Work Text:
the moment he’d entered the living room he instantly regret it. as he made his way deeper into their apartment he saw kirigiri kyoko glaring at him while she sat at the dining table placed in the middle of the room.
he stared kyoko in the eyes. she was enraged.
her usually cold eyes filled with anger and her face etched with fury. the way she glared at him was enough to make him cower in a corner and sob for hours. he knew she was furious, he’d known that before he’d even entered the apartment.
“welcome home, makoto.” her words were laced with ice and sarcasm, and she spoke so quietly he thought that it could have been a figment of his imagination.
“kyoko-“ he began
“no. I don’t want to hear it.”
her ironclad mask was nowhere to be found and the calm, stoic voice he had become so accustomed to was gone as well.
“do you have any idea how angry I am?”
“I can begin to imagine.”
without warning, her voice became louder.
“how could you be so reckless makoto? how could you run off by yourself without telling anyone? you could have gotten hurt! you could have died!”
she stood up and began to walk over to him so that they were just a few feet apart. for every step kyoko took, makoto felt the need to take three steps back, yet he stood his ground. if he ran away it’d only make things worse than they already were if it was at all physically possible.
he knew she had every right to be angry. he’d gone off to fight the remnants of despair without telling any of the other survivor. he should have at least told her, but if she had known there was no way in hell he would have been able to go.
“kyoko, I had to.”
“are you aware of how dangerous that mission was?”
“yes. I am, and I wanted to help! I’m not a child; if I wasn’t there they would have killed the remnants!”
despite the fact that he had said his statement calmly, he felt his mouth dry up and his throat felt like it would give out at any second. he was really struggling to keep a steady voice, but he tried his best. he wanted to avoid conflict as much as possible but he knew his attempts would be futile.
“the remnants could have killed you! makoto do you not understand that your life was on the line? the mission was incredibly dangerous, what if something happened to you? what if you didn’t come home?”
she had started to yell at this point, her words were no longer cold and devoid of emotion and her eyes were brimming with tears.
and almost as quickly as she had raised it, she softened her voice and looked down, trying her best not to cry in front of him.
“what if I never saw you again?”
makoto felt a pang of guilt rush through his body, he knew he’d be just as angry if kyoko had done the same thing he did. knowing her, she probably worried and spent the entire week drowning in her bottled up anxieties.
“kyoko... I’m sorry, please don’t cry.”
as he said this, he took her gloved hand in his own and squeezed it tightly. then, after carefully thinking about his words, he gently spoke.
“I should have told you, I know that and I’m honestly really really sorry... I know it won’t make anything better but I truly mean it. I didn’t mean to worry you!”
....
silence.
....
and then a deep, shaky breath.
“I know you didn’t mean to, but you did. when you didn’t come home I started imagining all of the terrible scenarios that my brain could possibly think of.”
her voice cracked as she tried to speak.
“and then togami wouldn’t tell me where you were and the others didn’t know and-“
she wasn’t able to say everything she had wanted to before she started to cry.
the moment she’d stopped speaking makoto let go of her hand and wrapped her in a tight embrace, whispering softly into her ear.
“it’s okay, I know. you found out from munakata right? I’m so sorry I didn’t tell you. I regret it so much.”
kyoko couldn’t say anything back. the only thing she could do was return the embrace and sob into makoto’s shoulder as he tried his very best to comfort her.
“I.. it’s.. it’s just, oh god, I was so worried makoto! I didn’t- I didn’t know what to do, and it hurt when I found out. i was hurt- no, I am hurt that you didn’t say anything! I just- I-“
“I know, I know.”
her voice was quiet again, raw with emotion and barely above a whisper.
“your life is so precious to me... I have no idea what I would have done if you didn’t come home tonight.”
makoto knew this, she’d told him before but every time she directly said it made his heart skip a beat. he stayed silent, he didn’t have a response. what could he say that would make it better? he knew there wasn’t anything.
so instead of speaking he just held her tighter as he rubbed small circles on her back, and his actions spoke louder than anything he could have said.
eventually, after she had stopped crying and was just trying to control her breathing he decided to say something.
“I love you.”
in all honesty he hadn’t expected a reply, but to his surprise she responded. her words were broken and shaky as she quietly spoke.
“you already know that I love you too.”