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cantdothefandango · 11 days ago

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family man | nanami kento ╰►things between you and kento have been casual the past couple of months, at least that’s what you think. he’s been crushing on you for a lot longer than that. he just adores everything about you. all of your little quirks, the way you smile, how you style your hair…it’s all a wondrous kind of beauty to him. problem is, you’ve been keeping a secret. not necessarily on purpose, but now that it’s coming to light, you’re sure it will be nanami’s deal-breaker, that he’ll have no choice but to break up with you. 7.4k words

a/n: hello hello!! thank you anon for this lovely idea :] I don't really know how to feel about it, it's not my favorite thing I've ever posted, but I'm proud of it nonetheless. I tried to make it angsty like you asked, but my man nanami is too pookie for that kind of behavior. warnings: infertility/talking about having children, cussing, mental health stuff, fem!reader. I hope this is what you were lookin' for anon, and thanks again for requesting!

it begins innocently. dinners that stretch long past closing time, candles burning down to nothing while you trace the rim of your glass and ask him what he wanted to be when he was ten. sleepovers that don’t end in sex, not always, but do end with your fingers curled against the inside of his wrist like you’re anchoring yourself there. like you’ve chosen him as your safe place, if only for the night.

he tells himself it’s casual. you say it like it’s obvious. casual, like the way you slip your shoes off by the door and tuck your legs under you on his couch. casual, like the shared toothbrush you pretend not to notice in his medicine cabinet. like the text you send after your first night staying over: thank you. I felt safe. safe. it echoes in his chest louder than it should.

you bring him warm bread on tuesdays. always from the same place, always still wrapped in wax paper, still warm when it hits his desk. he pretends he doesn’t notice the way your hand brushes his as you pass it to him. he pretends he doesn’t linger on the smell of it—of you—after you leave.

you remember things. things no one else ever does. the way he takes his coffee. the kind of tie clip he prefers. how he dislikes certain textures in food, but won’t say it outright. you remember, and more than that—you accommodate, without making a spectacle of it. just gentle kindness. just care. like it’s easy for you. like it’s instinct.

and he adores you for it. completely. wholly. it’s frightening, if he lets himself think too long about it. because he is falling. fast. and he cannot stop. more terrifying still, he doesn’t want to.

he thinks the first time he realizes he’s in trouble is on a wednesday afternoon. you’re sitting across from him at a coffee shop, the kind of tucked-away place he would’ve never found on his own. your hands are wrapped around a cup of something absurdly sweet, syrup lining the lid, a dollop of whipped cream sliding sideways, threatening a spill. he’s still mildly horrified you ordered it in front of the barista without shame.

you take a sip and immediately hum like it’s divine. “want to try it?” you ask, sliding the cup his way with a knowing smile. he declines, politely. you shrug. “your loss.” he watches you drink it with pink whipped cream on your nose, and he’s pretty sure his soul leaves his body.

he takes you on walks down along the waterfront, half because it gives him an excuse to spend time with you without distractions, and half because he likes the way the wind makes your nose pink and your hair messier than usual. you shiver even under your coat, but you never complain. never ask to turn back. you’re like that—endlessly game, endlessly bright. and he always walks just a little closer, always tempted to sweep you up and carry you the rest of the way home. not because you ask him to. because he wants to. because you’d let him.

the first time he does, you squeal in delight, burying your frozen face in his neck. “this is ridiculous,” you giggle. maybe it is, but he keeps walking. he doesn’t put you down until he’s set you in front of the heater in his apartment with a blanket and a steaming mug of chamomile.

god, his apartment. you never seem to want to leave it. and he never wants you to. it’s simple—neutral tones, clean lines, warm light. soft rugs underfoot, a record player in the corner he hardly ever uses until you put something on one night and danced barefoot in his kitchen. the walls smell like sandalwood and bergamot. like him, you say. and you breathe deeper when you step inside. there’s a throw blanket that’s permanently yours now. the first time he found it crumpled on his bed with your perfume still clinging to the fibers, he sat down and held it to his chest for an hour.

you are everything soft and strange. and he cannot get enough of you. you wear gowns to his formal jujutsu events—effortless and devastating, like you walked out of a painting and into his life. and the second you’re through his front door again, you toss your heels into the corner with a groan, flop onto his couch with your dress bunched around your thighs like royalty gone rogue. he offers you clothes. you always pick his ugliest pajama pants. plaid, red and black, cotton-worn and embarrassingly beloved. they swallow you whole, cinched tight with the drawstring, and yet somehow you make them look like high fashion. you always do.

you tell him they’re hot when he wears them. you call his biceps “biteable,” and once actually bit him mid-workout because you “couldn’t help it.” he’d blushed so hard he had to pretend he was suddenly exhausted and needed to stop. you just laughed and poked at his chest like you knew exactly what you were doing.

when he’s away—missions, business trips, one unfortunate week-long summit—you facetimed every night. it wasn’t something he ever asked for. he assumed you’d want space. assumed, foolishly, that your affection was casual, fleeting, like you said. but you answered every call, bundled up in his hoodie, hair messy, cheeks sleepy. you always had a tub of ice cream with you. “it’s fine,” you told him once. “this counts as dinner.” he frowns, but he memorized the flavor. wrote it down in the notes app on his phone along with a list of everything else you like. your favorite flowers, the perfume scents you like, the chapstick you buy.

and it all…it overwhelms him. because you are funny and vibrant and strange and shameless. you make him laugh out loud, which is something he didn't even realize he’d stopped doing. and you like him. really like him. he thinks. but you also call it casual, so he plays along. because the alternative—the possibility of losing you if he asks for too much—terrifies him more than silence ever did.

he hasn’t dated much. not like this. not anyone like you. before you, there were stilted dinners with ambitious businesswomen who wanted to compare portfolios. brief, forgettable flings with jujutsu sorcerers who talked about curses even during sex. there was never laughter. never whipped cream mustaches. never someone pressing their cold feet against his calves under the kotatsu and nuzzling into his chest.

he is terrified of how easy it is. how hard he’s falling. how none of it feels casual. he doesn’t know how to ask you what this is—what it could be. so instead, he folds another note into the pocket of your coat when you’re not looking. be safe. text me when you get home. you send him a selfie when you do, flashing a thumbs up with a big grin, and he saves the photo in a folder he visits on the rare occasions you don’t sleep at his apartment.

—

of course you like him. you must. you let him hold your hand, fingers woven like thread. you steal sips from his tea and grimace when it’s bitter. you wear his shirts to bed—always the same faded one with the loose neckline and a bleach stain at the hem, like it’s your favorite thing he owns. maybe it is. he wouldn’t know how to ask.

you press kisses to the back of his neck when you pass behind him in the kitchen. you text him on your lunch breaks. you beg him to take the little personality quizzes that float through your feed (“if I was a moth, what kind of lamp would I love most?”) and you call him on missions just to say goodnight.

he’s not imagining this. you like him. and yet—“he’s just so good to me,” you’re saying, in the distance, sitting with utahime and shoko. his students are warming up on the training field, practicing stance drills. gojo’s yelling about something in the background, but nanami hears your voice so clearly it’s as if the whole world falls quiet. “he’s so nice. I like him so much. I just hope he likes me as much as I like him.”

he stills. the sound of it—hopeful. uncertain. your voice, so soft. like you don’t know. like he hasn’t made it obvious. he’s disgusted with himself. furious. nauseated.

what more can he do? what hasn’t he offered you? you’re in every fold of his routine now, the gravity that orients his every plan. and still, somehow, you are unsure. tentative. wondering if he likes you. likes. as if that word could ever come close to what he feels for you. no, nanami doesn’t like you. he adores you. reveres you. he is obsessed with your every breath, every freckle, every sigh you release when you crawl into his lap and pretend you aren’t using him like a weighted blanket.

his hands tremble where they hang at his sides. he grips them into fists. he wants to walk over. wants to pull you away from shoko’s amused smirk and utahime’s knowing grin and push you against the side of the school’s old brick wall and tell you that you’re everything. that he’d marry you today, right now, if you let him. that you’ve already taken root inside his chest and every time you walk away he’s left scrambling to piece himself back together until you return.

but he doesn’t. of course he doesn’t. that’s not nanami; he’s not prone to the big gesture. instead he adjusts the cuff of his dress shirt, turns back to his students, and counts their stances like his blood isn’t burning beneath his skin. you hope he likes you. god, if only you knew.

—

he’s trying.he’s never tried like this before—not with the businessmen who introduced him to their high-powered daughters over stiff white-tablecloth dinners, not with the jujutsu sorcerers who flinched when he reached for their hand or laughed at the idea of a quiet life. but he’s trying now. because it’s you.

ever since that overheard confession—soft, tentative, delicate like glass he didn’t realize he was holding—he’s been desperate to prove it. not through grand speeches or some dramatic declaration (he’s never been one for performance), but in the little things. the small, deliberate choices. the love that blooms in the details.

he takes a personal day, for the first time in months. you both take the train to shimokitazawa, wandering bookshops and vintage stalls while you try on every oversized pair of sunglasses you find. he buys you a ring from a local vendor, nothing flashy—just a simple band with a tiny pearl. he doesn’t say what it means. he doesn’t have to.

you drag him to a matcha café, one of those absurd ones with neon signs and floating cloud decor, where everything comes shaped like a bear. you bounce on your heels with excitement as you order a matcha parfait, and because you look so happy, he orders one too. he takes one bite and regrets it immediately. it tastes like earth. bitter, grassy earth. but you’re smiling. so he takes another spoonful, and he nods when you ask, “isn’t it good?”

when you get home, you curl up on his couch and complain about your chipped manicure. he wordlessly disappears and returns with your polish bag, setting a towel across his lap and gesturing for your hands. the color you chose is a soft pink—subtle, warm, gentle. you tease him for concentrating so hard, and he only grumbles under his breath, a small crease between his brows as he perfects the edges. later, you’ll hold up your hands to the light and marvel at how clean the job is.

and through it all, sprawled across his lap like royalty, is cat. ceremoniously named kento jr. by you because of it’s soft, almost yellow fur. nanami simply calls him cat. nanami doesn’t like animals. they’re unpredictable, often messy, always shedding. but you showed up outside his apartment one afternoon with a kitten swaddled in your scarf, whispering “he followed me home,” and now cat lives here. cat purrs like an old engine, sleeps on his tax documents, and shredded one of his ferragamo oxfords. “cat, please remove yourself from the stovetop,” nanami sighs, gently lifting him away with a dish towel.

you just laugh and kiss his cheek. “he loves you.”

nanami’s not sure how he ended up with a clawed little gremlin in his apartment. but then again, he wasn’t sure how he ended up with you either. not sure what on earth he must’ve done in some past life to deserve even a fraction of you in this life.

he is completely, irreversibly in love with you. and god, he thinks you might be trying too. you set your alarm for 8:45, even though you’re the kind of person who thrives at 2am. you groggily crawl into bed beside him and wrap your arms around his waist, sighing into his chest. you pack him a lunch for work, slicing fruit, wrapping sandwiches with care. you even bought that odd oat milk he likes for his coffee and told him you’re “trying to acquire the taste.”

you’re always trying. meeting him halfway. offering him your time, your care, your thoughtfulness. but he sees it—the shift.

the way your smile falters when he holds your gaze too long. the way your laughter dips into something unsteady when he jokes about how cat will love having a little one in the house one day. how the idea of a family, of permanence, of building a life together—makes you shrink. retreat inward like a tide pulling back from the shore. and it kills him. because everything else is perfect.

but this—this love, this intensity, this truth in his heart that he can’t seem to temper—it seems to scare you. makes you look at him like he’s offering something too fragile, too heavy, too much. so he hides it. quiets the way his hands itch to hold you tighter. swallows the words burning the back of his throat every night he watches you fall asleep beside him. he’s trying not to drown in all of it. because he loves you. and if loving you quietly is the only way to keep you, then he’ll whisper his affection into the smallest spaces, again and again, until you believe it. until you let him stay.

—

it wasn't supposed to happen like this. nanami kento does not do impulsive. he is meticulous—every sock drawer, every budget spreadsheet, every vacation itinerary color-coded to match the mood of the trip. he is calm. calculating. the kind of man who triple-checks his grocery list before stepping into the store. so how—how in god’s name—did he let it slip?

the words taste like a wound the moment they leave him. not because they aren’t true—no, they’re so true they ache—but because they came uninvited, messy, chaotic, dropped into the air like a match over kindling.

and your face. your beautiful, expressive face. you turn to him on the steps of your little apartment, all golden light from the porch lamp spilling over your features. your lips part softly. your eyes widen. fingers twitch like you’ve been caught in the middle of a note you don’t know how to sing. he’s ruined it. he knows.

the night was already teetering on the edge of bittersweet. you’d told him earlier—softly, apologetically—that you’d need to be back at your place tonight. something about work. something about the morning. and he tried not to let his heart sink like an anchor in his chest. of course he understood. he always does.

you’d tucked yourself into his coat anyway, your frame swallowed by the warm fabric that still faintly smells like him—cedar and clove and the faintest trace of ink from the pen always clipped to the inside. he’d walked you home, matching your rhythm even though you kept stopping to point out interesting architecture, store signs, passing cats. you do that—wander through life like you’re tasting it, sampling it, delighting in every odd flavor.

and he loves you. god, he loves you. he’d been looking at you then, your cheeks flushed from the walk, lips moving a mile a minute about something he couldn’t even track anymore, too busy counting the ways your hands moved when you got excited, the way your lashes fluttered when you laughed. and suddenly the words weren’t in his head anymore—they were out there, between you.

"I love you."

he sees it happen in real-time. your body stills. your breath catches. your smile falters at the edges. and nanami panics. “I—I didn’t mean to pressure you,” he says quickly, too quickly, his hands rising in that calm-the-situation motion. “you don’t have to say anything. I know you weren’t expecting it, I just—I was trying to say that I've really enjoyed—”

but you stop him. not with a hand or a voice, but with a look. one he can’t quite name. something soft, and afraid, and reverent. "I love you, too.”

his world stills. but before he can breathe again, before he can even start to hope—you whisper it. broken. "I love you, too...but I don't know if I'm good for you." it knocks the wind from him.

you look at him like he’s divine. like he’s a monument to all things pure and steady. and you—you look ashamed, small, like loving you is something that should be hard. “you’re perfect, nanami. you’re thoughtful, and brilliant, and good to me. and I'm just…” you trail off, eyes glassy. “I'm just a mess. there are–there are things you don’t know about me. things I haven’t told you. I don't know how to do this the way you deserve. you should have someone funnier. someone better. someone who can give you what you want.”

someone who can give him what he wants. he’s never wanted to yell at a sentence before. scream at it. tear it into ribbons with his bare hands and cast it into the wind. but that one? that one skewers him. because what he wants—what he’s always wanted—is you. not a checklist of traits. not a curated resume of romantic compatibility. just you. with your chipped nail polish and your cracked phone screen and your way of flopping across his bed with a bag of chips and asking “so what did gojo do to piss you off today?”

he loves you, and he’s not ashamed of it. so he takes your hand, slowly, gently. as if you might run if he moves too fast. "I want you,” he says. quiet but firm. "I don’t care about perfect. I don't care if you’re a mess. I care about you.”

“I—thank you, nanami.” nanami? no, that’s kento to you. “I'll…I'll—we can talk about it more tomorrow.” talk about what? he wants to haul your ass back down the steps and talk about it now. give him what he wants? you’ve given him everything he could ever possibly want just with the mere presence of you in his life. but he lets your hand slip of out of his, chest cracking at the lingering look you give him before stepping inside.

he may have said it too soon, he may have jumped the gun. but still—that is not the reaction he’d been expecting. you’d said it back. you love him, too. so why does this hurt so badly? why does it feel like you just broke up with him? he sits down on the steps outside of your complex and replays every moment he can possibly think of that would’ve ever made you think you weren’t exactly what he wanted. it doesn’t help. it fixes nothing.

what on earth do you think you could tell him that would take away this ache; this gnawing, beautiful love that pervades his very being? there are things you don’t know about me. things I haven’t told you. and you continued not to tell him. you could’ve, right then and there. he’d have stood on this steps all night and listened to you tell him, and yet, you chose not to.

you hadn’t broken up with him, but the dynamic of your relationship had changed. and despite his most desperate efforts, you did not seem willing to let him fix it.

—

he spends the next few days in a kind of quiet agony. there are no words for it—not really. it’s not heartbreak, not yet. it’s the ache before the break, that slow pressure behind the ribs, like waiting for a wave to crest and not knowing if it will carry him gently to shore or drag him under.

you don’t disappear. not completely. you still text him goodnight. still send him a photo of the way your cat has somehow managed to crawl inside your hoodie again. still tell him, casually, sweetly, that your coffee tasted better when he makes it.

but he can feel it. that subtle shift. the quiet retreat. the way your sentences grow shorter. your replies more scattered. he knows people like you don’t mean to slip away. not deliberately. you don’t want to hurt him. you’re just scared. and he can’t blame you for that—not when he’s scared, too.

but god, he doesn’t know what to do. he’s never had to fight for something like this before. in his line of work, everything is practical. there’s a technique for every enemy, a strategy for every battle. but this? this is a war he doesn't know how to win without hurting you in the process.

so he gives you space. he doesn’t text first. doesn’t press. lets days pass where he imagines you curled up in your apartment, lights low, pretending it doesn’t hurt to not be near him. but he’s crumbling. because the truth is simple and terrible: he cannot lose you. he cannot.

so he tries the only thing he knows. not big gestures, not flowers or speeches. but the quiet language of effort, a language he’s fluent in. he drops off pastries at your office in the school, still warm. a book you mentioned once—once—three months ago, now wrapped in brown paper with your name in small, careful print. a single note, tucked beneath the ribbon: you said you liked stories with hopeful endings. he sends a photo of kento jr. in the windowsill, captioned only: he misses you. I do, too. he walks past your favorite boba shop and brings home your favorite flavor, sets it in his fridge, and never drinks it. just in case you come by. and all the while, he’s trying to understand.

“there are things you don’t know about me,” you’d whispered, voice trembling just slightly, not quite meeting his gaze. “things I haven’t told you.” and then silence. you never told him what. and god, it eats at him. gnaws at the base of his spine like a warning he can’t decipher. he wakes up breathless in the middle of the night, palm stretched toward the empty side of the bed, heart hammering like it knows. like it understands something he doesn’t. like you feel guilty. about something he can’t name. something he won’t be able to name until you let him in.

and what did you mean? someone who can provide what he wants. what did you think he wanted? perfection? structure? someone who could wrap their life in neat little boxes, a future on a clipboard?

no. he wants you. you, chaotic and wonderful. you, with mismatched socks and dreams that shift like the tide. you, who once said "I love you” like it hurt, like it burned your mouth to admit something so soft.

he doesn’t need a provider. he doesn’t need a flawless partner. he needs you, in whatever form you’re willing to give him. if all he gets is weekends and laughter and maybe a few stolen mornings in between, he’ll take it. if you can never say the words again, but still show up with coffee and curl up in his bed and whisper your thoughts into his chest, he’ll take that too. because he’s in love with you, fully, painfully, and beautifully. and he will not lose you without trying to tell you, in every way he knows, that you are already enough. you always have been.

—

you’re internally freaking the fuck out. full-body, bone-deep panic—like you’ve been flung from a moving train and left to crawl in the gravel. like there’s a hole in your chest no one else seems to notice, widening with every passing second. you want to be calm. composed. rational. but how can you, when you’ve seen this story play out before?

because this isn’t the first time. you’ve been here before—watched someone’s face change when you told them the truth. not right away. not always. but eventually, it always came.

that first boyfriend, the one who’d laughed too hard and kissed with teeth—he’d told you it wasn’t a dealbreaker, then stopped answering your texts three months later. the second had been kinder, in the way a storm is kind when it gives warning before it hits. he’d held your hands when you cried. said he understood. and then he left anyway. it’s not you, he’d said. I just always pictured kids. a family. you understand, right?

so you do. you understand perfectly now. this is the part where nanami realizes you’re broken. this is the part where he walks away, too. you don’t want to pull away from him. don’t want to shut him out. don’t want to feel your own body curl into itself like a dying star every time he mentions a future, or a home, or anything tender and terrifying.

you want him. desperately. deeply. you want to stay. but you can’t think of any other direction in which the story goes. you’re devastated. desolate. alone in a way you haven’t felt since long before you met him. before his laugh became your favorite sound. before his apartment started to smell like your shampoo. before his cat started crying at your door even when you weren’t there.

you try to talk to shoko about it. try to piece the words together in a way that doesn’t sound pathetic or pitiful or broken. she listens quietly, eyes soft behind her usual sarcasm. and then, in typical shoko fashion, she gives it to you straight: "you have to tell him."

you hate that answer. it’s not the one you wanted. you were hoping she’d tell you to run. to hide. to change the subject every time he brings it up until the fear stops chewing at your insides. but she doesn't. she just says, "he loves you. but he can't prove that if you won't let him see all of you." and maybe—maybe that’s what terrifies you most.

because you want to believe that this doesn’t define you. that you are more than the parts of you that don’t work the way they’re supposed to. more than the absence of something you were told should come naturally. more than your inability to give him what others can. but some days, that lie feels bigger than your body.

—

you open the door and he’s there. you didn’t know he’d come. weren’t sure if you wanted him to. weren’t sure if seeing him would make it easier or worse. but then there he is.

coat unbuttoned. shoulders tight. hands wrung together like he’d been trying to warm them against his own pulse. his gaze finds yours, and you know in that instant—he’s been worrying. unraveling. trying to reach you with little scraps of normal: texts about his book, a photo of his coffee, a blurry picture of the cat sitting in his briefcase. all attempts to touch you without pushing you. and you’d ignored them all. not because you don’t love him. but because you do. so much that it hurts. so much that it’s unbearable.

when he steps in, he closes the door behind him like it’s something gentle. something ceremonial. he doesn’t speak right away, just takes you in—your red-rimmed eyes, your oversized hoodie, the way your fingers tug the sleeves over your hands like a child hiding in plain sight.

then he pulls you into his arms. you let him. and it wrecks you. because he’s always so steady. he smells like bergamot and cedar, like clean laundry and the pages of whatever novel he keeps on his nightstand. his arms wrap around you like he was made to hold you, and you think: he deserves everything.

and that is precisely why you feel so ruined. so broken. so wrong. you swallow hard against the burn in your throat. keep your face tucked to his shoulder so he won’t see your tears, not fresh ones.

it’s been years. years since you got the diagnosis. since they used soft words and gentler voices and still managed to gut you clean open. since they told you—kindly, technically, permanently—that you’d never be able to have children. you don’t talk about it. not with most people. not with anyone, really.

you tried, once. with someone you loved. and he blinked and said, “oh.” and two weeks later, he started canceling plans. three weeks after that, he forgot your birthday. it happened again with someone else. different name, same silence. same empty goodbye. some of the relationships had been serious. some had been casual. the result was the same. it happened again and again until you learned. learned to shut your mouth. learned to make jokes about not being the “motherly type.” learned to make peace with a future you never asked for and didn’t want.

and then nanami came along, and it was just supposed to be dinner. just a few dates. just something light. but then he smiled at you like you were the punchline to the universe’s best-kept secret. held your hand like it was precious. built a quiet, sacred little life with you like he was laying bricks, one soft moment at a time. and now here you are. your chest against his, your breath hitching quietly while he strokes your back in slow, careful lines.

he’s everything. everything you want. and he doesn’t know. he doesn’t know what you can’t give him. doesn’t know what the future couldn’t hold. and worse—you know he wants it. the future. the house. the family. and you know you can’t be the one to give it to him. the thought alone makes you dizzy. nauseous. your stomach twists in on itself, a familiar kind of sick. the kind you’ve only ever felt in sterile clinics and cold bathrooms.

his hand comes up to cup your face. “hey,” he whispers, brow creased. “what’s wrong?” you want to tell him. you do. but the words catch like glass in your throat.

he lowers his face to your hair. breathes you in. and then, quiet—just for you, just between your temple and his lips: “whatever it is. whatever you’re carrying. it doesn’t scare me. I'm not going anywhere.” you tremble. just once. oh, you think, but you will.

finally, you cave and tell him right there in the doorway because it’s where you finally ran out of strength to keep lying by omission. the words come out of you in a tremble, like they’ve been waiting at the edge of your throat for months and now that they’re free, they don’t stop.

you try to make it sound calm, like it’s not a big deal. like it doesn’t matter. like you don’t matter. you tell him he doesn’t have to stay. that you’d understand. that it’s okay if he doesn’t love you anymore. because he was always clear. from the beginning. he wants a family. he talks about it like it’s holy—like he’s been building a future in the back of his mind since he first learned how to daydream. he deserves that. and you can’t give it to him.

and you hadn’t told him. until now. he doesn’t speak for a beat. or maybe two. maybe a hundred. you can’t tell. the silence is a living thing—wide and wet and crushing. you can’t look at him. you’re not even sure you can breathe.

you can feel it coming before it hits: the tears. the ugly kind. the sobs that crack open your ribs and scrape your spine and turn your voice into something broken and raw. it’s humiliating. it’s crushing. you curl in on yourself like your bones are ashamed of their own structure.

and then he’s holding you. arms around you, hands clutching, not tight but firm. like he’s afraid you’ll disappear if he doesn’t hold you steady. you don’t even register the way he shifts—lifting you effortlessly, carrying you to the bedroom. your legs draped over his arm, your face buried in his chest. his breathing is shallow, jaw clenched tight, but he doesn’t let go.

not when he lays you down. not when you curl against him like it’s instinct. not when your hands fist in the fabric of his dress shirt. you sob into him, and he takes it. absorbs it. one hand cards slowly through your hair. the other stays planted firm between your shoulder blades, as if keeping you from falling apart further.

you can’t speak. you can’t stop crying. and still, he says nothing. just shh. just a thumb brushing over your temple. just a soft, steady rhythm like a heartbeat saying I'm here. I'm here. I'm here. you don’t know how long it lasts. the tears dull eventually, worn out. your hiccuping breath evens into something closer to sleep, though your eyes stay shut tight—more out of shame than rest.

and nanami? he lays there in his slacks and wrinkled shirt, staring at the ceiling. arms locked around you. unmoving. he feels sick. not because of what you told him. but because of what it must have taken for you to tell him. how many nights had you laid awake beside him, wondering if you were enough? how many times had he mentioned the future, noticing how you flinched, and still didn’t say anything? what kind of man had he been, to make the woman he loves believe that this would ever change anything?

he presses a kiss to your hairline. closes his eyes against the heat building behind them. it will not change how he feels. not tonight. not tomorrow. not ever. he’ll tell you when you're ready to hear it. when your heart can bear it. but for now, he will hold you.

—

he wakes alone, which is strange. your side of the bed is empty. the blankets are rumpled but cooling, the soft dip where you’d been curled against him already rising in the absence of your weight. it’s early. he can tell by the light: pale and silvery and just barely brushing against the walls. he takes a moment. not to get up, not yet. just…to sit with it. your confession hums behind his ribs like a second heartbeat. steady. aching. unforgettable.

you’re in the kitchen. he can hear the soft clink of porcelain, the hush of your steps across the floor. and the domesticity of it punches the air from his lungs—because you’re here, because he still gets to have this, have you, even after everything.

he gets up eventually, shuffling toward the bathroom to splash cold water over his face. and then he looks up into the mirror. and there he is. tousled hair. wrinkled shirt. swollen eyes and a face carved too deep by worry.

but underneath it all? he looks so—loved. so in love it’s fucking humiliating. how could you ever think he’d walk away? he grips the edges of the sink and lowers his head, lets his thoughts come one at a time.

you think you’ve failed him. you think you’re broken. you think what you cannot give him will outweigh what you already do. every day. every moment. every time you smile at him like he hung the stars, or curl into him like he’s safe, or talk to him like he matters. he tries to imagine a future without you in it. he can’t. you’re already home. you’re already his.

he never said any of this out loud, not because it wasn’t true, but because he thought you knew. thought it was obvious. that his love was written in every action, every gentle moment. the matcha, the cat, the painted nails, the way he moved through life only slightly tilted now—always leaning toward you.

and now he realizes it wasn’t enough. not for this. not for the dark thing in your heart you’d been too afraid to name. not for the pain you’d been carrying alone, right beside him. and that—god, that kills him. he takes a breath. deep. calming. grounding. then another.

and he resolves, right then, that you’ll never have to feel that kind of alone again. he doesn’t know what he’ll say yet, not exactly. doesn’t want to startle you. doesn’t want to overpromise or speak too quickly or smother the tender wound between you. but he’ll say something. not to fix what was never broken—but to make sure you never question your worth in his life again.

you’re already bracing for it when he walks into the kitchen. arms crossed, jaw tight. like armor. like if you steel yourself hard enough, the blow won’t land as deep.

he just watches you for a moment. in his white button-down and rumpled slacks. eyes soft, sleep-warm. he looks like everything you want and everything you don’t deserve.

“you didn’t have to stay,” you say before he can speak. “you should’ve gone home.”

“this is home,” he says simply, and it shatters something inside you.

you laugh—mean, small, sharp. “don’t do that.”

“do what?”

“don’t act like this is still okay.” he doesn’t move. not toward you, not away from you. he knows enough about cornered animals not to reach too quickly. you swallow. look past him. “it’s not okay. I should've told you earlier. I should've said something before you got this involved. before I got this involved. and now—”

your voice cracks. you cover it with more bitterness. more bite. “now you have to figure out how to make a clean exit and I'm trying to make that easier for you.”

his brows furrow, but only slightly. like even confusion comes gently from him. “I'm not leaving you,” he says.

you scoff. “don’t say that.”

“I'm not.”

“kento,” you snap. “this isn’t some temporary thing. this isn’t a bad day or a bad week. this is forever. forever. I'm never going to wake up and be able to give you children. I'm never going to become someone who can give you what you want.” he’s already shaking his head. “don’t look at me like that,” you say, stepping back like the affection in his gaze is poison. “I'm not going to be your pity case. I'm not going to be some compromise you settle for out of obligation.”

“you’re not,” he says, calm. like he’s reciting scripture. “you’re the one thing I've never had to compromise on.”

you press your hands to your face. “why are you being so calm?”

“because I love you,” he says, stepping forward now, slow, deliberate. like trying not to spook you. “and because you’re scared. and because I know that if I so much as raise my voice, you’ll shut me out and convince yourself it was because of you.”

“you’re damn right I'm scared!” you hiss, and he’s in front of you now, close enough to touch, but he doesn’t. not yet.

you meet his eyes, angry and aching. "I can’t do the whole exes-who-still-text thing, kento. I can’t. if this ends—if you walk out—I can’t have you in my life in pieces. I'm not built that way. if you’re going to leave, just do it now.”

he exhales slowly. “I'm not going to leave,” he says again. like it’s the simplest thing in the world. and when you go to interrupt, to say something cutting or final or cruel-to-yourself, he hushes you. he cups your cheek, thumb brushing your skin like he’s memorizing it. “you think I want a future that doesn’t have you in it?” he whispers. “you think that not having children is some dealbreaker for me? you’re it. you’re the thing I want. the only thing.”

your eyes burn. your lips tremble. "I would bear every sorrow you carry, for the rest of our lives, if it meant I could wake up next to you,” he says. “and I'd never regret a second of it.” you try to look away. he doesn't let you.

“you’re not a burden. you’re my everything.” and when you start crying again, shoulders shaking, he finally wraps his arms around you. like the safest, warmest place on earth. he swallows, pain tightening his jaw. “it hurts. not because it’s hard for me. but because it means someone made you feel like you were unworthy of love because of it. and I'd like to kill them for that.”

you snort, even though it sounds half like a sob. “but then,” he says, softer now, brushing a hand over your arm, "I might never have found you. and you’re all I want.”

you shake your head, whispering, “you don’t know what you’re signing up for.”

“maybe not,” he admits. “but I know it comes with you. so I don't care.” your lip quivers. he holds your gaze. he can’t pretend that this is fixed, that you all of a sudden feel differently than you did before. but he is sure that he’s not going anywhere. he’ll wait as long as he has to for you to figure that out as well.

—

he doesn’t leave. you wait for him to. expect it in the small silences, the shifts in routine, the pauses in conversation where your anxiety gnaws at you like an old, familiar ache. but nanami doesn’t budge. he shows up. every single time.

you tell him you’re still afraid. sometimes out loud. sometimes just with the way your eyes linger too long on his, like you’re watching a sunset you’re sure will end too soon. and he answers with tea brought to bed. with a new toothbrush waiting for you in his bathroom drawer. with the way he never lets you wash the dishes alone.

it isn’t dramatic. it isn’t sweeping. it’s something better. steadier. it’s him pressing a kiss to your temple while you fold laundry together in the late afternoon. it’s the sound of his socks padding across your apartment floor as he carries two mismatched mugs—yours floral, his plain ceramic—and offers you the one with slightly more sugar, because you always take your coffee a little too sweet.

it’s brushing crumbs off your sweater after breakfast. it’s wiping toothpaste off your cheek. it’s silent glances across a grocery store aisle. it’s you realizing—slowly, carefully, achingly—that he means it. all of it. he chooses you, wholly and without expectation. not in spite of the parts of you that you’ve tried to hide, but with them. because of them.

he still talks about family sometimes. but now, it sounds different. family, for him, is no longer defined by children or legacy. it’s defined by warmth. by consistency. by mornings like this. by you.

people ask, sometimes. they ask at parties, at weddings, in checkout lines. older women with kind eyes and too many opinions. Coworkers with harmless smiles. even family, every now and then, with a tilt of the head and a hopeful sort of tone. “so, when are the kids coming?”

nanami handles it the way he handles most things—with grace sharpened at the edges. sometimes it’s a polite smile that never touches his eyes. other times, it’s a look—quiet but cutting—that makes them change the subject fast. and when he’s feeling especially tired of it, he pulls them aside, voice low and firm, and says something you’ll never hear. you’ll only notice how he looks at you afterward. like you’re the whole of his world. like they should know better than to ask for more. because he doesn't need more. his family is already complete.

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