Demonslayer X Male Reader Oneshots Sanemi x Reader (Part 4)

The next few days I spent on my toes, hyper aware of what I said and did around Sanemi to prove I could be more than a liability. I didn’t walk outside until I told him where I was going and how long I’d be out. Eventually, it became a habit to tell him everything I was doing, and it grew more enjoyable, something sacred and special to me that I kept close to my heart.

Some nights, my exhausted mind would play scenes of us laying on the hood of a car and watching the stars, our hands intertwined despite the fact we barely ever touched in reality. It was the only thing I kept to myself anymore; these guilty pleasure dreams of a world that would never come to pass. Each time I woke up from them, I had to unlearn all the affection that was never there in the first place.

“I’m gonna go onto the roof to warm up in the sun. It’s fucking freezing in here,” I groaned with an overdramatic shiver to accentuate my point as if the goosebumps on my arms weren’t proof enough. I strapped my knife to my thigh and headed to the sketchy rusted ladder, grabbing one of the cold rungs in my hand before I heard his steps behind me.

“I’m coming with. Hurry up,” he grumbled in a tone that implied he had woken up only minutes before me and was still shaking off the grogginess of sleep as well. I tried not to let my excitement show that this could be a rare bonding moment between us while dragging myself up the ladder one pull at a time, his weight keeping the metal from rattling.

The warmth of light cascaded across my skin while I squinted at the sunrise, moving to sit on the roof of the warehouse and tugging my jacket tight around my shoulders. For once, I didn’t look down to check if there were infected nearby, letting myself enjoy this with high spirits. With winter coming so soon, I knew we had a tough time ahead of us, more so than usual with a million and one problems. But I was looking forward to waking up early to bask in the warmth of the sun each morning with him despite it all.

“I don’t know how you put up with me,” I heard him mutter beside me, sitting closer than I had first realized. Our knees barely brushed from where we enjoyed the light together. With a subtle glance, I saw him up close for one of the very few times he let me. The scars along his face were deep and long faded, a grayness to his hair that could’ve been genetics but most likely came from stress. He was beautiful in an ‘end of the world’ kind of way.

“The same way you put up with me I guess,” shrugging with indifference. I didn’t tell him that I was scared of being alone again or how much it would kill me to be without him. Perhaps he already knew that but thankfully he didn’t mention it in the brief silence between us that felt more loaded than a gun.

“My brother said something similar once…” I was caught off guard instantly, trying not to let my surprise that he had opened up even the slightest bit in fear that he would clam up again in defense. Instead, I nodded slowly, pretending I knew all this already. But of course, he had a family before, we all did. I could only assume what happened to them that led to him traveling alone before I found him. Memories of my own mother came back to me right then, making me swallow hard.

Despite the itch along my arms to ask him endless questions and mistaking his temporary vulnerability as camaraderie, I kept quiet. I had never been so hateful towards the idea of silence though. In a world where sound was deadly and conversation was a weapon and not its old sacred treasure of humanity, I wanted to sit with this man somewhere and talk for hours without stopping. He would hate it and everything would be perfect.

“You scare me, y’know that?” he whispered under his breath in a way that had me closing my eyes to reel myself back in. When I opened them to look up at him with confusion, I was met with the rare sight of him staring right back at me instead of through me. I was no longer a ghost in this sunlight with him.

“I don’t understand,” I fought back the urge to tilt my head, a movement I didn’t need him scrutinizing right now. I needed him to focus on this moment, on his words, his intentions. Please, he can’t withdraw from me now. We’ve come so far, and I’ve worked too hard to lose this. I grasped the material of my pants to keep myself still. Trying to step quietly around this conversation like a curious cat to a wounded rabbit.

“You’re a weakness I can’t get rid of. I promised myself no attachments. Not after what happened to my family. It’s only a matter of time before our luck runs out and we die,” he huffed bitterly, the warmth of his breath coming off in tendrils of steam around the cold air. “I don’t want to be around you when you die…”

I blinked. Once. Twice. My mouth opened before closing, deciding what I could say that would’ve helped in some way. But it was true, we were destined to die sooner rather than later. And yet with that knowledge, I was smiling despite myself, giddy with the idea that he’d miss me if my time came first.

“So, you’re saying you’d miss me?” I gently elbowed his side, that first step towards the wounded rabbit. He didn’t run, his nose scrunching at the gesture. I couldn’t help starting to laugh at the absurdity of it all. The end of the world, sitting in the sun and finding comfort in this stranger who I barely knew, bonding over the looming threat of our deaths.

“I guess so,” he shrugged with indifference, looking away as if trying to spot any sort of trouble down below on the ground. I could see the pink at the tips of his ears even while he hid his face. I couldn’t have felt more cherished since the world first ended then right then.