Chapter Text
Iori Utahime was worried.
Gojo never went a day without blowing up her phone. Sometimes it was a call with a request, sometimes it was a call with an update. Most of the time, it was a stupid cat meme that made her reluctantly smile. Even during special, top-secret missions, he managed to send her coded emojis or obnoxious gifs.
The three days of silence were both a relief and a concern.
But something was wrong.
The urgency grew as no one she spoke to could pinpoint Gojo’s whereabouts. In fact, most people had shrugged nonchalantly. Maybe he was at the school or on a mission. Maybe he was trying sweets in Okinawa. It wasn’t abnormal for him to disappear for long periods of time. It was a bit irritating to witness everyone’s disregard for Gojo.
Her investigations led her to take the train from Kyoto to Tokyo. It didn’t take much effort to break down his front door and storm into his apartment. She half expected his dead body to be on the floor, not hapardazdly covered on his futon.
If someone had told her that someday she would be worried and investigating the disappearance of Gojo Satoru, she would have cursed them for pinning such an omen on her person.
What had she done to become his keeper?
From the moment of their first meeting, Utahime chalked him up as a pretty albino with weird blue eyes and kept her distance. If she was honest, she had only approached the first years and forced an introduction to befriend Ieiri Shoko.
Her plans to keep her distance were ultimately foiled, as he took every opportunity to annoy her. Long fingers constantly found themselves entangled in the white ribbons of her hair. Sometimes he was brave enough to run those fingers through the length of her braids and pull her closer just to blow a raspberry in her face.
One of the worst offenses was when Gojo had the gall to steal a ribbon right out of her hair and tuck it innocently into his jacket pocket. No amount of badgering had gotten her ribbon back.
Only in dreams did she ever get the ribbon back.
There were two dreams she recalled vividly during her injury and recovery in the hospital. In the first dream, her limbs were weighed down by ice and her vision wavered between clarity and darkness. Through blurred shadows, Gojo’s eyes had glowed with unshed tears. Long fingers had searched his front pocket before the length of familiar white quickly engulfed her right eye before staining red.
In the second dream, she was aroused by the sound of a familiar voice calling out her name.
“Utahime, I love-” a familiar voice began.
Love what, she had wondered. But when her eyes had lifted, it was the sight of Gojo’s tall, lanky form walking away from her hospital bed. Darkness had overwhelmed her before she could make sense of what was happening.
If Utahime was honest, something had begun changing between them after her accident. When the world had treated her like damaged goods, Gojo’s teasing had remained constant. When he kissed her damaged cheek at the river, she wasn’t sure if she wanted to throttle him or kiss him back in gratitude. The man was the definition of annoying, but he had saved her life and through his constancy and stubbornness, he had become a friend.
But that hadn’t lasted long after Gojo’s twentieth birthday.
Pushing back the sweat soaked silver strands framing Gojo’s face, Utahime studied the face of a man who had been a friend, a lover, and now a colleague. He was a complete nuisance, and sometimes it was hard to believe he was the most powerful jujutsu sorcerer in the world. Especially when it was obvious, he suffered.
“Gojo, you fool,” she whispered, wiping the sweating accumulating around his neck and shoulders.
It was frustrating how familiar his body felt beneath her fingers. Her hands traveled the paths they once did, mopping up the sweat and cooling the fevered skin. Utahime quelled a shiver at the blurred memories of quivering limbs and soft kisses across her skin.
She was familiar with the wave of frustration, conflict, and longing that accompanied those memories. Despite their agreement to sweep that night under the rug, their relationship had never been the same.
In the past ten years, she hadn’t been deaf to the rumors of his reputation in the bedroom. The orgy he held had been the talk of Jujutsu society for months when she moved to Kyoto. It had stung for years to realize that she was just another notch on his bedpost. Gojo probably worshiped all of his lovers with the same dedication he had shown her.
While Gojo had gone on to take multiple lovers, it had become a struggle for Utahime to find any sexual partner. Too many times, she had shared a hotel room with a beautiful stranger, but quickly ended the encounter when they could not satisfy her hunger. It became easier to finish the job with her own fingers. More than once she had pulled out the memories of their night together just to relive the feel of his body moving against hers. It was the only time a lover had ever made her feel so cherished, worshiping her body all night.
Utahime’s unintentional celibacy made it hard to be near Gojo. A madness seemed to consume her when he was near. Visions and fantasies of their entangled limbs and the warmth of his body protectively engulfing hers from behind plagued her mind. It made it hard to look at him. She ignored him at the Kyoto Sister-School Goodwill events and spent all her time and energy fighting her hidden desires. What did it say about her that she so desperately craved the warmth and devotion of a man like Gojo Satoru?
Yet, it had taken the simple request of protecting their students to crumble all the resistance she had built up over the years. It’s surprisingly easy to set aside their differences and join forces to uproot their enemies plans. For the first time, Utahime hadn’t seen Gojo as an albino, an annoyance, or someone to avoid. He had been a partner, and they had eased into another friendship so seamlessly.
“Get better, Satoru,” On a whim, she held his hand and brushed it against her cheek. “If not for yourself, then for me.”
Sometimes she wondered if they had wasted too much time being at odds with each other. Sometimes she wondered what their relationship would have looked like if they had called a truce sooner. In the end, she came to the same conclusion.
Staring at his vulnerable, resting face, Iori Utahime admitted to herself that she was falling in love with Gojo Satoru.
Gojo’s blue eyes were open and cautious, unable to look away even as she moved around the apartment to tidy his space. He looked at her as if he was afraid she would disappear, the confessions from the night before lost in some dream he may never find again.
“Utahime,” he finally said as she cleared the table of their meal.
From the sink, she made a noise of inquiry and was met with silence. Turning, she eyed him curiously.
Gojo swallowed twice before he spoke. “Can I hear you say it again?”
Utahime turned to start the dishes, trying to hide her blush. She murmured the words quietly without turning around.
“Again,” he whispered, much closer than before. The heat of his body engulfed her smaller frame before long arms came around her middle.
Turning off the water, she turned to meet eyes filled with wonder and longing. Taking pity on the man, she cupped his cheeks and stared deeply into his eyes.
“This isn’t a fever dream, darling. I won’t vanish when you blink or disappear when you turn away. No longer will I run anywhere but into your arms. I will give you all of my smiles and the sound of my joy. Please keep your heart, Gojo Satoru, because I’m giving you mine.”
She paused as the next words stuck in her throat. “I love you.”
When Gojo kissed her, it felt like domains colliding.