Chapter Text
“So, I heard him out.”
His voice barely shakes when he says that, and he’s a little proud. Of course, Ochako misses nothing.
“Oh no, Izuku, are you okay?”
“I kissed him, Ochako,” Izuku cries, “and then I told him to get out. Oh my god, that was the worst mistake I’ve ever made. I’m going to go, Ochako, and find him—”
“Hold up, hold up. Tell me everything, now, and then we’ll see if you should go or not. You know you don’t think right when you’re emotional.”
Izuku sniffles again. “You’re right. Ugh, my chest hurts so much right now. I knew this was going to be a bad idea, why did I even do it?”
“Did you get closure at least?”
“Not even! It felt good to finally get to yell at him, and have him hear what I had to say, but no, I didn’t get closure. I still wish we could be together.”
“Wait, wait, Deku, back up; what did Bakugou-kun say to you?”
“He asked me if I loved him. Kind of. He also told me that he loved me.”
“And you said…?”
“I kissed him!” Izuku yells into the phone. “God, I just kissed him. Without thinking! Then I pulled away, because I remembered all those times he pulled away from me, and how difficult it was to be with him.” Izuku breathes heavily. “Because even though I told him I love him, it’s so hard to. Do you know how hard it is to be with someone like Kacchan? Jeez, it’s the worst decision I’ve ever made.”
“Wait, wait, Izuku, you told him you loved him?”
Izuku rewinds. Remembers what he just said. “Uh.”
“Izuku. ”
“Maybe?”
“Oh my god. What were these past three years even about, Izuku? I know I said you probably weren’t over him, but I didn’t think you still loved him! Do you, actually?”
“I…”
He thinks about it, really thinks about it. He hasn’t seen Kacchan in so long, is it possible to be in love with someone you’re not sure you know anymore?
You do know him. When they cooked together. The way Kacchan scolds him for doing something dumb. The snarky jibes, his desire to be the best. His admirable ambition.
But then there are the changes—the patience Kacchan moves around with that was never there before. The way in which he moves, with no hesitation, but not as aggressive.
The understanding and compromise that he carries with him now.
“I think I do…I think I miss him being in my life, if anything. I wish we could work it out.”
“But…you don’t think it can.”
“It’s not worth it. The heartbreak I went through because I loved Kacchan, it’s not worth it.”
“Oh, Izuku…”
“Oh god, I feel horrible, Ochako.” Izuku wipes a blotchy tear that had begun to sting his face. “It must’ve taken him so much to find me, then apologize for everything, then actually tell me that he loved me…and then I kissed him and told him to get out! I’m terrible, Ochako.”
“First of all, Deku-kun, he deserves all that.” He can hear her roll her eyes at him as she says, “Who cares about all that an eye for an eye makes the whole world go blind bullshit, he hurt you, don’t feel bad for being selfish this time.”
Izuku wipes his tears, a laugh mixing with his sniffles. “You’re so brutal.”
“Whatever. Deku-kun, you deserve to say what you want. If you felt guilty and ran back to him, and asked to be with him out of pity, do you think Bakugou-kun is someone who would appreciate that?”
He smiles, finally. “No,” he answers, “he’d flat out murder me.”
“Exactly! So stop worrying about it. If you know that being with him is difficult and it’s something you don’t want, then there’s little to regret, right?”
“I…You’re right. I made my decision.”
“Good! I’m proud of you, Izuku. It’s rare to see you make decisions that’s good for you.”
Izuku frowns. “That’s harsh.”
“And that’s how you know I love you.”
“So, Deku is a piece of shit.”
Kirishima looks up from the TV and stares at him. Katsuki stands with angry fists and mussed hair in front of his apartment door. “We talking about Midoriya, the sunshine classmate and good-natured pro hero?”
“A piece of shit. ”
“Did you talk to him?”
“Yeah!” Katsuki hollers, kicking over a stool by the living area. “I—He—” He takes a huge breath, trying to calm down. Not that it works most of the time. “He told me he loved me.”
Kirishima pauses his show.
“He what?” Getting up from his seat on the couch, Kirishima shakes Katsuki’s shoulder. “He said what?”
“He told me he loved me,” Katsuki repeats furiously. “Then the bastard kicked me out.” Katsuki fixes the stool and sits on it, bringing one leg up and crossing his arms over it. “What a liar.”
“Slow down.” Kirishima grabs a seat on the couch near Katsuki. “He told you he loved you first?”
Katsuki covers his face with a palm. “No.”
“No?”
“I tried— apologizing. And explaining. You know. My feelings, whatever the fuck that is.”
“Did you tell him you were sorry?”
“ Yes!” Of course he did! Wasn’t that obvious?
“No, like really apologizing. Did you say you were sorry, and how you felt regretful for everything that happened? And that you’ll work harder in a relationship this time? That this time around, you’ll try to compromise and talk through complications?”
Katsuki looks away.
“So you didn’t?” he shouts.
“Not—exactly.”
“Then what did you go over there to do,” he demands, frustrated. “Didn’t you want to start over with him?”
“I did. You know I’ve been preparing a whole freaking monologue. But when I looked at him, I—” Katsuki turns away, shame curdling in his throat. Because despite everything, his pride still ate away at him, and the thought of admitting he was wrong couldn’t sit right.
“You can try again,” Kirishima tries, like the constant encourager he is. “Even if he kicked you out, you can always ask again!”
“I’m not begging him like some kind of dog.”
“I’m not saying that you need to! You know Midoriya—he would forgive you again. You just need to try—”
Katsuki pinches his eyes. “No.” As understanding Kirishima was, he still didn’t get it. “Just” need to try? He had tried. That was that. If Deku wasn’t going to accept it, he wasn’t degrading himself any further to try to get him to accept his feelings.
“Fuck that,” Katsuki mutters. He grabs one of the couch pillows, squeezing into it but making sure not to set off his quirk (Kirishima scolded him for that too many times). “After tonight, I never want to see him again.”
A lie. His chest aches at the thought of not going back.
It took Katsuki a lot. A lot to swallow his pride, to apologize, to finally go for what he truly wanted. Because no matter how stubborn and proud he was, he was also the fucking best and ambitious. He didn’t settle for misery.
Cooking with him, seeing him. Kissing him. Just talking for hours. Izuku changed so much, and yet, it was as if no time passed.
Kirishima sighs loudly and places a hand on his shoulder. “I know you probably expected something different from him, but give it time. After all, could you blame him? You had broken his heart.”
Katuski swats the hand away. “I don’t need you telling me that. I know very well what I did.”
Because Katsuki hadn’t just broken Deku’s heart. He had it served to him on a platter, opened up for only him to see, and he had taken that trust Deku gave him and crushed it.
“Have you talked to the others about this?”
Ochako’s voice is curious, not judgemental. Izuku immediately thinks of Iida and his wide, exaggerated hand motions and the reproaches he might offer.
“...Not yet. I don’t know how they would react. I thought you guys were all so against Kacchan, you know? You less so,” Izuku remarks, alluding to Ochako’s unnecessary teasing.
“It’s not that we’re disapprove of Bakugou-kun,” she replies after a long pause, “but more that we’re worried about you. I know you were happy with him, and we were all so happy for you when you guys finally became friends again! But after you guys had that fight, you were just so…”
She leaves the air empty. Izuku doesn’t want to finish it for her. What he was, after they had split.
“Well, either way, I hated Bakugou-kun for what he did, but I also understand. You guys were teenagers. He had a lot of insecurities and you guys still had a lot of growing up to do. He probably could have been better about it, but at his core, Bakugou-kun isn’t a bad person.”
“He isn’t!” Izuku agrees immediately. “That’s what makes all of this so frustrating!”
“Just because he apologized doesn’t mean you should let yourself love him again. He’s still got a lot to make up for. Besides, you’ve both changed, but you don’t even know by how much.”
“Ochako is always so level-headed,” Izuku says. She laughs.
“It’s easy when it’s not your own heart! I’ve got my own problems too, you know.” That makes him chuckle a little. “Ready for a sleepover? And a night of mochi ice cream?”
“Maybe tomorrow,” Izuku answers her. “I’m not really feeling it tonight.”
“Go for a run,” she advises, “that always clears your head.”
“Yeah,” he replies, “good idea.”
“Just don’t go overboard and start using your quirk to parkour on rooftops. We don’t need another strike!”
He laughs sheepishly. “I know, I know. Thanks, Ochako.”
“Anytime, trouble child.”
“Um.”
Katsuki wants to fold up his umbrella and smack him with it.
“What are you doing here.”
Deku looks away, hesitant and embarrassed. “I was just going for a run.”
He raises an eyebrow. “It’s raining.”
“I can’t run in the rain?”
Katsuki pinches the bridge of his nose and glances up. Heavy droplets of water pour down on to his umbrella, with no sign of stopping soon. “This park is nowhere near your apartment.”
Izuku flushes, either from his “run” or shivering in the cold. “Here,” Katsuki pushes, angry. Izuku stares, shocked, as Katsuki moves closer to shield him from the downpour. “Good?”
“Um—yeah.”
“Christ.” Katsuki thinks about slamming his purchases on the floor. “What a goddamn cliche.”
Izuku fidgets with the hem of his shirt. His t-shirt reads “v-neck” and fuck, he really didn’t change at all, did he? Katsuki would bet that he still owned fifty designs of All Might underpants.
“I’m sorry.”
It’s Izuku who says this. It makes him so angry.
Who the hell did Deku think he was, apologizing like nothing? What was he even apologizing for? Here, Katsuki stood, taking years and years of regret and pain and misery for him to swallow his pride and walk to Izuku’s apartment, and leaving without even being able to say those words. And yet, Izuku said it like it was nothing.
Did it mean so little?
How could he say it so easily? Say it without abandon, without the anguish that prevented Katsuki from doing the same?
But no, Katsuki knew, they weren’t the same. Izuku didn’t have his pride, didn’t have his arrogance. He didn’t need to swallow anything to give away his apologies so easily. It was how they became a thing in the first place, with Izuku’s big heart.
And it was Katsuki’s lack of one that ended their relationship. He gets that.
“You don’t need to do something like that,” is what Katsuki finally says. He’s still not looking at him. “You don’t need to apologize. Don’t say shit for what you don’t mean.”
“...I do mean it. I’m sorry. That—that I didn’t accept your feelings. For kicking you out. Despite—despite everything.”
Katsuki spares a glance at Deku. He’s still looking away, hunched shoulders and all. As if he was trying to run away, curl into a ball and disappear.
He sighs; that part of Izuku hasn’t changed.
“So…” Katsuki says half heartedly, staring uselessly at the gray sky. “You love me?”
Izuku flinches. Under a flush that spreads from his cheeks to his ears to his shoulders, he swivels and with the maturity of a child, stammers, “So do you!”
“Yeah.” He can tell from Izuku’s expression that he’s shocked from the lack of teasing or denial, or anything but a straight answer, but what else is there to give? Katsuki already said as much a week ago, so there was really little reason to be shocked. “I do.”
And that got a good reaction, one written all over his face. A flush that rose from his neck to his cheeks where his freckles sat, despite the cold rain. The wobbling of his lips.
Fuck, Katsuki thought as his chest throbbed, fuck, fuck, fuck.
He does love Deku. He knows this as much. But Katsuki also knew that loving someone wasn’t always the right thing. It wasn’t always the best, the healthiest. It didn’t always help him grow, not when he felt trapped by Deku himself.
And Deku?
He’s always known there was a part of Izuku that loved him. Not that he could ever understand why it didn’t disappear, after everything that Katsuki’s has done, but it’s there. The admiration he feels for him isn’t false, that he knows now.
But even so—admiration wasn’t love.
Katsuki sighs and glares at the sky. The onpour of rain fall on him but he doesn’t care. “We don’t love each other Deku.”
“…I know.”
“You're in love with the idea of us.”
“I know.”
“We’re a fucking mess, aren’t we?” Katsuki laughs. It’s bitter and short, and all but perfectly describes what they had.
And it only breaks his heart more when Deku bows his head, down so that his bangs covers his forehead, and there’s only a sliver of a smile as he whispers, “We’ve been a mess since day one, Kacchan.”
“Ain’t that the truth.”
The rain cloud Katsuki has been staring at passes through, and the gray gives way to a slight blue. The sun comes out, finally, and Katsuki looks at the disappearing storm with some sort of annoyance.
“I don’t want to be a mess anymore,” Izuku admits quietly. “I don’t want to fight with you and not talk to you for years. You came back this time, and even if…Even if it didn’t go the way you wanted it to, can’t we just—? Can’t we be friends again?”
Friends. Were they ever that? Childhood friends, yeah. Bullies and rivals and enemies. Friends with benefits, for a while. Just friends? They tried, for a bit, before that turned to shit.
He turns to the boy who’s been in his entire fucking life, who he can’t seem to get rid of no matter how hard he tries. Katsuki allows his head to dip a little in admission, ignores the surprised flush on Deku’s face, and asks, “Do you want to grab dinner?”
So that’s how they find themselves sitting in at a ramen bar. Kacchan slurps his bowl greedily, finishing half of it before Izuku even breaks open his chopsticks.
“And you call me unhealthy,” Izuku remarks, “with speed like that, your digestion must be shit.”
“Better indigestion than getting cancer in a couple years. Want to tell me about all the bulk instant ramen you’ve been buying?”
Izuku gasps, then flushes. “Is Shouto being a sneak on everything?”
Katsuki only shrugs, continuing to down his ramen.
Izuku turns back to the bar, eyebrows set in a flat line as he irritatedly picks at his bowl. “Since when did the two of you get so close?”
He thinks about what he’s going to say for a beat, then two. There’s hesitation, but if they wanted to make amends, he had to make the first move. “I’m transferring to his agency.”
Katsuki knows Izuku’s shell shocked expression before he’s even turned to look at the hero.
“B-but—that’s in—”
“I know. I’ll be getting all my stuff in town next week.”
“Weren’t you just doing an exchange?” Izuku blurts, as if that was the most important thing he grasped from the conversation.
“We were,” Katsuki answers, looking at his drink. “If you consider an exchange to be permanent.”
“Can’t believe Shouto didn’t tell me,” he grumbles and takes a large swig of his sake.
“I asked him to be quiet about it.”
“Yeah? So now that you two are best buddies, are you staying with him?”
Katsuki tries not to pretend that’s jealousy in Izuku’s voice. “I’m staying with Kirishima. He’s always had that spare room he uses for training, so.”
“So you really are just waltzing back,” Izuku grumbles into the lip of his sake cup.
Katsuki debates making a snide remark about how he wasn’t moving back in town for Izuku, or anything else but a better career opportunity, but retracks the defensive lie. “If you’ll let me.”
And maybe it’s the straightforward honesty he couldn’t show back in high school, or his blunt, bold moves that does it, but Izuku turns back to him with a gaping jaw and a warm flush that spreads across his cheeks.
“Look,” Katsuki starts, because they both know what he wants and he shouldn’t beat around the bush about it, “I know what I said. And I know what I did. But the fact still stands that I love you.” He ignores Izuku’s enflamed expression and pummels through, “And maybe it isn’t the right sort of love, that’s healthy or whatever. We haven’t seen each other in three years—of course it isn’t. But I’m here now, and I want to properly be—with you. In whatever way that you’ll let me.”
“I…” Izuku swallows. “I can’t give you a proper answer right now.”
“So don’t. I’m not asking for one.”
He can’t meet Kacchan’s eyes, not when they burn so passionately and Izuku is unsure of his own intentions. “I don’t want to hold you back, Kacchan.”
Irritated, he slams a hand to the bar, and shouts, “You’re not. I’m doing what I want. I’m trying to earn your trust, here. If you still love me, and you’re willing to give me a second chance, then let me try.”
“I don’t know if I am,” Izuku whispers. “Kacchan, you hurt me.”
“I know,” he says, “I know I did and I’m sorry for it! I was stupid and afraid and unwilling to try but I’m willing now! I’ll show you that I’m better!”
He’s yelling now, but that’s no detterrant nor a surprise. Kacchan’s always been passionate and fierce about what he wants, always wanting to prove himself. Even in high school, when they rivaled each other to see who can become the best hero. And now, just slightly different, he’s trying to prove he can be the best version of himself.
Finished with his tirade, Kacchan huffs a breath. “I don’t do things by halves, you shitty nerd. ”
That breaks Izuku’s tension. “I know.”
“So? Does that mean you’ll let me waltz back into your life?”
Izuku peers back down at his empty bowl. The remainder of his ramen soup already developed a filmy layer. “I’m scared,” he whispers. “I’m scared to get my heart broken again.”
“I won’t,” Kacchan declares firmly. “I won’t this time.”