Chapter Nine: Wifely Duties and Pretty Babies
2015 – Spring
Humid air filled with the stench of sweat and liquor. Sweat-slicked skin pressed against her back while labored breathing brushed against her ear. Damp sheets tangled and stuck to sensitive skin, trapping her in place. An arm made of iron wrapped around her waist weighing her down as she struggled. Wide dark eyes set in a face too young, reflecting her own fear back at her. Bare feet against hot pavement. Running and crying and vomiting.
"Natsumi-chan."
A large hand shook her shoulder, and she couldn't breathe, trapped, twisted in a tangle of sheets.
"Wake up."
Natsumi opened her eyes, bright blue eyes the only light in the pitch-black room. Her breathing was labored, and her clothes were sticking to her sweaty skin. She could see the barest hint of Gojou's outline in the darkness, crouching next to her with his hand still on her shoulder. She looked around, confused for a moment, still more asleep than she was awake. Her shoulders relaxed, she was where she'd gone to sleep, on the floor of her own bedroom wrapped in a spare blanket. She squinted at the bed, trying to make out the outline of the teenagers she knew were piled there.
"They're still asleep," he whispered.
She nodded, rubbing her eyes, "What time is it?"
Gojou stood straight and shrugged, "Dunno."
Natsumi kicked off the blanket, holding out a hand for him to help her up. He sighed but held out a hand for her, helping her stand out of the tangled mess that had been her bed for the past two nights. Gojou left through her bedroom door, but Natsumi stopped at the dresser against the wall. Her clothes were sticking uncomfortably to her back, and she grabbed the first shirt and pants she could feel before following him out.
She could still feel her heart racing as she changed clothes in the guest bathroom, the residuals of a nightmare she wanted to forget. It had been a while since she'd had that nightmare, she spent a lot of time burying those memories as deep as she could, but it wasn't even surprising given everything that had happened. For so long it had been her worst moment, her lowest low from which she knew there was no coming back. It was trumped by Sumiko dying in a hospital bed.
After Sumiko was okay and the doctors signed off on everything, Gojou took Sumiko straight to Ieri. He didn't even wait for Natsumi to drive them, just teleported straight there. Once Sumiko was cleared, he teleported back to Natsumi's house and proceeded to go back and forth between Jujutsu High, teleporting teenagers into her living room. Natsumi didn't get a chance to talk to him about anything, in the time it took her to drive from the hospital to her home Gojou had filled her house with five teenagers.
It was rude, and inconsiderate, he hadn't even asked if he could. It was lucky that the house wasn't a mess and Natsumi wanted to yell at him, to be upset with him. It had been the longest night of her life, and she couldn't deal with all these extra people when she was so emotionally raw. She hadn't, for so many reasons, but mostly because Sumiko had smiled and hugged the crying foreigner (she remembered finally her name was Emma). Gojou bringing all these kids into her house wasn't about her, it was about them and what they needed. That their friend had almost died, and it was scary, and they needed each other.
Sumiko, Tsumiki, and Emma were piled in Natsumi's bed while Megumi took over Sumiko's room. Unfortunately, Kohaku had ended up in Ichiro's old room since Megumi couldn't be trusted to be in a room with Kohaku unsupervised. The boy had finally apologized to Sumiko for almost getting her killed, and while she'd forgiven him, Natsumi and Megumi hadn't. If it wasn't for Gojou being in the living room, Megumi would have beaten Kohaku half to death already and Natsumi would have paid him for his services.
Natsumi washed her face and brushed her teeth, doing all the little things a person did after just waking up. She'd managed to grab a half-decent t-shirt for a band she'd never seen and a loose pair of shorts, and as soon she was dressed, she headed down the hall shooting a glare at the door to Ichiro's room.
"Do you want coffee?"
Natsumi grunted, and sat at the kitchen table, head leaning on her arms. Even washing her face hadn't fully woken her up though it had rinsed the sweat off her skin. Natsumi peeked at the clock on the wall, it was just a little after three in the morning. It was too bright, and she knew the lights were on more for her benefit, she was pretty Gojou could see in the dark. He could do almost anything.
Except save Sumiko. That had been Getou.
She did not sleep long enough for her to even start thinking about Getou and all his behavior.
Instead, she watched Gojou move around her kitchen because after knowing each other for almost three years he pretty much knew where everything was. He was fully dressed in a blue long-sleeve shirt, not too different from the color of his eyes, and a pair of khaki-colored slacks.
"When did you change?"
He stopped pouring the sugar into his coffee long enough to look down at himself. "I stopped by the school again right after everyone went to sleep. I had to talk to Yaga and deal with the Kamos anyway so I figured, might as well change. They're still pissed, but everyone is still looking for a solution and I heard back from Yuki, and she heard about a cursed tool that can fix things like this from a friend in Brazil. Then that guy said he might know a guy in Peru with access to a tool that can sever cursed energy so really, they should all be thanking me," he was talking too fast, and Natsumi glanced at the coffee pot. How much coffee did he drink already?
"Sumiko said you're not supposed to teleport this much."
"It's fine, I just heal myself as I'm doing it and a little after and everything is fine!"
"I guess," she mumbled, but didn't push the issue further, for now. She didn't really have the right to judge him for… anything really, not when she was letting him believe Getou's lie.
As soon as Gojou made it to the hospital, he woke Natsumi out of a dead sleep, shaking her roughly and calling her name. She had jerked awake, and her eyes had immediately gone past Gojou to the spot where Getou had been earlier. There was no one there, and it had been silly to look, Getou had probably left before she ever fell asleep. Gojou gave her no time to even think about confessing, he'd pull her into a hug, wrapping his arms around her shoulders tightly. She had let him hug her for a moment, her brain still trying to catch up, before she patted his arm. Gojou let her go and told Natsumi his friend had come by while she was sleeping, that his friend had taken care of it and Sumiko would be okay.
It felt like a knife had been twisted in her gut, and instead of telling him the truth, instead of coming clean, she let him believe the lie. Worse, she took advantage of the moment and hugged him again, letting herself cry and take comfort in his presence. She still didn't know if it was relief or guilt that had made her cry.
"Here you go," he set a mug in front of her, holding his own as he leaned back against the counter.
Natsumi mumbled a thank you and sipped the coffee, suppressing her gag as best as she could. She usually added a fair amount of sugar to her coffee, but the amount Gojou had added was obscene. Any other day she would have complained and insulted him, but she had let him believe the lie which felt the same as lying to him. Lying to the man who had spent an entire night searching for answers while she'd fallen asleep in the knowledge that Sumiko was safe. Saved by his best friend. The best friend she knew about and hadn't told him.
"Have you slept... at all?"
He flashed her a bright smile, "You worried about me, Natsumi-chan?"
"Yeah, I am."
His smile faltered for only a second before he fell into his usual theatrics. He tilted his head back, a satisfied smile on his face, "I knew you cared about me."
"Gojou, seriously. You look… you look a little – "
"You're secretly in love with me, aren't you? Let's plan the wedding. I'm thinking next Spring, or maybe the fall. Fall weddings are so nice, but then in the Spring, there's the cherry blossoms and –"
"Gojou, stop."
He laughed and it set her teeth on edge. "He asked if you were my wife."
"What are you talking about?"
"My friend, he asked me, if you were my wife."
"I'm sure that was… very funny," she said slowly, frowning as she took another sip of the coffee. "The nurses called you, my husband."
"You would be so lucky."
Natsumi gave a tentative smile, "A rich housewife, lucky me."
Gojou scoffed, "Is that what you think my mother is? A pretty little housewife? Please," he laughed. "Being the Gojou head's wife is sometimes more work than being the Gojou head."
"Oh, then I decline. That's a deal breaker."
"My mother is weeping as we speak, mourning the grandchildren that will never be."
Natsumi turned the mug in her hands, staring at the coffee, and tried to pretend everything was okay. Tried to pretend that she wasn't obsessively wondering exactly what Getou had said and why. Tried not to think about a not-too-distant memory that haunted her nightmares. "Do you think you ever will? Settle down and everything?"
"Are you proposing?" Gojou sighed at the look on her face, "I don't want to talk about this. I spend… I spend enough time talking about this with my parents and the clan elders. I'm tired of explaining myself to everyone all the time."
"Sorry," she mumbled and looked away from him.
Everything about him was always so bright. The blinding smile coupled with the glowing blue eyes and bright white hair made him stand out so violently. Once, she had hated him for it, resented him and his beauty, the ease with which she thought he lived. She thought she knew exactly who he was, cocky and self-important. It wasn't entirely inaccurate, but it wasn't the whole truth. Gojou was also the kind of person who teleported teenagers into her living room so they could be with each other. The person who woke her up from a nightmare then made her coffee after, even if it was really shitty coffee.
"I thought he killed you."
Natsumi snapped her eyes to Gojou, blue eyes shining, and she couldn't tell if it was his technique or if he was… surely, he wasn't. Gojou didn't cry. "I thought… I thought I would get back and you would be dead, but you weren't. He didn't kill you."
"Why… would you think…" but she knew why he would think. She said her next words with an air of surprise as if she had only just connected the dots. "The friend that you asked to help Sumiko, it's the same friend you talked about at Christmas?"
She hated herself for pretending she didn't know, for lying to the man across from her and really man was such a stretch because he was barely more than a boy. A boy who had the world on his shoulders and had since he was a child. A boy who still pined for his lost friend. She thought of the way Getou had said his name ('Satoru') and thought maybe his friend still pined for him too.
Gojou looked away from her, "No one… No one can know that but… yeah."
"Why did you call him if he's so dangerous?"
"Should I have let her die? Should I have –"
"No, that's not… I'm not upset, I just… I wanted to know why you would call him I guess, or why you trusted him to save her, or I don't know what I'm asking. Forget I asked." She looked away again disgusted with herself because she knew she wasn't just asking to keep up a pretense. It wasn't just about pretending she had no idea who Getou was, she wanted to find out more about him and no one knew more than Gojou.
Getou called her a manipulative woman and he was right. Manipulative and petty and selfish and jealous and angry and –
"He was a good person once," Gojou explained, his voice thick and she thought any moment he would fall apart. "He still thinks he is. He thinks he's doing the right thing. He's wrong, but… I told you he's always been very principled, and I don't know what he would do anymore, but I trust he would save a sorcerer. Especially if it was a child. There was someone we were supposed to save, and we didn't, and she died and then he almost died, and I should have died and then Haibara died," he was speaking too fast again, and he sounded half-crazed.
"I didn't think he would just show up, I thought he would call me first, and then I could bring him there and I could get you out of the room so he wouldn't hurt you. I wasn't going to just let you get hurt. I swear I wouldn't do that, I'm not that reckless. I shouldn't have said the name of the hospital, but I won't make that mistake again. I only make a mistake once, that's all it takes and then I know." Even when she saw Gojou be serious, she never saw this. Never saw him break down, never saw him falter and certainly she had never seen him cry.
"Stop." She couldn't take it anymore; didn't want to hear how he would hold himself responsible if Getou had killed her. It would be no one's fault but her own. Natsumi looked at him again, tears silently slipping down his face as he stared at his coffee. He looked delirious and she was very sure he hadn't slept in days, but he kept rambling.
"He wants to kill all the monkeys. He's fucking insane but he's still him, you know? He's still… I don't want to kill him. I can't. I can't do it, I won't. Not unless he goes too far and I was afraid you were dead because I was afraid I would have to kill him. I'm supposed to keep you both safe and if he killed you then I failed again. I can't fail, I can't. I'm The Honored One. I'm not going to fail, I have to do it all. I'll save everyone…" he continued rambling, his words coming so quickly she didn't know what he was saying anymore.
Natsumi stood slowly as Gojou laughed and rambled to himself. She took the coffee cup gently from his hands, his long fingers wrapped almost entirely around the mug. He let her set the cup on the counter, still mumbling his ridiculous rant that would be more irritating if it wasn't so… sad. It was all on him and he was too young for this, had always been too young. She didn't know if anyone was old enough to have the whole world on their shoulders.
She wrapped her arms around him, placing her palms flat against his back as she hugged him, rubbing soothing circles on his back the way her mother used to do for Ichiro. The way her mother used to do for her before everything went to shit. Before she realized nothing she did would ever be enough. Back when there were 'goodnights' and 'I love yous' and stories before bedtime and snacks and… and all the things a mother did for her child that Natsumi didn't think about. All the things Natsumi told herself her mother did out of obligation, not because she liked her.
"You know," she interrupted both his rambling and her own thoughts because this wasn't about her and her issues. "It's a real shame if you don't have kids because you'd have the prettiest babies."
He didn't hug her back, but he paused his rambling and took a deep breath, leaning his head forward until his forehead was against her shoulder. "Aw, Natsumi-chan, you wanna have my babies?"
"I would rather have a back-alley hysterectomy," she said sweetly, patting his shoulder gently.
He laughed and he hugged her back, arms wrapping around her tightly, "You're one of the few people who don't yell at me about passing on my stupid eyes."
"Well… they are a really pretty shade of blue."
"You know that's not what I mean."
"I know," she patted his hair. His hair was soft, and she'd always hoped it would be rough and coarse because there had to be one physical flaw on this overgrown boy. "You really should go to sleep. At least for a little while."
"I can't stop thinking," he muttered. "If I had said the right thing, would he come back?"
Natsumi shook her head, thinking of the anger that Getou wore so well. The false smile he gave the nurse and the disgusted scowl she saw on him while he walked in a crowd. She thought about a cold void, an empty nothingness, and the chill in his eyes.
She thought of the way she had run away and how nothing anyone said could have made her come back before she was ready. "I… I don't think so."
"How do you know?"
"Because of when I ran away," she whispered. "It's hard to come back… to admit you made a bad choice. Most days I couldn't even admit it to myself. My parents… they left me so many messages, begging me to come back and… nothing they said was going to change it. You have… you have to want the help."
"Sometimes I wonder… if his parents could have talked him out of it, if that's part of why he…"
She knew she shouldn't ask, should let the subject drop. She should tell him again to go to bed. It was cruel to take advantage of Gojou like this. "What did he do?"
"He killed them," he said. "I still don't really get why he did it, he liked his parents. He loved them too, but he liked them and respected them. I met his parents, and they were decent people. Fuck, they moved to Tokyo to be closer to him. It's the only reason they were even here."
Natsumi felt the bile rise, the guilt slithering under her skin. "Why… why would he do that?"
Getou who smiled so gently at children who weren't his, who had sounded almost soft when he told her Sumiko was okay… he'd killed his own parents. Natsumi understood rage and resentment, but she couldn't fathom this.
"They were monkeys," he was rambling again, the words running together, and she could barely understand him. "He said there couldn't be any special exceptions, that they weren't his family anymore and it never made sense and when he said he didn't kill you because you were raising a sorcerer, I thought he was lying to me. I thought you were dead. I thought I would have to explain to Sumiko that I killed you."
She continued rubbing circles on his back, pretending she didn't feel him crying as she did. "It wouldn't have been your fault, you're not… responsible for what other people do. Even if it's him."
"It is," he whispered. "If I'd… been stronger sooner, I would have stopped it all from happening. She wouldn't have died, and he wouldn't have been hurt and we would all still be okay. He wouldn't have left, and... Shouko and I could have fixed it. I knew something was wrong, I should have pushed it –"
"Gojou, stop," she hugged him a little tighter, and she was starting to realize that he didn't just bring the kids to her house for their sake. He hadn't wanted to be alone, and he'd wanted to make sure they were all okay. Afraid that they would share the same fate he and his friends had. "If anyone is responsible for what happened, it's not you. It's not your fault."
"I was his friend, I could have. I knew he was struggling; I never should have let them split us up."
"You were a sixteen-year-old boy that the world was asking too much of. They're still asking too much of you and… I'm sorry if I do that too."
"You don't ask too much; I think you ask the least of me." His shoulder shook as he took a deep breath. "That was the first time I've heard his voice in years, he's insane, but he's still him. I thought he would sound different but he's… he's still Suguru."
She continued rubbing circles on his back, pretending her shirt wasn't damp with his tears. Natsumi wondered how sleep-deprived he was to have a breakdown like this in front of her. Or maybe he just trusted her.
"Gojou, you need to need sleep."
"I can't."
"Come on, I'll sit with you. It'll be okay," she patted his shoulder, and he dropped his arms from around her shoulders. Natsumi sighed when he lifted his head off her shoulder, of course, he looked beautiful even after he'd been crying. There was no puffiness or redness, no snot running down his face. Natsumi dropped her arms from around his shoulders and grabbed his wrist, leading him into the living room.
Gojou choked out a laugh, "You must really feel bad for me."
"Yeah well, you look pretty pitiful."
She could hear the grin even if she couldn't see it, "Careful, Natsumi-chan. I'll start to think you like me."
"I do," Natsumi said, "a little. When you're not being… you know." She let go of his wrist and gestured at the couch, a blanket folded at the end of it, seemingly unused. "I take it back, I made the couch up for you and then you didn't even sleep, asshole."
"That's because you didn't tuck me in! Natsumi-chan, as my wife it's your job – " She cut him off by shoving his shoulder, but he just laughed at her and stretched out on the couch. "You would be a terrible wife."
Natsumi flinched and turned her back to him, fiddling with the remote to turn on the TV. "They wanted me to get married."
"Who?"
"My parents," she flipped through the channels, not really seeing what was on, she just needed to be occupied. "I graduated and I had no prospects, so they were going to get me a job at my dad's office doing something stupid, I'm sure. He was talking about a 'nice young man' who would be such a good influence on me and maybe, maybe, if I played my cards right. If I wasn't too loud and I didn't talk too much and I didn't swear, maybe that guy would marry me, and I would be taken care of."
"Is that… why you ran away?"
Natsumi nodded, "A little. It was a mix of everything but that was the night I left, when I just couldn't take it anymore. Between that and my friend's death and… and the… Whatever, what do you want to watch until you fall asleep?" She sat on the floor with her back to the couch, slipping her legs under the coffee table as she flipped through the channels.
"Natsumi… why did you come back?"
She froze, her thumb hovering over the button as she remembered wide dark eyes and suffocating humidity. "I... I was in a bad situation, and I needed help."
"That's it?"
She shrugged at the disbelief in his tone, "Yeah. I mean there's more to it but... I don't really want to talk about it. I… That was the worst time in my life, and I wish all the time that it never happened."
Gojou sighed, "I'm still hoping he comes back. It hurts, him being gone, and I… I almost forgot the sound of his voice I hadn't heard it in so long. He has never called me back, that was the first time. I don't know why he can't just talk to me."
Natsumi pulled her legs out from under the coffee table and turned slightly so she was leaning her side against the couch. She propped an elbow on the edge of the couch and leaned on her arm, "If he doesn't call… it's not because of you. It's not you."
Gojou was lying on the couch on his side, staring at her, beautiful blue eyes shining in the darkness. She couldn't even tell he had cried at all now, it really wasn't fair. "How do you know?"
"It's… different, but… there were a lot of days I wanted to hear my mom's voice even though I was mad at her. Even though I thought she didn't really love me. I wanted to hear her say it, even if it was a lie." She wondered if it was a lie if maybe her parents didn't like her as much, but they had loved her. Maybe it hadn't all just been out of obligation because she still didn't much like Gojou but holding him and comforting him hadn't been because of some obligation. She cared about him, and she didn't want to see this beautiful boy crumble and cry. "And if I called, she would say it, and it would make me feel better for a minute, and then… then she would ask when I was coming home, and I would have to say that I'm not, and she would have cried or yelled and it would have… would have ruined anything nice we tried to say," Natsumi blinked until the tears welling up disappeared because this wasn't about her.
"I don't know him… but, if he came because you called," and that had to be why, because he heard Gojou's message and he'd saved Sumiko, "then he still cares about you. He's still your friend," the way he said his name, affectionate felt like too small a word, "even if he can't be here because of his own stuff. The not calling and the not coming back and all the terrible things he's doing… it's about him, it's not about you." And really, she didn't think it was even about Getou, not when you put the pieces together because it was two twin girls and the village and killing non-sorcerers and leaving Gojou and it all had to be related, didn't it? And it was also the way, Getou said Gojou's name… Natsumi was pretty sure she'd said a name just like that once, and she couldn't imagine ever willingly leaving that person. Not for something she wanted just for herself. It had to be more, it had to be bigger than that.
It was quiet, the house nearly silent except for the low hum of the television and it made Natsumi squirm. It made her skin crawl, an itch she couldn't ever quite scratch, and she wanted a drink or a cigarette or… really, she wanted more. She wanted to be high and not care about Gojou and to lie without guilt and to not wonder about Getou and to not think about her parents or her brother or a girl she'd never see again. A girl who used to say Natsumi's name the way Gojou said Suguru. A girl Natsumi thought had abandoned her and had left such a hole in her that she'd sought comfort in the worst kind of people. A girl who had been dead the whole time. A girl whose death left a permanent hole she'd never really fill. Not with anything, because she sincerely believed that a person only got one of those. A person only got one and Natsumi's one was dead, but Gojou still had his, Getou was still alive even if he wasn't here.
She thought that maybe she understood what Gojou was feeling, just a little bit.
Natsumi grabbed the blanket at the end of the couch because he'd finally stopped rambling, but his eyes still glowed in the darkness.
"You're really tucking me in." There were those teeth again, all blinding brilliance in a beautiful face with captivating eyes. A boy who knew just how perfect he was. The strongest, but never strong enough in his eyes, because as strong as he was, he couldn't bring his friend back home.
"Yeah, well, wifely duties and all that," Natsumi joked with him as she put the blanket over him and sat back down in the position she had been in before. "Have you seen this movie before?"
He nodded, and for all his jokes about how he was fine, she knew he was tired because his eyes stopped glowing. "It's really shitty. Tsumiki said it's amazing but the art of it is lost on me."
"Fuck I hate those art movies. They always suck and they try too hard to be metaphorical and shit."
"Exactly! Just say what you mean to say and move on. I don't need a weird allegory for volcanoes being about a toxic relationship."
"That's not what it's about!"
"Oh, it definitely is."
They made fun of the terrible movie, with its shitty metaphors and awful dialogue. Natsumi tried to pretend she didn't want to drink, that she didn't want to do drugs, that all she wanted was to sit in this house and talk to Gojou and be there for Sumiko. Waking up to fearful eyes in the middle of the night and damp sheets stuck to her skin are what made her stop. It's what made her get clean. The haunting memory of it while she sat and lied to Gojou about knowing his friend, the guilt that stabbed at her endlessly, it might just drive her to give in, to scratch the itch that never really left. Natsumi didn't know if those memories were enough to stop her anymore.
Natsumi was hanging by a fraying thread, waiting for it to snap.
