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Gojo’s cheeks are flushed, his lips parted, eyes blown wide; It’s unreal, he’s unreal, pretty even under shitty bar lights that make halos around his head and draw out the line of his cheekbones, the shine of his eyes.
The lights are messing with his hair, spilling over his frame, shifting subtly across his features as he bobs his head to the pop song playing over the speakers - he must recognize it, which is odd, because he doesn’t listen to much music other than what Geto shows him, and Geto doesn’t recognize this one. Or maybe he’s just lost in it, the music, the lights, the flood of people.
Gojo usually enjoys gatherings like these, everyone at a bar, the music, the feeling of getting lost within the flood of putting on a show for the night.
He doesn’t look like he’s enjoying anything though, an absent stare, the light bob of his head throwing hair into his eyes that he doesn’t brush away. He orders another shot, and flinches when the bartender’s hands brush his own. Contact. He’s flinching at the physical touch, the same physical touch that he shouldn’t be able to feel.
Suguru takes the seat beside him, trying to not make the concern etched into the lines of his face as clear as they likely are. “Is your infinity down?”
“Yeah…” His voice is already slurred, eyes half lidded and cheeks pink. He doesn’t elaborate. He’s bitten his lips raw. They’re chapped and bleeding just a little. Geto is always just a little bit unnerved when he bleeds, because it comes out red and warm when he has known to expect something godly, golden.
“Okay… why?”
“I- Too much. Exhausting. Don’t wanna.”
They’ve been working him like a dog lately, mission after mission, and Suguru has seen it. He’ll leave early in the morning, and come back shirtless, with gauze across his chest, waist, shoulders, and say nothing before he collapses into Geto’s arms.
He’s the strongest, but Geto has seen it, the truth: he’s really just a little kid, even at twenty, whining for candies, or to sleep in, or for Geto to sleep with him tonight because he doesn’t want to be alone.
He was never allowed to be a little kid, in a sense, so Geto gives him that, and simply revels in the childlike reverie that lights up in his eyes.
It’s a kind of delicateness, in a way nobody can see, because he hides the way his eyes waver and his lips tremble underneath glasses and a glass of vodka, lifted to his lips and burning down his throat before Geto can stop it.
“Are you okay?” Geto attempts to put a hand on his shoulder, but he can see the muscles of Satoru’s body tense in anticipation of the contact, and he doesn’t want to touch him if he will be tense.
“Yeah, I’m-” Someone bumps into him from behind and he flinches, biting his lip. His teeth are red when he finally relaxes, painted with blood.
Geto drinks him in, bloody lips and the slightest show of sores under his eyes, angelic white locks falling into his eyes. He’s so pretty, even in distress, like the kind of masterpiece that painters spend all their lives trying to recreate - but they can never get the eyes right, the flecks of blue, or the certain red of the bloodied lips. They cannot recreate such pain, such tragedy, just as they are incapable of creating such beauty, he thinks, but he might just be buzzed and stupid in love.
“No you’re not.” He pulls his fingers to Satoru’s lips, wiping away the blood with delicate precision. He only succeeds in smearing it, painting the lips even redder than before. Perhaps if he licked the blood off... “Look. You’re bleeding. And you flinched, when I touched you. And you’re slurring your words and your cheeks are flushed and I don’t know why you let yourself get so drunk,” he lists off, in a soft voice, as if he’s trying to coax a wounded animal towards him, assuring that he is not here to harm. After a feeble attempt to clean the blood off Gojo's lips, has to fight the sudden, perverted urge to bring his bloody thumb up to his own lips, swipe his tongue across the taste just to see if Satoru bleeds sweetly too, even if red like everyone else. He wipes his thumb on a napkin.
“Look Suguru- I’m really fine. Okay? It’s like, I can live without infinity. I’m tired, and I can’t put it up, but it’s not like I’m weak, like I can’t handle the touches.”
You’re not weak, Geto wants to reply. You are so, so strong because you're tired and yet you came here when Shoko asked, just to attempt to smile. Instead he just places a hand on Satoru’s thigh, eyes stony and unreadable. Gojo hisses and winces, shifting uncomfortably in his seat. He draws blood from his lips once more when Suguru presses into the skin, rubbing a thumb over his inner thigh, the intimate movement rephrased as a dare, as something to prove. “You’re not okay. More than anything, you need to understand that it’s okay to not be okay.”
He goes quiet. Another shot burns its way down his throat soon, and then two. “My infinity. It won't work right. It’s messed up, Geto, I’m overused.” He pauses, stumbling over the words, choosing what to say carefully. “I’m weak. Right now, I’m weak.” Another shot, another finch at the touch of the bartender's hands, and then again, “I’m weak.” He says it like he’s scared of it, words falling clunkily out of his mouth, and he recoils from them the moment they leave his lips. This candidness could only come from Satoru when he’s drunk, or when he’s with Suguru alone.
“Can’t you activate it whenever? Or is it…” He doesn’t want to finish his sentence, in fear of Gojo recoiling from him, so he draws his hand away from Gojo’s thigh, already feeling the loss of warmth that accompanies it.
“I can. I could do it now.” He pauses, then sighs, fingers tightening around the empty shot glass. “But I don’t think I should. I don’t know what happens when I overuse my abilities under stress.”
“Then don’t, yeah? Just stay at home, take a break for a bit.”
“The thing is…” He’s pausing, the careful precision he reserves only for secrets, false composure. “It doesn’t matter if I get better.”
Geto keeps quiet, the silence an urge for Gojo to continue.
“Because I’m so sensitive - to touch, like, that isn’t harmful intent - I don’t know how I’ll handle it in the future,” he says. “I don’t want to be weak. I can deal with all the attacking touches, being fought with, but something so simple… I can’t have my one weakness be something so trivial as normal contact.” He’s always had a large ego, why wouldn’t he? A member of the prestigious Gojo clan, the first in centuries to be born with both infinity and the six eyes (the first in centuries to hold the burden of the world on his shoulders, the first in centuries to be taught that any sensitivity is weakness, the first to be abused like this, to have all his weaknesses drawn out of him by torment, and then tormented further for being weak at all). He’s bitter, that something so small could unravel him. That the one weakness of a god could be what no mortal would ever fear.
“I could-” He has to choose his words; he can’t say I could touch you so well, watch you unravel, revel in the sensitivity. I could hold you down and force you to take it till you’re begging for touch, even, begging underneath me. I could show you how good the contact would be. “...Help you. Come over to my place tomorrow, and let’s see how you take it without infinity.”
“Take what,” he sighs, and the way his voice slurs, softened by alcohol at the edges, is so tragic (so beautiful) that Geto cannot help what comes out of his voice next.
“We could try it - intimacy. Start small and…” He can’t do this as sober as he is now. He eyes the half-drank shot sitting in front of Gojo, and he downs it, then orders two more and downs those too. He ignores the pain as it burns down his throat (he hates alcohol, so much, but the place Gojo’s lips touched tasted so sweet that it was bearable). “And if you ever find the right person too, you’ll know how it goes.” He leaves it unsaid, but the romantic implications linger thick in the air, like the haze of sweat and alcohol and shitty pop music banging in his ribs.
Gojo’s eyes narrow at ‘the right person.’ Perhaps he has his eyes on someone then, Geto thinks sadly. He has to order and take a shot and simply promise that he’ll revel in touching Satoru before he has to leave. “Why?”
Because I’m stupid, and a little bit drunk, and I really want my hands on your porcelain skin before someone else gets there. “I can't stand to see the Gojo Satoru so miserable. It’s pathetic,” he scoffs instead, because there’s no right way to tell your best friend you love him, especially if he might love someone else - it might all break apart, their friendship, and even if he wasn’t deathly afraid, he doesn’t have the right words for the swelling in his chest, and this dirty bar’s walls don’t deserve such a feeling.
“Okay.” Nothing else, and nothing else for the rest of the night, or the car ride home. He’s oddly sober, but his cheeks are still flushed, and his eyes blown wide. By the end of the car ride, his lips are the color of the cherry candies nanami keeps in his car to deal with Gojo’s sweet tooth and blood, painting his mouth and tongue such a pretty crimson, flashing bright against his blue eyes.
When they drop Gojo off, his protectiveness hits him hard in the stomach, looking at Gojo’s hazy, half-lidded eyes (still so bright and beautiful it hurts to look straight at him). “Keep some painkillers and water with you for the hangover, and make sure to not drink anymore and don’t eat-” Shoko cuts geto off with an exasperated sigh.
“Are we going to drop you off? Or are you two lovebirds busy? ‘Cuz I'd like to get home soon.”
Geto’s face heats up, and he’s glad it’s dark and nobody can see. “Shut up, Shoko. The only person sober and even slightly worth listening to here is Nanami, and even he’s still being bitchy because Haibara’s unconscious in the backseat.”
She winks at Geto. “Oh~ someone doesn’t want to be outed for being next-level down baddddd,” She smirks.
He just rolls his eyes and looks back at Gojo. “And come over to my place, okay? Anytime works tomorrow, so just drop by whenever.”
Gojo just nods, and Geto can see the exhaustion seeping through his skin, eating him up.
He tries (and fails) to ignore all of Shoko’s comments about “a date.”
She doesn’t know when to shut up when she’s shit-faced, though, and slurs out, “Soooo… What's planned for tomorrow,” eyebrows raised suggestively.
“Just hanging out,” he deflects.
“Just use protection, okay?” There’s genuine concern in her voice, which is all the more embarrassing, so he whacks her on the shoulder.
“Shut up, Shoko. It’s not like that.” He’s red.
“M’kay. But do you want it to be like that? I see the way you look at him.” She lets out a drunken giggle and gestures for Geto to pass her a cigarette. “Like he fucking hung the stars or something. Like you worship him.”
He doesn’t say that he must have rearranged the stars when he was born, that he must have been so bright that the stars felt dimmer, that his body is an altar, himself a god, that he’s the epitome of everything divine and beautiful and that he spends hours imagining how he’s worship that body, with his hands, teeth, tongue, leave kisses as offerings, touches as divine symbols of something grander. “I’m an atheist, and you know that.”
“He looks at you the same way. Like you’re everything good in the world.” Suguru knows better than to hope that shit-faced Shoko is telling the full truth and that he really does have a chance, so he simply sighs.
That tragic, beautiful, godly thing that is Satoru, will be his if only for tomorrow, and he says that he’ll take hold of tomorrow, but the words feel empty, echoing back in a hollow room.
He should have realized then how hollow touching Satoru would be, all the ephemeral joy overshadowed by the knowledge that it was simply an arrangement, training or practice.
He should have known that every thought of Satoru would have felt more shameful once he knew how shameless he could be.
He should have known that knowing how good Satoru felt, tasted, would have made his unattainability even more excruciating.
But when he’s looking at Satoru, he can’t draw to mind what he should know. It all goes blissful and empty and Satoru, in the moment, becomes all that matters.
And that’s how he feels now, with Satoru pulling out the sake, pouring two glasses that are filled up just too much to be excessive.
“Can’t do this sober.” He eyes Geto the whole time he pulls out the drink, vision darting to him and away, like nervous fish in a great blue ocean. His cheeks are already flushed, his shoulders tense.
“Are you okay with this? I mean, I know you’re touch sensitive, and I just want you to know that-”
“I’m not weak.” His eyes wilfully focus on Geto, on his hands, resting uselessly at his thighs.
“No. You’re not.” You’re the strongest person I know. It’s not even the six eyes, god, it’s the way you smile and the way I hear you choke on your own sobs sometimes at night because you can’t cry, even in front of the person closest to you, even while they're asleep, and maybe you should let yourself be weak for a while. Like always, he has so much to say, and no way of articulating his words, of shoving them past his lips.
“I’m not.” It’s like he’s testing the words in his mouth, rolling a lie around to see where it fits, where it’s soft enough to bite into.
“Do you want- I mean, what do you…” his hands attempt to reach out, but they fall back again to his sides, itching to feel. “Should we go to the couch?” He’s glad he didn’t say bed. He wanted too though.
“Yeah. That works.”
Their conversation is so idle. There’s none of the witty banter, none of the looks they exchange, every word fitted neatly into a single glance. Geto can’t even read Gojo’s eyes; the shades are thicker than usual, and what he can see is simply Gojo’s vision darting nervously this way and that, only looking at Geto to flit his eyes away right after.
The air is stagnant, heavy with implication. It feels suffocating. Not a single breeze, or a word carried through the air, and it stays in this confused, molasses-slow state until Gojo speaks up again. “I don’t want you to feel- If you’re doing this, for me, I don’t want you to feel obligated and…” The sake burns a path down his throat, and Geto tries not to follow the addictive motion of the swallow, down the strong column of his throat. “If you don’t like me… like that. I don't want you to think you have to.”
He doesn’t know how to tell Gojo that he does like him like that and more, that he’d let Gojo cut out his own heart just to see how pretty the red of his blood looked cradled by Gojo’s slender fingers. “I would do anything for you.” The words carry a hollow sting that Geto did not intend, reverberating against the walls of the sterile apartment.
“Thanks.” He replies like the words are unfamiliar. Perhaps they are. When else, from who else, would the strongest ever need a favor. “But like, you’re not obligated to like, fix me or whatever, y’know?”
“What’s there to fix?” He sits down on the couch and beckons Gojo to sit next to him. “You’re perfect.” Oh, shit, he overstepped. He waits for the recoil, for Satoru to draw back, but he never does, blue eyes flitting from his hands to his waist to his jaw.
“Thank you,” this time more genuine, and Geto can let out the breath he’d been holding.
“First and last day you’ll ever get a compliment from me, so enjoy the feeling,” he jokes, in an attempt to break the ice, but he knows it’s not true. He knows how many times the word pretty falls out of his lips.
Gojo sits next to him, keeping a line of space between them, as if waiting, like a predator for his prey. Or maybe, likely, he’s just scared. Maybe he feels like he’s at the bottom of the food chain at this very moment. Maybe he feels vulnerable. Geto shakes off the thought. “Then compliment me again, if I get them today.” It's not teasing. It’s genuine, inquisitive as if he’s waiting to know what Geto’s going to say.
“What do you want to be told then, if it makes you feel better about having infinity down,” he smirks.
“Don’t say it like that… I feel fine.” God, that pout is adorable. Geto wants to kiss it off his lips.
“Well then… pretty, gorgeous, but you get that too often. They’re not adequate words of comfort.” From too many people, says the ugly, possessive thing in the back of his head. He’s learnt to ignore it, and his self restraint is phenomenal, particularly around Gojo, because he needs that kind of self restraint for all the intrusive thoughts he has.
Gojo grins slightly, though small, and Geto can see him warming up just a bit. “Oh, so you agree that I’m pretty then~”
Flirtation. It’s a joking routine they've built over the years. Geto can handle this, it’s familiar. He takes a gulp of the sake though, just so everything feels a little lighter. “I never said that. Other people find you pretty.” He smirks. “It’s likely the eyes, blue. Flecks of the stars reflected in the sea or whatever. The thing that artists try their whole lives to recreate. Or something.”
“Poetic. And I don’t assume all these ‘other people’ gave you this poetry.” The flush on his face gives him away, despite his confident words. Geto feels that slip of his sanity, that wonderful blankness filled with nothing but Satoru, Satoru, Satoru.
And that ‘wonderful’ blankness is what causes all the following mistakes of that night, he realizes when thinking about it later (because of course he thinks about that night, it’s all he thinks about) and all he can do is be remorseful that he drank too much (it’s not the drink, he's making excuses and he knows it. He’s drunk off Satoru, his eyes, his lips, his skin). “I’m not a poet. I just know. When it comes to you, I can guess what the poets would say.”
“Then what would the poets say about…” He pauses, choosing each word carefully. “About you.” Geto can tell it’s not what he meant to say, but he can’t tell what the original words were.
He pretends to think, but in reality, all he can think about, all he knows, is how the poets would speak of Satoru, how the saints would say his name like prayer. “I’m not sure. What would you say?”
“I’d say they’d make fun of your fuckass bangs,” he says with a slight laugh. “But also they’d say something about your eyes, I think. Like, sharp and violet, in this pretty, dangerous way. And about your hands, like, strong and scarred… but gentle.” He looks down at Geto’s hands, quickly coming back up to look at his eyes, just to instantly dart away. “And maybe something pretty about those shitty bangs, but I doubt it.”
Geto can see through the facade that Gojo is putting up. By making fun of him, he’s trying to draw attention away from all the sweeter, softer words. He should humor Gojo, ignoring the compliments, but he’s too drunk and too far in love and his head is too empty to be rational. “My eyes, you called them dangerous. What about them is dangerous, then?” He shifts so his knee is bumping Gojo’s thigh, watching in grotesque fascination how he tenses, then untenses, teeth working at his plush lips.
He inhales before replying, “That’s too many words to decipher.” He presses till him and Geto are knee to knee, shoulders bumping.
“Is this okay?”
“It feels better with you than with the strangers at the bar.”
The swell of pride, hot in his chest at the statement, should feel shameful. It doesn’t. “What should I do next,” he asks, tone sweet and soft.
“Whatever you want.”
Ah, but it’s not that simple. If I did whatever I wanted… I can’t do that to you, so soft and sweet and sensitive.
He knows, though, one appropriate thing that he’s been wanting to do for a while. He tilts his head to lock eyes with Satoru (looking into those big doe eyes, pretty like the sea and the sky and the size of the fucking moon). “You really should stop biting your lips. It’s a bad habit.”
He brings his finger to Gojo’s parted, bloody lips, and in response, Gojo gasps, eyes somehow even wider than before, like those of a doe (a deer in headlights). The sound is a fragile, broken thing. It is Geto’s new favorite sound (or maybe second, or third, because Satoru's laugh and Satoru’s voice are still so, so beautiful).
When he pulls his thumb away, Gojo is still tense, shoulders stiff, knee bouncing - hitting Suguru’s thighs to a beat his heart matches. “Was that okay?”
“I don't think anyone has touched my lips before you.” He brings a hand to his lips, touching the bloody area that Geto had just touched. “I don’t think anyone would have, for fighting purposes.”
“You didn’t answer. Was that okay?”
He blinks, once, twice. “Could you do that again?” and then a third time, long white lashes brushing the high line of his cheekbones. “I- I need to get used to it.”
“Relax your shoulders, to start.” He puts a hand flat on Gojo’s knee, pressing his palm against the fabric of his jeans. “And don’t bounce your leg.”
“Right…” His muscles are still tense.
“Hey, remember, it’s just me. Who am I?”
Gojo looks confused, but he answers, “Geto.”
“What does that name mean to you?” You know me, he tries to say, in reassurance of the familiarity they’ve built. He has to remind himself that the answer is friend, that all this touching is simply a trial run, the question a word of comfort, that Gojo will not answer the way he wants him too and that his heart is stupidly naive because it beats just a little faster.
He wants nothing more than to know what Gojo is thinking, but his blue eyes are a blank slate, and no response comes out. “Do it again.” A pause. “I need to get used to it.”
“Okay,” is all he can say before he runs a thumb across Gojo’s lips again, pressing into the bloody part. “Ah. It’s still bloody. Let me get you a napki-”
Gojo places a hand on his thigh, firm and tentative all at the same time. “Stay.”
“Okay,” he repeats. All his words simply hollow echoes of his feelings, his rationality lost because Gojo’s lips are so soft and just a little but chapped and he’s so fucking pretty like this that Suguru could lose his mind.
He whines, a purely animalistic noise. “Again.”
And it escalates. A thumb on the lips becomes a thumb in his mouth, tracing his teeth from canine to canine, running over the pad of his tongue till he chokes on his spit. And then there’s the alcohol, turning them stupid, so stupid that Geto leans in and now he’s sucking on Gojo’s bottom lip, blood on his tongue, and Gojo’s making all these obscene noises that drive Geto fucking insane.
“I- fuck,” Gojo breathes out, eyes hazed over with unspilt tears, overstimulation messing with his senses.
“I’m sorry, did I do too much,” he asks, deviously innocent. He licks over his own bottom lip, and tastes Gojo’s blood. It’s not golden, not honey-sweet. It’s red, human, the bitter taste of copper. He wipes away Gojo’s tears with the pad of his thumb, reveling in how even that tiny motion makes him freeze up, a guttural ‘please’ leaving his kiss swollen lips.
“No. It helps. I think I’m probably better at touch,” replies Gojo, fidgeting with his fingers.
Oh yeah. Touch practice. That’s what this was again, Geto thinks, realization slowly seeping into his alcohol and Gojo addled mind. I overstepped again. It was too much. Shit, I could have ruined our friendship, what was I thinking? “Uh… I’ll get going then. I hoped this helped.” His tone is so cold, so diplomatic that it hurts even him. It hurts more to see Gojo wince at his words.
“Goodbye.”
Geto can hear the faint sounds of ragged breathing as he steps outside the doorway, and he has to remind himself that it isn’t his place to go check on Satoru.
This isn’t the last time they do this. Gojo calls, every once in a while, and it always ends in them sprawled out on the couch, lips sweet, nothing but the sounds of ragged panting and broken gasps (more often Gojo’s than his) bouncing off the clean lines of the apartment. Every single time, that same shameful thrill runs down his spine.
From: Sats <3
Hey
Quick question pls :>
To: Sats <3
Istg Sats if u give me some dumb fucking “do you believe in like, the kappa” type question I will skin u alive
From: Sats <3
Nah, nothing like that
At least today lol
I went outside and stuff w infinity down
And it was still overwhelming so…
Idk only if u fw it yk
Like, i dont wanna force u or anythinf
He can’t do this again. He knows he can't. He knows this will only lead to a downward spiral in which he’s disillusioned that Satoru is his, which will make it all the more painful once he realises he isn’t
To: Sats <3
Yea ofc
Anything for u
The message feels so raw; it’s far too intimate, too revealing.
To: Sats <3
See u tomorrow then
And u owe me like, ramen or smth later for this imao
The ‘…’ typing bubble stays there for five whole minutes, an ominous prophecy of the modern age, he supposes.
Nothing worthwhile comes up once the message comes. A simple ‘cya,’ devoid of the stupid kaomojis and emoji overuses of Gojo’s texting style.
He rolls over in bed, holding his phone in his hands, waiting for a notification that never comes, till he falls asleep to the memory of his lips on Gojo’s tongue.
He wakes up filled with more shame than anticipation of the next day.
He wonders how Satoru wakes up after each time. Not shame, he isn’t one to be bashful. And not anticipation either, because for him, it’s just practice.
If anything, Geto would guess a morbid curiosity. He remembers the near-eagerness of Gojo in the past, Gojo kissing back fervently, pressed against the side of the couch, body begging for contact.
Curiosity, that’s all, physicality as a disguise for something as simple, something as cold as training.
That’s what he has to tell himself at least, as Satoru greets him by nosing into his neck, lips barely brushing his skin. His hands rest in the air around Suguru’s hips, as if unsure of whether to touch or whether it would be too much.
“Eager, are we?” The flirtatious words barely cover the crack in his voice, the drawn in breath he has to take to push the words out with an exhale.
“Haven’t been touched in a while. An’ it feels…” he trails off.
“Nice,” he offers, not wanting to see the struggling furrow in Gojo’s brow.
“Yeah… like- being held or like, uh… it’s kinda stupid, but I feel like a kid? Uh, except I never got this as a kid.” He steps away from Geto at this.
Simply curiosity, touch starved physical desire. He says, over and over again in his head, like he’s too scared to believe otherwise, he wants your hands and lips and friendship and no more. “So…”
He inhales, smiling softly. “Thanks. You’re a great friend to agree to something like this.” The words, no matter how well intended, break Geto's heart. He said it, friend. And I know that. I know that, so why is it so maddening to hear?
“No problem. What are friends for, after all?” The word tastes bitter on his tongue, a scathing, burning feeling taking over his chest and mouth as he spits it out in a false display of amicable intention.
“Uh, shit, you showed up early. I haven’t showered yet, or brushed my teeth for that matter, but you, like, practically live here, so settle in, grab a soda, whatever.”
“What’re the options this time?” He’s not going to drink anything; he doesn’t think he can push it down.
“I think I have sprites and cokes, and some capri sun from Choso’s lil’ bro’s birthday, but they’re like 6 months unrefrigerated so drink at your own risk,” he grins.
“That’s disgusting.” Geto’s smiling anyways.
Gojo sticks his tongue out at Geto (pink and wet, and so soft when it presses against Suguru’s own tongue).
“You’re like a child,” he scoffs in reply. “Now go brush your teeth, that’s gross too.”
He just laughs and turns around, walking away into the bathroom to leave Suguru alone with his thoughts.
Or, thought, singular, because the only thing on his mind is Satoru.
His eyes, like the sea and the sky and those blue raspberry candies always on his tongue - it’s a stupid flavor, Suguru argues, because what the fuck is a blue raspberry, but he likes them anyways because they taste like Satoru (because now he knows what Satoru tastes like) and they look like his eyes. Stupid reasons to like a candy flavor named after a fruit that doesn’t even fucking exist.
And his lips. Chapped and swollen and sometimes a little bloody from the constant abuse of his teeth, but soft. So soft, and plush, and the prettiest pink known to man, with this perfect little pout that practically begs to be bitten at.
And his hair, soft as Suguru runs his fingers through it. And perfect skin and a perfect smile and, god, if Suguru doesn’t want to ravish that pretty little smile till it’s bruised red.
It’s all he can think of, and the only thing he’s not allowed to think of all at the same time.
He’s abruptly interrupted - good, his thoughts were spiraling too far downwards - by Satoru walking out - bad, because holy fuck.
Gojo’s still pushing his shirt over his head, so Geto gets to see, if only for a moment, the bare plains of his abdomen, the dip of his v-line leading underneath the waistband of his shorts (Suguru wants it so bad, to trace down that line, to splay his fingers over Satoru’s bare abdomen, hold him down as he begs, kissing him sweet and slow and agonizing).
Finally the shirt lowers over his form with a final languid movement of his arms, but it does Geto no better to see Gojo’s head peek out. His hair is dampened from the shower, and water drips from it down the strong column of his neck, pooling in his collarbones, exposed by the wide neck of the shirt, hanging loose enough on his frame to engulf him (he looks so soft).
There are droplets of water on his ethereal eyelashes, and all the light makes rainbows across the shine of his eyes - angelic.
And the shirt, oh, the shirt is Suguru’s because he knows damn well that Gojo doesn’t listen to American music, or much music nonetheless, but here he is in a loose, black Nirvana shirt, worn by use (Geto got that at a concert. He’s not sure how it made its way into Gojo’s closet, but with the way their lives are intertwined, it’s highly plausible). That ugly possessive thing, the one that tells him to take and take and take, rears its head to eye Gojo up and down.
“Hey,” he says with a languid stretch. Geto swears that it has to be intentional because the shirt stretches out against his chest, riding up on his abdomen in an absolutely mouth watering, borderline sinful display, too perfectly painted to be accidental. “You’re staring.” That stupid grin. “See anything you like~” When he plops himself down next to Geto, his loose gym shorts ride up on lean, smooth thighs and Geto has to run his lips over his mouth and swallow hard to remember how words work.
“That’s my shirt.” A statement, because that's all he can force out right now. Playing it cocky, he thinks, because he’s too embarrassed to be as vulnerable as yesterday, but Geto’s too embarrassed to say that out loud.
“You want it back?”
Geto takes in the way the shirt, too large for Gojo, slips off his collarbones and nearly off a shoulder, folds pooling around the narrow line of his waist. “Keep it. It looks good on you.”
“It’s super,” and he draws out the word super, exaggerated lilt to his voice “comfy!” Then he looks down, in a sweet, coy display, before whispering. “And it smells nice. So it feels nice to wear.”
Oh, he’s wearing Geto’s shirt because he’s comforted by it. Because Geto comforts him, in such a vulnerable moment. It’s sweet, achingly so, and Suguru has to remember that his delirium is simply a dream. He cannot lose what friendship they have by overstepping, but it’s difficult now that Gojo’s in his shirt, smelling like 5-in-1 shampoo (he’s disgusting, and doesn’t deserve such perfect hair, as Geto always says) and something sweet and maddeningly, uniquely him. He’s simply glad to know that he comforts Gojo, as all best friends do, Suguru, he reminds himself. “You can have my cologne if you like it.”
“It’s not about the cologne.” Geto doesn’t read into that in order to keep his sanity.
Geto coughs and smiles, a false grin in order to pretend that he isn’t losing all thought function at the mere idea of sliding his fingers underneath Gojo’s (his) shirt. “So, pretty, where should we start today?”
“I mean, whatever-” he pauses. “You called me pretty.”
Shit, retreat, retreat, retreat, blare the alarms in Geto’s head. He decides (or rather, his lack of brain to mouth filter around Gojo decides) to ignore them. “What, do you like it, pretty?”
“I- uh…” he attempts shifting around, but when the line of space is broken between them and their knees bump, he freezes and abruptly stays put. “Feels nice… like, a little piece of comfort. Uh, wow, I just can’t believe you’re admitting it…”
“What are friends for?” Again with that word. He hates saying it, yet says it anyway, to remind himself of where they stand: purely physical, in order to help Gojo. Overstepping would be taking unfair advantage of Gojo.
“Yeah.”
“So, gorgeous, what do you need?”
Gojo looks like a deer in headlights. “I mean, just get me used to touch.”
“You’re the one who called me over, so is there anywhere where you’re more sensitive or-”
“Yeah. I tried to recollect the last few times.” An embarrassed flush spreads over his cheeks at the notion of yesterday. “And I think I'm mostly sensitive at my torso and neck and legs, like, mostly my upper legs. And lips, so, ah… I just thought that that would be useful information.” The flush creeps down his neck.
“Do you want me to touch you where it’s too much, then, or where it’s easier?”
Gojo’s lip is already red and swollen from abuse. “Maybe just work your way up?”
“Tell me if you’re uncomfortable, okay?”
“Yeah. And- and I’m sorry for burdening you with something so awkward and intimate.” Sorry sounds odd out of the mouth of someone so unapologetic. “Again, you’re a really good friend for being willing to do this, just to help me.”
“I guess we both get compliments today then, pretty boy.” He picks up Gojo’s hand and bumps their knees, starting off with slight contact so as to not overwhelm him (it takes all of Geto’s willpower to simply start small, but he’ll start. He’ll start wherever, end as friends, whatever it takes to keep Gojo in his life, no matter the way).
Gojo nods, and Geto takes that as an invitation to rub his thumb over the knuckles, pausing at each groove to see how his fingers fit into it. Gojo shivers a little when he unfurls each finger to rub circles into the palm, feeling the give of skin underneath his insistent presses. It’s reverent, a show of devotion in the gentle, careful attention he gives to just the hand, worshipping each tiny bit of Satoru’s skin.
“I- uh,” his breath hitches. “I feel comfortable with my hand now. I think I'm okay there, y’know, like, less sensitive, uh, so you can move on.”
Geto hums in acknowledgement, turning to face Gojo. He drags a single finger across the length of Gojo’s arm, fingernails just barely scraping the skin below the hem of the shirt sleeve. The air around them seems to still; everything in the world boils down to this for Suguru: His hands running over Satoru’s bicep, slipping under the sleeve of his shirt to run over the pale, flushed skin. “Are you sure you want to do this sober?”
“Yeah. I can’t always just be drunk.”
“Then get comfortable however you need.”
Gojo, tentative, gets up and moves forward to straddle Geto’s hips, slotting onto his lap. “This might be more comfortable.” He tries a cocky smirk, but it wavers, not as solid.
Geto takes in the compromising situation, bracketed on the couch by Gojo, thighs touching, chests nearly brushing, intimate in a way friendship isn’t. He’s doing too much, he knows he has to stop before he’s addicted (he’s already addicted). “Gojo… I know you didn’t have friends in the clan, or many real friends before me and Shoko, but I-”
“No, I have some…” He fidgets with the collar of Suguru’s shirt, biting his lips to a pretty cherry red. “I have some amazing friends. Who’d be willing to do anything for me, and I- I’m glad for that.”
“I know but… this,” he sighs, “This is too… too intimate, and Gojo, I don’t know your scope, but I- you should know, at least by now, that this isn’t- it isn’t right.” It isn’t right for Geto to take advantage of Gojo, to misuse Gojo’s naivete.
“What’s too intimate, Suguru? It’s practice.” Red, a drop of it clustering at the dip in the middle of his bottom lip.
“This.” And just like that, he shoves Satoru against him, gripping at his waist. Gojo trembles underneath his touch, lips parted and eyes watery, as Geto slides a hand underneath his shirt and over his abdomen. The final blow is delivered when Suguru dips a finger into the waistline of his shorts, running over the skin of his hips. “Friends don’t do this, Satoru.”
“Ah- I, it’s just experimental,” he stutters out, and the flush on his cheeks and his pout are irresistible, and he doesn’t know what else to do but fall in love again.
He kisses Satoru, kisses him like it’s the last time because he knows it is. He can’t bear the guilt, the knowledge that it’s all false, the tension between them at every small touch when Gojo’s infinity is down.
He will not let himself lose the friendship he cherishes, while at the same time too afraid to lose the opportunity to touch Gojo once more.
He runs his tongue across the seam of Gojo’s lips, tasting the copper tang of blood, the sweet taste of candies, Satoru’s spit and everything in between.
Satoru’s wanton whining, loud and shameless sighs and gasps echoing around the room, drives him insane. Ah- Suguru- please as he kisses him harder, teeth and desperation crawling into the final kiss, thumbs still brushing careful and gentle over his hip bones through the fabric.
When he pulls away, Geto is panting, and the telltale tears of overstimulation are welling up in his eyes. He’s squirming around Geto’s lap, flushed down to his neck, lips spit-slick and swollen, eyes blown wide. It’s an ethereal painting of ruin, of destruction and creation, both born of desperation.
He fights the urge to lean back in, exercising the self restraint he has honed day after day of knowing Gojo. The self restraint that is now struggling to stay intact. “Friends don’t do that.”
Gojo opens his mouth to say something, then closes it, the only sound between them their ragged breaths.
“Okay? Friends don't do that; they don’t make out drunk while straddling the other, and they don’t wear each other’s clothes, at least not like that, not that pretty, not that infuriatingly, because god, even the things we do as friends they drive me fucking insane. So don’t do this.” He quiets. “Dont do this to me.” He places a final peck (this is the last one, he tells himself, the last one for real) on Gojo’s lips, soft and chaste and sweet. It’s not a confession, not a true one, but it feels raw nonetheless.
“Am I?”
“Are you what?”
Gojo gets off his lap, sitting instead on the opposite side of the couch, and the distance tells Geto all he needs to know. “Am I driving you insane?”
“Yeah,” he breathes.
“And, and all this time, I thought you were driving me insane, because fuck, Suguru I hate being touched but with you it’s just like, it’s too much and too little all at the same time, and it all-”
“Don’t.” He gets up and grabs his keys. “I have to go now. I told Shoko I’d meet her to help her cheat on her dissertation.” Gojo flinches at his coldness, and he wants to say that he doesn’t mean it, fall at Gojo’s knees and kiss him breathless again, but he’s too scared to do that, and doesn’t know how to create the distance he needs to keep his sanity while still being nice. He doesn’t know what to feel, whether he should finish up his half confession, or call it all a lie, so he runs with his tail between his legs and the taste of Satoru on his tongue.
From: Sats <3
Ur not mad at me right?
Read: 1:53 AM
God, he really is an asshole.
The next time they meet is at another bar, two weeks later, at one of those parties thrown by people who know people who know you.
Geto finds Gojo’s eye by accident, and it’s too late to leave like a coward, so he simply watches from afar. Gojo doesn’t approach him until drinking an obscene amount of alcohol (Geto may be drunk, but Gojo is drunk).
“Hey.” His voice is the same deep and smooth melody as always, but something vulnerable mixes in with his slurred, drunk speech, and the facade cracks.
“I- Satoru.”
“You’ve been avoiding me.” It’s a statement, a fact that leads way into a question.
Geto doesn’t know what to say, so he simply leaves the sound of shitty pop and people’s laughter lying in between them.
“It’s less overwhelming. It still is, but less. But now…” He pauses with a hiccupy giggle.
“Now what?”
He doesn’t have time to think as Gojo’s fingers wrap around his wrist (surely he can feel how fast Geto’s heart is beating), leading him to the bathroom (single stall, surprisingly clean for a place like this - that is, fucking disgusting but at least there aren’t roaches that he can see).
He hears the door click locked behind him.
“But now…” He pushes Geto up against a wall, shivering giddily at the contact. Gojo’s trembling all over, oversensitivity fighting against his impulsivity. “Now it doesn’t even matter if I get used to anyone’s touch but yours.”
Geto’s heart goes too fast, thumping to the rhythm of the muffled music from the bar. “Mmph-” He can barely get out a muffled sound before Satoru is kissing him.
It tastes like alcohol, and there’s too much saliva and their noses are bumping when he takes breaths through his nose, all he can smell is the dank, rancid, bathroom. This is wrong, it’s all wrong. Gojo moans somewhere in the back of his throat.
He pulls away, received by a whine from Gojo’s end. “Why’d you pull away~”
“Sats, I’m drunk. You’re absolutely shitfaced. We’re best friends.” He sighs, tucking a strand of white hair behind Gojo’s ear, a movement far too tender for a moment so painful, so messy. All of his attention is drawn to the way Satoru’s fingers brush over his temple, the shell of his ear, in soft warm movements that leave him trembling more.
“Don’ wanna be best friends,” he pouts, and even in the dull lighting of the bathroom, his lips look deliciously plush. “Wanna- wanna…” he trails off into a sob. It’s a sad, stifled sound. No tears spill over.
“Sober up, Satoru.”
“I love you,” he says into Geto’s lips, murmuring the words against his mouth. His breath reeks of alcohol, and his words are slurred, and that grounds Geto enough to not be lost in this fantasy. He bites at Geto’s bottom lip, licking into the kiss. “Wanna touch you…”
His fingers find their way to Geto’s button up shirt. It’s clumsy, the way he undoes the buttons, fingers brushing Geto’s collarbones and neck as he shakes and fidgets trying to undo the shirt. He whines when it doesn’t come off smoothly. “Stop, please. Not now, when you’re drunk, in a dirty bar bathroom. Friends don't do this, any of this, any of the things you had me do in the past few weeks,” his voice comes out bitter.
“You don’t love me?” He looks like a wet cat, pathetic and overstimulated.
“More than you know.”
“Then why won’t you touch me? Not practice, not a lie, not chaste,” he says, mouthing at the line of Geto’s jaw, teeth scraping the skin in a way that’s so indecent it feels incredible.
“Because you’re drunk. And we’re friends.” As if that’s enough to justify his fear, because really he’s running not to keep a moral high ground, but to keep Satoru next to him, to stay in this happy friendship they’ve built: his comfort zone.
“I want more. You want more, so…” he finds a spot below Geto’s ear to sink his teeth into, sucking on the spot so it leaves a mark.
“It’s not that-” he breaks off in a strangled moan, the sound dirty, echoing off the bathroom walls. “Not that easy.” Now the pain stings again at the junction where his shoulder meets his neck and he’d be ashamed if it didn’t feel so good when Satoru laves his tongue over the bite mark. He shoves Satoru’s chest, putting some space between them. “And stop that. If people see- this, they’ll assume the wrong things.”
“Is it really wrong?”
He pinches the back of his hand to keep himself from allowing him to hope, just to have his heart broken for nothing but a drunken one night stand, nothing worthy of Gojo. “You’re drunk.”
“But why would I lie,” he whispers. “It’s so clear I’m in love with you.”
Geto turns around, clicking the door unlocked, leaving Gojo in the bathroom. “Take whatever time you need alone.”
“Don’t want to be alone.”
Geto sighs and looks back. He shouldn’t, but he must. To look back is to love, surety is his stability, despite the unstable situation. “I love you."
Gojo doesn’t chase after him.
When they drive back, Geto’s in the backseat with Shoko, with Utahime at the wheel as their designated driver. Gojo’s going in the other car, Geto made sure of it.
Shoko, ever the loudmouth when drunk, grins at him. “So… you and Satoru finally hit it off then~”
“We’re just friends, Shoko. I don’t know what gives you the impressio-” He cuts off with a strangled gasp when Shoko presses her finger into a blooming bruise just under the line of Geto’s jaw, received by a laugh from Shoko.
“Then was he biting you as a friend,” she laughs, poking again to see Geto wince.
“Fucking sadist. You didn’t have to poke the bruise,” he scoffs. “And we are friends. It’s just, it’s complicated.”
Utahime pokes her head back. “So you’re telling me, he always hangs out with you, laughs at your every joke, stares at you like you hung the stars, asked you to touch him experimentally, you made out multiple times, and, on top of all that, he confessed to you and now you have bite marks going up the side of your throat.” She raises an eyebrow. “I fucking hate him, and yet I can still read him better than your oblivious ass.”
“He was drunk, and it was just a favor, and really…”
Shoko looks at him earnestly. “Do you love him? Lets not ask about if he loves you, ‘cuz you won't take yes for an answer.”
“I don’t-” he sighs. “Yeah. He’s the prettiest person I've ever met, and sweeter than honey and those eyes are so, so pretty, and he’s got this one laugh, Shoko, that he does around me and…” His drunken rambling only results in judgmental looks from the other two.
Utahime scoffs. “I don’t see how you could fall in love with him of all people. But just confess. You’re so dense, it’s insufferable to all us third wheels.”
His phone chimes, and Shoko gives him a knowing look.
From: Sats <3
Heu im soery
Didnf mean 2 weirf u out
aplogees
Shoko laughs, “‘apologees,’ really? He’s even drunker than me.”
“You see, that’s why I don’t-”
“But he’s still so obviously in love with you, Suguru. So just- just talk to him once he recovers from that killer hangover he’s gonna have tomorrow morning.”
He hypes himself up all night for the next morning. He’s not ready anyways.
He shows up to Satoru’s apartment that day empty handed, wondering too late if he should have bought roses, or chocolates (it all seems so corny, so inadequate for the swelling truth of his feelings).
“Hey, uh, Satoru? Can we talk?”
Gojo runs his fingers through his hair, ruffling it up. He’s so pretty even like this, groggy and wearing Geto’s Nirvana shirt that cuts off just above the hem of his boxers. Geto swallows and attempts (failingly) to banish images of him running his hands over the exposed plains of Gojo’s thighs. “Look man, I’m sorry about yesterday. I was drunk and stupid and if you don’t like me back I get it but I hope it doesn’t ruin our friendship and-”
“Did you mean it?”
“What?”
“Did you mean it when you said you loved me? Do you regret those words?”
“I regret them,” he starts. “But I won't take them back.”
“And when I said I love you, do you think I meant it?” His voice is achingly tender.
“I think you regret it too.”
“But did I mean it,” he asks, breathless, half waiting to see if Satoru wanted it like him, half waiting for confirmation of his feelings, as if they’re all too surreal for him to know alone.
Finally they bare their hearts, veils taken down, and the moment is terrifying yet exhilarating all at the same time. This is the end, the place where their story stops and starts all at the same time. “I hope so,” Gojo says, and for now, hope is enough.
Their lips are on each other in moments, Suguru’s hands gripping at the collar of Satoru’s, or rather his own, shirt, pulling him close to kiss him slow and deep.
It’s a confession, a final acceptance of the feelings that have been bubbling up between them for the weeks they had their hands on each other.
Satoru whines, pulling away when Geto presses in too hard.
It feels so much better sober.
“You’re so sensitive, baby,” Geto purrs, trailing his hands inward to brush over the sharp lines of Gojo’s collarbones. “So reactive…”
Gojo whines, biting down on his lip to muffle the noise.
“And all this time you were driving me mad, calling it practice, and god do you know what it did to me.” Gojo’s trembling too much to get a word out, Suguru’s hands on his collar being the only thing holding him up. “All those noises you let out… all the smiles, and wearing my shirt and all the stupid shit you did to my head.”
Gojo’s hands thread delicately through Geto’s hair, a soft sigh escaping his pink lips. They’re reddened with abuse, a pretty color.
“Do you know the things you do to me? How scared I was of losing you?”
Gojo’s hand shakes when he brings it down to Geto's cheek, but he powers through the contact nonetheless. “I didn’t think- you were so scared, and you ran away, and I thought you didn’t love me back and-”
Geto cuts him off with a light, soft kiss to his lips. “We’re idiots.”
“The worst.”
“This was so long overdue.”
“Now you realize that,” Gojo pouts, but Geto only laughs and kisses that pout off his lips.
“I’m sorry.”
They end up on the couch, Geto laying on top of Gojo, trailing kisses down his neck.
Gojo’s lip is trembling, his breathing hard and heavy. “Ah- Suguru, my neck is- sensitive…” Gojo pants, as Geto drags his teeth down the column of Gojo’s throat. He smiles against the skin of Gojo’s pulse point, peppering especially gentle kisses over the fast heartbeat.
Geto makes an innocent hum in the back of his throat. “Then we need to practice, don’t we, ‘Toru? I’m doing you a favor.” He adds, “I’ve got nothing to lose, now that I don’t have to worry about losing you.”
“Fuck you,” Gojo replies, but Geto can hear the smile in his voice.
“You should leave your infinity down more often,” he murmurs.
“Not if you abuse that right like this.”
“You love it.”
Gojo sighs, laughing softly. “I love you.”