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The first time Izuku and Katsuki share a bed, they’re four years old. Katsuki’s parents have to go out of town and they talked to Izuku’s mom and now Izuku and Katsuki get to have a sleepover!
It’s so much fun–Izuku’s never had a sleepover before!
They eat dinner together and they each get to have a whole mochi and then they watch an All Might movie and then they play with Izuku’s All Might figurines in the bath. Then, when they start to have yawn attacks, Mom bundles them into their pajamas, settles them on Izuku’s futon, and tucks them in.
“Good night, boys,” Mom says, leaving his bedroom door cracked open just a little. Izuku’s not scared–he has a cool night-light that keeps the dark scaries away–but he knows Mom likes to check in on him and sometimes she even sneaks in before she goes to bed and she kisses his forehead and rubs his back and that is really nice.
“Quit moving around so much,” Katsuki grumbles, tugging at the covers.
Oh! Izuku didn’t think he was moving at all, but now he feels bad. Before Katsuki's parents dropped him off, Mom told Izuku to be on his best behavior and to treat Katsuki well since he is their guest. So, because Izuku wants to be good and because Katsuki is his friend and he wants to make him happy, Izuku pulls his limbs in straight and lies still, like a little sardine in the can. “Sorry, Kacchan.”
“It's okay. Your futon is small.”
“Well, I'm small, so it's the perfect size for me! Um, but maybe not for you and me.”
“Maybe you should get a big one if you want to have sleepovers.”
“Yeah, that’s a good idea! I'll ask my mom tomorrow, and maybe then we could have more sleepovers if you want to.”
“Okay,” Katsuki says, yawning. Izuku yawns, too.
They stop talking after that, which is okay, since they're supposed to be sleeping. The room is quiet except for the soft sounds of their breathing. The nightlight casts pale gold and blue stars on the wall like magic sparkles. Through the cracked-open door, he thinks he can hear Mom in the kitchen washing dishes.
Izuku looks over and sees Katsuki holding the blanket up to his chin. He is looking at the ceiling. “Do you miss your mom and dad?” Izuku asks him.
Katsuki frowns. “No.”
“It's okay if you do. I would really miss my mom if I was at your house.”
“I'll see them tomorrow,” Katsuki says, stubborn, his bottom lip curling. “So I don't miss them!”
Okay, Izuku thinks, but he still worries. He thinks maybe Katsuki does miss his mom and dad and doesn't want to say. Sometimes he calls Izuku a baby when he cries and Mom says that's what that word means, stubborn: when you don't cry even if your body wants to.
Slowly, so as to not wriggle too far out of his sardine shape, he grabs his All Might plushie that rolled away from the futon and arranges it beneath the blanket between them.
“You can cuddle All Might if you want,” Izuku whispers. He yawns so big that it hurts his mouth. They really did have a long day: he's so tired! “He helps me sleep sometimes and Mom says he protects my dreams so that they're always good dreams and I think it works really good. So he'll protect your dreams, too.”
Katsuki is so quiet that Izuku thinks he's fallen asleep, which is good. He knew All Might would help–he always does. Except Katsuki startles him a little when he says, suddenly, “Thanks, ‘Zuku.”
It makes Izuku smile. “You're welcome, Kacchan.”
Their second grade class is taking an overnight trip to a national park, and Izuku is excited. It's a whole hour away which is going to feel like
forever
, but they are going to get to do so many cool things: identify all the different trees and bugs that they see, and learn more about the water cycle, and there isn't any pollution in the sky so they can even look at the stars at night and see constellations!
Well, Izuku is excited until his class gathers in their big cabin and he sees who he has to share a futon with.
Katsuki used to be his friend until he learned that Izuku is quirkless, and now it's like he's a different person, like in the All Might and Silver Wave team-up series where aliens came and took over their bodies. A bodysnatcher. Izuku had even asked him once, if he was secretly a bodysnatcher and if that's why he acted so mean now, but Katsuki pushed him down and told him to go away instead of explicitly saying no , so it's not like he had discounted his theory…
“What are you muttering about now, stupid,” Katsuki snaps, throwing his bag onto the tatami near their futon.
Izuku doesn't want to be pushed again, so he says, “Um, nothing,” and shuffles things around in his own bag until Katsuki scoffs and leaves to join his friends. Snickering and teasing whispers soon follow.
It’s fine. There are other things to focus on, Izuku reassures himself, pulling out his notebook and his favorite pencil. They're going to take a walk to the creek first and Izuku wants to write down everything .
By the time the sun goes down, his wrist hurts and his notebook is full of tracings of leaves and bark and drawings of bugs and it's a little wet at the corner where he dropped it near the water, but he was able to check out an interesting part of the creek where the water built up to form a small dam, and that had been really cool! He even wrote down some of the stories the teacher had been telling about the different shapes and symbols the stars made and how important they were to the ancient people of Japan.
At the end of the day, face scrubbed and teeth brushed and thoroughly exhausted, Izuku flops down onto their empty futon and makes sure to keep to his side. At least it's bigger than the one they shared as little kids. The cabin is filled with the quiet sounds of his classmates situating themselves for bed, teachers and parent volunteers making sure everybody's accounted for. Some of his classmates are still washing up, and Izuku tells himself to wait for Katsuki, but he drifts off before he's even aware that his eyes are shut.
He dreams.
Sometimes his dreams are fun: he's All Might's sidekick and they're kicking villain butt, or his dad comes home and they go to the zoo and look at all the cool animals, or he and his mom are flying on a dragon made of mochi. And even though they feel so real sometimes, he knows those are dreams because they're so impossible.
This one, though, feels scary. Real. He's trapped in a dark and endless space. He can't move his arms or his legs. The place in his chest where he knows his quirk should be is cold and empty. Again and again he reaches for it, but there's nothing there, there was never anything there, there won't ever be anything there . He's trapped, he can't move, he's stuck here forever–
A sharp pain knocks him free.
Heart racing, Izuku gasps and sits up.
Dream.
He was just dreaming. He can move his arms and legs and he's sweating beneath his pajamas and Katsuki is glaring up at him in the dark and everything's fine.
“You were whining and crying too loud,” Katsuki hisses. “Shut the hell up. Some of us are trying to sleep.”
“You shouldn't say swear words,” Izuku says automatically, looking to where their teacher is sleeping next to the door.
“Hell isn't a swear, it's a place, and I don't even care!”
Izuku places a hand to his chest. Breathing comes easier. It doesn't make sense–he hates arguing with Katsuki, it makes him feel sad and makes him miss the time they were friends–but it's so normal that it helps him calm down. “I had a bad dream,” he whispers.
“I didn't ask,” Katsuki grumbles, kicking out at Izuku's leg until he scoots it over.
“It was really scary, Kacchan. I, um, I was trapped in this dark, empty space and I was supposed to have a quirk and it wasn't there and I couldn't get myself out.”
“Well, congrats, you're living your miserable quirkless dream, idiot. Now leave me alone. ” He turns his back on Izuku and takes most of the blanket with him.
“Boys, is everything okay down there?” Ms. Oyama calls quietly, leaning up on her elbows and looking down the row of children to Izuku, still sitting up. “Midoriya?”
“I'm okay, s-sorry, Ms. Oyama,” he manages to say. The tears in his eyes turn her face wobbly, but she seems to be satisfied because she lays back down after telling him to go back to sleep.
He lays down, too.
The sob stuck in his throat burns. He turns his face into his pillow to hide the hiccuping sound of his crying.
“And this is the only room they had,” Katsuki asks, standing just behind Izuku in the open doorway of the hotel, his voice dry and full of doubt.
As if Izuku asked for this!
As if Izuku specifically arranged a week-long internship opportunity in Hiroshima and then gave Shoto the flu so he couldn't join them, and then Izuku somehow made it blizzard so that their train ride home to U.A. was canceled and all outgoing ferries were booked solid and the hotel vacancy they'd managed to find was a closet-sized room with only one bed.
Yeah, because that's the dream: being stuck in a room entirely too small with someone who so deeply hates him and being made to either share the bed or kill one another over the rights to sleep in it.
“Move, Deku.” Katsuki pushes him into the room so that he can get out of the hallway. The door clicks shut behind them with finality. “Situation's not gonna change just because you stare at it hard enough.”
“Doesn’t hurt to try,” Izuku mumbles. The radiator struggles; the room is cold, but he thinks he’ll be comfortable enough in his hoodie and jeans, so he drops his bookbag and shucks his coat. He hangs it on one of the wall hooks, kicks his shoes off, and lines them up on the smallest shoe rack he's ever seen.
This is like a hotel room for ants. Small everything: a small window on the far wall, a small desk and chair shoved into the corner, a small bathroom squeezed into the opposite corner, and then a small bed in the remaining space in the middle.
“I'll sleep on the floor,” Katsuki grumbles, hanging his coat up on the second hook.
“Knock yourself out, Kacchan,” Izuku sighs. He flops back onto the bed and freezes when the frame creaks dangerously. He and Katsuki hold eye contact while they wait to see if the old piece of furniture is about to break.
When it seems Izuku is safe, Katsuki snorts and shakes his head. “You're so fuckin’ stupid. I'm gonna go find something to eat. Don't wait up.”
“Get me something!”
“No!”
The door closes.
“Whatever,” Izuku huffs into the empty room. It's not silent–there's a baby crying in the room next door, someone speaking loudly on their phone in the hallway, what sounds like an elephant thumping around upstairs–but the blizzard raging outside the window brings a quiet hush to the world.
He gets comfy in his hoodie and reads an article on his phone. Between one word and the next, he's out like a light.
A long, drawn groan wakes him.
He thinks maybe it's another hotel neighbor, but then he hears it again, closer, agonized, somewhere to his left. He blinks into the pale, snow-white moonlight and peers over the side of the bed to see Katsuki, lying on his back on the floor, head pillowed on his uniform jacket, fast asleep.
It doesn't look like a peaceful sleep. He's frowning, clenching his jaw, breathing short and choppy. Flint-light sparks dance in the air above his palms. It's this that makes Izuku reach out—otherwise he'd leave him be, all too aware of Katsuki's tendency to lash out, to recoil every time Izuku dares draw close, but the last thing they need is to accidentally light the hotel on fire in the middle of a blizzard—
“Kacchan, you're okay,” Izuku whispers, reaching a tentative hand for Katsuki's shoulder. Tap-tap.
As soon as his fingers make contact, Katsuki snaps awake and shoves a glowing hand in Izuku's face. Danger Sense moves his body before he's consciously aware of the threat: he wraps his own hand around Katsuki's wrist and squeezes hard.
“Kacchan, you're fine, you’re alright,” Izuku says, low and steady, watching the tension drain from that sleepy, angry, confused face. “You were just having a bad dream.”
The sparks die off. The room goes dark.
Katsuki snatches his hand back. “Don't touch me. I wasn't having a bad dream . That's kid shit.”
Still lying on his stomach, Izuku puts his hands on the bed and his chin on his knuckles. It's clear Katsuki is trying for normalcy, and it makes his heart hurt. He wishes… god, he wishes Katsuki would just talk to him.
Still, if he'd rather pretend things are fine, then Izuku can do that. “I didn't think you hated me enough to actually sleep on the floor.”
“Shut up,” Katsuki says, dropping onto his back. He stares up at the shadow of snowfall on the walls.
“You, um. I'm gonna just… close my eyes. And try to go back to sleep.” The words fall so clumsily from Izuku's mouth, despite his attempt at subtlety. He turns onto his back, too, and closes his eyes. “And you can come lay down up here, alright? There's enough room for us both. I won't even know. I'll be so asleep.”
Every one of Izuku's senses are on alert. It has to be so obvious that he's awake–he's lying stiff as a board, hands folded on his stomach, white-knuckling his own fingers–but he has to stay up until he knows Katsuki's alright, whether he chooses to stay on the floor or not.
Izuku hopes he doesn't stay down there. They'd been so snippy with one another when they learned the snow storm would be stranding them in Hiroshima, so when Katsuki said he'd take the floor, Izuku didn't have any energy left to argue with him about it. Maybe he should have.
Would that have just made things worse?
Before he can worry himself into a spiral, he hears a rustling at his side. Katsuki's moving—to his feet, around the bed. The thin blanket is pulled back. The bed groans with the added weight, complaining especially loud when Katsuki shifts until he's somewhat comfortable.
If he weren't pretending to be asleep, Izuku would take a victory lap around the entire building.
“I don't hate you, Deku,” Katsuki says, low. “You just piss me off.”
Heart tripping from joy into surprise, Izuku can't stop his sharp, audible inhale. Again, trying not to startle the skittish boy next to him, he whispers, “What a huge distinction.”
“I thought you were asleep.”
“Honk-shoo,” Izuku says, pretending to snore.
And then, for maybe twenty minutes, that's it.
The baby in the next room over starts crying again. A man's deep voice hushes them, sings a lullaby in a steady, sweet baritone. It’s a lovely voice. There's got to be some kind of quirk involved, Izuku thinks, his eyelids growing heavy, his breath slowing. The song feels like it's slipping syrup-slow through his veins.
Maybe Katsuki feels it too, because he whispers, “The League captured me again. In my dream.”
“S'okay, Kacchan,” Izuku says, fighting the urge to reach over to, what, pat Katsuki on the shoulder again, risk getting his hand bitten off? He decides to look over instead, feeling a jolt of surprise to see Katsuki already looking back. “I won't let them take you again.”
Katsuki doesn't say, Sure, nerd , or, Don't make promises you can't keep, or even, I wouldn't trust you to keep anybody safe from anything, dumb Deku, you walking disaster.
Instead, he nods.
Just a nod.
But it means, Okay. It means , I believe you. It means, I trust you.
Unsure what might come of his own mouth—emotional sobbing, probably, louder than the baby next door—Izuku clamps his jaw shut and simply nods back.
He thinks the warmth that has spread in his chest could sustain him even through the raging blizzard outside.
Seeing his friends from U.A. has become something of a struggle now that they're sidekicks and heroes and he's a full-time university student. That's a complaint—he's made peace with where he is in life—but just an explanation for why he's at a house party on a Thursday evening after finishing a three-hour exam that he’d prepared for over the entire past month.
His brain is mostly slush at this point.
And he has a class tomorrow morning. At 8:30.
So of course he takes the can of beer that Denki thrusts into his hand.
“Yea-a-a-ah, Midoriya's on fire!” Denki shouts over the music. He and Jiro share a narrow row-house in a popular ward in Musutafu, and Izuku got a text yesterday asking if he'd like to come over for a get together.
Izuku hadn't expected a crowded house party , but, well, he loves his friends, and he does deserve a break after working so hard, doesn’t he?
Ochako shows up, wraps Izuku in a bear hug, and doesn't let go of his hand for at least five minutes. Shoto and Iida and Momo ask him all about his classes and listen to him ramble about his professors and their lectures and all of the new people he's met. Tsu demands he joins her for a card game that Selkie taught her, which she now teaches Izuku, Kirishima, and Mina to varying degrees of success. Sero takes a guitar from a wall display and starts a sing-along.
It's amazing. It's bittersweet. He misses them even as he sits among them.
Katsuki shows up two hours in. By this point, the combination of the beer, the stress-driven sleep deprivation, and the rapid depletion of his dusty old social battery has Izuku almost laid out on the couch. He's slumped on the end, watching the impromptu concert and nursing his um, maybe fourth? beer, when there's a jostling next to him where Shoto had been pressed warm against his shoulder.
Izuku blinks, then smiles. “Hi, Kacchan.”
Someone nearby says, “Well, that was adorable,” but Izuku only has eyes for Katsuki, who he hasn't seen in a month. Thirty-six days, exactly. That's way too long.
And Katsuki looks way too tired.
Dark circles beneath his eyes, hair an unwashed mess, post-shift casual clothes a little wrinkled. He leans back into the couch cushions like he hasn't sat down all day. He says hello by grunting.
“Yeah, me too,” Izuku says. Asking if Katsuki had a long day or a difficult patrol would be a waste of breath: the exhaustion is written in every line of his body.
For a while, they sit together and watch Sero and Denki and Jiro jam, watch Mina and Ochako coax Iida into dancing, watch Kirishima try to explain the new move he's trying with his hardening, his hands going wild with the demonstration.
The beer can in his hands grows warm. He sips at it because the action keeps him awake, which only works for a while because it's also making him sleepy.
He blinks, and he's leaning against Katsuki, his head on that strong shoulder.
He blinks, and there's a warm arm beneath his knees, a cold arm behind his back. “This way?” Shoto asks, his voice close to Izuku's head.
“Yeah, just in here,” Jiro says. Click . The light shifts bright on the other side of his eyelids, and he frowns, tucking his face into Shoto's shirt. “Lie Midoriya here. Kirishima, don't drop Bakugo on him, please.”
“Have some faith, dude!”
“God, they both look like they haven't slept in a week.”
“I'd believe it. Kats is on doubles this week. I asked him why and he said–”
He blinks, and there's moonlight coming in through the blinds. Muffled, laughing voices ring from somewhere nearby. He has no idea where he is, but there's an arm around his waist and he smells faded cologne and sweet nitroglycerin and knows he's safe.
He blinks, and immediately regrets it.
Pale, pre-dawn light turns the room a soft, dark blue. Izuku squints through his headache to find himself on the bed in Denki and Jiro's spare bedroom that also, it seems, serves as an office and recording studio. There are thick foam pads on the walls and a huge computer setup against the far corner. A guitar rests beneath an electronic keyboard next to the desk.
And the heavy weight on his legs is Kacchan, sprawled on his stomach, starfish-stretching to every corner of the mattress. His big thigh has been resting on Izuku for so long that it's put his legs to sleep.
“Kacchan,” he groans, putting a hand on Katsuki’s arm and shaking him. “Kacchan.”
The groan that rumbles through Katsuki's chest is in parts scary and hilarious: it starts low and revs loud like a motorcycle or, in this case, a big, grumpy dog woken from his nap. “What.”
“Your leg's heavy.”
“So what.”
“So move it. I can't feel my feet.”
“Don't care.”
Sighing, Izuku wiggles and whines as he gets himself out from under Katsuki's thigh. His legs are dead weight and, as he starts to rub them, start to burn like static fire.
Because he's a jerk, Katsuki hears his pained hiss and starts kicking Izuku's legs.
“Stop, stop, ow, Kacchan, it hurts! ”
He stops only when Izuku stops reacting, and only then to lay down again. His cheek is smushed against his pillow. He peeks one eye open. “How the fuck did we get in here?”
“I think Shoto and Kirishima carried us after we fell asleep at the party.” Izuku sighs. “How lame.”
For a long moment, that red gaze lingers on Izuku's face, sharp, studying. He knows what Katsuki sees. He's been seeing it in the mirror for months: his long, messy hair, the frown lines making a home on his forehead, the bruise-blue bags beneath his eyes. He feels dull and lifeless and tired and—
“You sleep alright?” Katsuki asks.
“Bad dreams.” He bites at his lip when Katsuki raises an eyebrow and hem-haws about elaborating before saying, “Um. Nothing concrete, really, no flowery imagery or scenes for you to interpret, so it's probably boring to hear about, just—”
“Just fuckin’ tell me.”
“—just…I'm afraid that you guys will forget me. Forget about me. Now that I'm…”
With a heavy sigh, Katsuki rolls onto his side and yanks at Izuku's shirt until he's on his side, too, the both of them facing each other. Their knees and feet are touching. Katsuki's hand is fisted in Izuku's shirt, and he can feel the warmth of that deadly hand through the cloth.
It's almost like cuddling; he'd call it that if it didn't make his chest feel like it was caving in with unrestrained want.
Katsuki looks, and looks, and looks.
Finally, he says, “You're impossible to forget, Izuku.”
An alarm goes off somewhere near their hips. They spring apart.
“Come on, I've got a shift and you've got class in an hour.” Katsuki swings his legs over the side of the bed and stands, avoiding Izuku’s gaze. “Up.”
Slowly, careful of his aching head and heart, Izuku gets up.
A few of their friends are still here–Kirishima and Mina are asleep on the couch, and Sero is passed out in a beanbag, all of them so heavily unconscious that even Izuku tripping over a stray beercan doesn’t disturb them. Silently he slips into his shoes and follows Katsuki down the hall and out the front door. There’s some kind of strange, tense energy in the careful space they keep between them, and when Katsuki waves a wordless hand goodbye before turning away, it feels like Izuku has lost something.
He goes to class. His notes suck. He doodles in the margins of his notebook. When the professor calls on him, he admits that he’s missed what she’s said. After class, she asks him to stick around until his peers file out, and then, quiet and concerned, asks if he’s okay. He seems unfocused, sad, she says.
He doesn’t know how to tell her; he didn’t know what he felt until now. He wishes that he had just gone home when he started to feel tired. He wishes he had gotten up immediately when he realized who he’d been in bed with.
He wishes he could've stayed, shifted those two feet closer, pressed their chests together until he could feel Katsuki’s heart beat against his own. He wishes he could’ve–wishes they’d–
No. He can’t afford any more impossible dreams.
Unfocused
and
sad
are close descriptors, he thinks, but perhaps the most accurate word would be
mournful.
Loving Katsuki has never been the easiest undertaking, and getting close to him even less so. Izuku doesn’t know if or when he’ll ever get another chance.
Something bad happens. Why does something bad always happen?
That’s not true–there are good things, like hugging his mom, and eating katsudon, and seeing his friends smile–but then the bad things happen and Izuku might not be a hero anymore but his body remembers, his soul remembers, and he moves without thinking–
Something bad happens. He loses track of his body for a while.
He feels… floaty. Cold. That old nightmare he used to have as a kid, the one with the empty void in his chest where his quirk should’ve been, the one that had, for just a brief, bright little while, been filled with colorful stars—he thinks he’s there again. The stars have gone, but he feels the echoes of them, like phosphenes, like scars.
There’s pain, and voices, and quiet.
So much quiet.
And then–
He wakes up to the worried, angry, serious faces of his mother, All Might, and the doctor who put his body back together again after his final battle, so long ago, and he prepares himself to be lectured.
Recovery involves sleep.
He dreams a lot and wakes up just as often. Strange, disjointed things–brief memories, flashes of silly cartoons he’s seen, mere feelings, coming and going, ephemeral. He's as comfortable as he can be in starchy sheets and inpatient clothes, and the drugs they have him on are good, he thinks, because now he’s started to day dream. It seems his brain wants him to believe that Katsuki is here, sitting in the chair beside his hospital bed. The light coming in the window illuminates his hair like a golden halo.
“Kacchan is so pretty,” he mumbles. The hearts in his own eyes feel entirely too obvious. “Like an angel. Wo-o-ow.”
Katsuki looks up from his phone and glares. “Shut up. I’m so fuckin’ angry at you.”
“Even sounds like Kacchan,” Izuku says, wanting to reach out, to touch, but his arm isn’t listening to his brain. That’s strange.
He doesn’t want to look away from Katsuki, because he really is so, so pretty, but he doesn’t understand what’s going on and where the disconnect is between his head and his hand. It’s still there, he’s relieved to see, but it’s stuffed into a big blue cast. His other arm is squeezed into a familiar compression sleeve from shoulder to wrist.
“You shattered your fuckin’ forearm, asshole.”
“Oh, yeah,” Izuku mumbles. There's a memory floating around in his head: a stern man pointing at an x-ray and explaining things to Mom and All Might while the words wend through Izuku's addled brain, meaningless. “All Might said he flew in a bone guy from South Africa.”
“A bone guy .” Katsuki rubs a hand across his face. A vein pulses at his temple. “Izuku, that’s the top-ranked orthopedic trauma surgeon in the world.”
“Mm. He also has a pretty cool bone quirk but he, um. Didn't want to tell me more about it. He was not very happy with me.”
“Nobody is happy with you right now!” Katsuki shouts.
Oh.
Well, that hurts. More than the fuzzy, dull ache in his arms, more than the loud punch of Katsuki's voice against his ear drums. Disappointment settles like a dark, heavy stone in his stomach, but no matter how anxious it makes him feel, he can't find it in himself to regret his actions.
There'd been a villain attack on his university campus.
No, that's not right: the campus had been collateral damage in a villain attack that had traveled through the ward. The alert that went off on his phone advised all civilians to take shelter, and he'd been helping an old gentleman off of a bench on the park square and planned to assist him inside the nearby student union building when something hit the grassy field with the force of a meteor.
Dirt and grass and rocks sprayed everywhere. Izuku shielded the old man with his body until the debris stopped falling. When he turned around, a man dressed head-to-toe in a worn black costume was pulling himself up out of the earth.
“Oh, look!” He grinned at them, his smile missing a tooth, as he brushed himself off. “I love a good hostage situation. An old man and a college kid—this'll be good for the news coverage! Come here, before that splinter in my ass finds me.”
The villain advanced fast.
There were no heroes nearby.
No, that's not right, either: Izuku may have been rendered quirkless again, but he had the heart of a hero and someone to protect, so—
“So what were you thinking? ” Katsuki demands, pulling him out of the memory.
“I wasn't, not really. My—”
“Your body just moved.”
“—body just moved. Yeah, exactly. I couldn't just let him take Mr. Tachibana, he's old and uses a cane and he has a bad heart and likes to visit campus to watch the birds and do his sudoku, Kacchan. He could've really been hurt if he'd been moved around too fast and there weren’t any heroes nearby, I swear I looked, so I waited until the villain got closer to us and just… punched him.”
“Kamui Woods says he found you actively fist-fighting the guy to the ground. With arms that had been weakened even with the fuckin’ force of One for All behind them. You're not invincible , Izuku, especially now —”
“I know that,” Izuku says, quiet, staring into those angry red eyes. “I'm not going to apologize. I can't. As long as I can move, as long as there's something I can do to help… I have to, Kacchan.”
There's a fight brewing on his face, but before he can start yelling again, it looks like someone takes a pin to him, letting out all the hot air. He deflates. His shoulders curl inward, and he tilts forward until his forehead presses against Izuku's shoulder.
“You scared the shit out of me,” he whispers. “Don't… Just…. Be more careful next time, okay? …please .”
Izuku's eyes tear up. “Yeah, Kacchan. I promise I'll try.”
A long moment passes. He wishes he could do more than pat Katsuki's arm with his uninjured hand. He wishes… gosh, for so many things he usually tells himself not to think about, set loose from the forbidden part of his thoughts by the staggering lack of distance between them.
Maybe…?
Face red, he leans his head against the soft crown of Katsuki's hair. “Can we, um. D-do you want to lie down with me? Would you?”
For a breathless moment, Katsuki is completely still, and Izuku thinks he misstepped.
Just a few weeks ago, when they fell asleep at that party and woke up in the same bed, Katsuki had pulled him close and looked him in the eye and said, You're impossible to forget, in a way that sparked the cold ember of hope in his chest.
They'd been so close, and he'd thought, you know, maybe , but then Katsuki had kind of shut down and backed off so maybe not—
With an exhale, Katsuki stands up from his chair. He slips out of his shoes and so gingerly levers himself up into the bed.
Oh!
Oh man, oh god, it's happening. Izuku doesn't know what to do with his arms, doesn't know if there's anything he can do, so he lies still and tries not to giggle as Katsuki huffs and puffs and tries to rearrange himself as unobtrusively as possible. He ends up cuddled against Izuku's side, so careful not to jostle his bad arm, with his arm around Izuku's hips.
Finally, head on Izuku’s shoulder, he looks up. “Happy now?”
Aw, what the heck. Katsuki's already mad at him–it's not like this could make it any worse! Plus ultra, right? “Kacchan.”
“What.”
“I wanna kiss you.”
Katsuki's cheeks go pink. “Then kiss me.”
Well, he didn't think he'd get this far. Now that he has permission, his own self-consciousness slams the breaks on his actual, real-life dreams unfolding right in front of him. “I can't,” he whines, hating himself. “I don't want our first kiss to be in the hospital! My last sponge bath was yesterday and my hair is greasy and my breath stinks and I'm not supposed to move my arms–Kacchan, no–!”
“Relax, nerd,” Katsuki says, moving slow, pressing kisses to his greasy hair and his dry, unwashed cheek. “I don't give a shit about any of that, but if you wanna wait, we'll wait.”
“You don't have to be romantic about it,” Izuku pouts.
“Gotta make sure you still wanna kiss me tomorrow.”
“I want to kiss you every day, Kacchan.”
“Now who's being romantic. Gross.” Because he's laying further down, his legs are too long for the hospital bed and, even tucked up against Izuku's thighs, his feet still bump up against the railing at the end. “I hate these damn hospital beds.”
Usually Izuku would agree, but he can only hum happily when Katsuki stills and he can gingerly wrap his injured arms around him. Sharp pain burns through his casted arm as he moves, but being able to hold Katsuki close is so incredibly worth it.
Izuku is released from the hospital under strict orders from Dr. Nkosi to stress his arms as little as possible. That means no lifting or leaning on or stretching his arms, no carrying objects heavier than a few pounds, no pulling open heavy doors or trying to open tight jars or reaching above his head to change a lightbulb.
“No strenuous activities whatsoever,” Dr. Nkosi says. “It is a miracle of modern medicine that you still have both of your arms, not to mention full functionality. Do not disappoint me, Midoriya.”
Oh, well that's unfair. Is he so easy to read, that Dr. Nkosi was able to pinpoint his fear of disappointing people? Or is that just the doctor's stern demeanor?
Regardless, Izuku nods and gulps and nods again. Yes, of course, he'll work hard to not–well, not work hard because he's supposed to be taking it easy, but hard as in determined–he is determined not to ruin all of Dr. Nkosi's hard work in fusing all of his broken arm bones back together with quirk magic and scientific ingenuity and it's really fascinating how it all works, really, looking at his x-rays were so interesting, seeing how the shards of bone were essentially fused to the titanium plate–
“Alright, nerd, let's go,” Katsuki says, putting a hand on his back and guiding him firmly out of the room. In his other hand, he carries Izuku's bag full of the spare clothes that Mom brought for him and a bunch of medical supplies and prescriptions he's being sent home with. “Doc isn't being paid the big bucks to listen to you ramble.”
The nice nurses wave at them as they make their way down the hall to the elevator. “Yeah, but you listen to me ramble for free, so what's that say about you?”
“That being around you is payment enough,” Katsuki says, pushing the down button.
The words birth a swarm of butterflies in his stomach, but also, wow, that's a line. Is this what they're doing now? Cheesy flirting? Because Izuku loves it, but he also loves teasing Katsuki. “Ew, Kacchan.”
“I know. I just felt my fuckin’ breakfast come back up.”
They get in the elevator, and Katsuki maneuvers Izuku next to the wall so that he can put himself between Izuku's busted arms and everybody else entering and exiting the elevator in a rush. It's sweet. He holds open doors, too, including the passenger door to his fancy red car.
“Where are we going?” Izuku says, blushing when Katsuki reaches over and buckles him in.
“My place. Can't trust you not to go punching more villains.” A flicker of doubt crosses his face. “Unless you'd rather me take you home. Which I can do. But you gotta fuckin’ promise not to fuck your arms up, idiot–”
Izuku moves his less injured hand to Katsuki's arm. The touch halts his uncharacteristic ramble. “No, let's go to your place! I haven't been in a while. You were working on renovating the kitchen the last time I visited and I want to see what you updated!”
He'd never admit it, but Katsuki has a tiny little smile the whole trip to his apartment, and Izuku can hardly look away.
Katsuki's place isn’t too far of a drive–it's a small, relatively new one bedroom apartment with a nook for an office. There are tall windows that let in a lot of light for the single plant that sits on the television stand. The kitchen has been renovated to create more vertical cabinet space and better appliances–he even has a built-in oven, wow!
“This is so nice, Kacchan,” Izuku marvels, peeking inside the big refrigerator. “You did a good job!”
He rubs the back of his neck. “Whatever. Go shower. You stink. I'll make lunch.”
“Okay!”
Izuku makes it a step into the bathroom before he catches sight of himself in the mirror–ew, the sponge baths were definitely not cutting it–and remembers the state of his arms. He laughs. “Uh. Kacchan?”
They have to cover his cast in plastic wrap. His other arm just has a removable compression sleeve, which Katsuki gingerly removes and then tosses carelessly behind him. The shower is too difficult to manage, so Izuku plops down into the tub, his plastic-wrapped cast hanging over the side, and watches Katsuki putter around while the water fills. He hangs a clean towel on the warmer, sets a stack of clothes onto the sink counter, and then puts his hands on his hips like a stressed mother hen.
“You good?”
“Don't wanna give me a sponge bath?” Izuku wiggles his eyebrows.
“Fuck off,” Katsuki grumbles, stomping away, muttering under his breath the whole way back to the kitchen.
Giggling, surprised at his own audacity, Izuku takes a long-needed bath and feels a bit more alive as he dries himself off. He brushes his teeth and towel-dries his hair and dresses in the clothes Katsuki left for him–a comfy pair of sweats and his soft, worn Aji Fry tee–and then emerges to find a huge bowl of katsudon waiting for him on the dining table, along with a glass of water and a few pills.
He sits down and eats and cries. It's so good. Katsuki is being so good to him, and he doesn't deserve it, but he wants it anyway. He wants it so bad. The sweetness, and the dorky lines, and Katsuki opening doors for him and writing out his medicine schedule on a post-it and sticking it to the fridge like he expects Izuku to stay, like he wants Izuku to stay–
“Alright, let's go, crybaby.”
“But the dishes–”
“Can wait. Dr. Nkosi said your pain tolerance is out of whack, big fuckin’ shocker, so he asked that I help keep you on-schedule with your meds.”
Sniffling, stomach and heart both full to bursting, Izuku goes where Katsuki guides him, right down the hall and to the bedroom. Even though he's done nothing but rest for the past few days, he feels drained, exhausted by the healing his body is trying to do. The pain medicine, too, makes him drowsy, and the big lunch he just inhaled probably isn't helping.
And, fine , maybe he is experiencing some pain in his arm. An afternoon nap might be nice.
“This is the biggest bed I've ever laid on,” Izuku says, climbing between the covers. The sheets are a calm off-white, and the duvet is a light-weight, gray linen that feels like a cloud is being pulled up over his chest.
“Good,” Katsuki says, stripping to his boxers and laying down, too. “Because you take up all the room.”
Pleased surprise that they're going to nap together quickly gives way to outrage. Of all the cruel, stupid, ridiculous things that have left Katsuki's mouth over the past sixteen years, this is the biggest load of bullshit , excuse his language, but wow –
“ I do?” Izuku squawks, jolting up to sitting so that he can look down at Katsuki, lying comfortable and smug on his pillow.” You are the one who starfishes, and you hog all the blankets!”
“That's not even a little fuckin’ true–”
“You're always pulling at them,” he insists, mimicking a dramatic pulling motion with both of his arms. White-hot bursts of pain shoot through both arms, and Katsuki sighs, exasperated, as he helps Izuku lie back down.
“I gotta get ahead of you somehow,” Katsuki says, adjusting the covers. “If I don't get a good handful before I fall asleep, you end up with all the damn blankets by morning.”
This can't be true. Izuku narrows his eyes, scandalized, suspicious, but Katsuki only stares back. It's a contest, one that Izuku loses soundly by yawning so wide his jaw pops.
Katuski snorts. “Loser.”
“Not fair! Go again. Ready?”
“No. Here,” he says, reaching back and grabbing something off of the floor on his side of the bed. “I, uh. Just. Take this.”
Something soft is pressed into his good hand, resting on his chest.
It's…
Oh. It's an All Might plushie.
Soft, worn, its joints loose from age. One of its hair antennae is missing, and the corner of its felt cape has been burned away, and its vivid color has faded–signs of it being so clearly well-loved.
Katsuki clears his throat. “So you have good dreams.”
Izuku feels breathless. “You remember that?”
“I've told you before, nerd: you're impossible to forget.”
“Kacchan,” he laughs, teary-eyed, clutching the plush to his chest. “We were four .”
“Well, you fuckin’ remember! Why is it unreasonable that I do, too?”
“It’s different. I didn't think you–” Cared? Found that memory important enough to remember? It feels callous to think that way, but for so long, that's the impression Katsuki worked to give: mean, uncaring, unforgiving.
Before Izuku finds the right word, Katsuki says, “That's what I thought. You didn't think, and now–”
“Kacchan, can I have my kiss now? Please?”
He thought he might have to really reason his way to victory– I'm showered, I brushed my teeth, I'm coherent –but Katsuki grins, snatches the All Might plush and tosses it further down the bed, and says, “Hell yeah.”
For maybe the first time in their lives, they collide softly, with gentle intention.
Katsuki's lips are soft as he comes to lean over Izuku. His hand is warm as it slides up Izuku's arm, his shoulder, his neck, and makes a home between the pillow and the back of his head, holding Izuku close. It's over too quick, and Izuku's heart is about to burst with excitement, disappointment, hope, because then they kiss again, and again, and their lips slide slantways, and Katsuki traces his tongue against Izuku's lips, urging him open, and Izuku wants to cry because he's kissing his best friend and he tastes like chili flakes from lunch and he never thought he could have this, he never wants it to stop–
He yawns again.
“No-o-o-o,” he cries when Katsuki pulls away. “Come back.”
“You just yawned into my mouth. It's time for sleep–”
“Time for more kissing, come here–!”
“We can kiss when you wake up,” Katsuki says with finality. He hooks a leg around Izuku's thigh and pulls him close by his waist. “Sleep. I'll be here when you wake up.”
The word comes out small: “Promise?”
“Where would I go? This is my fuckin’ house.”
“I don't know, Kacchan, the gym? Kirishima's? The office? Ogawa's ramen shop? Yoga with Mina?”
“I'm not going anywhere. You're never gonna get rid of me. Sucks to be you, loser.”
“Oh no, what a nightmare,” Izuku groans, feigning dread at the mere idea of a forever with Katsuki. It sounds like a dream, honestly. He only wishes he had full use of his arms so he could hold Katsuki as tightly as he wants to.
They get comfortable with the old All Might plush snuggled up between them, warm and comfortable, and drift together into sweet dreams.