fuck buddies don't act like this (Gojo x Reader)

Chapter 84

~Gojo~

The beating of his heart has never spoken so loudly that his ears ring and all the other noise blurs into the background. All he can focus on is your hopeful smile and reassuring fingers rubbing circles into his palm. The doctors are all around him, cowering under his towering, ominous form as his twilight uniform drapes over him like a shroud of darkness smothering your soul.

The day has come and all he can think about is the worst-case scenario. Seriousness was never his forte; sarcasm and light-heartedness that's been soaked in backhanded comments and cold logic held him away from any of this. The toll that his fractured heart can't take is insurmountable and after everything this small, not-so-life-threatening surgery has him twisting up inside with feelings he's never been able to fully confront before.

The time he spent with Geto, and his friends will be something he'll treasure forever, especially when he knew Yuta wouldn't have the stomach to complete the order that he agreed to. His second comeuppance had to be from him, and the little trip away had to come to an abrupt end. For you, that trip is forever if the surgeons do not perform as well as they should, if in post-surgery something untoward or random happens. He would use his almighty power to correct it, however, out of depth he may be.

Sometimes mistakes happen, and sometimes the unimaginable is a random act amongst many that are out of his control. If he did have any semblance of control, he wouldn't be feeling jittery. Feeling electricity under his fingertips, the heart pounding furiously against his ribcage as his buzzing energy nervously bounced off the walls.

He needs to be in control before something even worse happens.

Masking his breathing behind the surrounding chaos from the charging party, halts at the heavy doors awaiting his removal to be flapped open, but he can't bring himself to pull away. Your hand is too smooth and gentle to let go. The imagery that follows easily plunges him into despair as he imagines the blanch colour draining out the warmth, the coldness burning his grasping fingers and the roughness in your skin bitterly chafing away the soft memory of you.

You seem to notice where his head is, act as your grip tightens and pulls him into your orbit.

"It's a simple procedure, I'll be out in a jiffy. If anything happens, make sure to call my parents." The lightness in your voice corrodes his thoughts.

Gojo holds you to that.

"I was thinking afterwards we should get Kikufuku." He jests, his mind a million miles away.

A smile slowly transforms the misery conspiring against him, an ache replaces the warmth in your slipping fingers.

"I can't wait." You half-whisper, holding back the pain until you've left him alone.

He sighs long and hard, watching the door ahead and waiting for any flicker of change or urgency to bring him back into the fold, but nothing happens. The clock mounted high on the wall down the hallway is ticking too loudly for his thoughts to bear, extracting himself from the situation, Gojo finds himself surrounded by sand.

Meticulous ploughed fields of sand.

His chest rises and falls heavily as the sudden taste of chalk coagulates into his mouth, choking his heart to a stutter. He pays no mind to his dry cough and focuses on the blood creeping out from every pore as a haunting gurgle ruptures from the inside out. Blood bursts, splattering the walls, the surgical equipment and blinding everyone in red. Inter-cranial haemorrhages aren't quite as violent as his brain concocts them up to be, but the heart-stopping, weightless idea flicks the ember into a wildfire.

The glass pane shudders beneath his palm, the ache in his head grips tighter as if someone fists his brain and is squeezing out the pulp. Gojo removes his blindfold, and yet he is blinded by the sight of the unforgivable when he feels the wet earth beneath his feet mulch into swampy puddles by the churning grey sky. He's staring aimlessly at the pit before him, a small huddle creeps over his shoulder resembling a sobbing ovation, Morgan, your parents and him watch sombrely as the casket is lowered into the ground.

A bouquet of white lilies wilting in his slack fingers.

He's alone, left to walk as the very thing everyone deems him to be.

The last remnants of his youth, his humanity, and love lays to rest in a field of erected grey slabs. A shadowy hand grips his shoulder, patting his back. Distorted words echoing in his ears.

You've got to start thinking about the future.

It's his grandmother's voice cruelly shoving omiai candidates into his chest after his month of mourning has passed. It would be considered lunacy if more was granted when his very kin have been mourned for less. He will not hold another in his heart again, he will not open himself up to that wretched yearning of understanding just to have the rug pulled under his feet. Again.

"... Gojo-san?" A hesitant voice lures him from his depravity.

Gojo gasps, forcibly choking back the tears as he turns to look down at the wavering nurse. His eyes widening in recognition.

She's the nurse who prepped you for surgery. Her scrubs are clean or fresh from the massacre within the amphitheatre. Her jumpy heart and twitchy fingers slants his expectations and plunges him into the Arctic Ocean.

"Is she alive? Did the surgery go well? Tell me, why aren't you saying anything?" His voice raises with each question, ending in furious urgency.

The nurse shudders under his words, cowering and curling into herself.

"The surgery was successful, L/n-san is currently sleeping off the last of the anaesthetics-"

Gojo barges past the jittery nurse and strides into the private suite he bought specifically for your surgery and stills. Despite the wires and gauze puncturing into your body with a steady beep from the patient machine, Gojo slumps against the doorway, sighing loudly that he hopes it jolts you awake.

You remain in deep sleep, the steady heart monitor neither fluctuating nor alerting any suspicion in any of the attending staff. The room is lit, welcoming the soft lull of the afternoon sun into the room through the shutters. The rays caress you, welcoming you back, before his own shadow casts over your sleeping form.

Gojo leans towards your face, peaceful and without any speck of harm. He wants to see the scar the doctors left but holds himself back from the urge to unwind the protective gauze wrapped around his head. He wants to wake you up and see your beautiful eyes and hear your voice sing in his ears, but still he holds himself back.

Looming over you, Gojo gently outlines the contours of your face before pulling back and slumping into the blue chair behind him. The plastic cushion farts out any offered comfort as the wooden back digs into his back, but Gojo pays that no mind as he bears the weight of his actions heavily. He is a despicable human being for even thinking of your death, imagining life after. When he knows that your death would ruin him. He's experienced too many deaths in his time, stood over the graves of his fallen brethren and had been asked to perform time and time again as if nothing has changed. No one holds him like Geto Suguru did, and he'd be damned to allow anything to come between you and him, now.

For this life is short, in his second chance at living.

~*~

Ig have fun in this Gojofest...