chapter 14: moonlight and riverside

cw: explicit sex scenes, mentions of death, hallucinations and lots of guilt and sadness

Two weeks after he dies (technically, almost, sort of), Satoru has sex for the first time. Two weeks after he is offered godhood and rejects it, he lets someone touch him in a way a god should never be touched, lets them push him onto the ground, run their hands his hair, lets them undress him and enter him and cause him pain and give him pleasure that Satoru has never felt before. Two weeks after Satoru truly realizes that he could become god, he lets a human (the strongest human, sure, but still a human) stretch him in the crosshairs of worship and defilement, lets a human own him so completely that even he is frightened by the responsibility.

"Are you," Suguru pants at Satoru's ear, his fingers buried in Satoru's hipbones, his chest sticky against Satoru's back, "are you okay?"

"Yeah." Satoru gasps when Suguru's hold slips and he accidentally pushes in too quickly. Suguru quickly scrambles to regain his hold, the grip slippery with both of their sweat. The summer night is hot and so humid it feels like they're fucking underwater, and Satoru desperately wants the pressure to release, convinced it will feel like the first breath of fresh air after nearly drowning. "I'm okay, Suguru. Go."

Suguru doesn't listen; he waits several seconds, as if he knows that Satoru is searching for some pain that Suguru doesn't want to inflict. He lets Satoru adjust to him and then slides in slowly, centimeter by centimeter. One hand slithers around to touch Satoru's cock, as if to comfort him in a way they are both familiar with, but Satoru knocks his hand away.

"No. Just focus on fucking me, Suguru."

Suguru scoffs. "Can't deal with people being nice to you, huh."

"I don't need your fake niceness right now."

He presses his lips to the back of Satoru's neck. "Suit yourself."

He slides in fully and Satoru can't resist letting out an uncharacteristic yelp, feeling the burn as his muscles stretch around Suguru's length. The little mean, punishing streaks Suguru is so good at hiding come out once in a while when he's annoyed, immediately chased by regret and remorse. It's predictable clockwork. Suguru's hand wraps around Satoru's neck and strokes it apologetically, pulling him gently back so that their lips meet and he swallows Satoru's noises as he begins to move inside him. His grip at Satoru's hip will surely leave bruises tomorrow, and it excites Satoru to know that someone will have left marks on him, willingly, marks to stay because Satoru won't use Reverse Curse Technique on them because they are injuries that Satoru welcomes, that Satoru consents to because no one will ever be able to touch him again.

Lightning shoots through his forehead, through his throat, down his torso, down his leg, and Satoru suddenly loses all strength in his body and collapses onto the mattress, face buried in his pillow.

"Satoru!"

Satoru doesn't say anything. The abrupt shift causes Suguru to slip out of him slightly, and Satoru wants nothing better than for him to be buried back inside, filling him, stretching him so that the pain Satoru feels is the one he wants, not the phantom pains of being stabbed in the neck and head and everywhere else—fuck, how could he be a god, crippled by a fucking monkey—

"Satoru." Suguru's voice is low and soothing, aloe gel on a searing burn. His touch is scorching and Satoru wants to be baptized in it.

"I'm fine," Satoru croaks, even though his vocal cords are crushed. "Just keep going."

Suguru doesn't listen again. He pulls out completely, ignoring Satoru's curses and instead rolling Satoru onto his back so that they are face-to-face. Strands of silky black hair have escaped from Suguru's hair-tie and frame his flushed cheeks. Satoru could feel Suguru's heart pounding when his chest had been pressed to his back, but now, basked and bare in moonlight with glistening muscles like one of Satoru's wet dreams, Suguru looks surprisingly composed.

"Don't be a brat." He kisses Satoru carefully, then trails his lips down Satoru's neck, lingering right in the center of his throat. Of course Suguru knows—he's always watching when Satoru abruptly touches his neck or head like he needs to be reminded that the skin and underlying tissues are whole. Suguru's teeth worry the skin, over the scarred place with no scar, and he sucks, sure to leave his own mark. Satoru buries his hand underneath the waves of Suguru's damp hair, holding him in place until he no longer feels the sharp, deep-seated throb of a dagger destined to kill him and instead only feels his best friend (is he allowed to think lover?) leave a bite. The phantom pain fades and Satoru lets out a sigh as his body relaxes. When Suguru feels the tension release underneath him, he scoots back up and hovers over Satoru's face.

"You okay?"

Satoru combs Suguru's hair out of the way. "Yeah."

"Want to keep going? We can stop if you want."

Satoru responds by wrapping his hand around Suguru's cock and giving it one deft stroke. Suguru jolts.

"Fuck you, Satoru."

"Yeah," he grins, "that's what I've been tryna get you to do this whole time."

"You're such a piece of a shit."

Suguru kisses him again, this time roughly and openly as he readjusts them so that Satoru's hips are lifted and his legs are wrapped around Suguru's waist. When he is satisfied with their positioning, Suguru re-enters him, a bit hastily compared to before, but maybe Satoru deserves that. His fingers dig into Suguru's back and he pulls him so close that Suguru is the only thing that occupies his vision, Six Eyes and all. If there were an option for this to be a mode for his Six Eyes, just on-and-off, Satoru would like that, so that he can just permanently see Suguru bearing over him, eyes dark and fixed on him, sweat dripping down his skin, bangs clinging to his face, muscles tense and contorted as he thrusts in and out of Satoru. The burn is so fucking good, the push and pull and sensation of being filled when Satoru has felt so empty and hungry for his entire life; he wants to laugh and cry all at once, but he doesn't, he just breathes and hangs onto Suguru and moves with him like he's chasing a high.

"Shit, Satoru," pants Suguru, "I'm not gonna last much longer."

Satoru instinctively tightens himself around Suguru and he loses it, spilling inside Satoru with a string of, "Fuck fuck fuck," that Satoru swallows into his mouth. Suguru rests his forehead against Satoru's with his final shallow thrusts, and Satoru studies his expression like it's the only thing he will see for the rest of his life. When Suguru opens his eyes, blissed out and smiling, Satoru's heart feels like it skips three beats. He does not know if he has been defiled or anointed, but it does not matter. Suguru is the most beautiful thing Satoru has ever seen, the most precious sight his Six Eyes will ever witness.

"You okay?" Suguru asks.

Satoru pushes his shoulder lightly. "Stop asking that. I'm not gonna break."

Suguru's mouth twists, apparently reminded that in actuality, Satoru can break. "Yeah. I got that." He pulls out of Satoru with a squelch of come and lubricant and settles back on his knees. His slender fingers wrap around Satoru's still hard dick. "I'll finish you off. Hand or mouth?"

"Wow, how generous, what escort service do you sign with so I can make sure to send a good review—"

Suguru scrapes his nail under Satoru's length and Satoru arches off the bed, words caught in his throat as his body comes alive with pleasant shocks.

"If it were me, I'd prefer mouth," says Suguru dryly as he settles into a swift stroking rhythm, "but only because it shuts you up."

"Haaah," breathes Satoru, his fingers and toes curling into the sheets, "I'm just that good with my mouth, what can I say."

"Only good thing about it," mutters Suguru. "Just shut up and come, Satoru."

It doesn't take long for Satoru to follow the order, just a couple good pumps and he spills over Suguru's hand, babbling some incoherent nonsense, as his vision goes white and he feels it, that brief, temporary high, surrounded by clouds and the heavens, before he blinks and he's back on earth, in his not-human, not-god body, but with the only thing that his not-human, not-god heart loves.

Suguru comforts him for a bit, then cleans him off with a damp towel and tosses it in the laundry hamper. He returns from the bathroom clothed in a pair of boxers and with another to offer Satoru, which he declines.

"Too hot," he complains.

"Yeah." Suguru sits down on the mattress while Satoru catches his breath. Suguru retrieves a cold grape soda from the bedside mini-fridge for Satoru while he himself sips on a bottle of water. The summer night lingers like a stagnant pond and silence yawns like a lazy cat. The soda is perfectly sweet and cool and fizzy, the sheets are soaked in their pleasure and work, and the room smells distinctly of Suguru.

Satoru never wants this moment to end.

"Did you mean it?" says Suguru abruptly.

Satoru turns to him. "Huh?"

"What you said just now. You said..."

"That it was too hot?"

"No, you idiot. When you came. You said you..." Suguru studies his bewildered expression, then realizes that Satoru has no idea what he's talking about. He exhales. "Never mind, Satoru."

"Wait, what'd I say? I just came my brains out, did I say something stupid?"

"Nah."

"Tell me."

"Nah. It's a secret."

"How is it a secret of a thing I said but that you can't tell me?"

Suguru shrugs before finishing his water and lying down next to Suguru. "Sucks to be you."

Their beds are too small for two teenage boys over one-hundred-eighty centimeters to be sharing. Satoru doesn't think he'd want it any other way. Their hands interlace and they both stare up at the same ceiling but see different things.

"For what it's worth," says Suguru after a long stretch, "me too."

"Huh?"

"In case you remember what you said in the future. Just know. Me too."

"This is the worst."

"You're the worst."

"Well you just fucked the worst, so joke's on you."

"Apparently, I have shitty taste, so that seems consistent."

Satoru snorts. "Tell that to my parents. You just got to fuck the Gojou heir. You're fucking welcome."

"I offered to bottom!"

"That's not even the point, you jackass."

He rests his head against Suguru's shoulder, and Suguru tightens his hold.

"Hey, Suguru."

"Mm?"

"That day." The day I died. The day Amanai died. The day I almost became a god by collecting my offerings. "I only stayed for you."

"...What do you mean?"

"I would've killed them all if you hadn't told me not to. That's the only reason I'm still here."

Suguru is quiet for a long time.

"Satoru, did you think of anything before you died?"

"Huh?"

"When you were stabbed through your throat. When you were bleeding out. What were you thinking about?"

Satoru tries to remember. "Well, I guess when my throat got crushed, I stopped trying to fight back. I just focused on learning Reverse Curse Technique—I knew it was my only shot, and if I learned it I wasn't gonna die. So that, I guess."

"Hm. I suppose that makes sense."

"Were you expecting something else?"

"No, not in retrospect." Suguru debates something internally, then decides to speak it aloud. "You know there was a good moment where I thought you'd died, Satoru? When that man showed up and he told me he'd killed you. And then when Morimoto-sensei found me. I thought you were dead. And I..." His voice trails off. "It was really horrible. I have never felt that before. That's what I thought you were referring to, when you said you'd stayed. Stayed on this world."

Satoru shuffles onto his side and drapes his arm around Suguru's shoulders. "Hey, Suguru. I'm never gonna die."

Suguru rolls his eyes. "Really rich words from someone who literally died two weeks ago."

"No, seriously. I've awakened. I'm never going to die." Satoru sits up on his elbows so that his face hovers over Suguru's. "I'm never gonna leave you, all right? You don't need to worry about that."

Suguru bares a thin smile. "Don't make promises you can't keep."

"I won't," he says confidently. "I'm never gonna leave you in this world alone. No one has that ability to take me away from you except for me. Trust me."

Suguru does not look more comforted, but he relents as he typically does. "All right, Satoru. I do. Go to sleep."

Satoru kisses him and they settle next to each other, sleeping under the same ceiling on the same bed, dreaming different dreams.

Ten years from now, Satoru will sleep under the same ceiling and realize he'd made a promise that Suguru hadn't wanted. He will finally remember the secret of what he'd said aloud, and he will remember the "Me too" and he will feel it and believe it and want it desperately, but it will not be enough.

In the end, it is not the god who abandons the human but the human who loses faith in a god he never wanted.

The god will sleep alone, as all gods should on earth.

"You're leaving, Yuki-san?"

Yuki's golden hair looks white before sunrise, like Satoru's. Yuna's body feels like it is hanging on by a single thread, perhaps spun by a spider, because only that can explain why she can muster the strength to move at all. She watches as Yuki slips off her side of the mattress and pulls on her sleeveless white tank-top and buttons her cargo pants. Yuna has always hated that Yuki's beauty is wasted on such ugly clothes.

"Yeah. My flight's going to leave soon. Have to get to the airport." She turns to Yuna. "Come with me."

"I can't."

"What this entire event should have taught you is that Gojou Satoru is not enough. If you want to do something about this world, the answers lie outside of Japanese jujutsu society. Get away from them all. Come with me."

"I don't want to do anything about the world, Yuki-san."

"We could get rid of all curses, Yuna. How is that not something you want?"

Yuna is not sure Yuki even really wants that. She doesn't know what Yuki wants. Ideas of grandeur, power to change the world. Just because Yuki wants to get rid of all curses does not mean she wants to do good.

"I don't know. Curses have never been the issue."

Yuki mulls over this, then climbs back in bed with her.

"If curses aren't the issue, what is?" Yuki presses her thumb against Yuna's lips gently, then down her chin, a stark contrast to how brutally Naoya had handled her earlier. Yuki tugs on Yuna's lower lip, as if reminding her that only hours earlier, she'd had Sukuna's finger in her mouth. "Humans? Sorcerers?"

"Broadly."

Yuki leans her forehead against Yuna's. "The Three Great Families?"

Something wicked, like hellfire, burns in her stomach. The stone in her gut, ever-present, ever-weighted, catches on fire and seethes through her; this reaction is new, since Toji-san died, every time she thinks of him, of the Zen'ins, of the Kamos.

(She does not remember from where this stone was birthed, from aching, gaping emptiness, from sorrow, a gift from a man on a park bench, his blood streaked on his chin as they pressed their blood together and swore a vow and she'd felt for the first time a desire to touch that scar on the left corner of his mouth and ease a wound she'd never asked the origins of.)

"Their power," says Yuki, catching sight of the fire and only eager to fan its flames, "comes from the fact that curses exist, Yuna. What is the point of sorcerers if there are no curses to exorcise?"

"Shouldn't that apply to you, too?"

Yuki grins. "Doesn't that seem consistent, me working hard to put myself out of a job?"

She wraps her arm around Yuna's waist and pulls her in. She kisses Yuna gently, like a butterfly landing on an open flower, and Yuna returns it dutifully.

"Come with me. If you do, Zen'in Naoya can never touch you again."

"I think Gojou-kun will take care of that."

Yuki arches her eyebrow. "He wasn't the one who took care of you this time, right?"

"I suppose not."

"Fine. One to one. Take your time." Yuki's fingers curl around a strand of Yuna's hair. "When you're ready, come to me."

"How will I ever be ready? I have students, Yuki-san."

The Special Grade laughs, amused by the trifling restraints Yuna imposes on herself. "Fuck them. When you feel like burning it all to the fucking ground, Yuna. You'll know you're ready then."

Yuna becomes ready sooner than she expects.

In the slums near the Edogawa River, the summer heat traps and lingers like a festering boil. Mitsuko's migraines are always worse in the summer, and if she were the selfish bitch she normally is, she would be in her air-conditioned apartment right now, popping painkillers and plastering a cucumber mask on. Instead, she's sweating through her nice silk tank-top, her head pounding with every step she takes.

It has been a long time since Mitsuko has ventured all the way out here—she has strong men on her payroll to do her dirty work at this point—but in this particular situation, for this particular tenant, strong men are as easily snapped as dry twigs. Zen'in Toji has always responded best to firm but supple handling, that of a stern reed that can mold into twine, malleable but unbreakable. Mitsuko is well-versed in this type of handling. Rent can be paid in different ways, and she is confident she and Toji will be able to find a compromise that satisfies them both.

It is not unlike Toji to be late on his payments. His vices are costly, and the pressures of the material world amount to little in the face of his nihilism. Still, it's one thing for Toji to be late; it's another thing for him to ignore Mitsuko entirely. Toji, for all his unreliability, is reliable in strange ways. They have an unspoken pact: when one calls, the other answers. After nearly two weeks of texts gone unanswered, Mitsuko had finally called him, only to be directed straight to his voicemail. If Toji has gone underground or fled abroad, he would have told her. Only she knows where that son of his is, after all.

Which is why Mitsuko has left her penthouse apartment in Roppongi to travel all the way over to Edogawa to find exactly what Toji is up to, and if needed, to bail him out of whatever trouble he's landed himself in again. Mitsuko knows he's involved in something shady—probably does one-off jobs for the yakuza to pay off his gambling debts—but she doesn't need to know the details. Ignorance is bliss.

She avoids eye contact with the staggering drunk in the hallway and walks up to the second-floor apartment.

"Oi!" She bangs on the door. "Toji!" There is no response. She bangs harder. "Toji! Open the fucking door. It's Mitsuko. You're late on rent. Are you fucking dead?" She waits three seconds, then unlocks the door with her master key. "I gave warning, I'm coming in."

She pushes open the door and is greeted by the foul smell of spoiled food, rotten eggs, and there, frozen in the center of Toji's sun-filled apartment, is a young woman Mitsuko does not recognize. She looks in her early twenties, with long, straight hair pinned neatly back, her face carefully made with the barest amounts of powder and lip stain that do not fully hide the dullness of her skin or sunken cheeks. She is dressed well, in a cream-colored dress that looks freshly ironed, though seems a size or two too large on her. In her arms, she carries a plain, black urn.

Mitsuko stares at her, and the woman stares back.

The woman does not fit in this squalor. She looks too prim, too young to be Toji's type. But Mitsuko asks.

"Did Toji hire a whore?"

The woman blinks slowly. She has large eyes, so dark it's hard to discern what is pupil and what is iris, and if Mitsuko stares in them long enough, the abyss threatens swallow her whole.

"No."

"A girlfriend? Surprised you know where he lives. You're a bit young for him, aren't you?"

The woman ignores these questions. "Are you Toji-san's landlady?"

Mitsuko bristles. "Yeah, I own this building. Who are you?"

"I'm…" The woman thinks over her words. "I'm just here to pay his rent."

Mitsuko glances at the woman, then down at the urn she is cradling against her belly, then back up at the woman. The stranger doesn't seem dangerous. Mitsuko thinks she could take her in a fistfight. But something about her seems off. Her eyes keep flickering past Mitsuko, as if she can see something behind her, and Mitsuko swears there are ink markings peeking through the sleeves of her dress. Maybe she has more spine than she appears to have. Maybe Toji was fucking her after all.

Never mind the warnings. Mitsuko has never been called a coward. She strides into the room and sits down on the couch as if she owns it (she does, she'd bought this couch for Toji back then). "Where's Toji?"

The woman looks at the urn. "He's dead."

Mitsuko stares. "You serious?"

"Yes."

A vein throbs in Mitsuko's forehead. Her headache pounds. "You're a real conversationalist, aren't you? What happened? Was it his family? You a Zen'in?"

"No. It wasn't. And I am not." She pauses. "If I were, you would be dead."

"Then who the fuck are you?"

"I...my name is Yuna." She gives no last name. She gives nothing else.

"And?" demands Mitsuko. "How'd you know Toji? Why do you have his remains—seriously, don't you think you should be giving me a little bit more than what you're telling me now, for all I know you killed him and—"

"I am unclear as to why a landlady needs to know details beyond where the rent is," Yuna cuts in. She sets the urn down on the edge of the coffee table and reaches into her bag to retrieve her wallet. "I will pay the rent. I am happy to take over the lease." She takes out a stack of bills, crisply pressed and beautifully straight, and hands them out to Mitsuko, who is tempted to knock them away.

"I'm not just his landlady. I was his wife."

Yuna's hand stills for a brief moment. She blinks, then presses the bills into Mitsuko's hands.

"Fushiguro-san?"

"How did you—"

"He told me he took his wife's name." She thinks for a bit. "I assumed you were dead."

"Why would you think that?"

"Because I didn't have another good reason to explain why Tsumiki-kun and Megumi-kun live with no parents."

Mitsuko feels her heart stop. Never mind how she appears; this woman is dangerous. Toji would have never told anyone about Tsumiki and Megumi—hell, Toji doesn't remember who Megumi is half the time—never mind this strange, blank woman who carries around ashes like she would an infant and who can utter the name of Mitsuko's child like a threat. She can feel it too, the judgment this woman holds for her, and what's worse is that Mitsuko doesn't really have a great excuse other than—

"Toji told me it would be safer if we left them."

She does not add that she'd taken the excuse gratefully. She'd been young when she'd had Tsumiki, too young, some would argue, and she wasn't ready. Tsumiki was a wonderful child, easy as they could come, but Mitsuko had been a burden to her parents and their dreams and Tsumiki felt like that to Mitsuko's wild, exciting lifestyle. She wanted the freedom, the luxury, the feeling of no responsibility, and when Toji had said that the kids would be fine as long as Mitsuko sent them money, Mitsuko believed him. Tsumiki was a good kid, able to take care of Megumi, and the community surrounding them in Saitama was safe and supportive, Mitsuko believed it would be fine.

She wanted, desperately, for it to be fine.

Yuna hums. "Him, certainly. You." Her eyes flicker up to above Mitsuko's head. "Maybe not."

"I send them money," snaps Mitsuko.

"They ran out last week."

"You...I..." Mitsuko stands up, the cash gripped tightly in her palm, ready to be hurled like a weapon, but Yuna does not budge. Mitsuko's vision spins and her head threatens to split in two. "Who the fuck are you? Are you...are you Megumi's mom?"

It doesn't seem possible. Yuna looks too young to be Megumi's mother, but Toji had said his family had kids at freakishly young or old ages.

"No." Yuna puts away her wallet and reaches for a worn, wooden staff nestled against the television stand. It is taller than her by two heads, but she manipulates it easily. Several strips of washi paper with unintelligible calligraphy are wrapped around its ends. "Toji-san and I met through work."

"Are you yakuza?"

"No. But maybe not far off in terms of danger that it poses to you." Yuna whirls the staff expertly and points it at Mitsuko. "The less you know, the better. Please hold still. It will make this easier."

Mitsuko backs away. Holy shit, this woman is going to kill her. This thin, waif of a woman can somehow spin a wooden rod nearly twice her size and is going to split her head open, literally, because it's already splitting metaphorically—what the fuck, Toji, this is not what she'd signed up for, in fact, this is exactly what she'd guessed she was running away from when she signed those divorce papers. She looks to the kitchen counter and grabs the first thing she sees, a rotten apple, and hurls it at Yuna, who merely sidesteps it and slashes her staff right at Mitsuko's head. It swipes above the top of her head by several centimeters. Mitsuko is rooted to the ground.

Yuna takes a step back and does not make a move to attack again.

"Is your headache gone?"

Her mouth has gone completely dry. Her heart is pounding and the rush of blood floods her ears, but at Yuna's question, Mitsuko realizes.

"Yes," she says, stunned. She brings a hand up to her forehead. "I...how did you know?"

A single washi seal burns at the tip of Yuna's staff. "Part of my work. I have done you a favor, Fushiguro-san. Your headaches are gone. In return, please rent this apartment to me. Please also burn every connection you have to Megumi-kun and Tsumiki-kun and pretend that you are childless. You have effectively lived this way for some time now, it seems, so things will not change much."

"Tsumiki." Mitsuko swallows. "Is she safe?"

"I have kept them safe." Yuna says this so simply that Mitsuko believes her. "Whether I will continue to do so, I haven't decided."

"What do you mean?"

"I did Toji-san a favor. He did not do the same for me."

"Did you kill him?" whispers Mitsuko.

"I did not." Yuna cradles the staff in the crook of her arm. She looks around the apartment, looks outside the window, and takes a deep breath. Something in her expression shifts. "I would not have been able to."

It is a statement of what should have been the obvious. Yuna, no matter how expertly she swings this staff, is nowhere near Toji's physique; Mitsuko had seen Toji splinter four men's heads through dining tables the first time they'd met, when the four men had harassed her while she walked home from the bar. Yuna does not look like she can do that.

But there is something more. For the first time, Yuna's expression cracks, just for a second, and she looks at the urn and cradles the staff like they are the most precious things in her life. The sunlight falls gently on her face and, bathed in golden glow, she looks in mourning. Mitsuko knows, then, what Yuna truly means.

"You really were his girlfriend."

"I was not."

"You love him."

"No." It is the first lie Mitsuko catches. "I do not."

"You know him. I know him. He is a difficult man to love. But I loved him all the same."

"He killed a fourteen-year-old girl." Yuna's eyes flash with something deadly and Mitsuko thinks that she will strike her, but then the moment is gone and Yuna just appears worldweary and exhausted and perhaps not too young for Toji after all. "He died hurting children. Children dear to me. How could I..." Yuna stops. "What does it say about me that I could love a man like that?"

Is it a testament to how terrible Mitsuko is that she is shocked but not surprised? She knew what Toji was capable of and had loved him regardless; she might have even loved him more or it. How liberating it was to see a man truly live for himself and only himself, unchained to expectations, like a wild animal with the sentience to roam free? She knew Toji could kill and get away with it, because what possible law could truly touch him? She does not know the world that Toji really lived in, but she doubts that even that world could fetter him.

"He is damaged," says Mitsuko. "He...he has gone through a lot."

"So have I." Yuna lets out a breath. "Never mind, Fushiguro-san. That should cover the missed month and next month's rent. I will pay the remaining lease in cash if you give me an address."

"What about Tsumiki? And Megumi?"

"They are no longer your concern."

"I am concerned if you put them in danger!"

Yuna clearly does not believe her, but she answers. "I will not let them be in danger. But they are no longer yours to worry about." She goes to the wobbling desk set against the living room window and reaches for the second drawer to find a notepad and a pen. She pushes the objects toward Mitsuko. "Your address, Fushiguro-san."

Mitsuko scrawls it down and hands it back. She glances at the urn.

"Will you keep his remains?"

"I haven't decided yet."

"He...he liked the river. And the sunlight. It's why he chose this apartment."

Yuna hums. It doesn't sound like she agrees, but she doesn't comment on it. Instead,

"I don't think what Toji-san likes matters to me anymore."

If Mitsuko did not feel the same way, she would not have caught the lie.

It is a trite, petty thing, to meet the ex-wife of the man she loved but does not love and to be jealous. But perhaps Yuna is exactly that, a trite, petty thing sitting on an abandoned dock against the Edogawa river, listening to the waves, Toji's ashes held against her chest. All she can think of is how beautiful Mitsuko is, her wavy hair cropped short at her chin, lips painted perfectly in crimson, pearl studs at her ears, buxom body clothed in silk. No wonder Toji was so hesitant in the beginning. Mitsuko has the kind of face that makes the room turn to her, sharp eyes and small nose and full lips, expressive and witty. She is older and mature, a wife, not whatever Yuna and Toji were (colleagues? Bound by a forced vow?). Mitsuko had taken the news that Toji had killed a child with barely a blink. Perhaps that was what her years gave her that Yuna did not have: the ability to reconcile knowledge with expectations.

She knows Mitsuko is right. Toji preferred the open river, the sun shining through his apartment, hated the sound of pelting rain on his too-keen hearing and smell of rotting fish on his sensitive nose. Even if he never voiced it aloud, he changed when Yuna put up the Barriers around his apartment. He was calmer, the raging, writhing mass of hatred and resentment mellowed into something subtle and sometimes even gentle. He liked the faint smell of citrus cleaner and incense, the warmth of a curse-free space, a place where he could not be found. He liked weekend breakfasts, the waft of freshly steamed rice, the sight of Yuna in his clothes. He never said these things aloud, but Yuna knows them to be true, even if they are just her lies.

But Mitsuko is wrong, Toji liked the open river and brightly shining sun but he belonged, whether he liked it or not, under the pale stream of moon and starlight. When crickets chirp and frogs croak and the hustle of the day has died down, when fishermen return home with their daily catches, when the boats are anchored in the harbor and all you can hear is the crashing of soft, foamy waves against the canal. Toji liked the windows open to catch the evening breeze, liked returning home and finding dinner cooked, liked the moments on the couch where he could touch Yuna casually, a reminder that someone was there who asked nothing of him, wanted nothing of him, except for potentially everything that he would never give. He liked taking her to his bedroom, pressing her into the mattress and fucking her more often than not like they were animals, until she was nothing but a wordless mess of tears and spit and release and even then he continued to use her until he was satiated, and he liked her because she let him, because she did not mind.

(Never mind the last night, when he'd fucked her like he loved her, because the morning after, he'd let her go with the most careful of kisses, only to then go and kill a fourteen-year-old girl and a god).

Nightmare's Whim is buried underneath her dress, in her side. It has grown to like Yuna, having been fed her Cursed Energy reliably, realizing that she derives a perverse pleasure from it and vice versa. Though it has grown greedy, requiring more and more of her Cursed Energy for release, it has also decreased the amount of pain it inflicts in favor of amplifying what it knows she is looking for.

"You're seriously debating who knew me better?" scoffs Toji beside her, his one arm balancing him as he leans back against the dock. "You're pathetic, hummingbird."

"Kaa-san," babbles her child, two heads, four-eyes, flopping like a fish gulping for water on her opposite side.

"I'm a fucking open book," continues Toji. "When people have problems with me, it's 'cause of what they expect of me, not because I lied about who I am."

"So you've said," she murmurs.

"You're still so fixated on me killing that girl. And your Gojou-boy. I flat out told you I would."

"Really, sensei?" Satoru's face suddenly appears in front of her, upside down as he leans in close from behind. "You knew he would, and you didn't stop him?" His face is bloody, there's a dagger sticking out of his forehead, and a large one nestled in the hollow of his throat. His eyes are bright, electric blue and manic. "You just let him kill me? And for what? A good fuck? The hope that he would love you? What a fucking joke."

Yuna rests her head on the urn. "It was a mistake."

"A mistake that cost the entire fucking jujutsu world, sensei. An innocent girl is dead. I fucking died. How can you even look at me in the eye?"

"I'm sorry, Gojou-kun."

"Kaa-san," wails the curse child.

"I'm sorry to you too."

"And me?" sneers Toji. He's always the touchiest of her hallucinations, his intestines always brushing her side, his one arm curling around her shoulders and god, she fucking hates herself that she still wants to lean into his touch no matter how bloody. Toji kisses her hungrily and she can taste iron and something vile and more but she kisses him back, cradles his cheek in her palm. She breaks away from him and looks in his eyes, dark green like the richest forest, and she allows herself to miss him, one last time.

"I told you before, Toji-san," she whispers. "I'll see you in hell."

She tosses the urn into the river, where it hits the water with a surprisingly loud crash and bubbles as it sinks. His ashes do not deserve to be buried, do not deserve to be even scattered. Just a single urn, the remnants of the strongest man sealed in a black container, tossed in the river, as if he never existed. The invisible man.

"Rest in peace, monkey." Toji's hallucination is gone, and beside her settles Satoru, dagger still sticking out of his throat, though his voice is crystal-clear.

"Don't call him that."

"I'm you, sensei. You're calling him that." Satoru's hand comes up to her chin and tilts it toward him. Yuna studies him, white hair matted in blood, galaxies shifting in his irises, lips curled in madness. "This means you're choosing me."

She nods. He laughs, and it is sharp and trill and threatens to shatter the moon.

"That's right. Don't you know, sensei? I alone am the Honored One."

They don't go out often, something about that's dumb if you've got a bounty on your head, hummingbird, but sometimes he indulges her and they go out for dinner and then take long walks along the riverside under the full moon and stars so radiant that she can make out constellations. She sometimes points them out to him, but he is not interested, instead watching the water crash into the banks, ever shifting and moving, then returning to the body. They don't talk much, now that she thinks about it, they often sit in silence, but she supposes that's to be expected between two people who talk little and listen much, though for entirely different reasons. She wants him to talk, though. He makes her laugh, even if he doesn't understand why, and she has realized that she loves to laugh, (or maybe she just loves him).

"Hey."

They sit together on an old, rickety wharf, the wood rotting and boards soft enough that she is surprised they bear his weight at all. It is not really romantic. It smells like fish and piss, and tonight the moon is mostly hidden by clouds, but it is only because it is overcast that he has consented to lingering outside at all.

(Something about that's dumb if you've got a bounty on your head, hummingbird, and don't you remember who has to protect you?)

He looks at her strangely. "I got something for you."

She blinks. "Sorry?"

He reaches in his pocket and pulls out a small glass orb. She takes it from him. It's old glass, sea-foam colored, an imperfect sphere with some air bubbles.

"What is this?"

"It's a glass float. Found it on the shore the other day. Fishers used to use these to keep their nets afloat. Not too common anymore."

"Oh." She turns it over in her palm, hiding her bemusement as she studies the object. Her nails clink against the glass and a pleasant hollow sound reverberates. The glass is three tones lighter than his eyes. There are some ridges near a slightly flat bottom. She runs her fingers over the ridges and realizes they are kanji characters.

Hummingbird.

"Cool, right?" He looks pleased with himself. "Whichever glassblower embossed it that way."

"I see."

She grasps the orb in her hands and looks away from him, trying very hard to keep her face straight and her heart from beating, but of course he can hear it.

"Hummingbird, you runnin' a marathon?"

"Please stop listening."

"It's an old piece of glass," he laughs. His hand curls under her chin and forces her to look at him, cheeks burning and heart hammering. "You that happy?"

She wants to die. "Please leave me alone."

"I'll take it back then, if you're so ungrateful. Could probably sell it to some collector, these things can be pricey, y'know."

"No." She holds the glass float away from him. "I want it. Thank you."

He grins at her and it is crooked. "You're welcome."

"I just feel badly," she murmurs. "I haven't given you anything."

He looks at her like she's insane.

"I'll find something." She traces the characters. "I'll think of something."

"You don't need to do that."

"I want to."

"You..." He exhales. "It's not an exchange. Just say thank you and move on."

"But—"

"You've given me enough." When she looks up at him, she swears his ears are pink. She reaches out to touch them, but he knocks her hands away. "Don't be stupid, hummingbird."

"Are you embarrassed?"

"Shut the fuck up."

She laughs at him and he looks like he wants to push her in the river, but she mouths the words, "binding vow," and he rolls his eyes and just lies back on the old wharf that creaks horrifically under his weight. Yuna sits, cradling the glass float in her palms. Briefly, the moon peeks from behind the clouds, and its curiosity shines through the orb, bathed in silver glow.

"It looks like I've caught the moon."

"That's not a thing."

She ignores him. Her heart beat beat beats, the moon pulses in her outstretched arms, and she holds it preciously, turning it gently, so that the characters read up right at her, so that hummingbird and the moon it has caught don't shatter.