your mouth.
But you returned it, accustomed to going with the tides instead of swimming against them, allowing him to possessively splay his fingers across your back as if Satoru’s fingers weren’t still sinking into your shoulder.
And by the time he pulled away, you had collected yourself enough to smile sincerely back at him when he rested his forehead against yours.
It wasn’t that you disliked him, or harbored any hatred for him.
The feeling swirling in your stomach was closer to pity. You felt bad for him.
He felt like a flip side to Satoru. Reminded you of her in his own strange way when he spoke to you like you were more than just a maid. Even if he only saw you as his own accessory instead of hers.
“Meet me in the gardens at noon,” he instructed, slipping out of his bed as you both stared. His back muscles flexed as he bent over, only throwing a look back to wink at you while Satoru made a quiet gagging noise next to you.
You nearly giggled, only holding it in when his dark brows pinched together in a glare back at her.
“Of course, Your Majesty,” you murmured, nodding dutifully as his chest puffed back out with pride. Finishing redressing quickly, his mouth twitching down at the two of you in his bed, but he didn’t say anything to disprove Satoru’s theory about men and beautiful women.
“Alone,” Suguru added, starting towards the door before Satoru could add something snarky.
The moment he was out the door, you could hear his voice calling through it for a servant, and you already pictured the way a few were likely stationed at the end of the hall, ready to accompany him and do whatever he wanted.
“Meet me in the gardens,” Satoru mimicked him, rolling her bright blue eyes as her long lashes fluttered dramatically as she twisted you back around to face her. “He’s so insufferable.”
“Satoru,” you said her name, face heating up at the way the syllables felt rolling off your tongue, still strange to address her so intimately when she was so far above you. “It worries me-”
“No,” she interrupted you sternly, your shoulders slumping at her unexpected scolding. “There is nothing for you to worry about.”
“But the two of you-”
“I know,” she sympathized, knowing what you were about to protest before you had to say it. Seeing through all of you the way no one else ever did, or probably ever would. “But you should just keep doing what he asks.”
Like you couldn’t see how much it hurt her to even suggest that.
Satoru was more sensitive than she’d ever show. Feelings hidden under her carefully crafted shield, always pretending to be the perfect princess on her towering pedestal, protected by some impenetrable glass that never let you touch her.
She could say she couldn’t stand Suguru. But who wouldn’t be hurt at the man they married so blatantly disrespecting them?
“I just want you to be happy,” you softly said.
“I will be. Eventually,” Satoru stiffly said, dragging her thumb over your bottom lip like she was wiping off his kiss. “We just have to grin and bear it for now.”
“And things will get better?” You hopefully asked, reaching up to clasp her hand. Feeling a little bit like a child again, looking up to her with blind trust, faith that she could fix problems that seemed far too big for you. Imagining all three of you a few months from now, getting along and grinning over lunch in the garden, sitting underneath the shade of an umbrella and snacking with Satoru on one side and Suguru on the other.
“I promise they will.”
There was nothing you craved more than for her to be correct.
But your blind belief in her started to fizzle and fade when the days refused to stop dragging on while you rarely got to see her. Only catching glimpses of her from across the room, usually when one of you was being flaunted on Suguru’s arm and the other was left to stand on the side and stare. Barely getting a chance to speak to her when the king you were both supposed to obey had decided you were better kept in your bed chambers or his private office, away from the wife he pretended didn’t exist around you.
You tried to tell yourself what she had.
To just bear it.
Comforting yourself with the handful of smiles she snuck you, reassuring yourself that you didn’t have to be wracked with guilt every second you spent with Suguru. That you shouldn’t hate yourself for the moments with him where you found yourself actually enjoying his company, or genuinely giggling at a joke he made.
It didn’t make it easier to stop loathing the parts of you that liked the attention. Being doted on and deemed deserving of more than just the monotony of being a maid.
Underneath it all, you still knew what was coming.
A girl like you was only measured by what uses she was good for.
Could taste his expectation in the air long before Suguru delivered the curdling news over tea, sitting there like a brainless doll as he informed you that he had the maids brew the kind that helped fertility.
Casually suggesting that you make a fine mother as you feigned agreement, running off to a bush to throw it up the moment he left to attend to other business.
You couldn’t do that to her.
No, you wouldn’t.
You refused.
It wasn’t like you had any idea how you would refuse, not when you were sure he would be back in your bedroom tonight. Stripping off his robes with that easy smirk of his, placing his crown on your head as he buried his cock in you, probably already planning on no longer pulling out but plunging himself deep enough to make sure the seed he planted was sowed.
That it would sprout into an heir he could use as an excuse to remove any power his wife politically held.
You puked again.
Bile rising that you couldn’t push down, getting sick until you finally managed to suck in enough deep breaths to pull yourself together, wiping the corner of your mouth and standing back up on trembling legs, looking around to make sure no one had seen you.
But a few maids were standing nearby, wide-eyed and whispering to each other before scampering off in a hurry once your stare caught theirs, surely off to spread rumors about what they’d seen.
You were stumbling away too, walking back inside the cobbled halls and hurrying through the twists and turns, ignoring the pointed looks you received from staff members and guards passing by. You weren’t sure where you were going until you were there, nervously tapping your knuckles against the door to Satoru’s office, hardly able to keep your breathing steady until you heard her call out in an annoyed tone, “Come in.”
You pushed it open, holding your breath as you peeked inside to see her head hanging down behind her desk. Her cheek resting on her hand, silky hair falling around her shoulders as she sighed and scribbled something into a thick book.
“What is it-”
“I’m sorry,” you half-whispered, your voice coming out as a croak from your sore throat.
She immediately stopped what she was writing as her head snapped up at the realization it was you, shutting the book and placing her palm over it. Her blue eyes were razor sharp, freezing over in a flash under furrowed brows.
“What happened?” She demanded to know without a pause. Ready to go to war with just two words.
“He wants me to have his heir,” you blurted out, still panicking as you looked to her like there was something she could do about it.
In all the years you’d known her, the only other time you’d seen the expression that was on her face now was the day you first met her.
Focused and flat at the same time, not betraying anything as she just blinked at you once more.
“Tell me you don’t want it,” she requested, completely serious as you struggled to tear your stare away.
“Of course I don’t,” you answered, shaking your head as your fingers nervously clutched at the skirt of your dress, fiddling with some of the fine embroidery as you struggled to catch your breath, the taste of vomit lingering in your mouth as you thought about what your life would look like a year from now if you did. A black-haired baby on your hip and a hole punctured straight through your heart.
You almost added that you had only come here for her, but you couldn’t bring yourself to when all that had resulted in was you warming her husband’s bed.
What would her life have been like had you stayed behind? Would you have been kicked out of the palace you’d spent years by her side in? Left to start over in some quaint village, maybe starting a small farm or working in a local shop instead?
You would choose any of it over being the reason she was suffering. Even if it meant struggling and scraping by all alone.
“I will take care of it,” she stiffly said, her nose upturned in the air as she pushed a plate of cookies someone had left on her desk away from her. “You should go now.”
A piece of you shattered.
Some deep internal wound ripping open at her quick dismissal, despite your instinct to believe that her words were more binding than any oath.
“But-”
“Trust me, princess,” she softened her tone, smiling now, like you couldn’t see how tight of a line her mouth made. Using a nickname she hadn’t called you in years, back when she tried to make you feel better about the difference in your status, late night promises that you could be her princess and she could be yours.
“Toru,” you murmured back, watching her eyes crinkle for a second before she shook her hair and pointed a delicate finger towards the door.
“Please leave,” she asked, and you had never been good at disobeying her.
Feeling like a mutt that had been thrown out in the rain, tail tucked between your legs as you walked all the way across the palace to your own chambers. Pacing the floor there in a panic, wringing your hands and wearing out the carpet as you tried to think of some solution.
Stupid nobles and their moronic obsession with bloodlines.
Why couldn’t they just adopt a child and raise it correctly?
You would have his child if Satoru asked you to. If she said she didn’t want to do it herself.
But you were scared for her. Terrified that she would somehow end up thrown out if you had an heir and she refused to.
Maybe it would be easier if one of them were less stubborn. If Satoru was less prideful and Suguru more agreeable.
Was that asking for the impossible?
Just an idiot jammed between a rock and a hard place and wondering why you couldn’t squeeze out?
You prepared yourself that evening anyway, going through the motions of putting on the thin style nightdress Suguru preferred, but picking one in a soft shade of blue that reminded you more of Satoru. Carefully applying a thin layer of makeup, exhaling at your reflection as you wondered to yourself where the girl from a few years ago had gone.
She probably would have strangled you for suggesting sleeping with Satoru’s king, no matter the circumstance.
And right now, you would give just about anything to go back to those days. Where the most important thing you had to worry about was how to style Satoru’s hair the next day, or what would be served for breakfast in the morning.
“You’re wearing blue.”
Your head turned to find Suguru standing there in the doorway, his lips turned down as his hazy stare slid over your body. You hurried to stand, forgoing spritzing the fancy perfume he gifted you across your skin as he strode over to you. Ready to fake moans and feign devotion.
“Is this not one you gave me?” You innocently asked, tilting your head to the side.
It wasn’t like you could purchase your own dresses.
Truthfully, you had no idea what even happened to the funds you saved up before Satoru brought you here. She had said she would take care of the transfer, but within days of coming here, you were being whisked off your feet and away from her by the man in front of you now.
“I guess it doesn’t matter,” he muttered, his fingers plucking one of the straps off your shoulder and pulling it down with a sigh as he ignored your inquiry. “I’m taking it off of you anyway.”
His hands shook while he removed it, his fingers unsteady for once as he tried to shimmy your panties down your thighs next. He kissed you, but the sour taste of wine was still on his lips, and you ached to pull away.
To ask him to reconsider what he wanted from you.
Even if you knew that wasn’t your place.
To your surprise though, he retreated first, your mouth still hanging open as he let out a low groan. You knew something was wrong at the sound of it. How guttural it came out when you hadn’t even touched his cock yet.
You blinked up at him only to see red.
Blood dripped down his lips as he stared at you without really seeing you, fear glittering his dark eyes empty in the candlelight as your own fingers reached out to wipe it away. Had you bitten him without realizing it? Was he hurt?
Before you could even touch it, he coughed hard, and your face was suddenly wet.
Your hand was still outstretching towards him the moment he collapsed.
Someone screamed, but it wasn’t until servants began running into the room that you realized the horrible sound was coming from you, ripped from the back of your throat as the scene immediately morphed into a mess. Maids shouting for doctors and rushing around to try and stop the bleeding that was still pouring from his mouth, propping him up. But even if his eyes were open, they weren’t blinking.
Had his soul already separated from the still shell he left behind?
Something damp hit your palm, your fuzzy vision struggling to focus as it belatedly struck you that you were still dripping with the red, your palms shaking, refusing to stop twitching at the unnerving sight of it.
Steady drops begging to drop down to your bare breasts, staining your skin as you stumbled back, running from the inevitable as your shattered gasps wouldn’t allow enough air into your lungs.
This wasn’t happening.
It couldn’t be.
This must be a nightmare. Some awful dream you’d gotten dragged into as you tried to wake yourself back up, desperately wiping your face as you struggled to get it clean, but nothing was working. Nothing was changing.
Hyperventilating as a maid shouted, calling in guards while your back hit the wall, your fingers trembling as you buried your face in your hands, as if you could hide from what was happening.
“Is he still alive?”
No. No no no.
If he was gone, what the hell would happen to you?
There were too many people in the room, too much going on for you to focus on what was happening in front of you. Your ears filling you in no matter how much you desperately wanted to shut it all out.
To rewind the clock, even if it was just for a few minutes. Bring it back to where everything was still normal.
The palace doctor arrived out of breath as you peeked back up at your world unraveling only to find him shaking his head as he checked the limp body on the floor’s pulse.
You knew it before he said it though. Had from the moment he coughed and collapsed.
“The king is dead.”
The only person in power now was his wife.
Someone was probably on their way to get Satoru now, to shake her awake from her bed and notify her that her husband was no longer among the living.
Even if you didn’t want to have his baby, you still never would have chosen this.
Curling up with your bare knees to your chest, staring at your blood-splattered blue nightdress left in a crumpled pile on the floor, eyes wild as you watched people rush in and out.
Guards filing in, one of them ripping you up from off the ground with a rough grip on your arm, barking some question you didn’t understand as you tried to shake your head, dragging you out of the room as you got one last glimpse at Suguru’s still form staring up at the ceiling.
“Did you do this?”
“What?” You blinked, turning back with disgust as you rebuffed it. “I-I wouldn’t-”
The guard wasn’t listening, pulling you out only for you to nearly run into someone else.
Your pounding heart stopped the second you realized it was Satoru.
Her pretty face pinched up with disdain, long hair loose and cascading down her back, an intricate amethyst-colored gown draping over the cobbled hall as she looked down at you, her mouth twitching as her gaze drifted across your exposed skin.
You were about to beg her to tell them that it couldn’t have been you, bottom lip trembling as you tried to get the words out, but she cut you off, looking to the knight by her side as she solemnly shook her head.
“Lock her up.”
She couldn’t mean it.
It honestly felt more far-fetched than Suguru’s sudden death. Unable to understand those three sharp words that left her lips until another man was yanking you away, pulling you down corridors.
Humiliation burned through you as the initial shock started to fade and the reality of your situation began to sit in. Being dragged naked across the palace until you were led up a long spiralling staircase to a tower you’d never stepped foot inside before.
Spared the cruelty of the cold dungeons only to be shoved inside a tiny room at the top, a heavy door slammed shut as your eyes struggled to adjust to the darkness surrounding you. A barren space with only a small bed pushed against the wall, a small window that was only big enough for you to peek out of, the bitter night breeze blowing in through it as you stood there, waiting for, well, you weren’t sure what.
Satoru to show up and swear this was all some awful joke? To tell you that she didn’t mean to scare you and that everything was fine? That this was all a part of some plan of hers?
Wishful thinking, wasn’t it?
If they thought you were responsible, that you somehow killed him, you would be executed within a month.
Maybe not even offered a trial, just dragged out to be hanged or beheaded without a chance to defend yourself.
Who would have sympathy for a traitor?
A poor maid masquerading as a concubine, one who truly should have never had a place beneath the king to begin with.
All you were was an ignorant idiot that was born to take the blame. No matter your innocence.
And yet, when you finally heard footsteps approaching your lonely room, you were still rushing towards it, ready to plead your case to whoever showed up.
When you heard Satoru’s voice, you nearly sobbed.
She must be coming to let you out. To explain everything away and bring you back to her room the way she once had. Whisk you away and remind you with that charming smile that she had told you not to worry.
Satoru wasn’t your knight in shining armor. She was better.
A hero with her white-haired halo, your blue-eyed angel in a gossamer gown.
“Toru, please,” you called out, peeking up to discover a rectangle carved out of the thick wood of the door, wide enough for you to look back out into the barely-lit hallway.
“Make sure no one comes up here,” Satoru coldly instructed the knights outside, your heart stalling as you stared at her through that thin slat. The heavy click of several additional locks followed while her sharp eyes watched you back, your heart shattering into even tinier bits with each one.
And then Satoru did something that stomped on all the remaining shards of it.
She left.
You broke down, sobbing on the floor until there wasn’t anything left in you to cry out. Curling up on the frigid ground instead of the bed, unable to even summon the strength to get up and crawl towards it.
At some point, you supposed you fell asleep like that, because when you woke up to a fraction of the sun slipping in through your tiny window, there were clothes and food delivered, along with a cold bucket of water and a washrag.
Too numb to feel thankful, as if someone had scooped every part of you out as you ignored the food in front of you, about to cup a handful of water and drink it before you looked down at your hands and saw all the dried blood still staining them, your stomach shifting once again as the memory of Suguru’s face before he died floated up in your brain.
You scrubbed your skin, washing Suguru off of you until the bucket had run red, staring at the liquid sloshing around. Refusing to stop until you were certain there were no traces of him left, your hands raw and trembling when you dropped the rag back down.
Putting clothes back on didn’t make you feel any better.
Not when you had traded the fancy dresses you had just begun to get used to for a plain one, the material scratching your skin as you finally managed to get yourself up into the bed.
But even just trying to go back to sleep didn’t work when a knight came barging in to conduct an interrogation.
Which essentially just meant hours of him asking the same questions and getting angry when you kept giving him the same answers?
“Did you conspire to kill the king?” No.
“Did you poison him?” No.
“Did you have any reason to want him dead?” Yes. No.
It didn’t matter what you said though.
As long as it didn’t align with what he was hoping to hear, he wouldn’t give any of your words credence.
And by the end of it, you were being dragged back to your cell, waiting for a fate far worse than simply being the mother of the future heir to the kingdom.
Even if you used to think there was nothing worse than betraying Satoru.
Being abandoned by her was the cruelest sentence of all.
A raw throbbing ache taking up residence in your chest, reminding you of her absence with every short breath you sucked in, no blankets to curl up and hide under as you waited for the inevitable.
You knew what the cold felt like. How brittle it could be when it settled into your bones. Knew how starvation felt when your body started to break down bits of yourself for sustenance.
But knowing her warmth, how full she could make you feel, only ate at you more. Shoved off the pretty pedestal she placed you on, no longer sparkling or polished as you stared at your bitten-down nails and numbly craved pieces of her you knew would never be yours.
Perhaps this was punishment for dreaming too big.
For ever thinking that you could have her while you were still catering to Suguru.
A day passed.
And another.
The hours slipping past you in a dull daze, food delivered that you refused to take a bite of. A little voice in your head that was quickly growing delirious suggested that it could be poisoned, and it was the only thing that tempted you into taking a small bite.
But then you thought of the fear in Suguru’s eyes when he died, and you dropped it again, returning to your uncomfortable bed, curling up to stare at the same wall you’d been studying the cracks in since you first crawled into it.
You were losing it.
About to start speaking to yourself just to stop the silence from driving you crazy, only your thoughts to keep you company as you tossed and turned, no energy left in your exhausted limbs as you tried to think of all the ways this could end.
Unable to come up with a way out of this when the only person you ever found worth living for had decided you weren’t worth it anymore.
Satoru had told you to trust her.
But you never had anything to offer her other than loyalty.
And what good was that when you would’ve had her husband’s baby if he hadn’t died?
She must hate you.
“Oh, princess.”
Great.
You had lost it.
Were you hearing things now? Sanity slipping away with every day you decided not to eat?
“Won’t you at least look at me?” Satoru’s sweet voice called out to you.
You weren't going to, stubbornly keeping your head forward until you heard the locks actually unlatching. Sitting up on the thin mattress and turning just in time to see the door opening, and your angel returning to you.
An easy smile curling up on her glossy lips, her ethereal eyes sparkling in the fading light of the day drifting in from outside, a white dress softly fluttering around her frame as she leaned against the wall like she was waiting for you to get down on your knees and thank her.
“I didn’t do it,” you breathed, almost automatically.
You needed her to believe-
“Sweetheart,” she softly shook her head as she sighed. “I know.”
Then why did she throw you in a tower and lock you up like this? Leave you a broken mess, laid bare and bloody?
“I just had to take care of a few things,” Satoru cooed.
You didn’t move. Couldn’t.
Unable to speak when you stared at her, feeling like a stranger in your own skin as you studied her back.
“Did you think I would just let you rot?” She teased, as if you weren’t still a prisoner while she tilted her head to the side, appraising you like you were some fruit she had finally decided to pluck.
It hurt.
A small wound ripping open beneath the surface, one you were quick to bandage up and come up with excuses for.
Almost immediately telling yourself that surely, she came to you as soon as she could, relief washing over the fresh sting at the realization she truly didn’t think you were behind Suguru’s death. That she hadn’t abandoned you after all.
“Don’t just sit there and stare at me,” she huffed, sick of your silence, folding her arms across her chest and frowning at you.
“Toru?” You croaked out her name, wanting to trust that it still had a place on your lips as you waited for her to disappear. Standing up on unsteady legs, muscles sore from how little you’d used them lately as you took unsure steps forward. A piece of you still convinced that you might be imagining this, or drifted off to some pretty dream where she played the same role she always did.
Your savior.
But when you got to her, hesitantly reaching out to touch her face, your fingertips trembling as you touched her cheek to discover it was solid.
Soft.
“I missed you too,” she murmured affectionately, reaching up to hold your hand there. Relaxing into your touch as you felt something inside you instantly crumble at the tiniest show of regard.
And before you could stop yourself, you threw your arms around her neck, tears welling up as you inhaled the sweet scent of her perfume, burying your face in her throat as a rough sob escaped you.
She let you.
Didn’t push you off or give you that look like you had overstepped some boundary.
No, she just slid a hand over your back, holding you closer and letting you cry into her collarbone. Stroking your hair, slowly picking out the tangles and knots in it as your body shuddered with the force of your tears.
You didn’t think you had anything left in you to cry.
But apparently there you weren’t dried out yet, and she held you through all of it. Murmuring soft words into your ear, coaxing you to calm down as you struggled to piece yourself back together after you let it all fall apart.
“I swear, I would never do anything that could put you at risk,” you added, anxiety still swirling around your thoughts as you shook your head.
“Don’t worry,” Satoru purred, squeezing you as another shudder wracked through your body. “The right person will be imprisoned soon.”
As terrible as it sounded, you couldn’t find it in yourself to care who had done it, or even why, as long as it meant you and Satoru would be safe.
The rest was just noise.
You could go back to being her maid. Waiting on her hand and foot if it meant you wouldn’t have to be away from her side again.
And if the court tried to take her crown, or shipped her back to her own palace after the rightful king had been killed, well, you both could get through it together, couldn’t you?
“I thought you left me,” you mumbled, your voice cracking as she tenderly hummed your name.
“I would never,” she swore, petting your head as she pulled you into her chest, your shoulders slumping at how tightly she held you.
“Promise?” You hopefully asked, needing to know. Needing her to say she wasn’t going anywhere.
Simply needing her.
“I promise.”
You believed her with just two words.
Under her spell in a handful of moments, your heart pounding in your chest when she eventually pulled away, cupping your face and wiping away your tears like it hurt for her to see you crying.
“Come with me,” she spoke slowly, her thumb skimming lightly over your cheekbone.
You would follow her anywhere.
Across the kingdom. To another, or even over the sea to some small countryside village. Any place was fine.
As long as she wanted you there.
Skipping down the long stairs after her, your pulse thrumming in your eardrums as you waited to get stopped by some guard, for a knight to pop up and point a sword at you for absconding with their queen.
No one else was around however, the halls barren and silent as her soft fingers interlaced through yours, tugging you ahead as she navigated through them with ease.
“Were you starving yourself for my attention?” She half-whispered, her voice hushed and husky as she threw you a look you didn’t understand.
Was she disappointed in you?
“I haven’t been hungry,” you mumbled, shaking your head. You never thought she’d come check on you. Or even be keeping tabs through whoever came to drop off the food for you.
“That’s no excuse,” she softly scolded you.
“I’m sorry,” you automatically apologized, hanging your head lower as she opened a door and ushered you into a room you’d never been in before.
It looked like it was actually fit for a princess.
Ornately designed and filled with expensive furniture you couldn’t fathom the cost of, your body freezing just two short steps inside as she shut the door behind you. Quickly making herself comfortable, slipping off her short heels and walking over to the massive bed against one wall, looking back at you with barely concealed excitement, searching your face to see if you shared
“You can stay here for now,” she whispered, winking at you as she ran her palm over the soft fabric of the blankets adorning the bed. “It’ll be our secret.”
Your secret.
The words echoed in your head, unable to shut your open mouth as you struggled to take your eyes off of her.
“Much better than that dingy tower, hm?” Satoru goaded, pride glittering in her brilliant stare.
“What is this?” You asked, looking around at the intricate tapestries hung on the walls, the plush carpets laid over the floor, the carvings into the wooden dressers and the canopy of the bed.
“Your room,” she happily hummed.
“My-” You couldn’t even say it out loud.
It had to be a joke.
“There’s a warm bath waiting for you,” she murmured, nodding towards an adjoining door you’d been too overwhelmed to notice before. “And some fresh fruit on a platter by the tub. Your favorites.”
What were you meant to make of this?
Her belated apology for locking you up for days? For leaving you behind to handle affairs far bigger than you?
Something itched at the back of your conscience, telling you to second guess this gift.
But how were you supposed to listen to your better judgement when everything left of your sensibility had been broken?
“Please eat something,” she added, and all you could do was nod your head like a moron.
“I will,” you dutifully answered.
Who were you to disobey your queen?
“Do you need help getting out of that?” She asked, glancing towards your dress, nose wrinkling at the dirt on it before she dusted herself off like perhaps you’d gotten her filthy too.
“No, I can do it,” you insisted, slipping into the bathroom before you could somehow end up even more self-conscious.
But your muscles were already aching for relief, a throbbing pain beginning in your shoulder when you lifted your dress up and over your head.
One that was thankfully soothed by the still warm water in the tub, a welcome relief to the frigid water buckets you’d been sticking using the last few days. Flower petals floating on the surface, bath salts mixed in as you sank yourself in neck-deep.
True to her word, there was a platter of food set up by the tub, and you forced yourself to take a few bites, nibbling on just enough to satisfy her request.
Satoru was trying to take care of you.
Shouldn’t it be the other way around?
Offering your shoulder for her to cry or cling to after her husband died horrifically?
Of course, you knew she didn’t like him. Or well, more accurately, she loathed him. But his passing put her in a precarious position, her own life most likely hanging in the balance when she had no heir to guarantee her safety or status here.
You didn’t know what she was going to do.
Which also meant you had no idea what you were going to do.
A piece of you wished you were born a man. That you’d been given the chance or opportunity to learn swordsmanship, or got to train with the knights. That you would be able to protect Satoru, shield her from these petty and cruel court politics instead of getting caught in the crossfire.
Washing yourself of the last few days did not help quell your feelings of inadequacy, or solve a single one of your problems, no matter how soothing it was to soak and scrub yourself clean properly this time.
You didn’t linger in the tub.
No matter how much you might have liked to, a far greater part of you longed to be around Satoru. Craving her company after you’d been deprived of her presence for so long. You wanted to curl up in her lap like you used to, back when you were children and she’d be the one to comfort you over every skinned knee and scraped elbow.
Stepping out of the tub with a heavy sigh, squinting when you discovered something wasn’t quite right.
“Toru?” You called out, glancing around the small room searching for something that was evidently forgotten. “There’s no towel.”
Or change of clothes.
Nothing but your discarded dress from before to cover up, although you weren’t exactly inclined to pick it back up.
You thought she’d just open the door and toss something to put on.
Not just swing the door open and saunter in a second later, not even blinking as her eyes swept over your bare form. Lingering on the swell of your breasts and the way the water droplets were still rolling down between them.
“The maid must have forgotten,” she hummed, dragging her stare off of you to do a courtesy sweep of the room. “Give me a moment.”
You were overthinking it.
Nodding obediently as you glanced down at your legs, shuffling on your feet as heat rose to your cheeks, thankful for the soft thud of the door shutting.
She returned a couple minutes later, a towel in one arm and a white gown that looked an awful lot like a short version of her own in the other, passing both to you with that practiced smile of hers she usually saved for when she was up to something.
“There you go,” Satoru chirped. “I’ll wait for you.”
It wasn’t like she hadn’t seen you naked before.
But this felt decidedly different.
And you didn’t know what to do about the strange fluttering in your stomach at the idea of her watching you dress, at the way her eyes had drifted so dangerously slowly over the shape of you.
Was this a dream?
Were you still asleep? Still stuck in that tower?
Wishing for something you had never once been able to admit to yourself that you wanted?
You took an extra few minutes to dry off, adjusting the way the dress hung over you five times too many before you paused to brush your teeth in the mirror, avoiding your reflection as you spit in the sink, watching the tinged pink drool disappear with a soft exhale.
Satoru was pristine. Pure.
And what were you?
You opened the door, fiddling with the hem of the dress she’d given you as you nearly ran straight into where she was waiting right outside of it.
“I was getting worried,” she lightly joked, and you were brushing past her, a painful surge of panic bubbling back up.
“Why are you doing this for me?” You asked, hyper aware of how undeserving you were as you padded barefoot back into the overwhelmingly lovely room. “It’s too much, I-”
“You should know by now that nothing is too much for me when it comes to you,” Satoru chided with a soft chuckle. Refusing to let you step away from her, grabbing your wrist before you could slip away.
She was so close.
That familiar scent of her lulling you back in, daring you to breathe her in again.
And god, you wanted to.
Satoru said your name, and before you knew what you were doing, you were leaning up on your tip toes and pressing your lips to hers, impulsively planting a kiss to her strawberry-flavored mouth.
You knew within half a second that you shouldn’t have done it, but you couldn’t stop yourself, deepening it as your fingertips tenderly grazed her impossibly perfect skin. It took every ounce of self restraint for you to pull away from her, shaking your head as you tried not to cry at the thought you would never get to do that again.
“I’m sorry,” you whispered, immediately wishing you could take it back, sure that she would throw you back in the tower for the crime of presuming you could possibly deserve anything as sweet as her lips. “I shouldn’t have-”
But before you could so much as finish your sentence, Satoru was cupping your face and pulling you back in, her nose nestling against yours as her blue eyes sparkled with something you’d never seen in them before.
“Do it again.”
ε✿з
You were kissing her.
For a moment, Satoru was sure she had died and this was heaven.
How often had she scrawled into diaries her deepest dreams of getting to experience the taste of you on her tongue?
Your gentle hands on her face and your heaving chest pressed against hers, lips slipping between her own with desperate affection.
You. Desperate. For her.
Her brain only conjuring her small words and short sentences, too overwhelmed by the sensation of your soft mouth to think straight.
God, you tasted so good.
Fruity and sweet at the same time, your delicate fingers sifting through her hair as you let out the quietest squeak Satoru immediately wanted to hear over and over, sure she’d never get sick of the sound.
And behind the lovestruck haze, a jealous voice scoffed that she should’ve killed Suguru far sooner for getting to taste you like this first.
Slipped the poison in his cup the moment he set his sights on you and made his intent to steal you clear.
Of course, cleaning it up would’ve been much messier, but red hot jealousy coiled and cut through all her cold logic when she thought of his massive mitts manhandling you instead of treating you like the rare flower you really were.
Satoru was the one who spent her life watering you, taking care to tend to the soil and fertilize it, making sure you’d bloom so beautifully for her, and he tried to rip your roots out like you wouldn’t just wither away without her.
“Satoru,” you whispered her name, sucking in a sharp breath as you pulled back, eyes shining with surprise.
“You have no idea how long I’ve been waiting for you,” she swallowed hard, spit pooling in the back of her mouth.
From the day you looked up at her like some wounded lamb, you had been hers.
Perhaps it had just taken a little separation for you to see that too.
“You were waiting for me?” You repeated, that dazed, dreamy look in your eyes as you looked up at her, as if you thought she was going to change her mind.
“My heart has always been yours,” she proclaimed, although the confession she used to imagine came out far more shaky than it had in her head. Not nearly as cool or collected or calm as she pictured when your cheek was so warm beneath her palm.
Praying that you wouldn’t change your mind now that she had no way to take back the words.
“But I’m-” You were about to put yourself down. To diminish the light inside you that she loved so much.
“You’re mine.”
And no one else’s now.
Before you could protest, claim something silly about the difference in your status, she was pulling you back onto the bed, your form landing on top of hers as the feathered mattress cushioned the fall. You tried to wiggle back, but Satoru simply gripped your waist, refusing to let you budge as she pushed her bottom lip out in a pout you immediately softened for.
“Say it for me,” she requested.
“I have always belonged to you,” you acquiesced, and Satoru wanted to bury herself inside of your heart to make sure there really was no space for anyone else inside of it.
That it was wholly hers the way you already occupied every nook and crevice of her body and brain.
She was craning her neck up to kiss you again, your mouth meeting hers a little slower, more hesitation creeping in as your body began to melt against her. A possessive hand sliding up your spine, already annoyed at the fabric separating your skin from hers.
Needing to feel you properly, for your soft flesh to dimple beneath her fingers, to leave lovebites scattered across every inch of you that you offered.
“It killed me to see you with him,” she muttered, chest seizing at how vulnerable the confession came out.
“I’m sorry,” you whispered, shaking your head before she abruptly flipped you over, pinning you beneath her and pushing your dress up to expose-
Oh fuck.
Was every part of you so pretty?
Your pussy glistening as she nudged your thighs further apart, her pulse pounding in her ears as she finally got to see all of you up close. Presented perfectly for her, your nose scrunched up like you might be scared she could possibly find something wrong with you instead of being awestruck by the simple sight of you splayed out for her.
She might not have a cock, but Satoru was sure she could make you cum hard enough to forget about any petty insecurities that might be plaguing you.
“Take your gown off,” Satoru instructed, only realizing how stern it came out when you faltered, hesitating as you bit your bottom lip. “Please.”
Before she had to break down and beg for you to strip.
Satoru sat up and started lifting off her own dress as well, watching the way your eyes hung onto the heave of her breasts, how they kept shyly flickering back up to her face as your fingers slowly moved to remove the fabric.
You weren’t girls anymore.
Not kids playing husband and wife, or king and queen.
Exploring each other for keeps, hands tepidly traveling across hips and thighs and breasts at first, although it didn’t take much time for the touches to turn needy.
Hungry for something you’d both been starving yourselves of for years.
Could you really blame Satoru for not being able to stop herself?
For hooking one of those soft thighs of yours over her shoulder and dragging her tongue along the inside of it before the last little tendril of self-control she possessed snapped?
She had to have you.
Slipping two fingers inside you slowly, feeling the way you squeezed around her digits, your mouth forming a delicious little ‘o’ she wanted to kiss again. Already shaking before she even began to swirl her fingers around inside of you, barely able to contain the heat rolling through her core just watching your reactions as she pushed in deeper.
You whimpered, and every single thing that led up to this in Satoru’s life was suddenly worth it.
The mocking, the marriage, every mistake she made on this meandering path, she’d do all of it again if you were waiting for her at the end of it.
Your lips swollen and kiss-bruised as you let out soft sounds of pleasure that were because of her. Your naked form shivering in the same bed as you reached down to run your fingers through her hair, holding it back as she found herself half-delirious with lust she couldn’t hold back.
Slotting in a third finger the second she thought you could take it, watching your eyes widen and start to water as they rolled back, your hips bucking up to drive her fingers as deep as possible.
“My princess can take more,” she purred, spreading you further apart, greedy eyes gazing on your stripped bare body, the thin sheen of sweat sticking to your skin as you moaned her name.
“S-S’toru,” you cried out, and she was a little tempted to just do this for hours and count how many times she could make you say it precisely like that.
Satoru must have imagined this moment a million times. What your face would look like all scrunched up, how you would shiver and shake as she swirled her fingers in, feeling for all those sensitive spots that had you immediately trying to squirm and wiggle away.
Pushing and pressing into them while she pleaded for you to stay put in her sultriest voice.
“Be a good girl for me,” she hummed, and you nodded, loyal as ever. Itching to please her as badly as she wanted to please you. “Let me love you.”
Let her hold you.
Fuck you.
Make you cum as many times as you could in a single night and then give her the rest of them. All your nights. All your days. Everything.
Satoru had always been greedy.
And you satiated her sweet tooth more than anything else ever did.
Sinking her teeth into the inside of your thighs just because she could, feeling your muscles twitch and spasm as you gasped, caught off guard.
You didn’t stop her.
No, you let her bite and lick and kiss, her mouth latching onto your swollen clit, swirling the tip of her tongue over it as you let out a raw noise. As if someone had just ripped it from your stomach, pulled it out of you too fast for you to soften it.
Her fingers continued to thrust in while she nipped at your clit, just for your body to confirm what she suspected by clenching around her hand like you wanted to trap it in there. You were cumming for her already.
She’d seen you do it with Suguru.
But this one was so much more visceral, no dramatic or drawn-out moan, just your body melting into a puddle for her to mold as you fell apart for her.
You were shuddering, limbs trembling, as you tried to pull her back by her hair.
But you had never been good at telling her no.
Even when she was driving you right to the brink of overstimulation, and then pushing you well past it, greedily sucking on that sensitive bud, pressing her tongue flat against it as she pumped her fingers in-and-out, finding a steady rhythm to ruin you too.
Satoru had never had sex before. Her purity protected well into the marriage she was supposed to save it for. No experience of her own to truly compare this too. But she’d touched herself and pretended it was you enough times to have an idea of what would make you unravel just right.
Operating on instinct, on need, peering up at you from her position between your thighs as pretty tears welled up in your eyes. Satoru wanted to soothe your ache, to kiss them away and drag her tongue over the streaks they left on your cheeks.
Perhaps she should’ve planned a little better, found something bigger to stick in you, to make you moan and murmur for mercy with, watching you fall apart while she teased and toyed with your body now that you had finally given yourself fully to her.
You were so beautiful like this.
Being brought to the heights of pleasure, worshipped the way you should’ve been from the start, her tongue and fingers working together as she clumsily made out with you, only pulling off to drag the thick muscle over your slick folds for a better taste.
“I-I-” You hiccuped, your voice half an octave too high as your thighs clamped down around her head, your own thrown back as you wiggled your hips, chasing a second climax. “I c-can’t-”
“You can,” Satoru hummed, rubbing her own thighs together to soothe the aching need between them. “Want you to cum for me again, princess.”
You wouldn’t deny her.
You never did.
Desperately groaning as you gave in, sweat making both your bodies sticky as you tried to not to tug too hard at her hair, still holding back to not hurt her as you crumbled into a crying mess. Tears slipping out that she was quick to climb back on top of you and wipe away, kissing your lips to swallow your whines, enjoying the way you fit so nicely beneath her until you started to come back down.
“You look so pretty like this,” she softly complimented, tracing her thumb over your lip, already missing your kiss the moment your mouths were apart.
“Toru,” you whispered her name, and she was sure that she would never get sick of hearing it. Far fucking better than the way you used to say Suguru.
“Mhm?” She hummed, chewing on the inside of her cheek as you stared straight through her. That fuzzy look in your eyes fading as understanding replaced the daze.
Like you’d suddenly gained some clarity.
“It was you, was it?” You asked, and you didn’t need to say what when you were both well aware of what you were accusing her of.
Were you really just now considering it?
Was your judgement clouded from your unconditional love? So devoted that you were deluding yourself into ignoring the obvious?
“No,” Satoru lied, still in the habit of hiding the truth if it meant sparing your feelings. Refusing to lose you after she just got you. “It wasn’t me.”
ε✿з
You were flying far too close to the sun.
You knew that somewhere deep inside of you as Satoru snuggled against your collarbone, her warmth wrapped around you as she burned you up. Her scorching touch seared into your skin as she refused to let even an inch separate the two of you.
Sooner or later, your wings were going to fail you, and send you tumbling out of the sky back to the ground.
Would she catch you when you crashed?
Or would you be left to stare up at her until she was just a beautiful bird flying high out of your reach?
All you were doing was damning yourself by dreaming of a happy ending with her.
You guessed you should just be grateful for what you had while you had it.
That she hadn’t cut your tongue out for daring to slip it between her lips.
It hadn’t been the first time you had thought about it.
But even entertaining the idea of her choosing you had always been so preposterous you pushed your budding feelings down deep, refusing to let them devour you no matter how often she occupied your dreams.
Your life had been built around the pristine pedestal you placed her on.
Your world revolved around her smile, her laugh, hearing your twinkling voice in your ear and feeling her soft fingers brushing over your skin.
Everything you’d ever done had been for her.
So why did it feel like you’d just gone from warming one ruler’s sheets to another?
As if you were just in her bed for the comfort she brought, the security of her position.
You hoped she wouldn’t think that. That she understood that if she asked you to run away with her today, you would accept without hesitation.
Next to her now, her sleepy eyes fluttering open as she hummed your name, it just made you think of how stupid you were not to have been doing this all along. For not seeing this for what it was sooner.
“You’ll be safe here,” Satoru murmured, snuggling against you as you rolled onto your side. Keeping herself glued to you, her lips lingering on your skin with a content sigh.
“What happens next?” You murmured, watching the morning sun beginning to rise through the stained glass window, slowly chasing the dark away as your personal sunshine faltered for a moment.
“They’re still investigating his passing,” she mumbled, refusing to say Suguru’s name. Or call it for what it must have been. An assassination someone wanted to make you the scapegoat for. “You haven’t been officially cleared yet.”
And still, she’d showed up for you, hadn’t she?
“But I will be?” You hopefully asked, your heart thrumming at the thought of this being ripped from you too.
“Nothing will happen to you,” she swore.
You had given her your heart. Your soul. Your body.
Those were all you really had to offer.
But handing her your trust?
That was…tricky.
Especially when she wouldn’t offer any more details about your detainment as the minutes melted into hours and the hours twisted into days that just kept passing.
In the dark moments, a cold voice suggested that you should at least consider the chance she could have done it. Orchestrated it from the shadows. But she had told you she hadn’t.
She would’ve confessed it if she had.
Suguru had his fair share of enemies. Disgruntled rulers from other kingdoms, angry nobles and dukes who wanted more power than he allowed.
It wasn’t like it was outrageous that one of them had grown sick of his antics and took matters into their own hands.
So you tried to be content too, Satoru trading your tower for more comfortable quarters, her trusted knights stationed outside the room you caught glimpses at when she slipped in-and-out, leaving you to attend to her duties most days.
She brought you meals, insisting on hand feeding you half the time, murmuring under her breath that you couldn’t be trusted to do it yourself before she had you for dessert. Hands spreading your thighs apart as she lapped and licked you up, refusing to pull off until you had cum on her tongue or come undone with her fingers, falling apart for her to mend back together.
Still, it had started to feel like you were becoming more a part of her schedule than like her partner.
Perhaps that was wishing too much though.
Wanting more than you had any right to ask for.
At the end of the day, you would still always be a maid in everyone’s eyes.
Her pet.
Her people wouldn’t exactly be pleased to know that their queen was more interested in women than securing another king or providing them an heir?
Were you a price she was willing to pay for political control? Would there come a day where she would remarry another man?
Was it already being arranged while you wasted weeks lounging around in her bed and longing for her to join you, smelling her scent on the pillow and aching for her return?
The worst part was how Satoru was so hesitant to let you hold her, doing everything on her terms as she came up with excuse after excuse to keep your hands either bound behind your back or tethered in her hair instead of tracing over her soft skin.
Did she think you were too dirty?
That you would stain her supple flesh if you so much as squeezed her close?
No matter how much it stung, you still shoved down your discomfort. Told yourself that you should be grateful for what she was giving you and ignore how much she withheld.
You had to plead with her just to be allowed to visit her office during the days to keep yourself from going insane. A trusted knight always had to accompany you there, a shawl hiding your face as they carefully took you there when no one else would be around. She stocked extra books for you, a basket left next to one of the armchairs with embroidery supplies, sometimes making you write letters for her that she couldn’t care to do herself to foreign kingdoms and nobles to settle their unrest.
And after a month, you began to settle.
Setting aside old foolish hopes and accepting your new routine.
Waiting for her to join you in her office, curling up in one of the other chairs as you tried to tell yourself that she’d come back soon. She had run off to attend some important meeting, patting your head and telling you that it was nothing when you tried to ask what it was about.
So what if it made you feel a little pathetic for waiting around like a poor puppy dog abandoned by her owner?
Satoru would return to you.
And she made all of it worth it.
Your body was beginning to fall asleep though, pins and needles pricking your limbs when you stood to shake it off, walking around in a circle and wondering if you were just destined to be on her leash before you decided to slump yourself in her chair instead.
It smelled like her.
Your body relaxing at the scent, already trained as your eyes skimmed over her cluttered desk space, papers strewn around from the hurry she left in before.
Curiosity pricking at you as you found yourself slowly opening up drawers and peeking inside to see if there was anything interesting hiding from you. And slipped underneath thick ledgers and blank papers was a plain black leather-bound notebook you’d seen her writing in before.
You pulled it out, a not-at-all small piece of you hoping that maybe it was a secret diary as you started flipping through it, that you’d find your own name scribbled down with hearts drawn next to it.
It turned out your name was there.
But it was the words that were with it that sent your stomach through the floor.
The contents of it were cold.
Sharp. Each word punctuated so deeply that the ink bled between the pages.
The confirmation that she loved you was there. Just sandwiched between white hot anger that someone else had gotten to touch you first. To fuck you in the bed you belonged in with her.
Queasiness slowly building in your core, something thick and slimy coiling around your heart as you skipped from the earlier entries to the more recent ones, knowing what was coming before you found the entry for the day Suguru died.
And there in between the lines, the truth stared back at you.
She had dinner with Suguru.
Shared a meal together right before he went to join you that she never once mentioned to you.
No.
This couldn’t be right.
Satoru couldn’t have-
Or well, if she did, she wouldn’t have framed you for it.
She loved you.
Swore that you were hers and that she’d never let anything awful happen to you again. The idea that she’d put you through hell just to have you all to herself was crippling.
Maybe she didn’t outright admit that she’d done it, maybe you still didn’t know precisely how, but you knew it was her with a scary sort of certainty.
Your body freezing as you read and reread the five short lines in front of you detailing her evening, forcing yourself to turn the page and read ahead, to see her absolutely unaffected as she offered just a single line about Suguru dying. Images of his face, that awful look in his eyes before he collapsed floating back up as you choked on the stomach-churning memory of him.
An awful thought crept in that she left it here for you to find. That some part of her hoped you’d be nosey enough to snoop and come across it.
For you to see all of her.
Was it a test?
Her attempt to see if your devotion to her was strong enough to stay despite what she’d done.
You closed the book, shoving it back where you found it and standing up as the knowledge started to sink in, to seep through and cast a darker shade on your days together as you rushed to return to your chair.
What if it had all been designed to keep you firmly in your place beneath her? Confined to her chambers and chained to her heart?
Didn’t she already know she didn’t need to do any of it for you to stay?
The door opened with a creak, and you were reopening the forgotten book you’d been reading before you found the forbidden one.
“Hi, beautiful,” Satoru greeted as she walked over, bending over to press a soft kiss on your cheek before breezing past to her desk.
“Hi, Toru,” you echoed, pretending to be absorbed in the book in your hands, hoping she wouldn’t notice you were holding it upside down.
You closed it, placing it in your lap as you looked up at her with easy obedience, praying she wouldn’t pay any mind to the suspicion now lingering underneath it.
“Was I gone long?” She earnestly asked as she slid into her seat, scooting it up close to her desk and leaning across it as her blue eyes focused solely on your face.
“It felt like it,” you confessed, swallowing hard.
“I must make it up to you tonight then,” your Toru teased, her perfectly cruel mouth curling up as she delivered a cute wink.
She did make it up to you.
But it didn’t make you forget what you found.
What were you meant to do about it?
Pretend you hadn’t? Pray that no one else would ever discover what you had?
You wished she would abandon this. Abdicate the throne and take you away somewhere warm.
But it was Satoru.
Hadn’t you learned already she refused to give up anything once it was hers?
The privilege, the power, the promise of a gold gilded future with you waiting on her.
She would never let it go.
It was you that didn’t know how to move forward. That could figure out where to go from here when she didn’t seem to notice your indiscretion.
You spent two days torn over it. Treading softly with her, feigning that you were fine overnight until she left you again and you unraveled in her absence.
Opening the bedroom door an hour after she left, already knowing who’d you find on the other side.
A brute of a man standing guard, his back to the opposite wall as his ruby red eyes narrowed at you with pure annoyance.
“No.”
You hadn’t even spoken yet.
Eying him with the same irritation he showed for you, nose scrunching up as you stopped yourself from huffing.
Most of the guards she had stationed outside your room changed, unaware of who they were even protecting, a rotating roster of men ready to keep you from breaking free. But not him.
He was always the one posted directly by your door.
Dark pink hair falling down in his face, scarred and marked skin always creased in a stern scowl when he caught you staring at him, one foot about to fall forward before he shook his head.
“Stop,” he grunted as you peeked out of the door, and you feigned innocence, shrugging your shoulders.
“I just want to go to her office,” you pleaded, and he glared at you, refusing to even entertain your request.
“No,” he deadpanned.
But there was something underneath his rude facade that you didn’t like. Your brows pinching together as you tried to pout at him, to come up with something persuasive enough to change his answer.
Before you could, there was the click of heels, and you glanced back to see Satoru returning, a platter prepared with desserts. Her pretty face was pinched up with obvious displeasure though, her mouth twitching down as you hurried to step back inside your room.
She was slamming the door shut after you a few seconds later, half-shoving the tray into your hands as she turned to you with a disgruntled hiss.
“Why were you speaking to him?” Satoru snapped, and the only thing you could properly think about was how pretty she looked when she was jealous.
The downturn of her lips, the way her blue eyes glinted with unfettered annoyance, blowing air out of her nose as she tilted her head to the side all dramatically.
“I wanted to see you,” you murmured, cupping her face just for her jaw to clench.
Torn between taking you at your word and questioning it.
“You know I would be here with you all the time if I could,” she softly said, despite how cold her stare still was. Her hands still held warmth for you though. Delicately picking up a slice of a cake she must’ve requested the chef make, bringing it up to your lips.
You opened up for her. Holding her stare as she pushed it through, taking a small bite as she watched you swallow it.
“I worry about you,” you confessed as she wiped the icing from the corner of your mouth.
“Don’t.”
You never thought Satoru could possibly ask too much of you.
But that was simply impossible.
And the longer you went without any answers, the more you found yourself starting to spiral. To unravel as you waited and waited for something to change.
What could you do?
It wasn’t like the court you’d never found any friends in would support what the two of you shared. Satoru had kept you completely clueless to what was happening outside of the two rooms you could be in, ignorant to how much trouble she might be in with no husband to wear the crown.
Truthfully, you had no plan.
No magical solution that struck you in the middle of the night.
But you wanted to help.
Peeking back out into the hallway a week after you first found her book, ready to prod and press her knight for more information on what you’d been missing, but to your surprise, the hallway was empty.
No sign of anyone as you slipped out, your heart thrumming loudly in your chest as you started down the familiar path to her office.
It was a short walk, but every step made your chest constrict, pulse pounding so loud you were sure someone had to hear until you were finally there, her office door cracked open just enough for you to steal a glimpse inside.
The knight was there, his brows knitted together tight as he looked through all the books lining the shelves, walking over to her desk and carefully looking through the documents on it with that permanent scowl of his.
Searching for something.
Oh no.
You had a feeling you knew exactly what he was hoping to find.
He was going to betray her, wasn’t he? Looking for proof of what she’d done
His hand reached for the drawer her notebook was in, and you were pushing the door open before he could discover it.
Your suspicions were confirmed with how straight he abruptly stood, acting as if he hadn’t just been snooping.
“What are you doing out of your room?” He snarled at you, his voice hoarse and harsh as you refused to tremble or back down.
“What are you doing in here?” You returned the question, throat constricting at the intensity of his glare.
You weren’t brave. Not nearly as strong or stubborn as Satoru.
It wasn’t like anyone would ever be intimidated by you.
But you would try for her.
He didn’t answer your question, just grinding his back molars as he stepped out from around the desk, starting to stomp over as if he planned to drag you out and toss you back into your room.
If he did that though, he might just come back and find precisely what he was looking for.
So while he started towards you, you walked the opposite way around to where he’d been, a lie slipping off your tongue like you were used to telling them, “I just wanted to grab some books I left in here.”
“Hurry up then,” he scoffed, biting his tongue, probably not pushing it so you wouldn’t go and tattle to Toru about him being in here.
He thought you were stupid.
Just a brainless fool who was only good for getting fingered and fucked.
Not batting an eye when you grabbed a couple books you’d set aside on Satoru’s desk before pulling open the drawer and grabbing her diary, sliding it in the middle of the pile as her knight impatiently looked outside the door.
She would notice it was gone.
And you would have to fess up, admit that you’d read it enough to know to take it.
You’d rather her be mad at you than to get caught for her crime.
Stoking the flames in the fireplace the second your guard half-pushed you back into the room you were supposed to be in, ripping out the incriminating pages first and using them for tender before tossing the rest of the book in.
Watching it go up in flames, ashes sputtering out as it turned to dust in front of your eyes while you paced the floor and planned out the speech you would give her.
Or would have given her had she actually returned for dinner.
The sun setting and the moon replacing it through your window as you waited and waited for her to come for you. Debating and drowning in your anxieties over what could be taking her so long, your eyes compelled back to the burning papers, using the fire poker to keep the flames going before you were finally forced to face the reality that Satoru might not be showing up tonight.
Climbing back under the freezing covers, the bed so much bigger without her there to curl up against.
It didn’t matter how silky the sheets were or how comfortable the mattress was.
You couldn’t sleep anymore when there wasn’t the scent of her perfume and the softness of her skin to comfort you.
Was she upset with you?
Had something awful happened to her?
To make everything worse, you started to hear a…commotion on the floor below you. Voices and the sound of things moving around, shouts and scuffles that only served to heighten your nerves.
You almost opened the door to go find out what was going on. Sneak out again to search for the truth, but every time your hand settled on the knob, you couldn’t bring yourself to turn it.
Ignorance could be bliss.
But the truth would come out sooner or later.
Curled up on the edge of your bed, hands clasped together as your eyes stuck to the door, shadows dancing across the floor as the sun rose once again.
When it opened again, you were immediately standing, wiping sweaty palms on your nightdress as your breath got stuck in your throat, a hot lump forming the moment Satoru actually walked through.
“Hi, sweetheart,” she softly greeted, exhaustion obvious in the dark circles betraying her beautiful face.
“What happened?” You asked, studying her features for some clue, heart slamming into your chest as you tried to figure out what the chaos beneath you could possibly be. What could’ve taken her so long to come to you.
“They discovered who killed our dearly departed king,” she said, a faint hint of amusement shimmering before she turned away to lock the door behind her.
“What?” Your throat closed up, the word coming out as a stunned squeak as your brain tried to add together everything you knew.
The person who killed Suguru was standing in front of you.
If they knew that, she would be on her way to the gallows.
Not turning around so you could undo her corset.
You automatically stepped forward, fingers trembling as you undid her dress out of habit.
“One of the knights slipped poison into his wine,” Satoru apathetically huffed, as if it was a waste of time to even talk about it.
“One of the knights?” You echoed, reaching for something you didn’t know if you were confident enough to confront her about right as you unlaced the final part. Satoru stepped out of it with ease, her perfect body on display as she twisted back around to look over her shoulder at you. “Which one?”
“Does it matter?” She scoffed, arching up an eyebrow, clearly unhappy with your question.
But you still had one more left.
“Why?”
Her hesitation to answer gave you a different one.
“You know as well as I do what he was like,” she said, a little too snappy as she squinted at you.
But the moment the words were out there, you could see she regretted her response, her fingers skimming over your waist and squeezing you tenderly. “It’s all over now.”
You stared at her.
Satoru was lying to you.
You didn’t know why it surprised you. Couldn’t explain why it left you so shocked, staring at her in silence as you struggled to find something to say that wouldn’t give away what you knew.
“The knight was executed over night,” she added, your heart stilling as you realized the toll had risen to two.
But could you be upset when the other option was one, or maybe both of you taking their place?
“How did-”
“He stole something of mine,” Satoru muttered, and you knew what must’ve happened without her offering anything else.
She must have returned to her office first and realized her journal was gone.
And there were only two people she trusted enough to have access to the office it was kept in.
So she pinned the blame on her knight and beheaded him before he could speak about any of its contents or piece together what she’d done for you.
“He didn’t,” you breathed, your lungs shrinking as you struggled to get any more air in.
One of you had to be honest here.
She blinked at you, not comprehending what you were saying.
“What?”
“It was me,” you admitted, stiffly shrugging your shoulders. “I saw him searching your office. And, I, um, took it and threw it in the hearth.”
“You burned my-?”
“I read it,” you swallowed hard, that hard lump still there, still choking you up as you avoided her stare. “Before. I know-”
“No,” she cut you off, grabbing your chin and forcing you to tilt your face up to meet hers. “You, you were supposed to stay out of this.”
You knew in an instant all she wanted was to protect you. To shield you from the nasty politics and petty games these awful people liked to play.
But you couldn’t stand the idea of her doing anything at the expense of herself.
“You should have told me from the start,” you insisted. “I-I would’ve-”
“Your hands were supposed to be clean.” And your head empty.
Did she think you wouldn’t have loved her if you knew what she had done?
And now you had helped her conceal it.
“We could have-” You started, about to tell her that as long as you were together, you could work out the rest.
“If I told you before, you would have said there was another way,” Satoru solemnly said, her eyes narrowing as her fingers tightened around your wrist.
You couldn’t really argue that. You would have said precisely that. Told her it was too risky. Tried to dissuade her from taking drastic measures and attempting to convince her to run away with you.
You used to wish that the two of them would find a way to work it out. That you could find a happily ever after where everyone would get along.
What would your reaction have been if she touched your face and told you that she was going to murder her husband?
“Isn’t this what you wanted?” She pressed when you took too long to reply, her fingers pinching your chin to draw your attention back to right now. “I was not about to let you carry his child.”
It wasn’t like you could have hers.
Even if you’d do that in a heartbeat.
“He would have just kept putting babies in you and pushing me away from you” Satoru hissed, jealousy and anger rolling into her raw voice. “I couldn’t-”
“I know,” you interrupted her this time, softening as you leaned into her.
“Now it’s just us again,” she whispered conspiratorially, pressing a clipped-short nail against the tip of your nose.
How were you supposed to be mad about that?
You held your breath though, still searching for anything that could stand in the way.
“These people, they are not going to just let you rule forever,” you whispered, thinking about what could befall both of you if her treason was ever discovered. Sure, she’d found someone to blame, but there must be other loose ends. Whoever she obtained the poison from. The subjects who never supported her as queen to start with. “If they find out or-”
Satoru pressed her finger against your mouth, stopping you while you spiralled.
“Princess,” she murmured, clicking her tongue as her initial emotions swirled into that cocky confidence of hers. Pride returning as she realized that you weren’t going to condemn or curse her, but that you were concerned for her. “Don’t you know me?”
You hoped that meant she had already considered every side of your fear and took care of every conceivable problem.
“I love you,” you offered instead, your voice trembling as you put your trust in her hands.
“His throne is mine,” she smiled softly. And his concubine.
“What if someone else challenges it?” You pressed.
“There’s going to be a baby born with dark hair and purple eyes in a few months. His child. The mother doesn’t want the child, so I made a deal. She gets her own estate. We will get our heir,” She explained, speaking in short sentences like it would make the revelation easier to swallow.
“Someone else was pregnant with his child?” You breathed, taken aback.
When the fuck did he have the time to plow someone else’s field when he pretended to be so preoccupied with you?
It was wrong, especially when it wasn’t like your heart had ever wanted him, but it wounded your own pride a little bit at the idea you hadn’t been enough for him.
You supposed you should’ve suspected it, if Satoru wasn’t enough for him either.
“You weren’t his only-”
“Whore,” you finished for her, the word coming out a little strangled as you saw the situation for what it was.
All you’d been was a warm body to Suguru.
You were both disposable, to be used and discarded when his interests drifted.
“We’ll tell everyone the baby is yours,” she added, as if she had already planned every last detail out. “And until the child is old enough, I can still rule as a regent.”
Was that why she’d been hiding you away?
Faking a pregnancy instead of keeping you prisoner?
“Do you think they’ll accept a child they think is a bastard?” You asked, needing her to say yes.
To assure you that your fears were unfounded.
That she’d take care of you the same way she always had.
“I will give them no other option.”
When she spoke like that, that cold look icing over her eyes as she steeled her resolve, you knew she would. That she would do anything necessary to make sure of it.
“And what? We live happily ever after?”
Say yes.
You needed it. Craved her confirmation.
Looking up at her as your trembling fingers reached out to trace her waist, holding your breath as she nodded slowly.
“Forever.”
Your angel was standing in front of you promising you everything you ever wanted.
How were you ever meant to say no?
Even if she would lead you straight to Hell.
“You can be my queen,” Satoru murmured, giving you that pretty puppy dog pout you always fell for, placated as she leaned down to leave a soft kiss to your forehead like it was all settled.
Regret still lingering in your body as you ached to actually be that for her. Wishing your circumstances had been different from the beginning.
That you were never cursed to be so far below her, and in the body of a woman that could never wear a matching ring or recite wedding vows to her.
“I wish I was a-”
“Do not,” she scoffed, shaking her head. “You are perfect precisely the way you are.”
“Then why don’t you let me love you like you love me?” You asked, almost immediately annoyed at yourself for sounding a little whiney.
But you wanted to be inside of her.
To feel her squeeze and squirm around you, to hear her dissolve into messy whimpers and whines because of you.
“W-what do you mean?” She stuttered, her white brows arching up high as her lips got stuck in the sort of ‘o’ that made you itch to slip your tongue inside of her.
“I want to make you feel good,” you simply said, cheeks heating up as you swallowed the spit pooling in your mouth.
You had never seen Satoru nervous before.
Her mouth opened and clamped shut a few times before she started trying to ramble off reasons that she was better at giving, but you were sick of them.
Sick of all the stupid things that had kept you apart.
All the years you could’ve spent in her warmth that you missed out on. Mourning what both of your lives could’ve been if you were born as other people.
But she had sworn you were enough for her.
Was it wrong to want to show her how she was far more than enough for you?
“I-I just like the way you taste and-”
You kissed her mid-sentence, shutting her up before she could stall this any longer.
Grabbing her this time, guiding her back to the bed one step at a time, tangling your fingers in her soft, silky hair as your tongue slipped past her lips, tracing the sharp tips of her canines until her back hit the mattress.
And god, the moment you climbed on top of her, straddling her soft waist and pausing to peel your nightdress over your head, you hated yourself for not doing it sooner.
For missing out on the view you were currently taking in, eyes slowly drifting over the swell of her breasts, the pink peaked buds of her nipples as she sucked in uneven breaths, staring up at you with those dazzling blue eyes.
“You’re so beautiful,” you whispered, the words ripped from you as you struggled to keep yourself steady.
It felt like you were defiling something holy.
Her sacred body below you, your fingertips skimming over her pale stomach, swirling slowly across her nipple as you bit your bottom lip.
If she was an altar, a god, you’d pray to her every day.
Swear your faith and undying devotion, shower her with offerings and pray for just a sliver of her favor.
You couldn't believe she was yours.
“I’m a virgin,” Satoru suddenly blurted out, your fingers freezing as you drifted them back down below her belly button.
“Oh,” you blinked.
You suppose it should’ve been obvious.
But you had never really thought too hard about it.
You never exactly prized your virtue. But hers was different.
Special.
“Do you want me to stop?” You tentatively asked, about to climb back off of her before her hand gripped onto your hip to hold you there.
“No,” she answered a little too quickly.
So you came up with another solution to, ah, quell her nerves.
The ribbons you used to tie her hair with now strewn all over the bed, a long one in your hands as you adjusted her head forward.
“I’ll be gentle,” you promised.
Even though she practically jumped at every tiny touch you delivered to her skin, shivering at just a brush of your thumb over her nipple and when you leaned close enough for your breath to ghost across her throat.
You wrapped the ribbon around her eyes, excitement tingling between your fingers as you fixed the silk ribbon into its proper place, tying a pretty bow around the back, careful not to get her hair caught in it.
“Can you see?” You asked, humming softly with satisfaction as you lifted her wrists up next, positioning them above her hair as she writhed in the sheets.
“No,” she echoed, her voice shaking a little no matter how cocky she still tried to sound.
“Good.”
You tied her wrists next, watching the way she tested how strong the knot was by flexing them as you smiled to yourself.
“You know, you’re so mean,” you murmured, tracing your fingertip across her sharp features, brushing your thumb over her defined cheekbones before drifting down to her soft lips. “It’s only fair I get to play with you too.”
“I’m never mean to you,” Satoru huffed, and you were a little tempted to grab another ribbon and gag her with it for playing dumb.
“I hate it when you hide things from me,” you muttered, shaking your head with a soft tut of your tongue.
“I do it because-”
“You love me?” You asked, slowly shuffling down her body, pressing kiss after kiss across her heaving breasts down her slender abdomen.
Hoisting one of her thighs over your shoulder, sucking in a breath before you leaned in to leave on the most sensitive spot on her body.
“S-so much,” her cute voice cracked, nearly crumbling at the soft contact.
All her strength quickly melted into a puddle of pure need, her hips bucking up when you shifted down to start sucking on it, a gorgeous whimper escaping her – and immediately making you greedy for more.
You never thought Satoru would be at your mercy.
Her pretty pale body shivering, perfect skin glistening with sweat as she shuddered for you, her soft thighs trying to close around your head as you dragged your tongue down across her soaked cunt.
You didn’t think anything could ever taste so goddamn good.
No better than a man, wiggling your own hips down into the mattress to chase friction you couldn’t find, pushing your tongue in-and-out as her muscles twitched and tensed beneath your fingertips.
Suguru had never gotten you half as wet as her.
Never worked you up like this, left you soaked and squirming without even being touched. Your thighs pressing together to push down the heat stirring in your core, your pulse pounding so hard you nearly couldn’t hear her whining over it.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck, I-I-”
You knew Satoru loved to chatter.
But once you were inside her it was like she physically couldn’t shut up, stammering and stuttering out curses, straining against the binds on her wrists and whining about not being able to see you.
“P-please, wanna see you, want to, oh god,” she begged, the beautiful arch of her back nearly breaking your resolve as heat soared straight up to cloud your head.
And before you could stop yourself, you were twisting around, angling your hips down to put your own pussy perfectly above her mouth, shutting her up by giving her something to lick and suck instead.
“Oh, fuck, ngh-”
Her words traded in for another heated moan as she shoved her tongue inside you, swirling it in with a desperation you found yourself quick to succumb to.
It really wasn’t fair that she was so good at everything you tried.
But you still refused to completely lose yourself, working harder to make her cum first, slipping your thumb up to her clit, only pulling off to start cooing and condescendingly coaxing her into coming undone, copying the same methods she so expertly pulled on you.
“C-come on,” you murmured, dragging your thumb in a slow circle as she shifted to suck on your clit just right, driving you right to the brink with her eagerness to give you everything she had. “Show me how much you love me.”
Preferably by falling to pieces on your tongue.
Sweat practically dripping off her, her moans reverberating through you as her body began to shake. On the very brink of breaking, pushed closer and closer as she started to cry out your name.
Her soft voice was music to your ears, a soft purr that made all the knots in your stomach pull tight instead of making them curdle like Suguru’s sometimes had.
You slipped your fingers inside her, feeling the way her walls squeezed down on them, trying to keep you in as you worked her oversensitive bud. She made a cute little squeak, her tongue lolling out as she began to babble again, “S’too much, I-I-”
“Shhh,” you murmured, pressing your tongue down as she spasmed and whimpered desperately at the sensation. “Can’t you cum for me?”
You glanced back over your shoulder to see the sight of her nodding hard and fast, the blindfold slightly crooked and her hands clawing at the pillow as she chased her climax.
“Put that pretty tongue of yours to better use,” you softly suggested, ignoring the initial discomfort at your reversed roles as you grinded your hips down on her face.
Apparently, your Toru could be a good listener too when she tried.
Doing her best to devote her tongue to you right up until the moment she couldn’t hold herself together anymore, cumming with a cry into your clit as your fingers found a sweet spot right below her cervix, pressing on it as you teased her swollen bud with the tip of your own pink muscle.
She was trembling, her legs twitching and toes curling as she let out devastated little whines that it wasn’t fair, squirming as you cleaned her up, enjoying the way she whimpered every single time your tongue dragged over her skin.
You could spend eternity buried between her thighs.
Or with hers between yours.
So what if it might be too much to ask?
She would make the universe give it to you anyway.
ε✿з
“My pretty princess.”
And her not terribly ugly son.
Satoru traced your face with her fingers, sighing to herself as the morning sun kissed your face, bathed you in beautiful warmth – oh, and the baby in your arms. Both of you snoozing softly, drool leaking out on your nightdress as you slept on your side, blissfully unaware of the outside world.
You made a pretty mother. Loved the little bastard Satoru did her best to tolerate.
Cradling an infant that neither of you had to carry, kissing his forehead and proudly showing him off to the other members of the court after he was born.
He’d never know he wasn’t yours. No one would.
Satoru would make sure of it.
His mother had been more than happy to take the estate. Especially when she knew the alternative would be Satoru taking her tongue to ensure she’d never talk.
She was still keeping tabs though. Just to be safe.
To make sure that this happy little family of hers would stay that way.
The nobles had protested. Insisted that she had no place as queen with Suguru dead. But his son, with his soft purple eyes and dark hair, well, that was enough to buy her eighteen more years.
Of course, there were still whispers.
Rumors swirled that she quickly snuffed out, either with quiet compensation or cold force. So what if a few more people had to be poisoned to protect your life together?
Rewriting history hadn’t been that hard.
No one needed to remember how much she hated Suguru. Or how rocky the marriage had been.
She got to be the mourning widow. The gracious wife still honoring her deceased husband by letting his bastard child be the heir. Raising him with a concubine instead of throwing both of them out.
That was how she’d be remembered.
“Good morning,” you yawned, slowly cracking your eyes open as you smiled at her.
“Sleep well?” She inquired, tempted to pick up the baby and place him back in his cradle so she could be cuddled instead.
You still had nightmares sometimes. Ones where you’d thrash around and she’d have to scoop him up and call for a wet nurse to take him until morning.
Waking you up to soothe you, stroking your hair and pretending not to know she was the reason for them.
And yet, you looked at her like she hung the sun in the sky and shined bright enough to chase away all the shadows. To bury the skeletons somewhere you’d never see them.
“Mhm,” you hummed, affectionately glancing between his chubby cheeks up to Satoru’s persistent pout as she puffed air into them.
“Have any attention left for me?” She pleaded, craning her neck over them to dramatically wait for you to press a gentle kiss to her nose.
instead of getting the girl, gojo just got her pregnant! how's he supposed to win you over when you only seem to see him as the baby daddy?
synopsis: when the frat president becomes the father of your daughter, the last thing you expected were his brothers to start bidding to be the step dad! can he prove that he's serious about starting a life together for the three of you - or will someone swoop in to steal both his girls?
pairing: frat!gojo x milf!reader x frat!geto (also starring frat!sukuna)
content: mdni!! fluff, angst, and smut, college au, unrealistic frat depictions, parties, drinking, accidental pregnancy, raising a baby, they all want to be the daddy, lots of pining, gojo being lovesick and stupid, denying feelings, possessive geto + gojo, titty sucking, lactation kink, heavy jealousy
art cr: @zeilorene0 on x div cr: @/tsumiinum
Going on a date with your baby daddy's best friend was probably not the smartest thing you could do.
"Would you like some wine?" Geto murmured softly, peering up at you from above his menu, the dim lighting in the restaurant casting shadows across his sharp features.
"Um, no thanks," you declined, glancing awkwardly around the restaurant as you felt the weight of his stare settle on your exposed cleavage, hyper aware of the low cut of your dress and the way your breasts were beginning to ache from how long it'd been since you pumped. "I'll just take a water."
Had Gojo remembered what time to feed her? Was she cranky right now, crying and wailing and beating on his broad chest waiting for you to come back?
"Thinking about Umi?" He softly asked, his honeyed voice soothing the ache in your chest as you offered him an apologetic smile.
"Is it that obvious?" You asked, swallowing the lump in your throat as you shoved down your discomfort, adjusting the straps of your chest and praying that your tits wouldn't leak through the nipple pads you slipped inside your bra.
"It's cute," Geto reassured you, reaching across the table to snag your hand, drawing a delicate star over your skin as you tried to match his smile. "You're a good mom."
You wanted to take the compliment.
But your brain was still unfortunately stuck on the white-haired father of your child who was probably pacing your apartment praying for you to come back any second.
Who would most certainly freak the fuck out if he found out where you were - and who you were with.
It's not like you meant to start sorta seeing Geto.
You weren't even sure if you could qualify it as dating.
He'd been around maybe even more than Gojo had since you got pregnant, and stayed afterwards. Staying late whenever Gojo wasn't there, helping you wash baby bottles and rocking Umi to sleep when you were too exhausted to keep your eyes open. Folding your laundry and keeping up with the chores, insisting that you shower and rest and take care of yourself first, murmuring softly that you were working hard enough as it was with that casual, crooked smile of his.
Until one afternoon, instead of your daughter falling asleep in his lap, you had, waking up to him stroking your hair with one hand and cradling Umi in his other.
And some awful part of you asked yourself what if he'd been her father instead?
Gojo might have flowers delivered to your door and fuck you when he wormed his way into spending the night with the excuse of helping on the night shift with Umi, but he hadn't been there before.
Not for half your appointments. Not for your labor.
God, if it hadn't been for Geto, he would've missed her birth.
He had been the one you met first. The one you knew better before his best friend went and knocked you up. The entire reason you even showed up to that party, chasing a stupid crush you were sure wouldn’t even notice you.
But he wasn’t the one you ended up sleeping with - or the one whose name was on the birth certificate.
"You deserve a night for yourself," Geto coaxed, and you knew that he was right. That you couldn't be there for her if you couldn't take care of yourself. Or let someone else help you do it.
Besides, wasn't it half Gojo's fault she existed anyway?
Maybe he’d worn the wrong condom size, but you were the one too stubborn to ask him to pay for a Plan B after it broke, clinging to your stupid pride. Too embarrassed to even face him after you hooked up until you absolutely had to, showing up to his frat house expecting him to shoo you away to get an abortion and slam the door in your face.
Perhaps if he had, you wouldn't feel the hints of guilt creeping in that you were sitting across from his second-in-command now, letting him say your name in that suave voice of his and tell you how pretty you looked in a dress that didn't quite fit your tits anymore.
Not that Geto seemed to mind, judging by the way you caught his stare drifting down to them no matter how chivalrous he was attempting to present himself tonight.
"It's just weird being away from her for this long," you shrugged your shoulders self-consciously, pulling back your hand to pick at the paint on your nails that was already flaking off despite the fact you'd done it only a few hours before your date.
You dropped Umi off with Gojo earlier, but he'd never watched her this long on his own either.
Would it start to become a more common thing? Afternoons or nights you swapped her so the other could go out and date around?
Despite Gojo swearing he only wanted to make this work with you, you had an incredibly difficult time picturing the campus's favorite playboy not pouring body shots on pretty girls all those Friday evenings he attended parties for his 'frat duties'.
You were sure that was just code for fucking other sorority girls and playing condom roulette to see if your daughter would get a half-sibling.
"She'll be okay," Geto reassured you, deliberately avoiding broaching who, exactly, was watching her right now.
That was the one topic the two of you tended not to discuss.
You wondered if it bothered him at all. Made him feel like shit when he held Umi and decided he'd rather be the stepdad instead of a supportive uncle figure.
Truthfully, you still couldn't understand why he decided you were worth fracturing his friendship with Gojo for.
If he had been courting you a year and a half ago, you probably would’ve been over the fucking moon. Thrilled that someone like him wanted you, but you simply weren’t the same girl.
It hadn’t slipped past you that all of Gojo's friends suddenly seemed to want you after he had you.
"Geto," you swallowed, unsure how to broach any of the thousand worries floating through your head as you worked up the nerve to bring up what had been looping through your head since he first started carving his own spot in your life for him. "You know Gojo will be pissed if he knows what we're doing right now."
"You didn't tell him?" He asked, amusement glinting in his dark eyes as you flitted your stare down to the tiny print on the menu below.
"You don't care?" You returned the question, sighing as you reluctantly looked back up at him.
"Do you want to be with him?" Suguru pressed, but you could tell be the curve of his smirk that he thought he already knew the answer, he just wanted to hear you say it.
Being with Gojo had never been a part of your previously well-thought out life plan. You had him pegged from the moment you saw him at a frat party your friend dragged you to during your first year here, surrounded by beautiful women and yes men, alcohol being poured in his pretty mouth. The kind of spoiled, stuck-up prick who breezed through life like they were used to winning first place just for existing. Handed the world on a silver platter.
And now he thought you were a prize he deserved simply because he got you pregnant.
But still, you weren't about to just make it easy for Geto either.
Not when you didn't even know if he really liked you, or the idea of stealing something from under Gojo's nose.
"Why do you want to be with me?" You returned his question rather than answering it, arching up an eyebrow and waiting for his response.
Even though you appreciated his help, it wasn't like you needed your support system of frat bros hanging around if all they wanted was to get in your panties.
Before he could reply though, a baby began to cry, and your head snapped up, scanning the restaurant as if it could somehow be yours, the ache in your breasts returning with a vengeance, a lot fucking harder to ignore when your tits were already confined in the tight dress you'd chosen tonight.
Maybe it was just how much you were missing her, your brain playing tricks on your ears, but it really did sound like her too, your heart squeezing and wrung dry as you glanced from table to table trying to spot where the baby was.
Wincing as you tried to readjust the strap of your dress, swallowing hard and cursing yourself for not bringing a pump or expressing the milk before you left your apartment, knowing that you'd probably have a clogged duct to deal with later. But before you could spot the baby, your waitress was returning, a practiced smile plastered on her face as she looked directly at Geto instead of you.
Probably sizing up the fact that a guy like him was a bit out of your league, or that this was a first date as she leaned over to his side and grinned at him, "Have we made up our minds?"
"I think we'll just get our food to-go," Suguru returned a polite smile to her, and a surge of panic spiked in your chest until his palm slid over yours with silent reassurance, his eyes narrowing as he slyly stole a peek at your chest like he knew why you were squirming before clearing his throat. "Baby's waiting for us back home."
The waitress's face deflated almost instantly.
Wrongly assuming that the two of you were more than just something casual. Thinking that the baby belonged to him.
"Oh, sure," she nodded numbly, regaining her composure. "What will it be?"
He ordered for both of you, and you just shuffled in your seat, caught somewhere between relief that he was freeing you from an hour and a half of discomfort and disappointment that your date would be ending like this.
But perhaps it was for the better.
Maybe it was a sign that this wasn't going to go anywhere.
And when she walked away with reassurances that she'd bring it out as soon as possible, you were about to apologize, but he just squeezed your hand as you started to softly say his name, "Geto-"
"How many times have I asked you to call me Suguru?"
You wished he didn't disarm you so effortlessly. Stalling your excuses with just a single look, with a simple motion of his thumb over your knuckle as he treated you like you were his girlfriend.
"Once the food comes out, I can go take care of you," he promised, and it wasn't until you were walking out to the car that it struck you how serious he was about that.
"You know, you don't have to-" You started, glancing down at the way he was still holding your hand in the parking lot, his fingers tightly gripping your hand and keeping you glued to his side as you tried to sound more collected than you really were. "I can just pump at home or-"
"I thought you liked it when I helped," he slyly said, teasing you in that soft voice of his, mouth curling up when your face flushed.
So what if maybe you let him get rid of your clogged ducts a couple times when Gojo was busy with work or class?
His big hands were good at it, thick fingers massaging and working the breast tissue as his lips latched on to you.
Besides, you liked the way Geto looked at you, even if it sort of scared you. The intensity in his stare, how he studied you like he was interested in every detail. How he spoke to you like you were something soft to be cradled, not just sloppy seconds or someone’s leftovers. The way he listened, his head tilted to the side as he nodded along with patience you’d never really received before.
You didn't need anyone.
Not Gojo. Not Geto.
Not even Sukuna, even if he was debatably the best when it came to helping with her or soothing her when she started to wail.
You could do it on your own.
But something about Suguru made you feel like it might be okay to be taken care of too.
“You know you can find someone better,” you bluntly blurted out as he held the car door open for you. He stopped, squinting down at you as you slid into the passenger seat.
Someone without stretch marks or, y’know, an entire baby with another man. Someone who would have all the time in the world to worship him without wanting or needing all the things you did.
“We need to work on your self-esteem,” he remarked, arching up an eyebrow with a sigh as he nodded towards your seatbelt to remind you to buckle up.
And before you could retort back that he hadn’t disagreed, he was shutting the door and walking back around to his side.
Like he could somehow anticipate what you were preparing to say, his mouth had already parted when he got in too, “If you want me to tell you how much I like you, all you have to do is ask.”
Suguru knew exactly how to shut you up.
And five minutes later, he had your dress pulled down, both breasts freed and exposed as he groped and squeezed and sucked you dry. Thick fingers dimpling your skin as he sank them in deep, his lips wrapped around your sensitive nipple and greedily drinking up every ounce of milk you leaked out.
Tongue dragging back over the peaked buds whenever any escaped, your fingers lacing through his dark hair as you tilted your head back and scrunched your eyes shut. Trying not to moan at the way he was holding you, one arm slipped around your back to pull you closer as he leaned across the center console to suck on your swollen breasts.
The to-go boxes half-forgotten in the backseat, the radio playing some slow, soft song as he groaned into your nipple, his sharp teeth grazing over it to send a sharp shudder through your body.
Glancing up at you with delight glimmering in his stare, possessively pulling you in as he popped off your chest.
“You’re wasted on Satoru."
And even though he didn’t say it, you could feel it.
Geto thought it should’ve been him.
ꕤꕤꕤ
Gojo wanted to bang his head against the steering wheel until the air bag went off.
Maybe if it broke his nose, he could get enough sympathy points from you that you’d stop seeing Suguru. And he’d never have to see his best friend sucking on your breasts from across the parking lot.
Umi was asleep in her car seat in the back, leaving him to his own embarrassing thoughts as he forced himself to turn the key in the ignition. To start the car after he completely and utterly failed the mission he should've never gone on in the first place.
You'd maim him if you knew he was spying on you with Suguru. Maybe accuse him of being a creep and somehow think even less of him than you already did.
And despite how much it fucking sucked, he forced himself to pull out of the parking lot and leave you there with your tit in Suguru's mouth, feeling like a moron for thinking tonight would ever end any differently.
Suguru was a good guy.
Didn't have the reputation he did. Was quiet where he was loud, soothing where he was brash. Wouldn't make you wonder where he was or what he was doing or who he'd been with before.
Of course, you'd choose him.
Gojo guessed he should just be grateful you'd have to at least spend the next eighteen years co-parenting with him. Attending parent-teacher conferences and planning birthdays and holidays.
But even when he made it back to your place, warming up a bottle to feed Umi, watching her big blue eyes sleepily blink up at him as her chubby little fingers still tried to grab it, he couldn't fucking imagine having to share her with Suguru.
Seeing her look up at his best friend and babble dada to him, at the apparently growing possibility he might miss her first steps, her first words, her first everything and Suguru might get them instead.
Spiraling long after he put her back down in her crib, laying flat on your couch and staring at the ceiling to count the seconds until you came back.
God, since when had he gotten so pathetic?
Why couldn't he just figure it out and fix this? What would it take for you to give him a try?
Did you want him to grow out his hair? Start watching pretentious foreign films?
He still didn't have a clue by the time he heard your key in the lock, sitting up straight and smoothing out the wrinkles and spit-up stain on his shirt as he automatically started walking towards the entrance, nearly running into you when you walked in.
"Hey," he muttered, running his hands through his hair and pretending he didn't notice how your lip gloss had smeared, or how stray strands of your hair were sticking out as you peeled your purse off your shoulder and hung it up by the door.
"Hey," you murmured, wiping the back of your mouth just to stumble a little trying to slip off your heels.
And even though he knew you didn't need his help, he was still holding out his arm for you to hold onto him and steady yourself while you took them off.
"Enjoy your dinner?" He murmured, and you cringed a little, looking up at him with the slightest hints of apology in your smile as you held up a to-go box in your other hand.
"Who told you?" You asked, even though he could see it in your stare that you already suspected the answer.
"Sukuna mentioned it," he admitted.
"I should've said something," you cleared your throat, the closest you could probably come to a sorry.
"It's fine," he lied, no matter how far he really was from it.
"Do you want the rest?" You offered, as if your leftovers were some olive branch.
One he'd gladly take it.
"Sure," he shrugged, grabbing it as you let go of his arm. "So, are you guys, like a thing, or-"
"It's not like you're not seeing other women," you defensively muttered instead of actually answering, scowling at him as he went slack-jawed.
"I'm not," Gojo huffed, unsure what the hell he had to do to get you to understand that.
Wear a fucking cock cage and give you the only key?
"Gojo," you said his last name, bottom lip pushed out all pretty, and he wished he could make you believe how badly he wanted to make it yours too. "Do you think I'm stupid?"
He actually thought you were incredibly smart.
Gojo would give up everything just to breathe in the scent of your soft skin every day and listen to your voice as you talked about your studies as he stroked your hair and nuzzled his nose against your neck.
But instead, all that came out was a stuttered, "N-no?"
"You're at frat parties every weekend," you pointed out, holding your nose up high as you exhaled, walking past him like you had come to your conclusion.
"B-but only as the president, I'm not-"
"You don't speak to the pretty girls that come up to feel your muscles and offer to play stepmom?" You sarcastically asked, and Gojo wished you could look a little less gorgeous when you were glaring at him.
"I mean, I only talk to them," he tried to explain, but he knew that was the wrong thing to say when you just scoffed and shook your head.
"Me and Suguru just talked then," you huffed, and Gojo hated how you said his name. Loathed that he probably got to hear it while he was still relegated to Gojo.
Especially when he had seen first hand what you meant by talking.
His mouth opened, but it never seemed to be able to form the right words to get you to see him.
"I'm going to bed," you stubbornly insisted, padding barefoot back to your room while he hopelessly stared at your shrinking figure.
What would it take to be the one you wanted to go to sleep with?
And how the hell could he make sure that Suguru never got the chance?
series | latest oneshots | patreon
p.s. everyone go check out this lovely art of baby daddy drama gojo
synopsis: you weren't looking for a boyfriend - one just found you anyway. but things start looking a little more complicated when the roommate you thought you hated starts cutting himself a bigger slice of your life than you ever meant to let him have.
pairings: husband!Gojo x f!Reader
content: smut + light angst, DOMESTIC IN LOVE GOJO!!!, gojo is our favorite green flag!, choso is heartbroken, arguing with yuji lol, reader is having a hard time, protective/possessive gojo, husband/wife time, unprotected piv sex, kitchen sex, kissing, they want each other so badly, accidental creampie
art by @/keki1205 + div by @/petalpxl
"Tell me he's lying."
You couldn't say that. Just like you couldn't stop Choso's heart from breaking the second it started to sink in for him that there wasn't going to be some second chance for the two of you.
He lost you.
And even in six months, if you decided that this whole marriage thing wasn't for you, you weren't sure you could go back to accepting the love he previously offered.
Not when you knew what it felt like to be chosen now.
To not constantly wonder when you'd be shoved on a shelf, only occupying some secret, hidden half of his heart that he couldn't share with the rest of the world.
Or really, just with the people he cared about the most.
"He's not," you muttered, an uncomfortable lump in your throat as you hesitantly found the strength to meet Choso's broken stare.
"How could-" Choso started, stopping himself to shake his head, dark bangs framing in the face you'd fallen for not all that long ago.
But it was betrayal burning beneath your skin now, hurt and disappointment coiling into a tight ball and bouncing around your chest as you nearly threw his question back at him.
How could you? How could he just stand in the same room he used to fuck you in and look at you like you were the one that left him?
"It's like you're not even the same person," Yuji huffed, as if the two of you had spent enough time together the past few months for him to see you changing.
You were different.
Not nearly as naive as you had been back when you were with Nanami, or quite as foolish as you'd been to think that the thing you had with Choso would ever work out.
Could you really call it a relationship? Truly?
When he would only worship you in silence?
"I'm moving out," you announced, figuring that if they were mad at you now, you might as well make it worse. Just throw everything on the table and leave them to clean up the mess. "I'll still pay my part of the rent, but I'll pack up my stuff soon."
Megumi or Todo would probably move in the moment it was empty anyway. The space you occupied in your best friend's life replaced with ease the second you walked away.
But you couldn't bring yourself to stay when you knew you would be spiraling living just a bathroom apart from someone who shattered your heart.
You'd rather stay with the person devoted to stitching you back together.
"To Gojo's place?" Yuji gawked, guilt swallowing you up as you shrugged numbly at him.
"I was thinking about it before we got married, I, well, I didn't really know how to tell you," you explained, knowing that he probably wouldn't buy it anyway.
"When were you actually going to tell me any of this?" He demanded, and you couldn't help but throw a strained glance back to his brother, not sure what you were even looking for from him.
That had always been your problem, hadn't it?
You could pretend that you didn't know what it was exactly that you wanted, but deep down, you did. Support. To be the one he'd stand up for without hesitation. For Choso to call you his without being so fucking scared of everything else.
But he wasn't capable of doing that if it meant pushing his brother away.
You hadn't forced him to choose, he had just done it anyway. And now you were picking someone else to be your priority above both of them.
"I don't know," you admitted. "I didn't want to."
You didn't want things to change. And everything did anyway.
A chapter of your life was closing, and you were already on the next page, waiting for the rest of them to catch up.
"What the hell?" Yuji asked, while Choso kept to his quiet. What else was there to expect?
"I didn't want to hurt your feelings, but I should've just been upfront with you," you continued, meeting his big brown eyes to see what you had been worried about wavering right there in them. All wounded as he shook his head, pink hair sticking up like maybe he'd been running his fingers nervously through them when he paced around here waiting for you.
"Am I just supposed to be okay with you marrying and moving in with a guy you haven't even known for a year?" He scoffed, as if Satoru wasn't literally his boss. And like he hadn't been in full support before you took him seriously. "I'm your best friend-"
"Are you?" You asked, your voice almost cracking as your throat constricted tight. "Because I don't think I'm yours anymore."
His mouth curved down, but even when you suspected water might be welling up in his eyes next, you doubled down.
“I mean, come on, Yuji, how much time have we really spent hanging out even when we already live together? You can’t just act surprised that I’m leaving when you didn’t care that much when I was here,” you added, forcing yourself to look away at that last part as you silently reminded yourself what you were here for.
To get what you needed and go.
Even if you had to sit on the curb outside and wait for Satoru to come back for you.
“That’s not fair,” Yuji argued, not entirely wrong either. You knew you were just saying that stuff because you were hurt too. But standing here, getting confronted like this in front of Choso was just rubbing salt in all your own wounds. "All I wanted was for you to be honest with me, and you just walked away.”
“You want me to be totally honest?” You asked, a defensive laugh escaping as Choso tried to call out your name, to deescalate when it was his damn fault the three of you were doing this now.
“Don’t-”
He shouldn’t have said that.
“I fucked your brother too.”
And okay, you really shouldn’t have said that.
But of all the things either of you had thrown out there, you knew that was the one you wouldn’t be able to undo.
Yuji’s anger immediately deflated into sheer disbelief, his stare shifting between the two of you like he was trying to somehow picture you together before immediately scrunching his nose up in disgust.
"No, no, you-"
"He broke up with me because he didn't want you to find out and get mad at him," you added, glaring accusingly back at Choso who was floundering for something to say, his muscled arms folded across his chest as hurt that rivaled Yuji's shined in his dark eyes.
"Broke up with-" He started to argue, but Yuji was talking over him, realization setting in that you really had slept with his brother. Understanding creeping into his expression like he was suddenly replaying every interaction the two of you had in front of him the last few months, his jaw clenching and releasing as he waved a finger at you that you just swatted away.
"Jesus, do I have to hide Megumi away from you after you divorce my fucking boss?" He snapped, and you winced at the weight of your...betrayal?
It wasn't like you were the only one who'd done it. And Choso had been more than willing before he decided you weren't worth the risk.
You hoped he was happy now.
After all, Yuji would think you were the bad guy here.
"Is there anything else you want or can I finish getting my shit and go now?" You asked, refusing to bite the bait.
You laid it all out.
If Yuji decided he didn't want to see you again, that this was the end of your friendship and he couldn't find it in himself to forgive you for fucking all the most eligible bachelors he knew, well, you would learn to live with his absence.
How different could it be from how you were already living?
"I want you to stay," he stubbornly insisted.
"Please," Choso added, stepping forward, his calloused palm grabbing your wrist before you ripped it away from him, recoiling from his touch. "You can still change your mind."
He hadn't changed his though.
Choso dumped you.
Why couldn't they just let you do the same to them?
"I shouldn't have to fight with you guys to feel like I'm wanted," you muttered, shaking your head as you brushed past Yuji to get a suitcase from the top shelf of your closet, unzipping it as you threw it on your bed.
Yuji made a noise, this strangled scoff that barely even sounded like it came from him, but you didn't stop, snagging the charger you needed and tossing it in. Moving quickly to pack more of your stuff in it, half-convinced that he'd just start putting your clothes back up in protest.
But they both only stared at you, a thick silence falling over as Choso's stare seared into you, silently begging you to look back. To not do what you had already done.
"I'm sorry," Choso started to apologize, his gruff voice even rougher than usual as you shielded yourself from feeling anything from his desperate plea. "I-"
"Don't," you whispered, rejecting it before he could pierce through and rip open your healing scars.
But he fucking sucked at listening.
"Please, just, get an annulment, okay? We can still fix everything, I'll-" Choso tried to promise, but you were past that.
Like you could ever believe it when he was only offering after Yuji already knew about the two of you.
He could see the resignation on your face, the way you refused to even glance back, his voice painfully breaking, "Please, don't do this because of-"
"I'm doing what I want because I want to," you deadpanned. He could blame himself, or blame Satoru, but it was your decision.
You didn't want to keep struggling in a relationship. To waste so much time struggling thinking that meant you must really be in love because you had to fight so hard for it.
Love could be easy.
If you let it.
And it simply was with Satoru.
There was no questioning. No wondering whether or not he wanted you, or wishing he could choose you. He was happy to have his ring on your finger and you by his side. Proud to be yours, permanently stained with his name on his skin and stuck to his hear.
"Do you even give a shit about our friendship?" Your (former?) best friend bluntly asked.
Would he believe you if you said yes?
"Yuji."
He froze at the sound of Satoru's voice, cold and sharp, silencing him as you both looked back at where he was standing in the doorway, his usual smile traded in for a tight-lipped frown.
Relief flooded you, your body relaxing before he even walked over to you, shoulders slumping as he protectively put himself between you and your roommates.
"You-" Yuji tried to sound tough, but his voice wasn't steady, shaking on just a single syllable.
"Don't speak to my wife like that," Satoru sternly cut him off. You forgot sometimes what that other side of him could be like. Looked over the fact that he was literally a lawyer who spent half his work hours arguing with people, his usually goofy grin and soft stare replaced with an icy mask of disdain as his gaze shifted over to where Choso was scowling back at him.
"You just couldn't fucking wait to swoop in and-" Choso snapped at him, unable to hold onto his carefully crafted image in front of Yuji at the hint of a smug smirk that automatically curled up on Satoru's lips.
"You had your chance, I just took mine," Satoru shrugged, wrapping an arm around you as Yuji just stared slack-jawed at the tension crackling between the three of you.
And you didn't really want to stick around for when he eventually realized that you all had a threesome while he was asleep.
"I'm almost done packing," you muttered to the man by your side, anxiously readjusting the glittering ring around your finger as he squeezed your waist affectionately.
"Can I grab you anything? Or-"
"My toothbrush and stuff from the bathroom," you softly said, and he was already moving to go grab them.
"Is this it then?" Yuji asked, and you hated that you could hear him getting choked up despite how heated it had been a handful of minutes ago.
"Yeah," you mumbled, keeping your head down as you chewed the inside of your cheek, refusing to let on how much it was hurting you too. "I guess so."
You hadn't figured out what that would mean for the future even after you left. Satoru carrying your suitcase for you down the stairs and putting in the trunk of his car, opening the door for you and playing the perfect gentleman as he chattered about ordering some wings with the pizza tonight, maybe some chocolate lava cakes too.
But once you were all buckled and he was back on the road, one hand on your thigh and the other on the steering wheel, he was glancing over at the first stop sign, his pretty lips parting slowly, "Are you okay?"
"Yeah," you lied reflexively, exhaling as you looked out the window. "I, um, don't know."
He squeezed your thigh, offering you one of those awkwardly apologetic smiles like he wasn't that good at comforting people. But he was trying. "They weren't being fair to you."
Were they?
Or were you all a little wrong?
You told yourself that at least it was over now.
That you'd done it.
No matter how fucking shitty it made you feel.
Even if your friendship had been beginning to fizzle out, Yuji had been there longer than anyone else. The one you always used to turn to when things were hard, the bright spot in your life when everything was dull and gray and dragging you down.
When had it started falling apart? When he hadn't told you about his brothers? When he started hanging out with Nobara and Megumi more than you? When he found out about you and Nanami?
Or was this just the fate for most friendships? To fade until he would someday be someone you used to know too?
An acquaintance you occasionally grabbed coffee with. A friend you saw twice a year to catch up, no matter how many times you swore you'd see them sooner next time.
Maybe the best thing you could do now was give him time and space. Send him a text next week or leave him a voicemail when things cooled off.
He'd probably chill out if he knew that you had only agreed to giving this marriage a six-month test drive, but for some reason, you didn't really want to admit that. Didn't want to give his concerns any validity by admitting that the morning after you had realized that you might've made a mistake.
Satoru didn't try to push you to talk about it. Gave you the space and changed the subject instead of dragging it out. Taking care of ordering the food for you when you got back to his apartment, clearing out half his closet for you to have more than enough space for your clothes in it, offering to put on a movie you mentioned you liked around him months ago, back when he first started pestering you with text messages.
Even if it didn't seem like there was space left for you in your old apartment, he made this one feel like your place already. Photos from your makeshift honeymoon already printed out and scattered on the counter, new cups and plates purchased like he had you in mind.
You changed into one of his t-shirts in his, or um, your shared room, your suitcase unzipped on his floor as you rifled through it for clean panties and a pair of pajama shorts as you heard him scolding Ijichi on the phone for letting the news about your marriage slip today to Yuji through the shut bathroom door.
Sighing, you walked back through the quiet apartment, peeking in through all the rooms before finding yourself in the kitchen, leaning against the kitchen counter and looking over the photos.
Most of them were of you.
Shots he snuck when you weren't looking, head turned away or distracted. They were all warm, filled with something that made your chest all fuzzy as you found the handful of photos where he had asked tourists to take of the two of you together. His hand on your hips or on your shoulders, keeping you pressed right against him as he beamed proudly, blue eyes glinting as he pointed to the ring on your finger in one of them.
"Food should be here in ten," his warm voice called out, pulling your attention back to planet Earth as you watched him walk around. He traded his button-up and slacks for sweatpants and a plain t-shirt you strongly suspected was deliberately a size too small judging by the way it clung to his shoulders and biceps. "You like those?"
"Yeah," you softly replied, picking up the most normal-looking one of the bunch. You looked happy in it. Had been happy in it. And not the forced, faking it, sort of happy you were used to convincing yourself you were. "I do."
When everything else fell to the wayside, when it was just you and him, you didn't think anything had ever felt better, actually.
"It's okay to not be okay, sweetheart," He murmured, seeing through your struggles, wrapping his strong arms around your waist and letting his heavy chest resting on your back as he squeezed you tight.
"I sorta wish I met you sooner," you muttered, voicing the thought before it had even fully surfaced in your mind.
"Yeah?" Satoru immediately latched onto it, amusement lifting his question as he leaned in somehow closer. "If you met me instead of Nanami, you think you would have given me a chance?"
You smiled to yourself, trying to consider what you might've done if he'd been the one at that bar offering to drive you home. Or if somehow Yuki would've set you up with him instead.
Would you still be his wife right now? Or maybe even sooner?
"You probably would've still had to work to get me," you hummed, a hint of teasing in your tone. He chuckled, and your chest constricted in response, heart speeding up at the warmth of his laughter.
"You think I wouldn't?" He huffed, feigning like you were wounding him with your hesitation.
"I dunno," you shrugged. "You might have decided I wasn't enough."
Maybe, if you had made it easier, he wouldn't have been so interested. You wouldn't be the prize he currently felt like you were if he didn't need to wait so long to have you.
But all your insecurities, the anxieties you were bottling up, were almost immediately dismissed by the next words that left his lips.
"You've always been enough for me."
Satoru seemed to have a knack for always saying exactly what you needed to hear. For being exactly the kind of guy you needed.
For loving you the way you never knew you wanted to be loved.
He brushed the hair off the nape of your neck, and you were already anticipating his touch, craving it. Breaking down the walls you once hastily constructed to board up your heart so that he could fill it back up. Aching for him to hold you and tell you that he wanted nothing more than to be yours so you could allow yourself to be his too.
"Want me to make you feel better?" He murmured, his soft lips pressed against your shoulder just above the collar of your shirt. Ghosting delicately over the tendon of your throat, sighing softly just so his warm breath would send a shiver down your spine.
"Please," you half-whispered back, shutting your eyes as he slowly began to trace careful kisses in a drawn-out line up your neck. It was torture, but it was tremendous and tantalizing and a thousand other things you were struggling to comprehend as you surrendered yourself to the moment.
To your husband.
His fingers touched you with a tenderness your heart no longer had a hard time accepting, his mouth devoted to making you moan and murder his name as he slyly tugged your shorts down, slipping two fingers along the band of your panties and humming happily to himself as he let the elastic snap back into your skin.
"My beautiful wife is sad," he murmured, his head pressed against yours, exhaling like your hurt hurt him too. "What should I do, hm?"
"Keep kissing me," you suggested, your voice coming out pitchy and high as your fingers gripped the counter for support, knees unfortunately wobbly as he used his own to spread your legs further apart.
"Where?" He lightly teased, one of his hands slipping around to the front, his palm pressing down just above your clit. "Here?"
Your face flushed, heat you were sure he could feel blossoming beneath your cheeks as his mouth moved to press an innocent peck above your collarbone.
"Or here?"
God, he knew just how to torment you. To drag it out and make you squirm as he adjusted the pressure on your already aching bundle of nerves, eagerly awaiting your response as a surprised squeak slipped out of you.
"That's not an answer, baby," he mocked, and if he wasn't so pretty and you weren't so tired, you would twist around and tell him that he wasn't being fair.
But you already learned that lesson about Satoru. He was never fair.
He got what he wanted. And that was you.
"I can get down on my knees right now for you," he continued, undeterred by your indecision, unaware that all his sweet talking was unfortunately a little too effective, a damp patch growing in your panties by the second as he talked to you in that low voice. "Suck on your clit and finger fuck you until you forget all about today."
A generous offer, really. But his impatience was beginning to rub off on you.
And there was an emptiness inside of you that you needed more than just his fingers to fill.
"I want you to fuck me," you murmured, staring down at the photos and trying to control your breathing only to hear his own hitch behind you.
It took a second for him to compose himself, but then your panties were being pulled down fast enough you weren't sure they would survive before he was babbling something about how you were killing him and he was trying to be romantic here blah blah blah, but all your brain was focusing on was the sensation of two digits dipping inside you, testing to make sure you were already soaked enough that he wouldn't hurt you.
Unable to resist the temptation to push in further, swirling around as he sighed and whined that he wanted you for dessert later then, his appetite apparently bottomless when it came to how many ways he could have you.
He didn't make you wait long, pulling his fingers back out and popping them into his mouth to suck them clean as you threw him an arched brow over your shoulder.
"Go ahead," he huffed, pouting at you as you resisted a giggle. "Say it."
"You're insatiable," you accused.
"Only for you."
You wondered what it was about you that made him feel that way.
Was it too much to hope it would never go away?
His cock slid between your slick entrance, and he got a little too much in playing with you, pushing it back-and-forth, shimmying his hips while he went back to kissing your throat.
It would be a lie to say you didn't like it. That you weren't about to giggle a little when he half-whispered that he could probably cum just doing this, holding it in just for him to finally slot himself inside you.
You were immediately giving into him, folding forward just for him to grab your hair with his free hand and pull it back light enough to not hurt, but to refuse to let you run or squirm away.
"Uh-uh," he murmured, tilting your head to the side enough that he had better access to sink his teeth into your throat in a heated love bite, inch after inch of his cock shoving in as your body easily acclimated him. Moaning softly at how right all of it felt, melting for him as he easily pushed his way deeper. Familiar territory you were both treading, even though this felt different somehow. "You're all mine right now, sweetheart."
"Just right now?" You asked, although it came out as a thin gasp, eyes rolling back right as he bottomed out, cock stretching you effortlessly out, molding you to his shape as his laugh morphed into a thick groan.
"Forever, if you'll let me have it," he immediately responded, like it was a vow he hadn't gotten the chance to say at your wedding.
Forever.
Since when had it stopped sounding so scary?
He fucked you soft and slow, nudging your shirt up and running his hand over the tattoo you'd gotten for him, rutting into you a little harder every time his thumb dragged over the outline of it.
Drinking up your moans and making a feast out of your neck and jaw, and you couldn't even bring yourself to tell him to not leave marks, not when any word you tried to get out just ended up in a mushy whine you couldn't control.
Thighs trembling, barely supporting yourself when he let go of your hair to start playing with your tits instead, adoring every piece of yourself that you allowed him to have.
Pleasure warping your brain until you felt like a puddle, heat coiling and curling until it was all that you were, bent forward and whimpering for him as he filled you up so completely.
"Y-you can't just make sounds like that, pretty baby," he purred, struggling to sound composed when his voice cracked at the first word, stuttering though it as his hips drilled back down into your ass.
"Or what?" You teased back, a funny tickling feeling crawling up your throat as air wheezed through it.
Your husband wasn't satisfied to just take you from behind, pulling out to hear your soft whine before flipping you around and crashing his lips against yours to swallow the sound himself.
Hands on your ass hoisting you up, picking you up and pinning your body between him and the counter. And you were kissing him back just as hard, tongue slipping into his mouth to taste yourself on it.
And for a second, you almost asked yourself why the hell it had taken you so long to let him in like this.
But then he was pushing his cock back in, some invisible string tying itself in a tight knot around your heart as the rest of the world fizzled out until it was just this.
Just his hands and his mouth and his cock.
Crammed full while he practically coddled you, reaching up to cup your cheek as he murmured desperate promises between kisses.
Claiming you like he couldn't stand the idea of you being anyone else's. Wearing his heart on his sleeve so that you could have it. Maybe it had taken him a little longer to win you over, but he had won.
"I love you," he blurted it out, and you knew he really meant it. That he was not the sort of man who would ever take it back. Not even when he just said it mid-thrust.
But his eyes still widened, all worried like he thought you would ask him to pull out and then never speak to him again, but you just nodded nervously, leaning forward to press a soft kiss against his lips.
"You can say it again," you muttered.
He already had your name on his back.
You sorta doubted he could make this more serious than that.
"I love you so fuckin' much," he breathed again, pulling you closer and practically grinding his cock deep enough you could nearly feel him rubbing up against your cervix, prodding against the spongy spot with a desperation you were a little embarrassed to share.
A fever burning beneath your skin you were sure that he'd soothe, pleasure pulling you closer to a climax as you nodded, unable to actually bring yourself to say the same words, even if you sorta wanted to just so he wouldn't be disappointed in you.
"My girl, my wife," he continued, rambling as his pupils widened, only a thin strip of blue visible as he called out your name like it was the last thread holding him together.
"My husband," you murmured back, letting a hint of your own pride slipping through as you reached up to caress his cheek, gently brushing your fingertips over his soft skin as he let out a long whimper that left your stomach in knots.
And before you fully realized it, he was cumming inside you, warm ropes of cum filling you up as he rushed to start rubbing your clit to get you to finish too.
"S-shit, I'm sorry, oh god," he whispered, his voice breaking as he threw his head back, his thumb twitching while he painted patterns over it.
You'd like to say that it was just that his touch that pushed you over, but it was how cute he looked, his white brows pulled together tightly as he put himself on the same level as you, giving you those pretty puppy dog eyes while you wilted into his touch.
So wrapped up in him you could barely breathe, barely process where your body started and his ended when every piece of you felt so connected.
"S'okay," you tried to reassure him right as stars flashed behind your vision, scrunching your eyes shut as he coaxed you through the wave of pleasure, just pumping his cock in deeper and pushing the cum back in as yours walls squeezed tight around him.
You didn't know how badly you wanted to stay like that until it was over.
Until he started to pull out and you found yourself wrapping your legs around his waist and digging the base of your foot into his back to keep him inside of you.
“I forgot the condom,” he mumbled, burying his face in your throat like he was embarrassed and pressing more feather-light kisses across it like little apologies. “I think I still have that extra Plan B in the bathroom.”
“It’s okay,” you murmured back, repeating yourself and running your fingers through his hair as you found yourself cradling his head closer.
You would take it, and everything would be fine.
A neat little slideshow of the next few months playing in your head as you caught your breath, feeling his cock throb and twitch as you pictured your new routine.
Waking up next to him and showering together before work. Coming home to takeout or cooking dinner. Curling up on his couch and having lazy sex on practically every available surface until there wasn't a space left you hadn't fucked. Falling asleep in his arms.
Would all of that really be so wrong?
Letting yourself get lost in this domesticity? Truly give the whole wife thing a try since you were having such a hard time just being a girlfriend anyway?
"So, do you like rent this place or own it?" You asked, looking around it and picturing whether or not you'd still be living here a year from now when you were having an awfully hard time imagining leaving.
"It's all mine, baby," he proudly proclaimed, leaning down so his nose was nuzzling against your own. "And yours now too."
"We should paint it then," you muttered, tilting your head to the side as he grinned.
"My wife has such great ideas," he hummed, and you couldn't believe how much you were starting to like him saying that.
"How long until you get sick of calling me that?" You murmured, swallowing hard and knowing what answer you were already hoping for.
content: angst. pining. what to do when the man you want only want money?
Sukuna stole your heart.
And your wallet.
Snatching both in his calloused grip, dark red eyes glinting at you as he snuck it from your pouch, clearly assuming you were just another foolish mark as he murmured seductive words meant to distract you.
Clueless to the fact your own hand had slipped into his own pocket to pilfer your own prize, feeling for a handful of small coins and some jewelry he must have snatched from his previous targets.
He thought he won.
Started to walk away before he felt for it a few moments later and looked back to where you were waiting for him to realize what you'd done and come back to demand his stuff back.
As if any of it actually belonged to him.
He stormed over, dark red eyes squinting at you when you expectantly held your hand back and told him he'd have to trade you for it.
Really, you hoped you'd get his heart in the exchange, but you settled for striking a different sort of deal.
A partnership of sorts. Like-minded people working towards a common goal.
Robbing idiots with loose pockets.
You started small. Lifting a few coins here and there from fools who were none the wiser. Then you started aiming higher. Richer targets. Greater rewards for the risk.
Usually, you'd fall in front of the carriage of some noble, or stop a merchant on the street, distracting them long enough for Sukuna to swoop in and steal enough to make a profit off of while still going undetected. Celebrating your earnings together over ale at the tavern in the evenings, giggling while he grunted over doing the real work.
But sometimes, you'd catch his mouth curling up in a hint of a smile, his hardened stare softening when you laughed and teased him.
Perhaps you were just as pathetic as the rest of your marks. Because despite knowing he'd betray you the second it was convenient, or the moment you turned into a cost instead of a benefit, you still fell for his glares, for his grumbles. For all the fun you had in the moments in between your scores, for the rare times where he looked at you less like a burden and more like a friend.
You were just the moron that wanted more.
Dreaming of a day that his eyes would linger on you, where his stare would share the want that burned in yours.
But dreams were just dreams. And all your wishful thinking landed you was in hot water when one of your schemes finally went wrong.
It was such a simple one too.
A nice carriage was coming by, and he'd pretend to be a stranger accidentally knocking you into the street with just enough time for it to stop before it could seriously hurt you.
You'd done it enough times to know the routine. Had the rhythm of it already down.
So you knew the very moment it was all fucked.
When you hit the ground half a second too late, the carriage driver not having the proper time to react. The horses in the front neighing as they struggled to stop soon enough, one of their hooves hit your side hard enough to knock all the breath from your chest.
This time, you didn't have to pretend to be hurt as you reflexively rolled away from the impact, a sharp whine of pain escaping as your hands shot to press down on the now aching throb in the left half of your stomach.
You were sure Sukuna would call it off.
Actually come check on you once he realized you were hurt.
But when you felt a hand on your shoulder, a honeyed voice in your ear asking if you were alright, you glanced up to find a warm pair of purple eyes instead of the sharp scowl you were expecting.
Dark hair framing his pretty face, his features surprisingly gentle as he extended a hand to help you stand. His outfit was ornate, far finer than even the more expensive fitted suits you'd seen some of the other nobles wear, yet still subtle enough that someone without an attuned eye for it might miss the detail. But beneath the concern flickering in his gaze, there was an intelligence to it that made your stomach drop at the striking realization that perhaps you'd picked the wrong target.
Stealing worked best when you were taking something from someone stupid enough not to notice.
And you had a funny feeling the man in front of you noticed everything.
"Are you okay?" He pressed again, pinching your chin between his fingers to guide your attention back to him when you didn't take his hand, forcing you to face him as you held in a stunned squeak. Pierced by his scrutinizing focus, chest constricting tight as you tried to force air out. "Looks like you got hit pretty hard."
It was hard to think of something intelligent to say when his presence made you feel small. Like some insect who accidentally stumbled upon a much larger predator, looking up at him as you slowly parted your lips, "I-I think so."
"We still better get you checked out," he hummed thoughtfully, although you couldn't shake that crawling feeling under your skin as he hoisted you gently up. "My estate has an excellent doctor."
"I'm really okay," you lied, ignoring the throb in your side as you resisted the urge to look back to see if Sukuna had snuck off with some prize from the carriage's luggage yet, or if he needed you to buy some time. "I can just walk it off."
Or crawl back into your bed to sleep for a day or two until it topped hurting, but he didn't need to know that.
"Nonsense," the stranger murmured, slipping a hand on your waist that pressed a little too tight to be considered purely polite. "My carriage hit you, so you're my responsibility now."
"I-I don't even know your name," you stuttered, aware that this was quickly devolving further and further out of hand.
"You can call me Suguru," he offered a charmingly crooked smile, although it alarmed you more than disarmed you.
And before you could scramble for an excuse, he was leading you back towards his carriage, opening the door and calling out instructions to his driver to return to his estate.
What the hell were you supposed to do when his status was so much higher than yours? When anyone else would think it was absurd you were rejecting his kindness?
You caught a flash of pink, your head turning in a panic to see Sukuna, his name about to leave your lips before you realized what he was doing - leaving you.
Rushing away from the back of the carriage, not even throwing you so much as a spare glance over his shoulder before disappearing into the crowd.
You knew you shouldn't be surprised.
But it still stung. Heart sinking as his broad frame disappeared right as you were ushered into the comfort of a carriage, the man beside you softly murmuring that you could just stay the night with him depending on what the doctor said. Offering to let you stay as long as you needed actually so you could recover.
What would you even have waiting for you afterwards?
Sukuna already got what he wanted. He wouldn't care what happened to you. Not even if this Suguru never let you leave.
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can you betray the man who once inspired your voice?
synopsis: you were just a dancer with bigger dreams before he came along. the voice in the dark. the man without a face. but you may have bit off more than you could bargain for when he comes to claim who he's made you into.
pairing: phantom!Sukuna x f!reader x bsf!Gojo
content: mdni, fluff and plot, heavily inspired by phantom of the opera, but more of a modern au where we will not exactly be following the original plot so there WILL be deviations, YANDERE SUKUNA !!, childhood best friend gojo (inspired by Raoul), pining, yearning, anxious reader, gojo already wants her bad
"Did you know they say this opera house is haunted?"
Gojo rolled his eyes as he fixed his cuffs, throwing an annoyed look over at the old idiot that dragged him here. Claiming it was part of his duty as a clan heir to show support to the arts, keeping up a public image they had worked so hard to craft. When really all they cared about was lining the pockets of one of their friends.
Painting him out to be some benevolent billionaire benefactor as if he had done anything other than accept his parent's fortune after they passed.
Of course he tried to do right.
Started community service programs and donated as much as he could without drawing their attention. But most days, he quite frankly felt useless.
A boring future ahead of him filled with events like this where he could only grin and bear the pretentious conversations from people who only ever wanted something from him.
He knew he shouldn't complain.
That anyone would trade places with him in half a second.
But he couldn't stop himself from craving something bigger. From aching for more than just empty smiles and endless days that droned on.
"We're actually sitting in the opera ghost's box," someone else chuckled, and Gojo resisted the urge to scowl. To focus on the show starting, reclining back in his chair as he tuned out the snickering of his haughty guests whispering about this opera ghost.
Was this supposed to be some shitty spooky story intended to scare him?
To mock him for not knowing the history of this place after they forced him to attend?
The colorful stage ahead was well-crafted, the dancers doing some delicate choreography on stage, but he kept glancing down at his watch, checking the time and counting down the minutes until he could return home until he heard something that made his heart stutter and stall.
Snapping up to look towards the stage, spine going stiff as his shoulders tensed, a clear voice ringing out and cutting through all the idiotic chatter.
Gojo leaned forward in his chair, damn near falling out of it while his chest strained with the quick beating of his heart, his sharp stare confirming exactly what he suspected.
It was you.
Standing there in the center of the stage, holding out your hands out and dazzling in a beautiful dress - although it didn't appear to completely fit you from where he was sitting.
Gojo was fairly certain he'd never caught so much as a glimpse of someone so beautiful.
The glitter in your hair catching the light, how it reflected in your eyes, your voice making his heart soar and swing with every note. You were magic.
A wish come true.
He never thought he'd see you again. Lost to time and distance despite the resources he'd spent trying to to find you for just a few fleeting seconds of conversation.
The girl that had once held his heart in your small hands, a simple childhood crush that lived on in his memory, of a handful of summers long ago where you were playmates. Running through fields and sneaking off to play house, pretending to be husband and wife before his clan caught on to his antics and stopped letting him leave the estate unsupervised.
Still, Gojo had gotten to take you on a date. The clumsy kind where he had stolen food from the kitchen and stuffed it in a bag, setting up a picnic for you as the sun set on the horizon.
He tried to find you when he turned eighteen. Actually, pretty much the second he got a phone. But the closest he'd come was finding your family's obituary a few years ago, his heart stalling at the idea of you being on your own.
But despite his efforts, he'd never been able
And here you were. Singing on a stage in front of thousands of people.
To think he hadn't even planned on coming to this show. It was probably the first time he had to be grateful for the practically ancient clan members forcing him to fulfill his duties.
But this had to be fate.
The universe handing you back to him on a shiny silver platter.
Who was he to deny the sweetest taste he'd ever been served?
He was enraptured.
Listening to every note that left your lips, holding his breath as he shut out the whispers of the men around him who had clearly picked up at his sudden interest in the show.
But he refused to pay them any mind. Not when he finally had you in front of him after so long.
It wasn't like he hadn't met other women since you. But he hadn't felt anything with them. No spark. No connection.
No magical feeling like everything in the world suddenly made sense the second he saw them.
"What do you think?" Someone asked him, but he didn't even look over to see who it was.
Just sucking in a sharp breath as he murmured, "She's fantastic."
"She's actually the understudy, our lead-"
Gojo had already shut out his rambling, refusing to miss so much as a line from you. He didn't even bother looking down at his watch for the rest of the performance, knee bouncing up-and-down impatiently during the intermission and all the bits that you weren't in, attention solely devoted into studying this new you he couldn't wait to get to know.
God, he had no fucking clue what he'd do if you weren't single.
Wait a few more years and hope from the opera house box that you would eventually see him as someone that could be a part of your future instead of your past?
It was torture to just sit there and suffer through his brain looping through all the different ways you might react to him, terrified that he'd approach you only for you to tilt your pretty head to the side and tell him that you couldn't recall him.
Half out of his seat the second the cast started taking bows, glancing around at the men accompanying him, trying to weigh which one would be the most helpful when they were all usually useless.
"Gojo, what are you-"
"I have to speak to her," he breathed, the lump in his throat bobbing hard as he looked back down at the stage to see you taking your final bow.
"Someone has a crush," one of the men snickered behind him, but all it took was a single scowl to shut him up.
"I know her," he muttered. Knew you. "We were chidhood friends."
The same one mumbled under his breath that he didn't know he had friends, but it was the man who asked what he thought who stood up too.
He belatedly recognized him as the owner, someone whose hand he'd been instructed to shake before the show started. His initial impression that he only had dollar signs in his eyes seemed to be confirmed at how eagerly he began to gesture towards the closed curtains.
"I would love to arrange a chat for you two then," he happily insisted.
Probably already imagining how much more funding he might receive if the head of the Gojo clan was seeing one of their stars. Still, he couldn't bring himself to care when he was nervously following him through the narrow corridors and winding halls down to the backstage area, plucking a rose from a passing flower arrangement and wishing he'd brought flowers as he pictured your face receiving them.
Next time, he would be waiting for you with the biggest bouquet he could find, ready to woo and impress you with his wealth now that he was no longer a boy who stuttered over every word exchanged with you.
"How long has it been since you've seen her?" His new acquaintance inquired, and he was counting the years in his head, mourning each one he missed with you.
"Too long," he mumbled, unable to hide the nervous tone to his voice as he rounded the corner - and you were there.
In the flesh. A few feet away.
Pulling off parts of your dress, your chest heaving hard as you were followed closely by a fellow dancer and another woman, both of them trying to get you to stay, to offer congratulations that you didn't even seem to hear.
Your eyes were all hazy, a thin sheen of sweat sticking to your forehead as you hurried, but before you could slip away, flee and fizzle out into another fickle memory, Gojo was rushing over and impulsively grabbing your forearm.
He started to say your name before you had even twisted around, but the grating voice of his companion cut through all the commotion.
"Miss, one of our sponsors is here to see you, I think you may already know him," he began, and Gojo saw the confusion twisting up your face through the stage makeup they must have spent nearly an hour applying.
And then you saw him too.
Your eyes widening in an instant, eyebrows arching up as that beautiful mouth of yours parted in pure disbelief.
"I was worried you wouldn't remember me," Gojo grinned, letting go of your arm to properly present the rose he'd stolen, drinking up every detail of your face.
"I-I-" You struggled for a reply, and for some reason, he found himself almost flattered by it, his chest puffing out as he hoped you couldn't see through the persona he was putting on.
"You've grown up quite well," he complimented, as if he wasn't about to make himself cringe with how hard he was trying to impress you.
"You too," you finally said, your stunned stare finally drifting from his face to the flower in his hand. You didn't reach out to take it though, hesitating as you looked over your shoulder before he impatiently pushed the stem into your palm.
"You were brilliant out there," he added, feeling more awkward than he anticipated when your attention returned to him, all the confidence draining out of him until your lips curled up into a small smile.
"Do you really think so?" You asked, your eyeshadow glittering and catching the lights as you looked up.
"I'd like to take you out to eat after this and tell you how much I loved it," Gojo smoothly offered, feeling awfully proud of himself for putting it out there.
Your face lit up, but as fast as it happened, it faded again, anxiety gleaming in your eyes as you chewed on your lower lip.
"Could you wait for me?" You asked, glancing down at yourself as you held your breath.
"Of course," he eagerly nodded, already thinking of what was still open, where he could take you - imagining the night ending with you back in his penthouse, of you sprawled in his sheets or sleeping soundly on his couch.
"I'll be back in a few minutes," you spoke so much softer now, but he wasn't sure if you were just struggling with nerves from the show or if you were simply more shy than you used to be.
"I'll be here," Gojo promised.
He would wait as long as it took.
What was a handful more minutes after so many years?
He watched the other ensemble members scurrying around, starting to realize a lot of them were just as skittish as you seemed to be. Always looking over their shoulder and scampering around quickly, refusing to linger too long in one place.
The owner had stuck around though, taking the opportunity to try and convince him to come back for the next show, dismissively mumbling about what a mess this foolishness with the opera ghost was making. Five minutes passed. Then fifteen.
And by the time thirty minutes had gone by, Gojo found himself pulling aside the dancer he'd seen speaking to you before he interrupted, asking if she could go check on you.
You had looked a little flushed.
Perhaps you passed out? Maybe got stuck in a piece of your costume and needed assistance getting out?
He didn't expect her to come back a few minutes later, her face pale and hands trembling as she gestured wildly behind her.
"S-she's gone," she stammered, fear etched into every feature of her face. "The opera ghost took her."
a/n: did it take me a year...yes...did i finally lock in and write it...yes
When everyone whispered of the big, scary dragon hoarding a sacred treasure in some secret cavern, you thought he’d be, well, a dragon.
Not just some ridiculously buff guy with thick, scaled wings and a tail sleeping on a pile of gold and gems like it was a bed.
Pink hair sticking up in every direction as he snoozed, muscles standing out on his toned, tattooed chest as it slowly rose and fell with loud snores. Or maybe they were markings, inky black and striped across his skin as his pink scaled tail thwapped against the floor, sending coins rolling across the stone floor.
You crept closer, more out of curiosity than anything else, holding your own breath as you squinted at his broad frame, trying to pinpoint how deeply he was dozing. You were fairly experienced as an adventurer, had plenty of expeditions under your belt where you fought beasts and monsters and occasionally even men.
Unfortunately, you weren't sure which category to put him in.
He was actually pretty hot. The sort of man you would approach at the tavern and try to convince to purchase you a pitcher of ale to share. Strong features, all toned and tan, the kind of jaw you could daydream about leaving love bites over.
But your experience was screaming at you that you were making a mistake here.
Your sword hung heavy by your side, still sheathed, your hand on the hilt while you debated on what you should do. You'd come here today expecting to slay a dragon. To chop off his head and collect a reward for it as well as claim your own share of his treasure.
For a moment, you debated on turning your back. Bolting before his slumber could end, maybe taking a few days to think over a new plan - but before you could so much as step back, his head snapped up.
Dark red eyes immediately locking onto yours, accusation burning in them as your grip tightened on your weapon, ready to wield it if he attacked.
"How did a mouse scurry in here?" He half-croaked, his loud voice coming out all gravelly as it ripped through your ears.
"I'm not a mouse," you argued, aggravated by the insult enough to huff despite the obvious danger you were currently in.
"What should I see you as then? A pest? Or a meal?" he dryly commented, brows narrowing as he blinked the sleep away from his stare, studying you with far more scrutiny than you would like.
You had felt his aura the moment you stepped inside his cave. The energy that pulsed around him and threatened to swallow you up. But now that he was awake, it was hard to even breathe in it, choking on the intense tension in the air. A crackling charge hanging between you, ready to ignite with a single movement.
Of all the monsters you faced before, you had more than just a sneaking suspicion this was the one you were outmatched against.
"I-I was just leaving," you stuttered, giving up on the gleaming gold, even though the idea of losing out on that much money put a huge fucking lump in the middle of your throat.
"It gets lonely up here," he sarcastically hummed, taunting you as he saw through your petty promise.
He knew why you were here. Knew that you were no different than a common burglar. One that snuck into his home with the intention to steal.
"I should still go," you mumbled, shaking your head slowly. He was standing now, his full height on display as you tried not to let your stare linger at the sight of his nude body. Or the two cocks currently getting harder by the second, or the way his swollen tips were leaking onto a particularly shiny diamond beneath his feet.
"Did I say you could?" He cocked his head to the side, and despite stepping back, you found yourself stopped.
The tail that had been just resting on the ground seconds ago suddenly wrapped around your legs, binding you in one place as he crudely chuckled at the scent of your fear.
"I've always wanted to add a thief to my treasure trove."
Ი ᰍ mdni. porn with plot. reader cheating on her bastard husband with her knight.
Knights are meant to serve their masters.
Which was pretty much exactly what Toji was doing between your thighs, wasn't it?
Thick, calloused fingers plunging in-and-out of his queen, watching your face scrunch up in pleasure, glossy lips panting out his name in stuttered protests.
"My husband will return soon," you stammered, as if you weren't squeezing around his fat digits so tight he could've sworn you were trying to snap them off in there. Sitting straight up on the edge of your bed, that fancy dress of yours bunched up high around your hips, held up with one of your trembling hands.
But you didn't stop him.
He scoffed, brows knitting together as his mouth twitched down in irritation. Like that loser hadn't spent his evening rolling around in his concubine's bed instead of taking care of his wife.
Could he really blame him for doing it instead?
You were merely a possession to the king. A political advantage. A pawn.
With Toji, you were just a woman. His woman.
"Let him come," he bitterly muttered, pushing his fingers deeper, finding that spongy spot that left you moaning even louder, daring some passing servant to overhear and scurry off.
"He'll have your head," you hissed out, despite the fact you looked like you were on the verge of your first orgasm, fingers raking through his dark hair to tug at his roots and force him to look up at you. To see that serious gleam in your gorgeous eyes as you pouted so prettily at him.
"You can have it first," Toji hummed, pushing your thighs further apart as he climbed fully under the fluffy skirt of your dress. It was hard to fit his bulking frame under there, but he made it work, knowing that you'd be blushing and barely able to hold it together as he pressed a heated kiss to your bare heat.
That pretty pussy slick and dripping for him, already all worked up as he slowly dragged his tongue across the entrance, teasing you to earn one of those cute gasps of yours he was so fond of.
But before he could properly enjoy it, there was the annoying creak of your door swinging open, and you were clearing your throat as a boisterous voice called out.
"There's my wife," your swine of a husband slurred, obviously drunk as he stumbled in, completely clueless to who was currently under your dress right now. Feigning care like he hadn't fucked every harlot in an hour radius. "You're looking a little flushed, dear."
"I, um, am not feeling very well," you lied, stammering out the words while Toji slipped his tongue between your slick folds.
"Well, I wouldn't want to get sick," your husband hummed, although Toji was sure he would have found some other excuse to go spend the night in someone else's bed.
The door shut again two seconds later, and you were smacking his head through the dress, letting out a dramatic huff that he nearly laughed at.
"You nearly got us caught," you whispered when you were sure you were in the clear, wiggling your hips like you were wanting more.
"Oops," he apathetically muttered before going back to swirling his tongue around, feeling your soft thighs squeeze down around him.
"Don't make me live without you," you defensively muttered, and Toji's hardened heart softened for a second as he slid back out, thankful he didn't have to see whatever vulnerable expression might be on your face right now.
ʚ₍ᐢ. .ᐢ₎ɞ mdni. fluff/angst. reader hates him. bet trope.
You were used to being a joke.
Face smeared with makeup, hair done up as you made a fool of yourself in front of the noble court. Bowing down deep and low, letting them mock you when you knew the only other alternative you had was probably a position as the court harlot.
You used to try harder. To make quick-witted remarks, sharp tongue ready to slip in a sly retort as you entertained the people you were paid to keep preoccupied. But they were too dull minded for that, refusing to pick up on your jokes when they came from a woman's mouth - although that didn't stop them from roaring with laughter when your fellow jester just repeated what you said.
Because of course, when it came from his lips, it was the funniest thing they ever heard.
God, you couldn't fucking stand Gojo.
He was worse than all of them combined.
No better than a common thief, snatching your best material and echoing them to the amusement of the crowd, earning their spare coins as tips while you scraped by with the meager base salary you made.
It was why you had resorted to this demeaning spectacle. Acting like the idiot you thought they were and batting your lashes to discover that you did make more when they thought you were being put in your place.
Perhaps it was time for a new profession.
A tavern maid, maybe? Baking bread or running errands for a merchant's guild? Surely, somewhere in the village below was hiring.
You didn't know how much longer you'd last pretending to be a brainless idiot prancing around a banquet before you'd jump off the nearest balcony.
"How did you do tonight?" Gojo grinned at you once it was over, sneakily sliding up to your side as you dipped out of the hall, cocking his head to the side.
You hated him for still being attractive under his own makeup. For wearing his hat all crooked and cute and revealing a sliver of his stark-white hair beneath it, blue eyes burning into you as he batted long lashes your way.
Squinting at him accusingly before turning away, refusing to acknowledge him with a sharp sigh.
Ignoring him was still easier said than done.
Especially when he was so...undeterred. Rambling on about which nobles he disliked and which ones offered him bigger tips, chuckling to himself over bits of juicy gossip he overheard, letting his elbow annoyingly knock into yours.
"I'm returning to my room," you bluntly interrupted him, stopping as you stared at him, hoping he'd pick up at the loathing lingering in your stare.
"I know," he chirped, a cheeky smile curling up on his lips as your own mouth clamped shut. "I'm walking you there."
"Why?" You deadpanned, squinting accusingly at his frustratingly happy expression.
"There are lecherous men around here," he hummed, and you couldn't tell if he was trying to make fun of you too.
You were so used to that being the case it was hard to conceive of another explanation.
"I sincerely doubt any of them are lusting after me," you sharply remarked, acutely aware of your current appearance.
And still, he nearly seemed sincere as he shrugged, "I disagree."
You brushed past him, heat flooding your face as you wondered what the hell you were supposed to make of that assertion.
He chased after you, refusing to let you get too many steps away as you approached the door to your quaint quarters.
"Have I done anything to irritate you?" He pestered, pulling on a loose piece of fabric in your ridiculous dress.
"Everything you do irritates me," you snapped.
"You wound me," he feigned injury, but when you glanced back, he was still smiling, still amused.
"I'll maim you next," you warned him, opening your door and throwing him one last scowl. But he was treating your threat like you were attempting to flirt with him.
"I look forward to it."
You were debating on making good on it too, collecting your porridge the next morning in the kitchen, picking up a particularly sharp pronged fork and considering plunging it into his arm when you passed by him.
Gojo didn't recognize you.
No one ever did when you went to the servant's breakfast without your uniform or makeup, starting to walk back with your bowl before you overheard his loud chatter cut through the other ten conversations going on.
-wants me."
"You think so?" His knight friend asked, leaning against the wall with a low laugh.
"I told you," Gojo grinned. "I walked her to her room last night."
"That's not the same as sleeping in it," His companion chuckled, and your stomach sank at the sudden realization they were speaking of you.
Freely discussing fucking you.
"Just give me a week," Gojo winked, and you were gripping your fork harder, already picturing what his pretty blue eyes would look like welling up with tears of pain. "Don't forget the deal-"
"Yeah, yeah, five silver pieces," the knight rolled his eyes, and you were fuming.
You paused where you were, lips pursing together tightly as you dropped your fork in favor of just getting a better grip of your bowl. And before you could properly think it over you were throwing it at Gojo's face.
He had a decent reaction time, blocking the ceramic from breaking against his face, but it didn't stop the porridge from covering him from his hair down to his tunic, some of it splattering onto his friend as they belatedly processed what the hell happened.
"Oops," you hummed, shrugging as you walked past them, figuring skipping breakfast was a worthy cause for the mess they'd get stuck cleaning up.
Everyone else already thought you were unstable. Wouldn't really bat an eye if you behaved...badly.
Why not make it his problem?
You didn't stop to see their faces. Didn't want to know what kind of expression he made when he wiped the porridge from his eyes. Not when you suspected there wouldn't be any remorse.
No, not unless you made him regret it.
Would all his friends think you were only worth five silver pieces? Or would one of them like to fuck you first?
mdni. instead of sleep walking, gojo’s sleep sucking on your titties!
“-ngh.”
waking up to satoru’s heavy frame slung on top of you wasn’t exactly anything new. but opening your eyes to discover his warm mouth wrapped around your nipple?
stifling a yawn and squirming, sleepily trying to regain a sliver of sensibility as he sucked hard, sloppily dragging his tongue over the peaked bud as his fingers squeeze and groped your other breast.
“satoru,” you softly whined, blinking as your boyfriend practically tried to breastfeed from you—absolutely undeterred at the lack of milk.
he made a needy noise.
a deep groan that came from his chest, his hips grinding down to rut against the blankets tangled around you.
when you suggested free use to him a few months ago, you figured he’d use it for actually fucking you. not just slurping on your nipple while you were half-asleep.
and even now that you were starting to rise, he hadn’t budged, still groping and grabbing at you as he licked up his own spit that dribbled down the valley of your breasts.
“toru,” you whispered again, gently running your fingers through his fluffy hair, pushing the soft strands back so you could see his eyes.
he blinked slowly back at you, lazy and unfocused, the blue still shining in your dimly lit bedroom. swirling his tongue over the sensitive bud, not slowing or stopping for even a second as you tugged lightly at his roots.
but even when he unlatched, he barely reacted, brows just knitting together in faint confusion. mumbling something completely incoherent before returning to nuzzling against your chest as it struck you that he wasn’t even awake.
exhaustion still heavy enough in your bones and luring you back into your own dreams, readjusting with a thick yawn as you let him snuggle closer, lips leaving lingering kisses. the hypnotic sounds of his moans lulling you under until you had drifted off once more.
“fuck,” gojo’s groans snapped you out of your sleep a second time, morning sun filtering through the window now as you sat up easier, squinting as you scanned the room to discover satoru out of bed this time.
his pretty face all scrunched up, staring down at the unfortunate dried cum stain splotched in the front of his boxers, not even a hint of embarrassment etched into his expression.
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how the hell were you supposed to stop writhing when shoko's nimble fingers kept dragging over your sensitive wings? spreading them out as you struggled to resist fluttering them? sprawled flat against the cool surface of her examination table, your wrists and ankles bound to stop you from wriggling away.
all the sensitive nerves that stretched across the thin, almost translucent fairy wings attached to your spine tingled as she traced them, your body shivering as you resisted the raw need it sent straight down to your core.
"i-i'm sensitive," you whined, wishing you had never agreed to being shoko's test subject now that you were pinned to her table. you were meant to be an olive branch, an offering to show trust between your tiny kingdom of fairies and the far larger one of humans that you shared a border with.
it hadn’t sounded so bad back then.
spending all your time with the most gorgeous woman you’d ever met? who would say no to her?
"i've only got an hour left to collect data," she sighed, clicking her tongue as she touched the bottom of your wings, drawing out a dramatic moan as you felt something damp start to seep into the thin woven fabric of your panties. of course, she had been the one to insist that was all you needed to wear for her exam.
she had used a spell to shrink down closer to your size for, uh, research purposes, but you were pretty sure she was just conducting practicing the best ways to totally torture you.
playing with all the places on your wings that left you whimpering protests while she feigned nonchalance, taking notes like your pleasure was little more than a passing amusement.
“you know what you’re doing,” you gasped, squeezing your thighs together as she delicately pressed on the spot just below your spine where they started.
“studying your anatomy?” she coyly offered, daring to let her hand drift down to where your underwear was clinging to the curve of your hips, plucking it up and letting the band snap back down against your skin.
“tease,” you accused, glancing back over your shoulder to see the small smirk curling up on her soft lips.
“if you’re good, you’ll get a reward,” she hummed, her warm brown eyes blinking slowly as you begrudgingly nodded.
biting your lip and making bargains in your head to keep your mind off the sensual way she skimmed her palms over your skin next, or the enthralling soft hum of a song under her breath when she lifted your hips to raise your ass in the air, positioning you like her personal doll.
"i'd like to get some samples next," she muttered, toying with the band on your panties again before pulling them down just enough to expose your entrance. a chilly breeze brushing against it as she did nothing but stare for a moment. "how would you prefer i take them?"
"is your tongue an option?" you tentatively asked, face flushing as you felt her warm breath ghost over your slick folds, a saccharinely-sweet smell of your sex lingering in the air from your arousal.
"are all fairies so easily excited?" shoko exhaled, teasing you in that deceptively bored voice of hers, despite how her tongue gave in anyway, slowly slipping inside and drawing a deliberately slow circle around as you melted at the intense sensation.
"are you saying i'm easy?" you whined, although you couldn't exactly argue as she worked her tongue deeper to drink you up.
you'd let her devour you if she wanted.
shoko pulled out for a second, and the way you quivered without her was evidence enough, "am i wrong?"
no.
but she didn't need to know that.
your anatomy wasn't all that different than a human's.
all you could hope was shoko wouldn't figure that out any time soon.
࣪₊˚☆ synopsis: you spent your life missing a man up in the stars. a shame he only came back down when you weren't there anymore. but as gojo picks up the pieces of you he left behind, he finds moving on is a lot harder when it appears you might not have either.
⊹ pairing: teacher!choso x f!reader x astronaut!gojo
࣪₊˚☆ wc: 19.0k
⊹ content: mdni, HEAVY ANGST + SMUT, make sure to read part one first! gojo is once again suffering with no relief, heavy tension, intense jealousy and insecurity all around, mentions of character death, mourning, anxious avoidant attachment, reader is an emotionally constipated mess beware, a lot of choso pov, conflicting feelings, kissing, piv sex, oral sex (f! receiving), aftercare, choso whimpering, choso LOVES his girl more than anything okay, parenting, proposals, breakups and makeups, some domestic fluff, uncomfortable conversations and confrontations, marriage, bittersweet endings, if you want comfort, not much to be found here once again i'm afraid
࣪₊˚☆ art cr: @yotume div cr: @/decomposedmaw
The ghost waiting at your grave wasn’t yours.
Not much older than he looked in that photo still tucked in the top drawer of your dresser, but rather than the brilliant smile plastered on his face back then, your former fiancé was grimacing. Leaning against the closest tree, head leaning back against the bark as he stared up at the sky accusingly.
As if he had anyone other than himself to blame for choosing anything over you.
Choso bit his tongue, reminding himself that in the end, he was the one who won, the one who got to spend his life with you – and if it hadn’t been for Gojo being an idiot who left you behind, he wouldn’t have gotten his wife. His kids – whether by blood or bonds. His grandchildren.
Gojo had given it all to him.
One foot dragged a little slower than the other, but he made his way to the grave, bending down on aching knees to place a bundle of lilac by your gravestone. Apollo came by once a week to clean it, the one next to it left dingy in comparison.
It had always been you who insisted on upkeeping it – but well, your son didn’t exactly share the same sentiment for his biological father.
Especially now that he was here.
“Lilacs?” Gojo grumbled behind him. The morning sun wasn’t very warm, the breeze in the air making him shiver as he reflexively fiddled with his wedding band.
“Her favorite,” Choso shrugged, glancing back at his…well, not competition anymore. It was irritating how attractive he was. Made it obvious why you’d fallen so hard – and never seemed to fully snap back out of his spell. That icy intelligent stare refocusing onto where he was still kneeling by your plot, making it clear he didn’t think he deserved that position.
Gojo was holding onto his own flowers, long fingers clasped tight around thin stems. Forget-me-nots. He felt a sick shift in his stomach, a familiar ache returning to the forefront of his mind at the reminder that the two of you still had something he’d never been able to touch. The peace he thought he’d finally managed rippled by his reappearance.
Choso didn’t want to let it get ruined though.
Clearing his throat as he gestured to the flowers, “She never forgot about you.”
Even though part of him had always hoped you would.
“Her favorite color was blue,” Gojo blurted out, and Choso felt his eye twitch. Mouth barely able to hold onto thin neutrality as he resisted reacting.
“When I was with her, it was purple,” he evenly replied, pushing off the ground to stand up straight. You wouldn’t even let him paint the kids bathroom blue. Skipped every shade of it to pluck out a soft lavender, smiling as you offered it to him.
“Well, I guess you just know her so much better than I do,” Gojo scoffed, white brows pinching together tightly as he walked over to place his flowers by Choso’s.
It was hard not to cringe.
Jealousy used to burn him up inside, gnaw at him endlessly at night no matter what you whispered or how tightly he held you in his arms. But now, seeing the man who was responsible for it teetering on a knife’s edge, miserably mourning your memory the same way he was, just sorta made all those harsh edges of his own hurt soften with unexpected sympathy.
“She wouldn’t want you to waste the rest of your life waiting by-”
“You don’t know that,” Gojo snapped at him, before immediately wincing, probably realizing how he sounded. “That was childish, I’m-”
“Don’t worry about it,” Choso waved it off.
Truthfully, he didn’t know what he’d do if he was in his shoes.
Except for maybe not leaving to start with.
“I used to be terrified I’d wake up one day and you’d be waiting at the front door,” he added, not sure if being candid would help him any, or if it just felt good to get it off his chest.
“I wish I was,” Gojo openly admitted, defined jaw clenched tight.
Up close, Choso could make out the curve of his cheekbones, a little too hollow to be healthy. A haunted quality etched into every line, every feature of his face. Not getting enough to eat. Probably not getting enough sleep either.
Struggling to cope with his new circumstances.
Displaced in time and space.
And still there was one thing they both had in common.
“I miss her,” Choso softly spoke, throat constricting as a lump started to take shape, blocking his breathing as he steeled himself. He wouldn’t cry. Not here. Not in front of him.
“Yeah,” Gojo awkwardly agreed. “Me too.”
“Do you want to go out for lunch later? Talk about her?” He offered, shoving down his own discomfort to extend an olive branch.
Hope blooming when Gojo hesitantly accepted it, nodding with just a short bob of his head.
“Can you bring some photos of her?”
And a couple hours later, they were sitting across from each other in a corner booth of a restaurant he used to take the twins and Yuji to with you, plates pushed to the side as they poured over photo albums, fingers tracing over the glossy plastic protecting your pictures.
Choso paused over an old one, back when the two of you first started dating, where you were sandwiched between Apollo and Artemis, smiling at him from behind a snowcone in a roller skating rink. It was supposed to be a playdate for the kids, but it kinda felt like one for him too. Holding your hand skating, making conversation over the loud bass of the obnoxious music blaring, and blushing when you nearly fell and sent him tumbling down on top of you. He could still remember that flutter in his chest when he helped you up, your fingers gripping onto his forearm and his own splayed across your side, lovestruck at the way you looked up at him with those pretty eyes, a temporary tattoo of a butterfly stuck to the bottom half of your cheek courtesy of Artemis and crinkled when you laughed.
He didn’t think he’d ever seen anyone so gorgeous.
Snapping photos of your side profile and the kids racing around the arcade section, glued to your side and feeling like a dumb dog lapping up every little sliver of affection you tossed down to him.
Devouring every ounce of it, feeling like he’d been stuck in a drought, wandering in a desert without you as he watched you help Yuji calculate how many tickets he’d need to get a ridiculous stuffed animal from behind the prize counter, Apollo tugging at your pants and pleading for you to play air hockey with him after Artemis went back to skating.
It had been a good day.
A great one.
The five of you together had felt like a family far before you actually became one.
“They look like they’re having fun,” Gojo muttered, tapping the picture of the little boy who looked so much like him.
It was strange, honestly, a little uncomfortable how much Apollo had grown up to resemble him.
And now Apollo was older than him, his dad damn near the spitting image as him at that age.
Not that he’d admit it.
No, his stepson had done everything he could to diminish the similarities, running as far from his dad’s shadow as he could while his sister found the light in it.
“We had just started dating back then,” Choso wistfully exhaled, reminiscing about how naive he’d been back then.
How easy things had been.
Artemis had filled your former fiancé on the basics. A rough history lesson on the years he’d spent in space. A vague outline of your life since he left.
But he didn’t know how much Gojo really knew.
“You seem pretty close,” Gojo commented, his mouth pressed in a thin line as he flipped the page to a photo Mrs. Geto had snapped of the five of you at a soccer game, Apollo still in his uniform and beaming at the camera while you leaned into his side for the shot.
“It, uh, was a little rocky,” he admitted. “Mostly because she was still in love with you.”
And you had been terrified of falling out of it.
“I think she was scared of falling for me too,” Choso added, leaning back against the leather seat, still able to shut his eyes and bring himself back to the first night he confronted you about it.
Standing in your kitchen, putting plates in the dishwasher as you wiped the crumbs off the table, all three kids watching a movie in the living room, throwing popcorn at each other and giggling while you cleaned up after dinner.
Another night where everything had revolved entirely around the kids, picking up after them and playing, breaking up their bickering or dragging them around from place to place.
He had felt like a fucking asshole for having any kind of complaints, but when the most the two of you managed was a handful of makeout sessions you had to sneak in, a brief foray to second base that ended in less than a minute when Artemis burst into the bedroom crying about a skinned knee, frustration had begun to build.
Choso didn’t mind waiting, if that was what you wanted.
Taking however much time you needed if the idea of being intimate was still too much.
But you weren’t saying anything. Avoiding the conversation every time he tried to bring it up, switching subjects or shifting back to the kids like you were searching for an excuse not to be close with him.
To not move to the next step together.
He wanted to take you on real dates. To spend time with you one-on-one. Be a couple instead of just coparents.
“Can we talk?” Choso cleared his throat, shutting the dishwasher and fixing the settings without looking over at you.
“Yeah?” He could tell you were nervous already, voice cracking on just a single word.
“I, uh, just was thinking that we haven’t gone on a real date, y’know?” He started, peeking back at you just to see how stiff you were suddenly standing, shoulders squared as your mouth parted in surprise.
“I mean, I guess,” you awkwardly replied, biting your bottom lip as you avoided his stare, turning your attention away, and he could already anticipate how many seconds he had left before you’d offer to check on the children or change the topic.
“Are you avoiding being alone with me?” He bluntly asked, a tiny bit stunned himself at the way the words just fell out of him.
“No, no,” you stammered it out, repeating yourself as you shook your head. “It’s just, it’s hard to find time with the kids, it’s not you-”
It was the fact he wasn’t actually their father.
But he didn’t say that. Didn’t bring him up.
“I don’t want to rush you,” he tried to clarify, stepping closer and reaching out. Desperate to feel some kind of connection even when he suspected he might only end up freaking you out. “If you’re not-”
“What if I, um, ask Suguru’s mom to watch all of them next weekend?” You offered before he could explain his concerns, cutting him off with the words he wanted to hear.
“You’d do that?” Choso asked, heart thumping against his rib cage as he contained the hope he’d been clinging onto since the first day he met you.
“Yeah,” you nodded, smiling at him softly as he ran his hand over your arm, leaning in to press a kiss to your forehead.
He hadn’t looked then.
But part of him wondered now, what he would’ve seen if he had. Would the smile reach your eyes?
Still, you kept your word.
Dropped all three of them off to be babysat for the night a week later, got all dressed up in a little purple dress that left him swallowing his drool throughout the entire dinner, clumsily opening doors for you and paying the check despite his dismal teaching salary.
You laughed at his jokes, leaned across the table and let him trace circles over your knuckles with his thumb over white wine.
Choso didn’t go on dates often.
But he hadn’t met anyone who made him feel like you did. Warm and fuzzy and frustrated and so entirely wrapped up in every word that left your lips that it was driving him mad.
Practically vibrating just from your touch, the way your fingers delicately intertwined with his when you led him back up to your front door, electricity he might just be imagining buzzing between your body as his as you leaned back against the the frame, giggling when you accidentally bumped into the bell.
He could see that nervous glimmer in your eyes.
Shared his own sea of anxiety over how tonight would end when everything inside him was aching for it not to.
“So,” you started, sucking in your bottom lip for a second as your unsure stare met his.“Are you gonna come in?”
Choso felt like he was going to black out.
Sure that he was going to blink and wake back up in his bed. Alone. Exhausted. Craving you so goddamn much he could hardly contain it.
And before he could hold himself back, he was cupping your pretty face and kissing those lips that constantly lingered in the back of his brain.
The rest was a blur. You kissing him back and looping your wrists around his neck. Shutting the door behind both of you and stumbling back to your bedroom, clothes hitting the floor while his chest strained to catch his breath.
And when your back hit the bed, he was sure this had to be heaven.
“You’re so fucking gorgeous, god, I can’t fucking believe you’re mine-”
He didn’t even realize he was rambling until your mouth collided with his again, your soft thighs wrapping around his waist as his cock pressed up against your entrance.
You were already wet, which felt like far more of an accomplishment than it should.
Pride sparking in his chest as his pre-cum unhelpfully leaked out onto your skin.
“Condoms are, um, in my drawer,” you blinked when you broke the kiss, swallowing hard as you tilted your head towards your nightstand.
“Okay,” he nodded, a little too eagerly as he climbed off to grab it, yanking open the drawer to find a sealed box.
Brand new.
Did you actually buy it for him?
Or was he being delusional?
He ripped open the top flap, but before he put one on, he looked back at you, feeling a little bit like an idiot for thinking with his dick instead of his brain.
How could he forget about foreplay?
Choso tossed a condom on the bed, walking back around to the edge of it before getting on his knees and yanking you down by your thighs until that pretty pussy of yours was right there in front of him.
Ready to be prepared.
“Can I taste you first?” He asked, not entirely selfless in his request.
He wanted to bury his tongue inside you. Get the whole experience rather than rush into it and risk cumming in just a couple clumsy minutes.
You nodded, maybe a little unsure yourself.
As rusty at this as he was.
You had confided in him before you hadn’t dated anyone since him. But Choso had no clue whether or not you’d actually been with someone else – even if it was just a hookup.
His fingers trembled as they slid over your pliable thighs, pulling them closer as he shyly leaned in to tentatively take his first lick.
But all it took was a taste.
And a handful of minutes later, he was nuzzling his nose as he sucked and lapped like a man starved, cock throbbing and twitching as he resisted the urge to cum every time you moaned and whined for him.
Pausing to ask if you were okay a couple times before he got too tangled up in balancing your pleasure and his.
Your fingers laced through his hair, tugging at his roots to keep him going, thighs clamping down on his head as he swirled his tongue around hungrily.
It honestly felt like a crime you’d kept it from him for so long.
He could spend the entire night like this.
Solely devoted to you.
Trying out every little thing, pushing and pressing and prodding at every spot inside you until he made a map of your likes and dislikes.
But you were prying him off, ignoring his deep whine as his glossy lips froze in a panicked pant, ready to plead his case to convince you to let him have a teesny more time.
“Are you alright?” He asked, swallowing hard as his own saliva and your slick dripping down his throat. Pretending he didn’t notice the rings gleaming around your neck, the diamond one you’d switched from your fourth finger to a dainty chain. Daring him to remember that you weren’t supposed to be his.
“I-I’m fine,” you murmured, chest heaving with every breath, making the necklace bounce with it. “Good.”
“Please,” he began to beg, brows knitted together tight. Desperate to make you his. For tonight, at least. “I just want-”
“I want all of you,” you half-whispered, like you could hardly believe it.
He couldn’t either.
Brain still lagging by the time he was sheathing his cock inside the condom, squirting lube on his hand and stroking his shaft before slowly starting to slip his way in you.
No resistance. No more holding back. No more hoping for something he didn’t know would ever happen.
Just you and him here together.
It was perfect.
You were perfect.
Your warmth, your touch, your scent, god, every last detail was far better than he ever dreamed it.
His thrusts were precise, dragging in and out all slow and deliberate so he could study the way your face scrunched up in pleasure, watch your lips part and purr his name like a prayer.
“C-Cho,” you groaned, raking your nails down his shoulder blades, not enough to sink into his skin, but more like a soft graze.
“Y-you like that?” He stuttered over his own words, not coming off nearly as confident as he liked.
You were nodding, your head on a bobble as your mascara-laden lashes fluttered.
He was shuddering, whimpering right as his cock pressed all the way in, bumping into the back as your walls squeezed down on him.
Nothing had ever felt so good.
He wasn’t sure anything ever would again.
Fucking you all soft, hips sliding smoothly against you, grabbing your hands and pinning them over your head so he could kiss you as much as he liked. Tongue slipping into your mouth, tracing your teeth, exchanging whines just for the other to swallow.
Pressure building and twisting in his core, terrible tension he couldn’t resist, trying to break him before he could make you finish.
Rushing to rub your clit, murmuring into your mouth and practically begging you to cum for him.
You were hurting.
He still thought he could heal you.
Intoxicated by your face when you unravelled for him, cumming into the condom twice as hard as usual hearing your breathy moan, half-collapsing on you as his knees went weak.
Choso might’ve been more embarrassed if he wasn’t so enticed by every little shiver and shake of your body, absolutely enveloped while he left kiss after kiss across your soft skin.
Talking to you in a soft voice, pulling your body back up the bed and flipping over so you could be on his chest.
It didn’t take long for you to drift off like that.
He didn’t blame you.
Between work and the twins, you barely had time to take care of yourself. You rarely got restful sleep.
He was feeling it call to him too.
Peace. Contentment.
Heat lingering underneath his cheek as he held you close, brushing your hair back from your face as you dreamed. Your mouth curled up, a pretty smile reflexively forming as your fingers tightened around his side.
Some sliver of him sort of wanted to wake you, to ask what occupied your mind when you slept so soundly. But he just craned his neck down to nuzzle his nose in your hair, pulling you up another inch or two closer to cradle your body against his.
And then you said it and shattered the illusion completely.
“Satoru.”
One sleepy word. Three soft syllables.
And you broke him in a way he wasn’t sure he could repair.
He stilled beneath you, heart lodged in his throat as he resisted the urge to throw it up. Flush it down the fucking toilet as he tried to lie to himself.
Swear that you didn’t mean it – even if your subconscious did.
That he wasn’t even here.
But fuck, that look on your face, so relaxed, so raw, it made something inside him snap.
What the hell was he thinking?
He couldn’t do this.
Slowly, he slipped out from underneath you, making sure to tuck the pillow under your head and cover your bare body back up with the blanket before he padded silently over to his discarded clothes.
Choso couldn’t take just being your consolation prize.
But the idea of going home and never coming back to you felt pretty fucking unbearable too.
He didn’t want you to know he felt like this either.
Hated the idea of you seeing him spiral into doubt.
His feelings were his responsibility. He couldn’t put anything else on you – be another burden on your shoulders. He just needed time.
Yeah, that was it. To think this through.
Figure out if you were really ready for this. If he was ready to be what you needed while knowing he wasn’t who you needed.
Choso had only managed to get his socks and boxers back on when he heard rustling behind him.
You were sitting up and staring, eyes wide and worried as you watched him wordlessly.
“I need to get Yuji,” he lied, sweat sticking to his forehead and plastering his bangs down as you blinked at him.
“Why?”
One word, and he nearly cracked. Changed his mind and caved in.
“I forgot that we’re supposed to go see Sukuna in the morning,” he excused, shrugging his shoulders. “I should probably pick him up and head home.”
“You’re going home?” Your voice was wound tight, but you didn’t call his bluff.
“I should, yeah,” he muttered.
You didn’t fight him on it.
Just covered yourself with the blanket as you got up to grab some clean clothes from the closet. Not looking directly at him when you got dressed, mumbling under your breath that you’d let Suguru’s mother know you were picking the kids up as you sent her a text message.
She answered the door with a soft smile for both of you, murmuring that the kids were still asleep as she let both of you in.
“I’ll go get them,” you yawned, walking past her – and all the framed photos of men who weren’t around anymore.
“Would you like some tea while she wakes them up?”
Choso always had trouble saying no.
Ending up in the kitchen, a deep line imprinting on his palms from the bite of the sharp counter’s edge as she poured him some fresh tea.
She glanced up at him with tired eyes, holding out a steaming cup he timidly took. She wasn’t a fool. Probably figured it out from your text alone that something was up.
“Can I ask you something?” He started, readjusting to lean against the kitchen cabinets as he looked at the ticking clock on the wall.
“Of course,” she nodded, a fondness in her gaze that he knew wasn’t reserved for him either.
You had told him about her son. Your fiancé’s friend.
Commenting quietly a month after he had met her that you thought he reminded her of him.
“Do you think I’m wasting my time?” He asked, keeping his voice down as he felt all the muscles in his face involuntarily clench. Mouth twitching in a tight line as he voiced the thought haunting his mind.
Was he just a moron for standing here wishing for someone who didn’t want him back?
He didn’t want to be a placeholder.
“Wasting your time doing what? Waiting for her to stop loving Satoru? Or for her to start loving you?” She asked, tilting her head to the side knowingly.
His mouth opened, but no sounds came out.
Unsure what question he really was trying to ask once she said the silent parts out loud.
“She’s never going to stop loving Satoru,” Mrs. Geto calmly said, no malice or condescension, just stating a fact Choso already knew. “But you’d have to be blind to not see how far she’s fallen for you.”
He hoped she was right.
Would rip his heart out of his chest and hand it to you if it made it true.
Artemis stumbled in first, sleepily rubbing her eyes and clutching a stuffed animal to her chest as the boys trailed in after her. You were behind them, but you weren’t looking at him.
“What’s happening?” Apollo grumbled, leaning all his weight against your leg as Yuji scampered over to his big brother.
“We’re going home,” you answered, your voice coming out all breathy, familiar heat still curling hot in his stomach just at your pitch . “And Yuji’s going home with Choso.”
“But I thought we were-”
“No buts,” you huffed, wrangling your kids towards the door without looking at him once.
He knew that he might’ve screwed things up.
Still, he didn’t think it would still be so tense a full week later.
That when he didn’t text you good morning, you wouldn’t either. No more dinners for five. Or carpooling to school. No more cozying up on your couch while the kids fell asleep halfway through a bad movie.
The distance didn’t make him feel any better.
It only made him miss you more.
Staring at the stars outside his window and wishing that he was home with you. Even if there would always be a ghost haunting its halls. Looming over the two of you no matter how much love he had to offer you.
Was the man you loved before him still out there somewhere?
Craving you the way he was now?
Sympathy he hadn’t anticipated surged inside him, daring him to fully empathize with someone he wanted to hate.
But he couldn’t hate him.
And he couldn’t stop himself from loving you.
So he sent you a text Saturday morning, typing and deleting a variation of the same ten words before finally hitting send.
He wasn’t lying when he said that Yuji missed the twins. Choso just didn’t know how to tell you how much he missed you too.
But you replied back that he could bring him over if he wanted, and he refused to miss the chance to reconcile. To fix things before they ended up broken.
Choso thought you might be a little upset. Confused by the sudden space between you.
But you barely even glance at him when you opened the door, speaking only to Yuji as you directed him to the backyard, nodding along to his endless chirping about what he learned in school yesterday before he ran out to join the twins.
The morning sun wasn’t too harsh yet, your side profile illuminated in the soft rays as you stepped out with them, wearing one of your favorite faded shirts he suspected belonged to him, the chain of your necklace peeking out underneath the color.
“Are you going to say it?” You broke the silence, your stare focused solely on Yuji and Apollo chasing each other and laughing.
“Say what?” He repeated, running his fingers through his hair, attempting to not sound as nervous as he felt.
You scoffed, low and soft, your mouth curling down as you looked down at the grass around your bare feet.
“I guess this is it then?” You asked, refusing to so much as glance his way. Leaning against the wall with your arms tightly folded across your chest like you were trying to protect your heart. “We’re over?”
His own practically fell through the fucking floor as he processed what you just said.
“What?” The question came out wounded. His throat drying out as he forced himself to exhale, “Why-”
“I don’t want to waste your time,” you coldly replied, but he could hear how much you were struggling too.
Oh god.
You must have overheard the first part of his conversation with Mrs. Geto.
“That’s not what I meant,” he defensively started, panic pulsing through him as he reached out to touch your arm. But you recoiled, flinching fast like his fingers would burn you.
“I thought things were okay,” you murmured, shaking your head like the very notion was stupid now. “Was it the sex? Was I not good enough for you?”
“No, no, I swear-”
“Then what?” You snapped, finally looking back at him, your beautiful face scrunched together in pain. Big tears welling up in your pretty eyes that you were trying to blink away.
For a second, Choso froze, stunned that he could be the reason for that. That you cared enough about this, about him to cry.
His mouth stuck open in a moronic ‘o’ as he stumbled for the right thing to say to stop your relationship from unraveling.
“You had your fun and fucked me. I’m just not what you wanted, right?” You were half-whispering, keeping your voice down to not alert the kids. Bottom lip quivering as you continued, “I don’t know why I thought you’d stay.”
Fuck.
This was not how this was supposed to go.
He was supposed to be smoothing things over, not losing you over nothing.
“No, baby, no,” he insisted, grabbing your hand before you could retreat even further away. “You are everything I’ve ever wanted.”
You tried to pull your hand out of his, but he wasn’t the kind of fool who would let you walk away.
“The sex was amazing, god, you’re amazing,” Choso rambled, rushing through his words as he felt a frightening surge of anxiety at the idea of you thinking he was just using you like some scumbag. “I just, I thought everything was perfect, and after you dozed off, you said his name and I-”
“What?” You faltered.
“You were in my arms, and you called out for him,” he murmured, attempting to suck air in his lungs as he inhaled sharply.
A tear slipped down your cheek, and before you could burst into sobs, he was pulling you back against his chest. Enveloping you in his embrace, arms wrapped around you as your body wracked with the weight of your sorrow.
“M’sorry,” you cried, your voice muffled as your tears left damp spots in his shirt. “I-I-”
He was stroking your hair, swallowing the lump in his throat at the sound of your broken voice.
“It’s okay,” he soothed, pressing your head against him to make sure the kids wouldn’t have to see you crying.
Not when you tried so hard to be strong for them.
Built a life around being there when their father hadn’t been.
“I didn’t mean-” You started again, and he only pulled back to wipe the tears away beneath your eyes, thumb slowly dragging over your cheekbones. “I just haven’t had sex with anyone since-”
“You don’t have to apologize when you didn’t do it on purpose,” he reassured you, feeling that hole in his own heart chisel just a tad wider at your acknowledgement he’d been the first man to fuck you since him. “I just needed some time to sort out my own feelings.”
“You’re still going to leave,” you mumbled, wiping your nose on your forearm as you tried to step back and recoil back.
“I’m not,” he promised, cupping your cheek. “I’m just scared of being his stand-in. A shitty replacement for the real thing.”
You stared back at him, taken a little aback before you shook your head, leaning into his palm. “You know you’re not.”
He didn’t though.
How was he supposed to believe he wasn’t second place when you wore the proof of who was first around your neck every day?
But he couldn’t point that out.
Not when he knew that he wasn’t being fair.
Your former fiancé had been gone for years. It wasn’t a bad breakup, or like you lost him in some tangible way.
You had no closure. No answers.
Just an empty hole in your heart that Choso was doing his damndest to fill.
He glanced back at the children, clueless as they played in the sandbox, Artemis threatening to dump a bucket on her brother while Yuji dared her to do it.
And his chest fucking spasmed at the idea that there might be another life where they weren’t his family.
Where you weren’t his.
“I’ll always love Satoru. I wouldn’t have the twins without him,” you admitted, sniffling a little as you pulled yourself back together. “I wouldn’t have you either.”
He didn’t know what to say to that.
Aware that you were right, but having a hard time finding it in himself to be grateful.
You were a gift.
Choso just couldn’t decide how to feel about the sender.
“I love you,” you spoke so softly to him though, so tenderly despite how scared he could sense you were just saying the words out loud. “I’m sorry it took me so long to say it.”
“I love you too,” he promised, leaning down to press a soft kiss against your lips.
To seal it.
“I think we just have to work on talking to each other,” Choso added after you started to pull away, slipping a hand around your back to keep you close. “Communicate better before it turns into this.”
He didn’t want to be the reason you cried. Be the one who broke you.
“Yeah,” you mumbled an agreement, relaxing into him before looking back over to the twins and Yuji. “I don’t want to lose you.”
“And then what?” Gojo interrupted his story, shoving a fry in his mouth with an annoyed frown. “You guys lived happily ever after?”
Wouldn’t that be sweet? If it had been so simple?
If you’d both stuck to what you swore?
“Uh, not exactly,” he muttered. “I mean, most of it was great. But we did have a pretty bad patch.”
Gojo freely glared at him, like he was offended at the concept of him having anything to complain about.
“Why are you looking at me like it’s my fault?” Gojo huffed.
Some childish part of him wanted to retort that it was.
That he spent his life fixing the damage he’d done to you by getting on the damn spaceship.
But Choso had made his peace with that long before you were his wife.
“You’re the one she married,” he bitterly added, jaw locked with barely concealed contempt he wasn’t bothering to hide without Artemis around.
Apollo didn’t even want to entertain him at all, only tolerated seeing him when his sister dragged him around to family gatherings and brunches, excited to have someone to chatter about science stuff the rest of them couldn’t comprehend.
Choso didn’t blame either of them.
“You know, she didn’t say yes the first time I asked her to marry me,” Choso confessed, twisting his own wedding band around a wrinkled finger.
You broke up with him, actually.
He had tried to dull the memory over the years. Make the edges of it less sharp, enough that it didn’t taint you in his mind.
But it still stung.
No matter how much time had passed. No matter what he knew now that he hadn’t then.
Choso had spent weeks planning it.
Debating on all the different ways to do it before finally deciding that he should do something as a family. Show you how much he loved you and the twins.
He didn’t want to just be your live-in boyfriend.
He wanted to be the step-dad to your kids. Your husband. To slip a ring on your finger and swear to love you for the rest of his life.
To never leave.
He settled on making the kind of meals usually reserved for holidays, buying candles and balloons, buying a pack of rose petals to scatter on the bed. Picking out a ring he hoped you’d like and saving enough money to afford a second if you didn’t.
Waiting for the perfect opportunity to get you out of the house long enough to set everything up only for you to hand it to him on a silver platter.
You were distracted when he got home from work, chewing on your lip as you dropped your phone in your purse and murmured that you needed to go run a couple errands while he tried to hide his excitement.
Maybe, if the kids hadn’t rushed over and started tugging on his jeans, distracting him with what they’d done at school, he might’ve seen your face before you walked out the door.
Maybe it would have all played out differently.
But he didn’t, and he’d never get to know what could’ve happened instead.
Roping the kids into the plan was perhaps a mistake.
But he wanted the twins' permission before he proposed.
“I need to ask you two something,” he hummed, ruffling Apollo’s hair as Artemis squinted suspiciously at him.
“What?” She murmured, glancing between him and Yuji, who was practically bouncing up-and-down with excitement he couldn’t contain.
“I would like to ask your mom to marry me,” he admitted, chewing on the inside of his cheek as he measured their reactions.
Apollo threw his arms around his leg, looking up at him with those bright blue eyes, absolutely elated. “So you’re gonna be our dad?”
“It would make me your step-dad,” he replied as calmly as he could, still trying to respect the man who made them – even if he’d never gotten to watch them grow. “And that’s up to your mom.”
You lived together. You told him you loved him.
He never thought no was really an option.
“If it makes mom happy,” Artemis murmured, a little more reluctant as she nodded.
“That’s all I want,” Choso softly replied, smiling at her.
She looked like a little version of you. Acted like one too sometimes. Slower to trust. Sweet underneath it all. She wanted to seem strong, but she was still soft underneath it all.
Choso had overheard her on the playground telling her one of the other kids swinging that her daddy was up in space, swearing that he’d come back after the child called her a liar.
He felt pretty fucking shitty for his silent hopes that her father would stay up there.
Did it make him an awful person? To want a place in your life that badly? Unsure if you would really pick him if your first choice became an option once more?
He did what he did best though.
Push down his anxieties and pray he never had to find out.
“Who wants to help set everything up for her?” He asked, forcing his brightest smile as his ring sat impossibly heavy in his pocket. Weighing his heart down like a lead balloon, threatening to bury it as he tried to swallow the fear that he might fuck this up.
But the chorus of ‘me’s and the bright faces of the kids that had all started to feel like his own was enough for him to forget about it and focus on you instead.
Getting all the details right as he devoted himself to the dinner, letting the kids lay out the tablecloth and set the plates up – although he had to stop Yuji from accidentally setting his hair on fire when he snuck the lighter out of the drawer to light the candles Choso had set out.
But eventually, everything was in its place, the lights adjusted and the food set out, the children all changed into nicer clothes as the twins talked about how they’d all be siblings soon.
“What do you guys think?” Choso grinned, wiping his palms off on the apron before taking it off.
“She’ll love it,” Apollo optimistically smiled, one of his front teeth missing from where it’d fallen out the week before and traded in for five dollars from the tooth fairy.
Choso really hoped you would.
It was too late to change anything, because they all heard the familiar sound of your key turning in the lock, the creak of it swinging open. The front door thudded shut, and he was pretty sure his heart was going to explode if it started pounding any harder.
“Are you guys hungry?” You called out, your voice wavering, bordering on exhausted, pride flaring in Choso’s chest at how happy you’d be to see the spread on the table, to see the way the kids were all eagerly holding their breath, glancing between each other and nearly bouncing out of their seats. “We could order pizza or-”
You stopped speaking the second you saw it.
Froze in the open doorframe, your eyes going wide as you scanned over the scene. All the food and the fancy tablespread and the flickering candles, the way the kids were holding in giggles as he stepped forward to bridge the distance between you.
“What is-”
Choso got down on his knees mid-question slipping a hand in his jeans to clumsily grab the crushed velvet box, blinking a little too fast, mouth opening too soon as he struggled to remember the speech he rehearsed a thousand times in the mirror over the last month.
“Um, I, uh,” he paused, spit thick in his throat that he had to swallow before continuing, “I love you, and I love our family, and I can’t imagine living the rest of my life without you or the twins in it. Will you make me the happiest-”
“I cannot believe you,” you interrupted him, shaking your head as you stepped back, your face blank, mouth hanging open as you sucked in a shallow breath.
“What?” He blanched, barely even processing the words that had just left your lips as your expression shifted to anger, of all things.
Brows scrunching together as you scoffed, fingers trembling as you pointed down the hall. “My room. Now.”
The kids looked at each other, awkwardly slipping into dining chairs as if they were the ones in trouble, but Choso didn’t know what to say to soothe them when it felt like his heart was shattering too.
Humiliation burning his cheeks as he put the ring box back, getting up off the ground and following you like some dejected puppy, hoping for his owner’s love. But the moment you were alone, the second you shut the door behind him, the way you were staring at him was closer to a stranger.
“What the hell did you think doing that in front of my kids?” You asked, and he couldn’t comprehend what the fuck he’d done that was so bad in your book.
“We’ve been talking about marriage for like, a year,” he argued, indignation he didn’t know how to handle boiling up inside his chest at your attitude. Glaring like he had done something so absurd to deserve it, your rejection leaving a sour taste in his mouth he didn’t think would be going away any time soon.
“We?” You hissed, hurt written all over your face before you wiped it and replaced it with thinly-veiled resentment. “You were the one who kept bringing it up.”
His jaw dropped.
“Are you kidding me?” Choso deadpanned, disbelief wracking through his body as he felt a shot of adrenaline begin to course through his veins, fingers flexing into a fist before he forced them to relax.
“I was just trying to keep you happy, I didn’t think that you were serious about it,” you said, turning away from him as you buried your face in your hands for a second, breathing hard like you might be on the verge of a panic attack.
Instinctively, he wanted to reach out. Hold you close and let you crumble while he whispered soft words to coax you through it. But he stayed still, nails digging into his palm as he found himself fuming at you for the first time ever.
“What the fuck?” He spat, his voice starting to raise as you recoiled back even further. “Why wouldn’t you say something? Why the hell would you just let me think you wanted it too?”
That you wanted him?
“Don’t shout at me,” you huffed, mouth still quivering as you folded your arms tight across your chest.
“What happened to communication?” He demanded, thinking about the fight the two of you had.
How you’d sworn that you loved him and didn’t want to lose him.
And now here you were, refusing to meet his eyes, mouth pressed in a thin line as you held your tongue.
Something he didn’t know he’d been holding back snapped when he realized you weren’t going to reply.
“Oh, I get it,” he grimaced, brows knitting together in frustration as his disappointment bubbled into disgust with himself for not seeing it sooner. “You don’t want to marry me because I’m not him.”
He knew the second he said it that he couldn’t take it back.
“That’s not fucking fair and you know it,” you snapped at him, and a bitter voice in the back of his head pointed out that you were only speaking up now that he brought up your real fiancé.
“You’ll wear his ring every day and not mine,” he retorted, doubling down rather than backing out of his accusation.
He thought you’d yell back.
That you would fight him on it. He wanted you to fight him on it. To finally let every thought you kept from out so the two of you could get out of this frustrating limbo. He didn’t care if it dropped him in hell.
He just wanted to get somewhere with you.
But you shut down.
Silently staring at the floor, chest heaving as you dug your own fingers into your side.
“I really am just a fill in for you,” Choso continued, trying to get any kind of reply out of you.
And still, you somehow found the only one he didn’t want.
“Get out,” you whispered.
“What?”
“Get out.”
Everything that had been boiling seconds before abruptly stopped, the pot ripped off the burner and left him stranded in hot water as his senses finally snapped back into place.
You had never kicked him out before.
What the hell had he done?
“I’m not trying to hurt you, I just, I want to understand,” he tried to backpedal, holding his hands out and stepping forward just for you to not even glance up at him.
“I need a break,” you said, your voice barely above a whisper, sounding like you were a world away.
“From this conversation? Or us?” He blanched. You were supposed to be throwing your arms around him right now. Telling him you loved him and discussing what season your wedding should be in. Not fucking dumping him.
“This is just too much,” you muttered.
What the fuck was that meant to mean?
He felt helpless as he stared at you, the way your head was hanging down, shoulders slumped as you shut him out.
“I’ll take the twins somewhere and you can get your stuff,” you added, getting up and walking around him, making up your mind without even giving him a chance to talk this out.
Watching you walk away, dumbfounded as you slipped out the door, the conversation over before it had even properly begun.
“Are we going to be a family now?” Apollo’s hopeful voice carried through the door down the hall, and Choso rested his head against the door, wishing the conversation had gone another way and still too upset to think of a reasonable way to reach you.
To break through the barriers you were haphazardly throwing back up.
“Yuji and Choso aren’t going to live with us anymore, baby,” you softly said back.
Fuck.
You were supposed to be his wife.
Not his ex-girlfriend.
“You’re a fucking moron.”
Said the jerk that left a pregnant you to go to fucking space.
“You’re one to talk,” Choso commented, mouth curling down as he grabbed his glass to take a sip, the sight of his own aged hand reminding him that he was definitely too old for starting fights like this.
“So she really dumped you?” Gojo grinned, irritatingly white teeth on display as he leaned forward, looking directly at him instead of the photo albums.
“Not for that long.”
“You should’ve fought for her more,” Gojo pointed out, before almost immediately stopping himself, brows scrunching together like he realized what he was saying and who he was saying it to.
“I thought she didn’t want a future with me,” he shrugged. “Not when she was still thinking about what one would’ve looked like with you.”
Always stuck in the same position.
Torn between wanting your heart and wishing that he wasn’t second-place in it.
“If I could’ve been there,” Gojo started, genuine remorse bleeding through, and Choso remembered once again why he’d never been able to bring himself to loathe the man you loved.
Because they both loved you.
“I know,” Choso murmured. “I sorta wished sometimes that you would just show up if it meant she would be happy.”
𖥔 ݁ ˖
You weren’t sure you had ever been so fucking miserable.
Breaking up with Choso had nearly broken you.
You hadn’t seen him since you came back home to find every trace of him and Yuji gone. Hadn’t said his name since you had to explain to Apollo that you were going to switch him over to a new soccer team for the summer. Artemis had asked if you were happy, giving you that look like she could see through the stories you tried to keep up for them. All you could do was twist the necklace and tell her that her and her brother were all you ever needed.
But she had wanted to go to a sleepaway space camp for the summer, and you couldn’t bring yourself to say no when everything you would have planned with Choso had fallen through. So she was hours away, gone for weeks while Apollo was busy with his own soccer camp and sleepovers with friends from school.
When he was home, he was just complaining about how much he hated the older kids in the 9-12 group he’d gotten stuck in, muttering under his breath that his old team was better.
You sort of thought if you stayed busy with him, you could forget about all the other stuff.
Shut out the awful spiralling that started in your head every time you laid down in your cold, empty bed and rolled onto your side to see the unwrinkled spot next to you.
Picturing your pretty dark-haired man there, his eyes lazily opening and noticing you staring before pulling you into a warm embrace. Waking up in a daze from a dream where your blue-eyed boy was still holding onto you, murmuring that it was all just a nightmare and to go back to sleep.
Now you didn’t have either of them.
God, you couldn’t even pull yourself together enough to send a video message to Satoru like you used to, staring at the unused webcam when you got ready every day and lacking the strength to even sit in front of it and say something. Couldn’t bring yourself to call your therapist either, cancelling appointments over text and shrugging your shoulders to swear that you were fine.
You wanted to believe that you could heal from this. That there was still real happiness to be found somewhere between the lines of hurt and heartache.
But it didn’t feel like it when you pulled into the parking lot for one of Apollo’s exhibition tournaments and he started bouncing around in the backseat swearing he was sure you passed by Yuji.
Shit.
God, you were sure that he wouldn’t be here.
Yuji was in so many sports, and Choso usually coached younger kids anyway, so what the hell-
“Can I please go say hi, mom?” Apollo begged as you stopped the car.
“Of course, sweetheart,” you nodded, going ahead and practicing your smile when the muscles to make it were a little rusty.
The second you had slung your chair over your shoulder and opened the door for Apollo, he was sprinting over to the grassy area, Yuji’s voice calling out his name as a boy you didn’t recognize protectively puffing up his chest as he stepped between the two of them.
“Who’s this, brother?” The boy asked, looking back to Yuji as he stepped out from around him.
“Apollo, are you playing?” He chirped, his loose soccer jersey swaying as he rushed over.
“Yeah,” he nodded, deflating the moment he noticed how close Yuji was with his new friend. “My team kinda sucks though.”
There really weren’t many feelings worse than watching your kid go through something you didn’t know how to help them with.
Seeing the shock scrawled all over their face the second they thought they were replaceable.
“You think we’ll play against each other then?” Yuji asked, grinning with a gap in his teeth, one that must have fallen out this month.
“We’ll definitely beat you,” the other boy boasted, and you knew you shouldn’t hate a kid, but you sorta did.
And then you looked up, glancing around just to see Choso approaching – but he was too busy talking to a blonde to notice you with his brother. Her hand on his forearm, leaning forward as he spoke all seriously about something, flipping her hair over her shoulder as she listened intently to every word.
You hated her.
Almost as much as you missed him.
But you couldn’t deal with either emotion. Had no way to defend or deflect it, just putting your hand on Apollo’s shoulder and nudging him away, “Sorry, but, uh, I should get him to start his drills. It was good to see you, Yuji.”
You didn’t stay long enough to see what kind of accusatory stare he’d give you for breaking his brother’s heart. Or run the risk of Choso coming over and catching you clinging to the remnants of your relationship by letting Apollo hang around Yuji. Rushing off to find the right field, a sick feeling spreading across your stomach, filling your lungs and choking up your throat as you set up your chair and tried to tell yourself that the chance of Yuji playing against Apollo was slim considering how many teams there were here today.
But luck hadn’t decided to grace you today.
Because standing across the field twenty minutes later, in his stupidly attractive jersey and shorts, Choso was tying half his hair up off his face, bending over to listen to Yuji before looking over to see where Apollo was sitting on a bench, a cap hiding the steaks of white from the sun as he kicked his feet and waited for the game to start.
You saw the way his mouth pulled tight. How his jaw clenched before he looked over to the sidelines, starting to scan it before you looked back down in your lap, pretending to be interested in something on your phone instead of staring at him.
Just one game.
That was all, you told yourself.
You could make it through that.
But fuck, it would have been so much more bearable if she wasn’t a few seats away once it started.
Loathing didn’t quite cover the jealousy simmering inside you at the way her pretty blonde hair cascaded down her back and gleamed in the sun, how freely she bounced and cheered, clapping her hands together and calling out Yuji’s name in a chipper voice along with her own kid.
The one who called Yuji brother.
That was how it was now.
Choso wanted a happy family. So he started one with some other soccer mom, huh?
It had only been two fucking months.
How the hell could he just move on like that?
Maybe you broke it off, but he could have at least pretended to be bent out of shape about it when he had said he wanted to marry you.
Were you just not that serious? Had the past few years really meant that little to him?
Every time she cheered for Yuji felt like a fresh stab.
It was hard to hold back your annoyance when Apollo was struggling on the field too, all his older teammates refusing to pass the ball to him on the rare chance that he got to play.
And then came the moment that her kid knocked Apollo down, big tears welling up in his blue eyes as the ref called it and his coach had to pull him off the field for good. He tried not to cry. To hold it in and not seem like a baby in front of the big kids.
But rage was boiling inside you, injustice at how fucking unfair everything always for you.
You were trying to fight for your kids.
It wasn’t like you had someone other than Suguru’s mother to rely on. Not really.
No one else understood.
Knew what it was like to lose your whole world and then have to hold it together anyway. To never get closure and still be expected to just move on like nothing happened. Like you weren’t reminded of what you were missing every moment of every day.
Apollo’s team lost. And you were still trying to be the mature adult you knew he needed you to be as you folded your chair back up and slung it over your shoulder, hurrying over as he nursed his scraped knee, still trying not to sob as he bottled it all in.
But Choso beat you there.
Kneeling down on the ground and putting a bandaid over it as he smiled at your son softly. You used to love the way he cared for your children like they were his own. But now you were second-guessing if maybe that was just who he was, that it never had anything to do with you.
“-did great out there, okay? You should be proud of yourself,” he spoke gently, using all the right words as you tried not to wince. But Apollo smiled, wiping his tears away with the back of his hand, ignoring the dirt and grass sticking to it before throwing himself at Choso in a big hug.
Arms wrapped around his neck before you could move forward fast enough to pry him off. Choso patted his back, but you were already trying to pick him off yourself, swallowing the pain threatening to close your throat.
You couldn’t breathe.
Couldn’t think straight.
Clouded with so much distress it felt like someone had embedded sharp shards of glass in every fiber and muscle of your body, limbs robotically moving as you mentally replayed what your last conversation had been.
“Can we go out for ice cream? Please? Like we used to?” Apollo blurted out, and you hated that you knew he would hold the refusal that was about to leave your lips against you.
Choso opened his mouth to reply, hesitating as your eyes actually met his for the first time, and you wondered if he could see the hurt in yours as the lump in his throat bobbed.
“Choso!” The blonde called out, her tits bouncing in her shirt as she waved to him. “Time to pass out snacks!”
“Choso’s busy, sweetheart,” you said, picking Apollo up, his long legs dangling as he kicked, trying to get put back down. Trying to save yourself from the scene of him begging for attention from a guy who wasn’t his father.
Even if you both wanted him to be.
He watched you leave.
Didn’t try to make you stay.
That wasn’t who he was, you guessed.
No, he just wanted to throw a ring at you on the second worst day of your life and toss the fact that you’d lost the father of your children back in your face when you were on the verge of a breakdown.
Apollo pouted the entire way back to the car, his little nose scrunched up as you pulled out of the parking lot, muttering that he didn’t want to play soccer anymore.
You tried to talk him out of it, saying that the next game would be better.
But you didn’t know if he believed you.
Not with the way he was dramatically staring out the window the rest of the ride home, switching between having arms folded across his chest and fidgeting with the seatbelt.
“I know you’re upset, but-”
“I’m fine,” he stubbornly insisted, shaking his head. He had his cap back on, unable to make out any of his white hair underneath it as his blue eyes looked up at you through the mirror. “Are you?”
“Why wouldn’t I be?” You asked, even though you knew he wasn’t stupid.
He wasn’t as scientifically minded as Satoru, or Artemis, but he read you like a book. Saw in between the lines without you having to say anything.
“I want to sleepover at grandma’s house,” Apollo murmured, diverting his stare as you swallowed your pride and shrugged.
“Okay,” you muttered. “I’m sure she’d like that.”
Suguru’s mom had never said no to either of the twins.
And when you brought him over in the evening, watching him run straight back to the spare room she made for them, hearing faint rummaging and rustling noises as he pulled out toys to play on his own.
“I take it the game didn’t go so well?” She asked, fine lines and wrinkles really starting to show on her soft, tanned skin. Wisdom you wished you had even a small sliver of in her kind smile as you flopped down on her couch.
“Choso was there,” you muttered, your stupid heart stuttering just saying his name.
“Oh?” That piqued her interest.
She always liked him. Told him that he was good for you. Good for the kids.
But you could see how much he reminded her of Suguru. Always chalked it up to her seeing some of her son in him.
“He already moved on,” you bitterly huffed.. “Some other soccer mom was practically all over him. God, her kid even called Yuji brother.”
“Honey, are you sure? Did you speak to him?” She started, trying to be careful with her words as you scoffed louder.
“No, but-”
“Have you spoken to him at all since you broke up?” She pressed, and you could only shake your head.
What the hell were you supposed to say? You were broken up.
It wasn’t like you had his number blocked.
But he hadn’t reached out either.
“That boy loves you,” she insisted. “He wouldn’t just-”
“He left me,” you muttered.
Well, you left him.
But if he loved you, he wouldn’t have let you leave. Just stood there when you walked away.
You had made that mistake before. You let Satoru go. Trusted him to come back.
He didn’t.
And you were the one who had been stitching yourself back up every time his memory tore your heart back open.
But how were you supposed to marry a man who couldn’t tell when you had come undone? That you were falling apart in front of him?
“Did you want him to stay?” She asked, and you knew the answer instantly, no matter how hard it was to actually say it.
Of course you wanted him to stay anyway.
Even though knowing that felt like betraying Satoru.
“I should go home,” you murmured, picking yourself back up off the couch and snagging your purse from the floor as you threw a long look down the hall to where Apollo was, debating on peeking in to tell him good night before deciding against interrupting him. “Just, uh, call me when I should come get him.”
Or just walk next door.
The house was horribly quiet.
Your footsteps echoing as you returned to your room, the silence following wherever you went as you stripped and showered, scrubbing your skin raw with soap and sighing at your blurred reflection in the fogged-up mirror after you got out feeling no fucking cleaner than you had when you stepped in.
Truthfully, you didn’t really want to look at yourself anyway.
Clinging to the towel you wrapped yourself in, staring at the clothes in your closet as you searched for something to hide yourself in, settling on an oversized hoodie you’d bought before either man you were wrecked over.
Throwing on pajama shorts too, wondering whether or not it was worth wasting an hour scrolling through shows and movies searching for stuff to watch or giving up and crawling into bed when you heard a knock on your front door.
A flicker of relief slipped in, thinking that Suguru’s mom must be bringing Apollo back, that maybe he changed his mind and you could offer to let him stay up late watching whatever movie he wanted together as you scurried back towards it.
You didn’t even ask before pulling it open, but you stopped in your tracks the second you saw who was on the other side.
“Hey,” Choso greeted, the single word shoved out unceremoniously as you just stood there and stared.
“What are you-”
“She, uh, called me,” he muttered, jutting his thumb over to the house next door. He had changed into an outfit you missed seeing him in. A sweater you used to steal of his, thick and cozy, in your favorite shade of purple. Jeans that were well worn. His hair was a little damp too, bangs framing his handsome face as the dim lighting made his dark eyes hard to read. “If you want me to go-”
“You didn’t speak to me today,” you pointed out, not that you made the effort to talk to him either. Picking a fight in the first five seconds.
“I didn’t think it was a good idea,” Choso sheepishly answered, and before you realized it, you were stepping aside, letting him back in. Although, you guessed it was better than letting half the neighborhood hear you bicker.
“Yeah, I’m sure your new girlfriend wouldn't be happy with you talking to your ex,” you defensively said, gritting your teeth as he shut the door behind him. Throwing you a confused glance before he fully turned to you with his thick brows all pinched together.
“What are you talking about?” He shook his head dismissively.
“Did you think I wouldn’t see the new soccer mom all over you?” You snapped at him. Your jealousy was plain to see, painfully obvious as the words came out all wounded and weak.
“Are you talking about Yuki?” He asked, his lips parting as you imagined her mouth meeting them.
“Oh, is that her name?” You spat it out, backing away as you resisted the urge to roll your eyes. “She’s pretty, huh?”
Did he think she was prettier than you? That he upgraded?
The worst part was you could barely recognize yourself right now.
You didn’t want this to be you. Petty and pathetic and pining over something you were trying to damndest not to want.
Since when were you so insecure? So jealous that you were starting an argument with Choso because you couldn’t get a fucking grip on yourself?
“She is,” Choso agreed, and you wanted to throw up.
Ruin his sweater like he ruined your day.
You didn’t know what face you made, but whatever it was, however wrecked you must have seen before you could recover, he softened. Unlocking his jaw as his eyes crinkled, exhaling slowly.
“I’m not into her like that,” he added. Treacherous respite rippled through your body, but you held onto your anger, resisting everything you instinctually wanted to do around him. “But, we’re not together anymore. We can see other people without-”
“You proposed to me two months ago,” you pointed out, but the accusatory tone didn’t really do much when it came out half an octave too high. A horribly familiar lump was growing in your throat, heat crawling up your cheeks dangerously close to your eyes. “If you actually loved me, you wouldn’t just move on like we were nothing.”
“I’m not just moving on, it’s just,” he paused, budding frustration threatening to boil over as he took a small step closer. Standing in front of you as if he was the victim, like everything was all your fault for being the fucked up one in your relationship. “I should be allowed to heal however I need to heal.”
For a second, you couldn’t stand him. His maturity. His rationality. The way he was still collected when it felt like someone had plucked out all your seams and left you to crumble.
Tears you couldn’t stop welling up, a choked sound coming out before your broken words, “I’m sorry I was such a horrible girlfriend you have to do so much healing.”
“I’m healing from your rejection,” he clarified, but you couldn’t stop yourself from crying, rubbing underneath your eyes as you tried to stop yourself, scoffing a little as you tried to reel yourself back in.
“You had an out from the beginning,” you sniffled, although it sounded more like a huff. “I told you I didn’t want to waste your time.”
He recoiled at the reminder, and panic sprung back up, hot and bright, burning your throat. You wanted to take what you said back.
But you were too stubborn to say that.
“Our relationship wasn’t wasted time,” he muttered, and there was a hint of remorse in his tone. Disappointment that things didn’t work out the way either of you wanted. “But this argument is.”
You were about to throw out a retort, ask him what that was supposed to mean, but then he was walking away, sweater stretched across his broad back as he started towards the door, and you were bridging the gap between you, snagging his sleeve to stop him.
“You’re just going to leave again? Like that?” You asked, voice quivering as you forced your stare to harden. He looked down at you like it was taking everything inside him not to give in too.
“You wanted to break up,” he murmured, and you bit down on the raw spot you chewed in your cheek, ignoring the taste of blood on your tongue as the temptation to take it all back grew harder and harder to resist. “I was stupid to think that maybe we could talk things through tonight.”
He began to slip away again, and impulsively, you were pulling him down by his sweater, your mouth crashing into his to reclaim him in a manic kiss.
You sort of thought he would push you away.
Tell you that he was really done this time. Through with you and all the baggage he’d have to bear being yours.
But then his calloused palm was cupping your cheek and he was kissing you back twice as hard, returning the fever with his own heat. It seared through you, fried your nerves as his tongue slipped past your lips, his nose nudging against yours while his body pressed up against yours. Clumsily forced back a few steps until you were both falling on the couch, sandwiched between his heavy chest and the stained cushions.
Having sex with your ex was almost always a mistake.
But you couldn’t bring yourself to let Choso go.
“I hate how much I love you,” he muttered when the kiss broke, and your pulse picked up, self-loathing sinking into you as it struck you how much your fuck-ups were fucking him up too.
“I’m sorry,” you whispered, weak and almost whimpering as your apology came out sincere this time.
You weren’t even sure which crime of yours you were apologizing for.
Breaking up with him to begin with. Forcing him to bear the weight of your burdens. Being too emotionally constipated to communicate what was haunting you without turning it into a fight.
“Show me then,” Choso dared, his usually low voice dropping down to damn near dangerous while his intense stare narrowed, studying your face for some sign that you meant it.
And then you were tethering your fingers through his hair, pulling him back down for another rushed kiss, shutting out all the thoughts of how many sins you were trying to atone for.
You spent so long trying to be strong for the twins. For Choso. For yourself.
But you were so tired. So exhausted from expending all your energy putting on a show pretending to be fine when you just kept failing.
Couldn’t you just let it go for a little bit? Let yourself love Choso without holding back?
His hands were slipping underneath the soft fabric of your hoodie, phantom shivers racing down your spine as he nudged your thighs further apart with his knee. You could feel each finger, how they tentatively ghosted across your side up to your chest, greedily grabbing a handful of one of your breasts, nothing shy or reserved about it.
No soft questions of if it was okay, or if you wanted more, just taking what he wanted.
And you were willing to give it.
To let him have all of your body when you struggled to hand over your heart.
Kissing him came easy. His palms pressed so firmly against your skin, pulling at the soft muscle and tender flesh, his lips fitting so nicely between your own as his nose nuzzled against you. The connection you had been fighting was too intense for you to resist his pull, the intimacy that used to terrify you slipping its tendrils around you and wrapping around you so tight you didn’t think you’d ever be able to escape the hold he had on you.
He pulled away, and you were left chasing the kiss, craning your neck up, whining and missing him the moment his mouth wasn’t on yours.
That was the truth, wasn’t it?
You had missed him the moment he stopped being yours. You were used to loneliness. To being lost in your head and longing for someone.
So why the hell did it feel so different with him? So visceral and raw to accept that he might move on if you couldn’t give him what he wanted? What he deserved?
“You don’t want me but you don’t want me to go,” he accused, and you were shaking your head, pulling him back down by his hair as you locked your thighs around his waist.
“I do want you,” you admitted, brows knitting together tightly as you practically begged him to believe you.
Your heart and your head might both be a mess.
But you could pick out that brutal fact between the wreckage any day. If you didn’t want him, it wouldn’t hurt half as bad as it did right now to see him hurt.
Like he was concerned you could change your mind (or maybe before he changed his), his grip slid back down to your hips, pulling you up some so he could get your clothes off. Adjusting down so he could shimmy your shorts and panties down your thighs in one go,
You awkwardly lifted your arms, and he was half-ripping the hoodie off of you, but the moment it was off, he was flipping you over in one rough move, one hand on the back of your neck to press your face into your throw pillow.
He left his clothes on.
All his shields still up when it came to you.
Your body trembled, cool air hitting your ass as you heard the rustle of him pulling down his pants behind you.
Usually the sex was slow with him. An hour long affair of foreplay and making out, rolling around the sheets before taking turns giving each other head, drawing out an orgasm or two before he actually fucked you, or you even rode him.
You were in uncharted territory.
On the outskirts of his heart instead of taking up space inside of it.
He ran his other palm over your ass, slowly trekking over your spine and letting out a low exhale you couldn’t decipher. You tried to look back at him, but the fingers on the back of your neck kept you firmly in place, sinking in a little deeper to get you to stay.
You shouldn’t be soaked. But you could feel the dampness leaking down your thighs, your hips aching to wiggle a little and entice him into just fucking you into feeling something other than sorry for yourself.
There was no prep.
Just him tentatively testing how wet you were with his swollen tip before smoothly sliding in, a drawn-out hiss leaving his throat at the way your warmth wrapped around him the same way it had a thousand times before.
You wanted him to kiss you again. Would even settle for a handful of pecks pressed to your shoulder blade or a few tracing up your throat.
But you didn’t feel like you had the right to make any kind of requests from him right now.
“C-Choso,” you whispered, your voice muffled into the pillow as your walls clamped down around him mid-thrust, squeezing as he shoved his way past the first ring of resistance.
“Don’t,” he murmured, and if he didn’t already feel so good inside you, you might’ve broken down from that single word.
Don’t what?
Call out for him?
“Not unless you’re mine.”
You knew what he was asking of you. To give him the pieces of you that you were still desperately clinging onto. To let go of the ones that were someone else’s.
His mouth hovered over your shoulder, so close to touching and still so far away, a little squeak escaping as his cock rubbed right into a spot he knew was sensitive.
“When you close your eyes, are you picturing me? Or him?”
The raw sound of his voice ripped through you, painfully piercing your heart as his hips pinned you to the cushions. Bottomed out and buried inside like he was aching to claim you completely and utterly as his own, his teeth finally skimming over your throat as a moan involuntarily slipped out.
“You,” you half-whispered, and you could see his face in your head now, dark and dreamy and dragging you over the coals of a fading fire. The fight you used to have in you, the one that kept you dreaming for the life you lost, dying out.
Choso had fire of his own. It was tamed, controlled, where the flames wouldn’t hurt if they licked your skin. A warm hearth you could curl up by without fear of being burned.
“Promise me,” he grunted, the springs beneath you creaking as he thrusted right where he knew you’d crumble and crack, your pleasure memorized like it was his favorite book.
“It’s you,” you echoed, a whimper echoing in your living room as his back pressed flat against your own, his hand moving your hair off the nape of your neck so he could kiss you again. Mouth leaving a messy trail of kisses, each consecutive one making the invisible thread in your stomach tense and tighten, pulled taut as he pounded you into the couch with no mercy.
“I said promise,” he groaned just before biting down, your wrecked whine just making his cock twitch as his free hand slipped around your side, roughly beginning to rub your clit like you weren’t already on the brink of breaking.
“I p-promise,” you stammered, clawing at the cheap pillow for grip, each of his thrusts threatening to make you jolt. But he didn’t stop fucking into you faster, no matter how hard you were clamping down around him, thighs trembling and toes curling at the force of his rough strokes.
So stuffed you thought you were going to snap, strangled noises buried into the pillow as his thick fingers worked your sensitive bud, his mouth littering your neck with what you hoped were love bites.
Even if he wasn’t fucking you the way he usually did, Choso was still Choso.
Still made sure you came first, waiting until your breathy gasps turned into a broken moan, shuddering as he painted white splotches across your vision, cumming and crying his name, ruined and half-limp underneath his body.
Hiding your face in the pillow as hot tears welled up in your eyes, knowing it would probably leave damp spots after this was over.
Were the two of you still over?
Now probably wasn’t the time to ask.
He pulled out at the last second, hand furiously pumping his cock, cum spurting out to spill all across your bare back as you started to come back down to earth from your climax.
Waiting for him to say something first, shutting your eyes as you struggled to catch your breath, the metal of your necklace pressing hard into your chest as his weight shifted. Carefully moving off of you instead of collapsing like he used to. Sometimes you could spend half an hour afterwards just with his body melting onto yours, playing with each other’s hair or listening to him murmur about whatever was on his mind. Letting him trace pretty shapes over your skin while he swore he adored you.
“I got some in your hair,” he mumbled instead.
Oh.
Right.
“We can shower,” you offered quietly, turning your head to the side, but still barely able to make out any of him in your peripheral vision.
You thought he’d turn you down.
Leave anyway now that he fucked you.
“Okay,” he agreed.
There was no big conversation. No emotional breakthrough under the hot water.
Choso cleaned you with the same attention he always had. Scrubbing your skin with the loofah, massaging your scalp when he washed your hair.
Taking care of you like a lover.
Even if you didn’t deserve it.
You knew you should have a proper conversation. Address what had landed you here, adjusting the water and pretending not to notice the ghost in the room.
But then the shower was over, and he was stepping out first, tying a towel loosely around his defined hips, water droplets still clinging to his happy trail as he handed you your own towel wordlessly.
Was this just how things were going to be from now on?
You watched him in the steamy mirror as you dried yourself off, searched him for remorse before he bent over to pick up his phone from the pocket of his discarded jeans.
“Yuji wants me to pick him up from Todo’s,” he muttered, looking back at you with an uncertain expression.
“Oh,” you muttered, stomach twisting with discomfort you once again didn’t want to vocalize. Todo. Wasn’t he the one that belonged to the blonde? “So Yuki’s place?”
And despite what he said earlier, a poisonous part of you whispered that he might be going over to just repeat what he’d done with her instead.
That perhaps he had just picked up those moves from being in her bed.
“Yeah,” he casually confirmed with a small nod.
You didn’t know what to say.
How to bring up your insecurity when you couldn’t even commit to him how he wanted in the first place.
So instead you deflected, biting down on your bottom lip before tilting your head to the side, “Do, um, you wanna come back over tomorrow?”
Surprise registered on his face, and he slowly nodded.
“What time?”
He was at your door the next afternoon while the kids were off at camp.
And the one after that.
Keeping your bed warm for an entire week, fucking you into your mattress like he was hoping to leave an imprint by the time he finished. To permanently press the shape of your bodies into the sheets, mold it around both of you while he molded you around him in everything from mating presses to reverse cowgirl. Any position where he could make a point in seeing how hard you would cum for him. Even in the shower afterwards when he was supposed to be cleaning you up.
Kissing you from the moment he crossed the threshold to the time he left. Desperate ones that gave away the craving you both shared, the hunger that seemed to spread and sink you further into starvation.
You didn’t know what this was.
What your relationship with him would be once the summer camps were over and you wouldn’t have the time to spare for having steamy sex with your sorta-ex.
“Shit,” he groaned, throwing his head back, the outline of his Adam's apple bobbing hard in his throat as you stole a glance over your shoulder at him. On your hands and knees, cum sticking to your ass and connecting your skin to his cock as he came a few seconds after you. His muscled abs glistened in the fading daylight, toned ridges and divots on display as he finished fucking his frustrations out on you doggy-style.
Pulling out instead of using condoms, the risk of it making your stomach flutter all funny even if you had a hard time imagining yourself ever having another kid.
You knew he wanted one though.
Another conversation you’d been avoiding.
But before you could even consider broaching it, your phone started to buzz beside the bed, and he was leaning over to pick it up for you, face softening as he held it out.
“It’s Artemis,” he muttered.
“Shit, okay,” you blinked, climbing off the bed in a hurry to grab your robe off the back of your desk chair, hastily throwing it on and tying it around your waist before rushing back to take it.
You barely got to speak to her since she’d been so busy with her space camp.
Answering before it could end, biting your lip as the facetime automatically connected, the image of her all fuzzy and blurred for a few seconds before becoming clear.
“Hi, sweetheart,” you greeted, heart rapidly thumping in your chest as you made sure she wouldn’t be able to see the rest of your room.
“I missed you, mom,” she grinned.
Artemis had a light in her eyes that you missed. That spark, that gleam of excitement that was infectious, smiling easily back at her as she pushed a planetary model in front of the camera to show off.
“Check it out. Do you like it?” She beamed, proud of her work as you instinctively thought of what Satoru would make of it. How he’d probably grin and goad her into going over every detail. How happy he’d be that she was into the same stuff as him.
“I love it,” you promised, nodding along as she started rambling about how they were learning about worm holes earlier, bouncing up and down as you tried to not let the sinking pit in your stomach swallow you up with how much she reminded you of her father.
But if he was really still here, would he be here to see this? Or would he still be choosing work over the three of you?
You were so distracted, you didn’t hear Choso creeping back up until you felt the weight of him against your back, bending over to rest his chin on your collarbone as he saw Artemis’ project on your phone.
“You made that all by yourself?” He asked, and you could see his soft smile on your screen, admiring her work like she was his. The pretty picture of a perfect father.
“Choso?” Artemis blinked, mouth falling open and nose scrunching up in surprise as she looked back at you with sheer confusion.
You stammered something out, a weak excuse about her brother calling, ending the call before you had to actually answer her reasonable questions about what you were doing with him. Turning back the second you were sure she wouldn’t overhear, scoffing as you shook your head at him.
“Why did you do that?” You asked, blowing a short puff of air out of your nose as his palms settled on your hips.
“Do what? Talk to Artemis? We’re back together,” He said it as if it was obvious, and you reflexively wanted to refuse. To sabotage the slice of heaven you were living in for the past week.
“I never said that.”
The moment those four words left your lips, you wanted to put them back.
Freezing as his hands fell away from you, loathing yourself for letting this happen, seeing how hard and fast he recoiled from you.
“I’m such a fucking moron,” he muttered, turning around and grabbing his sweater from the bed, pulling it over his head as your body seized with dread. “You’re just using me. You never wanted a life with me.”
“No,” you breathed the word, but you were already sure it was too late. You screwed it up again. “I didn’t-”
“Stop with the stupid lies,” he shook his head, not believing you.
“Stay, please,” you half-whispered, the slowly-growing guilt gripping your heart encasing it completely. “I wasn’t trying to-”
“To what?” He interrupted.
“I panicked,” you weakly explained, an excuse forming on your tongue about not wanting to confuse the kids anymore, but he wasn’t about to let it go this time.
“Why don’t you want to marry me?” He bluntly asked.
No room for wiggling out of the conversation or wishing it away when it meant watching him walk out your door again.
You had to be honest.
No matter how much your brain was trying to convince you that you were just jinxing it. Cursing him to follow the same fate as your former fiancé by saying the words out loud. Condemning yourself by tying yourself down to someone you were scared would slip away too.
“The day you proposed,” you hesitated, holding your breath as you swallowed hard. “While you weren’t here, someone from NASA stopped by that afternoon to tell me Satoru had officially been declared dead.”
You didn’t know why it had even surprised you.
All the years he’d been gone, the excuses his old coworkers had offered started to dry up, the same old stories they sold you not holding the same hope.
And now they were admitting there wasn’t any.
Satoru was dead to them.
And you didn’t even really get to be a widow.
“I went to his grave after you got home, but I just, I don’t know how to say goodbye to him,” you muttered, thinking about how it felt to sit there knowing his body would never be buried by his headstone. About the life he deserved and never got. Where he got to be a father and a husband and be a family. “And then you came home and pulled out the ring, and it was like everything was happening all over again.”
The memory of it was a blur, your head a complete mess as an awful as intrusive thoughts threw everything you were terrified of straight in your face.
Telling you that you were just replacing Satoru. That he would hate you if he knew you had moved on. Insisted that if you said yes, Choso wouldn’t stick around either.
So scared that he’d leave you too, that you nearly lost him anyway.
“Baby, if you had told me-”
“I know,” your voice broke, body trembling as he wrapped a warm arm around your shoulders to tug you into a tender embrace. “I should’ve said something. But I didn’t know how to bring it up and I just shut down, and-”
“If I had waited, would you have said yes?” He asked, and you couldn’t answer straight away.
Was it a betrayal to Satoru to say yes?
Or were you losing the best thing in your life by clinging onto the ghost of a man who hadn’t loved you enough to listen and stay in the first place?
“I don’t know,” you admitted. “I don’t want another proposal if it ends in losing the person I love.”
Looking up at him anxiously, waiting for the foundation you were standing on to crack and crumble – for him to prove you right. For the world to rip him away now that you admitted that you loved him enough to fear living without him too.
“The only way you’ll lose me is if you keep pushing me away,” he comforted you, and you wanted to cry.
“I don’t want to push you away,” you mumbled.
“Then let me in,” he whispered, pulling you onto the bed and placing you on his lap. Letting you curl up on him, holding you tight like he was trying to make it clear he wasn’t going to let you go.
Your sniffles turned into soft sobs, all the tears you’d been holding in, all the mourning you’d been rejecting released the moment you had someone to lean on.
“Are you still seeing your therapist?” He pressed, and you hung your head lower.
“No,” you confessed through the tears. “I haven’t been since we broke up.”
“You need to go back,” he softly goaded, and you knew he was right. That you were only hurting yourself the more you held it all in.
“Could, um, you go with me?” You muttered, unsure and anxious as you searched his face for some sign that you weren’t making a mistake, rubbing the damp streaks off of your cheeks as he nodded.
“If you want me there,” he muttered.
And you could finally admit to yourself that you did.
That you wanted there when you went to sleep, and when you woke up, and for everything in between.
“I want you here for everything,” you whispered.
“I’m sorry that I didn’t see what you were going through-”
𖥔 ݁ ˖
“So what? The second she thinks I’m dead she decides to marry you?” Gojo interrupted his retelling of it, Choso’s mouth finding it hard not to frown at how much he sort of reminded him of you. Seeing the bits of his personality that had melted into yours, picturing how the two of you might have worked together if the positions were reversed.
“It wasn’t like that,” Choso muttered.
“That’s what it sounds like,” he retorted.
His phone vibrated on the table, Artemis' name flashing on the screen before Gojo snatched it off and shoved it in his pocket.
“You can answer that,” Choso muttered, shrugging his shoulders. It was a little uncomfortable sharing a daughter, but she was too grown for him to say anything about it. And between the twins, she was the one who always had a soft spot for the father she lost to the very thing she was studying.
Of course she was going to be excited that he was home.
Even if some things were better left in her imagination than in real life.
Choso had never planned on meeting him. Never considered what he might actually be like.
Although he did find it a little annoying that he was somehow even more obsessed and in love with you than he ever conceived.
“I’ll call her back later,” Gojo answered, but there was a nervous glint to his eyes as he cleared his throat before picking up his fork to shove some food in his mouth, still talking mid-chew. “How long, exactly, did it take for you to marry my-”
He nearly said fiancée.
But Gojo corrected himself, clearing his throat, “Her.”
“Your friend’s mother, she, uh, got cancer a year later,” Choso muttered, still a little haunted by the look on your face when she announced it. At the hard memories always attached to the good ones. “The doctors thought she only had six months to live.”
“Oh,” Gojo muttered, a crease forming between his brows on his pretty, wrinkle-free face.
“It changed things.”
If it hadn’t been for her, he wasn’t sure if the two of you would’ve found your way back together at all.
It had been her birthday. All of you over at her house, the kids playing in the living room while you helped her clean up. Choso was supposed to be keeping an eye on the twins and Yuji, but he was within earshot of your conversation, beating a level that was too hard for them on the game console she’d bought them last Christmas.
He nearly died the second he heard the words terminally ill leave her mouth, using every ounce of his self-composure not to snap his head around and ask all the questions he was itching to know. But then the kids would notice, and the idea of the twins realizing that they were about to lose the closest thing they had to a grandparent was enough to make him hold onto his cool. Force his face into a neutral expression as he clicked buttons haphazardly.
“You can get a second opinion, or, or-” You were stumbling over your words, in denial as Mrs. Geto tutted at you.
“Sometimes, it’s just a person’s time,” she softly said. “I’ve lived a long life. A happy one.”
Choso glanced back right as your entire face fell, devastation obvious in every line etched into your skin, shaking your head hard as you rejected it.
You tried to speak, but nothing came out.
“I want to be with my husband and son,” she said, and you were trying so hard not to cry. Eyes watering with tears you were quick to blink away. “I’ve made my peace with it.”
Choso knew you. Could see how hard you were resisting the urge to say that you wanted her here too.
“Don’t give me that look, dear,” she lightly said, reading you like an open book too. “All I want now is to know that you’ll be okay when I’m gone. All three of you.”
You might not be her daughter. But you were damn near close to it after nearly a decade of leaning on each other for support.
“You know Choso takes good care of us,” you softly replied, your voice barely audible as you sniffled. Rubbing your face from the spot you’d frozen in, lip still quivering.
“He does, doesn’t he?” She knowingly said, and you were nodding.
“He’s great,” you reiterated, and even when the timing was terrible, he couldn’t help but feel a small flicker of gratitude at hearing you speak about him like that. On you counting on him.
“Not great enough to marry?”
He almost flinched.
A game over screen flashing across the TV as the kids groaned in unison, little fingers poking and pushing and telling him to try again.
“I don’t need his last name to know I love him,” you muttered.
“That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t marry him,” she argued, and Choso felt his chest constrict, wondering whether or not he should even be listening when she started talking about Suguru, so fondly, recounting a memory of his father, her husband, the weight of her missing them present in every syllable. “Even if it hurts sometimes, I wouldn’t take any of it back.”
You knew what that felt like.
Choso could see the contemplation scrawled across your face, struggling to keep his focus on the game as Mrs. Geto continued.
“You’ve known him longer than Satoru, sweetheart,” she guided, touching your shoulder tenderly as he caught a glimpse of you chewing on your lip. “He loves you just as much.”
It wasn’t a competition.
Even if sometimes did feel like he was fighting a phantom for your love.
“He would understand if you went all in with him,” she spoke gently. “All any of us have ever wanted is for you to be happy.”
You were about to start bawling, but you held it in, nodding along like you knew she was right. And Choso was already planning on sending her a gift basket the next day with all her favorite foods and snacks, including a note promising to make time to take her to any appointments she needed.
“I loved Satoru like he was my own too, but even if they came back tomorrow, I don’t know if he’d be the one that’s right for you now, dear,” she gently goaded, guiding you as you sucked in a sharp breath.
Choso waited for you to shake your head, to tell her that she was wrong.
But you didn’t.
And he was still thinking about what you were thinking that night. You told him about her illness after the kids had fallen asleep in their beds, sitting up with a pillow pressed against your chest as you gave him that look you always did when you were deep in thought.
He pretended not to know, just wrapping his arms around you to offer whatever comfort you needed. He wasn’t going to push. Press about marriage just because you had spoken with Mrs. Geto about it.
Truthfully, he didn’t expect anything to actually come of it.
He understood your reservations. Those fears you were still working through with your therapist.
So you caught him off guard when you looked up at him with wide eyes and nervously asked, “Do you still think about marrying me?”
“Of course I do,” he answered a little too fast. “But I understand why you don’t want to.”
He would take a forever of being your boyfriend than a future where you weren’t anything to him.
“Why do you want to?” You asked, the question coming out slightly stilted, a hint of something he had a hard time placing. It wasn’t dismissive. Not completely curious, more like, searching for confirmation from him.
“You already know I’m in love with you,” he murmured, reaching over to brush his fingers across your cheek. “And how much I love our family.”
You and the twins. The way you readily accepted Yuji as their sibling. Loved his little brother without hesitation.
“I want to grow old with you. Spend as many moments of our lives together as we can. Watch the kids graduate and get families of their own,” he mumbled, finding more confidence with each sentence as you leaned into his hand. “I want to write cheesy vows and say them in front of all our friends. I want Yuji to be my best man and Apollo to carry the rings while Artemis tosses flower petals down the aisle.”
And fuck, when you were looking at him like that, like you wanted all of it and more too, he nearly melted on the spot.
“I want to see you in a white dress, walking towards me while I cry at how beautiful you are,” Choso whispered, his gravelly voice standing out in the soft silence, the sound of crickets chirping through the cracked window as a breeze filtered in. “But really, I just want you to choose me. Forever.”
He didn’t want to spend the rest of his life waiting and wondering if he was the one you wanted.
You swallowed hard, your hand reaching over to graze against his fingers affectionately.
“Ask me again,” you breathed.
He stared for a moment, barely believing what had just left your lips. But the moment it sunk in, he was rushing off the bed, nearly stumbling towards his nightstand, pulling it open and rummaging through everything to find the ring box he tucked in the back when he moved in with you again.
You sat on the edge of the bed, a ghost of a smile curling up on your lips as you watched him hurry to get down on one knee and pop open the box, revealing the ring you didn’t get to see last time.
“Will you marry me?”
Gojo looked like he was about to puke over the photo album in front of him.
There you were, standing in your wedding dress, Choso’s hand slung on your waist as you leaned into him. Mrs. Geto was by your side, using a walker as her illness left her struggling to get around the way she used to. Yuji clinging onto the leg of his tux, grinning and sticking his tongue out at the photographer by his new step-siblings. Artemis and Apollo were in front of you, your bouquet in her hands while Apollo beamed at the camera, proud of himself for doing a good job not tripping or falling with the rings.
“She’s glowing,” Gojo murmured, tracing over your face down to the wedding dress, face twisting up in pained tension. Maybe thinking of what his photos might have looked like with you.
All his plans wrecked by his own confidence that the world would bend to what he wanted.
And before Choso could really react, tears welled up in his blue eyes, his jaw clenched tight as he tried to hide the fact he was crying at the photo.
“She was pregnant,” Choso explained, feeling himself getting choked up too thinking about that year. “It wasn’t planned.”
Honestly, when you told him, stepping out of the bathroom with a positive test, that nervous glint of pure fear in your eyes as you held it out, he was sure you were going to tell him you didn’t want it.
That you could marry him, but you would draw the line at having his kid. Sure that you wouldn’t want to put your body through it again, especially ten years after having twins.
But you just anxiously asked if he wanted it, if he thought the two of you could really handle it.
“How was it?” Gojo asked, a surprising sincerity to the question. Genuinely wanting to know, maybe because he missed his chance to go through it with you. Only got a handful of videos you sent when you were pregnant. Didn’t get to be there for the sonograms, or the appointments, or the birth.
Missed buying baby clothes and painting a nursery. Picking out names together.
Although, it had been you who suggested naming her Keso, after one of his brothers who passed when he was younger.
“It was hard, sometimes,” he admitted. The later months especially. Your anxiety picking up the closer your due date came, convinced that something would go wrong, going to see your therapist every other week until your delivery date. “But our daughter was healthy, and I was there to help her recover.”
Choso never left you once.
Was there for every diaper change and late night feed. Comforted every time he picked up his little girl relief he hadn’t expected blooming in his chest at having one that looked like him. He had told himself it wouldn’t matter. That he would’ve loved a little girl that looked like you too. Especially since he already adored Artemis.
But it was nice to know that strangers would see his girl and know she was absolutely his.
Gojo had only met her once since she came back at a big family dinner, and she was too preoccupied with her own husband and kids now to care about the man her mother once loved, just offering him an awkward smile before going back to talking to Artemis.
He was wiping his face, pretending like he hadn’t been crying as he flipped the pages back in the photo album, finding one where you were sprawled out in the backyard on a towel and smiling at the camera, shielding your face from the sun. Artemis was laying next to you, her head buried in a book.
“Can I have this one?” He asked, and Choso wanted to say no.
Not let him have any more pieces of you than he’d already stolen.
But it was hard to actually say no when he knew there was a second copy of the photo underneath, reluctantly nodding. “I suppose.”
“I’m glad she got to move on,” he mumbled, not that it sounded even remotely truthful. The only thing there was regret. “That she could forget about me.”
“I meant what I said,” Choso sighed, turning more serious as he looked into those frustratingly familiar eyes. He loved you too much to hate him. Loved Apollo and Artemis too much to loathe the man he had to thank for them. “She never forgot you.”
Gojo was the one who was struggling to swallow the fact he had to share your heart with someone else now.
“Yeah,” he dismissively muttered, lips pressing together.
“When she got sick a few years ago, her memory started to go too,” Choso reluctantly broached his least favorite subject, recalling the long months of watching you waste away. “Eventually, she forgot almost everything. Except you.”
Gojo didn’t know what to say.
Sitting there stunned as he stared at Choso, finding it too hard to meet his eyes and turning his attention to the wedding band still on his fourth finger.
“She couldn’t remember the twins or our grandkids. But she still talked about you. Called me your name a couple times when I helped her get out of bed. Looked up at the sky and told everyone who visited that you were up there,” Choso admitted, his voice wavering as he tried his damndest not to hold it against you. To remember all the decades that had come before that when you were more than happy to be his. “Swore that her husband was just with the stars for a little bit before he’d come back for her.”
He wasn’t quite as emotional as he had once been. But it was hard to not break down at the fact that he’d lost you long before you passed away.
That in the end, he hadn’t carved himself deep enough into you to be the one you recalled.
Sure, you still had moments of clarity. Rare days where you were almost like your old self, where you’d kiss him and hold him and swear you loved him more than anything.
And those were enough. You were enough. Even when there was barely anything left.
“We both loved her,” Choso murmured, although love didn’t seem like a big enough word for it. He had a feeling that Gojo would understand anyway. Know what he was trying to get at here. That they’d both felt the full spectrum of emotions, the highest highs and the lowest lows that came with worshipping you. “And lost her too.”
“Yeah,” Gojo whispered. “I guess we did.”
“I don’t know what’s worse,” Choso exhaled, taking one last sip of his drink. “Losing her all at once like you or seeing her disappear piece by piece.”
“I’m sorry,” he apologized, and Choso looked up to see the way his face had scrunched up, his brows furrowed as he twisted around the wedding band he started wearing too. The one you bought for him once upon a time.
“You don’t need to apologize,” Choso shook his head.
If anyone understood what it was like to miss you, it was him. Even if he spent most of his adult life despising him to some degree.
But Gojo was still staring at him with guilt he hadn’t anticipated. Like he knew everything was his fault and he didn’t know how to fix it.
Choso contemplated telling him that there wasn’t anything left to fix.
It wasn’t like he could go back in time to change anything. And even if he could, Choso wouldn’t change a single moment. Not when he’d gotten you. Gotten his daughter – and two bonus kids.
His life had been filled with your warmth and laughter and a million smiles he wouldn’t trade for anything.
Even if the ending had been a bit lackluster. Even if he had to spend the next ten years on his own wishing you were still around.
“I’m going to Apollo’s place,” he announced. “His daughter brought her baby over.”
Awkwardly extending an invitation even if his son wouldn’t exactly be thrilled at having the father that was now younger than him around.
“Oh,” Gojo said, his mouth curling down like he knew it too.
Recognized where he wasn’t wanted.
It might be too late for Apollo. But he still had time to get to know the rest of his family if he stopped focusing on the past and learned to live in the present.
“Don’t you want to come spend some time with your great grandson?” Choso asked, his voice coming out gravelly as his knee ached with the effort of standing. Gojo’s stare flicked down at his lap, towards the pocket he shoved his phone in.
And even though Artemis didn’t share his physical features, he recognized that distracted look of hers in Gojo now, like he was working out a problem too complex for anyone else to solve.
“I’ll, uh, catch you guys there later,” he excused, running his thumb over the edge of the photo.
He didn’t have the energy left in him to convince him to come.
Gojo would just have to learn for himself how little time there was left with the people he loved in this life.
Choso supposed he should consider himself lucky. At least he got to spend most of his by your side.
It wasn’t jealousy that plagued him as he collected his photo albums, the proof of every year you’d given him while Gojo was gone, but pure pity.
If only he had the foresight to realize how misplaced his empathy was.
But even if he had, he wasn’t the one who could turn back time.
a/n: this was also a commission by the super creative and inspiring @dayanim !! i love her and her big brain sm :3
𓈒⊹ mdni fluff + silly misunderstandings. reader is a lovergirl. slight yandere suguru. 𓈒⊹
All you really wanted was for him to like you back.
It was pathetic. A foolish girl’s dream wished upon a few too many falling stars.
Staring at the seams of the stained glass window overlooking the quaint village outside, sighing to yourself as you waited to be called into his office.
How many fates were worse than being condemned to a side character in your favorite romance novel? One where you would soon be forced to watch the second male lead you loved so much fall for the leading lady while you were stuck working all day and slumming it in the shitty dorms of the mage’s tower all night?
Even though you had access to magic now, you were barely an amateur, making low-level potions for them to sell to merchants rather than anything remotely cool or exciting.
“He’s ready to see you now.”
Shit.
You didn’t have your story rehearsed.
How the hell were you supposed to explain why you had stolen a handful of restricted books from their archives to research opening a portal back to your real world?
You nervously nodded, brushing down your skirt as you followed his assistant back into his office, sneaking a peek up at the beautiful man behind the desk.
Suguru Geto.
The most talented mage in the past fifty years. Dark hair spilling down his back, half of it tied up in a messy bun that still managed to look deliberate, thin glasses perched on the bridge of his beautiful nose. You didn’t think there was anything about him that wasn’t beautiful.
He came down to the level where you worked a few times a day, always offering warm smiles and murmuring things in that honeyed tone of his, checking in on how everything was going with the rest of the workers. Sometimes you thought he even looked at you, convinced you caught a glimpse of his gaze on your skin only for him to be focused on someone else every time you glanced back.
Sometimes he left treats for everyone. Ordered a round of drinks for the room when you were at the tavern next door.
But you never thought he really noticed you. Until now.
God, you were so going to be fired.
You knew he'd never like you. Not the way he would love her once the story you had the misfortune of getting sucked into started. So why the hell did you have to be punished for just trying to go home?
Even in a place like this where magic existed, you sincerely doubted he'd believe you if you confessed you belonged to another world where this was all just a book.
"Sneaking into the archives is a fireable offense," he spoke sternly, pulling off his glasses to look up at you with soft purple eyes. "Stealing tomes-"
"I'm sorry," you blurted out, your voice coming out all squeaky as you bowed your head with apology.
Maybe if you seemed remorseful enough-
"You weren't trying to sell them on the black market, were you?" He asked, his sharp tone nearly making you flinch as you starting wildly waving your hands in denial.
"No, of course not, I just-" You gasped, taken aback at his accusation just to clamp your lips shut before you could tell him the truth.
"You just what?"
"I just wanted to study some of the spells in it," you muttered, an awkward half-truth.
"Like the love spells?" He asked, your face scrunching up in confusion as you scrambled for a new defense.
What use did he think you have for a love spell?
Your cheeks were heating up, embarrassment coursing through you as you considered the possibility your crush wasn't nearly as subtle as you previously believed.
"N-no," you mumbled, cringing at how unbelievable you sounded.
"You're a cute girl," he murmured, and you wanted to dissolve into a puddle on the spot, a little whimper threatening to leave your throat as he pushed back his chair and stood up. "Why do you need a spell to get someone to love you?"
"I really wasn't-"
"The date you took it out was the same day the prince came by to visit," he commented, as if he was making a connection your humiliated brain was struggling to comprehend. "Was it for him?"
Just when you thought it couldn't get worse, he was convinced that you were a loser so in love with a man out of your league that you were willing to cast a spell to capture his heart.
"Am I being fired?" You impulsively asked, itching to just go back to your room and collect the meager handful of belongings you had and leave before your pride could take another hit. You'd rather go be a waitress or find work somewhere else than live like this.
"I was thinking of a reassignment," he hummed, a hint of a sly smile curling up on his lips as you contemplated just quitting instead. It's not like he'd expend any energy searching for you if you ran away either.
"Reassignment?" You nervously echoed, fiddling with your fingers.
"I've been needing a new apprentice," he murmured, shrugging his shoulders as his robes fluttered around him. Dignified. A dangerous glint in his swirling stare as it seared straight through to your shaking soul. "I appreciate your, ah, unconventional thirst for knowledge."
"Really, I, uh, couldn't dream of accepting," you tried to insist, caught off guard again as he effortlessly disarmed all the excuses you'd been preparing. "I'm flattered, but I'm not nearly skilled enough-"
"His Highness comes to visit me regularly," he added, as if it sweetened his offer, and you wondered if he could feel the heat of your humiliation burning you up from across the room. "I can't allow you to test your spells on him, of course, but-"
"I wouldn't do that," you protested, nearly stomping your foot in frustration as your lips pushed out in a pout.
He paused, smiling nonchalantly as he pulled out a paper from the thick stack on his desk and dipped his quill in ink, holding both out for you.
"Uh-huh," he hummed. "Please sign here to confirm your new assignment. It comes with a higher pay and a better dorm."
"I would be working directly under you?" You asked, swallowing hard as you eyed the parchment.
"Learning from the very best," he confirmed, eyes crinkling softly as he tilted his head to the side.
Spending your shifts by his side instead of the back of the sidelines.
Even if he thought your heart was in someone else's hands.
Perhaps that was for the best.
You'd be forced to move on if you were faced with proof of his disinterest every single day.
"Okay," you anxiously accepted, nervously walking over to his desk, leaning over to take the quill from his hands and sign your name by the X. "If you're sure you want me."
"I want you."
𓈒⊹
More than you knew.
Suguru ran his fingers over the dried ink of your name, still clinging to the faint traces of your perfume in the air, glancing up at the door you just walked out of as he sighed.
It wasn't his fault you had enraptured him from the first moment he picked up on the strange aura that surrounded you. Who could blame him for being addicted to your shy attention, the adorable affection you were too scared to show him? Shyly staring and sneaking around trying to look up love potions?
He liked your desperation.
How was it any different to devotion?
It was obvious on your face when he asked about the prince that you were trying to just cover up your crush for him.
Was he supposed to not find it cute?
He filed your contract away, an easy smirk curling up on his face as he got one last look at the fine print.
A little love spell of his own. Sealed by your own signature
love without loyalty is just lust - but which feeling lies where between the king you've sworn to serve and the clown who'll never be able to make you laugh?
synopsis: the only way for a siren like you to survive was as the king's pet, his pretty nightly pastime who spent years pining after him. but what happens when he's meant to marry another? or when a member of his court offers you a way out?
pairings: king!Sukuna x siren!Reader x jester!Gojo
content: MDNI, mostly angst ngl, medieval fantasy AU, forbidden love, heavy pining, very unbalanced power dynamics, messy relationships, gojo pov!!, asshole yandere!gojo !!, he is in love and he is TERRIBLE about it, reader is going through it
divider by @/bronzewasp
Gojo didn't want to see you like this.
Gagged and tied up, your eyes hidden behind a blindfold as he squatted down to study the way you squirmed against your restraints.
But how the hell else was he supposed to show you that you shouldn't be ashamed of yourself?
That unless you used your voice to protect yourself, you would just end up devoured. Chewed up and spat back out by the court, looked down on by the noble ladies and all the other morons who thought their inherited wealth meant they could push others around.
You inherited something far more valuable.
A gift that you could rule the world with.
And once he made you see that, everything would be solved.
You might be upset with him if you found out how much he had orchestrated. But you'd be grateful one day. Understand why he had to.
This would be your happily ever after.
Right now, you were playing the damsel-in-distress, not left in a dungeon, but the unused basement of the castle his stepmother must have found suitable.
He heard the sound of voices approaching from down the hall, tucking himself back into the shadows, slipping into the single storage closet attached to the dingy room just out-of-sight, waiting for his moment to strike.
His plan wasn't particularly complicated.
He knew his stepmother wouldn't stand for you taking her place, becoming the next queen once he took the throne. Unable to handle being thrown away, losing every ounce of power she wielded to someone she could never control. Gojo barely even had to snoop to discover her plans to pay off a few guards to kidnap you and sell you off in an underground market.
And okay, Gojo could have stopped it.
But wouldn't it be more romantic if he played your hero? Saved you from his wicked stepmother and showed you that you were his priority?
And most importantly, make you to use the ability you'd been blessed with while he was at it?
He could see through the cracked sliver of the door as two burly guards walked in, clearly drunk as they crossed the room, neither even glancing back in the corner he was in as they approached the chair they tied you to after stealing you straight from his bed.
"Think what they say about her is true?" One of them chuckled, daring to put a filthy hand on your hair.
"Careful," the other one half-slurred, slumping against the wall as the coins in his pocket jingled. "I heard she can drive a man mad just from a look."
"She's blindfolded, imbecile," the other one mocked, and you tried to say something, your voice muffled into the gag.
There it was.
His girl trying to fight back.
Before they could push their luck, the door swung open again, and tonight's villain finally decided to show her face.
"Is that thing tied tight?" His stepmother muttered, disgust dripping from her abrasive voice as his hands reflexively reached for the hilt of the sword strapped to his side.
"The gag is secured, Your-" One of the idiotic guards started to insist, but she just scoffed at him.
"I was talking about her."
You were a thing in her eyes.
A pest he had the audacity to bring home and treat like a pet.
To be fair, he sincerely doubted she would be happy with anyone she didn't select herself, irritated when he swore he was preoccupied searching for one and outright incensed that he brought home a woman who wouldn't fear her.
She wanted a puppet.
To act like she throne was hers even if she couldn't sit on it anymore.
Sure, to everyone else, she was doting, sweet, all supportive of the prince that wasn't hers. But Gojo had spent years seeing her for the snake that lived inside her skin.
"Have all the preparations been made?" She asked, walking around to examine you herself. Pinching your chin between her thin fingers before peeling the blindfold off to look directly in your eyes.
"Yes," the other one dutifully answered, shoulders stiff as he stood ready for her next command.
For all her flaws, she knew what you hadn't learned yet.
What you didn't want to learn.
How to wield every ounce of control she had.
"At least I'll make a pretty penny off of her," she exhaled. "I wonder how much you'll sell for at auction."
Sukuna and him could agree on one thing.
You were priceless.
Both the guards were distracted, nervously glancing at each other as his stepmother appraised you like some collectible, and Gojo supposed it was as good of time as any to put a stop to it now.
But before he could step out, you managed to wiggle one hand free and ripped the gag from your mouth, not giving her time to react before you were barking out an order.
"Don't fucking move," you whispered, your throat raw as the words ripped out of you.
It was a little satisfying to see them still.
Bodies frozen and unable to so much as budge an inch.
You were shaking, fingers trembling as you struggled to get your other hand out of the ropes keeping you tied to the chair.
Well, this would make the hero act he planned a little harder to execute, but he still stepped out of the closet with his sword drawn, puffing out his chest as he softly called out your name.
Your head snapped towards him, but there was no understanding in your stare as he preemptively prepared a speech to patch this over.
But his stepmother spoke up first.
"You stupid wench-"
"Shut up," you hissed at her almost automatically, chest heaving hard as you managed to tear your other wrist free, not even reacting to how raw it could've rubbed your skin.
She opened her mouth to argue, probably throw out another nasty name, but nothing come out.
Under your complete control.
"Don't worry, sweetheart," he soothed, walking over to the chair, bending down to release the restraints binding your ankles to it. "You did great."
It took you a second to meet his gaze, to really see him there, but you didn't talk either.
He didn't know how to read your face. What expression you were wearing now.
But your eyes were wild.
Like some untamed animal he startled in the woods.
"I was going to intervene, but it looks like you had it handled," he offered, cracking a smile like the last time he left you, you hadn't been pissed at him.
And apparently, still were, judging by the way your blank face abruptly twisted into something distraught.
Gojo knew.
Deep down, in the pit of the stomach, he knew who it was directed to.
But he still couldn't stop himself from acting like he didn't. Selling himself another lie and swearing that you would buy it too with time.
"I'll make sure she's imprisoned for kidnapping you," he comforted you, a hand on your forearm as he pulled you out of the chair, throwing a cursory glance back at the frozen statues behind him, their eyes moving back-and-forth as their bodies refused to let them budge. "Them too."
You had to be grateful for that, at least.
It would all work out perfectly.
With that ring on your finger, and the queen rotting in the dungeon, his father would be forced to relinquish the throne to him.
Maybe it made him greedy. Gluttonous for being unable to just accept what he already had.
He couldn't just go live off in a fucking cottage somewhere and pretend like he was happy to pick crops or play farmer.
Not when he had spent his life being waited on hand and foot. Knew what riches were waiting for those bold enough to take.
Gojo didn't know how to give.
Didn't it mean something that he wast trying to learn for you?
Sure, stealing you hadn't been enough. He still wanted Sukuna's kingdom too.
But he was just righting wrongs.
All of it should've been his from the start. He was just reclaiming everything that should have been his by birthright.
You looked at him like he was just as disgusting as the roaches scurrying over the stone floor.
"You let this happen to me," you whispered, shaking your head with the distrust he hoped to avoid shining in your eyes. Your voice was so fucking beautiful, it hurt. Lulled him even deeper in love with you, made his lashes flutter as he felt himself frown.
He understood, of course he understood, but he still huffed. Aching to make you understand him too. See that he only wanted to best for both of you.
You shouldn't have to spend your life accepting scraps when you should be showered with dresses and diamonds and desserts most people could only dream of.
"I would never let them hurt you," he insisted as you backed away, inching towards the door.
He touched your shoulder, fingertips grazing against your shoulder as you recoiled with a weak scoff like you were wounded anyway.
"You used me."
"You used me too," he reminded you, reaching out to tuck your hair behind your ear. "You wanted to run away. I did that for you. For us."
"This isn't the same," you protested, those pretty eyes watering as the blindfold that had been forced on you dangled around your neck with the gag.
"Don't be like this, baby," he murmured, tempted to bring up the fact that your kidnappers were still behind you, that they were the ones for you to be angry at. He was the one trying to protect you.
Gojo stepped forward, about to grab your arm to stop you from recoiling any further, when you swatted his hand away.
"Don't touch me," you hissed at him, your extra pointy canines glinting in the candlelight.
It was cute.
How convinced you were that your words would keep him away. He let you think that before. Played along when you kicked him out of his room.
But he supposed it was time for the truth.
To put all the cards on the table since he already rigged the deck.
He would claim the jackpot tonight, but it really was adorable seeing you act like you were the winner.
"You're going to get me a carriage and let me go home," you commanded, using your sternest voice, scowling at him as you rubbed the wrists you must have just realized were sore.
Home.
He nearly scoffed.
You were caged before. Confined to your bed chambers and the corners of Sukuna's court.
How the hell could you call that home?
And how long would it take for you to see that your home was here now? With him?
Sukuna might like his trophy to sit up on a shelf.
But Gojo wanted to watch you shine.
"Don't think so," he retorted, doing his best impression of an apologetic tone as he breached the gap between you. You didn't move. Too stunned to do anything but stare as he cupped your cheek tenderly. "I'm taking you back to our room."
"But-"
You couldn't even get more than the single word out.
And then your eyes drifted down to the engagement ring on your finger, his clever girl figuring it out for herself that it was more than just a show of his affection.
"It's charmed," he smiled softly, dragging his thumb over your cheekbone. "Your powers won't work on me."
𝜗❀𝜚 mdni. porn with plot. chasity cage. oral sex (f! receiving). gojo cameo.
“Have you come to repent your sins?”
No, you came to cum.
You squirmed in your confessional seat, glancing through the thin grate separating you from your priest, fiddling with the fancy fabric of your dress as you swallowed the lump in your throat.
“I wanted to see you,” you murmured, thighs pressing together as you tried to untangle the treacherous desire coiling around your heart.
Waiting for him to reply with bated breath, fingers trembling as you tried to picture the expression on his face.
Would he blush? Bite down on the inside of his cheek as his dark brows pinched together in disappointment you hadn’t even made it a full day before returning to him?
You heard the creak of the other confessional door swinging open, your pulse pounding in your ears as hope bloomed in your chest - and heat pooled in your core.
Was it wrong to want your priest?
To dream about the low rumble of his voice when he whispered your name or the way his soft hands felt on your face?
Truly, it wasn’t your fault he ensnared your soul - even if he had sworn to save it.
All it had taken was for you to get caught in a semi-compromising position with one of your knights for your family to panic of your virtue.
What good was a princess they couldn’t profit off of? One that might screw up the political alliance they planned on by selling you off to another snobby royal or noble?
Your parents had decided that your promiscuity was a problem only a priest could fix.
Who, in turn, came up with a solution that only made that you so much worse.
Being confined in a chastity cage was supposed to be a lesson. To teach you to not crave the pleasure of the flesh and prevent you from committing a cardinal sin.
Perhaps it would have worked if the only man who had the key didn’t have a proclivity for pleasure himself.
“Don't you have duties to attend to?" Choso dryly asked as he shut himself in with you, nose scrunching up as he scrutinized you, the marking across it standing bold even in the dim shadows of the booth.
"I was in dire need of your guidance," you lied, a little sin you were sure he'd make sure you asked forgiveness for later.
He clicked his tongue twice as he looked down at you, serious stare searing through you as he shook his head.
“Please help me,” you pouted, pushing out your bottom lip and clasping your hands together like you were ready to pray. "You're the only one who can."
He slipped underneath your skirts, big hands drifting over your legs before running across the cool metal of the cage he'd been keeping you all locked up in.
It had been humiliating at first, your face flushing when he showed you that it still allowed you to use the bathroom, that its sole purpose was to prevent anyone else from using you. But after a number of frustrating nights and even more numerous days of returning to his confessional to complain, he proposed a solution to solve your problem - and maybe scratch an itch of your own.
His tongue diving inside you didn't count as sex, right?
The key clicked in the lock.
And freedom felt a lot like his breath on your freshly exposed skin and his fingers sinking into your soft thighs.
"You'll send us both to Hell," he murmured, gravel stuck in his throat before his mouth latched onto your clit and feverishly sucked.
You wouldn't mind going if it was with him.
An afterlife spent squeezing his head between your thighs actually sounded perfect. His tongue swirling lazily around your pussy, drawing soft moans he had to keep shushing, your fingers itching to rake through his dark hair as you threw your head back and bit your lip to stifle your sounds.
A man like him had promised himself to his gods.
He wasn't supposed to marry or even make love.
You supposed you were really just his loophole.
And judging by the way he grunted and groaned as his tongue dragged across your walls, swimming around in the taste of you, you knew no matter how many times he tried to tell himself he was simply serving you, he never failed to finish too.
Thumb dimpling your flesh, his nose nudging so perfectly against the sensitive bud above your entrance, the warmth in your chest making your head feel all fuzzy as you bucked your hips up to drive his tongue further.
You were going to get what you came here for.
On the brink, so close you could practically taste your release yourself, letting out a barely audible whimper of his name as you pressed down on his head through your dress and-
"Well, what do we have here?" An annoyingly familiar voice called out, your eyes snapping open as you found the knight who used to warm your bed leaning again the now-open door.
"L-leave now," you stuttered, the priest between your thighs refusing to stop eating you out even after you'd been caught. His grip only tightened, his tongue forcing its way even deeper as you struggled not to squeak.
"Nah," he smirked, blue eyes glittering with amusement as he chuckled. "I wanna join."
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✮⋆˙ mdni. porn with a sprinkle of plot. power imbalance. unprotected piv sex. breeding kink.
The only place maids were meant to have in a prince's bed chamber was cleaning it.
Certainly not warming the silk sheets or having your legs spread and dangling off the edge. Especially not with said prince's cock buried balls-deep in your cunt.
"Y-your Highness," you gasped, clawing at the sheets, too cautious to scratch at his bare shoulder blades the way you truly craved.
Something like that should be saved for someone on equal standing.
Not a servant who just happened to temporarily suit his tastes.
"Satoru, sweetheart," he corrected you, cocking his head to the side as he plunged himself deeper, the pleasure coaxing your body limp beneath him. Your feelings for him didn't help. Heart ready to burst and chest straining to hold in the heft of your crush on the pretty prince you lived to serve.
"S-Satoru," you anxiously echoed, thighs tensing and trembling as you felt the knots in your stomach tighten the closer you came to unravelling - and the more unsure you grew of what would happen once the prince was finished with you.
You wanted to tell him you had no access to any of the herbal teas that would prevent you from conceiving, but every time you opened your mouth to speak, he practically fucked all the air back out of you. Hips slamming into your skin in fast thrusts, twisting your words into broken gasps.
"You look far better out of that uniform," he hummed, one of his soft palms tracing up past your exposed stomach to squeeze one of your breasts, smirking as he dragged a thumb over it just to make the rest of you shudder. "Maybe I should order you a shorter one."
"That would be indecent," you murmured, face flushing as you glanced over to the torn remains of the one you'd been wearing before he pinned you down and pried it off. The uniforms you'd been receiving lately all seemed to be...shrinking, but what were you supposed to do?
His word was final.
"I rather like you indecent," he teased, leaning in to wrap his mouth around a nipple, sucking softly as you bit back a keening moan. Scrunching your eyes shut as you toes curled, barely holding back your own climax as his teeth grazed over the sensitive bud, already peaked and swollen from how much he'd played with them before he even began fucking you.
"Y-you're being mean," you whined, stuttering over your words while your back arched off the bed, his swollen tip grinding deep into you and goading him into chuckling at your weak complaint.
"What? Would you like to leave?" He offered, just to make you say no, shaking your head and pouting as his lips curled into a cruel smirk.
"No," you softly said, unable to clear the fuzz from your head when he was making you feel so goddamn good.
"Maybe I should keep you stuffed," he hummed as he shifted from one nipple to the next, hips shifting to make you feel the full weight of him inside of you. "Would a baby keep you here?"
Your cheeks burned with embarrassment, your mouth falling open as you stammered for something sensible, "It would be a bastard."
The kind of child the court would look down on. Sneer at.
Maybe even poisoned or harmed if your baby had the misfortune to be born a boy - killed to ensure he never had a chance to sit on the throne.
He was supposed to be with a princess, or a noble lady.
You couldn't even dream to be a concubine.
"Says who?" He laughed, a dangerous glint in his eyes as he started fucking you faster, more deliberately, dragging his cock in and out like he was daydreaming about what a baby with you might look like.
"Everyone," you reminded him, briefly considering retreating, but before you could properly think it through, his hands found your hips, lifting them up at the same moment he bottomed back in, and you promptly forgot what made it such a bad idea.
"Don't worry, angel," he grinned, brilliant blue eyes narrowing as he shifted a palm to press directly down on your stomach. "You'll have my heir."
what could go wrong when you try to cure a disease by changing your colleague's DNA? more than you might think. now it's up to you to deal with the, ah, side effects.
synopsis: so you spliced your former friend-with-benefits DNA with a few different dinosaurs, all samples courtesy of your high-paying job at the world's most innovative research lab. the good news? he's not sick anymore. the bad? there's more to worry about than just scales and teeth and a tail when a certain white-haired investor catches on to your after-hour activities with the new specimen you created - and wants a bite of you for himself
pairing: dino!Sukuna x scientist!Reader x investor!Gojo
content: mdni, angst, jurassic park au, reader is a scientist but there's not even a drop of scientific accuracy here ok, sukuna gets his DNA spliced with a dinosaur (let's not ask questions), similar to true-form sukuna (one dick and also scales and a tail), emotional hurt/comfort, slight horror elements, everyone is INSANE in this
"I have two dicks."
"This is still fixable," you tried to insist, holding your hands out helplessly as your stare refused to drift from the topic at hand. Both cocks were so hard you wondered if it hurt, the pretty pink tips swollen and leaking with pre-cum.
You blinked as they dripped onto the floor, swallowing hard as it hit you the scales by his hips had started to spread towards them.
Shit.
"Fixable?" Sukuna scoffed, and you nodded uselessly, not actually sure what the hell you were going to do from here other than make him more promises.
The horny voice you'd spent far too much time listening too lately was already crudely suggesting to give the second cock a try - for scientific purposes. To see if it could cum like the first one, if it functioned the same or if there were some fundamental differences not immediately apparent.
"What the fuck are you gonna do? Cut it off?" He hissed, demanding more answers than you currently had available.
"No," you shook your head defensively, folding your arms across your chest as you tried to wake yourself up more. "I just need more time to figure out-"
"How much time do I even have left?" He grunted, the bed creaking as he sat back down, glaring at the greedy appendages practically begging for your attention.
But he wasn't wrong.
You were running out of time.
To fix him. To fix this.
Suguru had made your lack of funding pretty fucking clear.
You probably only had one more shot before you'd be forced to either give up - or make a deal.
Sell a part of yourself to save him.
Sure, the transformations to Sukuna's body, to his DNA, might stop.
But you didn't know that.
And with this latest mutation, you were beginning to worry about the growing chance these changes might not be reversible.
Yeah, you wouldn't mind it if he permanently had two cocks to plow you into the mattress with, but you had told him you'd take care of him.
That you could handle this.
And what the hell had you accomplished?
No matter how much blood you'd drawn and tests you'd put him through, all your fixes had failed.
"Tell me," he demanded, grabbing your wrist in an attempt to make you look up at his face. "How much time do we have?"
You guessed you weren't as good at hiding your concern after all.
Even if he hadn't overheard last night's conversation, he clearly had already anticipated that this current pace, your current plan, none of it was sustainable.
"We should go to the lab," you murmured, ignoring his question as you shrugged his hand off of you and got out of the bed. Picking up last night's clothes and hurriedly putting them back on.
"You really think you're just suddenly going to find something to undo this?" He snarled, and you tried to tell yourself he was just upset.
Lashing out from the lack of control he had over himself, trying to take it back with you.
"I have to try," you hissed back.
You had been the one to do this to him. Even if he let you, he'd only done it because he believed in you.
How the hell were you supposed to betray that?
Even if he had the misfortune of being correct after you spent the entire day going over lab results again and again trying to figure out what you were missing.
Where you'd gone wrong.
Tempted to tear your hair out as you glanced up at where he was sitting rigid on a too-small chair just outside of your office, Shoko pulled up to a stool next to him as she plunged a needle into a vein.
Having four arms did make it much easier to get his blood.
"So what'd you do in your last life to deserve this?" she snickered, drawing one last vial from the crook of his elbow as Sukuna openly glared at her.
"Can't you do this?" He called out to you, noticing your stare as he clenched his jaw, irritated at your mutual coworker's mockery.
"I'm busy," you muttered, rubbing the corner of your eyes as you tried to refocus on the data in front of you.
"I'll let Yuji finish you up then," Shoko hummed, returning his disdain with a bored shrug.
Cleaning up her equipment without even looking back at him, strolling away and calling for one of your junior employees to take her place.
You had actually hired Yuji because of Sukuna, even though he barely acted like they were related in the lab, feigning ignorance whenever anyone brought up the fact they were family.
"You could've said something," Sukuna petulantly suggested, as if you weren't already asking a lot from your team just to add onto their workload to help with him.
"I'm doing my best here," you muttered, your own fuse cut short with the weight of his problems and yours on your shoulders.
You wanted to believe that if you kept doing your best, you would find the solution. That every problem had one.
"Hey, boss," Yuji chirped, peeking through the open door of your office and waving before going back to where Sukuna was sitting. A vein was already bulging across his forehead, mouth twitching down in irritation.
He tried to hold himself together, to bite back his annoyance, but when he picked up the glass of water you had left there an hour ago, all the ice melted as the condensation dripped down the side.
But the moment he lifted it off the table, it shattered.
Despite seeing it happen, you still jumped, startled at the sound.
"Shit."
Everything was falling apart.
Even the glassware.
Yuji scrambled to grab a broom, cleaning up the mess as you stared at a now half-soaked Sukuna, his dark eyes burning into you as his hand was left holding nothing in the air.
He hadn't noticed that he was even bleeding.
Shards sticking out of his skin, dripping down to his muscled thighs as all the muscles in his face tensed.
You could go over.
Help Yuji pick up the rest of the pieces and fawn over his now injured hand.
But you were at capacity.
Debating on what invasive procedure you'd have to beg him to let you do, or whether or not to give chemo a try to see if you'd treated it like a cancer, you might be able to cure him.
Worrying about what his last straw would be, the moment he decided this was too much and gave up on you.
And if that happened, where would both of you be?
"Sucks that this happened to you," Yuji frowned, leaning over your boyfriend's body to pluck out a piece of broken glass stuck in Sukuna's wrist just to earn an aggravated grunt.
"I'm aware," he sarcastically scoffed.
"Jin misses you," he muttered, and you felt a weird twinge of jealousy at their connection. At the domestic side of his life you never got to see. To be apart of.
"He's fine without me," Sukuna derisively said, once again directing his anger at the wrong person. His nephew and his brother wanted to be there for him.
You wanted to be there for him.
And he wanted nothing more than to not need any of you.
For things to go back to how they'd been before.
"At least you have her," Yuji tried to offer his best attempt at consolation, sheepishly smiling, his fingers trembling as he tried to dislodge a particularly jagged piece from Sukuna's calloused palm.
"We wouldn't even be together if it weren't for this," Sukuna retorted, sharp and snarky.
You knew he wasn't wrong.
Had thought the same thing a thousand times since then.
But it hurt a lot more hearing it from his lips.
You grimaced, getting up from your chair and walking over to the door, refusing to look at him as you shut it.
No need to hear anything else that would just hurt your feelings.
At least you would simply have invisible scars.
You'd left more than a few marks on him.
You buried your face in your hands, exhaling as you leaned forward to just rest your head on the desk, knowing what decision you were being dragged closer and closer to.
Getting your eggs harvested didn't sound particularly pleasant. Knowing that you'd have a child that was half you walking around, maybe even multiple if you agreed to Gojo's offer was not exactly a dream come true for you either.
But you owed Sukuna his life back.
Even if he decided he didn't want you in it once you gave it to him.
Besides, hadn't he been through far worse because of you?
Growing extra appendages? Claws and scales and a goddamn tail because you made the choice to use dinosaur DNA to cure him?
You hesitantly picked up the phone, bringing it up to your ear as you dialed a familiar number.
The director answered on the second ring.
"Need something down there?" Suguru slowly asked, almost as if he could sense what you were calling him for.
