Chapter Text
Katsuki is tired. Tired and, as usual, vaguely irritated. He’s three hours into his Tuesday morning shift at Ground Zero, the coffee shop just down the street from Yuuei University, and the pre-class rush is in full swing. He’s got another three hours of making shitty extras unnecessarily complicated drinks before he has to clock out and run to his afternoon classes.
At least he isn’t on register; he doesn’t understand how Kirishima can just stand there and smile at every asshole who walks in for literal hours. It would drive him up a wall. He’s better working the back, where his questionable customer service capabilities are less likely to get him fired.
“Order for Takashi,” he grunts, sliding a hot mocha in a disposable cup onto the counter. A large man comes to collect it.
Katsuki grabs for the next order slip and sighs. It’s for one of their Fall seasonal specials, an overly sweet, pumpkin-flavored monstrosity of a latte that’s supposed to have a little jack-o-lantern drawn on top. So fucking cheesy.
He checks the slip again to see if it’s a to-go order—because who fucking puts art under a lid—but no dice.
Grumbling under his breath, he sets to work, drawing the espresso with practiced ease and adding the flavored syrup and spices. Katsuki knows some of his coworkers cop out and use a stencil with a cinnamon shaker to make the design on top, but he’s not a little bitch so he does it properly. He pours the steamed milk carefully until he’s left with a pumpkin-shaped blob, then takes a toothpick and carves out triangular eyes and a jagged little mouth.
Fuckin’ perfect. He hopes whatever idiot ordered this gets a good Instagram post out of being a complete pain in his ass.
“Order for,” he squints at the slip again as he carefully sets the mug on the counter, “...Deku?” He looks up, scanning the people waiting, but no one steps forward.
“Order for Deku,” he says, louder this time. Nothing.
Katsuki slams the slip on the counter by the mug, rattling it slightly. “Whoever ordered the fucking pumpkin latte, come get your goddamn drink.” He glares at the losers loitering nearby, because he’ll be fucked if he made a perfect goddamn pumpkin for nobody.
Some green-haired, freckled bastard comes up and peers at the slip. He’s distressingly cute, which only adds to Katsuki’s annoyance at being kept waiting.
“Oh,” he chirps, “actually it’s pronounced ‘Izuku.’”
Katsuki can feel himself grind his molars and bare his teeth, but the smiley asshole doesn’t flinch, just stares down at his drink with sparkling eyes.
“Wow,” he breathes, “this is so cute! Thank you!” He beams at Katsuki once more before carefully shuffling off to one of the tables.
Katsuki stares after him, seething impotently for every reason and no reason at all, before forcing himself to shake it off and get back to work. The shop stays busy, and by the time he clocks out he’s forgotten all about the annoyingly handsome, green-haired customer.
At least until Wednesday, that is.
Katsuki’s classes were in the morning, so he’s on the closing shift tonight. It’s finally starting to feel like Fall: a little overcast, blustery winds causing the students to dig out scarves and hats from wherever they stashed them for the summer.
It’s slow right now, so Katsuki notices when the bell above the door rings and their next customer steps in. Sure enough, it’s the pumpkin latte guy from the day before, all bundled up in a cream knit sweater that looks two sizes too big for his frame.
He unwinds a red scarf from around his neck as he approaches the register to order; good, the color clashes horribly with his hair. Katsuki busies himself with cleaning the countertops and tries to ignore Kaminari’s completely over-the-top attempts at flirting as he rings up the order, despite the fact that they cause the green-haired customer to stammer adorably and turn a rather fetching shade of pink.
What was his name again? Something stupid, Katsuki knows.
He starts preparing the lavender honey latte before Kaminari can even hand him the slip, drawing a leaf with the milk and topping it off with a sprinkle of dried lavender buds. He can feel the customer’s eyes on him the entire time he’s making the drink.
If Katsuki were anyone else he might find the close attention a little unnerving, but he isn’t, so he just keeps working at his usual, efficient pace.
He glances at the slip before placing the mug on the counter. Oh, right.
“Order for Deku,” he says with a smirk, spiteful.
Deku just steps forward to take his drink, eyes sparkling with mirth. He squints at Katsuki’s name tag as he cups the mug, warming his hands.
“Thanks for the drink, Kacchan!” He says, with a shit-eating grin Katsuki never would have expected would suit his dumb face so well.
Katsuki sputters, blood boiling, “The fuck did you just call me, you dickweed?” Fucking Pikachu is in stitches, completely ignoring the next customer waiting to order.
Deku just laughs, high and lilting, and goes to set up at one of the tables near the back of the cafe. Fucker.
It’s a slow night, and Deku stays for quite a while; Katsuki finds himself watching him in between making drinks and washing dishes. He sees Deku pull out a notebook from his messenger bag and set to scribbling in it immediately.
Katsuki can see him mumbling to himself as he writes, but he’s too far away for Katsuki to hear what he’s saying.
Over the course of the evening, Deku writes at a breakneck pace, hurriedly jotting notes down in margins, occasionally frowning and crossing things out. Katsuki huffs out a laugh under his breath as he watches Deku angrily rip a piece of paper out of his notebook and crumple it up, before crushing the ball on the table.
He’s probably also a student at Yuuei, Katsuki figures, but then violently follows that train of thought up with: who cares, it’s not like it fucking matters. There’s nothing particularly interesting about Deku, Katsuki tells himself, he’s just bored and Deku is right in his line of sight.
It’s definitely not because it’s a little bit cute the way he absently nibbles on the end of his pen as he works.
Katsuki forces his attention away, and he does it so well that he misses when the nerd packs up and leaves. He only realizes when he goes to bus the tables at the end of his shift and all that’s left where Deku was sitting is an empty mug and the crushed ball of paper on the floor.
Katsuki is annoyed; who the fuck just leaves trash sitting on the floor? At least leave it on the goddamn table, he thinks furiously as he bends down to pick it up and moves to throw it in the trash. But something makes him pause.
He fights his curiosity all the way from the table to the garbage bag propped up against the door, before he finally gives in and carefully unfolds the paper.
The handwriting is atrocious, total chicken scratch, but Katsuki can just manage to read it. It’s… a poem?
he says we are “compatible”
lost in the comfortable wrinkles of his
smile, I forget that
there are things that I jealously crave
that I cannot get for myselfhis gaze melts over me now, though
pools in the hollow of my throat
slides like sunlight down my legs
and I forget that I don’t always want
to be the one who puts out the streetlights
Huh. Katsuki isn’t much for poetry—he’s a chemical engineering major for a reason—and he’s not quite sure what it’s supposed to capital-M Mean, but he gathers that Deku must be in a relationship of some kind, one he’s not entirely sold on.
He can’t help wondering what Deku disliked so much about this poem that he decided to so violently discard it.
He holds the paper for a moment more, before folding it carefully and sticking it in his back pocket. He’s not sure why he does it, and aggressively declines to investigate the compulsion any further. After taking out the trash, he turns out the lights, locks up, and starts the walk back to his apartment.
He shivers slightly in the cool Autumn air, studiously ignoring the poem burning a hole in his pocket.