Archive of Our Own ^beta

now
"I have a big, fat, gay crush on my best friend, who is straight, stupid, stinky, and eats fingers", Megumi says, because he still has the slight hope that he can cringe Tsumiki back into consciousness with sheer second-hand-embarrassment.

It doesn’t work, but at least the words are out in the world now and he can’t take them back, so he just sits on the stool at the side of Tsumiki’s bed and sinks into himself, shoulders hunched and head tucked in, because it’s so not fair.
At least he got a muffin at the front desk, because there was some kind of anniversary happening and the hospital staff gave them out to visitors, but even the pastry looks like it’s sunk inwards.

Over the course of his life he has so far come out to two people, and both times it was hurried, whispered, ashamed, but Tsumiki had hugged him close and told him she will always love and accept him, and Gojo had just thrown his head back with hysterical laughter and said “Hi gay, I’m-” but hadn’t been able to finish, because Megumi had slammed a baking tray into the infinity in front of his face.

Gojo-sensei is, in fact, the thing that started the whole problem, being not only Megumi’s gay awakening at the ripe age of six, but apparently also determined to help Megumi come out to his friends by not being helpful in the slightest.

“You can’t imagine the things he comes up with”, Megumi tells Tsumiki in an exasperated voice, but Tsumiki doesn’t answer; of course not.

Megumi is tired.
He is tired of being so hopelessly in love with someone that will never like him that way, and he is tired of being scared that Itadori will avoid him when he knows Megumi’s dirty secret, and he is tired of his insecurity being a punching bag for Gojo, who is also straight, stinky and stupid.

Megumi seems to have a type, and it’s not good for his health.

So, Tsumiki is the only one that will listen to him vent, and he is going to tell her everything on the prospect that she wakes up one day and hopefully doesn’t remember anything.

Megumi bites into his muffin. Where the outside is inconspicuous and just looks like any regular vanilla muffin, the dough inside seems to be dyed in parts with different colours, making it look like a rainbow swirl.
Megumi grunts.
How fitting.

eight days prior
Megumi’s frantic fingers are gripping his smartphone tightly enough to break it as he holds it to his ear, but the only thing he reaches is Gojo’s voice mail.

“GOJO!”, he screams regardless, an action that triggers drops of blood to fly from his mouth to the concrete, and he wipes the back of his hand over his bleeding lip and stuffs the phone back into his pocket, all while running to catch up with Itadori in front of him.

“Did you get him?”, Itadori screams over the sound of the curse behind them tearing steel beams out of the walls of the old warehouse; the noise of metal screeching against cement like a cry in Megumi’s ears.

“No, he didn’t pick up!”, Megumi yells back, and, without his phone occupying his fingers, he has his hands free to form them into his shadow figures, but just before he can summon Nue, Itadori trips on something in the ground and falls down.

“Shit!”, he curses, immediately getting to his feet again, but Megumi sprints over to him and throws them to the ground again, just before the steel beam flies over their heads with only centimetres to spare.
The curse howls and moves to stand over them, both boys struggling to get to their feet, just as the monster reaches a disgustingly long arm out for them-

Then Kugisaki falls through the ceiling and saves their asses.

◇

Kugisaki is sitting in Ijichi’s car slurping a boba tea and seeming very content with the fact that she is once again the hero of the day, while Itadori and Megumi stand outside with their arms crossed, Megumi’s homicidal stare probably scary enough to ward of any civilians, and observe Gojo arriving at the warehouse - which is now completely torn to the ground - with a jute bag in his hands that says #1 sensei on it (Megumi is absolutely certain that Gojo has bought it himself).

“Gojo…”, Megumi starts, voice as cold as the steel beam that nearly squashed them to death only half an hour ago. “Why didn’t you pick up your phone?”

Gojo looks entirely too happy for Megumi’s liking, giggling his stupid little laugh and swaying the shopping bag in his hands.
"You see, I was already on the way over, but I had to hit the store first - because I was running low on hot chips - and then I noticed that I forgot my member card at home - and you know I can't go grocery shopping without my member card, because then I won't get my payback stickers - so I had to go back home, where I searched the entire flat only to find out I had it in my pocket the entire time! How hilarious is that?”

“We nearly died”, Itadori says.

“But you didn't!” Gojo does a silly little twirl and his smile is beaming. “Which just proves what amazing students you are!”

Megumi feels his skin boiling in a way that doesn’t happen often anymore since middle school. He didn’t get to murder the curse in the warehouse today, but he will murder the curse that is his teacher. “That only proves what a terrible sensei you are!”

Gojo wags his long index finger at him, as if he can’t believe what stupid things Megumi comes up with. “But I taught you everything you know, which made you survive, so, technically, I am the reason you survived today.” He stands up straight to his full height and towers over Megumi with an innocent smile. “You're welcome.”

Itadori is already extending his arm out to hold it in front of Megumi’s upper body without even looking at him, because they’ve known each other long enough that Itadori knows when to hold Megumi back from jumping Gojo and clawing at his infinity like a furious cat.

“Thanks…”, Itadori breathes weakly.

Megumi can’t see Gojo’s eyes behind his stupid blindfold, but he is absolutely certain that they are sparkling with the hellbound terror of the joy that humiliating Megumi brings him, when Gojo reaches into his reusable shopping bag. “Aw, don't be mad at me, Megumi-chan, I bought you gingerbread cookies!”

Megumi’s sigh is irritated. “There is literally no ginger in gingerbread.”

“Oh no, I didn't do it because of your faible for ginger, I did it because the packaging reminded me of you.” Gojo pulls out the cookies and that’s when Megumi sees it.

It’s a square the size of a small book, with the brand name at the top and the ingredients list on the back, and right in the middle of the packet, there is a rainbow. Obviously it doesn’t mean anything regarding the cookies, it’s just a cute design feature to make the packaging more appealing, but Megumi’s face grows hot at the sight of the half-pipe of colours stretching across the plastic wrapping.

He wonders if he should form an alliance with Nanami to murder Gojo in his sleep.

“If you catch my drift”, Gojo concludes with a nasty smirk, this time his head is tilted towards Itadori, whose face is scrunched up in confusion.

You can catch these hands!, Megumi thinks, but only balls his fists in the pockets of his uniform, too humiliated to even look at Itadori.

“Now, that's not very nice, sensei, Fushiguro doesn't look like that at all!” Itadori interjects his racing thoughts and makes him glance over regardless.
Itadori is pointing to a tiny printed ladybird underneath the rainbow, and Megumi is once again thanking whatever god invented himbos, because this could have gone so much worse, would Itadori actually possess any braincells.

Gojo turns his head back to Megumi with a frown and the eyes behind the blindfold seem to ask “Are you sure this is the one? He's fucking stupid.”

“Go fuck yourself” , Megumi answers with his own eyes.

◇

They are in the car back to school when Gojo goes in for his next kill with no mercy. He turns in the passenger seat next to Ijichi to look at his students, that are squished together in the back, with Kugisaki in the middle this time, who is happily nibbling Megumi’s gingerbread cookies and telling Ijichi about how she defeated the curse while the boys where shivering on the ground.

“Let’s play a game!”, Gojo interrupts her, because he has no respect, neither for Kugisaki’s exaggerated story, nor for Megumi’s mental health. “I spy with my blindfolded eye someone who starts with an h and ends with an omosexual.”

And while Itadori is still tying the letters together to sound out what they spell, Kugisaki is already giddily pointing at herself. “Oh, me! Me! I win!”

“Congrats, Nobara-chan”, Gojo says sweetly through his teeth and turns back in his seat to look out of the window and probably ask himself why exactly he ended up as a teacher with all the potential he has, but Megumi can’t relax yet, because-

Because Kugisaki just came out on a fucking car ride back from a mission and she doesn’t look scared or nervous in the slightest, and Itadori doesn’t seems to give a single fuck and just steals a cookie, and Megumi wonders, if it’s because Itadori doesn’t care about Kugisaki being a lesian, or, because he gave up on deciphering Gojo’s riddled word.

Apart from the fact that Kugisaki can hammer anyone into the ground who makes fun of her, she looks so calm. So confident. So everything Megumi wishes he could be when confronted with sexuality.

Megumi turns his head and exhales into the window. The air in the car is stuffy and he is pressed from shoulder to toe against Kugisaki, but still feels so far away from her, with the way she’s loudling denying Itadori’s accusation to have a crush on Maki-san (so Itadori did get that she’s gay!) so casually; so freely talking about her actually very obvious crush, and receiving supporting words from everyone in the car but Megumi.

And Megumi can’t even be jealous of her, because he’s so happy that she found this trust in herself and everyone else.

He’s not ready for that, he decides. He isn’t ready for Itadori to know, because no matter whether Itadori will avoid him because he is disgusted (which Megumi can’t imagine, but his anxiety can) or whether Itadori will look at him with the same fondness in his eyes that he is currently directing at Kugisaki, and say “I will support you no matter what, because you are my friend” , both scenarios scare the shit out of Megumi.

“Are you alright, Fushiguro?”, Itadori, sweet angel Itadori, promptly asks and bends forwards to look at him past Kugisaki.

“Just tired”, he answers and grabs a cookie to have a reason to be quiet.
It tastes disgusting in his mouth, but the unsaid things between them taste worse.

five days prior
They have the day off, which happens as rarely as a full moon during an eclipse, or Kugisaki being nice, so they want to make the most out of it.

For Megumi, that usually means spending the day with some reading or with his dogs, but naturally, Gojo has a different plan, because Gojo’s idea of fun means terrorizing Megumi even more than usual.

At least, that’s what Megumi interprets it as, when Gojo comes barging in his room at ass o’clock in the morning in a flowy white tunika and a ridiculous sun hat, screaming “Up, up, champ, we’re having a picnic!”

“No, you’re having a picnic, I’m having a cardiac arrest”, Megumi mumbles into his sheets but can already feel the tiredness slipping away from him at Gojo’s loud voice, that is suddenly overlapped with Itadori’s, who peeks around the door to Megumi’s room now as well. “C’mon, get ready, lazy butt, we’re gonna miss the bus!”

Ah. So Gojo already snarfed Itadori into his silly little field trip as well. Megumi wonders if Kugisaki or the second years are joining them too, but, of course, when they are waiting at the bus station twenty minutes later, it’s just the three of them.
Wow. So, a picnic with just Gojo and Itadori. Great. Maybe, when the bus arrives, Megumi can sneakily throw himself in front of it.

“Why did everyone else have a choice?”, Megumi asks, and wonders if he’s already breathing fire from how angry he is.

Gojo ignores him, something Megumi wishes he would do more often, and Itadori just laughs and drags him on the arriving bus, something Megumi wishes he would do less often, considering how the skin of his arm tingles under Itadori’s fingertips.

Itadori is looking even more stupid than Gojo today, wearing jeans shorts with his red boots and his yellow hoodie over some kind of shirt, in case he gets too hot. Megumi fears that Itadori paired his fit with his neon green hawaii shirt with the pink flowers on it.
He’s almost certain he did.

They arrive at the little park and spread their little blanket and pack out their little lunchboxes, and everything could be so cute and wholesome and relaxing if both Itadori and Gojo wouldn’t exist and Megumi wouldn't exist as well.
Sadly, humanity is approximately two million years old and still, Megumi has the misfortune of being alive at the same time as Gojo, who accidentally whacks a chihuahua with his sandal when he shakes it off his foot, and Itadori, who immediately strips off his hoodie to reveal that Megumi’s worries were reasonable.

Megumi comes to sit on a tip of the blanket as far away from them as possible, turns his back to them and starts nibbling on his sandwich with a stern look on his face. It’s his day off as well, after all, and he’s not going to let it be ruined, only because his legal guardian is a more embarrassing child than an actual child.
Maybe he can bribe Nanami into adopting him instead.

He sits and eats like this for a while, tuning out his teacher’s and classmate’s stupid banter, and Megumi almost thinks he’s safe, just as Gojo jabs in. “Yuuji-kun, you're sure wearing pretty revealing clothes today! If someone your age around here was gay, they would really start to sweat it!”

Megumi’s head yanks back over to his teacher, who is not even looking at either of them, just leaning back on his elbows with his face turned towards the sun, which is tinting his silver hair almost platinum, making him look like a very stylish granddad.
He seems relaxed enough to let his guard down, maybe if Megumi is fast enough, he could stab him with a plastic fork-

“What an oddly specific thing to say, Gojo-sensei!”, Itadori responds, happy and oblivious, and Megumi wonders how easy life must be if your only worry is your own dawning execution.

The worst thing is that Gojo is not even particularly wrong, because yes, for god’s sake.
Megumi is thirsty and it’s not necessarily the heart that is bothering him, but the way the watermelon juice drips down Itadori’s wrist and bare forearm, or the way Megumi can see his whole chest whenever he bends forward and his ridiculous shirt falls away from his body with the force of gravity.

He wishes he could just turn back around again and go back to ignoring them, but… when Itadori now bends his head down to lick the watermelon juice off his fingers, Megumi finds himself transfixed on the sight of Itadori’s lips and tongue appearing and disappearing in the gaps between his fingers, lapping until there is no liquid left, but missing the streak of juice running down his muscular forearm, gathering at his elbow and dripping down onto his pants.

“Oh no!, Itadori wails. “My favourite jorts!”

What kind of god is it, Megumi thinks, What kind of god is it, that would rather let Megumi go on a field trip with his humiliating teacher and his hopeless crush that is way too good looking but uses the word jorts, instead of just straight up killing Megumi and releasing him from his suffering?

He doesn’t get an answer, but he never stops wondering, especially when Gojo’s next attack catches him in his own home.

yesterday
They are sitting at the kitchen table for breakfast, Kugisaki silently stuffing toast into her face and Itadori looking way too cute with his fresh bedhair as he pours some milk into his empty bowl (because, of course Megumi falls in love with a milk-before-cereal kinda guy), when Gojo barges in and claims to join them, something he usually never does, so Megumi is alert.

The comforting smell of coffee and the first gentle sun rays of the day waft through the air, clouding the scenario in a false sense of security, as Gojo takes his #1 sensei -mug (again, that he bought himself) and leans onto the kitchen counter, blindfold obscuring the mischievous look on his face that Megumi can just sense through infinite layers of fabric.

Even though there is plenty of space at the table, Gojo doesn’t move, and it takes Megumi’s morning brain a few seconds to piece the reason together.
Gojo is ridiculously tall. And standing right in front of the cabinet that Megumi needs to reach into to get his ginger tea.
He can’t go without his ginger tea in the morning.
And Gojo knows that.

Forever annoyed but not surprised by his antics, Megumi just sighs without even bothering to stand up. “Gojo-sensei, can you get me a teabag, please?”
Gojo smiles sweetly, turns around to reach into the cabinet and pulls out a teabag. Suspicious.

“Let me do it for you, Megumi-chan!”, he propositions, turns on the kettle and reaches for a plain white IKEA mug to place the teabag in. Even more suspicious.

But maybe Megumi is still dumb enough to believe in the good of the world, because when Gojo holds out the steaming mug, he reaches for it, not aware or not awake enough to react immeadiately when-

When Gojo lets go of the mug just millimetres before Megumi can grasp it properly.

The cheap porcelain shatters on the ground and the boiling tea luckily only splashes against the furniture, so no one gets hurt, but Kugisaki lets out a surprised stream of curses and Itadori shrieks.

“Shit!”, Megumi mutters and gets up to clean the mess, idly tiptoeing around the shards and the pathetic puddle of what is left of Megumi’s relaxing morning.
He half expects Gojo to say something like hey, look, broken like your self-esteem, but instead, he says something much worse.

“Oh, my…” The sorcerer’s voice is dripping with fake concern. “Seems like Megumi-chan has a bit of a limb wrist. Must come with him being… you know.” And he does the motion with a nasty smirk; bends his wrist halfway and lets his hand fall down, the universal sign for faggot.

And Megumi sees red.

He doesn’t even care about the shattered pieces on the ground or about Itadori’s genuinely worried “Fushiguro, are you alright?”, he simply wants to grab Gojo and slam his stupid head against the counter, wants to make him pay for all the humiliation and hurt, want to unleash the beast that he was in middle school when someone dared to call him that f-word back then.

Instead, he fixes Gojo with his stare, because he can’t touch him anyway. He feels his eyebrows draw in and his lips quiver at his words.
“This is going too far”, Megumi says, surprised at how level his voice sounds, at least to his ears. “Can we go outside for a second?”

And Gojo knows him, knows him better than he knows himself most of the time, and wants only the best for him, and Megumi is aware of that, but it doesn’t change the fact that Gojo isn’t all knowing and that Megumi needs to tell him that this has to stop.

Gojo complies, and is strangely quiet on their walk through the hallway and out onto the porch.

The sun has risen a little higher in the meantime, greeting Megumi like an embrace and a punch to the face all at once, the humid air making it hard to breathe, or maybe it’s a different reason.

Gojo sits down on the floor criss-cross-applesauce and gestures to Megumi to join him whenever he is ready. Megumi sits down next to him, the wooden floorboards warm and comforting under him, and he claws his hands into fists against them. Hopefully he won’t get splinters.

“Before you say anything, I need to apologize”, Gojo starts, his body and eyes turned towards the garden, face towards the sun again.

Megumi swallows and doesn’t know what to say, but he doesn’t need to, because, of course, Gojo just keeps talking (and for the first time, it’s nice that he is filling the empty space between them with words).
“I realize now, that my actions upset you, and that it was wrong of me to assume you needed my help.” It’s weird to hear him talk so rationally and level-headed, but he is an adult after all, Megumi assumes, so he just lets him talk.
“I guess I just wished for someone to help me when I was in the same position as you are now, but that doesn’t justify that I hurt you.”

“Wait-”, Megumi interrupts. He’s fully awake now, after everything that happened, but his brain suddenly feels foggy again, thoughts racing so fast that he can’t keep up. “What do you mean, ‘when you were in the same position’?!”

Gojo’s mouth stretches into a smile, and Megumi is almost certain that his eyes behind the blindfold are not smiling with it. “You know, when I first heard about boys liking boys, it was the nineties, and things were a lot different back then. I’m not saying your struggles and insecurities are less valid just because you’re younger, I’m just saying…” He turns his head towards Megumi and lifts a hand to put on his shoulder. The touch is comforting, warm, and rare (because it’s only much later that Megumi realized Gojo turned his infinity off for him).

“I’m just saying, the world is slowly becoming a better place, so you will find your spot in it just like I did, and I will always be there for you, because I love you no matter what.”

Megumi is starstruck. His fists relax against the floorboards, his eyes big and unbelieving. “A… Are you saying, you’re-”

“Oh, and don’t forget to use protection!”

“GOJO!”

still yesterday, but a few hours later
Itadori (12:43 pm): fushiguro r u ok? u seemed kinda stresed at brakefast
me (12:44 pm): i hate gojo so much
Itadori (12:44 pm): he's not that bad
Kugisaki (12:44 pm): stfu itadori u r his fav
Itadori (12:44 pm): literaly what has he ever done to u
Kugisaki (12:45 pm): gojo sensei doesn't walk in on you when you have someone else's fingers inside of you
Itadori (12:45 pm): but i hav some1 else's fingres inside of me all the time
Itadori (12:46 pm): w ait no
Kugisaki (12:46 pm) hahahhahahah
Itadori (12:46 pm): WAIT NO
Itadori (12:46 pm): I JUST MENAT LIKE
Itadori (12:46 pm): BC I EAT THEM
me (12:48 pm): anyway
me (12:48 pm): even though he’s a nuisance, he made me realize something, so…
me (12:48 pm): would you two please meet me outside the dorms sometime in the evening tomorrow?
me (12:49 pm): I need to tell you something.

now
“So, yeah, that was pretty weird”, Megumi concludes his story so far.
The sun is almost touching the horizon he can see from Tsumiki’s room window, and soon he’ll have to leave the hospital.

“You don’t think Gojo is…” Megumi’s eyes dart to his half-eaten rainbow muffin, before he pauses for a couple of seconds. “Ah, it’s not like I care.” He stuffs the rest of the muffin into his mouth so he doesn’t have his hands full, and gets up to return home.

“I’ll see you around”, he bids goodbye to her. Tsumiki doesn’t respond.

When Megumi arrives at the school and sits down on the porch outside his room, he relents in the last few minutes he gets as the closeted person he’s been his whole life. He doesn’t even know what got him to make the impulsive decision to text his classmates, but he just feels like tonight is a time to be brave.

Still, being brave doesn’t help if he’s not ready to tell them yet.
He quickly thinks about cancelling everything, pulling out his phone to text his friends to not come to his room tonight, but before he can do that, the sound of a familiar step-sequence interrupts him, because he knows Gojo by his steps alone.

“Hey!”, Gojo greets and does a little wave even though Megumi is standing right in front of him. “How was your hospital-visit?”

“It’s not like anything ever changes in her room”, Megumi spits back, anxiety making the walls behind him cave in, pushing him further out of himself.
He feels Gojo staring through his blindfold; of course he knows what Megumi is up to.

And Megumi breaks, all the hurt and insecurities and stress of the time since he got his first ever high-school classmates crashing down on him with the weight of a secret that has him ashamed, but that he can never change.

“I just don’t know if it wouldn’t be easier to just not say anything!”, he almost yells into the empty garden, a few birds fleeing from their place in a treetop at his voice. “If it’s easier to change myself before they have to change for me.”

Gojo grips his shoulder again and draws him in for a hug, that is less of a hug and more of Megumi standing with his head pressed into Gojo’s jacket and his arms hanging uselessly at his sides while Gojo rests his head on top of Megumi’s hair, even though he always complained about how that tickles when they were younger.
Gojo smells exactly like Megumi, because Gojo buys all of their toiletries together, so Megumi doesn’t have to submit himself to his grocery-shopping anxiety.

“What if none of you have to change?”, Gojo asks in a low voice.

“I don’t know if I can do it.” Megumi shakes Gojo’s arm off and takes a step back, and he doesn’t know if he does it because he’s embarrassed at his moment of weakness, or if the familiar warmth of Gojo’s skin and voice bleeding into him gave him enough strength to pull himself together.
“I don’t know if I can look Itadori in the eye and tell him-”

“Tell me what?”

They turn around so fast Megumi’s hair almost spikes Gojo in the eye, and Megumi stares at Itadori with unadulterated panic, while Gojo just lets out a silly little “Oop” and places his hand in front of his mouth like he’s some kind of teen girl reacting to the latest drama.

Itadori looks so pretty in the setting sun, even though he’s just wearing a big shirt and some sweatpants, a towel hanging over his shoulder and protecting his clothes from the droplets of water running out of his wet hair. His eyes dart to Megumi and he looks apologetic. “Kugisaki can’t make it, she’s been laying in bed with period cramps all day, but… you can tell me what’s on your mind.”

No, nononononono, Megumi can’t do this! Yes, he can! No, absolutely not!
“Uhhh…”, he grunts intelligently.

“Well, I’ll let you two boys alone in this compromising situation! Ta-daaa~” Gojo does another little wave and just like that, he’s gone.
“You’re so full of shit”, Megumi says into the empty space he left.

Itadori looks visibly uncomfortable, he’s knocking his big toes together and tugs at the towel around his neck. “If you changed you mind, I’m just gonna-”

“No!” Yes! He can do this! Itadori is his best friend, Megumi’s got nothing to lose, other than his best friend, the respect of the other students, his dignity, his mental wellbeing, and his chance to a normal life (as normal as his life can be, anyway).
Maybe he can’t do this.

You can’t do this, his anxiety says.
Shut up, he says. Also, you’re stupid.
No u <3, his anxiety responds, and Megumi knows it’s not true, but he believes it anyway.

“I need to tell you something!”, he blurts out without thinking further, without letting his mind control his happiness again, and his heart is beating out of his chest.

Itadori simply smiles curiously and nods in a go on kinda way. He’s so, so sweet, Megumi doesn’t deserve this. What is he even afraid of?

“It’s something about myself”, he starts again, eyes darting towards the floor and transfixing on the puddle at Itadori’s feet from the water running out of his hair. “Something I’ve been scared to tell you since I met you…”

“What, that you’re gay?”, Itadori says incidentally. “Yeah, we knew the entire time. No worries, bro.”

Megumi feels his heartbeat in his eyeballs. The puddle on the floor suddenly looks a lot less sharp, as if the floor is being pulled away from under his feet, leaving him to fall into a spiral of please can this be a weird joke or a bad dream, please can I wake up and was never gay or enrolled in this fucking school or in the knowledge of Itadori Yuuji’s existence.

“What?”, he asks instead, voice hoarse and empty. “How?”

“No offense but no straight guy has ever stared at my ass the way you do-”

“Wat.”

“Like, seriously dude, and I thought I was an ass man, but you really take the cake, pun not intended-”

This is too much for Megumi’s little heart to handle and he really wonders by now, exactly how much bad karma he must have harvested in his past life to warrant this.

“How do you even notice that?!”, he snaps out, but Itadori doesn’t look offended in any way, just grinning with the intensity of a million suns and about this blinding.
“Dude, Sukuna plants his eyes on the back of my neck all the time and watches you, because he's, like, obsessed with you, and then he snitches to me.”

Megumi feels his knees weaken. He needs to sit down, but he doesn’t. “And you… don’t mind?”

“That you’re gay?” Itadori vigorously shakes his head and looks almost a little perturbed that Megumi would even think such a thing. “I mean, I’m bi and Nobara’s a lesbian, so if anything, we’re happy we collected the whole set.”

Megumi can’t even fathom the exhale of sheer relief that rushes out of his mouth, his shoulders slacking down. He needs about two weeks of sleep after this.
Only then, when he calms down, he registers Itadori’s words and his heart involuntarily speeds up again. “Wait… you’re bi?”

Itadori shuffles his toes again, looking so young in the soft glow of the sunset, but… happy. Content, almost. That he can share this information, that is so much more than simple information, but a testament to his being and his life and his pride, with Megumi. “Yeah…” He scratches the back of his neck with one hand. “But I’ve never kissed a guy.”

The fact that other people are nervous about their sexuality, and everything that comes with it, too, has Megumi endeared and makes him want to protect and uplift Itadori, the same way he feels protected and uplifted now. “Oh, you’re still valid, you don’t need to prove your sexuality to anyone-”

“God dammit, Megumi-chan!”, Gojo suddenly yells from where he is standing a couple of metres away and stuffing hot chips into his face like he’s at some kind of movie premiere. “Take a hint!”

“Fuck off!”, Megumi yells, entirely too happy with relief to be angry at him right now.
“Off I fuck, then.” Gojo shrugs and teleports away once more.

Megumi sighs, turning his eyes to Itadori again, who is suddenly looking a lot closer now than just a few seconds ago. “So, do you want-”

“Yes, I want you to be my first gay kiss!”, Itadori spurts out and his eyes widen almost immediately, as if he can’t believe he just said that. “Now I really hope that’s what you wanted to ask.”

“Actually, I wanted to ask if you want to put orange dye in his shampoo again, but...” Megumi swallows, the ground getting stolen from under him once more, but even if it feels like that, Itadori is right there, only an armlength away, and it doesn’t seem like he’s going anywhere. “... your proposition is acceptable too.”

Itadori is really, really pretty; eyes in the same colour as the sunset now, that’s painting him in rich ginger and apricot, wrapping around his skin, clouding him in soft curves instead of sharp edges. He has to look up slightly, because Megumi is still a bit taller, and he’s smiling now when he goes to his tippy-toes at the same time Megumi leans down and they meet in the middle.

It’s no fireworks going off or loud cheering or any of Gojo’s other annoying antics, it’s just Megumi and Itadori, and it feels nice, that’s all Megumi can say. It’s gentle and tender and smells good, like fresh shampoo, and when Megumi cups Itadori’s warm cheek in his hand and strokes his thumb over the skin, he feels like he doesn’t even need the floor under his feet anymore when he can just hold onto Itadori and never let go.

And when he feels Itadori draw back only a millimeter and shakily exhale into his mouth, the world is not more or less weird because Megumi kissed a boy.

“So?”, he asks in a trembling whisper. “What’s the verdict of your first gay kiss?”

“Mhm”, Itadori hums with his eyes still closed, his hot breath on Megumi’s cheek driving Megumi crazy. “Might need a second recollection of data to fully draw a conclusion here.”

Itadori gets his second recollection. And a third. And a fourth.
And, because Megumi is so nice, he volunteers to be Itadori’s boyfriend as well.

Tsumiki is going to shit when she hears about this.