Chapter Text
His watch said it was only half-past one but the throb behind his eyes said it was much closer to four or maybe five in the morning. His computer screen went dark in the time Nanami spent zoning out staring at his wrist.
His desk lamp was the only source of light left on the entire floor of the office. The last of his subordinates were at home with their families or out doing whatever people who don’t run themselves ragged do. Nanami wouldn’t know.
This was one of his later nights but it certainly wasn’t even the latest he had been that month. It had to stop. He knew that. He couldn’t go on like this and keep pretending there was something other than himself preventing him from having a life. Having sex, having a partner, a goodnight's sleep, a goddamn vacation.
But he also knew that no one else was going to handle these international trade agreements before Thursday's board meeting. So all those things would have to wait until this weekend.
Nanami properly saved his spreadsheets and contacts before shutting off his monitor completely. His own ragged face reflected in the black screen, maybe he should start using eye cream for his bags.
The sounds of the empty elevator were on the cusp of eerie as it took him down from his own office to the ground floor lobby.
“Late again, Nanami-san?” The night security nodded to Nanami as he walked across the lobby to the open locked front doors for him.
“Yes. Apologies for the inconvenience.”
“Never a problem at all, sir.”
“How is Kaori-kun?” Nanami asked more out of pleasantry than a real concern. The guard made a happy face but adjusted his cap as if nervous.
“Actually we’re pregnant again, so,” he shrugged but couldn’t hide his joy.
“Congratulations,” Nanami was sincere but he didn’t have the energy to keep the slightly jealous edge out of his voice. The guard didn’t seem to notice.
“Thank you! We, uh, we are hoping for a girl. Third times the charm right?”
“Right. Well, thank you. Goodnight.”
“Goodnight Nanami-san. Get some rest.”
They nodded to each other and Nanami turned away from the building when he heard the glass double doors locking behind him.
The cement of the sidewalk was clear but it was certainly cold enough to snow. Nanami tightened his scarf around himself and tucked the ends into his coat. This late in the evening it was as if the entire world was dead. As if some spell kept the world frozen in place and only Nanami and his shoes on the pavement existed.
He walked through his own puffs of frozen breath. The metro would no longer be running his circuit but calling a cab would be a ridiculous waste of money and time. It was better to walk. Maybe it would shake the hum of stress that seemed to perpetually destroy his sleep.
Nanami stopped and waited at a crosswalk. There weren’t even any cars but the light refused to turn in his favor. He pushed the crossing button a few more times but the bright red ‘halt’ hand didn’t vanish.
He looked left and right as he considered crossing anyway. Again, no cars. On one look left Nanami’s vision caught a glimpse of neon. He did a double-take.
It was a neon open sign. The four-letter word in bright blue was arched over a simple line of neon pink in the shape of a martini glass. The bright colors cut through the darkness and contrasted to the low glow of yellow streetlights.
A bar.
Nanami glanced back at the unyielding cross sign. His fingers were growing numb on the hand holding his briefcase. They tingled as he thought of the warmth of a quality liquor sliding down his throat. He considered his alternative. Returning to his empty and cold apartment. Maybe his spider plant would be less dead than he had left it that morning.
Another sharp exhale in the cold air and he had decided. The front door of the small club jingled as he pressed into the establishment.
The door closed against his back and Nanami was suddenly washed in a warmth that made his cheeks sting slightly. There was music playing low but the dance floor was empty. There were only three other patrons. One obvious bum at the end of the bar and a pair of middle-aged women in nice dresses at a small table in the corner. Their quiet chatter was at the same volume as the music so he couldn’t hear the individual words even if he cared to.
Nanami pulled the warm air in through his nose and made his way over to the bar and the man facing away behind it drying glasses. He purposely chose a seat far enough from the drunk passed out over his glass to avoid possible conversation but not so far that it would be obvious.
“Excuse me, when is your last call?” Nanami asked, undoing his scarf and setting it on the bartop.
Without looking at him the bartender leaned backward and to the left to glance at the clock. His unusually light hair falling back just enough to reveal the tip of his nose to Nanami.
“Just in time. I stop pouring at two and I’ll kick you out at three,” the man said and put down the glass in favor of a different damp one. “What can I get for you?”
Nanami shrugged off his coat. “Whiskey. Two fingers.”
The man plucked a bottle off of his wall of shelves and finally turned around to face Nanami. The first thing that Nanami registered was how intense his eyes were. The blue was almost as cold as the air outside but so much more alive.
“Rocks or neat?” the bartender shook the bottle lightly. His engraved name tag read ‘Gojo’. Nanami raised one eyebrow. Who would want ice on a night like this?
“Neat.”
“You got it, handsome.”
Nanami didn’t respond to the compliment or the wink because before he could even fully register it in his tired mind Gojo tossed a coaster at him and flipped an empty glass onto its small surface. Nanami jumped slightly expecting it to shatter. When it didn't, Gojo smirked and poured. While Nanami watched brown liquid fill his glass, Gojo watched him. Examining his rumpled suit and loose tie. He saw the creases under Nanami’s eyes and the tight draw of his shoulders.
Nanami took a long, indulgent sip.
The whiskey ran smooth over his tongue, it was a lighter taste than he preferred but the quality was apparent. When he swallowed heat ran down his esophagus and into his chest. His fingers already felt better.
Nanami licked over his bottom lip, dragging a remaining drop into his mouth. He looked up to find blue eyes watching him. He raised his eyebrows as he took another sip.
“Rough night?” Gojo asked and slung a towel over one broad shoulder.
“Excuse me?”
“You’re having a rough night.”
Nanami looked over at the other patron at the bar as if he had the answer to why this bartender thought Nanami had invited conversation.
“Not particularly.”
Gojo hummed, disbelieving.
“What?”
“Most people would call drinking whiskey alone late at night on a Tuesday the result of a rough night,” Gojo smiled and flopped his head to the side.
“Are you always this polite to your customers?” Nanami swigged half of his remaining drink.
“Only the cute ones,” Gojo replied casually. Nanami nearly choked. He swallowed roughly, alcohol burning on the way down. He coughed twice. The look on Gojo’s face suggested that was intentional. “So if you aren’t having a bad night, what do you do when it is a rough one?”
Nanami stared at the bartender. His odd inquisitive expression caught all the shadows of the low light but that only added to his attractive smile. Nanami pondered how best to answer.
He was forced to admit to himself that he indulged in a similar fashion in his own home regardless of the night. Rough or not.
Gojo took a sip of a dark liquid through a straw, continuing to stare at Nanami. It looked like rum and coke, maybe a jack and coke but Gojo really didn’t look the type.
“Are you in the habit of drinking while working?” Nanami asked in obvious deflection. Gojo must have realized it too as he stopped chewing on his straw in favor of a smirk.
“I don’t drink.”
“You don’t drink.”
“Not a drop.” Gojo said the ‘p’ on the last word with an exaggerated popping sound.
The smooth glass turned easily under his fingertips as Nanami examined the remaining whiskey that sloshed inside. His tired mind rolled possible explanations behind his eyes, all of which would be rude and presumptuous to say out loud.
Gojo dipped a hand into his pocket and flicked something at Nanami. He barely caught the small flying object. It was warm between his palms from Gojo’s pocket and Nanami could tell it was a small disk of some kind.
“My sobriety chip. Ten years last month,” Gojo said with a dark expression.
That had been Nanami’s first conclusion but that just meant he felt even more like an asshole for thinking it. He was also quite bemused as to why a complete stranger would share such a personal struggle with him and - Nanami opened his hand.
Just when he was on the cusp of apologizing for his tone there in the palm of his hand was a regular coin. Not a sobriety chip, just a plain coin.
Gojo had tossed him a tip.
“Oh wow, your face! It’s sweet you care but I actually just don’t like the taste,” Gojo giggled and leaned one hip against his side of the bar.
“You’re not ten years sober.”
“If you want to get technical with me, salaryman, I've been sober for almost thirty.”
The bum down the bar started to laugh into the crook of his elbow. His voice was hoarse from the dryness of his drinks and the accumulated mucus in his throat. He lifted up his head to reveal his red cheeks. He pointed and laughed at Nanami and the silly joke.
Nanami downed what remained of his whiskey and stood to leave. He had gotten what he had come in for and he had no interest in playing games with a bored bartender.
“Oi, don’t be like that! I saw the way you looked at me, people like to make a lot of wrong assumptions. Sit back down,” Gojo ordered gently and poured another two fingers of whiskey into Nanami’s abandoned glass.
“No, thank you.”
Nanami reached for his scarf but Gojo was faster. He snagged the scarf and slid the glass into Nanami’s outreached hand instead.
“On the house. C'mon.”
His watch said it was only three minutes till the hour. Gojo was cutting it very close to last call.
“Ah, let the poor bastard go home. Don’t let ‘em bully ya- jus cuz he’s got those eyes,” The drunk man slurred at Nanami.
“Oi. I’m not bullying him,” Gojo said defensively.
“Then where’s my free drink?” The question was followed by a hiccup.
“When you’ve got a tab longer than the Nile it’s like all your drinks are free!”
While they continued to bicker, Nanami glanced around the bar again. The pair of women had gone, leaving just the three of them. That didn’t last long.
The drunk didn’t seem to appreciate Gojo bringing up his bill and within a minute was stumbling out into the cold with a slurred goodbye. Nanami watched through the window as the drunkard stumbled off a curb and almost fell.
“He’ll be fine. Have a seat,” Gojo put Nanami’s scarf around his own neck so it dangled down his chest.
Nanami was the last patron in the last hour on a weeknight. He shouldn’t stay.
“I don’t want to waste your time.”
“My time costs less than that whiskey and I’m certainly not going to drink it.”
He considered the glass for a moment. It would go to waste and what had brought him into the bar was still true. There was nothing else waiting for him and Gojo’s smile showed no trace of faltering.
Nanami sat back down with his glass. He slid the coin Gojo had tossed him back across the bar top. Gojo picked it up and rolled it mindlessly over his boney knuckles.
With the warmth of his first glass in his stomach and the new privacy of the bar, Nananami lost his reservations and asked, “Why do you serve drinks when you don’t like alcohol?”
“Because I have a talent for knowing exactly what people need. Everyone comes into a bar looking for something, even if they don’t know what. I’m very good at finding it.”
Nanami lifted his glass, resting the edge to his lips, and looked over the top at Gojo and into his intelligent eyes. “Is that so? And what do I need then?”
Even as he closed his eyes to take in the long sip of whiskey he could feel the other man's devilish smile.
“Oh, dear. It’s past last call. I’m afraid you’ll have to come back and see me again if you want to find it.”
“Has it occurred to you that I don’t need anything?”
Gojo whistled. “You’re a shit liar, anyone ever tell you that?”
As a matter of fact, he had been told that. Even so, Nanami didn’t dignify it with a confirmation.
Instead, he took another sip and let Gojo start off on the next piece of their conversation. They talked nonsense as if it were meaningful and Gojo carefully avoided asking anything too personal about the stranger at his bar.
Even when Nanami’s glass was long past empty they talked. Nanami was dragged through topics with the extra ease the drinks had brought him. He scoffed at Gojo’s jokes and rolled his eyes at innuendos.
It was an hour but it only lasted ten minutes. Gojo leaned and looked at the clock. It was time for Nanami to go.
They exchanged few words as Nanamif slid on his coat and pulled out paper bills for his drinks. He left excess for a tip, probably more than was polite and definitely enough to let it go to Gojo’s head.
Nanami grabbed his briefcase and headed for the door. Saying goodbye felt a little too sincere.
“Oi, wait a second,” Gojo called from behind him. Nanami turned as Gojo hopped over the bar top using only one arm to aid his motion. He crossed the open floor and entered Nanami’s space.
He was so close Nanami thought he could smell the other man’s light cologne. Nanami was so tired and warm he didn’t put on the facade of stepping back from Gojo’s approach. He was completely still as Gojo leaned down to eye level, putting their faces only a breath away.
“You don’t want to get cold, do you?” Gojo asked with a smile.
Nanami raised one eyebrow in exhausted confusion. He watched as Gojo pulled his scarf from around his own neck before tossing it over Nanami’s head.
Gojo held the ends of the scarf in his hands and pulled Nanami’s face just a little closer. As his brain went slightly numb Nanami instinctively parted his lips. “Come back when you actually have a rough night and I’ll tell you what you need.”
With that Gojo’s warmth and body were gone from in front of Nanami and the hands that were around his scarf were now holding open the front door for him. He swallowed his own embarrassment and stepped out into the early morning darkness.
He left Gojo and the warmth of the bar behind, retying his scarf against the cold. He crossed the street that still forbade him, ignoring the red-orange hand sign. Even as the bitter air nipped at his cheeks it couldn’t remove the pink warmth emanating from them.
It was just the whiskey and the time. That's all. It had been a long day. He was tired. It was that extra glass. It was the extra glass that made blue eyes and a devilish smirk follow him home to his still-dead-house-plant and empty bed.