❤︎ 𝚃𝚛𝚒𝚐𝚐𝚎𝚛 𝚠𝚊𝚛𝚗𝚒𝚗𝚐𝚜: 𝚜𝚎𝚕𝚏-𝚕𝚘𝚊𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚗𝚐, 𝚐𝚘𝚛𝚎, 𝚟𝚒𝚘𝚕𝚎𝚗𝚌𝚎.
❤︎ 𝚃𝚑𝚒𝚜 𝚜𝚝𝚘𝚛𝚢 𝚌𝚘𝚗𝚝𝚊𝚒𝚗𝚜 𝚏𝚒𝚌𝚝𝚒𝚘𝚗𝚊𝚕𝚒𝚣𝚎𝚍, 𝚞𝚗𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚕𝚒𝚜𝚝𝚒𝚌, 𝚑𝚊𝚛𝚖𝚏𝚞𝚕, 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚝𝚘𝚡𝚒𝚌 𝚍𝚎𝚙𝚒𝚌𝚝𝚒𝚘𝚗𝚜 𝚘𝚏 𝚊 (𝙱𝙳𝚂𝙼) 𝚛𝚎𝚕𝚊𝚝𝚒𝚘𝚗𝚜𝚑𝚒𝚙.
❤︎ 𝙷𝚊𝚝𝚎𝚏𝚞𝚕 𝚌𝚘𝚖𝚖𝚎𝚗𝚝𝚜 𝚠𝚒𝚕𝚕 𝚋𝚎 𝚛𝚎𝚖𝚘𝚟𝚎𝚍 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚞𝚜𝚎𝚛 𝚋𝚕𝚘𝚌𝚔𝚎𝚍. 𝙸 𝚘𝚗𝚕𝚢 𝚠𝚊𝚝𝚌𝚑𝚎𝚍 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚊𝚗𝚒𝚖𝚎 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚗𝚘𝚝 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚖𝚊𝚗𝚐𝚊. 𝙽𝚘 𝚜𝚙𝚘𝚒𝚕𝚎𝚛𝚜!
❤︎ 957 𝚠𝚘𝚛𝚍𝚜, 3.75 𝚖𝚒𝚗 𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚍𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚝𝚒𝚖𝚎

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"He'll die if prompt treatment isn't received, do you understand, Ms.?

My world is in a daze, my ears ringing. Why is everything so... bright?

"Ms.?"

"Yea–yeah...?" I blink stupidly, my senses returning. Right. I'm still at the hospital. "Sorry, Dr. Nims... I was just..."

"Ms., your brother will die if he does not receive proper treatment. I need you to understand the gravity of this situation."

"Right."

My brother will die and the situation is dire. Okay.

"Ms.... The treatment is expensive, as I said. And since neither of you are enrolled in any insurance plans..."

God, I want a smoke.

My phone rings.

"Sorry, doctor. I must get this." I step out, phone in hand.

"Director Wes! Any updates since we last talked?"

I think of my life as before and afters. Before Tokyo Jujutsu High, and after. Before TJH, an aspiring sorcerer and after, well... I'm a playwright now. I love the job. I truly do–none of that Jujutsu, curses, death, ranking bullshit. Pay's shite but I get by–used to, anyways. Director Wes has been my mentor and working partner ever since I started writing my first play.

"Y/n, I'm sorry, I tried talking to Sunny but, unfortunately, as the producer, they told me they can't pay for your future works until you've written them. And besides, even then, they can't pay you without instalments, like they always have... Y/n, can you just tell me what this is about? I've known you since your college days and you know you can trust me, right?... I can lend you some cash, if that's what you need... just ask, yeah?"

No, Director Wes, I need more cash than all of your savings combined. More zeros than what our little artist brains can fathom. Cash. Money. Dough. Heaps. Mounds. An amount so obscene... Maybe... maybe it is time I look into selling my organs for real.

"Nah, Wes. You've already done enough for me. Thank you, truly. I gotta go but, hey, say hi to Sunny for me! And you take care now, yeah?" I hang up before he could say anything and squat down in the sterile, echoey hallway of the hospital. What bullshit this all is.

Why did I have to think about TJH just now?

Mom and Dad were both first-grade Jujutsu Sorcerers. Were. Growing up, I had never once doubted how powerful Mom and Dad were; how capable, how beloved, how respected. I worshipped them; they were my everything.

I started training in Jujutsu as soon as I could walk. I wanted to be as strong as they were and one day, become a first-grade, too–a special grade, even.

I was so naive.

Their hopes for me were as heavy as the depth of their disappointment when they realized that... I just wasn't gifted. I couldn't tame shikigamis, I was no good in close-quarter combat, nor was I capable of wielding cursed tools. Neither was my brother. Hell, he barely has cursed energy in him at all.

"Something must be wrong with our bloodline... it can't be..."

I can still hear Mom's wailing in my ears. Those words... That night, I fell asleep in my brother's room, my palms closed around his ears.

We weren't part of the three big houses. Nonetheless, the pride and self-importance of my "first-grade" parents still led them to insurmountable despair when they realized that their eldest was a failure and their youngest was a dud. 

Nothing, nothing I did could make them happy or proud of me. I tried.

In second grade, I drew Mom and Dad a picture of our family, alongside a poem about cats. I loved Garfield, Doraemon, and Hello Kitty back then. But, guess what, my motherly mother tore my art project right in front of my eyes. On top of screaming at me for spending invaluable time on these frivolous trivialities when I could've been training even harder, she also threw out all of my cat plushies, and, along with them, my young soul.

By middle school, they had completely given up on correcting our uselessness and cared little for us outside of the bare minimum of parental obligations.

Eventually, they planned to conceive a third child, through whatever means possible.

We never had a chance to see our youngest sibling, though. All three of them died during one of their missions.

It was a special-grade curse.

They never do have enough sorcerers on hand. They had Mom and Dad go on that mission without disclosing the curse was a special grade.

All three got sliced in half.

Dad from head to groin. Mom from the hips–alongside our unborn baby sister.

I was fifteen, and my brother, ten. What bullshit.

Anyhow. Mr. Yaga took me in at Tokyo Jujutsu High shortly after that. Out of guilt, I suppose. He gave my brother and me a place to live. I started training again to become a full-fledged sorcerer and on top of that, he promised to help my brother become an assistant at the school as soon as he got older.

I remember my first month at the school–I was timid, ugly, small. I could barely speak to any of my classmates and largely kept to myself. I had only two classmates, anyway: Haibara Yū and Nanami Kento. Nanami freaked me out–he barely talked. Haibara scared me–he talked too much. And so, during lunchtime, I went onto the rooftop, bringing my food and book with me. I had some discounted onigiris from the convenience store; I'd hate for those two to see that. The school gave me stipends but I always saved most of that money; now that we were orphaned, I was in charge of the family.

So I was on that rooftop, reading Kafka, eating my old onigiri with its rice, like pebbles, when I heard footsteps coming from behind.