#el writes

Ijichi seemed to make up his mind about something because the man suddenly pushed away from his desk and climbed to his feet.

“Come on, we’re both exhausted and are running on fumes.”

Nanami blinked up at him, unprepared but quietly delighted by his lover’s sudden bout of bossiness. Ijichi could be bossy when the situation called for it, but his timid nature meant he usually defaulted to letting Nanami call the shots a lot of the time.

“I would kill for a nap right now.” The blond admitted and climbed to his feet and dragged the poor chair around the desk once more to clear a path for Ijichi. “Don’t forget your lunch.”

“Have you eaten?” The dark-haired man asked as he wrote a note saying he was taking a rest break and not to disturb him unless it was a genuine emergency.

“We got McDonald’s on the way back,” Nanami confessed with a grimace. “Gojo and Akari’s choice, of course.”

“McDonald’s now and then isn’t a bad quick meal.”

“Their fries are the best thing on the menu. Unfortunately, Gojo has ruined them forever by dunking them in his milkshake like a weirdo.” He knew he was being petulant and chalked it up to the exhaustion. The younger man took it in stride and picked up the bowl before he gestured for Nanami to precede him out of the door.

A couple of pieces of tape and the note was posted.

“Shall we?” Ijichi asked sweetly, and the blond nodded as he fell into step next to him. Last night, he’d felt daring enough to walk hand in hand with Kiyotaka in the dead of night, but it was different in broad daylight. So while his hand itched to reach for the other man’s, Kento shoved his hands into his pockets and followed Ijichi towards the staff dorms.

Once they reached the apartment, the younger man opened the door and gestured again for Nanami to follow him inside. “Do you want to take a shower first?”

“I should, but I might fall asleep standing up.” They had showered last night; he figured he could wait a few more hours.

“Alright. I picked up two of your suits from the dry cleaners, so you’ll have a fresh change of clothes for later.

“God, I love you.” The words flew out of the blond’s mouth before he even had a chance to examine the thought. He wrapped his arms around the other man and pulled him into a hug. “Thank you for being you.”

Trust Kiyotaka to think about something as simple yet necessary as Kento needing a change of clothes but not having time to head back home to pick one up. That kind of conscientiousness was just intrinsic to the other man’s nature and was a major reason why Nanami had fallen for him as hard as he had.

“Oh. You truly are on your last legs, poor thing.” Ijichi said, not unkindly, and pressed a kiss to the other man’s temple.

“I really am. I don’t think I’ve been this tired since Yu died.” He admitted softly, and Ijichi reached up to start unbuttoning his blue dress shirt.

“Can you undo your harness?” The dark-haired man gently instructed, and Nanami obediently reached to unfasten it at his waist. With one shrug of his broad shoulders, the harness was shucked off, and he carefully set his cursed tool down on the nightstand. Between the two of them, the wordlessly finished undressing Nanami until he stood there in just his underwear, and then they moved on to Ijichi.

There were no cheeky caresses meant to titillate or excite because neither man was in the headspace for that. But there was an intimacy to the act of undressing a lover that helped center Kento further and beat back all the horrors and stress of the last few days.

Soon enough, they were both dressed down to their underwear and were crawling under the covers of Ijichi’s bed. The linens were scratchy and nowhere near as nice as the ones Nanami had at his house. Kiyotaka had discovered the man was a little bit of a hedonist and enjoyed soft bedding and clothing.

But after the last two days, neither man was complaining about the quality of Ijichi’s bed linens. Nanami pulled the smaller man close until they lay flush with arms and legs entangled and Kento’s face was buried into the silky darkness of Kiyotaka’s hair.

“Once all of this nonsense is over with, I think we need to find a way to take a few days off and go relax. Get away from the grind and stress. Maybe somewhere down by the coast where we can stuff ourselves with amazing seafood and enjoy the ocean views.”

“That sounds absolutely amazing. I’m down.” Ijichi murmured and nuzzled his face into the curve of Nanami’s neck.

“Actually, Gojo was trying to convince me that Okinawa is a better spot to retire than Malaysia. I’ve only been there once on a mission; it might be nice to experience it as a tourist.”

“I’ve never been to Okinawa. It’s one of those places I keep telling myself I’ll go but never manage to find the time to do it.”

Nanami’s arms tightened around him in a squeeze. “We’ll find the time. There is so much more to life than the misery and drudgery of the jujutsu sorcerer’s world. I hated my life as a civilian, but it at least showed me there are more choices in life than just grinding yourself down to a nub at the pleasure of the higher-ups and the most powerful clans.”

Ijichi craned his head back so that he could look at Nanami fully. “You truly hate this life that much, huh?”

“I think the life of a sorcerer is shit. But I also think a civilian’s life is shit. At least with this life, I feel like I’m actually making meaningful changes to people’s lives and I’m more suited for it.” The blond man stated honestly.

“That being said, I do intend on retiring before I’m thirty-five or forty. And then I’ll have time for all the things I keep telling myself I’ll do.”

Kiyotaka was tempted to ask where Nanami saw their relationship in that timeline. Suppose he’d even considered that they might last that long. It felt almost farcical to consider they could go that distance or that either one of them would even be alive in a decade.

The death rates of sorcerers were almost as bad as those of assistant managers.

Still, listening to Nanami paint a fantasy of his retirement was beautiful, and he desperately wanted the man to get his wish.

“That sounds lovely.”

“You should be saving too, Kiyotaka. If you ever need help building a retirement portfolio or you need some financial advice, I’m right here.”

“Hmm, you’re certainly more handsome than my regular financial advisor. I could be tempted to jump ship if you find a way to make it worth my while.” The dark-haired man teased with a smile, and that garnered him a throaty laugh from the blond man.

“I think I can manage that.”

rating: general audiences

archive warnings: no archive warnings apply

category: M/M

fandoms: the outsiders: the musical - jamestown revival & levine/rapp, the outsiders - s.e. hinton, the outsiders (1983)

relationship: darrel “darry” curtis jr./paul holden

characters: darrel “darry” curtis jr., paul holden, socs (the outsiders), greasers (the outsiders)

additional tags: pre-canon, high school, first dates, introspection, implied/referenced domestic abuse, milkshakes

There was a half-beat pause before Nanami narrowed his eyes at Gojo. “Going back to what you were saying earlier about people wanting to ‘take me for a spin.’ Please tell me you don’t count yourself in that bunch?”

“And ruin our friendship? Never! I mean, I’d be lying if I didn’t admit I wasn’t curious to see if that no-nonsense strictness translates to the bedroom and whether you would be a complete cold fish or not.” A smirk pulled at the silver-haired man’s lips as he tilted his head ever so slightly at a curious angle. “You seem like you’d be bossy in the bedroom; I bet Ijichi eats that right up.”

“You’ll never know.” The younger man stated blandly. “On either count.”

“You’re so meaaaaaan. If the two of you are ever looking for a third for a little fun…”

“Absolutely not.”

“Fair, poor Ijichi would probably faint the first time he saw all of this gloriousness revealed in the bedroom.”

Nanami just rolled his eyes to convey his thoughts on that subject.

“I don’t share, so this is a completely moot point.”

“Yep, you’re definitely the bossy one in the bedroom.” Gojo seemed to find this endlessly amusing and sucked on the straw in his now mostly melted milkshake as loudly as possible.

“I am not having this discussion with you, Gojo, so move on.”

“Fine, so you’re serious about him, I get it. But don’t you think that’s going to interfere with your retirement plans to move to Malaysia?” Satoru pointed out more seriously now. “You know homosexuality is outlawed there, and they actually imprison and beat people up for being gay there.”

That earned him a frown from the blond man. Nanami certainly didn’t want to discuss that with Gojo of all people, but it had been a concern that had been circling in the back of his mind.

“I have considered that, but I have at least another seven years before I can comfortably build my nest egg and get serious about retiring. Things may change, or maybe my plans will change. It’s not like Japan offers much in the way of partner rights to gay couples either.” They couldn’t get married if they wanted to, and to date, Japan barely offered any real protections for same-sex partnerships.

“You should consider Okinawa.” Gojo put in suddenly. That earned him a surprised look from the other man. “I bought a house there years ago. Back when…well, it doesn’t matter when, but it checks most of your boxes.”

They both felt the ghostly shape of Suguru Geto's memory haunting the conversation now. Nanami had never known if they’d ever officially gotten together. Still, he’d suffered through dealing with the teenage angst, hormones, and drama of witnessing the blossoming of their first love from the sidelines along with the others, and it had been unbearable at times.

After Geto’s betrayal and defection from the Jujutsu sorcery world, Nanami didn’t think Gojo had ever seriously dated or even tried to pursue anyone romantically. He claimed he did it because he didn’t want to deal with clan politics and people forcing him into some loveless marriage just in the hope that he would breed some powerful child who could take over the reins of the clan once he was gone.

According to Shoko, it had gotten so out of hand that by the time he’d turned twenty, Gojo had rebelled so hard that he’d shocked his clan and the jujutsu sorcerer world by going to an outside world doctor and getting a vasectomy in a pique of outrage.

Everyone had been shocked, and Gojo had apparently held a party to celebrate.

Nanami was glad he hadn’t been around to witness that particular shitshow, but Ieiri assured him it’d been hilarious. One day when they’d both been shitfaced after work, he’d worked up the courage to ask why Gojo had gone to a non-sorcerer for the surgery, and Shoko informed him she’d had zero interest in handling her best friend’s junk.

When he’d floated the idea of someone using RCT to undo it, Shoko had laughed at him and reminded him that would require her to touch Gojo’s dick, and that was never happening in a million years. She also pointed out he had RCT himself, so while it would be interesting to see if you could play tug of war with someone’s physiology like that, it would probably end up messing up his reproductive system anyway.

“Why Okinawa?” Kento finally asked when his curiosity got the better of him.

“That weekend I spent there with Suguru and Riko was one of the happiest weekends of my entire life. Sure, some weaklings were trying to kill us, but we got to spend a few days just being regular teenagers. I think it was probably the most relaxed I’d seen Suguru in years.” Satoru admitted with a sad little smile. “I told him we should retire there, and he laughed at me, but he seemed to get on board with the idea pretty readily. There was no clan politics there; we were close enough to the mainland that if they needed us, we could fly out for missions.”

“You and I have vastly different definitions of the word ‘retire’, Gojo.”

“Just being realistic, Kento. Being the world’s strongest comes with a price. I’m never going not to be called upon to take missions and take out the bad guys.” He said without an ounce of humility, but that was Satoru for you. The man wouldn’t know the word if it came up and bit him in the ass. “I never begrudged you leaving, though. And I will support your decision to leave in a few years as well. You deserve to be happy, and it’s clear this world doesn’t make you happy.”

“I don’t think it makes anyone happy, Satoru.” He hadn’t planned on the more intimate usage of his friend’s first name. As a general rule, Nanami tried to avoid using it because that had always been Suguru’s thing, and he knew it pained the man and haunted him to this day.

“That’s what I’m trying to fix, Kento. Hopefully in the future, being tied to the sorcery world won’t hang like a millstone from the neck of every young sorcerer out there. One day I will root out the corruption that fails our people like they failed Haibara and Geto and countless other people like them.” He sounded so resolved, and the intensity that radiated from the man in palpable waves was almost uncomfortable to behold.

This is what Satoru Gojo looked like when he gave something his pure focus and energy.

It was terrifying, and Nanami prayed he never found that intensity centered on him.

“I hope you’re right. Itadori and the others deserve to have a world better than the one we grew up in.”

“That’s why I’m doing it. For kids like Yuji and Yuta and for Megumi. All of them.”

“You don’t have to pitch me, Satoru. You know I’m willing to support this goal 100%. It’s part of why I’m still here shoveling my way through all the bullshit that comes from being a jutjutsu sorcerer.”