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The collar had always smelled wrong. Not in the way spoiled milk or rotting fruit did, those scents made Megumi's nose wrinkle instinctively. No, this was a deeper wrongness, like someone had taken warm honey and poured vinegar into it.
He'd caught whiffs of it in crowded subway stations, clinging to beta office workers who didn't know any better, or worse, sticking on unpresented children whose parents thought leather looked "tough."
"Fushiguro?" Yuji's voice snapped him back to the playground. The afternoon sun cast long shadows across the woodchips where they sat apart from the others. "You're doing that nose thing again."
Megumi hadn't realized his nostrils were flaring. He wiped at his nose with the back of his hand, the motion too sharp. "It's nothing."
Yuji leaned in, his stupid bowl-cut swinging forward. Six years old and already incapable of respecting personal space. "Is it my new collar? Grandpa got it for my birthday!" He stretched his neck proudly, showing off the thick black band. "Real leather and everything."
The scent hit Megumi full force, that acrid wrongness layered over Yuji's natural peach-skin sweetness. His gums ached before he felt the sharp points breaking through.
"Don't-" Megumi's voice came out garbled as he scrambled backwards, hands clapped over his mouth. Saliva flooded his tongue, thick and metallic. Through watering eyes, he saw Yuji's smile slipping into confusion.
Woodchips scraped his palms as he pushed himself upright. Somewhere behind him, a teacher blew the whistle for lineup, but the sound seemed distant beneath the roaring in his ears.
Yuji reached out—always reaching, always too close, and Megumi reacted before thought, shoving him hard enough to send him sprawling into the woodchips.
Later, he wouldn't remember running. Only the burn of his lungs and the way his newly erupted fangs kept catching on his lower lip. That night, curled in his bed beneath sheets that felt scratchy on his damp skin, he'd press his tongue to his fangs and taste copper mingled with phantom sweetness of honey.
When Yuji showed up the next morning with the collar still fastened tight around his throat, Megumi turned away. He didn't see the way Yuji's small fingers trembled when adjusting the buckle, nor how his scent soured with something sharper than leather.
At recess, Megumi hid behind the storage shed where the gym equipment smelled of old rubber and dust—safe, neutral scents. But then came the crunch of sneakers on gravel, "Fushiguro?" Yuji's voice was quieter than usual. His shadow stretched long across the pavement as he stepped closer, the collar's metal clasp glinting in the sunlight.
Megumi pressed his back against the rotting wooden walls of the shed, the ridges digging into his shoulders. "Go away, Itadori." The words tasted bitter, but not half as bitter as the relief he felt when Yuji's footsteps retreated.
That night, curled beneath his sheets again, Megumi realized something worse than the hunger, the absence of the sweetened scent where Yuji usually pressed too close during storytime. The space between their desks stretched impossibly wide, and for the first time, Megumi understood what loneliness felt like.
The first time he hated it.
Morning came with rain drumming against the classroom windows. Yuji's usual desk remained empty, the hollow space smelling vaguely of cleaning spray instead of peaches.
Megumi stared at the scuff marks where Yuji's sneakers usually kicked restlessly against the chair legs—now motionless, now gone. His pencil splintered between his fingers, graphite dust settling like ash across his worksheet.
At lunch, Nobara dropped her bento onto Yuji's desk with a clatter. "You two fight?" she asked around a mouthful of tamagoyaki. Her scent spiked with curiosity, citrus sharp beneath the soft scent of roses. Megumi watched a single grain of rice cling to her lower lip before shaking his head. Nobara sighed, flicking the grain away. "Well when he comes back, tell him he owes me three milk breads for worrying me."
The rain had stopped by final bell, leaving the playground asphalt steaming. Megumi's shoes scuffed through a puddle as he approached the storage shed, fingertips brushing the metal where yesterday's heat still lingered in the surface. He inhaled deeply, nothing but mildew and the ghost of Yuji's leather collar. His newly-presented fangs ached at the absence.
That's when he smelled it, creamy peach drizzled in honey diluted by distance, but unmistakable. Megumi turned just in time to see Yuji's small form disappear around the corner of the school building, the straps of his backpack bouncing with each hurried step. The collar was gone. His scent poured freely into the damp afternoon air, and for the first time in 2 days, Megumi's jaw unclenched.
He found Yuji squatting behind the dumpsters, digging through mud with a stick. "Itadori?" Megumi said, and Yuji startled so badly the stick snapped between his fingers. Up close, the scent was overwhelming—ripe peaches with that underlying note Megumi's instincts insisted belonged to him alone. Yuji's neck was bare, the skin there pink and irritated from the collar's chafing.
"Grandpa said I don't have to wear it anymore," Yuji blurted before Megumi could speak. He rubbed at his throat self consciously, fingers catching on fresh bite marks—shockingly his own, from the look of them. The scent of a distressed omega flooded the narrow space between dumpster and brick wall. "S'not fair if it makes you sick..."
Megumi's hands moved without permission, cupping Yuji's face to tilt his head up and analyze him. His thumbs brushed the tear tracks cutting through dirt smudges, smearing them wider. The first sob hit like a punch to the ribs, Yuji's small body folding forward until his forehead pressed against Megumi's sternum. "Don’t hate me," Yuji sniffled into his uniform shirt, clutching fistfuls of fabric.
Behind them, the school bell rang. Neither one moved. Megumi pressed his nose to the crown of Yuji's head and inhaled deeply while his newly-presented fangs finally, finally stopped aching.
"Never," Megumi said into Yuji's hair. His voice came out mangled. "Just," He jerked his chin toward Yuji's bare throat, where the scent glands pulsed visibly beneath tender skin. "That thing smelled wrong."
Yuji hiccuped against Megumi's chest, his grip tightening. "Grandpa said alphas get stupid sometimes," The words vibrated against Megumi's ribs, warm and damp through the fabric. "Said you probably didn't mean to be scary."
Megumi stiffened
Scary
The word lodged between his ribs like a splinter. He'd seen his reflection in the equipment shed's window the other day, wild-eyed, fangs covered in blood, and understood where scary came from.
But Yuji was already squirming away, wiping snot on his sleeve with a wet laugh.
"Race you to the gates?" he asked, eyes still swollen but bright again
Megumi thought dimly that alphas weren't the only ones who got stupid sometimes.
——————
Megumi balanced a precariously stacked box labeled "Yuji's Shit (Do Not Touch)" while dodging a flying sock.
"You packed your damn bong before winter clothes?" he growled, watching Yuji, now with broader shoulders and the same terrible packing skills, grin sheepishly from beneath a pile of unfolded laundry.
The scent of peaches hit Megumi's nose as Yuji stretched, his worn-out university tee riding up to expose the smooth dip of his waist.
Megumi's fingers twitched against the cardboard, phantom-memory of those childhood bite marks flashing behind his eyelids.
"Help me fold these," Yuji said, tossing a pair of briefs at Megumi's face, blissfully unaware of the way Megumi's throat worked as he inhaled the fabric, still honeyed underneath the cheap detergent, still unmistakably, infuriatingly his.
The scent glands on Yuji's neck pulsed as he wrestled a fitted sheet into submission, and Megumi found himself staring, not at the curve of his collarbone, but at the old scar tissue just beneath it, faint white crescents where childhood teeth had broken skin. His pupils dilated before he could stop them.
"You're doing that thing," Yuji remarked without looking up, rolling a sweater into a tight coil. "Where you pretend not to watch me, but your shoulders get all tense." He flashed a grin that still carried elementary-school mischief. "At least buy me dinner first."
Megumi threw the briefs back hard enough to snap against Yuji's forehead. "Shut up," he muttered, acutely aware how his own moss and tea scent flared with embarrassment, betraying him as thoroughly as he'd betrayed Yuji twelve years ago behind the equipment shed.
Yuji caught the underwear mid-air with his teeth, grinning around cotton as he turned to grab another box. The movement stretched the fabric of his pants taut across thick thighs, the scent of fresh honey in the summertime intensifying, a scent Megumi had catalogued in forensic detail over years of shared dorm rooms and accidental touches. His gums ached faintly.
Something cracked when Yuji bent over—either the cheap cardboard box or Megumi's last remaining shred of restraint—as those ridiculous sweatpants slid just low enough to reveal the twin dimples above his waistband. Megumi's incisors lengthened reflexively before he bit down on his own tongue hard enough to taste copper.
"Hey, Fushiguro." Yuji straightened with an old polaroid pinched between calloused fingers, six-year-old Yuji grinning in his ill-fated collar, Megumi scowling beside him. "Remember when you gave me this?" he asked softly, rubbing his thumb over the healed bite marks visible beneath the leather strap. The unspoken question hung between them like the pheromones thickening the air; Do you still want to?
Megumi turned on his heel and walked out. The apartment door slammed behind him with enough force to rattle the framed diplomas in the hallway, two for business management, one for culinary arts. His reflection in the elevator mirror showed pupils blown black, canines fully descended.
The convenience store's fluorescent lights burned his retinas as he grabbed the first pack of gum he saw. Three pieces in, his gums still throbbed. The cashier's beta scent did nothing to mask Yuji's lingering pheromones trapped in his nasal passages, in his pores, in every memory since childhood. His phone buzzed in his pocket—three vibrations, a pause, then three more. Their old distress signal.
By the time he'd circled the block twice, his fingertips were numb from clutching the apartment key too tightly. The scent hit him first when the door opened, thickened, richer, with an unfamiliar herbal note beneath the sweetness. Yuji stood in their kitchen wearing Megumi's high school judo hoodie, sleeves rolled to show bite-scarred wrists. "Took you long enough," he said, voice carefully casual except for the slight tremble on the last syllable.
Megumi's growl tore from his throat before he could stop it. He caught Yuji's wrist mid-air as the omega reached for him, pinning it against the refrigerator. The fabric of the hoodie rode up to reveal fresh bruises circling Yuji's bicep, finger-shaped, unmistakably his, his own handprints from an earlier scuffle.
"Gojo called," Yuji murmured into the charged silence between them. His free hand ghosted over the hollow of Megumi's throat where his pulse hammered. "Something about...archival boxes in his storage unit?" The deliberate casualness shattered when Megumi's thumb found the racing pulse beneath Yuji's jaw. Their shared shudder had nothing to do with the autumn chill.
The scent gland beneath Megumi's fingers burned fever-hot as Yuji tilted his head in instinctual submission. A droplet of sweat slid down his temple—too fast for normal perspiration. "How long?" Megumi's voice came out gravely. Yuji's answering sigh confirmed what his dilated pupils couldn't hide; pre-heat pheromones lacing every exhale.
Three strides took them from doorway to couch, Yuji's back hitting the cushions with Megumi's forearm braced beside his head. The judo hoodie's worn cotton muffled but couldn't disguise the way Yuji's chest hitched when Megumi's knee slotted between his thighs. "Still playing dumb?" Megumi inhaled sharply as Yuji's teeth caught his lower lip
Yuji's answering smile shook at the edges. "You're the one who ran from unpacking." His fingers curled into Megumi's sweater, pulling just enough to press their foreheads together. The first real scent-marking in twelve years, without ceremony, without collars, with only Gojo's forgotten boxes witnessing how Megumi's mouth finally found its way home to Yuji's throat.
The vibration between them wasn't pheromones but Yuji's phone buzzing against Megumi's thigh. Gojo's caller ID flashed with a photo of their teacher making bunny ears behind an unsuspecting teenage Megumi. "Fuck," Yuji gasped, hips bucking when Megumi bit down on the old scar tissue precisely where childhood teeth had failed to connect. The phone clattered to the floor as slick soaked through his sweatpants.
Gojo's voicemail played at full volume: "seriously kids, these boxes contain your middle school mating contracts-" Megumi's snarl cut off the recording as Yuji dissolved into breathless laughter, the sound rolling into a moan when clever fingers found the damp spot. "Sensei timed this," Yuji panted, "he absolutely knew-"
Megumi wrenched himself upright with a shudder that looked physically painful, his sweater riding up to expose the sharp V of his hips where Yuji's legs had been moments before. "We're finishing this," he growled, dragging Yuji up by the hoodie strings, "after." The promise landed somewhere between threat and plea as he stormed toward the shower, leaving Yuji sprawled across couch cushions that smelled like peach tea and regret.
——————
The hot water ran for precisely seven minutes before cutting off abruptly. Yuji counted each second through the bathroom door, his nails leaving crescent moons in his palms. When Megumi emerged with damp hair clinging to his forehead and a towel slung dangerously low, he didn't meet Yuji's eyes. "Boxes," he said to the wall, his voice raw like he'd been screaming. Scent blockers clung to his skin, clinical and wrong.
Gojo's storage unit yielded precisely zero mating contracts, but three crates of middle school notebooks where Megumi's careful handwriting documented every time Yuji's scent had changed. The fifth page of the third notebook bore teeth marks—canine punctures through paper—right beside a scribbled margin note; Itadori cried when I wouldn't bite him properly. Neither mentioned it.
By dawn, Yuji's pre-heat had crystallized into something sharper, his scent glands swelling against the collar of Megumi's stolen hoodie where he'd slept curled around a box of Megumi's old track medals. Megumi was already gone, leaving behind only the indentation of a fist in the pillow and a sticky note on the fridge; Finish unpacking. The ink smudged under Yuji's thumb, still damp.
When Megumi returned at noon with grocery bags full of ginger tea and scent-neutralizing spray, he found Yuji methodically reorganizing the kitchen wearing nothing but that damn hoodie and mismatched socks. The omega didn't turn around, but his shoulders tensed as Megumi's keys hit the counter.
"Fushiguro Megumi," Yuji said with terrifying calmness, measuring rice into their new cooker, "if you walk out that door one more time, I'm swallowing the key." His voice hitched on the last word.
Megumi's hands twitched toward the bag of suppressants before aborting the motion. He crossed the kitchen in three strides, trapping Yuji against the counter with his body. "Twelve years," he muttered into damp strawberry-scented hair, fingers digging into Yuji's hips where their scents had mingled into something undeniable. "Twelve years of pretending I don't want to wreck you, and now you're gonna hold me hostage with Ikea instructions?"
Yuji's answering laugh vibrated against Megumi's chest as he turned, pressing an unopened box of alpha-grade condoms between them. "No," he corrected, dragging Megumi's hand beneath the hoodie to feel the feverish skin stretched over his ribs, "I'm holding you hostage with this."
Megumi groaned against Yuji's pulse point, his fingers flexing against sweat-slick skin before abruptly straightening. "We'll-" the alpha swallowed hard, visibly steeling himself as he stepped back, "finish this after your heat breaks." The lie tasted bitter even as he said it, twelve years of avoidance coiled tight in his shoulders.
Yuji caught Megumi's wrist with perfect timing, pressing his palm flat against his mating gland where old scar tissue overlapped fresh teeth marks. "Liar," he breathed, pink dusting his cheekbones despite the challenge in his eyes, "You ran after the first bite too." The accusation landed with surgical precision, reopening wounds they'd both pretended weren't still bleeding.
The rice cooker beeped innocently as Megumi's control shattered, not in the explosive way Yuji expected, but with the quiet thud of knees hitting linoleum. His forehead thudded against Yuji's stomach, fingers digging into bare thighs where the hoodie rode up. "Fuck," Megumi choked out, breath hot through thin fabric, "I can't keep-" The sentence died unfinished, another in their endless series of almost confessions.
Yuji tangled both hands in dark, messy hair, forcing Megumi to look up at him. Twin realizations hit simultaneously, the dampness on Megumi's lashes wasn't sweat, and the fingers trembling against his skin weren't from restraint, but terror. Twelve years of carefully constructed barriers lay in ruins between them, the battlefield littered with unpacked moving boxes and Yuji's quiet, broken laughter. "Too late," he murmured, thumb brushing Megumi's lower lip, "We're already here."
The alpha surged upward with a wounded noise, catching Yuji's mouth in a kiss that tasted like salt and desperation. When they broke apart panting, Megumi's hands were already moving, not toward flesh, but to methodically unpack the nearest box marked KITCHEN. His voice came out eerily calm while stacking plates in the cupboard, "After your heat. We'll do this properly." The porcelain rattled slightly in his grip.
Yuji watched Megumi's retreating back with the hollow ache of old familiarity, this was their dance, after all. The alpha would return in three days smelling of antiseptic and regret, they'd share awkward smiles over reheated meals, and the condoms would go quietly expired in some drawer. Except this time, Yuji's fingers closed around his hoodie sleeve still warm from Megumi's skin. This time, he thought as pre-heat burned through his veins, he wouldn't let the cowardice win.
The sound of ceramics flooded the kitchen as Megumi dropped another stack of plates. His reflection in the microwave door showed wild pupils swallowing green irises, throat working around unspoken words. Yuji knew that look, the same expression twelve-year-old Megumi wore before bolting from their treehouse after their first scent exchange. Back then, Yuji had laughed. Now, he stepped over the broken shards barefoot, pressing their foreheads together until their breathing synced.
"You're shaking," Yuji murmured against Megumi's lips, tasting salt and spearmint. Megumi's hands convulsed around the remaining plates, tendons standing stark beneath his wrist. When Yuji slid the dishware from his grip, Megumi made a wounded noise and caught his wrist, pressing Yuji's palm flat against the jackrabbit pulse at his throat.
“I can't trust myself.”
Yuji bit back a laugh that would've sounded too much like a sob. Of course Megumi would choose this moment to develop a conscience. When Yuji's sweat-slicked thighs were leaving marks on the kitchen cabinet, when his scent glands throbbed with every uneven exhale Megumi took. He dragged their joined hands down, down, until Megumi's fingers brushed the feverish skin beneath his waistband. "Then don't," Yuji said, and meant it as both challenge and absolution.
The rest of the plates shattered when Megumi pressed him against the refrigerator. Megumi's teeth scraped Yuji's scent gland, but never bit down, his ragged breaths burned hotter than any mark could. Yuji arched into the contact, laughing breathlessly when Megumi snarled at the movement. "See?" Yuji taunted, dragging Megumi's hand lower. His voice broke on the next words. "Not so noble now, huh Fushiguro?"
One moment Megumi was trembling against him, the next Yuji found himself lifted onto the countertop, the edge biting into his thighs. Megumi's mouth crashed against his, all teeth and desperation, while his hands, those carefully controlled hands, dug bruises into Yuji's hips hard enough to stain.
Yuji gasped as Megumi's torso shoved his legs apart. He could feel every erratic heartbeat where their chests met, taste the salty-copper tang where Megumi's canine had split his own lip. "Say it," Megumi growled against his mouth, voice wrecked. "Say you want this."
Yuji tangled his fingers in Megumi's hair and pulled until their foreheads knocked together. "I've wanted you since you bit me at seven." he admitted, voice raw with a truth too long buried. The confession hung between them, fragile as the broken plates beneath their feet. Then Megumi kissed him again, slower this time and devastatingly tender.
Yuji thought wildly that maybe some things were worth waiting thirteen years for.
The refrigerator hummed in the background when Megumi's hands slid under his thighs. Calloused fingers traced the faded scars there—childhood bites healed wrong—before Megumi lifted him with a reverence that showed brighter than any bruise. Yuji wrapped his legs around Megumi's waist instinctively, gasping when his back hit the hallway wall mid-stride. "Bed," he managed between kisses, "unless you wanna explain to Gojo why-"
Megumi bit his earlobe hard enough to sting, he definitely didn’t want to think about his teacher right now. "Shut up," he muttered, but pivoted toward their bedroom anyway, stepping over discarded clothes without breaking their feverish kiss. When Yuji's nails scraped down his neck, Megumi retaliated by sinking his teeth into the junction of Yuji's shoulder hard enough to make Yuji's hips jerk.
The door slammed behind them with enough force to rattle the framed Gojo memes on the wall. Megumi dropped Yuji onto the mattress with none of his usual precision, following him down before the springs stopped bouncing. His hands skimmed up Yuji's ribs, pausing over the racing heartbeat beneath. "Last chance," Megumi warned, though his dilated pupils betrayed him. Yuji just grinned and hooked an ankle behind Megumi's knee, pulling him down into the nest of mismatched hoodies they'd been stealing from each other for years.
Megumi cursed when Yuji's teeth found his collarbone, retaliating by catching Yuji's lower lip between his canines. The sharp sting made Yuji moan into his mouth, legs tightening around Megumi's hips as their bodies aligned. Something plastic crunched under Megumi's knee—probably the condom packet Yuji had shoved in his pocket earlier—but neither noticed. The scent of heat flooded the room, thick enough to taste, mingling with the scent of Megumi's pheromones going haywire.
Yuji arched off the bed when Megumi's thumb brushed his scent gland, gasping "Fuck just-" before Megumi silenced him with a kiss that stole his breath. His hands fumbled between them, clumsy with urgency. Yuji laughed breathlessly against his mouth. "Slow down, alpha," he teased, though his own trembling fingers betrayed him. Megumi scowled and pinned Yuji's wrist above his head, grinding down hard enough to make them both gasp.
A scar on Yuji's inner thigh burned under Megumi's palm, a bite mark from when they were kids. Megumi pressed his lips to it now in silent apology before dragging his tongue upward, savoring Yuji's shiver. "Still romantic enough for you?" he muttered against damp skin. Yuji's answering giggle dissolved into a moan as Megumi's mouth found its true target, his hips bucking uncontrollably when clever fingers replaced teeth.
Their first real kiss happened mid-thrust, messy and off-rhythm because neither could stop moving long enough to align properly. Yuji bit down on Megumi's lip when he hit that perfect angle, tasting iron as Megumi's groan vibrated through them both. The headboard cracked against the wall in time with their ragged breathing, punctuated by Yuji's gasped insults, which only served to make Megumi bite harder at his throat.
Megumi's hands shook wrapping around Yuji's cock, his usual surgical precision abandoned as precome smeared across their stomachs. "Look at you," he breathed against Yuji's temple, hips stuttering when Yuji's nails scored angry red lines down his back. The possessive thrill of seeing his fingerprints bloom across Yuji's hips warred with the dizzying realization that this was happening, that after years of restraint, Yuji was unraveling beneath him.
When Yuji came with Megumi's name mangled in his throat, Megumi followed instantly, partly from the clench of Yuji's body around him, but mostly from the way Yuji's eyes flew open in shock, golden irises blown wide as if he'd forgotten anyone could feel this good. The aftershocks left them tangled in Megumi's ruined sheets, legs still intertwined, Megumi's forehead pressed to Yuji's shoulder as they fought to breathe. "Still think I could hate you?" Megumi murmured when he could speak again, lips brushing the fresh bonding mark on Yuji's pulse point.
Yuji responded by shoving him onto his back and straddling his hips, fingers tracing the scars Megumi usually kept hidden beneath his shirt. "Hm I don’t know yet" he challenged, still flushed from orgasm but grinning like he knew something Megumi didn't, like he'd known all along how this would end. Megumi grabbed his wrists and flipped them again, pinning Yuji with a snarl that dissolved into laughter when Yuji kicked at him like a petulant child.
The second time was slower, Megumi mapping every scar and dip of Yuji's body with his mouth while Yuji arched beneath him, alternating between breathless curses and choked-off moans. When Megumi finally slipped inside again, Yuji hooked his ankles behind Megumi's back and pulled him closer, his whispered "mine" sending a possessive thrill down Megumi's spine that had him biting down on Yuji's collarbone in response.
They fell asleep hours later, Megumi's knot still keeping them joined, Yuji's head pillowed on his arm. The last thing Megumi remembered before drifting off was Yuji's sleepy mumble against his chest, "Told you you'd crack eventually." He didn't have the energy to respond, not when Yuji's scent clung to his skin, not when the bond between them pulsed warm and content in his chest.