hi baby

"i think what you need right now is time off of work. and i mean real, genuine time off. slow days filled with routine. no curse chasing or late office nights." your tone was light, but it was laced with the kind of finality common amongst doctors that made it clear: this was not up for debate.

"if those are my doctor's orders." he'd quietly teased, fingers tapping against his teacup.

"they are."

"then it's done." he'd paused, before adding on. "and maybe, it'll help me remember."

"maybe." you'd admitted, weary optimism on your lips.

he'd placed a warm hand on top of yours, trying to give you his most reassuring smile.

"i know it'll happen. not a matter of if, but when."

that had been a week ago.

and on weekdays like today, nanami spends most of the day counting the hours until you return home.

at this point, he has a mental list of things to get done in the house. fulfilling each task carries a slither of hope that his past will suddenly jolt back to life, a familiar routine unlocking his brain.

but mostly, it feels like an odd guessing game of who he was before, what his marriage was like before the accident.

he waters the flowers by the windowsill (peace lilies and marigolds). he doesn't know if these were planted a month or three months ago. or if they were your idea's to get or his.

he washes, dries, irons, and folds the laundry. sometimes, when he's re-arranging the closet, nanami discovers a new piece of clothing that bears semblance to something important. just holding it in his hands elicits a strong emotion, though he can't exactly place what he's feeling or why.

he fluffs up the cushions on the couch, vacuums the oak wooden floors, and scrubs down the marble kitchen counter till it shines. he passes by polaroids stuck to fridge magnets and printed photos bookmarking half-read books, snapshots of a life he cannot remember.

his hand on your thigh on a sunny beach. your frozen laugh and his scowl at someone's birthday party (he guesses), with frosting caking half his face. a fluffy white cat snoozing on his chest in a sneaky photo clearly taken by you, as nanami's left arm covers his eyes in a midday nap.

as if on cue, a gentle meow interrupts his thoughts. yuki pouncing onto the kitchen table, her light blue eyes burning holes into his head.

"hello yuki." nanami mutters, setting down his cleaning products for the first time in hours. it's only then he realizes that he hasn't sat down since 9am, and he gladly collapses onto the nearest armchair.

yuki is watching the whole ordeal from the kitchen counter, her tail swishing as if she's deep in thought, her piercing blue eyes never leaving his figure.

nanami suddenly remembers your comment from earlier this morning.

"it's weird. it's like she recognizes you, but knows that you're not the same."

yuki meows again, extending one paw towards him, a tell that previous nanami would have understood instantly but one which puzzles him in the present. instinctively, his hand raises to pet the top of her head, his thumb carefully stroking the fur on top.

her spine tenses at first, eyes flickering in hesitation, before she suddenly melts in to his touch. rubbing her face closer to his calloused palm, she eventually climbs up his back and onto his shoulder. head nudging the crook of his neck, fur tickling his bare skin.

he attempts to finish up the rest of his cleaning with her on his shoulders, but she meows in protest every time he tries to resume cleaning - her tail nearly slapping him in the face with dissatisfaction.

"what now, yuki?" he wonders aloud, amused. the cat simply stares at him, then at the door of the home office, before looking back at him. "you want me to go there?"

she meows again, as if understanding every word he's saying. thinking maybe she's managed to lock one of her toys in the room, he slightly pushes the door open. to his surprise, she instantly bolts through the gap to curl up against the bottom drawer of his desk, a space he hadn't really bothered to look at given his break from work.

"what is it, you silly cat?" he mumbles to himself, crouching down. curiosity getting the better of him, with yuki watching him quietly from the corner of the room, he pulls open the drawer to find a heavy stack of leather books.

his breath hitches at the discovery.

they aren't just any books.

they're photo books.

hundreds of pages of dated photos pasted messily next to faded handwriting (yours and his), sandwiched between crinkled receipts and ripped out pages of travel brochures.

tears gathering at the corner of his eyes, he turns the first page.

he needs a pen and paper, he thinks.

=================

you're so tired when you close the door behind you that you don't immediately call out for your husband, your first priority being to shrug off your coat (hanging it messily by the front door) and toss your work bag onto the couch (to be dealt with later).

you frown when you turn the corner and don't see him in the kitchen. he's usually standing there when you've returned from the hospital, adding the final few garnishes to whatever dish he'd decided on cooking, sculpted face pulled in deep concentration.

stumbling into the shared bedroom, where he sometimes like to draw a bath for you, knees folded over the floor as his hands dip into the tub to check the temperature - you also find it empty, though perfectly cleaned and organized as always.

"uh... hello?" you question aloud, returning to the living room.

"in here, darling."

his voice comes out muffled from the last place you expect him to be: the spare room converted to an office. when you carefully creak open the door, hesitant eyes trying to find his, you find that his usual work files and binders have now been thrown onto the floor.

instead, his desk has been transformed to a glorious mess of half-opened photobooks and hurriedly scribbled notes. he murmurs a quiet hello, eyebrows furrowing in a deep concentration, the type that you know you can't easily break him out of. his shirt is slightly unbuttoned, cuffs rolled up past his elbow, and his cup of tea is no longer hot when you touch it to move it out of the way.

"what... are you doing, nami?" your question comes out as more of a whisper, shock minimizing your voice.

you think he's going to ignore you for a moment, as his gaze is unwavering from the pages and his hand continues to furiously scribble onto the notebook, until he suddenly slows down.

"if i can't remember, i figured..." his voice is hoarse, voice hollow as he continues to avoid your gaze. "i should learn."

your heart breaks at his confession.

because it's so like him to try and recall his marriage the way someone would memorize an equation or re-organize a budget.

analytical. studious. data driven.

the petname escapes your lips without you even realizing.

"oh, honey..."

your trembling hand touches his shoulder, squeezing his collarbone in a comforting manner. he's watching you nervously as you sit down onto his lap, his pen now long forgotten on the edge of the desk when his hands move on their own accord to touch your skin. left hand drawing circles onto your knee, right hand sneaking up to link fingers with yours.

the two of you stay like that for a few moments, your head finding its resting position against his chest, the only sounds in the room being the ceiling fan whirring above and the steady breathing of your joint bodies.

you feel him take in a deep, shaky breath, and look up in time to see him finally looking down at you. gaze burning, voice low when he speaks.

"i'm sorry i still don't remember."

you notice his hands are shaking as well, as you try and calm him down with your own touch, fingers curling around his.

"i-i thought maybe if we gave it time. if i did the domestic routines. if i, fuck, looked through the photos-"

his voice is so heavy with guilt and self-hatred that you can't stand it.

"don't blame yourself, kento." you cut him off, shifting around in his grasp to cup his face with your hands. "you've done nothing wrong. and i'm so appreciative of you even trying."

"still..." he trails off, unconvinced. his head finds its way to rest on your shoulder, pale eyelids slowly blinking. "i wish it was enough."

and just what are you supposed to say to that?

what can you say to that?

your broken husband, still trapped in the past?

ignoring the thundering in your own heart, you just smile, squeezing his hands again.

"you never know what might happen, okay? you just have to take it one step at a time."

nanami lets the optimistic comment hang in the air, appreciative of the comfort but letting out a deep sigh of frustration. your weak smile is confirmation that you empathize with him, your smaller hand now drawing circles onto his palm.

"it's a Friday." you offer. "let's just... sleep late and do whatever we want over the weekend."

he laughs at that - the melody short, but sweet. his eyes crinkles at the corners and his whole body reverberates when he does.

"sounds perfect. then would you like to pick the movie for tonight?"

you raise your eyebrows.

"i picked last time."

"mmm, and I'm letting you pick again this time."

dinner is thai takeout - both of you too drained to cook and wash up. you fall asleep with your head on his lap and yuki curled into your chest, whilst nanami's lost in his thoughts till 3 in the morning.

thinking.

pondering.

worrying.

====================

when you wake up the next morning - miraculously in bed, tucked in, and in your comfortable sleepwear - someone is knocking at your door, waking you up. rubbing the sleep out of your eyes, eyes bleary and still half-closed, you stumble over to the doorway and open it to find nanami.

he's impeccably dressed, hair slightly cut and styled, holding a large bouquet of flowers in his hands.

it's as if someone has suddenly dumped fifty gallons of ice water onto you. and you feel wide awake, blinking at him wordlessly, your tired brain taking extra long to make sense of the situation.

"i've been.... thinking." he starts off, slow and deliberate. you're still staring at him, dumbfounded, only being able to nod along.

"yes?"

"if i can't remember our past... i want to at least create our future together. now."

you raise your eyebrows, unsure of where this is going.

"okay..."

"how does a romantic day out sound?" he asks, offering you the bouquet of flowers in his hands. you look down at them and see it's from the flower shop you've always wanted to visit down the street, purple hyacinths intertwined with yellow daffodils and red roses.

you accept the flowers with a slightly opened mouth, sleep-fogged brain needing a few moments to grasp the weight of his words, before you're jolted to reality.

"nanami kento, are you asking me to go on a date with you?"

he flushes red at that, coughing nervously.

"i suppose i am."

you would tease him more, enjoying the way his muscles tense and his handsome face contorts in worry, but there's something so precious about your own husband asking if he can take you out on a date. so you swallow your remarks and grin like an idiot.

"sure. i mean yes, i'd love that."

he refuses to tell you much about what he's planned for the day, your biggest hint being to wear comfortable walking shoes. you chastise him for staring at you for too long when you touch up your makeup in the mirror, him raising his two hands in mock surrender, and you swear your heart might explode from how much you adore this man when he ties up your shoelaces for you in the hallway.

"ready?"

"ready."

his first choice is a bakery uptown. pastries and coffee, latte foam on his upper lip that you smear away with with your thumb. (and you don't miss how deeply he flushes red when you lick your thumb afterwards, him mumbling something that you don't quite catch but still makes you giggle nonetheless).

he asks you if he can hold your hand before he's leading you to a nearby park, cherry blossoms floating down from the sky, covering the ground in pink confetti.

"hold on."

his left hand doesn't drop yours as his right slides up to take a lone pink petal out of your hair, tossing it to the side and continuing to walk with you as if nothing happened. a small group of elderly woman "aw" out loud from the side and you look away, embarrassed, but nanami just smiles wide in a way that says he has no regrets.

next is a 30 minute train ride to an aquarium, his tall muscular physique sticking out amongst the hordes of schoolchildren on their school trips and exasperated parents running after their toddlers. you're too busy marveling at the fish, the endless blue water, the colorful corals - to realize that nanami's looking more at you than the tanks.

"woah, do you see how big that eel is?" you squeal out, pressing yourself against the glass.

"mmhmm." is his response, affirmative but his mind elsewhere. he's too busy committing to memory how full of wonder and joy you look - fingers tracing the cold glass, giggling at the sting ray passing by the glass roof, face glowing with happiness. his stomach full of warmth, skin buzzing with love.

lunch is quick and convenient - a bento box and green tea from 7/11, nanami happily sacrificing his chopsticks for you to use when you realize you've forgotten to get a pair. (it just gives him an excuse to have you feed him mouthfuls in between bites).

when the sun begins to set, he steals you away to an italian restaurant hidden between a bank and a local library.

ever the gentleman, nanami takes off your coat and pulls out the chair for you when the waiter confirms his reservation. and when you try to put down your handbag on the floor, he stops you. saying it'll get dirty, before hanging in on the coat rack beside his seat.

to strangers looking in, it looks like a first date. nanami's asking all kinds of questions about yourself - what's your favorite movie, what do you like to do during your time off, do you have any siblings - and his hand occasionally brush against yours resting on the table. lingering, but soft, the type of touch only two people truly comfortable with each other could do.

when the pasta comes, he lets you take as many photos as you want before he starts eating, offering you as many bites of his dish as you want. he refills your glass of water before you even have to ask for it, and his eyes never dip below to stare at his phone while you talk.

"god, you're brilliant." he suddenly says mid-conversation, voice soft with sincerity. you were half way through describing how you two had first met - him wheeled in by stretcher to the ER, a panicked gojo yelling for help in every direction with you the only available ER doctor working on christmas day.

his sudden compliment makes you hot with embarrassment, causing you to nervously twirl your fork in your pasta in an effort to suppress your shyness.

"what's with the sudden compliment, nanami?"

he shrugs, as if it's the easiest thing in the world.

"how could I not compliment my stunning wife?" he seems almost proud to make you embarrassed, a faint smirk on his lips.

you narrow your eyes at him in accusation.

"... you know, you were nowhere near this flirty on our first date."

"really? what was i like on our first date?"

"a little tense. you hit your knee on the table while pulling out the chair for me and then you apologised three times for mispronouncing prosciutto when you were ordering."

the tips of his ears flush red and he's quick to change the subject.

he asks about your first impression of him (bloodied but handsome), who said i love you first (him), whose idea it was to adopt yuki (yours). anything and everything, your answers slowly filling out the missing spots in his brain, anything to piece together his past.

the hours flow by quickly, the sun now fully set over the horizon, your smile brightened by the golden glow of the candlelight.

this is heaven, nanami thinks.

and when he's walking back home with you hand in hand after the dinner, sharing an ice cream cone that is quickly devoured and leaves a sheer strawberry gloss on your lips, his body actually itches with the urge to kiss you.

he hasn't dared yet, since he's woken up. the most he's done is hug you, hold your hand, and wrap his body around you in bed when you sleep (his favorite).

but he's wanted to, of course. god, has he wanted to so badly at points. when you'd woke up shaking from a nightmare, when you'd squish yuki in your arms and quiet her protests with soft kisses on her fur, the urge to kiss you nearly deadly when he found out gojo used to have the biggest crush on you before you two were married.

but he's been over rationalising to himself - he's only "known" you for 2 weeks. even if his body has this constant pull towards you, like the moon pulling the tides back from the oceans each night, he's been telling himself to take it slow.

the last thing he wants to do is overwhelm you, what in between the never ending hospital shifts and this situation.

"what's bothering you?" you ask, pausing mid-step, breaking him out of his thoughts.

"hm?"

your eyes survey his stoic expression, but something tells him you can read the truth beneath his micro-expressions and calm facade.

"your face is scrunching up in your 'i'm debating something seriously' face. is something wrong?" you joke, pushing his shoulder lightly.

nanami pauses, considering his options for responding.

fuck it, he thinks.

"yes, something is wrong."

your eyes widen, being genuinely taken back by his answer. but he doesn't leave you too long to guess.

"i want to kiss my date silly even though it's only my first date with her." he admits, hands dropping down to above your waist. still respectful, but daringly more intimate than any time before.

you smile so wide your face actually hurts.

"well, good thing you're already married to her." you retort, stepping closer.

he returns your smile - with that boyish, handsome smile that lifts the corner of his mouth and raises his dimples.

"you're damn right."

then in a flash, before you can even blink, his lips are on yours. the taste: a mix of strawberry and chocolate ice cream. his hands come up to cradle your face, and he's so gentle with how he moves your jaw, his fingertips brushing your skin so tenderly as if he's trying to kiss away every worry and sorrow you've felt for the past two weeks.

it's long-awaited.

it's desperate.

but above all, it's loving.

he's cradling you as if you're the most precious artifact in the world. and the way he's looking at you when he pulls away momentarily (dazed, bewitched, hungry), before kissing you again, makes you dizzy.

it feels like ten minutes have passed, when he finally pulls away, ending the kiss with swollen lips. his mouth remains hovering only a few inches away from yours, and your mind still feels hazy from the fireworks.

"i... i still wish i could remember." he chuckles, voice breaking. but this time, there's a certain lightness to his tone. "god, do i wish i'd remember what it was like for the past two years as your husband, instead of hearing about it or seeing pictures of it. but-"

he presses a kiss to your lips again, this time firmer and stronger, teeth grazing your bottom lip. you swear his eyes are golden now: bright, energetic, swirls of yellow reflecting from the streetlamps up ahead.

"but falling in love with you again... isn't so bad."

and you can't help but agree - pulling him down by his necktie for another kiss.

a/n: soooo i have a couple of announcements to make at the bottom of this fic.

(1) i will be posting a part 3 at some point which will be an alternate ending to part 1 (I won't say more than that bc I don't wanna spoil the surprise!!!). (2) there were so many ways i thought of taking this chapter and it took way longer than i anticipated to write/edit because I didn't want to post something I wasn't proud of. so thank you all for your patience and i hope this was servicable uwu. (3) finally, thank you for all your love on this (now) amnesiac husband nanami series! i cannot describe how overwhelmed with joy I've been for all the love it's received and for all the funny/heartfelt comments, reblogs and asks people have sent me. i hope to see you all for part 3 soon x

“I'm literally two meters of muscle, angel. I don't 'fit' in there,” he grumbles, but you've already hooked your fingers around his wrist and started pulling.

Sukuna lets out a long, resigned, and put-upon sigh to show you he’s doing you the biggest favor in the history of the world, but he follows, easily keeping up with your excited steps, even if he complains the entire time. “It’s dumb. We’re both going to look stupid, and I’m too big for that thing anyway.”

Standing in front of the booth, he looks like he's regretting every life choice that led him here, rubbing the back of his neck with his free hand. He has to duck just to get his head past the top of the frame. Once inside, the space feels impossibly cramped, even more so than it seemed from the outside.

His broad shoulders take up nearly the entire width of it, forcing you to tuck yourself firmly against his side just to make room for his legs.

"Move over, Sukuna. You're hogging the whole seat."

“I’m not hogging it. I’m on it,” he grunts, his knees nearly bumping the opposite wall as he awkwardly tries to maneuver his massive self. He looks less like a man getting his photos taken and more like a bear that accidentally got stuck in a dog crate. “There’s not enough room, woman. This thing was built for children.”

You burst out laughing at the sight of him being so clearly defeated by a piece of 90s mall furniture. “You look completely ridiculous. Here, stop fighting it.”

Without waiting for him to argue, you step over his leg into the narrow gap between his knees and sit down on his right thigh. Sukuna lets out another low grumble, and his big hand immediately comes up to steady your waist.

“Well,” he mutters as he adjusts. “I guess that’s one way to solve the floor plan issue.”

You pop the coins in, and the machine’s timer begins to count down for the first photo.

Flash. Sukuna’s still wearing the same deeply unimpressed look he brought into the booth, jaw tight, brows slightly furrowed, the full weight of being dragged into something he would rather not do visible in every part of his face. You, on the other hand, are bright-eyed, caught in a blur of laughter, your face turned toward him instead of the camera, delighted by his misery.

“That’s perfect,” you beam.

“It’s awful,” he mutters, silently begging the machine to wrap it up so he can escape this cramped little prison with whatever scraps of dignity he has left.

You can’t resist teasing him just a little, so you reach up and poke his cheek, giggling softly as you whisper, “Come on, at least pretend you’re having fun, you big grump.”

The machine beeps the second countdown, and his arm hooks securely around your waist, pulling you flush against his chest so you don’t slip. 

Flash. This time, he's got a look of reluctant acceptance, as he's finally resigned himself to the fact that escape is impossible and that the only way out is through. His chin rests near your temple, the scowl is a little less intense, and he looks like he’s trying really hard to remember he’s supposed to be annoyed.

“Okay, no—wait,” you say, trying to physically force a smile onto his face by lightly pushing the corners of his mouth up.

He catches your wrists instantly, pinning your hands away from his face.

“I'm not smiling for this.”

“Yes, you are.”

“I’m not.”

You poke his cheek again, a little harder this time. “You look like someone stole your last protein shake. Come on, just one little smile for me, Kuna.”

He huffs through his nose, low and exasperated, keeping his jaw stubbornly locked.

For the third countdown, you lean in to murmur softly into his ear, “You know I still have a video of you trying to pet that stray cat and getting rejected. Imagine Satoru seeing that.”

Sukuna’s eyes widen, and the corner of his mouth twitches violently at the memory as he fights the laugh that wants to break free.

“You’re lying.”

“I’m not. You called it ‘baby,’ remember?”

He clenches his jaw, stares straight ahead with fierce determination, struggling visibly as his shoulders tense and his nostrils flare slightly, but he refuses to give you the satisfaction of seeing him break.

Flash. The photo captures his full internal battle.

You giggle against his ear, poking his cheek one last time for good measure. “See? You’re fighting it so hard. It’s adorable.” You turn back to the screen with a wide grin, basking in your small victory.

With only four seconds left on the timer, Sukuna suddenly moves. His hand shoots from your waist to the back of your head, tangling in your hair and pulling your face to his. His thumb grazes your jawline, turning you fully toward him, and then he meets you halfway, drawing you into a deep, slow kiss.

Flash. It goes off right in the middle of it, capturing the moment perfectly, but Sukuna doesn’t stop. He just keeps kissing you, even as the machine starts spitting out the first photo strip. His hand stays tangled in your hair, his other arm locked around your waist like he has no intention of letting you go anytime soon.

The photos slide out of the slot, but neither of you reaches for them.

When Sukuna finally pulls back, you’re both a little breathless. He rests his forehead against yours, looking at you with dark and satisfied eyes.

His voice is low, rough, and full of that familiar blend of exasperation and affection as he murmurs against your lips, “You’re impossible.”

You smile, still a little dazed, fingers curled into the front of his shirt. “And you love it.”

He lets out a quiet chuckle, presses one last soft kiss to your mouth, then keeps one arm around your waist as you step out of the cramped booth and back into the bright lights of the mall.

You grab both strips of photos, the paper still slightly warm, and look at the progression from grumpy husband to reluctant participant to barely contained laughter to the sudden, fierce kiss that ends it all. You giggle and make a big show of tucking them into your purse, giving him a mischievous side-eye.

"Well, since you were so miserable and forced to be in there," you tease, starting to walk away, "I guess you won't want these. They’re both mine. Proof of your suffering."

Without saying a word, his long fingers dip right into your bag, snatching one of the strips before you can even react.

"Nice try, brat.”

He carefully folds the paper, making sure the crease falls between the photos, then flips open his leather wallet and slides the strip behind his driver’s license, smoothing it with his thumb.

"I did the time," he says after, catching your hand in his and lacing your fingers together as you head for the exit. "I’m keeping the prize."

Well, the half of you that he could see in his vision. You were tucked behind your friend, who had enough to say for the both of you. She was halfway through introducing the college newspaper before he noticed you at all. The setting sun pooled golden along your throat and cheekbones, your hair lifting softly in the wind, and your expression, through all of it, utterly relaxed. 

"So would that be okay?" Yumi finishes, he had caught her name somewhere in the middle of her spiel, but the rest of it flew over him.

"Uh," Satoru hums, a real testament to his sharp mind. Suguru answers for him; at least one of them had been listening. Suguru walks Yumi back through everything she had just said, the newspaper, the semester, the plan to cover the sports section, like he had been listening to every word. 

Well, because he had been. Suguru had been listening while Satoru was just standing there with the sun in his eyes and you in his line of sight, watching the way you hadn't looked at him yet, the way he already found himself wanting to know what your voice sounded like, what you thought about, what you were like when you weren't standing on the sideline of a soccer field looking like you had somewhere better to be.

"Great! See you tomorrow," Yumi says, already turning on her heel. You nod after her, a small polite gesture, your eyes cast somewhere just past Satoru's shoulder, and then you turn and follow her across the track, leaves skittering around your sneakers as you walk away.

Satoru’s eyes follow you, and he only snaps out of it when Suguru reaches over and smacks the back of his head. 

“You done?”

Satoru gapes at him. “What?”

Suguru just looks toward where you disappeared, then back at him.

Satoru immediately looks away. “Shut up.”

“Do you like soccer?” It slips out of Satoru’s mouth before he can stop himself. It was either that or saying something objectively worse, like admitting the fact that he’s thought about you an unreasonable amount since yesterday’s practice.

Suguru told him your name yesterday, and you introduced yourselves properly today, which means there is absolutely no reason for him to be embarrassing himself like this already.

“No, not really,” you confess with a shy laugh. “The sports section wasn’t exactly my first choice-” Your eyes widen slightly. “Not that there’s anything wrong with soccer. Or sports. God, that sounded bad.”

Satoru laughs, not because you’re funny (although you are, a little) but because you’ve known him for roughly 10 minutes and already managed to reject something he likes, unlike most people who hear he plays soccer and start pretending they’ve always been deeply invested in its history.

Satoru has never put much belief into that whole opposites attract thing, mostly because it sounds like something people say after making objectively questionable decisions, but he looks at you for a second longer than necessary and thinks maybe there are more flawed theories in the world.

Satoru’s known you for almost a month, mostly through awkward encounters at practice and increasingly less awkward walks afterward. Somewhere between post-practice interviews and waiting for his teammates, who insist warm-down stretches take thirty years, he learns you’re pre-med. 

He also learns that you’d originally wanted to cover research studies in the biology department for the paper instead of sports. Unfortunately, most of those positions had already been filled by upperclassmen before applications even reached sophomores.

Satoru nods sympathetically and says something supportive like a normal person when you tell him. Secretly, though, he’s glad, which immediately makes him feel like a terrible person. 

He wants you to get the opportunities you actually wanted, but selfishly, he likes that sports means you end up here instead, sitting on cold bleachers with your laptop open and asking him questions after practice and pretending not to laugh when he starts giving useless answers just to keep the conversation going.

On the first practice of the week, you’re nowhere to be found. Satoru notices on his first sweep of the bleachers, the sidelines, and the small cluster of students hovering near the track. Yumi is there, which means you should be too, tucked somewhere close to her with your laptop balanced on your knees. But today the space beside her is empty.

He tells himself it’s nothing. People miss things; it’s normal. He repeats this to himself twice during drills and once more during the cooldown. But after practice, he finds Yumi anyway, hands shoved deep in his pockets like that makes any of this casual.

"Hey," he says, "Where's your friend?"

Yumi's pen stops moving. "She's sick."

"Sick?"

She turns to face him fully then, "Relax, she’s not dying. It's a cold, not medieval tuberculosis."

Satoru laughs in return, because it was funny, but underneath it, the same low hum of worry was sitting unmoved right in the middle of his chest. "...Do you think I could get her number?"

Yumi stares at him. "I just told you," she says slowly, as if he's a little bit foolish, "she's sick."

"I know."

"So why do you need her number?"

He opens his mouth, then closes it. His hands are still in his pockets, which is the only place they could be right now, because they have gone slightly damp, and he absolutely has no interest in Yumi knowing that.

Yumi watches him for another second, letting him sit in it, and then the corner of her mouth pulls up. "I'm kidding," she says, already flipping to a new page in her notepad. She scribbles your number down, tears it off, and holds it out to him. 

Satoru sits in his car for an embarrassing amount of time, staring at your name at the top of a blank text message. He types something. Deletes it. Types something else, reads it back, winces, deletes that too.

Satoru: Hey, it’s Satoru Gojo. Heard you’re sick, hope you feel better.

He deletes it. Too formal, sounds like a get-well card from a coworker.

Satoru: Hey! It’s Satoru from the soccer team. Yumi gave me your number.

He deletes that too. He should’ve scrapped it after the exclamation point.

Satoru: Hey.

He stares at that for a long moment, then deletes it. He throws his phone face down on the passenger seat and runs a hand through his hair, tipping his head back against the headrest. He has played in front of hundreds of people, taken penalty kicks with the score tied, and not once felt his hands shake, so he doesn’t know why drafting a single text message to you is doing this to him.

He picks his phone back up.

Satoru: Hi, it’s Satoru. Yumi mentioned you were sick, feel better soon.

He reads it four times. It’s fine. It is completely fine and normal. He sends it before he can talk himself out of it and turns his phone face down on the passenger seat, wishing that he could do the same with whatever is sitting in his chest every time he thinks about you.

He hears his phone ding and something in his chest flinches, which is insane, which is genuinely embarrassing. But he still reaches for his phone off the passenger seat so fast he nearly fumbles it between his fingers.

You: hiii satoru!! yeah im okay, just a cold! thanks for checking in tho

He reads it once and types back:

Satoru: And here I thought you had perfect attendance

He stares at it and immediately regrets sending it. But 2 minutes later, your typing bubble appears.

You: i have a 102 degree fever. so sorry i couldn't make it out to stand in the cold and watch you run in circles like a hamster on a wheel >:( have some compassion

He grins at his phone like an idiot.

The next time you come to practice, there is a bottled tea drink sitting in your spot on the bleachers, impossible to miss. Beside it, a post-it note pressed flat against the cold metal.

Glad you're feeling better.

Beneath the words, occupying considerably more space, is a small doodle of a hamster. You look up. Satoru is already on the field, in the middle of warming up, looking right at you. 

Suguru falls into step beside him during a water break, glancing once in your direction and then back at Satoru. "So when are you going to tell her?"

Satoru, mid sip, chokes. Water goes everywhere, a significant amount of it landing directly on Suguru, who recoils and shoves him hard in the shoulder.

"Tell her what?" Satoru asks.

Suguru wipes his sleeve, unimpressed. "That you like her."

Satoru wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. He seems to be processing this like it’s new information. "I don't… " he starts, and then stops, and then says nothing.

You had only made it out to a handful of games during the season; you and Yumi split the roster between you, trading off week by week. But it’s the last game of the season, and you are both there, and Satoru sees you from across the field during warm-up and has to actively remember how to breathe.

You are wearing his jersey. His number, his name across your back, which you have because 2 weeks ago in the library, you had knocked your drink across the table and onto yourself, and the only thing Satoru had in his bag was a spare jersey. You had given it back the next day, freshly washed, but he had told you to keep it and then walked away before his face could do anything embarrassing.

Your hair is tied up with ribbons in the team’s colors, and there is face paint on your cheeks. You are standing next to Yumi, who is scribbling something in her notepad.

Suguru appears at his shoulder. "Breathe."

Satoru shoves him lightly for being insufferable and then, annoyingly, takes his first breath after seeing you. 

A week after the last game's victory, the final sports issue finally gets printed. You and Yumi had spent stupid amounts of time on it, more than necessary, probably. You had argued over layouts, stayed late editing quotes, and gone back and forth over photos until both of you were cross-eyed under the fluorescent lights of the newspaper office.

You almost don't give it to him, but you'd written this one with him in the back of your mind the whole time. And it was the thing you'd spent the better part of two weeks on, the piece your editor sent back twice with notes that made you want to close your laptop and walk into the ocean. 

There was no practice to go to anymore, no bleachers to sit on, no easy excuse to find yourself in the same place at the same time. You hadn't quite realized how much of your access to him had been built into the structure of the semester until the season ended and took all of it with it.

But you ran into him on a Thursday morning. He was coming out of the building you were going into, his bag over one shoulder, looking like he'd had roughly just enough sleep.

"Hey," he says

"Hey," you hum back, and then, before you could think about it long enough to talk yourself out of it, you pull the folded copy from your bag and hold it out to him. “The final issue."

He takes it and finds your name before he finds anything else, which he does every time. He stands there in the cold of the path like he has nowhere else to be, like the words you wrote were worth taking the time over, and you let yourself look at him the way you don't usually let yourself look at him.

October had been all fire and gold, the air still holding the last warmth of summer in the afternoons. But November had come in quietly and taken all of that away, leaving something crisper and cleaner behind, the trees stripped back now, the sky a pale gray that sat low over the campus. 

Satoru’s white hair catches the morning light the way it always does, but there is something about the gray November sky behind him that makes it look softer. A few strands have fallen across his forehead, and the cold, with its real teeth to it this week, has put the faintest color along his cheekbones.

He turns another page, and something in his expression shifts. You look away before he can catch you watching.

"You wrote about the last game like you actually cared about it," he says, which was not what you expected him to say.

"I did care about it," you say, carefully.

"You told me a month ago that you didn't even know the offside rule."

"I looked it up," you confess, and something paints his face at that, something warm and slow, and you feel your heart do the thing it has been doing around him for months. 

He closes the issue and looks at you. "It's good," he says, which you can tell is not what he actually wanted to say, which is its own thing to think about.

"Thank you," you say.

The wind moves through the bare trees lining the path, and he shifts the issue to one hand, and you watch him not quite look at you, which is unusual because Satoru Gojo has never once had trouble looking at anything directly in his life.

"I kept thinking about what you'd write," he says finally, still not quite looking at you. 

You don't say anything.

"And then I kept thinking about that and then about other things and then," He stops, then starts again. "You take up all my mind when you're not with me. And half of it when you are."

Something blooms in your chest, your heart doing something without your approval, your hands not entirely steady either.

"That's a lot," you say finally, which is not really a response, which you are aware of. So you reach out and close your fingers around his wrist, then lean forward and rest the top of your head against his chest.

"I know," he smiles.

You pull back to look at him and think about September, the soccer field, the afternoon you didn’t dare to look at him yet. You think about cold bleachers and post-practice walks and every conversation that started about one thing and ended somewhere neither of you had planned. You think about his jersey still hanging in your closet. 

"I chose the photo of you from the third game," you say. "There were better ones technically."

"You're not looking at the camera. You're looking at something off to the side, and you're..." you stop for a second. "It's the best one because of your smile. I've never seen you smile like that in any of the other photos."

"I know that photo," he says, quietly.

"It ran on the front page."

"I know." He hums, "I was looking at you."

He closes the distance slowly. His hand comes up to your jaw, cold from the November air. He’s so close that you can see the gray sky caught in his eyes, and then he kisses you, his thumb moving once against your cheek. When he pulls back, he doesn't go far; his hand is still at your jaw, and you feel the cold on your face and the warmth of his hand and your own heartbeat, shaky and loud, and entirely his fault.