Work Text:
"Your call has been forwarded to an automatic voice message system. This number is not available. At the tone, please record your message. When you are finished recording, you may hang up or press 1 for more options."
Satoru sighed as he waited for the beep. His gaze found the mirror that was hung up on the wall. He looked pathetic, just like the last time he had done this. And the time before that. And the one before that too. This whole thing was pathetic and embarrasing yet he kept doing it anyway.
*beep*
"Hey, Suguru." he spoke quietly. The phone was already close to his mouth so the mic would be able to catch his words without any issue. He found the act highly embarassing so he wouldn't be able to speak any louder even if he wanted to.
"Shoko came back from that medicine conference she went to. She offered to hang out, we're going to a bar in like-" he checked the clock beside his bed. "In like an hour. She always finds places with alcohol-free options. Even makes sure to check out said alcohol-free options to see if there's something that fits my taste. It's sweet, no?"
He chuckled to himself, even though it wasn't funny. Nothing was funny, actually. Nothing had been funny since Suguru had left 3 years ago.
"It reminds me of you." Satoru admitted. "Of how any food you bought, any snack you ate was somehow fitting for my taste. Of how you always seemed to take me into consideration whenever you bought something. 'I was gonna buy myself this hoodie and noticed it would look better on you so I bought it for you instead.' Remember when you gave me that hoodie? I still have it. Or this shirt I'm wearing right now. Oh- right, you can't see it. It's the one you bought 2 of, one for yourself and one for me. I remember you saying you knew I liked this fabric so you just bought one for me too. You didn't know back then how much I adored matching stuff but you must've figured it out cause for my next birthday you bought us matching pyjamas."
A fond smile was starting to form in his face, then he remembered he would never get matching stuff again. He gave a pause, then sighed. "I should probably go." he said, remembering the time limit that had costed him a dozen unfinished messages until now. "Bye." He hung up the call.
He was pretty sure Suguru never listened to these messages but he kept sending them anyway. At first it had been because he genuinely believed Suguru would listen, or maybe even pick up his next call. Of course, Suguru never picked up the next call so Satoru would just send a new message next time. Then it turned into a way of... grieving, perhaps. A way of dealing with the fact that Suguru was seriously gone, happily living the life he chose for himself somewhere out there. Satoru could even call voicemails an attempt to replace what he lost, but if the voicemails are for the person you lost, are you really replacing them... or are you holding onto them for dear life?
He rolled out of bed to get ready and meet up with Shoko.
***
"Suguru, it has been over a week. I know you're not coming back, you shouldn't anyway. They want you dead. But... are you really not coming back?"
"Will I ever see you again?"
***
*beep* "Hey, Suguru. Our hangout with Shoko went fine, if you're wondering." It was 2 days after the last message he had left. He was calling to share news that he knew Suguru wouldn't even care about in the slightest. "You probably weren't wondering though." He mumbled to himself. "You didn't even know we were hanging out."
He sighed. That seemed to be something he did a lot when sending messages to Suguru. Would Suguru be worried and think this is how he usually feels and behaves if he listened to the voicemails? Satoru wasn't sure. "I know I sound depressed on most of these messages but rest assured, I'm doing fine." he added anyway. He wasn't doing fine at all, he felt like a clown.
"Anyway, I'm going on a mission to Australia. That's like- the other side of the world. Crazy. While I'm already there, I figured I could do some sight-seeing." He paused. "I just wanted a break from the higher-ups, really." he admitted sheepishly. "Whatever, I'm telling you this because it means that I won't be sending messages for a couple days. And will be unreachable by phone. I don't want to get called back earlier than planned so... yeah. Bye."
***
"Hey, Suguru. Shoko and I graduated today. I wished you were there with us too. Shoko didn't say anything but I know she felt the same."
"We miss you. A lot."
***
"What do you mean you don't want any souvenirs? It's Australia! Have you ever even been there before?"
Megumi shook his head. "No, but that doesn't change the fact that I don't want any souvenirs from you."
"Ouch." Satoru said, jokingly placing a hand on his chest, pretending to be offended. "Tsumiki, what about you?"
"Sweets, please." the girl replied with a smile. "Oh, oh! Is it true that It's summer in Australia right now?" Satoru chuckled. "Yeah! Cool, no?" Tsumiki gave him an excited nod. Satoru didn't miss how Megumi's eyes widened with interest but he knew the kid would never admit to it. "Then eat ice cream when you're there!" Oh, how Satoru loved the purity of this girl. "You can eat ice cream in winter, silly." he said. "But then you'll get sick!" Satoru shook his head. "Nah, you wouldn't." Tsumiki gave him an exaggerated sigh. "Whatever, I didn't expect an irresponsible adult like you to know that anyway." Satoru was never gonna let Utahime near these kids ever again.
"Also," she gestured Satoru to bend down so she could whisper in his ear. Satoru happily obliged. "Megumi's 9th birthday is near. Don't listen to him."
Satoru straightened his back with a chuckle. "Wasn't planning to anyway! See you guys in a week." He turned around and left, sweet little Tsumiki waving him goodbye and Megumi not even bothering to look his way.
***
"I found Toji's kid. I talked to him today. He doesn't even know his father is dead. He thinks their parents abandoned them."
"I have no idea what you would think about the fact that I'm taking in Toji's kid of all people."
"I really wish I could ask you."
***
Satoru spent his entire flight reflecting on how embarrassing and idiotic it was for him to still be sending voicemails to Suguru. He kept thinking this over and over again, he had been doing so for years now. However no matter how stupid he found the act, he always went back to leave another message. Satoru wondered if he would ever be able to put an end to it.
He thought about telling Shoko about it. He knew Shoko would make fun of him for it though. Perhaps her laughing at him till tears fell from her eyes would be enough to make Satoru stop.
Except, he knew nothing would be enough.
***
"I think I'm gonna be a teacher at our high school. It's a little funny. While still studying, I was looking forward to graduating and never stepping foot in one of those classrooms ever again. Every corner of that school reminds me of you. I hated it."
"And now it's the reason why I want to go back."
***
'You have 1 new voicemail.'
Satoru looked at the notification with shock as his eyes slowly went down to check the number. He couldn't believe what he was seeing, this had to be a mistake of some kind.
The voicemail was from Suguru.
Satoru knew better than to get hopeful and let himself believe Suguru had listened to each and every voicemail and was replying only now. Suguru must've gotten rid of the number long ago and this was probably the new owner of the number, begging him to stop sending him messages. Satoru wanted to turn off his infinity and repeatedly smash his head against a wall when he realised the new owner must've listened to at least a few of his voicemails and was probably wondering what the fuck jujutsu was and what kind of delusional person was on the other side of the line, talking about fighting curses and shit while pathetically begging for some Suguru person to reach out to him.
He had to stand up and walk around for a few seconds to mentally prepare himself. Embracing himself for an extremely humiliating experience, he opened the voicemail.
"Hello, Satoru."
It took Satoru all he had to not scream and fall to his knees and break down. This wasn't the concerned voice of a total stranger. It was the sweet, caring voice of Geto Suguru. His Suguru.
"Don't feel bad about not being able to pick up the call when you receive this voicemail. I only called because you said you would be unreachable."
Satoru was only realising now that despite years of telling himself 'I'm sending these for myself, I know he won't listen to them, which is fine.' he had never stopped wishing he would. Before he could even register how the fact that Suguru had, in fact, listened to the messages made him feel, he started sobbing like a child. (A child that was not Satoru himself, of course. He never sobbed like this as a child.)
"I know this might not mean much coming from someone like me but it would be very cruel of me to do this without letting you know first so I decided to send back a voicemail for once."
A pause. Satoru could hear the distant laughter of two girls. He couldn't help but wonder who they were. The two girls that were reported missing from the village Suguru massacred? Was it them? Had he taken them in?
"I'm gonna have to get rid of this number, Satoru. I'm sorry. But I want you to know that I've always looked forward to your next voicemail. I want you to know that all this time, I've been staring at your name whenever you called, waiting for it to go to voicemail. I really liked listening to them." A sigh was heard.
"Bye."
When the voicemail came to an end and silence filled the room, Satoru came to the awful realisation that this time, he had lost Suguru for real. All this time Suguru had actually been so close, not fully gone, yet Satoru hadn't been able to see it. And now he had lost Suguru for the second time.
He crouched down to the ground, feeling unable to breath. Suguru listened to my voicemails. Suguru. Listened. To. Them.
Another sob escaped him as all the things he said in those mails came flooding back to him.
"Will I ever see you again?"
"We miss you. A lot."
"Please come back."
"Merry Christmas, Suguru. I wish we could have celebrated it together, like last year."
"I want to see you. Promise I won't let the higher-ups know. You know I don't like them anyway."
"Megumi asked me about you today."
"You turned 20! Happy birthday Suguru."
I'm gonna have to get rid of this number, Satoru. With his hands shaking in panic, he tried dialing Suguru's number yet it was hard to type it right with his hands shaking so much. Gojo Satoru, the strongest, wasn't used to his hands shaking and his lips quivering like that.
After several failed attempts and cussing himself out multiple times for not saving Suguru's number for 'safety purposes' (Satoru didn't even know what he was keeping safe from whom) he managed to hit the call button.
"We're sorry, you have reached a number that has been disconnected or is no longer in service."
Unable to contain his rage and agony; he threw his phone to the nearest wall; his sheer strength being too much for the wall to stand, let alone the device. A scream was building up inside him but he still had some dignity left in him. He couldn't let the maid downstairs hear him lose it like this.
He picked himself up from the ground, taking the mirror off the wall and leaning it against the wall to cover the damage he caused seconds ago before quietly wobbling down the stairs and out of the house. He walked out into the yard and towards the forest they owned which was seemingly neverending. As a kid he liked being out here, their yard being the only interesting thing in his caged childhood. He liked escaping the maids and his parents to disappear into the woods. He would find joy in the panicked maids running around the trees and his parents crying out his name, all trying to find him unharmed (not that he was an easily harmable kid, but you can never be too safe considering all the people after his head) as quickly as possible. Now it only made him feel more suffocated with every step he took further inside.
He passed by an old log that had been lying on the ground for well over a decade. He remembered the Christmas he brought Suguru and Shoko home to celebrate together. It was their first year in high school. After a long conversation they had about their own childhoods -in which Satoru had received a lot of concerned or pitying looks from his friends, them both just realising that someone who was born into such a clan and destined to be strong wouldn't have a normal childhood- Satoru had insisted they play hide and seek -which would eventually turn into a complete mess as them being sorcerers made it almost impossible to actually hide from each other and they would resort to running away (which wouldn't work either)- and he had shared a moment with Suguru on this very log, while Shoko -who was severely handicapped against the two special grades- was chasing them. He had sat down with Suguru, then he had laid on Suguru's lap, telling the boy he 'got tired' even though they both knew it was a lie. Satoru was just yearning physical contact and, somehow, Suguru understood that. He always did, which was what made Suguru so special for Satoru. Suguru always knew. Suguru always understood him. Sometimes even better than Satoru himself.
Suddenly despising his own living place for the unnecesarry reminder, he left and threw himself to the loud crowds of the city center. He walked around aimlessly until he made it to a park. He sat down on an empty bench. He leaned back and looked up at the sky. The sun was starting to set, painting the sky with beautiful shades of pink and red. He wondered if Suguru knew how pretty the sky looked in that moment.
He listened to my voicemails. Why hadn't he said anything sooner? Why hadn't he picked up any of the calls and had waited for it to go to voicemail? He felt upset, even a little angry. He wanted to hate Suguru for not reaching out to him. Except he could never hate Suguru. No matter what he did, he would never be able to hate Suguru.
He watched a weird-looking bird approach him, without actually paying much attention to it. It was hard to not notice something moving across with eyes like his. Didn't mean he would always be hyper-aware though. Which is why he was startled when a piece of paper was dropped right in front of his feet by that very bird. As he looked up at it again, he noticed it was a curse, rather than a bird.
Suguru.
He considered following it but he knew Suguru knew better than that. The bird wouldn't go straight to him, so Satoru wouldn't be able to find him.
He leaned forward and grabbed the paper.
'I know you can keep a secret.' the paper wrote with Suguru's elegant and all too familiar handwriting. Confused, Satoru unfolded the paper. He had to refrain himself from kicking his feet and giggling like a stupid toddler when he saw what was written on it.
In the middle of the unfolded paper was a phone number.