Work Text:
*Ring*
*Ring*
*Ring*
~click~
“Hello?”
‘He picked up…’ Gojo smiled numbly in relief as he heard Geto’s voice on the other side of the line.
Not wanting to show his desperation from hearing Geto’s voice for the first time in months, Gojo goes into his already carefully planned "random" spiel.
“Hey remember when we stole Shoko’s uniform? We took all the uniforms in her room and buried them on campus so she wouldn’t find them, then we both wore her skirts to class until she showed up in her underclothes.”
Geto laughed a little bit, and Gojo lit up, taking that as a positive sign and started laughing alongside him.
“Do you remember that?” Gojo asked.
Geto chuckled,
“Yeah, of course I remember that. She got so mad at us that she burned our uniforms and we had to wear her skirts for two weeks until they finished making our custom ones again.”
“You mean your custom ones. Nobody told you to get sashinuki-style pants, you and your traditional fashion fetish.” Gojo pouted.
Neither of them decided to mention that Geto still wore traditional clothing to this day, specifically, a gojo-gesa.
“They’re called tobi pants, and they were very fashionable when we were young, okay?”
“Sure they wereee.” Gojo teased, “Why didn’t we just dig up her clothes and give them back to her again?”
“I’m pretty sure we agreed that only one of us should hide them, so I distracted Shoko while you hid them ‘somewhere where no one would ever think to find them’, and then you also forgot where you hid them.”
Gojo barked out a laugh as Geto stifled a chuckle.
“Oh my god you’re right. I bet they’re still on campus somewhere. I’m actually surprised that they haven’t been dug up by now with all the debris from the fights at Jujutsu tech.”
“I can’t believe I took the fall with you, even though I wasn’t the one who hid them.”
“Hey!” Gojo whined, acting offended, “It was your idea too!”
“Yeah, and if I knew how long it would take for our uniforms to be finished, I would have never let you be the one to hide the uniforms.”
“Why did we even want to hide Shoko’s uniforms anyways?”
“Remember the special grade curse at Tokyo Tower?”
Gojo hummed a yes in response,
“Well I think that after that Shoko said…." Geto started to explain, as Gojo finally relaxed a little, leaning back in his chair knowing that he already the story by heart, "and then you weren’t very happy, so you said...”
“...And I was right to say that! Who did she think she was claiming that I…" Gojo interjected, as he heard Geto groan on the other side, "that’s why I wanted to go with you into the city and…"
"….then I suggested that we play a prank on Shoko..." Gojo continued,
"…and then after the movie you…” Geto retorted
…
…
…
They talked more, reminiscing over old memories.
When Gojo last checked his phone, the call time had been 2 hours and 56 minutes and that was around two conversation topics ago, so he was sure the time was probably double that by now.
He had long changed from the chair in front of his desk to the outlet besides his bed and was sitting on the floor as his phone lay atop his blankets, on speaker, as it overheated and charged.
“I mean I know how much you liked them, so of course I bought you those-”
“Hey Satoru?”
Geto suddenly cut Gojo off.
“Yep?”
Gojo replied, intentionally popping the p to sound more annoying, his heart was pumping and he felt more light and alive than he had in months since Geto left Jujustu Tech.
“Don’t call me again.”
And the blood in Gojo’s veins went cold.
“Suguru-”
“This was a really nice conversation but I mean it Gojo, don’t call me again. Please.”
Gojo swallowed the lump in his throat, noticing the return to his family name.
“Yeah, okay I’m sorry.” He mumbled the daily numbness he has grown accustomed slowly crawling back and returning to his body.
“No, don’t be, you don’t have anything to be sorry about.”
“I do though…”
The line suddenly became silent and until Geto broke it softly,
“...you do. But not for this call, besides you’re not really sorry about the other stuff still, right?”
For one of the first times in his life, Satoru had nothing to say and stayed silent.
Geto tended to have that effect on him.
I do feel sorry though. Gojo wanted to say, he felt sorry that the world was built like this - that the jujutsu system had rigid rules and scales, how no matter what anyone did their entire life and death essentially hinged upon natural luck or their bloodline. How the oldheads had control and say over everything while they sat secluded and safe while younger jujustu sorcerers had to deal with the real consequences and casualties of curses and exorcising them.
But Suguru was right. At the end of the day, Satoru stood by the jujutsu council; despite sometimes ignoring their demands and bending the rules from time to time. Because he did believe that at the end of the day, the system for sorcerers was intended for good - even if it didn’t seem it most of the time.
Perhaps that's why - no, that was exactly how Gojo was unapologetic.
“Are you the strongest because you’re Satoru Gojo? Or are you Satoru Gojo because you’re the strongest?”
It was a line that constantly haunted Gojo since Geto said it.
Was he just protecting a system that he greatly benefited from? Was that why he could still stand by and watch innocent people, like Riko, die by command? It didn’t matter how much he “rebelled” against the council of jujutsu sorcerers when at the end of the day he still stood in front of them, even when having enough power to do differently.
Gojo could trick himself into believing that, at the very least, his own values and actions were good and that was good enough despite accordance with systems already in place.
But he could never trick Geto into believing that.
That was why they didn’t work out – why they could never work out.
The silence continued as the air was filled with the quiet static of the phone line, until a small sigh came on the other end.
“Goodnight Gojo.”
“Goodnight Suguru.”
Gojo couldn’t bring himself to hang up, so he watched as the called ended and his photo contact of Geto, smiling brightly twinning with Gojo's own in the photo, disappeared from his screen.
And he sat there.
.
.
.