Koi No Yokan (gojo x oc)

Juju Stroll: A Simple Favor

It was another one of those "urgent" calls from Satoru. The ones where her phone rings out of the blue and he puts on that helpless, whiny tone, "Come over."

"For what?"

"I need you," he'd say. "Hurry."

And Kaede would drop everything at hand. She'd forget her million responsibilities, the dozen lives under her care and she'd rush to his side for whatever trivial task awaited her. To be needed by the strongest again.

"What is it this time?"

She steps into his new place, seeing a chair set up next to a razor and pair of scissors.

"I need you to cut my hair."

"Why me?"

"I feel weird when strangers do it," he said. "Besides, I asked Shoko already and she said no."

"Fine," Kaede sighed immediately, knowing how much easier it was to go along with these things than to argue. She had him sit in the chair before her, run her fingers through the strands of white bunching at the back of his head. "How do you want it?"

"Like these," he pulled out his phone, showing her example pictures of guys with an undercut. "I'm thinking of new ways to cover my eyes for missions. This haircut should work."

She combed through his hair a little more, then sections off the top layer before turning on the razor. "What if I mess up and you have to go bald?" she asks over the razor's buzz.

He hums for a moment, "Would you still think I'm cute?"

It's Kaede's turn to pause, to feel the familiar wave of guilt when she realizes how quickly she'd left to meet him. How she could be convinced to split the world in half if he asked nicely enough. "I guess so."

"Then that's fine, do whatever you want. But preferably like the picture."

Slowly, the thick muss of hair she knew so well thinned out, the bottom layer sheared so short that the ends pricked against the pads of her fingers. She trimmed the rest, cleaning up the locks that would fall into his eyes, cutting around his ears and transforming him somehow into a new version of himself—one that immediately looked older when she put down the scissors.

He looked up at her. "How is it?"

She runs her hands through his hair one more time, "You look cute."

His lips curl into a familiar knowing smirk, but it fades when she tries to pull away. He reaches for her hand, fingers warming her cold wrist, and sets it against the soft skin of his cheek.

They stay like this for a silent moment, Satoru closing his eyes as he intakes her touch, Kaede staring at his beautiful face, hardly wanting to let go. But she does eventually, retreating towards herself as her skin returns to cold.

"Shigeri's coming to Tokyo to become the Third Year teacher," she confessed. "We..."

She can't finish the sentence. She doesn't need to.

"Do you think..." Satoru hesitated, something only Kaede could make him do. To doubt. To yearn for her ability to manipulate time—to take back all the awful words he'd said and redouble all the efforts he didn't make. "...Your happiest with him could compare to your happiest with me?"

Kaede lifted her gaze to find his, unobstructed orbs of brilliant blue. The embodiment of the skies and oceans all at the same time. "What kind of question is that?"

"Because if it can't, then you should find someone else. Someone better," Satoru said. "I want you to love someone who will make you the happiest you could possibly be."

Kaede's caught up in the tangled anger and love she still harbored for him. The choked down urge to scream and cry that he could be all of those things for her if he'd bothered to care. The mess of feelings that she hoped with her whole heart would fade as the situation with Shigeri progressed.

"I can't know unless I try, right?"

The forlorn look on his face disappeared in an instant. His tall body shoots up quickly, heading for the bathroom to look at his new hair. "That's true."