sugar ! ♬⋆.˚

it meant satoru noticing when you weren't there— going to lunch with nanami and shoko, and him immediately asking where you were.

it meant satoru calling you to ask why you weren't there before begging you to come over.

being apart just made the group feel incomplete. it didn't feel right to have one of you without the other.

it meant telling him the little things about yourself— telling him your beliefs and opinions on literally anything only to be met with a soft: “i know.”

the murmur always rendered you speechless for a full thirty seconds before you could reel back in your train of thought and switch the topic, ignoring the pang of something against your chest.

it meant satoru silently grabbing your hand and gently fidgeting with your fingers whenever his hands felt empty. during meetings, during group hangouts, during movies— whenever he could get away with it, he would.

it meant glancing at each other, yet never at the same time.

catching a glimpse of his face and looking away before you could get caught only for satoru to look your way the second your gaze was rested elsewhere.

it meant being the first person he'd ever cried in front of— seeing the tears fall down his cheeks in rivulets while he forced a laugh as if he wasn't falling apart right in front of you.

it meant crying together; feeling the weight of everything on your shoulders come tumbling down once in the comfort of each other's privacy.

giggling and cracking jokes like two idiots through the tears; unable to take yourselves seriously— his murmured: “well, that was awkward” after you'd both finished sobbing.

it meant him getting back his hoodie after you borrowed it and finding all the junk you'd built up in the pockets.

gum wrappers, store receipts, sticky notes of scribbled reminders, and loose change; it was so mundane, yet it had his heart skipping beats for reasons he couldn't quite identify.

sometimes, he'd leave junk of his own in the pockets and picture you getting that same feeling in your chest when you inevitably borrow the hoodie again.

it meant that funny feeling of forgiveness after a big fight; talking it out and seeing each other's sides after blowing up on one another. that bittersweet feeling of getting to have your best friend back after feeling like you might've lost him.

it meant everyone by default associates the two of you with each other. there's no satoru without you and there's no you without satoru.

it meant not needing to talk everyday to know you were still each other's everything.

realistically, if you wanted to, you could talk daily, but you loved the feeling of being able to take time and space to yourself and still knowing you're his and he's yours.

to you, being the one satoru gojo is in love with meant everything. you'd do virtually anything to fill in that roll.

unfortunately, by the time you entered his life, the spot had already been taken.

suguru geto. oh, how you despised him.

you didn't hate him because he had what you wanted— well, at least not just for that. you hated him because he would never commit to satoru. you saw how badly satoru wanted him and suguru to be official. you saw how suguru would pull away when he got too close.

you were angry because you knew if it were you with satoru, you would've made things official far sooner. you could treat him right, you know it.

best friend! satoru who insists that you share a bed when you have sleepovers.

the first few times, you were weirded out.

“satoru, no. you're a boy and i'm a girl, that'd be weird!” you stick your tongue out to emphasize how gross you find the idea of sleeping with him to be, even if it's not in that kind of way.

“don't you think it's a little sexist to assume that just because i'm a man that me sleeping in the same bed as you would be for alternative motives?” he grins, fully aware that that line alone would be enough to get his way.

because really, is he wrong?

your exhaustion mixed with his not-so-horrible point is what makes you give in.

“fine,” you spit out.

“but kick me and i'm making you sleep on the couch.”

satoru grumbles something about “this is my house anyways...” as he lays down beside you, but doesn't push the issue further.

the next morning, satoru wakes up to you in his arms. for a second, he actually enjoys your warmth, until he realizes what he's thinking. he pushes you off of him hard enough to wake you up with a confused: “huuuh..?”.

he hides in the bathroom for half an hour.

“i don't like her like that. she's just a friend. i'm probably only thinking like that because i'm tired and i didn't realize it was her! right, nothing to do with liking her.”

best friend! satoru who stares a little too often for it to be considered completely platonic, but you don't seem to notice the underlying meaning behind it.

you don't know how many times you've been sitting peacefully, minding your own business, when suddenly you feel this enormous weight on you, like someone is crushing you into the pavement and making you kiss the core of the earth with how hard they're staring.

you look up, and to no one's surprise, satoru is gawking at you like you're some ancient species, like he's seeing a dinosaur in real life.

he looks away as quick as you catch him and you can't help but chuckle when you realize he thinks he's being slick.

at some point, you stop looking up when you feel his eyes on you, and you just let him peer at you. he knows you're doing it on purpose, and for some “unknown” reason, that makes his heart skip a beat and his head feel dizzy like he just took fifteen edibles.

best friend! satoru who is always flicking you.

at first, you didn't mind. in fact, you found it a little endearing, but it became so annoying so fast.

you would just be having a conversation with nanami, talking about annoying mission reports and what bread is the most ideal kind to have during fall when he sneaks up behind you and flicks the back of your head.

you know he's doing it just to get on your nerves and capture your attention, and that's what makes it so aggravating.

and the fuck of it all? he only does it when you're focused or busy.

cooking dinner for the both of you because he insisted that he burns water? flicked. doing his laundry because satoru is a manchild who can't take care of himself? flicked. flipping through the pages of a book that you and shoko are both reading so you two can discuss it's contents when you get together for brunch on weekends? flicked.

there's no escape.

best friend! satoru who sits in the bathroom while you shower at his place.

surprisingly, it's not weird. in fact, it's never felt weird. it's one of the most natural and routine parts of your guys' life together.

you hop in the shower and get yourself all cleaned up while he sits on the bathroom floor beside the door and rambles to you about the pokémon that he's convinced he could beat if they were real and he didn't have his infinity.

though you'd never admit it, it's one of your favorite parts of the day, and you miss it when you're showering all by yourself in your lonely, eerily quiet apartment.

sometimes, you'll go to his house just so you can shower and talk to him.

despite his regular playful attitude, satoru never picks on you for needing him. he knows that if he does, you might get embarrassed and stop letting him stay in the room while you shower, and he doesn't want to ruin what you two have going.

not because he likes it, though! just because you seem to like it. yeah, this is just for you. has nothing to do with his feelings.

best friend! satoru who buys you anything and everything even if it's not your birthday or a special holiday. more often than not, you'll show up to his house and he'll have a medium sized box full of all the random shit he bought you throughout the few days of you not coming over.

and it's never expensive clothes or pricey jewelry like most people would expect from satoru, no. he buys you everything from soft, stuffed plushies of characters you like to a box of screws that in all reality, would mean absolutely nothing to you if anyone besides satoru had gotten it for you. he'll buy you anything if he thinks it's worthy of being bought.

“i saw this pack of batteries and the shape of the box reminded me of the hem of the shirt you wore last week so i bought it for you.”

“satoru, what the fuck is wrong with you.”

best friend! satoru who, in his own weird, slightly questionable way, loves putting on and tying your shoes for you.

literally, he's made you take off and untie your shoes just so he could have an excuse to put them back on you.

you've tried to question it a few times but he always changes the topic before you can get a straight answer.

you're convinced he has a foot fetish.

best friend! satoru who is always bugging you about the guys you like yet never seems to want to talk about the girls he's into.

“it's different. me having feelings for someone and you having crushes are totally different concepts.” he'd say with a mocking chuckle.

you foolishly assumed that he was acting like that because he's gay and not yet ready to come out. when you tell shoko, she groans muttering something about “god, you're so oblivious, it makes flies look smart”, but you just roll your eyes and hit her with a: “what? he could be.”

best friend! satoru who wakes up at almost 4:30 am one of the nights you sleep over.

he doesn't say anything. doesn't get out of bed or wake you. hardly even moves. he just stares at you.

you must've felt his piercing gaze even through your slumber because after a few minutes of him staring, you stir awake.

you groan softly as your eyes flutter open and see satoru laying across from you, just staring at you like you hand crafted his heart and gently sewed it into his chest.

(you pretend it doesn't make you want to kiss him stupid)

“what?” you mumble groggily, still half asleep.

he opens his mouth to say something but stops himself.

“what?” you repeat, now slightly concerned by his less-than-usual behavior.

he pauses for a second, his breath catching in his throat.

you must have no clue how angelic you look right now, huh? he knows that if he said anything about how pretty you are, you'd probably roll your eyes and start listing off all your ‘ugly’ features, so he doesn't say anything. but that doesn't mean he doesn't look at you like you're some sort of alien goddess who's come down to earth to show him the secrets of the universe.

“you're my best friend.” he mutters under his breath.

his voice is oddly soft. it makes you feel things you shouldn't be feeling about your best friend, but you push it down.

“i know.” you murmur quietly, almost silently.

he doesn't say anything else after that, simply pulls you into his arms and falls back asleep. but you don't. because now you feel strangely allured and captivated by the hushed whispers shared between you and satoru in the last five minutes. it felt weirdly intimate— and the worst part? you kind of like that.

best friend! satoru who starts acting strange around you after that night.

it's hard to explain how so, but you definitely notice it.

the way he starts holding your hand more often, his palm sweating a little against yours even when it's cold out— something that rarely happened before. the way he stares at you, which he did do frequently before, sure, but it's different this time. there's always this spark of something deeper swirling around in the depths of his irises.

whenever you're talking or are even just in the same vicinity of each other, he'll say something that makes your heart clench in your throat and make you feel like your ribs just shrunk down seven sizes in your chest.

something along the lines of: “i love you, by the way.” or “you look so pretty.”

and it's never in the teasing way he used to speak to you. it's abnormally genuine, like he's legitimately in love with you and thinks you're the most bewitching human being to ever exist, like his love for you is magnetic and your beauty is hypnotic.

but he doesn't mean it like that. of course he doesn't. you guys are just friends. that's how it's always been, right?

right?

best friend! satoru who calls you at three in the morning on a random wednesday when he was fully aware you both have work in the morning.

you had just fallen asleep an hour ago since your sleep schedule had been kicking your ass lately, when you're suddenly awakened by the maddening ringing of your cell-phone from your bedside table.

at first, you're annoyed. until you see the caller id. it's satoru, and that makes your stomach squeeze together into tight knots.

you answer the phone and open your mouth to say something, but the second he realizes you've picked up the call, he immediately stops you from saying anything by dropping a bombshell on you.

“i'm in love with you.”

the silence makes a library or a church sound loud and you feel your lungs shrivel up into small, compact balls while your heart gains an extra fifty pounds and falls through your body like a bowling ball through thin sheets of parchment paper.

you try to speak, really, you do, but nothing will come out.

did he really just say that? this has to be some kind of prank. there's no way that satoru gojo— your best friend— is in love with you. and there's especially and definitely no way he just confessed over the fucking phone.

the only thing you can manage to croak out once you finally catch your voice again is a shaky: “excuse me?”

satoru responds by hanging up the phone. that pisses you off further. there's no way he has the balls to wake you up an hour after you pass out, claim to be in love with you via a two minute phone call then hang up before he can explain himself or you can ask questions!

best friend! satoru who shows up at your house barley three minutes later.

he knocks aggressively at your front door to the point that you almost think it's some cursed spirit showing up at your shitty, low-rent, rundown apartment to avenge it's dead brother.

you're honestly a little surprised to see satoru standing in front of you when you swing the door open.

you open your mouth to say something, but much like your earlier phone call, he cuts you off before you get the chance to get anything out

except this time, it isn't with a heavy verbal confession, this time, it's with his lips pressing against yours in such a way that makes you feel like you're having your first kiss all over again. (which was also with satoru, but we don't speak of that.)

you're stunned, immobile as he moves his lips against yours. you don't kiss him back but you don't pull away either.

after a few seconds, satoru parts from your mouth just enough to see your face, your noses still brushing against each other and you can feel his warm breath grazing across your lips.

best friend! satoru who is finally ready to admit he's in love with you— that he's been in love with you, even if it means destroying years worth of friendship.

“just my mind. i've been having a lot of dark thoughts and they're fucking with my head. i'm sorry.” you mumble softly in response.

on any other day, you would've avoided the question. you would've brushed it off and said you were fine. but this week, your paranoia had been acting up so much that you physically couldn't sleep. so at this point, you don't care about hiding it. you just want this feeling to go away.

satoru's regularly piercing gaze subsides at your admission.

“when was the last time you slept?” he asks, though it comes out sounding more like a gentle demand rather than a curious question.

“i... i'm not sure.” your brows furrow together as you try to recall the last time you actually got a good night's sleep, but to no avail.

your voice sounds so much more delicate that it usually does. your vulnerability seeps through your tone— not that you were trying to hide it. not anymore, at least.

satoru doesn't need to hear anything else. he laces his fingers between yours and drags your stiff, near shattered form off to the bedroom.

he sits you on the foot of your shared bed and places a chaste kiss to your forehead.

“i'm gonna go get you your meds and some water and something real to eat, alright? stay here.”

he gives you one final look of sympathy and crystal-clear concern for your mental well-being before forcing himself to brush it off for the sake of getting himself to slowly walk out of the room to fulfill his duties.

in his absence, your thoughts start acting up. you feel a thousand invisible pairs of eyes on you and your own organs of vision widen.

you feel yourself start to sweat. it's a gross feeling, truly. you can smell your own fear radiating off your body like a dead rat in dirty sewage water but somehow, you can't bring yourself to care. not with all these uninvited terrors swarming in your mind.

it gets so bad that you don't even hear satoru re-entering the room.

he sees you starting to spiral and immediately jumps into action.

he sets your meds, water and food on the dresser that's pressed up against the wall across the room from your bed before strutting over to you.

he grabs your face carefully in an attempt to anchor you away from whatever is plaguing your mind this time. he's trying to bring you back down to earth where you belong.

your blurry vision tries desperately to focus onto satoru— it needs to. you can't deal with this alone. you need to know someone else living and breathing is here with you.

“baby, look at me. no, not at the bed, not at the window, at me. over here. there you go. focus on me.”

he talks you down until your mentally agony is just static buzzing annoyingly loud in the back of your mind. you try not to focus on it. it certainly doesn't deserve the attention after all the time you've spent with it being your top priority. (even if that was only because you were trying to rid of it.)

he walks over to the dresser and grabs your meds and the glass of water.

“here. take these.” and you do.

the relief isn't immediate. hell, you don't even feel it trying to cultivate in your stomach, but the idea that there's something in your system that'll take away these petrifying sensations attacking the space right behind your eyes seems to soothe you ever-so-slightly.

satoru grabs the plate of food he brought you— fried rice with a side of two hard boiled eggs— and begins to spoon feed you.

you feel your eyes water. not because you're sad, you're not sad. panicked, sure. but not sad.

you're crying because satoru is kind. he doesn't have to take your paranoia seriously, he doesn't have to remind you to take your meds, he doesn't have to feed you, but he does. that makes you feel loved, and you can't even focus on your cynical fears, but rather the affection you feel under satoru's care.

“there there, baby.” satoru whispers as he wipes your tears from under your eyes with his thumbs.

you melt under his touch. everything starts to feel lighter— you're not sure if that's your meds kicking in or just from satoru's presence. both, probably.

satoru gently pushes you backwards onto the bed, and the second the back of your head meets the soft cushion of the mattress along with plushy pillows atop, you fall off into a deep, much needed sleep.

you don't know it, but satoru holds and watches over you the whole night. he doesn't mind being your guardian angel and missing out on the rest he needs just as much as you if it means you'll be able to sleep comfortably in your own skin.

“sweet, beautiful girl, how many times do i have to tell you that i would rather eat a bucket of dog shit and climb mount everest naked before even consider leaving you even for a split second and that the thought alone of living a life you're not present in makes physically vomit and sucks the life from my body before it gets through that unbelievably thick skull of yours?”

he sets the book down beside him on the cushion and cups your face with both his hands.

“okay, but what if some third party comes in and takes you away from me and you have no choice? like, what if you go off on a mission or a war or something and you don't make it and the next time i see you, you're six feet under?”

you pause for a fraction of a millisecond before returning your paranoid rant.

“and even if you say you won't willingly leave me, what if someone tells you i did something horrible that i didn't do but you don't believe me and leave anyways? and what about manami? what if you realize she's better in every conceivable way possible and you start a family with her and leave the one we created together because, much to my ignorance, it was just us playing house the whole time but now you're ready for the real deal? and, what if the sky—”

suguru cuts you off by pressing his lips to your forehead and placing his index finger against your lips and that seems to shut you up— for now, at least.

he pulls away but keeps his index finger in place before speaking in an ever-so-slightly condescending tone.

“honey. i understand that the future can be a scary thing to think about, especially for you, but your poor little head will combust if you spend a single second more pondering on whether or not you'll get to keep the happiness and life you've built with me. let yourself live in the moment, won't you, sweetness?” his thumbs brush over your cheekbones and he smiles hopefully at you in a way that makes your heart flutter and all those scary, troublesome, and slightly— no, very dramatic fears melt into the back of your mind almost as if they were never there to begin with. almost.

“right. you're always right. if i waste all my time with you troubling myself about you being gone soon, then it'll hurt worse to know that every moment we had together was tainted by my unrelenting worry of the worst when you actually do leave.” you state matter-of-a-factly and pull away from his touch to nuzzle your face into his chest.

“sweetness, that's not what i— oh, nevermind, forget it. if that's what keeps you calm, then so be it. i won't fight it. at least not right now while you're content.” suguru places a soft kiss to the crown of your head and starts carding his fingers through your hair again.

a few minutes pass like that, just with the two of you enjoying each other's presence now that you have a distraction from the seemingly never-ending anxiety that sits in the pit of your stomach and claws into the depths of your soul all hours of the day.

“i think you need a nap, my love. sleep for me, yeah?” he speaks up again in a soft murmur, careful not to startle you, and you can't help but oblige.

as you fall asleep, suguru takes this as a time to think about all your emotions, fears, and general mental health and how it all affects your relationship with him. he knows you'll likely never fully get over this fear of him ever going away— no matter the cause, but he's willing to help you through it every single step of the way into the life you two are forming together if it means he can stop you from spiraling back into the physical and mental state you were in when he found you.

anything to keep his precious darling feeling secure and safe, even if it's only for a few hours at a time.

satoru dying had killed something inside of you. of course it did. you had loved him since high school and suddenly he was nothing more than a name etched onto a tombstone. it stung to know that all those memories would haunt you forever and that you'd never get a chance to make new ones with him. the love you still held for him lingers in every crook and crevice of your once-shared home. everything still smells like him. the cracked coffee mug still on the kitchen counter with dried liquid sitting in the bottom of it from the month before, his worn pair of slippers on the floor at the foot of your now freezing and oddly stiff without the presence of your soulmate bed, and even the dirty laundry piled on the couch is now just a cruel reminder of the man who once shared this space with you.

and, alongside all that pain, you had to bear the knowledge that you'd never feel this way about anyone else as long as you shall live.

but what hurt the worst? all your fields of dreams that the two of you had shared are now engulfed in fire, never to come true in the absence of satoru.

you two had figured out a whole life together. a future that most people never expect to get the chance to hold in their arms and call it theirs. he told you that whenever you were ready to settle down, that he was more than excited to do so. and, foolishly, you believed him.

you both bought baby clothes just for your future children since satoru was convinced it was never ‘too early’ to start getting ready. you had a whole drawer in your shared closet dedicated to tiny shirts and onesies for children who will, now, never exist. you had even been looking at different homes together, arguing over which one would be a better choice, ‘what about the school district? our children need a good school to go to.’ and ‘okay, but what if the neighbors aren't nice? we should see what other options there are.’. every month, satoru would take you to animal shelters just so the two of you could get an idea of what pets you wanted.

all he ever talked about a year prior to his death was how he was going to marry you and you two would have the most beautiful children with your eyes and his charm and how perfect everything would be. how perfect everything almost was.

and now what? all that talk about rings and cradles just disappearing as quick as they came?

even now, sitting on the floor in a room that now feels so cold and empty despite all the love it held two months ago, you hold the pastel yellow baby onesie satoru had picked out, “daddy's strongest soldier” printed in bold, navy blue letters on the chest of it. you have an entire box of memories that the two of you made, everything from polaroids to dried flowers, even grocery store receipts that you had planned to share with your future children to show them what real love looks like, that they'll now never receive.

you can't help but realize how pretty he looks when he's slightly distressed. the way his eyes narrowed the same way they do when yuji turns in an assignment and his handwriting is illegible. his brows knit together like he'd just heard one of the elders suggests something stupid, and his lips are pursed together in the way he does whenever he's trying to keep himself from making a dick joke to nanami. all of that paired with the soft glow of the bedside table lamp behind him really makes him look ethereal.

you're snapped out of your thoughts when satoru speaks up again.

“do you think we're married in every universe, yes or no?” he repeats his earlier question, his fear of what you might say growing by the second.

it's almost comical how serious he's taking this question, but that's something you'd never say out loud, no matter how often you thought it.

“...honestly? no.” you shut your eyes tight, ready for him to start crying and whining about how you don't love him anymore and that this basically means you want a divorce.

but he doesn't. he stays silent.

when you finally realize he's not overreacting or teasing or even joking like he normally would, your eyes flutter open.

he's still staring down at you, but this time with a look of betrayal and confusion, one that makes your heart clench in your chest.

“why don't you wanna be married in every lifetime?” he mutters softly, his voice oddly vulnerable despite the situation.

it suddenly hits you how bad your statement must've sounded and you gasp.

“shit, 'toru, i didn't mean it like that!” you exclaim as you sit up straight in the bed and grab his hand.

he doesn't pull away, but he doesn't hold you either.

“okay, well then, what did you mean?” he asks, his voice is slightly shaky and he looks genuinely nervous.

if you told anyone that satoru gojo, the strongest sorcerer of the modern era, was scared over a two-am “would you still love me if i was a worm” type of question, they'd laugh in your face and call you psychotic and delusional. but this is real. he's genuinely afraid that you're going to dump him over this.

you take a deep breath before explaining.

“i just meant, there's an alternate universe for everything. like, there's one where we're married, so this one, but then there's also one where we're enemies, or we're siblings, or you're my teacher, or even one where we never meet!”

satoru's eyes seem to soften as you explain yourself, but the hurt doesn't completely vanish.

“okay, well at least she wasn't saying that to hurt me or imply that she thinks our love is weak.” he thinks to himself.

you see the sliver of sadness still lingering in the hues of his dark blue pupils and you continue speaking.

“but doesn't that just make the love we have that much more special? like, really, there's all those universes where things happen differently, but we were lucky enough to end up in the one where we're together. isn't that amazing? that's basically fate pulling us together, y'know.” you intertwine your fingers with his and he smiles.

he laces his fingers between yours as well, finally holding your hand back and gives your palm a light squeeze.

“i guess you're right–” he pauses to flick your forehead with his free hand, pulling a hushed “ouch!” out of you.