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There's this feeling Itadori likes to call love. It fulfills him deeply and he finds it in every little and big thing.
Some days love looked like a little spark in the grass, the water spray from the early hours taking the sunlight and transforming it into hope. Some days it felt like a caress on the cheek, soft and devoted to fill him with a mushy feeling he could only describe as cotton.
And lately, love looks like a pair of blue eyes that usually seemed bored but that he knew could be filled with an indescribable passion Itadori had never seen before. It looks like long eyelashes and hair as black as a moonless night and it feels like hands holding his face while a pair of lips kiss him so softly Itadori forgets there was a moment in which he wasn’t loved.
Other days it's harder to be filled by love.
——
They had a mission, a hard one, the curse they were fighting turned out to be way more powerful than they expected and as a result things got complicated.
Maybe complicated it's not the right word to describe it but Itadori can't think of anything else as he sees how a sorcerer takes an unconscious Megumi from his arms.
He looks at how Megumi's skin is too pallid, the contrast between his hair and his skin is striking, it feels like death has come and gone taking away the easy smiles and the unstoppable force behind him.
He knows Megumi is still breathing, he just cradled him in his arms and he can see how his chest goes up and down with each breath but when he looks at his hands there's blood.
It's too much blood, it feels like a never ending red river that didn't belong in this world.
He knows some is his, he can feel the wounds in his arms, how the blood is going down his face from a cut on his cheek. But he knows the blood that paints his hands comes mostly from the wound in Megumi's stomach.
Another sorcerer comes and tells him to follow her, she guides him to a station they had installed just outside the area in which the curse was trapped. It worked as an infirmary, a quick fix for the least injured and to stabilize the most severe cases.The same girl patches him up quickly to send him back to the school.
He can see from where he is standing how the sorcerers that are examining Megumi’s injury shake their heads and make several gestures with their hands.
“Is he going to be alright?” Itadori finds himself asking without thinking.
The sorcerer that is attending him pauses her work for a minute, looks at him and gives him a little smile.
“I’m sure all of them are doing their best to help him.”
That’s not an answer to his question but he doesn’t push, instead he replies with a little nod to show he was listening and lets her continue her work.
——
Ten minutes later he finds himself in the school, looking at Gojo and giving him a report about everything that happened. Although he is speaking, it feels like he’s underwater, things are far away but also so close and nothing seems to go past this bubble that surrounds him.
“Itadori, you can continue the report tomorrow. I’m very tired right now and in great need of a snack.” Gojo stops him in the middle of his report, even though he doesn’t look tired at all and is currently eating some kind of cake. Itadori just thanks him and leaves towards the bedroom area.
He passes Megumi’s room without giving it a glance and enters his.
It must be late in the evening his brain points out to him as there is almost no light entering from the window and every corner of his room is covered in shadows. Itadori is too tired to turn on the lights so he quickly changes in the dark and goes to his bed. He just wants this moment to pass so tomorrow can come.
He tried to go to the infirmary right as he arrived at the school but the medical team prohibited the entrance of visitors until all the patients were in a stable condition. Itadori tried asking a nurse how Megumi was doing but she told him they were not allowed to disclose any information unless he was family or guardian.
Not being able to help Megumi was too much of a nightmare for him, he felt paralized and so the only thing he managed was to close his eyes and dream.
——
When he opens his eyes again, the first thing he sees is his own face staring down at him.
“You couldn’t even keep the only human I liked alive?” Sukuna rolls his eyes.
“This is the last place I want to be, why am I here?” Itadori stays laying on the floor, both eyes staring at the endless void that surrounds Sukuna’s domain.
“Because I wanted to see you.” Sukuna says as he circles him “I still have plans for little Fushiguro. Did he survived?”
Itadori remains quiet. Sukuna stops moving and crunches right over his face.
“You are so pathetic Itadori Yuji. Always going on and on about giving people a fair death but can not even protect the person you hold dearest to you. If Fushiguro Megumi dies it’ll be no one’s fault but yours for being so weak.” Sukuna then cackled, “He really trusted you to protect his back this time and you failed, how pitiful.”
“Can you let me go now?” Itadori’s face was expressionless, Sukuna kept laughing. “I fell asleep for the quiet, not to hear your annoying voice, bye Sukuna.”
Itadori wakes up.
——
Nobara is looking at him.
They are both sitting at the dining table, Itadori trying to ignore how tasteless everything is under the high anxiety that currently fills his body. He probably is eating weird, slower or something like that because Nobara. Will. Not. Stop. Looking.
“He is going to be alright.” Itadori raises his eyes from his food.
“Are you sure? How can you know that?”
Nobara rolls her eyes.
“As if his stubborn ass would let himself be killed by a fucking curse.”
Itadori cracks a little smile, just a ghost of his usual shine but still better than whatever it was the expression he had been wearing before.
Nobara smiles back.
——
The infirmary was quiet. Itadori is alright with that. His head full of thoughts and worries is loud enough as it is, external noise would just give him a migraine.
The nurse in turn tells him that Megumi is stable enough to receive visitors and guides him to his bed.
He was still out from the anesthesia used in the several procedures the doctors had to do to him; Fushiguro still looks pale, but it’s nothing like the night before.
Itadori lets himself take a deep breath for the first time since all the mess happened—the fear inside of him still active but not as present as it had been—and he sits beside the bed to take a hold of the hand closest to him, now it’s time to wait.
——
Itadori doesn’t remember falling asleep, just sitting down and resting his head on the border of the bed watching over Megumi. The exhaustion probably catched up to him, it’s not as if he had actually rested the night before; between the unexpected visit to Sukuna and his own insomnia after that he probably slept three hours or less.
Itadori wonders why he is awake now and then he feels it. A little tugging at his hand.
He probably raises his head faster than it’s good for him, dizziness hitting him hard after the sudden move. Things come in focus slowly and he gets to see Megumi opening his eyes with effort.
He starts to rise from the chair to look for the nurse but Megumi stops him; he doesn't let go of his hand and tugs harder. It appears as if Megumi is trying to tell him something but his body is hit by a coughing fit, Itadori lets go of his hand and serves him a glass of water from a water jug nearby.
Megumi takes it grateful, drinks half of the water before trying to speak again.
“Yuji, are you okay?” Megumi asks him and Itadori freezes where he stands.
He stares at Megumi. Things look more blurred the longer he gazes at him, next he notices the wetness on his cheeks; tears are leaking from his eyes while surprise fills his chest, the weight he had been carrying without noticing since the battle is gone and what's left is relief—so deep inside of him his bones feel like they might crack in half.
Megumi looks alarmed and all Yuji can muster is a little kind smile.
“I am now.”
——
Two days later Megumi is finally released from the infirmary, Gojo and Nobara want to throw a little celebration for not kicking the bucket—Itadori would usually be down for it—but Megumi and him aren't in the spirits to go out or invite people to their dorms; so they find themselves cuddling in Megumi's room.
“I'm glad you're fine, for a minute I–I thought I had lost you.” A few tears escape Itadori's eyes at the declaration and he lets them fall into Megumi's shirt.
He's resting his head on Fushiguro's chest and the beating of his heart calms down the trembling of his arms; Megumi kisses the top of his head, Itadori hears him take a deep breath that's followed by a little tapping on his arm.
“Look at me Yuji.” Megumi begs him, his voice quieter than Itadori has ever heard it.
“I'm here and I'm not leaving. I can't promise I won't die—the same way you can't promise it either—because we both know the life of a sorcerer is based on death and that's what we'll gain from it."
He pauses to take a breath and search something in Itadori's eyes. He doesn't know what it is but he must find it because his eyes soften.
“But I will be right beside you as long as I live.”
Itadori feels a breath leave his chest, a second or two pass; afterwards he surges up to kiss him.
The kiss is soft—full of the relief that invades every crevice and nook of Itadori—and it's a conversation too; Megumi is telling him how much love and loyalty are dedicated only to him and Itadori answers in kind for there's so many emotions cursing his body right now he thinks the only way to tell him is like this.
——
Itadori thinks about love; he thinks about blue eyes, dark hair and a crazy bed head. He thinks and thinks.
But he also knows, and the most important thing he knows is that even though sometimes it is hard to see where love is—harder to be filled by it when it seems far away—love always comes back and it'll never leave him as long as he holds onto it.