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Katsuki didn’t get sick easily or often, but when he did it was hell.
The school had a policy on sickness: students should go straight to Recovery Girl so they didn’t miss any class, and then take it easy just to be safe. Everyone complied; the second a sore throat started to scratch or a fever started to rise they hastened to her office and popped back out with a lollipop and a healthy gleam in their eye.
Trust Katsuki to be the one who makes it difficult. He flat-out refused to allow her to heal him.
The responsibility of keeping the fiery hero from spontaneously combusting while on fell to everyone in Class 1-A, and he made it far more difficult than necessary. Once a year or so, when he did catch something, he caught it hard. For a week straight he’d be sniffling, sneezing, coughing, aching, and fever-racked, and therefore exceptionally grumpy. And every single one of his classmates had to make sure he didn’t set anything on fire out of sheer annoyance while bedridden. The first time he’d fallen ill at UA they’d needed to replace three pillows and a blanket after he’d set them alight in his boredom. Needless to say, most of Class 1-A was fed up with his antics and piled their Katsuki-tending responsibilities onto the nearest willing person.
Which happened to be Izuku.
He’d tended to Katsuki long enough, patched up his scrapes and iced sore muscles since they were children, so bringing him notes and classwork wasn’t as much of a step as it could have been. The blond had a habit of being all bark and no bite while sick, and he’d grumbled a begrudging “thanks” to Izuku more times than he could possibly count.
That didn’t change the reality of it, though, which was that every day after class he’d have to collect up his notes and a mug of spicy chicken soup and take them to his friend. Who promptly shouted at him every single time from his blanket and empty tissue box nest.
“I don’t need your help, Deku,” he growled, same as always, as the green-haired boy eased open the door, and then followed it with a soft “thanks” when his eyes landed on the steaming mug he was holding.
“I know you don’t Kacchan, and of course,” he said, stepping over piles of papers and the left gauntlet of Katsuki’s hero costume to get closer to his bed. He held out the soup, turning the handle towards the bundle of blankets on the bed. “Brought you this.” The boy scowled up at him as he disentangled one hand to reach for the proffered mug. “Soup, not tea,” he added, as Katsuki breathed it in. The chili oil in the soup formed a thin red film across the top of the broth, and the steam coming off of it was eye-wateringly spicy. Katsuki took a long drink, sighing and closing his eyes as he did so.
“How’d you know to make it spicy?” he asked, wiping his mouth off with a tissue from a nearby overturned box. “Not even my mom knew I liked it that hot.” He took another sip, smiling and breathing deeply through his nose as the warm soup ran down his throat.
Izuku considered lying, making something up about his fiery Quirk meaning he’d probably like spice, but decided to go with the truth instead. “I remembered from when we were little,” he confessed, and images of a dandelion-haired boy crunching through hot peppers like they were nothing drifted across his mind. “You used to love spicy peppers.” He stepped over another pile of dirty laundry composed largely of Katsuki’s trademark black pants, setting his notebook down on the nightstand and sitting on the bed, which creaked a long, groaning creak as he did.
“Tch, nice memory, nerd,” he said, and shifted over to give Izuku more space. “What did you do in class today? I’m fucking done with missing.” His voice was gritty from underuse and sickness, the sandpaper scratchiness in his throat dropping his words an extra octave. He cleared his throat.
“Before we start on classwork,” Izuku began, pushing the notes further away, “I wanted to know how you’re feeling.”
Katsuki stiffened, taken aback, but nevertheless slipped the blanket down off of his head and around his shoulders instead, flashing his maroon UA sweatshirt in the motion. His posture sagged, and for the first time in a long time Izuku could see just how tired he looked. Gone was the fearless, white-hot, headstrong confidence that had dominated his personality for years. He seemed small.
Slowly, as gingerly as if Katsuki were a stray cat he was trying to befriend, Izuku shuffled closer on the bed. He expected the other boy to lean far, far away, get up and make him leave, even, but instead he sighed and leaned his shoulder closer. With the same wariness, Izuku placed his arm around the other boy’s waist. He took the empty mug and placed it on top of the classwork on the nightstand, and returned his attention to the oddly pliant boy pressed up against his side.
“You’re not good, are you, Katsuki.” It was more an admission of fact than anything, and when he simply shook his head in response, no words even trying to make their way from his lips, Izuku tightened his arm around him. The last time he was this close to the hot-headed blond had faded from memory over time, their once-casual touches blowing away on the winds of time like dandelion fuzz. He’d gotten much stronger over the years, much more substantial than the boy with too many ideas for his head to contain when they were small.
It took far too long to notice that his shoulders were shaking, that his face was red with shame and wet with tears.
“If you,” he he threatened, heaving sobbing breaths between words, “tell anyone, abou-about this, I’ll fucking kill you, Deku.” A tear rolled from his eye and splashed down on his leg, and he pulled the blanket tighter around his shoulders. “Don’t wanna be weak,” he added, so quiet Izuku thought maybe he’d imagined it. But the boy next to him was cracking open, perfectly-constructed walls crumbling down around his ears, and all Izuku could do was hold onto him as he cried.
“You’re not weak, Kacchan,” Izuku tried, and the trembling figure next to him let out a groan.
“Exactly what I want to hear coming from you.”
“Kacchan, come here,” he said, and moved over on the bed until his back was against the wall and he could haul the blanket-wrapped boy in front of him. “It’s okay. You’re okay.”
He slumped down, settling his head on Izuku’s leg and pulling the blanket over the lower half of his face. Izuku dug through the covers for a tissue box and started to dry his face off, ignoring grumbles and half-swears and protests. He tried briefly to shove himself up off of Izuku, but a coughing fit interrupted him and suddenly he couldn’t be bothered to move. He leaned back more, and Izuku had to concentrate on continuing to breathe normally.
They sat there in the silence, which had slowly warmed from angry and spiteful cold and tense and everything a silence shouldn’t be to two boys, close together, just being in the same space.
Katsuki rolled over, blindly reaching out for something to hold onto. “You’re my new pillow,” he mumbled into Izuku’s leg as his fingers brushed his hand. Apparently, his subconscious deemed this an appropriate thing to grab onto, and he intertwined his fingers with Izuku’s smaller, calloused ones. Another cough wracked his body, and had it been anyone else curled up in his lap Izuku would have pushed them off. Instead, he smoothed one hand over the boy’s sweat-darkened blond hair and pushed it off of his forehead. When he leaned into the touch, Izuku ran his fingers through it, tracing delicate lines across his scalp with his nails.
“You are shockingly endearing when you’re half-asleep.”
“Mmm,” was the only audible response as he began to drift off in earnest. “And Deku?” he added, mumbling, “thank you for the soup.”
“Of course,” Izuku whispered, carding his fingers through the boy’s hair.
When Katsuki’s breathing evened out and his perpetually lined face smoothed and went sleep-lax, before they’d managed to get any studying done whatsoever, Izuku simply smiled, whispering a “sleep well, Kacchan,” before lunging to pull a notebook off the nightstand. He still had to know the material, after all. The mug rattled against the remaining textbook as it settled back down after his disturbance, and he eyed Katsuki, but the boy was sound asleep in his lap.
And if Izuku sat down on the bed every time when he brought Katsuki the notes for the day and the blond settled back down in his lap, then only the two of them would ever know.