Chapter Text
The first thing that pulled Yuji out of sleep wasn’t his alarm clock. It was breathing. Slow, even and familiar in a way his half-awake mind clung to instinctively.
Sukuna.
Yuji could have recognized that sound anywhere. He was knocked out in the other bed, one arm thrown over his face.
He looked annoyingly peaceful.
Their beds were only a couple meters apart, but in this tiny room it felt closer, too close sometimes. Yuji’s eyes drifted to the tattoos curling over Sukuna’s shoulder.
Bold lines. Sharp edges. He remembered the day he got them. The fight he picked to get them, of course.
"Heeey," Yuji rasped, his voice sounded sleep-stupid. He stretched his leg out under the blanket, foot tapping lightly against the wooden frame of Sukuna’s bed to wake him. "’Kuna. Come on, time to get up."
All he got was a low, annoyed noise. Sukuna shifted a little, face disappearing even deeper into his pillow with a tired, stubborn sigh.
“Seriously….we’re gonna be late.” Yuji sat up with a groan, dragging a hand through his hair, which stuck up everywhere.
He stretched, spine popping in a few spots that made him wince. “I’m making toast,” he mumbled. “And if you’re not downstairs in five minutes, I’m eating your share. I mean it, I’m starving.”
That finally got a reaction. One crimson eye cracked open, glaring from under a toned arm. The look was pure venom. "You lay a finger on my food," Sukuna’s voice was a sleep-ravaged growl, "and I'll dig out that photo of you from the school play in fifth grade. The one with the tights... I'll make it my phone background."
Yuji felt a hot flush creep up his neck. He hated that photo. "You're the worst."
"You love it."
A reluctant smile pulled at Yuji’s lips. This was just how things went. Their routine. Their stupid little morning script. He was the one who dragged himself up first, who made breakfast, who tried to keep them on some kind of schedule.
Sukuna was the mess he had to fight into consciousness every single morning. Grumpy. Impossible. Completely dramatic about waking up.
It was familiar. It was weirdly comforting. It felt safe.
Yuji swung his legs out of bed, padded over to the dresser and tugged out a worn shirt and a pair of jeans.
In the mirror, he caught movement behind him. Sukuna was finally sitting up, but it looked like it took actual effort. His back rolled, muscles shifting under skin in one smooth line of strength, like it was the easiest thing in the world to be built like that.
Yuji’s gaze lingered a second longer than it should have. The morning light hit Sukuna’s shoulders just right, tracing the sharp lines of muscle in a way Yuji really did not need to be noticing right now.
He tore his eyes away fast, throat tight and warmth curling low in his stomach.
Nope. Not dealing with that thought at seven in the morning.
In the mirror, Sukuna finally looked back at him. Still sleepy, but sharp around the edges. That lazy smirk slowly spread across his face, like he had caught Yuji red-handed.
“See something you like, little brother?” his voice came out rough, slow, way too smug for someone who had just woken up.
Yuji’s brain stalled. Then heat shot straight into his cheeks. He grabbed his shirt like it was a shield. “Yeah… my patience dying. Thanks for that.”
Sukuna let out that low, rough laugh of his, the one that always seemed to settle somewhere in Yuji’s chest before he could ignore it. He didn’t even pretend to look for a shirt. Just stood, stretched and then tugged on a pair of low-hanging sweats.
A second later he padded after Yuji toward the stairs.
Yuji moved on autopilot: the clatter of two plates, the click of the toaster, the sticky sound of the jam jar lid giving way. Sukuna slumped into a chair at the small table, immediately propping his feet up on the one opposite.
"Feet off the chair," Yuji said, not even turning around from the counter.
"Make me."
Yuji let out a long sigh as he set a plate in front of him with two slices of toast, golden and steaming. “Just eat, you dickhead,” he muttered.
They ate in silence. A good one, for once. Yuji stared out the window, watching raindrops race and felt quiet for once.
This was the part of the morning he actually liked. Simple, easy. Just the two of them hanging out before the world started yelling and expecting things again.
"You got that history test today?" Sukuna asked around a massive bite of toast.
"Yeah...I'm screwd. You?"
"Free period. Gonna see if Uraume needs a hand with that absolute piece-of-junk car their are trying to resurrect." Sukuna took a swig of orange juice. "You think Gojo-sensei is sadistic enough to make us run laps in this weather?"
"Probably. He'd call it building mental fortitude or something."
"Guy's a psycho," It was just a fact of life.
School hit him like always, the lights too bright and everyone talking at once. Yuji dropped into his seat next to Megumi just as the bell finished ringing.
“Cutting it close,” Megumi said, totally deadpan. He didn’t even bother looking up from the book he was reading.
“Sukuna’s fault,” Yuji muttered, still a little out of breath. Megumi only nodded and that was something Yuji liked about him,because he never needed the whole story.
Between classes, Yuji found Nobara digging through her locker. She spotted him right away and hooked her arm through his with all her bright energy.
“You look like you slept maybe three hours,” Nobara said, jabbing him in the ribs without mercy. “Let me guess. Sukuna kept you up gaming and ended the night yelling at some twelve year old again?”
"Something like that," Yuji said, offering a weak smile. It was easier than the truth, which was just lying awake and staring at the ceiling.
As they walked to their next class, Nobara launched into a detailed, brutal play-by-play of her latest dating disaster. "…and then he had the nerve to try and hold my hand. Yuji, I’m serious, it felt like holding a sweaty fish. I almost threw up right there."
Yuji managed a chuckle, but it felt tight and strained in his chest.
"You know, you're actually lucky," she said, bumping his shoulder with hers.
The tension instantly coiled back in his shoulders. "Huh? How am I lucky?"
"You don't have to deal with any of this nonsense! You're like... a celibate monk of dating. I've never even heard you mention a crush. You're just... happily, simply you. It's kind of pure, in a weird, uncomplicated way."
Pure. The word landed in his gut like a lead weight. He forced a laugh, hoping it sounded more casual and less hysterical than it felt. "I'm not a monk. I'm just... busy. With track and school and... stuff."
"Busy being blissfully unaware of the dating hellscape," she teased, but it was fond. The splinter was in, though. A tiny, nagging thing.
The comment wouldn’t leave his head. Through class, while the teacher rambled about something he didn't understand, Yuji’s mind kept drifting back to that middle school dance.
The girl with the really nice smile. His heart going crazy. Leaning in, thinking it was going to be a perfect moment and then totally whiffing it and smashing noses so hard he saw stars.
The embarrassment after that had been brutal. He spent the rest of the night hiding by the punch bowl, silently begging for an earthquake to bail him out.
Yuji’s eyes slipped to the window. Outside, across the rainy courtyard, he could see the auto shop building. A familiar shape stood there in a grey jumpsuit, half-hidden under the hood of some beat-up car.
Sukuna.
Even from here, it was obvious. The broad shoulders, the way other students drifted away from the open garage like it had its own gravity. Nobody got too close. People always walked a little faster around him, because Sukuna carried this aura around him, a literal do not fucking approach forcefield that everyone, instinctively, respected, or were smart enough to be scared of.
And honestly? Yuji couldn’t blame them.
On the walk home, the rain had turned into a thin mist. Nobara hadn’t stopped talking the whole time.
"So, for real real," she pressed, hopping over a particularly large puddle. "There is no one? Not even, like, a secret thing for some pop star? A hot anime character? Nothing?"
Yuji shoved his hands into his pockets, shoulders practically up to his ears. He stared hard at a crack in the sidewalk. “Nope. No one.”
It wasn’t totally a lie. There weren’t any faces in his head, no names that made his stomach do flips like everyone always talked about.
Just… nothing.
Like that part of him was a blank spot. A weird empty space where all that stuff was supposed to be and underneath it, this constant low worry that something was wrong with him, like he missed the day they explained how to be a normal person who likes people the way you’re “supposed” to.
Back in their room, something felt off. The easy quiet they’d had that morning was gone.
Nobara’s comment was stuck in his head, poking at him over and over. And now it just felt… embarrassing. Like there was something wrong with him and everyone else knew how to be normal except him.
Yuji sat at his desk with a highlighter in his hand, but the page might as well have been blank. The stuff he was supposed to learn had turned into one big yellow smear.
Sukuna was stretched out on his bed, one earbud in. Yuji could hear the faint, angry beat of whatever he was listening to.
The only light came from Yuji’s desk lamp, warm and yellow and the blue glow from Sukuna’s phone. It gave the room weird long shadows.
He was hyper aware of Sukuna's presence. It was always there, a constant like gravity, but tonight it felt different. He was tuned into every tiny sound: the rustle of Sukuna's sheets, the soft thud of him shifting his weight, the faint sound of his breathing.
Sukuna pulled the one earbud out. "You're being weirdly quiet over there."
"Just got a lot on my mind," Yuji muttered, not daring to look up from his textbook.
“Sure you do.” Sukuna kept scrolling on his phone, the room falling into this stretched, awkward quiet.
Then, without even looking up and in that blunt way only he could manage he threw it out there: “So… you ever gonna get a girlfriend? Or are you planning on staying a virgin forever?”
Yuji’s hand stopped mid-stroke, highlighter hovering in the air. Heat rushed up his face so fast it made his stomach twist. “Shut up, Sukuna.”
"I'm dead serious,it's getting weird. You're eighteen. Don't you get… you know. Curious? Or are you just scared?" He knew it was supposed to be teasing, but underneath was something real, and that made it ten times worse.
"I'm not scared!" Yuji snapped, finally turning to glare at him. Sukuna was propped up on his elbows, that infuriating, knowing grin plastered all over his face.
"Dude. You are bright fuckin’ red."
"I am not!" The protest was weak, pathetic.
He could feel his ears burning. God, he hated this. Hated how Sukuna could tear him apart with just a couple of words, like it was nothing. How he could hit the exact spots Yuji tried hardest to hide, without even trying.
Sukuna laughed, but it wasn’t his usual loud, obnoxious one. It was softer, more focused. His red eyes were fixed on Yuji, too knowing, like he was really looking at him, trying to figure him out.
It made Yuji feel stuck in place, like he couldn’t move even if he wanted to.
It was weird and uncomfortable… and also, annoyingly, kind of exciting. Warm, in a way he didn’t want to name.
When Sukuna paid attention like that, really paid attention to him, it felt a little like standing too close to a fire... intense, almost too much, but impossible to look away from.
Yuji gave up pretending he was studying and shut his book a little harder than he meant to. He just sat there, trying to breathe around the way his heart was going way too fast.
He felt… exposed, all the little defenses he'd built were holding together about as well as wet tissue.
Sukuna took his other earbud out. "Hey," he said, and his voice had lost all its edge. It was...almost gentle. "What's actually going on with you?"
The shift in tone, the lack of mockery, the simple, direct question it was what finally broke the dam.
Yuji stared at his hands, fists tight in his lap. He didn’t want to say any of it. It sounded stupid in his head. Childish. But it still came out, low and shaky:
“I don’t know, Kuna… sometimes I feel like something’s wrong with me.”
His voice cracked a little. He hated that.
“Everyone else just… gets it. They know how to talk to people, how to flirt, how to-” he waved a hand vaguely, face burning, “you know….kiss and stuff. And I don’t. I feel like I missed some big lesson everyone else got. And it’s so embarrassing even saying this out loud.”
He sucked in a shaky breath, shoulders tense like he was waiting to get laughed at. But also…saying it made something in his chest feel lighter, just a little.
He dared a glance at Sukuna. The smirk was gone. Completely. His face was neutral, but his gaze was intensely focused, taking in every little expression.
“It’s not like I don’t want to,” Yuji said, voice dropping like he was scared the room itself was listening. “I do. I’d like to figure it out. I just… can’t tell anyone that.”
He rubbed the back of his neck, heat crawling up his face again.
“I can’t just walk up to someone and say, ‘hey, I have no clue what I’m doing, wanna, like, give me a starter course?’ I’d die on the spot.”
Sukuna didn’t answer right away. He just stared, and the whole room felt strange and tense.
Yuji’s arms tingled.
"You're a dumbass," Sukuna said finally. But the words were soft. Almost… affectionate.
"I know," Yuji sighed, the fight going out of him as he slumped forward, his forehead nearly touching the cool wood of the desk.
Another moment passed, then Sukuna finally spoke, sounding way too casual for the situation. “So what? You want me to show you or something?”
Yuji’s head snapped up so fast his neck popped. His heart didn’t just skip, it tripped all over itself and crashed somewhere around the floor.
Sukuna’s face looked totally calm, like this was nothing. But his eyes… yeah, he wasn’t joking. Not even a little.
A nervous sound escaped Yuji’s throat. "WHAT? No! I mean…" He was floundering. "If you weren't my brother, maybe I'd… I don't know, trust you to show me. But you are."
Sukuna didn’t move. He just stared at him, and Yuji could feel it everywhere, like his whole body was suddenly too warm.
The room went awkwardly quiet. Not normal quiet, the kind that makes you want to look anywhere but the other person.
"You're such an idiot for saying that out loud," Sukuna murmured, his voice dropping to a low rumble. "You know I would actually do it, right?"
Yuji’s mouth went completely, utterly dry. His brain was a screaming chorus of NO, ABORT, THIS IS A BAD IDEA, THIS IS THE WORST IDEA IN THE HISTORY OF IDEAS, but his body was frozen, trapped in the undeniable gravity of that look. He felt a pull, a terrifying, magnetic attraction to the edge of this cliff.
His voice came out small. “…Would you?”
Sukuna’s eyes went darker, pupils eating up the red. He leaned back, a hint of a smirk tugging at his mouth, but it didn’t touch his eyes. Those stayed sharp.
Predatory.
“Think really carefully about what you’re asking for, Yuji.”
Yuji didn’t sleep. 11:47 p.m. glowed on the clock. Then 12:29. Then 1:15.
He lay on his side and stared at the wall. Every time he blinked, he saw Sukuna’s eyes again, that look burned into his head.
Think really carefully about what you’re asking for.
His whole body felt wired and jumpy. Panic buzzing under his skin and under that, something he didn’t want to name.
Scary. Exciting. Pulling at him indispensable.
He flipped onto his other side, facing Sukuna's bed. His brother was a still, dark shape under the covers, his breathing deep and even.
Was he really asleep? Or was he lying there, awake, his mind racing with the same insane thoughts?
He must’ve moved too much or breathed too loud, because a low, annoyed voice cut through the dark: "Will you stop fucking moving? Some of us are trying to actually sleep here."
"Sorry," Yuji whispered, voice tight.
The silence came back, but it didn’t feel the same. It sat between them, tense and weird and way too charged. It was unbearable.
Sheets shifted and Sukuna sat up. Yuji could make him out in the dim light from the window,his broad shoulders, his eyes open and watching in the dark.
“You’re not gonna sleep like this, are you?”
Yuji’s throat felt tight. Talking wasn’t happening. He just shook his head, small and stiff, hoping that counted as an answer.
He heard Sukuna swing his legs off the bed. The floor complained under his weight, a soft groan in the quiet. Yuji’s breath caught. He stayed still, unsure if he even remembered how to inhale.
Sukuna moved across the room, his shape getting closer, blocking what little grey light came from the window until Yuji was sitting in nothing but his shadow.
Oh god. This was actually happening. Right here. Right now.
Sukuna leaned over him, one hand braced on the mattress by Yuji’s head, closing him in without a word. Up close, It was a lot, a little scary, a little electric and suddenly Yuji felt light-headed, like his brain was trying to catch up with what his body already knew.
“...You still want to know, huh?” It wasn’t a taunt this time. More like he already knew the answer and was just giving Yuji a second to realize it too.
Yuji froze. His mind was all static - wait, no no no, this can’t be happening - but his body didn’t move. Didn’t want to. He somehow nodded. Tiny. Almost nothing.
Sukuna didn't say another word and just leaned down.
The first touch hit him like a spark. Soft. Warmer than he expected but a little rough.
Sukuna’s mouth stayed closed against his, just the light press of lips; hesitant, like he was checking if Yuji would pull away.
Yuji didn’t.
His eyes flew open anyway, staring up at nothing, breath caught in his throat as everything in him tunneled down to that single point where they touched.
It felt unreal. Too real. Like the world had narrowed to just this one impossible moment.
This is my brother. My brother is kissing me. Oh my god.
Then Sukuna moved, tilting his head just so, and the kiss… changed.
Sukuna’s mouth softened against his, warm and deliberate, and then his lips parted. A slow brush of tongue traced the seam of Yuji’s mouth, asking for permission.
He gave it without thinking.
His lips opened on a shaky breath he couldn’t control, and Sukuna met him there sliding his tongue against Yuji’s in a way that felt terrifyingly careful at first, like he was learning him, tasting him, deciding how far to pull him in.
Heat rippled straight down Yuji’s spine,curling in his stomach and catching low and tight before he could even breathe around it. There was a confidence in the way Sukuna kissed and Yuji felt like he was being guided through something he didn’t even know he’d beenwaiting to feel.
A sound escaped him unplanned, too close to a whimper and he didn’t recognize it until it was already in the air between their mouths.
His hands moved before he even decided to. One second they were useless at his sides, the next they were in Sukuna’s shirt, fingers curling tight in the fabric like it was the only thing holding him together.
He wasn’t pulling him closer, he just… needed something solid to hold onto, because the world had tilted and his body felt like it might come apart without an anchor.
His hands flattened against a wall of solid muscle, Sukuna’s chest. Heat bled through the thin fabric of his shirt, a searing brand that shot straight to Yuuji’s core.
And the taste… the ghost of mint from toothpaste was there, but underneath it was something else, something darker, addictively bitter and so fundamentally him that it made Yuuji’s head spin.
The world didn't just narrow, it shattered into a million sensory pieces.
The frantic drum of rain against the window. The soft, wet, obscenely intimate sound of their kiss. The rough, ragged gasp he realized was his own. The dip of the mattress as Sukuna’s weight settled beside him, caging him in.
It felt like an eternity, suspended in that hot, dark space and it felt like a single, fleeting second, gone too fast.
Sukuna was the first to pull back, just enough for space, not enough for distance. His breath still brushed Yuji’s lips when he spoke, voice rough and deliberately careless, like he needed to shove the moment back into something simple.
“There,” he said. “Now you know how it’s done.”
Yuji couldn’t think. Everything in him was buzzing, everything too warm, too dizzy, too unreal. His lips tingled like they’d been marked, like the feeling wouldn’t fade no matter how many times he tried to swallow it down.
“That was…” His voice came out rough, breath catching around the words. “…not what I expected.”
For a second - just a second - Sukuna’s expression shifted. The usual edge in his voice thinned, something small and almost uncertain bleeding through before he could choke it back.
"Was it bad?"
"No." The word left him in a breath, stripped bare and impossible to take back. He could feel heat flooding his face, the darkness was a mercy, he didn’t think he could stand this in full light.
“But you shouldn’t have-”
“You wanted it.”
Sukuna cut him off sharply, whatever softness had been there a moment ago vanished like it had never existed.
“You asked,” voice hard again in a way that felt like armor. “Don’t look surprised now.”
The words were a physical slap. The spell shattered into a million glittering, guilty pieces. Reality came crashing back in, cold and brutal and suffocating.
Brothers.
He's your brother. What the hell did we just do? What did I just let happen?
Shame hit him hot and fast, burning straight through whatever warmth the kiss had left behind. It hollowed him out in one breath and then panic flooded in to fill the space, it was too overwhelming.
A small sound clawed out of his throat before he could stop it. He pressed a hand to Sukuna’s chest, forceful to break the contact and moving before he registered it, scrambling out of the bed like the floor was the only safe place left.
He didn’t look back at Sukuna.
The room felt too close, too loud in the silence, so he bolted pushing the door open and spilling into the hallway. His heart was pounding too hard, too fast, like his body thought it could outrun the moment if it just kept moving.
He leaned against the cool wall, his whole body trembling violently, his breath coming in short, sharp, ragged gasps that he tried to stifle with the back of his hand.
He could still taste Sukuna on his lips. He could still feel the phantom pressure of his mouth, the slight scratch of his stubble, the wet heat of his tongue.
It was wrong.
It was so fucking messed up.
It was a line they could never uncross.
But underneath all the panic, buried deep where he couldn’t touch it or tear it out, something warm still burned. A tiny spark of that shock-hot pleasure he’d felt, alive in the center of him he couldn’t release.
It should’ve vanished. Drowned in fear, drowned in shame.
But it didn’t. It stayed.
A low ember he couldn't stamp out, no matter how hard he tried, glowing stubbornly against everything he knew he was supposed to feel.
And that was what scared him most...not the kiss, not the panic that followed, but the fact that some fragile part of him didn’t want that heat to go out at all.
Back in the room, Sukuna hadn’t moved far. He stood beside Yuji’s empty bed, the sheets still creased where he’d been a moment ago, staring down at nothing and everything at once.
Slowly, almost without thinking, he lifted a hand to his mouth. His fingers brushed over his lips, to save the feeling there before it could fade, to make sure he didn’t imagine it.
He wasn’t sure whether he’d just won something or broken it beyond repair.
Outside, the rain kept tapping at the window, steady and indifferent, marking time while everything between them shifted into a shape neither of them knew how to undo.
He let out a long, slow breath, the air leaving his lungs in a weary, resigned sigh.
"That wasn't a joke," he whispered to the dark and now empty room. "And it sure as hell wasn't practice, either."