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Three years.
Three years of carefully hidden feelings. Three years of longing looks. Three years of doing anything and everything he’d ever ask.
And now here he was, waking up in a body that was decidedly not his, but Inumaki’s.
“Oh no.” Ren breathed, staring at his half naked self in the mirror. Except, that was just the thing - it wasn’t his half naked body.
Inumaki’s deep purple eyes stared back at him. The boy, while shorter, was still better built than he was. Abs and a scarred collarbone, built arms and a v line to die for. He let out a hopeless whine, spinning away from the mirror. He was so fucked. So extremely fucked. The moment Inumaki woke up in Ren Naoki’s body he’d be greeted by Yuji going, “Morning, nerd! Dream of Inumaki-senpai again?”
But thanks to the high heavens above, Inumaki was always asleep until the last moment. Hurriedly Ren pulled the closest long sleeve shirt over his head and raced out the door of his dorm. Reminding himself as he went - Don’t speak. You don’t know what you can do right now.
He knocked as hard as he could on his own door, already aware his own body was stark fucking naked. He was going to cry, maybe. He was never going to live this down, it was going to live in his brain forever -
The door was pulled open, his taller self holding the handle as he looked down at him sleepily. His own gold eyes blinked, then blinked significantly harder as Inumaki realised his doppelganger was at the door.
“Tuna, okaka!” Ren exclaimed, pushing him back into his room. He was already speeding around the room, face most likely completely red as he collected his clothes and pushed them into Inumaki’s waiting arms.
His own head blinked, then looked down at himself, blushed, and said, “Woah.”
Ren dropped to the floor with his head in his hands. He was going to cry, well and truly. He couldn’t even say ‘kill me’ because his own body would actually do it. This sucked. Inumaki was still openly ogling his body, twisting and eyes wide.
“Mentaiko.” Ren huffed, peeking at him through his hands that were over his face. “Okaka.”
“Salmon - wait, I can…” Inumaki’s gaze shot to Ren suddenly. “I can speak!”
Miserably, Ren nodded. But I can’t, stupid beautiful idiot.
“What on earth - what… what happened?” Inumaki asked, still looking over Ren’s body. Ren huffed and got up, slapping his hand over Inumaki’s eyes. “Wait, hey! I’m just trying to understand the situation!”
After a minor scuffle against his own naked body (“You really want to cover up this masterpiece, Ren?”), he finally got Inumaki clothed and somewhat presentable. Inumaki was red now too, realising he had openly looked all over his friend's body… in front of said friend.
“Ren.” Inumaki said suddenly. “...Ren Naoki.”
Ren looked up at him flatly. He was really saying his name out of all the words he hasn’t been able to use since he was born?
“You have no idea how… amazing it is… to be able to speak.” Inumaki marvelled. Ren pouted, pushing the unfamiliar long hair out of his face. “Oh, wait, you can’t.”
Ren made a shocked noise, making Inumaki smile. “Sorry! But… What happened to us?”
Ren shrugged, rubbing the ends of his fingers over his mouth. His habit of when he was anxious. Inumaki’s lips were soft, which made him flush at the thought. He stuffed a hand into his pants pocket before realising he didn’t have Inumaki’s phone on him and instead trudged over to his own by the bed and pulled up his notes.
I don’t know what happened. Maybe a side effect of that curse I got called out to fight. There was a guy trying to control it getting all excited talking about its abilities. This might have been one of them, I wasn’t listening to him.
Inumaki’s face fell into thought. He didn’t speak for a moment before he blinked. “Oh wait, I can speak. Uh, sorry. Why was I chosen if you were sent there with Maki?”
At that, Ren went very red and didn’t answer. He sighed into his hands, making Inumaki come closer to him. “What? You know why?”
Ren hurriedly shook his head. A giant, humongous lie. The crazy guy had explicitly said, “Yua here is so… very powerful… that she can send your mind to your beloved’s! So amazing, right? Let her play, please!” Remembering that, Ren glowered. Now even Maki was going to know. She already had her suspicions, but now she would know for sure. Suddenly he made his way to Inumaki, grabbing his arm. If this had happened, then he must have been nicked by that curse.
Maybe a little roughly, he pulled his body this way and that to inspect his skin. When he finally tilted his head upwards, he saw the cut under his jaw. Blackened by a curse. He felt sick. This was all his fault. Inumaki had seen his face fall.
“Shake -” Inumaki chuckled at himself, before starting again. “Hey, we’ll work this out. I-I’ll go ask Gojo to inspect the cut, okay?”
Ren felt horror grip his chest. He’d find out. He’d know. He didn’t know if he was quite ready for that. He was going to get rejected by his own face. Inumaki made to move, but Ren caught his arm. “N-”
He forgot he couldn’t speak. Angrily, he sighed, and let him go. He was going to know. He was going to find out. It was going to be awful, but Ren would get past it eventually, right? Right?
“You don’t want me to?” Inumaki asked, turning back around to look at his own body. “Well, I mean, we can work this out on our own, if you want to?”
Ren sighed, rubbed his face, and looked into his own eyes. He had learnt sign for this dumb loser, and hadn’t even told him yet. No time like the present, right?
Let’s go to Gojo, he signed. Inumaki’s eyes went wide, and a smile pulled at his lips. Though I can’t promise you’ll like what you hear.
“Since when did you learn sign?!” Inumaki grinned, grabbing Ren’s hands. “Okay, let’s go to Gojo. This’ll all work out, okay?”
Even in this weird situation, he was still so kind. A slow smile came to Ren’s face and he nodded carefully. “Okay.”
—
“So…” Gojo hummed, looking at the two teens. “You’ve swapped bodies.”
Ren nodded miserably. Gojo grinned. “And it’s because of a longing curse.”
Ren, again, nodded. He refused to meet Inumaki’s eye when he immediately turned to him. Gojo clapped his hands together. “I’ve waited so long for something awkward like this to happen!”
Ren levelled Gojo with a furious glare. “Alright, alright. For this to go back to normal, we’re just going to have to wait for that cut to heal. Two to three weeks. Or…”
“Or..?” Inumaki echoed.
“You can kiss.” Their teacher winked.
Ren put his face in his hands. He didn’t want to see Inumaki’s face right now. “What? Really?”
“Yup!” Gojo leaned back. “It’s a curse created from unrequited love and strong feelings. If you kiss, the curse will assume the feelings returned and you’ll go back to normal.”
Ren sunk further into the seats they were in. This was the worst, most mortifying moment of his life. He was either going to be kissed to get out of this stupid situation, or he was going to have to wait three weeks because Inumaki was disgusted by him. He wished a curse would come to kill him now. Geto, even.
“Welp, I’ll leave it to you two to talk about it. Good luck, Ren!” Gojo waved as he left the classroom. Ren stood up, slamming his hands against the table to get the teacher to shut up, only for Gojo to break into a run to get away. With a long, exhausted sigh, he sunk back into his seat.
He risked a glance at Inumaki, who had a red face and was staring at his hands in silence. When he realised he had eyes on him, his head perked up. Ren felt like he was genuinely about to cry as he signed. I’m sorry. Maybe I should have just told you. Having him find the answer was worse.
Inumaki smiled faintly. “So that was all true?”
Ren held his head high as his stomach sunk into the depths of hell. “Shake.”
“Do you -” He paused, a hand over his mouth. “Do you mind if I just take a minute?”
Ren nodded, and then Inumaki was out of the classroom even faster than Gojo was. Ren rested his head on the desk and tried desperately not to cry.
—
After ten minutes, Inumaki had not returned. Ren had attempted to revitalise his view on this whole thing - now he got to use Inumaki’s super cool curse! So he left the classroom, ignoring the utter misery pushing at the sides of his heart of his impending rejection, and climbed his way up onto the roof. Birds scattered around him as he walked carefully along the beams of wood.
He just wanted to speak, so he moved as far away from everyone as he could. This was the roof of the third year dorms, of which no one was in because the third years and up were always being called away to missions. He sat over the edge, letting his feet dangle into the open air. He sighed and attempted to ignore the fighting lump in his throat. He wanted to cry so badly.
A bird beside him remained, cawing loudly. Irritated, he whipped towards it. “Shh.”
The bird’s beak continued to open, but now no sound came out. Immediately his throat dried out, and he felt awful. How could he undo that? He just messed with power he doesn’t know how to use. This was why nothing went well for him. He was stupid, reckless, obviously undesireable-
“S-Speak.” He choked, and the bird began to caw again. Overcome with relief, he felt tears fill his eyes and he curled into a ball, pressing the circle of his eyes against his knees so no one would see him cry.
—
It was hours before he moved again. Eyes sore and dry, mentally exhausted and frozen to the bone by the night air, he dropped from the roof and stumbled on the landing. He hadn’t eaten. Oops. Vaguely, he wondered if he should go back to his own room or to Inumaki’s.
Quietly, he walked back to their dorm building. On his way he passed Yuji who raised his hand in a wave as he went to the bathhouse, and he returned it. This made Yuji pull a face for whatever reason. Ren ignored it and went around the building instead of entering. He peeked in his own window and saw Inumaki in there, sitting on his bed. Assuming they were trying to hold each other’s place until they swapped back, he went around to Inumaki’s room’s window and shoved himself through.
Surrounded by the tame scent of jasmine and rice, tears welled in his eyes again. He angrily shoved through Inumaki’s clothes, pulling out a hoodie and long pants and dragging them over himself before even going to find a mask to put on. Then he laid on Inumaki’s bed and pretended he was still himself. Still joking about his crush to Yuji. Still letting his heart flutter when he accidentally locked eyes with the white haired boy for too long. Still had his dignity, in a way.
His tired eyes bore into the ceiling. Should he stay out of Inumaki’s way for the rest of the three weeks? Neither would be able to fight like this, in unfamiliar bodies and powers they wouldn’t be able to master in the timeframe. They wouldn’t have a reason to be near each other. Has Inumaki told anyone about the situation? Had Gojo? Did he need to pretend to be Inumaki, or would they act as normal?
It would be easier to hide, he decided. After that reaction, there was no way in hell Inumaki was going to kiss him. Or have any positive interaction with him at all in the next few weeks.
Miserable, he pulled the blankets over his head and pretended this was his room with the familiar smell of smoke and coffee, that his phone was by his head playing soft music, that Yuji was just a door away.
He fell asleep.
—
Minutes later, the door opened.
Inumaki stood in the doorway, rubbing the back of his neck nervously as he shut the door behind him. He hadn’t been able to find Ren after he had left - Gojo had taken him aside to explain the entire curse properly, making a 5 minute conversation into a half an hour lecture, ending it with “Don’t you dare hurt that boy, you hear me?”
Not like he’d ever dream of it. He was in love with him - he had needed a minute to process that God, Ren liked him! Liked him enough to have such powerful feelings that could carry a curse!
He spent the entire day looking for him afterwards, and came up empty. He wasn't in either of their dorms, he wasn’t with Yuji, he wasn’t still in the classroom, he wasn’t in that café he had been so excited to take Inumaki to just a month ago and he wasn’t burning himself out on the field. He had asked everyone, as weird as it was, if they had seen him. Everyone gave him weird looks at the way he was speaking and said no.
So he had resolved to wait in Ren’s room until he returned. Surrounded by his scent of smoke and coffee and a hint of that eucalyptus washing detergent he used, around all his photos and memorabilia he had brought from his home. Pictures of Ren younger and happier with his dad scattered the room, as well as increasing numbers of pictures of them - their high school group.
And a few of just Inumaki and Ren that he hadn’t noticed before. The year before with their hospital beds pushed together as they played their switches. Ren straightening Inumaki’s hair so his hair would fall into a bowl cut. Many of their selfies together.
He knew he shouldn’t have run like that. Ren would most definitely have the wrong idea of why he had run - overthinking and assuming Inumaki now hated him. That’s why he had tried to find him. So when Ren didn’t return to his dorm after an entire day of no one being able to find him, he slumped back to his room feeling extremely guilty.
Which was where he was now. Literally. His body was in his bed. Ren was sleeping here? Maybe he had seen Inumaki go into his room and thought they were pretending to play each other.
What was weird, though, was that he was sleeping with one of Inumaki’s masks on. Inumaki’s heart dropped into his feet. Did he hate seeing the marks in his face? Carefully he took it off. It wouldn’t be comfortable to sleep in.
Pushing his feelings aside, he slumped down next to the bed, curiously watching his own face. This whole experience has been freeing, in a way. He’s found out his long time crush likes him back. He’s been able to speak. He got to look at Ren’s entire body unashamed. That was a win.
But with all these misunderstandings between them, he didn’t know what would happen next.
—
When Ren woke up the next morning, he was so surprised to see his own body leaning against the bed next to him he fumbled in the bed and yelped much too loudly. Inumaki awoke with a start, looking around for danger before he exhaled.
“Tuna.” He huffed before looking at his own face. “Oh. Good morning! I’ve finally found you.”
Ren blinked. Inumaki, undeterred as he rubbed sleep out of his eye, spurred on. “I-I just want to take the opportunity while I can still speak to, uh, explain. Myself and um… my feelings.”
Ren’s face fell and he moved to sign, but Inumaki pushed his hands down. “Please just let me talk now. I’m already tired of it.” Ren’s hands hovered before he let them fall to the bed, looking at Inumaki expectantly.
“We’ve been friends for a really long time, Ren. And it’s a little weird, that after so long, I could still hold onto feelings like this…” He seemed to realise he was speaking ahead of what he was thinking. “I’m talking about the wrong part. I ran after we talked to Gojo-sensei because I just… I couldn’t comprehend that you liked me. T-That you had feelings strong enough to carry a curse, at that. And my heart just jumped into my throat, and I thought, ‘wow, I can’t believe that… he likes me… the way I like him’.”
Ren’s eyes went wide.
“I’ve loved you since that month before we came to Jujutsu High and Gojo-sensei made me, you and Maki hang out so we’d get along at school. You thought that deciphering my weird rice ball speech was going to be the most interesting task of your life, and I just… had never had someone try like that for me before?”
“It’s been a really long time with these feelings. Is what I’m trying to say. And I wanted to say it now, while I still can, because I really want to kiss you right now even though I’ll basically be kissing myself but I’m hoping that somewhere in there we swap back and I get to look at your face without the mirror-”
Ren grabbed him by the front of his shirt and pulled him in. He didn’t really notice swapping back, but suddenly he was being held in place by a hand fisted in his shirt and his knees were aching from the hard floor but Inumaki’s mouth was so sweet.
They broke apart with a gasp, and Ren gave a slight chuckle, happy to hear his own voice again. Happy to see his love’s face in front of him instead of in a mirror. “Uh, I guess it’s my turn?”
Inumaki nodded quickly, hand falling from Ren’s shirt to his hand. Smiling, Ren turned their hands over as Inumaki soothed circles into them.
“It’s been three years.” he said quietly. “Since I started liking you, I mean. Uh, I first saw you when the head guy of your clan invited me and Dad to a meeting. You were sitting across from me in the kids hall and you were just… so pretty. And then you stuck your tongue out at me and I saw the tattoo and I was an immediate goner.”
“Then we found out we were going to school together and I was just so excited. I mean, I was afraid you’d grow to dislike me, but that never happened. And then we got really close, and I was just going deeper and deeper. I-I raced to find you yesterday morning because Yuji always wakes me up and says some kind of version of ‘dream about him last night?’” Ren smiled, gold eyes on their hands. “I learned sign for you so we could talk easier. When you told me you were six months into your sign lessons, I was already a year in. If it had taken you any longer to start learning, I was going to suggest it to you so I wouldn’t be learning for nothing.”
“But then we got hit with that weird curse. Or rather, I did. And every moment about the last twenty four hours has made me want to sink into a miserable hole and die because of how embarrassing this has all been. You completely abused my beautiful body with your eyes.”
Inumaki licked his lips playfully. Ren took a shaky breath as he watched the movement. “Stop it. But uh, yeah. That’s sort of it. I love you. I have for a long time.”
“Kiss me.”
And who was he to say no? As if he could anyway, as the powerful shake of Inumaki’s speech washed over him and he was already leaning in to press their lips together again. Ren gently pushed Inumaki down on the bed as he leant over him, lips moving in tandem as his hands ran down his sides. He pulled away to breathe, pressing his face against Inumaki’s neck.
“Inu-”
“Toge.” Inumaki worked out, words careful around his speech.
Ren smiled, kissing the side of his mouth before leaning over him to look him in the eye. “Toge, then. Does this mean… we’re together?”
“Shake!” Inumaki exclaimed, sitting up so he could pull Ren over him. Ren, hopelessly gone on this boy, kissed him again. It was so nice to hear his dumb rice ball language again he didn’t care about much else but him.
When they broke apart again, he grinned. “You can call me Naoki, of course. If you can get the words out.”
Inumaki narrowed his eyes, and his lips lifted in a smirk. In his soft voice, carefully practised, he said his name. “Naoki, kiss me again.”