Check out my new fanfic: Jujutsu Kaisen: What is Life?
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Advice: listen to Where Have You Been (Orchestral Version), by the YouTube channel James Liam Figueroa.
Trust me, it will be worth the effort.
I poured out my heart in this chapter... Hope you would like it.
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The next day.
Akira stood at their usual spot, leaning against the wall with his hands in his pockets. Nia sat on his head, her tail swishing lazily.
He was wearing the school uniform again.
Grey blazer. Red tie. Pressed pants.
No yukata. No pipe. No sandals.
Two days in a row.
Nia had been staring at him since they left the house. She hadn't blinked once, which was impressive for a cat.
"I still can't believe you're wearing normal clothes," Nia said, her voice flat. "Without a pipe."
Akira laughed. "Well, seeing my classmates take my side and believe in me... it motivated me to blend with the class a bit more."
Nia's ears went flat. "Wow. Daddy has gone soft."
"Not really," Akira said casually. "If a villain shows up and does something stupid, I'd still prefer to kill them."
Nia laughed at that. "Never change, Daddy."
He smiled and reached up to scratch behind her ear. "You got it, sweety."
"G-good morning, Akira."
He turned.
Momo was standing a few feet away. Her school bag hung from one shoulder. Her hair was in its usual ponytail. Everything about her looked normal.
Except her face.
She was looking down, fiddling with her fingers, her cheeks already turning pink. She couldn't seem to decide whether to look at him or the ground, so she kept switching between both.
Akira looked at her.
Mom really wasn't lying.
Last night, Honoka had cornered him in the kitchen. She had that look on her face. The one that was part excitement, part conspiracy, and part "I am about to say something that will ruin your evening."
"So," Honoka had said, leaning against the counter with her arms crossed. "I got a very interesting phone call from Reika today."
Akira had poured himself a glass of water, not looking at her. "Okay."
"She told me that Momo came home today in a very specific state. Running through the gates and holding her face. Which was bright red. Screaming, 'You saw nothing' at the guards. Then she dodged Reika's hug, sprinted to her room, locked the door, and screamed into a pillow."
Akira had paused mid-sip.
"Reika and I are both so happy you finally made your move," Honoka had continued, her eyes glistening. "You have our full blessing."
Akira had just looked at her. Then at Nia. Both of them stared at him with expressions that expected an answer.
He had put the glass down.
"What move?" he'd asked.
Honoka had blinked. "That you should know, honey~"
He had rewinded what he did. The hand on her cheek, the words that came out of his heart.
Oh.
He had stood there for a moment, processing. Then a thought crossed his mind that surprised him.
But the idea doesn't sound that bad.
He hadn't said anything. He'd just picked up his glass, walked to his room, and closed the door.
Nia had looked at Honoka. Honoka had looked at Nia.
"He's processing," Honoka had said.
"Daddy.exe is loading," Nia had confirmed.
In his room, Akira had sat on his bed, staring at the ceiling.
He had thought about it properly.
Okay. Let's take it slow and actually think about this. I really don't want to go down the path where both people like each other but never make any progress because they're too braindead to say their feelings out loud.
He'd seen it a thousand times. In his past life. In every manga, every anime, every web novel. Two characters who obviously loved each other, spending three hundred chapters dancing around it. Blushing. Misunderstanding. Running away.
It was the most painful thing to watch/read, and he refused to live it.
So, do I like Momo?
He thought about her. Not the Yaoyorozu heiress. Not the Creation quirk user. Not the girl with the perfect grades and the perfect posture.
Just Momo.
The girl who showed up at his gate at 7 AM every morning because she promised she would.
The girl who got back up every time he knocked her down during training, wiped the sweat, fixed her ponytail, and said, "again."
The girl who tased a guy twice her size in China because he was hurting a cat she had never met.
The girl who stayed after the training ended, when she had no reason to. Who called him every day. Who asked stupid questions about his pipe. Who laughed at things that weren't funny because she knew he needed someone to laugh.
The girl who watched him tear through villains at USJ — the blood, the fire, the severed limbs, the screaming — and instead of running, looked him in the eye and said she didn't care what he did to villains.
The girl who said he was stuck with.
He thought about her smile. About the way she fiddled with her fingers when she was nervous.
About the way she rolled her eyes when he said something dumb. About the way she looked at him when she thought he wasn't paying attention.
His heart felt at peace.
Not racing. Not confused. Not anxious. Just... still. Warm, and in peace.
Like a flame that had finally found its place.
He smiled.
Well, would you look at that. Guess I'm in love.
***
Back to the present.
Akira looked at Momo, standing in front of him, fiddling with her fingers, unable to make eye contact for more than half a second.
He smiled at her.
The same smile from yesterday. The real one. The one that made her brain crash.
Momo saw it, and her panic intensified. There it is. That smile. That stupid, unfair smile. Don't look at it. Don't look at it. Don't-
She looked at it.
Her face went red.
Akira reached up, gently picked Nia off his head, and placed her on the ground.
"Daddy?" Nia looked up at him, confused.
"Give me a minute, sweety."
Nia looked at him. Then at Momo. Then back at him. Her yellow eyes went wide.
"Oh," she said quietly. Then she trotted a few feet away and sat down, watching.
Akira walked up to Momo.
She took a step back. He took a step forward. She tried to look away. He placed his hand on her cheek, softly, the same way he had yesterday. His fingers were warm. He gently tilted her face up until she had no choice but to look him in the eyes.
She was shaking.
"Akira, I-"
He placed a finger on her lips.
"Shush," he said. "Let me say my part first."
All Momo could do was nod.
Akira looked at her. His crimson eyes were calm. Steady. No teasing smirk. No mask. Just Akira.
"What I said yesterday," he said. "It wasn't an accident."
Her eyes widened.
"I meant every word I said. I... Akira, am glad you came into my life."
He paused.
"And after saying that yesterday, I realised something else."
Momo's heart was beating so fast she was certain he could hear it.
"It seems like I'm in love with you, big brains."
Her eyes went wide. Wider than they'd ever been. Her mouth opened, but nothing came out.
Akira continued. His voice was calm and honest.
"I really don't want to play that game where two people like each other but are too shy to admit it, and it keeps dragging on. I've seen story like that. It's stupid, and I'm not doing it."
He pulled his hand back from her cheek.
"So take your time. Sort out your feelings. You know how I feel now. Let me know what your heart says when you're ready."
He turned and started walking toward the school.
So casually like he hadn't just detonated a second bomb in two days.
Momo stood there.
Her arms were at her sides. Her bag was slipping off her shoulder. Her brain had shut down again, except this time it wasn't crashing. It was doing something else.
It was replaying.
Everything.
China.
The first time she saw him. Standing over Peng with fire in his eyes. She was terrified. A boy her age, torturing someone without hesitation.
Breaking bones and healing, she had been scared.
But then she realized why he had done it. For the cat. For the waiter. For the people who couldn't fight back.
She understood him.
She looked up to him. To his strength. To the way he saw her quirk, and made her realize how strong she was.
"You are a walking factory, and you're making scissors?"
His words echoed in her brain.
The training.
Every morning at 7 AM. The drills that made her body scream. The bruises he healed without asking. The way he pushed her harder than anyone had ever pushed her, because he believed she could take it.
And then the moments in between. The quiet ones. The ones no one else saw.
Him painting in the corner of the gym, lost in a sadness she was just beginning to understand. Him flicking her forehead when she said something dumb, then healing it immediately with a tiny spark.
Him sitting with Nia on the porch, smoking his pipe, watching the sunset, saying nothing.
His soft side. The one reserved for family.
Somewhere during those weeks, he started showing that side to her, too. And she hadn't even noticed when it happened. One day she was a training partner. Next, she was something more.
"Just friends," she had told herself. Over and over. Like saying it enough times would make it true.
It never did.
Then USJ happened.
The blood. Villains dismembered in minutes. The Nomu reduced to ash. Akira standing in the centre of it all, burning like a god.
She was scared of him again.
But by the time it was over, by the time she saw him collapse, saw the exhaustion, saw the human under the fire — she understood something she had been running from.
She was in love with him.
"I don't give a fuck what you do to villains."
She had meant it.
"You're stuck with me."
She had meant that too.
And then yesterday.
His hand on her cheek. That smile. That stupid, unfair, beautiful smile.
"I'm just glad to have you with me."
And last night, in her room, face buried in a pillow, screaming, she had asked herself a question.
"Why am I so scared?"
Now she had the answer.
She wasn't scared of him. She wasn't scared of his feelings. She was scared of her own. Scared that if she admitted what she felt, there was no going back. Scared that loving someone like Akira meant walking beside fire for the rest of her life.
But she had been walking beside fire since China.
And months later, here she was..... still walking with that beautiful fire.
Momo stopped blushing.
The panic left her face.
The nervousness and the confusion were replaced by certainty.
A small, dangerous smile spread across her face.
If I'm stuck with you for my entire life, then I'd rather have you as my man.
She started walking.
Then faster.
"Akira!"
He turned.
"Wh-"
She grabbed him by the collar of his blazer with both hands and pulled him down to her level.
And kissed him hard.
Akira's eyes went wide. His hands froze at his sides. His brain, for the first time in his life, went completely blank.
Nia, sitting on the sidewalk a few feet away, stared.
Her yellow eyes went wide.
"Oh my god," she whispered.
Then she pulled out a tiny phone from her pink fanny pouch.
She hit speed dial.
Ring. Ring.
"Hello?"
"GRANDMA! DADDY AND MOMO ARE KISSING!! I REPEAT, DADDY AND MOMO ARE KISSING!!! THIS IS NOT A DRILL!!!!!"
On the other end, somewhere in the Shuzenji estate, Honoka dropped her coffee mug.
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So... yeah. After 83 chapter's they are togather. I hope it was done right, without any rush, and felt natural. I added some personal touches too, from my life.😙
Plus if you want, you can read up to +10 advanced chapters and support me you can alway join my P@treaon. (Just search up Joe_Mama p@treon on google.)