3. The Shadow of His Smile

It was late Sunday afternoon and Gojo was standing on his balcony. His arms were propped on the railing as he squinted angrily down at his phone. The screen had a big crack in it, acquired during its unfortunate fall from the top of Sukuna's stupid looking throne.

Fucking asshole.

Now every time he looked at the screen, he was reminded of the other artist. Which just pissed him off.

The fucking gall of him, showing up at his place unannounced. Begging for favors…

…but no. That wasn't right. Sukuna never begged. He didn't ask. No he—

—he commanded. Like he expected everyone around him to just automatically do his bidding.

Come model for me…

Well, fuck that. Gojo wasn't one of his P.A.s or a stupid star struck groupie. And after those last two boundary-pushing-and-canvas-licking encounters, he decided that the man was an obvious creep with a couple of screws loose.

Scratch that.

A lot of screws loose.

Gojo slumped further against the railing, trying to make out Suguru's last text. The glare and the cracked screen didn't help any. The sun was just starting its inevitable descent, the yellow sliding into a darkened amber, the light gasping out its last breath. Everything was painted in vivid honey gold. The domed clock tower across the way looked afire with a reflective liquid sheen.

Everything was too damn bright and abrasively loud.

He was trying really hard to ignore the siren's call of the stash in his drawer.

He'd only taken a single Xanax the night before and was mercifully spared from any dreams featuring big red moons or men on bridges or rolling fields of wheat. No, he had dreamed about being at his work table, methodically grinding some lapis lazuli down for some paint, and he had felt distinctly happy…

…but now that he thought about it, the clock tower across from his balcony had looked all wrong. In the dream it had been fixed to a piercing spire, and it wasn't painted gold. No, the tower had been etched and cross hatched with dark Tudor style beams.

Strange. But the lingering feeling of contentment, the smell of linseed oil, and the sky blue view with the spire in the background— all of it had felt entirely real, dream or no.

From the distance some piano notes drifted up from the courtyard one street over. Five notes, repeating, echoing with sadness. A tinkling and melancholic scale. He recognized an old song:

Who Killed Mr. Moonlight?

The music played in the background as Gojo stared at his spider webbed screen. I shouldn't have answered for you. I'm sorry, can I please come over? Gojo chewed his lip, considering the text. He started to type 'yes' when a loud banging sounded from his studio door.

Perhaps Suguru hadn't wanted to wait for his answer?

Gojo padded barefoot back through the studio. Today he was dressed normally in black pants and a long sleeved black tee. He threw open the front door, only to find an empty hallway.

Well, not quite empty.

There was a flat square package in front of his door. Raising an eyebrow at it, he picked it up. His name and address were printed on the side, but there was no return label.

He closed the door and brought the package over to his drafting table. His partial sketch from the day before sat unfinished there like an accusation. He slapped the box directly on top of it, refusing to look at it.

Had Suguru sent him an apology gift?

He pulled off the tape holding the cardboard in place and folded back the lid. He stared inside the box, at the object cradled within a nest of delicate white tissue paper.

He lifted it out and unfolded it.

It was an antique fan.

A ladies hand fan, to be precise. In black, white, and gold, with a picture of a long legged crane standing in a pond dappled with white water lilies. Edged in reflective gilt, its silhouette caught the light.

A card lay inside the tissue with a simple note:

For your piece, to replace the monocle.

It was beautiful. In fact, it was perfect.

"Clever," Gojo whispered, turning the fan about. His eyes flicked to the message written on the card. A conflicting set of emotions immediately started warring within him.

The fan was indeed perfect, but—

It was also presumptuous. Especially since he hadn't asked for that stupid prick's input.

How dare he—

How dare he presume to know exactly what his piece needed!

Especially before even he himself did.

That fucking insolent bastard!

Gojo glared at the fan, eyes narrowing with growing hostility.

He was actually feeling hostile towards an inanimate object.

But no, there was also something else simmering just underneath, and in a flickering image he saw—

Water rolling, dark and tinged with red—

A blue kimono floating—

And up above, on a bridge, a figure looking down—

Always this view, always—

He was always looking up—

Because he was dead, floating in the water—

Gojo dropped the fan back in the box as if he'd come in contact with a live wire. Unnerved, he quickly closed the lid. He didn't want to look at it.

Maybe Sukuna had sent him some kind of cursed object. Like that cursed painting The Hands Resist Him. And now that he'd touched it, misfortune was probably sure to follow.

"Presumptuous prick," Gojo muttered under his breath. By this point, he'd completely forgotten all about Suguru's text. His mind was fixed on one man and one man only:

Ryomen Sukuna.

He stalked away from his work table and went to the drawer on the side of a small kitchen island. He pulled it open and started rifling through various pill bottles. His hands shook as he took out a bottle of Percocet. He opened the top and dry swallowed some pills.

And he waited.

Waited for the onslaught of negative emotions to pass. Waited for a soothing and synthetic sense of calm to overtake him. He didn't want to feel upset or angry right now. He didn't want to think about Ryomen Sukuna.

He didn't want to think about anything…

He didn't want to feel anything…

It wasn't enough. He eyed the box with the fan from across the way, anger surging.

Fear—

Anguish—

And finally…

Fury—

And then he decided…

He decided he was going to take it back to Sukuna's gallery and shove it right in his face.

He got an Uber to drop him off in front of the Malevolent Shrine. Gojo knew Sukuna had a lavish, gothy looking loft/studio combo up above the gallery. He knew because Artforum had a whole spread on it a few months back. He remembered seeing a plethora of skulls, a zen fountain with a tacky red pool, and a reproduction of Judith Slaying Holofernes (the Artemisia Gentileschi version, for maximum blood spray) on one wall. That was all he could remember about it.

And it was a wonder he remembered that much, because by the time he got there, the Percocet was kicking in.

He was still angry when he burst through the doors leading into the atrium. Not only was he still pissed, but he was also as high as a kite.

He knew, in some far off and still rational corner of his mind, that confronting Sukuna like this wasn't a good idea.

That it was, in fact, a very bad idea.

But he didn't care. He was feeling self destructive. And he was spoiling for a fight.

And since Suguru wouldn't give him one, maybe Sukuna would.

He had the box with the fan in it tucked beneath his arm. The feel of it being so near caused him an unexplainable, anxious feeling. It was irrational but the thing really felt like a cursed object.

Or like a death flag.

A man standing on a bridge—

Looking down—

Eyes full of contempt—

Gojo spied a woman (or possibly man) with silvery, severe pageboy hair standing by the greeter's lectern. They had a look of bored indifference on their face and an icy demeanor. They tilted their chin up and looked down their nose at Gojo's approach and said in a genderless voice, "May I help you?"

It sounded more like fuck you.

Or maybe that was the Percocet talking.

He looked at Silver Bob over the top of his dark glasses and said, "I'm here to see Ryomen Sukuna. Tell him I have a package for him."

A well groomed eyebrow shot up. "Is that so?" Silver Bob said in a doubtful voice. "And who should I say is calling?"

"Infinite Void."

The eyebrow climbed even higher at this response. Still, they pulled out a phone and typed out a quick text. It only took a few seconds for them to receive a reply. Gojo knew exactly when it came through because of the sudden wide eyed look of surprise that came over Silver Bob's icy face. They looked up from their phone at Gojo then back down at their screen again. Then they schooled their face into one of neutral apathy and said:

"I can take you upstairs."

Gojo followed Silver Bob to an open elevator that resembled a giant birdcage. They got inside and rode up together in complete silence. When they got out, Gojo followed them down a short blacklit hallway to a blood red door. Silver Bob knocked twice and entered the loft without waiting for an answer, simply calling out: "Sukuna, I've brought you Gojo Satoru."

Like they were delivering takeout instead of a person.

"Thank you, Uraume."

Uraume left with their nose still up in the air, silently closing the door behind them. Sukuna was sitting at an overly large desk that was backed by a bank of floor to ceiling windows. The twilight view of the dappled, diamond like cityscape behind him was impressive. Even better than Gojo's own, to his immense irritation.

Sukuna didn't acknowledge Gojo's presence or even look up from his laptop. This blatantly dismissive attitude worked wonders at getting under Gojo's skin. Despite all the downers he was on, he started seething all over again.

He went directly over to the desk and loudly dropped the box with the fan on top of it.

This finally got Sukuna's attention. He looked up at Gojo and Gojo asked him point blank:

"Why did you send me this?"

Sukuna stared at him as if he'd gone feeble. "Why? You know why. Because it's a perfect replacement for the—

—that's not what I'm asking!" Gojo said heatedly, "You and I are not friends. And we're certainly not collaborating—

"—not yet." Sukuna interrupted him, a growing smirk conveying his absolute certainty on this point.

Gojo blanched at this. He stared at Sukuna and it took him a moment to recover before he finally said, "No! There is no 'yet '! And there isn't going to be one!" He jabbed angrily at the box with his finger. "I don't want your stupid present. And I don't want to sit for you—"

"—which is a real pity. Because we could do great things together, you and I." There was that low, insinuating tone again. Deep and delectable, like melted butter.

It was a sound that caressed and licked its way down you and grabbed hold, that made you want to do his bidding…

Gojo ignored the possible double entendre that lay like a land mine in that last sentence. "I'm not doing it—"

"—did you really break apart and grind down a four hundred year old vase for that painting of yours?"

Gojo froze. "What does that have to do with anything?"

"It would have been worth—about what—sixty thousand on its own? More? But you cannibalized it for your own work—"

"—so what?"

"That's a level of selfishness I can respect," Sukuna said with an evil grin, leaning with his chin on top of his curled fist.

Gojo could see the unspoken question dancing in Sukuna's eyes. And he had that feeling again, the same one that he had back in his studio, during Sukuna's first visit. That feeling they were speaking to each other in shorthand, that they understood each other in a way that didn't really require words.

At least as far as making art was concerned.

"You want to know why I did it?" Gojo asked him in a low voice, leaning across his desk. "Because I could, that's why. I saw that particular shade of blue and I decided I wanted it. So I took it and I broke it and I ground it down and I put it in Infinite Void, along with a bunch of other precious stones the price of which would make most poor art students weep."

Sukuna threw his head back and laughed at this. "That is so obscenely self centered and wasteful!" Sukuna said, sounding delighted. It wasn't an accusation at all. Quite the opposite.

Gojo narrowed his eyes. Somewhere inside his foggy brain he had the distinct impression he had said too much. And yet—

—he had wanted to say it. Because no one else knew what exactly was in his painting. Or how he had slaved over making those colors himself. He knew that others wouldn't approve of his methods, so he had never revealed them. But he knew that Sukuna wouldn't care, because the man clearly didn't give a damn about propriety or boundaries or anything of that sort.

He did exactly as he pleased.

It made Gojo feel a little envious.

Sukuna learned forward, steepling his fingers and said, "I was kinda hoping you would show up looking like you did yesterday. In that kimono looking robe with the black eye makeup. It reminded me so strongly of the very first time we met."

Gojo remembered what Mei Mei had said about Sukuna having a very specific type. He thought of Uraume's pale silvery hair, but couldn't remember whether or not they had been wearing eyeliner. However, when he mentally tallied everything up, he still found himself firmly occupying the column labeled 'Sukuna's preferred type.' How unfortunate. Then Gojo said:

"You baited me into showing up here by sending me that stupid fan. Also, I didn't look like that when we first met. That was back in the gallery when you first asked me to pose for you." Perhaps Sukuna really did have more than a few screws loose…

Or maybe he wasn't the only one here who was completely high…

"I sent you that fan because it was what the picture obviously required," Sukuna told him. "Nothing more, nothing less. You know this—"

"—I don't know anything as far as you're concerned! And I don't want to know!" Gojo huffed in an exaggerated manner like an angry teenager. He spun away from Sukuna's desk, intent on leaving. He walked past the wall covered with the oversized reproduction of Judith Slaying Holofernes. The painted blood spray arced violently, glinting wickedly beneath a pair of low wattage spotlights.

Judith had only been successful in beheading a king because she had seduced and slept with him first…

From behind him Gojo heard: "You should really agree to come sit for me—"

"—go fuck yourself!" he seethed, locating the red door. He wasn't sure he'd be able to find his way out in his current mental state, but he was damn well going to try.

Luckily he didn't have to, because once he made it into the hallway, he found Uraume waiting by the elevator, apparently on standby.

It occurred to him then that they probably thought he was just another Sukuna groupie. That they were no doubt used to seeing good looking strangers rolling through here on the regular. Were probably used to shuttling people to and from the loft on Sukuna's whim.

Well, fuck their misconceptions of him, too.

They got on the elevator and rode in complete silence again. The moment the cage hit the bottom Gojo angrily slammed the sliding door back and stomped through the atrium. He only stopped because his phone was buzzing loudly in his pocket.

Oh shit, he thought.

He'd forgotten all about Suguru's text.

But when he pulled out his phone, the text he received wasn't actually from Suguru. In fact, there wasn't a text at all. It was just a picture. Of a painting. From an unknown number.

But Gojo knew exactly who the sender was.

Gojo stared at the screen. He pinched it in and out, squinting around the cracks. The angry expression that had taken up residence on his face slowly started to dissolve. His lips subconsciously parted as he tilted his head from side to side, carefully viewing sections of the spidered screen like he was staring through panes of stained glass. His eyes grew brighter, infused with a growing interest.

Or a budding captivation…

Or maybe a beginning obsession…

As he stared at the screen an actual text popped up. It read:

I'll give you a showing in my gallery if you say yes.

Gojo just stared at the text.

Then he swiped it away and went back to looking at the picture.

Because the lure wasn't in the text. And he knew Sukuna knew that.

He felt his initial resolve starting to founder. As he stood there, still as one of the gallery pieces, he could feel Uraume's appraising eyes on him.

He put his phone back in his pocket, trying desperately to ignore its latent pull. He started to walk from the atrium, but stopped short again. Instead of taking out his phone to reply, he turned to Uraume:

"Tell your boss I said yes."

Then he abruptly fled the building, putting distance between him and Sukuna's gallery, before he could change his mind and take that answer back.

To be continued…