Chapter Text
Gojo pops up behind her one day while she is typing away at her computer -reports that she could do in her sleep at this point seeing how they rarely differ from the thousand others that threaten to overwhelm her cramped desk.
“What's that?”
“A report on one of the bodies that Nanami found,” She glanced up, catching his eyes not on her screen but by the object next to her, that still held her burning cigarette. She paused in her work, picked it up and flicked off the ash. “Silly of me to assume you were interested in work. It's clearly an ash tray.”
“It's ugly.”
Shoko frowned. “I made it.”
“...It's beautiful. Such lovely craft work.” He corrected himself, giving her a big smile that she gave into temptation to ruin by blowing smoke rings in his face. Idiot just kept smiling. “Who painted it? Your three year old niece? Why is it so blotchy?”
“Rude. She's four and no. I did that too.”
“Ah.”
There's growing silence where Gojo fidgets like a child, uneasy in the lack of conversation where he clearly wants to ask more questions but worries he's already pissed her off (he has). He learned a long time ago that Shoko does in fact have a limit for his nonsense and once she reaches it, the consequences are dire.
His hair had been an ugly green color for a month.
Shoko isn't that annoyed, so she turns back to her work and says, “Go on. Ask.”
“You made it? Where? Why? When? I thought they had you chained up in here. In fact I distinctly remember Yaga even got them to install a vending machine for cigarettes in the hall. Those aren't even legal anymore are they?”
“First off, they are and second he did that because he lost a bet with me.”
Shoko can actually see the eagerness blossom in his eyes like an anime character, she shuts it down quickly.
“No. I'm not telling you what.”
“Shoko. Come on. Please? I need to know. I'll die if I don't. Was it about me? About Nanami? Did he finally ask out that cute bakery chick?”
“Third,” She starts, moving on. “I got a free coupon the mail for a pottery class in my neighborhood. The first class was free, but I liked it so much I decided to keep going. It helps me unwind. Plus. Free ash trays for life.”
“I can't see you....making pottery.”
Shoko shrugs, indifferent to lackluster view of her hobbies. It's not like she was the most art driven person in the world. Her favorite color was black and she could barely draw a decent stick figure. Although drunk Shoko had a certain way with a black sharpie. Gojo could attest to this, having been the victim many times.
“Well, no one can see Yoshinobu being a Taylor Swift fan either but you'd be surprised.”
“What?”
“Oh, hey look at that. Lunch time.” Shoko casually announces as she stands up and grabs her bag, quickly leaving Gojo in the dust. Metaphorically and physically, it takes an extended amount of time for his brain to catch up to her words. To process them. She takes that time to speed walk out of the building.
“Wait, Shoko! Is that what the bet was?!”
It's honestly her fault to assume she had managed to distract him with the bet.
“Hey Shoko-chan~!” Gojo sings out from across the street where her pottery class is located. It's a small hole in the wall type of building that was once a factory or something, reconverted into a local community center. Part of her liked the class because it was close to home and also small enough that no one really bothered to talk with each other. Shoko liked that part a lot.
“Go home.” She tells him, “Go home now and I won't tell Megumi that you're the one who broke his phone trying to record a tik tok video.”
“Rude.”
“Yup. Rude and armed with a life-time of embarrassing stories of your youth. Think they will get a kick outta that time you ended up licking a metal pole in the middle of winter?”
“That was on a bet made by you!”
“Yeah, and it makes for a lovely Christmas card for all our coworkers. Nanami will probably frame it.”
“Rude and mean and...gate keeping.” Gojo accuses, pointing at her, “I can join if I want to.”
Shoko plucks the glasses right off his face -she knows for a fact that she is literally the only person in the universe who can. Anyone else would have been blocked by his barrier, or he would have ducked away on instinct. Only Shoko can reach up, steal the frames and look into his intense eyes.
“Real reason loser or I steal these for my next art project.”
“I'm bored. Come on, gimme them back.” He whines, reaching to steal them back but she ducks. Hiding the shades behind her back, “Maybe I just wanted to hang out. We haven't hung out in forever!”
“Ah. That's true.” She is thrown a little off by both the truth in his words and the unguarded look of embarrassment in his gaze. Shoko hands the glasses back and hates that her hands feel distinctly tingly by the mutual touching of skin. “You could have just asked. To hang out I mean. We could have gone to get drinks or whatever, not this. Why do you even want to do pottery?”
Gojo fixed his glasses, “Honestly, I'm so good at everything, why not try my hand at this?”
Ah, there it is.
Shoko laughs. Maybe this will be fun.
“Hey. Hey. Shoko. Shoooooko. Shoko look. Look at me.” Gojo whispers loudly, he's right next to her. Looming angrily over his own mess of a 'vase' -that looks more like a punched curse made of mud. “Shoko, what am I doing wrong? You made it look easy. Give me a hand. Don't gatekeep.”
Shoko who is busy making her own vase, (which might not be smooth, but at least it's vaguely vase shape.) shakes her head.
“I told you to pay attention, Gojo. It's not like you'll be graded, chill out. Make an abstract piece of art instead.”
“...That's just your way of saying I'm terrible and should just give up.”
Shoko ignores him, focusing on making her vase taller by stroking the clay upwards.
“...it looks like you are stroking a dick.”
“I know. Shut up.” She snaps.
“Look what I made!”
Shoko makes the mistake of looking over, to see that Gojo has in fact, made a rather large clay dick. Without thinking -to preserve her chances of not being banned for life- she snakes a hand out and breaks it to pieces, Gojo squeaks like it was his junk personally that she just smashed and starts to push at her hands away.
“What the hell, that was art!”
“I will do the same to you for real, Gojo.” She hisses, “I want to be able to show my face here again.”
“Unfair. You are the one who inspired me- Ow! Shoko! Did you just throw clay at me? Is it in my hair?”
“Let me try this at least once, Shoko.”
“No.”
“Come on. Just for a second.”
“Try it and suffer.”
“...I'll buy you dinner after this.”
“...I want fancy grilled meat and all the beer I can drink.”
“Deal!”
Gojo swooped in behind her, snuggling in to rest his head on her own as his hands moved under her own in the swirling clay before them. For a second, it was actually pretty nice, to have his warmth surround her as he hummed and they worked together.
“When was the last time you washed your hair, Shoko? It smells like cigarettes.”
Shoko shoved both her elbows viciously into his gut and smirked with satisfaction as he nosily fell off.
By the end of it, she's exhausted but pleased with her pink medium sized vase. It's a little funky in shape, but it's cute. It might be a good piece to put in the window at home. She's waiting for Gojo to appear outside the building, smoking and waving softly at those who are also leaving. He's the last of the group to pop out, with a bag in hand.
“Here.” He hands it to her. She blinks at the gift but peers inside. It's the piece he was working on all day, a little bright blue ash tray -that's more of a wobbly plate than anything but Shoko smiles.
“It's cute. Thanks.”
“Yeah, well, of course it is. I made it for you.”
“Thanks.” She says again, blushing at the sincerity. A rare thing with him. “What's the special occasion? It's not my birthday for a couple of months.”
She usually gives him a week's notice to that. He's good at casual gifts (money does wonders for gift giving) but Shoko's always been easy in that regard. She would be happy with a pack of cigarettes as she would be with a new purse. This little ashtray, made by his own hands feels steeped in care, making her a little awkward to receive it without prompt. Should she have made something for him?
“No reason.” Gojo says, but she's not sure she believes him. He's doing that thing where he leans back on his heels and stretches out his spine. “Come on, I promised you dinner, didn't I?”
Shoko is tempted to push, but her stomach makes a loud sound in reply.
“I guess that's one way to answer.” He remarks, “You can eat your weight in beef tonight!”
Shoko laughs and sneaks her arm through his, letting him lead her to dinner. She can bug him about the meaning of the surprised gift later.
"Ready to go broke?"
"For you? Always."