#eheh

ㅤㅤㅤㅤ──── BIRTHDAY BOY GOJO SATORU who comes home from a two-day mission with limbs as limp as noodles and a face hanging with exhaustion, moving sluggishly and heaving a great sigh that hardly relieves his chest of all the knots in it. But nothing can relieve the tension that throbs in his every muscle.

The apartment door clicks closed, shutting him into pitch-black darkness as he haphazardly discards his shoes in the entrance—then in that instant, the living room lights are turned on.

“SURPRISE!!”

“—happy birthday to you—”

“wha—not yet, Yuji!”

“—happy birthday to you... happy birthday to the... bestteacherinthewoooorrrrllllldddddd—”

“—ow, Yuji! My foot!”

“—sorry Nanamin!—haaaaappppyyyy birthday, tooooooo—”

“youuuuuuuuuuu—”

“WOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!”

Confetti pops, Yuji is hollering with Nobara, Megumi and Yuta are softly mumbling. Nanami—in a party hat, I repeat; someone managed to get this man to wear a party hat—is shifting away from Yuji before he falls victim to his clumsiness again.

“Gumi, ya gettin’ this on camera?”

“Yup yup.” Megumi confirms, sweeping the scene with his camcorder, holding it at eye-level, zooming in (wayyy too much) at his teacher’s face, smile appearing on the flip screen in 480p resolution.

A soft, melodic chuckle followed by a gentle sob comes from the birthday boy, who’s nipping at his blindfold to make sure it’s adjusted right—the bottom of it slightly wettened.

“Ahah... you guys really didn’t have to...”

“Of course we had to! It’s the one day in a year we get to celebrate you!” exclaims Yuji, scarred face breaking into the sweetest smile the world has ever known.

“Cute.” Gojo sniffles—subtly, not enough to let others know that this brought the strongest to tears—but that blindfold is starting to betray him because the bottom is staining darker as his tears begin to pool.

It’s okay, though, they’re all in a buzz—too distracted to realize that the birthday boy is weepy.

“Yuta, Yuta; the cake!”

“No, no—I got it!”

“NO Yuji you don’t got it. Let Yuta handle—THE CAKE!!”

“—NOOO!!”

“Got it.” beams Yuta serenely, swiftly yoinking the falling cake from Yuji’s clumsy hold just in time before the strawberry-topped masterpiece became a happy little accident.

“Nooo! Strawberry casualty!” gasped Yuta.

“Five second rule!”

“Ew, Yuji!”

Yuta carefully brings the candle-lit cake to his beloved teacher, bearing a face full of fondness up at him.

Another sobby chuckle escapes Gojo, wiping a finger under his leaky nose. His face glows, alight in the blooming light of the candles.

“You’ve gotta blow out the candles.”

“Make a wish!—”

“—Yuji, my foot!”

“Sorry, sorry!”

Bowing down, Gojo pushes a strong breath through his pursed lips—the flames disappearing instantaneously into nothingness, smoke curling up to signify the light that once existed.

I wish you could be in this moment with me, Suguru.

He’s pulled out of his teary reveries before they can even start to take shape.

“Yuta. Cake. Knife. Sensei. Give. Biggest. Slice.”

“Yes ma’am, on the double, ma’am.”

Yuta’s quick-acting under Nobara’s orders—Gojo’s stifling a laugh but breaks when he looks over at Nanami, who’s quaking with a million suppressed giggles already. And the kids just continue in their roar of endearing craziness.

“Damn, check it out; Nobara’s got Mount Fuji on her face.”

“Megumi STOP zooming in on my zit or I will pop it on you.”

“Yuta, that’s like, half the cake!”

“—well you told me to cut the biggest slice, so I’m giving him the biggest slice!”

“So, sensei; how’s it feel to be thirty-whatnow?” Yuji asks.

“My bones! My bones!—kidding, I feel forever seventeen.”

“You sure act like it.” grunts Nanami.

“—acting tough but you baked a cake for me.”

“They baked, under my supervision—” he answered.

“—I did all the work; Yuji preheated the oven too high, and Nobara was busy painting her nails.” Megumi snitched.

“—and I’ll paint yours in your sleep tonight, you hedgehog-lookin’ ass.” bit back Nobara.

Another laugh left Gojo’s lips.

From the moment the lights turned on, all through the messy melody of Happy Birthday, his face has been creased into a smile bigger than he’s had in a long time.

In this company, his blackout exhaustion suddenly disappeared at once, like he wasn’t burned out from a two-day mission. He knows nothing about that now.

The only things he knows are the warm honey-glow of Nanami and his students gathered in his living room, the smoky scent of his wish lingering in the air, the heating of his apartment that warms his chattering bones on this snowy evening, the amateurishly yet lovingly decorated strawberry cake with pink icing that he couldn’t wait to sink his sweet tooth into.

A clattering of plates and buzz of conversation fill every corner of Gojo’s humbly small apartment until it’s brimming with life, pulsing with all the buttery good vibes he’s needed his whole life.

But something’s still... missing.

Elbows bump elbows, cake slices are passed out and argued over—Sensei’s slice being the biggest without any further debate, leaving the kids to squabble over the rest.

Tummy full of cake, Gojo leans back with a relishing smirk, savouring the taste of the cake and the company.

Then Yuji pops at him, like he just remembered something he had to do which he shouldn’t have forgotten to do at all—but he’s Yuji, cut him some slack.

“Oh, sensei, by the way—this letter’s for you; it’s from someone named—uh? 青い春? That’s not a name, is it?”

Everything in the world holds still for a moment, at least in Satoru’s world.

“Oh.” Gojo feathers, gently but surely taking the envelope from Yuji’s hold—like it was not a letter, but something impossibly important that belonged to him and only him. Something intimate, unknown to the rest of them. A fragile secret safely kept inside the sorcerer’s ribcage, locked away in his big heart.

“Thank you, Yuji, for taking care of it.”

“Who’s ‘Blue Spring’?”

“It’s, uh, a sort-of inside joke...” Satoru mutters dreamily. “Don’t worry about it.”

The cream-white letter—pinched delicately between softly trembling thumb and index fingers—finds itself concealed behind the man’s back—but one thing that can’t be concealed is the glow on his face. Even though he tries to soften his smile, it still grows out of hand, like flowers blooming in timelapse, like spring rushing in too early. His feelings rush in as suddenly as that.

He waits.

And waits.

Aaand waits.

For what?

For the party to be over.

Yes, he loved it. He’s never had a surprise party before. The cake tasted good. The kids were adorably bickering amongst themselves for the whole night. Nanami reminisced with him for two hours, and told embarrassing stories until Gojo turned thirty-six shades of pink.

But he kept turning over the envelope in his pale hands, impatient to open it.

So, when the party’s over, and the kids are escorted home by Nanami—the door clicks closed in relief.

And then Gojo can just be Satoru; boyishly smiling to himself, opening the letter like he knows it’s going to be his favorite gift.

He sees the familiar scribbly handwriting, reads it ten times over, before toppling over onto his side, hiding his brightest neutron-star smile into the sheets.

Happy birthday to my forever and always. See you at midnight.

—xoxo, your one and only.