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Tomoko’s emergency call reached Jotaro on an especially rainy Thursday afternoon, in the middle of boarding his plane to Amsterdam.He had undoubtedly received far more unusual calls in his 29 years than any normal person did in their entire lifetime - mainly from the Speedwagon Foundation to inform him about whatever enemy stand user they had dug up on the other side of the globe. Or, even less preferably, from his senile gramps when the guy was bored. (Jotaro hadn’t even bothered picking up the phone after the second time. That old geezer could be dying in a ditch for all he cared.)But out of those calls, not many had managed to shake Jotaro up quite as much as this one. Which said a lot, considering that he took great pride in his near impeccable composure.“Jotaro, sorry to be calling you so suddenly, I know you’re probably busy as always, but there’s something really important I need to discuss with you. It’s about Josuke.” Those words alone, combined with Tomoko’s urgent tone, was all it had taken for Jotaro to take a later plane just so he could give her his full attention.-As it had turned out, Tomoko’s call wasn’t as much about the emergency Jotaro had initially feared and more about a favor that should have been too big for anyone in Jotaro’s position to grant. (Or should it? Jotaro was far too detached from normalcy to make an astute judgment.)Surprisingly for everyone, Josuke had gotten his hands on a scholarship for a high school in the USA and had only recently had the grace to inform his mother about the fact. The hows and whys of the idea and process remained a mystery to everyone involved - though Jotaro suspected that stands were involved somehow. From what he gathered from Tomoko’s somewhat hysterical torrent of words, Josuke’s preparations included “becoming a master chef” - Tomoko’s words, not Jotaro’s - and working on his English skills like crazy, even though Jotaro remembered them being practically nonexistent when he had left Morioh months ago. He had to begrudgingly agree with Tomoko that that effort in particular proved that the kid was serious, especially since Josuke had never exactly struck Jotaro as the studious type.“He said he’s really serious about pursuing fashion as a career which I don’t doubt one bit. I know my boy, after all.” Jotaro could easily picture Tomoko smiling on the other end of the call. “He’s adamant that the best chance to make that happen is to study in the USA as soon as possible. I can’t quite disagree, based on what I know. He seems to have researched the topic quite thoroughly, too… Sure, I want to keep him close to me for as long as I can…” She trailed off and cleared her throat before continuing in a slightly less steady tone but Jotaro didn’t need her to finish her sentence to know its contents. He’s all I have now. I don’t want my beloved son to leave me too.“B-but despite that, there’s nothing I want more than for my baby to be happy. I wouldn’t dare stand in the way of his dreams. And with all the money my dad left us, it’s not like we can’t afford it. If he was still with us, I’m sure he would agree.”Jotaro was well aware of the deep frown that had gradually overtaken his face over the course of Tomoko’s monologue. As a father himself, he didn’t have it in him to pretend he didn’t understand her train of thought. Still, her obvious decisiveness on the matter did beg the question of why she had bothered calling Jotaro in the first place, if not to get his opinion. She definitely wasn’t asking for his approval.He had a pretty clear idea of where this conversation was going and he did not like it. Good grief.“The school Josuke was accepted into is one of the only ones in the country that offer a special fashion design program. It’s located in Miami, Florida. That is the city you live in, isn’t it? You teach at a university there, right?” That piece of information gave Jotaro pause. Considering his theory about her call, it made sense for Josuke’s future school to be somewhat close to Jotaro’s place of residence, but in Miami itself? What were the chances?Well, at least there was no doubt about Tomoko’s intentions at this point. As much as Jotaro dreaded to hear her say it. “I do. I teach a few classes at Miami Central, though my main focus lies with marine exploration and research.” He highly doubted she cared much for the specifics, but whatever. Anything to postpone her next question for just a bit longer.“In that case… I know it’s a lot to ask of you, Jotaro, and I’m sorry I couldn’t bring it up any sooner. Please understand that I wouldn’t have asked this of you a few months ago, before really getting to know you in Morioh…” You don’t know me. What you know is the small, limited and idealized part of me I allowed you to see. It’s a lie. “But I’ve seen how well you take care of Josuke, even after… that accident…” Jotaro openly cringed at the way her voice faltered once more. He couldn’t even begin to imagine how Tomoko had felt during the few days Josuke had spent in the hospital after what she believed to be a traffic accident.No, that was a lie. Jotaro knew exactly how she had felt. Unbidden, a suppressed memory pushed to the forefront of his mind: Josuke’s unconscious body, beaten and bloody, impaled on a piece of metal, just barely holding on. If Tomoko knew that Jotaro could have prevented Josuke’s injuries if he had been just a bit more alert… he had a feeling she wouldn’t be nearly as accommodating then.“I know I can trust you with this, Jotaro.” Jotaro closed his eyes against the ache he could feel throbbing to life in his temples. Don’t put your trust in me. “You’re part of Josuke’s family. I know you two have become really close during your time in Morioh.” Now she was just pouring salt in the wound.“But anyway, I’ve been rambling for far too long, haven’t I? My point is that no matter how much Josuke wants to take this opportunity, the USA is a foreign country on the opposite side of the world and I… I just can’t send him over there on his own without knowing that there will be someone looking after him, keeping him fed and safe. I know you care about that too, Jotaro. What I’m trying to say is…”
No, don’t say it.
But alas, Tomoko remained entirely oblivious to Jotaro’s inner crisis. “I’m asking- no, I’m begging you to let Josuke live with you in America and to take care of him where I can’t. I wouldn’t ask this of you if there was an acceptable alternative, I promise. I just… I really want to help make my baby’s life the best it can be. I’m sure you understand.”Jotaro did - that was the problem.But wanting to abide by Josuke’s wishes wasn’t the most important factor in this. Not that Tomoko would know - not when she was and would forever be entirely unaware of Jotaro’s circumstances. Circumstances that simply did not allow for Jotaro let Josuke live with him. It was a matter of safety, of responsibility, came down to something as simple as doing the right thing. And yet…“Jotaro? You’ve been quiet for a while. Is there a problem with the connection?”There was a war taking place in his mind. A war far too convoluted, too even to be won in mere seconds, even though righteousness was sure to prevail eventually. Or so Jotaro would like to believe.Jotaro heaved a deep sigh, feeling more exasperated than he should after a day of doing a lot of nothing apart from sitting around on a plane. He brought a hand up to massage the bridge of his nose, knowing already that it would do little to soothe the pounding in his head. He shouldn’t be feeling this old at 29.“I’ll need to know the exact details of Josuke’s schedule. His planned date of travel, any appointments he has to attend, the beginning of his enrollment, and so on. I’ll mail a list to you. If you haven’t booked a flight yet, I’m sure my connections will be of help to ensure that everything goes smoothly.” Fuck, what the hell was he doing?On the other end, Tomoko remained silent for a moment, likely taken aback by his answer, before he picked up on a deep intake of breath. Relief. Well, that made one of them. “Thank you so much, Jotaro. It puts me at ease to have you on board.”The call didn’t last long after that, Tomoko declaring that she had a long list of preparations to make. Frankly, Jotaro was grateful for it.He remained in the same position, leaning against the glass of the gate for support, staring at the planes outside without really seeing them. The cold sensation coupled with the silence of his mostly abandoned surroundings, blissful as they normally would have been compared to the alternative, brought little reprieve from his raging thoughts.Jotaro had made more irresponsible decisions in his life than he liked to admit - decisions that had cost more than Jotaro could ever hope to repay. But even among all of them, this most recent one might just take the cake.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
“Here, let me take your coat. Your hat, too.”Grabby hands reached out to wriggle Jotaro’s coat out of his grasp when he had only just begun to take it off. He’d hardly even had the time to close the apartment door behind him before he was surrounded. Simultaneously to the hands making quick work of his outer layer, a pair of equally grabby but slightly more graceful pink hands snatched his hat from his head with a gentleness that defied the action itself and skillfully positioned it at the very top of the coat rack.
For the third time this week in the same amount of days, Jotaro found himself startled into compliance.Even after almost a month of the same pattern, he just couldn’t seem to get used to the sudden attention awaiting him the moment he unlocked the door to his once deserted and silent apartment after yet another taxing day of work. The hands that never failed to relieve him of his coat and hat the moment he began to remove either, the energetic chirp of a familiar voice urging him to take off his shoes because the entrance hall had “just been cleaned”. A glance around confirmed that the place was more spotless than it had been in years. As though Jotaro had hired an especially dedicated and persistent maid.But no, it was just Josuke, playing that weird little housewife game he was so insistent on for some reason. (No, not ‘housewife’ - that would imply that he and Jotaro were… ehem.)Yet again, like every other time without fail, Jotaro was so taken aback by Josuke’s fussing that he didn’t even get the chance to protest.“How was work? Stressful, apparently? You look pretty tired. That’s not exactly anything new, but still,” Josuke pointed out as he hung up the coat beneath the hat. Jotaro simply watched, dumbfounded.
“Your shoulders seem stiff. Want me to give you a massage? My mom says I’m pretty great at it.” Probably better not to answer that one at all.Josuke ushered Jotaro to the sofa and pushed him to sit down with gentle force. Jotaro, out of instinct rather than a conscious decision, let him. “Dinner’s ready, if you want any. You like traditional Japanese foods, right? Not to toot my own horn or anything but I really have a knack for making those.” Jotaro moved to get up with the faint intention of heading to the kitchen and taking care of his nutrition for himself, as any adult man should be well capable of, as opposed to letting his kid relative handle it. Josuke, of course, shoved him right back into his seat, his expression one of fierce determination. “No, stay right there. I gotcha.”Most people would have felt pleasantly surprised at the sudden consideration, flattered even. But Jotaro wasn’t most people. And as far as he was concerned, this entire situation was suspicious as hell. Not even his wife had ever pampered him like this, not during their (admittedly very one-sided) honeymoon phase nor at any point after. To be fair, Jotaro’s constant absence had made it pretty hard.If he didn’t know any better, Jotaro would have assumed Josuke was about to beg him for more pocket money.Having Josuke live with him as the unpaid equivalent of Jotaro’s housekeeper came with a generous stab to his pride and an even greater amount of shame, despite Josuke’s extensive attempts to talk him out of it.
(“You don’t have to do that. Stop, Josuke. Sit down and let me do this.” “No, you sit down! Eh, stay seated, I mean. I told you I’d do this for you! Just think of it as me earning my keep.” “And I’ve told you, repeatedly, that you don’t have to-” “Sit back down, Jotaro. I want to do this and I’ll do it if you want me to or not. I don’t care that this is your place. Now, just sit back down and enjoy the show.” He was grinning, that damn cocky brat. Though what ultimately made Jotaro stay seated despite his rapidly rising irritation - his temper wasn’t that much better than Josuke’s when it came down to it - was the realization of just how much Josuke looked like his mother with his brows drawn closely together and his hands at his hips. And Jotaro knew better than to cross Tomoko when she felt especially bossy. Besides, Josuke had a point - his hands moving skillfully across the kitchen surfaces and dicing up ingredients at record speed made for quite the impressive view. It was news to Jotaro that Josuke could cook at all but apparently, the kid was a natural.)However, Jotaro had soon had to admit that the advantages of Josuke’s excessive care far outweighed any negative feelings associated with it. On the first evening of Josuke’s stay, to be precise:“Wait, you got this jagged living off cup noodles? Wow, that’s hella impressive, dude, for reals. Like, I knew you were one cool guy but you’re always good for another surprise. No, wait, that’s not a good thing. You’ll die young with a horrible diet like that.” Jotaro bit back the morbid comment sitting on his tongue (“I’ll die young anyway. Younger, probably.”). Instead, he settled on watching with a mix of amusement and disgust as a few grains of fried rice fell from Josuke’s open mouth back into his bowl. Jotaro had noticed back in Morioh that he did that sometimes when he got just a tad too excited to contain himself, then was absolutely mortified about it as soon as he remembered his manners. It was beyond entertaining to watch.Fried rice was the meal they had ended up with after Josuke had realized Jotaro’s intentions and snatched the assortment of cup ramen from his arms, his gaze alight with exaggerated horror. “You weren’t actually planning on eating these, were you?! Have you not checked the list of ingredients? Or whatever they’re trying to pass off as ingredients.” Just a glance at the back of one package made the horror in Josuke’s expression grow tenfold. Jotaro hadn’t thought it possible. “I don’t even know what half of these are in Japanese but even I can tell this shit is a one way trip to an early grave. That settles it, I’m throwing these out. Right now.” But before stomping out of the room to look for the trash bin, he turned to stare up at Jotaro with a reproachful pout. “Don’t buy any more of these. Ever. Promise me.”Jotaro let him have his way, even giving him the nod of agreement he wanted, because despite what everyone thought, Jotaro wasn’t always a killjoy and Josuke was always good for a fresh breath of air. Endearing, to boot.
Which was only confirmed by the way he huffed at Jotaro as he left the room, even though there was clearly a good-natured grin tugging at the corners of his lips. And because Josuke’s joy had always been a little contagious, Jotaro found himself smiling a bit too, after Josuke had turned his back on him. He had a reputation to uphold here.Upon his return - without the cup ramen - Josuke had ended up making fried rice because that was all the little ingredients in the apartment were good for. The ones without a thin layer of mold growing on them, anyway. “How do you live like this?! I get that you’re rarely home but seriously?!” Josuke had complained as he disposed of the offending piece of meat, far more elegantly than the action had any business being. Only the fact that the rice was the most delicious meal Jotaro had had since his stay in Morioh kept him from complaining.Jotaro didn’t bother giving a detailed explanation about how his irregular lifestyle - namely, being called to the other side of the world without prior notice at least once a week to hunt down another enemy stand user - made a healthy diet pretty much impossible. It wasn’t like he had the time or money to dine in fine restaurants at whatever place he was sent to protect. And when Jotaro did make it home after yet another trip or a tiring day of teaching, he was far too exhausted to cook anything other than ready-made meals. Which, according to Josuke, didn’t count as cooking at all. Hiring a housekeeper was out of the question, in order to keep his private details - stand research - from being leaked.Well, it seemed Jotaro had accidentally found himself one of those anyway.But seriously, was this behavior normal for a 17-year-old boy? Jotaro highly doubted it. Then again, apart from being a pretty sheltered kid, Josuke was about as far from normal as it got with no small amount of confidence about the fact. And honestly, Jotaro wouldn’t have it any other way.Needless to say, he hadn’t had cup ramen even once since Josuke had started living with him.-It hadn’t escaped Jotaro’s notice that lately, he had been coming back to the apartment a lot more than he usually would. Working at home rather than at the university was just part of it. Until about a month ago, falling asleep at his office desk - an inevitable conclusion to a night of grading assignments rather than a conscious decision - had happened more often than not during his time in the city. Now, Jotaro had trouble even just recalling when the last time had been. No matter where he was in the world, he always hurried home at the first opportunity after a mission these days, sometimes even knowing that he would have to leave again come morning. As though an invisible force was pulling him right back to Josuke. And maybe it was - maybe those Joestar family bonds were doing their job or whatever.What family bonds couldn’t explain, however, was how just a glimpse of Josuke’s confident grin had the power to get Jotaro through the day, be it stand hunting or grading papers. Never research - Jotaro didn’t need extra energy for that, it just came naturally to him. The best part of his job by far.
As for the remaining aspects that came with being a professor… he never had enough energy for the bothersome task of teaching a class of noisy brats. Worse even - noisy brats that seemed far more interested in him than in marine biology for some unfathomable reason. They were older than Josuke, so why was Josuke’s fickle nature so much more bearable than those little fuckers?Actually, bearable was the wrong word - spending time with Josuke was fun, real fun, in a way that had always been hard to come by for Jotaro, especially when other people were involved. Once he had gotten past the initial irritation at Josuke’s mood swings, Jotaro had never once wished for their time together to be cut short by responsibility or whatever bullshit the world threw at him next. Be it eating together, playing a card game or two on the rare occasion Jotaro could spare the time - Jotaro was surprised every time Josuke managed to sit still for long enough before remembering that the kid was capable of both dizzying giddiness and excessive focus - or helping Josuke with his assignments. (His English was impressive for his age and the fact that he hadn’t known more than a few words half a year ago but he still struggled sometimes.)
Jotaro had always been pleasantly surprised by how easy it was to listen to Josuke talk - he had initially expected to be put off by the intense excitement Josuke poured into topics he was passionate about. But even though fashion wasn’t exactly Jotaro’s comfort zone (“What do you mean, I love your style! Nothing more satisfying than having a fashionable nephew! Wanna go clothes shopping together sometime? I’ll put together an outfit that’s so awesome you won’t wanna wear anything else!”), even that topic was bearable if Josuke was the one rambling on and on about it. Jotaro was infinitely better at listening than talking, anyway.All things considered, Josuke was a far more pleasant student than any of the brats Jotaro had to deal with on the daily. Not that any of that was much of a surprise when even just being around Josuke never got boring. The kid somehow had more stories to tell than Jotaro himself and his life hadn’t exactly been uneventful until now.So far, Jotaro had pointedly refused to question what it said about his supposedly exceptional intellect that a kid twelve years younger than him was currently his favorite person to be around. At the end of the day, all that really mattered was that Jotaro felt more alive than he had in months and was quite a bit more healthy than before. So no complaints there.For the first time he could remember, his apartment actually felt like more than a place where he spent the night every once in a while. It felt like a home.-One of the few downsides of having Josuke live with him, however, was that Jotaro had no way of completely keeping the kid away from the parts of his life that he didn’t want anyone involved in. Especially not the people he cared about. One could argue that it was too late for that in Josuke’s case - had been for months - but hindsight was 20-20, wasn’t it? Foolish as it had been to think that Jotaro could ever restrict someone as curious and righteous as Josuke.“Take me with you.”Jotaro growled in annoyance as he turned to rush out the door, only to find it blocked. The call from the Foundation had been especially urgent this time, meaning that lives were in danger this very moment and Jotaro was already running late just by not being out there right now. And even though Josuke knew that, the ignorant brat had nothing better to do than to deliberately place himself in Jotaro’s way.As much as he hated that he had to address Josuke’s insolence at all, it was the best way to get him to budge. Best, as in the least risky for everyone involved. “We’ve talked about this. It doesn’t mean shit that you held your own against Kira in a fight. You almost died because you didn’t reach out to your allies despite our agreement. I’m not taking you anywhere.”Josuke didn’t move - honestly, Jotaro hadn’t expected him too, the kid could be thicker than a damn brick if he tried. Instead, his eyebrows furrowed into that look of defiant anger that Jotaro sometimes found strangely charming and that sometimes made him feel the need to strangle the air out of Josuke at the mere sight of it. Today was definitely part of that latter category.“I told you I was sorry! I learn from my mistakes, you know I do! You know you can trust me and you know I can help!” Jotaro clearly wasn’t the only one getting more worked up by the second. “Don’t think I haven’t seen that gash in your arm that you got last time! I could have healed you with Crazy D! Fuck, I could heal you now if you weren’t so stuck in that shit delusion that I’m not dependable enough to be exposed to any danger at all!”Jotaro grit his teeth so hard it hurt as he tried to keep himself from lashing out. Josuke was right and they both knew it, as much as Jotaro hated to admit it - which only added to his already boiling fury.
Josuke’s reliability wasn’t the reason why Jotaro would rather watch a dozen civilians die - or even himself, should it come down to it - than ever take Josuke along on another mission. The kid had indeed proven that despite irregular bursts of idiocy, he was more than able to shoulder as much responsibility as Jotaro did every time he went out into the field. But if he could help it at all, Josuke would forever remain oblivious to the real reason - the side effects of that very responsibility that had long become Jotaro’s constant companion. If anyone had to be the keeper of that secret, Jotaro would much rather remain the only one.“Josuke. Get out of my way. Before I make you.” Yet another fact that the both of them were fully aware of - that, if deemed necessary, Jotaro wouldn’t hesitate to manhandle Josuke with however much force he saw fit. And that Josuke’s chances of coming out the victor were basically nonexistent.Josuke looked like he wanted to rearrange the molecular structure of yet another room and likely would as soon as Jotaro was out the door but at least he finally stepped aside. He pointedly refused to look Jotaro in the eye when he added, an affronted grumble, “You better be back for dinner. I did practice quite a lot for that karaage, you know.”Jotaro was halfway down the stairs by the time he finished speaking.-Jotaro groaned in pain as he forced his protesting body to crawl through the dumpster that was this particular Miami back alley. As it turned out, the task of moving any of his limbs at all became an exponentially more difficult and painful task when his body was missing half its water supply, quite a lot of blood and half an organ on top of it. His liver, if Jotaro were to take a guess.
At least his enemy was faring much worse - a beat up pile of meat on the piss dirty cobblestone with no heartbeat to speak of. Star Platinum had made quick work of that fucker as soon as Jotaro had seen through his stand’s liquid control ability. One torn liver too late for his taste.Jotaro didn’t even want to think about what had drawn the power hungry asshole to the city in the first place, what - who - his opponent had been looking for. The answer was plainly obvious. If one strived for greatness, it was beneficial to remove the greatest obstacle in their way as soon as possible. The greatest obstacle… A title that Jotaro had been carrying on his shoulders like a suffocating weight since Egypt.
But now, if another enemy stand user were to discover the place Jotaro had only recently learned to call home and come to hunt him down, there was a significant chance they would find a different member of the Joestar bloodline in his stead.But no - Jotaro had more present matters to focus on right now, as opposed to questioning his choices all over again, mulling over the risks he shouldn’t have tolerated but stubbornly, selfishly refused to take back, well aware he would come up empty by the end of it, just like he had so many times before. Like the issue of bleeding out on the dirty cobblestone floor, for instance.Past the small wall separating the street from the beach, the sun was setting already. Fuck, there was no shot he’d make it home in time for dinner. Josuke would be pissed - who was Jotaro kidding, the kid would understand. Even if he did make it back in time to watch the steaming karaage be served, Josuke would fuss over Jotaro’s battered self until the food had turned cold.Still, Jotaro should at least let him know if he was to disappoint Josuke. Again. His stomach churned painfully at the thought and Jotaro had an inkling it wasn’t because of his injuries.But first, the Speedwagon Foundation. In his current state, Jotaro wasn’t making it across the city anytime soon. Or anywhere at all. He’d need them to try and patch him up first.
He really should count himself lucky the enemy had been looking for him in this dump rather than at his actual address. Where Josuke was. The mere thought of it made Jotaro’s blood run cold. Nope. Never. That was exactly why he wouldn’t call Josuke to fix that damn dehydrated, bleeding body of his, the consequences to his abysmal health nie damned.Still, when Jotaro reached for the tiny electric device in his coat pocket, it wasn’t the Speedwagon Foundation who received his first call. (A smartphone, they called this impractical brick. His mom had insisted he get one, in hopes he would “call her more often than just once a year”. Well, it wasn’t her wallet the damn thing had made a dent in.)The few seconds it took Josuke to reach the apartment telephone and pick up were the longest of Jotaro‘s life. Which made no sense at all - this was about nothing more than a simple domestic dinner. It wasn’t like Jotaro was canceling a date or anything. (What a ridiculous thought. Jotaro was factually still married and Josuke was his kid uncle, dammit.)But even so, at the sound of Josuke’s light but slightly concerned voice, it felt like at least a bit of weight had been lifted from his excruciatingly heavy body. “Hello? Who is this?”
Right, Josuke hadn’t had to answer the phone at Jotaro’s apartment before.There was no reason for a wave of pride to wash over Jotaro at the fact that Josuke hadn’t mentioned either of their names. Jotaro had drilled it into his head repeatedly that they had to be careful not to be discovered and Josuke did know how to listen if he wanted to. So yeah, no reason for this sudden feeling of pride at all. The blood loss must have made Jotaro all light-headed.“Jotaro, that’s you, isn’t it?” …Or not. “Don’t worry, I recognized your breathing. Speaking of, you’re breathing pretty heavily. Are you okay?” What a weird kid. And one who clearly knew Jotaro far too well for comfort - the sound of his breathing and the complaint he would have made if he had enough air in his lungs to say anything at all.“Josuke,” he eventually managed to croak out. “Sorry but I won’t make it back in time for dinner.”The ensuing silence stretched so long Jotaro would have assumed Josuke had hung up on him if he hadn’t still been able to listen to the faint sounds of a shuddering breath on the other side. Huh?
When Josuke spoke again, his voice was tight and almost too steady - the calm before the storm, as though he was desperately trying to keep himself under control. “Where are you right now?”“Some dirty back alley by the beach.” Curse his mouth for completely betraying him. And curse Josuke for having this effect on him.A shaky exhale, then, “Don’t move.” Very funny. “I’ll be there in ten.”Just as Jotaro had feared. “Josuke, wait, you don’t even-”
The telltale beep left no doubt that Josuke had not, in fact, waited for anything before hanging up, not even for Jotaro to finish.Good grief. Good freaking grief. The stubbornness of that kid was going to be the death of him. He did realize just how huge and dirty-back-alley-polluted Miami Beach was, didn’t he?-True to his word, Josuke arrived by Jotaro’s side within ten minutes of their disaster of a phone call. Long before any Speedwagon Foundation member could even make it to Miami itself. “Jotaro!”Well, Jotaro had brought that one upon himself.One unsuspecting blink of Jotaro’s tired eyes and Josuke was crouching next to him, uncharacteristically indifferent to the effect the dirt must have on his new jeans - some expensive American brand that he had been dying to get a hold of for months. (Jotaro couldn’t even begin to pronounce the brand and the fact that Josuke managed without any trouble spoke of his undeniable dedication. All he knew was that those pants had cost a shitton of money, though not quite as much as Jotaro’s damn non-smart phone.)Even with his rapidly dwindling eyesight, Jotaro could recognize the deep creases of worry disturbing Josuke’s natural beauty. That look was exactly why he hadn’t wanted Josuke involved in this. One among many reasons.
“You fucking idiot,” Josuke hissed as he leaned in to inspect the damage, Crazy Diamond’s hands on Jotaro’s chest already making quick work of his injuries. Jotaro released a small sigh of relief as he felt that comforting warmth of healing seep through him, blood and water flooding back into his body, ripped tissue, cells and fabric repairing themselves. The pain was gone within seconds, leaving behind only comforting numbness.Jotaro allowed himself a moment of just laying on the cobblestone, his body devoid of tension, hoping to regain just a bit of energy. Allowing himself to let his guard down in a way he hadn’t been able to since Egypt, simply because Josuke was there, next to him. Josuke could handle the both of them for a second or two - Jotaro trusted him with that much. And with so much more.Josuke, meanwhile, was far from thrilled. He hadn’t stopped cursing under his breath ever since that first comment, muttering something along the lines of “Stubborn hypocrite, almost getting yourself killed in my absence again, damn you, you self-important moron…” Jotaro let his eyes flutter closed, feeling unreasonably reassured. If there was the tiniest smile tugging at his lips, he hoped Josuke was too busy working himself up into one of his infamous rage outbursts to notice. Speak for yourself, brat.Josuke, unfortunately did notice - he had the horrible habit of being perceptive at the worst times. Clearly, Jotaro’s amusement did little to appease him.
“You done?” he huffed, recalling Crazy Diamond, getting back to his feet and brushing off his precious pants with a pained grimace before turning to walk away. “With that weird delusion that you have to save the world on your own, I mean. Before tomorrow if you got any say in it. That bullshit. And whatever you’re doing lying around down there.”Jotaro didn’t have the energy to be irritated at the unusual combination of condescension and sarcasm in Josuke’s tone so all he did was to allow his smile to linger for another second before slowly picking himself off the ground. Not because he was still in pain - he felt healthier than he had in months, thanks to Crazy Diamond’s power - but to give himself a moment to think. As amusing as Josuke’s reaction might seem at first - to Jotaro’s exhausted mind, anyway - he knew from experience that a sulking Josuke could be quite troublesome to deal with.Still, it was essential that Jotaro made this clear with every bit of authority he had to spare. “On the phone, you know I was about to tell you to stay at home. We had an agreement, Josuke. The condition for you staying with me is that you listen to my orders. Even the unspoken ones.”Josuke stopped in his tracks and spun around to face Jotaro so abruptly, a man less pretentious might have flinched in shock. His glare was livid. “Well, fuck you too! How about I let you bleed out in a ditch next time?!”Now he wasn’t just sulking anymore - he was furious. A state of mind that, with Josuke, was bound to hold up for at least another few hours. The kid was stubborn enough to hold a grudge, even against Jotaro.“Good grief,” Jotaro muttered to himself as he got up and followed after Josuke - he thought he saw Josuke halt in his step for a split second but there was no way to be sure. Best to leave the kid alone for now and give him some space to calm his temper.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
As soon as they arrived at the apartment, Josuke stomped off to his room and, in perfect angry teenager fashion, threw the door of his room shut behind him with much more force than necessary, making Jotaro’s pristine walls vibrate. A few framed articles about different sea creatures almost went tumbling to the floor, causing Jotaro to frown in great displeasure.
That would be the last he saw of the kid tonight, apparently. Probably better for both of them. Josuke was fuming - quite the bad prerequisite for a civilized conversation - and Jotaro felt like he would topple over from exhaustion any second now. That enemy stand really had been quite the nasty one. Unfortunately, even Crazy Diamond didn’t have the power to heal exhaustion if its source wasn’t entirely physical.Only halfway to his room did Jotaro catch a whiff of the smell of burned meat wafting into the hallway from the direction of the kitchen. Right… dinner. Feeling hesitant for all the wrong reasons, Jotaro slowly made his way to the kitchen counter, where he found a plate of perfectly crisp, still slightly lukewarm karaage quite literally waiting for him. Along with a burned batch still sitting in the deep frier.
The sight left a bitter taste in Jotaro’s mouth. Not once during the few weeks they had been living together had Josuke burned any food, despite cooking almost every day. He really must have dropped everything and run to get to Jotaro. And Jotaro… had been an absolute ass about it. Rightfully so, he would argue.“You never bother to apologize. You don’t even know what you did wrong. There is no mistake, as far as you’re concerned, in that damn rationality of yours. I can’t believe I married a guy like you.” Jotaro pushed the intrusive female voice in his head away but its message lingered nonetheless.
Should he have apologized to Josuke? But what for? For making him worry? That was an inevitability. As much as Jotaro understood his concerns, Josuke was the one who had acted out of turn.But even so, Jotaro felt somewhat guilty when he stored the karaage in the fridge and disposed of the burnt ones. His appetite had been gone long before getting back to the apartment.Even though he felt like his legs were about to give out beneath him, Jotaro forced himself to stop by the guest room on his way back - rightfully Josuke’s, at this point, not only because he was the only person to ever stay in it. Jotaro gave the door a tentative knock. “Josuke.”Silence. Of fucking course.Jotaro heaved yet another sigh before trying again anyway. “I put the karaage in the fridge if you’re hungry. Have as much as you want. I’ll be in my room.” Which was a shorter and hopefully more subtle version of “You won’t risk running into me in the kitchen tonight so make sure to feed yourself.” Jotaro wouldn’t know - apparently, he wasn’t exactly the most subtle guy once he opened his mouth.(But seriously, the kid was either more pissed than Jotaro had experienced before or extremely exhausted if he didn’t bother washing all that gel out of his hair before bed like he usually did. Gel, wax, pomade… whichever one it was. Jotaro had never bothered to educate himself about the topic - his hats were much more practical for many reasons. Anyway, Josuke had mentioned something about putting in the necessary care for the best possible result. The daily styling and endless showers seemed to be part of that. It was the kind of time Jotaro would never have. The kid was so damn high maintenance.
But he had done none of that today… Jotaro was right to be worried, right?)His olive branch went ignored even after another minute so in the end, Jotaro simply turned and sought refuge in his bedroom where at least he had yet to chase away the furniture and walls by saying the wrong thing.He had always had a knack for that - losing people he cared about due to his own screw-ups. Be it by royally fucking up with something he said or did or by getting them killed. He had hoped to keep Josuke around by taking him in, to have at least one person who cared depended on him enough to stay, shielded from the part of Jotaro’s life that claimed the most casualties. Even though he should have, no, had known that neither would work out in the end - because Josuke was not the kind of person who let himself be confined or controlled. Which was part of the many things Jotaro valued greatly about him.
No matter how much he tried to avoid the inevitable, Josuke would soon be nothing but yet another entry in Jotaro’s ever-growing book of failures.And Jotaro would be alone again. Left behind to endure the strenuous, lonely existence that his blood and his past had burdened him with. However, Josuke’s comment that afternoon hadn’t been all that off - this life was also the one Jotaro continued to choose for himself. His self-imposed duty. His purpose. There was no escaping it, no matter how much he might want to - at least not in this lifetime.-Especially on nights like this one, following a mission that left regret sitting deep in Jotaro’s bones, his dreams were haunted by a mountain of corpses. Stacked higher than the eye could see, even with senses as sharp as Jotaro’s - a mass of bodies, winding into each other, faces without shape and yet still somehow writhing in agony so great it was tearing them apart at the seams, their unintelligible cries meant to go forever unheard and yet forever chained to the one who had failed them and so many others. And would inevitably fail many more.“They waited and waited for a savior who never came.” The entire realm shook with the malice of that dark whisper, another permanent guest in Jotaro’s dreams, another one killed by his hand. The most significant, some might argue, though Jotaro could never quite bring himself to agree.
“They must have been in so much pain by a force they could not comprehend… ah, the sweet, sweet despair.”“Stop it.” Jotaro couldn’t bear to hear it. Not again. But what was worse was that he knew what would follow - that compared to what lay ahead, along the stream of blood flooding steadily away from the mountain of bodies, his current pain was but the calm before the storm, a brief moment of relief before Jotaro was pulled under, into a suffocating sea of darkness he could never seem to escape.And yet he was forced to walk down that path again and again, by an invisible force so much stronger than Jotaro, try as he might, would ever be. No matter how much he struggled and screamed and begged, the cycle would repeat, never-ending. Vicious.First was Avdol. A dark shape standing next to the path Jotaro was damned to walk, arms missing, a black hole in his middle that grew bigger with every passing second, soon to swallow him entirely.
“This is what your quest did to me. You asked for my support and took my life and so much more along with it.”They were the same words he always said and though every single one stung like a bullet to the head, it wasn’t nearly as painful as the suffering Jotaro had long learned to endure. “You’re wrong. You chose your own path, no matter the consequences.”The pull of the bloody stream guided him further along. Past the battered form of a small animal - a dog, one Jotaro would recognize anywhere, its bones shattered and body torn open. Iggy barked as Jotaro approached, short and ragged, his eyes narrowed in a much angrier expression than a dog should be able to convey.
Jotaro might not understand his language, yet he always knew what Iggy wanted to tell him anyway. He wished he didn’t.“I died because of you. If it hadn’t been for your dumb choice to save your mother, I would’ve never had to suffer like this. She would’ve died of age soon anyway.”Jotaro swallowed heavily, his hands clenching into fists with enough force to break the skin of his palms. “There was nothing I could’ve done. I wasn’t around when you died.”“When were you ever?” Iggy’s reproachful gaze seemed to say.Jotaro was forced onwards, but this time, he struggled against the pull with all his might. He knew what came next. Who was waiting for him in the shadows further down the path. No amount of rationality, no amount of “It wasn’t my fault, dammit!” was going to save him from that. It never did. And Jotaro couldn’t take it. Not again.“Jojo.” Kakyoin smiled up at him the way he always had. Jotaro couldn’t bear to look, not at his bloody face, not his torn uniform, nor his broken body that shouldn’t be able to stand tall as it did. “Jojo, I died for you.”Jotaro knew that. Please, he didn’t need to hear it again.“I’m in love with you, Jojo. I’d die a thousand deaths for you in a heartbeat.” And he did, in Jotaro’s dreams.
“If only you hadn’t fallen in love with me, you would’ve left before we even got to Egypt. I’m the only reason you stayed. I wish you hadn’t. I wish you hadn’t stayed for a love that never would’ve blossomed anyway.” As much as Jotaro wanted to say it, hoping that by doing so, he would finally get the closure he so desperately needed, he never could. His throat was closed up, this phantom body fighting him even now.Then again, knowing what would follow, Jotaro would take the pain and responsibility of his best friend’s death over it any day. If Kakyoin’s death had broken him - which it had, not just a bit - that next one would shatter him into a million pieces, never to be glued together again.
Yet the cruel stream pushed him onwards, further and further, until Kakyoin faded into the all-encompassing darkness, past the familiar corpse of a blond woman who never spoke to him in his dreams, as though to repay all the times Jotaro had knowingly disregarded her. He was grateful for her silence, the guilt at the sight of her a small throb compared to the sight of what lay behind her, who lay behind her, unmoving, skin white like that of a ghost, looking even tinier on the dark floor.They weren’t real, these last two deaths, and never would be, not if the precautions Jotaro had modeled his life around bore fruit, and yet… And yet the sight of her, looking as she had in the last picture his wife had grudgingly forwarded to him, yet so much more lifeless, made Jotaro’s knees give in. He sank down next to her, acutely aware of his heart being ripped from his chest, leaving him in a world of hot, searing pain, as he wept like he had never allowed himself to in reality. The way he undoubtedly would if the sight before him ever existed outside of his self-destructive mind.“Jolyne.” Her name was a desperate prayer on his lips, a wish for her to open her eyes, to just look at him and never stop.But Jotaro should have long learned to be careful of what he wished for.When she did open her eyes and sat up in one slow yet fluid motion, a grace unbefitting of a five-year-old - the grace death bestowed upon some - and looked up at him, her eyes, almost identical to his own, were cold and lifeless. Her skin, too, remained white like the corpse it belonged to, devoid of blood. The sight made Jotaro break all over again, though there should be nothing left in him to tear apart.“Daddy, why didn’t you come home? Jolyne misses you. Granny said you’re protecting me but… Daddy, why did I die?”Jotaro’s breath hitched with the effort it took to open his mouth. “Stop, please… anything but this…” But he knew with what little conscious thought remained beneath the pain that it was no use. There was no one around to listen. Nothing but corpses. Besides, Jotaro had done this to himself. He was doing this to himself.“And daddy, why did he die? What did that boy do wrong?”“What?” Realization hit Jotaro with the force of a truck at the same time as the whispered question left his lips, far more parched than they should be with all those tears running past them.No. Please no. Don’t make him look up and follow the direction that tiny white finger was pointing in. The grief was killing him already, what more did the demons of his subconscious want from him? There was nothing left to take. Jotaro felt like his blood had been drained just like that of the corpses surrounding him.But even so, his head was forced up against his will, making him stare wide-eyed at the body sprawled out behind Jolyne’s.
If he didn’t have a heart left to be torn to shreds anymore, why did it hurt so much? Even though the rational part of him knew that this was a mere dream and that the real Josuke was sleeping soundly in his bed right now, his hair a mess and a string of drool drying on his chin. Definitely looking like an idiot but like the most lively and alive idiot Jotaro had ever had the pleasure of encountering.Nothing like the bloodless, white-skinned corpse Jotaro was staring at now, ocean eyes dead and unseeing. But even so, the sight made Jotaro’s throat clench to the point of suffocation. No more. Don’t make me suffer like this. Hadn’t it been enough? So much more than enough?Jotaro didn’t remember what his own sobs sounded like. Honestly, he wasn’t sure he had ever known at all. He would’ve liked to keep it that way.
By the time those dead eyes moved, their unsettling stare finding his own, Jotaro was sure he hadn’t taken a breath in at least one agonizing minute. Unfortunately, in this damned dream, a complete lack of air didn’t have the ability to knock him out, no matter how much Jotaro wished for it.This version of Josuke, all scuffed and wrong, had never spoken to him before. Jotaro had been eternally grateful for it - he was all too painfully aware of the words his subconscious would make fall from those dry lips if they ever were to open. Never in his life had he wanted to be wrong so badly.“Look at what you did to me, Jotaro. This was all you.” No. Please, no. Don’t make him hear it. Not in Josuke’s voice. “Why didn’t you keep me safe like you promised? Why didn’t you stop me from fighting your battle? You knew it would kill me. I never wanted to become broken like you, Jotaro.”There were cuts and bruises littering his bare arms. Scars that would never fully heal, inflicted in the midst of a battle Jotaro had been desperately trying to keep him out of. And though Josuke’s rigid expression was no indication - would never be anymore - Jotaro could tell that those scars ran far beyond what was visible or tangible. Hell, they were probably so much worse on the inside. Everything Jotaro had never wanted Josuke to endure.It was too much to take. It had been too much all along but Jotaro had long learned to move past his limits and then some - necessity had taught him ten years ago.
But eventually, even the most resilient one - not that Jotaro would ever call himself that - reached the point of falling apart entirely. Jotaro rarely did, never in reality, that would truly be his end.
But right now, in this hell of a dream, there was nothing left for him but to crumble, to be reduced into a trembling ball of grief, defeated and useless.-The next time Jotaro opened his eyes, feeling like hours had passed and yet not trusting his perception of time, it was to the familiar sight of his bedroom ceiling. Familiar yet almost indiscernible in the darkness. His eyes were dry. They always were. As though at least that part of him had long become numb to emotion. Like so many people believed was the case for all of Jotaro. Numbness to sadness, pain, happiness. Actually, the latter part might just have a grain of truth in it.More often than not, Jotaro wished he was. Especially in moments like this one. He wished desperately that time had dulled his ability to feel anything at all, eased the pain like people said it did. At least then all of this would be bearable.
But instead, it only seemed to get worse every damn time Jotaro had to endure that dream. Especially now, with Josuke’s lifeless voice still ringing in his ears, every word like a stab to the chest.It had just been a dream, sure, but one that could easily become his gruesome reality in the blink of an eye. Some of it already had.And once again, it would all be Jotaro’s fault. In Jolyne’s case, because she was unfortunate enough to have been born Jotaro’s daughter, just as much as for Josuke.
After all, Jotaro had been the one to come to Morioh, to turn Josuke’s sheltered life upside down even more than it would have become anyway. And while his presence might have saved Josuke back then, it was even more likely to ruin him in the long run, in more ways than one. In fact, Jotaro should count himself beyond lucky that Josuke had hardly been scarred by their fight against the enemies in Morioh, despite the hardships it had brought into his life. He was more grateful for the kid’s resilience than he could even begin to put into words.Jotaro had known all that even when he had foolishly accepted Tomoko’s request to let Josuke stay with him. He had known that by selfishly giving in to his wish to keep Josuke around, keep him close, closer than ever before, and make another attempt at the happiness Jotaro knew could never last for him, he would put more than just Josuke’s life in danger. That Josuke was more curious, stubborn, determined, righteous and selfless than Jotaro had been in a long time. That Josuke would soon be begging to help, disregarding the consequences like the reckless kid he was.
And Jotaro was terrified that even just another glimpse of that world would break Josuke, like it had Jotaro. The kid was 17, dammit, barely older than Jotaro had been when his own living nightmare began, one that would hunt him forever and that he could never fully recover from, even if given the chance to try.Yet he had told himself that it was a small price to pay, an insignificant risk, as long as he vowed to send Josuke right back to safety if his fears ever came close to reality. If it ever looked like Josuke was about to get himself involved in a mission far too overpowering for the both of them.
After all, no one knew better than Jotaro his inability to protect, to save anyone at all, especially those he cared about the most. His past, present and future were engulfed in the proof of that very fact: proof that for anyone Jotaro cared about, their safest place was as far from him as it could get. Japan would be a good start.But hadn’t they crossed that line just this afternoon? Hadn’t Josuke forced his way back into that world today, by actively seeking Jotaro out to heal him when Jotaro was battered and bleeding out? Knowing the kid as well as he unfortunately did, it wouldn’t be the last time. Far from it. Now that Josuke had another vivid image of the risks that came with Jotaro’s mission, there would be no keeping him away. Not when Josuke knew just how closely death hovered over Jotaro, following right behind him every step of the way.Jotaro had known, as much as he had pushed the thought away, that this little domestic paradise they had built together had been nothing but an illusion all along. A play with an imminent expiration date. An indulgence that Jotaro should have never allowed himself in the first place.He would send Josuke back to Japan. He had to. There was no excuse to keep pretending, now that the curtains had closed over their tragedy. Tomorrow, Jotaro would gather every last bit of authority he had over Josuke and force him to go. It was the only way Josuke would listen, if at all. It was the only way Jotaro could ensure his safety.
Then Josuke would leave, just like Jotaro had left Jolyne behind, and watching him walk away wouldn’t hurt any more than it had to walk away from Jolyne. All it would do was tear Jotaro apart when he had long shattered anyway.He didn’t even feel the same way for Josuke that he did Jolyne. And yet, similarly. With a similar intensity.
Not that it mattered, not in the face of Jotaro’s purpose. His pain, no matter how great, was entirely insignificant. It was just the hidden side of a coin glued to a solid surface, never to be looked at by anyone, never to be known by anyone but the coin itself.Jotaro would persist as he always had. He would live on, somehow. If any of this could be called that, anyway. If lying awake at night, staring at the ceiling, unseeing, his entire body numb like a corpse, forever doomed by loneliness, could be called living.Except, he wasn’t alone. There were quiet footsteps on the wooden floor of the hallway, a hesitant tap tap in the direction of his bedroom, too quiet to be picked up by ears any less sharp than Jotaro’s.Jotaro’s instinctive guardedness, the frantic compulsion to be prepared for an enemy attack at as much as a change in the breeze, didn’t even last long enough for him to bolt upright and call upon Star Platinum. He would recognize the sound of those footsteps anywhere, their exact weight and cadence, no matter where in his hearing range they popped up, even in his sleep. Maybe that was what had caused Jotaro to wake up in the first place - the mere possibility that Josuke might need him for something. Anything at all.But even so, the fact that it was Josuke out there, coming steadily closer, didn’t keep Jotaro’s heart from hammering wildly in his chest and his breath from stuttering. Not tonight.
However, the agitation gnawing at his bones was gradually replaced by active concern as Josuke’s steps, strangely insecure as they seemed already, continued to falter. As though every step led him back to doubting his objective. How unusual.Eventually, after what felt like a small eternity of Jotaro lying atop the covers, wide awake yet unmoving, there was a soft, notably careful knock on the door. Even so, it was loud enough for Jotaro to wake up with a start if he had been asleep - no matter how horrible his nightmares, his hypervigilance rarely allowed him a restful night, if ever, alarming him at even just the sound of a fly in the room next door. But Josuke didn’t need to know that. He was already far too conscious of Jotaro as it was.“I’m awake, come in,” Jotaro called, cringing at just how groggy his voice sounded. Josuke shuffled inside, Jotaro’s eyebrows furrowing almost immediately at his demeanor, even more unusual than the hesitation in his steps. There was no trace of his usual confidence to be found in the way he held his arms in front of his body, almost defensively, one hand clenched around the sleeve of his ridiculously expensive pyjama shirt, making him look so much smaller than he was. The fact that his precious hairstyle was in the middle of falling apart certainly didn’t help with that. His head was lowered in… shame? Insecurity? as he glanced in Jotaro's general direction.
Jotaro only noticed when Josuke stepped into the small ray of moonlight that had made it past the closed curtains but… were those tear stains on his cheeks? No doubt about it. His face was flushed, a bit puffy too, in the way that Jotaro had only witnessed once during the year he had known Josuke. He had clearly been crying, but why?At least Josuke managed a smile at the sight of Jotaro, who had long been startled into a sitting position. It was a flimsy, shaky little thing but a smile nonetheless.
“Hey,” Josuke breathed, a choked little whisper befitting of his current posture but completely unlike the cocky brat Jotaro was used to.Considering the signs, Jotaro had a pretty good idea of what was going on but he opened his mouth to ask for confirmation anyway. To cut Josuke some slack, probably, because if there was one thing Jotaro was good at, it was being either too harsh or too soft on the kid.
But before he could, Josuke guessed his intentions from his supposedly unreadable expression and interrupted him with a defiant huff. “Just so we’re clear, I’m not some elementary school kid who needs to climb in bed with you because of some stupid nightmare, okay?” Of course, the prospect of being looked down upon in the face of an allegedly pathetic weakness would be what made Josuke act up, even in his current state. Jotaro would never think less of him because of such an insignificant detail. Josuke should know him much better than that. In fact, Jotaro doubted anything could make him think less of Josuke at this point - he was far too deep in for that.As soon as Josuke’s sudden burst of bravado had appeared, it slipped away again, leaving Josuke to awkwardly avoid Jotaro’s gaze as he stumbled over his words. “I, I just… It’s just that I wanna…”
He swallowed heavily around whatever request he was trying to formulate. His gaze found Jotaro’s once more, ocean eyes wide. As though he wanted to beg to have his wish granted but his pride kept his desperation in check. “I just wanna sit with you for a bit. If that’s okay.”Anytime, Jotaro didn’t say but if Josuke knew him nearly as much as he seemed to, he could feel the weight of that one word hanging in the tense air between them nonetheless. “Sure,” he added, just in case.Josuke nodded shakily and slowly patted further into the room, cautiously, his every movement laced with an insecurity Jotaro didn’t recognize. He crawled onto the bed, sitting cross legged as far away from Jotaro as the limited space allowed.When, after a minute of silence, Jotaro realized that shivers tore through Josuke’s body at irregular intervals, he decided that he had had enough. “What’s up with you pretending to be shy after all those months? It’s not like I bite.”“I don’t…” Josuke seemed to shrink further into himself as he grumbled something unintelligible but shifted over anyway, until only about an inch separated him from Jotaro. From this close up, even in the dim light, Jotaro recognized the traces of dried sweat on his skin and the dark circles under his eyes. He knew from experience that they were far worse than a few hours of bad rest could cause on their own. There was also the fact that, despite being the one to seek Jotaro out for comfort, Josuke blatantly refused to look at him, staring stubbornly ahead at a speck of moonlight on the wall.As the tense silence persisted, Jotaro waited with every bit of patience he had to spare - which wasn’t much, not when it came to anything but sea creatures and enemy stand chases - for Josuke to find the words to express his dilemma. Jotaro dearly hoped that was what he was doing.It felt like a small eternity had passed when Josuke finally opened his mouth to draw in a deep, shaky breath. “Take me with you next time.”
Jotaro had to physically keep himself from rolling his eyes in growing exasperation. Goofs grief. Sure, the matter was clearly important to Josuke, considering how often he brought it up, but this was unusually excessive even for him. He had no reason to believe Jotaro’s answer had changed at all in the few hours since Josuke had last made his request. It hadn’t and wouldn’t, not anytime soon. Or ever.“I proved my worth today. I saved your life,” Josuke argued, his hands clenching in Jotaro’s covers in an attempt to find purchase, keep himself grounded.Part of Jotaro hated that he had to burst Josuke’s optimistic bubble. “No. You didn’t save my life. I could have easily held out until the Speedwagon Foundation arrived. I’ve learned from experience. Something you clearly lack.” It wasn’t entirely true but fitting enough for Jotaro’s purposes.“You wouldn’t have to be experienced with injuries at all, if you weren’t such a stubborn bastard deluded by his hero complex!” There had been no trace of Josuke’s anger earlier, amidst his hesitation, but now it was rapidly flooding back into his harsh, elevated voice. When he finally looked at Jotaro, it was in the form of a burning glare. “Don’t give me that bullshit! We both know there’s no reason for you to not take me along! I could be saving so many lives out there every day, including yours!”Jotaro suppressed a heavy sigh. “No.”From Josuke came a sound somewhere between a furious growl and a high indignant scream. Sheer willpower kept Jotaro from doing something as pathetic as flinching or shuddering in response.
He expected Josuke to do anything ranging from ranting on to getting up over storming out of the room to straight up punching Jotaro - it wouldn’t be the first time a temper tantrum made him turn to violence. What Jotaro hadn’t bargained for but what was arguably even worse than the alternatives was for the silence to persist until it was finally broken by a quiet sniffle, then an unmistakable sob.No, please, not that. Don’t do that to him. There was nothing Jotaro could hope to do about Josuke’s tears - it was already a stretch to assume he had the ability to ease Josuke’s pain at all.“That dream I had… you died in it,” Josuke choked out, unrestrained tears streaming down his cheeks, glittering in the moonlight. Oh. “Y-you and mom and my dad and my friends and… everyone.” Josuke’s entire body had long started shaking with the force of his sobs. “And I wasn’t there to help. I couldn’t do anything. And your c-co-you told me it was because I didn’t try hard enough to help. That it was all my fault…”A description that sounded a lot more eerily familiar than Jotaro would have liked. Good grief. This was exactly why he had been trying to keep Josuke out of a battle that was no one’s but his own to fight.
Now here he was, in the middle of the night, the teenager he should have never taken responsibility for crying in his bed about the very dream Jotaro would never get rid of for as long as he lived. And Jotaro, damn his social incompetence, had no idea what to do about it. But he had to do at least something, not only because every fiber of his body urged him to but because it physically hurt to see Josuke like this. Suffering. Because of Jotaro - because Jotaro had failed him. Like so many before him.In perfect not-Jotaro fashion, he went with the first idea that occurred to him before any other even had the chance to form. “Hey… want a hug?” That was what kids wanted when they were sad, right? Hugs and candy. Jotaro didn’t have any candy on hand, unfortunately, so his clumsy attempt at a comforting hug had to suffice.
But… wasn’t Josuke too old for that? Kids his age, the “bigger” and more smartass ones, didn’t they prefer money as a treat? The normal ones, anyway. But Josuke was pretty far away from what people considered normal nowadays…Before Jotaro had the chance to overthink his offer enough to retract it entirely, Josuke reluctantly glanced up at him out of teary, red-tinted eyes. His ocean gaze wandered from Jotaro’s awkwardly outstretched hand to his crooked, very clearly fake smile - it was supposed to be encouraging - and back. A suspicious frown climbed onto his face but at least the tears halted their flow temporarily. “But… you’re not a hug kinda guy?”Yeah, no shit. But why did he have to phrase it like a question? Kid really wore his heart on his sleeve.
Jotaro gladly dropped his sorry attempt at a smile, instead reciprocating Josuke’s gaze with a frown of his own. “You want that hug or not? I won’t sit here waiting like an idiot for much longer.”Instead of a verbal answer, Jotaro thought he caught a glimpse of an amused smile before his vision was filled with the baby blue of Josuke’s pyjamas. The next he knew, he had an armful of half sobbing, half giggling uncle, clinging to him like Jotaro was the last remaining pair of limited edition designer shoes at the store. A soft, slightly chubby cheek was pressed into the crook of Jotaro’s neck, a wet patch already forming on his collarbone, a pair of hands clawing desperately at the fabric of Jotaro’s shirt. (He had resigned himself to always wearing one in the apartment as soon as Josuke had moved in, just in case. One of his first attempts at being the responsible adult everyone needed him to be, including himself. And clearly, it had paid off. The shirt part, not the being a responsible adult part. That last one had long gone to absolute shit.)Jotaro took a moment to recover from the shock of ah, person, warm body, crying teenage boy in his arms, before he could even begin to hug Josuke back, one arm loosely wrapping around Josuke’s smaller form, the other coming up to awkwardly pat his head.
He was probably doing a horrible job but somehow, it seemed to be enough for Josuke. He clung to Jotaro even harder as the seconds passed, holding onto him for dear life, with a strength that Jotaro would have normally considered impressive. If he wasn’t so focused on making sure Josuke’s crying subsided.Jotaro hadn’t noticed the weight that had lasted on his shoulders ever since he had woken up - an additional weight on top of the one that had come to stay, the one that he had long gotten used to - until it lifted, at the feeling of Josuke’s warmth in his embrace, the feeling of Josuke’s heart beating a little to fast, not far away from Jotaro’s own. The undeniable proof to all his senses that Josuke was alive and well, at least physically.Josuke calmed down, slowly but surely, until the only sounds left in the room were quiet sniffles. There was definitely snot on Jotaro’s shirt. He hated dirt on his clothes. Josuke should count himself lucky that this wasn’t Jotaro’s coat. (Who was he kidding - when Josuke was concerned, most other things and people came in a far second.)
Eventually, Josuke took an especially audible breath, which was as little warning as Jotaro got before he spoke up again, his already subdued voice muffled by Jotaro’s shirt. “Thanks, Jotaro, really. I needed that.”Jotaro could only sit in silence, absently letting his hand glide over Josuke’s hair and wondering whether he should accept Josuke’s gratitude or not. There was nothing Josuke should be thanking him for - nothing at all. Everything he had done that Josuke seemed to regard as kind, self-sacrificial gestures had been nothing but selfishness on Jotaro’s part. His heart wasn’t nearly as golden as people seemed to think - and definitely not as strong.“And thanks for taking me in. Sure, you’re an ass about it sometimes but it’s not like playing my caretaker’s an easy job.” But you’re the one who’s been taking care of me. The way Josuke chuckled into his shirt collar was far too soft to feel like a million needles piercing Jotaro’s neck.“Don’t thank me,” he muttered, hardly managing more than a choked whisper. Weakness that completely betrayed the grave honesty of his words. Don’t thank me, I don’t deserve it.Josuke either ignored him entirely or thought that his statement was too nonsensical to deserve an answer - or maybe he was just too busy… nuzzling Jotaro’s neck like an especially needy puppy. The fact that Jotaro let him, without as much as a complaint, was yet another testament to the fact that he let Josuke get away with far too much.
But why shouldn’t he? This was… nice. Embracing someone, holding them close, feeling the warmth of another human body and being relied on for physical as well as emotional comfort - regardless of whether Jotaro was able to provide it - was pretty amazing. Jotaro had almost forgotten what it felt like after, what, ten years? (At least if one considered only the few times it had truly meant something.)But in the end, the fact that he had allowed himself this weakness for the first time in years, the fact that he was able to enjoy it despite the way he usually shied away from human contact - it all came down to Josuke. Josuke, who had let himself sink into Jotaro fully, who seemed so comfortable in Jotaro’s arms, whose tears had been dried by Jotaro’s embrace. The fact alone felt entirely alien to him.Jotaro didn’t know how long they sat in silence, Josuke’s face still buried against Jotaro’s collarbone, his limbs interwoven with Jotaro’s body like a disproportionate octopus, partly sprawled across Jotaro’s lap, his breathing so relaxed that Jotaro would have assumed he had fallen asleep if it wasn’t for his tight grip on Jotaro’s shirt.Jotaro soon found a weird sense of comfort in stroking Josuke’s gel(?)-knotted hair and, when he lowered his head against Josuke’s shoulder to get more comfortable in their embrace, Josuke’s scent turned out to be similarly pleasant - the somewhat flowery smell of the fabric softener Josuke insisted on using because “A guy’s gotta take care of his clothes. Wait, what are you doing?! Don’t put that in with the white stuff! Jotaro, what the fuck?! How are your coats not pink yet?!”
Beneath lingered something Jotaro could never quite identify but that reminded him pleasantly of the cinnamon cookies his mom always used to bake for Christmas. The combination was somehow so inherently Josuke that it put Jotaro at ease every time. The same scent that had spread through the entire apartment in a matter of days, and, along with or maybe precisely because of Josuke’s livery presence, had made it into a home for the very first time.No, it was not weird smelling his kid uncle like this - Josuke had been doing the same thing for minutes now. Much less subtly, Jotaro might add. Then again, Josuke’s behavior generally tended to be more on the wild side of things so that was probably a shitty indicator.Whatever. Jotaro couldn’t be bothered to care. Not about Josuke’s weirdness, his own counterpart or anything else.
At least that was the case right up until he became acutely aware of a certain growing hardness poking his hip. Okay, what the actual fuck.
Now, don’t overreact. That’s a perfectly normal occurrence in a man, especially a teenage boy. Kids his age get hard all the time for no reason. It definitely isn’t because of you. Not after the moment you two just had.
Josuke must have felt Jotaro’s body go rigid with surprise because when Jotaro raised his head, Josuke was already looking at him in a unique mixture of defensive and sheepish that Jotaro’s treacherous mind might have called endearing in a different situation. At the sight of Jotaro’s gaze, probably somewhere between suspicious and reproachful, the kid started babbling almost immediately. “I-I’m a horny teenage boy, I can’t help it! You’re just hot, okay? Like, really hot. …O-objectively, I mean.”Yet another encounter with Josuke’s self-destructively loose tongue that Jotaro could’ve gone without. He didn’t even want to begin to interpret that. Or at least it was definitely better for the both of them if he didn’t.“Don’t beat yourself up about it,” Jotaro muttered, fully intending to drop his head right back on Josuke’s shoulder. Fuck, he was so tired and his entire body felt so unbearably heavy. He never got any rest during that damn dream and his insomnia always spiked after.
Only halfway through the motion did he realize that this was probably a horrible idea. Responsible adult, all that.For once in his life, Josuke seemed to have had a similar thought - despite his obvious reluctance, he pulled back until air could pass between their bodies again and then some. The room suddenly felt so much cooler than it had a second ago. “Yeah, right… sorry about that.” Now the kid was back to avoiding Jotaro’s gaze. Why was he doing that, dammit? “I should probably go.”“…probably, yeah,” the tiny bits of responsible adult left within Jotaro echoed. Already, Josuke had moved away entirely, climbing off the bed and straightening, ready to disappear from the room and out of Jotaro’s sight and reach, as though he had never been there at all.
As though he hadn’t made the massive impact he had, hadn’t carved a hole into Jotaro’s sad excuse for a life that only he could fill… or maybe that Josuke-sized hole had been there all along, even before Morioh, and it had taken meeting Josuke a second time, letting Josuke invade every inch of his life and see Jotaro at his most vulnerable, for Jotaro to finally realize.Good grief, he was being dramatic tonight. Must be the exhaustion.But dramatic or not, there was no denying the physically painful sensation of Josuke’s warmth fading from his body far too quickly, every lingering trace of it, leaving the cold to overtake Jotaro along with the intrusive thoughts Josuke’s arrival had temporarily suppressed.Fuck, he had to tell Josuke to return to Japan. Tomorrow. He would lose Josuke, would lose that warmth for good in just a few hours. It was a sacrifice he needed to make because his urge to protect Josuke had to be stronger than his longing. It had to be.If he let Josuke go right now, he would not only damage the bond of trust he had tried to build between them, against all odds - his selfish attempt at making Josuke believe he could always confide in Jotaro about anything at all and never be turned away. No, if Jotaro didn’t act now, if he watched uselessly as Josuke slipped away, he would never get another chance to simply be with him.
Jotaro knew instantly that he wouldn’t be able to take it.In the end, it was a mix of icy panic and despair that forced his tongue. “Josuke.”Josuke stilled in his step at the sound of his name. Didn’t he always, when Jotaro was the one calling?“It’s fine. You can stay.” Whatever that means. Anything.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
In the back of his mind, Jotaro’s logical side and his morals, messed up as they were, screamed at him to take back his foolish offer while he still could. Screamed to remind him of the consequences of his choice. But none of that mattered, not right now, as much as it would control his thinking and decision making at any other point in time.“Are you sure?” Josuke had turned back to look at him, ocean eyes alight with confusion and doubt. He looked just as insecure as Jotaro should be feeling right now.His inquiry… he was giving Jotaro an out, a much-needed opportunity to reconsider.Not that Jotaro was about to take it. “I am.”This is nothing for you to be ashamed of. Whether there’s a reason and whether I’m that reason, it would be hypocritical to turn you away. After all, it’s because of you that jacking off is enjoyable to me now rather than the chore it’s always been. It’s not like I wanted to blow my load to the thought of you squirming under me. I know perfectly well just how wrong it is. But just like you now, I was powerless to resist.Wrong or not, this guilt over wanting someone he wasn’t supposed to was just another burden that Jotaro didn’t want Josuke to share. Especially if, in Josuke’s case, none of this meant anything at all. Or, hell, even if it did mean something.But no. As far as Jotaro was concerned, Josuke’s reaction to their proximity was nothing but a brief moment of teenage idiocy and daredevilry, a childish, superficial infatuation, never meant to last in the first place. Nothing Jotaro was entirely unfamiliar with. And if the phenomenon happened to manifest more severely for Josuke than it did for most, that wasn’t really a cause for concern - because Josuke wasn’t normal anyway. Neither of them were - a mere side effect of the blood they shared.Josuke still seemed hesitant as he turned around and took step after tentative step back towards the bed. Jotaro couldn’t exactly blame him for it.He hoped that at least this time, his crooked smile managed to provide some overdue encouragement. “I’m not turning you away, Josuke.” In fact, Jotaro wasn’t sure he still had that ability at all.Josuke nodded shakily and Jotaro took a moment to realize that it was his mouth Josuke’s gaze had zeroed in on. Ah.An involuntary shiver ran down his spine as he watched Josuke swallow heavily, the bobbing of his adam’s apple clearly visible to Jotaro’s elevated senses in the fleeting moonlight.There was no doubt about it - by now, they had both realized that there was far more to Jotaro’s invitation than a mere offer of unconditional comfort. Josuke knew him well enough to be perfectly aware of it.Up in the night sky, the moon briefly disappeared behind a cloud, draping a blanket of darkness over the room. By the time the moonlight returned, Josuke was curled up in Jotaro’s lap again, fully this time, leaning his entire weight against Jotaro’s broader chest. In this position, he could probably hear the rapid beating of Jotaro’s heart, betraying his unreadable expression. Not that Josuke would be able to see it, anyway.“Hey, Jotaro.” Josuke was leaning up now, closing the distance between their faces inch by incriminating inch. “You can tell me to stop anytime. You don’t have to do this for me. You don’t have to but…” Ocean eyes, illuminated by the faint moonlight, blinked up at Jotaro, wide with an honesty so raw it made Jotaro’s breath catch in his throat. There it was, the truth, willingly, vulnerably laid bare for Jotaro to see, for him to judge and decide accordingly. “I want you to do this. I want you - I need you to want this as much as I do. I really, really do.”It sounded as though Josuke was asking him to come closer while fully expecting him to pull away. Did the kid realize he wasn’t doing himself any favors with that attitude? (An attitude so painfully unlike Josuke’s usual confidence that Jotaro would have stopped to question it if he’d had the presence of mind.)Jotaro did neither - he remained completely still even as Josuke crossed those last remaining inches between them. Even when a pair of plush, soft lips, smaller but fuller than his own, pressed against the corner of Jotaro’s mouth. Brief. Chaste. Insecure.And suddenly, Josuke’s entire housewife act made a whole lot more sense. Hell, even that out of nowhere scholarship in Miami of all places, on the opposite side of the globe to Josuke’s first and only home for 17 years… even that part didn’t seem random at all anymore.Jotaro should have known. Damn, why hadn’t he known? Had he really been so blinded by his own issues that Josuke’s obvious affection had bounced right off his oblivious self?Either way, Jotaro wouldn’t have refused Josuke’s advances, no matter how bold - he simply didn’t have the strength to. Not anymore. Not after that rollercoaster of a day, not after that night. In hindsight, there hadn’t been any doubt in Jotaro’s sick, corrupted mind since the moment he had first told Josuke to stay.“Jotaro…” the sound of his name on Josuke’s lips was hardly more than a breath and yet, in all of its weakness, it conveyed the longing of a lifetime. Jotaro hated that he knew all too well how it felt.Josuke kissed him, fully this time, inexperienced lips moving against unresponsive ones. Jotaro let him. He let him, not least because he had been imagining this very moment for months now, always in the few seconds before sleep fully overtook his senses. In the moments when he couldn’t keep his mind from slipping into forbidden territory, the few seconds when he lost any semblance of his prized control. Or in the moments just before he was about to cum.It wasn’t long before Jotaro found himself actively kissing back because hell, regardless of how much he wanted this - so fucking much - giving in to Josuke just came far too easily to him at this point. Allowing his lips to slide against Josuke’s, his teeth to nibble teasingly at that soft bottom lip, letting his tongue pry its way into that hot mouth - all of it was far too easy. Far too tempting.Josuke’s high-pitched sigh of surprise - so close to a moan of pleasure already - wasn’t supposed to go straight to Jotaro’s groin. Neither was the undeniable sensation of Josuke’s dick twitching in his too-thin pyjama pants.“Ah, Jotaro… You’re so hot, you’re driving me crazy, you always drive me crazy-”There were greedy hands in his hair, feeling, exploring, tugging; a hot, puffy breath on his lips as Josuke tried and failed to keep the last remnants of his composure; needy hips grinding against Jotaro’s own. Josuke probably wasn’t even aware he was doing it.Fuck, that kid was going to be the death of him.Their bodies were pressed flush together once more, Josuke’s smaller chest and erratic heartbeat against Jotaro’s own, Josuke’s throbbing erection rubbing insistently against Jotaro’s. Jotaro could clearly feel himself hardening more rapidly than, well, ever. To think he would be doing this out of genuine desire one day, rather than out of curiosity or obligation. With his teenage uncle, of all people.Well, there was no going back now.When Josuke made a clumsy but enthusiastic attempt to mimic Jotaro’s advances and deepened their kiss in the process, Jotaro felt nothing like the broken mess he had become back in Egypt, the cracks widening further with each passing day. Just for a moment, he felt as though he had become whole again, in a way he hadn’t since that magic moment of holding his newborn daughter in his arms five years ago. The only time he had held her, period.But there was no space for anyone else in his mind right now, not even for Jolyne or the devastation associated with the giant rift between them that Jotaro himself had caused. Not when his mind and all of his senses were completely overwhelmed by Josuke.Not when kissing Josuke felt like his salvation.Meanwhile, Josuke himself still had yet to conquer his disbelief, even as Jotaro pulled him further up to leave a trail of kisses against his cheek, his neck, his collarbone, fighting the urge to mark him right where everyone would be able to see. He didn’t have the right to claim Josuke as his own like that. No matter how much he craved it.“Jotaro… I can’t- I can’t believe you’re going along with this. I can’t believe you want this.”Jotaro’s answer was a muffled growl against Josuke’s skin. He reveled in the way it made Josuke tremble all over. “Stop acting like I’m doing this for you.” I’m not that selfless. I’m doing this because I’m so fucked up that I can’t keep my mind off you. Or my hands, apparently. Or my mouth.Fuck, he didn’t want to think about any of this. He didn’t want to be slowed down by Josuke’s misplaced disbelief. As soon as he did, there would be space for his makeshift determination to waver. For coherent thought to slip in, for sanity to make itself known. For the illusion to shatter, for Jotaro to second-guess. For Jotaro to doubt, as he was prone to, always.Just let me have this. Just this once. It’s all I’ll get.“O-okay. Anything you say.” The words were barely more than a whisper against Jotaro’s hair, hard to focus on amidst the shivers still shaking Josuke’s body. It was a reaction born from arousal rather than insecurity - Jotaro could tell from the way Josuke was making a conscious effort to keep from mindlessly rutting against him, with limited success, and from the trembling eagerness of the hands feeling their way down to the hem of Jotaro’s shirt. Maybe he wouldn’t have had to wear one, after all. (Or ever again, after tonight, though the reason wasn’t the one he so desperately wished for.)“Can I… touch you?” No matter how hard it might be for Josuke to hold himself back, Jotaro wasn’t surprised by his resolve to do so anyway, for Jotaro’s sake. For Jotaro’s approval.Not that Jotaro needed him to. Or wanted him to.Before he could start overthinking as he feared would, he reached down to strip off his shirt in one fluid motion and let it drop behind him, an action that radiated more confidence than he was feeling at this point. But then again, hadn’t Jotaro always had a knack for pretending?He regretted the action the moment he watched Josuke’s eyes widen and - fuck, Josuke would be able to see Jotaro’s scars like this, even though the dark concealed the worst of them for now. Hopefully.Jotaro wanted to curl in on himself. Those scars, he wouldn’t get rid of them if he could. They were a reminder of battles fought, mistakes made, comrades and lives lost… but even so, they had no space in a situation like this. In a situation that was already as fragile and fucked up as this, yet surreal in a way that made Jotaro feel lightheaded and giddy. A situation so addictive he never wanted it to end. A situation that was already on the brink of being ruined by the harsh cold seeping into Jotaro.It took him a second too long to realize there was no disgust on Josuke’s face - no fear or repulsion in the way Josuke sucked in a half shocked, half awestruck breath at the sight of Jotaro’s bare chest. In the way his tongue slid out of his mouth to lick his lips. And Jotaro realized, with a sudden rush of exhilaration, that Josuke was turned on by this, by the bared sight of Jotaro’s imperfections. The thought alone, accurate or not, had heat flood back into him in an instant, chasing away the chill. Stop it, you fool.But even so, it was surprisingly challenging to keep a self-satisfied smirk off his face when Josuke’s eager gaze wandered over his abs - however much of them was even visible in the shade - intense enough for Jotaro to feel his skin prickle under the attention. It was an exaggerated reaction that Jotaro would have rolled his eyes at in a different situation, no matter how deeply affected he was by it.Jotaro’s spontaneous act of undressing seemed to constitute the non-verbal permission Josuke had been desperate for. Admiring with his eyes alone didn’t satisfy him for long - his hands soon found their way to Jotaro’s pecs, squeezing greedily, touching and stroking and exploring with a combination of reverence and unobscured desire, tracing scars with a gentleness that somehow made the action all the more sensual. All of it affected Jotaro more than he liked to admit, making his breath and heartbeat pick up simultaneously. His brain was definitely feeling all the cloudier for it. Good.The sound that escaped Josuke as he let his hands wander over Jotaro’s abs could only be described as a moan of arousal. He wasn’t even the one being touched, for fuck’s sake. Then again, maybe Jotaro should be relieved that just this much contact between them had Josuke drooling and the wet patch on his pants expanding gradually - it made Jotaro’s own shameful hardness just a little less embarrassing. Then again… comparing himself with a horny teenager didn’t exactly set a high standard.Just when Jotaro had resigned himself to the fact that, fuck, he was really enjoying even just such a small, fairly innocent touch from Josuke far more than he should, more than should be possible at all, those hands stilled on his skin, then retreated entirely. What…?Looking up, Jotaro found a sheepish grin on Josuke’s face as his nimble fingers made quick work of his shirt buttons. Which was… a nice idea, sure, if only Jotaro couldn’t think of so many better ways to put those hands to good use. He was in a bit of a hurry here - interruptions didn’t exactly help him keep his mind in the gutter.To Josuke’s credit, he shrugged out of his shirt before Jotaro had the chance to think about much else, that ocean gaze and subdued smile now imbued with shyness. Which made little sense - Jotaro knew Josuke was fairly confident about his body despite the insecurities many of his age group suffered from. As he should be, with a body as pretty as his. Lean yet athletic, toned yet still holding just the right, healthy amount of baby fat that made Jotaro want to reach out and dig his hands into those sinful curves.Fuck, those weren’t even new thoughts. Jotaro had had them all along, hadn’t he? The small glimpses of Josuke’s body he had gotten before and during their few weeks of living together had been enough for that disgusting hunger to take root, hidden just under the surface of Jotaro’s conscious mind, lying in wait for any sign of inattention. No amount of denial or deliberate ignorance could ever erase it entirely.Was it the new scar on Josuke’s abdomen, left by the close call that was his last encounter with the claws of death, that made Josuke hesitate, much like Jotaro had before? …What a horrible thought. And an unnecessary one, considering that Josuke, in his entirety, was downright mesmerizing. And so were his scars, remnants of a battle that had become a part of him, just as permanent as the scars themselves. Captivating. Beautiful.…Jotaro was staring, wasn’t he.“Just to… even the playing field, you know.” Even Josuke’s breathing was heavy with arousal as he directed that shy smile up at Jotaro again, eyes half-lidded. No, not shy. Sly. That cocky little bastard had abandoned all shame and was now openly trying his hand at seduction. And damn was it working. (Not just because Jotaro wanted it to work so badly.)Restraint compromised along with his remaining rationality, Jotaro was all over Josuke in a matter of seconds, pressing his pliant body down into the mattress, hungry lips descending on equally if not even more eager ones. Josuke kissed him back like he was starving, desperate for any bit of contact Jotaro was willing to give, inexperienced but greedy tongue licking into Jotaro’s mouth, trying to mimic what Jotaro himself had demonstrated mere minutes ago. Jotaro was more than happy to push back with equal force and more, dominating the kiss, leading and guiding and Josuke followed, sucking up every oh-so-tiny flick of Jotaro’s tongue like it was the best thing he had ever had. Maybe it was.Josuke clearly had trouble breathing, far too riled up to get into a rhythm even if he had had the practice to know how - Jotaro was his first, wasn’t he? Even just the thought made pure euphoria pump through his veins as his teeth pulled at Josuke’s lip again, earning him a muffled groan. The stubborn brat refused to part for air even when he was clearly close to passing out. It was so stupidly and endearingly like Josuke that Jotaro couldn’t help huffing a quiet chuckle against those sweet, kiss-swollen lips.He eventually had to pull Josuke back by his hair - Josuke’s grip on Jotaro’s own hair was too tight to allow for separation - the sting of which made Josuke groan again, his back arching and hips bucking more insistently into Jotaro’s own. So damn needy. Jotaro loved every second of it.“Breathe, you idiot,” Jotaro growled lowly as he lowered his mouth back onto Josuke’s collarbone, laid bare for Jotaro to mark, to blemish as he so selfishly craved. Fuck reluctance, it was for losers. Let Jotaro be selfish for a bit longer.He relished the way his tone made Josuke shiver uncontrollably, the grip on Jotaro’s hair tightening almost painfully. Or maybe it was the feeling of Jotaro’s breath, followed by lips and teeth against his heated skin, that was driving Josuke crazy?“Jotaro, ngh, Jotaro, touch me… more…” Josuke’s breath was coming in short, wet pants. They left little doubt that he had trouble breathing at all. So desperate for me. So fucking sexy.One of Josuke’s hands was sliding downwards, reaching for Jotaro’s - a weak, trembling attempt at directing his attention down to where Josuke’s leaking erection was undoubtedly straining painfully against his pyjama pants. A clear message. I need you to be the one to do it. I need you to touch me so damn bad, Jotaro. It was more than a mere request. Josuke was begging, had been for a while now.And damn, if that wasn’t an invitation far too tempting to refuse. Now, to find out how much better the real thing was compared to Jotaro’s depraved imagination.Josuke gasped loudly as Jotaro’s hand pushed past the waistband of his pants and underwear to wrap around his throbbing shaft. So wet. If Jotaro didn’t know better, he would have assumed Josuke had cum already. He was undoubtedly close, though, just short of tipping over the edge.Jotaro didn’t bother with unnecessary care as he pulled Josuke’s dick free from its soaked confines, allowing himself to stare openly between their bodies. He hadn’t expected the sight of anything, let alone another man’s penis - of an underage blood relative, dammit - to ever make white-hot arousal shoot through him, overwhelm him, to the point he felt his own cock drip with pre-cum. Josuke wasn’t quite as big as Jotaro himself - who ever was, really - but it didn’t matter, could never, when the sight of Josuke’s flushed dick leaking against his stomach made Jotaro’s mouth water.All those new sensations overtaking him, lust unlike any he had felt before, the all-encompassing need to be closer, to touch, to feel, more, so much more of Josuke… it was a lot. Too much to keep his hand from stroking over Josuke’s throbbing length, his thumb caressing the head and gathering up the latest drop of pre-cum from the slit, making Josuke keen and arch into the touch.“Yes, so good, so damn good, Jotaro-” He had barely even done anything and Josuke looked and sounded like he was about to combust. Still, his half-lidded gaze remained fixed on Jotaro with more adoration than a single human being should be capable of.Fuck, no man should have as much power as Jotaro suddenly found himself wielding. The feeling was simply too ecstatic. And Jotaro was way too far gone, drunk on Josuke’s reactions.It didn’t take much for Josuke to spill all over Jotaro’s hand and the bedsheets - a few uncoordinated strokes, a flick or two of Jotaro’s wrist and Josuke’s moans morphed into a scream that made the heat in Jotaro’s gut boil, not least because it sounded so much like Jotaro’s name ripped from Josuke’s lips, even beyond Josuke’s conscious control. The sound alone was nearly enough to make Jotaro cum in his pants, completely untouched. And wouldn’t that have been embarrassing.Josuke slumped against him as he came down from his high, his body relaxing but not enough so to keep him from clinging to Jotaro like a vice, making a clumsy attempt at wrapping his legs around Jotaro’s torso. As though, even after the experience they had just shared, Josuke didn’t feel close enough to Jotaro yet. And in Jotaro’s hand… that was not what a softening penis felt like. Good grief. Teenagers.Already, Josuke’s hips were bucking up to rub against Jotaro’s own too-hard erection again. Yeah, he should probably do something about that - it was actually getting painful. The friction of Josuke’s grinding provided but a small, temporary relief. Then again… Jotaro had a feeling he knew what else Josuke wanted to do to help relieve them both.“Jotaro, I want you so bad. I want you inside me.” There it was.Frankly, Jotaro hadn’t done much in the ways of sexual intercourse in his 29 years - if he got a coin for every time he had tried, he’d have two. Curiosity and obligation. Anal penetration certainly hadn’t been a part of either encounter and Jotaro hadn’t thought that it would ever be. Hell, he hadn’t even expected there would be a third time at all.But quite a lot had happened today that Jotaro hadn’t bargained for. What was one more? After all, he hadn’t lived his days under a rock these past years - he‘d picked up a thing or two in passing. It would be enough. It had to be. Your last and only chance, remember?There it was again, that damn invading cold. Fuck. Keep it together, coward.“Josuke.” Jotaro tried to keep his voice as steady as possible as he scooped up the mess of cum and sweat gathered on Josuke’s skin and experimentally rubbed it between his thumb and index finger. There was… a lot.When he lifted his gaze to meet Josuke’s, he found those earnest doe eyes looking back at him in quiet anticipation. As though Josuke could tell just from his tone that Jotaro was about to say something important. At this point, he really shouldn’t be surprised. “I need you to be absolutely sure about this.” If we’re going to do this, I need at least one of us to not stand in his own way. And it’s not going to be me.Fortunately, it was a pointless reminder and they both knew it - Josuke wore his heart on his sleeve on a regular day but he had never once been more obvious about what he desired. Even so, Jotaro had to make sure. He had to. Had to force himself to ignore the devious voice of self-sabotage in his head, crashing into him in irregular bursts even now. Always to cruelly remind him that none of this was meant to last.Still… right now, Josuke wanted Jotaro - it couldn’t possibly have been more obvious from his demeanor, his heated stare, the way he was trembling with the need to be closer in whatever way he would get. It had to be enough.All Jotaro had to do was focus - focus on nothing but Josuke’s tired yet determined smile, combined with the fiery glint in his eyes. He was absolutely dazzling. “Never been more sure about anything in my life.”Jotaro wanted to believe him so damn badly.He shouldn’t be feeling relieved about Josuke’s insistence. His heartbeat shouldn’t be picking up at the sight of the sheer melancholic longing in Josuke’s gaze. This was wrong. But damn, it was so easy. Felt so damn right, as long as he had just let himself have it.“Jotaro… You have no idea how much I want this. How many times I’ve imagined this. How many times I’ve dreamed about this. About you. It’s always been you.”No matter how unstable his state of mind, the words still sent a pleasant shiver down Jotaro’s spine. Me too, Josuke, me too. I’ve thought about this too, about being as close to you as I possibly could. I pretend I can help it, that I can control it because anything else scares the shit out of me. But I really can’t.Jotaro’s breath was far from steady when he leaned back to look down at Josuke, reduced to a boneless, panting mess beneath him, eyes half-lidded and expression urgent. Jotaro let his gaze wander downwards, past the undeniably delicious sight of Josuke’s half-hard dick, down to where his spread legs revealed his pink little hole, already clenching and unclenching with the anticipation of being filled.It was all Jotaro could do to keep his hands from trembling - rarely had he been this grateful for his commendable self-control - when he laid his index finger, coated with sticky fluid, against the tight ring of muscle, earning him a shudder and a deep inhale from Josuke.“Go on. Please,” Josuke urged as soon as he picked up on the slightest hint of faltering in Jotaro’s touch.Right. There was no fear, insecurity or hesitation in the way Josuke strained his body just to press against Jotaro’s finger. Yet another sign that Josuke was not the one holding them back.When Jotaro’s first finger pushed inside, his initiative was rewarded with an unrestrained moan that some might consider exaggerated. However, one quick glance upwards told Jotaro that Josuke was just as into it as he sounded, looking completely blissed out already. Jotaro pressed further in, prodding carefully at hot walls of soft flesh. Another moan, deeper this time. Could Josuke really derive this much pleasure from a single finger up his asshole? It seemed impossible.“Add another one - I can take it.” The breathy whisper sure didn’t sound like he could.Jotaro obliged anyway, drawing back only briefly to guide a second finger inside along with the first one. At the loss, Josuke made a sound suspiciously close to a whimper, followed by a deep inhale when the pressure returned twofold.Since the resistance to his actions was nonexistent - quite the opposite, really - Jotaro gradually pushed in deeper. Up to one knuckle, then two, until both fingers were completely enveloped in tight warmth and Josuke’s breath had turned into bated pants. It wasn’t out of pain - if it was, how could Josuke be smiling so easily, his mouth hanging open and his eyelids having long fluttered closed to allow him to focus on the sensation entirely?Encouraged by the good reception, Jotaro let himself prod around Josuke’s insides, ever so softly, scissoring and curling his fingers as he did. Exploring and admiring - not just the feeling of intimacy but also the sight of Josuke, beautiful, pliant, trusting, happy, beneath him.Until, “Ah, Jotaro!”Jotaro stilled his movements in surprise. Had that been a positive reaction? Or a negative one? Which was it?Once again, Josuke seemed to sense his hesitation - to feel it deep in his body, quite literally. “D-don’t stop… that was good. So damn good. Touch that spot again for me. Please, Jotaro.”Josuke didn’t need to tell him twice. With just a few determined rubs over that spot he seemed to like so much, Josuke was reduced to a squirming, panting and shamelessly moaning mess - squirming to get closer to Jotaro, to his fingers, even though they already filled him to the brim.“Another one. Hurry, Jotaro - I’m gonna cum again but I wanna… with you…”Once again, the simplicity with which Josuke voiced his wishes - with which he demanded another finger up his asshole - stunned Jotaro enough to give him pause. That wasn’t the behavior of someone without any experience in the field, he knew firsthand… His chest grew unpleasantly tight at the thought.“You’ve…” He didn’t quite know how to phrase his question - when did he ever - so he ended up trailing off before he had even really begun. Though it didn’t seem like words were all that necessary when Josuke still somehow had the presence of mind to see right through him. Jotaro couldn’t tell for the life of him how he did it.“Done this before? Hell yeah I have. I cum so much harder when I imagine it’s you fucking me instead of my fingers.” Oh.Jotaro’s cock actually twitched at that. Fuck, if there was such a thing as Heaven and Hell - not that he had believed in it in over a decade - Jotaro was sure to rot in that blazing abyss for all eternity.Though if this was what he got in return - Josuke under him, naked, sweating and hard as a board, looking up at Jotaro out of half-lidded eyes filled with all the adoration and lust mankind had to offer - that might just be a fair deal.This time, when Jotaro pushed in one more finger in accordance with Josuke’s wishes, it was with determination. Sure had taken him long enough. Three… Jotaro looked down at where Josuke’s hole had adjusted to fit his fingers, no more and no less. It was one hell of a sexy sight, that was for damn sure. Still, if Jotaro’s cock was supposed to fit in there, that amount of stretching wouldn’t quite suffice. Especially without any actual lube around. (The closest substitute Jotaro owned would be olive oil but that just- no. Josuke would have his head if he so much as tried.)He gradually spread his fingers apart, pulling out and thrusting back in, relishing in the mewls of pleasure his touch elicited from Josuke. If he happened to regularly brush past Josuke’s sweet spot - prostate, was it? - in the process, Jotaro would like to pretend it was on purpose, but alas.“S-so good, Jotaro… But I need more. I need your cock. Please, give it to me?” A glance upward showed that Josuke had lifted himself up onto his elbows at some point to be able to watch Jotaro’s fingers fucking in and out of him at a steady pace, and now to blink up at Jotaro out of pleading, ocean-colored puppy eyes. Cocky little brat - he must have long recognized the tremendous effect he had on Jotaro. The very same one that still had Jotaro leaking puddles into his painfully tight pyjama pants. Honestly, it was nothing short of a miracle he had even lasted until now.But no matter how desperate he might be feeling, he could not afford to mess this up by rushing things along.“Josuke.”Anything else he could have said caught in his throat. Jotaro didn’t quite know himself - he should probably inquire about how Josuke was feeling, clarify again that Josuke was certain he wanted to take this further. Then again, they had long passed the point of no return.From the solemn look that made its way onto Josuke’s face, more solemn than a person with three fingers up their asshole had any business looking, Jotaro could only guess that Josuke had seen right through him. Again. “Jotaro, please.”Good grief. Jotaro huffed in exasperation as he pulled out his fingers, leaving Josuke’s greedy little hole to clench around nothing and making him whimper again. Not so tough now, huh? “Don’t you dare complain if it hurts.”Josuke’s gaze when he met Jotaro’s head on was filled with fiery determination. He’d never been one to back down from a challenge, not with all that pride. “Wouldn’t dream of it.”Smug little bastard. But you like it.Cracking just the tiniest grin at the cheeky voice in the back of his head and how damn right it was - he’d take that one over its cruel sibling any day - Jotaro reached down to shove both his pants and underwear down to his knees in one go. From further up on the bed came the unmistakable sound of Josuke’s breath hitching at the sight of Jotaro’s cock, glistening with pre-cum and standing at its full, impressive size. Holding back a triumphant grin at Josuke’s awed expression was a hard endeavor (literally) and Jotaro was just a man with too many flaws to his name.Jotaro glanced down at the pre-cum dripping down his length, then at the bit of excess cum leaking from Josuke’s hole and decided that this would have to be enough preparation. Josuke either agreed or was in too much of a hurry to care and well - he knew his body better than Jotaro did, especially in that area, so who was Jotaro to question his choices?He let his hand glide up and down his erection a few times, spreading the pre-cum over heated skin and was pleased to discover the lack of resistance. One hand held onto his cock as he guided it in the right direction, the other settled between Josuke’s asscheeks to spread his hole for better access. Damn, what a sight.Jotaro forced himself to pause with his cock lined up with Josuke’s hole, the tip just short of dipping into that alluring warmth, even though he was starting to feel lightheaded from the amount of blood that had rushed down to his groin. Was that even a thing? Jotaro was an expert in marine biology, not the human counterpart, dammit - fuck if he knew. He might be able to identify certain human bones but… this was another matter entirely.“Ready?”Josuke sucked in a trembling breath, his determined gaze holding Jotaro’s captive. “Fuck yes.” Of course he’d say that.Jotaro took a deep breath of his own in one last attempt to calm himself. Swallowed down the heavy lump in his throat. He was really doing this. Even after everything they’d gotten up to in the last half hour, it still didn’t feel quite real.“Let me know if…” If it hurts. If I’m going too fast. If I fuck this up, no matter how hard I try not to. Wouldn’t be a first.“Hey, Jotaro.” Josuke’s serious tone caused Jotaro to look up once more, easing the calculating frown he hadn’t even noticed had overtaken his face. Josuke smiled up at him, steady, certain, devoid of any doubt whatsoever, his big ocean eyes filled with such affection it warmed Jotaro all over. Fuck, this was so much more than Jotaro deserved. Josuke was so much more than he deserved. “Relax. Stop overthinking. It’ll be fine. I trust you.”You should not give your trust quite so easily, boy. This man is entirely clueless about what he is trying to accomplish. There it was again, rearing its ugly head - that dark, malicious voice in Jotaro’s mind that had become more quiet in recent years but had never quite vanished. As though to never let Jotaro forget about the dead that haunted him in more than just his nightmares.“Jotaro.” There was a warm, gentle hand on his chest, unblemished by the calluses of age and battle, right over his racing heart. Wide, gorgeous ocean eyes staring right into his soul. Had Jotaro… been trembling? “Don’t think about anything else. I’m right here. I want you to enjoy this.”Easier said than done. Then again, if it was for Josuke, in return for that look, Jotaro might just manage.However, before trying anything else, Jotaro leaned forward, a hand settling on the back of Josuke’s head to pull him up and into another kiss. It was messy, sure, any attempt at finding a rhythm ruined entirely by their irregular breathing, lips and tongues haphazardly sliding over each other. Nonetheless, it did the job. Much better.At least Jotaro’s panic attack or whatever hadn’t reached down to his still painfully hard cock.“I’m going in,” Jotaro muttered against Josuke’s lips, hot breath puffing over his lips, just before he finally pushed inside. He could clearly feel every inch of Josuke’s puckered hole stretching to fit even just the tip.Overthinking became pretty much impossible after that, at long last. Hell, forming any thought at all, let alone a coherent one, suddenly seemed like a challenge when all of Jotaro’s senses had zeroed in on the searing sensation of heat enveloping the sensitive skin of his penis inch by maddening inch.Josuke was… tight. So incredibly tight. More so than either of the women Jotaro had been with. Not only did it feel good - nothing short of incredible in the most uniquely intimate of ways - the feeling also happened to be fucking addictive. And Jotaro wasn’t even halfway in, forcing himself to press inside agonizingly slow, giving Josuke time to adjust that the brat would probably claim he didn’t need and… every second that passed without Jotaro slamming his entire length inside drove him a little more insane.Damn, if only he didn’t care as much as he did, he might be able to abandon his self-control - it was already hanging by a thin thread.It took all he had not to come right then and there.“Josuke,” he panted out, eyes clenched shut with the effort of holding back. “You okay down there?” It must have been years since the last time his voice had shaken even remotely as much, if ever, but there was simply no space left in Jotaro’s mind to give a shit. He had been so focused on himself that it had taken him until now to notice the needy moans spilling from Josuke’s mouth and fuck, had he been missing out. Those must be the lewdest sounds Jotaro had ever heard. Somehow, they turned him on even more, as much as he had thought it impossible.“Don’t hold back - I’m fine. Great, actually.”Jotaro’s eyes blinked open to the sight of another smile on Josuke’s lips, wide and real and so happy. His hand was cradling Jotaro’s jaw - Jotaro must have clenched it at some point - his thumb gently easing the tension out of Jotaro’s agitated muscles. Jotaro loved him so fucking much.“Okay.”They both groaned in a mixture of pleasure and relief when Jotaro pushed further inside, faster this time, and finally bottomed out, Josuke’s muscular asscheeks fitting snugly against Jotaro’s pelvis. If Jotaro hadn’t currently been overwhelmed by blissful warmth, a physical sensation unlike and better than any he had ever experienced, he would have taken a minute to question how the hell Josuke was able to accommodate his size at all. Biology couldn’t have intended any of this, could it?“Is this alright?” he forced himself to pant out, fighting the jittery urge to move, unsure where it came from in the first place - the near-compulsive need to pull back and pound into Josuke with all the force he could muster, to chase his relief, lift himself further up on his ecstatic high. But again, he couldn’t. He’d rather fight another torturous battle against DIO and lose than hurt Josuke.“Better than alright,” Josuke huffed back, predictably enough. Jotaro could already feel him grinding back against his crotch, looking for more proximity where there was not even a millimeter of space left between them. “You gonna wait till I fall asleep over here or will you start moving?”A quick glance downwards, predictably enough, showed Josuke smirking up at him. Brat.“Good grief,” Jotaro muttered, luring a breathy laugh out of Josuke.Just to spite that cocky little bastard, he pulled out entirely - Josuke whined in protest at the loss - before slamming back into that tight heat in one go, feeling Josuke’s body make way for him as he did. Fuck, that felt amazing. Except, he wasn’t the only one groaning in deep satisfaction at the sensation. “Yes, just like that…”Josuke’s earlier reactions should have told Jotaro that this would be more of a reward than a punishment to him - no, Jotaro shouldn’t be happy about that. This was the exact reason why he couldn’t deny Josuke anything anymore, responsibilities be damned. He’d grown way too soft.So of course he obeyed Josuke’s demand, pulling out almost completely before thrusting back inside with enough force to make the wet slapping sound of skin against skin vibrate through the entire bedroom. It mixed beautifully with Josuke’s moans that only seemed to grow in volume and frequency and with the breathy whines that were unmistakably Jotaro’s name. Over and over, like a prayer.Jotaro had never thought it possible that sex could feel this good, that anything could feel this good, so infinitely much better than he deserved, so euphoric, so ethereal that he definitely wasn’t going to last, not for more than another few seconds, even though they had only just started.But even so, he couldn’t stop his hands from wandering up to Josuke’s hips and taking a firm grip right there, of deliciously soft and pliant flesh, guiding Josuke’s haphazard attempts at meeting Jotaro’s trusts halfway, always searching for more - more contact, more friction, more sensation. Jotaro would never dare deny him either.Josuke looked as much like a mess as Jotaro felt, all thoughtless instinct and desire, sinful sounds and desperate calls, his leaking dick bouncing wildly with the force of every thrust, his flawless skin coated with sweat, tears of pleasure falling from his eyes, his pompadour ruined beyond recognition, dark hair clinging to his forehead like a second skin.Jotaro’s hands were full, still holding onto Josuke’s hips for leverage and undoubtedly working bruises into his unbelievably silky skin. Instead, it was big purple fingers that brushed Josuke’s stray bangs out of his eyes and wiped his tears. Hands with the power to crush the fiercest opponents suddenly wielded more gentleness than Jotaro thought himself capable of, ironic as it was. Star Platinum was still an extension of himself, after all. Jotaro felt it clearly in his palms when Josuke nuzzled into the stand’s hand.Star Platinum disappeared to make space for Jotaro to lean in for another kiss as he picked up his pace, mercilessly pounding into Josuke’s prostate and making him scream against Jotaro’s lips. “Jotaro, I’m close, so close, oh Jotaro-”He wasn’t the only one.“Hold me,” Josuke demanded into a kiss that was more heated breaths into each other’s mouths than anything else. “I want to see your face right in front of me when I cum.”As it happened, Josuke wasn’t the only one craving that. Jotaro, for one, wanted to commit the face of Josuke at the peak of ecstasy to memory, burn it into his mind to remember for however long he had left. To keep him grounded. To keep him going.When Josuke reached out to embrace as much of him as he could get his hands on, Jotaro wound his arms around Josuke’s back as well. He pulled Josuke in even more, held him close, cradled him to his chest with the sincerity and reverence he deserved - Josuke deserved so much more than this, so much more than Jotaro could give. And yet Jotaro owed Josuke his everything in return for all that honest and unconditional adoration.“Jotaro.” Even just the quiet mumble of Josuke’s voice in his ear was enough to make shivers run down Jotaro’s spine. “I love you so much. I’ve loved you for months. I’m so, so fucking deep in love with you. Jotaro.”Jotaro clenched his eyes shut as the words washed over him - so incredibly heavy, so meaningful, so much more than… So much more than you’re able to understand yet. Maybe ever. You’re young, Josuke, but even more than that you’re fickle - you’re dramatic, you’re reckless. You don’t understand the true weight of what you’re saying, not yet. You don’t understand that if this was something you truly meant, you wouldn’t be able to recover. At least I wouldn’t be. I won’t be, ever. But it doesn’t matter - I’m already broken beyond repair anyway. I don’t want you to ever relate to any of that, Josuke, I love you way too much for that.
No, don’t cry now. Don’t ruin the moment like you ruin everything else.
Jotaro somehow managed to keep thrusting, even though a good part of his strength was directed towards forcing back the tears threatening to spill from his eyes. Everything after that was a blur - Jotaro would have liked to pretend that it was simply because he was fast approaching his orgasm. The details of the hickey he sucked into Josuke’s skin, just beneath his jaw, of how he breathed Josuke’s name against heated skin when he felt Josuke’s insides clench around his cock, when Josuke’s loudest scream yet vibrated through him, driving him over the edge and into the abyss as well, forcing a guttural groan out of him - all of that was much too hazy for Jotaro’s liking.Clear as day, however, was the sight of Josuke throwing his head back in utter bliss, eyes closed and lips pulled up into a huge grin.The two of them slumped into each other, Jotaro draped over Josuke’s body like a blanket - the heaviest blanket in existence, probably. But Josuke didn’t even complain.Their energy was used up almost completely. Jotaro couldn’t remember the last time weariness had felt so good but he would be willing to bet that the answer was simply never.Josuke didn’t let go of him, fighting to hold on even as his body went entirely limp from post-nut exhaustion, all tension leaving him at once. The moment his strength returned, his arms wrapped securely around Jotaro, his cheek pressed against Jotaro’s chest, just above his steady heartbeat. As though even now, even while having Jotaro all over him, inside him, he needed to feel Jotaro’s life right under his fingertips to be completely reassured. Jotaro hated how much he related to the feeling. So he had already passed on part of his curse to Josuke, huh?Jotaro somehow managed to pull out, despite the vice grip Josuke had on him, earning himself a mewl of protest, which, seriously? Good grief.He tried to appease Josuke by wrapping his arms around him - who was he kidding, he was doing it to satisfy his own craving for proximity first and foremost, just one more time. The all-encompassing craving to hold Josuke tightly, protectively, even though Jotaro knew all too well that it could never be enough to shield Josuke from that world of pain. He had tried, he really had. At least he would be able to spare Josuke any further suffering if he…“Don’t send me back to Morioh.” Josuke might know Jotaro well enough to guess his thoughts sometimes but that was just uncanny. “I know you were going to, don’t even try to deny it.”No. Jotaro couldn’t have this conversation now. Why not let him ignore the rest of the world for a bit longer? Not that that part had ever worked out well for him.Still, was it really too much to ask for just another moment of peaceful relief before the darkness swallowed him for good?“Josuke…”“I won’t go. You can’t make me.” Jotaro couldn’t find it in his wounded, aching heart to correct him. Especially when he could tell from the shakiness in Josuke’s voice that Josuke was about to add another wet patch to his skin. Not that it mattered in his current state. Here he was, having sworn to keep Josuke safe from any more pain and yet… yet he had managed to fuck up all over again.“We both knew what we were signing up for when I came to live with you. I knew it would be risky. You knew you might get me involved. But we did it anyway. You can’t take all that back now. You can’t.”Josuke’s declaration was followed by silence - a tense moment of Jotaro battling his inner demons. Selfishness, irresponsibility, longing. He didn’t want to return to that darkness. And if he had to either way, at least he didn’t want to be alone in it.Was it too much to ask? Yes. But after all they had been through, after all the times he had already given in to Josuke and, most recently, his overwhelming need to be with Josuke, Jotaro should have known it was a losing battle. Had been all along, ever since that first concession he had made by letting, no, inviting Josuke back into his life with open arms. Weak. A mistake. And yet, so inherently human.“Okay.”Josuke’s head shot up in surprise, his incredulous gaze finding Jotaro’s pointedly expressionless one. His face was flushed, mesmerizing ocean eyes bright with hope, a beautiful grin beginning to form on his lips and spreading across his face in that semi-impossible Josuke way. “Really?”He clearly hadn’t expected Jotaro to be so easily convinced. Well, neither had Jotaro, after all that struggling. At least Josuke was still oblivious to the extent of his impact on Jotaro, if nothing else.“Really.”It would be a lie to claim Jotaro wasn’t flooded by pleasant warmth at the way that single word made Josuke light up like a Christmas tree. If, under the cover of the night, Jotaro couldn’t help smiling a bit too, wider than he usually allowed himself to, it was no one’s business but his own.“So you really moved to the opposite side of the world just to live with me?” It was an unnecessary question - Jotaro knew the answer. But well, that was just one more instance in which he simply couldn’t help himself.Josuke blushed a charming crimson at having been caught but overall looked pretty pleased with himself. “Don’t forget, I’m a…”“A romantic, I know.”Josuke nodded solemnly. “A full-fledged one.” And clearly proud of it to boot. Good grief. Just what had Jotaro gotten himself into.Not for the first time, Jotaro found himself wondering how Josuke was handling this development in their relationship with such ease, no insecurity in sight. Despite the severity of the line they had just crossed - taken a running jump over, more like. Despite the fact that Josuke was much more of a people-pleaser than he liked to admit.Either he had done enough agonizing in advance to have fully accepted what he wanted along with all the inevitable consequences, or maybe he felt like half the world was a big enough distance away from the prying eyes of those whose opinion he cared about. Well, everyone other than Jotaro himself.Or maybe, just maybe, Josuke had just somehow come to the conclusion that Jotaro was worth it all. However the fuck that had happened.In the end, did it really matter? No matter the journey there, Josuke was stuck with him now. And wouldn’t try to change that fact anytime soon if he knew what was good for him. Jotaro sure as hell wouldn’t.…But damn, he was so going to regret this, wasn’t he.