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chunkyblossomberry

1 year ago

This is 💞beautiful💞

MY LIFE BEFORE YOU [ ♡ ]

summary. how jjk men fall in love with single-mom reader.

cw/ tw. fem!reader, fluff, domesticity, brief mentions of pregnancy, mild hurt/ comfort, pining, original child characters, aged-up characters, boss/ employee relationship, mildly suggestive toward the end

featuring. gojo, yuuji, sukuna, megumi, nanami

an. hello, this is an updated repost from my @/satorini blog:3 enjoy! reblogs are appreciated!

✢ GOJO

Being a single mom has its ups and downs, especially when it comes to dating. You can easily recount the times you sat across from a date who looked like they ate something sour after the mention of your daughter, how they paused, spine going stiff—never keen on the type of baggage that comes in small packages.

So it’s only natural to expect the same with Gojo when you tell him on the first date in the back of a coffee shop, wincing internally with a tight grip around your cup. You wait for the awkward laugh, the promise to call you later, even though they never do.

But then he surprises you.

He smiles—that same one that filled your belly with butterflies the first time you ran into him in the elevator at work—his gaze unexpectedly soft, and he asks, “What’s her name?”

You sip your coffee to distract yourself from that fluttery feeling in your chest. “Ma—um, her name’s Mai.”

Your heartbeat doesn’t slow for hours after that date; you admit you hadn’t expected him to take it in full stride.

Almost two years later, sometimes you still can’t believe it—how he fits so effortlessly in your life, that he’s shown you time and time again that he has no problem treating your daughter like his own.

He calls her princess and treats her like one, too. One day, you walk into the living room to find Mai putting clips in Satoru's hair and unicorn stickers on his face, letting her ramble about her day at daycare (because the afternoon reading circle is apparently very eventful for a bunch of four-year-olds).

On the days he’s off work, you have to keep the fridge stocked with food, or else they’ll eat nothing but sweets all day. And when he does cook, he'll have a chair pushed up to the counter for Mai to see and help—though your kitchen is often left a total mess afterward.

It’s after dinner, Mai tucked into bed, his arms curled around your waist while you scrub a pot, a thumb tracing your abdomen—sweetheart, what if we had another?—and you let yourself think about it. Can’t help it.

This time, you won’t be alone in a delivery room, Satoru’s large hands comfortingly wrapped around yours before holding his newborn for the first time, one with Satoru’s smile and maybe your eyes. Another set of small feet running down the hall for cuddles in the morning…

You reach down and cup his hand, despite it being covered in sudsy dishwater, though he doesn’t seem to care.

“I think…I think I’d like that.”

✢ YUUJI

He’s always been your best friend; since that time you fell off the swingset when you were six and after you found out you were pregnant and never heard anything back from the father.

It's possibly the best and worst thing that could have happened to you.

The best because he’s there for you until the twins come screaming into the world; it’s no surprise they’re just as drawn to his sunny personality as everyone else. Yuuji becomes a shadow at your side in the weeks after, becoming somewhat of a quasi-parent even though you never asked him to, which is why it’s the worst.

Those easy smiles are slowly replaced by the feeling of your heart trembling in your chest whenever you catch him hastily tripping up the stairs to the nursery to wake the twins from their nap. Or when he takes the three of you to the park for a picnic and spends the entire time staring at one of the sleeping little boys on your chest as if they’re doing cartwheels.

You try not to think about it too much unless you want to risk losing Yuuji, to crumble whatever solid foundation your friendship sits on. Plus, why would he want to settle with a single mom anyway?

You’ve seen the girls he’s dated, and none of them walk out of the house wearing a sweater covered in baby food stains, pretty, willowy girls who put a little more effort into their appearance than you have in months.

And the sadder, more obvious answer is that there’s no way he feels the same about you—sweet, whole-hearted Yuuji who’s friendly to strangers and always willing to help wherever he’s needed.

You’re no different.

There’s some truth to that, which rapidly disintegrates as the months go on. You can no longer ignore how Yuuji lights up whenever someone accidentally mistakes him for the twin’s father or mentions how cute your family is.

It’s easy to imagine until you’re so wrapped up in thoughts that make you bite back a smile—of coming home to Yuuji napping with the twins on the couch, quiet evenings snuggled up under soft blankets on the couch, kissing him when he leaves for work in the morning—that you nearly miss what he says to the sweet old man who’s been giving Yuuji unsolicited parenting advice, “Maybe she’ll actually say yes when I ask her to marry me someday.”

He’s not looking at you when he says it, but you see how his smile reaches his eyes (soft as if he’s inserted himself into the same future you thought of), and for a moment, you allow yourself to hope.

✢ SUKUNA

He’s never been the type to want kids of his own, and yet he couldn’t turn a blind eye when you call him nearly two months since that night at his brother’s birthday party—hazily remembering you telling him you’re one of Yuuj’s friends before he took you back to his place—to tell him you’re pregnant.

“You don’t have to be there. I just thought you should know,” you say wetly.

“Jesus—” he sighs, scrubbing a hand down his face. He doesn’t think the employee breakroom at the gym is the right place to have this conversation. “Listen, don’t cry. I’ll be there, alright? Whatever you need.”

Sukuna at least thought he’d actually be with the person he has a kid with. Over the next four years, that couldn’t be further from the truth.

There’s a lot that’s undesirable about the situation, like the fact that every time he walks out of his room, he always ends up stepping on Legos because you insist on buying Hana more and leave them at his place, or that he can't eat anything these days without a small hand reaching out for his food.

But the one thing that really makes his blood curdle is whenever he has Hana for the weekend, and she rambles through a mouthful of mac n’ cheese about how you and Yuuji took her to the park, with more stories about Yuuji this and Yuuji that.

He should be grateful his brother is such a doting uncle, yet he grinds his teeth the longer his daughter prattles on.

Out of everything, this is the one thing he chooses to find an issue with: high-school sweetheart Yuuji, pictures of him found in frames all over your house; helpful and supportive, perfectly polite, always-nice-to-be-around-Yuuji who everyone gravitated towards, even you, it seems.

He tells himself it’ll go away eventually, that strange pit of jealousy festering in his chest like an open wound. It doesn’t.

Sukuna spends so much time thinking about it that he’s thoroughly annoyed by the time you stop by to pick up Hana for the week.

“Did you guys have a nice weekend? You seem…” Of course, you’d pick up on his shitty mood. “Upset.”

“I’m fine,” he grumbles, hoping you’ll leave it alone.

You don’t.

“Listen, if this is about Friday, I told you Yuuji’s okay dropping her off.”

“I bet he is,” Sukuna sneers, shoving the last of Hana’s Legos into her bag.

You huff. “What is your problem?”

“Nothing, but I have a feeling you’ll run back to Yuuji and tell him about it anyway.”

“Are you seriously jealous of your brother?”

He scoffs but doesn’t answer.

“If you want to be with me so badly, just say it.” You put your hands on your hips. “Go on, say it.”

Obviously, you’re joking (at least, maybe a little, the unsure smile on your face wavering), but he’s not.

In the end, he breaks first. Wrapping his hand around the back of your neck, he presses his mouth to yours, fingers flexing at your little gasp. When he breaks the kiss, panting a little, he says, “I want to be with you, and I want to raise my fucking kid with you. Happy?”

There’s a scandalized gasp, and he looks down to find Hana standing there with her sandals on the wrong feet, blinking up at him with round eyes.

“Daddy, that’s a bad word.”

“Listen here, brat—” you pinch his side. “Ow.”

✢ MEGUMI

He admits he doesn’t know what he’s doing, not when it comes to being a parent. The best-dad-of-the-year didn’t exactly exist in his household growing up, considering his dad was never really around.

There’s a learning curve when it comes to four-year-olds and what they’re interested in; he discovers this the hard way when he bores your son to sleep by talking about mundane adult topics. He thinks you’re only trying to make him feel better by saying Rin never takes naps for anyone.

It festers, that feeling of inadequacy, between daycare pick-ups and co-parenting with Rin’s father—who happens to be a pediatrician, no less, while Megumi’s been working the same dead-end desk job for almost a decade—until he has his first win on a trip to the beach.

He teaches Rin how to make sand castles the way he and Tsumiki used to when they were kids. That’s apparently enough to win your son over, and he doesn’t know how to react the first time Rin calls him dad—second dad, he tells his teacher at school, but still dad. He thinks he might’ve looked at you in shock while soft giggles escaped your lips.

There’s still that underlying need to prove himself: to you, to Rin. That he can get along with your ex-husband and figure out the ins and outs of being a parent now that another set of feet will be waking him up in the middle of the night.

He would never admit it out loud, but Megumi can’t help the way his heart beats a tattoo into his ribcage at the glimpse of the engagement ring adorning your left hand as you drink your coffee—proof that you are willing to be his for as long as you’ll have him, and that…does something to him. It has him thinking about you holding a bouquet, of you smoothing that same hand over a steadily growing belly.

Every day, it amazes him how something so small—something that used to have no real purpose at the back of his sock drawer until you let him slip it onto your finger—can hold his whole future in its shining stones and delicate silver band.

Sometimes, Megumi can’t wrap his head around the fact that you still want him even though he’s still figuring things out, and his words don’t come out sappy like in those romance novels you enjoy so much—that he isn’t the best with feelings, yet he tries so hard to be a little more vulnerable for you.

It took him so many years to realize that this is what being in love feels like, and he’d be an idiot if he ever let you go.

“Megumi,” you say softly, noticing that he’d stopped making breakfast. “Are you okay?”

He brings his gaze up from your hand to meet your wide doe eyes. So pretty, he thinks, and all his. His mouth quirks into a not-quite smile, helping Rin pour more batter onto the skillet. “Yeah. Better than okay.”

✢ NANAMI

The first time he meets you, one of the associates for his company introduces you as his wife—a fresh-eyed college student who’s more concerned about staring at other women at the business function than the beautiful one on his arm—and he kindly shakes your hand, watching you give such devoted attention to a man undeserving of it.

What would it be like to be loved like that?

A few years trickle by before he sees you again, except this time, there’s no ring on your finger, and you’re in the middle of walking into his office for an interview with a little boy balanced on your hip.

“Sorry, my babysitter called in sick, and I couldn’t find a replacement in time—Oh.” It’s in that small moment between closing the door and hauling a diaper bag up your shoulder that you recognize him, too. “I didn’t realize you were the one doing the interview.”

He arches a brow. “No?”

“Sorry…again. I didn’t mean it like that, and I’m usually not this unprepared.” You set the toddler down on the floor and straighten out your skirt, giving him a shy, pretty smile.

Nanami swallows and gestures to the seat in front of his desk. “He can stay.”

While he asks you questions, your son—Haru, he learns—keeps busy with a coloring book you give him, and before you leave after the interview, he silently proffers Nanami a sheet of paper filled with yellow and green crayon squiggles.

He tacks it to the corkboard wall next to his desk.

When you start working as his office assistant, he never brings up the topic of your ex-husband. It’s obvious the man doesn’t care about his family, anyway—not when you show up most days looking worn out.

It starts to burn in his chest, the way your eyes drop sometimes, the little reassuring nod he’ll catch you giving yourself after what must’ve been a rough morning.

Nanami knows he’s in way over his head when he asks you out for coffee; how surprised he is you say yes, which leads to more dates until he slowly finds that smile of warm devotion aimed in his direction.

Eventually, your things fill the empty spaces in his home, and the spare room in his house becomes a nursery. His once quiet mornings of reading the paper are now pleasantly disrupted by the smell of pancakes and Haru trying to climb into his lap to read with him.

The first time Haru asks for Nanami after a nightmare—rubbing his wet eyes while standing near Nanami's side of the bed in his shark pajamas, sans one sock, until Nanami scoops him up and deposits him between you—he winces (because he doesn’t want it to seem like he’s taking something away from you) before he notices the soft smile curling your mouth.

He can’t pretend to fully understand why you ever agreed to that first date when the odds weren’t terribly in his favor, but he has a long time to learn, and right now, he’s focused on other things.

"Quiet, dove,” he murmurs, kissing your temple. “You're going to wake the baby..."