-ˋˏ 10.55 PM ˎˊ- GOJŌ SATORU.
your fingers trailed up behind his ears and pushed down on the handles of his dark glasses, sneaking a quick peak at his crystal blue eyes before letting the glasses drop on the bridge of his nose again.
the prettiest smile adorned his lips as he watched you so closely, your arms now curled around his neck loosely. the moon shined through the parted curtains, making the man in front of you look so unreal, so otherworldly.
“so, what are the plans for today, sweetheart?”
you smiled at the petname, shaking your head gently.
“i should be asking you that, oh greatest sorcerer of our time,” you replied to him, teasing him happily.
your fingers that were playing with the soft tufts of his hair right by his nape slowly trailed to his face, grabbing the thin handles of his glasses and sliding them off his face. he slowly opened his eyes, stunning white lashes clashing with the icy blue of his iris as he lifted up his hand and reached out to hold your face.
“no plans today, just us two.”
you raised an eyebrow, smiling softly, “your students don’t need you?”
he shook his head, “they’ll be fine without me, i trust them.”
you hummed, adoration filling your body as you stared at the man in front of you. he was so selfless, so caring of all the people around him and they had no clue. they just had no clue how much he loved everyone dear to him.
“alright.. how about we just chill at home ‘n go out for dinner later tonight? have a walk after maybe? just a day where it’s about the two of us,” you offered, watching him as he continued staring at you.
“sounds perfect, sweetheart,” he replied, his hands having moved to your hips, gently squeezing you as his head rests against the back of the couch he was sitting on.
you hummed, laughing lovingly as you leaned in close to him. “does it now..?” you ask, softly pressing your lips against his for a moments as it was now his turn to hum. “if i get more of this, definitely,” he said against your lips, his signature bright smile curled into his lips.
you laughed in reply, pressing your lips once again against his, continuing your silly talks and spending some well deserved quality time together before having to get up and get ready for dinner later tonight.
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(CW for Suicidal Ideation)
Hinata’s breath was heavy as he landed the final move of their act. The tinny music playing from their speakers went quiet and the audience clapped politely. It was always the same song and dance as the crowd moved on with their day. A few of them tossed some yen their way but otherwise it was time for them to regroup for their next performance. Yuta knelt down by the hat with some coins and bills sticking out of it, counting their earnings thus far.
“Hey aniki! We might be able to eat well tonight! There’s like 3,000 yen in here!” Yuta exclaimed. The idea of a filling dinner made Hinata’s mouth water. Oh what he wouldn’t do for even warm noodles not from a cup.
Hinata turned to grab the iPod from its place on the speaker, choosing the next song to play. He put the phone back and turned the volume up a little more to play over the evening rush. The music started and he and Yuta moved in unison around their little stage, taking in the crowd. There were some regulars that Hinata recognized, the businesswoman who was perpetually tired but always stopped for their performances and a few kids who looked up at them in awe as their parents were trying to usher them away. There were always new faces too, of course people traveled across the country all the time or took new trains or moved cities, but there was something different about the boy with the bright red hair at the back of the crowd. His sky blue eyes pierced straight through to Hinata’s heart and made him stumble when their gaze connected with his own.
“Hey, aniki focus! We’re almost done, don't fail on me now!” Yuta whispered, carefully shielding Hinata from the crowd as he regained his footing. Yuta was always so quick thinking. Hinata got back to his position and finished up the routine, eyes looking for that boy he had spotted earlier. He half hoped the boy would come talk to them afterwards while they were packing up for the evening, but when he finally saw that shock of red hair, it was moving away with the rest of the crowd.
Hinata sighed, disappointed. Maybe that boy would come back someday. There was something about him that drew Hinata in.
Someone bumped his shoulder, drawing him from his thoughts. “Hey, aniki, are you alright? You seem out of it today.” Yuta’s hand rested on his shoulder and Hinata couldn’t help but smile. Wasn’t it supposed to be the other way around, the older brother checking in on the younger one?
“Hey hey everything’s fine Yuta-kun, don’t worry about me. I was just thinking about that delicious dinner you’re treating us too~” He playfully pushed back on Yuta, the red haired blue eyed boy all but forgotten now.
“Hey! It’s technically our money so I’m not treating you to anything!” Yuta scowled but the smile in his voice was obvious to Hinata.
“Hehe, then dinner’s on me! Say ‘thank you aniki!’”
---
It was a week before Hinata saw the red headed boy in their audience again. He had all but slipped his mind, but those striking blue eyes were impossible to forget. Yuta was introducing their next performance which allowed Hinata to take a better look at the older boy who had made his way to the middle of the audience. He was tall and what Hinata could see of his outfit seemed ill-fitting at best, along with a headband holding his hair away from his eyes.
Hinata scrambled to his position as the music queued up and let his instincts take over. Every so often he found himself glancing at the red haired boy, trying to see what he thought of their performance, but his face revealed nothing.
Why was he so focused on this one boy? It’s not like they didn’t have strangers who watched them sometimes, and none of them had caught Hinata’s attention quite like this boy. He really couldn’t be much older than Hinata, maybe 17 at the oldest. Was he an older brother too? The boy’s eyes made contact with Hinata’s and it took everything in him to not look away.
Once again however, Yuta snapped him out of whatever trance he had been in and everything was forgotten.
“Are you really okay aniki? You’ve been out of it a lot recently…” Oh how it pained Hinata to see the concern on Yuta’s face. Nothing was even really wrong per se, but Hinata was distracted nonetheless.
“I’m fine, Yuta-kun. Geez, can’t your older brother have some peace?” His mouth ran faster than his brain and he immediately regretted it. Yuta’s face flipped through several emotions; hurt, confusion, exhaustion. It wasn’t like him to hide things from his brother, so why was he doing it now? “Whatever, let’s get some dinner. My treat~”
“It’s our money!”
---
The boy continued to make appearances at the twins’ performances on the street, becoming something of a regular but disappearing before Hinata could flag him down. Hinata wasn’t even sure what compelled him to want to talk to the older boy, but he wanted to say something. He had even noticed that the boy seemed happier and his clothes fit a little better, not like they were just the first thing he grabbed out of a donation pile.
Finally, after almost a month of trying to say something to the boy, Hinata saw him walk up to their hat on the ground and drop a few coins into it.
“Thank you!” He said, walking up to the boy. “Hope you enjoyed the performance!”
The boy froze as if he wasn’t expecting to be greeted like that. There was a slight flush to his face. “I-it’s nothing, don’t worry about it. You uh…you were great?” The boy seemed unsure of how to reply, though Hinata was happy with the compliment nonetheless. Maybe…
“What brings you here? I mean--agh, sorry! I just mean…I noticed you don’t have a regular schedule?” The words were practically falling out of his mouth and Hinata wasn’t really sure what they were doing. “Like you show up a few days in a row but then go three weeks without stopping by at all!” He was just digging a bigger grave for himself! Great!
“Ah uhm…I’m not from around here.” The boy scratched at the back of his neck. Maybe Hinata should back off.
“O-oh, yeah of course. Duh. Are you visiting family or something?”
“Not quite. I really should get going though. See you…later?”
“Yeah, see you later.”
“Hey Aniki, are you coming or not? The food’s gonna get cold!”
“Coming!”
---
It was almost a month before the boy appeared again. In the time between, Hinata had come up with a million different ideas for what his life was like. Was he a delinquent who skipped school to hang out on the street with gangs (how scary! But he looked strong enough to fit in)? Or was he a runaway from a city far away, somewhere Hinata only dreamed of visiting like Okinawa? Maybe he had a bad relationship with his dad and ran away, a thought that Hinata hated to admit had crossed his mind more than once. Or maybe he just passed through the city on the way to somewhere else. That seemed to be the most likely option, especially if he couldn’t come very often.
When the boy did finally show up again, Hinata had to hold himself back from practically jumping him after the performance. Something looked…different about him though. His eyes seemed more tired? Like he hadn’t been sleeping well. Hinata thought of a fight he had with his dad a few weeks ago that made it hard for him to sleep and thought maybe this boy was the same as him in that regard.
Hinata decided to wave him down after the performance, hat in hand (they had done pretty well! It felt heavier than normal and even without counting everything, they’d probably have enough for breakfast too).
“Hey! You look tired, are you--did you want to get something to eat?” Please say yes please say yes please say yes--
The boy’s mouth opened, then closed, then opened again. Did Hinata mess up? Oh he overstepped and now there really wasn’t any chance of getting to know him. Why was he so interested in talking to the boy anyway? Hinata had been asking himself that for a while now and he still had no answer.
“I…I can’t. I need to go.” The boy turned and ran off before Hinata could ask more. He just kept messing up, didn’t he? Maybe he really was just a burden to Yuta and their dad and the restaurant owner. He shouldn’t have been born and Yuta would’ve been better off--
“Aniki! Sheesh, get your head out of the clouds. How much did we make?” Yuta grabbed the hat out of Hinata’s hand and quickly counted out the coins and bills. “Woah! We could eat a whole five course meal with this…”
“Think with your head a little Yuta-kun. We’ve got breakfast paid for if we don’t blow it all tonight!”
Yuta nodded before handing the hat back to Hinata. “So, my pick tonight?”
---
Hinata signed the note, trying his best to keep the tears from dripping on it and smudging the ink. After his blunder with the red haired boy, he hadn’t shown up to their performances for over two months. Hinata was certain that he had messed up and was too forward. He didn’t even know the kid’s name! Why did he think the two of them could ever be friends?
And on top of all of that, Yuta had become more and more distant from Hinata, as if Hinata just existing was dragging him back from his full potential. Yuta would have been better off as an only child and maybe Hinata deserved this life. Thirteen years living with their father, who had treated them as nothing but monsters, blaming them for their mother’s death and everything bad that had happened since, Hinata had resolved to run away. He’d make his way to the mountains and maybe he’d find someone willing to help him or maybe he’d slip into an endless sleep.
Dear Yuta-kun, the letter had started. I’m sorry that I’m leaving like this, but I know that I’m just a burden to you. I’m sorry for that. I wish I had more to say but I just want you to be happy and maybe father will treat you better without me. I love you.
The other letter, already folded and placed on the table, was much shorter, addressed to his father.
Dear Father, I’m sorry I couldn’t be a better son. Please don’t take this out on Yuta-kun, it was my decision.
The less words he spent on that man, the better. Hinata folded Yuta’s note and placed it on top before quietly exiting through the front door.
---
Everything was cold. Hinata slumped against a tree, head between his knees in a last ditch effort to keep warm. Sleep should come soon and he could painlessly move on, at least that’s what he hoped. He barely registered someone approaching him, but didn’t look up.
“Hey.” The voice was vaguely familiar, but where did he remember it from? A warm hand shook at Hinata’s shoulder.
“‘M fine.” The words were barely a whisper. The other voice grunted before walking away. It was another minute before Hinata felt something drape around his shoulders and a cup shoved in his hand. Whatever was in it was steaming, warming his fingers.
“Drink.” The voice said. And he did, the tea was very, very bitter. That voice…
Hinata looked up, meeting a pair of bright, sky blue eyes. That’s where he recognized the voice from. Did he…live? In the mountains? The boy seemed to recognize him too. He was wearing a headband and what looked like very warm clothes that Hinata wished he had. Hinata finished the tea, trying not to focus on the flavor. It helped at least, in warming him up a bit.
“Why are you here?” The boy finally spoke again. It sounded like he was unsure if he should be mad or concerned, or both, but he offered Hinata another cup of tea, which he accepted if only to warm his fingers up. He pulled the blanket closer around his body.
“I…ran away.” Hinata looked downward, as if admitting this out loud was a cardinal sin. The boy gestured for him to continue. “I guess I just…I was dragging my brother down. I’m not really talented at anything like he is and I’m the reason our dad sees us as monsters. He shouldn’t have to deal with a brother like me.” Hinata wasn’t really sure why he was spilling this so easily. The boy was a good listener though, hanging on every word Hinata spoke. Was he shaking? He’d never admitted this out loud before and it felt oddly freeing to say it to someone.
He waited for a response, anything to chase away the uncomfortable silence Hinata had created with his confession. He really fucked up, didn’t he. He should have just kept that to himself like he always did instead of burdening a stranger like this!
“I…” The boy started, barely audible above Hinata’s racing heartbeat. “I’m glad you’re alive.” He sounded unsure of his words. Was he just trying to be nice? Of course he was, how else do you respond to a kid telling you something like this?
“You don’t have to pretend.”
“I’m not. When I saw you singing and dancing…I think I realized something--” The boy cut himself off, the suddenness of it making Hinata look up. A moment later he heard his brother calling out from the woods behind him.
“Aniki! There you are!” Yuta tackled him to the ground, squeezing Hinata like he might just blow away in the wind if they weren’t careful. “You scared me! I can’t believe you’d do something like that!”
Tears pricked at Hinata’s eyes again. “I’m sorry, Yuta-kun. I’m really sorry.” He buried his face in Yuta’s jacket. His nose started to run, from the cold or the tears he couldn’t tell.
“You aren’t a burden to me. I don’t know what I’d do without you around Aniki!” Yuta pulled back, hands gripping Hinata’s shoulders. “Promise you won’t do something that stupid again.”
Hinata wiped the tears from his eyes, sparing a glance where the boy had been. It was as if he had never been there at all and Hinata had just hallucinated the whole interaction. He looked back at his twin brother. “I promise.”
“Now let's get you home and warmed up. Where’d you get this blanket anyway? It doesn’t look like one of ours.”
“I…” The boy had been real, and he told Hinata he was glad he was alive (even if his explanation was cut short by Hinata’s brother rushing in). “I guess I just found it. There must be people living nearby or something.”
---
The chatter of the night club died down for the night as everyone was getting ready to go home. Hinata’s feet were sore from running around, but it was satisfying to be back in a restaurant like this. It reminded him of his childhood working for the Chinese restaurant with Yuta.
Rinne, the leader of Crazy:B who had wanted to get closer to Hinata, and by extension 2wink, slid a drink down the bar. It looked like a horrible mix of syrups and club soda, but one sip was all it took for Hinata to drink it all down.
“Great job tonight Hina! You’re a real natural at this stuff.” Rinne was washing the other glasses behind the bar now as Hinata finished the rest of his soda.
“Yuta-kun and I used to work in a restaurant so it comes pretty naturally to us!”
“That so?”
“Mhm!” Hinata slid the empty glass back to Rinne, who quickly dumped the ice and washed it before tossing the towel over his shoulder. The entire week they’d been working the club together, there had been something bugging Hinata at the back of his mind. “Hey, Rinne-senpai…did you ever watch our shows?”
“Huh? ‘Course I have, vice prez wants us to work together so I’ve seen a few of ‘em.”
“That’s not what I mean. I mean like…back when Yuta-kun and I did street performances.”
Rinne paused for a moment. “Why’re you askin’?”
“Oh, it’s nothing. You just reminded me of someone who used to watch them.”
“Well I’m sure whoever it was is proud to see you singin’ and dancin’ on stage.” Rinne had come around the bar and stood next to Hinata, ruffling his hair. “Let’s get goin’ or I’m never gonna hear the end of it from Niki-kun.”
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wherever you want to go with this but i trust you -- prompt: blood
[uh @unicyclehippo & i are writing joan of arc themed lil fics bc … hello ava 👀 & mine is undoubtedly the more deranged of the two but ... here u go lol]
//
ava comes back gentle; ava comes back covered in blood.
‘i came back,’ she says, in the middle of the night when neither of you can sleep, after she’d stood in the shower until the water ran cold, scrubbing red from her skin, in the middle of a beautiful valley in france that has crumbling wine caves and a slow river, covered in reeds, currents that remember its history, the rot and death and face-down bodies.
‘i came back,’ she prays into your skin, her fingers tracing the curve of your ribcage like she’s remembering a church she worshipped at centuries ago, an organ and its pipes; your heart and ventricles and your own blood, faithful. ava touches you like she’s lived a thousand years; maybe she has. her eyes are the same brown as they were when you met, when she’d only been resurrected once, when she had cried at the marvel of the ocean and her own hands, and sometimes you wonder if you’re worthy of a strength like this — worthy of sacredness and consecration and your mother’s voice — i’d rather you take your own life than be gay — and maybe for so long you had taken your own life and shoved it down into the hollow of your throat, into the spaces between the bones of your wrists; you had discarded your want and offered up your slow-beating heart in its place.
ava kneels before you and scrapes her teeth along the inside of your thigh, the skin there pale and soft. it’s dark until she brings her mouth to your center and moans, and then the room glows: gold and blue — ava, ava, ava: life; some kind of god, some kind of — i am begging you to touch me; oh, i’m on fire, oh, i’m on fire; history and elegy are akin; you are my sweetest downfall, i loved you first. the holiness in ava is not of this earth — the metal, the burn — but she is, dirt under her fingernails when she came through the portal, blood coming out of her ears, covering her face. ava’s tongue is soft and she holds your body in the palms of her hands and the room is blue and gold, a room where you get what you want: crosses held before you while you die and eternal salvation and her name like a goddamn hymn and fuck, fuck, baby and your hips grinding down on her mouth and your hands tangled in her hair — hair that you had cut when you had wished for a home amidst the mountains and the tender press of her spine in the morning blue and hair that you had cut again a few days ago, trembling hands both times because she was beautiful, a blade at her neck and curls floating to the floor. she had asked you to, and now she asks you to do something for her again — to come, to come, to come. you hold your breath when you do, consecration.
the holy and the horror — the light comes in the name of the voice — and ava comes back ready to dance with you and laugh and ava comes back with enough power to detonate bombs with her hands. you kiss her and she tucks a flower behind your ear, waiting for your next battle at a convent in the countryside. ava eats without apology, whatever she wants, and drinks wine that stains her lips red, and kisses you in front of everyone; she is hot when you touch her, when her walls flutter and curl around your fingers and you touch her. sometimes you don’t know what to say so you just tell her what you know: primeval forests are so remote that humans don’t belong there, that people die when they go there, that there are wolves and moss and weather so cold humans can’t feel their hands. ‘what do you think our past lives were like?’ she asks, one day as you spar, divine powers aside, and you wonder: were you always her protector? have you always been by her side? have you watched her die, every time? ‘one,’ you say, like you remember it in your hands, ‘we were happy; we lived on a farm and we were poor, but we had milk and eggs and bread you knew how to make. i’d go out in the morning with the dog and you spun wool and it was quiet, and green.’ she sits against you, the halo and the divinium in her back against your front, enough to kill you, and her, many times over. ‘verde, que te quiero verde,’ she says, ‘we grew old. who died first?’
‘does it matter?’
‘no.’ she’s quiet; a ship slowly goes by. ‘we’d wake early, for breakfast and you rested your head in my lap when you were tired.’
‘i have loved you a long time.’
she traces a pattern along the lines of your hand, a scar straight across the passes right through them.
the days move on and ava heals and ava bandages your cuts and bruises and a broken wrist when you don’t, when you are human and frail and strong; ava falls asleep, too wild and small and lonely and beautiful, her spine curled against your chest. she wakes you with coffee and once, after a particularly bad battle, where you can’t move the next morning, a blow to your head too hard, she stays with you all day in bed, reading and running her fingers through your hair. she wears a soft sweater and socks with little dogs on them and says you’re a miracle, you’re such a miracle, i would destroy the world before i lose you and it’s true; it’s scripture it’s sacred it’s heresy it’s a blessing. a promise from a god, while you feel woozy and nauseous and your neck aches — a promise from a god, weighty and beautiful and sighed into your skin in the afternoon rain.
ava comes back in love with you; ava comes back —
there’s an explosion inside the sepulchre and everything is on fire; you have not been scared for so long — forgive us, we lived happily during the war; but on the wild nights who can you call home? only the one who knows your name — and you wonder if ava died staring at a cross; you wonder if you will grieve in this life, as you had before. you wonder if ava knew, if ava has always known, if ava was tired.
but then ava comes back — again, again — sooty and with torn armor and a gash across her face that hasn’t healed, blood streaming down. she walks through fire, unburnt, a smirk, even, on her face. ava comes back and kisses you and you taste blood and ash and dust to dust and the strawberry chapstick she had put on in the van before the battle, tucked in into her pocket with a wink. you have seen many miracles but this is one of an order you will never understand, one that will stop people from killing each other, one that is catastrophe and heaven.
‘let’s go home, bea,’ ava says, and you search her mouth for a sacrament and find it in the press of her tongue on the backs of your teeth. ‘let’s go home.’
and you do — the ocean, and in bed weeks later, the cut across her face red and shiny and healed, the edges pulled together taught, the burn on the palm of your hand a webbed scar right in the middle —
‘did you know,’ she says, in the moon and the quiet, ‘that joan of arc was put to death for wearing men’s clothing? she was so theologically clever that they could only order an execution if she relapsed into heresy; the guards at the prison she was at only gave her men’s clothes, which they eventually used to convict her.’
you kiss ava’s temple; her skin smells like lavender. she presses her lips to your pulse point.
‘being a girl,’ she says, her brow furrowed, your bodies stretched and tangled under the sheets. ‘she burned at the stake for being a girl.’
‘do you — do you remember?’
she turns toward you, different than you remember but still the same, still exuberant about the sea and ice cream and books she loves, texting and movie theaters and petting every dog you pass on the street; ‘sometimes.’
‘okay.’
’there are days —‘ she laces your fingers together — ‘that i feel a call backward, in my palms, in my knees, in the back of my skull. to understand, to see. there are days when all i know of this life is to love you.’ she presses a kiss to the divinium tattoo on your forearm that glows blue in the dark when she’s near. ‘this is how i know you. you are what i know.’
‘i will never watch you die again.’
‘i’m not sure i can.’
‘well then i’ll join you, wherever we go next.’
‘yeah,’ she says, so sure, prophetic, ‘you will.’
ava comes back for you —
what did the voice tell you when you returned to your room?
it told me that i should answer you bravely.
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