#softer

there it is - that strange attitude he has around you, like he doesn't want to be there. it's a lie, you both know it is. if sukuna didn't want to be around you, he wouldn't be. you've seen him just up and leave during lectures, had even heard a rumour that he'd given the finger to one of the professors once, so somehow, this - having him take the time and effort to come to you after a long, hard day - was a lot more flattering than how it seemed to the naked eye.

you barely have time to step aside before he's pushing past you, all six foot four of him, with muscles that you know are rippling beneath his black hoodie. unusually enough, you've managed to detach yourself from the little voice in the back of your head that froths at the mouth whenever he's near.

you're smart enough to know not to fuck around with guys like him - guys who fuck for one night and leave you for the next warm body that breathes, guys who hide the fact that they're scared of the emotional intimacy.

and sukuna, he likes that about you, in his own gruff, stupid way. he likes the fact that you want nothing to do with him, that your eyes don't linger on his form the way his vermilion ones can't seem to separate themselves from yours. so he sits on your bed that looks too small for him, the springs creaking under his weight, and he musters up the strength not to snap at you when your question thickens the air.

"yeah, i won." he mutters, and you close the door, shutting it with a tiny click! that almost has him flinching, because he's not used to the domesticity of it all, watching you move about your dorm like nothing is eating him up.

you don't notice the suffocating burden of his stare, unblinking, eerie, like he knows he shouldn't be wishing for the thing he'd buried in his chest for so long. "knocked his fuckin' teeth out."

"right." you grab the first aid kit stuffed in the back of one of your drawers (and stifle a proud smirk when you think back to utahime firmly insisting that you wouldn't need it), tugging it out from under piles of trinkets and junk, placing it on the bare space of your study desk beside him. "are you gonna tell me why you thought it was smart to get into a fight, or am i gonna have to find out through satoru?"

your chair squeaks as you sit in it, the sound of the wheels rolling over fill sukuna with an unfamiliar sense of nervousness.

he pushes it down, tries to mentally wrap his thick, tattooed hands around those weak thoughts of mushy love and unbridled want and strangle them into nonexistence.

it doesn't work.

he hears the faint clicks of the first aid kit being opened and his skin prickles with the fantastic idea of your skin on his.

looking after him. touching him.

you rip open one of the antiseptic wipe packages, the clean smell of alcohol abusing your senses while you reach for his chin and shuffle closer. sukuna tenses but doesn't fight you, he just leans closer instead, so you can clean the blood on his chin a little better, removing crimson from tanned skin to reveal the small black lines of ink that lined below his lower lip.

"you don't wanna be talkin' to gojo." he scoffs, narrowing his eyes. did you have to hold him so tenderly? like he was glass?

last week he fucked some chick who'd left red marks running up his back, still there, still stinging, but proof that he could handle intimacy when it was ugly and mean. maybe he should have you tend to those wounds, too.

"yeah?" you murmur, brows furrowed as you fold the wipe so that you can cleanse his lip a little better, huffing when he hisses in pain and wrenches his jaw free from your hold, only to relent once more when your fingers find his chin again. sukuna forces himself not to move, wincing at every flicker of pain from where you dab at the corner of his mouth. "why's that?"

would you be hurt if he told you what those scratches on his back meant? would you be jealous?

he wants you to be. (fuck- how he wants you to be-)

or would you have that same, focused look in your eyes like you did right now, so unbothered by how he came to the state that he was in?

you don't know about how hard it is to hold back, to stop staring at your lips like he wants to consume you from the inside out, to stop thinking about you in the middle of the night when his bed is too cold, and he can't help but reminisce about that time you fell asleep on him in the backseat of satoru's car, with your head on his shoulder and your legs thrown over his lap like you were fine with touching him so casually-

"'cause it was him that i fucked up." the words are rough on his tongue, and you pause for the slightest moment before resuming your fussing, ripping open another small, square package of an antiseptic wipe and working on that cut by his temple, cooing as he flinches, cupping the side of his face.

his hands curl into fists as they remain still on his lap. your palm is warm. sukuna flinches a little more, away from your cleaning, for the sake of being able to press into it without suspicion. it's too perfect, he thinks, how your hand is made to mould against the angles of his face.

it wasn't much of a secret across campus that satoru and sukuna were a more twisted version of frenemies. more enemy than friend, they rarely got along. respect was strong between them, but sukuna couldn't handle more than three hours of the white-haired freak before he wanted to drive his face into the nearest brick wall. you had always said that the dislike was because they were so similar.

("like two sides of the same coin." you wrinkled your nose, briefly glancing up at him from where you quickly whisked the eggs into the cake mix, swatting at his hand and earning a derisive scoff from sukuna.

"must be some coin," he muttered, bare shoulder brushing yours through your knitted jumper, and then, quieter "his side would be uglier."

you smile. something tugs at his heart.)

"right." you say again, although this time, you sound more unimpressed. the look on your face says the same thing - it's not like you can really help it, after all, you've never had to reign in your expressions around sukuna, not when he was a hundred times worse with keeping a straight face during the most serious of situations (you really have got to get him to stop rolling his eyes when somebody says anything that prompts sympathy - it's starting to look bad on you). "…are you sure you won?"

he damn near chokes on his words as they all scramble to get out of him at once, and he downright glares at you, his mouth falling open at your absolute audacity. "am i sure i- are you fuckin' serious, woman? of course, i won." he snorts, folding his arms over his chest.

you try not to glance down at his arms when he does so. the effort almost kills you but you manage it. "he didn't stand a chance against me."

you nod, shrugging your shoulders, "alright. alright." there's a smile on your lips as you finish cleaning that cut on his temple - it's shallow, but deep enough to have bled down the side of his face. thanks to your good nature and wonderful medical skills, though, he'll be fine. maybe a little grumpy, but fine. "just wanted to make sure. you're telling me that if i go up to nanami and ask him who won, he'd say you?"

sukuna snorts, "shouldn't be askin' that little emo twerp anythin'. he's a friend of gojo's, remember?" a wrinkle appears between his eyebrows, and something flickers behind his eyes, dark, deep-rooted. "everybody's a friend of fuckin' gojo."

you frown. that doesn't sound like the sukuna you're usually met with. today he sounds more…defeated, a little more bitter, and he's not so irked by the thought of satoru to the point where disgust mingles with each syllable associated with him, not like how it does now.

The bed creaks as you move to sit beside him on the mattress, and his gaze doesn't budge from where he bores a hole into the carpet between his feet with his eyes. the muscle mass of sukuna has the mattress dipping, and your form slides down a little, side faintly pressing against his. he stiffens. you ignore it and place your chin on his shoulder.

god, his profile was fucking gorgeous.

that low set of his brow, the curved line of his nose, and the almost petulant slant of his lips, the strong jut of his chin, all outlined by his facial tattoos. you note the muscle in his jaw twitching, once, twice, before he stops clenching his teeth and forces himself to relax.

"what's this about, ryomen?" you whisper, wrinkling that delicate brow in the same way he notices you always do before tackling a particularly hard question. he can't deny you. not even when his pride sings otherwise, he won't deny you.

it's hard to not admire him then. you pretend you're a sponge, just soaking up all of the cursed energy he's giving out, taking the parts of himself that he just can't accept. he seems to sense it, that vibe you're giving off. muscles ease beneath your chin, and a little breath of air shoots out of his beautiful nose, like he has to physically expel his indignation at his entire life.

your chin lifts, and he misses your body heat once more. he's aching for something, for someone, for you. it's shameful, he hates himself for it. this yearning that won't dislodge its claws from his skin. he feels it scream whenever he fucks a girl he doesn't care about, feels a little piece of him die when he shows up outside of your dorm and does nothing but mope about and snarl, like it's your fault he feels like this for you.

maybe it is, partially. sukuna ryomen doesn't do affection. he doesn't do stupid shit like love or promises, and you aren't stupid enough to want that from anyone either.

the difference between you both is that you're better at handling it than he is. you don't crumble around this same foreign feeling that festers in his gut like a rot that spreads and threatens to steal every breath he takes.

"'s nothin'."

that's all he can force out of himself. it sits on his tongue, though, that confession that's just waiting to rip out of his throat. biding it's time. that's what scares him so much around you. the fact that he can't even hold himself back.

you raise an eyebrow, shaking your head but not pushing further. he was like a cat, really. you couldn't be too picky, too excited with something, otherwise he'd never repeat that behaviour again. you just had to remain a constant. stable. and sukuna never appreciated it when people were too overzealous. he liked to be in control, liked to prompt people for a reaction or emotion he'd planned for beforehand.

he liked people predictable, basically. only you weren't that. you - unbearable, tender, gentle you - didn't care about what he liked, not really. you didn't change your behaviour for him. in a world full of bastards who kissed his ass (and rightfully so), you remained the immovable object.

which is why he isn't surprised when you accept his answer, donning it like a second skin and patting his thigh thrice in solidarity.

there's the sound of rustling sheets as you move to sit just behind him, leaning back against the headboard and shifting to pull your phone out from your back pocket, your back sliding down until you've reached prime bed-rotting position against your various array of pillows.

sukuna doesn't even lift a finger. just stares at the floor between his feet and marinates in everything that had happened prior to showing up to your room. waking up that morning to that girl he'd taken home the night before, denying her fruitless attempts at trying to reach inside a chest with a heart that beats only for you-

-and then that fight with gojo. too many words thrown at each other, both reacting with sentences equally as obscene, equally as rude ("like two sides of the same coin." you'd said). sukuna closes his eyes, unclenching his fists and smoothing out his palms over his jeans, letting out a long, shuddering sigh.

…

you're halfway through scrolling through whatever social media happens to take your fancy, when sukuna stirs from where he sits, leaning down to undo the laces of his boots, setting them to one side. you don't think anything of it, he's just making himself comfortable in the same way he'd done a thousand times before.

but then he grunts, taking the hem of his hoodie in his hands and lifting the fabric up over his head, letting it fall to the floor by his shoes, pulling up the sheets as he slides underneath them, joining you under the covers.

you catch a good look of his rippling muscle in your peripheral vision, allowing yourself one glance to soak up how tattooed black lines move with his tanned skin, and red irises meet yours, stubbornly looking away as he curls closer. "shut up."

you do nothing, just bite your tongue and hope that whatever sudden movements you make don't happen to scare him away.

because it isn't like you don't want this. it isn't like you don't know that sukuna mentions your name in every conversation he's ever had since he's met you, that you don't know about how he speaks so fondly about you behind your back. it's just that he's a coward.

you're lucky. he's millimetres away from you, cheek against one of your pillows as he lays on his side, facing you, glancing at your phone every once in a while as you scroll through the silly little videos shoko sends you, liking and replying with the same languid ease anyone else would have when tucked into bed and comfortable (excluding the absolute tank of a man to your left).

there's that same wrinkle between his eyebrows, like he can't help but feel a little ignored.

it's almost painful, pretending like he wasn't as close as he was, pretending like having him merely a breath away from cuddling up to you didn't over-step every rule you'd set between each other to keep your friendship simple. because that's how you both liked it, no loose ends, nothing to tie the other down.

no sex. no kisses. no hugs. just proximity and waiting.

more minutes pass by. the silence that was once calm and soothing was now charged and tense.

a long breath draws out of you, eyes still trained on your phone screen, when your lips part, trying to form words to either beckon him closer or ask him what he's doing, only he beats you to it with a quiet snarl, followed by an irritated, "fuck this shit." and suddenly sukuna is closing the distance.

his arm wraps around your waist from underneath you, the other throwing itself over your stomach, finding purchase in the fabric of your shirt, pulling you down so that he can tuck his head beneath your arm and place it against your collarbone, throwing a very heavy leg over both of yours.

his usual cologne fills your nose, rubbing off on your skin like some sort of subliminal claim, and he notices the way your breath hitches, wills you not to say a single word out loud, something you manage to pick up on with the way that he's still so tense.

because he can't help it. he can't muffle all these doubts running through his head, wondering if this is okay, (as if he's ever felt the need to clarify boundaries with anyone - sukuna ryomen didn't do reassurance, he didn't do hesitation), trying to see if you were already planning to shove him off and tell him he's ruined the friendship he'd tried so hard to keep with you by being too fucking clingy and pathetic and-

...

your fingers sift through soft, pink spikes, nails scratching his scalp at the base of his head lightly, and it's like a switch has been flipped. crimson eyes fly open, noting the way you don't show a shred of acknowledgement for what you're doing to him, like this is a normal practice between you both, your eyes trained on your phone, thumbing through your emails while every muscle in his body screams to just run fucking run because this is getting too real-

-but eventually he's putty in your hands, indulging in your warmth, the rise and fall of your chest, the way your body fits every hard edge of his front like you'd been made for him.

or maybe it's the other way around. maybe he was made for you. that was more likely, sukuna thinks. it'll explain the hole in his chest when he tries to fill it with someone else.

his entire weight settles half on top of you, and politely, you shut up about how he's practically breaking your ribs, because his breathing has grown heavier, and his eyes aren't closed and playing at faux domesticity. they're half-lidded, slipping shut and being forced open manually, like the sound and feeling of your breaths hitting the crown of his head is the sweetest lullaby he's ever known.

his breathing evens, his breaths escaping his mouth in little puffs. there's something innocent about the way his usual frown melts into a peaceful expression. all for you. a devious idea forms in your head, and a quiet chuckle manages to find it's way past your lips. you click to your camera. one snapshot is all it takes.

sukuna was never one for gift-giving.

but he's given you about fifty years of blackmail in one picture.

you pray he never finds out.

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⋆. 𐙚 ˚a/n: i hope you enjoyed the fic!! once again, i'm thinking of doing a part 2, so let me know if you'd be interested in that hehe! any requests or tips are also more than welcome (sorry if he's a little bit ooc gulp)! have a good time wherever you are <3