A FACE SO FAIR
YOU COULD NOT SEE
ALL THE LIES I TOLD TO YOU
kill yer darlin,
emme woods
A nightmare elicits more than the reality of bloodied lands. When you can't fully be here, you go to the places where you did feel alive - even if those places are filled with horror and misery. Feeling alive is a soliloquy of all the thoughts in the world amassing to the bluest one; you are not you in those nightmares, not the person you make yourself out to be, not a god or a human or a curse at all.
Instead, what plagues on your first night in the dorm alongside the raging moon, cold as the smile Father last gave you, is the litany of distant memories crowding your head like a pile of autumn leaves. You know those leaves are dying, that everywhere things are falling to sleep just like Mother, but the disappointment of 'yesterday' in the murky timeless echo was just the reminder of how you watched Mother's grave be dug.
It is not necessarily a nightmare, but death held her hand and you had watched those curses swallow her whole at the mercy of a thousand gods in agony; they will writhe in human emotion when you ascend to find her again.
She is lost; where is she? At the family grave on the hill overlooking the town, or deep in the waters of an unforgiving echo, pulled out from the framed photographs on walls for Father to hoard alongside a pint of gin?
O' death, she sings, where is thy sting?
Without an answer, you awake.
▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃
Tokyo sings with the click of boots against pristine pavements, marble touching marble; words ebb from people's lips around you but they become webbed into the air tightly, too disillusioned to understand. It was a city that makes you wonder if it cries itself to sleep every night, hurting from the pain of being alive; it's eyes must ache with the weight of unshed tears, for the burden of humanity brings to life anything it touches.
You sit on the metal railing, unfazed by the passing cars and loud traffic to which you become accustomed to with every passing minute. Eyes drift over to Fushiguro and Itadori, who wait patiently with you.
You cannot escape the feeling that, below the surface, something is breaking. Below the surface of the fragile web of thoughts, lingers the truth.
"I'm gonna get an ice lolly," Itadori says decidedly; immediately, he looks at you. "Do you want one as well?"
You blink, the mist around your eyes clearing, "Sure. I'll have whatever you're having."
Fushiguro rolls his eyes, unamused, "Be quick. It would be rude if we turned up late."
"Gojo-sensei is always late," You hum, "We learn from the best."
Two minutes later, Itadori is sprinting towards the two of you with two blue lollies in his hands. He hands one to you and you hate how a blush creeps onto your cheek at the brushing of your skin with him.
"Hm," Itadori ponders, looking over to Fushiguro, "How are there only four first-years? Isn't that too few?"
As he asks so, you take a bite out of the lolly, the taste of blueberry lingers on your tongue with a curling sweetness. It was a beautiful flavour, and you understand why he had it. Blue holds the deepest connotations, after all.
"Well, have you ever met anyone who can see curses before?" Fushiguro replies.
You don't bother opening your mouth to say something; what would you say after all? For a long time, curses were a silent outreach of the devil's smile, healing in the ruptures in your broken heart with a frothy venom. It was some black and rotting cavity of wrongness that hurt somewhere inside you; you had felt it but could never quite name it.
Itadori stops himself before he takes a bite out of the lolly, "Nope."
"That just proves how small a minority jujutsu sorcerers are," Fushiguro says, thin eyebrows meeting in the middle.
You tilt your head, "Didn't you say that Itadori and I were the third and fourth first years?"
Fushiguro nods, "This person's entry was decided a while ago. You know what our school is like. Everyone has unique circumstances."
Turning, you look over at the entrance to the train station and spot Gojo-sensei arriving with a wave. "Sorry for the wait!" He exclaims, walking over, "Your uniforms made it in time, I see."
You blink, looking down at seeing that he was right; how could you have forgotten? Perhaps the nightmare of last night had blocked out the memory of this morning.
What you were wearing consisted of a black button down jacket, black long skirt, and your old pair of sneakers. Thankfully, your attire was not a morbid black, which would have given you fears of forever looking like a funeral attendee when out in public. It was simply the colour of black just before midnight hit, the colour of blue like a midwinter night an hour before pitch dark.
There was, rather curiously, a notable difference in your uniform compared to the other two; an emblem was stitched onto your jacket, which you had seen before but can't quite place your finger on it. You had a hoodie attached to yours like Itadori, except yours was the same colour as your sneakers-light pink like sakura blossoms.
"Yeah," You smile weakly, "It's a perfect fit."
Itadori's finished popsicle is pinched between his fingers, "Though, ours are slightly different to Fushiguro's."
His thumb grazes the soft material making up his hood, brown eyes looking confusedly at it, "Ours have a hood, for one."
Gojo grins, "That's because the uniforms can be customised upon request."
"Huh?" You frown, looking away from your attire and at your teacher, "But... I never put in any requests. At least, I don't think I did."
"That's because I was the one who put in the custom order for the both of you," Gojo explains nonchalantly.
You look down, unsure how to react. Itadori's response is a shrug along the lines of 'Okay, I guess.'
Fushiguro looks even more outwardly stoic, "Be careful. Gojo-sensei has a tendency to do things like that." He lifts his head, looking around, "More importantly, why are we meeting up in Harajuku?"
Gojo gestures for the three of you to trail him as you go deeper into the crowded streets, "Ah, because it's what she wants."
And so, about ten minutes later, you spot her across the street, your eyes widened at what was happening. The teenager was practically barking at a pot-bellied man about something to do with a modelling gig, an iron grip around his collar as he tried to flee.
"We're about to meet her?" Itadori asks, a terrified expression on his face. "This is kinda embarrassing."
You stifle a laugh, "So are you."
Even though you and Itadori were from the countryside, it was only you who seemed to be less 'touristy' about your surroundings. Itadori, on the other hand, was wearing a bright pair of sunglasses that said 'ROOK' as well holding a bag of buttery popcorn in one hand and a strawberry crepe in another.
"Hey!" Gojo waves with a smile at the girl, completely unperturbed at her seething temperament, "Over here!"
You admire her when she comes into view. Her hair was a wonderful orange, and given what little you had seen of her personality, the viperous analogy of such a fruit seemed to fit her well. Her expression was tough to discern, icy in the distinct corners of her features; narrowed eyes and a sharp smile reminds you of the dry sweetness that hides inside an orange. She seemed to have built the layer of tough skin around her, a cold wall that aimed to block people out but you suspect it was simply trapping her in the tyranny of her mind.
Even her eyes were startling to look at; the shape of them appealed to you, like the natural ephemerality of a doe in the wild, and the sting of her long eyelashes made you weep at her beauty. She looks over all of you, a bitterness tucked behind the tendrils of tangerine.
And as she stares at the people before her, it's only now that you realise she is just a smidge shorter than you.
Itadori is the first to speak, "I'm Itadori Yuuji. I'm from Sendai."
And as if that was a cue for everyone else's introductions, Fushiguro says something dull next, "Fushiguro Megumi."
You bite your lip nervously, fiddling with your fingers at her burning glare, "Uh... [L/n] [Y/n]."
She sighs, fixing her gaze on the concrete pavement, "I always get stuck with unfortunate circumstances."
"She took one look and sighed," You deadpan, blinking at what had just happened. Even Itadori doesn't quite know how to react.
Fushiguro turns and looks at Gojo-sensei, "Are we going somewhere from here?"
Gojo has both his hands in his pocket, laughing quietly to himself, "Hm, well... We do have all four of you here together... And three of you are from the countryside... So, that means only one thing. We're going on a tour of Tokyo!"
"A tour of Tokyo?!" A wide grin appears on your face and you twirl on the spot, immediately jumping up and down.
Tokyo is a jewel beyond comprehension, hidden behind foggy mornings with blankets of grey smothering the sky, but peel back the layers and the truth is revealed. The sky was azure, white clouds as fluffy as they look, drifting hazily across your peripheral vision, thousands and thousands of feet away from your mellow eyes. The harsh gaze of the sun had dwindled in the early morning, now emitting a more soft beam of light down on the very populated city, the sunlight reflecting off the glassy windows. Such natural beauty, and such a waste it would be concealed by the smoke of the furnaces and the emissions of vehicles. Humans cluster their world with their own devices, ruining the beauty of something else in order to add to the beauty of themselves.
That was the endless treasure your parents had embedded into your head about the cunning wealth that life brought; the serenity of the countryside is nothing compared to the endless possibilities that a city as large as Tokyo seemed to brim with.
After you, Itadori and Kugisaki collectively hug Gojo-sensei and squeal together in excitement about the so-called 'tour' (Fushiguro remained completely unfazed), Gojo relents, "I will now tell you the name of our destination."
Both you and the other two drop to one knee, head bowed as you await an answer. It was likely very comical for passerbyers to watch but you were just wanting to have fun with your new-found friends. It wasn't like this sort of thing was a commodity back home; people are often wary of a lonely, loveless girl whose mother is rotting in a grave and father is a drunkard.
"Roppongi!" Gojo puts his hands around his mouth, speaking in an amusing announcer voice.
If you thought Roppongi was a fairytale castle dripping head to toe in Tokyo's most lavish sights then sadly, whatever dream you were euphorically reeling in, was as fake as the promises father made.
▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃
Your mind is as fragile as the teacups inside an antique store; it has it's uses but in a witting admiration, it can fumble and collapse. And once fractured, it can never be the same again. Such an analogy is befitting of a girl who was plagued by hallucinations of cursed spirits across your lifetime. Roppongi is not a place where frail sakura blossoms bloom on the crooked branch of every tree, but instead it is the end of everything in existence, Tokyo's end.
"There's a curse here," You say suddenly, lips moving without thinking.
The wave of darkness crawls unwelcomingly across your skin, a vivid coldness that reminds you of the sulphur lakes trembling in hell. You are standing in front of a four story building and every nerve in your body feels like it's been painfully unwoven at the merciless thought of a curse.
What a delicate aura, like a black heart. This curse was visceral in its approach as it tears open your chest to reveal a broken heart, no longer pulsing but instead, it withers like the strings have snapped in two. Rotten flesh lays aghast around the ribcage; like the jagged cutting rock of a cave, it surrounds the demise of your organs. You recoil, stepping back in horror at the descriptive nightmare presented in front of you. Your hands press against your breasts and the wavy skin to reflect the ribcage, but you feel no gaping hole physically present on your body. While metaphorically, your heart is cut open with a surgeon's touch, beautified for the world to revel in it's pitiful plight, realistically, the organ was beating away within you, a constant force that shrouded your shrivelled body everywhere you go.
"You alright?" Fushiguro turns and looks at you; his eyes haunt the remains of something somber, lonely and lost. The green hues take some of your sadness away, leaving you a little hollow at the beckoning thought of sorcery.
As he asks this, Itadori and Kugisaki are pulling their hair out, angry and frustrated expressions on their face, "You liar!" Kugisaki waves her fists around.
You look away, catching your breath; curses seem to affect you more than anything else, "Yeah... I guess I'm still adjusting."
Itadori's lips bitterly curl, "This isn't even Roppongi!"
You didn't even know what Roppongi even looked like, so Gojo's little trick seems somewhat funny now that you reflect on it.
Pouting, Kugisaki points at the building, "You were toying with us country folk!"
After the two calm down ( you had to clasp Itadori by the shoulders and make a promise to take him to the real Roppongi oneday ), Gojo starts speaking.
His expression is always difficult to place, an illusion that befits all. Perhaps it was the blindfold masking his eyes that made him such a mysterious figure; he was intrepid in his gaze, and far too wise with his words. Something about him makes you quiver with anxiety, like he is simply a deity too far away, out of the reach of a powerless human. He understands things you cannot even begin to comprehend, and you imagine there to be a plethora of secrets webbed tightly into the string of his thoughts. Not that you could ever predict what a man like him was thinking.
"There's a big cemetery nearby," He says, slightly shifting his head and you look over, eyebrows knitting together when you realise how the hours ticked by. A whole day disappearing at the premise of dusk; was it wasted or was Gojo-sensei initiating some sort of training coup? "The double whammy of that and an abandoned building brought out a curse."
Hands inside your skirt pocket upon the crisp breeze brushing your cheeks, you reply idly, "So they really do pop up more often around graves?"
Fushiguro shakes his head, "The issue isn't the cemetery itself. It's the fact that people associate cemeteries with fear."
Itadori quirks his eyebrows, "Oh, it was the same for schools too, wasn't it?"
"Hold up, you guys don't know that yet?" Kugisaki asks, rather surprised too. Perhaps she was raised more cordial compared to you and Itadori; the two of you were still learning the workings of this separate world to the one you were most used to.
Fushiguro replies stoically, "To be honest... Itadori did eat Sukuna's finger."
"He swallowed a special-grade cursed object?!" Kugisaki waved her arms frantically, "Gross! Unbelievable! That's so unsanitary and disgusting!" She shuffles away with a weary expression on her face, "No way! No way! No way!"
"What?" Itadori whines; he can't really complain after all. He did do it, and besides, judging from the collection of descriptions you acquired about what happened when you were unconscious, it seemed like Itadori did it randomly without a single sane or rational thought.
Both you and Fushiguro say the same thing in response, monotonously, "I agree with her..."
Gojo sighs, still looking ahead at the building, "I want to see what you guys are capable of. Just think of this as a field test."
You scratch the side of your neck as you listen patiently to his words, heeding to them, "Nobara, Yuuji, you two go exorcise the curse inside that building."
Not me?! You cover your mouth to stop yourself saying that out loud. Really, you should be lucky that Gojo hasn't asked you to go along. Your stomach is already twitching at the idea of fighting a curse.
"Huh? But I thought only curses could exorcise curses, right?" Itadori inquires, "I can't use any jujutsu yet."
Gojo points at Itadori's heart, "You're basically half a curse already. There's cursed energy flowing throughout your body." He steps closer with the same poker expression he's had on all day, "Though controlling that energy isn't something you can learn overnight, so use this."
Rather unexpectedly, he pulls out the cover for a blade, making everyone's jaws unhinge and drop to the floor. Where did he even get it from?! You don't even know how logically such a wicked weapon would go undetected as you ventured across Tokyo with him for the day.
"It's the cursed tool, Slaughter Demon," Gojo explains as Itadori unsheathes it and holds it out above his head. "It's a weapon imbued with cursed energy. It'll work on curses, too."
The silver metal flashes under the depth of the moonlight, a stunning gunmetal grey that was not as ashen or nondescript as one would think, but instead it glistened with a frightening power. The sharpness of it's outline did not fail to make your heart jump out of your throat. It's right there when it hits you like a bag of bricks about the compromising reality of this jutting world; a line of morals and ideologies where the fixation of magic involves handing teenagers weapons made to kill.
You don't remember this life, a life spun together by fate with a dash of mundanity. It gives rise to so many questions, but you must shun them away in the moment to clear your cluttered head; the answers may not even be known yet.
"Oh, one more thing," Gojo adds as you watch Itadori and Kugisaki walk towards a graffitied wall, "Don't let Sukuna out. If you use him, you'll get rid of all of the curses nearby in a flash, but you'll also drag everyone around into it."
Just hearing the name makes your fingers curl around the hem of your black skirt, fear throbbing in the hollow vessel of your heart, veins sizzling with an unknown anxiety, stemming from thousands of years of instinctive pain.
"Got it," Itadori does a thumbs up, "I won't let Sukuna out."
After watching Kugisaki and Itadori lift the closed shutters, you retreat alongside Gojo and Fushiguro, sitting on a block of cement around the abandoned complex.
"I think I'll go," Fushiguro says sullenly.
Gojo shakes his head; he's sitting on the floor but his head still matches the same level as yours given his height, "Don't push yourself. You're still recovering."
Fushiguro sighs, "But someone needs to keep an eye on Itadori, right?"
"True," Gojo taps his chin, "But the one we're testing this time is Nobara."
"Oh, is that why I am not joining them, sensei?" You tilt your head in inquiry, wondering what the reason for your non-participation was.
Gojo nods, "Well, that and the fact that I want you to be thoroughly trained and tested. Up until recently, you were just a normal schoolgirl. It's fine for you to not have conquered your fear or disgust yet but..."
He turns and looks at you for the longest time, as if you can spot the irises hidden behind his thick blindfold. He's reading you like you're an open book and it would be unsettling if he wasn't being so truthful and nonchalant about it.
"What?" You ask blankly, wondering what he is thinking.
Gojo waves his hand, "Nothing, nothing! We'll be getting sushi in Ginza after this."
Something tells you that wasn't it, but you just hope he'll tell you at some point.
Fushiguro rolls his eyes, "Yeah but I bet you'll be making us pay for it."
Gojo beams, "You know your teacher so well, Megumi! A student helps out their tall, handsome, broke teacher any time, you know."
Your lips curve upwards into a small smile; looking up at the twinkling stars locked in the dark blanket rolled across the sky, you think about the sting of death just as how you had thought about it that morning.
One day, it will sting you, the hardship of jujutsu sorcery, and you know you'll never be the same after that. For now, sitting outside a compound in the middle of empty Roppongi with your teacher and friend would suffice. You're just grateful you're not the one exorcising the curse.
It's just a waiting game now.