Chapter 28: Back to Normal (Part 1)

A/N: Now this is embarrassing ... Updating the fic after two weeks, only for the chapter to be a short one 💀

Anyways, enjoy!


Chapter summary: Megumi's and Yuuji's lives are back to normal. They visit Gojo again.

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"You're a free man, Megs!!"

Yuuji shook Megumi's shoulders back and forth playfully, grinning widely. Megumi giggled and accepted Yuuji's way of breaking off the last bits of tension that were left.

And now ... after such a long time ... the reawakened bond and relationship between Megumi and Yuuji could finally blossom and prosper.

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Megumi and Yuuji were lying on Yuuji's bed, Megumi on top of his boyfriend.

Megumi had his head resting on Yuuji's chest while the other was caressing Megumi's back tenderly.

Megumi had come back from Professor Nanami's office an hour ago, but all the two boyfriends had done so far was finding comfort in each other's embraces.

Yuuji was caressing Megumi's back in steady intervals, while Megumi was listening to Yuuji's heartbeat.

"I'll go take a shower," Megumi said after a while, standing up.

"Okay."

Yuuji sat up in his bed and watched Megumi grab some clothes and enter the bathroom that was connected to their dorm room.

He stayed like that for a while, his eyes fixated on the closed bathroom door, almost spacing out. The dull sound of the shower running spread in the room softly.

Yuuji freed himself from his motionlessness and walked on all fours on his bed to reach his bag on the floor. He grabbed his phone and immediately unlocked it to go through his contacts.

His hands were shaking a bit and he lied down on his back and brought his phone to his ear as he waited anxiously for the person to pick up the phone.

"Hey, Yuuji. Everything alright?" came Gojo's voice from the other side.

Yuuji felt relief sagging from his chest to his stomach upon hearing his adoptive father's voice.

Everything was alright again.

"Megumi is freed from all accusations. There's no case of attempted sexual assault against him anymore."

Gojo breathed out audibly and laughed a little, feeling overly happy and relieved. If only Yuuji knew why Gojo was reacting that way.

"That's great! I'm so happy for him!"

Yuuji's hands were shaking again.

"I'm so glad ... It's just ..." And then his voice started to quiver, his breathing went flat, a lump formed in his throat and wetness accumulated in his eyes until tears were spilled at last. He choked, "I was so scared."

Gojo took Yuuji's reaction lightly to alleviate the seriousness of 'what could have happened'.

"God, Yuuji. Why are you crying? Imagine how Megumi must be feeling right now. Or how he was feeling the past few days."

Yuuji thought about Gojo's words a bit. The past few days of uncertainty and emotional pain. The way he had felt so helpless while seeing Megumi suffer.

And then there had been Megumi's panic attack. Yuuji was glad he had been able to help him through that panic attack ... because of Gojo, actually.

"Thank you, dad," Yuuji said as he dried his tears.

"What for?"

"Everything ... For being my dad."

"You and Megumi can visit me tomorrow and tell me everything, if you want."

Yuuji affirmed that with a hum.

"I knew that Nanami would do the right thing."

Yuuji sniffled as he pondered on that last comment. And then he remembered Megumi's words.

"Wait. How do you know our principal's name?"

"See ya tomorrow. Go spend some quality time with Megumi. Bye!"

Yuuji frowned at his phone when Gojo ended the call, not understanding what this behavior was all about.

***

The next day, Yuuji and Megumi had actually gone to pay Gojo a visit.

The two students were sat at the kitchen table while Gojo was standing and listening.

Yuuji was definitely more excited and incredibly eager to talk about the things that had occurred after leaving Gojo's house the last time. He told Gojo all about how Megumi was freed from all accusations. Since Megumi had told him everything, Yuuji had no problems retelling the story to Gojo.

While Megumi was watching Yuuji be expressive and excited, smiling at his boyfriend, Gojo was sharing Yuuji's excitement by replying with 'Woah!'s, 'Really?!'s and 'That's nuts!'s.

Gojo was acting as carefreely and casually as he always would, as though he was seriously amazed by the turn of events. Neither Yuuji nor Megumi knew that he was simply playing along.

Until ...

"And—and, like ..." Yuuji said, pausing for a quick moment. "It's just so crazy, you know? Somehow, someone found out the same person who he saw that weekend was the same one that needed an alibi. It's so crazy. I still can't wrap my head around it."

Yuuji looked at the table, thinking about how something like that had actually saved Megumi from getting falsely charged with attempted sexual assault.

Gojo smiled at him.

"Yeah, it wasn't easy for me to make something up," he said casually. "But of course I had to help. And it worked in the end. Luckily."

There was a long silence. Both Megumi and Yuuji had their brows furrowed before they exchanged glances and then turned their heads to Gojo.

"It was you?!" they exclaimed simultaneously.

Yuuji stared at Gojo with wide eyes.

"You were Megumi's alleged alibi?!"

"Yes! I saved your dear Megumi!" Gojo pointed at himself proudly, winking. "I'm a genius, right?"

"So, you went to Nanami and ..."

"Gave Megumi a fake alibi. Yes," Gojo finished Yuuji's sentence.

After the initial shock, Megumi remembered something from their last talk.

"You know Nanami?"

"Yes. We went to JJK uni together. When I was a researcher at the medical faculty later, he used to be a lecturer."

"I never knew you went to the same university that we are enrolled at," Yuuji said, hearing this piece of information for the first time in his entire life.

"Your fault. You never asked your amazing and handsome adoptive father about his past. If you don't ask, I won't tell."

Megumi took his time to process everything. The one who had apparently seen him studying ... had never actually seen him. The alibi that had been given to Megumi ... had been a fake one. A lie.

"Wait, that means ... you lied?" Yuuji concluded with incredulousness.

"And?"

"That's perjury."

"Where are we, in court?!" Gojo said sarcastically and unseriously. "Besides, Nanami isn't the police. This investigation wasn't official anyway."

Megumi and Yuuji were flabbergasted, the latter one staring at his own adoptive father with his mouth agape.

"Oh my god, I can't believe it. You lied?" Yuuji still felt so utterly baffled. "That's why you were asking us so many questions last time? To know what you have to say? You went to Nanami and actually lied about everyth—"

"Megumi didn't do it," Gojo interrupted Yuuji sternly.

Like last time, Gojo's steely ice-blue eyes were back.

"He was close to getting expelled with dishonor for something he didn't do. Something that would change his future. He was close to being forced to give up his dream. He started med school this year. He has his whole life ahead of him! I don't mind telling Nanami a few constructed lies, if it means that Megumi's innocence can be proven that way. So what? If I have to face consequences one day, I won't care. I have nothing to lose anymore. You can't say the same about Megumi."

Gojo paused a little, breathing in and out deeply with closed eyes.

He was back to his playful self, smiling brightly now.

"Who wants ice cream?"

Gojo opened the freezer even before Megumi or Yuuji could give an answer, and took out two little buckets of vanilla ice cream. He served both students one bucket each, together with a spoon.

"Gojo's false testimony wasn't enough to free me from the accusations, Yuuji," Megumi added after a while. "His testimony somehow managed to unsettle Mahito enough to tell Nanami the truth. Nanami talked to him again, after all. But I do wonder how Nanami did that. What did he say to Mahito for him to confess?"

Gojo sighed lowly while still smiling.

"The thing with my false testimony was risky, though." Gojo looked at Megumi bittersweetly. "All it took for my made-up story to fall apart was Nanami asking you, if I had anything against your relationship with Yuuji before asking you anything else in a possible second interrogation. I was thinking about letting you in on my plan, but – that last time when you were here – I could see how desperate and distressed you were. I didn't want to burden you with more. I didn't want you to keep a fake story in mind on top of your stress."

Megumi stunned a little.

"Nanami did actually ask me a question like that ..."

"Really?"

Megumi nodded.

"Yeah. He asked if there was someone who didn't approve of my relationship with Yuuji. I said that I didn't want to answer such a personal question. It didn't make sense to me. What did that have to do with the sexual assault case?"

Gojo released a sigh of relief as he threw his head back, exhilarated.

"Wow! You're the second most genius person in the world, Megumi!"

Megumi averted his gaze timidly.

"He asked me that at the end, though. After I was already freed from all accusations."

"It doesn't matter when he asked you that. What matters is that you gave the right answer."

"What exactly did you tell Nanami?" Yuuji chimed in.

"None of your business."

"But you just said I'm not asking you enou—"

"Ask me something else," Gojo said sassily.

Yuuji pouted, but eventually drew his full attention to his ice cream.

Megumi opened his own can of ice cream, too, and was about to dig in when Gojo leant forward next to him, propping his face with a palm and smiling cheekily at Megumi.

"How ya feelin'?"

How was Megumi feeling? Mahito had lied to harm someone who had been innocent. Gojo had lied to save someone who had been innocent.

"Thanks, Gojo."

Megumi smiled softly. He was serious. Without Gojo, Megumi would have probably been kicked out of med school and would have possibly been facing charges.

Gojo grinned.

"You owe me one."

Megumi's smile loosened. Knowing Gojo, Megumi prepared himself for the most unhinged request the other would be able to come up with.

"What do you want?" he said with squinted eyes and a hostile touch in his tone.

"How about you make sure that Yuuji doesn't drop out of university and actually finishes his major instead?"

"Aren't you worried about me with med school?"

"Oh, I'm sure you can do it. If anything, I can even help you navigate through your studies. I'm seriously more worried about this guy."

Gojo pointed at his adopted son. Megumi noticed how – right at this very moment – Yuuji was whining to himself because he had clumsily dropped ice cream onto his shirt.

Megumi could only huff a chuckle at that sight.

"Fine," he said solemnly.

Gojo raised his upper body from the kitchen table with a loud, casual sigh.

"I'll leave you two alone tonight. I'm gonna meet up with old friends who I studied with together. Nanami and Haibara included."

"Isn't that going to be awkward?" Yuuji asked earnestly, inclining his head. "You and Nanami, I mean?"

"Oh, not at all. Don't think too much about it. Nanami probably didn't believe anything I said anyway, but in the end he got what he wanted. He was able to close the case successfully. That's all he cares about."

Yuuji nodded slowly at that, not entirely convinced yet. Megumi was eating his ice cream, unbothered.

"Anyways." Gojo clapped his hands together. "Don't forget. You two need to get back on track. You know that, right? When I told you, Megumi, once that you should make sure that med school doesn't start with any troubles, I was dead serious. Same goes for you, Yuuji."

Both of the students looked at Gojo with questioning glances and mouths full of ice cream.

Gojo chuckled, placing his hands on his hips.

"Finals week is soon."

Deafening silence wrapped around them. Yuuji and Megumi looked at Gojo, frozen in place and horrified. Gojo looked back at the two students with a confused glance. Megumi's spoon dropped to the floor, ripping the tranquility away with a loud and forceful 'clank'.

"Oh, fuck ..." Megumi and Yuuji said in unison, looking at each other with horrified expressions.

Finals week was indeed soon (very soon!) and both students had studied ... nothing so far.

Megumi and Yuuji had totally forgotten about their upcoming finals, having been too distracted by the Mahito case after all.

"I totally forgot!" Megumi yelled, slowly panicking.

As a medicine student, he needed to cover a lot of topics to barely pass his exams, but the thing was that Megumi wanted to pass his classes with good grades, so he had to study even more than 'barely enough'.

Yuuji wasn't feeling any better because he knew that he had to study everything, if he wanted to pass his classes. And not much time was left for that.

"Oh my god, finals week is soon, Megs!!"

"It's finals weeks for me. I have so many upcoming exams. Fuck!"

The two students were groaning and moaning in exasperation, thinking about how to tackle this almost impossible challenge.

Gojo laughed heartily at that.

Megumi turned his head to him.

"I told you once that I don't need your help, but ... you gotta help me, Gojo! Please!!"

Gojo laughed again, but of course he would help him out.

He told Megumi that he could visit Gojo again with his study materials and that Gojo would then let him know what exactly Megumi needed to know for his exams. As a pharmacy student, Yuuji couldn't get help from Gojo as much.

Yuuji was devastated. Gojo could help him a bit when it came to pharmacology, but everything else needed to be prepared by himself for the exams.

Yuuji grabbed his head with both hands and wailed nonsense.

"I should have chosen med school, too!"

***

As soon as Gojo was gone, Yuuji suggested going to his old room. They did so and Yuuji was the first one to jump onto his bed and lie down on his back. He patted the empty space next to him.

Megumi climbed onto Yuuji's bed calmly. For a while, he couldn't keep his eyes off the dried speckle of ice cream on Yuuji's black shirt, his lips curling in disgust. Yuuji didn't mind that speckle and didn't care about it.

He was focused on looking deeply into Megumi's eyes, wiggling his eyebrows then.

"It's just the two of us now ..."

Megumi snorted, giving a crooked smile.

"Whatever you have in mind, it better not involve a joint that belongs to someone else."

Yuuji giggled.

Megumi was now looking deeply into Yuuji's eyes, too.

Yuuji crossed his arms and put them behind his head. He felt at ease, smiling; his eyes hooding lightly, a glint crossing over them.

"Let's have sex."

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A/N: Guess what is going to happen next chapter 🤪

Two more chapters left! I think I'll try to finish this fic around the same time as the JJK manga ending 🤧

Comments are appreciated!


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