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Megumi is a logical person.
There’s little room for feelings in what Megumi does, and he knows that. His entire life has consisted of death and violence, fear and fight, and there’s a logical order to what should be done and what must be done.
Among the chaos, Megumi craves order. Law. He likes things that make sense, things that he can explain in a world of the inexplicable.
Unlike his other first-year peers, there’s a part of Megumi that actually enjoys studying because of this. Math, science, and other subjects have rigid structure that contrast nicely among the chaos. There’s a right answer when it comes to those, and he likes that certainty. He sometimes finds himself questioning if anything is right in his gruesome, brutal world at all.
Therefore, Megumi doesn’t like the part of him that goes crazy at the thought of you. He doesn’t like how he can control the blush that spills across his cheeks and snakes up his ears. He hates how desperate he feels to be close to you all the time.
It’s like his heart can’t quite decide how to feel about you, so his entirety goes into a frenzy whenever you’re around, and it’s a feeling that annoys him to no end.
“Hey, Megumi?” Your quiet voice sounds from right inside his room, a few feet away from where he stands on the balcony. “Are you alright? You’ve been out here a while. If there’s something bothering you, you can always tell me.”
Megumi wants to curse and scream at how awful your timing is, how he just can’t think straight when you’re around, but he doesn’t. If nothing else, your offer is tempting, because there is most definitely something bothering him. It feels like everything in Megumi’s body is pulling him in your direction, but he stops himself.
“It’s nothing.” he spits sternly, and he pretends he can’t feel the distinct twitch in his chest when you shrink away.
He wants so badly for what he’s saying to be true— wishes it were true—because it’s all growing to be too much. There’s a certain threshold of selfishness he allows himself, yet his affection for you has grown far beyond that.
He watches you advance in his direction, hand outstretched, and only reacts with confusion. And then, the warm embrace of your arms around him knocks the wind out of his lungs.
“Megumi, I can tell something is on your mind.”
It’s unfamiliar and terrifying to let someone so close. Megumi knows that everyone around him could be ripped away at any second. There’s no safety in his line of work. There never has been, and there never will be.
That includes you, and the mere thought of it makes bile rise in his throat. It’s like a horrible stop-motion film, a series of still images that remind him what could happen to him, the people around him, and the people he cares about , if he doesn’t focus.
He can’t do this.
Newton’s Third Law of Motion states that for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.
You inhale sharply when Megumi firmly untangles you from him, strong hands holding you at arm’s length.
“It’s nothing.” he repeats, a bit harsher than he intends, and you back away hurriedly.
It’s a Pyrrhic victory, something he’s become all too familiar with after years of exorcising curses and suffering losses too heavy for his weakening shoulders to bear.
Because while Megumi has already succeeded in pushing you away, he can already feel the guilt tearing at his chest, crawling up his throat to ask him why .
Megumi doesn’t say anything when you silently retreat back inside the dorms, and he doesn’t say anything when the sky grows darker and the stars slowly reveal themselves, one by one. Because while the air is filled with silence, Megumi’s mind is filled with a tangle of endless words he should’ve said.
He sighs, turning to go inside with his head hung low.
“I’m sorry.”
The Jujutsu Tech campus is quiet most days, the perfect atmosphere for Megumi’s morning walks. It leaves a lot of room for his endless thoughts, most of them plagued with guilt for what he had done to you.
Thinking rationally, what he had done wasn’t wrong. Holding people too close, in this line of work, was a death sentence. It was just a fact.
So why did it hurt so badly to watch you leave?
“Megumi?” you call meekly, shoulders hunched as you fall into step beside him. Megumi flinches, then maneuvers a few inches away from you. “Is something on your mind? Can we talk?”
Another confusing wave of euphoria settles over his skin, only to be interrupted by the logical part of him holding it down.
Focus. Not now.
He kicks weakly at a stray pebble in his path, watching it clatter past the swirls of overgrown moss wedged between cracked stone bricks. The hands shoved into his pockets curl into reluctant fists as he desperately grasps for something to say to you.
What is on his mind?
Curses. There’s never a moment where curses aren’t on his mind.
No. Try again.
Certainty , he thinks. I want certainty. Fact. Law.
What do I know? he wonders. What could explain the way I’m feeling?
Hubble’s Law states that the universe is constantly expanding in infinite directions.
Megumi has always felt trapped in this life. Exorcise, heal, and repeat. There were few options for him from the beginning, yet somehow you make him feel like there’s something more for him out there.
The Second Law of Thermodynamics states that the total entropy of the universe is constantly increasing.
That would explain the escalating chaos in his heart every time he sees you. He’s caught between the half of him that knows he shouldn’t want you, and the half of him that knows he does .
He wants you. That’s the fact, the undeniable truth that’s been slowly creeping its way out of his heart for months now.
Swallowing a final breath for courage, he turns to you with as much confidence as he can muster, much to your surprise.
“Oh,” you stutter, eyes wide and inviting, “I just wanted to apologize for what happened. I shouldn’t have done that. I was wrong.”
Megumi finally gets it.
“I…”
Despite your confused expression, you wait patiently as he struggles to get past the first word, hands clasped politely behind your back. The anticipation builds until Megumi thinks he really can’t take it anymore, and then—
Newton’s First Law of Motion states that objects at rest tend to stay at rest, while objects in motion tend to stay in motion.
“I like you.”
It’s weird how easily the words flow after that, countless words flooding through a single breath.
“I like you, and I know it probably doesn’t seem that way because I was kind of rude and… this is really hard to do. But I like you and I’m sure of it, and I was thinking that maybe you might like me too.”
The first word was just that: an obstacle.
The confession scatters the air like the thousands of stars in the sky, like the endless galaxies left to be explored, like the infinite butterflies that burst in his stomach.
“Oh.” comes your quiet reply.
“I’m sorry.” he says. “This is really hard. This doesn’t make sense.”
He doesn’t specify what ‘this’ is, but you think you get it.
“Nothing about our lives is easy, Megumi,” you sigh. “but sharing it with someone makes it easier.”
There are few easy things in Megumi’s life, and he can’t really say that you’re one of them. It’s not easy to quell the clench of his heart at the sight of you, but it is always simple just being with you.
“But I get it. It doesn’t make sense. Some things are just meant to be, I guess.” You smile, letting your hands fall back to your sides with a careless shrug. It’s only careless on the surface, though; there’s a deep affection buried in the depths of your eyes, in the hesitant stretch of your fingers toward his heart.
Maybe this time, he’ll let you near enough to reach it.
His hand grasps yours, drawing you closer and letting your fingers rest right above the steady beating in his chest, a low rumble vibrating down your arm when he speaks. This time, he’s sure you’re worth it.
This time, it just makes sense.
“It’s the law of the universe.”
fin.