Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Akechi Goro has made an extremely large amount of mistakes in his forlorn little life, but this one is pretty close to the top of the charts, subjectively speaking.

It is hot today. He is wearing a plain white shirt (short sleeved) and long black pants and feels very average and plain, which is good. It’s what he is going for. In the morning he contemplated for a good ten minutes whether or not he should tie his hair back, and in the end, decided to do so. He’s glad, because there’s sweat gleaming on the back of his neck and he is sure that had he left his hair down, it would be much worse.

He sighs.

He is standing outside of Leblanc at the moment, having an internal debate with himself. The mistake mentioned earlier is the fact that he is here, in Yongenjaya, in front of this stupid cafe with his stupid clammy hands and a heart rate that would scare ER nurses. He should be back at his apartment in sweatpants and a t-shirt trying not to feel sorry for himself, but he isn’t.

It’s a bad idea—to do this. To see Akira again, to see Akira’s friends again, to see Sojiro again, etcetera, etcetera. He has nothing to give them; he has never had anything to give to them besides agony and irritation and probably some premature grey hairs. More than that, he doesn’t deserve to see them, doesn’t deserve—what is it he’s trying to accomplish here, disclosure?—anything from them.

That’s what Goro tells himself, against the advice of a self-help book he once read.

For a minute he considers going back home, giving into cowardice in favor of taking a nap. He reasons with himself, though, says to himself, you spent money for the train ride here, so don’t waste the money.

Apparently that reasoning is enough for his subconscious to put his hand on the door to Leblanc and push it open.

A charming scene unfolds before him: the ex-Phantom Thieves strewn about the cafe, and Akira standing behind the counter, a cup of coffee in his hand, extending it to Haru, who sits on one of the stools. She is smiling, laughing at some annoying joke Akira probably made, basking in the kindness he so easily has under control. Time slows down, just for a moment, when Goro sees this; his eyes are a camera and he is watching his younger self sitting at that same counter smiling and laughing in nearly the same way.

Nearly.

It irritates Goro, seeing them so happy, and he hates that this is his first emotion. He isn’t entirely surprised at it, though. Typical, typical Akechi Goro, unable to keep himself in check in even the shortest of time spans.

Well—this isn’t entirely true. Goro had great self restraint, back then —”back then” being when he was dealing with the entire Phantom Thieves slash Shido slash Kurusu Akira mess. He could keep himself calm and collected relatively proficiently when around other people. It was more of a defense mechanism he taught himself, a way for others to find him amicable, but, well. He has no use for that mechanism, not anymore.

Goro used to do a lot of getting angry, but in private: in his apartment, at night, smashing his glass of water on the ground and picking up the pieces and dreaming of maiming himself as he threw it all away into the garbage bin. Now he does a lot of getting angry in public—kicking benches, kicking vending machines, kicking shelves. He never means to do it, never means to yell at people and inanimate objects. It simply happens. There are a lot of things, he has come to realize, to be angry about. Even when the things are miniscule in the long run.  

His brain stops functioning as a camera and he lets the door to the cafe shut behind him with a familiar jingle.

“Hello,” Akira says, turning his attention to the doorway, “welc—”

His eyes widen when he sees Goro standing there. The cup of coffee he holds in his long fingers falls and shatters on the ground.

Oh, Goro thinks, what am I doing here.

Akira just broke a cup at the simple sight of Goro’s face. Not only is that humiliating, but it’s also aggravating, and immensely upsetting, and a whole plethora of other things.

He considers saying something smug in the terrible silence that follows, but doesn’t. He simply stands there, hands folded together to stop them from shaking, staring at the room.

This isn’t like him—not knowing what to say, being unable to find even the vaguest semblance of a conversation starter. Perhaps he can’t find words because the sound of porcelain shattering is still echoing in his ears like some kind of silly omen.

Goro knows better than to think omens are real, though. Fate is not kind enough to give human beings omens of real meaningfulness. She prefers to watch and confuse instead.

“Um,” Makoto offers, “hello.”

A good start in retrospect. Goro nods and says, “Hello.”

More silence. This is ridiculous, Goro knows, particularly ridiculous on his own part for not being able to think of anything to say. He lets his arms fall by his sides and digs his nails into the flesh of his palms.

“I imagined that this would go differently,” Goro says. The minute the words leave his mouth he wants to take them back. What did he imagine would happen? All of the Phantom Thieves, whom Goro had so proudly declared he would kill, jumping for joy and rushing to hug him? Very funny. What a sad fantasy.

Perhaps he imagined that there would be more panicked pandemonium and less awkward silence. Perhaps he imagined to be kicked out of Leblanc immediately.

These stupid, stupid Phantom Thieves and their unpredictableness that Goro absolutely hates.

Ryuji, thankfully, is the first to give some sort of actual conversation starter, though it isn’t a pleasant one. “We thought you died, man,” he says rather incredulously, holding a popsicle in one hand.

From the corner of his eye, Goro watches Akira clean up the porcelain and coffee on the ground. He seems to be taking his sweet time with it.

“Unfortunately not,” Goro says.

Ryuji’s eyes widen a bit at the response.

Goro hates this. He hates himself for coming here, because he hadn’t realized how impactful his presence would be, somehow. After all, he’s been dead in the eyes of the Phantom Thieves for the past year and a half, and now he is standing before them, definitely alive.

This is a recurring problem Goro has: he impulsively maps out a plan in his head and doesn’t consider the consequences of said plan until something bad happens. It seems meticulous, all the thinking he does, but there’s always one detail he misses. Case in point: attempting to take down all of the Thieves by himself. One person against eight—nine if he counts his cognitive double.  

Yesterday was the day he made the decision to “visit” Leblanc. It took a lot of pacing around his apartment and hair pulling. Even at the time, it felt like a bad idea, but the part in him that still aches for love and freedom and whatever else good there is overwhelmed the rest of him. He wishes he hadn’t listened to it. No good seems to ever come from listening to it.

But, well. There isn’t any way to go back now.

“How did you make it out?” Ann asks, leaning forward a little. She looks much, much older now.

“I don’t remember,” Goro says, and it’s true. He has no idea what happened. “One day I woke up, laying in the park. It was April. I don’t know where I was in the months between then and December, but I don’t particularly care.”

He looks at Akira, who is deftly avoiding eye contact and making more coffee. Oh, to feign obliviousness.

“Well, I’m glad you’re not dead, Akechi-kun,” Ann says in that kind way of hers that makes Goro want to peel his skin off. “What did you do after you woke up?”

“Actually, that local doctor found me lying under a tree,” he says. “Takemi-san. I’m sure you know her. She was very nice and took me back to her clinic and treated me and made sure I didn’t kill myself.”

More silence. Goro forgets that they aren’t supremely used to him speaking this way.

“I apologize,” he says tersely. This isn’t going well. He wishes a beam would fall from the ceiling and crush him.

Futaba still hasn’t looked at him. She is petting Morgana, back to Goro on the stool she is sitting on, shoulders visibly tense. Haru hasn’t looked at him either, and that’s fine, it’s fine, it happens. They’re allowed to feel however they want.

Goro hums.

He goes over potential courses of action in his head. He could leave, obviously, wave a stupid goodbye and never come back and live with this experience on his shoulders until his inevitable young death; he could also properly apologize, but something inside of him is afraid to do that. He is worried they won’t accept an apology, which is fair, Goro knows this—but he still can’t bring himself to do it. He can’t face rejection from any of them, not yet.

Besides that, an apology seems pathetic and immature. Elementary. Sorry I tried to kill all of you doesn’t really carry as much weight as it should; there’s no way to apologize for that using any phrasing in any language.

“Here,” Akira says suddenly, voice cutting through the silence. He places a (new) cup of coffee in front of Haru, and then another at the spot Goro used to normally sit at. “Have a seat.”
Goro looks at the rest of the group, then Akira, mouth slightly contorted, and waits a moment just in case someone interjects and tells him to leave. Nobody does, though; instead they simply stare quietly. The tension is unbearable.

A this point, it would be foolish for Goro to leave, so he sits down and looks at the coffee. He entertains the idea that Akira poisoned it, that he and the rest of his friends had an elaborate plan to kill him would he ever come back into their lives.

“It’s just coffee, Akechi,” Akira says, breaking Goro’s train of thought. “You don’t need to scrutinize it.”

“I… I know.” Goro frowns and drinks. It tastes familiar, as indicated by a wave of sadness that hits him like a magnetic field. It’s definitely smoother; clearly Akira has improved his technique. “Thank you,” he says. It comes off sounding more like he is thanking someone for saving a drowning animal than thanking someone for a cup of coffee.

“Is it good?” Akira asks with an irritating level of casualness. “I might have put too much sugar in it.”

“It’s good,” Goro says, examining the cup. It isn’t shaped the way he remembers the cups to be shaped. Sojiro must have bought new ones.

It makes Goro sad. He pinches his thigh to focus on something else. This is getting stupider.

It’s also far too much emotion at once. Coming here has done nothing for him so far. He doesn’t know what he expected. There is so much bullshit extraneous noise going on inside his head that it’s difficult to keep track of what is happening right in front of him.

Goro tilts his head and stares at the Sayuri painting in lieu of having to make more conversation. He traces different parts of the painting with his eyes, counts to one hundred as he does so—anything to distance himself from Leblanc. If he tries really hard, he might be able to make it feel as though he isn’t here at all.

Even the place he’s found most comfort in has become a temporary prison. How heart-break-ing.

The rest of the Thieves break back into conversation, pretending Goro isn’t there at all, which is just fine by him. Preferable, actually. It’s a bit bizarre that they haven’t booted him out yet. Everything that has happened thus far is a bit bizarre, actually; perhaps more appropriately a bit disorienting.

Goro is underestimating their capacity for kindness once again.

Although, because of the reaction they’re having, Goro feels as though he isn’t in Leblanc at all. His body is separated from his brain, or something; he knows that he is in fact sitting in Leblanc drinking this cup of coffee that tastes like a warmth he has never quite been able to permanently obtain, but it doesn’t feel that way. It feels—like he isn’t anywhere, like a purgatory, almost. Like he’s in a limbo between two worlds that don’t know what to do with him.

Incredibly unfortunate and unlucky, really.

But Goro supposes that’s how it is with him: put on a planet just to be toyed with, just for a puppeteer to play around with like he’s a prototype for something more stable to come. Everything good seems to always be only ever so slightly out of reach—if he had longer legs, arms, if he could find a loophole, he could lean forward enough to grasp it.

Akira was always dangling right in front of him, so close, so willing to reach out, but Goro kept retracting. No steps forward, all steps back.

Perhaps a better way to think of it is that Goro was the one dangling, constricted by chains, and the more he ached to reach, the tighter the constraints became. Or something equally as tragic.

Sayuri’s face contorts into a grimace as Goro stares at it. He blinks and it returns to the watchful mother it is supposed to be.

Once Goro surpasses counting to one hundred, he decides to keep going, to one thousand. He’s in a bit of a predicament: it seems too rude to leave suddenly, but why still be concerned with appearances around these people? They have seen him at his very, very worst. It shouldn’t matter what he says or does—within reason, obviously—because there’s nothing that can surpass attempting murder and then sealing himself behind a massive metal door out of inexplicable guilt.

It’s stupid, really. Thinking about it makes Goro feel stupid, makes him want to leave even more. Sitting here idly isn’t occupying his brain enough, and when his brain isn’t occupied enough he thinks about himself, and when Goro thinks about himself, he—

“Akechi,” a voice says. Goro looks away from Sayuri and to the direction of the voice, which happens to belong to Akira.

He had counted to five hundred and six seconds.

Akira places another cup of coffee in front of him. “You seem distant,” he says. “You can read one of my books there, if you want.”

So polite of Akira to act neutral towards Goro despite the obvious discontent in his eyes.

Goro is distant. He is distancing himself from Leblanc on purpose; he is trying to mentally remove himself from the cafe and project his consciousness into some other realm, trying to disconnect it from his physical body. It was working until Akira interrupted his counting and shot him back down to Earth.

That’s a terrible coping mechanism anyway. It’s best to do that when he is home, by himself, as that’s when there truly isn’t much to distract himself with.

Goro sighs quietly.

He still can’t seem to think up a reason as to why he had come here other than his own impulsivity, nativity, the works. Perhaps that annoying hopeful part of him that really needs to stay permanently silent was imagining something sweet and movie-like to happen where the Thieves all welcome him back with streamers and open arms and invite him to the arcade.

He knew that wouldn’t happen, though. He reasons he had come because of his tendency to inflict misfortune upon himself.

Still, though—because he hasn’t thought up a good way to say goodbye so he can go home and pull himself together, he must continue to sit. The Thieves probably think he’s gone braindead, what with the way he’s been sitting at the counter and staring at the wall for half an hour. Maybe I am braindead, Goro thinks sullenly.

Why is everyone acting so normally?

For lack of anything better to do, he picks a book out from the few that are in front of him. He chooses The Setting Sun which he has read multiple times before and flips to a random page.

Every now and then Akira wordlessly refills his coffee and then goes back to whatever other conversation he is having. It feels like high school and Goro doesn’t know what to think about that.

Goro is nearly done with the book when someone firmly places their hand on his shoulder. He nearly jumps out of his skin.

“Sorry, sorry,” Akira says, stifling a laugh. “I didn’t mean to scare you. I just wanted to tell you that everyone left. You can stop pretending you aren’t here now.”

The implication of that last bit leaves a funny taste in Goro’s mouth. It’s as if Akira is trying to say that because it’s only the two of them, he can act however he wants, or something. Goro could laugh.

He furrows his brows and scans the room. “When did they all leave?”

“About fifteen minutes ago, maybe. Nobody wanted to… disturb you, while you were reading.”

Ha. Nice way of saying they didn’t want to talk to you.

Which is fine, for now, forever. Goro doesn’t know what he’s doing. His critical thinking skills have apparently been thrown out the window.

Akira must have adapted the ability to read minds in the time Goro was gone, though, because then he says, “If you think they didn’t say goodbye because they didn’t want to talk to you, you’re free to think that all you want. Just know that that isn’t true, because Ann wanted to say goodbye, but Yusuke told her to give you space. It was out of consideration.” He puts his hands on his hips as if to punctuate the statement.

Goro doesn’t know what to say. These people and their ridiculous capacity for kindness are just—baffling.

Akira takes a seat on the stool next to Goro and plucks the book from his hands. Goro grabs for it, half assed, then sighs and slumps over the counter. In retrospect, he should have anticipated that Akira would bug him, but all he had envisioned in his mind was to be immediately leave the cafe, go home, never come back, etcetera. It’s been at least an hour, though, since Goro has arrived, and these things have yet to occur.

“Interesting choice,” Akira says, waving the book around. “World War II and family stuff, right? I never finished reading it. My mom gave it to me as a ‘gift’ when I went back home.”

“That’s a simple way of summarizing the plot,” Goro mumbles, tapping his index finger against the countertop. “And a rather hilarious gift.”

The last gift Goro’s mother had given him was a taketombo. He lost it shortly after she died.

“I tried to be appreciative of it anyway. We hadn’t said anything to each other for an entire year and I think she forgot that I have a personality. Also—” He waves the book around more, “—I’m a simple kind of person.” He grins and hands the book over.

Goro takes it, more or less just to give his hands something to do. “That really isn’t true whatsoever,” he says, slightly irritated at the fact that Akira considers himself simple. Simple is a drop of water and Akira is an entire lake. Perhaps an ocean. The Red Sea and the Dead Sea.

“What’s really not true whatsoever?” Akira asks with a head tilt.

Oh, Goro can feel an aneurysm forming. The blood flow in his brain is picking up speed quickly, and if it continues moving at the pace it is right now, Goro is positive that the pressure will kill him right here in Leblanc. Sojiro wouldn’t be happy at all.

“You’re not simple at all,” he grits. “You just act like you are. Other people act like you are.” Maybe a better way to put it is that Akira acts like he is simple, thinks he is simple, and other people act like he is simple, but know that he is not. Goro hopes that Akira’s friends are perceptive enough to see that, at least.

“It’s barely been two hours and you’re already psychoanalyzing me. So very detective of you,” Akira jokes, shifting in his seat.

Goro is going to need BETA blockers by the end of this conversation. He isn’t sure why he’s so irritated by all of this, but then again, it seems that everything irritates him these days, those days, etcetera.

“First, detectives don’t psychoanalyze people. That’s reserved for psychologists and psychiatrists and whomever else you’d like to include in that field. Second—I’m not a detective anymore. Clearly. And I likely won’t be one ever again.”

He closes The Setting Sun and places it back into its respective spot.

“Well, sorry for my mislabeling. Next time you call me complicated I’ll make sure I use the right terminology in my response.”

“How can you be so calm?” Goro asks, finally turning his head to make eye contact.

Akira makes a face. His eyes are less grey than they were in the interrogation room. “What do you mean?”

“Will you stop replying to everything I ask with another question?” Goro snaps, immediately regretting the words that fall out his mouth. He sighs. “You know exactly what I mean. You are remarkably composed, even sitting next to me. You’re…” he waves his hand around, “...making jokes.”

“I don’t see why I wouldn’t be calm. Although, I’m not sure if that’s the word I would use to describe how I’m feeling right now. Personally.” Pause. “And I always…” Akira waves his hands around in mockery, “...make jokes.”

“I appreciate your attempts to lie, but I’d much prefer you being honest right now,” Goro says. “Don’t worry about sparing my feelings.”

Akira stands and walks around the counter and into the kitchen. “I’m not trying to spare your feelings, Akechi,” he says, opening up the fridge. “I’m calm right now because I have full confidence that you aren’t going to kill me. I can be calm and cautious and nice at the same time, you know. And in case you forgot, I did break a cup when you walked into the door.”

“Oh, right.” Goro’s face falls. “I can pay for that, if you—”

“No, it’s fine. It was chipped anyway.” He pulls out various ingredients from the fridge before half disappearing back into the kitchen again. “Anyway—I am calm, somewhat, but I wasn’t when you walked in, and you weren’t either, because I’ve never seen you act so… reserved. And I’ve seen you act a lot of ways. You’ve also talked my ear off more than once.”

Goro rolls his eyes. “All right, you’ve made your point. Are we not going to address the elephant in the room? The fact that I—”

“Hush,” Akira says, peeking out from the kitchen. He menacingly points a wooden spoon at Goro. “I’m making you food. We can talk about it afterward. Read your book or look at Sayuri some more.”

Akira is insufferable, Goro decides. This incredibly annoying act of indifference is making Goro feel, emotionally, like the size of an ant. More than that, it’s also making him feel incredibly halfwitted for a variety of reasons.

He isn’t in the mood to argue, though, so he opens up the book again and reads.

Fake reads, anyway. His eyes keep drifting to the kitchen where Akira, who must be on an entirely different level of fool tonight, is making Goro food. Akira is making food for his attempted murderer. Food for Goro. Food for thought. He has also given him multiple cups of coffee and made no mention of payment for it. Thinking about it, Goro isn’t sure if he ever paid the rest of his tab back in—back two years ago. Maybe it’s hung up on a wall somewhere like a dartboard.

Goro hates Akira, metaphorically. He cannot and does not actually hate Akira, as Morgana had so righteously pointed out. What he does hate is that Akira has some gene inside of him that lets him be open and genial even in situations that warrant the complete opposite. Akira should be throwing packets of salt at Goro, not taking the time to make him a meal. He should be angry, not so relaxed, not so Akira. For once.

Maybe it bothers Goro because he could never be like that. He can feign it, of course—but only on the surface. Goro can put on a smile and dance and make himself think he understands his own feelings, but that’s just about as far as it can go. Akira, however, seems so… in control of his emotions; he is genuinely calm, loath as Goro is to admit it. Either that or he is one of the best actors in all of Japan.

So frustrating.

It isn’t like Goro doesn’t have the capacity to be kind, though. He knows that he does, underneath all the cement he’s covered himself up with. He just needs to find a reason to uncover it.

He puts down the book and rubs his eyes hard enough to see black spots. Akira is a reason to uncover the cement, he knows he is. It’s unfortunate that after today, though, he can’t ever see Akira again. This is a one time thing, that’s what Goro promised himself the minute he left his apartment earlier today. This is just to—prove something to himself. He doesn’t know what it is, exactly, but it’s something.

This whole escapade was supposed to make him feel better. Apparently not.

After a short while Akira places two plates of curry at one of the booths. He vaguely gestures at Goro to sit across from him, and then settles down on the seat facing the door with a hmph sound.

“Don’t worry, I didn’t make it very spicy,” Akira says as Goro sits down. “Because you’re sensitive to that, if I remember correctly.”

“Please shut up,” Goro says, keeping his eyes focused down on the food. It smells wonderful. Maybe if he tries really hard he can eat it without feeling guilty.

That’s extremely wishful thinking. He takes a bite.

“It’s good,” he says, because it is. Goro could probably put a little more effort into the compliment than that, but he doesn’t have the willpower to think up something snappy and charming.

“Glad to hear,” Akira says through a mouth of food. “I assumed so because you didn’t freak out this time and run away like you did at the school festival.”

Goro puts his head in his hands and sighs. Akira gives a rather hearty laugh.

“I’m glad you find pleasure in my misery,” he says, voice muffled.

Goro is becoming increasingly concerned for his own mental health as well as Akira’s. Here they are, pretending there has never been an issue between the two of them, joking about high school like they’re two childhood friends in an movie that have reunited at a bar after a decade of not seeing one another.

Which, to be fair, isn’t that far off from their situation.

“So,” Akira says after a moment, and Goro’s fist clenches at the tone of his voice, “Takemi, huh?”

“She’s far too generous for her own good. She refused to let me pay for the time I stayed with her, which, mind you—was at least a good five months. I don’t remember exactly.” Pause. “Although she did say that I looked like a sewage creature when she found me, so perhaps that’s payment enough in her doctoral world.”

“I’m not surprised at either of those things,” Akira mumbles. He crosses his legs underneath the table and his shoe hits Goro’s knee in the process.

“I was quite a pain, honestly. At least, looking at myself from an outsider’s perspective, I think that I was a pain. Constant… monitoring, and all that. I wasn’t very happy to be found and it was disorienting as well.” He sighs, wants to say, and now I have a lot of burns on my chest and a bullet hole shaped scar near my ribs but doesn’t. “I don’t know why I’m telling you all this. I also don’t know why she helped me in the first place.”

“Hm.” Akira sniffles. “She’s just the type to do that, I think. She’s the type to do that under certain circumstances, anyway, which I guess you fit.”

“Certain circumstances,” Goro repeats. “Such as?”

“I don’t know. Why don’t you ask her? She’s done something similar before.”

“Perhaps one day.”

In the time that Goro stayed with Takemi, he hadn’t taken the time to get to know her. Granted, getting to know his provisional doctor was the last thing on his mind at that time, so Takemi probably doesn’t harbor many negative feelings toward Goro in that respect. He hopes so, at least.

A long beat of silence passes between the two of them. Goro thinks about Takemi again. He should—send her something nice, like flowers or medical masks; he isn’t sure what doctors like. If he really wanted to, Goro could go see her right now, considering that her clinic is just around the corner. It’s probably still open.

Truthfully, though, he doesn’t want to see her—not yet. Takemi had put up with such a terrible, pitiful version of Goro that he would much like to forget about. He needs to get the rest of his bearings together before he sees her, whatever those bearings may be.

“Akechi,” Akira says quietly, breaking his thought, “why did you come here?”

Goro imagines the curry suddenly growing into a monster and eating him.

“I don’t know,” he says. Akira gives him a doubtful look. “I’m being truthful. I was trying to think up a reason the whole time I was sitting at the counter but couldn’t come up with anything adequate.” He sighs, tapping the end of his spoon against the table. “If you want an unsatisfactory answer, it’s partially because I was curious.”

“Partially?”

“Yes, partially.”

Akira inspects his palms like they will tell him what to say next. Goro hopes they don’t tell him anything, because he really needs to be leaving. This is starting to get a bit excessive; next Akira is going to pull out a cake and ask Goro to stay for dessert.

It was interesting, stopping by Leblanc. Interesting seeing the slight differences in all of the Thieves’ bodies and personalities that came with the passage of time. Goro missed the coffee too, and the uncomfortableness of the stools.

Of course, he really can’t come back. He’s allowing himself to visit just this once, just to see, just to make the tugging feeling around his heart go away. He can’t give himself anything else. It’s unfair to Akira and everyone else for Goro to jump back into their lives and impose on their routines.

More than that, Goro doesn’t deserve their kindness and blah blah blah. He’s gone over this self deprecating monologue in his head dozens of times. Now that he’s been to Leblanc he needs to get back to his life.

A part of him doesn’t want to. Being lonely is so—hard. It’s all he’s ever known, for the first part, but it always hurts when he walks into his empty quiet apartment with his empty quiet rooms and empty quiet belongings.  

He clears his throat, not wanting to think about it much longer, although he knows that once he’s on the train he’s going to cry. That’s all right, though. This is entirely his own doing and he has to deal with it.

That’s another thing he read in a self-help book.

“Kurusu, I—”

“Where do you live now?” Akira interrupts.

“Um.” Goro crosses his arms. “Fifteen minutes outside of Shibuya.”

“By yourself?”

“Yes,” Goro says, wondering if Akira only said that to make him admit he’s lonely. “Do you still live here? Upstairs, I mean.”

“Oh, no. I live with Ann and Ryuji in an apartment in Akihabara.”

That’s interesting. He cannot imagine the rent. “How? Don’t you—you’re not twenty yet, you can’t sign the lease.”
“My parents signed it,” Akira says, standing up and collecting their plates and spoons in a rather impressive swoop.

Goro shrinks further into the seat and tightens his crossed arms. “Lucky you.”

Akira either genuinely does not hear this or pretends that he doesn’t hear. He fumbles around in the kitchen a bit, cleaning up the plates and putting away a few miscellaneous items that were left out on the counter. Goro takes this moment to gather his things together and prepares to say goodbye; he rehearses it in his head a few times to ensure that it goes as smoothly as possible. If his voice even so much as wobbles, he swears he’s going to wring his own neck, right in front of Akira.

“Well,” he starts, “thank you f—”

“Do you want to see the attic?” Akira interjects again, hands folded sweetly behind his back. He’s definitely doing this on purpose now.

Goro should say no, really. He should say no and go home and then sit on his bed and wish he never saw Kurusu Akira today. But he probably won’t.

At first, he thought coming to Leblanc would help him. He thought it would put him at ease and quell his curiosity. He thought this on the train ride to Yongenjaya and thought this just until he was standing in front of the cafe a few hours ago. What a foolish idea.

Only when he saw Akira’s face did he know he made a mistake.

When Goro was a teenager he didn’t cry. He never cried, with the exception of a few times. It wasn’t in him to cry; the only things inside of him were anger and desperation ( ha! ) and the urge to jump in front of the trains at the station. He didn’t cry when he killed someone, didn’t cry when he went to sleep by himself, didn’t cry when he woke up from dreams of his mother slitting her throat as she held him in her arms and cooed Goro, Goro, my sweet son.

He didn’t cry.

He cries now, though, quite a lot. And he hates it. Crying makes him feel sickly—makes him throw up and makes his nose bleed because of the fervity at which it hits him. Little things set him off and Goro despises how weak and helpless he feels all the time . He is twenty but feels more like a child than he ever has in his entire life and it’s stupid. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

Looking at Akira makes him want to cry. Looking at this attic is going to make him cry.

“Sure,” he says anyway, because living is a disease and a joke and etcetera.

Akira leads him up the stairs and into the attic. There isn’t a bed anymore, just a bunch of boxes in its place. It’s been thoroughly cleaned out, actually—not so many cobwebs, not so much dust. The terrible, old television is still there, though, and so is that gross couch. Goro assumes it’s gross, from the stains. He never sat on it himself.

The attic is quiet. Goro can hear the wind.

“Kurusu,” Goro mumbles, frozen in place, “why was everyone so calm when they saw me?”

Akira looks up at the ceiling in thought before saying, “I think you just rendered them speechless.”

Goro can’t tell if that’s an honest answer or if he’s making a joke and decides to not comment any further. He stares at the attic wall—so sticky and humid today—and thinks about how strange the passage of time is. This attic he once knew is now an attic he doesn’t know.

“Akechi, can we—can I have your phone number?” Akira suddenly asks. He’s looking at a bag of soil sitting in the corner of the room.

Goro doesn’t say anything, only laughs a bit. Funny. This isn’t what he wanted to happen. He was supposed to come in, make his presence known, have one coffee if Akira would let him, leave, and then regret coming. Some of those things happened, but not all, and not in that particular order either.

Now Akira is asking him for his phone number. To stay in contact.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Goro says.

“If you were expecting to just waltz in and waltz out of here and give no sign of your existence for the rest of your life, you must have another thing coming,” Akira says sternly, turning away from the soil bag. “And don’t tell me you don’t deserve to see me, or us, or any of that, because I don’t really want to hear it right now. I’m not trying to dismiss your feelings because they’re obviously hurting you, but just—another time. Listen to me for once.”

Goro’s eyes widen at the sudden shift in Akira’s demeanor. He hadn’t expected him to react like this, but that seems to be a pattern today: nobody reacting the way they should, Goro himself included. It’s starting to become a bit comical.

He decides to be honest, partially because he can’t think up a feasible excuse to decline and partially because he wants to see how much he can rile up Akira. “I have to admit that I was thinking exactly all those things.”

“That’s funny.” Akira folds his arms. “Do you think this is just about you? You can’t expect me—everyone else too—to be unaffected after you walk in here. I hate phrasing it this way, but you’re selfish if you assume the best thing for me is if you never appeared ever again.”

Goro’s lip curls up, because what Akira has said is spot on and Goro doesn’t like how easily he is able to point it out.

He only considered the possibility of Akira wanting Goro to stay out of his life, not in. He isn’t completely sure why Akira would want him to stay, but perhaps he can pry that out of him, someday. Or perhaps not. It really isn’t a good idea for them to stay in contact with one another, is it? It’s not. It’s not.

Goro doesn’t want to hurt Akira. He doesn’t want to exist as a reminder of betrayal and certainly doesn’t want to be an added stressor. But—considering it now, no matter what course of action Goro takes from this point forward, they all will have some element of stress attached.

This is such a mess.

“I’m sorry,” he says lamely.

Akira sighs and steps away from the soil bag. “Can I please have your phone number?” he asks earnestly, and it makes Goro flinch. “I want to see you again, to talk.”

“Why?”

“I know that your empathy level is lower than the average human being, but understand that your death sat on my shoulders like a— like a boulder — until you walked in the door today. The way I saw it, back then—was that you died because of me. You died because I couldn’t save you, or help you, or whatever, however fucked up that may be considering the circumstances. And I’m sorry if me saying this makes you seem like you were helpless. That’s not what I’m implying. You—I mean, you thought the only way you could fix things would be by dying. Sorry if I’m wrong in that assumption.”

Goro fantasizes about hanging himself from the beam above him. Akira isn’t wrong. “Excuse me for my emotional stuntedness.”

“Sorry,” Akira mumbles. “I don’t want to talk about this now, I didn’t mean to bring that up.” He removes his glasses and rubs his face with a hand before putting them back on. “I didn’t mean to get all aggravated.”

“You can have my phone number,” Goro says too quickly. The words tumble out from his mouth without being prompted to. “I’d like to apologize again. I shouldn’t have… assumed that I knew what was best for you.” He still doesn’t understand it, still doesn’t know what he’s doing or why he is going to torture himself with this, but apologizes anyway.

Things just seem to happening on their own, undirected, without Goro asking them to. Maybe he can still wiggle his way out of this somehow.

They exchange numbers.

Akira leads him downstairs and offers to walk him to the train station, explaining that he needs to stay at Leblanc for a little while longer so he won’t be getting on it. The setting sun casts orange shades onto the buildings and stretches Goro and Akira’s shadows across the ground and the walls like portraits.

It’s a nice moment of quiet, Goro has to admit. Just the sun and footsteps and a strange, familiar presence. Not that he would say any of this aloud—this wasn’t supposed to happen. Goro should be walking to the train station by himself, should be feeling a completely different way than he is right now, but he isn’t. Once again his plans have gone completely and utterly off course, and it’s all Goro’s own fault.

“I’ll see you,” Akira says once they’re at the station. “Right?”

“Right.” Goro considers extending his hand for a handshake but isn’t sure if that’s too businesslike and opts against it. He has no idea what’s acceptable and what isn’t between he and Akira but supposes that as long as he is reasonable with boundaries and standing distance that it can work.

“We can talk about… the stuff, eventually,” Akira adds. “Just not now. Akechi, I want to... get to know you a little before we talk about all that. You know, like a temporary blank slate. The real Akechi.”

“That’s all right with me,” Goro says, and he can’t tell if he’s being honest or not. His brain isn’t functioning properly.

“I want to make up for lost time,” Akira says, quietly this time. Goro can’t take the solemn facial expression he has when he says this and pretends to look at the train schedule.

“If that’s what you want,” he says vaguely, clenching and unclenching his fist.

Akira smiles—a real one, then—and reaches out to Goro but then retracts his hand. “I’ll see you,” he says. Goro offers him a smile as he turns away.

He’s realized what has just happened all at once.

[2:09 AM] Kurusu Akira: do you want to go fishing this weekend?
[2:13 AM] Me: Fishing
[2:13 AM] Kurusu Akira: yes, fishing
[2:13 AM] Kurusu Akira: it won’t be boring
[2:13 AM] Kurusu Akira: why are you awake?
[2:14 AM] Me: Why are you awake?
[2:14 AM] Kurusu Akira: touche
[2:14 AM] Kurusu Akira: sooo do you want to or not
[2:20 AM] Me: Sure. But please have low expectations

Goro is going fishing today, apparently. A lot of mental preparation has had to go into the lead up to this.

He’s staring into his closet. He has never gone fishing before, and therefore has no idea what he should wear. It’s not like Akira’s going to take him into the marshes and make him wear huge rubber boots and catch fish with nets, right? He should be fine to wear anything within reason.

It doesn’t take him long to get ready after he picks out clothes (a very light blue t-shirt, brown pants). He gathers a few things he thinks he might need—wallet, waterbottle, and so on—and heads for the train station.  

Akira is waiting for him outside, fanning himself with a flyer. It’s even hotter today than it was last time they saw each other; Goro can feel the heat weighing down on him like tarp. He wipes his brow with his forearm and grimaces at the sweat gleam that is left in its wake.

“Hey,” Akira says, continuing to fan himself. “You look nice in blue.”

That catches Goro thoroughly off guard. Insteading of saying thank you, he says, “I’ve worn blue before.”

“Don’t tell me you’re talking about that nerdy argyle sweater,” Akira laughs, starting to walk.

“It was not nerdy,” Goro says, terribly offended.

“Oh, it wasn’t? What was it, then?”

“Comfortable,” he settles for, which is true. He liked that sweater.

They fall into a normal pace for a bit. Goro has no idea where this fishing hole is, nor did he know that it existed, truthfully—but it’s both an excuse to get out of his apartment and an excuse to try and pick at Akira’s brain a little more and see what he’s thinking about all this. Though there is the possibility that Akira won’t tell him anything, considering he was so adamantly speaking about “getting to know” Goro a few days ago. Besides that, Akira isn’t really the type of person to reveal his more personal inner thoughts very often anyway.

Once again, Goro has no idea what he’s doing with himself. The lack of control he has on his life is extremely frustrating and entirely his own fault.

Though—Goro could have declined Akira’s invitation to spend time with him. It’s not like Akira is holding him against his will. Goro made this decision entirely on his own, even if he doesn’t want to admit it.

They make it to the fishing spot shortly. It isn’t very crowded—whether it be because of the hot weather or because only certain people find fishing fun, Goro doesn’t know. He watches in a mix of awe and shock as Akira gets poles and bait for the two of them. It appears that he completely knows what he is doing.

They sit down on the dock. Akira takes his shoes off and sets them down while he—what is he doing?—plays around with the ferrules or something.

“Here,” he says, handing over a rod. “Do you know how to use it?”

Goro deadpans. “Do I look like the kind of person that knows how to fish?”

Akira laughs at that. “Not particularly, no, but I just wanted to make sure.” He fiddles with his own fishing rod for a short moment before asking, “Do I look like the type of person who knows how to fish?”

Goro considers the question. He looks at Akira and his solid green shirt and blue jeans that are torn at the knee, his shoeless feet, and his sweaty forehead and wonders what constitutes someone to look like they fish.

“Yes,” he decides. “You do.”

“Well, I’ll take that as a compliment.”

“Are you going to show me how to use this thing or not?” Goro asks, waving around the fishing rod like it doesn’t have a huge hook at the end of it and the potential to poke someone’s eye out.

“Just… watch what I do,” Akira says slowly, putting his hand on Goro’s arm to stop him from waving. The touch makes him flinch.

After some apt observation Goro flings his line out into the water. All he can do now is wait until you get a bite and pull it in with the reel, as Akira had explained.

The heat continues to bore down. It’s midday, so there isn’t much chance of the weather becoming more bearable anytime soon. Goro pauses ten minutes into waiting to balance the fishing rod between his knees and tie back his hair.

“It’s gotten longer,” Akira says as he picks the rod back up. “Your hair has, I mean.”

“I know.” Pause. “Does it look bad?”

“No, it looks fine. Just different. But in a good way.”

Goro hums. He’s glad it doesn’t look bad, though he doesn’t really have any way of discerning whether Akira was being truthful or whether he was only saying that to be an appeaser. Either way, Goro has no plans to cut his hair shorter in the near or distant future. He wants to stay away from having short hair.

He had short hair, once, when he was just barely ten. His foster mother said he looked like a homeless boy and chopped a bunch of it off in the bathroom. It wasn’t a fond memory.

Besides that, long hair acts as a mask to Goro in some sense. It covers his external self in an ambiguous way that makes him seem more charming and soft than he really is. He has been told that when he pulls it back it makes him look older, more mature, and doesn’t know how to feel about that.

He stares into the water.

It’s the weekend, and he’s sitting on a dock fishing with Akira, who, not long ago, Goro was fated to kill. It’s the weekend, and Goro is fishing with Akira, a choice he made to do out of his own volition. It’s the weekend, and he’s fishing with Akira, Joker, leader, etcetera, and has no idea why. Just a few days ago Akira thought he was dead, and just a few days ago Goro didn’t think this is where he would end up.

“What do you do?” Akira asks after a few more minutes of silence pass.

“What do you mean, ‘what do you do?’”

“I mean, do you work anywhere?”

“Oh.” He should have expected that question. “I work in Jinbocho.”

“Do you like it there?” This is the opposite of what Goro was going for: Akira, getting answers out of him about his personal life and not the other way around. In retrospect, talking about jobs isn’t the deepest of subjects, but it still bothers him.

“It’s all right,” he says, swinging his feet. “It’s a lot of checking stock.”
Akira winces. “That makes it sound boring.”

“It isn’t b—it’s a little boring. It’s quiet there, though, so a lot of the time I just end up sitting around and reading. I know a wide variety of things on a wide variety of subjects now, such as mathematical practices, medical ethics, interior design in North America, card tricks—”

“Card tricks?”

“Yes, multiple card tricks. I’m very multifaceted, as I’m sure you know.”

“I can imagine you sitting on a stool at the back of some dusty bookstore with—”

“—Kurusu,” Goro says suddenly, unthinkingly gripping the other’s forearm and surprising himself when he does so, “I think there’s a fish.”

He’ll have to ask Akira to finish his statement later on.

Akira scrambles to put his fishing rod on the deck, which is unnecessary because Goro has two hands and can reel it in himself but, well. Apparently catching a fish for the first time is the type of thing that requires complete attention from all parties.

“Okay, you have to—you have to reel it in a little, then give it some slack if you need to, and pull the rod up some when it gets closer and then drop it down a bit and—”
“—you sound like a mariner,” Goro interrupts as he attempts to follow these guidelines. It doesn’t feel like a heavy fish, and so he assumes he’ll be able to pull it in no problem.

Assumes. Assuming has always been a problem for Akechi Goro.

Suddenly the fish starts tugging harder at the line, and his reel goes all wonky. “What the fuck,” Goro hisses, yanking the fishing rod hard upward.

“It won’t help if you start getting all aggressive,” Akira says, extending his hand. “Let me—”

“I can do it myself!” Goro shouts, surely gandering a few head turns from the people around him. “It’s just a fish, why is it so—so—”

“Strong? Muscular? Athletic?” Akira offers, hand still outstretched, hovering just next to the reel.

“—so stupid!” is the adjective Goro decides to go with. He knows, deep down, that he is not going to win against this fish just by flailing around, but at the same time, he refuses to let Akira reel in a fish for him. It’s a fish, for god’s sake. A hardy one at that; it’s a wonder how it’s still hooked.

“Calm down,” Akira says, frustration evident in his voice. “Are you even listening to me? You’re making a huge scene.”

Goro opens his mouth to argue but realizes that there isn’t anything to argue about. He’s getting worked up over a fish and people are looking.

The fact that people are looking, though, only serves to make him more determined to reel in this stupid thing. He straightens his back out, repositions his hands, and tries again. Akira is mumbling something about the best way to angle the blah blah blah but Goro isn’t paying attention. Right now, the entire world is this fish.

To his own surprise, he is able to reel it in.

He grabs it with his bare hand once it’s out of the water. “It’s mine,” he whispers, then immediately lets go when it wiggles.

“I can’t say I’ve ever seen someone so upset over a fish, but good job,” Akira says, waving over a man standing nearby so it can be measured. Goro doesn’t care about how long it is, he’s just pathetically proud of himself for managing to reel it in.

They spend another hour fishing, and Goro catches nothing else.

They decide to buy food when they leave the fishing spot, which is weird, because of the whole—everything. They go to Chinatown and Goro pays for Akira’s food to make up for everything he had at Leblanc.

When they say goodbye and get on separate trains, it feels much more solemn than it should. Goro had—a really nice day, which he hasn’t had in an extremely long time, and now it’s over and he wishes it weren’t. Amidst all the laughing and talking Goro forgot who he was for a while, and now he’s remembering again.

And, to add onto it, of course Goro can’t help but feel guilty for having a nice time with Akira. He cannot grasp why on earth Akira would want to even be in the same room as him let alone sit next to him on a fishing deck for an hour and a half.

This is irritatingly confusing.

He doesn’t know what to do with the fact that there is someone that wants him around despite the amount of dirty blood metaphorically dripping down his shoulders. Nobody wanted Goro when he was a child, everybody superficially wanted him when he was a detective, and now somebody wants him and Goro doesn’t think anybody should. He isn’t sure if he wants anyone to, either. He can’t handle it anymore, can’t handle friendships and being close to anyone and so on because he doesn’t know how they work and because there is always the potential for abandonment.

Which is a pathetic mindset, he thinks to himself as he unlocks the door to his apartment.

Goro takes off his shoes and sits his bag on a chair before going to shower. His nose is sunburnt, he notes when he looks at himself in the mirror, which is annoying. Every part of him feels gross, in more ways than one, and he wonders if spending time with Akira twice in one week has the potential to give him cardiac arrest from the sheer ridiculousness of it all.

If he were Akira, he wouldn’t ever want to talk to Goro ever again, or look at him or anything. Goro doesn’t have a heart made of gold, quite obviously, and he doesn’t think Akira does either, but could get something close to it at this rate.

He turns up the water as hot as it can go. It hurts his skin, but he doesn’t allow himself to turn it any lower because he needs it to be hot or else he’ll start thinking about himself. His arms and back are bright red when he steps out.

Goro changes into a t-shirt, lays down on his futon and stares at the ceiling.

“What have I done?” he asks the air, and the air doesn’t reply.

Loneliness is comforting, sometimes. That’s what Goro likes to tell himself when he wishes he had someone to talk to—about anything. Someone to talk to about the weather or the news or anything equally arbitrary. And now that he’s been given the potential of having just that, he doesn’t know if he likes it—or perhaps, better put, if he can handle it. It would be so simple to open up and spill every poisonous emotion he’s held in to Akira, because he is so uncannily easy to talk to. Words form so naturally when he talks to him; Goro doesn’t have to think about each morpheme coming out of his mouth.

But he can’t do that to Akira—he can’t dump any of that onto him. He can’t. It isn’t fair to him.

Goro is terrified. He doesn’t like it.

He is terrified of someone caring about him and of someone enjoying their time with him, especially now. Goro hasn’t been close to many people, really, because he’s too afraid of being abandoned and left alone. He talked to Sae about whatever he pleased but it usually wasn’t anything personal or revealing. Either way, there hadn’t been much of a point in befriending people back when he planned to die before he was nineteen, but now Goro is twenty and, well.

Nothing ever goes as it is intended to, and he should know that the most out of any other person on the planet.

He tells himself loneliness is comforting but it isn’t at all. Spending time with the Thieves and spending time with Akira has given him a taste of what it’s like to not be lonely and he hates that he wants more of it.

Goro wishes Tae didn’t help him. He wishes he died in the engine room.

He sullenly debates killing himself but is too tired to get out of bed.

His phone buzzes, suddenly, and it makes him jump. After taking a second to compose himself he looks at his messages.

[8:44 PM] Kurusu Akira: thanks for hanging out with me today. i had a nice time

Goro stares at his phone.

[8:46 PM] Me: I had a nice time too, thank you for inviting me
[8:46 PM] Kurusu Akira: you don’t need to thank me
[8:47 PM] Kurusu Akira: want to do something tomorrow? i don’t have work
[8:47 PM] Kurusu Akira: it’s fine if you can’t though. tell me if i sound pushy

Goro stares at his phone more. He can’t deal with this. He throws his phone into the corner of the room, half hoping it breaks, and stands up.

This is extremely pitiful. His heart is racing, hands are shaking, and why? Because Akira asked him if he wanted to hang out? What is there to be afraid of?

A lot, apparently.

Goro yanks open his wardrobe door and pulls out all the clothes inside. He tosses them onto the ground, onto his futon, anywhere that there’s space, and then falls to his knees and begins sorting them. He sorts them by color and by hanger style. When he hangs everything back up in its new order, he doesn’t feel any better, so he goes into the kitchen and proceeds to take all of the plates and glasses and things out of the cupboards.

He reorganizes everything by their relative size and shape, stacking each plate and cup individually to take up as much time as possible. Once he is finished he washes all of his cutlery and pots and pans.

Goro wonders if he should throw his knives away. Goro has thrown out a lot of things—a letter opener, sleeping pills, painkillers, the works. He doesn’t trust himself, and he tells himself that it’s good he at least has the mind to throw them away in the first place.

When he puts away the last pan, Goro feels significantly calmer and returns to his futon with a glass of water and an apple.

There are many messages on his phone, which is stressful. It makes him think of Shido. He bites his lip and unlocks his phone.

[9:01 PM] Kurusu Akira: we don’t have to if you don’t want to or can’t
[9:09 PM] Kurusu Akira: you could just come to leblanc if you want
[9:39 PM] Kurusu Akira: i sound dumber with every message i send
[9:53 PM] Unknown: hey akira told me u work in jinbocho? ive always wanted to go…. so..
[9:55 PM] Unknown: oh yeah this is ann btw

Goro sighs, briefly considers moving far away, and replies.

Somehow, someway, this is all happening, all occurring, all tumbling, and Fate is just watching.