Chapter Text
"Suguru, do you want to watch a movie?"
It follows on like clockwork, the words a slight variation of a common motive: Gojo Saturo wants to spend time with him. And Suguru would rather die.
Every day, at 11 p.m., Satoru knocks at his door, locked shut, and asks Suguru for his presence. Every day Suguru tells him no, wondering when his once or yet still best friend will give up.
It started right after Riko died. Right after Satoru died and then came back like nothing happened, as the strongest. He barely sees him anymore, but when he does he feels so many conflicting emotions that he can barely stand in his presence. It's funny how he is the one who is blinded now, so much so that sunglasses would never suffice to relieve him; he’d need to blindfold himself.
The first time Satoru comes it’s 11 p.m.; he doesn't even knock, tries to open the door but finds it locked. He yells: "Oi, Suguru, is your door stuck, or what?". And then, when Suguru doesn't answer him, he continues, "A new crepe place opened, wanna go?"
Suguru, in his bed, has words stuck in his throat that won't come out. They range from "Go fuck yourself", to "Please" and he doesn't even know what he is begging for. Please don't die? Please don't leave me again?
The only thing he manages is: "I am tired, Satoru, leave me alone".
And it's true. He is hollow, scraped clean of whatever energy he needs to be a person. He is just curses and regrets now.
"Oh. Sure. See you tomorrow then". Satoru's tone is the fake giddy one he uses when he is upset. Suguru tries to find empathy inside his body but he is left wanting, so he doesn't say anything and goes back to the stifling limbo between wakefulness and sleep.
The next day Satoru actually knocks. It's 11 p.m., same time, but different proposition: he's asking about taking a stroll outside.
Suguru almost teases him for it, wants to call him an old man and ask him who even says stroll nowadays. But it dies in him and he just mumbles something about having had a bad day. Again, it's true, but at the same time it's so reductive it's almost funny.
Satoru stays silent for a moment and Suguru worries that he will insist, but then he just tells him from behind the door "Okay, see you tomorrow", and leaves only silence in his wake.
He won't see him tomorrow, though, because the next day Suguru hears the higher ups bragging about how Gojo's technique has flourished. "It's good that he fought with Fushiguro." one of the geezers says, "Now he can finally be as strong as we need."
The rage that chokes him is the first emotion he has felt in days. But that too dies down and it just briefly arises again to tell Satoru through the door that no, he doesn't want to go out for a drink. Yet he's still told that ‘see you tomorrow’ which leaves a bad taste in his mouth.
And so it goes for days and days, always a different thing to do, always met with a half-hearted rejection.
Today, after Suguru doesn't even answer the request for the movie, Satoru's ‘see you tomorrow’ is so low that it's barely audible and yet the pain in his voice still reaches Suguru's ears.
He doesn't feel anything.
There's only a minute till 11 p.m. and Suguru is struggling to fall asleep. He feels nauseous, the taste of the curse he swallowed this afternoon persistent in his mouth, even after he washed his teeth for three times and went through a packet of chewing gums he didn't know he still had. He looks at the hour hand of his alarm clock and tries to come up with a new excuse to turn down Satoru, so tired that even thinking hurts.
But Satoru doesn't come at 11. He hasn't knocked at 11.05. He hasn't told him he'll see you tomorrow and it's 11.10.
At 11.30 Suguru starts to worry.
Satoru was on a mission today, but did he actually come back? He didn't bother to check when he returned from his own mission, the exhaustion etched in his bones making it impossible to do anything other than going back to his room. He pushes this thought away; of course Satoru came back, he is the strongest after all. Then the sound of Fushiguro’s voice pervades his mind, reminding him that he did die, right after Suguru left him.
He’s on his feet, running to Satoru’s room, his heart beating so fast it deafens him. Satoru’s door is open, thank God, but his room is dark and silent. His best friend is lying on his bed, his eyes covered with a piece of black cloth, still as he’s never been. Suguru rushes to him, his heart screaming with the need to check Satoru’s pulse, and he’s hit with the full force of Limitless. He falls, gracelessly, in the pile of dirty laundry next to Satoru’s bed.
Satoru removes the cloth from his eyes without a care in the world.
“Suguru! Did you want to watch that movie?” he stands up, pinning Sguru from above with the full intensity of his gaze. It dawns on him, in that exact moment, that he hasn’t really looked back at his best friend in weeks. He looks as awful as Suguru feels, blue eyes red with tiredness, deep eyebags and strained smile.
“Is everything okay? I know I did not come to you tonight, but I was feeling a bit tired.” Satoru continues.
It’s the first time in three years that he has ever heard him say he’s tired. In his mind Satoru is indefatigable, always buzzing with energy. He is the strongest.
How dumb he has been, he thinks now, putting him on the same pedestal the sorcerer community has confined him; he is his best friend, his one and only, and yet he has treated him as everyone else. He has forgotten that Gojo Satoru, as divine as he looks, is just human at his core. It hurts, this conviction that he is not better than the people he loathes.
“Suguru?”
He breaks eye contact and stands up.
“How long has your Infinity been up, Satoru?”
It bothers him more than he wants to admit and he knows it’s because Satoru never kept it up when he felt safe. Coincidentally, feeling safe and being with Suguru used to overlap.
“Don’t know. What’s today?”
“It’s Wednesday”.
“Uh”, Satoru drops his gaze “then a lot”.
Suguru thinks that a lot means that he has never dropped it since he almost died. And he didn’t notice.
“You are killing yourself, Satoru”.
“You are killing yourself too.”
His words feel like a hole in his chest and he wants to rebut, but he can’t deny the truth. He has been cruel to himself. He has been even more cruel to Satoru.
“I know, you are right”.
And it’s the fact that Satoru doesn’t answer him with his usual ‘I am always right’ that makes him fight the urge to flee, even when his body is begging him to go back to bed. It’s the fact that Satoru is ‘a bit tired’.
It’s the fact that deep below all his bitterness and resentment, he misses his best friend.
“Yes Satoru, let’s watch a movie”.
He looks at Satoru’s first real smile since God knows when and feels himself copying him.
It’s a start.
Later, when the movie has ended and Satoru is asleep next to him, he feels a ripple in the air surrounding them. Slowly, his fingers unsteady, he reaches his hand to caress Satoru’s hair. He feels featherlike strands on his fingertips and a happiness so big it warms his whole body.