Email, outgoing from: Gojo Satoru, scheduled 9:00 AM. 〚February 14, 2019〛

Hi, all!

I'll be out for the entire day today to attend to some personal matters, but if you need valentine's day chocolates or wingmen rest assured that I'll be available 4 PM onwards to assist you. That'll be my present to you all as deputy project director.  That said, I'll see you tomorrow at our scheduled meeting, still at 10:00 AM. I'll be giving everyone their chocolates then.

I hope you enjoy your day!

– Gojo

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A photograph  〚February 14, 2019〛

There are four people in the photo. On the leftmost portion is a grumpy-looking boy with blonde hair, holding onto an ice cream cone and a pink paperbag decorated with hearts. The boy beside him is beaming at the camera and has his arm around the blonde's. He is holding up a peace sign with his other hand. On his right is another dark-haired boy in a bun smiling slightly. He is holding a cinamoroll plushie and has his hand intertwined with the rightmost person, a white-haired, bespectacled boy. Said boy is sticking his tongue out at the camera. A ferris wheel looms behind them surrounded by other sights and fairs.

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〚March 2019〛

Trying, as Satoru had learned earlier on in his life, isn't linear. That's totally credible because he's been through a ton of shit in the earlier parts of his life. You could ask him about what packing tape tastes like and he'd prompt you with "wet or dry?" as if eating any kind of tape was normal. (In his defense, both tape incidents were purely accidental, and both involved Suguru.) He'd never been through this, though. It was like living just slightly beside himself—everyday he'd go through his days feeling like he was looking at a shitty third-person rendition of himself in a terrible video game that was struggling to load because of even more terrible wifi.

His days went like this: he'd go to university ten minutes before his first class and arrive exactly ten minutes after his class starts. He doesn't take notes because he believes he doesn't need to, but he makes at least five mental reminders to hit the books later that day when he's free. He goes to his second class; rinse and repeat. By the time lunchtime rolls by, his head's more full of mental reminders than actual class material. It doesn't matter. He studies better alone.

He talks to some people involved in some shit he doesn't want to involve himself in but has to anyway because it's their final year next year and he has to rack up some points on his would-be resume like the good part of the workforce he is. He gets asked at least thrice that month if he and Suguru are dating again, and he answers that no, they're just trying things out and seeing what's best. He gets pissed after because it's only then that he realizes he doesn't even need to answer them.

He crashes home, alone. He's used to it. He opens his books and papers and tries to shut himself off for the rest of the day, but not before he sends seven photos of himself doing the weirdest faces he could think of to his best friend.

Some things needed upsetting so they could fall correctly into place, and that was how it was starting to become with Suguru. They'd fallen into some unspoken agreement that wasn't stifling for once. It felt like they should have been doing this before instead of putting on labels, even; they weren't built for those anyway. The lines were so blurred with them that they simply ceased to exist. Still, it was a gradual process—the I love you's weren't new, of course, but their reintroduction rearranged some things in the precarious balance of things with the both of them.

They're treading on thin ice, Satoru knows, but it's ice they crushed and put there themselves.

When it's time for him to sleep, he doesn't—he traces the glow-in-the-dark stars above his bunk, feeling them, letting them grace his fingertips. He thought once that these stars were made of both him and Suguru; they'd witnessed everything in silence, wrapped in the gray-dim light of the room. Suguru had kept a nightlight when he lived in the apartment. He feels sorry to the stars for not getting a replacement light when Suguru's had gone.

It's not so bad most of the time. He's not even tired. He's swimming again, he feels, but in shallow waters this time: a cool limbo of this-and-that but never anything tangible. He doesn't let himself want, or need—that wasn't his call to make.

He falls asleep as slowly as the last dregs of the night dripping into the dawn.

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An Instagram post. 〚March 24, 2019〛

The post is a photo of two boys both holding large bouquets. The caption reads, "bought each other flowers without knowing lol anyway happy end of the year!". There are five likes and the singular comment from user @ not.yu says: happy end of the year to u both! :D

The comment has two likes; one from user @ sa2ru, the other from user @ ge2ru.

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Text messages  〚May 4, 2019〛

(10:04 AM) bff suguru 🥸 : guess who got regularized

You: no fucking way (10:04 AM)
THIS CALLS FOR A CELEBRATION (10:04 AM)
@ shoko get ur ass in here STAT (10:04 AM)

(10:09 AM) bff shoko 😰 : my ass was too big it took me a while to get in here sorry

(10:10 AM) bff suguru 🥸 : false

You: false (2) (10:10 AM)

(10:10 AM) bff shoko 😰 : i'm leaving this friend group

You: i'd like to see you try (10:10 AM)

(10:10 AM) bff suguru 🥸 : i wont forget to bring my wallet this time

You: no u know what my treat (10:11 AM)

(10:11 AM) bff shoko 😰 : suddenly not leaving this friend group(¬‿¬ )

(10:11 AM) bff suguru 🥸 : looking up michelin star restaurants rn=))))

You: i get it u guys only love me for the money u dont have to be so obvious😕 (10:11 AM)

(bff suguru 🥸 unsent his previous message.)

(10:12 AM) bff suguru 🥸 : why would you ever think that🥺💛

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3:33 PM  〚July 13, 2019〛

"Do you and Getou fight?"

A slow smile spreads across Satoru's face, a direct contrast to the lightning-quick supercut of arguments he and Suguru have had that passes through his mind. He crosses his legs in his seat and leans back, takes a sip of his coffee. "That's only natural, isn't it? Why do you ask?"

The trick to talking to Tsukumo Yuki is to appear as calm as possible. The woman is inscrutable and impervious to anything; it's always a different kind of conversational warfare with her. He doesn't even know why they're talking about this now. The last time they talked was three years ago in a back-alley that smelled of shit because she was "doing something important" and had only fifteen minutes free for conversation, which, mind anyone, was something she'd invited him to. Turns out she was just trying to recruit him to some firm of hers that he never got around to checking out properly.

Her enigmatism is what draws people to her, Satoru thinks as he watches her watch him. She hasn't been too concerned with anyone from school—all he remembers of her during the intersection of their years in university was that she operated solely by herself. That, and the fact that at some point she and Suguru conversed regularly about fucking—he doesn't know—the tenets of life or something. He never asked Suguru about it.

Yuki sets down her own cup now. "Nothing," she says airily, "it's just that I never really kept tabs on anyone except three people, two of which are you and him. Plus, he's something like a...friend."

Satoru raises his eyebrows. "You talked once every two months, and that was back when you still went here. I doubt you even talk anymore."

"Correct," she smiles. It looks a little out of place. "But I told him some of my thoughts about...well, himself. I never got to have that conversation with you. I was meaning to, but it looks like you've got it sorted out. I hope you both have it sorted out as well."

What does that even mean?

"Where did that come from?" Satoru prods. What does this woman know? "And why are you asking?"

She chuckles. The small movement looks graceful on her, making her look every bit the person she was made out to be in her reputation at Waseda. For someone who sounded like they were bigger than life, though, she sure does look awfully confused. Satoru is, too, so it's a draw for now. "I have some contacts in the firm he works in. I drop by sometimes as well, so of course I'd know about the flowers and the notes. Cute, by the way," she winks. "He's the best there, or so I hear. Has a nasty streak when he's put off, though; shuts down arguments in the root before they even happen when he's on his worst days. It's only natural that I began to wonder about the only person who could match him."

Satoru smiles, softening the hard-set edges around his eyes. "I don't know how any of this concerns you."

"I'm doing research, you see," she plucks off invisible lint from her blouse, "on people. I found the both of you fascinating."

"We're not research subjects," Satoru laughs incredulously. "You'd need our consent for that, wouldn't you?"

Yuki laughs just as well, perfectly in stride. "I'm not doing my research on you. I just wanted to pursue some observations."

"Well I hope my answers satisfied your...observations." Satoru picks his cup back up and takes a sip. The tea is scalding, and he winces. Yuki looks on passively.

"I wonder..." She muses after a minute. "How does it feel to find someone whose soul is so similar to yours—and yet so different—so early on in your life?"

It feels like having a home without having a home. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"Don't play dumb," Yuki laughs, "Humor me, it's just a simple question. I'll be leaving in a bit anyway."

Satoru looks somewhere else. He begins to wonder if he hates being seen through because it happens to him only rarely, or if he hates it because nobody can know him that much and just run off with that knowledge. "He's my best friend," he confesses quietly. "The only one. No soul shit involved or anything." He plays with the hem of his sweater. "I just happen to be in love with him, that's all."

He doesn't say he's someone so ingrained into my being I probably wouldn't be able to escape him even beyond death.

Yuki nods as if she understood what was left unsaid. "And it feels reassuring, no?"

It does, with a certainty that can't be rivaled by anything else. Not that Satoru would admit to it in front of fucking Tsukumo Yuki. "Perhaps," is all he says. "You?"

"You know me." She flicks one of her bangs away from her face. The movement is cutting and precise despite its casualness. "I might find—they call it soulmates, can you believe I'd call it that too—my soulmate at some point in the future. I'm not holding out for it, though, if you must know."

"I don't," Satoru nods his head at her once. He loves adding on to the irony of things when he can.

Yuki's expression is wry. Satoru doesn't want to uncover what in the flying fuck that means anymore. She only replies with, "Good, I'll be going then. Good luck on your endeavors with Getou Suguru, then, the risk of losing him always runs perpendicular to how you both are at any given moment,"—which doesn't mean anything to Satoru, because what the hell is that even supposed to be, it's not even her relationship (it's not even a relationship)—and leaves him the amount of the entire bill on the table before standing up and walking out of the place, heels clicking in her wake.

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✰Omoide no yokocho✰ episode #58 transcript — excerpt . 〚February 10, 2018〛

SUGURU: I think what matters most at the end of the day is the effort in trying. Because that's the hard part, you know? It's not a one-time thing; you have to try every single time you want to sustain something.

SATORU: Hmmm...I think if you want to keep something, you won't really find it hard to sustain it. Trying is a given, yes, but it gives you joy to exert effort.

CALLER: Have you both ever tried to sustain something on a person-to-person sense?

SUGURU: (laughs) Have we, Satoru?

SATORU: I definitely wouldn't say so. I mean we probably did, but nothing ever ends well with the both of us, right, Suguru?

CALLER: You guys talk like you've been through it though.

SATORU: Well you don't know that. Maybe we have, maybe we haven't.

SUGURU: Stop being rude to our caller, Satoru.

SATORU: I'm not being rude! Hey caller, am I being rude?

CALLER: N-no, not really.

SATORU: The people have spoken, Suguru.

SUGURU: Whatever.

CALLER: What do you think about quitting on something you really want to sustain because it's tired you out a lot of times?

SUGURU: It would make sense, but then your goal wouldn't be realized then. It doesn't matter if it's something that has to do with another person or not. You would have worked for nothing, in a way.

SATORU: That's pretty harsh. I'm not going to tell you that it's your call to deem it as something toxic since most people know toxicity but don't disentangle themselves from it, but if it really made you tired multiple times and you feel like you can't have a go at it anymore, then you should definitely stop. I mean there's no use trying to kick a dead horse back to life, or so the saying goes.

SUGURU: I don't think that's correct.

SATORU: Well sorry, Mr. Know-It-All.

CALLER: Would you?

SATORU: Would I what?

CALLER: Quit, in that situation?

SATORU: I'd find other ways to work for it. Suguru?

SUGURU: I'd keep working towards it, probably.

SATORU: And there you have it.